I shut the door on the upstairs playroom. We’d tossed the toys into bins and laid out an assortment of blankets, pillows, and sleeping bags. Each of the kids had a comfy spot to sleep, and there was enough space for us adults to join them later. For now, Pointy would serve as our alarm system, cuddled under a blanket with Cassie.

The turtle’s acerbity with everyone else didn’t extend to Cassie. She never complained about the copious cuddles, and was reciting a basic fairytale she’d had in her cultural data as we left. Like so much else the turtle did, it left me with curiously mixed feelings: gratitude for all she was doing for us, but uncertainty at how much we were relying on, essentially, a two-day-old-alien.

Behind me, George was doing a silent dance, shaking his hips like a teenage girl and pulling Priya into a spin, clearly relieved to be able to move again. As Gavin had applied his ability, we’d carefully counted the uses. On the eighth cast, the surface scar completely disappeared. George had gotten hugs from his relieved children. Gavin had clearly been delighted by the “Thank yous!” and happiness everyone felt, but he’d also been tired. Not falling-over tired, but tired enough to be asleep before we’d finished tucking everyone else in.

As George and Priya moved toward the staircase, I called out to them softly. “Ah… actually, before we head down… I’m sorry to ask, but do you think I could raid your anniversary presents?

Both looked at each other, and Priya put a hand to her forehead. “Of course! How obvious. I’d been thinking about trying to make armor like yours this evening, but I guess part of me still hasn’t really accepted that we were going to have to fight.”

The Turners had only one spare bedroom upstairs. A guest bedroom, ostensibly, with its own private bathroom and a comfortable queen-sized bed backed up to the windows. Of the other two walls, one was floor-to-ceiling shelves filled with board games. The other held Priya and George’s anniversary presents.

Each year, the couple would go all-out on a sci-fi or fantasy weapon as a joint anniversary gift to themselves, and most of them were hung on the walls of this room. It was a little odd, but Priya had once told me privately that she took a certain amount of glee in having her mother-in-law sleep surrounded by such nerdy decor. George’s mom had always childed him for his interests in comics and games, telling him that he’d have to grow up and stop wasting his time when he got married. Priya had been a surprise for her, and she’d always been a bit distant toward her daughter-in-law.

Some of the weapons, like a futuristic model laser rifle, were totally useless. Others were overly ornate or massive, replicas from videogames with blades were an inch thick or edges that curved and twisted like flames. But still, they’d been married for more than ten years. They still had six swords and long knives that looked fairly functional. Sure, they might have some decorative nonsense on the hilts and all of the blades were blunt, but they were at fairly smooth-edged steel, and George said these had all been marketed as real, heat-treated weapons. George grabbed them off the wall to take downstairs with us.

The three of us sat in the family room in the light of the dwindling fire, preparing for tomorrow. George brought out a knife sharpener and started trying to put an edge on some of the blades. One, he discarded instantly after managing to unscrew the handle from the blade, cursing the money they’d wasted on such shoddy workmanship. He said without a real tang - the part of the blade that goes inside the handle - we could just expect it to snap off at the hilt almost instantly.

Priya was trying to replicate my armor process, while she’d dug out their wagon and asked me to try to do what I could for Arvan. After how things had gone for us, I thought starting him out in an armored box was the right call, though I imagined it would be tough for him to earn points. His ability wouldn’t help; he’d agreed to let Pointy check his interface, and she’d announced he had an ability called “Synthesize Sustenance.” Priya had managed to get him to activate it by telling him she was hungry and asking him for a snack, and he’d produced a small wafer that looked kind of like an oyster cracker and tasted like a pretzel. At bedtime, we’d all convinced him to make some more, cheering each time he did so. He’d made three before falling asleep.

Maybe it would be more useful if Arvan could get points and power it up, but for now it wouldn’t be adequately feeding the two-year-old, let alone the rest of the family.

My second attempt at a tagon went just as smoothly as the first. The Turners’ wagon wasn’t identical to ours, but it was close enough that I didn’t really need to adjust much. The only major differences were the style of their dish-rack and the fact that their wagon was largely clad in vintage Babysitter’s Club books. Priya was sanguine about the loss.

“I’d only kept them for a daughter to read someday, but Anju was never into them. At least she and Samar both love my Choose-Your-Own Adventure books.”

There was one more addition to both wagons. I’d told the Turners about the time Cassie had rolled away, and together we’d brainstormed a solution. A long flap of cardboard rolled into into a “C” shape was attached to the back of each wagon, long enough to drag on the ground. It shouldn’t stop us from towing the wagons, but would hopefully catch the wheels if they tried to reverse down a slope. The handle had slowed any motion in the forward direction, so that should keep the toddlers relatively stationary while the rest of us fought.

While I worked, I ran some of the tests I’d wanted to run earlier on Assisted Strike. I found out I could use it for thrown strikes too, which was fun. In spite of not being the slowest or chubbiest, I’d always been a “picked-last-in-gym-class” kind of person when it came to things like baseball or basketball. Being able to throw something and have it land where I wanted it over and over again was a heady feeling.

I actually did damage their wall with my first throw, even though I was only throwing a little plastic ball. I felt awful, but George and Priya gave me more of a hard time for feeling bad than about the dent I’d made (“How could you detract from our lovely charred interest piece, Unpermitted Fire Bolt, with such pedestrian work!” “Truly an uninspired installation. We want to see verve and panache! Such a tiny design… it’s like you weren’t even trying.”). After that I made sure to keep my intention to hit my target lightly in mind and everything went smoothly.

I did manage to gather some evidence in favor of a theory I’d had. The first step was throwing the ball over and over at the same spot. After ten uses, I felt noticeably tired. Then I waited to feel better, using a 3-minute sand timer from one of the Turners’ board games to try to gauge how long it took. After an hour or so, I felt fairly normal, so I started casting my ability again… but not in quick succession. I used it once, then waited for the timer to run down before doing it again. I was able to use it over twenty times this way, and only felt the slightest bit fatigued. I wasn’t even convinced that tiredness was due to ability use; it was pretty late, and I’d had an exhausting day. Even if the weariness was ability-induced, I had still cast my ability twice as much in about the same amount of time and felt less tired. If you had the luxury of doing it, spacing out your ability use would let you use it much, much more overall.

That was really good information to have, especially for things like healing. Once you got a person stabilized, you could get them back in fighting form much faster if you didn’t wear yourself out by pouring all you had into them. I wished we’d known before Darryl left, but Priya promised to pass it on the next time we saw him.

...

The next morning, I woke up in an empty room and panicked. The sun was high enough in the sky that I could actually see it through the window. I burst out of the room and rushed down the stairs, only to find everyone sitting peacefully in the family room.

Priya was helping the younger kids through some owl board game while George continued to try to put an edge on the swords. Anju and Micah were in the middle of a game of chess. Anju had taken out both of Micah’s rooks, but it looked like she had lost her queen. Maybe he’d win this one. Anju probably won slightly more than he did, but both were very good. I hadn’t played against Micah in a while, but the last time I had, he’d almost beaten me.

“Figured you deserved a chance to sleep in while other adults could watch your kids. We finished breakfast a while ago, but we saved some for you.” Priya gestured to a plate of chicken.

I thanked her and started to eat. They hadn’t left me a ton, but it was more than adequate, considering our circumstances. I wanted to get home soon. Not only did I feel guilty about eating their food, we needed to get Micah over to freeze ours before it went bad.

Gavin abandoned the board game to invade my personal space, staring as I moved each bite to my mouth.

“Hungry?” I asked.

“Nooo.”

Too bad. Wishful thinking. Giving him a little of my food would have been easy. Honestly, this was my fault for rushing out of my room as soon as I woke up. Ideally, I’d like to be awake for 30 or 40 minutes before anyone asked me to make decisions, but Gavin had probably been sitting here waiting for hours.

“Waiting to pick your ability?”

“YESSSSS!” he yelled, throwing himself down on his back and waving his limbs around.

I rubbed my eyes with the back of my hand and glanced around. “Did Pointy come up with anything overnight?”

“Nothing for the healing abilities. She is pretty sure that Anju’s flight ability has nothing to do with air powers, so that’s helpful,” said Priya. “George and I have been brainstorming though. Maybe go old-school tabletop roleplaying on it? Inflict Wounds, Harm, that kind of thing?”

I considered this. It was as good as any other idea I had. Kind of basic, but it was the inverse of Healing Touch.

“Gavin, have you asked the system about an ability like Inflict Wounds? You should be thinking about something that sort of… unheals someone.”

Gavin took a moment. “It says I could do a thing called Touch of Desai.”

Desai? Okay, so I was sure he was getting the D right, but if he was saying a C as an S….

“Decay? You mean Touch of Decay?”

He shrugged. “Maybe.”

“What’s the description?”

Gavin looked at his interface, and then away from it towards my face, eyes wide. He was a trooper, though, and he looked back and gave it his best shot.

“Imin… Imminical organs break down the target?”

Okay, so… Inimical organisms. Would they break it down fast enough to be useful? It took pretty much all Gavin had to heal one moderate injury right now. Dealing damage at the same pace as he healed it? He’d take all day killing a monster that was holding still.

And a damage-dealing ability that required touch? That seemed… suboptimal at best.

On the other hand, it meant he’d never be truly helpless, even if he was caught without a weapon, and while I didn’t want him to go chasing down monsters for cuddle time, I definitely did want him to have options if he was jumped. Plus, if it was meant as a last-ditch defense, he’d have energy back for healing as long as he didn’t get in a sticky situation.

Of course, if he did get jumped, he might burn his energy hurting his enemy and have none left to heal himself. But wouldn’t that be true for most offensive abilities?

“Mooooooooooommmmmm…” there was a wealth of frustration in the word. “I’ve been waiting forever! Can I pick it?”

He had been really patient. If I didn’t help him choose something soon, he’d probably choose on his own. This seemed like a good bet if our theories were right about the synergy, and it might help him defend himself in a pinch.

“Go for it. Take Touch of Decay.”

Gavin shivered, giving a full-body wiggle. “Oooh, that feels weird.”

Pointy called it out before I could even ask. “180%! He’s at 180%.”

“Yes!” I said triumphantly. It wasn’t as big a synergy as Micahs, but it was far, far better than mine.

We were figuring this out.

…

As I started getting the kids ready to go, George came up to me, carrying two swords.

“Been working on these most of last night and this morning. These have the best construction and balance, so they’re the ones I focused on putting edges on. Take your pick.”

“Take my pick of your two best?” I laughed. “What are you and Priya going to use, then?” I would have been happy with any sword, just to have something other than my spear to use against these fast, agile enemies.

George didn’t laugh. “Yes. Really. Pick the one that you think will best suit you, Meghan. I really wish you all could stay here. But we’d run out of food twice as fast, and a lot of the stuff at your place will rot. So… I know you gotta go. But when we’re telling Vince what we’ve been up to while he was on his way back, I’m not going to tell him that I sent you and the kids off with anything but the very best.”

“When we tell Vince?” I asked, voice faint.

“Yeah,” he said. “Definitely.”

I searched his eyes for any hint that he was patronizing me, trying to give me false hope that we’d see my husband again… and found none.

“Thank you,” I said.

He nodded and handed me the swords, as if that’s what I’d been thanking him for, but his smile let me know he understood.

The swords themselves were pretty different. One was a single-bladed katana-style sword, but shorter, with a blade a little under two feet long. The grip was comfortable, but I was drawn to the western-style sword, sharp on both edges with a fuller in the middle. The sword was straight and simple, its only real adornment being some curving metalwork on the crossguard.

I swept it around a little, liking the way it felt.

“You want that one?” George sounded surprised.

“If that’s okay?”

“It’s absolutely okay, I’m just surprised. It’s a little heavy.”

“Is it?” I asked in surprise. It hadn’t seemed heavy to me.

“Hey, if you feel it’s not, that’s a good thing. There are a couple blades there I think I can make work for me, and that wakazashi-” he nodded toward the near-katana I had handed back to him “-should be just about perfect for Priya, since she’s a bit shorter.”

“I heard that! I am the perfect height,” Priya shouted.

“For a gnome!” George called back.

“Don’t you discriminate against gnomes!” she said, coming in to see us off.

I’d brought a little jar of the homemade pepper oil. I’d already used it to replenish the supply in the squirt guns, so I pressed the remainder on the Turners.

“This should be enough for two big squirt guns. It will give you a head start on making it to that first threshold.”

Priya took it from my hands with great care. “We’ll put it to good use.”

And then… that was it. There was nothing else to do, nothing keeping us from leaving, other than the fact that every single person present would rather we stay.

I tried to keep the mood light, for the kids’ sake. “See you again soon. Maybe after you get a few levels Anju can fly over to visit, eh?”

“Maybe!” Priya said. “See you soon!” She spoke with determination, as if sheer willpower could make it true.

Not one of us said “goodbye.”