Four days. Double the time that even Devon and Dai being cautious took to get to the first river site. It wasn't a surprise, not really, considering our group was reclaiming a piece of the wilderness a foot at a time via the Beast Tamers and the Stoneshapers. What it was was a drag. One curious thing I noted the Stoneshapers did was add markers every so often on the road. They were simple pillars with a circular bulb at the top. When I asked them about it, they explained it was a comm indicator. Someone standing at one of the markers could contact another at the following or previous one and be guaranteed to be within comm-plant range. It was a genius idea I couldn't believe we hadn't thought of on the first run from Wildwood to Lake Weir.

Despite the wonder that was watching the Stoneshapers work in concert and the Beast Tamers feeding their energy into the forest around us, I was more than a little relieved to encounter the change in vista. It was subtle at first. When we passed Gec's crystal the trees had been tropical before returning to the more mundane oaks and pines of the area. Less than a mile beyond, it was like the world opened up to a whole new region.

The further north we traveled on what was once known as highway 475, the shorter and the more sparse the plants grew. Monstrous live oaks that I was sure had to be Attuned in their own right dotted clear open plains. A ruined house here, or a worn down gate from the old world there, attempted to denote who had once lived in the area. The more I explored the world, the happier I was that we hadn't needed to find more titanium to use in the printer down in the Bunker. We wouldn't have been able to provide Implants and make the difference that we had. You go Tec! You awkward, recklessly handsy magic rock.

A sense of wonder I hadn't felt since we'd first discovered Wildwood lightened my steps the further we got from the Allied Towns. We spotted herds of wild cattle and a handful of horses running wild at speeds that would have put their thoroughbred pre-Fall cousins to shame. Neither of those approached our group, but I did spot a few of the horses pause to stare at our odd grouping. Samuel and the Beast Tamers, on the other hand, had to be physically restrained from pursuing the creatures.

"You have a whole herd and a Raymond waiting for you. Why the eagerness to make contact?" I asked Sam on the second day. He didn't have a good answer, but grumbled something about 'animals are nicer than people' under his breath before he returned to the back of the wagon holding our Infused jelly. He'd been 'talking' with the oxen and with Anthony the fire ant for the majority of the trip; based on the gesticulation towards the wagon, I was fairly sure he was using them as sounding boards for whatever mad scientist stuff he did to create the healing goop.

For the others, sans Billy, the novelty of the area wore off quickly and they each kept to themselves while watching for any potential threats. Daniela ranged far and Jolene left to go with her on more than one occasion. The Wild Fist kept up their training even while we traveled. The whole squad would rush forward ahead of the expedition, blasting out a quarter of their mana pools on various attacks mixed with martial art-looking movements while we caught up. Then they would repeat, but spar with each other until their mana was regenerated. Their energetic 'tsks' and 'ha!' and '1-2s' had become background noise by the end of the first day.

Supper was a muted affair since we only spent a token amount of time building camp. A two person watch rotation was established and the group called it a day.

The following two days were almost carbon copies of the first. It was on the fourth that the open areas around us turned... Mushy. The usually dry expanses of grass that had flanked our expansion of AE-1 manifested ponds and small creeks that drifted away into the distance. Devon and Dai had shared their maps ahead of time and a glance at the LPS showed we were less than a mile out from the river. The oaks that had pushed through the nothing were quickly replaced by a nubby expanse of roots I quickly recognized as cypress trees. The scope of the trees was extreme compared to what I'd seen of the ones near Lake Weir, but the answer made itself known when the first trunks came into view.

They were neck and neck with the oaks for size, but instead of reaching up and out, they did so below ground. The further north we went, the more I sensed them through vibro and I realized that we would have been walking through muck if the tree roots weren't stabilizing the ground to an extent. When a handful of Death Attuned cedar trees and Air Attuned birch trees, in addition to their mundane counterparts, started to mingle with the cypress ones, we arrived at the end of the road. Literally.

The asphalt had been torn off and the base materials were eroded away to a slow swirling pool of mud. Beyond the muddy water was the river.

"That's big," I whispered.

"I told you it was," Devon air whispered to me from where the agile elf had perched himself on a nearby birch.

Slow waves painted a deceptive picture of how much water something with the cross-section of the river would be moving. The manifestation of nature dwarfed anything I'd expected. I'd seen out towards Lake Weir and been amazed, but there was something about possibly tons of water flowing by you each minute that just hit different. The banks of the river brushed up against the forest around us, watermarks telling of how high the water got during the rainy periods. Beyond that was what had to be a half mile of water.

"Does it have a name?" Daniela asked. The brunette had been sitting at the edge of the water when the main group arrived. Her expression was soft, none of her usual snark or tongue-in-cheekness in sight.

"This didn't exist in the world before," Robert, the only non-Fallen in the group, said. "There were a few nature parks to the east, but nothing that would have led to this. Well, not before the Fall."

"What was that place called?" I asked, turning to Robert.

"Ocklawaha Prairie, if I recall." Robert took several minutes to try to recall, but no one in the group begrudged him the effort. It must be weird to come back to something you once knew to see it changed in its entirety. It's almost the opposite of what Daniela, Sam and I are experiencing...

"The Ock River, huh?" Daniela said, quietly.

"We did not name it," Dai said. "I don't see why we can't call it that."

"The Ock River it is," Robert finished, smiling softly.

I had a sneaking suspicion that I would get some river-related memories if I touched the man. It had been a while since had triggered, and I hoped to keep it that way unless absolutely necessary. Guilt over the dead and the flashes of memory I'd already taken were enough nightmare fuel.

I waited a beat before being the spoilsport of the sober moment. As the one with the 'crazy' idea to build over the hydrological monster that was the newly christened river, I'd been assigned as the expedition leader. Just for major decisions, thankfully. Sam had still been placed in charge of our supply chain. "Now, let's dig in. If we work quickly, maybe we can sleep on some proper, secured hammocks tonight."

That statement was met with both groans and cheers in equal measures. The more punch-y members of our group made up the bulk of the cheers, since they got to just punch more stuff. The Stoneshapers and the Beast Tamers were the ones with the terra and biomancing Skills to construct our temporary domicile. More like barracks... I thought as the comment about my over the top buildings flashed through my mind.

Just you watch, I am going to make the most ridiculous bridge you've ever seen. The crenelations are going to have crenelations. How about a fountain? I'm sure we could manage to form a siphon to move the water from the river up high enough if I take into account the velocity of the river moving into a stone pipe and--

"Ronan?" Sam's voice broke me out of my reverie.

"Leave him. He's got the nerd face again. If we don't leave him alone he's going to be all butt hurt for the whole time we are here," Daniela said.

I glared at the brunette as she smirked. Instead of rising to the bait, I thanked Sam for pulling me back from my thoughts. I didn't tend to drift so far into my mind... except when it went to creating. The simulation programs in the Bunker had been great --amazing even-- but they didn't compare to reality. Now that we were on the surface, I needed to remind myself that I had the ability to turn my thoughts to reality. It's all just some mana away.

Grinning widely, I closed my eyes before slapping both of my hands down on the ground as hard as I could. Limestone Skin redirected the force through my body, strumming my Harmonic Sinews as it reverberated off of my Quake Osseum. A detailed picture of the soil around me lit up ripple after ripple. "Time to build again."

---+---

It took less than ten minutes to find the optimal location to build. Some two hundred feet from AE - 1 were the remains of a building from before the Fall. Hilda from the Wild Fists found a mostly rotted sign that read 'cal olo clu'. Robert was once again kind enough to provide his knowledge of the world before to point out it probably said it was the Ocala Polo Club. Despite a sudden bout of interest to ask about the sport I'd only learned about adjacently, I focused on doing another in-depth vibro scan of the area. A thick footing around the old walls complemented a thin slab of concrete that made up the floor of the old building. After probing around while the other arcane shapers recovered their mana, I had a good picture of what we had to work with. Even if part of the old footprint was partially broken into the banks of the Ock River, the material's reinforcement would save a lot of work.

"Alright. We'll want to raise the structure to at least the water mark," I said, pointing out the closest tree. Before I got too carried away, I turned to where the Beast Tamers and Sam were discussing something quietly. "I think we'll want clear line of sight to the road and to the bridge. Can you guys work on that? Maybe that's were we can set up the local garden?"

"I think that might be manageable. Everett might be able to coax these Attuned plants out of the way," Veronica, the leader of the tamers, said.

"If not, I've got the solution right here," Igor said, grinning wide to show off his prominent tusks. Fire flickered around his fingers, sparking in concert to the man's eagerness as he flexed his impressive bicep.

"I don't know if gaining the animosity of the trees is the first step we want to take in the area," Fowler said, patting the orc on the shoulder.

"Not you too," Igor lamented, head drooping as his own squad's healer reeled back his enthusiasm. The red fae continued to comfort his squad leader as he led him away towards the water where Dai and Daniela were talking animatedly.

"Right. Elevation," Patrick Patrick said, bringing my focus back.

"Yeah, I'm thinking ten feet would be good. Maybe reinforce the existing concrete with some passive mana effects before raising it on stilts."

"Hmmm, I think I can work some cross bracing into the structure once we get it up in the air, but that sounds reasonable. We can start on that if you want to flatten the area. Francis can help you reinforce a path from the road and make an area where we can keep the oxen at ground level."

"Let's do it," I said, clapping my hands together.

Three Shapers split off to clear away debris from the husk of the structure while channeling mana to their feet. Gentle, swooping beige spell chains wrapped around their ankles without actually triggering. I didn't know you could do that...

I shook my head to focus back on my task. After seeing that little bit of control, I felt ambitious for my side of the task. Primarily, getting the path from the road to the building restored in one shot. A brief discussion with Francis set him to work on mounds to be compressed into a fence for the beasts of burden of the Tamers while I focused on the path.

I focused on the area I wanted to affect as I took hold of the lever for in my mind. With the training I'd been doing, the mana cost of the Skill got brought down to the single-digit percents but was maintained consistently. It was a two fold drain of power that often ended up draining more mana as I tried to liquify material. For the pathway I fed the base power into the Skill, but I ground my will against it to reshape the intent from a circle into a four foot wide path. I tried to visualize the 'shortcut' that presented by focusing its liquidation force forward. The spell chain snapped into being around me. It twitched like a worm as I strangled my Foundational Hemisphere for all the control it was willing to yield.

Several of the glyph-like formations on the chain turned into puffs of umber light that flowed to different areas of the Skill. This went on for a handful of seconds before the Skill finished adjusting to my desires. Then I folded like a house of cards. Half my mana was gone in a second and I could practically feel it being wrenched from my muscles, bones and tendons thanks to the ripples they sent through my Traits. The trigger had been faster than any I'd done before where the Skill just happened before I even had time to register it.

By the time Samuel had made it to me and worked the kinks out of my body, the modified Skill had run its course. There was a swath of over two hundred feet cleared and hardened before me. The modified had actually bisected the road the Shapers had made, leaving a clear cut dip in the packed soil before it pushed beyond. There was a tree toppled over where my Skill had weakened the hold its roots had on the earth.

"What the hell was that, Ron!?" Sam asked, slapping my face gently to get me to focus on him. I tried not to say anything about the dozens of nerve filaments poking and prodding my cheek out of respect for the healer. Plus, if I'd acknowledged it I would have been squirming with discomfort that would have set my muscles burning again.

"Tweaked a Skill. Just a tad," I managed, already feeling the easing of my mana side effects being further soothed by Sam's .

"Can we maybe not try new techniques out in the middle of nowhere? Yeah? Stick to tried and true, please?" the blonde said, sighing in exasperation as he let my head drop to the ground. The gentleness of his concern was all but gone. He walked away from me, mumbling and shaking his head. "Crazy bastard. He really does have rocks for a brain."

Francis looked distinctly uncomfortable as he approached where I just laid on the ground, unmoving. "Sir?"

"Just give me a minute. You can go ahead and work on the beast pen," I replied.

Francis hesitated for a moment before nodding and walking away. I closed my eyes and felt for the man's ripples as he headed for the spot where we'd discussed putting the pen. His, and the mana of the other Shapers, sent pulses of energy barely perceptible by my vibrosense. If I hadn't been practicing since we left Lake Weir, I wouldn't have been able to spot them through the natural frequency of everything around me. I focused on that sense as a meditation of sorts, waiting for my body to set itself back together.

Eventually, I actually managed to doze off but it didn't last. A slimy appendage tugged at my beard and I cracked my eyes to see Blobby looming over me. Even if the creature had shrunk, it was still too large for it to rest right next to one's head. I'd seen the creature suffocate more than its fair share of enemies to know how deadly the bulk of my silent companion was, size notwithstanding.

Obviously, the slime didn't say anything. Its appendages, however, spoke volumes as it pointed in the direction of the construction. The construction that was well on its way to complete without much input of mine other than the pathway. I got a flash of that snickering mole that seemed to be Fievil's desired mental visage as I groaned my way to my feet.

"I'm gonna hear about this," I said, shaking off some of the loose dirt that had accumulated on my hair and clothes from my dirt nap.