They arrived soon as the second, blissfully unoccupied swimming hole. Anika looked around suspiciously, expecting some person or creature to burst out of the water to interrupt the solitude of the gently rippling water on the shore and the sound of a small waterfall where the pool met the river. It had taken another 20 minutes to reach the pool, about half an hour on Earth, so it made sense that most would stop at the closer pool rather than continuing this far away. Anika didn’t mind the extra walk - she enjoyed spending time alone. Besides, she would be too self conscious to try to practice her magic if other people sat around staring at her.

  “Can I go swimming in this one, Anika?”

  Anika looked down at Lily, who hopped back and forth in excitement, and smiled, “Dive in!”

  “Yay!” Lily rushed to the side of the pool and ran straight in, immediately diving underwater and zooming off like a torpedo.

  Anika took off her dress and left it draped on a moderately sized shrub with bright green, wavy leaves before following Lily into the water at a more sedate pace. The cool water touched her and she shivered briefly, the temperature almost too chilly in the shadow of the trees that towered over the swimming hole. Nearer to the center of the pool, sun glinted off the water in a small area free of the forest’s shadow.

  Anika looked through the clear water and saw the bottom of the spring-fed pool covered in a mix of sand and stone, with occasional larger rocks dotting the space. Several of the larger rocks looked like nice spots to sit and relax without being fully submerged, their flat tops inches beneath the surface of the water. As she waded further into the pool, she realized that the water wasn’t very deep, and she likely wouldn’t need to put her head underwater even if she walked to the deepest part of the spring. She crouched into the pool, kicking off from the ground and propelling herself forward with a frog-legged kick as she began to swim around the pool.

  Living in Georgia, knowing how to swim allowed Anika to have a refreshing summer hobby when the heat became oppressive. She appreciated that her mother had insisted upon swimming lessons for her as a kid, even though she hadn’t been born in the South. It saved her a lot of embarrassment when they moved. Anika had some friends in college, also from the north, that didn’t know how to swim, so they couldn’t enjoy the pool parties and other activities that so often occurred in summer.

  After a lap around the spring, Anika felt more accustomed to the temperature of the water and swam out to the sunny spot before rolling onto her back to float, deciding not to worry about wet hair so she could fully relax. She could hear occasional splashes as Lily continued to swim back and forth as she closed her eyes to feel the sun on her face in contrast to the cool water at her back. She was amazed by how much this new Mizeta body felt normal after so little time. An alien body should have felt, well, alien, but she felt like she always had. The sun felt the same on her blue skin… though she doubted she would need to be quite so worried about sunburn compared to when she had pale, pasty white skin.

  Even dark skin tones could get melanoma though… could water magic heal cancer? The thought made her irrationally angry that magic existed inside her on Earth but was locked away for reasons she couldn’t fathom. If magical healing could cure illness as well as injury, they could save so many people and spare them the misery of chronic conditions or life threatening injuries instead of having treatments locked behind poor access or excessive cost. She thought about her aunt, who had cancer. She passed away several years ago. Her mother and cousins had been inconsolable, and Anika had cried her fair share as well. Her mother had only one sibling, and she had grown up near her aunt’s house. Aunt Inga had been like a second mother, and Katja and Karl more like siblings than cousins. She hadn’t seen them for a few years after moving south for Anika to attend school. They still lived in Wisconsin - with Karl finishing high school and Katja choosing to go to a state school for college. Her family had planned a trip later this year to visit and now, instead of visiting them, Anika would be another loss for her family to suffer.

  Anika pressed her eyelids tightly together, trying to stop the tears she could feel welling once again as she remembered the life she, without a choice, left behind. Her efforts failed, and drops streaked down her face to join the pool beneath her. She tried to push the thoughts away, not wanting her cries to disrupt the serene landscape around her, but a sob escaped her throat.

  Lily appeared beside her, as if by magic, as soon as sound escaped her lips.

  “Anika, what’s wrong?”

  Anika shook her head, knowing if she tried to talk she wouldn’t get the words out. Her body shook, and tiny waves splashed against her cheeks as her involuntary movements churned the world around her. She flipped awkwardly onto her stomach and paddled to a nearby submerged rock, pulling herself up so that she wouldn’t have to worry about drowning in anything but her own tears.

  Lily followed, nuzzling her side as she stood beside Anika on the rock. Her concerned hums interspersed Anika’s sobs, and Anika realized Lily hadn’t activated her Calming Aura like she had last time. Instead, she listened to what Anika said - sometimes you just needed to cry it out.

  After a time, Anika’s sobs began to fade and her tears dried up. She sniffed to find her nose uncomfortably clogged and, with not a tissue in sight, she awkwardly blew her nose into her hands and then washed them in the water around her. Too bad she didn’t have a Scouring Slimes around.

  When she could speak, she looked at Lily, waiting surprisingly patiently for Anika to explain.

  Anika grimaced, “I’m sorry, I ruined your swim.”

  “I can still swim later! Why did you cry?” Lily stared up at her, as if to say she would not allow Anika to change the subject.

  Anika sighed, “I just thought of home and my family… I don’t want them to think I am dead. But… I know I can’t do anything about it. Crying doesn’t help. It’s just so easy to forget that there is no way back and no way to tell them where I am. I’m busy learning about magic and it’s easy to get caught up in everything and ignore that I am far from home.” Anika ineffectively brushed tears from her cheek with her wet hand. “Thank you for letting me cry. I feel better now.”

  “You said you needed to cry sometimes so I let you cry but I was still really worried and wanted to help and didn’t know what to do to help.” Lily’s voice increased in pitch as she spoke, a tone of frantic worry sounding at the end of the sentence.

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  “You don’t always have to do something to help. Sometimes you just have to be there. You can just sit with me and it will be ok. You don’t always have to know what to say or do - just being there for someone is enough.” Anika gently picked Lily up and gave her a hug. “You did what I needed you to do. And I’m okay now. So go swim!”

  Anika playfully tossed Lily lightly into the water so she wouldn’t argue. Anika knew she wasn’t actually okay, but there was nothing that Lily could do to help her mourn her family and old life. It would just take time. And until she could deal with the thought of her past life without crying, she would just have to find ways to distract herself.

  Lily resumed her water frolicking, taking a more leisurely swim this time that involved lots of rolling near the surface of the water like a dog flipped over and rolling in the grass after going outside on the first warm, sunny day of spring. Anika allowed herself a moment to get lost in Lily’s unabashed joy in life and she managed a small, slightly sad smile.

  Turning her attention back to one of the reasons for coming, she felt for the magic inside her and reached out towards the water in front of her. She left her hands at her side, trying to just loosely grab whatever water she could and lift it out of the pond. An amorphous blob rose from the water, undulating and rippling in her loose magical grasp. She thought about hurling the blob away from her, taking out some of her frustration and sadness on the water in her grasp, and it responded by splattering forward in an ugly spray before falling back down into the pool beneath it.

  As good a way to practice her magic as any, she decided to let her emotions take the reins as she manhandled the water around her, hitting the water with magical water blobs, creating rough waves, and throwing the water violently around the pool. The previously tranquil pool seethed with the force of her magic.

  She got lost in the magic and the satisfying sound of churning, splashing, and exploding water. She barely noticed the tidal wave of magically powered water crashing through a small tree on the banks, leaving it cracked and broken, as if hit by lightning. She threw magical blobs of water around, allowing her anger at being stolen from her home infuse the water with dangerous energy. A chunk of a rock poking out above the surface shattered with the force of her raw aptitude, as ugly, uncontrolled water spewed across the lake.

  She stopped, coming back to herself as she suddenly felt faint from the magical expenditure and panting as she realized how much energy she had been putting into her magical tantrum. She relinquished control of her mana and relaxed her hands from the tight balls they had become during her outburst. Taking several deep breaths, she rolled her neck and shoulders, feeling the emotional pain and muscular tension melt out of her as the pool quieted around her, bringing her back to a calm center.

  Realizing she had not thought about Lily while caught up in her cathartic release, she frantically looked around, hoping she hadn’t hurt the small capybara. Her eyes finally fell on Lily as she turned to look behind her, towards the small waterfall that allowed the water of the spring to trickle into the river. There, she found Lily sitting on the rocks, sunning herself as she napped.

  Anika looked up towards the sun, realizing she must have been going at it with her magic for longer than she planned if Lily had fallen asleep. At least the capybara had wisely left her to her own devices and decided to stay clear of the chaos of Anika’s water magic.

  Her breathing normal again, Anika slipped off the rock and swam over to Lily. The capybara must not have been sleeping deeply, as she opened an eye to look at Anika as she approached. Lily slowly moved to a sitting position, giving herself a little shake, as Anika arrived beside her.

  “You were doing scary things with your water magic. I decided to stay away. Monsters would be really scared of you if you did that to them!” Lily spoke with the kind of cautious awe a child had when they saw something powerful and dangerous for the first time.

  “I don’t know if I would have done much damage, but maybe the ruckus would have scared them away. Sorry if I scared you.” Anika scratched Lily on the head and she purred with delight.

  “I wasn’t scared!” Lily shook her head, her voice only slightly higher than usual, and Anika almost believed her. “I just decided to swim over here and stay away. You needed to practice!”

  “Yeah… I did need to practice. I don’t think I remember much of what I just practiced though. I guess I was more upset than I realized earlier.”

  “I can use my calm spell if you are still upset!” Lily perked up at the idea of using her magic.

  “No, that’s okay. I am much better now. I think I just needed to release some tension. So much has happened, and I haven’t had a lot of time to really process everything. I think having these few days where I had more time to rest and less time to worry about running around to the next activity let all those emotions catch up with me. I don’t usually deal with change really well, and coming to a new world is a lot of change, even without magic and monsters being involved.”

  “You have been doing a lot and I think you are doing really good, Anika!” Lily got on her feet and did a little hop of encouragement.

  “I’m glad you think so, because I think I’m a mess.” Anika let out a disparaging laugh at herself, the last of the tension releasing. Then she noticed the box blinking in her vision.

  Level 8 Achieved

  Potency: 14

  Anima: 18

  Vitality: 16

  You have [1] stat point to assign

  “Well. It seems I am at least a productive mess. I haven’t been paying attention to how much experience I was getting from practicing magic, but I’m level 8 now.” Anika quickly assigned the stat point to Vitality and another window appeared.

  Improved Splash is now available.

  Improved Splash: increases range and damage of Splash

  “Ooo yay! I am also almost level 8! I need to practice my magic more and then I will level up. You can get a lot of experience from magic practice, but it stops giving so much experience at level 15.” Lily nodded, clearly pleased with herself for remembering to provide information to Anika.

  “You use your magic all the time, so it makes sense that you have almost caught up to me.” Anika hoped the improved Splash skill would have a bit more punch than the base spell, but she didn’t want to get close to enemies to find out how much damage it did.

  “We’ve been out here for a while, and we don’t want to miss lunch, so we should probably head back to the temple.”

  “Yes! I am hungry! Let’s hurry back!” Lily turned and ran over to where Anika’s dress hung on the shrub. Anika laughed for real this time, and quickly followed Lily out of the water.

  —--------------

  Water watched the screens in front of her with glee.

  “Wow… that is… violent.” Earth gaped at the scene of Anika’s outburst.

  “I told you she would be great!” Water popped a snack in her mouth and held out the plate to Earth. “Want one?”

  Earth mindlessly took a fluffy white tidbit and put it in his mouth, chewing mechanically, not able to take his eyes off the screen. .

  “She still has to learn to control that power.” Air crossed his arms grumpily in front of him.

  “She can’t be worse at control than your Champion, Air.” Water smiled sweetly and popped another salty morsel into her mouth. It was a great day to be her.

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