Baoba found himself in the white void once again.
This was strange. Not too strange, but still-
"Please wake up. I have a question."
Oh. That was why.
The mother had brought him here just to wake him up.
He felt like there was a comment about fancy alarm clocks to be said here, but he wasn't quite that rested yet.
'Nice of her to explain so fast. Didn't even have time to speculate in vain.'
"Why can't you ask it here ?" He answered, instead of waking up. "I'm supposed to rest."
"This does tire me a little. Not by much, but I would rather not spend my power on this. Please wake up. It has been long enough."
He mumbled an annoyed "alright" and woke up instantly. Doing so might have proved a bit more difficult for anyone else, but he was exceedingly experienced in sleep after all these years. This was his favourite hobby.
The first thing he noticed was that the little orb of light from which the mother communicated was right in front of his eyes.
The second thing he noticed was that he overslept.
'It actually has been long enough. Wow.'
"Baoba ! Finally, you wake. I was curious about the queen's gambit you told me about."
He tried to swat her away with the back of his hand, but it passed right through. She took the subtle hint, though, and moved out of the way on her own.
After a half-assed attempt at conquering his hair, he rubbed his eyes and replied with a question. "Well I'm curious about how the hell you can get tired. Aren't you like, a god ?"
She remembered her lesson about personal space and floated further away from him. "This term implies a sort of omnipotence. Spirits and deities are nothing special. We simply have the ability to grow by feeding on the fabric of the beyond, and use this energy to modify the within, or what you call the 'real world'. None of this is infinite, therefore, we spirits are limited as well."
This felt like important information. Their archnemesis and strongest ally were both spirits, so learning about their powers would surely prove important to the Hunt.
"So like ,you get bigger the more you eat ? And then use that to do things down here ? Do all the blessings drain you ?"
She kept answering like she had forgotten about her own question. "The more correct term would be 'mass' not 'size'. Neither are exact, but mass is the closest equivalent in the within. And yes, blessing all the elves does drain me quite a lot, but I have grown powerful enough over the eons to passively regenerate that mass. I only come into contact with souls that pass by, after all. It is rather easy."
Baoba nodded, even if he wasn't sure he understood. He would slowly try to familiarise himself with this concept, instead of trying to understand all of it at once.
This was not needed right now.
After precisely five seconds of silence, the mother floated just a bit closer, and the ethereal voice rang out once again. "My turn. What do you do if the opponent refuses to take the pawn ?"
He stared blankly for a little. "That stuff about mass and power sounds really important. Why have you wasted some just to wake me up ?"
"I had a question."
"Right..." Seemed he wouldn't get anymore details.
"Isn't it my turn now ? I answered all your questions."
Baoba looked at the clock. It was past twelve. The day had fully started now.
But this was a day off.
Talking chess with a deity wasn't normally a regular occurrence. He had some time for it.
"Well, first, you have to suport the position, and solidify the advantage..."
***
Some time later, after a quick bite that Baoba decided to call his dinner.
"Pando ! Anything new ?"
She threw a glance over her shoulder.
"If you are talking about new info about random citizens, then yes. Lots of news there. If you are referring to the mission you have assigned me, then no. I thought I made myself clear : it there is news on that front, I'll come to you."
Walking into her room, he raised his hands to show innocence. "And I don't question that, believe me. But come on, you must be bored as hell. It just so happens, I am too. Could you tell me about the random citizens, please ?"
He couldn't see her while face from where he stood, and she hadn't bothered to turn when he entered either. But regardless, he could tell she was relaxed just a bit more than before.
Talking with her was easier. Other people always had secrets, layers, they implied the most important parts and just expected to be understood.
Pando never had the time for that. She always spoke her mind, and was extremely straightforward. Granted, Baoba suspected she actually didn't know herself how to function in an other way, but that was a mere detail.
She was simple to figure out. Less fun, maybe, but simple and competent most of all.
"Well, let's see..." She opened her eyes and squinted. It seemed she hadn't seen light in a while. "There's this lady that's just having the worst week. She just got fired, and she's always in fights with her neighbours. Today, she burnt her breakfast two separate times. She ended up eating the charred remains. I stopped paying attention after that, she at least deserves some privacy.
"On the contrary, this one person is in a lucky streak. He has just picked up a purse, right after kissing the woman he's been seeing for the first time, and I know the owner of this purse is pretty wealthy. They dropped it only minutes before our lucky guy came by.
"There's the fair share of parties and overall assemblies, some of them more reckless than others. We even have small shady organizations.
Some of them meet up regularly, always with some kind of knocking code or key item. Seems pointless, the members are always the same and they never conceal their faces.
"There is a major dog fight happening right now. Two different packs are going at it, completely unprompted. They are fighting over territory. Another similarity to humans."
"Not one of mine, though, right ?" Baoba suddenly got worried. "The dogs I feed. They're not included, are they ?"
"You'd be surprised at the amount of different packs." Her eyes had accustomed to the light of day, and she turned them to him."Don't worry, they're safe."
"That's good then. Anything else ?"
"Let's see. This one couple I've been tracking is back together. I give them two weeks tops. The sandwich place you like is preparing an expansion. The band Venus follows has signed a new member, a second guitar, looks like.
"As for the important stuff, nothing to report on the human squad, they are slowly preparing. Given this speed, I expect we still have about two weeks before the day comes. And apart from the church raising an elite force, like we planned, there is nothing else to say. I could keep going on the benign things, but those are starting to get boring as well."
Baoba was starting to feel bad about springing this mission on her. She had to watch the whole city, and while she was no doubt used to it, there was no way it was a fun activity.
"Sorry."
"What for ?"
"Well, you've been doing that since we arrived, and I kinda feel bad for making you waste your time like this."
She paused, either to find her words or to follow some unknown person at a distance.
"Don't. It's our duty, after all. This isn't close to being the most unpleasant thing about our mission. I would even say it's sort of fun."
He blinked a couple times. Apparently there was a way.
"Feeling so much life and complexity... Following my favourite stories... Making sense of scenes without colors or sounds... It's all very interesting. If you hadn't assigned me to this, I might have ended up doing it anyway. So don't feel sorry. You didn't make a mistake."
He remained pensive after hearing her. The silence grew more and more, but neither were bothered by it. They both knew it was a choice.
Suddenly smiling, Baoba sat down on a chair backwards, facing her.
"So what's this I hear about an expansion ?"