Parker's tablet chirped before sunrise as it downloaded a new document. It woke Parker up and they couldn't get back to sleep after that, even if they tried. Instead, they read the new download. It was their itinerary.
Despite the sense of urgency, it would be a full week before they set out for the first actual island of the challenge. Apparently, more Gamblers than EA anticipated passed the evaluations and so the boats from the nexus to the first island needed to be staggered to not crowd either location.
The week did pass quickly enough but it felt like the calm before a brewing storm. Parker took the evaluator's last advice by signing up for a counseling session, which turned into three spread out over the week, and started going to the gym to do some basic exercises.
While Parker did fine in normal counseling, these sessions focused more on accepting the changing circumstances, modifying their breathing techniques to correct bad habits, and identifying new stressors that had come up. Parker tried to take it all in step, but the new counselor was not the reassuring kind. They wanted to make sure that Parker was mentally ready for the next week and that was a little uncomfortable.
The gym, on the other hand, was terrible. Parker felt leagues behind the other Gamblers as just a light job and some resistance training was enough to floor them. Meanwhile, other Gamblers were swinging steel beams and lifting concrete boulders as a warm up. It was hard to not compare.
In the afternoons, Parker looked for their friends. First, they went back to the herbarium to look for Gere but never ran into him again. Instead, Parker wandered the raised garden beds and did their best to remember what he had said about each plant. They looked for issues of weeding, crowing, and rot that Gere had talked about. There was little to find and little to fix but by the end of the week, Parker felt better.
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In the evenings, Parker would go to the cafeteria and sit there to eat instead of retreating to their room. The salads got better with time, or Parker lowered their standards. The crowds were still overbearing but now that the evaluations were done, the conversations were much quieter. Those who passed and those who failed both knew where they stood. Parker kept an eye out for Devon's group but never saw the gunslinger or any of the other strangers in his group.
At the end of the week, Parker felt as ready as he could. The counseling had been validating, if a little uncomfortable at first. The exercise had been awful but eye opening and now Parker felt like they at least had a better idea of their physical limits. They truly weren't the worst, they just weren't impressive in any way.
As for the herbarium visits, Parker felt that just with a glance they could tell more about plants than they could before. Instead of just an admiration for nature, when Parker looked at a plant they could see the natural flow. It was like they imitated Gere. They saw the parts of the whole, the supply and demand of floral life, or even a general sense of health from the plant. It felt like their mother had described in years long gone: like connecting with something.
A slightly biased view was that Parker felt like a better version of the same person. It wasn't monumental, but it was hopeful. They had their gear ready and an adventure stretched out before them. The arm guard felt heavy on their wrist. The shortsword was alien on their hip. The breeze as they made their way down to the dock at the back of the nexus facilities felt fantastic.
Parker was one of ten getting on the boat. They weren't friendly or familiar with any of the others, but everyone on that dock had the same thought. It was finally time. To each of them, the Odyssey Vault meant something different but in that moment each of them believed that they would be the one to open it. It was a child-like fantasy shared by the reckless Gamblers who were called to this place. For the first time, Parker truly felt it.
