Alex stepped out into absolute chaos.

There were emergency personnel all over the containment area. The entire platform seemed like it was crawling with either people in white and red uniforms belonging to the local paramedics, or the grey and black uniforms of Golden Swallow. She had just enough time to recognize Forsmith standing back from it all, his expression a picture of reluctant relief before a pair of medics practically tackled her from the platform.

“Ms. Morrison, are you wounded? Are you experiencing any aftereffects of magical exposure? Can you hear me?”

“Yes, I can hear you. What is going on? Where’s the rest of my…” She caught sight of the other members of her team a short distance away, undergoing a similar level of grilling. They all looked slightly dazed from exhaustion, and their uniforms showed the bloodstains and tears of their now-healed wounds, but they seemed fine enough. What was all this?

She was still struggling to answer the medics’ questions—all while being manhandled into various medical tests—when Clara came from nowhere to tackle her a second time. Her new point of Strength might have managed to keep her from going all the way to the ground, but it was a close thing. Clara was whispering something over and over, like a vicious swear. “You promised, you promised, you promised…”

“I did. I promised.” Alex hugged her, awkwardly. Clara shuddered. “We made it home, just as planned. You guys are going to be fine.”

Clara, still shuddering, pulled back slightly to stare at her, but before she could say anything, Audrey barged in. “Well, there she is! Look who decided to come home!”

Alex glared at her. “Audrey, what is going on? Why are all these people here?”

The Squire grinned and shrugged. “Turns out that when a team is more than two hours overdue, there’s an emergency protocol that gets activated. Special first responders get called in, backup teams get activated, that sort of thing.” Audrey winced. “Parents get phone calls…”

“Oh no.” Alex pictured what was waiting for her at home, and shuddered. Then she looked in a different direction, somehow warned by some sixth sense.

She found Liliana staring at her.

There was no trace of a smile now. No, the team captain was just staring at her, face pale and eyes shining with hate. Alex looked back at her, remembered her father’s warning—and smiled. She gave the woman a little wave, mostly secure that if she was giving a report that night, it wouldn’t be to her, and turned back as the medics forced their way back in to continue their work.

Maybe it hadn’t been perfect, but it had still been a win—and that was more than okay by her.

“So you survived a semi-obvious suicide mission, completed every Quest the portal gave you, and destroyed at least four Camps, all in a single Survey where none of your team died.”

Alex nodded, feeling a small glow of satisfaction at the summary. “Yeah, sounds about right.”

Zach raised his eyebrows. “And so, for a reward, you’ve been confined to the dorms and PAD, denied weekend leave, and officially reprimanded for abusing company resources.”

She slumped, looking at him through tired eyes. “Yeah, sounds about right.”

He shook his head in amazement. “Well, the Group is nothing if not consistent.” His lips twitched with something like a smirk. “I would have given anything to see Liliana’s face, though. How did she take the news of your miraculous survival?”

Alex’s grin came back at the memory. “She looked like she was ready to swear some kind of blood oath to kill me. I’d be surprised if she hasn’t, actually.”

“Me too.” Zach leaned back in his chair, shaking his head. “You heard that she got knocked down a peg, right?”

She blinked. “No. What do you mean?”

“Turns out that her promotion to team captain was kind of on a provisional basis.” Zach’s smile grew. “Your little emergency situation has attracted enough attention that they’ve put her on probation. If she hits one more screwup, then she might end up losing her job completely.”

“And what a shame that would be.” Alex’s grin widened as well, and they both broke down into quiet laughter a moment later.

As the humor ran down, Alex sat back in her seat. She still felt fatigued, though to be fair it was only the next day after her first Raid. The memory of that hissing, purple-streaked sky still lingered in the back of her mind, and she shook her head, trying to focus on something else. “How did the readings look? After we were done, I mean.”

He nodded, his own demeanor becoming far more businesslike. After a few tapped buttons, he slid her a tablet with a familiar-looking graph. “Before you went in, here’s what I was seeing on the monitors. You’ll notice it was worse than anything we’d seen before.”

She nodded, feeling her eyes widen. The magic levels had spiked much higher than before; had that been the reason there were so many Camps? Zach waited a moment and then tapped a few buttons on a second tablet. “Here are the readings I was getting while you were on the Survey. You’ll notice that things were looking pretty grim for a while, at least until you started making progress.”

The graph slid forward, showing a new section of readings. She watched as the lines continued to climb upward…and then they abruptly plunged. They rose a little after that, as if trying to recover, and then dropped again. And again. A fourth drop, followed by one last brutal decrease shortly afterward. “The drops are when we managed to take down a Camp?”

“Yeah. At least, that’s what I’m assuming.” Zach tapped away at his tablet, and the final decrease glowed on her screen. “That last one is when you left the portal. I’m assuming that was the result of you completing your Quests, leveling up your Role, etc, etc.” He waved his hand in a dismissive gesture. “Either way, your antics didn’t just give Liliana a black eye. You also cut the magic levels from the portal almost all the way back to a normal level. They’ve risen a bit today, but I think they won’t be anything close to where they were yesterday when you went in. Not before this afternoon, anyway.”

Alex nodded, letting out a sigh. A weight she hadn’t noticed she was carrying was lifted from her shoulders. “So Joanna’s team isn’t going to be running face first into a wall of Grue the way we were.”

“No. In fact, unless I’ve missed my guess completely, I’m betting that they’ll be able to drop the levels back to where they actually should be for an E rank portal.” He grimaced. “The team going in on Monday will have the easiest time out of all of you, but that’s been the way it has gone for a while.”

“True.” Alex felt a small glimmer of resentment about that fact. She didn’t know many of the people on the third team; she had met Paul and the others before. Most of them had been on the other team that they’d ‘competed’ against when she was still with Joanna’s team. She’d run across them occasionally as she ate in the cafeteria, or participated in the mandated sparring sessions in the dorms, but hadn’t really talked much with them outside of that. She did wonder how they had scored so much favor with Liliana that they had been given the prime, safest schedule for their Surveys, but it wasn’t like they were the ones messing with the portal.

She shook her head. There would be more than enough time to brood over the situation over the weekend, while she was more or less trapped in the dorms. Right now, there were more important things to worry about. “Hey, have you figured out anything more about the operation they are running here?”

Zach sighed and shook his head. “No. I’m starting to think unless I score myself a Talisman and slip through the portal after them, I’m not going to get much more information than we already have. I mean, I’m just a junior researcher at the PAD. Not a lot of doors open for me here.”

Alex smirked. “Well, maybe that’s what we should do. I wait until Forsmith and the others go in, and then I sneak in after them. That should solve things, right?”

He gave her a wary look. “Okay, I’m ninety percent sure that you’re joking, but on the off-chance you aren’t, please don’t do that. You’re in enough trouble already, and I don’t think any health potion I have access to will help you if a C rank Surveyor catches you trying to spy on him.”

She laughed. “I’m joking, I’m joking. I’ve had more than enough fun for one week.” Then she leaned forward, still snickering a little at his offended expression. “Come on, you didn’t really think I would do that, did you?”

“Oh, like you can blame me.” Zach leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest. “You just led a bunch of E rankers on a Raid, at a lower level and a younger age than I’ve ever heard of before. You might have been the youngest Raiders ever, for all I know. I think it’s possible that others might consider you a bit reckless, Alex.”

Alex felt a shiver of…something…pass through her as he said her name, something that caught her a little off guard. She hesitated, feeling a little heat rush into her cheeks. “I was only doing what I had to. It was the only way my team was going to make it out of that Survey alive.”

He leaned back a little further and put his feet up on the desk. “I know, I know. I just wish you hadn’t been quite so dramatic about it, you know.” Zach eyed her a little. “Your parents weren’t the only ones worried about you when you didn’t come back. Try to keep that in mind the next time you throw yourself into the fire, okay?”

She raised an eyebrow. “I will.” Then she allowed herself a half-smile. “Though I didn’t know you were that attached to me, Zach.”

He blinked, as if she’d managed to catch him off guard this time. Then he grinned. “How could I not be? Remember, you’re the only Surveyor disobedient enough to get punished by being sent down here. How else am I going to get all of my questions answered?”

Alex rolled her eyes. “Oh yes. All the important information you’ve been asking me about. ‘What does the otherworldly air smell like, Alex? Is the broken down pavement extra crunchy, Alex? Did you see any science textbooks while you were fighting Grue, Alex?’”

“Hey! Those are legitimate questions!” Zach kept grinning at her, folding his hands behind his head. “And I noticed you did actually find me a few interesting books for me to comb through. The RDD was gracious enough to lend me them, for the next little while at least. I still can’t read the text, but I can get some information from the figures they drew. They had all kinds of figures, including an occasional picture of the crystals you seem to be finding in the Camps. That’s pretty interesting, wouldn’t you say?”

Feeling that she was on somewhat safer ground, Alex nodded. “Yeah, fascinating. Definitely worth risking my life for.”

“Your efforts are appreciated.” Zach dropped his feet off of the desk and leaned forward, a conspiratorial glint in his eyes. “While I have you here the next few days, I do have a lot of questions about what you experienced on the Raid. I’ve heard that the longer you are in the other world, the more that you start experiencing a kind of time dilation. I know with the clouds it is hard to tell time, but while you were there, did you…”

By the time that Zach was done with her, Alex felt a headache coming on. She once again felt a little wrung out by the conversation, but at least she hadn’t been stuck in another dimension for eight hours. It was funny how a single experience could change her perspective so severely.

When she checked her phone, she saw another handful of text messages from her parents, both of whom had given her an earful the prior night. Her father had been the more understanding of the two, surprisingly; perhaps he thought that the Raid had been part of her plan to undermine Liliana. He would have been right, but it had been just as much about survival as anything else.

Her mother, on the other hand, had been furious. The fact that she’d given Alex the background on her own Raids had not helped matters; her mother had been at least D rank before her first long Survey in the other world, and the fact that her daughter had willingly risked her team on one at E rank had not sat well with her. Alex had not seen her mother angry often, and it had not been a pleasant experience to be on the receiving end of a lecture from the Crimson Blade.

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Since then, her parents had been yoyoing between frightened parental anger and sullen pride in their daughter’s accomplishments. The general summary of them had basically been a consistent message of We’re very proud of what you’ve accomplished. Never, ever do it again.

It was hard not to feel at least a little resentful at that message. After all, how many times had she been waiting for them to come home, wondering if they had survived the dangers of their job? At the same time, those memories told her exactly how her parents had felt when they heard her team was overdue. The prospect of her mother and father waiting helplessly by the phone soured a little of her victory over Liliana and the portal.

There was one other worry tucked into the back of her mind as she checked her phone. Joanna’s team had gone into the portal a couple of hours ago. If things on the other side weren’t as good as she had hoped, it was possible that they had run into just as bad of a time as her team, with far less preparation. Would she end up waiting for an overdue team, the same way they had?

Her answer came a moment later via a text from Clara. Mission complete!

Alex broke into a wide grin and headed back to her bunkroom. Some more good news would always be welcome, even if she was still stuck here.

“It was barely bad at all this time. Like the wind had gone right out of their sails.”

Audrey shook her head, her expression a little incredulous. “Seriously, what did you guys do in there? They didn’t even try to set up an ambush outside the portal this time. They were too busy forting up around the Camps.”

Alex blinked, and she turned to Joanna. The Adept nodded. “There were only two of those left, by the way. One at the soccer fields, and the other one inside the church.” Both locations were further south from the portal, probably where the Killer had been roaming around the day before during the Raid. “No sign of the archer. It looks like you somehow managed to chase him away.”

“Not that we had everything that easy.” Clara shifted uncomfortably on her bunk; she wore at least one bandage on her arm. “With all of the Grue gathered up around the Camps, we had to fight a ton of them at once. Luckily we ran into a few patrols so we could train up the new Skills first, but even then…”

The Acolyte shook her head, and Alex reached across and squeezed. “I’m just glad it worked out all right. You guys deserved to get a bit of a break, and those Skills are going to make it that much easier for you going forward.”

Audrey snorted. “Easy for you to say. You know you guys are probably now the highest Skilled team here, right? I doubt any of the rest of us even come close.” She looked around at the others, who nodded. “We might be level three along with you, but none of us have survived an eight hour Raid and lived to tell about it. If we ever get back to real sparring, we might need to start sending three of us against you instead of just two.”

Alex rolled her eyes. “I doubt it’s that much of a difference, now that you are getting your own Titles and Chained Skills. Besides, I’m betting you get plenty of chances to catch up.”

“Not if this stuff with the portal keeps going.” Joanna’s dismal pronouncement dumped a load of cold water on the conversation, and the Adept grimaced. “Sorry, but you know I’m right. If this keeps up, our luck is going to run out eventually. The Raid might have calmed things down, but it isn’t going to last. Not unless somebody pulls that same kind of stunt every couple of weeks.”

Clara looked at Joanna, her frown mixing disapproval with uncertainty. “Are you sure? Now that we have higher level Skills…”

“The other world was gaining about a Camp a week, even with all of our teams knocking out one or two with each Survey.” The Adept shrugged. “If we fail a Survey, or one of the teams suffers severe losses, then that rate of growth is just going to escalate. Who’s going to want to try a Survey when there are eight or nine Camps worth of Grue sitting on the portal? We’d almost have to do a Raid just to get back, at that point.”

Alex nodded slowly. Much as she disliked it, the math checked out, and she doubted there were a whole lot of ways to change things. Though she was reluctant to just give up. “So maybe we need to start knocking out more Camps each time? If we started hitting two or three a Survey…”

Joanna was shaking her head. “Keep in mind that now that we’ve leveled up, things will get harder again. The Grue we’re facing were still the lowest leveled enemies we can run into over there. The Killer is a step up, but there are other possibilities as well.” She paused. “That’s only going to get worse as we level up, too, so just doing more work might not do the trick. We have to come up with some way to get this under control, or to convince the Group to stop whatever it is they’re doing.”

Clara shook her head. “You’d think Alex’s Raid would have been enough to convince them. I don’t care what they say about the magical readings. The fact that a team had to stay in there that long just to get home means something is going wrong. Don’t you think they would abandon it and try something else?”

It was a logical argument. Unfortunately, Alex felt remarkably sure that the logic was precisely why it wasn’t going to apply. “Liliana hasn’t managed to get me killed yet. It’s actually started hurting her chances at promotion. Does anyone here think she’s going to stop?”

She looked around, but none of the others spoke up. Alex nodded. “I think whoever is behind the abnormalities is probably involved in over their head. If they back off and admit failure, they probably take it in the neck from whoever is supervising them. If they double down and maybe succeed, then they come off looking like a genius and a hero. Besides, it isn’t like they’re the ones who are going to be dying on a Survey, right?”

A grim silence descended on the Surveyors, and Alex grimaced. She felt a little upset with herself for not finding a better way to phrase things, but it was the kind of truth that didn’t lend itself easily to being smoothed over. Someone, somewhere, had pretty much made the decision that their career prospects mattered more than the health and safety of a bunch of E rank Surveyors, and she couldn’t see a good way to convince them otherwise short of finding them in a dark alley and beating them half to death. It was…not the best plan.

Audrey was looking somewhat serious for once. She shifted her shoulders, as if working out a knot in her muscles. “So what does doubling down look like for whoever is behind this? Are they just going to start throwing more Surveyors at the problem, or something else?”

“I don’t know, Audrey.” Joanna shook her head, looking out at the rest of the dorms. She seemed like she was trying to glare her way through the wall on the far side of the corridor. “But I have a sneaking suspicion that we are going to find out. Soon.”

“Welcome Surveyors! I am so happy that you were all able to attend today’s mandatory planning meeting.”

Liliana beamed at all of them, her petty hatred locked behind her false smiles once again. It was honestly impressive that she wasn’t spitting absolute venom every time her gaze moved over where Alex stood. Maybe the team captain only succeeded because she was steadfastly refusing to look Alex in the eyes. She definitely hadn’t gotten over the emergency she’d caused on Thursday; it was only the next Tuesday, after all.

All three teams of E rank Surveyors had been gathered in one of the conference rooms in the dorms. They exchanged a few wary looks among themselves; clearly nobody thought that a mandatory corporate meeting was a good sign for the future. Even the third team, who seemed to be in the best spirits, seemed a little unhappy with the situation. One of them, a young man named Rudy, was wearing a cast on his arm, and wasn’t even looking at Liliana. Instead, he was staring at the seat in front of him, his expression utterly without hope.

“I know that some of you might have expressed some concerns about the direction some of our Surveys have been headed. In fact, I share your concerns, and have let our supervisors know you are worried about your future here at Golden Swallow.” The false companionship in those words rang painfully in Alex’s ears, but she tried as hard as she could to keep her face blank of reaction.

Audrey was a little less subtle. The Squire’s open snort of derision echoed through the conference room and brought Liliana’s speech to a dead halt. She paused long enough to look vaguely in Audrey’s direction. Her smile grew brittle. Then she launched back into her presentation with the apparent goal of staying on track.

“Fortunately, our planning committee has listened to our feedback and prepared a new Survey schedule for us. This schedule will be followed in the near future, and will allow a far more engaging opportunity to excel during your time with the company.”

“From now on, every other weekday will be considered a group Survey day. All three teams will be entering the portal together, in order to cooperate and support one another during their time in the other world.”

Someone behind Alex swore, just loud enough to be heard. If she had to guess, it had been Brian. There was a brief pause as Liliana was thrown off her script again, and in that moment, Sam raised a hand.

“Wasn’t the reason we stopped going all together because the planning committee determined that bunching up all the Survey teams provoked the ambush at the portal?”

The question made Liliana’s smile go brittle again, but she ground out an answer. “It has been decided that the number of Surveyors has been low enough recently that another major ambush incident would be unlikely. Further, we have not observed a lack of ambush activity since we reduced the number of teams involved. Therefore, it would be beneficial and advisable to return to group Surveys. Are there any other questions?”

There was a murmur of commentary in the background of the room now, but no one rose to the challenge. Most of the Surveyors had to know that it was all useless excuses, not real answers, anyways. Alex felt a creeping sense of dread steal over her that only grew as Liliana continued.

“As I said, all three teams will be working together to complete their Surveys. There may be times when the presence of other teams might lead to an overlap in Quest objectives. Please be aware of the accommodations needed by other teams, and work together for the good of the company.”

The murmuring had gotten a bit louder now, and she paused long enough to stare at the offending Surveyors. When the noise died down, she continued in that same bright, untroubled voice. “On the days when there are no Surveys, the containment area around the portal will remain unavailable for Surveyors to use for Skill training. Alternatives include studying recommended Group resources, development guides, or other materials. The gymnasium remains open for your use, though you are encouraged to not injure yourselves as you prepare for your missions.”

Sam raised a hand again. “Team captain, why is the containment area unavailable?”

There was another silence, and Alex tried not to smirk as Liliana now actively struggled to maintain her composure. “The presence of Surveyors near the portal has been determined to be a distraction for other Group projects located around the portal. For that reason, you will be restricted from the area.”

He raised his hand again, but Liliana just ignored him. The dread was in full swing now, filling Alex as she realized what it meant. Whatever the Group had been doing to the portal every four days, they were now going to be doing every other day. They’d wanted to know what doubling down would look like; now she was sure that they did.

Which meant that every single Survey was going to happen in the face of the same level of danger that had killed or wounded almost half the Surveyors on their original teams. The coil of dread that was worming its way through her insides had grown incredibly uncomfortable.

Liliana was still talking, however. “As we move to this new schedule, you will all have just as many, if not more, opportunities to prove yourselves as members of the larger Golden Swallow Group team. I hope that you continue to take your responsibilities seriously, and that any injuries or interpersonal problems can be kept to a minimum. We will be working hard over the next few weeks, and I expect every team to work effectively and efficiently.”

She paused, her smile becoming a shade less cheerful and a lot more malicious. “For this reason, we will be accommodating certain personnel transfers that have been requested before we move into this new and exciting phase of your careers. Please pay attention so that you can get adjusted to the new arrangements before you begin working together tomorrow.”

Silence had fallen across the room completely now. Alex thought there was a terrible kind of satisfaction in Liliana’s expression as she looked them over again. For once, she met Alex’s eyes, and her smile grew sharp. Dread boiled like a cauldron as the team captain looked back at her notes.

“First, we’ll be assigning each team a name for future reference. We’ll use these callsigns when we refer to the areas of responsibility you will be assigned. Remember them for use in the future.”

“Team Gamma will be made up of Brian, Samuel, Timothy, Marcel, and Rudy.”

Alex pivoted around to stare. Marcel looked nonplussed, but Brian, Sam, and Tim all looked vaguely shell shocked. They looked at her, and realization washed over them, followed by barely restrained outrage. Obviously, Liliana was up to old games again, and now that she couldn’t isolate the misfits into one group, she was after something else entirely.

Rudy, by contrast, just sighed and sunk into himself. He didn’t look at his former teammates at all, just continuing to stare at the seat ahead of him. They weren’t looking at him either; instead they were trading smirks and muttering to each other. It was like watching a pack of jocks in high school, and not the nice, charismatic kind. Alex’s eyes narrowed, and she looked back at the front.

Liliana was smiling right at her. She continued.

“Team Beta will be made up of Joanna, Audrey, Clara, Alessa and Ruth.” Alex heard a slight stir among her former teammates—all her former teammates. She had a dull moment of gratitude that Alessa would be going with a safe team. Marcel and Rudy might be a bit unknown, but at least Tim, Brian, and Sam would outnumber them and show them how to maneuver around things.

Unfortunately, that left only one team left. Her new team.

“Finally, Team Alpha. You have Paul, Emmett, Cash, and Christopher. Oh, and Alexandretta.” Liliana sounded thoughtful and forgetful, but her eyes glittered like hateful stars. Her smile stretched a little. “I hope that you all enjoy your new assignments. The new Surveys start tomorrow. Until then, get to know your new teammates, and have a wonderful Golden Swallow day!”

Alex watched as the Surveyors funneled out of the conference room.

Liliana had led the way, waving goodbye to the people she had reassigned. The only ones who had waved back were the members of Team Alpha. Her team. She’d been assigned to the team that had been kept the safest and left the least harmed by the actions of the Group. Only an idiot would have assumed that it was because Liliana was trying to make things up to her.

No, this was some kind of trap. She knew it was. The real question was how she was going to manage to get out of it.

Someone touched her shoulder, and Alex nearly jumped in her seat. She turned to see Clara looking at her with a clear expression of concern. “You okay?”

The question carried a lot of different meanings. Alex nodded carefully, trying to force a smile. “Yeah. You guys lucked out getting Alessa. She’s going to be a big help.”

“I’m sure she will.” Clara was forcing a smile of her own. She glanced up at where the others from Team Alpha were joking around where they’d been sitting. Rudy had gotten up and joined the new members of Team Gamma without looking back. “Be careful, all right? Remember your promise.”

“You too, Clara.” They gave each other an encouraging nod. Alex watched her walk out with the rest of Team Beta and then sighed. She stood, squaring her shoulders. Better to get it over with than to put it off for later.

She turned and went up to the rest of her new team. They paused their conversation as she approached, looking her over. Her skin seemed to crawl for a moment, as if she was walking up to a pack of Grue. “Hello. I guess we are teammates now.”

“I guess we are!” Paul looked around and spread his arms. “Welcome to Team Alpha. Looking forward to working with you.”

“Me too.” Alex hoped she didn’t sound as insincere as Liliana usually did. At best, she probably sounded flat. She stuck out her hand. He shook it.

“We’re going to do great things. I just hope that you can keep up with us.” Paul shrugged. “Rudy was a good guy, but he had a hard time coming through for the team. We can count on you, though, right?”

She forced a smile. It was like chewing ground glass. “Yeah. Sure.”