Ron walked out of the room into the hallway, feeling cautiously optimistic about Mr. Sanderson’s chances. He enjoyed the feeling — it was rare enough over the last few hours.

For most, Numbers resetting to zero meant exhaustion, confusion, and clumsiness. For the extremely old and extremely sick, however, the loss of Numbers could have a much more significant consequence. Ron worked in a nursing home, so he was no stranger to death, but over the last three hours he had seen so much more of it than he ever wanted. So many of the rooms were filled with the corpses of what previously were relatively healthy old men and women. Without any Numbers, their bodies just couldn’t support them any longer.

Ron’s shift technically ended an hour ago, but they needed all the help they could get. He’d been going room to room, explaining the situation and helping the patients add their free Numbers. He advised almost everyone to put all of their Numbers into strength and charisma to hopefully prevent any more deaths.

Ron turned the corner in the hallway and froze. At the end of the hall stood a monster. Standing like a human, the arms of the creature hung unnaturally long with blades protruding from the arms instead of hands. Red dripped from the blade on the end of its right arm, forming a bloody trail leading from Mr. Henderson’s room.

The head of the monster turned to Ron. Ron couldn’t see any eyes, but he could feel the attention of the monster pressing on him, making it hard to breathe. The moment seemed to last forever, but finally the monster turned away, walking into the nearby room of Mrs. Lacklyn.

Ron had explained the Numbers to Mrs. Lacklyn just an hour earlier. She had been fine, if a bit confused, one of the few who didn’t seem terribly affected by the loss of their Numbers.

For a frozen second, Ron felt a choice rise up before him. Two options, two paths leading forward. He knew he would have to live with the results of this choice for the rest of his life, however long or short that might be.

Ron sprinted toward the monster.

- Ron of Piney Woods Nursing Home, Inclusion +0 days, 03:12 hours

“You understand that I will not be of much assistance, right?” Sam says.

“Yeah, yeah, we heard you the first five thousand times you said so,” Melete replies.

Melete may be exaggerating, but not by much. For perhaps the first time, Sam truly seems scared. There isn’t anything in its body language or voice that reveals this, as it still speaks with the same even-keeled southern twang, but I started to suspect as much when it tried to dissuade us from fighting for the third time.

“I just want to make sure that you understand,” Sam says. “My illusions will be of little use against the hive. Even against a full colony of Alatir, the hive can be dangerous. Our illusions are significantly weaker as the number of minds to affect increases, and the hive has some sort of connection between them that make their minds naturally resistant to outside influence.”

“Would you call it a...hive mind?” Melete asks, then turns to the rest of us with a wide grin plastered on her face. I just stare at her before continuing the conversation with the others, refusing to acknowledge her weak joke.

“Anything else we should know about this ‘hive,’ Sam? Any special abilities to watch out for?” Sam starts to talk before I cut it off. “Aside from its resistance to your illusions, I mean.”

“...no, nothing I have not already mentioned. Against most creatures, the hive is not especially dangerous. Individually, they are weak, slow, and stupid. Their lethality just comes from their Numbers and their coordination, if a queen is nearby.” Sam pauses. “Keep in mind that none of this applies to a queen. They are significantly stronger than the rest of the hive and are likely to have at least one skill at their disposal. They typically stay within their burrows and rely on the rest of the hive to bring them their prey. It’s also why many creatures do not bother attacking a hive nest: only the queen has Numbers worth fighting for, but you would have to defeat the entire hive to even get a chance at the queen.”

I nod. “That sounds good for us then. We aren’t looking to fight our way through their whole nest, we are just looking to get some easy Numbers. So remember,” I make eye contact with each of my friends. “Don’t overextend, don’t push too far forward, don’t let us get surrounded. We only push forward if they are retreating, and we don’t get anywhere close to the entrance of that nest.” They each nod, and I turn to Melete. “Melete, we’ll mostly be relying on you to take them down with your skill. Don’t stop singing, not for anything. We’ll stay on you and make sure nothing can get close. Everyone understand?”

“Don’t worry, Atlas,” Styx says. “We’ll be careful. We’re not idiots.”

I nod, chagrined. “I know, I know, I’m just worried. This is the first time we’re actually seeking out danger.”

She reaches across our small circle and takes my hand. “It’ll be okay. We’ll be smart, and we’ll work together.” I smile back at her.

Melete reaches into the center and places her hand on top of ours. She wiggles her head at Pallas until he sighs and places his own hand on top of the stack.

Melete lifts her hand high in the air, the rest of our hands reluctantly following, and shouts, “Go Team Titans!”

“...Team Titans? Really?” Styx asks.

“What do you mean, ‘really’? It fits with all of our names! And we’re even teenagers!” Melete replies.

I just shake my head. “Let’s go hide our supplies. If you need to use the bathroom, now’s your chance. We’re starting in fifteen minutes.”

Twenty minutes later, the four of us stand with weapons in hand and slowly approach the cave entrance. Sam elected to stand guard over our supplies, apparently serious about its inability to help in this battle. Despite knowing it was coming, I feel a pang of nervousness at the realization that we will be fighting without its illusions. I push the feeling away. We need to be completely focused on the task at hand.

Melete is at the back of our formation, Styx is on the left, I’m on the right, and Pallas guards the center. Pallas’ ears are plugged once again, with an additional cloth wrapped around his head to further dull the sound — when escaping from Fort Carscott he apparently had endured a not inconsiderable amount of pain despite his makeshift earplugs. It’s further evidence of the growing power of Melete’s skill, reflected in the light-blue color of the tattoo on her right arm.

Against weak monsters, like Sam describes the hive to be, I expect Melete’s skill to be extremely effective. As long as the hive doesn’t have the ability to turn off or otherwise block their sense of hearing, this fight shouldn’t be too difficult. Our jobs will just be to make sure none of the monsters can engage Melete in close combat and let her skill do all of the work.

Twenty feet away from the cave opening, we stop. Pallas hefts a large rock in his right hand, lining up his shot, before releasing. The rock bounces once before rolling down the hole into the cave. Immediately, we retreat to the edge of the clearing. Only once we have trees to our backs and the cave is over a hundred feet away do we stop, weapons held at the ready.

At first, there is no response. I worry that we might have to try something more to gain their attention. I worry that Sam is wrong, that this actually is just a normal cave and that the hive have nothing to do with it. I worry, simply because I can.

But my worries prove unfounded as monsters crawl out of the cave entrance.

Despite Sam giving us a description of the creatures we would soon be facing, I still pictured the hive as some sort of insectoid creature. My mind refused to imagine something called the ‘hive’ as anything else. The reality, however, proves my expectations wrong.

At first glance, they look like large, skinny lizards with an extra pair of legs in the center of their snake-like bodies. The six legs are much longer than a normal lizard’s. Pushing up from the body before turning at the joint to return to the ground, they remind me of a grasshopper’s hind legs. Their bodies are dark green, and red tongues continually flash out of their mouths.

Of course, they are also way larger than any normal lizard. From extending tongues to the tips of their tails, they stretch a full three feet.

For this battle my only job is to keep the monsters away from Melete. As useful as the machete has been, I’ve lent it to Styx for this battle and instead hold the shovel tightly between my fingers.

At first the monsters don’t notice us. More and more of the hive pour from the cave and congregate around the entrance, tongues flicking and heads turning back and forth. As their numbers increase, I have second thoughts on the wisdom of this endeavor. But just before I flash my teammates the sign for ‘retreat,’ the head of every monster turns and looks directly at us.

There’s a moment of stillness, four pairs of eyes staring into hundreds. Frozen.

But then the spell breaks and the monsters charge towards us. Melete immediately starts singing. I feel a slight twinge of pain and spare a second to thicken the growth over my ears, muffling it even further.

It feels surreal, standing with just a shovel in my hands and three friends by my side, preparing to face a horde of lizard monsters. All of it in complete silence.

More of the hive is emerging from the cave, but luckily some face the opposite direction to guard their home. The first monsters are now within thirty feet of us and moving fast, their gangly legs carrying them quickly across the ground.

At twenty feet, the effects of Melete’s skill make themselves known as several monsters in the front row fall to the ground, rolling and tripping up the monsters behind them before resuming their run.

The rest of the hive is not dissuaded though, and their charge continues.

When they’re only ten feet away, I raise up my shovel and prepare to swing. More of the hive are dropping, but not enough.

And then they are upon us. All I can see are thrashing tails, beady black eyes, tiny razor-sharp teeth. I swing my shovel back and forth in front of me, every swing connecting. One wraps its body around the end of the shovel, attempting to crawl up the shaft. Before it can make progress, it dies from Melete’s voice and limply falls to the ground. It did its job though, for it slowed my swings down enough to allow two other monsters within my guard. I kick out at them with my feet, hoping to knock them back. I can’t stop swinging the shovel, can’t allow more to get through. I crush the head of one beneath my foot as the other latches on to the same leg, sharp teeth sinking into my thigh. I yell in pain, but don’t stop swinging.

After a moment, the pressure from the monster’s jaw loosens as it succumbs to Melete’s song. The body is still wrapped around my leg though, the weight slowing me down.

I ignore it. My role is not to move or dodge around these monsters. My role is to be a wall. As long as Melete keeps singing, we’ll win this, no matter how many of the hive charge us.

I keep swinging my shovel, focusing on just knocking the lizards back rather than hurting them. This close to Melete, they’ll be dead long before the physical wounds I inflict can have any effect.

I notice some of the hive circling around the side. It isn’t the most effective strategy, as this just means more time close to Melete, but we can’t allow even a single monster to get to her. If she stops for even a second, we might not be able to recover.

I glance quickly to my left. Pallas is swinging the axe in wide arcs, brown blood splattered on his face. Unlike mine, his strikes are actually killing some of the hive before Melete’s skill gets the chance. He seems to have his area well covered, so I shift a step back and to my right, making sure nothing can get around us.

I’m not sure how long we fight off the waves of the hive mobbing us. Each second stretches into an eternity, but when the monsters finally stop coming it feels like only an instant has passed since the first wave. The bodies piled up around us tell me that it was at least a few minutes.

I breathe heavily and reach down to dislodge the monster still wrapped around my leg. I don’t drop my guard, though, for there are still hive left alive. A wall of them sit patiently about fifty feet away and stare at us, unmoving.

Is that it? Has their queen realized they can’t overwhelm us with numbers and called them back? If so, it’s time for us to retreat. We’ve already gained plenty from this expedition, and mounting an offensive is way riskier than I’m comfortable with.

But before I can flash the sign for retreat, I notice movement in the cave entrance. Something much larger than a normal member of the hive shifts in the shadows.

The queen has arrived.

S: 102

D:100

W: 322

I: 102

C: 72

?

Skills: Adjust:Self