Janet looked up at me and smiled. Well, smirked. “Um,” I said, standing on my tiptoes, “do you mind removing that blade.” For some reason, she glanced over her shoulder at Tanya and then they both started laughing. “No prob,” she said and stepped backward and pulling out her machete.

The two girls kept laughing. One of them would start to stop and then the other would go “Ah” or scream like a little girl (which in my opinion sounded nothing like me) and then they’d start rolling with laughter again.

Looking around the place looked like a scene from a horror show. There was blood and rat fur everywhere. It smelled of blood too. And, of feces, of that weird stench of death, of bodies releasing their hold on this world as organized objects and breaking back up into individual parts, this much oxygen, this much carbon, calcium, iron, copper, all the individual components that somehow make us into living beings.

I sat and watched the girls laugh. And slowly began to decompress. First I noticed the sword in my hand, I finally released it and began massaging my hands, stretching them out again. The wounds that covered my thighs and back and legs were already not bleeding. For the first time, I was able to see my new body’s natural regeneration rate. At almost four points a minute, I could almost see the wounds closing themselves. Almost like a stop-motion film. But I didn’t have to wait, I could heal myself, and so I did. I used the Qi ability on myself.

Closing my eyes, I gathered myself and then, gathered a ball of the golden energy of from my abdomen. I separated it from the bigger ball of energy there and, splitting it in two, I sent the energy up my trunk and then down my two arms to my hands. I could feel it gathered in the palms of my hands, golden. Faintly, through my closed eyelids, I could almost see it, like a bright light, but this was more a soft glow and, yet it wasn’t. I didn’t see the glow, I sensed it. Like you can almost see a glow of heat around a log fire burning in a fire pit or fireplace on a cold evening. Then I simply washed my hands over the wounds, not touching them, but lightly tracing their outlines and they simply closed up and vanished. It must have looked funny when I tried to get the wounds on my back and shoulders because I heard the girls laughing some more, but it was warm laughter. Inclusive, like when you are watching a baby dance along to music. I had to repeat the procedure twice in order to get all of the wounds, but by the end of it, I was totally healed. ‘Not all of the Event is bad,’ I thought.

I opened my eyes to find two curious girls bent over my thighs, the rents in my armor. “Ahem!” I said.

They both startled back and then Janet said, “That was so cool! It was like your flesh just zipped up. I mean it left all of the blood and stuff outside, but I could see the wounds closing, from inside to out.” She looked thoughtfully at the machete she was still clutching.

“No,” I yelled. “We’re not going to play doctor on me! I mean it.” She and Tanya both laughed again.

“Well,” I said. “That was about as wrong as wrong gets! One of the things my sensei said was that you should always have a walk through after combat. It helps solidify the lessons learned. He said, ‘It’s a hard school and doesn’t give second chances. Make sure you learn each lesson that it teaches because you’ll only get one chance to learn.’”

“Just a question,” said Tanya. “Are we out of combat yet?” and pointed toward the nest.

“Huh, good question,” I answered. “I don’t know. We had a mother, which means that there’s probably babies. I don’t know if there are others. We can’t burn it down, do we want to try to search the nest?”

We all turned and looked at the nest. It was a huge, circular pile of junk, riddled with holes and passages. It was about 18 feet high and, it extended well beyond where our lights faded into darkness. I’d say that it was at least a hundred feet, maybe more in diameter. There was no way three giant rats created this. It was either System generated or there were a whole lot of other rats in there. I could see the decision forming and that decision was not only nope, but hell no!

“Ok,” I said. “Let’s get out of here. Tanya, lead us out.”

“Still going to check on boxes?” she asked.

“Might as well, we’re here,” I answered. Looking at Janet, I got a nod.

“OK,” she said. “TUp. Skinny. Straight ahead.” We started walking toward where we left the boxes.

Surprisingly I think they were mostly still there. Fifteen of them were still in their relatively neat lines that I’d put them in. Of course, what used to be made out of clear plastic was now a wooden box. Since the lids were on them, I couldn’t tell if they were full or empty. The other two, the first two that I’d packed, were disturbed. The first one was evidently the one that I’d packed with water and pop. It looked as if the top had been knocked off, but the contents were not disturbed. It was filled with bottles of water and what vaguely looked like bottles of pop. Different, but from five feet away, they looked similar.

I heard Janet chanting softly, “Dr. Pepper. Dr. Pepper!”

The other one was the one that I’d tried to cram full of survival supplies: Fruity Pebbles, cheese blocks, milk, granola, meat, gum, beer, toilet paper. It had been turned over and was now upside down. From the litter surrounding it, I assumed my Fruity Pebbles didn’t survive. The box was also moving. Not much, but it definitely had something inside it and the thing inside was evidently moving around.

I glanced around and saw the girls looking ready. We moved closed and got ready. Tanya prepared her spell, Janet readied her machete, and I, after setting down my shield, reached out and grabbed a handle that had been created on the end and flung the package up, exposing the contents.

After the contents settled, we could see the culprit. It was a rat pup. About the size of a four-week-old puppy, it looked nothing like the momma and poppa rats that we’d just fought. This one was fuzzy with long white fur, big ears, and black, round eyes. It stared up at us as it chomped away at a block of American cheese that I’d put in the box. It didn’t seem disturbed by us, just continuing to eat at the cheese I’d packed. I guess it was cute, but, you know, giant rat. Eating my cheese.

I readied my sword to take care of it and Janet said, “Don’t you dare.”

‘Crap’, I thought. “Look you can’t be thinking of keeping a giant rat, can you?” I asked. “I mean, sure it might be cute now, but what about when it gets to be the size of a … well, the size of those three. It doesn’t even look like the same kind of rat.” I attempted to identify it and the thing showed up as Greater White Furred Mouse (pup) - Evolved, Level 1, 2 HP. “There,” I said. “It’s not even the same kind. And it says it’s evolved. I don’t even know what that means? Do you? Are you really thinking of keeping this rat, mouse? You don’t even like rats!”

“First off,” Janet said. “It’s a mouse, not a rat. Secondly,” and here she knelt down and gently scooped up the pup and held it in her arms while continuing to feed it cheese. My cheese. “It’s totally different. Evolved monsters are no longer monsters. They are called beasts. And they can grow in the same way the humans can.”

“How do you know this?” I asked.

“My imu told me!” she said. “I am going to keep it!” Tanya meanwhile had dropped the spell and was now busy petting the mouse. And cooing at it.

I looked down at the box of stuff, now strewn all over the floor and said, “It didn’t even eat my Fruity Pebbles. Why the heck did it have to destroy them?” I started gathering the other things that were in the box.

Behind me, I could hear Janet’s voice saying, “Aren’t you the cutest thing. I’m going to call you Roxie! Yes, I am. And you’ll be my pet mouse. My little, pet mouse guard!”

“OK,” I said. “That’s just great. Darn cheese eater.” I threw all of the fifteen boxes into my inventory. They went in fine. However, when I attempted to add the open box with the water and pop, it wouldn’t go. I stared at it for a second, and then, put the lid on it and tried again. This time it worked. I gathered up the remaining stuff that the rat, no mouse, had not destroyed and put it all back in the box and fastened the lid on it as well, and threw it in the inventory as well. When I looked into my inventory, I now had 17 boxes, a bow, a quiver, some other miscellaneous stuff, and a red potion showing up.

“Ok,” I said. “Let’s get out of here before we have to fight more rats.”

The two girls agreed and Tanya got us back in order with a call of “T-Up. Skinny. Forward toward the door.” We marched toward the door, pausing beside the mother rat to allow me to salvage the bolts from her, and then I was back outside in the afternoon sunlight.