“You mad, bro?”

Gene tried to ignore Johnny’s irritating voice. He knew that was mostly because of the lack of sleep due to the mental assaults they’d all been undergoing. Finally given confirmation with the recent attack that had struck Bastien and left him bleeding from the brain. The nightmares had officially crossed over into reality. They were all waiting for their turn.

Which was the main reason that Remy was sending them all back to base ahead of schedule, with the exception of Tessa. She had one last mission to do before joining them.

“Guys I think, Gene’s mad,” Johnny continued in a loud whisper. “His eye’s twitching—”

“— like it always does when you’re talking too much,” Mads said flatly.

“Alright, I’ll shut up. I was just going to say that we shouldn’t be mad. Need those positive vibes, dudes. We need to chill. The enemy doesn’t want that. He wants us all pissed and stressed like we’ve been for months,” Johnny said.

“Eight weeks. Almost to the day since I had my first nightmare,” Gene said. “We haven’t had more than a few hours of uninterrupted sleep in two months. That damned music is playing through my head as I speak.”

“It’s in mine too and I’m trying, bro. Turn that frown ups—”

“Dude, just shut up!” Olo snapped.

Eyes went wide.

“That’s not like, but okay. Quiet time,” Johnny mimed zipping his lips.

The rest of the flight was completed in silence, welcome to most of them, if awkward.

“So… are we still on the buddy system?” Johnny said as the transport doors opened.

“No. We’re all going to be closely monitored by dedicated medical teams. Anything happens and they’ll be on us in seconds,” Gene said.

“What if I need a few minutes of privacy?” Johnny said.

“Temporarily suspended.”

“What Gene’s trying to say is don’t do anything you’d be embarrassed by,” Olo said.

“Yeah, keep it in your pants,” Bastien added.

“Even in my quarters?” Johnny feigned outrage.

“Especially there, you degenerate,” Mads said.

“What?” Johnny blinked. “Isn’t that the only place it’d be acceptable in?”

The argument continued as Johnny pestered Mads while the two headed into the base.

“Hold on,” Olo held up a hand.

Bastien and Gene eyed him.

“Just give them a minute or two to get far enough ahead that we don’t have to listen,” Olo explained.

“I think you need a break more than I do,” Bastien said.

“Seconded,” Gene added. “And Bastien’s the one that was leaking brain fluid just a few days ago.”

“Accurate, if macabre,” Bastien said.

“Sorry, guys. I just feel helpless. Weak,” Olo said.

“We’re all in the same boat,” Bastien said.

“Attention, Designation: Bastien. Designation: Mother requests your presence in Medical Chamber 2 immediately.” A flat-toned voice filled the chamber.

“Right, more testing, later,” Bastien hurried down the transport ramp and toward the same corridor that Johnny and Mads had already disappeared into.

“What’re you gonna do?” Gene said.

“Dunno… lift weights,” Olo shrugged.

“Want to fight first?”

“Seriously?”

“I have a headache and I just want to sleep, but I also don’t want to sleep… you get me?”

“Same,” Olo said.

“Might as well get some practice in.”

“Let’s see if we can get some team battles going if there are any uniques in the training chamber,” Olo said.

“I was thinking just us two. The commander won’t like us disrupting assigned training patterns.”

“So, Shira will override them. Especially, if they get to participate,” Olo said.

“Shira? I was thinking of a light workout. Safe and not life-threatening,” Gene grimaced.

“You’re the one always complaining about being behind in levels. You’re guaranteed one or two if Shira fights you… even if they’re holding back and not actually trying to kill you,” Olo said. “Think of it as the price for dual-classing.”

Several minutes later, Gene breathed a sigh of relief.

The training chambers were all empty.

“You dodged a bullet,” Olo smirked.

“Alright, let’s gear up and get going.”

“How are we doing this? Simulated combat with the holograms? Or straight up PVP?” Olo said.

“Why not both?”

“Holograms first.”

“You trying to tire me out first?” Gene grinned.

“Nah. We won’t get the chance to do the sims after I beat you up,” Olo shrugged. “This is the only way we’ll get to do both and I really want a chance to cut loose, which we can’t against each other.”

They donned training gear and entered the empty chamber. This was one of the smaller ones, about half the size of a football field. There was one chamber that was the size of a small town in length, width and height.

The gear would keep them safe while accurately modeling damage. They’d feel pain and end up bruised, but be spared from broken bones or anything fatal. In any case, medical was always watching whenever a training chamber was in operation.

“Which program do you want to go with? Something easy to start?” Olo said.

“Solo boss-style fight?”

“That doesn’t sound easy, but… okay,” Olo shrugged.

“Computer…” Gene called out, “give us an Orchestral Meridian sub-level as the setting and a single Gyxdor as the opponent. Blind start.”

“The fuck, man?” Olo said.

“We’ve never had the chance to try him out. I want to see how accurate the programming is. It’ll be a good test in case we ever go up against the real thing.”

The virtual intelligence began counting down from ten.

“You know they’re never going to put us up against him as anything other than support, distant ones at that. We’ll get flattened,” Olo said.

“Then it’s good that the worse we’ll get here are some bruises.”

“Easy for you to say. You’re not the one tanking,” Olo grumbled.

The open space slowly filled in with a near-perfect replica of a typical Orchestral Meridian sub-level. Lights illuminated the metallic surfaces.

“He doesn’t know where we are, right?” Olo gripped a large rectangular shield and spear in either hand. “Feels like I’m wielding a toothpick against that monster.”

Gene put his helmet on and drew his longsword. He kept his left hand free to wield his magic.

“Maybe you should start with the gun?” Olo said.

“I’m trying to be a Magesword—”

“If that’s even a thing,” Olo muttered.

“If Bennett can be a Vampire, then I can be whatever I want,” Gene said. “Anyways, this is practice, so I need to use the two things I need for the potential class. Magery and a sword.”

“Fine… what’s the plan? I’m thinking our only chance is an ambush,” Olo said.

“We find a long, narrow corridor with duct work or side chambers. You taunt him to you and when he’s distracted I’ll unload on his face—”

Olo snickered.

“Grow up, dude. You’re like 25,” Gene frowned.

“26, actually.”

“Shit… really? Damn, does that mean I’m 26 too?”

“Yup. We had birthdays a few months ago. You were there.”

“Yeah, but I thought that was for you and Bastien.”

“You too. Johnny’s is coming up… I think. I’ve sorta lost track of time,” Olo shrugged.

“Jesus… same here apparently,” Gene shook his head. “Whatever, the plan… you’re the bait. I’ll hit him with spells and try to take out his eyes. His big ass should have trouble moving through a narrow corridor. Once he’s blinded we’ll take him out a cut at a time. You can shoot him to your heart’s content at that point.”

“No offense, but that’s terrible,” Olo said.

“Yeah, good thing this isn’t real then… so, let’s start looking for him.” Gene walked through the only door out of their starting area.

“Fuck! He’s going to hear us coming,” Olo said as he followed.

The big man was right.

As it turned out the training chamber was too small to face an opponent of Gyxdor’s type. Even if this one was a simple copy made from the mixture of machine skeleton and hard light hologram.

It didn’t take long for heavy, lumbering steps to shake the entire place around the two.

They had failed to find a corridor long and narrow enough to suit Gene’s plan.

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Instead they were in a wide chamber with several platforms of varying height arranged in a fashion that reminded them of living quarters. They also made a convenient obstacle course.

“He’s coming from above us!” Gene said.

“How do you know? The whole room is shaking—” Olo began.

The screech of tearing metal swallowed the rest of Olo’s words.

“Above us!” Gene pointed.

Gray fingers big enough to grab him around his torso were ripping through the ceiling. The tell-tale protrusion of ivory bone around the knuckles and other finger joints was a tell-tale sign of their opponents identity if they hadn’t already known.

“That looks so real. You know, I’m glad that we’ve never seen Gyxdor up close before,” Olo said.

The Gyxdor copy had torn an opening large enough so that they could see his broad, snarling face with fearsome eyebrow ridges of bone poking through the thick skin.

“So real…” Olo stared up. “I know it’s mostly holograms, but damned if I can tell the difference.”

“Fireball,” Gene pointed his free hand. An orb of fire flew and struck the Gyxdor copy.

The flame and smoke cleared to reveal a singed face. Black eyes stared down at them.

“Didn’t work,” Olo said.

“Magic Missile.”

Two marble-sized orbs of purple energy arced up.

The Gyxdor copy pulled his face away from the hole.

“Did you get him?” Olo said.

“I didn’t see,” Gene frowned. “Get over there,” he pointed to the space between two pillars. They were wide enough that they looked like a corridor, just not as long as they wanted. “I’m going to try to get out of sight. See if you can get him to follow you through that. Might get him stuck long enough for our plan.”

“I doubt that,” Olo said. “He’s tearing through the ceiling like it’s made out of paper.”

Sure enough the Gyxdor copy had widened the hole big enough to get through.

“Go!” Gene barked while he ran to the opposite side of the chamber where there was a large number of obstacles he could hide behind.

Olo went to the mouth of the opening and waited for the Gyxdor copy to drop down to the floor.

The entire chamber shook with the impact as the fake Inheritor landed with a booming thud.

“On me!” Olo banged spear to shield.

He didn’t wait to see if his Skill took hold on the Gyxdor copy. He turned and sprinted into the corridor-like space. Judging by the roaring and the sound of thudding steps, it had worked.

“Oh… crap! It’s a dead end!” Olo called out.

Neither he nor Gene had checked.

Olo turned at the sound of rending metal.

The Gyxdor copy was indeed too wide for the space that could only fit two Olo’s shoulder to shoulder. However, he was strong enough to simply deform the pillars to make room.

Olo raised his shield as the fake Inheritor drew closer. “Bulwark.”

A massive fist struck and he was driven back into the wall.

“Fatal damage. You are incapacitated,” the voice in his helmet said in a flat tone.

The training armor locked his movement and all he could do was stand there as the fake Inheritor turned in search of the remaining target.

“Oh well… shouldn’t take long,” Olo sighed. He couldn’t warn Gene even if he wanted to. He was dead according to the rules and as such had to wait until the end of the program or for someone to let him out. At least it wouldn’t take long. Gene wasn’t going to last against that thing.

Olo watched through the gaping passage the Gyxdor copy had made. He couldn’t see much aside from several flashes of different colored light. Gene’s spells.

Gene hadn’t seen what happened and Olo wasn’t responding, which meant that his friend was out.

The plan was a spectacular failure.

He was running and dodging through the various obstacles while blindly firing spells behind him at the gigantic chasing fake Inheritor. He decided at that moment that he never wanted to do this out in the real world.

He hit a large open space and was suddenly flying through the air. He registered the fist hitting his back a split-second later.

When he hit the ground, he couldn’t move.

A flat voice in his helmet announced his demise.

The landscape disintegrated into nothing.

Bright lights revealed the empty training chamber.

Olo was leaning against the far wall.

“We lost,” Gene said.

“Yeah, it was a spectacular failure. I got one-hit. You?” Olo called back.

“Same.”

“I feel a giant bruise forming on my arm,” Olo said.

“My back…”

“Let’s do something easier next?” Olo said.

“Horned chimps?”

“How many?”

“A troop?”

“Not with just us two…”

“Four?”

“Okay. That sounds reasonable.”

At Gene’s direction the landscape shifted to resemble a forest. Trees, grass, dirt. The whole thing.

“Birds even chirping and shit,” Olo said.

“I like the breeze and the smells,” Gene said.

“You know, I’ve been here for almost a year and I still don’t know how the Threnosh pulled this whole danger room thing off,” Olo said.

“You could ask. I did.”

“And?”

“It was a highly technical answer that I couldn’t understand.”

“What about the fruit?” Olo pointed to a few plump specimens hanging off a nearby tree.

“What about them?”

“If they can do smells, then maybe they can do tastes.”

“It’s a hard light hologram,” Gene said flatly.

“Oh… yeah, that makes sense… maybe in a few months,” Olo shrugged.

“Computer… begin,” Gene called out.

“Acknowledged.”

Horned chimps hooted from what felt like every direction. Branches shook and fist struck trunks.

It was a hard battle, but a fairer one.

The two young men were bruised more at the end of it, but felt much better about their abilities after coming through with a clear victory.

Gene examined the edges of his practice sword. There were more than a few nicks from the fight, but it didn’t look bad enough for him to switch to another one. His armor was scratched and dented, but was similarly in good enough shape. “You want to switch out for a new shield? I can wait.” He eyed the huge fist-shaped dent in the middle of Olo’s rectangular shield.

“I’m good.”

“You sure? Isn’t it hitting your arm?”

“Nah, it’s curved, so the dent isn’t touching me. Close though, but I think it’s fine for our upcoming short fight,” Olo grinned.

Gene snorted.

“I’m ready when you are,” Olo banged spear and shield.

“You don’t want to switch weapons?” Gene frowned.

“Nope. It’ll be harder this way,” Olo replied.

“Hoping to get more out of this then. Suit yourself,” Gene nodded. “Any battlefield requests?”

“This is fine,” Olo gestured to the same forest environment they had just defeated the fake monsters in.

“Computer, we’re doing a one versus one fight—”

“Best two out of three,” Olo added.

“What he said… on ten.”

“Acknowledged.”

Gene struck as soon as the countdown ended.

“Fireball.”

Olo blocked it with his shield while Gene dashed forward in an angle toward Olo’s spear side.

“Mage Shield!”

A ghostly buckler with a purple tinge appeared around Gene’s fist. He used it to punch away Olo’s probing spear thrust.

“Quick Cut!”

Gene’s blade carve through the air with a whistle.

“Block!”

Olo’s shield moved with the perfect blend of quickness and technique to intercept and deflect the blade before it could strike him on the side of the head.

“Shield Bash.”

It slammed toward Gene, but he was already backing away.

“No Power Strike, nor Cleave with a spear,” Gene chided.

“You might be right about the latter, but I figure I just need to keep trying for the former,” Olo said. “That one should be usable with every weapon.”

“Why not just purchase a Thrust Skill from the spire?”

“And waste my points when I can just develop it like I did for my starter Skills,” Olo shook his head. “I’m not wasting points or slots on basic stuff. I’m saving them for higher level stuff.”

“You’re not the only one that remembers what Ms. Gozen said about learning technique and improving skill rather than relying on Skills.” Gene feinted with a low thrust aimed at Olo’s foot.

“Yup, that’s why you got to focus on purchasing passives over the rest of it,” Olo said as he stepped back while thrusting his spear at Gene’s body.

Gene deflected the point with his ghostly buckler with a wince. Olo’s strength had grown immensely so that a light jab felt like a full-powered strike from someone like Johnny or Bastien. “Not everyone can be pro-level athletes like you. You’ve got a huge advantage in that regard. Besides, I can’t do that when it comes to magic. I have to purchase spells. Aside from the odd Quest reward, I don’t know any other way to learn them.”

“On me!”

“Shi—” Gene was forced to attack without thought. His sword clanged off Olo’s shield.

“Shield Bash.”

Gene went flying a dozen feet.

Thanks to his Enhanced Reflexes passive he had managed to pull away from the blow enough that he wasn’t ruled out by the training system.

He came out of the roll without his sword, which had been jarred loose.

Olo was bearing down on him with his spear poised.

Gene raised both hands toward his friend. “Fire Spray.”

Olo skidded to a halt and tried to crouch down and cram as much of his big body behind his shield as the waves of fire swept over him.

“Fireball.”

Olo peeked over the edge of his shield and saw a basketball-sized orb of fire forming in front of Gene’s outstretched hand. “Brace!” he said at the same that Gene released the spell.

Olo’s world was awash with heat and flame as the explosion sent him flying back. His Skill had been overpowered by Gene’s spell. He climbed to his feet while Gene rushed to pick up the sword. “Not bad for a Level 22 Mage.”

“I’d be happier if I was in my 30’s like the rest of you guys as a Magesword,” Gene sniffed.

“You’ll get there one day,” Olo said. “Until then— Charge!”

It was like facing down an angry bull or a speeding car. Gene fired a magic missile, but missed as he was forced to dive out of the way or be run over.

The two went back and forth for the next fifteen minutes.

Gene threw spells and Skills while failing to get past Olo’s shield to land anything of consequence with his blade.

Olo’s Skills allowed him to defend even against magic, while occasionally using openings to attack.

In the end both were drained of stamina, while Gene had the added pleasure of running out of mana.

Neither could do much more than flail at each other with leaden arms, so they called it a draw.

They both lay flat on their backs inside a brightly-lit training chamber. The forest had long vanished.

“Yo… so why not Swordmage?” Olo said.

“Cause I want to be a mage first, then a sword fighter second. Since you’ve already got the fighter part of our team covered.”

Olo pondered that for a few moments. “Guess that sorta makes sense. I’m good with Warrior for now. Don’t want to get gimped like you,” he grinned to take the venom out of the words.

“You’re going to have to get something better eventually.”

“If the theory on better classes being possible is right,” Olo said.

“It’d be nice if I could justify spending points on an advanced-level tutorial or maybe even one of the intermediate ones,” Gene said.

“We can’t and those are super expensive. We’ll never be able to accumulate enough points to get home if we’re spending them on those things. Johnny got really lucky with that Quest. 100k plus a Skill,” Olo sighed.

“We’ve got to figure out how to self-generate our own Quests like that.”

“Have to be doable with a good chance of success and survival,” Olo said.

“Also need to get it past Remy. I’m still surprised that he let Johnny go out all alone,” Gene said.

“Maybe we can get Caretaker to send us on some kind of objective capture Quest. Just the team. No babysitters,” Olo said.

“Difficult, but vital and not dangerous enough for Remy to stop it,” Gene mused. “Hey… the song in my head got really quiet. Did yours?”

“Yeah, started softening when the fake Gyxdor started tearing through the ceiling. It’s not too bad right now. Thanks for mentioning it,” Olo frowned. “I’m blaming you when it gets louder.”

“Shit! I’m thinking about it now. My bad,” Gene sighed.

Later that night, Gene had cause to rue his words. Despite how bone-tired he was the song in his head was so loud, so insistent. As if it wanted to press itself upon his very soul.

It took hours to fall asleep and when he did, he dreamed of golden-winged angels burning and tearing everything he had ever cared about into nothing.

In a way he missed the old nightmares.

The ones in which he couldn’t see what exactly was responsible for the terrors.

Bastien’s experience had opened his eyes.

The knowledge was unwelcome.