Caught between panic and confusion, he didn’t know what to do. His world changed again.

The gentle orbit of fading memories fell toward Seth, bombarding him with centuries of experiences, false and true. It was too much to take in all at once. The squad captain crouched, covering his ears and squeezing his eyes tight, as voices from a lifetime that wasn’t his thundered at him, each desperate to be remembered over the others. Laughter, tears, conversations intimate, deep, and trivial, threats, violence, promises, all hung on the surface, desperate for his attention. Despite shut eyes, he felt blinded by the brilliance of Videl’s few cherished memories.

It was an all-too-familiar feeling that reminded him of his captivity within the hospital private care center. His migraines permeating voices that were not there, feelings that were not his, and echoes of memories long forgotten. In his youth, he had overheard his father discussing his condition with staff, suggesting that Seth’s mind was in a constant state of tearing apart and reshaping itself. He was too young to have a fully formed identity. Learned traits became a part of his sense of self, but those too evolved. With each new episode, Seth’s perspective of the world and his sense of self was reformed. Was he Seth Wright or Videl? Or was Seth merely the assumed identity he had chosen? What kind of monster was he?

As sudden as it had begun, the bombardment stopped, and he found himself back in the digital enclave. Something had changed within the program, he could feel it in his gut. It was more than instinct. His body burned, his fingers numb with hot-cold tenderness. His bones ached as he fought back nausea. The symptoms reminded him too much of his illness. He couldn’t relapse. Not now. Not when he was so close...

The hungry undead grabbed at him, risking the sting of the dwindling light to pull him into their ranks. The swing of his blade was clumsy, wrought with fear internal and external. He swung again urging the long dead students to shy away, only to feel his sword cut into meaty lumps. He chocked back a cry as the betrayed expressions on the students faces felt too real, too human.

“Get away!” he shouted, reefing his sword back to him. Astral’s scythe cut through demons with expert precision, why couldn’t he manage a few stray husks. “Get away!” Tears blinded him, long before the final brick blocked off the last of the light.

The force of his next swing forced him backward, colliding into Astral. He knew it was her. He hoped it was her. She’d know what to do. He swung at the darkness, while she remained at the ready. “You can calm down. He’s thinking,” Astral said, “preserve your energy.”

He expected her to be angry, cursing at him and then some. He felt the heavy rise and fall of her back on his. He heard the bone crushing transformation of the husks and the wet stickiness of the reshaping of muscle and tissue. Behind him, Astral let out a long tired breath. “Is that all you got!” she roared with a ferocity that he admired.

Her scythe glowed in the darkness. He suspected that she was charging the weapon to deal with their assailant quickly. In the dim light of her weapons, corpses twitched at their feet, pulling themselves apart as muscles wove around borrowed bones.

Seth grimaced, fighting back the urge to vomit. Astral struck before the creations were complete. Half formed arms, severed legs, and a massive modified torso were cut apart. The seared stains a remnant of Astral’s assault ate away at the animated remains. Spawn cut away the disease before it spread across the usable asset. The Hunter returned to Seth every time she struck at the hoard, making sure she was close enough to defend him.

His grip on his sword tightened. Why was he so useless? When she struck again, he charged after her, driving his sword into a demon’s opened chest, and driving down to sever the six hearts it had stolen to make it’s body.

He surprised himself with his strength. He glanced to Astral with a touch of pride for his kill. The Hunter spun around, scythe whirling a dangerous few inches from his head as it cleaved his kill’s head from it’s shoulders. A second later, he realized that the demon had wrapped it’s elongated razor tongue around the captain’s legs, it’s face open to a gullet full of teeth. In her graceful dance, Hunter severed the tongue’s grip, her blade infection spreading through the membrane until it fell apart as ash.

The undead, lesser husks, surged forward, buying time for their larger constructs to finish reshaping themselves. Astral snarled, gripping his weapon with both hands. “You neglected to mention that you were already a Hunter,” she said. He could tell her focus was on the army rushing toward them. He suspected that she was calculating her odds of survival.

“I could say the same for you,” Seth replied. “It’s not like I had any official training.”

“Oh, that’s part is obvious,” she retorted. “The fundamentals would really help about now.”

“Teach me.”

“Now is not the time.” Her grip on his arm was so strong he was sure he’d see her hand print for a few weeks. They ran into the darkness, away from the hoard of undead. The husks leaped after them, springing into the air and falling above them, opening themselves up to a swift kiss from Astral’s weapon. ‘keep running,” she ordered, as she fell to the rear to fight their pursuers.

“You can’t be serious! You can’t hold your ground here!”

“I said RUN!” she roared as a dozen husks launched themselves at her. He wanted to fight. No, he didn’t want to be that guy! The guy who left his friends behind. He didn’t want to be that guy who had the baggage of surviving when he knew damn well he should have.

She fought off the first three, took a few fleeting steps back. “I swear to god almighty, if you so much as think of engaging, I will kill you myself right here, right now!” Her scythe had split into two pieces as she cut into the next six.

He didn’t doubt her words. He fled, his hands slapped against cold stone as he tried to find his way in the darkness. To his relief Astral wasn’t far behind, lingering just long enough to deal with the undead nipping at their heels. He followed the wall, pressing onward.

A cool breeze promised salvation.

Light ahead, blocked by the violent sway of branches. The wind howled as they broke free of the darkness, in to the cold night of the school year’s first winter storm.