Dan sighed as he watched the tender heading to the open waters, his mind heavy with both worry over the group heading out to hunt those eels, and Voyager's ongoing situation.

  Dan focused a bit on the connection between them, just to see that she too had most of her attention on the tender on the ocean, ready to help whenever things went south. He couldn't help a smile as he noticed that, no matter how mad she was at him, she was still an angel at heart.

  At first, Dan had thought that she wouldn't stay mad for long, that she was going to calm down soon and he would be able to explain to her why he was doing what he was doing, why it had to be done. Who knew that even after the day ended and he found himself with the others preparing for the group heading to the open waters the next day, she didn't get back to him at all.

  In the end, he could do nothing but let her be for the moment and focus on the matter at hand first. It did help him a bit that Mrs. Raily had told him to give Voyager some space, so that it might help her think things through. She even joked and said that a growing young girl needs a bit of space for herself.

  Taking all that into account, Dan just decided to take a step back and let her calm down first, he just hoped it wouldn't take too long.

  Calming himself, he focused again on the tender. They had spent most of the day before and that morning preparing for the mission, doing their best to come up with a way to deal with those eels safely, at least enough for a small group of people to tier up. They didn't hope to solve their problem entirely, just a way for a small team to grind.

  In the end, they focused on one of the key personnel for the mission, Martin, Ricky's brother, the mathematician who had been keeping his Class a secret from the beginning. They didn't know much about his Class -other than it being a support Class more than anything- but they had an idea about one of his skills. They didn't really know what it was, but could somehow conclude from when they had seen it active that it could affect chance or possibilities to a certain degree.

  That could be seen from how people with him always seemed to be luckier to a certain extent, finishing their hunts faster or finding it easier to find prey. At certain times, even monsters with long-range abilities seemed to miss them often, barely even hitting the tender itself.

  Having that first cornerstone to focus on, Marcus didn't waste any time and went straight to Martin, aiming to ask him if he wanted to join and if he truly had a skill that would help with that.

  One thing Dan liked about Martin, even though they hadn't interacted much, was how straightforward he was. He knew that the man wouldn't keep them waiting and would give them the answer they needed without much flair.

  As expected, the man agreed readily and said he would help, that he could most likely hold on for quite a while too.

  Another support was Brittany, her illusions would be of great help in confusing those eels even further.

  With the supports dealt with, they moved their focus to the next matter, who they were going to level up. The people they needed most to be tier 3.

  The first person on that list was of course Rose. If she could make the Tanks -the name she gave the defensive tenders- even stronger, to the point that the eels' attack does not affect them, then this whole mess would come to an end then and there.

  They also had William, Francis, and Luke join. They needed some levels, and for their existing skills to tier up, so they can work on some upcoming projects more easily, bringing their ideas to life.

  Seeing the tender close on the Obsidian Eels before turning around and aligning itself towards Voyager in preparation for what was to come, Dan felt his worries rise even higher, doing his best to stop himself from turning his walkie-talkie on and calling the group. He didn't want to distract them at such an important moment.

  Soon after, the sound of shots rang out as they made contact, followed by the tender exploding in movement towards Voyager and her protective aura. Dan then watched as a few of the eels separated from the group and chased after the tender, almost just as fast as the boat.

  Soon, the tender made it within the range of Voyager's protective aura and Dan watched as the eels stopped on their path followed by dark darts flying at the tender. He didn't see clearly what had happened, so after things calmed down on their side, he contacted them.

  "Dan here," he said, "How did it go? Did it work? Over."

  "It worked," George's voice came through, "All their attacks missed us by quite a bit, a mix of Martin's and Brittany's skills seems to have done the trick. We will continue the hunt as we discussed. Over."

  "Good luck, and be safe. Over." Only then did Dan let out a sigh of relief, feeling his heart relax.

  Things after that went smoothly, the gang outside kept grinding those eels slowly, while Dan watched from afar.

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Again, his mind wasn't focused on them entirely. His worry about Voyager only grew with nothing else holding his attention anymore.

  It seemed he wasn't the only one struggling with that though. Quite a few times, he felt Voyager approach the link between them, as if wanting to start the conversation, yet stopping herself at the last second in hesitation.

  The third time that happened, Dan knew that he had to act as the adult he was and take the lead, he couldn't let the poor girl suffer like this. So after saying goodbye to Marcus who was with him watching what was happening on the outside, he headed to his room.

  Voyager must have felt his emotions and understood what he aimed to do as he could feel her focus her attention on him. Once he was in his room, he sat down as he called to her:

  "Voyager, are you there? We need to talk."

  ***

  She hated how she acted as soon as she saw how down Dan got because of her. She almost apologized right then and there, she didn't want to hurt him. But she also knew that if she let him use the dark aura, he would be in even more pain! She didn't know what to do, so she just ran away, ignoring all his calls.

  It was the first time she was consciously keeping away from Dan, not having full access to his emotions and feelings, his gentleness and care towards everyone, she almost couldn't take it, but it was his fault! He was going to hurt himself, she wouldn't let it be, no matter what!

  It felt so lonely to be on her own, it was as if she had returned to the beginning when she woke up and everyone was frozen. All the loneliness, sadness, and panic were returning to her. Except that this time, she knew exactly what had happened, she did that to herself, and she was even hurting Dan with her.

  Talking to Mrs. Raily was nice, she was nice. Voyager had seen her many times before talking to people and comforting them whenever they needed it, she was so kind.

  She felt a bit sad that the nice old lady couldn't hear her and they couldn't really talk, that kinda made her sad again.

  She even got annoyed at her once as she felt that she was pushing for her to accept Dan taking the aura. But that had been just her being a bit mean again, the good lady just said that it would be better for her and Dan to talk together, leaving without pressuring her any further.

  After seeing her and how gentle she was, Voyager felt a weird sadness once more as she plunged into loneliness, it was stabbing and made her feel as if she was the worst. She did this, hurting both Dan and herself, instead of just talking to him like the nice Mrs Raily said.

  She knew she had to do something, but she also didn't want Dan to hurt himself, there was no right way to go about it, and there was no right choice.

  Even though she understood that, she couldn't bring herself to talk to him as if nothing had happened. How would she even start? Should she apologize? Would he be mad at her? Would he have her bring the aura to use? She didn't know what was going to happen and it scared her.

  She couldn't do it, no matter how she tried to push herself to, she just couldn't. In the end, a whole day passed and she hadn't said a single word to Dan throughout it, she could only watch as he appeared more and more stressed, not just about her, but also about the people going to hunt those foggy eels, the source of all this trouble.

  She worried about those people too, she focused her all on them, preparing to save them if anything happened. She would bring them back safely!

  Fortunately, nothing like that happened, everything went well! But without that worry to keep her thoughts occupied, she found herself unable to keep on pushing the matter anymore.

  Many times she tried to say something, call out to Dan, but at the final second, she would hold herself back. What if he was still mad at her?

  Suddenly, Dan started walking, making her pause for a second. Even though she was keeping her distance from him, she was still part of him and he was part of her as they always were, so she had access to his emotions still, she understood what was coming.

  Once he got to his room, he closed the door, sat down on his bed, and called to her:

  "Voyager, are you there? We need to talk."

  It was just that, but with it, she also felt his gentleness and warmth, she missed them so much!

  Before she could control it, her aura moved almost out of her control as it came out from everywhere and surrounded him in a tight cocoon.

  "Whoa!" Dan exclaimed at first before a happy carefree laugh sounded. "I missed you too, big girl."

  They remained like that for a while, just enveloping him in her aura as she felt a bit embarrassed at how she had reacted and how she had made him feel.

  I'm sorry, she finally said, feeling not just a bit of shame.

  "No." Dan shook his head. "I'm sorry, I pushed you so hard without considering your thoughts. You're still so young, I shouldn't have expected you to just accept what I told you to do, it must have hurt you so much to see me like that, I was in the wrong."

  Voyager didn't say anything, she just surrounded him with even more of her aura, not wanting to let him go at all. If not for worrying about hurting him, she would have used her aura appendages to hold him!

  Sorry... She sent again.

  Patreon is at chapter 182 if you want to read ahead~