Rei: I'm so sorry

"I dunno, maybe. You could probably use it for self defense if you needed to."

She was poking her hand with it, not realizing that was stupid since if it was actually a weapon she'd probably cut her hand off

"Don't do that. You're gonna hurt yourself," Mal said, shaking his head at her. Meanwhile he was trying to figure out the bow and arrow, which wasn't going well since the only things he knew about bows and arrows he'd seen on TV. "And we don't want monsters chasing after you while you're gushing blood.

"Nuh-uh, it's not sharp." She actually seemed disappointed, having thought it was a weapon and that they'd have a chance to survive. It was clear she doubted they'd figure out the bow and arrows. Sighing, she continued to play with the flint and the steel it had come ith, banging and rubbing them together when it sparked, Rei yelping and dropping them

"Whoa." Mal watched as the flint sparked and put down the bow and arrow. "Do that again!" he encouraged. "Maybe that's what it's supposed to do!"

Rei clearly didn't want to, but she picked it up anyways and started at it again. The sparks fell again, landing on the wooden chest

Mal grinned as he watched the sparks fly. "I think I figured it out!"

She didn't smile, not liking the sparks, but continuing what she was doing. After a while the chest caught on fire

"It's a fire starter!" Mal exclaimed happily. "This is good."

"C-can I put it down now?"

Mal nodded. "Sure." It wasn't like they needed fire right that second, since the place they were in was pretty warm, but the knowledge of having a fire starter was very helpful.

She dropped it the moment he nodded, actually scared of the sparks and the flint in general

Mal grinned and shook his head, picking up the flint and putting it with the rest of the stuff from the chest. "It's just fire, Rei," he teased.

"But fire is dangerouuussssssss"

"Then don't touch the flames, silly," Mal replied, sticking his tongue out at her.

"I'm still scared of it..." She pouted

"No need to be. It's perfectly safe. We've got water and everything," Mal said, gesturing to the pool of water.

"I.. guess that makes it.... kind of safe."

"Safer than if we didn't have it at all." Mal shrugged. "At least we know what that does now."

".... I'd like it better if it was a weapon..."

"It can be a weapon if you wanted. You could probably throw it at someone's head, but I think we should probably keep it for fire."

"But can't we just not go somewhere where we'd need it? We don't need fire here..."

"We've gotta get back to the school somehow, and we don't know how long that'll take. We might need fire once we leave here."

"I-I doubt it'll take very long to get back" How little she knew

"Better to be safe than sorry." Mal shook his head. "I don't want either of us freezing to death because we couldn't start a fire."