Daughton looked over the poster one last time before nodding his approval, setting it on top of the stack of hundreds just like it and pushing the pile to the corner of his desk.

He wasn’t entirely satisfied with the solution. How could he be? He was basically deputizing citizens to do the jobs of soldiers, without any of the training or backup.

Of course, it wasn’t quite as bad as all that. Citizens were already regularly leaving the safety of the city center to forage for supplies. This would just make it more official, offering incentives to those who did it regularly and provided information regarding the monsters along their routes.

It was a necessary task, and one that his platoon unfortunately could no longer handle by themselves. He’d managed to keep it from the notice of most of the citizens, but they were in dire straights. Daughton hadn’t heard from his superiors in almost two weeks, and his remaining soldiers just weren’t enough to protect the steadily increasing population of refugees by themselves.

Hopefully, this would help them last just a little bit longer.

- Sgt. Daughton, Inclusion +28 days 12:16 hours

I jump to the left, dodging the flurry of spikes shot at my back, proud of my quick reaction.

Try and get them to aim at the woods, please, I send to Pallas through my bond.

“Yeah, sorry, moving now,” Pallas replies.

His and my ears are both completely sealed, but I’m able to hear his response through the ears of Melete, who stands off to the side, silent and still.

Despite the near-miss of a potentially painful wound, I smile excitedly as I dodge a similar group of spikes shooting at me from the front.

I’ve finally hit my goals of four hundred in both intelligence and wisdom, and over the last four days of travel have started to invest my gains into my physical Numbers. Just a few days ago, I wouldn’t have had the dexterity to dodge either of the last two missiles.

Just an increase in my Numbers couldn’t leave me this excited, though. While my slow-but-steady gains are something to celebrate, as long as I continue to battle monsters the growth of my Numbers is inevitable.

No, what has me excited is the fact that I dodged the first spikes without looking at them. At least not with my own eyes.

Over the last few days, I’ve been training my Bond: Mental skill. Not the skill itself, but rather my use of the skill. I’ve taken to hiking with my eyes closed and ears blocked off, relying totally on the perception granted to me through my bonds to avoid obstacles and keep moving forward.

It’s taken a lot of getting used to. For my entire life, I’ve been accustomed to my point of view originating five feet or so above the ground. Trying to account for how high I need to lift my legs to step over a log based off of the eyesight of someone more than five yards away? On that first day my companions took great joy in teasing me, joking that it was as if I was learning how to walk entirely from scratch all over again.

But all the training has been worth it. I’m able to at least somewhat integrate the additional perspectives with my own as we fight, reacting correctly to dodge an attack I only perceive through my bond with Melete.

Of course, my almost three-hundred and sixty degrees of vision means nothing if I’m too distracted to pay attention to it. In my excitement, I lose focus and get clipped by one of the small flying spikes.

“Ouch,” I say mostly out of reflex as I pull the spike out of where it’s lodged in my jacket. Luckly, it’s light and doesn’t have enough momentum to pierce all the way through my clothes into my skin, and comes out easily without any blood. I take three steps forward to the small monster, and with a small flick of my booted feet flip it onto it’s back.

Normally I’d be reluctant to start a conversation mid-battle, but it’s difficult to exercise my normal level of caution against such pitiful opponents. How could these things ever be considered the dominant force on a planet? I ask Sam through my bond.

Melete is sitting this fight out while Pallas, Styx and I make our way around the grouping of monsters, methodically flipping each on their backs where they helplessly flail their legs as they attempt to right themselves. Ms. Kathy and the twins stand behind Melete about twenty yards away, Sam keeping watch next to them. The twins cheer for us as we dodge around the monsters, Ms. Kathy staring on with a frown on her face, the only one who seems to actually take this battle seriously.

“Dominance doesn’t always come through strength of arms,” Sam says. “The spike tick, as they would be called in your language, is not very dangerous in combat. But it is extremely difficult to kill. They can heal from almost any wound that isn’t immediately lethal, their bodies are very resilient to any crushing force, and they can survive in practically any environment. Although they are a species with Numbers, most see them as an infestation to be ignored, their miniscule Numbers not even worth the effort to exterminate them.”

The little monsters look similar to a porcupine, or at least I think they do. I’ve never seen a porcupine in real life, only in pictures online that I can only hazily remember. They’re less than a foot from front to back and covered in tiny spikes that they can launch with surprising aim, considering I don’t see any eyes, ears, nose, or any other sensory organs that might be tracking our positions. They’re flatter than their earthly cousins, though, and once flipped onto their backs they can only helplessly flail their short legs as we move on to the next spike tick.

In just a few minutes we’ve defeated the last of the monsters, their legs all wriggling in eerie synchronicity, even Pallas’ low dexterity, coupled with his ability to turn insubstantial, enough to avoid all but superficial wounds.

I trust Sam’s description of the monsters is correct, but move to one of the helpless monsters with my knife anyway. Their flesh looks weak, but it’s surprisingly rubbery, and even after breaking the outer layer there’s only more rubbery flesh waiting beneath.

I press deeper with the knife for another few seconds until the skin I’ve already sliced through starts to mend over my knife, at which point I hurriedly retrieve my weapon. Maybe Pallas with his higher strength Number would be able to kill them quicker than they could heal, but I’ve got to agree with Sam: it’s not worth it. On one of their flailing limbs I can see their line of five Numbers, the total even less than the twins’.

“I don’t think it’s going to work,” I say as I walk back over to my companions, unblocking my ears as I move. I notice Ms. Kathy’s sigh of relief in reaction, but I ignore it.

Over the last week since we left Clayton, we’ve fought monsters on almost a daily basis. Luckily, nothing we’ve faced has been on the level of the hive queen or the blob monster at Styx’s house, but it’s a new type of life that Ms. Kathy has been slow to adjust to. She’s been even slower to accept our latest plan of keeping her and the twins safe: monster executions.

Whenever we’ve encountered monsters that are weak enough that we don’t have to go all out, we’ve aimed to disable rather than destroy, allowing the three ‘civilians’ to finish them off for their Numbers.

Of course, this isn’t as effective as we originally hoped it would be. We don’t allow Ms. Kathy or the twins near any monsters until we can absolutely guarantee that they pose no further threat, which unfortunately means most of the monsters we face we kill without even trying to subdue. We’ve also found that the proportion of Numbers allocated to each person is skewed heavily based on contribution, and dealing the killing blow to a monster immobilized by others isn’t worth much.

Still, even the few Numbers gained are a boon to our weaker companions -- when you’re dealing with Numbers as low as theirs, even a few extra here and there can be game changing.

This is the only reason Ms. Kathy agreed to let the twins participate, her distaste with the practice clear on her face as Melete and Pallas gently guided the scared kids through the grisly executions.

Surprisingly quickly, though, the kids adjusted. As the days passed they became more and more willing to do the deed, which is worrying in its own right, but I believe it to be necessary in our new world.

It wouldn’t be an issue today, though. If I couldn’t quickly kill these spike ticks, there’s no way Hyper or Phoebe will be able to with their meager strength.

“Back on the road then?” Styx asks as she pulls her pack up onto her shoulders.

“Yeah,” I answer, shouldering my own pack and leading the way around the edge of the group of flailing spike ticks which block half the road. “I think we might have a chance to make it to Bothell before it gets dark.”

This prompts a cheer from the twins, followed by a chant of, “Bothell! Bothell! Bothell!”

I smile, my expression mirrored on the faces of my companions.

The energy and youthful enthusiasm has been a balm on our spirits since leaving Clayton, their seemingly endless optimism in the face of our tragic world able to bring joy even to the often annoyed Styx.

It’s helped that the average power of the monsters has been much lower since leaving the city, getting progressively weaker each day as we get further and further away. We haven’t abandoned our regular vigilance, of course, still ensuring that someone is one watch all hours of the night and day, but we’ve relaxed some of our more stringent measures, allowing the kids to make more noise than they were allowed early in our journey.

As we resume our trek, Hyper runs over and grabs my hand, walking by side as we lead the group.

“Why’d you pick the name Atlas?” he asks after five minutes of hiking in silence. A new record, I think.

I shrug. “No reason, really? He was the only one I could remember. I don’t really know much about greek mythology.”

“Really?” Hyper asks, “Melete got us a book for our birthday two years ago and would read it to us before bed almost every day. Do you want to hear about them?”

I give Hyper an indulgent smile. “Sure. Which one is your favorite?”

“Pallas, of course! He was the best fighter!” Hyper pulls his hand from mine and throws a few punches into the air before grabbing my hand again. “Although I like Hyperion too. His name is the coolest. Hypeeeeerion,” he says, stretching out the middle.

“What about…” I think, struggling to remember my greek mythology. “Ares? He’s a good fighter too, right?”

Hyper made a face. “He’s just a bully, and he was never as cool as the titans. They’re all my favorites. I feel bad for them, cause I don’t think they deserved everything that happened.”

I huff a laugh. “Really?” I’m definitely not an expert, but from the little I can remember of Greek mythology, pretty much everyone in those stories were terrible in one way or another and deserved some sort of punishment. I definitely wouldn’t pick it as reading material for a couple of kids, but I can’t say I’m surprised that Melete would choose it.

“Yeah. But I always felt bad for Atlas. He was forced to hold the weight of the sky, all by himself! Forever! Think of how hard that would be. I tried to carry a book over my head for as long as I could, but I got tired after just six minutes. He had to hold the sky forever, without any breaks!”

“But the sky is just full of air, so it can’t be all that heavy, right? Not as heavy as a giant book, at least,” I say, needling the young boy.

“But the Greeks were stupid! They didn’t know all about space and stuff, at least not as much as us. ‘Sky’ meant everything that was up, including the stars and planets and sun and moon. So the whole universe! Atlas had to carry the whole universe, all by himself! That would suck.”

“Hey, what’d your grandma say about using that word?”

“Ughhh...fine. That would be bad,” Hyper mumbles, freeing his hand and running off to find someone else to distract who wouldn’t correct his language.

I smile, look around the surrounding trees for any monsters, and continue my march.

We elect to eat our dinner a little later than normal, hopeful that we’ll reach Bothell before stopping. But after delaying our regular mealtime an hour, we finally give up on reaching the city tonight and set up our camp, reluctant to travel as the sun’s setting.

We light a small fire and heat some water in a pot, everyone waiting while Pallas mixes in a few containers of ramen and sauce packets, stirring occasionally. It isn’t the tastiest or most nutritious dinner, but after a week away from the city with almost double our normal mouths to feed, we’re once again running low on supplies.

We were able to restock comfortably before leaving Clayton, and although Ms. Kathy and the twins don’t eat as much as the rest of us, especially Pallas, they don’t carry much, either, the twins’ small backpacks usually ending up in someone else’s arms a few hours into the day.

I’m not too worried about our food situation, though. A few days ago we fought another small pack of dog monsters, even allowing the twins to get a few stabs into the last monster before finishing it off. And, figuring that it’d be necessary to test eventually, I cooked and ate a few small bites of their meat.

Everyone else abstained, as we didn’t want more than one of us to get sick if their flesh turned out to not be edible. And we figured with my Adjust: Self skill, I’d have the best chance to heal from or ignore any food poisoning.

But luckily, I’ve felt no ill effects from the meat. So even if we aren’t able to resupply in Bothell in the next few days, I’m confident that we can survive at least a little longer off of the flesh of some of the monsters.

Pallas ladles out servings of the ramen into each of our bowls, smiling at the twins before bringing Styx her meal where she’s keeping watch.

To be honest, probably my biggest worry has been our interaction with the human bandits almost a week ago. I haven’t talked to Pallas or anyone about what happened, not even Styx. And honestly, I don’t feel as if I need to. Despite the shock I experienced in Pallas’ moment of action, I can’t honestly say that I feel any remorse for his decision, nor does anyone else appear traumatized or regretful.

Which is what worries me.

We killed a fellow human. Well, Pallas did, but at the very least we were accessories to the murder -- and it unquestionably was murder. Despite the man’s threats and his recent attempted murder of our group, I don’t think there’s a jury in the world that would judge the throat-slicing of an unarmed man with his hands on his head as ‘self-defense.’

Why don’t I feel guilty about it?

Everything I’ve heard and seen in TV shows would indicate that, unless I’m a sociopath, I should feel some level of guilt or stress. Yet over the last week I’ve barely considered the man except to keep on the lookout for similar bandits.

Are we all just so desensitized from constantly fighting and killing monsters that killing a human no longer feels any different? Is latent stress just building up, waiting for us to get somewhere safe before we collapse into a heap of uselessness?

I don’t regret Pallas’ actions. He may have acted without consulting the group, but he did what I think was necessary in that situation, and if Pallas weren’t there we probably would have been forced to kill the man eventually -- if not at that moment, then after he chased us down and attacked us later.

I do regret, though, being a person who can condone murder without feeling guilty. I feel guilty for not feeling guilty...how does that even work?

As we settle in for the night, picking our sleeping areas and assigning the watch schedule, I firm my resolve. Tomorrow I’ll talk to Styx about it. I’m stuck in my head right now -- maybe an outside perspective can help me clear some of this up.

With that thought, I drift off into an untroubled sleep.

S: 163 (+10)

D: 186 (+42)

W: 402 (+12)

I: 400 (+35)

C: 100

0

Skills: Adjust:Self, Bond:Mental