By the time they made it to their assigned barracks, it was already past 11:00 at night.  Over two dozen bunk beds lined the walls, but they seemed to have the place to themselves.  Atria took the opportunity of a free water closet and a borrowed set of fatigues to change out of her blood-crusted uniform.  When she came out, she found Cap approaching Stella and Adam.

    “Stella,” Cap said.  “I’ve got a question about what you said in the meeting.”

    “What is it?” Stella asked.

    “So, I get that if I stay here, my powers are going to fade,” Cap started.  “So, I’ll lose my ability to fly and shoot lasers from my eyes.  But what about things like strength and longevity?  I mean, I’m not human to begin with – I fell through a dimensional portal into my world.”

    “I’m sorry,” Stella said.  “I just don’t know.  You’ll lose any ability that breaks the laws of physics, but I don’t think anything else would be affected.”

    Cap looked slightly unhappy about the answer.  “Well, thanks anyway.  I’m going to go see if they brought me the street clothes I requested after the meeting.”

    After Cap wandered off, she saw Adam give Stella a hug and kiss and make his way to the water closet.  Stella sat down on the lower bed and buried her head in her hands.

    “Are you okay?” Atria asked, stepping over.  Stella looked up, her eyes red.

    “I’ll be fine,” Stella said.

    “I’m sure the thing with your documents will get sorted out,” Atria said.

    Stella smiled, her eyes sad.  “It’s not that.  Well, it’s not just that.  When the battle started, I was completely useless.”

    “From what you said in the debriefing, your bluff distracted the thief long enough for Cap to show up.  I would have died if that hadn’t happened.”

    “Five years ago, I would have rained destruction on his head,” Stella said.  “I would have been able to paralyze him in place, or put a magical barrier between you and one of those spikes of his.  That’s all gone now.”

    Atria took a deep breath.  “Stella, I don’t want to ever hear you say that you’re useless again.  Not ever.”

    “But it’s true.”

    “Why?” Atria demanded.  “Because you can’t fight on the front lines anymore?  Because you can’t do what you used to be able to do?  Everybody goes through that.  I’m going to go through that.  There’s already things I used to be able to do as a teenager that I can’t do now.  You’re not the same person you were five years ago.  In five years you’re not going to be the same person you are right now.  That’s just life.

    “You may not have noticed this, but there was a grand total of one person in that conference room who had any understanding of why any of this is happening, and that’s you.  There’s only one person who has any chance of unravelling all this and getting us home, and that’s you.  There’s only one person who those officers are going to turn to for answers, and that’s you.  And there’s only one person with enough experience to be a good candidate for first contact with others like us who fall into this world, and that’s you.  If a battle starts, you are the only person in this barracks who isn’t expendable.  There is nothing Cap and I can do that can’t be replicated with enough firepower.  You are irreplaceable.”

    Stella gave her a fragile smile.  “Thank you for saying that.”

    “It’s all true,” Atria said.  “Leave the fighting to Cap and me – you worry about doing the things that only you can do.”  She saw Adam returning from the water closet.  “I’ll leave you in the hands of your fiancé.”

    Atria grabbed the lower bunk beside Stella’s and fluffed her pillow.  On the other side, Kaguyama and Mitsubi were discussing who would take the top bunk bed.  Kaguyama glanced at Atria, and just as quickly glanced away.

    Atria sighed.  “It’s okay,” she told him in Japanese.  “I don’t hate you for what you said.”

    Kaguyama looked at her.  “You have every right to.”

    “I imagine I do,” she stated.  “But I don’t.  I’m an officer in a combat unit – I’ve sent men to their deaths in diversionary attacks.  I imagine what you do is the same.  I’m not happy about it, and I don’t know if I ever will be.  But, I know there isn’t any malice in it.  You do what you need to in order to tell a good story, and I’m just one of the pieces you use to do it.”

    “That’s not true,” Kaguyama said.  “You’re not just a game piece to me, and you never have been.  None of my characters are.  You’re all like the children I never had.  I know everything about you – every triumph, every setback, everything.  The same goes for Abel, and everybody else in your story.  I know how much it hurt you when Abel died, but I cried when I wrote it too.  You lost your best friend, and I lost a surrogate son.  But that was where the story went, and that was what it required.”

    Atria nodded and settled back in her bunk.  “We should all get some sleep.  Tomorrow could be a busy day.”

The next morning they found their luggage waiting just inside the door to the barracks.  Included were some street clothes for Captain Infinite – a button down shirt, sports jacket, and slacks.  Cap held up the clothes and grinned.  “Just what I asked for,” he said.

    Once everybody had finished using the water closet and getting changed, Atria sat on her bed and took stock.  Regardless of what happened today, she needed to check her antigrav unit.  Her pistol was almost certainly a lost cause – even if it could be located among the rubble from the battle, it wasn’t designed to withstand a building falling on it.  She’d also need a new uniform jacket, at the very least – her street clothes were good for now, but if she was going to represent her nation to the Japanese Army, she needed to be properly attired.

    The door opened, and a couple of orderlies walked in with a large folding table and a meal cart.  Quiet and polite, they set up the table and laid out breakfast, then saluted and left.  Atria and the others sat down.

    “I’ve been wondering,” Atria said to Adam in English, “how did you two meet?  I’ve heard Stella’s side, but I would love to know yours.”

    “I found her mostly starved in an alleyway on my way home from school,” Adam said.  “She claimed to be a character from a video game I had been playing.  So, I asked her for proof.”

    “And she showed you a spell, right?”

    Adam shook his head.  “She tried, but she was too weak.  Nothing happened.”

    Beside Adam, Stella startled.

    “But she seemed so convinced of it,” Adam continued, “and so desperate, that I made a leap of faith and took her home with me.  I got my proof a couple of days later when Stella tried to fetch something from a tall shelf with magic, and accidentally brought down everything on it.”

    Atria nodded.  They sat and ate in silence for a couple of minutes.

    “Not bad for army food,” Kaguyama said in Japanese after swallowing.  “They’ve gotten better since I my time.”

    “You were in the army?” Mitsubi asked.

    Kaguyama nodded.  “Just for three years after school.”

    “That explains all those military terms we had trouble understanding in the anime,” Adam said.

    “You write what you know,” Kaguyama stated.  “And I wanted to write a military science fiction story that got things right.”

    They ate in silence for another minute.

    “Well, this brings back memories,” Atria said in Japanese, smiling.

    “What, being in barracks?” Stella asked.

    Atria shook her head.  “Being confined to barracks.”

    Stella perked up.  “What happened?”

    “So, for any unit in training, the final exercise before graduation is to take on another training unit in live-fire field manoeuvres, using training rounds,” Atria explained.  “At least, that’s what everybody in the unit is told.  In reality, you’re put up against one of the elite combat units.  The army wants to give you a bloody nose and knock some of the arrogance out of you, you see.  So, the fact that you are up against an elite unit is a closely guarded secret that the trainees should never, ever discover.”

    “And you did,” Stella said.

    Atria grinned.  “Somebody told us about it, yes.  So, the night before the exercise, someone – and I’m not saying it was me – snuck into the depot and someone – and I’m not saying it was me – replaced all of the opposing force’s training rounds with weighted foam.  So when the exercise started, our unit was the only one firing any live rounds.  The CO was pissed.  Our entire unit was confined to barracks for one week.  They were so annoyed at us that they forgot to swear us to secrecy right after the exercise was done, so we tipped off the next class.  Worth it, though, especially since it took us three hours to finish spray painting all that foam.  That was the first time I was confined.”

    Stella and the others laughed.  “What was the second?” Stella said.

    “Well, two years later it was our combat unit’s turn to go up against the graduating class.  And, just in case the word was still spreading about what the exercise really was and somebody decided to do something about it, I went into the depot and checked our training rounds.  All spray-painted foam.”

    “But you didn’t report it,” Stella guessed.

    “Absolutely not!  Our unit got together, and replaced all of their training rounds with foam too.  It needs to be a fair fight after all.”  Atria laughed.  “Both units were confined to barracks for two weeks.  That was the last year they used those training rounds.  I think they shifted to a laser targeting system after that.”

    Kaguyama chuckled.  “I remember writing that.  It was fun.  One of the best parts of volume three.”

    “It was volume two,” Mitsubi said.  “Remember?”

    Kaguyama closed his eyes.  “Ah yes, you’re right.  Sorry.  I mis-remembered.”

    “Was it based on real life?” Atria asked.  “Did you do something like that?”

    Kaguyama shook his head.  “The army didn’t do that sort of thing when I went through training.  I just thought it would be a good idea if they did, so I put it into your story and let you react to it.  It was the first time your character surprised me, and the moment I knew you had truly come to life.”

    “I actually drew you painting the rounds,” Mitsubi said.  “I could show you that when this is over, if you want.”

    Atria nodded.  “I think I’d like that very much.  It’s one of my fondest memories.”

    The door opened and a pair of orderlies entered the room holding luggage.  Behind them were two newcomers, carrying duffle bags and looking annoyed.  One was an African American woman of medium height and stature with curly hair, and the other was a slightly overweight grey-haired caucasian man.

    Cap waved at them.  “Welcome to our little hotel,” he said in English, shifting over to make room at the table.  “Plenty of food left, if you want some.”

    The orderlies put down the luggage, bowed and left, closing the door behind them.

    “They arrested us and told us this unbelievable story about fictional characters coming to life,” the man said.  “Do any of you know about this?”