The Daily Grind - Chapter 222 (Patreon)

Not sure if I like this chapter.  We'll see.  Also, sorry for the fact that I left you all on a cliffhanger!  I didn't do that on purpose, I'm just dumb!

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“The less you eat, drink and read books; the less you go to the theatre, the dance hall, the public house; the less you think, love, theorize, sing, paint, fence, etc., the more you save-the greater becomes your treasure which neither moths nor dust will devour-your capital. The less you are, the more you have; the less you express your own life, the greater is your alienated life-the greater is the store of your estranged being.” -Karl Marx and Fredreich Engles-

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Space snapped into place around him with the smell of fresh baked chocolate chip cookies.

This was, in and of itself, not the weirdest experience James had ever had.  It was the most pleasant teleport he’d been offered, though.  He assumed it was a teleport, anyway; it had that feel to it, and the fact that he could say that was just yet another sign of how weird his life had gotten.

The telepads were still his gold standard for teleportation as a day-to-day travel method.  He wasn’t a fan of the weird Wolfpack ‘make a bubble of somewhere else’ thing, since it had sort of had a lot of turbulence.  And he absolutely hated the old Akashic Sewer teleportation, just on principle.  And because it smelled awful.

This one, in contrast, smelled great, and the only problem it had generated was that the wave of painless heat and light seemed to have removed Alex from existence.

That might just be the cafe smell, though.  They were still in the cafe.  As he blinked spots out of his vision, the whole place seemed to still be around them, dark wood walls, tiny potted plants, and stylish decorations still intact.  The lights were out, though.  And whatever was outside the windows was similarly dark.

Someone was screaming.  A lot of people were screaming, actually, but one of them sounded bad.  The kind of hoarse, devastated scream of someone who had been hurt in a way they didn’t know was possible.

Harlan got their bearings before James did, jerked their arm out of his grip with an exact motion, and made the situation worse by shooting the man that had brought the cube in another three times in the head.  The body slumped against the wooden cabinet around a garbage can didn’t react, except to jerk as Harlan added more gore to the scene.

“Stop fucking shooting people!”  James bellowed.  Harlan shot James an irate glance, but at least didn’t keep pulling the trigger.

Around them, the cries and screams kept going.  People who’d been thrown to the floor by whatever happened, or who were just taking cover already, yelling for help or pleading not to be shot.  The cafe had devolved into chaos.  James, though, zeroed in on the scream that sounded like it was someone actually injured, and ran to that, moving as well as he could in the darkness.

There was still some light from glowing points outside the windows that looked like streetlights.  Though after what just happened, James wasn’t about to claim he knew that’s what they were with any certainty.  And between that, and the score of phones and laptop screens, James made it to the man next to the front door without tripping.

He was still screaming as James crouched near him and instantly found the problem.  His arm was missing.  Severed off just above the elbow, a disc of flesh and exposed bone showing that James would have called clean if not for the river of blood draining out of it.  “Medic!”  He yelled.  “Alex!  Where the fuck…!”  James was halfway through yanking his coat off and wrapping it around the man’s stump when he remembered Alex was gone.  “Harlan!  Or anyone who’s a doctor or something!”  He clamped his hands around the man’s wound.  “Stop thrashing, man!  Help me hold this!”

One of the patrons crawled over to where James was, keeping low.  “Holy fuck.”  The man said when he saw the bloody mess.  “He wasn’t shot!”  He didn’t explain anything, just pushing James hands aside firmly and pulling the sleeves of the coat into a makeshift tourniquet.  “Hold this.”  He said in a low stern voice to the victim.

“Of course not.”  Harlan’s voice cut over the ongoing cries.  “I don’t miss.  What happened?”

“Guy’s arm’s missing.”  James said.  “Also what the fuck, put your gun away!”

“Um…!”  The other man who’d made his way to James blanched as Harlan casually walked up to them.  “I’m just an EMT, man!”

Harlan didn’t even reply to him.  “We’re outside somewhere.”  They said, trying to look out the window of the cafe.  “You should calm everyone down, before…”

A cluster made a break for it, running from the gunshots and whatever the explosion of light had been, four or five young people who looked like students abandoning books and laptops to sprint for the back door.  “Wait, no!”  James’ brain suddenly realized what Harlan meant when they said ‘outside’.  “Wait!”

The other patrons ducked as he yelled, while one of the students screamed again and they all rushed for to yank the glass paneled door open and flee into the night.

James was no stranger to panic, and how it could blind you to obvious things.  But he was pretty sure they should have noticed how the afternoon, grey and dim as it was, had transformed into night.  And he was already running after them, because he saw where this was going.

Heedless, the kids sprinted out of the cafe in a mad rush, across the sidewalk that absolutely hadn’t been behind the cafe before, into the street.  It was only when they realized they had run onto asphalt that they started to slow in confusion.  Which was when one of the streetlights twisted down next to them, the orange glowing bulb in it casting unfamiliar angled shadows across the road as it peered at them like a lit eye.

The students paused.  Even inside the cafe, as he ran past, James could see some of the other patrons staring out the open door, screams dying to confused whispers as the shadows stretched around the fleeing group.  They stood transfixed as something strange and wonderful and completely new happened to them; a piece of what should have been terrain bending like a curious snake to look at them, light cast around like a kaleidoscope.

Then one of the translucent things in those shadows lunged out and wrapped around one of the girls.  And made a sickening crunch as barely visible fangs, hidden in the lengthening shadows, pierced into her skin and flesh.

James leapt over the sidewalk as his high speed sprint got him close enough, slamming his shoulder into the second fanged shadow and knocking it back briefly as the street light turned its glowing eye to him.  “Back in the cafe!”  He shouted.  The students did not listen, and instead started to scatter, with one of them trying to grab their friend who was being lifted up off the ground.  James shoved the guy aside and drew his pistol from the concealed holster at his back, rapidly shooting into the space where he could see something like a thin film in the air that connected the teeth to the lamp.

Clear blood spilled, and after the fifth or sixth shot, it had dropped the girl and jerked backward, which was when James let out a Breath, manifested a third arm that he gave spiked knuckles to the fist of, and slammed it into the incoming second set of invisible fangs.  Then he shifted his stance slightly and unloaded the rest of the mag into the streetlamp, shattering the crystal covering and popping the bulb, the ‘body’ of it going limp and sprawling into a loose coil of metallic flesh on the asphalt.  Something inside James incremented.

“What is happening?!”  The guy screamed in terror.

“I’ll tell you in a second.  Get her back inside!”  He pointed back at the cafe with his extra arm, noting that the translucent attackers were a lot more visible when there were fewer weird shadows around them.  But there were still streetlights all down this road, at irregular intervals, and James needed to catch up to the others.  With his normal hands, he flicked the empty magazine out of his gun and smoothly pulled another from his belt to reload, lamenting that he hadn’t brought a gun bangle, or the fucking fireball gun.  “Okay.”  He took a breath, trying to banish the creeping chill from his use of a Mountain spell, and then started running after some of the others who’d scattered.

He got to three of them before they got too far.  And was greeted by a screamed “Please don’t kill me!”  From one of them, who reflexively covered her face with her hands.

The scream made James wince, for a lot of reasons, but mostly because this was a dungeon.  “I’m not gonna kill you.”  He said in a low voice.  “I didn’t do this, and I don’t know what happened, but this place is wrong.  Get back to the cafe, it’s gonna be safer there, please.  Your friend is hurt, and needs you there.”  He punctuated the words by holstering his gun and spreading his hands.  One of them just pointed open mouthed at his extra arm, the blue tinted ice seeming to host a deep darkness in the darkness of the street.  “Look, that’s not the weirdest thing here. You just got attacked by a lamp.  Come on.”

There was a scream from the other direction down the road, and James smothered a groan.  “Lopa!”  One of the guys yelled, and started doing that kind of half-run toward the source, craning his neck like he was trying to see what was happening.  “We have to-“

“Cafe!”  James said, gesturing with his other hand.  “I’ve got this!”  His gun was back in his palm, the weight disturbing in how comforting it had become as he started running.  He zeroed in on another scream, soles of his shoes pounding on the asphalt as he let his purple enhancements push him beyond how fast a human was supposed to be able to get up to speed.  He found the girl sprawled on the sidewalk a half block away, next to a leafy hedge in front of what looked like the silhouette of a suburban home.  James didn’t have time to take in the scenery, as the girl was currently kicking at something that looked like it was growing out of the hedge; four legs and a flat muzzle, the impression of the shape of a dog.  Only with thick skin, and some kind of twisting organic lines leading back into the vegetation.  James arrived and aimed an awkward kick at its head, sending the creature jerking back with a wet crack as its hide split open like a pumpkin, complete with pungent smell.

Before it could recover, he grabbed the girl’s outstretched hand and hauled her up.  “Let’s get the fuck out of here.” He said, leading her back to the cafe.

By the time they returned, things had not calmed down.  There was more yelling, more people trying to leave.  Two people were directly yelling at Harlan, who was just ignoring them, but at least they hadn’t tried to restrain them.

James came in with the girl, Lopa, letting her run to her friends as he tugged the door shut behind him.  For all the good an incredibly breakable glass pane would do against anything in a dungeon.

He took a deep breath.  The air already smelled different.  Whatever the smell of their teleportation had been, it had faded rapidly, but now even the coffee and pastry scent of the cafe was being pushed down.  Something thick and cloying coming in from outside, a sickly sweet smell that was thin now, but growing bit by bit.  James had noticed it when he’d rushed out after the students, along with the fact that the air here was warmer than the wintery chill back on Earth, but now that he wasn’t shooting anything it was harder to get away from.

That wasn’t important though.  What was important was that there were people here, in the middle of a dungeon, where someone had fucking teleported a whole building.  And then died.  The dying part was important.  James saw Harlan checking the body, and winced.  That wasn’t a great look.

“Alright.”  He said to himself.  It wasn’t like he didn’t know what to do, really.  He just hadn’t planned on this today.  And he was tired.  “Okay.  Excuse me, everyone!”  He raised his voice.

The yelling came back.  And worse.  People noticed him, noticed he wasn’t panicking.  Someone demanded to know what he had done, someone else started crying.

This was a lot different than last time.  “Holy shit, I’m not good at this.”  James breathed out.  He knew, for a fact, that trying to yell over everyone wouldn’t help.  The darkened room was packed with people who were scared, half of them of him, and yelling wasn’t going to solve anything.  And worse, they were on something of a time limit to get organized.  “Okay!  I’d like to explain what’s happening!  Can everyone please just… just not panic for a second?  I realize that’s kind of a stupid thing to say, but we’ve gotta sort this out!”

The words, said with a kind of self-aware humor at how dumb they sounded, actually worked.  The people who heard James gave the kind of nervous laughs that you got when someone who was having the worst day of their life suddenly heard a joke.  People around them noticed too, and, while the sounds of a crowd didn’t cease, a lot of them did turn their phone flashlights toward James, illuminating him standing in the middle of the floor.  Further helping, one of the baristas spoke up.  “I know him!  He’s okay!”  Something small and meaningless, but even that little thing was reassuring to the cluster of terrified civilians.

“Alright.”  James said, taking a deep breath.

“What happened to us!?”  Someone shouted, and got a wave of agreement.

Before that could get too loud and waste more time, James rapidly answered.  “It looks like the whole building got moved somewhere else.  Somewhere pretty dangerous, from the looks of things.”  He glanced back to the injured student - high school or college he didn’t know - where the other barista had gotten out their first aid kit from under the counter and was using too many bandages to seal up her puncture wounds.  “I know how weird that sounds.  You can argue with me later, and you won’t when you see what’s outside.  If anyone has cell service, try calling who you can, but I doubt it will work.  Though let me know if you do, I’ve got a number that might help.  Right now, is anyone else injured?”

Everyone checked themselves, and then a pair of women who reminded James of more pleasant versions of his mom started checking on everyone else.  There was an older man in a wheelchair who couldn’t actually talk much and who’s caretaker had been outside when they’d warped, and the husband of a married couple who had gotten his ankle stomped on during the frantic explosion of panic earlier.

“They’re going to be dead weight.”  Harlan said from where they slipped up to James’ side.  It didn’t sound malicious, just appraising.

“No they aren’t.”  James said with sigh.

Harlan looked at him, and a few people who heard him gave him alarmed looks as well.  “Wow.  That’s pretty mercenary of you.  And I’m saying that, which I think means something.”

In response, James pulled his backup telepad out of a coat pocket.  “Wheel that guy over to the armless dude.  Excuse me, ma’am, can you move your husband over by the door?”  He raised his voice.  “And the two injured girls in the back, Lopa and… I don’t know, whoever’s hurt.  The six of you.  Up here please, if you need help ask.”

James took a pen and wrote the Lair’s coordinates as they nervously collected themselves.  The EMT gave him a worried look as he kept pressure on the severed stump of the man’s arm.  “He’s going into shock.”  He told James.  “If no one’s coming…”

“Yeah.”  James said with a sigh.  “Alright, you six.  Hold hands.  Or… uh…” He mentally slapped his forehead as he looked at the one armed victim on the floor.  “Skin contact, in some way.  Hands are easiest, but the six of you need to be touching.”

“W-why?”  The girl who had been bitten asked.  Her makeup had lines carved by tears in it, and her voice was high pitched and close to breaking from the pain.  “What’s happening?!  Are you going to kill us now?!”

“No.”  James said reassuringly.  “There’s a guaranteed way to safety.”  He looked down at the telepad in his hand, and briefly considered… a lot of things.  Then he stopped considering, and crushed the blooming seed of guilt in his chest.  “But it only works for six people.  So here.”  He handed the girl the telepad.  “Link up.  Everyone good? Yeah?  Okay.  Tear the page.  You, keep a grip on that wound, okay?  There will be people where you arrive who will help you.  Tell them everything.  And tell them we’re not dead.  And… and…”  He looked out the dark window.  He didn’t have time for this.  DIdn’t have time to waste having a panic attack now.  “When you meet Anesh or Alanna, tell them that I love them very much, and I’ll see them when I get out of here.”  He grinned at the assembled group.  “My name’s James, by the way.  I’ll ask you yours when I get back.  Now go!”

The girl gave him a disbelieving look, but tore the page anyway, leaving James standing in a now-clear part of the cafe near the front door, standing next to a crouched EMT and an empty wheelchair.  He hoped that part wouldn’t be too much of a problem.

“What about us?”  The man whispered.

“We get out the hard way.”  James said, turning back to everyone who had been watching.  “And from now on I’m carrying more than one backup.  Actually, shit.  Harlan!  Teleport us out of here!”

“Can’t, paladin.”  Harlan shrugged.  “Mine needs to be targeted.”

“They all need to be targeted!  Don’t fucking tell me there are teleports that are random!  That’s insane and I’m running out of patience for magical bullshit today!”  James called back to them.

Harlan just gave James a level stare.  “Targeted from the outside.”

He repressed an urge to sigh again.  Nothing was ever easy.  Teleportation was supposed to make life easy.  “Okay.”  James waved his arms.  “Everyone come on in.  Gather round.  We’ve gotta sort this out.”

“Yeah, I’d love to know what’s happening aside from you telling us we’re gonna die.”  The EMT said in a voice that was more steady than James expected.

“Where’d those people go?”  A man in a pink beanie and a lot of tye-dye asked, pointing to the door.

“And is this going to impact my tips?”  A barista asked.

James looked at the barista first.  So did everyone else.  A couple people started yelling at them to shut up, to not make jokes, that this was serious.  But James just started laughing.  “Ohhhhh man, yeah.”  He nodded sadly.  “It’s also gonna ruin your resume.  You’ll go to apply for a job, and they’ll say ‘why did you leave your last position’ and you’ll have to tell them that the building got kicked out of reality.  That’s gonna be awkward!”  He cleared his throat, and scanned the group, noting a few twitchy smiles.  At least he’d gotten them around to not thinking he was gonna shoot them.  Though maybe he could keep Harlan back for a while.  “Okay.  I’m gonna say some shit, and it’s gonna sound insane, and I acknowledge that.  Please wait until the end to interrupt.”

He took a breath.  “I’m part of a group that explores spaces connected to our world, but outside of reality.  This appears to be one of them.  I don’t know how an entire building got dumped into it, or which one this is, or why that asshole decided you all were acceptable collateral, but I can tell you this place is going to be hostile to us.  As for the people who vanished earlier, I had a way to teleport on me.  So I sent them home, because they were the six most vulnerable or injured, and that’s the cap.”

“You didn’t have a right to make that choice!”  A man with perfectly wavy hair and a soul patch and scarf that matched his outfit choice of ‘everything black’ snapped at James.

“Okay.  I will not be engaging with that right now.”  James bluntly shut him down and ignored the indignant sputtering.  “So.  Here’s the only way this is going to work.  We need to figure out where we are, figure out where the exit is, and figure out how to get from here to there without dying.  Because let me tell you, we’re sitting here and it seems fine, but this place is not nice.  But I swear that I will do everything I can to get you all home.  Harlan too, though they’re going to be creepy about it.”  James gestured to Harlan.

“Homes are an illusion, kid.”  The guy in what James instantly thought of as too much tye-dye said.  “Your home is wherever god put you!”

James nodded politely.  “Okay.”  He said.  “I’m glad that works for you.  I’m gonna put myself somewhere else.  And I’ll keep you safe if you wanna come with me.”

“Why us?”  One of the students asked in a shaking voice that bordered on a whine.  Understandable, really, so James didn’t hold it against her.  “Why is this happening to me?”

“I think someone was trying to murder Harlan, and didn’t care about who was around.”  James jerked his thumb to where Harlan was lurking by a window, peering out into the night.  “I’d ask him, but…”

A lot of people’s eyes crept over to where the human corpse was still slumped on there floor.  “They killed him…”

“What?”  Harlan asked as they rejoined the group.  “Who?”

“You.  Him.  Killed.”  James pointed and glared.

“Did I?”  Harlan asked.  “Huh.  Hope he deserved it.”

James widened his eyes, face tight.  “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“I don’t joke.”

“What’s happening?”  One of the baristas asked in a mutter.

“Harlan, you fucking… how have you lived this long?!”  James burst out in a sudden yell.  “This is the most reckless shit I’ve ever seen!  You can’t just feed every new memory you make back into more violence!  What the fuck are you even doing?!”

Harlan faced him with a curious and stoic expression.  “I’m doing what is needed to win.”  They said.  “Why would you ever do anything less?”  They flipped something through the air to James; a single 9mm bullet.  But something was wrong with it; it practically vibrated in James’ palm as he snatched it.

“Because I’ve got priorities beyond shooting people? I don’t fucking know!  A million reasons!”  James snapped back.  “No more feeding your memories into bullets!”

“You forget that you are not my leader.  We‘re equals.”  Harlan looked at James evenly.  “Or so I’ve been told.”

In the background, James caught the edge of someone whispering “Mom and dad are fighting…” and a snicker from one of the students.

He pressed the knuckles of a hand into his forehead.  “Alright.”  He breathed out.  “I hate you so much right now.  Does anyone here have a problem with anything so far, aside from this asshole?”  No one said anything.  “No one gonna ask if magic is real or something?  That’s usually how this goes.”

“You… uh…” the EMT jerked his chin up at James in a nod.  “You’ve got an extra arm.”

“Oh, right.”  James dismissed the Mountain spell, letting his new limb break into fragile ice that would probably be a slipping hazard on the floor.  “Okay.  We need to take stock here.  Does anyone have any military experience here?”

No one raised their hands, which actually kind of surprised James.  He’d seen one of the guys here around the cafe before in camo fatigues, but he guessed that was just a bizarre fashion choice.  When it came to medical, though, there were several hits.  The study group actually were med students, and with the EMT, they had a good five people left who knew a bit more than basic first aid.  For other useful skills, one guy went camping a lot, and the guy in the beanie got a lot more direct about being homeless and knowing how to manage rough living.

And that was kind of it.  “I’m a history major who reads poetry all day instead of working!  What the hell am I supposed to contribute to an adventuring party?!”  The scarfed man cut to the heart of the issue with a sentence that annihilated any irritation James had felt toward him.

“Oh.  Uh… I do SCA stuff.  Does that count?”  A guy with a beard worthy of a dwarf warrior and an eyepatch offered.  “Well, you know, used to.”  He tapped his leg with the cane in his hand, and James really wanted to ask what had happened, since he looked late thirties at most.

“That counts enough.  Harlan, give him a sword.”  James said.

“What?  No.”  Harlan frowned.  “That’s my sword.”

“Are you going to use a sword and a gun at the same time like you’re some kind of action movie hero that can aim one handed and cut through trees without leverage?”  James provoked.

“Yes.”

“No you are not.  Besides, we’ll need someone to run rearguard.  Give him your sword.  Please?”

“Huh.  Notes were right, you did ask nicely.”  Harlan pulled back the sleeve of their turtleneck and flicked their arm, the tattoo of a blade slipping off their skin and into the world in a flash of sickly light that was only visible in the darkness.  They handed it out hilt first to the man, who took it with a look of deep confusion, shifting in the creaking cafe chair as he did.  “So.  What’s your plan?”  They asked.

“For what?”

“For getting out of this context.”  Harlan said.  “You know we can’t just go in a straight line.  We’re dead unless you have a way to find the exit.  So what is it?”

“Oh. That.”  James nodded.  “Okay, everyone who’s new here, please don’t panic.  I’d like to introduce you to a friend of mine.”  He dipped his mind down, and prodded at something inside himself.  Layering onto the nudge the feeling of needing to go somewhere.  And a second later, a dusty orange light began to clad his shoulder and left arm, trailing down his back into a feathered tail, as Zhu pulled himself awake and into his manifestation.

The navigator opened a set of eyes from within the feathered pauldron he formed.  “Hello.”  He greeted the crowd.

“So, this is a really elaborate practical joke, right?”  Someone spoke up.

One of the study group that had remained started shouting.  “The streetlight tried to eat us!”

As the cafe patrons broke into a spirited argument, James cocked his head to look at Zhu.  “I won’t lie, I thought they’d be more interested in you.  How’s it feel?”  He asked.

“Being ignored?”  The navigator asked.  “No different. I’m not like the others that need the right balance of thought about them to be.  I am content with the motor control center of your brain and the existence of an atlas.”

James squinted.  “Really?”  He asked.  “Because you sound pretty indignant there.”

Zhu made a strange sound like tires slipping on wet metal, which James took to be some kind of haughty grunt.  “I can’t get us out, though.”  He continued in a smaller voice.  “I can’t even feel for how far away we are without it costing me.  Costing you.  And it isn’t simple distance.  There’s something… familiarly wrong, here.”

“Wrong like it’s a dungeon?”  James murmured.

“Wrong like the shape of it is unpleasant.”  Zhu muttered back, dusty orange light pulsing along his body in a way that lit up the space around them both.

James felt a dark feeling in his chest.  The stirring, again, of that thought that maybe this time, he wasn’t going to be getting out of this alive.  That they really were in too deep now, and he wasn’t just looking at a tough run back to the escape, but something much, much worse.

He still didn’t even know what the dungeon looked like, aside from a brief skirmish across a sidewalk and part of a normal enough street.  That should be first on their list of things to fix.

“Okay.”  James held up a hand and, waited impatiently for the tense and angry kidnapped patrons to stop their argument.  “Okay!”  He added more loudly when that didn’t work.  “We need to know what we’re working with!  So far, nothing’s tried to break in here, which is good, but we can’t count on it.  Let’s get most of these chairs and tables up against the windows, and move everyone into the back, okay?”  He glanced at a barista, who shrugged.  Any sense that they should keep people out of the employees only area vanished when the power, water, and sun did.  “Alright.  Harlan, keep an eye on things here.  I need two people who want to get out of table stacking duty who want to come with me and take a look around.”

“Wait, they have a gun!  Why don’t you take them!”  The history poet complained.  “I don’t have a gun!”

“You don’t have to come, I can…”

“Of course I do.  I might die.”  They sounded too enthusiastic.

James tipped his head in a series of tiny jerks as he tried to process that.  “Alright, whatever.  Also Harlan’s staying here because I want an experienced fighter on site in case something shows up.  And I’m not going alone because places like this tend to have stuff that kills loners instantly.  In my experience.”

“Your experience is fucking wild man.”  The drifter said around a mouthful of muffin one of the baristas had given him.  “I wanna check this out.”

“Alright.  Everyone else, move your stuff, get the back door blocked.  If you’ve got phones or laptops, turn em off to save battery.”  James paused.  “Are there emergency lights here?”

Harlan pulled the neck of their turtleneck aside.  “I’ve got us covered.”  They said, lighting up the interior and casting reflections across the black pane glass around the cafe as one of their tattoos writhed off their skin and into the world.  A second later, a rainbow macaw came into being, glittering beads of light dripping from it like water to evaporate in the air around it.  It cocked its head at the assembled patrons, trilling and chirping lightly before hopping onto a table and strutting back and forth as a mobile avian lamp.

“That’s fucking cool.”  Someone said.  Several someones, really.  James was one of them, too.  He wasn’t above admitting that was fucking cool.

He helped move a couple of the heavier tables up against one of the broad windows, and aided in mopping up the pool of blood by the front door, while the other two who were coming with him stowed their stuff, and tried to find anything to defend themselves with.  There was a broom and a mop in the back of the little eatery that a barista helped remove the heads from, leaving a couple mostly sturdy wooden poles.  And a couple kitchen knives shoved into belts.  But aside from that, well.

James had gotten used to having an armory.  And a strategy.  And a team that he’d worked with on more delves than he could remember.  At least the people here were being more or less reasonable.  No one was trying to do anything stupid yet, at least.  Everyone was showing a remarkable amount of calm for the situation.

He got the names of his two temporary partners for this scouting operation.  Aurelio, who told James that he could just call him Leo if that was too hard to pronounce, in the kind of voice of someone who was exhaustedly familiar with hearing that, and Del from the other man, who started a long and uncomfortable explanation of his name as something he chose after escaping the foster care system and finding god in the woods.  Well, uncomfortable to James anyway.  Aurelio seemed to be taking notes on the other man’s tragic backstory.

“Alright.  Harlan, keep this place together.  I’ll be back when I’m out of bullets.”  He said.  And then slowly pushed the front door open, wincing as he noticed the blood spray on the outside from where a man’s arm had been severed outside the radius of the teleport.

It was almost pitch black here.  In the indeterminate distance, there were orange dots of streetlights hanging over head, but when James looked up, he couldn’t even tell if there was a sky.  There was a breeze that felt like the outdoors, though it had that same sickly sweet smell as had been seeping into the building.

He flicked on the flashlight on his phone, set to a low power, and led the way out into the darkness with Zhu lighting up the space around him in an equal glow.

The first thing that became clear was that whatever had brought them here, it brought the building, and only the building.  Underfoot, something crunched, and it took him only a step or two to realize he was walking on bark chips.  The patio of the cafe was gone; tables and fire pit and all.

“Aw man…” Del said in a voice that was far too loud.  “My bike was out here, man!  All my stuff is gone!”

“I think,” James spoke quietly, “that your bike is right where you left it.  We moved, it stayed behind.”  He swept the light around, trying to get a sense for where they were.

It wasn’t, as he’d worried, completely pitch black.  The sky was dark, but it was a shade lighter than everything else, so it was possible to see objects against it.  It certainly wasn’t easy to see, but as his eyes adjusted to the glow Zhu was putting off u7yaround them, James started to get an impression of where they were, and what was around them.

He turned around and looked at the cafe, a dark boxy silhouette, with flickers of white lights inside from phones and the emergency flashlight they’d had under the counter.  Around it, there were tall and narrow figures reaching up to the sky; like trees, but if they were trees, they didn’t sway in the breeze like James figured they should have.

He looked back ahead of them as they took some cautious steps toward where he could see the texture of the ground change.  As James stepped off the bark chips and onto what was more clearly cracked concrete, the tree-things gave way on either side of him and he could see the orange glow of streetlights to his left and right.  Well, sort of left and right.  He’d almost tripped as this patch of sidewalk had been at an angle to him.

Once more he glanced back at the cafe.  It was easier to see the shape of it now, and it was definitely lopsided.  Or at least, not lined up with the tall shapes around it, and the sidewalk.

The sidewalk lined a road, the shape of which he could make out; an asphalt outline that almost, almost gave James a sense of security.  After all, if anything too serious showed up, he could just stab it with the street.  But he remembered his time in Route Horizon, where control of the material was fleeting and sporadic at best, and he didn’t feel like a life or death situation here would be the best place to test his luck.

“Where’re all the cars?”  Del asked.

“Why did I agree to this…” Aurelio whispered.

James didn’t bother to tell him that he’d volunteered, and did so after saying he wouldn’t be good at it.  “Looks like we landed in something like a park or an empty lot…” He spoke softly, but pointedly did not whisper.  “Also, ground rules.  Speak in a low tone, it doesn’t carry as far as a whisper does.  We check in every few minutes to make sure no one got snatched by something in the dark, but don’t talk unless there’s a reason.  You two stay behind me, and if things look really bad, don’t try to help.  Book it back, and get Harlan.”

“You have spent too long practicing that spiel.”  Aurelio told him.  James could practically hear the creaking of the wood as the other man tried to crush the makeshift weapon in his hands.

A dozen small quips jumped to James’ lips.  He wanted to say he’d done this before, or that he’d practiced on a live audience, or that practicing in front of a mirror was easy when you were as good looking as him.  That last one he stole from JP, though, so it didn’t count.  But he took his own advice, and just waved a hand down in the orange light from Zhu, quieting the other two.  “We go that way, but not too far.  Try to keep track of the way back to this spot.  Be careful about the lights, and any hedges.  Actually, let’s walk in the road.”

Even though he’d run into it earlier, he was still apprehensive about the street.  That old lived experience of not wanting to get hit by a car sticking with him.  Also he wasn’t sure if it was dangerous on its own, so James tested it with the toe of his shoe first.

But when nothing happened, he started walking.  The other two falling in behind him, though James noted that one of his temporary squadmates walked too-quick to stay close to his side, while the other guy stuck near the sidewalk a ways away, tapping at the ground with his stick like he was using it as a cane.

There were no cars on the side of the road, though when he was standing in the middle of it, James could only barely see the curb.  It felt like being submerged in an inky black pool.  Outlines in the distance he could see, but around him, there was nothing.  Just road and sidewalk.

As they got closer to the part of the street illuminated by the assuredly-predatory streetlight, James started to make out larger shapes on the edges of the road.  Not like the trees that reached far into the sky.  These were just rough triangles poking up into that slightly lighter shade.  It was like trying to see the dark part of the moon against the night sky; possible, but only if you were really looking.

“Roofs.”  James said, pointing with his left arm so Zhu got a view of exactly what he was looking at, and also so the other two could follow the glowing line of his arm.  “There’s buildings around us.”

“That’s good, right?”  Aurelio asked.  “We can go ask for help!  We’re probably just in Canada or something!”

“Keep your voice down.”  James hissed.  “And no, look at the sky.  This isn’t anywhere on Earth, and-“ He froze as, a couple hundred meters ahead of them, someone came into view under the streetlight.

Several someones, actually.  All of them shorter than James by a bit, maybe capping out a little over five feet tall.  They were wearing dark hooded sweatshirts that obscured their faces - which was a massive red flag already - and walking in a very tight group.  The noise of laughter and chatter reached James and his companions as the group moved through the light.

And then Del made the stupidest move James could possible have imagined.

“Hey!”  His voice echoed against the unnaturally quiet false night.  “Hey!  Over here!  Hey!  We’re lost!  Where’d you guys come from?!”  His coat flapped as he waved his arms over his head.

“Oh you fucking…” James drew his pistol in a motion that was becoming far too practiced, double checking the safety as the crowd of human shaped figures stopped sharply, still mostly under the puddle of light.

“Over here!”  Came a yell from their direction.  “Hey!  You guys!”  The voices sounded like teenagers.  But the words, James realized quickly, were just loops of what Del had yelled at them.  “Hey!  Here!  Lost!  Here!”  The sounds of speech blurred together with mocking laughter and the rapid slapping of steps on pavement as the cluster began moving.  Just as sharply as they’d stopped, exploding forward and out of the light, almost totally vanishing into the darkness between where they’d been spotted, and where James was standing.

“Fuck me.”  James hissed.  “Del, back!”

“Naw, man, it’s fine!  They’re a bunch of kids!”  Del called over from where James could just barely see his form in the darkness.

And then he started screaming as the pack of hooded figures swarmed over him; edges of their dark clothing illuminated in orange by the streetlight at their backs and Zhu ahead of them.  It was hard to tell what was happening, but when the sound of flesh tearing started, James started shooting.  His heightened Aim letting him extrapolate and hit targets in the dark even if he couldn’t still see them; a kind of magically induced instinct on where they might be (and absolutely were) that he’d never noticed before and needed to learn to push farther.

The gunshots got attention.  Ahead of them, the streetlight twisted slightly to peer in their direction, and the hooded mob peeled away from Del’s fallen form, moving like a single organism as they ran for the cover of true darkness on the side of the road.  James didn’t stop shooting at them, emptying his magazine rapidly and swapping out for one of his two remaining spares in a fluid snap of his hands.  “Del!”  He yelled into the sudden quiet.  “…fuck.  Okay, stay with me.”  He said to Aurelio, who had frozen up entirely and was gripping his staff in front of his face with both hands, twitching at every noise.

Regrettably, none of those noises were of footsteps; the band of what were clearly not human teenagers having gone totally silent as soon as they were out of even the thin amount of sight that James had.

Creeping forward, he made it to where Del had been standing.  Or at least, to the edge of the scene of the attack.  A wet gurgle alerted him to the fact that Del was still alive, which James would not have guessed otherwise.  One of the man’s arms was bent, wrapped around under his back with bone sticking out in two places.  Several layers of clothing had been shredded open, and his stomach underneath hadn’t held up any better; intestines and gore splayed around with the stench of filth and blood.  He was missing an eye, his remaining eye bloodied and wide, staring up at nothing as James tried to keep down the urge to throw up.

Aurelio didn’t manage it; vomiting whatever was left of the coffee and pastry he’d had from the cafe not even an hour ago onto the pavement.

“We need to get back.  Now.”  James hissed, flicking his eyes around for any sign of blood that wasn’t human.  He couldn’t tell if he’d hit, or damaged, the hoodies.  Which was generally a bad sign.

“He…he… but he…”  The words were just a frantic stammer, one hand pointing a shaking finger at the person who had, within the last few seconds, transformed into a corpse.  “He just… they…”

“Yeah.  We need to go back.  Now.”  James said, putting a hand on Aurelio’s shoulder and half pushing half guiding him to return the way they came.  With a lot less careful movement and a lot more hurried power walking.

Stumbling over barkchips to the door of the cafe, realizing he hadn’t had a way to tell anyone inside he was coming back, but with Zhu wrapped around his arm being a good indicator that he was who he said he was, James and Aurelio slipped back inside the cafe as Harlan opened the door barricade for them.

“How was it?”  They asked.  “Also where’s the bum?”

“He didn’t make it, and don’t be an asshole.”  James answered reflexively.  “Holy shit, it was so fast…” He holstered his gun, shaking out his sweaty palm as the event caught up to him.  Feeling dazed and unsteady, James stumbled to the counter where drinks were served up, setting his palms flat on the cool surface as he just stared at nothing.  “I don’t know where we are.”  James said.  “But we’re deep enough in that wandering life can rip a human open in seconds.”

“Some contexts are like that.”  Harlan nodded.  “If we’re on the outskirts, that’s a good sign.  If we’re deep enough, it doesn’t mean anything.”

“How could that possibly be a good sign?!”  James snapped, glad that most of the people here were in the back and wouldn’t have to see him starting to lose his cool.  “Harlan, we’re fucked if that’s what this place is like.”

“Strong guardians can always be handled with more firepower.  If a context is focused on that, it often doesn’t have the worst kinds of other problems.  Weather, infection, mind control, that sort of thing.”  Harlan tipped their head at James.  “That’s one of the important things the Wolfpack learned over a lot of casualties.”

“Or so your notes say.”  James couldn’t keep the bitter words back.

“Yes.”  Harlan agreed without hesitation or even annoyance.  “Some things are better forgotten.  Impersonal.  Professional.  That’s our way.  It works for us.”

“…I don’t wanna have this argument now.”  James said, suddenly exhausted.  “I don’t… I don’t know what to say to you that would matter now.  We’re in so much trouble.  We don’t have firepower.  Unless you’ve got a rocket launcher tattooed somewhere?”

“No.  Though, cards on the table, I do have a set of ball lightning inks.”  Harlan finished replacing the furniture barricade and turned back to James.  “You’re a survivor.  A killer.  The two of us, at least, we’ll make it out.”

James snapped his head up, an abrupt and unwelcome snarl on his face.  “And what about everyone else?!”  He demanded.  “You’ve got these professional ethics and your flowchart on how to act properly and all that power, and what the fuck are you doing with it?”  He stabbed a finger in Harlan’s direction.  “Just surviving?  That’s it?  Kill things and take their stuff?  Get by, and don’t worry about anyone caught up with you?”  James took a shaking breath, and then, quieter, added “You know this was targeted at you.  You’re not the reason everyone is here, you’re sure as fuck not responsible for this; that’s not how it works.  But you’ve made enemies you don’t even remember, and you could maybe show a little fucking compassion for the people who’re turning into collateral damage.”

“No.”  Harlan answered bluntly.  “Because I didn’t do this.  You said it already.  Someone else killed everyone here, not me.  I won’t feel guilty for that.  And if I did, I’d just use it as ammo anyway.”  Harlan didn’t even look angry at James for his outburst.  Just mildly curious.  “I’ll try to help.  But they’re flat, and civilians at that.  They’re already dead, no matter what we do.”  They smiled slight.  “I guess we are having this argument now.”

“Guess so.”  James said, voice hard.  “And you’re wrong.  I’ve done this before.  I’ve been here before.  This sucks, and I’m about to fall apart, but it’s not hopeless.  So don’t write everyone off ahead of schedule.”  He took a breath, then another.  Realized he was still panting from exertion and stress and anger.  Tried to steady it, and ended up sighing instead.  In a small voice, he tried to set aside his frustration.  “Anything serious happen while I was gone?”

“No.  Hard to see outside, though.  What’re we looking at?”

“Streets and houses, I think.”  James said.  “Like you said, hard to see.  And we didn’t get close to anything.  Barely got a block away before…” He trailed off, a rush of emotion shoving its way up his throat.  “Yeah.  Waiting for morning might be our best option, assuming this place has morning.”

“If it doesn’t?”  The question wasn’t accusatory.  Just tactical.  Harlan was a consummate professional, after all.

James shrugged.  “Then we secure one of the houses, and start moving building to building, until we find something that we can use as a way out.  Worst case, we set something on fire and use that.”

“Something, in this case, being…”

“Maybe the whole forest around us.  Or a few houses.”  James wasn’t feeling especially restrained right now.  “Alright.  I’m gonna go check on the-“ Whatever he was about to say was cut off, as from the back kitchen, a broken warbling scream resounded, followed by the smashing of porcelain and the metal clanging of pans hitting the floor.  “Stay here!”  He ordered Harlan, who seemed content enough to follow the command.

Maybe he shouldn’t have taunted fate, James thought as he vaulted the front counter, following Zhu’s traced orange lines in the air as he avoided slipping on anything and ran for the door to the back.