Danielle and her party headed for the corner of the building they needed to go around, the three boys following close behind; Lauren and the Lemonade party fell in behind them. There was some rumbling and murmuring among the rest of the group at the unexpected announcement, but everyone seemed to be following around the block of buildings to the trailhead. Lauren assigned Marc and Gonzo to go ahead of the main group as scouts, and gestured Danielle and the rest of her group in while she double-checked that everyone had made it.

  The trail was just barely wide enough for two people, and the SHAD girls all had their double-satchel-and-backpack loadouts – even Cassy, this time, though Akari still didn’t have a proper backpack and hadn’t wanted to bring a salvaged bag with the big, mixed group. All in all, they were loaded up a bit wide, making it hard for them to walk side-by-side, so they tried to walk single file. Sadie went first behind the scouts, then Danielle, Heather, Cassy, and finally Akari. It would have made for a quiet walk, except the three boys only had one bag with a tent strapped under it, each. They promptly moved up along the column. Jordan won a bit of a subtle race to be next to Danielle, and Tom was equally determined to be next to Heather, which left Zephyr next to Cassy.

  “So, Danielle,” Jordan began, puffing just a little from his rush towards the front of the column, “I was kinda in shock yesterday and we didn’t really talk much, but now we’ve got some time, right? So, um, tell me about yourself and your party and stuff?”

  “Um, sure, if you want. Let’s see. I’m Danielle Falconer, I would be going into ninth grade if we hadn’t been Sent, the Dome declared me a Survivor and I mean to live up to it, but I’m still asking for an extra Career today. I took a Medic Skill in the Dome, and I’ve had a chance to use it in three different emergencies already. The Rangers responded to all three of them also, but not as fast. My friend Heather, who is also our hunting party’s Healer, was also there and working all three times of course; life’s not all about me!

  “Heather and Sadie were my roommates in seventh and eighth grades, and Akari is a friend from church, so we roomed together. Cassy joined our hunting party a few days into the Sending. She didn’t go to our school, so she’s a newer friend, but you know how it is – the last couple weeks have been intense, so it already feels like we’ve been through a lot together. We all work together to keep everyone in the party safe, fed, and leveling up at a healthy pace,” Danielle continued.

  “My room made the system org for the SHAD Party on the first day, just to kind of make sure we were all on the same page about everything, and ditch that horrible ‘nobody wants me’ feeling that being Sent can give a person. Our charter has a bunch of stuff about membership levels and how to join and leave and stuff, but besides that, the main rules are that members can’t attack other members unless they agree to it in advance, like for sparring; attacking includes physical attacks and hostile Skills. Members can’t share information that’s been entrusted to them as a secret of the Party. Members have to protect each other, as much as they reasonably can without endangering their own lives. Finally, if the council (which is us four founders) asks someone to help out another member, they have to do it, again within the boundaries of not putting their own life or health at risk. There’s an appeals process for that kind of requests, but we’re so small that it’s kind of a joke. We got a little grandiose that first night,” Danielle said with a laugh. “Mostly, though, we were trying to make an org that was more solid than a stupid Awakening-school room club, you know?”

  “It definitely sounds better thought out than the one my roommates and I made back in seventh grade,” Jordan joked. “That’s a pretty low bar, not gonna lie; but your rules sound like rules I could live with. Um, so you have a Healer in your group, what does everyone else have?”

  “My promise not to share their System info without permission,” Danielle said, with a smile to hopefully clue him that it was a teasing reference to the rules and not an angry brush-off.

  “I don’t mind sharing,” Cassy said. “I’m a Basic Mana Caster with Camper. It’s a Class with a lot of potential, but it’s going to take some time to get up to speed on it, so I’m going to ask for an extra Career today too, to help me get useful Skills along the way. I’m not sure what I’ll get, but I’ve done enough fishing and foraging and small-game-gutting that I’m hoping for something more survival-oriented, like a Hunter or Trapper Career or something.”

  “Caster Cassy, got it,” Jordan said.

  Zephyr opined, “I bet you’ll be fun to talk to, too!”

  “Are you hoping for anything specific from the Access Point, Heather?” Tom asked, “or are you just here to support your party?”

  “Well, I was originally hoping for Identify Plant,” Heather said, “but I actually got that one from a mana burst a couple days ago. I’m also hoping for a support Skill to let my Healer Skills bypass mana resistances, but I’m not sure if that’s even a thing, much less a level 1 thing. I’ve had to push through that stuff a couple times now, though, and it slows everything down even when it works. It’s a pain, and it’s not safe for the patients who have it. Um, anyway, what about you?”

  “Me?” Tom asked. “What about me?”

  “What’s your Career and stuff?” Heather asked. “I don’t know anything about you except that I healed you that one time.”

  “Oh! R-right. Um, well, I’m a Lost Boy with Basic Weapon Fighter, so I’m, uh. I’m your basic ‘completely unprepared’ type I guess. I started the new Career search from the System Interface on Sunday, after Danielle told everyone how, and I’ve been setting traps and checking them several times a day, and reading up on other ways to get food in the room library, and doing my best with the occasional thing I catch. I’ve been having more luck with squirrels than rabbits. Anyway, I’m hoping for something a little more helpful, like, um, like Cassy. I’m here to see if I’ve gotten any unlocks, but also just to hang out with people who have a clue what they’re doing and see what I can learn from you all,” Tom admitted.

  “I hear that!” Jordan said. “I’m a Camper with Basic Crafter, but I might have picked the worst possible starting Skills. I’m not doing great, and if I have unlocks they’re probably mostly from yesterday. I learned more yesterday than the whole week before that, though, so I figured I may as well come out with the people I met yesterday and see what else I learn, right? Besides, one of the things everyone kept saying yesterday was that I gotta get with a group. Well my roommates are just as hopeless as me – worse, even, because I invited them to come to this thing, and they said no.”

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  “You didn’t pick the worst possible starting Skills,” Sadie said, over her shoulder. “The worst possible starting craft Skill is metalworking, not bone carving.”

  That got a laugh out of the group. “What about you, um, Zephyr?” Cassy asked. “What are you hoping to get out of this trip?”

  “Well, Danielle taught me an awesome new trick on Sunday,” Zephyr said with a grin Danielle could hear in his voice. “I’m hoping it unlocked a new Class, and I want to know if it worked. I’m also working on some other Skills, and same deal, I want to know if I’ve gotten there and unlocked them, or if I still need to keep working on it. I mean, I still have to save up mana, but there are always new Skills to work on, so I don’t want to keep doing redundant unlocking activities if I’ve already done enough that it’s just a matter of mana now, you know?”

  “Anyway, half the camp knows, so you might as well know too,” he continued, “I’m a Career Camper and a classed Basic Scout. All my Systemist ‘friends’ are freaked out about that, because they know I have the requirements for Basic Element Shaper, and our religion says Element Shapers are the best. All I know is, I’ll do anything – and I mean, anything – rather than end up sounding like a carbon copy of my dad, and he took the classic path of Basic Element Shaper to Fire Shaper. I will need an element shaping career before I go back in, or I won’t be able to live with my family, or really anyone considering who my dad is. I don’t need it to be my first and only, though, and I swear to the System, I will get an elevated shaping career without taking Basic, because I will not take the same path as my dad!”

  “If you’ve already got an unrelated Class, you’re already safe on that one, right?” Danielle said. “Basic Element Shaper to Fire Shaper is a path that does not contain Basic Scout, so making sure you don’t take his path is already a solved problem!”

  Zephyr laughed. “That’s true!” he said. “But Lithios has always been held up as my rival, and I – I don’t know. I’m not sure either of us exactly takes it seriously, really, it’s kind of in everyone else’s heads. I’m just super tired of everyone making out that he’s ‘winning’ at our ‘rivalry,’ though. I don’t know how he managed to do what it takes to get Stone Shaper in the Dome, because that seems impossible, but at the very least, I think I can also skip Basic on my way to whatever element or elements I eventually pick up.”

  “I could’ve done it in the Dome, if I’d wanted to, and I’d known what Robin knew and mentioned to me on Sunday,” Danielle said. “That Illusions Skill is my youth Skill, you know?”

  “You also needed to know the mana symbol, though,” Cassy said.

  “Well yeah, but if Lithios has a famous Systemist as a father too, I’m betting he knew his symbol before he even got Sent, too,” Danielle said.

  “For sure he knew the symbol,” Zephyr said. “Learning our dads’ element runes was one of the things our dads had us competing over. I just don’t know what Skill he could use to shape it the way he’d need to. He’s not telling, either, I tried – although, he might have just not wanted to tell me. What with the supposed rivalry and all.”

  “Who even is Lithios?” Heather asked.

  “Who – ?! Um, right, I keep forgetting you guys don’t know everybody,” Zephyr said. “Um, Lithios is the Systemist with the best holy Class in camp, and as far as we know there aren’t any level 2 followers of the elements yet, so we can’t go by level. That makes him the official head of the Systemist meetings in this sorry excuse for a town. There are supposed to be six leaders, who should ideally be the most elevated Element Shapers of each of the six elements; it goes by Class type, level of said Class, and total number of Skills – advanced and unlocked, in that order. There’s not much variety there, though, everyone’s pretty much got the same number of Skills right now, you know? So we’re actually going more by who were the youth leadership people in the school interest groups and stuff. Why are you giving me that look?”

  That last was addressed to Cassy, Danielle thought, though if he could see her face she imagined he’d ask the same. “Seriously? Everyone has the same number of Skills? Really?” Cassy asked incredulously.

  “Um – yeah? From the Dome, you know?” Zephyr said, bewildered. “Nobody’s saved up a hundred extra mana yet, there hasn’t been time. Oh, hey, and if you’re thinking about those Wolf Pack crazies, they don’t count!”

  “So not a single one of your Basic Element Shapers has gotten a Career Skill yet?” Cassy asked skeptically.

  “Um, no?” Zephyr said. “Why, have you?”

  “Well, yeah, I think all of us have!” Cassy said.

  “Not me,” Sadie said. “Wrong kind of lucky.”

  “Me either,” Jordan said. “Do you think it’s because you have to be out using your Career?”

  Danielle chuckled. “That’s probably true too, but we’ve been getting them from mana bursts. In the last two weeks, this party has seen bursts from two different vine monsters, a massive wildcat, a guy the wildcat killed, and three deer, all big enough to trigger potential Career Skills for people who were close but not participating in the kill. Heather and I were also there when a deadly fight went down and two more people died there. Not the most pleasant way to grow one’s level, nor one I’d recommend. The result of all that, though, is we’re all pretty well ahead of anyone who’s just been killing their one fish or rabbit per day; and most of us have picked up a Career Skill or two because of the way our Systems processed the mana bursts.”

  “Oh, wow,” Zephyr said. “I thought you might object on the unlocked-but-not-advanced Skills part, but I hadn’t even thought about that.”

  “Well, personally, I don’t feel the need to tell Systemists how to arrange their leadership,” Danielle said. “I’m Christian, so Systemist leadership is none of my business.”

  “That’s a fair point,” Cassy said. “Sorry for getting all worked up about it.”

  “That’s OK,” Zephyr said. “So, ah, are any of you – ?”

  “Nope!” Sadie said cheerfully.

  Heather added, “In the party so far, we have three Christians and two non-religious people. We kind of worked out a “nobody tries to force anybody else to live as if they believed something they really don’t” rule for living together, back in school, and it mostly works for us.”

  “I’m non-religious too,” Tom said, “but I can live with hearing it about it once a week as long as people aren’t harping on about it all the time.”

  “My gram was religious,” Jordan said. “All three of my grandparents, actually. Never knew my other grandpa. I’m used to being around that stuff. I never really took it seriously before yesterday, so I’m rethinking some stuff, but I got a little background in it. Um, Christian stuff, that is. I have Systemist friends, but I always figured, if the System was a god, then where was it before the meteor? I don’t think it’s a deity, I think it’s just aliens.”

  “Oh, please, not another conspiracy theorist,” Marc groaned from the head of the column.

  “Hey!” Gonzo objected.

  “Um, I’m really not,” Jordan said “Honestly! But the meteor came from space, and the System is intelligent, so what else would you call that?”

  “You know what?” Zephyr said. “If I was my dad, I would have a whole lecture about that, but I’m not, so let’s talk about something else!”

  “Yes please!” Jordan said. “Like, um, what Skills does everyone want to buy once they do save up enough mana?”

  weeks (or less!) Danielle isn't the only one thinking about the whole issue differently.

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