[color=#b97703]“I don’t mind it at all,”[/color] Cas said honestly when Iris thanked him. [color=#b97703]“You’re not as much trouble as you seem to think you are, you know. Considering everything you’ve been through, you’re keeping it together really well.”[/color] He couldn’t even imagine what it would be like to suddenly wake up with no memories of who he was. If she’d had daily breakdowns instead of stepping up to lead him back to the capital, he wouldn’t have blamed her for it in the slightest. [color=#b97703]“If anything comes back to you that you feel like you need to talk about, I’ll be your listening ear too,”[/color] he added, not wanting her to feel like she needed to process all her memories alone.

As they approached a fork in the road, he looked down each path while she explained their options. To him personally, it didn’t make much of a difference whether they headed into the adjacent district or continued walking toward the capital. However, based on what she said, it sounded like detouring through Eulmore would give them the best chance at finding a shelter to use for the night. If continuing toward the central district meant they might end up walking the extra length for nothing, he preferred taking his chances down the other street and seeing what they could find. Worst case, they would have to make another camp, but he was hopeful that they would come across a place to stay. Bel Bicis had been a disaster, and they’d still found an empty apartment there, after all.

[color=#b97703]“I think it’s worth a shot,”[/color] he decided, turning back to her with a shrug. [color=#b97703]“If there’s even a chance we can find shelter, we might as well take it. It’s not like we’ve got a better option anyway.”[/color] Having made up his mind, he gave her hand a tug as he led her toward the road she’d indicated that would take them to Eulmore. Despite the firmness in his voice, he hoped the next district, which if he remembered correctly was the eighth, wouldn’t be a repeat of the eleventh. If he saw any more dead bodies that day, he wasn’t sure if [i]he[/i] could make it all the way to the capital without breaking down along the way. As one who’d grown up in the lap of luxury, he could only take so much death and destruction without losing his composure—or being plagued with nightmares, apparently.

Looking over the road they were walking alongside, he wished they could have gotten access to a car. Driving would have been much faster than walking all the way back, and they could sleep in the cab instead of go looking for a new place to lay their heads every night. It was too bad they didn’t have one, but there was nothing they could do about it now. Knowing how little the people outside the capital had in general, he didn’t feel right about stealing one when the owners of any cars out here probably needed the vehicles much more than he did.

[color=#b97703]“When you said it’ll take a long time, what did that mean?”[/color] he asked, glancing up at the darkening sky. The sun still hadn’t disappeared, but it looked like they didn’t have much daylight left before sunset hit. He was hoping to reach a shelter before dark if it was possible.