Wesley

"So," One-Eye said, exhaling a lungful of smoke, "tell me your troubles, Wesley Dayton."

"Do I really have to?"

"Unless you'd prefer to be thrown off this watch tower headfirst? Yeah, you kind of do."

Over on their left, at the edge of the property beyond the main house, stark orange light illuminated a section of the woods. The firelight flared repeatedly in time with the rhythmic clanging of metal on metal. The robot's forge. He worked there day and night creating all sorts of bizarre inventions. He was supposed to be producing firearms for the Blackwatch, but most of his time went to obsessing over those creepy toys of his. Wesley wasn't sure why One-Eye put up with it. He wasn't that lenient on anyone else.

"Okay," Wesley said after some hesitation. "You'll laugh at me, though."

"I do that anyway."

Wesley cracked a smile—a small one, but still. "True enough, sir. Well…" He looked away, pretending to study something in the featureless middle distance. "Uh, well… the truth is…" He sighed and shut his eyes for a second, consigning himself to the shame. "I miss Serene."

He braced for laughter, but got nothing. Looking up, he found One-Eye picking over his nails with a sharp knife. Barely paying attention.

Wesley bristled with indignation. But the silence stretched on, and eventually got awkward, and he found the need to fill it with words increasingly irresistible. "I'm bad at everything, and everyone hates me here—even my own damn gun. But Serene was nice to me."

"Sam is nice to you," One-Eye pointed out.

"Okay, fine, yeah. But she's always in the city, and besides, it's… it's not the same."

"Why's that?"

"Serene makes me feel good."

"You're in love with her, you mean."

"I dunno if I'd go that far…" But pretty much, yeah.

"Did she ever tell you she's not interested?"

"Only about a dozen times." Wesley leaned forward over the railing, shoulder hunched protectively about his hot ears. "Look, I know it's stupid, okay? That's why I didn't want to tell you. Go ahead, make fun of me. I know I deserve it."

One-Eye chuckled. "You might not expect this from me, but for once, I'm prepared to do you a favor and sprinkle a little sunshine over your life."

"Am I allowed to decline?"

"Listen here, Wesley," One-Eye said, and dipped his elbows onto the railing next to him. "Yes, everybody in the Blackwatch hates you. It's true. Do you know why?"

"Because I'm a fuck-up? Because they think I'm your favorite even though I haven't earned it?"

"Sure, that. You're also kind of a whiny turd in general, but that's beside the point, because there's one more thing you're missing—the most important one. Which is…?"

"I dunno," Wesley muttered, lowering his head even further until his chin nearly touched the railing. "Am I really ugly or something?"

"You're special, Wesley."

"I… am?"

"Sure you are. I mean, not special like Sam, or Sunny, or Gug, or ADAM, or even Serene. But, you know, a little bit special. Maybe ten percent special."

"Great. Thanks."

"That's better than all these other idiots snoring away down there! Now, I can make them useful—and by god, I will—but I can't give them that X-factor. That's something only the vicissitudes of life's circumstance can do for you."

Wesley blew out his cheeks, not sure if he was supposed to feel inspired yet. "I don't know what vicissitude means."

"It doesn't matter. Point is, that gun of yours makes you special. No one can take that away from you—and believe me, there's plenty of recruits who'd happily pry it from your cold, dead hands if I'd allow it. Only I don't, because as I said, you are my investment and I intend to squeeze some value out of you yet, so naturally they take their jealousy out on you however they can."

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"That's great and everything, only this special gun of mine doesn't even work, so it's kinda hard to take any comfort in it."

"Sure it does!"

"I can't even shoot it—the sheriff won't let me."

"You can't shoot it on command. Yet."

"I've only actually been able to fire it a few times."

"So you'll keep practicing. And the struggles you're going through now will only make it feel all the sweeter when everything finally comes together for you."

"I guess I'll take your word on that."

One-Eye finished his cigarette in silence and immediately started on another. Exhaling a thin stream of smoke out the corner of his mouth, he said: "You know, it's a good thing I found you here, actually. I just had an idea."

"Oh, no," Wesley groaned. He put his face in his hands; still damp from his breath.

One-Eye chuckled. "It's nothing bad, Wesley. Promise."

"Respectfully sir, I'll believe that never."

"You'll want to hear me out on this one." Standing away from the railing, he pinched the cigarette between his lips and tucked his hands under his armpits to warm them up. "You see, I've got an errand in the city I need someone to run for me. At the same time, I think Serene's due a bit of a break from her assignment—she's been going at it pretty hard.

"Now, I was just going to send Francine, but how about I let you tag along? I could set up a little hangout between you and Serene while you're out there. Having a pint or two with your crush can never be a bad thing, right? And by pint I mean whatever watered-down piss they're serving over there these days, and of course Serene will be sticking to cranberry juice, but hey, it's about the company, right?"

That got Wesley's attention pretty fast. Shooting up, he asked: "Really? You'd do that for me?"

"Why not? You've caught me in a rare generous mood."

He studied the side of the killer's face for any sign of deception, but couldn't make heads or tails of his stony expression. "You're not pulling my leg?"

One-Eye took a long drag off his cigarette. "Nope." He tapped some ash over the side of the tower.

Wesley frowned with suspicion. "Why? What's the catch?"

"Nothing. I expect you to work as hard as you play, that's all."

"I can do that."

"Oh, and just… don't make things weird. She's really not into you, okay? Just enjoy her company."

"Yes, sir." Like I didn't know that already, you lanky bastard. "So, what's this errand, then?"

"I need you to check up on Gug. He's been going on about an… investigation? Clues? Some kind of monster? I don't know, but he's not making any sense, and I think he might be going a little off his nut, cooped up in the library with only the old man and an imaginary twin for company. Fletcher tells me he hasn't seen or heard anything regarding whatever monster Gug is waffling about, so just… see what the troll is tinkering with, put this nonsense about a monster to rest, and come back. Shouldn't take more than a few hours."

"What happens if there is a monster?"

"Then Francine'll kill it. You can act as moral support."

"All right. Fair enough, then." Wesley had a strong suspicion that this 'errand' was going to turn into something needlessly sinister and probably life-threatening, but he'd spent enough nights jerking himself to sleep with just the thought of Serene that his desire to see her was a lot stronger than his self-preservation instinct at the moment. The latter was on a bit of a soft strike in the first place considering he'd been just about ready to paint the watchtower with his gray matter less than an hour ago.

One-Eye put out his cigarette and sent the butt flipping into the night, then gave Wesley a hard clap on the shoulder. "Good man. Speak with Francine in the morning and let her handle the details."

He didn't feel too bad about going on an assignment with the instructor. Francine wasn't exactly friendly with him, but at least she didn't seem to outright despise him the way most people did—probably because she wasn't too interested in kissing One-Eye's ass in general. She chewed him out when he messed up, which happened a lot, but she never beat him, so that already put her among his most favorite people at the Farm. The bar, to be fair, was somewhere in the planet's upper crust, so maybe that endorsement didn't say a lot.

With a mumbled "Thank you, sir," Wesley turned to head back to ground level. He had a lot to think about.

"Hold on. Where do you think you're going?"

Wesley turned, confused. "I thought you said you wanted to be alone, sir."

One-Eye wagged his finger in the air. "I just had to listen to you whine about your stupid problems, which means you're at least obligated to hear me whine about my actually important ones."

Wesley lingered near the ladder, fighting the strong urge to make a run for it. "Aren't you worried I'll blab to someone about it?"

The killer cocked an eyebrow. "Are you going to blab about it?"

"No. Wasn't planning to."

"Good. Then get your sorry ass over here."

One-Eye's problems were rather boring, as it turned out. Something something worried about Sam. Something something having trouble figuring out how to break the trade blockade keeping merchants from getting food to the city. Something something seizures getting worse lately. Something something memory gaps. Something something taking meds to mask the symptoms. And so on.

Wesley managed to keep himself from yawning the whole conversation through until One-Eye had talked himself out, which he was pretty proud of. Then he left, and snuck back into the bunkhouse without waking anyone, and slept well for the first time in ages.

In his dreams, the sheriff blabbered at him like always, but Wesley wasn't listening.

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