I like Mike. He didn't look like much, had hardly noticed him before, but now I begin to see. He's really what's holding us all together. You can stick any combination of us with him and it just works. But without him? It's just a mess. You can think of him as the plain white bread of our group.

When I was younger, going to the park, throwing the lines out and having a bbq was one of Dad's easy wins for a Saturday. I was still getting use to his life lesson style of parenting, which meant Murphy's law for me, and always carry a gun and don't let Cody die, for him.

And I learned a lot very quickly, like the huge difference between geese and ducks, and to always throw the bread.

"Ahhhhh! Ahhhh!"

"Mike! Shut up! We're trying to escape!"

'Ahhhh! Ahhhh!"

Hard smacks and tight teeth slide off my face trying to find purchase, leathery wings flap over my head as I try to lean forward and use my body to shield Mike and his unprotected body from the bombing dives. I'm carrying him like a baby, except he's over half a foot taller, and weighs seventy pounds more.

"Your leg will grow back!" I shout as I briefly consider buying a potion and instead wait for his next scream and popped a fruit right in his mouth from my inventory.

"Arrrgggghhh, Arrrrggghh."

"Fuck it. Brandon, catch!" I shout, tossing my burden as Brandon spins around and I see his eyes widen. He totally would have made the catch, too, if Mike could have just gone with the spiral. Or if I had ever practiced throwing people, but I was already flipping around - mauls whistling and tearing, screaming myself now that I wanted the attention.

Derek popped out from a cluster of the tall thin palms he always disappeared into, letting arrows fly, missing most, but big enough and ugly enough that even he could get lucky. Jason stayed back, too, with his new magic missile that looked like a blue baseball as he wound up and pitched each one. It had been a consolation prize for being the worst at almost everything.

This whole day would have been awful. Terrible. If I wasn't so much stronger then everything. Instead it was hilarious because these were all people in one way or another I had at least somewhat jealously admired just over a month ago and now, well, they were acting like a bunch of pussies. So I guess it was terrible and awful, just not for me -

I turned to see Mike on the ground clutching at his regrowing limb with one hand as he struggled to tug out the fruit while Brandon rolled on the ground beside him wrestling a pterodactyl.

"Kill them, Cody!" Derrik yelled for the 100th time.

"You need to fight!" I shouted back as I made sure that nobody got overwhelmed, the second they were double teamed I rushed over, slapping the second offender down - but somehow that wasn't good enough, "Drop the bow! Fight!"

Derek was always looking around like he wanted to grow a second set of eyes. What he really needed to grow was his first pair of balls -

All of a sudden Mike was there again, this time he was trying the bone spear I made for him and, held up above him he looked about as threatening as an hours' devours, and the reptile birds agreed, swooping down but it was exactly what everyone needed. Derrik's first shot hit true, not enough to kill but to send the frontrunner spiraling off and Jason's slower orb splashed into the other, causing them to abort their assault.

Mike took the front position, the point of a triangle between them both -

He had the lowest pain tolerance of all of us. He screamed like a baby over the tiniest little bite and I thought he was done. Like a gun-shy dog, I was ready to take him back to the truck, but the second he healed he was back out front. He tried to jump in front of me when we were moving in our squad sweep because one of the reptile birds swooped at me, had I known he was that stupid, I'd of warned him as to why I stopped right there - anyway, his leg went right into the open mouth of...something.

And apparently the particular yodeling sound he made, as well as the lack of threat he was giving off was just too irroestiable for the birds to pass up, apparently any of them...

I turned to check Brandon and he had a knee on each wing and he was pummeling it, his hands covered in blood, "It's already dead!" I shouted.

"I know!"

I turned back again, sweeping the sky and saw the rest flapping above in their strange bouncy flight, not looking interested in joining us so I marched over and snagged the one Derrik had dropped, still flapping and struggling to get air, I broke it's neck.

"God." Derrik shivered, staring at me, "I don't know how you do that."

"Opposing pressure." I replied, walking over to show him where to put his hands but he didn't hold up one of the bodies so I could demonstrate. I watched, as they grabbed the kills, closing their eyes for a few seconds until they vanished, and then grouping up on Mike. Why we always headed to Mike? It just happened the first time, and I'm still figuring it out...

"Good job, bud." I said slapping his back.

"Yeah, thanks." Derrik fucking hugged him.

"You were like a fucking Knight!" Jason shouted, pretending to hold a spear as he galloped over, "There was ten of them coming right at me, and I knew I was going to die, no way I could handle that many on my own, and you just came through."

I couldn't be jealous, because I liked Mike. You couldn't not like him, who doesn't like just wholesome, dependable, plain white bread?

I touched Brandon's eyes for a second, expected a smirk - and of course it was there, but even he was nodding.

We headed back to camp, which was nothing more than a fallback site right now. I'd just thrown some chopped palms down into a square, Lincoln Logs style with more for a simple roof. The ground here was too sandy to grow something proper, and the breeze that blew through the gaps was nice to enjoy in the shade as it just kept getting hotter the higher the sun went.

"Alright, anybody learn anything?" I asked, seeing the rest shake their heads as we leaned back, resting, "You guys have to figure these shit out. The inventories at least. It all goes together, it's why you're getting so fucked up out there."

Of course I had started to explain everything to them back home, except they'd already known everything - or so I thought at the time. The problem is, how do you explain something you don't really see? That there aren't words for, except they had words for them. They were researching like crazy, reading everything out there - and I thought, well, if somebody knew enough to write about it...

Except then we got here, and while I was building the shelter, Mike dropped into the sand and pretended he was giving birth, and instead of baby, a big jug of water appeared...I'd clapped him on the shoulder laughing, thinking it was a joke.

It wasn't - or, at least it wasn't his joke. Not everything online was accurate. And while most of the stuff had been vanishing or hidden, apparently a large amount of the good 'guides' still proliferated in the 'deep web.' Which none of us had access to, but thankfully Mike had found that some places on the web still posted reliable information - like 4chan.

And at first I thought the information was wrong - oh, dear. But it turns out, it was right, just wrong for me. And I started to see the common threads surrounding what they knew and understood - because what had my inventory started as? Nothing, really, but space. Who's to say how much my personality influenced it, in what way I encouraged it to grow.

I can't help but wonder, in a way, of how before in my life I'd spent so much time reaching - I always had a sense of what was inside me. Always felt the shape of it, how much of that had led to what I could do. The way I did it? And because nobody told me any different...I just did what came natural.

It wasn't wrong of a pregnant lady, who went into a dungeon and did what came natural to her - to use the training she had, and what came natural to her to get something out of her body. It wasn't Mike's fault either.

But now I had to test it, I couldn't rely on the knowledge I thought they had, and I had to make sure it wasn't doing the opposite. Which meant skinning reptile birds.

"I'm telling you, Cody. It's the stats. It's the only difference." Jason repeated, and I could somewhat agree that they were important, "If we all had fives we could learn and fight and use the inventories like you. Now we're fucked."

"It's a part of it, Jason." I nodded, "But there's got to be something more to it then that. Brandon didn't get Wrestling the first time he came in, nor when he wrestled after, only today - only when it was a creature, or maybe just because we are here - and his strength is a three. Yet when I wrestle him, he feels almost as strong. There's more to it."

"It's gonna take us years to catch up." Jason kicked the sand, causing Brandon to jerk his head up and growl before brushing the sand off his work. The scalpels I'd gotten made it much smoother then it was with scissors - that's for sure, I needed to get more, I should of thought of surgical tools before today.

"We never will. Not if stats cost ten times more each time." Derek added.

"Hey, stop being drama queens, and stop exaggerating if you're gonna jump my ass every time I do it. If what Cody says is try with his Vitality, the second stat you buy costs twice as much each time, at worst. Maybe it just costs 75 coins and -"

"Maybe it's worse than that, maybe it doubles the first five, then doubles again after - maybe you can't buy more than five. You don't know -"

"Which is why we can't waste time." I gestured at how slow they were cutting, how reluctant they were. And maybe it was just intent - or what you were naturally good at, that too was a test, "We at least need to know if intent matters, if its luck, actions, or something else. Brandon got the Wrestling Skill today almost instantly after beating a monster. I got my harvesting skill after hours. His intel is lower than mine, but no matter what way you look at it, it's not acting at that much of a multiplier. You feel the differences of memory, already."

"I'm just saying it's not fair - the stats should cost the same, and everybody should start out with the same amount. I'm tired of people having a leg-up on me, when I'm still getting out of bed."

"You should have lifted with me, bro." Brandon said, glaring past Jason, and we chuckled at one of his rare jokes, but, it wasn't really - Brandon had a strength of three, everybody else had twos - really everybody was pretty close to a two average with something they just excelled at and something they dragged behind on -

And I didn't remember what it was like, even what my stats were before I had fives, which worried me, too. The others said they could remember coming in, and it just felt like passing through maybe a microwave? Strange, a little painful, and then different -

But there had to be a pattern to it beyond our intel stat, I just didn't have enough to know about it yet and Mike's memory hadn't improved enough that he could recall enough of the minute details of what he read to give me more information - so it was either figure it out for ourselves, or swim in ignorance. And when it came to ignorance I was more of a sinker...

They described their inventory to me. Jason's was a closet. Brandons was a locker. Derek had a social media page. And Mike's was a box.

I shook my head, scooping up the meat - of course, we were doing more then skinning. Butchering too, and then dropping the meat in a wood bucket of 'salt water brine' for flavor. Because if wrestling and crafting are possible, then certainly cooking or butchering, we'd have to see - and if it was as good as the fruit.

My stomach growled and Jason gave me a strange look.

"I just want to see if there's something special, what it takes to gain a new skill," Or an Affinity. I could make a far more compelling argument if I told them everything. But the fact that they didn't mention it as something they heard of... "Try everything out and we can -"

'I got it!" Derrik shouted suddenly, causing Jason to squint and Brandon to throw down his knife.

"Did it give you ten percent more material?" I asked.

"Oh, never-mind. False alarm" He chuckled, "I opened the store by mistake."

I shook my head and Jason just whispered idiot as Brandon took up his knife. I glanced at the progress and they all were working through it, the bucket was filling up, Brandon the hardest with four birds and Derek just as hard with one, and Mike and Jason with two...

"What skill did you get?" I asked, and he didn't so much as flinch - it was only everybody looking up at me and him being a microsecond behind -

"Derek" I looked at him.

"Dude, I told -" I did the best impression of my father. I said nothing, and I let him see the disappointment in my eyes, disappointment I cast at myself - because how do you make someone trust you?

Eyes are honest. Eyes are mirrors. I was glad to see him meet mine, not drag away like I had always done when put on the spot, but reflect our shared truth. It was okay we didn't like each other, and I felt bad for pushing him to reveal his secrets but what choice did we have?

"It's all or nothing, isn't it." Derrik finally said, and the other guys looked up sensing something significant between our interaction, felt the definitiveness I put in my voice.

"It doesn't have to be." I replied, "It's up to you."

"Acting." He blushed, and turned down to make another cut and the others followed suit, the pressure passed with the breeze, and a part of me felt relieved, felt myself trusting him -

"Lying." Derek said suddenly like the word burnt his tongue and I dropped my knife, walked over to him and grabbed his shoulder, before anybody could react and jerked him off the ground, bringing him into a hug I felt him fidget strangely then relax and through an arm around me as well.

"Thank you." I whispered to him.

"I got it before, the inventories." He said as I loosed my hold and was surprised to see him smiling, he moved to bring his knife down to hold it away - a razor sharp blade, from where it had hovered close to my side. I hadn't even registered it when I grabbed him - a person I didn't particularly like, didn't trust yet - was I being arrogant? Was it because I was strong and it didn't matter, or was this a sign of how much his honesty had improved things between us...

And the fact that I moved to hug him aggressively? It hadn't been my intent but the weariness of Mike's glance - it actually did more for me, my peace of mind and my understanding of his character then the words, alone...

"Fags." Brandon said and I laughed at the irony. Brandon didn't say much but half the time he did speak I thought it was just to piss me off.

"Anybody else want to share? I know we hardly know anything about each other," I asked, "I know - it's hard to trust, and it feels like taking a chance - I get it."

Everybody sort of shrugged and Brandon met my eyes, daring me. Like we'd shaken hands with a lit firework between them. Who would rip their hand back first. It wasn't my place - I'm still learning, understanding what friendship even is -

"I sell pics on the web." Jason said -

"What?" I swung over to him.

"The Yeezy's? You asked. Just my feet. My family's poor as shit, they won't take the money, they think I sell drugs, but thing's have gotten a lot better since my dad started letting twenties go through the washer."

"I've never had sex." Mike said, "Not even second base."

"Guys -"

"My inventory is porn hub." Derrick said.

"Hey -"

"I gave Eric five bucks to send me a picture of his sister's bra."

I tried to stop them - one embarrassing comment after the other, like gunfire, and they didn't so much as blush or even blink. Nothing terrible, but...things you wouldn't share with a stranger, or really anybody. They already knew. I realized Brandon had been watching me the whole time, waiting for something, as the only silent person, besides myself -

Jason stepped in first -

"We don't keep secrets from each other, we don't need to, if I thought they could do anything that would keep me from being their friend...I wouldn't be their friend. They don't have a reason to keep a secret."

"I know-"

"You don't. If you need to see a skill to know Derek is an actor, or a liar." He shook his head, even as he Derek punched him, then shrugged, "You're a different cat is all, and if you can't see that we were going to trust you enough to take us into a dungeon, it's you, bro, with trust issues. Don't just think about what somebodies keeping from you, think about why."

I felt my mouth grow dry and I looked between them and saw the nods, even Brandon's. I was so shocked because I'd never in my life thought about it that way, that it took me a moment to realize -

"Wait. They know?" I asked Brandon.

Derek sniggered and Jason gave me a weird glare and Mike just sorta flipped me a thumbs up.

"They know everything!?" Throwing down my knife, I blushed, jumping to my feet, walking off.

"Later." Brandon said, I couldn't tell what he meant - but...Laughter, like fireworks broke out amongst them and I felt my blush go hot - I turned around, to what? To fight - why? Because they laughed at you? Because they don't care if you're embarrassed?

I killed a fucking tiger. They don't care about that either, I realized.

And I understood that Jason was right, I didn't trust them, hadn't let them in at all. And wasn't this proof? That they trusted me. They had seen me fight, knew I could sweep the beach with them, and they laughed. They trusted me not to, No - they trusted me not to go to far, they were willing to fight, willing to piss me off and have a bit of fun, but they trusted me enough to know that it was good after, that it was friendship.

Was this what having friends was? Was it really this stupid? Was it just mostly not caring...And laughing? But, I do care, And I'm blushing! Embarrassed. Jogging away! I'm a man, I'm an Abbot, I stand for something, I have to be taken seriously, it's too important to laugh at, I stand for...

Freedom - And I felt it ring - with laughter. And friendship. And life. Because they were all easy, they could all be good, and that made them important, just as important, but never more -

I stopped, watching them as they went about cleaning up as they finished the butchery, bringing out food, relaxing and joking amongst friends - how good, how much fun, how right.

And I wanted that. But even as I did, even as I felt myself reaching - more foolish pride dissolved, I still held myself back. Because I realized another truth, that while we could be friends, we'd started, what did that really mean for the future, because I am going to stand up -

Put a target on my back, what did that mean for the people around me. I remembered Derek earlier, leaning away as he realized...

This was about more than trust. It didn't matter how good your intentions were, if you weren't capable of keeping a secret because you were weak, and I found my attention drawn - in what I had believed to be the least, - who already had two skills...

Would I ever be able to trust him?

I saw Jason's wisdom again, thinking on it. True friendship was knowing what made a person, what made up the soil - seeing the worthiness there, accepting that weeds would grow amongst the flowers, because nobody was perfect - and you wouldn't plant the tree of friendship in toxic soil in the first place, you wouldn't grow something you didn't want to eat -

And a tree takes time - even if it's just a sprout, it's still a tree, but you can't expect all the fruits, the shade - and it would still take work...work that I hadn't put in yet.

Time I didn't have...

And I realized that an easy friendship, as much as I wanted it, I knew, it was wrong. Because I am going to stand up, and it's just inviting them to get hurt because they were weak. They didn't know, didn't fully realize what I planned to do when I went back. That the reason I had been pushing them was that I hadn't really been looking at them as friends at all, because as much as I wanted that, there was something I needed more then just trust -

More then just friends...

Semper Fidelis

I needed Marines....

People that understood how high the stakes were, people that were strong enough to fight, to realize it was more important to them then their lives, more important to them then my life...and they were just kids, there was no way they could understand...not without my experience because I didn't understand before, not until it was...too late.

I was torn, trying to decide if I was trying to rationalize, if it was weakness, if I was trying to find an excuse to expose them to danger, to make this their battle - because I wanted the comfort of friendship. Or was it a different weakness - Arrogance. Pride. That I felt I didn't need them, that they would hold me back, be used against me -

But from somewhere in the recess, a soft whistle played through my thoughts, echoing through hundreds of memories, my mind had never connected it to the lyrics - I had never heard him string them together - not all at once, just a few notes at a time...

I get by.

My father was never a hippie, I couldn't imagine him listening to, or even needing -

With a little help.

But I never met them, never heard him pick up the phone and call -

From my friends.

But he couldn't. Now all he had was a flag. A few notes to a song, from a band he didn't even like...

What would my dad do?

No - what do I think is right?

I walked back. Because no matter what else was true, friendship would come in time, and grow, or not - there was something more important -

And Freedom is choice.

Who am I to say they are unworthy, or incapable. To decide what's in another man's heart, or if they're ready, or strong enough to stand. To do that - to take that choice from them would make me less of a man, less of a friend. Even if I did it to protect them...

And if I'm going to stand up and fight, if I'm going to win - I need to be more then a man, strong enough, not just to stand on my own, but to lift up others. To make them stronger, to carry them if they fall, and to admit, I too, can fall, that I may need help - if they find me weak, or have fallen, to let them lift and carry me. To know that I can be strong alone, but stronger, together -

They're going to hate you.

I'll hate myself if I don't.

They're never going to trust you after this.

...Good. They'll be safe.

"I have something to share as well." I said, "And whatever your decision I'm grateful, for your friendship, for saving me, and I wish I had something better to offer you then pain..."

*Buzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz*

It appeared pinched between two fingers of my left hand, I brought my right up and pushed the stinger inside my palm, and let the agony pump into me as I began to tell them what I intended to do, what I thought it would mean, and how much it would hurt -