The Law of Averages

Book 2: Chapter 138: Vacation

Dan flopped onto the bed with a groan, spreading himself out like a starfish.

“I’m so glad that’s over,” he declared to the ceiling. “Giving advice is not my forte.”

The bed bent slightly as Abby sat down beside him. She patted his cheek affectionately. “I’m sure you did fine.”

Dan made a disagreeable noise. Abby’s hand roamed from his cheek to his head. She ran her fingers through his hair as he stared up at the ceiling.

“What did you end up telling them?” she asked.

Dan tried to shrug, but the wrinkled comforter trapped his shoulders. “A lot of things they already know. Maybe one or two things that they didn’t.”

She pressed hard against his scalp, massaging away his budding migraine. “Did you say what you needed to say?”

Dan considered the question. He had gone into that meeting with only one thing in mind: to make sure those idiot kids understood what they were getting into. He’d done his best, but it was hard to predict how they’d take his words. It was a different world, a different culture, and he might not have gotten his point across. Dan had tried, though. That was all he could really do.

“I think so,” he said, after a few minutes of contemplation. Then, he laughed. “I don’t know if it was what Gregoir intended. I have a feeling I didn’t win over many recruits.”

Abby hummed low in her throat. Her fingers danced across his shoulders. “So long as you spoke from the heart, I’m sure he was happy.”

Well, he’d certainly done that. It’d been surprisingly exhausting. Dan wasn’t much for public speaking, even when it was something he cared about. He really didn’t know how Gregoir did it. Half an hour of lecturing, and he was ready for a vacation.

Hm. That was an idea.

“I think I’m done adulting for a week or two,” Dan decided, snagging Abby’s hand and giving it a squeeze. “We should go somewhere, have some fun.”

“Go somewhere?” she echoed quizzically. “Like where?”

Dan grinned up at her. “Anywhere! I can make portals, babe. Where do you wanna go? Where have you always wanted to go?”

Abby blinked at him, tilting her head like a confused puppy. Her ever-present ponytail dipped past her shoulder as she considered his offer. Her lips pursed cutely, and her nose crinkled in thought.

“I’ve always wanted to see Venice,” she said, slowly. “Mama Ana always said it was too dangerous. International flights are too closely monitored. I’ve never actually been out of the country.”

Dan hadn’t known that about her. His smile widened.

“Can’t track my portals,” he pointed out. “No passport or paper trail, no airline food, we don’t even need to rent a hotel room. We’ll just be two faces in the crowd.”

“It’d be super illegal,” Abby pointed out, but a matching smile was growing on her face. “What if someone asks for our passports?”

Dan shrugged. “Then we leg it home.”

“Mama Ana will lose her mind if she ever finds out,” Abby said.

Dan waggled his eyebrows suggestively. “That’s just the cherry on top.”

The next day, they were in Venice, walking hand-in-hand through St. Mark’s Square, lost among the crowd of tourists. Abby munched on some sort of fried fish that they’d bought from a street vendor, while Dan absently took pictures of their surroundings with his phone.

The Square was absolutely packed with bodies, bustling and hustling and posing for photos in front of random pieces of masonry. It was odd to see a sea of people that looked like, well, people. There were fewer mods on display than Dan had ever seen in a crowd this size in America. Most people seemed to use the basic body mod; that, or everyone in Europe was born insanely attractive. Dan could pick out the Americans in the crowd. They were the teenage girls with fox ears and fluffy tails. They were the young men with iridescent scales running along their necks and arms. They were the people drawing disapproving looks as they swaggered through the crowd, broadcasting their individuality like blazing bonfires.

Dan nudged Abby, and nodded at the groups of tourists from their home country. “Stand out a bit, don’t they?”

She hummed in response, taking a large bite out of her fried fish. She chewed happily, eyes crinkling at their edges as they flicked across the busy crowd. Dan guided her through the plaza, towards the exit. They’d seen everything there was to see, here. He could barely breathe in this damn crowd.

Eventually, they made it out. The noise of a thousand curious tourists faded into the background. Abby polished off her snack, licking each finger and smacking her lips in satisfaction. Dan summoned some wet-wipes from his hammerspace, and she took it gratefully.

“Frivolous mods never really caught on outside North America,” she said, as she delicately wiped her lips.

“Why’s that?” Dan asked. The two began to walk towards the Grand Canal, fingers intertwined and arms swinging. Abby was practically skipping along, her gaze roaming the foreign architecture.

“The Genius upgrade,” Abby replied absently. “Mods were only discovered after a Genius figured them out, and America had first access to the Genius upgrade. Only access, technically. It never actually spread outside our borders, not legally. Though it managed to spread around, despite that.”

They finally reached a bridge that crossed over the canal, and they paused to lean against it. Boats passed beneath them, some paddled, others controlled through upgrades. Dan watched their path, noting the crystal-clear water. Obvious trash sluices were placed every so often, manned by sanitation workers with hydrokinetic upgrades. Their job was to keep the water clean, diverting trash and pollution into specialized sections of the canal. Dan was certain that the canal was nothing like the one in his home dimension. It was impossibly blue, and it smelled like roses.

“It’s beautiful,” Abby murmured, her eyes glistening.

Dan smiled softly, and looped his arm through hers. “Let’s take a ride.”

It was unsurprisingly easy to book a gondola tour. Dan and Abby sat side by side as the gondolier piloted them along the narrow canal. The man looked like Waldo, to Dan’s eyes, and he carried a paddle twice as long as he was tall. Despite that, he barely seemed to use the tool. The boat moved at a decent clip, almost of its own accord, with the gondolier only giving it a gentle nudge every now and then. Dan suspected power shenanigans, but he couldn’t figure out how the man was doing it.

Abby was wide-eyed and smiling the entire trip. She kept her free hand dipped in the water, dragging her fingertips along its shimmering surface as they moved. There was constant sound, wherever they went. They city felt every bit as alive as Austin, but without any of the unsettling tension that seemed to infest his city. They were far from the People, here. Far from the problems of home. He could finally relax, and unclench. He hadn’t realized how much he needed to, until he’d let it all go.

They had lunch at a restaurant that Dan couldn’t pronounce, but came highly recommended. He had some kind of seafood dish—again, that he couldn’t pronounce—and sipped on expensive wine. Abby devoured an entire basket of warm, fresh pastries, then ordered another basket to go. They paid for their meal, ducked briefly out of sight, then walked through a portal.

They emerged in Hong Kong, with the sun setting. They wandered the night markets, picking through piles of crap with other tourists. Abby bartered, loudly and enthusiastically, over a boot-leg DVD of Dimension A’s version of Star Wars Episode One, except the title crudely photoshopped over the front was How I Met Your Mother. Dan bought a new sword; it was a misshapen piece of crap, but it had a neat guard and sheath. He’d stick it on a wall, somewhere. In the meantime, it would sit pretty in t-space.

They took the Star Ferry, once it was good and dark. They watched ten thousand neon lights dance along the waters of Kowloon, as the ferry drifted past the Hong Kong skyline. Colors lit the edges of entire skyscrapers, marching up and down like rows of ants. Brilliant lasers strobed the sky, piercing through the thick clouds that always seemed to linger over the city. The Symphony of Lights announced itself to the world, and it was beautiful.

Time passed without incident. There were no gunshots. There were no disasters. There were no terrorists or stuck-up feds. There were no vigilantes or villains. There was nothing to occupy Dan’s attention, except for Abby, and the world they shared. It was a rare break in a life that had somehow become hectic, despite Dan’s best efforts to the contrary. It was a quiet moment of peace, in what had been a very rough year.

It was a good day.