Tutorial (R,C,A)

After a while, Richard’s friends dispersed. Felicia said something about finally wanting to check out the library and rest after how hectic the last few days had been. Stella stayed for a bit to socialize and apologize to Aubrey five more times, which was obviously unnecessary by the third. She mentioned that she was heading down to the athletic complex, and that she was planning to spend more time with her mentor up on the mountain if anyone needed her after lunch. Luna left the last of the three, saying something to Aubrey that he didn’t understand before heading out.

Maeve finally arrived within minutes of Ava, the former gently smiling at both he and his girlfriend before claiming her usual spot by Genet’s stairs. The Japanese woman had the same backpack that Felicia had used in the challenge, and set it down with a thump on the bench. She sat down next to it, beaming as the host came out of the kitchen with a plate.

“We’re doing french toast today? Nice!” She looked back up. “Could I get some-”

“Cashew butter? I’ll be right back out.” Genet promised her, before ducking back into the kitchen. She came back with a small jar that Ava opened and spread on her breakfast before digging in.

“What’s that?” Dick asked, pointing to the backpack.

“Mmych wunf colltcn.” She answered, trying to talk without taking a break from eating.

“What? Dude, how many times have we asked you to swallow?” He reminded her.

She paused to clear her throat. “I brought my Wonders collection.”

“Why?”

His girlfriend answered for Ava as she took another bite. “I asked her to. I hope you don’t mind her tagging along for the first part of our date?”

“Not at all.” He assured her. “I just didn’t think you’d want to…” Honestly, he didn’t think she’d want any part of the situation. That she’d be willing to invite anyone into our private time might be the most surprising thing. But he chose not to say that. “That you’d want to try Wonders. I remember how much you hated it in the old days. You cried when I tried to teach you and said that it was impossible for you to learn.”

“Yeah… I did. I still think I’m probably right, but I want to try. When we were together before I was rude to your friends and icy towards that part of your life. This time I want to be better at it.”

“You don’t need to **** yourself to like the game. I know this kind of thing is hard for you, I don’t want to make you uncomfortable for my sake.”

“I don’t think I’ll like it.” Aubrey admitted. “But I still want to give it a try. When I asked Ava earlier she said she thought she knew a way to make it easier for me. The point isn’t because you like it, it’s because she and your other friends like it and I want to show them that I’m making an effort. Even if I don’t like it, maybe I could hang around for your game nights. Do you remember when I told Stella that I was saving my new experience energy for later? This is it.”

“As long as you’re sure.”

Ava vocally cleared her throat. Now that he was looking back, she’d managed to finish four slices of the french toast during the short time since she’d sat down. “I have faith in her, and you really should too.” She put down her fork and fished out of the backpack a red deck box he hadn’t seen before. “Aubrey, if you want to check out what I came up with while I finish eating, go ahead. I should be done soon.” She passed over the box before moving onto her fifth piece.

Aubrey opened it, and he peeked over, his worries for what she might be getting into only growing. The leader of the deck was Reynard the Fox. He’d never actually seen the card, Ava had got it and lost interest long before he’d started playing. He could see how hard it was to cast from the fact that it had three passion pips and one knowledge pip, with no generic pips to make it easier to cast. Once when it’d been brought up Felicia had gone on a tirade about how Reynard was a “bullshit ragebait engine made by a third-rate designer jerking themselves off on complexity.” And if Felicia thought it was too complicated… As Aubrey silently looked over the deck and Ava finished her fifth slice, he hoped that the afternoon wouldn’t go too badly.

***

After Ava finished eating, all three of them went back together to the Master’s Cottage. He and Ava sat across from each other like they had the previous night, while Aubrey sat down at the middle seat to watch.

“Here.” Ava said, digging through and handing his girlfriend a small notebook and a pen. “He and I are going to play a first game between the two of us, and we’ll explain out loud why we’re doing something. If there’s anything that you have a question about, but you’re not comfortable asking right at that moment, just write it down there and we can try to figure them out together at the end.” She slid over his Sir Bors deck to him before showing Aubrey her Jörmungandr and shuffling to play. “I’ll play a knowledge temple. Temples are used in the game to give you resources each turn. You can use them to pay for your other, more interesting cards. I only have one temple and everything currently in my hand costs more than one, so I can’t do anything more and have to give up my turn. Does that make sense?” She looked over to Aubrey, waiting for a confirmation.

The blonde shakily nodded, caught off guard. Richard followed along, trying to slowly explain what he was doing like Ava had. They both had drawn opening hands without many low cost cards in them, so it wasn’t until the third turn that one of them played something and she had her first question.

“Why do you need to use so many of the temples to play that?” She asked her boyfriend. He’d just played one of his weaker creatures, Ravenous Rabbit.

“What do you mean?” Richard responded.

“It has two pips, right? And you used three temples for it?”

Oh, I see. The rabbit cost three mana, but two of them were generic. The generic mana was written simply as a two, next to the one ambition pip. He was trying to figure out how to explain it when Ava spoke, quick as usual.

She’d turned the card he’d laid down sideways so Aubrey could read it more easily and explained: “So most cards cost some of any type of mana in addition to their specific school, and they’ll note how many generic they require as a little number in the circle. Any of the mana in a specific school will be counted one pip at a time. I actually made sure to only use cards without generic costs when making your deck for you yesterday morning. It may not be as strong as it could’ve been, but I’m hoping it’ll be easier for you to track.”

“Thank you. I’m sorry, that was a really stupid question.”

“No, it wasn’t.” He disagreed with her. “You’re learning something new. We want you to ask questions, Aubs.”

She nodded, slightly blushing as she struggled to maintain eye contact with him. “You two can keep going.”

He nodded and passed the turn. Their explanations meandered into the midgame, in which Ava began explaining how attacking and defending worked as they both tried to be more aggressive. Aubrey asked a few questions, but they were outnumbered by the amount of times a card or a creature’s ability changed how combat worked and they’d hear her quietly scrawling something down.

Unlike when they’d played this game last night, he just barely managed to edge out a win. He’d drawn enough removal and creature killing spells like Patrise’s Apple that the healing and undeath themes of his deck had time to work and outlast Ava’s sea monsters. They spent a bit of time afterward trying to help with the list of questions she’d made before all three of them shuffled again so they could play Aubrey’s first real game. While they were explaining things Ava pulled out a bag of premade pigs in a blanket from the freezer and let them cook in the oven. She and Aubrey’s style of cooking seem to mesh pretty well. I guess that makes sense.

Like most casual Wonders games it started slow; on turn two Richard managed to get a sword on the field and Ava played something that let her put down an extra temple so she could move faster. Aubrey nervously tried to follow along.

On Aubrey’s third turn Richard saw her lips purse as she looked at her part of the table. She took one of the cards in her hand and gently tapped it against the three temples she had on the field before setting the card down and announcing: “I’m going to play Scholar’s Fervor. If I haven’t attacked that turn, I can copy the first ritual I play in my second phase. I think I did that right?” Seeing both of them nod, she continued. “I’ll finish my turn.”

Richard played one of his more defensive creatures, Argumentative Trees, before ending his turn. It attached a small mana cost to attacking him as long as the trees were there. Ava got a creature of her own out with Sea Horseman.

Now that it was back to Aubrey’s turn, Richard saw her pick up Reynard from the side of the board it got to wait while not in play. She tapped it against her temple cards again like he’d seen before, clumping her passion temples away from the knowledge temple that she’d put down a moment ago. “Now that he’s on the field, the first spell anyone plays each turn fails and is replaced by the top card from their deck.” She announced nervously.

The next turn started growing chaotic. Richard had his Lost Knights replaced with a random temple. Ava’s Swooping Skyshark got replaced with a counterspell, which had nothing to counter. Aubrey played a cheap spell that would’ve done nothing even if it hadn’t been replaced by a kitsune that let her draw extra cards. Now that she’d triggered Reynard once she cast Lightning Loop and inched towards the lead, ready to start pinging away at her opponents once she started playing rituals.

Richard got lucky with his next draw, and tried to copy what his girlfriend was doing. He baited out Reynard with a cheap spell of his own before bringing out Sir Bors. Ava used her deck’s ability to get mana faster to do the same, bringing out Jörmungandr.

It was back to Aubrey’s turn. She played into Reynard with another cheap spell, Faith-led looting. When it cancelled that spell, it replaced it with the more aggressive enchantment Mist of Frenzy. It was another spell that did nothing on its own, but would make anything she attacked with more dangerous. “I’m skipping combat.” She announced, which at first sounded unnecessary. She’d already quietly skipped combat four times. “Now that I’m in my second phase and I didn’t attack, I’m going to cast Mist of Obedience,” she declared, laying down a card showing a devil being overwhelmed with pink mist as its eyes turned white. “This would let me take control of one creature on the field. But since I’ve got Scholar’s Fervor, it’ll let me take two creatures. Both of you will take damage from Lightning Loop twice. I’ll take those two, please.” She pointed to Jörmungandr and Sir Bors as if it was a request.

From there, the rest of the game just snowballed as the stolen champions gave Aubrey the ability to press her advantage. The blonde struggled each combat to both figure out who to attack and how to calculate damage afterwards, but Ava stepped in each time to guide her through the math and Richard reassured her that he wouldn’t be upset by losing. So the game slowed down as they supported her, even as it became more and more of a forgone conclusion.

“So I’ll pass my turn.” Aubrey said after combat and another series of small damage bursts.

“No, you don’t.” Ava pointed out.

“I don’t? Did I do something wrong?” Aubrey asked with concern.

“No, I’m saying there’s no one to pass the turn to. We’re both dead. You won.” The Wonders expert clarified.

“Oh. Oh!”

“How did that end up feeling?”

“Good, but tough? I think what you did with the pips helped.”

“Would you want to play again?” Ava asked hopefully.

“Only if you want to, of course.” Richard added.

“Maybe? My biggest problem is all the combat stuff. I might be willing to try it more for you guys if I could avoid being involved in that.”

“There’s ways to avoid combat,” Ava started to explain. “Combo decks usually don’t need to attack, and pillowfort strategies can make it harder for people to attack you.”

Is she aware of what she’s offering? Dick thought. Combo with some pillowfort could describe Felicia’s playstyle, and if either of them realized they were doing the same thing… “I appreciate that you tried today at all.” He tried to gently take their attention away from the topic.

“Thank you both for being willing to teach me. I know I made it hard at points.” Aubrey thanked them both at first, then directed her next statement to Ava. “I think you’d be a good teacher, if you wanted to be.”

Ava looked down at the floor, feeling embarrassed and trying not to make eye contact with Dick until she felt her face looked normal. She got up and started packing her bag back up until she thought of something. “I should go soon, I was planning on meeting Felicia at the library before dinner. Before I go, can I ask for a favor?”

“What is it?”

“Would the two of you mind kissing in front of me?”

Richard and Aubrey looked at each other, each caught off guard. He wasn’t sure how she’d feel about it until she stood up, nodding at him to check whether he was alright with it. He stood up with her, and she took the lead this time. She nearly threw herself at him, and he caught her as he leaned against the wall.

She softened at his touch, giving way to him. He gently pulled her in closer until they were up against the wall together. All the anxieties about their relationship and their future were pushed down in their moment between breaths, something in Aubrey’s soul telling her that she could always trust him, that he’d always be there to catch her. His hand slid down her back, and she was ready to melt for him.

They pulled away for a moment to breathe, and it was like time started again. He pulled his arm back up to brush his hair away, and she remembered that they weren’t alone.

Ava Soto, +1 BP (Voyeur, Kiss) (Storytellers)

Aubrey Conners, +1 BP (Exhibition, Kiss) (Storytellers)

Aubrey Conners, +2 VP (French Kiss)

Ava spoke, filling the silence. “Thank you for that. I was worried kissing was overhyped, but that looked like you both enjoyed it.” She started packing the cards they’d used back into her bag. “I’ll head out, but I hope you both have fun. Best of luck, Aubrey, with whatever you’ve got planned for the rest of the day.”

Dick felt his girlfriend stiffen. “What do you mean?” She asked.

“What do you mean?”

“You’re wishing me luck with him tonight?”

“Of course.” The Japanese woman was smiling amicably.

“Aren’t you trying to compete with me?”

“No one needs to compete with each other.” Dick interjected, trying to stave off a fight. She’s been so good with everyone lately, I don’t want to go back to before.

Ava shrugged, unperturbed by the concerns from either part of the couple. “Yeah, we’re competing for who can do the most interesting things for the audience. But what’s the point of a competition if we can’t have fun together along the way?”

“You’re not… trying to compete for him?” Aubrey asked hesitantly.

“If you’re talking love wise, I don’t even know if I want that. I just want everyone to be able to do their best and have fun. That’s why I’m trying to wish you luck tonight. Does that make sense?”

“As much as it can…”

“Good. I’ll see you both tomorrow.” She smiled again, slinging the backpack over her shoulder and left the kitchen. They heard the front door open and shut.

“I don’t really understand her sometimes, but I like her. I think she might be my favorite of your friends.” Aubrey told him.

“I’m glad you both gave each other a second chance.” He agreed, squeezing her tight as she gave a content sigh.