As we were walking, I found myself continually shooting sidelong looks at Mom.

After a couple of blocks of this, she finally gave me a look and asked, “What?”

I made sure the girls were far enough ahead not to overhear. “You almost killed a guy.”

She paused, then nodded. “Do we need to talk about it?”

I missed a step, then had to scramble to get back beside her. “Do we need to talk about it? My Mom, almost killed a guy. YES we need to talk about it.” I struggled to keep my voice down; shouting in a whisper added up to an embarrassing squeak.

She nodded again. When she said, “Do you need to talk it out first, or do you want to hear my side first?” it wasn't really a surprise. It was how we usually did it when one of us had big feelings about something.

Still, I had to think about it. When I was ready, I said, “I think my side is just that. I'm shocked and I don't know what to do with what I saw. So. You first?”

“He came down the river. I don't know if you noticed but he was soaking wet before he wet himself. Panicking, angry. He said the monsters in the City were so bad that you couldn't keep them dead; they'd just pop right back up again. Being outside is certain death, just from how endless they are. So he jumped on a rain barrel and took his chances in the river.

“That was all fine. I would've given him a drink and sent him on his way. But he didn't want a drink. He decided he wanted all of our supplies. And since he was bigger than me and had a pipe, he decided he could just take our supplies.

“He never bothered to ask what my Ability was. Turns out his Powerful Blow wasn't worth much while he was under the effect of my Blindness. And he never spent one day in a fencing class.

“You saw the end of our fight, but you didn't see the beginning. You didn't see him smash a kitchen chair with this pipe with a swing he thought was meant for my head.

“So yeah. I almost killed a guy, because he almost killed me.”

“Are you... okay with that?”

“Yes and no,” she said, “I'm not... Hmm... I'm not okay with it. I'm shaken and doing my best not to show it. But I'm not sorry I did it, either. It was a fight. He picked it. I won it. It's really that simple.

“Everything I taught you about non-violence and not raising your hand to other people... that was based on the idea of a civilized society. We don't necessarily have that now. Now... you have to be able to look out for yourself. Not just capable of it but willing to, too.

“I don't want to see you being a bully. I'm proud of you for sticking up for other people. And I'm not saying you should go ahead and turn into a Mad Max style warlord or something, either. But I am saying now is less a time of 'do no harm' and more a time of 'take no shit,' if you know what I mean.”

I listened.

I thought about it.

It needed thinking about.

We were past the gas station and well onto the highway – three ground-mimics and seven leaf-hounds between the four of us later – before I knew what I wanted to say.

“I'm not okay with it.”

“Which part?”

“All of it. It's not okay that you did that, and I don't want to be the kind of person who would, either. There has to be a way to get through this without killing people, right?”

“I hope you can keep on believing that.”

I opened my mouth to snap back, but closed it. She couldn't see that under the helmet. What came out was a half-hearted, “Me too.”

~*~ ~*~ ~*~

Our return to A to Z was a complicated thing.

The boys saw us coming, and ran for the Director. Renee came, too.

Mostly they were glad to see us back safe.

Chloe and Nicole got an earful for bullying the boys and for running off alone. I didn't step in for that part; they knew I agreed.

Then the adults tried to praise me for looking after them.

I reminded them, “Those two have more firepower between the two of them than I have. And they tracked me all the way to my house without me ever catching on that they were there.

“They shouldn't have snuck off on their own, but once they did they took care of themselves and each other just fine.”

They'd had their scolding, now they deserved a headpat, and I was happy to give them one.

Then, of course, it was time to introduce the new person.

“Everybody, this is my mom, Crystal DeVries.

“Mom, this is Director Debbie Lundy, her son Todd, and this is Renee... Y'know, you never told me your last name.”

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

“Gilmore,” she supplied.

“Renee Gilmore.”

Director Lundy started in, “We've been organizing things while you were away.

“My office is being used as kind of a 'war room,' so to speak. We can head there now, if you're up for a meeting.”

Mom and I exchanged shrugs, then I nodded and we were off. The walk wasn't far; the Director's office was on the ground floor, through a little reception area just off the main lobby where we had come in. We were enjoying her comfy chairs almost immediately. I held the door for Chloe and Nicole and nobody questioned their right to be there this time. Archie had to stay in the lobby, though.

Once we were settled in, she went on, passing a clipboard around so Mom and I could share a look at the roster. When we realized how awkward it was, there was a shuffling of chairs until Mom was in the middle with Renee and me over one shoulder and the twins over the other.

“We've got the kids back to their rooms and everybody set up with sleeping bags.

“There's enough trash bags and people with Cleanse on hand that our latrine situation is best described as 'under control for now.'

“Sleeping arrangements, the grownups are staying with the kids, except for myself and a handful of others who don't oversee classes directly. We've got ours set up in the music room, which Renee can show you to.

“You can choose if you want to stay with the girls or with us. Miss Crystal, of course, you're welcome to stay with us or with your daughter.”

“I won't break up my team,” I said.

My mom nodded towards me. “I won't break up my family,” she said.

The Director nodded and Renee poked her head out the door. I could just overhear her sending one of the other kids to move the last three sleeping bags in the auditorium up to Room 10.

“Todd and Renee showed us your way of making shields. We've had the older kids working on it under supervision. There's a part of me that about had a heart attack at handing a bunch of twelve-year-olds sharp tools, but... times are what they are, and there aren't enough of us to do everything for them. I'm not sure how many we're up to now; the kids have been trading off between each other to keep making them.

“The biggest problem we have right now is water, then food.

“The water in the building is already failing. I did the math, and we need something on the order of a gallon a day per person just for drinking. Maybe more if we're going to be fighting those... things. Add up everything else and wastage and you're looking at close to 500 gallons per day.

“And food. We're stocked to provide one meal and one snack per child per day. At that rate, we would have provisions for about a month. Extend that to everyone, including the adults, and we'll be lucky to last a week.”

“Rationing?” Mom said.

Director Lundy sighed. “Those numbers are with everybody over the age of twelve on half rations.”

I bit back a snort, but not enough. They all looked at me. I thought for a minute, then shook my head. “Idle thought,” I said, “Just ignore me.”

They went on. The clipboard had lists of all the kids and who had taken what abilities, which kids thought they might be up for fighting and which ones definitely wanted not to, and so on. Bunches of ways to analyze the same lists of names, all written out by hand.

Nobody actually had any idea what to do about the water situation yet. There was a stack of scrap paper and some pencils outside the director's door serving as kind of an idea box but so far that hadn't caught anything actionable either. It was definitely everybody's top priority 'thing to work on.'

The girls had had the biggest day of all of us, and it was no surprise that they fell asleep first, Chloe sagging against my mom's arm and Nicole sagging against her. Mom, being, y'know, a mom, didn't so much as budge as the twins settled in, even when Nicole started snoring.

I tried my best but after all day out in the sun I was flagging, too, by the time we were done being brought up to speed.

“I keep the clipboard in here but you're welcome to come back and look it over again in the morning,” the Director said.

I nodded gratefully. Mom and I gently nudged the girls awake, and Renee showed us up to Room 10 where our sleeping bags were laid out. Ridley had apparently left all of our stuff outside that same door before Nicole stopped giving him orders. He was still just standing there, until she remembered to un-summon him.

Mom helped me get my armor off, as quietly as we could, but we still ended up having to shush some inquisitive kids by promising story-time in the morning.

And then we bumped into each other carrying our sleeping bags towards the door, where I had left my shield on the way in.

“Guard spot?” I said.

She nodded.

We each held up one hand, fingers in a light fist.

Three rounds of Rock-Paper-Scissors-Lizard-Spock later, Mom was the one lying there with my shield over her, the first line of defense inside the door.

She rolled over to face me, and said, “What were you thinking about, before?”

“In the war room?”

“Yeah. That sounded less like an 'idle thought' and more like 'big feelings for later.'”

“It just struck me how... everybody over twelve is expected to go on half rations and suffer like they're adults, but... most of us aren't going to be listened to like we are.

“Pretty soon there's going to be things like guard patrols and work assignments, and... what do you bet they're going to run the caregivers ragged before anybody under thirty other than maybe me 'n' Todd get asked to lead one?

“And you can't say it's one of those 'kids have less experience' things, cuz, like, how many apocalypses have any of you lived through? It's just... not a thing that exists. Nobody knows what to do about the water thing, and...”

She took a deep breath, then reached over and patted my head. I … wasn't too stubborn to admit I needed a headpat, too, sometimes. Even if it did derail my train of thought, in this case I didn't mind.

She said, “It's true. Young people get the short end of the stick all the time, and now? With this going on? It shouldn't be that way.

“But getting people to see it isn't going to be easy. It's... how can I say it... It's literally our purpose in life, not just as 'old people' but, as living things, it's our reason for being to make sure our young grow up.

“Getting people to recognize the truth of this new world – that we need to let you all put yourselves in danger so that you can become strong enough to be safe – is... going to take time. I'll push for it. You know I will. You know that I know how amazing you've done since this all started.

“But you should give the people from here a break, too. Just like you do, they need room to make their own mistakes sometimes. And if it ends up that their mistakes mean some people advance more slowly than they could, well, time can be made up a lot easier than lives.”

I didn't really want to hear some of that, but I could admit she was right about most of it. It still sucked that no other young people were going to be in charge of themselves, but at least I could keep on doing my part, and help to lift up other people that way.