Day 2 - Recovering

[Corporal Light]

Three hour later

Knock

Knock

Knock

Knock

Ballad's left hand, clasped around his revolver, continued smacking the handle of his gun against the limb of the tree he was conveniently laying his stomach on. His head rested against the cool bark; his arms hanging out like a pair of vines. His winter clothes bristled as a soft breeze floated through the tree, causing ripples of leaves to fall down onto him as they knocked against each other, creating an orchestra of sound that filled the air with its music. Some of the green leaves settled down onto Ballad's back, scarcely camouflaging him thanks to his rather uncaring laying position. Thankfully, he wasn't as easy to spot thanks to the sun slowly coming down, providing a violet-orange contrast to the leafy green surrounding him.

This guy is taking an ass load amount of time. I mean, seriously... Ballad thought to himself, letting out a long sigh that was covered up by nature's melody. He had been spending the last three hours passing the time as much as he could like a security guard operating as a human scarecrow who is forced to slap himself in the face several times an hour just to remain awake, because he also apparently works the night shift. One of these ways was looking around the tree. He had figured that, if the kid was even coming, that it would take a long while, so might as well make the best of it right? He DID manage to find a rather interesting object within a hole in the tree. It had been covered with a bunch of sticks and leaves, which Ballad removed. After taking it out of its hiding place, he climbed back up to his perch, taking a good long look at it.

It was metallic, yet not rusty. It had a white see-through screen, and dozens of buttons along a small, rectangular plat thing, most of which also had letters of some kind on it. Ballad easily recognized most of the letters, though some of the buttons were odd. For example, there was a single, lean rectangle with nothing on it. There were also plenty of buttons that had words like shift and caps lock. He had decided to ignore the no-word button and just focus on toying with the thing.

Long story short, it was a device that could access... something. He was able to talk to other, living people by just tapping a few buttons. He met some.... interesting folk, but what was more interesting was what they had to say.

The vast majority of them didn't really say anything worth mentioning, but one of them did. His or her words had been bouncing around in his brain for an unusually long time, no matter what he did to rid himself of them. It wasn't persistent; it was more like a stalker following its victim rather than a nagging maid. But it was there... and he had been acknowledging it for quite some time.

"Dammit... is this kid even coming? I hope he is... I want to fucking strangle the bastard." he growled to himself, only to go silent, his glowing eyes mollifying as the words spit out of his mouth, "Though.... would it even matter?"

"I mean... surely it would, but... I'm getting this feeling that all I'm doing won't make a difference to him. If the kid has any brains, he'll ignore all of my messages. Besides, it's simply easier to actively search for him, instead of sitting here WAITING to fight him. None of all this effort will do anything if the kid doesn't even come."

"Then again.... maybe killing him isn't the best idea. I mean, all he did was beat me... oh what am I saying. That's a PERFECTLY valid reason to kill him. But... maybe they have a point. Going through all this, just to kill one stupid kid?"

Ballad closed his eyes, parting his coat before sliding his revolver into his holster. "Alright.... I won't stay here. Er... I'll sleep here, but as soon as morning comes, I'm leaving this place. Just not worth it."

"But I will mark my words here. If I ever meet him again... he will die."