Derek found himself lying on a lawnchair in his parents’ backyard, staring into the sky.

  Oh, sure, he’d been planning on reading something; in fact, the book in question was open across his stomach, but he hadn’t touched it in … well, who knew how long.

  Couldn’t have been more than an hour, because he’d started after dawn and the sun wasn’t that high in the sky … but it had still been a while.

  Isaac’s showing up had seemed normal, in the grand scheme of things. Isaac, getting called away in the middle of a family meal, had not, but it should have been expected.

  What was currently eating at Derek, however, was the news, specifically, the fact that he was finding out about the reason why his brother had run off like that from the newspaper before said brother had even returned.

  Sure, in theory, that could have happened with the twins, too, but they were mostly just powerful, without being wrapped up in politics the same way their elder brother was.

  Isaac running off like that had also recontextualized everything that had happened before. Compared to all the stuff out there in the world, all the shit his older brother oh so often had to deal with, who was Derek to claim some of his time? He …

  The house’s back door opened, the sound it made just barely audible, to the point where Derek would one hundred percent have missed it if he’d been doing anything save getting way too far inside his own head.

  He sat straight, spilling the book down into his lap as he did so, then froze when he saw Isaac walking down the garden path towards him.

  God. Fucking. Damnit. That reflexive “deer in the headlights” look needed to go.

  “I’m sorry abou- …” he began, only to stop himself when he realized that Isaac had started speaking at the same time.

  “I have to apo- …”

  Isaac had also stopped at the same time, though it had seemed as though he’d been saying the same thing.

  And then they stared at each other, neither particularly eager for a repeat performance.

  Then, after a long moment of silence, Isaac spoke once again.

  “So, this is weird, right?”

  “Yep,” Derek nodded.

  “How about we try to just ignore it?”

  “Sounds unhealthy,” Derek shrugged. “I’m game.”

  Isaac laughed softly. “Yep, you’re my brother, alright …”

  And Derek could practically hear the “and doesn’t that feel weird to say” that Isaac chose to avoid voicing out loud.

  “Anyway, the twins giving you any trouble?” his older brother asked after a long moment.

  “I think you know how they are,” Derek said. “They mean well, but …”

  His words failed him.

  “… I know how they are,” Isaac finished for him before he could figure out a way to phrase that properly.

  “Yep.”

  The conversation continued on in that vein for a while more. Mundane banalities, safe topics, normal shit that was, in the grand scheme of things, a waste of time to discuss on the face of it, yet still nice enough to talk about.

  Until they weren’t.

  “What would you do, if you could get out into the galaxy?” Isaac asked, and Derek felt his face flush, remembering his earlier gaffe. Perhaps showing he had a proper plan would help make blurting out “I like everything” sound less bad?

  “Figure out what sells best at the outer colonies, take those goods with me while I head out, then head into unexplored space with whatever useful stuff I can trade them for.

  “Then … go explore until I need to return. With enough of a margin for error, obviously.

  “And if I find something cool, it depends on what I find, guess. Build a cool house in a cool spot or something, I guess.”

  There were actually laws in place to avoid planets and even star systems from getting claimed wholesale by those who got to them first, otherwise, the first ones to jet out into space would have grabbed all the good real estate and been able to lock everyone else out of space, but the discoverers often did claim the best spot on a given planet to build a vacation home or something.

  Though, historically speaking, it was often just a log cabin or the like, built purely for the hell of it.

  “So you’d be exploring,” Isaac said. “Did you hear that, after my announcement at the UN, ships are being made available for people willing to scout for problems?”

  On one hand, it sounded like getting his hands on a ship had become far easier. On the other …

  “I don’t think I should be taking that kind of charity,” Derek admitted, after a long moment. “I … it feels like a millionaire going to a food bank, you know?”

  Sure, he was willing to take some deals that would have made this path easier, but grabbing what sounded like a free starship? That felt like a bridge too far.

  Isaac raised a single eyebrow, so high it looked borderline unnatural.

  “Huh. That’s an interesting point. But it’s not the UN that’s giving away ships, they haven’t gotten their crap together yet. I am. So, you want a starship?”

  That caught Derek sufficiently off guard that his response was … not the best.

  “Hell ye- …” he cut himself off with a cough that he was painfully aware of how obviously fake it sounded.

  “I …” he felt himself flush once again. If he hadn’t spoken, he’d have had the time to come up with a proper response, but he’d opened his stupid mouth, so that wasn’t an option anymore.

  “I don’t want to be that guy, you know? The one who always asks for money, for favors, for all the stuff I haven’t lifted a finger to earn, but act like I’m entitled to? I’ve met that guy. And I’ve met that girl. Several times. But also …”

  “If you were that guy, I wouldn’t have offered,” Isaac shrugged. “And you didn’t ask, not that asking would have been wrong, especially if you knew I was giving away a bunch of ships already. Also … isn’t it the job of older siblings to spoil a little, as long as the parents are there to raise them properly?”

  “Thank you,” Derek finally said, deciding to stop shoving his foot in his mouth.

  “I’ll talk to you once everything is set up properly,” Isaac replied.

  After that, once again, the conversation wandered until, eventually, Isaac wound up switching to another area of conversation.

  “So, you said you can fuse [Skills], right? Do you know if you can relearn [Skills] you’ve fused?”

  Dereks shook his head. “I was going to try and relearn the ones I put into [Stellar Mental Math], but I haven’t had the time yet.”

  In theory, that might have tripped him up later, but [Branching Capabilities] would have negated most of the issues that might crop up.

  Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

  “How about we try with some of my teachable [Skills]?” Isaac offered. “You use a rapier, right? Any plans on changing that?”

  “No,” Derek shook his head. “I’m going to become a mage, I figured it’d be a nice backup weapon.”

  “So the strike-type [Skills] for a [Rogue] would be better … accept that prompt, please.”

  Derek promptly did so, but it raised a question.

  “I thought the [Rogue] [Skills] would be better. Aren’t these the [Warrior] versions?”

  “I figured that, since I have access to all the standard weapon empowerment [Skills] from every standard starter, we’d try with something you could afford to lose.”

  Oh, that made sense. Derek fused the two, and then shared the description.

  “Okay, that’s pretty cool,” Isaac announced with a grin, while another window popped up before Derek’s eyes.

  “I can relearn them,” Derek said, mirroring his brother’s grin.

  “Great,” Isaac said. “Now, how about we figure out what happens when you fuse all of these?”

  “Holy …” Derek breathed, having to give himself a mental push to remember to close his mouth again. A quick check of the proffered “full list” revealed that Isaac had, in fact, pushed every single one of the standard, starter [Class], weapon empowerment [Skills] onto him, as well as [Epic Blow], which was one of his more famous teachable [Skills], which allowed one to stack the lesser empowerment abilities up to four times.

  Now, Isaac could, according to the history books, stack them up to five times, the teachable version of his [Legendary Blow] being weaker, obviously, but even so, even the form in which it could be passed on was bordering on the overpowered.

  Which left the question they were obviously both dying to answer: just what kind of absolute unit of a [Skill] would be created if nearly thirty [Skills] were combined into one? Plus [Rending Impact], of course …

  This kind of unit, apparently.

  Isaac started to laugh uproariously. “You are going to look like you had a legendary combat [Class] by the time we’re done.”

  Maybe. Hopefully. Though, since Derek’s was the first legendary starter known to exist, there wasn’t really a comparison that could be made.

  “Also, I think you could use the rest of my teachable [Skills],” Isaac added.

  Once again, Derek accepted.

  “Are you sure you should be giving me all these [Skills]? Doesn’t your teaching [Skill] have limits?” he asked.

  Isaac nodded. “Yep, it’s got limits. And it’s my [Skill]. I get to pick who I use it to help.”

  A way to store armor, though Derek was much more likely to just keep changes of clothing in there instead, though to steal one of Isaac’s better-known tricks, he’d also keep an outfit in there that was basically just made of pockets, and use those pockets as an extra source of storage space, one that would be far harder to take away than his storage ring.

  This thing, on the other hand … it was essential for coordination in combat situations. Which was why it was great that he had it, though he’d probably have to spend a week or two to learn to use it adequately.

  And the final [Skill] was made largely redundant by the abilities of his [Class], though at the same time, it was free, so why complain?

  All of them were very good [Skills], though, while the temptation was there, Derek decided against fusing them; he didn’t really see any good combinations. At least not yet.

  Because the range limit on [Knightly Discipline] was low. Granted, it’d doubtlessly grow as it leveled, but he strongly assumed that he might be able to turn it into something more suited to space combat if he bashed it together with something in that vein. A fleet coordination ability, maybe? But that was something to try later.

  “What do we do now?” Derek wondered.

  Isaac shrugged. “We do whatever the hell we want, and eventually head to our respective homes when we decide it’s time.

  “And then, you can join me on the Squidworks station in a week, so we can talk about the best way to explore space with people who know more about that than me?”

  “More than …” Derek began to ask, then his brain caught up with the other weirdness he’d heard. “Squidworks?”

  Yep, congratulations, Derek, that couldn’t have come out dumber.

  “I know how to explore space when capable of flying through the heart of a star unharmed, any tips I have are liable to get you killed,” Isaac pointed out. “And a lot of the advanced laboratories have weird names. Skunkworks, Eagleworks, that sort of thing. The station mostly researches naval tech, and a friend in the Marine Corps gave me the name.”

  How did that … oh, right, sailors were sometimes called “squids.” Still a stupid name.

  True to Isaac’s suggestion, they ended up out in the garden for several more hours, talking about normal, mundane, boring things.

  Until eventually, Derek wound up deciding to make his goodbyes and go try out his newest [Skills]. Well, one [Skill], because there was a single specific one that should make all the difference.

  After all, it was the weapon-buffing abilities that made melee combat against any enemy with an even remotely supernatural physique possible …