The subway station-turned cave ended in two tunnels where the bathrooms had been, just beyond the turnstileagmites. If I remembered right, there wasn’t much space in the men’s room, so there shouldn’t be much danger in checking it out first.

As I got closer to the two cave entrances, I slowed down. The stone floor leading into what had once been the men’s room was worn smooth. That meant traffic—was it a leftover from when this had been the Chicago station, or was this a sign of Rat Men?

I gripped the Rat Man’s spear and crept forward into the cave. It was time to avenge my lost headphones.

Something shifted in the semi-dark ahead of me, and I turned the corner as fast as I could, stabbing in front of me just as the Rat Man jumped forward. My spear caught the monster in the stomach while its weapon grazed my side painfully. I pulled it out and readied myself. Something else was moving inside, and the yellow-green orb was floating toward me again.

This Rat Man had only been Level Two, so if the progress was anything like I expected, it wouldn’t give me a whole level, but it might get me close. I stepped toward the orb, swinging my spear upward to block a second Rat Man’s strike and thanking God that my Awareness was so high.

The second Rat Man’s spear butt caught me in the stomach, driving the air out of my lungs. I blocked one attack, then another, but the Level Three Rat Man had me on my back foot, and I couldn’t get control of the fight. It was all I could do to keep the Rat Man’s spear out of my face, and I took a couple of grazing cuts.

I needed to change something. Defense wouldn’t work; neither would weak, probing spear thrusts.

But something unexpected might.

I caught the monster in the face with the spear butt. The Rat Man staggered, and its leg glowed an orange-ish color for a second. It drew my eye toward it. A moment later, I thrust my spear right into the meat above its leg.

The monster snarled, recovering a little, then took a second thrust—to the shoulder this time. It staggered again, squealing, and I took advantage of the moment, stabbing the Rat Man and finishing it off. As the orb floated into my chest, I groaned; my bite wound was starting to hurt, and I needed to find something to patch up my scrapes and bruises—plus something that’d help me take hits.

The rest of the men’s restroom looked bare—there wasn’t much around except for a pile of charcoal from a fire, a few half-burned-out torches, and some rotten-looking scraps of what was either a hamburger or shawarma. My stomach growled. I hadn’t eaten anything in…a while. Since lunch—and that’d just been a sandwich. But I wasn’t hungry enough to eat that.

I readied my spear and turned to the women’s restroom.

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The cave that’d once been the women’s room was empty. No Rat Men, no crazy monsters—I couldn’t see anything except a pile of what looked like leather. Some of it was cut into strips, but four nearly complete hides sat in a messy stack. They weren’t mange-covered, filthy things like the Rat Men’s fur, either. These looked like deerskins that’d been freshly tanned. They were tucked into one of what used to be bathroom stalls near the entrance in a neat, folded stack.

That was odd. But then again, this whole thing was odd.

I sat on a toilet-sized rock in one of the dozen alcoves lining the cave wall. The station was silent—I couldn’t even hear the wind in the subway tunnel. It would have been easy to forget what was happening around us and focus on the leather—and on what I wanted to make.

But I hadn’t forgotten. The cut on my side and the puncture wound in my arm—not to mention the bite that definitely looked red around the edges—were constant reminders that I was in serious trouble. I had to do something to even the odds. The pile of hides, my Leatherman multi-tool, and a basic knowledge of how riding chaps and horse saddles worked were my best bet at doing that.

The patterns were easy to see; my Awareness made shapes all but pop out of the hides with light blue outlines. I could see every hide's strengths, weaknesses, and possibilities: shoulder pads, skirts to cover our legs, and even gauntlets. I’d never done much with leather, but I felt like…not an expert, but maybe a solid journeyman? If I’d had this kind of Awareness at the auto shop, I could have solved that Explorer and had that woman halfway to Wyoming by now.

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I felt a rumbling as I worked, cutting out the patterns for a leather shirt about my size and boring holes in it to stitch it together. It started in my feet, then my rear, and before long, I could hear the Redline Wyrm coming around again. The screeching, crushing sound pressed down on me like a vice, and I couldn’t move until it passed.

For the next hour, I cut leather, stitched it together, and added layers. Layers were the key, I decided; anywhere I didn’t want to get stabbed, folding the leather over itself or adding another section could only help distribute impacts and catch spear tips. I’d have killed for some Kevlar chainsaw chaps, but I didn’t have those.

For the first time, my mind wandered from trying to find Tori. But it didn’t wander far. Why had I thrown myself into danger like this for a stranger? What was so special about Tori?

It took a few minutes to figure out.

Jessica reminded me of my mom. That woman was obviously working hard to connect with Tori, just like Mom had with Beth. Her relationship with Tori was probably closer to my sister’s and mom’s than mine. I didn’t blame Tori for not warming up to her. It had to be tough to adapt to a new mom. But at the same time…

She was trying. Mom had tried, too.

I shook my head, clearing it, and tossed a ruined scrap of leather aside. I needed to focus; leather wasn’t exactly abundant, and even with the patterns jumping out of the hide at me, I couldn’t afford to waste it—or waste time.

The train passed by two more times, and each time, I got jumpy and had to talk myself out of panicking. Eventually, though, I finished two suits of armor—one for me, and one for Tori, when I found her. They weren’t pretty. But they’d work.

The armor looked nothing like I’d hoped it would. I’d wanted something that looked like movie armor. I’d gotten two tightish, crude suits of leather armor. Both looked like a cross between a Roman legionnaire’s armor and a mountain man’s makeshift warm clothes. It wasn’t what I’d intended, but it would solve the problem.

Mine felt a little loose, like it’d buckle with a blow instead of redirecting it or absorbing the force. The stitching wasn’t built for looks. It was built to be easy to fix if I needed to. When I needed to, rather—I’d definitely need some repairs. But it did cover my whole body, from my neck to my knees, in linked leather sections.

Tori’s was a little smaller, but I’d helped fix plenty of clothes her size.

I couldn’t get Beth out of my head.

She was always the family’s troublemaker. Mom said she was a rebel. Dad thought she was a free spirit. I just figured she wanted to get out of work. She’d go missing early in the morning, and I’d have to track her down—only to find her barefoot out in the cornfields singing with the crows. We’d both be behind on our chores, and Dad didn’t like that much, so I’d end up having to work extra hard to catch us up.

Beth and I had fought a couple of years ago, just before she graduated. I didn’t go home to see her commencement. She’d been so pissed about it.

I forced my thoughts back to Tori and the armor. Hopefully, she wouldn’t drown in it when she put it on.

“This might actually work. If it gives me enough of an edge to get a couple of levels, I can get my Body stat up. Then, it won’t matter if the armor’s bad and falling apart. I’ll find Tori, and then we can ditch it and still be okay. Or maybe we’ll find something else in the tunnels. Something better.”

The leather was so out of place in the former bathroom that I couldn’t help but think there’d be other discoveries in the Redline Tunnels. Maybe another cave would have better materials, or something left over from when it was a subway station. But before I could explore, I had one more piece of business to cover.

I needed a plan.

The stats were easy to think about. I needed to invest a couple of points in Mana because the Redline Wyrm’s level—Twenty—made me think that the Consortium liked fives. I had an idea about how Mana and Awareness worked together, and I wanted to raise my mana to confirm it. If I was right, I wouldn’t need a lot of Mana—just enough for one or two spells. I hoped it’d be like breaking nuts and bolts to pull an engine, where you could either push hard or use the right tool.

After that, I’d split between Body and Awareness until one of them started looking more useful than the other. I could already see things I shouldn’t be able to—it’d only get better from here. I hoped.

The other plan was harder to figure out, but eventually, I decided to wait for the Redline Wyrm to come around. It wasn’t moving back and forth—it was on a circuit—so the best way for me to move was clockwise, with it instead of against it. That’d give me the most time to get from station to station.

An ex in high school had been into video games—Dark Souls and MMOs, mostly. She was serious about World of Warcraft, but mostly for the collectibles. I’d never gotten into the games myself, but sometimes, I’d see if she wanted to go get pizza or a burger, and she’d be too busy grinding for rare mounts or levels or digital pets.

I’d never understood that mentality. Grinding wasn’t a puzzle to me. The solution wasn’t ever clever. It was just busy work. But now, I understood.

Once I got to the next station, I was going to grind.