They didn't have much time left. She had to hurry. It was all riding on her now. If she failed, she would let everyone down.

She brushed by people in the corridors, ignored their shouts, dodged out of the way when they tried to reach her. They weren't going to stop her, nobody was. She couldn't stop.

Running, running down hallways, past rooms– was she lost? She'd studied the map for hours, but in the rush of things, did she take the wrong path? No, this had to be right, it had to be. She hopped on her staff and darted forward.

The hallways became a blur. She had to make it. She had to.

She found it, then, the stairway, the one she was searching for– she dove down it, relieved she'd found it, but wary of what she would have to face.

As she barreled into the familiar room, it wasn't what she'd expected. There was nobody there, no coven heads, no Belos, no crowds of guards. No one stood there, except a single, lone guard.

A golden guard.

He lifted his artificial staff, glowing an angry red energy, pointing it at her.

"Stay back," he commanded, his voice biting, cold, so unnatural for the person she knew hiding behind the mask.

"I can't," she answered, almost apologetically. She looked at the portal behind him.

"They're holding the ceremony in the Human Realm, aren't they? And they left you standing guard. We have to stop them."

He stated plainly,

"No."

She told him,

"You know what this unification will do. The people it will hurt."

He did not budge. He responded with the same coldness.

"I'm not discussing this. I have my orders."

Luz took a few steps closer and he opened fire with his staff, beams of red energy scattering in the air around her. She ducked and dodged, repelling the shots with a swing of her staff. He shouted again,

"I said stay back!"

Luz continued to walk towards him. He gave an angry cry and fired at her again, but she avoided the shots, each in turn, threading her way through the chaotic patterns of energy. When the magic subsided, she said calmly,

"Hunter."

He raised his staff, barking,

"At least fight back!"

He sent out a large arc of magic, but she easily avoided it. She said,

"I'm not going to fight you."

She continued to walk towards him. He twirled the mechanical staff, summoning a large fireball. She felt the wave of heat as she barely slipped past it. His voice taking on a desperate edge, he commanded,

"You have to."

Luz ignored his warning and continued forward at the same steady pace. He shot wildly, dozens of blasts of red magic raining down on her. She dodged as many of the blasts as she could, but many of them grazed her and several hit her head-on. She looked down at herself, at the singes on her clothing and skin, but they hardly made a mark on her. She looked up at him. She said,

"You're holding back."

His posture rigid, weapon aimed menacingly, he snarled,

"If you keep pushing me, I won't."

Luz shook her head.

"No. You won't hurt me."

She dropped her staff, held out her hands.

"I have no glyphs. I'm unarmed."

She stepped closer to him, slowly, and he began to back away. Sounding absolutely frantic, he screamed,

"I'll kill you!"

Luz did not flinch, even as his staff glowed with a massive charge of energy, even as he pointed it at her with shaking hands. She continued to calmly approach until she stood right before him. She gazed steadily at the slit in his mask, trying to see his eyes, but could see nothing more than a glimmer.

Slowly, slowly, she reached a hand out to him. She grasped the side of the smooth metal, then lifted it gently, pulling the disguise away.

And there it was: the truth. Everything about him she knew to be real, shining in his eyes. She looked at him with soft understanding, with kindness. Carefully, she lifted her hand up to him again.

In a quiet, strangled voice, he choked out,

"I'll ... I'll kill you ..."

She settled her hand against his cheek, cradling his face. A violent tremble ran through him at her touch. His eyes were wide, terrified. Luz never broke eye contact, even as his staff continued to buzz dangerously with a magic charge, as the garish red light reflected across his face.

In a voice filled with the purity of her convictions, she told him,

"I believe in you, Hunter."

He seemed on the verge of collapse, his panic at a fever pitch; as if the slightest move Luz could make might cause him to snap. Luz tried to think of how she could push through all that fear, how she could reach him.

A thought entered her head, and she acted on impulse before she could think the better of it. Leaning up, she pressed her lips to his, trying to channel all of her feelings into a kiss.

The harsh whine of red magic immediately stopped, and the mechanical staff clattered to the ground, forgotten. Hunter felt absolutely frozen at first, paralyzed by shock.

But then, all at once, he responded. Trembling hands slid up her arms, fingers sinking into the hair at the nape of her neck; he kissed her back with a fierce urgency, almost as if he was afraid she would vanish at any moment. He pulled back to trail fervent kisses down her neck, leaving hot tracks across her skin; the sound of their harsh breaths were echoing in her ears, and the sensation of his fingertips sliding through her hair and over her scalp was hypnotic.

And then Luz woke up, sitting up in bed with a jolt, gasping for breath.

She blinked in the dim light of her bedroom, her brain scrambling to catch up with reality.

As things sunk in for her, she made an involuntary whine. Burying her hot face in her hands, she chanted quietly,
"No no no no no no ..."

Things were already complicated enough as it was already. She didn't need to add to things by waking up from ... from whatever that just was. God, why'd her brain have to conjure something so vivid?

Embarrassed, she lifted her head out of her hands and tried to ground herself in reality. Memories of last night came back to her out of order, and she realized going straight to bed after their conversation about the Azura chapter probably didn't help matters.

Yes, she'd blame it on that. And on Hunter, to be honest, who seemed to positively relish teasing her.

"Ngghh," she grumbled, doing a poor job of chasing away the memories.

From below her, she heard a soft mumble, and she immediately jerked, startled out of her thoughts. Right, he was still here. Obviously.

Dang it. She needed a few minutes to recover from this. Hopefully he would stay asleep.

Slowly, cautiously, she peeked over the edge of her bed. To her relief, he still seemed sound asleep– blankets tossed askew, snoring softly, her rabbit plushie held tightly in his arms, the little bunny head mashed up against his face.

Luz blinked. What in the absolute heck, what business did he have being so freaking adorable?

Ok, ok. Never mind that. She needed to get up, get dressed. That would help her snap out of things. Yes.

With more caution than a ninja, Luz climbed down the ladder of her bunk beds, then tiptoed across the room to her closet. She tried to quickly select an outfit for herself without making any noise, which thankfully didn't prove too difficult. Once she'd gathered everything up, she snuck across the room to exit. Looking back, however, she hesitated.

She had to admit this was an opportunity she couldn't pass up.

Sneaking back, she carefully picked up the cell phone off her desk, aiming it at Hunter. She snapped several photos, grinning and fighting to keep herself from giggling. Ok, perfect, excellent blackmail material. Hmm, should she take video too?

The phone in Luz's hand suddenly chimed loudly, and she jumped in surprise, eyes wide in panic. Quickly, she put the phone on mute, looking nervously at the boy draped out on the bed in front of her. He hadn't moved, but the little bird snoozing in his hair woke up, gazing up at Luz. Upon seeing her, Rascal chirped cheerfully.

Luz immediately held a finger to her mouth, shushing the palisman. The bird tilted his little head and chirped again, as if it was confused, and Luz whispered desperately,

"Shh-shh, let's keep quiet little buddy!"

Unfortunately, Hunter mumbled and began to stir, and Luz had about one second to ponder her regrets over recent life choices, in particular her failure to get out of the room sooner. Magenta eyes blinked open, and he looked briefly confused about where he was. Rascal twittered at him and nibbled his hair, and he began to lean up– but froze when he spotted Luz standing there.

Luz said,

"Uh."

He seemed to realize he still had a stuffed bunny in a loving embrace and quickly leaned up the rest of the way, shoving the plushie aside discretely. Luz stammered out,

"G-good morning!"

He gave her a confused look. Voice rough from sleep, he said,

"... g'morning?"

Luz laughed nervously and scrambled to explain herself.

"I was just, um ... phone! Yeah!"

She looked at her cell phone, her savior. She swiped the notifications.

"I got a text from mom. She says ummm ... she wants to know if I'm awake yet and if I saw her other messages. Uhh, hold on a sec."

Luz rapidly clicked through her phone and opened her texts. Scanning the messages, she read;

"Had to head to work this morning. Tried to get out of it, but nobody to cover my shift ... will be back at 5, you kids will have to entertain yourselves 'til then ... left some money on the kitchen table, etc..."

She glanced back to Hunter, who had adorably sleep-tousled hair he was only further messing up as he ran a sleepy hand through it. She blurted out,

"Yeah so just wanted you to know! Anyway I'm gonna go get dressed now bye!"

She escaped the room hastily, grateful for her quick thinking. After dressing in the bathroom, she went back over her mother's texts and replied. Her mom was very apologetic about needing to go to work, but Luz assured her it was fine, she needed to help all the sick kitties and doggies, after all. Her mom explained she didn't want to wake them before she left because she figured they needed the extra rest. Luz texted to tell her that yeah, it had been a pretty long night, and they definitely appreciated the extra rest.

She was standing in the hallway, sending a text when the door to her bedroom opened and Hunter immerged, dressed in his blue shirt and black pants, foregoing the rest of his coven uniform. Luz turned to greet him and he approached, asking,

"Hey, so I didn't catch all of that before . . . your mom wanted us to do something?"

As he stood there, he continued to try and hand-comb his hair. Luz opened her mouth to respond, but her eye caught the sight of his tongue wetting his sleep-dried lips, and suddenly she was assaulted with memories of her dream– those lips burning on her neck, the sound of hot breath mingling, and she emitted a panicked, unintelligible squeak before babbling,

"YEAH SO UH NO she just– just– she just said we should entertain each other, whatever we felt like doing, since it's just the two of us today– I mean, not that I mean anything by that! I just mean she'll be back this evening!"

He frowned, giving her a concerned look.

"Um, are you ok?"

"I'M GREAT, actually I forgot to wash my face I'll be back in a bit, you can go ahead and use mom's bathroom, haha cool–"

She turned and locked herself back in the bathroom, turned on the sink and stuck her face under the cold water, gurgling. The water rolled off her hair in rivulets and she remained standing there for a while.

After several minutes, she felt like she was starting to expunge the imagery from her mind. She turned the faucet off and toweled off her face and hair. She took a moment to look at herself in the mirror, take a breath, and say firmly,

"OK. We're chill. Everything's chill."

With that established, she exited the bathroom, then cautiously went downstairs. She found Hunter in the living room, studying the remote control for her TV as if he was analyzing some foreign anthropological artifact. Which, to be fair, was exactly what is was for him.

Luz cleared her throat and said,

"Heyya."

He turned and looked at her.

"Hey."

There was a note of concern still present in his expression. Luz took a breath and pressed on.

"Um, so, sorry about that. I had some coffee this morning and it makes me a bit hyper sometimes. You know how it is."

Awkwardly, he answered,

"Oh. Uh. Yeah."

Now that Luz thought about it, maybe they didn't have caffeine in the Demon Realm. Well, it didn't matter either way. She continued,

"You want second breakfast or something? I think we have some cereal."

He seemed to be amenable enough to the idea and shrugged, answering,

"Sure, I guess."

As they ate cereal in the kitchen, Luz took the time to relay her mom's messages in a less frantic way, explaining that her mom was a veterinarian and she couldn't get out of work today. She got a new text from Camila while they were eating, noting that Vee would be coming over for dinner tonight. Luz relayed this as well and then realized she hadn't even explained Vee's whole story to Hunter yet, so she gave him all the backstory. For the most part, Hunter stayed very quiet, letting Luz's lively chatter fill the space. Eventually, though, Luz grew curious about his silence.

"So anyway, what do you think? You feel like doing anything today? I could show you around the Human Realm a little."

He seemed tempted by the offer, but he glanced away, hesitating. After a lull, he finally murmured,

"I dunno. I'm not sure if I should be spending so much time with someone who's supposed to, y'know, be my enemy."

Luz had to suppress the urge to snort. He was still on about that? A response spilled from her automatically, her tone light and teasing.

"What's the matter, afraid you'll start liking me too much?"

His glance snapped to her, and he was clearly ruffled by the accusation. She chuckled and said,

"C'mon, I know you're curious about the Human Realm. You might as well let me show you around a little, since we have the time to kill anyway. It'll be educational, right?"

She watched as he internally debated this. Eventually, his resistance crumbled. He looked away, intoning quietly,

"... fine."

Luz smiled at the victory and began to cheerfully think outloud.

"Ok, great! So let's see, where could we go to give you a better idea of the Human Realm? Hmmm ... there's a couple of nice parks not far from here ... there's a museum ..."

Her eyes widened and she suddenly realized,

"Wait, I know! The perfect place for you to observe and participate in human culture: the mall!"

He seemed somewhat wary of her idea.

"The mall? Are you sure? That sounds ... crowded."

She gave him a concerned look.

"Oh, do you not like crowds? I didn't realize."

He shook his head.

"It's not that, I'm just not sure if I might stand out in the human realm. Do you think anyone would notice I'm a witch? After what you told me about Vee, I'm not exactly eager to be found out."

Luz considered that a moment, gazing at Hunter carefully, trying to look at him from an outsider's perspective.

"We'll need to get you a hat for your ears, obviously. I have a beanie you can borrow. But honestly, I think you should be fine otherwise. Just so long as you don't wear your cloak and mask or go around zapping people with your staff, people will just think you're a normal human teen."

Looking at his eyes, she added,

"Well, ok, you do have hot pink eyes, that's pretty unique. But I wouldn't worry about that, you could just tell people it's genetic or you felt like wearing some trendy contacts or something, if someone bothers to ask."

He frowned, but reluctantly agreed,

"If you say so."

Luz sprung up from her seat, feeling excited about the prospect of their trip out.

"Trust me, we'll be good! Mom left us some money so we can even do a little shopping. Lemme grab that hat for you and we can get going!"

After equipping Hunter with a black beanie and stuffing the cash and her phone into a fanny pack, they waited in front of Luz's house so they could catch the bus to the mall. Hunter was fascinated with the concept of cars and buses, which must have seemed like great, hulking, mechanical beasts to him, belching out noxious fumes. Luz spent part of the bus ride talking to him about cars, although he kept asking how they worked and was frustrated she could only provide a very vague explanation. Something to do with internal combustion? Lots of controlled tiny explosions inside the engine making the wheels move? Something like that. She promised that later on he could look under the hood of her mom's car to see the engine, and that seemed to satisfy him. He spent the rest of the ride gazing curiously out the window, watching as they passed through Gravesfield. Luz breathed a private sigh of relief that her weird thoughts seemed to have cleared up (mostly) and she wasn't being bothered by dreams anymore. Thank goodness.

When they reached the mall and stepped through the automatic doors (another detail Luz took for granted but Hunter found intriguing), the smell of stale recycled air hitting her and the sight of so many humans milling about, Luz was struck with a strange feeling. It was a feeling she'd already had many times upon returning to the Human Realm. It was sort of a mixture of nostalgia and comfort but also a feeling of being out of place– almost as if she was a stranger in her own home. It was a little unsettling. She actually felt very glad that Hunter was there, because she could focus on showing him around.

Grinning at his open fascination with all the shops spread out before them, she leaned in and told him,

"Let's just walk the circuit for now, and you can tell me when something catches your eye and we can check it out. Sound good?"

He gave her a distracted nod, eyes scanning the crowds.

It was an early Friday afternoon, and the mall was pretty busy, full of families and people who had gotten off work for an early weekend; a constant background noise of chatter filled the echoing halls. Luz and Hunter passed by clothes stores, beauty boutiques and shoe shops, pausing on occasion to peek at the display windows. When they came across a shop focused entirely on Croc shoes, Luz tried to convince Hunter that they were the pinnacle of human shoe fashion and he should own a pair, but unfortunately he noticed the grin she was suppressing and called her bluff. A few shops down, Luz pulled Hunter into a candle store, specifically so they could spend time smelling the weird collection of scents they had there. Luz started off quizzing Hunter on the more normal smells and moved on to the stranger and stranger ones.

"Ok, what do you think this one is?"

She held out a blue candle towards his face, and he gave her a wary look.

"Is it as bad as the last one?"

Luz giggled, telling him,

"C'mon, this one isn't that bad. Guess."

Cautiously, he gave the candle a sniff.

"... I don't know, mostly it just smells like soap? Maybe ... flowers?"

She turned the candle around to show him the label. He made an incredulous face.

"'Turquoise Sky?' What does that even mean? The sky doesn't smell like anything."

Luz shrugged, laughing.

"I dunno either, maybe they mean the smell of rain or something?"

"Then they should call it rain. Which it also does not smell like."

Luz had already moved on, sticking her face in more candles, and interrupted,

"OH WAIT, try this one!!"

He groaned as she stuck a black candle in his face.

"Luz–"

She blinked, startled at the sound of her name coming from him. She couldn't help the grin that reached her.

"Whoa, I think that's like the first time you've actually used my name."

Looking mildly flustered, he said,

"It's fitting that it's to tell you that you're being annoying–"

She waved the candle enticingly.

"You really wanna miss out on this amazing black candle? This incredible fragrance explosion? This delightful miasma–"

He grabbed the candle from her and smelled it. He made a terrible face.

"OK, this is just a super-concentrated stick of deodorant. Why would you want your entire room to smell like that?"

She pointed out the label, saying with a grin,

"But doesn't it smell exactly like the night sky in the middle of summer?"

He moved away, saying,

"Your human candles are trash and I am no longer smelling things you stick in my face."

This was a lie, because Luz actually convinced him to try several more before they finally left. Once they were back out wandering the mall, Hunter became distracted by the flashing lights and loud noises emanating from one of the stores. Pausing, he asked,

"What's over there?"

Luz followed his gaze and then smiled.

"Ooh, this is perfect. That's what we call an 'arcade.' Wanna take a peek?"

He nodded. They entered the large, darkened room together, and Hunter's eyes grew wide at the sensory overload. All around them, arcade machines beeped and shrieked and zapped, lights flashed, and kids were laughing and shouting. It was an absolute cacophony of noise and activity.

Leaning closer to Luz, he semi-shouted,

"What is going on in here?!"

She gestured grandly at the machines.

"These are called ... video games! They are, like ... uhh, man, how do I explain? You know how you guys have shows you can watch on a crystal ball? Kinda like that, except you interact with the show. You can control a character and move around in a digital world and stuff."

He only looked more confused. Luz facepalmed and tried again.

"Arghh, ok, it's kind of hard to explain. Here, I'll just show you."

She grabbed him by the arm and pulled them through the den of noise, coming up to a Pac-Man cabinet. She pointed at the screen.

"See the little yellow circle guy on the screen here? This one's a very simple game. You use this knob here to control the little yellow guy, and the goal is to go around eating all the dots. But you have to avoid the little ghostie guys or they'll kill you."

He stared curiously at the bright screen for a bit, and then cautiously touched the control knob. Luz explained,

"Oh, we have to put money into it first if we want to play. You wanna try it out?"

He eyed the machine, then answered,

"Yeah, ok."

She squinted, scanning the room, saying,

"We'll need to find a token machine first. Not sure where it is. Follow me, it's easy to get lost in here."

They wandered around until Luz finally found a group of the machines crowded in one corner. She unzipped her fanny pack to fetch a bill, but almost shrieked in surprise when something leapt out at her. It took her several moments to realize that a troublemaking little palisman had stowed away in her pack.

"Rascal," she exclaimed as the bird chirped and fluttered over to land on Hunter's shoulder. She scolded gently,

"You gotta stop stowing away like that, Rascal! You could end up going somewhere you shouldn't really be."

Hunter sighed, petting the bird. He told it,

"She's right, you know? You were supposed to stay back at the house. It can be dangerous out here."

The cardinal gave him a series of chirps. He looked to Luz.

"He says he wanted to make sure I was ok."

Luz made an adoring face.

"Aww!"

However, Hunter just looked worried.

"What should we do? I don't want him getting hurt, but he can't be comfortable being stuffed in that little bag."

Luz glanced around, considering the general chaos of the arcade.

"Honestly? I don't think anyone will even notice him. Not in here, at least. If he sticks with you it should be fine."

Hunter glanced around too.

"You think so?"

She nodded.

"If somebody does see him, well, all they're really gonna think is you have a pet bird. Not something you see everyday, sure, but it's still pretty normal."

Hunter seemed to accept Luz's judgment. Turning to the little bird, he told it quietly,

"Ok, you can stay, but don't leave my side, all right?"

The bird gave a happy little trill. Luz grabbed a bill from her pack and said,

"All right then, let's get you some tokens!"

Hunter watched as Luz fed the five-dollar bill into the machine and it spat out a big handful of tokens. She grabbed the heaping pile and turned to him.

"Here, you can have half ... wait, do you have any pockets or anything?"

He glanced down at himself, looking a little self-conscious.

"Pockets really aren't a part of the coven's uniform."

Luz shoved the tokens into her fanny pack and handed him one.

"Hmm, maybe while we're here we get you some clothes so you're not stuck with just that. Anyway, here, let's go play some Pac Man."

They retraced their steps to the arcade cabinet, and Luz pointed out where the token slot was. Hunter inserted the token and gazed down at the screen.

"... now what?"

Luz checked the screen and said,

"Ah, right, just hit the start button right there."

Warily, he pressed the red button, and the starting jingle played before the game began, pacman automatically moving forward and making little munching noises. Hunter pressed experimentally on the control stick, watching as the circle moved along in the maze. It didn't take him long to grasp the basic concept, although he was a little clunky with the movement. When he was cornered and died, Luz took a turn. She explained screen wrap and the power pellets and how to juke the ghosts out. After watching Luz he rapidly improved, losing his initial awkwardness and growing comfortable with the movement. He completed several levels in a row, starting to strategize with his power pellets and clearly getting into it. He eventually died when the ghosts got really fast but he had an impressive run. When he finally died Luz grinned and said,

"Nice! Dang, you got really good super fast. So what d'you think? It's kinda cool, yeah?"

With a little smile, he admitted,

"Yeah, I guess I can see the appeal."

She turned and looked eagerly into the rest of the arcade.

"Want to try something a little more advanced?"

He agreed, and followed Luz as she wandered among the rows of machines. Eventually she narrowed in on Streetfighter.

"How about this? I'm not any good at it, but fighting games are a pretty big arcade staple."

He studied the screen, which was playing out an example battle.

"I guess?"

Luz dropped some coins in.

"Ok so first you select the character you want, and then it'll put you into a battle. You move around with the stick just like last time, and these buttons are all different attacks you can do."

"Ok ..."

He moved around on the select screen and eventually settled on a green orc-like character. Luz stepped beside him and picked out the one female character, and Hunter gave her a confused glance.

"I thought I was playing?"

She gave him a playful smile.

"You're fighting me."

He immediately looked about a hundred times more interested.

"Wait, really?"

The game announced,

"Round One! Fight!"

Luz charged Hunter's character, flailing and kicking as fast as possible. He quickly protested,

"Wait, wait! I have no idea what I'm doing!"

Luz laughed,

"To be honest neither do I!"

They proceeded to mash buttons and move around wildly. Hunter seemed to get the upper hand right away, but then Luz somehow did a spin kick and started to really destroy him. He demanded,

"How did you do that kicking thing?!"

"I don't know, I just push a lot of buttons at the same time!"

Luz won round 1 quickly and felt confidant she'd win round 2, but then Hunter discovered the jump button and played a lot more defensively. The round took a lot longer and he eventually won, so they were pushed into a third round, where they smashed buttons even more frantically. Luz's chaotic kicking won out in the end, and she gloated obnoxiously, cheering,

"Yeeeah! Eat that! Look who's the best at bashing in faces, it's this girl!"

Looking annoyed, Hunter complained,

"Hold on, I feel like I need a better idea of what all these buttons do."

She sighed.

"I guess if you wanna be logical about it ..."

They started a new game and Luz explained they could just not attack each other and practice learning what the buttons were. Hunter also decided to try a new character. Luz offered what little knowledge she had of the subject, which was each of the buttons did a thing but sometimes combinations of buttons also did a new thing. Luz figured out how she did the spinning kick thing, but unfortunately, during all the button mashing, Hunter discovered his character could throw a fireball.

"Whoa wait how'd I do that?!"

Luz groaned,

"Oh no. Please don't figure out how you did that. Just forget that ever happened—"

"Shh! I know I was punching, it was something like this ..."

Alas, Hunter eventually figured it out, to his great excitement.

"Ok, ok, I'm ready to fight now!"

Luz groaned again but reluctantly agreed to another battle. As she suspected, Hunter decided to spam the heck out of his new magic fireball move and she was absolutely bodied. Even learning how to block didn't help her much, because she couldn't get close enough to him to get her hits in. As the game flashed the winner on screen, Hunter grinned, commenting,

"This game is actually pretty fun."

Luz grumbled,

"Ehh, it's all right. Let's try something else out."

They abandoned Street Fighter to wander the arcade again. A racing game caught Hunter's eye and he tried that out, while Luz played on the machine right next to him. He decided the game was kind of disorienting and not his favorite. After passing by the racing games, they came across a small row of air hockey tables. Hunter asked,

"What are these?"

Luz lit up at the sight and ran up to one.

"Ooh, air hockey! Here, go to the other side. I think you'll like this."

After dropping in their tokens, the air switched on and Luz placed the little plastic puck in the center of the table. Hunter watched curiously. Luz waved her little plastic paddle.

"See this thingymajobber? Take it and smash it against the puck. There's a little hole at your end and my end, your job is to shoot the puck into my goal."

He raised a brow.

"That's it?"

She nodded.

"Yep."

He grabbed hold of his paddle.

" ... Ok?"

Luz leaned over the table eagerly and shouted,

"OKAY GO!"

She sent the puck flying and Hunter made a startled noise, apparently not expecting its speed. He reacted automatically and sent the puck clattering along the sides of the table noisily. Luz whacked it back and they volleyed back and forth several times before the puck hurdled into Hunter's goal. He blinked, surprised. Luz smiled,

"First point for me! Look down, it goes into a little chute."

He retrieved the puck and placed it back on the table, giving her a questioning look. She encouraged him,

"Go ahead, you get to hit first now!"

To her amusement, she watched as a competitive gleam entered his magenta eyes. He grinned, leaning over the table, eyeing her carefully, while moving his paddle back and forth, as if trying to juke her. Luz laughed,

"Oh my god, just hit it."

He did not, instead continuing to grin at her and faked hitting it, causing her to flinch and react.

"Hunter–"

In the middle of her protest, he shot the puck straight into her goal. Shooting him a defiant look, she said,

"Oh, it's on, buddy!"

The puck went rocketing at him, and they immediately fell into a volley at breakneck speed. Surprisingly, they kept up the back-and-forth for quite a long time before it finally scored a point in Luz's favor. Luz concentrated on hitting the puck at a weird angle so it could slam back and forth drunkenly and be difficult to pinpoint, which seemed to work well for her for a little while– until Hunter learned how to deal with it, slowing down to time his shot more carefully. He started racking points up, sniping her with deadly accuracy. She tried slowing down herself and sticking closer to her goal, which seemed to help. The game completed with Hunter the winner, but they immediately started another. They seemed pretty evenly matched, the points remaining very close the whole while. Hunter started to put a subtle angle on his shots and it was messing Luz up for a bit, but then it felt like she was settling into The Zone. She won the match but they decided best out of five.

The matches became an exhausting, jubilant blur, both of them lunging back and forth at the puck and panting from exertion. It seemed to grow into a contest of how skewed and bizarre to make the shots, which was maybe not the best strategy but it was funny. They had to retrieve the puck from the floor a few times, and Luz accidentally whacked the puck into her own goal more than once (something that made Hunter cackle with glee) but still, her chaos was working part of the time. Eventually, after finishing a match, a breathless Luz asked Hunter if it had been five rounds yet, but his answer sounded a little uncertain. They argued a little over the score, but it soon became obvious they'd both lost track entirely. Deciding they were too tired to keep playing rounds, they called it a draw.

The mood seemed to really shift after playing air hockey. Luz had never seen Hunter laugh like that before, and to truly lose all sense of self-consciousness. He seemed very relaxed and loosened up as they continued to wander the arcade, wearing an honest, open smile that he couldn't seem to stop. It made Luz feel practically giddy to see. As they came across a huge screen lit with colorful LED lights, Hunter peered up at it with awe. He enthused,

"This one, we gotta try this one."

Luz agreed happily and hopped into one of the seats, which had a large red laser cannon mounted in front of it. Hunter hopped into the seat next to her as she dropped the tokens in.

The huge screen displayed a starry sky and flashed a message: 'Shoot Enemy Ships!' Red and blue reticules appeared on screen. Luz grabbed the handles of her cannon and Hunter imitated her. The game prompted: Ready, GO! and the screen filled with colorful rows of alien spaceships. Luz opened fire and yelled,

"Shoot em!!"

The speakers for the game's sound effects were cranked way up so they were hit with a wall of noise as they blasted away. The handles of the laser cannons also vibrated as they fired, making the whole thing feel even more intense. Hunter exclaimed something that Luz didn't catch over all the noise. The ships started to speed up and she yelled,

"Don't let 'em reach the bottom!"

It was a frenzy of noise and explosions but they did a pretty good job keeping up. Hunter yelled that he'd guard the bottom row and Luz could go after the bonuses and bombs, and they chewed through a ton of enemies, although the ships eventually overwhelmed them. They both decided this was one of the cooler games and played several more rounds, improving their teamwork and lasting longer and longer each time. Eventually they ended up earning a spot on the lower half of the High Score board. Hunter asked her what it was and she explained,

"We put our name, it's the high scores."

"Yeah, but I mean, what's the reason?"

She waved at the screen and laughed,

"You know, just to show off. Everyone who plays can see who did really well."

"Ooh. Ok."

She started to spell out her name but then said,

"Wait, we should both have our names in here. Hmm, is there room? We need to mash them both in there."

She attempted to spell 'LuzHunter' but it was a character too long, and she griped,

"Aw man, hold on, how's this?"

"Pfft, 'Hunt' looks weird."

"Yeah, I know, but Hunter won't fit. Hmm."

She erased and started again, this time spelling out 'GoldLuz.'

"How's that?"

He chuckled.

"That works."

She hit enter and then beamed proudly at the huge LED display with their name.

"And now it's there for all to see and honor! ... until like tomorrow when some kid with too much time wipes out the whole score board, I guess."

He chuckled and they left the game, moving on to whatever else might catch their fancy. Hunter was drawn to a couple of glass cases lit with neon lights, filled halfway up with a huge jumble of prizes.

"Oh, you don't wanna do that one," Luz warned him. He looked at her, curious.

"Why?"

Luz approached the machine and pointed to the metal claw at the top.

"These are basically designed to scam you. You put money in and get to control that claw there and you're supposed to grab a prize, but it never works. The claw is super flimsy and crappy."

He frowned.

"So it just never works?"

Luz nodded.

"Pretty much. Maybe every once in a great while but trust me, it's a huge money stealer."

He eyed the claw, commenting,

"How is that even allowed?"

Luz shrugged and gazed into the glass box.

"Dunno. It is kinda a shame, sometimes there's cute stuff in there ... like– OH MY GOSH LOOK AT THAT!"

She pointed emphatically at a wee, teeny tiny hedgehog plushie perched on top of the pile of prizes. Her eyes were wide and adoring.

"Look at the widdle bitty squishy hedgehog baby . . . eeeee!"

Hunter chuckled dryly.

"You wanna try to get it?"

Luz was tempted a moment, but then shook her head adamantly.

"No! It's a trap! This is exactly how they get your money! ... ooh, but ... maybe ..."

He held out his hand for a token.

"Here, let me try. Just one shot, maybe it'll work."

Luz fished into her pack, handing him a couple tokens and saying,

"Okaaay. But don't hold your breath."

He dropped a token in and pressed the little control stick. The claw lurched to life, wibbling and wobbling. Carefully, he aimed the claw directly above the toy, feathering the stick back and forth, trying to get it perfectly aligned.

"So I just hit the button now?"

"Yeah."

He pressed the red button and the claw dropped, dead-center on the hedgehog, looking perfect. But as the claw lifted back up and closed, the tiny toy slipped through immediately. It automatically moved over to drop nothing into the chute. Luz sighed.

"Yeah, just what I expected. That's exactly how it always is. It's not a skill thing, it's just designed to screw ya."

Hunter scowled at the machine. Luz told him,

"It's ok, the 'lil hedgehog will just have to stay in there forever. Thanks for trying though."

She checked her bag and realized she was down to a final token.

"Looks like we're outta tokens anyway. I'm gonna go burn the last one on whack-a-mole or something."

Still staring into the machine, Hunter answered distractedly,

"Uh-huh."

She made her way over to the ancient whack-a-mole, letting Hunter remain staring into the claw machine. Well, it technically wasn't a whack-a-mole, since they were alligators. So, whack-a-gator. She popped the money in and started smacking gators with the padded mallet. Honestly, a very basic but very cathartic game, you can't go wrong with just smacking some things. The speed and number of gators gradually increased, until it got to the point where the entire population of gaters popped out all at once, and Luz laid carnage to them all. To her slight disappointment, when she glanced up she saw Hunter hadn't joined to watch and so he missed the glorious destruction. Ah, well.

When the game finished, she turned to look for him, but she couldn't spot him anymore. Crud, did he wander off? It was a pain finding anyone in this place. She was about to start looking, but then his voice came from behind her.

"Guess what?"

She turned, faced with a Hunter who seemed strangely ... pleased. Luz raised a brow.

"Uh? What?"

It was only then she realized he had his hands behind his back. Proudly, he presented her with the itty-bitty hedgehog plushie in his cupped hands. Her eyes widened and she squealed in delight, taking it.

"How?! Oh my gosh, you're amazing, thank you thank you!!"

She smooshed the hedgehog to her face, giggling.

"Little tiny boy, little tiny hedgeman~"

Reality started to catch up with her, though, and she gave Hunter a curious look.

"Hold on, seriously though, how did you get this? You had like one token. And ... the claw was way, way too big to even grab this tiny thing. How did you do it?"

Hunter's smile began to slip into something sneakier looking, and he gave the palisman in his shoulder a little glance.

"Well, I might've had just a little bit of help ..."

Luz took a moment to analyze that. Then she gasped.

"Hunter! Did you ..." she threw her voice into a dramatic whisper and leaned in:

"Use magic?!"

He just smiled and shrugged at her.

"That's cheating!" she said, trying to sound stern and disapproving, but it wasn't very convincing with the way she was smiling. Amused, he defended himself,

"Hey, it's not cheating if they're the ones already cheating, right? I'm just scamming the scammers."

Luz realized he had some pretty sound logic.

"Wow. A thieving badboy and yet still ethical. I like it."

He laughed and spoke in a slightly lowered voice;

"Yeah, well, we should probably go now, just in case somebody saw me."

Luz glanced around, grinning, and grabbed Hunter's wrist, sneaking through the arcade and back out into the mall.