Waiting to die is actually very boring.

There are spikes of adrenaline, when one thinks the moment has finally come. Those stinging, unstoppable panics happened a lot, in the camps, when one of the Saurians took notice, and began to walk towards him, but always at the last second they grabbed someone else, and vanished them. Nosedive had been extremely lucky, and was never selected.

Wildwing had not been as lucky, and had been taken once, in the middle of a cold night, and for three weeks Nosedive had been on his own, until, improbably, the group Wildwing had been spirited away with had been brought back. Neither brother talked about it, and it was a tacit agreement between them, from then on, that they would rather die refusing to be separated than to have to endure that uncertainty again. They could not tell when they eat or slept or walked, but maybe they got to choose when to die.

In between those moments of terror, there was the melancholy and depression of waiting. It was not as bad now, on Earth, and most days Nosedive could pretend the troughs of the emotional waves did not exist. Most days.

Now he could not go anywhere, and he could not do anything, and why bother to start or continue something he would likely never see to completion? He did not like finding himself back in the old patterns of anxiety. It made his skin itch, as if by sitting still there was no where for all the nervous energy to go, so instead it vibrated inside his fingers and made his teeth hurt.

Grin arrived, in the silent manner that he did, in the midst of the crisis that neither of them could affect or help. Nosedive could not tell if it was because Wildwing had told him to supervise, or if it were of Grin’s own volition. In either case it seemed someone had decided that he needed to be kept out of trouble, which, while perhaps true, he could not help but resent the assumption just a little bit.

Grin had set him down in the recreation room, spreading a hand-drawn game board over the central table, and dropping colored glass pebbles across it into starting positions. He suspected that Grin had created this thing himself, though he was not familiar with it, and could not say for certain whether or not it was a faithful recreation of a Puckworld game, or a total fabrication.

Grin tried to teach him, and when he started complaining, offered a game of chess instead, which was infinitely more unbearable because chess was a game he was supposed to play in silence. Hem was a social game and conversation was permitted, or so Grin said. It could very well have been a tactical game played on the high peaks by the warrior monks of his monastery, as he claimed, or it could have been something he had made up that afternoon to distract them both.

“I feel like there’s a million other things we could be doing,” Nosedive said, assessing the board of colored tokens and realizing he did not understand half of the positioning.

“When I found you, you were removing labels from shampoo bottles,” Grin said mildly. “And you did not wish to explain why.”

“You didn’t have to come find me at all,” Nosedive protested.

“I am not sure I agree.”

“So, what’s this game for?” Nosedive sighed, pushing one of the colored pieces to a position that looked more defensive to him.

“I thought you might enjoy it.”

“No, I mean, what’s it supposed to teach me?”

Grin seemed to genuinely find this amusing. “It’s not that sort of game. The monastery was a place of mental discipline, but there was time after the day’s duties to rest.”

“I’ve never seen this before, though.”

“I believe Hem was brought to us by a gentleman who wished to eschew most of his previous life. Ashamed of his avarice and greed, he gave up all his worldly possessions to tend to the vineyards,” Grin looked at the board thoughtfully. “The order had very strict rules about games of chance and currency, but it turned out a great number of them had no qualms about a friendly game of strategy if the end reward was an extra glass of wine.”

No one would ever believe it, but Nosedive would swear that here, Grin winked.

Nosedive carefully said, “I approve of a good rule bending.”

“Strictness does not inherently lead to order. Quite the opposite. Allowing a little fun keeps all in good spirits when the morning chores arrive.”

“Oh, I’m sure you were a rowdy lot,” Nosedive smirked.

Grin made a slight twitch of the eyebrow that was his acknowledgment, and moved a piece. “It is best played with a group. The strategy is not so much winning as cooperating towards a common goal. Perhaps I could teach all of you.”

Nosedive sat for a long time in silence, watching as Grin moved pieces around the board, unsure of exactly what he was watching, but choosing not to intervene. “I’m serious, though. You don’t have to keep me company. Today’s not any worse now than it’s been before, I’m not a child.”

Grin seemed to give this a great deal of thought. “I cannot decide if the perception of your age is fair. There is a tendency among us to be protective of you in particular.”

“You’re barely older than I am,” Nosedive scoffed. “You just have the unfair advantage of improbable height, so people have to take you seriously.”

“Perhaps, but you do rather enjoy the image of a mild menace,” Grin advised. “Perhaps if you wish to be perceived as an adult, the decision is not ours, but rather, yours.”

Nosedive looked at him, irritable, but had no response. His skin was still crawling because he was bored, and they were under a lock down to keep a contaminant in, and all he could think of was how much he would like to go outside. It was not mature, and it was not smart, but he could not help it. He so deeply desired to no longer be stuck here, in this place.

Grin nodded towards the game board. “Also, I win.”

“You said it wasn’t about winning!” Nosedive shouted.

“Yes, but I did.”

“You’re making this up as you go, I can tell!”

“You haven’t been paying attention, you don’t know if I am or not.”

“I see your plan now, your plan is to make me so angry I spend the afternoon proving that you’re cheating at a game that doesn’t exist.”

Grin looked at the game board, contemplating this accusation, before responding. “I recall being very poor at Hem. Especially when Elder Greenspire was managing chores in the morning. Somehow, when he played against me, he always slept in.”

Nosedive stared in bewilderment, but could not help but abandon his sour mood and laugh.