[Sabre's POV]

As the lightning faded, I saw a white house with an orange roof and a few lanterns lighting the doorway in front of us, and Orange slightly smiled.

"Well, here we are." Orange says. "Welcome to my home."

"It's really nice..." I say, admiring the different style of the building from the houses in the village.

Orange walks inside, closing the door on his way in. He then walks over to an a orange couch and carefully sets me down on it. Then, he sits down next to me as I lay on the giant cushions of the soft couch.

"Are you holding up alright?" Orange asks me.

"Yeah, I'm good." I answer. "Do you, uh, have any more apples?"

"You already had three!" Orange giggles.

"Like I said before, it wasn't exactly easy for me to get any food..." I say, slightly grinning. "Besides, I need it to get my energy back so I can recover."

"Alright, alright." Orange says, taking off the backpack and rummaging through it for a little bit. Soon, he takes five apples out and holds them up. "This enough?"

"Plenty." I say, reaching for them.

Orange hands them to me, and I happily start eating one of the apples. We sit in silence for a little bit.

"So... I'm guessing from the recordings we find of humans, you're not supposed to look like a tiny skeleton?" Orange says.

"No, that's part of the 'starvation' thing." I answer. "Basically, when I ran out of food and couldn't find any, my body started using muscle to keep giving itself energy. That, of course, made me weaker than I'm supposed to be. The only real upside to it doing that is I could go faster than normal, so it was easier to outrun the groups I couldn't fight... which was all of them."

"Wait, hang on." Orange says. "So when you couldn't get any food, your body basically started destroying itself  to keep you alive for just a little bit longer?"

"Yeah, basically." I say, putting the first apple's core down and picking up a second.

"...Well, I'm glad we found you, then." Orange says. "Don't want that happening anymore."

"Yeah, that kinda sucked." I say.

Orange and I keep talking for a while, as I answer his questions about me and my world. Suddenly, a robot pig walks into the room and cuddles up next to Orange.

"Oh, hi Gerald!" Orange says, petting the pig.

"You have a pet pig?" I ask.

"Multiple, actually. Gerald is just the smartest one." Orange says, then looks at the pig. "Say hi to Sabre, Gerald."

The pig looks at me, and I reach my hand out to pet it. It just looks at it for a minute, then turns away from me. O-kayyy?

"Well, there's no need to be rude." Orange says to the pig, which snorts in response. "Sorry Sabre, I guess he has to warm up to you a little bit."

"That's alright. There's always later to get to know him." I say, putting down the last apple core.

"If he feels like being nice." Orange says, looking at the robot pig.

I laugh, and Orange smiles too. I suddenly yawn, and realize how tired I am. Orange notices this and looks at me.

"You good?" He asks.

"Yeah, I'm okay. Just tired." I say.

Orange gets up, carrying Gerald. He looks out the window at the moonlit forest outside.

"Well, it is kinda late. 11:00 is pretty close to midnight, after all." Orange says.

"Oh wow, I've never stayed up that late before..." I say, sinking into the couch.

Orange looks back at me, and goes over to the backpack he left on the ground to look for something in it. He then pulls out a blanket, and lays it over me.

"The Leader told me that you'd need this while sleeping. Doesn't it get annoying, dealing with temperature and all that?" He asks.

"Yeah, it does. Especially during the summer months." I say, wrapping myself in the blanket. "Thank you, for all this."

"No problem, buddy." Orange smiles. "Seeya in the morning!"

Orange walks into a different room, Gerald following him, and turns off the lights in his way out. As I drift off under the comforting warmth of the blanket, I smile, glad that I have a new friend like Orange Steve. In fact, the whole village is really nice to me... I like it here.

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[Orange Steve's POV]

Okay... today wasn't so great.

I've already set up a little thing for Red in my backyard... I hope he'd like it. He loved the copper flowers.

However, I need to figure something out; Even with my house being in the middle of nowhere, we're still in danger of Darkness showing up and attacking, not to mention the dangers when it finds out there's a human here. In fact, there's a lot of crazy people out here that would hunt us down if they knew about Sabre... I need to do what I promised the Leader, and protect Sabre from whatever could be out there to get him. Especially while he's recovering.

I know I can make something using my powers, but no matter how sturdy something is the Darkness can break through using their overwhelming numbers. I need something better than a fortress... and I know just what that is.

I quickly, but quietly, go up to my room and grab the thing I need. Normally, I would be in trouble for using it for something like this, but... it's to protect Sabre, so it's fine, right? I'm sure it's okay if I add a few little extra things too.

I finish my little project in a few seconds, and I gotta say, it looks pretty freakin awesome. I even made all the stuff in there biological, just for him! He'll have no problem surviving in this world now, and Sabre could have a lot of fun exploring the forest around the place. Maybe we can eventually plant stuff for him too, so we won't have to keep going out on supply runs for food, and we've already got water covered thanks to the rivers I put in. I can't wait for Sabre to see!

But... it's 2 AM. And I have to wait at least until seven to wake him up... dang. I wish Sabre didn't have to have so many ways of restoring his energy so I could show him now. He'd be so excited! Oh well... I can find other things to do.

I quietly go back to my room and put the thing I used to help build my little project back where it should be. Gerald suddenly bumps my leg, and I sit down on the floor to pet him.

"What's up, buddy?" I ask him.

Gerald just climbs onto me and lays down, letting me scratch the little spot behind his ears. I start rambling to him again, he's a good listener.

"Isn't it a little weird that Sabre has to basically be unconscious in order to get energy back? Like, does anything even happen during that? Maybe I should ask him later..." I say. "I mean, he could miss out on a lot while he's sleeping! Like what I did just now, the 'new base' thing. You think he'll like it?"

Gerald oinks and bumps my hand with his face, his little way of agreeing. I smile, and start petting him again.

"Heh, thanks buddy." I say. "Hey, since Sabre's basically unconscious right now, you think I could pick him up and he'd stay asleep?"

Gerald looks at me, shakes his head, and I think for a minute.

"...I'm gonna do it." I say, getting up, and Gerald stays where he is.

I quietly approach where Sabre is, and see that he's still asleep. I just gotta be sneaky. I carefully pick him up, and he doesn't wake up, sooo... I was right!

...Now what?

I... did not think this through.

Wait, I can just- I'll just put him back down.

I carefully do so, and then retreat back to my room quietly, silently celebrating the little victory. When I get back to my room, Gerald is waiting there for me.

"I told you so." I say, smiling.

Gerald just snorts and looks the other way, towards the window.

"What? You mad you were wrong?" I continue, sitting down next to Gerald. He still doesn't look back at me.

I giggle, and know that Gerald is just pouting about how he lost. I take a book from my pocket and start reading it, not really having much else to do. I can't wait for morning to come!

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[Sabre's POV]

I'm woken up by feeling someone poke my shoulder, and I open my eyes to see Orange excitedly standing next to me.

"Psst! Sabre!" He whispers. "C'mon, I wanna show you something I made!"

"Huh...?" I mumble, still half-asleep. "Wh- okay?"

"Yes! C'mon, you'll love it!" Orange says, picking me up off the couch and heading towards the door.

"OH- okay, uh, it's outside?" I ask.

"Kind of, you'll see!" Orange says.

My eyes adjust to the sunlight, and Orange Steve walks over to an orange pedestal with a beacon's light coming from the middle of it. Standing on the pedestal, Orange starts preparing to teleport again.

"Brace yourself, buddy!" Orange says.

I cover my eyes to keep them from the bright light, and feel myself once again be transported to a different area.

"Alright, we're here!" Orange says excitedly.

I uncover my eyes, look around, and see a colorful area full of life and structures. We're under a gazebo, with a house in front of us, a statue opposite of the house, and seven different portals lining the walls around the statue. Everything is surrounded in a lush forest, with a set of mountains in a circle around the area. It's beautiful.

"Woah..." I gasp, taking in the sights around me.

"Welcome to the Rainbow Hub, buddy!" Orange exclaims. "Do you like it?"

"Like it? This is AWESOME! And you made this by yourself?!" I say, admiring the area we're in. "Can you- can you put me down now? I wanna explore!"

"Can you walk on that leg?" Orange asks. "It still looks pretty bad."

"I was able to run from a monster without it being bandaged, so I'm pretty sure it's fine." I say.

Orange carefully sets me down, and I immediately run out towards the set of portals. Orange follows me, laughing.

"Hey, slow down, Sabre!" Orange says, catching up to me as I look at the different portals.

"What are all these for? They look cool!" I ask.

"These are portals to different kingdoms of the Steves." Orange explains. "They'll activate when one of them needs help, so we can be right there to help them!"

"Oh, like how I'm supposed to in the prophecy?" I say, already excited for the adventures to come.

"Exactly!" Orange says, then he turns towards the house, me following. "But first, you need to recover. That's why I made this place; you'll be able to get better safely, out of reach of the Darkness."

"Safe...?" I say, slightly surprised by the concept.

"Uh, yeah, I don't want you getting any worse from fights while you're trying to regain your strength." Orange says. "Did... did you not have somewhere safe to go to in your world?"

"No, everywhere was dangerous there." I answer. "The most I could do was hide somewhere and hope the monsters wouldn't find me until I healed."

Orange looks concerned, then gives me a look of sympathy while opening the door to the house.

"Well, as long as I'm here, you'll never have to worry about that again. You're going to be completely safe in the Hub, no matter what." He says.

"Thank you, Orange." I say.

The inside of the house looks similar to Orange Steve's house, except it's a little smaller and I can easily see into the upstairs. There's a bed with a light greyish-green blanket next to an end table on the second floor, and the first floor has a couch, some bookshelves, flowers I recognize on a windowsill, and a door labeled 'Storage Room' at the back, and a door leading to another bedroom next to it. There's an orange rug in front of the couch.

"This is cool!" I say, looking around the house.

"Your room is upstairs, I put something better for you to sleep on than a couch there." Orange says. "Need help getting up?"

"Nah, I think I got it." I say, climbing up the huge staircase. Everything is so much bigger than normal here, I feel like a freakin toddler next to stuff.

I eventually get to the top of the stairs, and run over to the bed, jumping onto it. I realize while laying down that the color of the blanket matches a patch I have on my hoodie. When Orange Steve follows me up, I'm already wrapped up in the giant blanket. It's super comfy.

"Whoops, I might have made it too big for you..." Orange says, looking on as I untangle myself from the fluffy fabric.

"Nah, this is perfect." I say, and notice there's an entry to a balcony near the bed. I quickly run over and look out onto the new space my friend has made.

"Oh yeah, there's a balcony too." Orange says, walking up next to me as I sit on the fence. "Careful, there."

"I am, I do this a lot." I say, admiring the tall mountains and forest around the base.

We just sit like that for a while, talking more about each other. It's nice, having a change from fighting for my life. I already know I never want to go back to that terrifying world, full of monsters and people that only care about their own survival rather than their morals. Even though I've only been here for a day, I already like this place better than the heckscape I used to call home.

Our conversation is interrupted by a growling noise, and Orange looks a little confused while I freeze.

"Was... was that you?" Orange asks, giggling a little bit.

"Um... yeah." I say, feeling slightly embarrassed.

"Let me guess, you want food?" Orange says, shifting from the place he was leaning on the balcony fencing.

"Yes, please." I say, jumping down from the fence and walking with Orange back into the house.

"C'mon then, bud." Orange says. "I'm pretty sure there's still some apples in that backpack I brought in."

Orange and I joke around as we go back downstairs, and I'm even happier that I came to this world. I'm glad to have a friend like him.