As Mark trudged through the snow of the streets that Waia’s fight had wrecked, the first thing that he ruled out as a hiding place was the area even remotely near the locals. It was too obvious, that would be the first place the Servants looked for anything suspicious.

That left Mark with several dozen square miles’ worth of city that he could look for the three Primoi in. He’d been vaguely following Waia and the Chosen east towards the Willamette, but the two had quickly outpaced him, and the hiss of evaporating had stopped twenty minutes ago. Odds were, one of the two had killed the other and went on with its life. Once again, a dead end.

Mark stopped in the middle of what had once been a traffic light-laden intersection, with rusted metal barricades and non-functional spotlights indicating that it had been converted to a military police checkpoint in the days following the Nabbing. Mark looked down each of his potential routes, sighed behind his gas mask, and sat down in the snow. He could handle his entire lower half becoming soaked through.

The last three buildings that he had selected as viable scavenging options had all been revealed as duds by the reflective tape that the Servant scavengers had put up to mark their cleared-out venues, and those were just the ones where he hadn’t been able to spot the markers from a distance. Considering the fact that his backpack had been left in the parking garage when the building above was flattened, that confluence of events left Mark with absolutely nothing to keep him going besides his mask, his clothes that wouldn’t keep the surrounding radiation at manageable levels for much longer, and his multi-gun. At least the last time he had been alone for more than a few hours, he had had an SUV stocked full of radiation-free water and non-perishable food.

He was in the earliest stages of considering going to the Servants and begging them for admission when he noticed that the Servants were coming to him. The three Huntsmen’s arctic camouflage was made rather moot by the presence of their shoulder-mounted hand-crank flashlights. Then again, they weren’t exactly prioritizing staying hidden at this point.

Mark stood up, wiped his pants down, and waved at the approaching volunteers. There wasn’t much else around for him to do.

As the three approached, one of the Servants tilted her head to activate the compact radio visible behind her mask’s visor. Her voice was muffled by the two masks between her and Mark’s faces, but he still managed to vaguely put together her words. “This is SDT-17-6, reporting a sighting of unknown individual. Confirming identity now.”

“Don’t mind me, I’m with you guys,” lied Mark. The extra effort he had to put into each individual syllable to be heard through the mask helped mask the insecurity of his statement.

“You sure?” asked the Huntsman. “You’re dressed like a civvie, but we’ve got all our scavvers running teams of minimum five. And I did some time on watch duty, I don’t recall any of the locals being dressed like you.”

One of the other Huntsmen made a noise behind her head and cocked her head as she looked at Mark.

“Yeah, I, uh…” Mark scratched his side and looked down. “Okay, fine, I’m just passing through.”

“Huh,” said the Huntsman. “Didn’t think there were any folks not signed up, even this far north.”

“…Surprise.”

The second Huntsmen signed something to the third, who stared at Mark for a second before signing back.

Mark stared at the two’s silent conversation. “So now what? Do you arrest me or something? What’re you even doing out here, anyway? Figured all the Huntsmen in the city would’ve swarmed on the big lava monster out east.”

The Huntsman shrugged. “Chosen dealt with that a while back, actually. Blew the thing to smithereens. Bosses said that that was no excuse to slack off on our patrols, even though I’m not sure what we’re even looking for now that the Burning One’s dead as a doornail.”

The third Huntsman signed something to the second, who turned to the first. “Red, Simon says if you’re talking to this possibly-dangerous stranger like you’re around a water cooler again, he’s reporting you to the Huntmasters himself.”

“He can’t seriously be worried about the catgirl thing happening again,” said Red. “Wait, do you think the higher-ups know about that thing and that’s what we’re looking for? We did report it.”

“Di– I…” Mark struggled to think of where to move past all the curveballs that had just been thrown at him like it was nothing. “…Did you say ‘catgirl’?”

Pendleton sighed. ‘Red just brought up the cat and it’s confusing the quote-unquote ‘stranger’.’

Messier groaned. ‘Fine. Tell her who this guy is and maybe she’ll understand how to shut up.’

Pendleton nodded at her partner and turned back to Mark. “Yeah, y’know, you see the craziest things on the job. It’s, uh, y’know… fulfilling, or whatever. I’m sure you’d know about that kind of thing, seeing as I know you were locked up a while back under–” She leaned towards her subordinate and raised her voice. “–accusations of being a Primus!”

Mark, already frozen, felt like he might lock up permanently. “…Yeah, that… I recognize that voice.”

Red’s masked face turned ever-so-slightly to look at Pendleton. “…You can tell that just from, like, the hoodie?”

“Voice too,” said Pendleton. “It’s got that classic walking-joke-about-Mondays richness to it. So, uh, considering that I highly doubt someone with a record like that being saved by the Burning One only to turn up in the same city as it a week later is a coincidence…” She patted the stock of the shotgun slung over her shoulder. “…I think we might be about to stand out here for a little while.”

“I…” Mark probably should’ve expected everything would go downhill fast once the Servants got involved. That always happened. “…Look, I don’t really know where you’re going to take this, but there’s really nothing I can do to hurt anyone at this point. Like, she’s already dead apparently, and if you–”

“She?” asked Pendleton.

“…You didn’t know that.” Mark sighed. “Do you just want to interrogate me on this now of all times? Yes, the Burning One is a she, now what? You got rid of the last thing proving to be an actual problem for you, and I have no idea where I’m going to go from here or if I’m just going to starve or what. You don’t even know what to do out here, from the sounds of it. Can we all just, like, go home now?”

‘Either we do this now,’ signed Messier, once Pendleton had finished relaying all of Mark’s speech to him, ‘or the people back at base ask us about what happened to that stranger we called in already.’

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Pendleton repeated Messier’s explanation to Mark. “We’ll probably have to bring you in no matter what,” she added. “Nobody’s meant to be in the city proper at all without proper clearance.”

Mark groaned. “Seriously, why even bother with all this? The Burning One’s dead. You guys won. Is all this to rub it in my face specifically or something? Go home! There’s nothing out here anymore!”

‘Repeat the thing I mentioned about having already called him in,’ signed Messier.

Pendleton nodded. “It’s still true that you’ve–”

“I know you already told them about me!” Mark kicked at a pile of wet snow on the ground. “Why do they care?! You people are infuriating! What’s wrong with you?! Just let me leave and get on with what little’s left of my life!”

‘I don’t think he knows what ‘called in’ actually means,’ signed Messier.

It took a moment for Pendleton to get on with relaying Messier. “…I don’t know what to tell you, man, a job’s a job.”

Mark stared at Pendleton, his face unreadable behind his mask. He pointed at Messier. “You’re just saying what he’s saying, right?”

“More or less,” replied Pendleton.

Mark stomped up to Messier. “Get ready to repeat after me.”

“I’d think very carefully about what you’re about to do,” said Pendleton.

“Whatever.” Mark looked Messier in the eye, or where it would be behind the thick plexiglass of his mask. “You are like talking to a brick wall. I am aware that this isn’t going to be fun. What I am asking is why any of you care about making this big of a deal out of it. You’ve been doing nothing but ruin my day every day for the better part of a year. You know that, right? Or are you gonna keep saying how you’ve already called me in? Is there an actual human being I can–?”

Pendleton stepped between Mark and Messier. “Alright, buddy, that’s enough of that. You aren’t helping your case.”

Messier tapped Pendleton on the shoulder to get her eyes on him. ‘He said a lot, do I want to hear it?’

Mark stepped back and looked between the three Huntsmen. Gears were almost audibly turning behind his mask. “It’s… I’ve had a long day.”

“Yeah,” muttered Red, “join the club.”

“No, it’s…” Mark ran a hand down the length of his mask. “Look, I’ve dealt with the same stuff as you, and for way longer.”

“Oh,” said Pendleton, “did two thirds of your family also vanish into thin air?”

“Wha–? I’m not a Primus!” Mark resisted the urge to stomp back into the Huntsmen’s faces. “My name is Mark, I’m thirty-six years old, and I’m literally just some guy! Is that what you want?”

“Okay then,” said Red. “I don’t think you meant it by that, but you did make it sound like you volunteered for an apocalypse beta-test or something.”

“I…!” Mark breathed in through his nose and out through his mouth. “I’m not talking about the Na– about all that. I’m talking about the rest. The stuff in front of me. I’m telling you now that you can drop the whole just-following-protocol act, because nobody’s going to give you a backrub just because you were their specialest little boy.”

“Gross,” said Red.

“Whatever!” Mark gestured in the vague direction of the river. “They can’t hear you unless you turn that radio on again. They’re all the way out there, you can be honest here. I genuinely want to know, because you guys have fascinated me for a while: What are you getting out of this?”

Pendleton looked at her two partners, then back to Mark. “…Food?”

‘Nice job shutting him down, by the way,’ added Messier, as an aside to his two companions. ‘If we put this in our report, we might get a commendation.’

“…Was… Was I like this?” Mark stared at the Huntsmen as they had their own discussion amongst themselves. “Are you doing this on purpose now? Have you always been doing this on purpose?”

‘He’s stalling,’ signed Messier. ‘Let’s just bring him in before a secret Primus shows up and melts us or something.’

‘I’m inclined to agree,’ signed Pendleton in return. “Red, make sure this guy doesn’t do anything stupid.”

“Already watching him,” said Red, one hand on her shotgun.

After a moment’s pause, Mark snorted behind his mask. “Of course. I should’ve figured you people would sandbag me the second I try to point out how stupid and pointless all this is. Not really any other way to keep faith, huh?”

‘Alright, great,’ signed Messier, ‘now let’s get you out of here and back into a cell until we figure out what else you can give us about the Burning One.’

“The same Burning One you already killed?” asked Mark.

‘That’s the one.’ Messier produced a zip-tie from one of the pockets of his vest and walked towards Mark.

Mark looked past Messier at the other two Huntsmen. “You know, I was figuring at this point that it might be worth it to just try my luck and see if you would let me in. I haven’t eaten in hours, so I’m off my game and I’ve gotten pretty desperate.”

“Great,” said Pendleton, “you’ve got a head-start.”

Messier walked around Mark’s back, grabbed one wrist, and inspected the chrome cylinder tucked into his waistband.

“It’s a shame you guys are such bad salesmen.” Mark wheeled around and elbowed Messier in the side of the head.

Both of the other Huntsmen immediately unslung their shotguns. Mark immediately ducked to the side, interposing himself between the staggering Messier and the other Huntsmen. He pulled his cylinder out of his pants, pressed the button at its hilt, and pointed the newly-reformed taser at Red.

Two cables shot out of the mirror-polished handgun, landing in the middle of Red’s chest. The Huntsman jerked backwards and fell over, her shotgun firing wide into the air. Half a second later, Mark retracted the cables back into the gun and rolled forward.

Pendleton attempted to fire into Mark’s center of mass, but the shrunken target of his curled-up form plus the forced caution required from her due to Messier stumbling around directly behind him made the shot go wide. A square foot of snow four inches from Mark exploded in a cloud of greyish-white sludge.

Mark sprang out of his roll and punched Pendleton in the solar plexus with his free hand. The blow was lessened by her jacket, but Pendleton still doubled over as the air was knocked out of her lungs. Mark briefly glanced over his shoulder, saw Messier shaking his head in recovery, and stood up to his full height. He slid behind Pendleton’s bent-double form, wrapped his arm around her throat, and pulled her back up so that she acted as a human shield between Mark and Messier.

Messier raised his shotgun, but paused at the sight of Pendleton being held in front of his target. Mark seized the momentary hesitation by pressing the button now located at the base of his gun’s stock, transforming the end of the weapon into a cumbersome lamp reflector. Mark pointed the lamp-gun over Pendleton’s shoulder and pulled the trigger.

Artificial night was turned to artificial day for a quarter of a second. The searing beam had already shut off by the time Messier was able to react, recoiling and howling in pain as his vision filled with agonizing white.

Mark kept the lamp-gun trained on Messier until the Huntsman collapsed on the ground, writhing in pain. He sighed with relief. “That was the same intensity as a flash-bang, he’ll be okay in a minute or two.” With that, he struck Pendleton in the side of the head with the butt of his gun and dropped her into the snow.

Mark figured that the Servants really ought to have put more effort into actually teaching its soldiers basic tactical theory as he picked a random direction and ran out of sight of the stunned Huntsmen. At least his gambit of them having the slightest iota of collateral safety training paid off. Aside from that, little had happened other than losing hope for them. Plus he’d officially made his choice regarding how long it would take to starve to death: The Servants were against him, and he preferred it that way. Independence had been working out just great for him so far, hadn’t it?