Vernon entered the rooftop of Sun Hall with a groan, setting his backpack down and dropping onto the coarse blue blanket that Althea had laid. He gazed at the false night, at the golden Ordo Outbreak Barrier, and the distant fight beyond between man and stars. “Hey Thea, since Kosmos can fly and all, d’ya think he can fly to the moon?”

“Why do you always ask the weirdest things?” Althea complained. Vernon did that often: Hey Thea, do you know how straws are made? or, Hey Thea, have you seen this video where a guy runs down a tunnel screaming? or even, Hey Thea, where do babies come from? Personally, Althea thought Vernon had finally cut down on the bullshit and gotten bold, but no, he was too much of a dork to propose something like that.

“It’s not a weird question,” he defended. “I mean, I think it’s possible. He can fly, he can survive going out into the stratosphere—”

“Is he in the stratosphere?”

“I dunno.”

“D’you even know what the stratosphere is?”

“It’s one of the layers in our Earth’s atmosphere.” Vernon raised his hands as if he was touching the stratosphere. “It’s kinda like onions.”

“Onions?”

“Y’know, onions have layers, our atmosphere has layers, so it’s like onions.”

Althea hummed. “So Kosmos is bursting into the great onion of the universe where the other vegetables are. Kinda like, I dunno, potato meteorites or cosmic radishes, and the suns are tomatoes—”

“That’s a fruit.”

“Huh?”

“Tomatoes are fruits.”

Althea paused. She remembered having this exact conversation with Alexander once, something about her calling tomatoes a type of vegetable. “...I knew that. I was just making a point—”

Vernon nodded, staring blankly at her. “Yeah.”

“Tomatoes are fruits—!” She stopped seeing Vernon’s expression, so incredibly annoying, “—stop looking at me like that or I’m gonna peel you like an onion.”

He turned away with a teasing smirk on his face, one that she wanted to tear off. She didn’t say anything else after that, neither did he; thus, a steady silence settled in, disrupted only by the distant fighting beyond the campus walls. Sometimes a distant scream was added in similarly to how you’d add ingredients to a soup, and it’d become one with the stock, bitter to the tongue, poison to the ears.

Althea tasted blood in her mouth.

Vernon sighed, rubbing his lips, the smirk gone. Probably thinking about Mark again, probably thinking about his mom and dad, his sister-in-law too. According to some Commander or Lieutenant or Captain—Althea hardly knew anything about military organization—Mark was in Windvent. Beyond that however, there was no information.

Since Vernon was a Zero, he could be transferred to Primordial Zero where he’d be safe for the rest of the disaster. Though he had confided in Althea that he didn’t want to leave. The military couldn’t physically force any of the Zeroes to leave either, so if he wanted to stay, he could. That came with its own challenges.

“...It’s surprisingly beautiful, don’tcha think?” he asked, attempting to lighten the mood.

“You have a funny idea of romance, Vernon,” she replied. “We got explosions and gunfire and people screaming. Blood too.”

“Hey, I’m trying to be a little optimistic here since, uh, y’know…” Vernon gestured to all of Ordo. “It looks like it’s the end of the world but we should try to cheer up. And I know exactly how to do it. Gimme a sec.” He grabbed his backpack; to think they were about to have a picnic under the warring stars. How cute.

He dug inside.

Althea commented, “You got a love poem in there too? I’d love to hear it.”

“Yeah yeah, I got something better than sonnets, better than iambs! Here!” Vernon took out a packaged meat-stick about a foot long. “A better foot!”

Althea frowned.

“Y’get the joke, right? Iambs, a metrical foot. This stick—” Vernon wiggled the meat-stick, “—is, y’know, a foot-long. You get it, right? ‘Haha, you’re hilarious, Vernon!’?”

“Haha, you’re hilarious, Vernon,” deadpanned Althea.

“Anyway!” Vernon continued to dig into his backpack like a looter, grabbing anything he could find. “Juice boxes! Apple, my favorite fruit! Some, uh, chips!” He frowned. “Crushed chips. What else? A few water bottles, candy, and uh… Oh, MREs! I stole a few of ‘em.”

He laid out four different MREs: beef ravioli, ramyeon, pulled pork, and seafood stew. Gourmet Ordoian cuisine. More like a hodgepodge of different cultures slammed into one. When it came to MREs, every culture brought their worst. Except for ramyeon maybe. She’d always eat a pack whenever Alexander was too lazy to cook.

“You stole these?” Althea asked, eyeing the various labels. She wasn’t too hungry. After having seen her classmates and teachers be torn apart by ghouls, her appetite was a tad ruined. Less ruined than they were, but still. “Didn’t know you could be such a criminal.”

He blushed. “Hey, I’m not a—well, it’s a bit of a dick move yeah, but I dunno. How should I put this? I guess… I guess I’m worried. The Barrier’s up. Ordo relies a lot on imports; we’re gonna have shortages. It means tomorrow will be worse than today. I hate to say it, but this is the good times. We can go stargazing and have a buncha snacks at our feet; from here on out, we prolly won’t get to do that anymore. Not until we kill whatever the heck’s attacking us.

“Why can’t they do it? Taking down the Barrier, I mean? The GG has protocols for this! We got warships and big cannons and awesome artillery, and I haven’t mentioned the Otherguard yet. Elysian Fourteen has a freaking mecha! We could drop the Barrier and kill the fuckers that raided us! We have an entire arsenal, so why aren’t we using it?! I—” Vernon stopped, realizing that he was shouting. He pressed a hand against his head and took a few breaths in. “Never mind, it’s stupid.”

It’d be an amazing fantasy, but that was exactly it: a fantasy and nothing more. Hangzhou didn’t have an outbreak barrier when the disaster began; in fact, it was precisely because of Hangzhou that the Global Guards wanted all portal-bearing cities to construct one. Although the Chinese military had established checkpoints around Hangzhou to hinder the monsters’ movement, they broke through and expanded into Zhejiang, then the rests of China. The government was still dealing with small enclaves to this day.

In summary, because of Hangzhou, no one wanted to risk a single monster entering the outside world.

“It’s not stupid at all,” Althea reassured him, pressing her shoulder against his. “Y’wanna know why we’re locked in here? It’s called ‘fear’. It’s called ‘geopolitics’. It’s called ‘old men don’t know nothing’ and ‘no one can agree on anything’, so we’re ‘dead meat’.”

Althea didn’t consider herself a political expert but she knew how inefficient old bureaucrats could be. After all, she had survived two disasters: Hangzhou and the Global Guards’ gross mismanagement. Alexander had to go through dozens of hoops just to guarantee transportation back to America; he was even detained at one point for no discernible reason according to some vague and abstract policy.

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Although the world had moved technologically, the bureaucrats had only aged and become more enshrined in their stations. She heard from the other officers that since the Cosmic Beast was outside of the Ordo Outbreak Barrier, it’d slow everything down dramatically. The strongest Slayers in the Otherguard were tasked with helping Kosmos kill the Beast, or Beasts, plural.

Meanwhile, there was the case of fear: other countries would be concerned about an outbreak occurring within their cities, thus ordering most, if not all, of their domestic Slayers to remain on standby. Some countries were so afraid that they refused giving the Global Guards any additional Slayers. This had happened during Hangzhou. Though with the appearance of the Cosmic Beast, they may more open to the idea.

While the Global Guards had the Otherguards, they could not devote all of its forces into Ordo without jeopardizing the safety of other regions. They needed support from other countries but that would take a while. They’d be an emergency meeting at some point with the world leaders, where they’d discuss who will be sending what, when, and how. Taking in the fact that every politician had their own interests, it’d be a messy, messy debate. In other words, a shitshow. While the Slayer Emergeance had increased global unity, nations were still nations, and politicians were still politicians.

Common sense was uncommon and nonsensical in the greater scope of things, Althea experienced.

“We can’t count on other people to help us, Vernon. Especially not the Global Guards,” she concluded. “This is something we gotta do ourselves.”

“…I wanna wake up, Thea.” Vernon laid down, hugging the ramyeon MRE to his chest—what a delicious teddy bear. “I wanna wake up on my soft bed smelling blueberry pancakes in the air. Then, I’d lay there for about ten minutes before my alarm goes off. I’d get ready, I’d eat breakfast, I’d do all that boring, mundane crap because I really miss it now. And I really miss texting you in the morning going: ‘Hi, sleepy head. Ready for another exciting day? Winky face.’”

“So how’s your day, Thea?” Vernon had no emote other than a somber, melancholy expression.

“Fucking awful.” Althea forced a smile. “I’m doing horrible.”

“Yeah, I feel that. At least we’re doing horrible together. I—“ A radio buzzed, hooked onto Vernon’s pants pocket. He pulled it out and listened, sighed, and began putting the food back into his bag.

“What is it?” asked Althea.

“Convoy. Remember those transport trucks they sent to Black Paladin?”

“Mhm.” Black Paladin Station wasn’t so far from System Articles; however, there was no word about Alexander or Leona, not from the people she asked anyway. In fact, a rogue Slayer had taken over System Articles and was currently raiding the item vault. She prayed that they were okay.

“They’re coming back with lots of injured,” Vernon explained, standing. “They need hands at the hospital.”

“Of course.”

Vernon nodded. “Alright, let’s head down.”

***

The Army had recovered Ordo University Hospital with the help of a few junior Slayers, one of which being Victor Holidays—Slayer name: Victor—the Class Representative of Combative Class A2. He was the guy that Alexander fought because he kept bothering Leona. Deon Griffiths had been trapped in the hospital, but luckily he survived with little injuries. Though according to Victor, Deon saw some horrible stuff.

Thankfully though, the hospital was largely intact. There were backup generators in the basement precisely for situations like theses; meaning, it had power. Most of its facilities were relatively operational but there was a massive shortage of workers. Of course there was. The wounded outnumbered them five to one. People lined the sidewalks, their wounds sloppily wrapped in rags. If they weren’t screaming, they had to wait.

When Althea and Vernon entered the hospital, it had no semblance of order, even with the military’s involvement. Volunteers, who were covered in blood, ran around headlessly, people had to be operated on benches and seats, and there was little protection against the gore, the cries of pain, and the sheer panic of it all.

Naturally it got worse. It took no more than thirty minutes after the initial alert that the first trucks came from Black Paladin Station. Soldiers and civilians were carried out on stretchers, many of them missing limbs or parts of themselves. They had been stabilized back in Black Paladin but came here to retrieve proper treatment.

Althea helped wherever she could, whether that be carrying boxes of medical supplies or holding a man down while the medics did their bloody jobs. Whenever she had the time, she asked about what happened back there. According to them, it was a slaughter. Invisible entities had attacked from the underground tunnels and one of the Cosmos Caller’s lackeys had assaulted them. Because of Archknell, there were survivors.

‘There were survivors,’ she thought long and hard about that phrase: there were survivors. Not ‘everyone survived because of him’, but there were survivors.

As more people from Black Paladin trickled in, she understood the meaning behind that phrase. A mother had experienced severe third degree burns to an acid spell. She hardly looked human anymore. There was a man who suffered from necrosis from another spell; his legs had to be amputated.

The stories, though, were worse. Vernon listened to them too: details about how invisible monsters had killed entire families with a single swipe of its claws, or watching your husband be split apart by a red beam, or hearing about how a soldier was crushed when a humvee fell on him.

Althea thought she was lucky.

At some point, Vernon received a direct order to head back to Ordo University with Althea.

They stumbled out of the hospital, having changed into clean clothes. Vernon sighed and stuffed his hands into his pockets. “That was something…”

“Yeah,” she replied, not quite sure how to exactly respond to any of that.

“So…” Vernon awkwardly began, “...think we’re in trouble?”

Althea shrugged. She looked around, always looking for Alexander and Leona just in case. “If we are, it’d be because you stole too many MREs.”

“I’m not a criminal. Look, if it’s ‘bout that, I’m gonna say it’s for charity.”

“How sweet.”

“I’m the sweetest.” Surprisingly, the walk back to Ordo University was quiet. Well, quieter compared to the hospital. Military vehicles drove down the street, watching for any threats. When they got closer to the entrance, Vernon yawned and began stretching her arms. “Man, I bet this is about Prim Zero. They want me to run away.”

“You gonna?” Althea stopped and crossed her arms.

“Of course not. I’m an idiot, not a coward.”

She chuckled. “You’re right ‘bout that. Hypothetically though, you think I could come along to Prim Zero? If, y’know, you are coward?”

He frowned, shrugging. “I dunno, probably? I’ve been to Prim Zero before, it’s a lot more spacious than you think. They could comfortably fit more people in there. I—” Vernon stopped, his mouth dropping.

“Vernon?”

“Holy shit.” Was he staring at her? No, he was staring behind her.

“Vernon? What the hell are you looking at—?” She gasped.

Waiting at the entrance of Ordo University was a group of three. One was a dark-skinned man with an irritating smile, one that her brother hated and would always threaten to punch him or something. The man was from New York City, Manhattan. Eldest son of Duskfire, the Chief Slayer of the American Otherguard Alliance. He majored in Systemic Physiology, meaning he researched the effects of magic on the human body. Damien Fayer, who had coincidentally joined the group.

Another was a caramel-haired woman that always had a beautiful smile. Althea loved it but her brother loved it more (he’d never confess). She was born in Ordo to two loving parents, who were S-Rank Slayers in Angels: Hwaseong Heavens. How they met was a funny story. In Hwaseong-si, they were rivals, attempting to best the other with their swordsmanship techniques.

The woman was a byproduct of their rivalry, and their legacy. When they passed, they wished her a normal life, so she was here, studying economics. Above all, however, she was one of the kindest people Althea. That was Leona. Leona Ahn.

Last and certainly least was the black-haired man at the front of the group, ugly as ugly bastards put through grinder. Words could not describe how hideous this asshole was, but Althea wanted to do her best: imagine living, breathing horse shit. That was him. That was an accurate description of him and no one could disagree. He was six feet tall, plus one depending on the shoes, and had an athlete’s physique although he too studied economics.

Most people didn’t know this but he wore glasses, though he prefered using contacts. That was an example of his apathy to fashion. Unlike Althea, who often went on shopping sprees with Leona, he wore whatever popped up first in his drawers. He liked wearing plain clothes, something to blend in with the crowd, even if it meant being completely and utterly boring.

Unfortunately, no matter how much he may deny it, he was born with great genetics. He had pretty silver-white eyes—Althea did as well, they were Mom’s eyes—and inherited Dad’s muscles. Like Leona, he was a celebrity (although he was ignorant to his own popularity) and he deserved none of the attention.

It was him, the asshole who loved to bully everyone, who loved to criticize Althea from her cooking to her attire always telling her to cover up. It was him, who didn’t think that highly of himself because of what had happened in Hangzhou and High Home. Yet he had Dad’s willpower, the same man who’d fight an army of orcs by himself and win. Yet he had Mom’s heart, the same woman who’d save anyone no matter if it was suicide. He was the best of both, and he was the worst for it.

He was…!

“Alex…?” muttered Althea.

Alexander smiled and nodded. “Hey, long time no see.”

She ran towards him and experienced the first miracle, that of love—because love was always miracles, like a child’s first steps to the lone lighthouse on the perilous seas—and granted herself the permission to cry.