“Jack, we need you to open the box so we can confirm it’s a taipan.”

  Zack Adder was currently holding an incredibly venomous snake in a box within a box, in a room with head receptionist Rosa, Adventurer and Tamer Gerald, and Zinnie, a witch currently maintaining a barrier spell between Zack and everyone else in the room.

  He frowned. “Is that safe?”

  “Gerald,” Rosa said, delegating to the resident Tamer.

  “First of all, before you open the box, try to feel through your bond how the snake is feeling.”

  Zack closed his eyes, listening to that faint whisper in his mind.

  Food coma.

  He opened his eyes and blinked. That was… surprisingly specific.

  “She feels asleep and full,” he said.

  Gerald blinked. “She?”

  “Huh?”

  “You said, ‘she,’ Jack.”

  “Huh…”

  Zack thought about it. It just felt right, based on the feelings coming from the snake in the box.

  Gerald grinned. “That’s a good sign. You might have an affinity for snakes, Jack. That would also explain why you [Tamed] her so fast, and got the [Skill] right away. Anyway, she feels calm and relaxed, yeah?”

  “I guess so.”

  “Okay, now try to convey to your snake that you’re going to open the box, and other people are going to look at her, okay? From what we know, taipans don’t like that, so, uh, try to get her on board with it.”

  Zack raised an eyebrow. “Seriously?”

  Rosa nodded. “We have to confirm whether or not it’s really a taipan, for a couple different reasons.”

  “Such as?” Zack pressed.

  “Well, normally they’re forbidden within the city, for obvious reasons,” Rosa said. “But there’s a blanket exception for familiars, also for obvious reasons.”

  Not that Zack knew those obvious reasons.

  “If it’s not a taipan, we’ll need to identify it. If it is a taipan, we’ll need to register you with the Guild—it is a B-rank familiar, after all—and get you set up with safe handling equipment. And we’ll need to work out a deal for milking her.”

  Zack nodded tentatively.

  Gerald took up the conversation again. “Okay, go ahead and try to tell her, through your familiar bond.”

  “Okay,” Zack said, and he looked down at the box.

  The wooden box was visible inside the transparent, plastic-like box Gerald had given him, and he could sense the snake inside, dozing.

  “I’m going to open the box,” he said, softly.

  Alert. Bad. Scary.

  The snake within shifted.

  “No, it’s okay, it’s me and three other people.”

  Quiet man. Loud boy.

  A faint hiss emanated from within the boxes, and Rosa frowned at Zack.

  “Jack, you need to calm the snake down.”

  “I know, I’m trying, just hang on.”

  “Give him a minute, Rosa. He only just got the [Tame] skill an hour or two ago,” Gerald said, backing him up.

  “Nobody’s gonna be loud. Nobody’s gonna touch you. I’m just gonna open the box a little bit. You don’t have to move.”

  Quiet. No moving. Scary.

  Zack looked up. “I think she’s worried about loud noises.”

  The witch shifted her weight from one foot to the other. “Shall I make the barrier sound-proof?”

  Rosa nodded. “Jack, we’re going to do that. If there’s an emergency, raise your hand with all fingers out. One finger up means wait, two fingers up means you’re ready for sound again. We’ll raise two fingers to ask if you’re ready for sound. Three fingers means we want a closer look at the snake, if you can manage it.”

  With that, Zinnie tapped the barrier again, and there was no sound.

  “It’s gonna be quiet, alright?” Zack said to the box.

  Quiet. No moving.

  “Can I open the box?”

  There was no clear answer, just a sense of trepidation.

  Zack held up one finger, and Rosa nodded.

  “I’ll wait until you’re ready.”

  One minute.

  Two minutes.

  Rosa raised two fingers, and Zack raised one finger again.

  Look.

  There was a sense of curiosity coming from the snake, through their bond.

  “Okay, I’m opening the box.”

  Zack slowly lifted the transparent box’s lid, and then unlatched the wooden box’s lid. He waited a moment, but the snake felt okay, so he slowly opened that lid as well.

  Inside the snake was coiled up, and the bulge from the swallowed mouse had moved down to the midpoint of her body.

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Her tan head raised out of the box and looked around, tongue flickering in and out. She turned and looked at Zack, and he felt his heart skip a beat.

  If she bit him, it would likely be fatal.

  [Calm Down].

  He forced his heartbeat back into a normal rhythm.

  Saa.

  He felt confused, and the snake seemed to pick up on it. She flickered her tongue out again.

  Saa. Quiet man. Saa.

  Gerald moved closer to the barrier, and the snake failed to react, still looking around. He held up three fingers, the signal to get a closer look.

  “I’m gonna move the box, okay? No biting.”

  Bite. Food? Full.

  “No, no food, no biting. Stay still.”

  A mild sense of dissatisfaction. Zack carefully, smoothly lifted the the box and brought the snake closer to Gerald.

  But his worry was for naught. The snake remained calm, looking around the room, tongue flickering. Gerald peered in for a dozen or so heartbeats, then stepped back, saying something to Rosa that Zack couldn’t hear.

  Eventually, Rosa held up two fingers again, and Zack responded by raising one.

  “Snake, I’m gonna close the box again.”

  No. Saa.

  Zack froze as the snake turned to look him in the eye, and then, slowly, placed her head on his hand holding the box.

  Saa. Saa. She bumped his hand with her head. Saa.

  “Is that… a name?”

  She merely gazed at him expectantly.

  “...Sienna,” he said, and there was a shift in his [Tame] skill.

  Good. Sleep now.

  The feelings from the snake came through more clearly, and she withdrew into the wooden box. Zack gently closed the lid and latched it, then closed the transparent box as well. Finally, he raised two fingers, and Zinnie tapped her staff on the invisible barrier again.

  Gerald heaved a sigh of relief. “That scared the crap out of me, Jack. That’s definitely a female taipan, about a year old it looks like. It’ll be fully grown in another year.”

  “Gerald says it’s not safe to try to collect venom from a juvenile until your bond deepens, Jack,” Rosa said. “But we can still plan to collect it later, provided you continue deepening your bond. We’ll get you registered, and we can do some negotiations today with an eye towards the future.”

  Zinnie waved her staff, and Gerald walked over and double checked that the box was securely latched shut. The invisible barrier was gone.

  “Now, we’ll wait to collect the venom until later. We’ll need to prepare for antivenom production, anyways. The normal method will need adjusting for venom this potent… Regardless, at that time, we can pay you twenty-five fortins per collection.”

  Zack did the math in his head.

  That was…

  A lot.

  Five evening tickets to the Rose Theater’s Lives and Love Lost was one fortin, or a hundred lindra.

  Two drinks and food at the concession stand were ten lindra, and that was wildly overpriced compared to food out in town, from what Zack understood.

  The math was based on conjecture, but if a fortin was about $200 back on Earth, in America, that meant they were offering him about $5000 per collection.

  Not bad.

  Zack nodded. “That’s fine. However…”

  Rosa perked up.

  Zack turned to Gerald. “I need an advance on the first collection’s payment. I don’t know how to take care of a snake, and I certainly don’t have any of the stuff I’ll need…”

  Rosa and Gerald both nodded.

  “That’s fine,” Rosa said. “The Guild can cover your equipment expenses and count it as an advance.”

  More accurately, the Guild would buy and own all the equipment, and if something happened to Zack in the meantime, they would repossess all the stuff. Zack was on his own for food supply, but he could handle that easily enough.

  There was some registration paperwork, filled out with false information, and then Jack Werdruf was registered as an unranked Adventurer with a B-rank familiar. Gerald showed Zack how the milking process would work, using a small dish to collect the venom, and then took him to a specialty pet store down the road. The transparent material was called clearsteel, and was indeed a kind of metal using an ore unique to this otherworld (at least, Zack assumed so), and the Guild purchased a clearsteel case not unlike a terrarium, as well as a heating lamp. A red crystal was embedded in a round, curved dish and pointed down in one corner of the terrarium, and the shop owner filled the terrarium with a variety of stones, sticks, dirt, and leaves, creating a small cavern for the snake to retreat into as well as a rock to warm itself on.

  “For juvenile snakes, feed them a small mouse once every five to seven days. Eh, you’ve bonded with it? Then whenever it feels hungry. Keep the water bowl topped off and clean it out every other day at the latest, but really every day if you can. Then once every month or two clean out all the dirt, scrub off the rocks, and put fresh dirt in. Clean out the droppings as you see them.” The shop owner gave Zack a look. “You wouldn’t want to live surrounded by your own droppings, and neither will your pet, er, familiar.”

  “Right.” Zack nodded.

  The shop owner smiled. “Good. Take good care of your familiar, and they’ll take good care of you in return. Once your [Tame] skill hits level four or so, you’ll be able to sense where you familiar is even when they’re hiding. Until then, keep a close eye on your snake while you’re cleaning out the case, so they don’t wander off and get lost. Snakes like to explore and they’ll find cozy little spots that are a devil to find if you’re not careful.”

  This was starting to sound like a lot of work and responsibility.

  Exactly why Zack hadn’t had a pet back on Earth.

  But…

  Nobody had come looking for him in the weeks since he’d escaped the castle.

  He’d settled into the theater troupe.

  He even had friends now.

  He could have a pet. A familiar. It was kinda cool, actually, although a bit worrying how deadly the taipan was.

  A faint, sleepy smugness emanated from within the box.

  There was one problem, however.

  Would Vlad be okay with Zack having a familiar, especially one so deadly?

  If he wasn’t, Zack would have to move out, which raised a number of issues.

  There was zero chance he could keep Sienna at the theater. It was far too dangerous.

  So he’d need to rent a place.

  Which meant he’d need a proper income.

  Collecting Sienna’s venom would cover some of that, but that was possibly months down the road.

  He might have to get a day job...

  Gerald helped him carry the supplies back to Vlad’s apartment, and even helped him set up the terrarium.

  “You just flip this switch to activate and deactivate the heatstone,” he said, demonstrating. The heat lamp turned on and off. “The stone should last a few months, even leaving it on all the time. If you need another, swing by the Guild and we’ll write you a voucher.”

  “Got it, thanks, Gerald.”

  “No problem, Jack. Now, I’m gettin’ back to work. You keep that case closed a good couple minutes after I leave, alright?”

  For all Gerald’s experience with taming, he wasn’t taking chances with the taipan.

  After waiting, Zack placed the entire wooden box in the terrarium, which was quite large, and slowly opened the lid. Inside, Sienna was still curled up, snoozing, eyes open even while sleeping.

  He closed the terrarium’s lid, turned on the heat lamp, and tried to convey that he was leaving, but wasn’t sure if he’d gotten through to the sleepy snake.

  Hours later than expected, he returned to the theater shortly before the matinee showing. With nothing pressing, he went to practice [Memorizing], but the Director found him backstage.

  “Jack, you’re late! Yeah, yeah, I already heard from Millie. Doesn’t matter. Come to my office.”

  The short, bald, and remarkably imposing man turned and strode towards his office, certain that his newest foundling was following behind.

  Once they were inside, he sat behind his desk.

  “Shut the door.”

  Once Zack had done so, the Director leaned forward with the most serious expression Zack had ever seen him make.

  “Jack, I need to know where you stand. Are you part of this troupe or not?”

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