What hit me first was the smell.
Cooked flesh. Not the kind you would go around looking for at happy hour. No, definitely not. Maybe to a different race with a different palate, but this particular kind of meat didn’t sit well with my mind. Whatever it was, the source from which the scent was emanating from was in the area of effect of a fiery explosion of some sort. Chunks of metal, shrapnel, were embedded into it as well as the surrounding walls.
My side hurt. My shoulder hurt. Everything everywhere hurt, but especially my left side. Thankfully not my main hand. The faint numbness in my offhand was some small cause for concern.
“WHO THE HELL IS THAT?!” a voice below me screeched in alarm.
As if a parameter to be noticed was the cue, the delayed sensation of falling I distinctly remember not a moment ago resumed its natural velocity.
Nothing broke my fall as I landed heavily on solid stone.
“Ackgh, stars above and below, Reaper’s kiss taking the Heartfire and all the Ancestors combined!” I swore loudly, curling up onto the side that didn’t absorb the fall. I was wearing a shirt and what felt like shorts, judging by the cold my clammy calves were inflicted with.
“Is that-? Could it be?!” an Orcish voice rang out. “Indeed it is, ancestors preserve me! You! Yes, you, get Koliastrazana and tell her ‘Cordo called you Ana!’ on the double, no, triple!”
“But sir, she’ll-!”
“And then run like the devils themselves were behind you. Now move!” the quite familiar refined cadence ordered.
Eyes closed, I laid down on the floor a little while longer.
“Cordo, what the fuck is going on, why are you-? IS THAT JERICHO?!” one more person I recognized shouted from one of the entrances connected to the lobby. This one should still be tall, violet, and horned. “OH MY GOD!”
“Fireteam roster lit up, is it really him?” a plucky ?Human?, assumedly, chimed in from the third floor and looking down. “Hey, boss, you’re back!”
I opened an eye to see Perez hop the railing without a thought, landing with lupine resilience absorbing the fall. Opting to wait for other individuals to crowd me and answer their questions all at once, I covertly shut my eye once more. Groaned plaintively. Massaged my wounded shoulder. Rather, what used to be it. Limb was still connected it seemed, so that was good.
Fwoom-th-fwoo-thoom!
I could feel the air become disturbed by a shape high above the atrium. Too steep for a dive, they must be breaking their fall with some kind of half-glide with their wings. Perhaps leaping from balustrade to balustrade? Quickly following behind, the distinctive sound of Arcane force breaking like glass, reforming, shattering again rang in my ears.
Principal players almost all gathered, I sat up.
It wasn’t just the original three, almost five, Administrata personnel I had banded together with to retake the tower, brand it the Rook. There were two, three, maybe even four dozen others. I didn’t recognize most of the other faces. Odd, especially considering I was the only one who could allow entry as Faction Leader.
Unless-
“JERICHO-“
The only warning I had-
“-VENI-VICI AMONTILLADO!”
-before a compact overgrown lizard woman landed on the ground next to me, sending spiderweb cracks through the floor.
Then bundled me into a tight hug. Tighter than any I’d received before, even in the middle of a diplomatic incident with a den of Lamia sisters which I still maintain was an honest mistake. Not enough to damage or inflict a Condition, for which I was thankful, but it was difficult to breathe.
“Ai-airrrrr,” I wheezed, seeing Lyissa hopping from platform to platform made up of her Shield or Aegis Skill presumably. Curious implementation. “Air!”
My feet touched the floor but I was still firmly in Ana’s embrace. Was she nuzzling into my chest? Her fingers seemed to be tracing over where my new massive scar rested, though I wasn’t sure if it was out of concern or admiration.
Damned Dragonkin and their eccentricities.
“Jericho? Is that really you?” a certain Elf asked quietly.
Looking around, there were many hopeful stares, disbelief, prayers perhaps mouthed.
What had happened after… After…
Oh. Yes.
I died.
Post-Recursion.
“I…”
My Fireteam held a collective breath.
“I… the last thing I remember was… being hit by a truck and ending up here. Who are you people?”
What can I say, I couldn’t resist.
“Bash.”
“Eh?”
Grabbed by the back of the head, I looked into Ana’s furious orange glare for perhaps half a second before the world went black and hazy again.
+Status warning! Stun threshold reached! You are Stunned!+
Trying to keep my balance, the world turned upside down and I had trouble standing up.
“He’s fine,” she growled with a sibilant rattle deep in her chest. Small wings flapped, kicking up scree from her earlier entrance.
Despite her displeasure, I felt another presence keeping me steady. Hazarding a glance downward, I didn’t need a Condition to be awestruck. Even when the Stun cleared up, I blinked rapidly to make sure what I saw was real. Reached for the appendage wrapped around my leg-
-to be stopped by the tightened coil of Ana’s former shadow of a tail around the limb. A miniature version of the glaive-like blade occupied its tip, gently reminding me of times past when it had been used to deadly effect.
“Koliastrazana, you have it back,” I observed quietly.
“What? Oh! Oh no!” Ana blinked, then squeaked as she realized the possessive display of her unruly tail was out for all to see. Quickly releasing me, she wrestled it back between both hands and took a step back. “Y-yes, it happened after-, after we reached our Prestige Class! I-, well, I am now a Lancer and it had a Dragoon Stance and I theorized, well, you know, it was one letter off, and, uh, it felt natural, so I-“
“Alright, everyone, this is wonderful news. However,” Lyissa clapped loudly, beginning to scatter the crowd, “we still have much to do, walls to build, sorties to prepare! Get back to work!”
Sensing an out, Ana began to turn away and shroud her face with the curtain of messy oil-drop hair.
I pulled her back. Embraced her. She stiffened for a moment. Slowly wrapped around my waist. Her fledgling wings engulfed us both. Small, petite like her current frame, span just long enough to hide both of us from the world for a moment.
Partners back together.
Lyissa waited patiently for us to break apart, cleared her throat. Ana slapped my arm with the flat of her tail blade to get me to stop, leaving a nasty sting, as she darted off back to her duties – ostensibly leaving the giant fissure in the ground for someone else to deal with.
“Are you able to climb a few stairs?” Lyissa asked. Her welcome back was reserved. I’d have to settle for a quiet smirk.
“I think-“
My left fingers twitched. Uncontrollably. I steadied my hand over the forearm, over the likeness of a certain Dragoness in her True Form. Looking around, there was actually a banner or two with the same emblem hanging off the balconies.
“I think so,” I cleared my throat.
I followed her eyes up to the top floor and groaned.
///
A magical barrier provided by the Rook and then an actual door sealed us into what used to be the Prefect’s office. Now it was just the Nexus room I suppose.
Lyissa seemed to have made it her personal quarters. A plain cot and stacks of dishes rested to one side where we had kept the Terrans off in the corner. Boards, papers, some equipment occupied the majority of the space except for the meeting table in the center. Three cups and some papers, one of them steaming, were still there.
“Has anyone else died?” I immediately asked.
“Among us six? No,” she sighed, clearing a spot for us to sit at the table. “That night, once the sun rose, some of Greenharbor began to join in resistance. It took a while, but eventually we found the last few Terrans that stayed behind to harry us while the main force retreated.”
If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.
Moving to her bed, Lyissa picked out unopened tins. Containers? Rations came to mind. Some form of meal. I didn’t know what, only that the System suggested something edible was in her hands.
“Perez hunted the rest down with his Pack. Try as we might, he couldn’t avoid adding two more to his Pack. Jake was odd in that he was receptive to the idea, but the other pair have been – Flame Burst – less than willing,” she continued, then ignited a gentle tongue of fire under both of our meals. “It’s been harder without… without the Faction leader amplifying his control.”
“Come again? Am I still it, even though I died?” I asked, warily observing her casual use of the same ability that blinded a contingent of Terrans in a different context. “You seem to have been able to take care of things.”
“As second-in-command,” she whispered, looking down. “Rook contacted me. After you passed. I was desperate and touched the-”
“Wait.” A shiver went down my spine – thankfully the whole length, not severed at any point by my Vorpal wound. “Why does it feel like you are obscuring the weight of the past tense?”
“There’s no easy way to say this. You’ve been dead for two weeks. Your body only disappeared on the second day after we tried preserving it.”
The tremor in my fingers started up again.
“Diagnose.”
+Diagnose activated. Target is you, level 10 Human Specialist Arcanotechnician. Status: Maimed, Resurrection Sickness. Warning! You require a Surgeon to Recover from Maimed.+
My arm twitched again involuntarily. I think she misunderstood and put her hand in mine, abandoning the food for the moment. I couldn’t meet her gaze or tell her otherwise.
+Diagnose activated. Target is Lyissa Stormleaf, level 19 High Elf Heavy Artillerist. Status: Firebase Aura, Hardening, Offensive Defense.+
“Nine Level difference. I’m at 10, so the Debt must have been taken out as time as opposed to something else. Hopefully.” I did my best to remain analytical. That’s what I was good at. Not panicking, that would not help anyone. “Have all the others-?”
“They are 19 as well, the Fireteam has been kept intact. New members to Reclamation are put in their own Fireteams to make sure everyone has two Supports and a mix of other Classes,” Lyissa informed me, tenting her hands. “Fighting as a unit has more merits than a single person holding power. We’ve found more SysTablets, the odd Arcanotech item, someone has picked up Fabricator and been crafting ammunition and food, but have no means of repairing EMF’d magic equipment.”
“Only one?”
“There’s only 30 of us willing to do anything, Jericho,” she scoffed, slapping the table while shaking her head at me. “When word got around that you died and still hadn’t come back, despite the tower being brought to life, the Terrans repelled, people decided to hide! Fights over resources started breaking out. We’ve had to maintain some semblance of law and order over what remains by ourselves!”
I kept quiet.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured, running her fingers through her hair before tucking strands behind her long ears. “That sounded like I was placing the blame on you.”
“Maybe it was. I shouldn’t have been that close to the front.”
Blinking, Lyissa’s lips parted but could find no words.
“Even if Vorpal worked the same way it did, there’s no telling now if someone of my-, if a Support could mitigate the damage. If Perez or An-,” I started strong before choking. “O-or if Liastra were hurt, I might have been able to bring them back. Level 8 gave me something called Resuscitate at the least. Or Triage could have done something. Or something, something else in the moment, I just-, no-, maybe it’s all for-, I could’ve-, stars bel-!“
At some point the tears fell freely. Two weeks and a day. The mask shattered and a dam broke as I finally gave in, hiding my shame within my hands.
Between whimpers and poorly stifled cries, I heard a chair move closer. A friend’s warm embrace, rubbing my back, stroking my hair like my mother used to.
“Shh, shh, it’s okay. It’s okay, Jericho, it’s okay,” Lyissa whispered, rocking me back and forth. “It’s not your fault. I’m sorry, it’s not… not your fault.”
“I-, I don-,” I shakily managed to whisper between sobs, “it’s funny, I don’t think it’s your comfort I want ri-right now. Weir-weirdest feeling.”
“I could try asking Perez to turn into a walking shag rug to warm you,” the Elf mused, gently continuing. “Maybe Cordo or Mae, see who is comfier.”
I laughed, an ugly thing as I coughed and tried to swallow another bout of weeping. Reaper’s shroud, why did I want Her to be here? She’d probably smirk and tell me to grin and bear the burden in that offputtingly smarmy but genuine tone her kind used.
“She was planning to go outside the city and scout for creature spawning areas. It would solve our Leveling issues and confirm if the System still worked in that regard. Otherwise,” Lyissa informed me, turning serious as calm returned, “I would have invited her here.”
“Careful, people might talk oh great and mighty Stormleaf,” I muttered, patting her on the arm. I wiped my face with the back of my hand, tattooed Draco’s head scouring away weakness.
It was the Elf’s turn to chuckle heartily, to my surprise.
“I wouldn’t dream of it. You’re spoken for, little Jeri,” she chided, letting me sit of my own accord. Producing a handkerchief, I graciously accepted the token. “I have a lot of gold in the pool for when-, well, mhmm.”
“What?” I queried, not quite understanding.
“What?” Lyissa replied innocently. “In any case…”
Resuming the task of prepping something food-like for us – I guess mainly me – the Elf Heavy looked out the window.
“Right now, all we can do is focus on Greenharbor. We control the Strategic Point. There are some Outposts that need investigating, but the saving grace is we only have three other cities connected to us on the Overworld, two of which are terminal points.
“From what Rook told me, since you… died, the adjustments you requested that she pulled from your memory have led to other Nexus activations. We can only hope they are in a similar situation to ours. Better yet, splinters of the Arcanocracy fighting for control amongst themselves. I have to hold fast hope that there might be more individuals like Jake that perhaps went so far as turning on their leaders.”
Should I raise that other concern?
A starved System didn’t have the resources to function properly.
Then again, there was enough fear running rampant. Adding another variable could – no, would shatter what precarious control we had over our lives.
Lyissa stood, the food tins having begun to boil within. I’d never experienced cuisine like this. It must have been from the Fabricator she mentioned earlier. There was neither hide nor hair of a traditional crafting profession, nothing came to mind since Recursion. Maybe someone had checked on a SysTablet.
“We are sitting on the only seaport on this side of the continent. Once we regain access to the harbor structures, we can reap the bounty of the waves. After that it’s claiming Kar Ambercrag near the Ironspine Ranges, then Foxfire Glen towards the interior to secure our rear, opening up two more zones to exploit.”
I looked at her like she’d grown two extra heads and was now a Cerberus, rattling off all that information to a dead man now up and walking only for the better part of a half hour.
“Ah. Right. Sorry,” she winced apologetically, approaching the ancient piece of junk. “Here, one moment.”
Gracefully manipulating the Nexus as its glass panels reacted to her will, a map of the Viridian Tundra projected itself in the air. Complete with terrain and an overlay similar to how I treated Ana’s broken leg, flipping between different layers of information. Terrain, points of interests, individual zones like jigsaw pieces, and finally what I imagined was the Overworld Network.
Greenharbor faded into translucency, replaced by a banner. The flag representing us carried the black Draco of Reclamation over a field of the Administrata’s familiar teal. Blackened lines extended out from us, this Strategic Hub if I remembered correctly, towards where I knew the Kar Ambercrag mountainhold and the small city at Foxfire Glen were.
The last third line extended further out into the Viridian Tundra toward a place I didn’t recognize, maybe inside the Boreal Wilds, before branching out in three other directions. Then the map simply stopped. Incomplete. No influence over there.
“If I am understanding correctly, we can’t expand until we secure a solid foundation. We can afford to wait on Ambercrag and Foxfire because they’re only connected to us?” I asked, reaching out for the curious food ration tin – bubbling now silent. Still warm, I used a fingernail to start peeling back the thin metallic leaf sheeting. “We have no immediate Overworld threats, but that doesn’t mean things like bandits or monster incursions are out of the-, Lyissa, what in the hells is this you’re trying to get me to eat?”
“Oh, it’s, well, it’s classified as food.” She tried to hide a smirk behind her fingers, turning to the side to prevent me from seeing that sylvan face of hers. “So far, it’s the only thing the Fab can create out of raw organics. Go on, try it.”
Fully uncovering the source of the rankling scent of what I was being told was edible, there were three… shapes. One was white and could charitably be called a biscuit or roll. The next was a cube of what at some point could be a cut of meat, fish or animal or both was anyone’s guess. Finally rounding off the trio was a multicolored circle of what could only be considered plant mush of some sort. Absolutely nothing discernible about the composition of any
“Are you this won’t come to life and-, you know what,” I grunted, daring to put my fingers on the ration container, “Diagnose.”
+Diagnose activated. Target is a Common Tier Fabricated Food Ration. Provides sustenance for two days, can be utilized as Thrown or Improvised blunt weapon when unprepared.+
“It can be used as a weapon?” I whispered incredulously.
“It said that? Curious. Perhaps your Prestige Class lets you see more details than other Supports,” Lyissa nodded, back still towards me.
“Eating the whole thing lasts for two days as well. Have you had one of these? Has anyone else-, I’m not the test case for it, right?” I ranted, looking at the dubious shapes of mush in front of me. I realized the stack of dishes next to the bed were more or less identical. “Oh, stars above and below, I just got back.”
Choosing at random, I closed my eyes and bit down.
+Fabricated Food Ration used. Hunger is the best sauce, down the hatch!+
Looking at what I decided to eat, it was the pink cube.
It… was… palatable.
No. The aftertaste.
Oh, the nausea impacted my empty guts like this mythical Truck Otherworlders managed to keep encountering before joining our World.
Something hurtled through the air. I caught it out of reflex, realizing it was an old friend.
“My canteen?” I exclaimed, quickly undoing the cap and washing down the chalky texture the moist-looking Mimic of a food dish transformed into within my mouth.
“We weren’t able to repair your handcannon, but it’s in the armory,” she chuckled. Then paused, looked down. “The Runetech blade was recovered too. Hidden.”
My spine stiffened. I fought off the urge to make sure my chest was still in one piece. Thankful for the distraction of a poor meal, I opted to wolf down the three nutritional shapes. Water with the Purify Rune attached to the metal container helped chase off the residue.
I stared out the window to the mid-morning sun. What season were we in? Two weeks wasn’t significant. The full moon was probably another week out, that would be an interesting predicament now that Lycans were unleashed near-unfettered on our World.
Autumn. Reds and oranges on that day two weeks ago. We picked Carl up in a forest preparing to lose its Spring and Summer coat, Winter soon approaching.
One Fabricator making food. No source of killing grounds to help Level people over the Prestige wall and start forming a proper organization, a strong Faction. Ramshackle city full of dead souls waiting for something to happen. A faceless, voiceless Rook watching from beyond our reality that I wasn’t present to talk with. Something about memories.
“How long ‘til Ana gets back from scouting?” I asked, rubbing my temple.
“With her new motivation?” Lyissa chortled for a moment before clearing her throat, straightening her uniform. It was tattered, frayed at the edges, some of the metal plating showing where the gambeson repair patches had split over what they were meant to seal up. “Perhaps a day to investigate towards Kar Ambercrag, another to sweep all the way to the Boreal Wilds and the coast. I estimated Foxfire Glen to be too risky, considering its challenge rating before.”
“Even Ambercrag might be pushing it, assuming the numbers mirror Recursion’s. I sincerely hope that the Artificials and Slates haven’t gained access to Firearms as well,” I grumbled, flicking the empty Fab Ration platter away from me. “Well, I should be good for two days.”
Standing tall, I stretched as much as I could. The tightness in my left arm refused to go away. I couldn’t push it too far. Not until we found ourselves a Surgeon.
“I’d like to meet our Fabricator.”
“Are you sure?” Lyissa said, coming alongside me. Worry etched across her face, she hesitated to lay a hand on my arm. “You have only just-“
“Observer Lyissa, I am a man of very few talents. I need to justify my existence with what I can do, and do it to the best of my ability,” I grinned. It was the real article. I could push through the fear and doubt. “And right now, I’m one of two very important people key to getting Greenharbor back on its feet. Let’s get to work.”