Dreams under the stars

You walk outside. It's actually a bit chilly. The town is asleep. You even doubt that either Trisha or the sheriff is awake. You make your way to the general store. On top of the house is a small water tower. You decide to spend a bit of the night sitting on the platform of the tower and look over the town.

It's a bit of a climb. You forgot where you put the ladder, and you don't want to risk waking up anybody, so you use a nearby barrel to climb the house and then use the brick railing of the roof to reach the water tower platform.

You sit down on the wooden platform with your feet dangling over the edge.

You want to think over things, but you don't know what to think about. You don't know why, but you just feel... wrong. You look up. The stars are fully shining, like tiny blemishes on the otherwise perfect dark. The moon half-hides cheekily behind the mountains to the southwest. It's hard to believe that just behind those tiny mountains are a city as big as Undercreek. You can't even imagine how it would feel to be among that many houses, among that many people.

A melancholy mood presses itself unwanted into your head. Undercreek sure had many opportunities. There were so many things you could become. So why did you waste almost three decades doing nothing but being angry? You have become free of the orc lifestyle. You now have a name. You are now Jess.

Who is Jess though? Who can she become? Just what is it that you want to do?

You feel empty. And you feel guilty about that emptiness. You have a woman that loves you, and another one who clings to your every action. You have a job, however temporary, and a roof over your head. And you don't deserve any of it. So how come you feel entitled to more? You haven't earned it yet. You have barely earned any sort of redemption. You have a feeling that the past may haunt you forever. But maybe this isn't about you.

"Can't sleep?" a voice rings behind you. You were so preoccupied with your thoughts that you hadn't even noticed Farah getting the ladder and climbing up the roof. Her silver hair and eyes are the only thing the truly reflects the moonlight, shimmering brilliantly towards you. Her dark purple skin is hard to see in the darkness. The lighting both perfectly highlights and obfuscate her exceptional beauty. You extend a hand down to her and she jumps and grabs it and you pull her up to the platform with her.

"Nightmare." you state: "Don't feel like going back to sleep."

"Wow, that must have been some scary shit to make someone like you quiver in your big boots." she chuckles.

"Your mind knows exactly what to do to rattle you."

"True enough, I suppose." she says as she sits down next to you: "Anything you'd like to share?"

"I'm honestly trying to make sense of it myself." you sigh defeated.

"Alright." she concedes: "How about a late night tryst then?"

You just scowl at her. She really turns on a dime.

"Hey now, big gal." she laughs: "I'm just kinda kidding."

"And I'm just kinda considering throwing you off the roof." you bite bark.

"And you don't think that we would make a lovely couple with all of this adorable back-and-forth squabbling?"

Within a second you're standing up and grabbing Farah into your arms ready to throw her. Of course, you're not really intending to do so, you just want to shut her up a bit. Farah yelps in surprise.

"Alright, Jess." Farah is laughing in your arms: "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'll stop teasing ya."

You put her down on her feet gently. You try to hold a straight face, but you can't quite contain a small smile. As Farah sits down again, you calm yourself and gets back the control of your facial muscles. You hope Farah didn't see the smirk. It would completely undermine your clearly established authority.

"You ever find out what the bandits wanted me for?" she asks changing the subject. She doesn't sound sad, but her voice isn't as heavily sultry as it usually is. She sounds more curious than anything.

"Trisha said that you were a high value target." you reveal: "You're apparently worth quite the amount of money that they could use for their actual goal... whatever that is."

"They'd sell me into slavery?" she asks. She doesn't sound particularly horrified at the prospect. Again, just curious.

"Beats me." you shrug. Maybe you aren't showing enough compassion here. It's something you'll have to work on: "Or maybe they wanted to hold you for ransom."

"No, that can't be it." Farah sighs in response: "I'm just a street brat. A stray. A homeless orphan, who conned her way to a reasonable living."

"Then maybe they wanted you for **** for a con-job?" you suggest.

"Maybe. But I was just a child, and all I did was small scale. I just did it for pittances of money that most people wouldn't really miss. And the people I conned didn't exactly have mercenary money. I wasn't able to do heists or get anything fancy. Just enough moolah to get some food, ya know?"

"And you had to go through all that alone?" you ask.

"Nah." Farah beams, seemingly remembering fond things: "I grew up in Everground. It's a city about a weeks travel away from here if you travel south of Undercreek. It's nowhere near as big as Undercreek but it's still fairly large. The thing about the homeless in Everground? We stick together. I might not have had any parents, but I did have a family. Most of them were a lot older than me, so in the end I had to take care of them. But I didn't mind. They had taken care of me as a child, so I was fine with taking care of them when I got into my teens."

"So why did you leave?" you ask.

"Money." was the answer: "Greed does a lot of things. When a bigshot money-man came to Everground, he twisted the politicians hands and **** the homeless out of the city. Most of the community were too old to move to another place, so they got arrested. Loitering was the charge. Before they got taken in, they gave me a pouch of money they had been saving up. I begged them to use the money to save themselves, but they wouldn't budge. It felt like they tore the whole community apart for my sake. They sacrificed themselves so I could get to Undercreek and fulfill my dream."

"Your dream?" you raise an eyebrow.

"Well... uh..." she stammers. This might be the first time you've ever seen Farah be flustered: "This is kinda embarrassing, but I wanted to be an actress. It didn't really matter if it was on a stage or on the screen. But Undercreek is filled to the brim with seedy shitheads who use their influence to trick gullible girls into warming their beds. Being a con-artist myself I saw through it all, but at the cost of not getting my foot in the door. At the end I just had enough, and wanted to get as far away from everything as possible."

"So you traveled here?"

"Yeah. "The Last Post" sounded like a place to go if you didn't really want to be in a big city. Turns out they needed a bartender. I'd never done it before, but it's easy enough to just open bottles and talk about nothing to people who'd drank too much. So that's what I've done the past two years. Plus, there are some real advantages, like having a place to stay, nice townsfolk to befriend, and the opportunity to shamelessly flirt with cute orc girls."

You ignore the last statement and just pat Farah on her shoulder.

"Heh... I thought I would be safe and happy forever. I thought I'd finally found stable ground until..." she trails off.

"That's why you were so scared?" you ask.

"Yeah." she admits: "I mean, they were threatening me, and while I know how to fight, I'd have no chance against that many. I was scared in the moment, but I'm usually good about getting over things. But this felt like another community, another place that I could call home, getting torn apart because of me. Which is why I wanted your protection so badly. I was afraid of being alone again. I just desperately wanted to cling on to the people who took me in and to find a way to redeem myself for being the cause of the **** of Claire's parents."

"Okay. I'll erase the image of your **** plea from my mind, and replace it with the carefree girl you want to be." you nod.

"Thanks, but don't erase it too thoroughly."

"I won't."

"Thank you Jess. Could you stay with me a bit longer?"

"Sure." you reply as you and Farah scooch back and lean up against the water tower. She leans her head on your shoulder and moves her fingers in between yours holding your hand tight. You let her.

"Oh, and don't think I didn't see your little smile earlier. " she sleepily announces: "You're starting to like me."

"I have no idea what you're talking about." you deny.

"Sure you don't, darling." she softly chuckles: "You will be mine someday, Jess. You can't run from me."

So Farah wanted to become an actress, but kind of threw that idea away. You wonder if there is something you can do for her. For her dream. Hmmm... "Her dream". You wonder how it would feel to have a dream. You ponder further while Farah falls asleep on your shoulder.