Blake laughed late into the night with his old friends at Montgomery’s parent’s house. It was the first time he had met his friend’s family, as they died shortly after Invasion day.

They were nothing like he expected. His mother was warm and kind, while his father was reserved, but friendly. He was not sure how they produced someone as unique as Montgomery, and could only assume his friend’s personality was due to nature, not nurture.

Their loss was the one topic guaranteed to silence Montgomery in the future. Blake was glad that his friend’s families would be safe from Invasion Day this time around.

After a large, home cooked breakfast of bacon and pancakes the next morning, Montgomery and Jeff packed for an extended stay at the faction town. Once goodbyes were exchanged, they left in Montgomery’s compact car.

Now, they drove along the highway back to Pinetop.

“It’s so green!” Montgomery said with awe. He craned his neck to watch the tall trees fly by.

“Watch the road,” Blake reprimanded his driver from the back seat.

Montgomery ignored him and continued to stare at the forest on both sides of the road. “Who knew there was a freakin’ forest just a couple hours from Phoenix?”

Blake wrinkled his brows in incredulity. “Pretty much everyone but you, evidently.”

Jeff nodded his agreement from the passenger seat.

The car drifted into the other lane, and an oncoming truck blasted its horn. Montgomery swerved to the right just before the vehicles collided.

“Can you please watch the road now?” Blake begged.

“Wow, you sound like my dad,” Montgomery laughed. “How old are you again? Eighty?”

“Twenty-eight,” Blake forced out through gritted teeth.

“Besides, what are you worried about? You’re bulletproof.”

“You and Jeff aren’t,” Blake reminded him.

“Not yet,” Montgomery agreed. “When do we get to dodge bullets and throw fireballs?”

Blake snorted. “You’re never gonna dodge bullets. But, if you become a mana user, you can throw a fireball at level one if you want.”

Montgomery’s eyes lit up at the thought. “How long will that take?”

“That depends on you and Jeff. But, if you work your asses off, maybe a month or so.”

Montgomery grimaced. “You DO sound like my dad.”

Blake rolled his eyes and thought he saw Jeff silently laugh.

An hour later, they arrived at their property. It was hard to see the town within as trees and bushes lined the road. However, when they turned into the short gravel drive and stopped at the old metal farm gate, the buildings in the distance were finally made visible.

“Crazy,” Montgomery remarked. “It’s like a ren-fair or somethin.”

“For now,” Blake agreed and opened the car door. “It’ll look nicer when we upgrade the buildings.” He then exited the vehicle and opened the gate. After Montgomery taxied through, he closed the thin metal barrier and hopped inside the compact car.

As they drove toward the center of the lot, they passed a row of old diesel trucks. Half of them were rusted, and the paint was faded, but Blake didn’t care what they looked like. As long as they ran and were converted over in time, they would be priceless. Those trucks would allow them to traverse long distances to rescue people and scavenge necessary supplies.

I hope it’s enough.

“Where should I park?”

“Here’s fine,” Blake responded.

After they exited the vehicle, Montgomery stared at the bunkhouse and frowned. “Is that where we’re going to sleep?”

“Yep,” Blake confirmed. “You and Jeff grab your bags, and I’ll show you to your rooms.”

“I call top bunk,” Montgomery announced.

“You guys don’t have to share a room yet. We’ve got plenty of space. It’s just the three of us living here right now.”

As they walked past the faction hall, Blake noticed Jordan and Brent hard at work. They were on opposite sides of the building, and focused on its expansion. At level three, its footprint would be four times the size it was at level two, and it would soon have a second story.

“Welcome back,” Jordan greeted him in his southern drawl.

“Thanks Jordan.” Blake pointed to Montgomery and Jeff. “These two are our new recruits, Montgomery and Jeff. Jordan here and Brent over there are our two constructors. These two are going to clear scenarios like me.”

Jordan stood and shook each of their hands. “Nice to meet ya.”

“How long do you think it’ll take to finish the upgrade?” Blake asked and saw Montgomery shift impatiently next to him.

“Don’t rightly know,” Jordan admitted. “But if I had to guess, I’d say another two or three days. Of course, that assumes we get the nano we need.”

“How long until we run out?”

“A few hours at most.”

“Well, after I get them settled in, I’ll transfer some more over to the treasury.”

Jordan nodded. “Appreciate it.”

The constructor returned to work, and Blake waved goodbye. The three men passed by the well and entered the two-story bunkhouse. Blake turned to his friends. “Do you guys want the first floor or second?”

Jeff shrugged, while Montgomery added, “What eves.”

“First floor it is, then,” Blake decided and turned to his left. He heard typing from the first room on his right, and poked his head inside.

“Oh, hey Blake,” his mother greeted him. “When you’ve got a minute, I have some things to talk about.”

“Sure, let me just get these two settled into their new rooms.” He pointed at Jeff and Montgomery.

“Oh! Are these the friends you were telling me about?” She stood, walked into the hallway, and shook each of their hands.

“Yeah, that’s Montgomery, and this is Jeff.” Blake pointed each out.

“Nice to meet you, Mrs…” Montgomery trailed off.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Just call me Donna, and if there’s anything you need, let me know.”

Blake waved goodbye, and continued down the hallway until the corridor ended. “Here you go, pick a room.”

Jeff tried to open the door on his right, but instead ran into an invisible wall. “Oww,” he complained and rubbed his knuckles.

“Sorry. Let me give you two permission to enter.” Blake opened his interface, navigated through the menus, and assigned the two rooms to his friends. “There you go, now the room belongs to you.”

“Wait, what the hell is going on?” Montgomery demanded.

“It’s just building and room permissions. Right now, only Jeff is allowed in his room. The Collective will stop anyone else from entering.”

Jeff opened the door and dropped his bag in the center of the floor. Inside the eight by eight room was a twin-sized bed, a couch, and a chest of drawers.

Nice, they furnished all the rooms, not just mine.

Blake was incredibly grateful that his mother attended to the details. It left him open to grow stronger and take on any assignments like he had in Phoenix.

“I gotta see this,” Montgomery insisted as he strode past Blake into an invisible wall. “Oof.”

Blake laughed. “He’s gotta invite you in.”

Montgomery ran his hands along the invisible barrier and pushed. He then set his own bag down and leaned into the doorway.

When he began to strain with the effort involved, Jeff grinned and said, “Come in.”

Montgomery suddenly fell forward into the room. “Ahh!” His arms pinwheeled and he crumpled to the ground. He groaned as he lay sprawled out on the wooden planks of the floor. “Asshole.”

“Nice one, Jeff.”

Jeff grinned.

Okay, enough playing around.

“Bathroom’s down the hall. If you get hungry, you can head over to the cookhouse. My dad will fix you up some food. Don’t worry, he’s an amazing cook. He actually had his own restaurant before all this”

“Nice,” Montgomery said while he slowly climbed to his feet.

Blake nodded. “I’m going to see what my mom wants and then get something to eat. After that, I can get you guys some gear I stashed for you and start your training. I’m sure you two want to get started right away, am I right?”

“Twink us out! Hell yeah!” Montgomery agreed.

“Hell yeah,” Jeff added, albeit less enthusiastically.

He nodded goodbye to his friends and entered his mother’s temporary office. “What’s up, mom?”

“Have a seat,” she gestured toward the sofa as she swiveled around in her office chair.

Blake frowned, but complied.

This can’t be good.

“So, I talked with Jessica last night for over an hour. She’s a smart woman. She thinks she can secure a two million dollar loan in the next month, but she’s worried that it won’t be enough.” Donna paused. “I have to agree.”

Blake nodded slowly and accepted their judgment. “Okay, then what do we do?”

“The only three options I see are scaling back operations, securing new funding, or resorting to crime.”

“Crime?” Blake frowned, but was inwardly surprised his mother presented the option. “Like robbing a bank?”

Donna shook her head. “If only it were so easy. Even if you made it out with a bag full of cash, it wouldn’t be that much, and almost no one takes cash anyway. Not for the large purchases. For that, you need a financial institution, which is going to ask where you got the money from.”

“Okay, then what kind of crime?”

She hesitated. “I don’t even like to suggest it, as it just feels wrong. But, if everything is going to end in four months anyway, I don’t see how it’ll matter.” Donna took a deep breath. “One of our biggest expenses is supplies. What if Jason made a trip to a lumberyard and used his class ability to teleport the wood from there to the warehouse?”

Blake slowly nodded. “That might work for the low level buildings, but I’d only resort to that if we get desperate.”

“I agree.”

“We can also send Jason out with a chainsaw to the National Forest. Lots of downed trees he can cut up and transport.”

“That’s a good idea.”

“I have one occasionally,” Blake smiled. “What about if we scale back? How far do we need to go?”

“That depends, do you still plan to house ten thousand people in four months?”

Blake nodded. “If I can, yes. We need to save as many as we can.”

“That’s going to use a lot of wood.” She shook her head. “I still don’t see how it’s even possible to house that many people in such a small area.”

“Each time you level the bunkhouse up, it gains another two floors.”

“That still isn’t that many rooms. At eight per floor, that’s only thirty-two when upgraded, or…” she trailed off as she did the more difficult calculation. “...or forty-eight if we upgrade it to level three.”

“I’m sure people will be more than happy to have roommates if it means not dying,” Blake said dryly.

“You’d think so, but you’d be surprised,” she chuckled. “So, if we have four people per room with forty-eight rooms, that’s almost two hundred people per building. If you want to house ten thousand, that’s…” she turned to the laptop behind her and used the calculator app. “Fifty, level three bunkhouses.”

Blake winced. “You’re right, that IS a lot of wood.”

Donna swiveled her chair to face her son. “It’s also going to take a lot of time for Brent and Jordon to build them. I’m not sure that it’s even possible for them to build fifty bunkhouses in the time we have left, let alone upgrade them. Are they even going to fit on fifty acres?”

“Oh yeah, there’s plenty of room,” Blake said confidently.

“Let’s see,” she said and turned back to her laptop. “A fifty acre square is…” she typed a query into the search bar. “...a little under fifteen hundred feet on each side. We’re a bit of a rectangle, but that shouldn't matter too much. Each bunkhouse is about forty feet long, and twenty-five feet wide.”

“Just round that up to fifty feet so you can walk between them,” Blake suggested.

His mother nodded. “Okay, so if we have two rows of twenty-five bunkhouses, that’s actually doable.” Donna swiveled back to her son. “It actually takes up a lot less space than I thought it would,” she admitted.

“Yeah. It’ll leave room for Mister Grayburn to farm, once we get that made.”

“Oh, that’s finished already.”

“Really? How did I miss that?”

“It’s on the North side, there were probably buildings in the way. Here, let me share my interface with you.”

Her eyes crossed as she navigated the menus within her heads-up display. Suddenly, a list appeared before Blake.

Faction Structures

Faction Hall - lvl 3 (Under Construction)

1 - Metal Workshop - lvl 2

1 - Wood Workshop - lvl 2

1 - Quarry - lvl 2

1 - Well - lvl 1

1 - Bunkhouse - lvl 1

1 - Cookhouse - lvl 1

1 - Farm - lvl 1

1 - Glassblower’s Workshop - lvl 1 (Under Construction)

“Oh, you started the glass shop too?” Blake asked rhetorically.

Donna nodded. “They finished the farm before you gained the faction hall’s supplies, so I had them start on that next. It’s a requirement for most upgrades, so I figured we should probably get working on it. Although, it’s on hold until we finish upgrading the faction hall.”

“Smart. That way, we get two more constructors once we hit level three, according to Metal.”

The last time he summoned Metal, his companion had revealed what each level of faction hall granted them. At level one, the faction was limited to a single constructor, a sphere of claimed territory with a radius of five hundred feet, and a faction roster of fifty people.

At level two, you were allowed two constructors, a thousand-foot radius of territory, and five hundred members. Level three would grant them four constructors, a two-thousand foot radius, and five thousand members. Each level afterward granted similar expansions.

Of course, until Invasion day, they could only build within their leased property. If they expanded outside of it, their industriousness would likely alert the authorities. It made things far more difficult for Blake, but there was nothing he could do about it.

After a pause, Donna asked, “Do you have anyone in mind for the positions? If not, I’ll ask for family members of our faction first.”

Blake was about to respond, when a message suddenly appeared within his vision.

Oliver Summers: Hey Blake, think you can pick me up?

Blake glanced at his mother. “Looks like Oliver needs a ride. I’m kind of busy, do you have anyone that can pick him up?”

“Of course. Where is he?”

Lord Blake Summers, Scion of Humanity: Sure, where are you?

Oliver Summers: Not sure. I had some cops chasing me near the grocery store, for uh… some reason. I ran through the woods, saw the fire tower, and then had the best idea. Cops can’t follow me through the portal, am I right? It worked great, but it won’t let me back through until I finish the scenario. Can you come finish it for me real quick?

Lord Blake Summers, Scion of Humanity: YOU DID WHAT?!?!?!