Accidents Made Right 3: Philophobia

Chapter 3: Love Comes Together

Once I pushed the flaps of the tent out of the way and stepped out, I saw Steve inspecting Samantha's left robotic arm while Matthew looked down at the town below.

I walked up to Samantha and Steve, and asked "W-What's going on?"

Steve looked up at me, then back down at the arm, then explained "Matthew's observing patrols down there, so in the meantime I'm figuring out how Samantha's robotic enhancements work."

"S-so you can later remove her l-limiters so she can have full c-control over her powers again," I added.

After a moment, Steve nodded, so I walked up to Matthew to see if I could talk to him.

"H-Hey," I greeted.

"Hey," Matthew greeted back.

...

"S-so... h-how exactly are you f-figuring out their p-patrol patterns," I asked.

"Oh, you know, just focusing on the entire language that is the human mind a hundred times over so I can read the mind of somebody thinking about the schedule. Nothing much," Matthew joked sarcastically.

Something about him seemed off, so I put my hand on his shoulder and asked "Hey, is something wrong?"

...

"Maybe."

...

"Is it about Samantha," I whispered.

"Yes," Matthew replied quietly.

"You... y-you wanna talk about it?"

...

"It's just...," Matthew started to explain. "I'm totally fine if she doesn't like me back. I just... don't wanna lose a friend."

"Why would she not be your friend," I asked with concern.

"Believe it or not, I have shockingly low self-confidence," Matthew said with a chuckle. "I'm just afraid that she doesn't like me because I'm... me."

"W-wow. We really do have the same p-problems," I commented.

""Yeah. At least that means we can have an easier time helping each other out."

"H-huh?"

"Because we know more about what we're going through than anybody else, and can help each other easier because we can tell when the other's down."

"Y-yeah, I guess that m-makes sense."

...

After looking on at the beautiful mountains crossing each other in front of the camp for a few minutes, I heard some leaves rustling in between the trees next to the camp.

So, I quickly turned right to face them, and saw Josh stepping out of the trees.

"Oh, the gang's all here. I kind of expected just Steve and Rowan to be here," Josh quipped.

"How did you find us? We didn't tell you where we went," Steve asked accusingly.

"Dylan told me. Said he wanted his son and his best friend to be safe."

Steve scoffed, then went back to studying Samantha's enhancements. Seeing this, Josh walked up to me and Matthew, a happy smile spread across Josh's cheeks.

"So, why did you come to help Matthew," Josh asked as he leaned forward. As he did so, magical electricity came from Josh and formed a railing out of the electricity so he could lean on it.

"B-before you answer that M-Matthew... how are you u-using magical electricity right n-now? M-my father said Grim R-reapers can only use m-magic when it's around them."