Ava had been outside when the apocalypse hit, taking a late-morning run. She’d been a part of the track team in her middle school, a specialist in sprinting. When monsters had appeared around her, she’d done what came naturally: run.

Speedy as she was, though, she could tell she wasn’t quite fast enough. She’d brought up the interface, continuing to run with it blocking her vision, begging for an ability that would “make her faster.” She couldn’t even tell us what she’d selected. I'm sure we could check with Pointy later, but I didn't want to disrupt her story. The point was, it had worked. She’d gone from the pace of a competent middle-schooler to Olympian in seconds.

Ava’s dad had been working from home, and Ava had pelted toward her house. Her father had been waiting to fling open the door, and she made it inside with only minor injuries to both her and her father.

They’d had quite a bit of food in the house, especially given that only the two of them had been home. Ava had an older brother, who ate like a stereotypical teenage boy, but he’d been across town visiting a friend when the apocalypse struck. Her mother had been at work. Their excess of food had been highly fortunate, as whatever Ava had selected seemed to come with a hugely increased appetite and caloric consumption. That struck me as weird and fairly arbitrary, considering that none of the other Biological Augments had done the same, but, well, whatever, I guess. The trap-like nature of the ability was unsurprising, at least. It reminded me a bit of Priya’s Armored Skin, which had removed the ability to sweat without immediately adding heat resistance.

Maybe Ava’s downside would have gone away, too, if she’d continued earning points and taking more abilities, but she and her dad had stuck close to home until they’d heard our Announcement. The news the colonel had shared - that Ava would have to fight, that more food was available for purchase with the Money earned from killing monsters - had shaken them out of their stasis. He’d spent the evening nailing together boards and bungee cables into a makeshift ballista, and in the morning they’d tried it out. Both he and Ava had earned points from the kills as long as both had a hand on the weapon when it fired any shot on the monster. (Their ramshackle siege weapon was neither that powerful nor that accurate; Ava told me that it frequently took multiple hits to take down a monster, and they'd mostly been firing at leafenrats.) He’d gotten his second ability, with Ava close to hers, by the time they’d cleared out everything they could fire at from their house. They’d cautiously ventured out to look for more monsters to kill.

“The Dragons found us after a little while,” Ava said. “They came at us in a group, four of them. I think Dad might have tried to fight, but this invisible one had his claws at my throat before we realized they were there. When my dad saw that, he looked…” She swallowed, then shook her head. “They took us to this house. There were a few other people there, and they asked us how many abilities we each had and what they were. They had someone who could tell if we were lying.”

“Why’d they want to know that?” I asked. It seemed like a weird thing to want to know after you’d taken someone prisoner.

Ava shrugged. “They knew about your Combat Groups - I don’t know how - and they were worried about them. They thought you were going to attack, and they didn’t think they had enough people to fight you off. So… they told my Dad he was going to fight for them, and in exchange they’d feed him and me. If he refused, they’d…” her voice dropped. “...kill me.”

My stomach churned. I knew the Dragons had killed people before, but at least the ones we’d heard about previously had been adults. And it was true that they’d told us that they planned for most of their neighborhood to be dead eventually… but even so, openly threatening to kill children seemed like a new low.

I tried to contain my reaction, but unfortunately Ava had an audience. Tamara and her helpers had come out to listen, and the crowd of petitioners had gathered around too. Her words brought fury, an incoherent wave of rage and objections. Many people were just upset, but others seemed disbelieving.

Ava looked up, alarmed at the anger her words had inspired. “They… I don’t know if they would have! Only a few of them seemed really, um, serious.”

Tamara clapped her hands together, her southern twang getting thicker as she snapped at the crowd in fury. “All y’all! Outside. The poor child doesn’t need a dozen pairs of eyes watching her, and she sure as sugar don’t need to be apologizing for the people who terrorized her just because y’all can’t keep calm.”

I was sitting next to Ava, and offered her my hand as the crowd sheepishly filed out. She clung to it tightly.

Tamara shut the door behind the group, and walked over to sit down on Ava’s other side. “What happened next, honey?”

She shifted. “I’m not really sure what happened to my dad. They moved me to another house. A bunch of other people were already there. A lot of kids, but some grownups too. Dad wasn’t the only one they wanted to fight for them. I think they wanted to keep where we were a secret.”

I squeezed her hand. “I’m sure he’s okay.”

She looked worried. “I hope so. I don’t know what they’ll do to him if they find out I’m missing.”

“If?”

She shrugged, an incomplete motion that left her shoulders hunched up around her neck. “The Dragons asked me what ability I had, and I told them, but I only realized later that I’d gotten enough Points for another one. I told one of the other prisoners, and she said I should use it to sneak away. She said I should take the ability the Dragon used to be invisible. I didn’t want to, because I was worried about what they’d do to my dad.”

“They let you talk?” I asked.

“Yeah. Uh, kinda. I mean, there was just one person watching us. She was really strong. She didn’t even react when anyone tried to attack her, and I think one guy broke his hand trying to punch her. But there were like twenty of us and one of her. She said not to talk at first, but… people kept trying, and eventually she got irritated with stopping us. Anyway, she seemed distracted a lot of the time.”

“What made you decide to leave?” Tamara asked.

Ava squirmed uncomfortably. “Well, I told the others why I didn’t want to try to leave, and people seemed to kind of accept that for a while. They kept asking the people the Dragons brought in if they could pick an ability, and eventually the Dragons wheeled in this old dude who could. He took… I don’t know what it was, but he could make, like, an illusion? It looked really good until you touched it. So he made one of me, and I took Camouflage, which I think was what the invisible Dragon had. It, um, didn’t make my clothes invisible, though, so…”

Ava had started speaking more quickly on her last words, then trailed off, clearly embarrassed.

“Wow,” I said. “You snuck out of captivity and across a mile or so of the outdoors all by yourself?” And butt naked, too. I was sure she wouldn’t thank me for stressing that part, though, so I left it unspoken.

She nodded. “Yeah. Everyone wanted me to. They kept telling me to go for help, so… I did.”

Ava looked miserable and uncertain.

“You’ve been incredibly brave,” I said.

My words didn’t seem to shake her misery. She looked up at me. “Maybe. I don’t know. I hope my dad’s okay. Are you… going to be able to help us?”

Her earnest question was like a punch to the gut. I wasn’t the boss here. We didn’t have a boss, not like the Dragons did. I couldn’t promise her what she wanted; I didn’t have the power.

And yet, looking at this young girl who’d risked everything, I couldn’t find it in me to explain all that.

I met Tamara’s eyes hopefully, but she shook her head. Not a negation; just showing she was at a loss.

I sighed. “When will Colonel Zwerinski be back?”

“About a half-hour,” Tamara said. “He’s been keeping me posted. They just went out to collect the last of today’s groups.”

“Fill him in when you can,” I said. “We’ve got a lot of strong people out front working on the wall. I’ll start asking around, to see if we can find people who are willing to help.”

I stood, and glanced at Ava. “Do you want another ration bar? I know you said you need a lot of food, now.”

“Yes, please.” Her voice was quiet.

I could tell she was worried that coming to us for help had been a mistake.