The moment that their quarry stopped its death knells, Oja sprung into action.

They ran towards Phineas with great alarm, Aurelio's cursory distant inspection of his crewmate being one of shallow breaths and severe injuries.

Kalani and him followed behind the Sawbones, their presence a silent acknowledgment that the doctor could use them how they saw fit to assist in ailing their friends injuries.

His leg was mangled and raw, yellow pus melting away flesh and sinew with a sickening hiss. The rest of his body was suffering from bloody, pus filled lesions. He was breathing, at the very least.

They were lucky.

Without armor, sudden, violent retaliations from the local fauna of the planet would see them losing arms and legs alike. There were devices to offset the loss of a limb. Of that he was certain.

But that would be dipping into their incredibly finite resources. He’d prioritize their comfort over the advancement of the colony if need be, but that sort of compassionate maneuver would see their enclave get whittled down to nothing.

They simply couldn’t afford that.

“The good news is that the bone is just fractured and the bleeding has been stemmed by the suits emergency functions. You won’t walk properly ever again, but you’ll at least have a leg to walk with.” Oja offered their diagnosis.

Phineas barely registered the comment, his eyes sinking into and out of consciousness. He couldn’t blame the man for being so out of it.

Oja turned their attention to Kalani, “The bad news is that with how many open wounds he’s suffering from, his chance of infection is quite high. Between the monster’s acid pus and the fact that we’re in a swamp, virulence is an expected outcome if we don’t act now.”

The sawbones stood up.

“Commander, I’ll need you to carry him underneath his armpits. Archivist, be careful in lifting up his legs. I’ll see if we have anything around the clearing here to fashion up a gurney for the trip back.”

Oja walked off on that endeavor.

Kalani and Aurelio stared at one another.

“Was this in line with your expectations?” She asked, failing to hide the hardness in her voice.

He didn’t recoil though.

“Somewhat.” Aurelio stated. Before the commander could jump down his throat for the statement, he continued, “We could have either hunted a higher tier Vessel or expanded our hunting grounds to cover other creatures and gain access to a greater diversity of tools for our survival. My cost-benefit analysis suggested the latter was more important than the former.”

“But we weren’t ready for this. It took everything we had just to make it out of here in one piece and we still suffered injuries on this mission.” Kalani retorted, gesturing at the delirious scout on the floor.

Not my fault that our heavy hitters suffered from fatigue.

He shook his head, “We incurred some bad luck on this quest and this particular creature doesn’t suit our current damage output. It’s a hardy bastard and it prolongs fights to have us incur injuries from eventual mistakes.”

The pair exchanged hushed statements while Oja collected fungal bark and wiring for the gurney.

Her perspective on the matter was sound but they were on a timetable that wouldn’t allow for such coddling of the crew. They needed to make every mission count or suffer the consequences.

The thought of being unable to go home placed a damper on the victory as a whole. They were capable but adversity would meet them at every turn.

It needed to, unless he wanted to coast through the early portions of the game and allow himself to stagnate into an ailing outpost like so many campaigns before him.

Kalani pressed her fingers to the bridge of her nose and cooled down, “If this really was the best case scenario for our group, then we need to invest in thicker armor plating. This particular beast was ripping through our armor like paper.”

“If we have the resources and I invest our latest technological advancement into {Art of Refurbishment}, sure. And then we can have our little brown dust clouds sprinkle more scrap onto the armor you all came here with and prolong the melting process by another round or two.” Aurelio spat out.

The venom was unwarranted and he immediately apologized.

Stress is getting to me.

“Well,” Kalani mercifully ignored his outburst, “What are our resources looking like and what are we planning to invest in?”

Before he could provide an answer, Oja returned with the materials to build a gurney.

He wished that Cantwell was in the group, if only to use his ability to fashion wheels for the gurney and make it into a wheelbarrow of sorts.

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Instead, Kalani and Aurelio were stuck with lugging their knocked out friend back to the settlement while Oja conducted routine inspections on his injuries.

It didn’t escape him that the rest of the crew completely ignored the presence of their spoils of war. Another trick of the system to register the resources he’d won through hard-fought combat without forcing him to bring it home.

He was certain that their stash of goods were filled with their new spoils.

A mystery for another time.

Instead of unraveling a trick that benefited him in that moment, he talked economics with Kalani while they walked back to the outpost.

Oja listened into their conversation and offered their own perspectives on what they should prioritize but deferred the final decision to them.

He’d come out of the outpost in hopes of landing the medical bay event and failed to do so. His adherence to the systems event generation approach didn’t cause complications like their last venture had, but it hadn’t yielded them the result he wanted.

They would need to fashion a makeshift medical bay for the crew, now that injuries were a statistical guarantee on the varying hunts. Letting the wounded and infected rest in the barracks with the rest of their tiny crew was a recipe for disaster.

It never ends.

Eventually the discussions died down into silence. Their trek was uneventful and yet Aurelio remained on high alert. The feeling was unpleasant. Hairs would stand on end and his heart would lurch at alien sounds nearby. The darkness creeping around them obscured threats waiting to take advantage of their weakness, threats that would pick them off one by one if he gave them the opportunity.

Threats that would never materialize.

Equal parts paranoia and anxiety. He acknowledged the thought process as illogical and detrimental to his mental state, and yet here he was jumping at shadows, lamenting his hands being occupied with the gurney over the comfort he’d feel wielding his [Ember Lance].

“You’re gonna spend yourself like that.” Oja whispered.

“Huh?” Aurelio was surprised by the death of their silent trek.

“You’ve got the eyes on you. Darting around, looking for problems at the sign of a mushroom rustle or the violent buzz of a firefly swarm.”

He laughed, “I’m that noticeable, huh?”

Oja shook their head, “It’s my responsibility to look after the rest of my crew, and that means looking after their mental health as well. You’re responding poorly to the mission's aftermath. The danger is off but you’re still on. Wired. That kind of behavior burns scavengers out.” The way Oja spoke of the feeling made him think they were speaking from experience.

What their hypervigilance would look like in their mechanical state made him dive through a cavalcade of old robot films from his previous life.

“I have to attend to Phineas but we’re going to work through this problem together when I’m free.” Oja placed their hand on his shoulder in reassurance.

For his part, he tried his best not to react to the stimuli all around him, instead keeping his fingers crossed that the outpost event they came back to wasn’t going to upend his newfound relaxation plans.

---

The outpost gates opened up on their arrival with a surprising amount of fanfare.

Elena, recovering from her fatigue, ran up to the returning party with shifting expressions across her face. From elation to confusion to anger to frustration, she carried her emotions plainly on her face for all to see.

To his surprise, Aurelio watched Cantwell break from his stoic demeanor. The massive man broke into a sprint, taking the reins from Kalani to lug his brother to the barracks.

“What happened to him?” Cantwell asked. “Is he going to be okay?”

Oja nodded, “The boys going to be fine if he gets the rest he needs and recovers to my instructions. We’re gonna need your help on that front.”

The man vigorously nodded, eager to assist however he needed to.

“What happened out there that you all are coming back like this?” Elena asked. Her scrutinous gaze fell upon him first before settling on Kalani.

“The new monster served us new problems. The automatons we were fighting before were the tip of the iceberg in what's out there, and our equipment wasn’t tailored to contend with the new challenges.” Kalani diplomatically answered.

Elena turned back to look at him with suspicion but held her tongue. She was actively avoiding a confrontation, much to his relief.

“Anything happen in the outpost while we were gone?”

Elena shook her head, “Negative, commander. When the both of us felt fit to crawl out of the barracks, we did some stretches in the plaza and messed around a bit. Nothing of note occurred while we waited for your safe return.”

With Cantwell’s foot tapping and the growing fatigue in his muscles, he exited the conversation and followed Oja to the smithing station. The sawbones motioned for Cantwell to trade places with them and instructed the man on handling his domain over the area.

“Use what scrap is available to create a lean-to. If the mites do not wish to make it whole cloth next to the barracks, then instruct them to create the pieces necessary and we will build our makeshift medical bay by hand. Until an alternative presents itself, this is the best we can do.”

Cantwell registered all of the sawbones requests and got to work. He used his limited abilities to create pillars for the gurney, freeing them for work.

“Do what you need to do.” Cantwell curtly stated before focusing his attention to the junkyard.

Aurelio grew more uneasy with each passing second.

No settlement event had triggered upon the defeat of the Malignance.

Nothing.

“Are you gonna need me here for anything?” He asked Oja.

With the sawbones dismissal, Aurelio left the building and investigated the interior and perimeter of the outpost to the best of his abilities.

He was tired and anxious and this diverging point in the system's behavior filled him with terror.

Maybe the Monolith will have insight on this.

Aurelio walked into the radar station.

The white noise that was familiar to him was replaced with a bright blue light and big bold letters.