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Blarney had celebrated his one-year anniversary of awakening just a few days ago, and that meant only one thing:

The Demon Chickens were bound to show up, any freaking minute now. He had a tiny scar right at his hairline from where the one last year had clawed the daylights out of him - it had been magically healed, so Blarney had thought that it wouldn't leave a mark, but he had apparently been incorrect about that.

The closer it got to summer, the warmer it got, the more he could've sworn he felt the tiny scar pulsing, like a warning, like a countdown. So he started going out more again as the days began to get longer and longer, patrolling in general, but specifically on the lookout for--

SQWAAAAAUK

For that. Blarney grimaced to himself and ran in the direction of the terrible noise, shillelagh in hand. Whoever it was that the bird had found - and he was sure that the bird had found someone, that was a hunting sqwuak if he had ever heard one - would probably need help.

Especially because - oh no - Blarney realized the faint plink at the edge of his consciousness meant that there was a Page on the other end of that sqwuak.

Blarney ran faster.

Okay, that was a good sign - the Page was terrified and was running away. That meant the Page was alive! And had the common sense God gave a prey animal to get out fast.

"Keep going!" Blarney shouted as he met the Page halfway and zoomed past them. He threw up his magical wall between himself and the Page, putting him and the demonic chicken on one side and the Page on the other - hopefully far on the other side, still running, if they had any sense.

Blarney didn't lose his momentum, though, in the casting of the wall; in fact, he sped up and ran straight for the demon chicken, taking aim with his staff - a slightly more substantial weapon than he'd had the last time he came face to face with this ugly thing before he pulled back, swung, and--

CRACK

Blarney, panting, grinned as the chicken went flying like feathery grand slam, an angry, confused SQWUAAAK ringing out before it hit the nearest tree with a satisfying thump. He was so focused on the demon chicken that he didn't even notice the bright little drop of light that hovered approvingly near his shillelagh.

Blarney knew better than to - pun intended - count his chickens before they were dead. He'd hurt the thing, sure, but that didn't mean it was down and out. He stalked closer, hands still gripping his staff like a bat, ready to - if necessary - beat the cluck out of this creature.

It had got him last year, and it would never get him, or any other poor defenseless Page, ever again, if he had anything to say about it.

...Or if it did, it at least wouldn't get both of them. Blarney had no idea where the Page had gone, but his wall had crumbled away into nothingness somewhere many feet behind him. If this chicken got up and went after the Page...

Well, no it wouldn't. No matter what.

Blarney was too late to stop his swing, and the momentum carried him forward, through the space where, until just a second ago, a flailing screaming sqwuaking chicken had been, and fully into the tree behind it.

"Ow," Blarney said, rubbing his forehead. At least it had gone better than the year before...no bloodshed, no needing to phone a friend and get immediate magical healing. "Guess it's a good thing I've got a hard head," Blarney muttered, then turned and spotted the Page, lurking and looking terrified in the bushes.

"Thanks for the assist," he said, moving over to them and offering his hand to help them up--away from the smell, which Blarney was only partially avoiding by breathing through his mouth.

"I think technically you're the one who gets to notch that on your tally," he added with a chuckle, then looked them over more carefully. "Are you okay? Do you need first aid? Or healing-healing?" Blarney himself could not provide that, but he knew people who could. But the Page looked okay--the dress was messy and the bow was askew, but otherwise it didn't look like the chicken had gotten a chance to really lay into them.

Phew.

"I'm Blarney, Squire of Earth," he added, extending one gloved hand to them. "You're...from Lysithea, right?" Once again, he was grateful to know Halle - not only because he recognized their shared symbol, but because he'd encouraged Blarney to really nail down his memorization of all the symbols and who they belonged to.

Blarney chuckled. "Yeah, I'm okay, thanks, Weser. Don't worry about it," he said, waving a hand easily to dismiss her worry. "Takes more than that to knock this outta place," he said, playfully knocking his knuckles against his own temple.

"Friend of mine's a full Lysithea Knight," he added, smile still in place. "He's a good guy--Halle is his name. Maybe you know him? If not, I'd be happy to do a little intro. Plus," he added, "I marathoned flashcards matching the symbol to the court," he admitted with a chuckle, "so I'd never have to be like uhhhhhhhhhhh about it," he said with a shake of his head. "It was boring, but totally worth it. Sometimes it makes me look like I know stuff," he added with an impish grin.

"Which, speaking of," he added, glancing back over his shoulder to where the chicken had sqwuaked its last, "I think you did do something. That chicken didn't disappear 'cause I whacked its noggin," he said, spinning his shillelagh absently. "Whatever you did back there worked well enough to make it go away, so I'd call that a win if I were you." Blarney gave her an easy smile, then rested the shillelagh on his shoulder.

"How long have you been doing this whole thing?" Blarney asked, not unkindly. "I haven't been a Squire so long that I've forgotten how much being a Page kinda stinks sometimes."

Blarney nodded in understanding. "That's good. School's important. Y'know how people talk about work/life balance? Sometimes I think there should be lessons on Knight/life balance," he said with a laugh.

"C'mon. If you don't mind, we can patrol together," he said, leaving out for the moment that it was safer for the two of them, with their combined auras, to stay on the move. He tucked his hands in his pockets, feeling the familiar shape of the yellow Starcharm he'd picked up earlier nestle between his fingers. "If you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer them if I can."

He kept himself from saying more than that - for now - but what he really wanted was to see if she'd be interested in and willing to join their maybe-brigade. And the way to do that...

"What's one way you think this," he said, gesturing between the two of them as they walked, "would be better or easier for you? Aside from like...not having to do it, 'cause that's a little bit above my paygrade."

Blarney tried and failed to smother the laugh at the self-censoring; his sister would've been proud of Weser's commitment to keeping everything PG. As she continued to speak, the smile remained on his face as his heart gave an excited double-thump in his chest: this was it.

This was the perfect time for his Pitch TM.

He just needed not to screw it up. He took one breath, squared his shoulders, and thought to himself: I'm the leader of this Brigade, and I can do this. He really tried to believe it.

"Funny you mention something like that," Blarney said. "So, I just learned about this myself, which should tell you that there's definitely a marketing issue around this thing," he began, "but, now that I know about it...I want to put it into action. There's this thing called a Brigade, which is basically a bunch of Knights - and Squires, and Pages - intentionally working together, in a team, basically. They can patrol together, fight together, learn from each other. When there's enough of them around, they even get some like..." Blarney gestured vaguely, "some fancy super-special magic that may or may not be a sort of combo deal of all the different kinds of Knights there, which sounds awesome," he said, unable to hide the big grin across his face.

"And and, coolest part, I think, is that when you get a Brigade, you also get a sorta--like, a headquarters? Like your Wonder, but a shared space! So no baddies can get to it, but it's a place that multiple Knights can gather and talk and hang out without having to worry about getting Got, and from what I gather it's like--that's also sorta customized to each person. I'm personally imagining a giant treehouse, but that's just me." Blarney chuckled faintly and shook his head at himself.

"Anywayyy, my friend, a Knight of Lysithea, he found himself in a Brigade kinda--not quite accidentally, but they didn't know they were a Brigade until they did that special magic thing and figured out about their headquarters. We were talking, my friend and I, about how...well, frankly, how dumb it is that a lot of this magic stuff is found out just by accident or by chance, so we're trying to--to make a Brigade on purpose. We want to especially help Pages get the ground beneath them and stay safe, help Chaos folks who might want to purify, and just--like, in general, do some research and get some of this stuff less...theoretical, less guesswork, more definite, so we can share that with other Knights, even if they don't necessarily want to join up with us. It feels like--like that's an important tool that hardly anybody knows about." Blarney shook his head. "Which is extra dumb, because like you said, networking and just - organization would help so much, and having a headquarters where you could meet without fear would go so far, and--well, anyway, I'm rambling. I guess--I guess all this to say..."

Blarney took a breath. "Would you like to join our Brigade?"

Blarney absolutely beamed - rivaled the sun with the brightness he gave off in that moment. Was it a low bar to clear, with a Page who hadn't even found their ring yet? Maybe so, but who cared! He'd gotten a non-family member on board! Yes!!!

Barely resisting the urge to fist pump in celebration, Blarney shook his head. "No no, no initiation or tattoos or anything. Unless we all decide to get tattoos," he added thoughtfully, tapping a finger against his chin, before he shook his head, "but that's wayyy way down the line, if ever, so don't worry about that. And don't worry about finding your ring - it'll come to you when it's supposed to," he said with an easy smile. "I--we--could even help you look, if you want. In the meantime..."

Blarney reached into his subspace and removed one of the many burner phones he had bought and programmed with each other's numbers.

"I got a whole bunch of these," he explained. "They're burner phones, so nobody has to give up their civilian identity unless they want to, and you can reach people while you're not powered up, if you have to. All the other numbers are already programmed in there, and I have mine and the others have theirs, so you should be good to go. It's not a special communicator, but it's something, right?" Blarney chuckled and shook his head.

"So far, there's---well, there's not a whole ton of us," he admitted with a sheepish smile, "but there's enough! Me, my sister Edam, who's a Cybele Page--and who also hasn't found her ring yet, by the way, so don't feel bad about that--and that Lysithea Knight I mentioned, Halle. He knows, like, everything about this stuff. Or, well, I guess not everything, 'cause we're all kinda figuring it out together, but he knows a lot, and he wants to figure out more. He's the one who had the idea for us to make this thing on purpose," he explained with a smile. "He's really smart, if there's any questions you have that I can't answer, he probably can."

Blarney felt something close to giddy - he'd done it! He'd gotten one other person on board with this insane Brigade idea. He'd done it once, and that meant it was possible to do it more times. He felt a little dizzy with the possibility of it all, but he really tried to keep himself grounded and focused on Weser.

"You've been to your Wonder, right? That's the best thing you can do as a Page - spend a ton of time at your Wonder, connecting with it, cleaning it up, exploring it. I guess I got lucky and found my ring at my Wonder like, right away," he said with a one-shouldered shrug. "But you never know what you'll find at your Wonder. I found this," he said, brushing aside his hair to reveal the simple black earring perched in his ear, "and my sister has the other half. It lets us communicate telepathically, no matter how far away we are form each other, which is freaking awesome and only sometimes very annoying," he said with a laugh. "My point is, while I and the others I'm sure would patrol with you any time you want, what you need to focus on is getting stronger, and that means connecting with your wonder. And probably taking some regular old civilian self-defense classes--that's what me and my sister did, and I think it helped."

Blarney paused and gave another sheepish smile. "Sorry, I don't mean to like, be giving you--like, orders, or homework, or whatever. Did you have any other questions about this whole Brigade thing? Or the whole Knight thing? I had about a bazillion questions and now I only have like half that amount, so maybe I can put some of my answers to good use."