When Dave awoke he was laying on a small clearing in the forest. He looked up and saw the darkness of the night sky between the canopy of trees. The scent of smoke and burning fire was in the air but Dave couldn’t bother to look for it. His whole body was exhausted and in pain. He heard some voices talking, arguing, but he couldn’t quite make out the words. Warm energy was flowing into him. A soothing feeling for the aches in his chest.

Dave turned his eyes to the side, even that took effort and he saw Sam kneeling over him, white light emitting from his hands and illuminating his concentrated face from below.

Then Dave slipped out of consciousness again.

Max still had a little headache. He had woken up on a clearing in the middle of the forest. It took him a few seconds to remember why he was there and not in the usual hostel bed he used to wake up in if he couldn’t quite remember the night before. However he still didn’t know how he got there. Talking to one of the other people he couldn’t believe what they said. But now he remembered the visions he had. And the moment when these squirrels jumped them.

But a giant tree dungeon? Dave fighting squirrels? Super powers?

They all told him the same thing though. One of the girls, Sarah was her name, apparently had only woken up a little before him and was still a bit in shock. They had dragged them out of the tree dungeon and decided to wait here for Dave. It was about an hour ago though and they started to worry.

Just when Max couldn’t take it any longer a squirrel thing had jumped out of the clearing. Ryland had stepped forward menacingly but when the thing had started talking he, Sam and Clara just acted like it was the most natural thing in the world. Max almost fell down again.

However he had soon forgotten his shock about the talking squirrel as it told them about Dave and that he needed help. Max was about to run off himself when he heard Dave was hurt. It took Mira and Sarah to calm him down somewhat and in the end they decided to send Ryan and the squirrel thing.

Now it was a few hours later and Max still couldn’t wrap his mind around what he saw. Dave was laying there on the ground with wounds that looked like he shouldn’t be able to survive them. A big gash ran along his leg and his shorts were completely soaked in blood. His chest was a mess of scratches and bite marks, Max could see a little white from his ribs here and there between the deep red color of his blood. However his left arm looked the worst. A big chunk of flesh was simply missing and deep bite marks were seen.

Max noticed he had balled up his fists in anger and forced himself to relax them. He should’ve been there for Dave. That was his friend that had risked his life for him and now he was laying there barely clinging to life.

Max couldn’t stand to look closer but Sam who was taking care of him told them it may look nasty but no vital organs were hurt so he should make it.

As it turned out Sam was actually a doctor back in India, which was good. But even better was that he apparently had gotten some healing skill. So now he was kneeling over Dave and working on him tirelessly. He put out a soft white light and Max had seen how some of the smaller wounds on Dave had mended before his eyes. Every now and then the light stopped, Sam told them he had cooldown on his healing skill, but he used the downtime effectively by cleaning and bandaging Dave's wounds as best as he could.

Bixby actually made himself pretty useful, he had gone back to the tree dungeon and had gotten most of their packs. Without them they would have struggled a lot here in the wilderness. Now Sam could use some of their spare clothes to help Dave's wounds.

They had decided to build a little fire, it wasn’t difficult to find some dry wood around here and Ryland had supplied a lighter. They were still arguing a little over if that was a good idea though. Most of them were afraid that the squirrel things would find them if they made a fire. Bixby assured them that the Nodefoxes, as his race was called apparently, went out hunting pretty far and would likely only return in the morning. Since they weren’t nocturnal they were probably sleeping.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

If it would’ve been just for comfort, they could’ve missed out on the fire, but Sam was depending on it to keep Dave safe. As the discussion turned more towards Bixby enlightening Ryland and Mira on the qualities of Nodefoxes, Max decided he had enough and made his way over to Sarah, who was sitting a bit further away from the group leaning against a tree.

It was a chilly night for the depths of Cambodia. Chilly still meant comfortably warm though. Sarah, like him, was unconscious for longer than the rest. Max wondered what exactly that meant. He also wondered what his Skill meant. He could see no real use for it yet and he was hesitant to tell the others about it.

Ryland was pretty quick to learn his skill and Sam had also immediately known how to heal after discovering his skill menu. Mira still had problems opening hers. Bixby said that can sometimes happen to newly attuned people.

“Hey, how are you doing?” Max asked. Really smooth you idiot, he thought, just pick the most boring line ever.

“Well as good as I can I think” Sarah shrugged and continued staring into the night. After a second she added “What about you?”

Max looked at her, the campfire throwing half her face into shade but also accenting her high cheekbones. Under different circumstances Max would’ve thought her cute. Or rather he even now thought she was cute but he wasn’t looking to flirt.

The whole world had been turned upside down less than 24 hours ago, he had been unconscious 3 times, or at least he could only remember 3 times and his best friend was lying on the Cambodian forest floor with a half open chest barely hanging onto life. And there was nothing he could do about it and it nagged at him. He just needed to talk to someone right now.

“To be honest, not good. I always imagined getting super powers more fun but this right now just sucks.” Max was surprised how shaky his voice got by the end of it. Even now he was trying to seem cool and make a humorous comment. That had always been his coping mechanism and his way to not feel little in the world. Surprisingly it had always worked, but it seemed as if there was a limit to it. “I hate how helpless I feel…”

Sarah turned to look at him, but she really looked at him. Max could see she wasn’t sure how to respond. In the end she just put an arm over his shoulder and let her head rest against him.

“Me too,” she said softly. “You know we just wanted to celebrate graduation from college. My Mom was so scared about me flying here. It’s only been a little over a week since I left but right now it feels like a lifetime.”

“For us it was just having an adventure. Dave’s girlfriend left him a few weeks ago and he was really down about it. I hope.. I hope he will be okay” something broke in Max. Tears slowly started rolling over his cheeks. “I need him to be okay.”

Sarah hugged him a little tighter “He will be. Max. He will be okay. Sam said he had seen people with worse wounds making it through and that was before magic.”

Max just managed an ahem sound but it was exactly the sort of reinforcement he needed to hear.

“Also he’s tough. The others say he stayed to fight these Nodefoxes for us to escape. Ryland says there were four of them dead. Four! Bixby told me he hadn’t killed a single one. I don’t think I’ve ever met someone as tough as this guy.” Sarah continued.

Max was actually surprised to hear this, after he had seen the state Dave was in when Ryland brought him he hadn’t been in a state to listen to what the others said. Worry had consumed him as he pushed for Sam to do something. He had obviously deduced that Dave had done fighting but the mere fact that he survived facing four of these monster squirrels was incredible. He felt his mood lifting again.

“Yeah I always knew something was special about him. Even when he never wanted to see it.” The tears had stopped by now and his mouth turned into a smile. “I wonder what kind of powers he has gotten, I know he would like nothing more than to geek out with me about it.”

“I bet. To be honest I would love to know what his powers are as well.” A grin spread over her face. “Wanna talk superpowers with me Max?”

They sat and talked for a while after that. About their powers, their life’s back home and everything in general. Mira and Ryland soon joined them.

The smell of smoke lingered in the air, giving everyone that cozy warm feeling of evenings at a camp fire.That feeling that everything was alright. So they sat and talked through most of the night, even though they knew the world wasn't alright, just for this moment they felt at peace.

Eventually they decided to sleep after checking with Sam and Bixby. Who both stayed awake during the night to care for Dave. Thanks to Bixby’s Skill they could go without sleep with no problem. Sam worked hard and by the time morning rolled around Dave looked much better.