Now that she’d started, Hildi didn’t know quite how to continue. How do you tell a woman that her dead son is alive and no longer human, that he is a dungeon?

“I spoke to Jake,” she said.

She saw Fern flinch, a whole-body shiver as if she been struck in the gut by a fist.

“This must have been last Christmas when he was in town. He took the car and drove around some, said he met some people,” his mom replied. “He was a good talker. He liked people.”

“No,” said Hildi, “I spoke with him yesterday.”

There was a moment of silence and then Fern began carefully, “Honey, I buried my boy three weeks ago. Well, cremated him. He always said he didn’t want to be buried. Then we scattered his ashes right here in the garden, in the yard. I was finding gray ashes for the next two weeks before it rained whenever I came out here to work.”

“He didn’t die,” said Hildi. Behind her, he could hear the sound of the porch open and Jake’s dad saying, ‘Fern, where you at? Honey, they need some more cantaloupes.”

“He did, baby,” Fern said sadly. “I said goodbye and watched them send his body into that furnace. He’s dead.”

“Before you get mad or stop listening, I need you to hear my story, Ok?” said Hildi. “It’s important.”

The older woman gazed at Hildi for a second and then breathed out, “Fine.”

“I was being chased by some men. Bad ones. This happened yesterday. Billy and I ran out of food and I went out to get some. I was going to QT. I hoped that there would be something left on their shelves. The men chased me into Mighty Max’s and I hid inside. That’s where I met Baxter and Jake. There were giant rats and the men didn’t come inside. I found a tunnel and Baxter came up it and then I heard a voice, in my head, that said, “Girl Listen. Be calm, I am not the dog, I do not wish to harm you. I am Jake.”

“No, no,” said Fern. “People don’t come back from the dead. They don’t.”

Jake’s dad must have seen that something was not right with his wife because he came over then and put his arms around her waist. “Honey, you alright? What’s going on?”

Hildi ignored him. Fern leaned into his arms. Jake’s dad looked at both women, trying to figure out what was going on. He was leaning towards getting mad because he could sense how upset his wife was.

“He said you called him ‘Boo’! Wait, he said, to tell you, ‘It’s true, I’m your little boo!’” He said that he used to call you ‘mama ghost.’

“What’s going on here,” said Will, Jake’s dad.

“This girl says she talked to Jake. Yesterday,” Fern said.

“That is not possible,” said Will. “We cremated him and scattered his ashes.”

“She thinks it is,” said Fern. “She said he spoke to her in her head, told her to tell me that he was my little Boo.”

Baxter came to the front door, looked out, then pushed open the screen door and wandered over to the three of them and leaned up against Hildi’s leg.

“What wrong?” he asked.

“I’m telling them about Jake. I don’t think it’s going well.”

“Why would she say a thing like that?” Will asked his wife. Then turned to Hildi and said, “Why would you say a thing like that? Can’t you see she’s still hurting.” By this time, it was pretty clear that he’d decided to go with anger.

“Because it’s the truth. I met your son yesterday. He’s not human anymore, but he’s still your son. He wanted me to come here and make sure you're  safe. He wanted me to bring you back if you wanted to, so he could help keep you safe,” Hildi said.

“Not human,” asked Fern. “What do you mean by that?”

“He was changed. When he died, he woke up in an office and a god offered to let him and Baxter here come back to earth after the apocalypse.”

“Baxter?” said Fern. “That’s the dog that killed him.” Everyone looked at Baxter then and Baxter looked down at the ground.

“Say sorry!” said Baxter to Hildi.

“He says that he’s sorry. He didn’t mean for it to happen. He didn’t know that the air conditioner wouldn’t stay in the window, didn’t know that he couldn’t leap out the window and stand.” Much of this explanation came from Hildi. Baxter and Jake’s death was a week-long internet sensation. Everybody in the Tulsa area had heard about how Jake had died. Talked about it over dinner, coffee. There was a huge upset. Clive was arrested, then released, the head of the apartment building’s maintenance department was arrested, then released. Everyone agreed that something bad happened, but not who needed to pay for it. Justice was still flailing around when the apocalypse occurred.

“How do you know that he says he’s sorry,” Will asked.

“Well,” she said. “That’s part of the story. I bonded with Jake and when I did, I started being able to hear Baxter.”

“What do you mean, bonded?” said Fern. “Is that like getting married or something? You just met him, didn’t you? How do you hear a dog? I didn’t hear anything.” She paused for a second and then continued, “And why would I believe that this Jake is my dead son. And what is he? You said he wasn’t human.” The last part was said curiously hopefully. Like she wanted to believe, but forty-eight years of common sense prevented her from doing so.

Hildi decided to take on the questions in the order that they’d been asked.

“Bonded is, well, bonded. It’s something new, I guess. I said yes when he offered and the bond allows us to talk from a distance and share mana and Qi back and forth. I don’t think it’s like getting married. I mean how would a woman marry a bunch of rooms?” Hildi finished a little defensively. She held up her hand when she saw the two of them begin to open their mouths.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

“On the description of the bond, it said it allows me to ‘communicate with each other’s servants or companions’. That’s why I can talk mentally with Baxter here. He’s Jake’s dog. You’re not bonded so you can’t hear him.’

“Companion,” said Baxter.

“Yes,” said Hildi, “You’re are Jake’s companion.”

“And as to why you’d believe that my Jake is your dead son, I don’t know. That was the hard part of this job. Jake helped me to get to my brother. He built me this armor, these knives, even this crossbow. He said it didn’t look like his old Excalibur Crossbow Matrix SMF Grizzly, but more like his dad’s Avalanche.”

At this, Will looked away from his quiet, crying wife and looked instead at the crossbow that he could see peeking over Hildi’s shoulders.

“Can I see that,” he asked.

Hildi said, “Sure,” and then took the crossbow off and handed it to him. After looking at it for a few moments, he said, “It does. It looks more like what my Avalanche looks like now than what it did before the event. That’s what we’re calling it. Too much baggage on apocalypse. But yeah, I can see why Jake thought so.”

“You think it’s possible? That this is our Jake?” his wife asked him.

“Well, the thing is, I don’t know what’s impossible anymore, hon,” Will said. “I mean my dead son and the dog that killed him showing up is kinda par for the course, you know Fern? I don’t know.”

“What is he?” said Fern. “You said that my son wasn’t human. But you bonded with him so he must not be a monster. What is he then?”

Hildi wanted to be truthful to them. She didn’t like lying at all. Her family had learned to accept that Hildi was going to tell it like she saw it and damn the consequences. “He might be a monster,” she said. Baxter looked at her then.

“Hush,” Hildi said to him. “He might be. He probably is, but we’re going to be working on it. You are too,” she said looking straight into the dog’s eyes.

Looking back up at Jake’s parents, she said, “I don’t know yet if he is a monster or not. He’s a dungeon. I’m hoping that if he is, I can control him or change him back. He’s young. Whatever he is, he might be shapeable. Like he told me not too long ago, everybody starts kind of neutral, then learns to go one way or the other.”

“So, to be clear, he’s one of those places where people go to get spanked,” Fern asked.

Hildi laughed, “No, more the kind of place people go to fight monsters and get treasures. Something like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, except the Temple, can think. Something like out of a video game. Jake would be the Temple in that example, not Indiana Jones.”

“He’s really a building now?” asked Fern?

“He’s more than a building. He made me everything I’m wearing. It took him like three minutes to do it. He made a giant snake, a rattler, to protect himself when I took Baxter with me. He’s been digging holes and tunnels like mad. He says he has or is building a room over a kilometer in size. I haven’t seen it, but I believe him. He’s pretty powerful. And he wants to help you all survive. That’s what I know. He still loves you all and he’s worried about you. But he isn’t the Jake you knew. He’s changed into something else. What he thinks of love may be something else.”

“But this creature was my son?” Fern asked.

“Yes,” said Hildi. “I’m pretty sure about it. He told me that he dated my sister. He even apologized for dumping her.”

Fern winced a little at that. “Yeah, the boy was a little full of himself in high school. Can you talk to him now?”

“No,” said Hildi. “I can’t. I think that we have a limited range. And I’m outside of it.”

“I talk,” said Baxter.

“Why didn’t you say so?” said Hildi. “His dog says that he can still talk to him,” Hildi said to his mom. “If you have any questions, he can ask Jake, but Baxter doesn’t really talk that well.” At Baxter’s offended look, she said, “Look, two-word sentences don’t really cut it for serious conversations.”

“What do you mean,” Fern asked.

“Baxter just learned to talk. So far, he’s only on two-word sentences. It kind of makes figuring out what he’s saying a little bit of a guessing game.” Baxter looked a little sad at that, so Hildi stopped talking and began scratching his ears.

Fern stood looking at the dog for a second, then looked at her husband, who stood there holding her, looking at her, waiting for her to tell him what she wanted. Although Jake was his son too, the bond between the mom and son was stronger. Finally, she looked at Hildi again. “You say that he made all your equipment. Can he make more?”

“I guess,” Hildi said. “He seems to use mana to do it.”

“Mana? You mean the same stuff that we have inside us,’ Fern asked.

“Yes, but he uses it in a different way. He can make things, we use it to cast spells.”

“Can we make stuff too?” asked Fern.

“I don’t know,” said Hildi. “I started learning all this stuff yesterday. Your son wasn’t impressed with that by the way. Said I should have started earlier. So, maybe we can? I’m pretty sure that we could create spells that would do the same stuff that he can do. He says he uses skills though. I think that’s the difference between being a dungeon and being a human. And the urges.”

His mom’s eyebrows went up at that last part, “Urges?”

Hildi blushed and said, “I’m pretty sure he doesn’t have those kinds of urges.”

“At least he better not,” Hildi murmured to herself think of undressing and putting on the armor.

“Remember when I said your son might be a monster?” she asked.

Fern nodded.

“Well, he mentioned that he has urges. Dungeony kinds. Like he wants to put traps in his floors, make monsters, things like that.”

“Would he make things for us?” Fern asked.

“He said he would. He wants to keep you all safe,” Hildi answered.

“What you thinking, hon?” asked Will.

“I’m thinking that we might have a chance if Jake means what he said. With classes and his ability to create stuff we might be able to survive.”

“You mean like crossbow bolts?” asked Will.

“Exactly, plates, clothing, eyeglasses, batteries or something similar, maybe even food, we’re out of flour, haven’t had any bread in about four days, no eggs either. Don’t have any milk. No aspirins left, no antibiotics, although maybe spells can take care of that, wax, soap, shampoo, running water, sewage. Cooking oil, light oil. We’re barely hanging on. Sugar, chocolate, coffee! Oh my god! Coffee. I would about kill somebody for a cup of coffee. It was all I could do to not snatch that last cup of coffee out of old man Withers’ hands yesterday morning. My garden’s been feeding all us with the monster meat supplements, but look at this place. We got monsters and a decorative fence.” By the end of her speech, she was crying into Will’s chest.

He looked a little wild, not sure what to do, wanting to solve the problem, but it was too big. It was the apocalypse. The four of them stood there for a while. Hildi kneeling and petting the dog, Will holding his wife. The foursome didn’t go unnoticed, the porch was filled with people all gazing into the garden, observing.

Finally, Jake’s mom stood up and asked her husband, “How many crossbow bolts do you have left?”

“Twelve,” he said.

“Rex?” she asked.

“About the same,” Will answered.

“It’s clear we’re not going to make it if things don’t change,” she said. “This girl and what may be my son Jake offer us a chance. We need to take it.” Here she looked up into his eyes and then he nodded his head, accepting the choice she’d made.

He leaned down and kissed her, long and slow. Slow enough that Hildi felt a little uncomfortable standing next to them. Slow enough that some of the people on the porch began clapping and whistling. The kiss finally came to an end and, gazing down and looking happy and self-satisfied, he said, “I’m with you, babe. We’ll make it.”