Getting the people out of Winchester’s a slog.

Sometimes literally, as a few of them end up being more than average and I have to slug it out with them. With each day that passes, we increase the number of people waiting for us to get moving.

I don’t keep track of the number.

The idea of keeping track eats away at my willpower.

Dealing with that stress is clearing out the trees they need to settle down and provides ample firewood. Not that there’s a danger of anyone getting cold. Whatever the system did to the world, it hasn’t changed how hot and humid summer is in Virginia.

Keeping my distance pushes me ever deeper into the woods, and that doesn’t ensure I’ll be left alone.

While it’s fortunate for them that enough of the people we pull out get over the trauma and join in helping, it means more and more of them wander the woods looking for food.

Each morning my father’s voice is nagging me to get out. Grab the pickup and head to Cross Junction. Then to move on without waiting for any of them. Each morning, I muster my willpower and join in the rescue efforts.

I’m not abandoning them.

I’m not doing to them what my father did to me and my mother.

I just wish doing that felt better.

My temper frays before work starts.

After the third day, when I got into a screaming match with one of the rescuees over, I have no idea what anymore, that nearly devolved into me punching them, John assigned Terry as my guardian.

It’d be funny if his intervention hadn’t saved so many skulls over the following days. It’s primarily him warning others to leave me alone, but he also has this knack for talking me down. It makes no sense, but he’s made me see reason enough I was able to walk away from the annoyance and go hit trees. And in one case, some sort of giant slug creature that if I’d had killed it outside of Winchester, I’m sure would have earned me a level.

* * * * *

Eighteen days.

It takes eighteen days before John gives up rescuing anyone else.

The last three days were us running into well-organized militias protecting those who are left. A reminder that to them, we are the monsters stealing their neighbors away to turn them into more of us.

The last straw was when we made it into a bunker and found two dozen corpses. They’d taken their lives rather than let us take them.

No one spoke for the rest of that day.

This morning, John announced we were moving out.

Some protest. They didn’t take part in any of the raids in the city. Those who did don’t even look toward the green anymore.

If taking what has to be a few thousand people out of Winchester did anything to reduce the green’s influence, like Terry thought it might, I can’t see it. I figure we need access to that city control node to see how we affected the levels of whatever’s causing the green.

As soon as I attach the harness to the pickup, I pull. Terry, Deloy and Maggie hang around me. Albert comes and goes, as does Elizabeth. I have no idea why Deloy and Maggie are here. All they do is glare at each other when they think I can’t see them.

I don’t get them.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

I don’t get any of them.

I don’t think we’ve traveled half the distance we would have without the mass when John tells me to stop. The sun’s still a few hours away from setting and I consider continuing, putting even more distances between me and them.

My father encourages me. I’m no longer abandoning them anymore. There’s enough of them to take over for whatever I could do. None of them need me, or even want me there.

Even knowing all his reasons are selfish, it’s difficult not to give in. The constant company chips away at my willpower.

If I thought continuing would result in being left alone by at least Deloy and Maggie, I would.

I’m out of the harness and into the surrounding trees before they comment. And, at least, they know better than to follow me.

Silver joins me once I’m about a hundred meters in, walking at my side, then vanishing in the underbrush and returning. When he’s gone for more than a minute, he returns licking his maw and with a satisfied expression that makes me think he’s eaten well.

At first I’m just walking away from where the mass of people will be. Then, I pay attention to the ground, looking for tracks. Then I actively follow the largest ones I find. Since passing level twenty, I can identify tracks into broad categories. These are from something within the canidae family, although the tracks are easily four times larger than any dog or wolf should make.

The system hasn’t thrown me anything outside what I’d considered pre-system prints since I’ve been able to identify them, but that’s coming. That armored bear I fought around Harrisonburg couldn’t have had normal prints.

When Silver goes on alert, I stop. He’s a more accurate gauge of how close we are to a creature than my tracking skill. I listen and hear the snuffling. We are upwind, so it’s not us it’s smelling, but it sounds on alert too.

I step cautiously, the extra time making it easier to notice the twigs and dry leaves that would give my presence away. Instead of pushing branches out of my way, I step around the trees and bushes, careful to remain upwind.

I round a bush and there stands my quarry. It’s wolf-like, but taller at the shoulder, at least a meter and a half, with a sloping back to its hindquarters. It, too, is on alert, peering into an opening in a rocky outcropping. Fifteen meters separate us.

I nod for Silver to get closer. He’s stealthier than I am, and using him to switch will guarantee the element of surprise. He looks at me and I can imagine the roll of the eyes as he yawns. He’s not there to make my job easier, he might as well be telling me.

I grin. Why is it that every fantasy novel I’ve read makes the hero and animal companion relationship so easy, or so in the hero’s favor, while Silver is more than happy to ignore me?

I’m no hero, is the easy answer. Silver’s probably smarter than those animal companions. And I don’t have some idiot of a writer twisting the plot, so I’m going to survive my idiocy.

I summon my bar and run at the creature just as something screeches from within the opening. Before I can stop, or the wolf-thing can bolt away, tentacles burst out of the opening, wrap around the creature and drag it in, ignoring it struggles to escape.

We lock eyes before it vanishes into the darkness and I can’t help feeling like it’s pleading for help. I carefully step away and rejoin Silver, who might be wearing something of a smug expression.

“Yeah, yeah,” I mutter. “You were smart enough to let me take the risk. But if you tell me you knew about the thing in there, you’re going to have to be really good at explaining why you let me do this. You’re smart enough to come up with ways to keep me from doing something that stupid.”

Yep, that’s definitely a smirk. Maybe he’s smart enough to know there is no helping me. He turns and walks away. I follow him, looking over my shoulder at the dark maw in the rock. There is no taking for granted that caves are safe anymore.

* * * * *

The noise is more a rolling wave than voices, and I freeze. It doesn’t matter that I’m carrying an elk-like thing over my shoulder that has to mass nearly five hundred kilos. The idea of stepping closer to that sound terrifies me.

Either I miss-judged where the pickup is, or they’ve made it the center of their camp. I can see my tracks from when I headed into the forest. I didn’t miss-judge.

Silver backs away with a ‘you’re on your own’ look.

Thanks a lot.

With a breath, I steel my willpower and forge forward.

When they come into view, they aren’t people. They’re this mass rolling through the trees, bringing the furthest ones down to make a clearing on each side of the road. I look for a passage through them, but they are a wall that I will have to force aside.

I go around them.

It’s a long way to the road, then the other side, before I find an opening. It seems to be the official way in and out as other hunters come and go, carrying rabbit, foxes and other small game equivalents. John is right that I seem to be the only one finding large creatures when I go out, or that find me. The largest I see a hunter carrying is some lizard thing the size of a full grown doberman.

The butchering area is a series of tables where the hunters drop their kills for others to prepare. I don’t question how they’re bringing the tables along. I find one no one’s using, pull it away from the others, and drop my kill there before I set to skinning and butchering.

Once I’m done, I start a campfire away from everyone, make a drying rack of branches, and let slices of meat dry.

Just how many more days of this am I going to endure?

If you were smart, not one more.