The Scumbag's Guide To Heroism novel Chapter 446

Chapter 446: 446 | Institutional Irresponsibility [CASTLE BONUS]

"You introduced the concept. You own the consequences."

The boardwalk appeared through the windshield four minutes later, a stretch of weathered planks running along the coast with the Pacific glittering behind it.

At nine twenty on a Saturday morning the place held joggers, dog walkers, an old man with a fishing pole, and the kind of empty commercial charm that suggested the funnel cake stand would be open because funnel cake stands operated according to economic principles nobody had successfully explained.

The Uber driver deposited us at the southern entrance and departed with the quiet efficiency of someone who had already composed his two-star review and was waiting for a stoplight to submit it.

Salt air hit me the second I stepped out. The smell underneath carried the specific coastal California combination of sunscreen, aging infrastructure, distant kelp. Something in my chest loosened by three percent. Enough to notice. Not enough to acknowledge.

The Bond Resonance carried Sloane’s emotional frequency from campus. Warm. Settled. Faintly amused. She had tracked the shift in my mood from anxious to annoyed to reluctantly entertained, and her response was the particular quality of satisfaction that meant she approved of whatever had changed without needing details.

The group assembled on the boardwalk with the organizational discipline of six cats released into an unfamiliar room. Caden identified a funnel cake stand that was, against all reasonable probability, open and operational. The fryer was already producing the sound and smell of dough meeting oil at temperatures that would concern a health inspector.

"See?" Caden gestured at the stand like he had personally summoned it into existence through force of will. "Told you."

"I never doubted," Marco said, which was a lie.

"You specifically said it wouldn’t be open."

"I said it shouldn’t be open. Different concern."

Eden approached the stand with the posture of someone evaluating a tactical position. "The real question is whether we’re committed to the bit or just getting one to share."

"Sharing is what people do when they lack conviction," Caden said.

Finn, who had been quiet until now, spoke without looking away from the ocean. "I want two."

"That’s the energy we need," Caden said approvingly.

I pulled out my phone and checked the group fund we had theoretically established for situations exactly like this one. The fund contained zero dollars because nobody had contributed to it. "We’re paying individually, apparently."

"Capitalism," Caden said sadly. "Ruins everything."

"You introduced the concept. You own the consequences."

"Funnel cake," Eden said with the reverence of a man addressing a religious experience. "So manly."

"It’s fried dough."

"Manly fried dough."

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