Malcolm Specter was angry. While he was often in an irritated disposition, anger was rarely within his range of emotions. It was inefficient. It made a person inaccurate and heedless. He clenched his fists and focused.

“Search southwards in a fan of five yards,” Malcolm said in clipped tones to the agents standing in a row in front of him. “Do not look for the boy. Look for tracks.”

“Yes sir,” They said in a chorus and went off.

He looked at his motley military crew. These were good men. Loyal men. He and these people were lucky to have brawn in a situation like this. And luck is what they needed. If only that damn boy did not oppose his every move.

Malcolm went on to address the next issue at hand. He needed to make rounds. He needed to keep busy. It was hard managing a group this small a scale. The idiosyncratic nature of humans needed to be a consideration. Groups were easy. People were… Complicated.

Simmons needed no direction or management. Malcolm wondered if he could keep up this mechanical pace that he had set. Malcolm supposed losing himself in rote labor was his way of coping with this ridiculous new reality.

Malcolm had a lot of varied things to say about his son. A fair amount of them were not savory. But he had taken to this world better than anyone else. He had gone out and acquired valuable resources. He was brave and he was resourceful. An active, forward going person.

To that extent, Malcolm could appreciate his son. But he was reckless, heedless, irresponsible, emotional, thoughtless and selfish. The perfect example of that was his latest stunt.

After a cursory check-by with Simmons he turned and growled to himself. “How dare he..?”

He went ahead and made sure the camp’s bustle was running in an efficient manner. Everyone had something to do, and they knew what to do next. There were a little over 30 people by now. Once Malcolm was sure all of those people were productive, he went towards the river to wash and drink, and carry water on his way back, as he had decreed.

That decree had leveled him up in the [Governor] class to 2 earlier. His two subclasses were [Leadership] and [Management]. Those were at levels 3 and 7 respectively. Malcolm wasn’t sure, but it seemed low. He would like to confide with someone about it, but not projecting weakness in this situation was important.

Malcolm made a few trips for water. They had enough clay pots to fill. The manual labor would help him think.

Stolen novel; please report.

“Goddamn classes and levels,” He muttered to himself, as a splash of water wet his tattered suit pants.”What are we supposed to make of this? What are the implications?”

There was no saying. They just had classes and they did something. What was the most practical approach? What was the proper distribution of classes and how should they be leveled?

Malcolm Specter was used to having the answers. At the position he had been, he had rarely needed to ask questions. If he had needed to ask questions, it had meant that the people he was managing weren’t doing what they were supposed to do. Now he would need to adjust, he knew this. But at the same time, he wanted to do nothing less. What he had been doing before had worked so well for so long. He squeezed the water bowl he was carrying so hard that a piece of it cracked and fell into the drink.

“Well, one thing is sure, that fool of a boy is wrong,” Malcolm muttered to himself. “We have enough military power in the agents and the weapons Logan already provided. We need housing, food and water, tools, clothes. All of the base necessities. Humankind did not need weapons of war before meeting other tribes.”

Other tribes Malcolm could handle. Their group had to be the most organized enterprise within a hundred miles. And people kept flocking here. No other human tribe would oppose them, even if they had run out of bullets and only had spears, rocks and knives.

Logan had said something about irrigation and farms. That boy had new ideas as quickly as he forgot the old ones. They could use a stable food source. Once they found the boy, Malcolm would confiscate the crystals and have Logan figure out farming for them.

Malcolm had suffered his son’s insolence long enough. He had known for years that he needed a special kind of patience to deal with his son’s antics, but this had been too far. Now Logan would do as he decreed, or he had no place in the tribe. Even if he was his own blood, Logan was undermining his authority constantly and placing over 30 souls in danger.

That did the trick. Malcolm Specter’s resolve snapped in place like a steel whip. Logan would be found and given an ultimatum. Co-operate or fend for yourself. Even if he would refuse, as he very likely would, a few days alone in the jungle would surely make him see reason. Malcolm now knew he had been far too lenient with his son. It was not time to go draconian on his son, but if that boy could not self-rule, then Malcolm would.

“Mr. Specter!” One of the doctors, now turned [Craftsman], suddenly yelled out. The man in his forties was chubby and he wore spectacles with a broken lens. He pointed at the sky, and Malcolm drew in a breath.

It was that thing. It had come out of absolutely nowhere in the empty bright sky, but now it was moving in to cover the sun. A great black cloud surrounded its body, and a giant head resembling a whale’s with a thousand eyes covering it, opened its mouth. A terrifying trumpet call pierced the sky and men around the camp fell on their knees, holding their ears. Malcolm wasn’t afflicted as strongly, but he clamped the pain and terror under his will to look at the creature.

The black cloud pulsed hues of dark blue and soon giant raindrops began to fall. The creature was not directly above them, but wind carried a few stray drops somewhere nearby. One of the car-sized black droplets crashed in the middle of the camp, next to their fireplace. The black viscous orb did not break, but now that it had landed it bulged and heaved, as if something was trying to get out.

Seconds later the bubble burst. A great black humanoid rose from the oily bubble. There were streaks of blue criss-crossing around its muscular frame like glowing lightning. It rose like a looming tower up to eight feet in height. Four long arms hung from its torso. The black goo dripped from its round face with two beady black eyes, a snout nose and an underbiting mouth with jagged teeth protruding over its fat gray lips.

As if by a whim of fate, the creature turned and locked its black eyes on Malcolm. Malcolm flinched, but he hunched forward, raising his fists. He was in good shape, but no fighter. This creature would end him. But he knew he wouldn’t outrun this thing, so he stood his ground.

The creature lunged. Malcolm roared in fear and anger.

Abruptly, a great bright flash blinded and deafened Malcolm Specter.