“So,” Rick asked. “So how does level up a caravan work?”

“Progression is straightforward,” Slate continued, his tone growing more animated. “You build a group of serious dungeon crawlers. They level up, gear up, form a retinue, and earn the right tokens to build their base. Then they win a challenge dungeon to get a transport token. And that’s our ticket off the planet.”

Rick nodded slowly. “So the transport token is key?”

Slate grinned. “It’s the transport token that lets your mobile base move to another world.”

Rick leaned back, processing the information. “And let me guess. We find these tokens….”

“At the end of the hardest dungeons on the planet, of course.”

“Where else?” He sighed. “Right. I’ll make sure to pass this along to Gambit. Let’s get back to business.”

Schneider indicated that only one person was needed for guard duty, so Rick figured it was more like a retinue slot that needed to be filled than an actual risk of attack. Gambit and Daniel declared they wanted to get some rest, leaving Rick to fill out the role as the caravan got underway. He could have given the job to one of the other Mars Expedition survivors, but he was wary after seeing Schneider’s new weird dual personality quirk. Until he understood better what was going on, he didn’t want to sacrifice any other humans to the System’s tender mercies.

The Mars Expedition team hitched up the large dinosaur-like six-legged beasts with practiced efficiency, even though they had never done it before. In a few minutes, the wagons were rolling out of the clearing.

Rick rode on top of the first wagon in the line, sitting just behind Dr. Schneider, who was handling the reins. Slate climbed up and rode with him, and Rick used the opportunity to ask the game guide more questions.

“Once we get off-world, then what happens?” Rick asked.

“How should I know?” Slate replied, exasperated. “I’ve been trying to get off this rock for a million years.”

Rick seized on the opening. “A lot of you Rorks talk about millions of years for this and thousands of years for that. Has Mars really been a game system for that long? How long has it been? Are your people really from Mars, or have you always lived in the game?”

“My ancestors were from Mars. I was born here in the system. I’m fourth generation, more or less. And yes, it really has been millions of years. How long it has been, and what our world was like before? We’ve pretty much lost all that. As for how long, things work… differently… in here. I’ve met players who were born when our sun wasn’t even burning yet.”

Rick tried to imagine that, and couldn’t. “So, this probe just came along and slurped all of Mars up like a vacuum?”

“The probe has a minimum number of inductees for every civilization it encounters. It looks for volunteers first, but if it can’t find enough, it fills out the quota with whoever it can grab. My ancestors were already on the decline. It took three-quarters of a million of us. Nobody knows if there were others left behind.” Slate had a wistful note in his voice. “Do you know? Your people were on Mars, are there Rorks there still?”

Rick shook his head. “Our scientists didn’t believe Mars ever was home to anything more complicated than lichen. It’s been… a long time. We haven’t found any trace of your people.” At Slate’s dejected look, he quickly added, “But we’ve only been looking for forty years or so, and this was the fourth manned expedition we’d sent. There’s a lot of Mars we hadn’t visited.”

“It’s all right.” Slate shook his head. “You don’t have to try to make me feel better. Rorks live here, now.”

The wagons creaked past the stone spire. Rick waved to the guards, but they didn’t wave back. Then they trundled up the road through the boulder field where Rick and the others had found the Mars Expedition survivors.

Rick wondered aloud, “What would we do if another caravan came the other direction?”

Slate laughed. “It doesn’t matter. It’s instanced. There’s just us on this road, and there will be until we get to where we’re going.

“Good,” Rick was relieved.

“Unless we get attacked.” Slate added.

Rick was surprised. The impression he’d gotten from Dr. Schneider was that guard duty was merely a formality, but Slate bore a serious expression. The Rork glanced at the spire dwindling behind them. “The first attack should be right about now.”

The first wave of attackers hit the caravan just as they topped a rise.

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They had wings like bats, though colored like butterflies, and swooped down on the line of wagons from above. They were labelled as [Axe-Tails] and each had 20 HP. He spotted five of them in the attack wave.

Rick jumped up and raised his hands to Force Wave, but the first one reached him before he had a chance.

It hissed at him with a fanged mouth. Its jaw and face were tiny, like a bat, even though the wings were five feet across. Its small face resembled a cat, and it had a long, sinuous tail tipped with wide curved axe-shaped barbs that lashed and cut him across the bicep. He ducked away, protecting his face, and the attacker was gone in a flap of leathery wings.

Another circled above, and farther down the line, three more dropped from out of the sun, making dive-bombing passes at the driver of the second wagon, Dr Takashi. The slashing tails sliced the driver. He cried out in pain, voice echoing along the caravan, his health dipping precariously to 7/14 HP.

What happened to the NCP expedition survivors if they died again? Rick wasn’t going to wait to find out. He jumped up and ran down the length of his own wagon. The dinosaur-sized beast pulling the next wagon was close, its back broad.

Rick took a chance. He leaped off his own wagon and landed on the creature's back with surprising ease.

Takashi was in range. Rick threw Healing Mist, taking him back up to full health. Another of the Axe-tails was diving down, and Rick followed up his heal with a Protect to protect the driver. The Axe-tail's attack glanced off the shield of magic, and it veered away.

Rick kept moving. He ran down the back of the dinosaur mount and along its wide tail, Flintstone-fashion. Now he was close enough to leap for the driver's seat. He fell short, catching the edge just below the driver's seat and pulled himself up.

A notification scrolled up his vision [Your Skill in Jump has increased by 1!] At least there was some benefit to his crazy tactics. But how was he going to fight all these off on his own?

He scrambled up into the driver’s seat, heaving upright.

"Thanks," Takashi said with heartfelt emotion. "I thought that one had me."

"It looks like there's more down the line," Rick replied.

A notification popped up. [Caravan Attack: Phase One – Survive the Initial Assault Complete.]

[Phase Two – Save Wagon Number Three.]

Rick turned and took off running down the roof toward Wagon Three. Sure enough, two Axe-tails were making swooping passes—one attacking the driver and another harassing the mount.

The dinosaur snapped at the swooping bat-butterfly. It connected, and a health bar, half gone, appeared over the flying creature.

Rick ran flat-out for the end of his wagon. He jumped.

The half-dead bat was swooping in again. Rick's leap took him straight into it. He swung a fist as they collided. The impact knocked the wind out of him, and he fell hard onto the back of the dinosaur, but the dead bat fell next to him.

[Unarmed Combat +1]

[Jumping +1]

[Achievement: Air Combat - Kill a Creature you are while in the Air]

Rick looted the body as he jumped to his feet, then took off running down the dinosaur. The dinosaur's tail swished as Rick tried to balance. He lost his footing. He tumbled to the ground and barely threw himself to the side before the wheels of the wagon rolled over him. He rolled over and over, then scrambled up.

The driver of Wagon Three, Elliot Mason, was waving his hands wildly to ward off the attacker. The bat-butterfly's health bar did not budge.

I guess that is what is means to be non-combat players, Rick thought as he lined up his Protection.

He fired the shielding spell and followed up immediately with a Healing Mist. It ticked twice before the bubble broke, and Mason was back to almost full health.

The wagon was pulling away. Rick jumped up and ran after it, trying to keep up with a near-galloping dinosaur. He was reaching for the rear ladder as the next announcement popped up:

[Phase Three - Defend Wagon Number Four]

Rick dropped back and turned. The fourth wagon’s draft dinosaur passed him. He leaped for the ladder at the front of the wagon, a risky move with the enormous rotating wheel just beside the ladder. Rick caught hold of the rungs and scrambled up all the way to the driver's station.

Dr Eva Martel held the reins, looking impassive. "I've activated the defenses. You should use those."

Rick was about to ask what defenses she meant. There was a grinding clank, and he turned his head to see a crossbow turret emerging from a hatch in the middle of the wagon. It was an impressive contraption. It had a seat at the back and quad crossbows mounted to the front with an array of arms and levers. Rick didn't stop to study it, just ran over and jumped into the seat. He was worried the strange device would require a special skill, but as soon as his butt hit the seat, a giant button appeared in the center of his interface that said [Fire]

An aiming reticule appeared in front of him and moved with his vision.

Oh, right, one of those mini-games. Rick had never minded vehicle-based combat, but some of Team Technique had bitched long and hard any time they were required to use a different skill. Jens had never been able to get the concept of leading his target.

He swung around to acquire the nearest bat, which was swooping back down to harass Dr, Martel as she drove Wagon Four. The reticule snapped onto the bat. Rick mentally slammed on the fire button.

Cogs and levers whirred on the crossbow turret. Actuator arms pistoned up and down, and the bows were drawn back.

**Twang, Twang, Twang**

The four crossbows revolved around the mechanism, and as each one reached the top, its bolt was released.

Sweet! A Gatling crossbow turret! Rick held down the fire button. There was an ammunition counter in the corner that started at 100 shots and spun rapidly down as his bolts riddled the target.

The bat plummeted from the sky, looking more like a porcupine than a bat.

Rick looked around for more attackers. As his reticule reached the edge of his vision, the whole turret rotated to follow. It was disorienting at first, but Rick rapidly got a feel for it.

The next phase announcement popped up.

[Protect Wagon Five.]

The flying attackers of Wagon Five were much farther away. Rick's reticule didn’t snap onto the targets. He quickly realized he had to lead the target, or the bolts would arc harmlessly beyond. It took a bit of trial and error, and he was almost starting to think Jens was right, but at last Rick took down the final two bats. The ammo counter had reached 64, which Rick didn’t think was half bad.

[Quest Complete: Defend the Caravan.]

Light exploded around Rick as he leveled up to six.