What a weirdo. He sounded pretty sincere, though. It was hard for Anise to keep giving Leonard a hard time if he was going to say something like that. Hopefully this meant he was going to get serious about keeping up with information about threats and other scary stuff.

The girl looked at the offered hand for a moment, then forced herself to bring out one of her better smiles for the guy. Hey, he earned it. It wasn't often that Anise was the one getting encouraged by someone else. "Right!" She took his hand and pulled herself up to her feet. Once she finished brushing the grass and dirt off of her clothes, she looked up at the man's face again.

"Don't get yourself killed, okay? I'll be really disappointed in you if you do." Despite talking about something so morbid, she was back to wearing a bright, childish smile. "I'll see you again later!" In a way, it was a promise that she'd stay alive, and that she fully expected him to do the same.