“Welcome to The Perch, your local hole-in-the-wall café owned by a rebellious teenager. What can I get for you?” said the earar behind the counter in a flat, unwelcoming voice.

“Uh...” Dassah hesitated, stupefied by more than one thing about her current situation.

It turned out that Bahena had to go meet her brother, and Stella had wanted to run a quick errand, so Dassah had volunteered to get them a seat at the café. Of the several cafés in their shopping center, this one, up on the second-floor corner of a quiet alleyway, looked like it would offer a relaxing place to people-watch and enjoy fancy-looking pastries. The coffee was the next thing to test, but this barista was more than she’d bargained for.

“Please hurry up and order. There are other customers,” he told her, his large black and brown ears twitching and jet-black eyes narrowing as he crossed his winged arms.

Dassah turned around, actually hoping there was someone else to witness this guy. No one. She turned back to him. “Um. I’ll have a caramel macchiato, please.”

“Right. One caramel macchiato for the bottom feeder. Coming right up,” he said dismissively. The hair on the back of Dassah’s neck stood on end as the anger inside her grew, but she quelled it with a silent nod.

“That will be five creds,” he ignored her and held out his leathery, black hand.

After staring at him and his hand for a moment, Dassah handed him her card. While she wasn’t one hundred percent comfortable with the bat people, they were far less scary than jikak and garule. Still, this kind of treatment was a lot, even for her.

Despite the barista’s attitude, the earar as a species were oddly... cute. Their faces were a little bit like a Labrador retriever’s, covered in fur with wet little noses, and their eyes were round and usually either black, red, or gold. And, as much as Dassah wanted it to be so, their wings weren’t cool like in art from Earthian fantasy stories. Earar had eight fingers on each hand, four supporting the leathery wings that ran from their wrists all the way to their ankles, three fingers that served as hands, and then one extremely flexible pseudo-thumb which had a stiff, hooked nail for hanging and climbing. As a matter of anatomy, Dassah found them fascinating — plus, as pacifistic fruit and insect eaters, she found them quite agreeable as a species.

Until meeting this guy.

Watching him as he made her cup of caffeine crack, she supposed she shouldn’t have been surprised that with his wings folded up behind him, he was at least graceful enough to not knock anything over. The service area — much wider than average coffee shop service areas — seemed like it had been designed with larger, bulkier species in mind. Even then, though, the earar were a flying species; they weren’t known for being too graceful on their feet. Just admit it, Dassah, she thought to herself with a sigh. You just want to see him trip.

She chuckled at the image in her mind and checked her messages.

After a couple of minutes, the barista came out from behind the counter and gently set her cup of coffee in front of her. “One caramel macchiato. Can I get the ugly girl anything else?”

“Um, no, thanks,” she managed to say just before Stella came rushing in, shouting her name.

“Dassah!”

Putting her cup down, Dassah turned and greeted her. “Oh, thank God.”

Stella threw her things down on the stool next to Dassah and asked, “how’s this place?”

“The coffee is irritatingly fantastic,” Dassah told her, shifting her gaze to the earar who was currently leaning by the register, watching them with his chin in his hand. “The customer service on the other hand... leaves a lot to be desired.”

“Sounds fun!” Stella laughed. “Oh, interesting! He’s not bad looking...” she said and went over to order. Dassah grinned and sipped her coffee as she quietly watched the quickly-devolving interaction between Stella and the barista. Aren’t they a good match. Fun, huh? Stella, meet Karma.

“How about your name so I can send a customer service complaint?” Stella growled as Dassah took the chance to taste her coffe. Another shock! It was probably the best caramel macchiato she’d had on the ‘bergs.

“Don’t got a name for you,” the barista said with a shrug. “But if do you happen to see the irritating runaway who owns this place, tell her to come back and do her job so I can go back to doing mine.”

“Which is?” she asked.

“Not supplying undeserving people with my sparkling customer service skills, that’s for sure,” he yawned, as the bell on the door jingled.

Tuning out Stella’s squabbling, Dassah reflected on her plans for the day.

TheirWorld was certainly involved. How long would it take her in real time to get through the starting area? A day? Two days? Dassah frowned.

She pulled up the small holographic monitor and keyboard from her WristComp and typed in [theirworld tutorial mist bade dusk children]. Clicking on the first forum link that came up, she skimmed through some of the posts — which were mostly useless, as far as Dassah’s question was concerned.

Posters did talk about the competition between the Children of the Dawn and Dusk and speculated that it was an area of growing content. There were some who even suggested that recently-appearing quests were likely connected to some upcoming event or patch that would make the Children of the Dawn and Dusk a major part of the game. Though the speculation was interesting, it wasn’t helpful for her specific situation.

“You weren’t kidding about the customer service. What the hell is that guy’s problem?” Stella complained when she came over.

Dassah laughed as she closed her windows. “Can’t say I didn’t warn you...”

Stella waved a hand in the air. “Whatever. This had better be the best coffee ever.”

“Sadly, it kinda is,” Dassah told her, looking into her cup. “‘Least mine is...”

Stella “Hmm”-ed as the earar came over with her cup and set it down in front of them.

“Caffè Americano,” he said. “Anything else?”

“If I need anything, I guarantee you’ll be the first to know,” Stella told him. A slightly disgusted smile flickered across his lips, then he turned and went about his business. “Ass,” she muttered.

Dassah quietly appreciated Stella’s ability to speak Dassah’s inner thoughts.

“Mmm,” Dassah gulped down some of the delicious drink. “So, what are your plans for the rest of the day?”

“Well, the first thing I’m going to do is try that trick of yours to get into the school grounds,” Stella told her, tasting her coffee like it might be poisoned. Her eyes went wide as she looked at it. “What the hell...? What sort of black magic did this guy use? Does he have some kind of coffee-making mystriks? I’d almost marry him just for that!”

“Right? Though I wouldn’t go quite that far,” Dassah laughed, then tilted her head. “Wait, mystriks? Isn’t he an earar?”

Grunting over her coffee, Stella pointed in the direction of the barista. “Look by his eyes. He’s either a half-kind, or a special case.”

Glancing over, Dassah saw that she was right. Three clear stones just barely showed through the dark fur on his face. “Huh...”

A valkyrian’s mystriks weren’t just for aesthetics. They may have been traditional body modifications, but they were traditional for a reason. Granted at a coming-of-age ceremony, the embellishments were made from special gemstones found only on the valkyrian homeworld of Yidar. Dassah was vaguely aware that there was some sort of test at the ceremony, something to do with the way the child resonated with certain stones, colors, shapes, and patterns. After, the stones granted the wearer a special ability. It was cool — kind of like valkyrians were all superheroes — except most of them had more domestic abilities. Every now and again, though, someone would emerge from their ceremony with powerful abilities that would ensure their futures.

The process of making the mystrick stones work was a heavily guarded secret. You could still get a set of mystriks if you weren’t a valkyrian, but you had to apply for them. And in order to do that, you had to be sponsored by a valkyrian. And that meant, more often than not, that they were a sure sign of a half-kind.

Maybe that’s why he’s so bitter about everything... Dassah chewed her pinky nail as she rested her chin in her hands. Not that it matters, she dismissed the thought and returned to the topic of TheirWorld. “What jobs are you thinking about doing once you get past the Gatekeeper?”

Stella shrugged. “I’d like to do something with magic,” she said. “It’d be nice to have actual power for once, and not simply the power of flipping pages.”

“I see...”

Stella’s power fell into the ‘practically useless’ category, the kind of mystrick that was often the butt of other species’ jokes. It allowed her to manipulate lightweight materials within a foot of her stones, a set of three purple diamonds embedded on the back of her left hand. While it made for a great party trick, there was little else to it.

“So?” Stella stared at her, a smile growing on her face. “How did you make out during

character creation? What did you think of the process? Dish!”

“Well,” Dassah started. “It was an adventure, for sure. I enjoyed it. I think. At least there weren’t any clowns.”

“You would say that!”

“I do find it a little disconcerting that character gen is so heavily based on our own personalities,” Dassah traced the lip of her coffee cup with a finger. “I mean, I don’t normally play to my... erm... real-life character? In games like this.”

“I didn’t mind that so much myself,” Stella took a swig from her own cup. “At least it makes it harder to pretend to be something you aren’t. It can be tricky business since you’re using your own face to do potentially horrible things.”

“I can only imagine.”

“I will say, as much as I didn’t mind the personality thing, I found the trait options seriously limited. I didn’t get a few of the ones I wanted.”

“Actually, I got most of what I was looking for. I’m hoping to go for more of a spiritual-type class. I’d be nice if I could play a healer.”

“A healer?” Stella stuck her tongue out in disdain. “You can be anything, and you want to be someone who works for other people? Don’t you hate people?”

Dassah laughed. “Weird, isn’t it? But I usually play healers, and it’s not as bad as you make it sound. It comes down to the mechanics, more than anything.”

“If you say so...”

“I do,” she said, though she probably wouldn’t have admitted that to anyone else.

“Well, at least you should be able to gain money and reputation pretty easily,” Stella said. “I’ve heard that healers get good bonuses for events and faction quests and the like.”

“Healers and tanks tend to,” Dassah agreed.

“No love for the damage dealers, I guess.”

Dassah grinned, but that shifted into a frown. Faction quests? She knew they were out there, but she hadn’t realized they’d have to deal with them so early on. It would probably be better for her to keep her assumptions about TheirWorld’s similarities to other games to a minimum.

“What clan did you end up joining?” Dassah asked.

“The Noble Clan,” Stella answered in a tone that seemed to add ‘of course’ to the end of the statement. “You?”

“Mist.”

Scrunching her nose, Stella muttered, “Mist?” “... I can see it fitting you, especially going for that spiritual type, but I feel like they’re supposed to be super-weak as a clan. some stuff about having quite a few disadvantages at the start of the game.”

“They do fit me, though,” Dassah pointed out with a shrug. “Plus, I may have found a decent quest chain for a class that fits me just as well.”

Stella’s eyes lit up “Oh? What’s that about?”

Dassah went ahead and gave a short explanation of what she had run into while playing — though she glossed over some of the details. “Who knows what it will actually end up being, but it’s rather interesting, don’t you think?”

“Indeed,” Stella nodded seriously, then clicked her tongue as she flicked her head sharply to her right. “Hey. Have you noticed that that bat bastard has been watching us?”

“Wow, Stell, way to make us stand out to him more,” Dassah said, looking at the earar behind the counter from the corner of her eye. She shook her head. “I’m sure he’s mostly harmless. Earar have some ridiculous sense of hearing anyway; probably can’t help himself.”

“What? ‘Cause stunning ladies like ourselves are too interesting for him to ignore?” Stella made a face as she swirled her cup around like it was a glass of wine, then grinned mischievously. “Either way, it’s still rude. Rude, rude, rude — and I shall never expect him to be any better in the future.”

“...In the future?” Dassah asked, as she was filled with a sense of amused dread.

“Of course!” Stella exclaimed. “He’s so interested in us, we must come more often! Grace him with our presence!”

“At the very least, he’s just a poor, antisocial, misanthropic child who doesn’t know how to deal with people.”

Stella snorted. “Isn’t that a better description of you?”

“Hey!” Dassah glared, then the two shared a laugh. Out of the corner of her eye again, she caught the earar smirking. Once he noticed her looking, he put on a disinterested face and yawned widely. So, not such an ass after all? Now that she looked at him closer, Stella was right. He really was cute.

“So. What do you think? This place, same time tomorrow?” Stella asked.

“We have stuff to do tomorrow.” Dassah scrunched her nose.

“That’s right! I forgot! Well, why don’t we bring them here?”

Dassah groaned, “Stella...”

“I know, I know,” she raised her hands, then put them on her hips. “But just think how good it will be for you! You’re more at ease in coffee shops, right? It’s the perfect place to have a good conversation! You may even like it.” Dassah made a face, but Stella shook her head. “Nope. Besides, you agreed.”

“I know I did...” Dassah mumbled.

“On that note, my dear,” Stella said, looking at her watch. “I have a date, so this is where I will leave you!”

“Wait, what? With whom? What about the game?”

“Secret!” Stella bopped Dassah’s nose and collected her things. “You should get back to TheirWorld and find all the secrets so you can share them with me later!”

“We’ll see,” Dassah told her, waving her off. “Go, play with your little boy-toys.”

“Oh, I will!” Stella waved, then looked at the earar leaning coolly behind the counter. “See you tomorrow, bat boy!”

“Joy,” he answered lifelessly. She laughed and ran out the door. Dassah shook her head and looked at him with pity as she grabbed her things.

“Congratulations,” he said to her, his voice flat. “Of the two of you bottom feeders, you are arguably the less annoying one.”

Dassah fought the urge to throw her shoe at him as she turned and left the building, a false smile frozen on her face.