After paving a furrow in the earth from all his pacing, Dorian peeked into the dilapidated warehouse for the umpteenth time and found things still the same. His friends sitting in a meditation pose with monster cores floating around them.

Dorian wanted to sit inside and watch them more closely and yet he refrained. The whole thing should it work, would be momentous and life-changing for all hunters. Not really understanding exactly what was going on and not wanting to influence anything, the hunter decided to play it safe and just wait outside.

Dorian leaned up against the flimsy wall of the structure and pulled up his terminal. With all the time on his hands, he finally decided to add the much-needed security that had proven insufficient in the face of a casual hand wave from a Steward.

Hours flew by with Dorian tinkering with his terminal and then creating a program to be sent to his friends to also bolster their own terminal's security. In a different world, Dorian knew he would have been good with computers and technology in general.

In this one, he was a hunter. A killer.

Long have debates been had on the criteria the System used to pick hunters, at least such debates had been had when the world cared about their chosen defenders. Many people had differing theories and yet there was one theory that pervaded through all. The willingness to kill.

It was something all hunters had in spades, the willingness, and the callousness to do what needed to be done and to do it over and over again. It was what had made some omnipotent god or being grant magnificent awe-inspiring abilities to ordinary men and women. The System had left and taken its powers along with it and left broken hunters in its wake. Now said hunters were regaining their power.

Dorian's thoughts screeched to a halt when the foulest smell he'd only ever smelled once hit his nose, making him retch. With a hand over his nose which really didn't help much, he peeked back into the warehouse and found black sludge dripping out of his friend's orifices and pores. With eyes tearing from the all-pervading smell, Dorian retreated a good distance away from the structure.

No way in hell was he staying in the vicinity of that smell.

Against his better judgement, Dorian drove home and took a much-needed shower and comforting himself with the thought that nothing— human or otherwise would want to get close to that stench. He packed up extra clothes, food and a portable burner knowing it was going to take a while and drove back to the warehouse, this time parking a little ways away.

As night fell, Dorian boiled noodles and dumped all the vegetables he found handy into it. He had to keep his word to himself. With dinner done, he climbed up to the roof of the van and laid on his back to stare at the stars. He hadn't done anything this freeing in such a long time that he spent hours just staring into space and the lights that dotted it.

The thought of stars and planets and the knowledge that humanity wasn't alone, what with the System and its monsters, had Dorian thinking of something he'd been actively avoiding. His powers and the ability he'd gained. Looking back at his last fight, the one against the Ratkin he grimaced when he thought of how he'd used his abilities then.

Years after the Systems departure and the first thing he had done when he'd gotten his power back was to use it like the damn thing was still around. Dorian tried to reason through his confusing feelings and made no headway, he knew for a fact it was the same for other hunters. They despised and at the same time revered the System, it had killed billions with its monsters and had also raised a few to fight for the ones left.

Unlike the other hunters though, Dorian had gotten his powers back bereft of the System and didn't really know how to feel about it. He missed the Systems blue boxes that had once filled his vision and made life so much simpler. It told him everything he needed to know— how to use his powers through stats, and what to do through quests.

And yet again, thinking of the boxes sent a wave of fear through him. To see that blue light would mean the power he currently wielded was given by the System and it could easily take it back like it once did. It was a confusing medley of emotions where he wanted direction and not to flounder but feared what getting that direction meant.

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Dorian closed his eyes and focused on the core within him, on the little spinning orb that reminded him of a black hole. He compared the feeling of the core within him and the feeling he'd gotten every time he pulled up his stat sheet to level up a skill or read some new quest. And with a smile, he found though the System was comforting in a messed up kind of way in its omniscient knowledge, he much preferred the feeling the core gave. It was a part of him and he chose to believe it could never be taken away.

He had to believe that.

With that realization came a sense of peace and a quieting of a voice that had been quietly clamouring for attention. With his new outlook, Dorian looked closely at his core and began to think of ways to really make use of it, to make what was essentially a part of him, his. Dorian sat up and looked around in the darkness to find something to truly test his powers on.

He thought of using the ability on himself but quickly discarded the idea, baby steps. It wasn't the fear of floating away into the inky black sky that stopped him. Not at all. Speaking of the black sky, Dorian looked up at the stars and a wild idea entered his mind. It was stupid in the extreme and yet his mind refused to let the idea go.

Knowing he was doing something monumentally stupid, Dorian reached out with his mind at a star he picked at random and tried to pull it towards him, towards Earth.

Nothing happened.

He laughed softly at the absurdity of his thought and was about to lay back when a sense of weakness hit him. He quickly checked his core to find it empty and spinning sporadically. Dorian frantically attempted to cut the energy flow but it was too late, a crack echoed in his mind and soul and he knew no more.

Dorian woke with the sun beating down on him, he attempted to move and a shooting pain from his midsection slammed him back into the roof of the van he'd spent the night on. With fear in his mind and a wildly beating heart, he closed his eyes to check his core and the sight of it deflated his body and made his heart sink.

The core was empty and spinning fitfully and along its side was a massive crack. Dorian didn't know how long he lay there staring at his core and the crack that seemed to mock him. Everything he'd done so far and the power he'd gained had been as a result of his running headfirst into situations he had no idea of. It had worked so far, till now.

It was the thought of his friends that finally gave him the strength and will to roll himself off the roof and onto the ground. The fall hurt and yet it paled in comparison to the pain the sight of the crack in his core elicited. With supreme effort, Dorian struggled to his feet and stumbled his way towards the warehouse.

As he walked, the less his core hurt though the thought of it still burned. The lessening of the foul smell saw Dorian moving in close and checking in on his friends, they were all still in the meditation pose and covered in the hardened black goop and breathing evenly. That was a relief.

With zombie-like movements he retreated to the van to prepare what he checked his terminal was lunch. The thought of sitting and eating with his mind occupied with his recent folly was too much and Dorian collapsed onto the floor of the van.

Hot tears slid down his cheek and thoughts best not had pervaded his mind. He had been at the crux of something special only to throw it all away with a stupid short-sighted mistake. Dorian was lost in his own world of pain and self-recriminations till a beep on his terminal roused him.

His friends were awake.

With renewed energy, Dorian struggled to his feet, grabbed his shopping bag from the mart and forced himself into a stumbling run towards the warehouse. He got there to the sounds of splashing and retching, with a strained smile he flung the shopping bag into the warehouse.

“There's soap and detergent in there, clean yourselves up. ”

With more energy in every step, he stumbled back to the van in the falling darkness and got spare clothing for his friends. After hours of scrubbing and swearing his friends exited the warehouse and Dorian's strained smile blossomed into a full-on grin.

Adonic was the word that came to mind when he saw his transformed friends. Dorian took a picture for posterity his terminal's flash lighting up the darkness.

“The hell was that for?” Dan complained.

“Don't worry about it, ” Dorian replied. “Now more importantly what ability did all of you get?”

“We have the cores you told us about, but they appear empty,” Jax said.

“Does this mean we get no powers?” a dejected-sounding Leo asked.

Dorian wondered why his core had formed full whiles theirs had formed empty of echo. The answer came to him when he remembered he had double the number of monster cores his friends had when he formed his own core. Which meant one thing, he had to get to the power plant and fill up on more cores.

“I think you just need to fill your cores and then we'll know what abilities you've gained. I gotcha on that front.”

'Assuming I still can.'

The thought of the power plant brought his mind back to his cracked core and Dorian's smile soured. Wanting to change the topic he continued, “Guessing you're all starving I know I was. ”

Receiving assents all around, the hunters piled up into the van and drove off. And hanging light years above them in a sea of stars was one star that shined just a bit brighter.