As soon as the group reassembled, Karl took the lead and set a brisk pace, so no one could talk to him or see his face for a while. They had almost three miles to cover each way, and the return trip would include toddlers, so they needed to save time anyway. That they all could do this run without really thinking about it (aside from Tabitha, who rode a bike to keep up) just showed how much the world had changed in such a short time.

There were dramatic advantages to the new ways. Any injury or wound a person suffered short of death healed itself completely in about half an hour. People also now had inventory spaces that they could vanish things into and summon them back out—even to the point of summoning clothing or armor directly onto the body. Karl made such extensive use of it in combat that Terry had dubbed his fighting style Inventory Fu, although personally he still thought of it as, “I don't know what I'm doing so I'll just mess up whatever you're doing.”

Some had learned magical spells and could throw Mana Darts and Fireballs and God only knew what else. People who earned experience and leveled could dramatically increase their 'stats' such as strength or charisma or agility, giving them essentially superhuman capabilities. Karl had started out with a strength of two, and it was thirteen now that he was at seventh level.

If only the world weren't swarming with monsters out to kill them all, things would be great.

Karl still had no idea what the System would do about his age, if anything. He was starting to bulk up in response to the increases in his strength and constitution stats, making him extremely hungry most of the time. He'd finally gotten a look in a mirror that morning and found he was starting to look like an elderly bodybuilder. Just how healthy was he going to get?

What had happened to people with diseases? Missing limbs? Chronic conditions? Cancer? Cancer had taken Jane from him only a few months ago, after over forty years of marriage. If the System had arrived sooner, would she have lived? He had a million questions, and if the world were not one big struggle for survival now, he could easily spend the rest of his life hunting answers to them.

The seven of them covered the miles quickly. The asphalt, like everything else manmade, was decaying, but more complex things decayed faster, so the roads should be useable for things like Tabitha's bike for at least a little while longer. Soon they were at the mansion where they had set up Temporary Safe Zone #2 yesterday when they realized they could only get halfway home with the toddlers before nightfall.

Their departure that morning had been dramatic, forming up in two teams to chase after their people kidnapped from the burning Temporary Safe Zone #1. They had left Paul Goodman in charge here, and he reacted swiftly to their return.

“Hello and welcome! What's your status?” he called from the front door as he stepped out.

Karl took a deep breath and started summarizing. “We rescued our people, and a whole lot of others as well. The first Safe Zone was burned down. We built a third temporary one nearby, and then finally cleared out the mill and managed to build the permanent Safe Zone there. We named it Endurance. It's a lot more secure, and your brother Chad helped design the defenses. Anyway, we managed to empty out Safe Zone #3 and brought all of our people there, so now we're back to escort you to our new home.”

“Excellent news! I'll get people to start loading up their inventories with anything useful. Do you need anything immediately?”

“No, we loaded up with food, water and weapons in case you had any problems here. Were there any attacks?”

“Not a one. Maybe we've just been lucky.” Paul shrugged. “Anyway, come on in!” They followed him inside to warm greetings, that turned much more excited once Paul relayed the information.

“Is Jake with you?” asked someone whose name Karl couldn't remember.

“No, he's holding down the fort back at Endurance. He and Letisha are administrators. I expect people will just be exploring the housing and other features for a while.”

“Ah, okay, I was hoping he might be able to fix some things.”

“Strollers breaking down?”

“A little. Toys too. Maya would really like it if her toy horse got fixed.”

“Well, we'll see what he can do after we get back.”

Paul was good at organizing. Toddlers were good at disorganizing. They seemed to be evenly matched, though Karl put Paul ahead on points. It wasn't all that much longer than adults alone would have taken, before they were ready to leave.

Karl looked again at the exterior as they walked away from the building. “I noticed you managed to board up most of the windows. Where'd you get the wood?”

“That was Madeleine.” Paul pointed her out.

“Hello Sir Karl. Madeleine Bourne, Carpenter class. With Paul's help, I tore up a lot of the hardwood floor in one of the bedrooms upstairs. Turns out there was enough of a subfloor that the room was still useable. I made level two, and I'm almost to level three.”

“Unless something breaks in or spawns inside, it should last a good while as an emergency refuge. I wish we could leave ten silver as an emergency stash for whoever comes upon the place next. Maybe something to do if we find a way to make a lot more money,” Paul suggested, carefully watching the right side of the road as they walked.

Karl sighed while watching the left. “Well, Jake has done well auctioning some items, but that's a limited resource. It would be good to get some sort of steady income going. We just about completely tapped out our finances, with everyone contributing what they had, to scrape together enough to buy metal to make up the shortfall at the mill.”

“Even the mill didn't have enough metal?” Paul shook his head. “Damn. It must be really hard to get all the resources. You'd have to have just the right mix. I suppose big suburbs would work well. Military bases too, if they have woods adjacent.”

“New Hampshire has endless trees and rocks, but metal is a lot harder to come by. If it weren't for the mill, we might have had to migrate a while to get to something like a shopping plaza that backed onto woods. The mill was Michael's idea. And now, it's the Endurance Safe Zone.”

“Endurance, huh? Sounds like a wild west frontier town name. Which, I guess, is pretty similar to what we have now.”

“It seemed fitting. It tells the world, 'we're going to tough it out, so bring it on.'”

“Hell, yeah.” Paul nodded approvingly.

Terry led the little group in cheers and chants to let survivors know they were passing by. Every so often they fell quiet to listen for cries for help. She left notes on doors and messages in sidewalk chalk on the asphalt, telling people where Endurance was. They didn't get any takers on Oak Hill Road, or find many signs that there were any people left to rescue. Finally they reached the turn onto Sycamore Street.

Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.

“You know...” Karl mused. “I don't want to be the one to slow things down, but we're actually pretty close to my house.”

“Something you need, Karl?”

“Of course! I'd love to pack a suitcase full of clothes, but even more importantly I want to save some of my books. I wasn't a military buff by any stretch, but at least a few of my books might be helpful.” He sighed. “I suppose it would be hypocritical to go to my own house when I'm not volunteering to escort others to theirs.”

“Karl, don't be ridiculous,” Chenelle answered. “You're tough enough to make it there and back on your own, so you wouldn't be slowing us down if you left us for a few minutes. And I certainly plan to do the same when we pass my house! Go. We'll be fine.”

Karl dithered a few moments, then nodded. “Thank you. I'll be as quick as I can.” He passed off a few inventory items to those with room to spare.

He started jogging, and was at his house in only a minute. He marveled at how things changed. Five days ago, I was panting from the exertion walking this same route slowly. Of course, my Constitution was three then... He started up the driveway lined with woods on either side. When it opened out into his front lawn, he stopped and stared.

The gray squirrel looked down at him. Not from a tree, just sitting on its haunches. It must have been seven feet tall at least. Its giant gray tail fluffed up, and it charged at him. You've got to be kidding me. He had a bare second to equip his shield and short sword, before doing the math on the momentum and tonnage chittering his way, and realizing that dodging was the only real option here.

“Damn it, I don't have time for this!” Karl dodged, and ran for his front door. Fortunately the squirrel did not appear to have gotten the hang of its new size yet, as it crashed into an oak tree before it could stop or turn around. Quickly he fished out his front door key, unlocked the door, jumped inside and slammed the door shut behind him. It sounded like an elephant was hot on his tail and the house rattled when the squirrel hit it. Fortunately the door held.

Karl shook his head at the ridiculousness of his situation and ran to his bedroom. When he got there, he found it infested with half a dozen minor imps. He seized one out of midair and slammed it into the wall, killing it with one blow. “OUT!” he snarled at the rest, and he discovered that even System creatures had the sense to flee when facing something much, much tougher than they were. The imps flew off to the kitchen from the sounds of it.

He didn't care. He grabbed both his and Jane's suitcases, and quickly threw a lot of his clothes into them, just the essentials. As soon as he slowed down, unsure what else to take, he forced himself to slam the suitcases shut and vanish them into inventory. Then he went to the library in his office, where there were no spawns. Thank God for small mercies. You too, System.

This would be harder, but again he made himself hurry. The Art of War was an easy choice. A History of World War II . A history of Europe. A history of the American West. Books on crafts that he had never gotten around to picking up: woodworking and so forth. A couple of his favorites because he couldn't bear to leave them mouldering at an accelerated pace; they already looked yellowish. Books on nature, birds, flowers of New England, and so forth. His paper maps! He was so glad he had kept them. They went on top of the pile. A book on laws and the legal system. A couple of basic layman introductions to economics.

He took another look at the shelves, marveling at how much of the nonfiction was utterly obsolete in this new world. He grabbed a couple of math textbooks, fairly confident that even the System couldn't screw up algebra—though it certainly played havoc with geometry! Then he called it quits, discovering to his relief that the entire stack of books and papers only took up a single inventory slot.

He was about to leave when he hesitated. Surely there was something he could take and sell to raise money for Endurance? Neither he nor Jane had been very interested in spending money on art. He had no stash of gold or silver coins, nor a stamp collection. He tried to remember what else Jake said might be valuable. Then it came to him. Spices!

Jane had always teased him for buying far too much of everything. At one point he'd gotten a gigantic box containing lots of different spices that never got opened. Where is it? He wondered if it was still intact. It took a minute of searching the closets before he remembered where he had stashed it: in the cupboard above the refrigerator, almost inaccessible.

Or rather, it had been. While the imps fled back to the bedroom, Karl started to look for his large step stool, before he turned and eyed the fridge speculatively. He walked up to it, reached up, and lifted himself up with ease. He held himself there one handed—okay, that he wouldn't be able to keep up for very long—and fumbled the package free with his other hand. A moment's thought vanished it into inventory.

The System makes the world incalculably easier, at the low low price of constantly trying to kill us.

Karl opened the front door to find the giant squirrel waiting for him. “Oh, for God's sake!” The squirrel started to put its nose in through the doorway, so Karl punched it on the snout as hard as he could. He slammed the door on its nose next, locked it, and quickly went around to the back door. Then he walked around, hoping the squirrel would be using the other side and he could get away without a serious fight.

Sadly it was not to be. Karl growled in frustration and brandished his sword at it. “Squirrels don't even eat meat, do they?” He wasn't actually sure. “Get out of here! Go find a giant acorn or something! Damn it, get off my lawn!”

There was a sudden burst of laughter off to one side, startling paladin and squirrel; they both turned to look. There on a branch was Terry, looking like she was on the verge of falling out of the tree. She was laughing hysterically.

Karl mentally reviewed what he had just said and groaned inwardly. I'm never going to hear the end of that one, am I? And of course she had to be around to hear it. Karl sighed.

It took an embarrassingly long time to kill the squirrel, especially as Terry was too busy laughing to help. Just how many people are going to laugh at me today? This is already two too many. The corpse yielded four silver and change, which made about as much sense as anything else the System did. They're just score points given form. Karl couldn't bring the whole squirrel back.

Jo had briefly vanished a giant bear corpse into her inventory yesterday, but he'd never gotten around to asking her how she did it. So instead he cut off the big fluffy tail and hoped someone could make a fur coat or something out of it. He still had two inventory spaces left, so he decided to saw off a big piece of the squirrel's body. Maybe somebody could make food out of it.

Food's going to be the next urgent problem, I'll bet. We've grown too fast. When they had set off yesterday morning to hunt for food and survivors, there had been sixteen mouths to feed, three those of children. Now they had something pretty close to a hundred people who would be wanting food, and they no longer had sufficient coin to buy meals from the Shop.

We'll have to go house to house, taking all the food we can find, and mount a larger expedition to another grocery store. Karl sighed. “All right, Chuckles, let's get moving.”

More serious now, Terry dusted herself off. “Hold up. I've got three slots open. Cut me off some of that.”

“You've got knives.”

“Your strength is thirteen, mine's five. How much time do you want to spend here?”

Mumbling imprecations against demanding teenagers under his breath—knowing full well that her enhanced hearing could pick all of them up—Karl cut her some big hunks of squirrel meat. Thank God we don't have to clean inventory space. We put some of the most disgusting stuff in there.

Finally, they left Karl's property and jogged down Sycamore Street to Walnut Street. Terry begged off and vanished, presumably to raid her own house for clothes. He wondered if she were going to leave some squirrel meat in her bedroom to make room. He also wondered if she was going to think of getting some clothes for her parents. Should I remind her? No. Call it payback.

He arrived at the Hoopers' mailbox just as they were coming up their driveway to the road. “Seen Terry?” Doug asked, sounding grumpy.

“Just a minute ago. I'm sure she'll be along. Let's get moving.”

“Once we pick out an apartment, we can make a run or two back here for more of our things,” Chenelle murmured to her husband.

“I know, I know.”

When they passed the Cook residence, Karl was reminded that neither Jake nor his father Michael were along on this trip. Terry rejoined them shortly thereafter and they made good progress. Apparently nineteen people was a large enough group to scare off common spawns, as nothing attacked them.