Each of the siblings returned in failure, the bell even further out of their grasp than it was before the contest. Despite their individual talents, they were insufficient to complete the task, for each sibling had weaknesses their attribute alone could not overcome. Realizing this, the siblings resolved to never again separate. United, they pursued the mercenaries, employing each of their strengths together: Strength’s power, Dexterity’s sneakiness, Wisdom’s cunning, Intelligence’s knowledge, and Charisma’s persuasion. Working together, they were able to easily take back the golden bell for themselves. For each attribute in isolation is weak, but only in unity of the attributes can true power be found.

- Excerpt from “Fables of the Five Siblings”

The rush of Numbers increasing on my palm is overwhelming, larger than ever before, but only for an instant. After the rush fades, the spiking pain from my leg returns, and it’s all I can do to keep myself from screaming. After all, there still may be monsters around.

Styx rushes over to my side, while Pallas jumps out of the truck to where Melete is lying in the dirt.

I look down to my leg, and almost puke. Everything below my knee is turned almost ninety degrees from normal. There’s no blood or open wound that I can see, but the skin is a dark purple color that’s rapidly spreading.

I reach down to feel my calf, only to flinch back from the slight touch. I squeeze my eyes together and clench my teeth, trying to focus on something, anything but the fire from my leg.

I can just barely hear the sound of Styx’s voice as she yells at me, asking how she can help, but I tune her out. At some point Melete and Pallas must have come over as well, as they are now also crouched over me.

I ignore all of them, pushing them outside of my awareness, and focus inward. I ignore my body, the sound of my friends, the feel of the dirt beneath my hands, and most importantly the lancing pain of my leg. Instead, I turn all of my focus to my skill.

When fighting the monster, the skill was gone but now it’s back -- as if it never left. And I cling to it, pouring every ounce of concentration into it.

Every time I’ve used my skill previously, I’ve simply imagined the change I want to make to my body and it happens -- assuming I am strong enough to handle the modification. I know what change I need to make now. It’s just a matter of being strong enough to make it happen.

I focus on my leg -- not my hurt leg, but my good leg. What it looks like, how it moves, how it feels as I run, walk and crouch. I visualize what I need my left leg to become. I don’t bother with anything technical, with muscles, ligaments, or bones. I don’t have the understanding of physiology to make the change that way. I just imagine what I need it to become, the end result of a working leg, and hope my skill will do the rest.

After what feels like an eternity of visualizing, when I don’t believe I can concentrate any more on what my leg will need to be, I flex the muscle of my “third arm” and begin the adjustment.

I immediately feel the weight drop onto me. The pressure is immense, as if every part of my body is being crushed simultaneously. I can barely breathe, and if I had any other recourse I would give up immediately.

But I don’t have any other recourse. There isn’t any hospital nearby, we can’t call nine-one-one, and there could be more monsters around any corner. This needs to work.

I continue on. I can feel the skill working, can feel my leg changing, but it’s so slow. I’m not sure how much longer I can keep going. A week ago, I would have given up in an instant. But despite my lower Numbers, in some ways I am stronger now than I ever was.

Suddenly, the weight lifts. Not completely, but the crushing weight has dimmed to a bearable level, a level I can actually maintain while functioning. And with the loss of the weight comes an awareness of my surroundings.

The first thing I notice is the lack of pain from my leg. I open my eyes and look down, only to see two normal looking legs. The pain isn’t gone entirely -- I can still feel that the change I’ve made is only temporary. Just below the surface of my now healthy looking leg I can feel the injury is still there, lurking, waiting to return. It’s been masked, as if a timeout on the pain has been called: once the timeout ends it will come back with a vengeance, but in the meantime I can ignore it.

I finally stop studying my leg, only to meet the eyes of my three companions, staring in amazement at me. Styx has both hands held to her chest with party dried tear tracks running lines through the dirt on her cheeks. Pallas just stares at me, face inscrutable, while Melete looks almost...angry?

“...how long have you had that skill?” Melete finally asks, a hard edge to her voice.

I swallow, regretting my earlier reticence. We don’t have time for this.

“Since the tree monster.” I reply, “We can talk about it later though. We need to get moving, in case there are any other…”

“NO!” Melete screams at me, and I flinch back, startled by her outburst. “We’ll talk about it NOW! You’ve been lying to us this whole time!”

I am a bit relieved that Pallas at least seems to give more attention to the environment at my statement, but it doesn’t look like I’ll be able to brush this under the rug.

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Styx whispers. She’s holding her right hand in her left, clutching it tightly as blood seeps between her fingers, clearly still hurt.

“Your hand!” I exclaim, and sit forward to see how bad it looks. But she leans back, avoiding my touch, and repeats in a louder voice.

“Why didn’t you trust us?!”

I stutter as I respond, “I...don’t know. I just...I mean, this was MINE, why should I have told you?”

The excuse sounds weak even to my ears, and Melete yells out, now hysterical.

“We TRUSTED YOU! And you betrayed us! What else have you lied about? Why should we trust you?!”

“I haven’t lied about any....” I start, before Melete cuts me off again.

“We don’t even know you! You’re not even Atlas!” At this, she takes a second, in tears, before she continues, “You’re just...Jason!”

I’m not entirely sure what point she is trying to make with this statement. But I can see the statement was made to hurt and insult me, and realizing how much pain I’m causing the already broken Melete, I shrivel inwards. I didn’t want this.

But a second later, my anger flares up, and I respond by yelling at the top of my lungs.

“I DON’T KNOW YOU!”

There are a few seconds of silence at my outburst, before I continue, much more subdued, “I don’t know you. Any of you. At least I didn’t, not before this all started.” I look away from Melete, to make eye contact with both Pallas and Styx.

“How can I trust you? Why should I trust you? Before this week, I’ve barely said ten words to all of you together. And once we get home, it’ll all go back to how it was.”

“This,” I gesture to the four of us, gathered together, “is all temporary. Once we get home, everything will go back to how it was, and this will just be one big unhappy memory. And then you won’t have to trust me.”

I look back to Melete, and continue in an even softer voice. “And I’m not sure how to make you understand, but...I’m not Atlas. I’m just Jason.” To my shame, tears start to leak from the corners of my eyes. “And I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know how to be a leader. I don’t know how to fight monsters. I...just want to get home.”

The silence that follows my last statement is deafening, and I choke down sobs, my head between my knees. After what feels like an eternity, I feel a hand on my shoulder. Looking up, I’m surprised to see Pallas leaning over me.

“So do we.” He says, in his quiet voice. “And we will. I don’t know how long this will last, but just know that, as long as it does, you can trust me.”

Standing back up, he glances to his right to Styx, who starts and then mumbles awkwardly, “...me too. I mean you can trust me...and not just until this ends -- after too.” She ducks her head shyly after saying this, which causes me to notice her hand once again.

“We should get that cleaned and wrapped as soon as possible.” I state, glad to change the subject. Pallas nods, and runs over to where the backpacks were left on the ground when the monster first appeared, Styx and I following slowly.

I feel a small hand touch my elbow as I start to walk away, and Melete interjects, “Um. I’m sorry, I guess. I may have gone a bit overboard there. We just...we need you, Atlas.”

I nod to her. I think I understand, at least a bit more than I did. “I’m sorry too,” I reply back. “And I’ll try.”

“So, what does your skill do?” Styx asks?

We’re sitting in a circle, eating lunch behind the barn. As much as I want to get a move on and get home as soon as possible, we all need a break after that battle.

I hold up my right arm, motioning to the now visible bright orange tattoo with my left hand. “It says ‘Adjust: Self.’ Basically, it lets me make modifications to my body.” I look down in contemplation at my perfectly healthy looking legs. “Before today, I’ve just been able to make small changes. Cosmetic only -- covering my tattoo, changing the color of my skin, making my Numbers look different from what they are. But this...this is an entirely new level.”

“Can you show us another change? Oooh! Make your hair blue! Or yellow!” Melete exclaims, clearly back to her normal self.

I shake my head quickly. “Not now. And maybe not for a while…” I continue. “The bigger the modification, the harder it is to make. And if I already have a modification in place, adding another modification is just as hard as adding the first one.” Melete looks skeptically at me, and I reassure her, “No, I’m serious. And my leg isn’t really ‘fixed,’ only covered up. If I were to try to make another change...well, I don’t think I could, and then my leg might go back to how it was.” I contain a shudder.

“Fiiiinnnneeee…” Melete sighs.

“Um, just so you all know...on the topic of skills…” Styx cuts in, curiously timid. “I think I got one from the troll monster…”

“What? Really?!” I exclaim. I scoot closer over to her, as she pulls up her right sleeve to show a red, loopy tattoo on her forearm.

At first glance, it appears very similar to my tattoo when I first got it: the same stylistic patterns that appear to be some alien language. But looking closer, it is clearly different. First of all, I can’t read her tattoo, while I seem to have an inherent understanding of my own. And the patterns on her arm are definitely different -- the loops are slightly larger, and the middle section is less jagged than on my arm.

“What does it say?” I ask. Even Pallas looks interested, and has set down his can of food to lean over Styx’s shoulder.

“Nullify: Skill,” Styx responds. “I can… feel how to activate it. Want me to try now?” She gives a small excited smile, which the rest of us share.

“Wait!” I suddenly interrupt. “If it’s anything like what that troll monster was doing, then it may keep me from using my skill. That may not be smart right now…” I gesture to my left leg.

I’m sad that we won’t get to see the skill in action, and my feelings are clearly reflected on the faces of Melete, Pallas, and Styx. Thinking some more, I present a solution. “Maybe it has a range? Let me run to the other side of the house first, and then you can try to activate it. If you hear me scream, stop using it.” I joke, and give a strained smile.

“Are you sure?” Styx asks. “We can always just leave it for later…”

After thinking for a second, I respond, releasing a sigh. “Yeah, we need to test it. Better now when we’re mostly safe than later when a monster is attacking us. Come and get me when you’re done.”

I jog over to the other side of the house and part-way up the driveway. I’m about fifty yards away, which hopefully is far enough I won’t see any of the effects of her skill.

I can’t help but bite my lip as I position myself on the ground, making sure there’s no weight on my left leg, and get ready to start using my skill again. I really don’t want to have to face the pain from earlier, but everything I said to Styx is true. Any skill could be a huge boon if we face another monster, and to not test it now would simply be irresponsible.

I duck my head, remembering that I kept my own skill a secret for so long.

The time passes as if in molasses. I worry that any second my leg will go back to how it was, but after a few minutes of nothing happening I realize I’m probably fine. A few minutes after that, I am bored and wondering what possibly could be taking them so long.

How did I ever survive by myself for those first few days without dying of boredom?

I distract myself by analyzing the Numbers on my arm, considering how to allocate.

S: 88

D: 52

W: 51

I: 39

C: 51

176

The troll monster gave me a huge increase to my free Number, more than I've ever had before. How long should I wait to allocate these after I get home? Growth of the Numbers after getting to age twenty-five typically slows down considerably, but I can't imagine having enough self control to save the Numbers for almost a decade.

And how should I eventually spend the Numbers? All to one Number, or split among all the Numbers? I mull over the possibilities.

Eventually, I see Pallas walking towards me, and I stand up to meet him halfway. He glances at my leg as if to confirm I’m fine, and then nods. We walk in silence back over to join the others.

“What did you find?” I ask when we finally meet up with the rest.

“It’s interesting,” Styx begins. “I honestly don’t feel very different when I’m using it, aside from a slight strain. But it’s really easy to use -- like I’ve always known how. Even though it’s completely different from anything I’ve ever known before. Kinda...creepy, honestly.”

“Yeah, but what does it do?” I question. Everything she’s mentioned so far I already know.

“Ah, yeah,” she replies, blushing, before she continues. “At first, nothing. At least not that I could tell. But once Melete started to sing -- it has no effect on me anymore! But it doesn’t keep it from still hurting Pallas.”

I rub my chin, considering. That makes sense, based on what we’ve seen of skills so far. “So basically just a weaker version of what the troll monster was doing? That only affects yourself?” Styx nods in reply.

“How did you get the skill though?” Pallas asks. “I’ve killed, or helped kill, all the monsters so far. Why haven’t I gotten one?” Strangely, Pallas looks almost relieved at this last statement.

We sit around staring at one another in silence for a few seconds. I have no idea why.

“...maybe it has to do with who actually kills it?” Styx finally replies. For some reason, the rest of them are looking at me, and I simply shrug in response.

Eventually, Melete chimes in with her opinion. “Beats me. Sucks to be you.”

I can’t help but agree.

S: 88

D: 52 (+13)

W: 51 (+3)

I: 39

C: 51

176 (+124)

Skills: Adjust:Self