Statement: At this point, I’d encountered five different humans who also survived ‘The Event.’ Each of them were changed and different. Some were obvious, such as the giant’s laziness or his wife’s frantic and overclocked libido. The others were harder to pin down. Leon’s reluctance to be in his current role, Allegra’s pencil markings and layers of clothing. These things weren’t normal behavior—their changes were more subtle.

There was a price for every power. Does that price make us more primal, that is to say; more in touch with who we are at the core? Is it this world that does this? Is it simply what happens to humans when they’re tossed into new situations? I had never expected this sort of situation to be a ‘quiz’ in my life, and feel like I spent most of high school studying for the wrong test.

People shouted. I couldn’t distinguish one voice from the other. Powder was everywhere and I heard a low rumble. Loud words were broken up by even louder laughter.

Confession: I lost time here. It was only a few seconds, but by the time I’d come to, the situation had changed radically. A tougher man should have stayed coherent. Sadly, durability is not in my gifts.

The members of my temporary group were talking but I couldn’t separate who said what.

“The raiders!”

“Where’s Kent’s son?”

“We have to hide.”

“Not without Thorn. He’s the whole point of coming this far.”

“Speak for yourself. I knew we needed the potions.”

They had to be close by. Their tone aggravated me. They barely even used my name. Kent’s son, that’s all I was to them. They were like mindless sheep following a man’s orders.

“I don’t know!” one of the women shouted. A second explosion rocked the wall behind me. Rubble went everywhere. There was a vending machine standing nearby.

It might have been a trick but the vending machine only moved when I blinked. My eyes weren’t staying open long enough to find out. Dust kept stinging me. Both arms burned. There was this tingle, a nagging one from my pinky toe which overpowered the real pain. It made me need to pee.

Something in my neck popped. Words distorted. Laughter, loud and deranged sounding came from multiple sources.

“Find him, and we have to pull back!” Callisto said.

It sounded like they were right next to me, but my neck couldn’t move. I was unable to raise a finger or lift my chest. Each attempt caused me to wheeze.

“We can’t stay. We have to get to a safe house.” Allegra was much harder to pick out. Their words rang at longer angles, which made no sense.

“Is that him?” Leon whispered. There was a scuffle and the sound of hushed shouting. Callisto and Leon argued while Allegra stepped closer. I could see them moving from narrow holes between the barrels.

I knew exactly where I was. My body was covered by an empty container that used to house propane. Wooden barrels were scattered all over me.

The vending machine was a silent killer. While the bandits screamed and fired off abilities, it moved between them. People’s parts simply disappeared.

“Nix! Do your thing, woman,” a voice bellowed. “Otherwise you’re going back to the whore house with your sister!”

The man’s voice alone made me feel violated. Skin around my neck would have crawled away if it were able to. Perhaps it did and I simply couldn’t tell anymore. The thick dust lining my throat didn’t help, nor the tirade of filthy thoughts. This form made it hard to stay sane.

I groaned while wiggling an arm. The pressure lightened and I shifted my sight to one side. Fingers grabbed my arm and pulled. I didn’t have enough breath to scream. Allegra stopped then knelt in front of me. Her robe was dirtier than ever. I managed to turn my head. There was a small hole in one of the walls.

“Thorn, can you escape?” she asked. The others waved hands through the wall.

I shook my head. There were too many objects. My body felt broken. I knew what that felt like. They’d have to carry me out and that was impossible. Dragging me would only increase the damage, and cause me to bleed more.

“Okay. Keep quiet. The raiders might miss you. Stay safe. We’ll double back once it’s clear.”

The barrel shifted off my chest a little, enough for me to breathe. My chest heaved to get air but dust in my throat made it difficult.

“We’ll be close. Leon’s barely conscious. Callisto, she wouldn’t let ’em die or risk a potion to save you,” Allegra said. “The raiders may find you. They may take you.” There was a crunching sound. The raiders still fought an evil vending machine. I felt like that one move had bought us time, but I didn’t know how tough those things were compared to powered people with rocket launchers.

“Stay alive,” she whispered.

My eyelids fluttered. There was only one question to ask a time like this. I smiled and felt my ears lift a good inch. Pain hit and I spit up something. My arm worked a little now that she’d removed one of the heavy barrels. “Do they give orbs?”

She tilted her head down at me. I struggled to think of something normal, like survival. Instead those damn robes were burned through and she wore less than before. She had a body like an hourglass. My mouth watered.

“Stay alive. You have to do that.”

I wondered how many explosive spells it might take.

She bit her lip and ran for the hole in the wall. The women whispered to each other but the raiders were louder. There was a crash followed by a keening whine that somehow made me think of a dying puppy and a tire losing air.

“Nix! You used too much and broke the machine. Now the boys can’t tie it down. We’re going to have to find another one.” The invasive deep rumble of the leader only knew how to speak loudly. The others laughed.

Bright lights poured in through the broken windows. I jerked and attempted to hide in the pile. Hopefully whatever ability I had which let mini-orcs and other monsters ignore me would kick in.

“Look at this place, there’s shit here. Why waste those babies on the dungeon?” a high pitched person said.

“Because someone cleared it,” the deep voice responded. “If we just had a fucking person with a map. But no, no that bitch Allegra went and joined Kent’s cowards.”

Long shadows stretched into the building. People swept to the right and combed over the aisle. They showed no fear or hesitation. They all wore the same mishmash of clothes. It was like no one here had a proper wardrobe.

“Toy! Amp them lights. Sweep every wall for leftover prizes. I want to be out of here in three minutes.”

Those bright lights intensified. One hit the edge of my entrapping cover. It was strange, because I’d been under the impression that vehicles simply didn’t work. It didn’t matter, I was buried under supplies against one wall. Near me was the hole the others had vanished through.

These people were probably ruthless when it came to survival. I assumed they came here to pick on easy victims, rob them—us—and maybe even get access to the vending machine. They might have intended to make purchases as well, but firing rockets at us felt more like a preemptive strike.

I suddenly wanted a potion. The single one I’d had poured one me worked wonders. If I was naturally healing and used a potion too, that might be even better.

The raiders whooped. Their leader, or the loudest, held up a tube that amplified his voice. He repeatedly barked a noise that caused my back to shiver.

The barrels on me shifted. Something snapped. Sound dimmed and my head swam. That one crunch sent me reeling back in time to the car accident. I shuddered and a struggled not to cry out. I’d felt this way before. My leg was definitely broken.

I assumed sex would help distract me. The idea rolled around a few times before I realized this alternate form needed to go. Raiders shuffled through everywhere and I was making too much noise. In a spy thriller, this would have been close to deactivating a cell phone ringer. It would be difficult to hide from raiders if the slightest rub against my crotch kept me moaning for all the wrong reasons.

My fingers functioned more than the joint. The arm didn’t move right but I needed to deactivate this spell somehow. I pulled my hand into position and found the marking which bound my new form to me. Recent holes in my clothing made it harder to move.

Post Note: It was the pressure. I was broken all over again and still fighting back a curse. Recall that I mentioned how the other woman—whose name I never learned—could only talk about sex even while dying.

The spell peeled away and faded into nothing. My body shivered in release. Everything became duller than it had been. The pain, lights, and our supermarket battlefield. I gulped again and managed to swallow a lump of dust that sent me into a coughing fit. I tried to be quiet. The effort was unsuccessful.

Post Note: I later learned that there were people with oracular abilities—that is to say they could “see” the future. This seems silly to me, because I felt, at times like this, that anyone could “see” me getting caught.

“Well, what do we have here?” a man said. I looked up to see an entirely too excited man staring down at me. His face was bloodied and teeth were missing. When he grinned, a waft of foul air escaped.

Pressure pushed down on my other leg. I couldn’t contain my cries anymore.

“Found a rat!”

I felt stupid for being compared to a rat. He could have used a less stereotypical slur. A cockroach might have been more fitting. My arm and legs felt better already. Allegra had been right, I was healing. Deactivating the spell helped somehow.

Two other figures charged into view. A set of rough hands pulled at the fallen supplies boxing me in. People shouted about what they found but nothing sounded impressive. They were likely looking for treasures, in the same manner I’d raided that giant’s house. This was my reprisal for being cutthroat.

I didn’t fully understand what was happening when people pulled me out of the mess. They grabbed parts of my body which only registered pain. I reached for pills but came up empty. My bag of stuff hadn’t made it with me.

The sudden change my made head swim and eyelids fluttered. I shook. My heartbeat thudded weakly. The people who had been clear were now blurry. I could feel my toe and it hurt, tingled, went numb, and repeated the cycle.

They pulled me out of the store while asking questions. I struggled to hear any of them and failed. It was as though my body was trying to shut down but these people wouldn’t let me. I faded in and out.

I drifted to when they dumped me onto the truck bed. There was no rumble of an engine. The back had been gutted and the only thing nice was a sprayed out bedding. It felt disturbingly normal.

“It’s here!”

I groaned. Apparently that was funny because two of the people in the back laughed. Another kicked my head. The nasty voice that made me feel slime covered barked orders.

A foot slammed into my head again. I moved an arm and discovered my limbs responded easier. A bunch of people were around with all sorts of clothing. One man had black face paint under his eyes like a football player. Then the truck’s lights went off and we were silently cruising down the street, far beyond the recommended speed limit. It felt like a nightmare.

“Down, Rogers! Go!” They were being too loud. The monsters would hear us. Even a mini-orc would be able to figure out where we were, and they were stupid.

“It’s still on us.”

“Take Clements and Fifth, we’ve still got the traps there, right?” The truck jerked left. My body slammed into the side and a muffled groan escaped.

“Busted two days ago,” a man whispered.

“Shit.”

“Nix, make yourself useful.” He gestured to the creature chasing us.

I reached for the book but my arm felt numb. It was impossible to tell if I’d touched the page for my explosive rune. A constant wall of new sensations assaulted me. I felt hair regrowing. It itched, tingled, and made me shiver.

“I’m out,” a woman’s voice said. “Used both strikes on the vending machine.”

“Which still died.”

“Your fault,” Nix responded. A hollow absence to her voice might have been a result of my screwed up situation. She’d only spoken a few sentence and seemed loath to speak more.

There was a crack of noise. A face hit the floor near mine. For a second I stared into dead eyes. She hardly noticed my presence. Thin strands of sherbet dyed hair hung over her face. An obscenely muscled arm yanked her back up.

“Find more energy, and hit it, before it eats us all,” the slimy-voiced man said.

I groaned and managed to turn my neck. Something large and slobbering was behind us. Its teeth gnashed and the people in our car jostled each other around. They were strangely resolute, as if they’d done this a dozen times before.

The man who sounded like a pig was actually anything but. His form was huge and mostly muscle. He wore a baseball helmet along with sunglasses, at night. It made about as much sense as the rest of his people, who wore football helmets with sticks all over their sides.

Others were in the front cab. At least five people had crammed into the seats. I couldn’t tell how they drove the vehicle but it probably wasn’t motorized. No sounds of an engine idling or pistons turning. It had to be magical in nature, which meant it followed rules I barely started to understand.

“Hey, new guy’s moving!”

I hated the man for tattling on me. Someone also deserved hate for unleashing rockets into the storefront after we’d defeated the place. There were at least two explosions, maybe more, that had bombed the area around us.

Post Note: This is a good a place as any to stick this note in. I’m still unsure exactly what destroying a ‘dungeon’ location does. Somehow they’re tied to monsters spawning in the area, but what happens if the dungeon is killed? Are monsters spawning uncontrollably, or do they stop all together? Does it simply change locations?

Their leader didn’t care about me. He turned in my direction briefly and dismissed me. “So?”

His voice felt vile.

“He’s going for something. It’s all fuzzy though. Shit.” One of the men poked me. Another stomped on my arm. I grunted in fresh pain that quickly turned off.

“What are you after?”

I wiggled my fingers but couldn’t tell if they worked. They had no sensations of pain. My body had turned off every single nerve but still functioned. It helped, because above all, I didn’t want to be in lingering pain like the car accident had left me.

As for my surroundings; the truck bed was crowded, even with some standing. My eyesight was fuzzy but I finally got my first sight of the monster chasing us. It had huge teeth, extra eyes, and three heads. I’d swear it was a multi-headed dragon or similar. I’d never been one for the fantasy world, keeping to movies with friends, so its exact name escaped me.

Its mouth was large. Hundreds of teeth in multiple rows. The creature moved fast, but we were going quicker.

Being upright caused dizziness. I swooned while staring at the raider’s leader. His large gaping mouth flattened at me. The stubble and tanned skin made for an extra gruff face. I couldn't figure out why he disturbed me so much.

“You got something?” he asked.

“I’ll stop it,” I muttered.

“You think you can stop it?”

I nodded.

“Well ain’t that a kick. Go for it, freshman, let’s see what you got,” the man said. He slapped me on the back and my feet staggered. Two large men held me up. We swayed as the truck rounded another corner.

I opened my eyes and wondered how anyone could go through a city at such high speeds. No other cars were on the road and this high pace would be exhilarating if my brain could focus enough.

The man who made me feel gross smiled. He adjusted a ball cap and twisted it backward. He pointed at the creature charging wildly after us. “Aim carefully. Anything funny and you’ll get stabbed.”

“Uh huh,” the person behind me said. He probably smiled. I wanted to feel my fingers. They came to life and screamed in pain. I found myself yelling and felt a blade in my back.

My fingers crawled into the book’s pages and pooled red energy onto the tips. My hand came up and fingers curled. A bolt behind my eye made me lose focus and I grunted. It hurt, despite the apparent numbness of my body.

My fingers weren’t moving right. I ignored the other’s words regarding my stupidity. The monster got closer but my eyes were unable to focus. It was as if he barely existed. It was yet another creature in this world trying to kill me. The only difference was the size and three heads. I expected that there’d be another triple-headed monster around the corner.

Maybe I was beyond caring. I managed to form the spell and simply flung it behind us. There was no effort to aim or attach it to something like a tennis ball. It latched onto the dragon’s tooth. Then the world brightened as a plume of fire, bigger than I’d ever seen before, curled the head back like a banana peeling. The running multi-headed creature fell, biting at its own head and crying out loudly.

I’d done it. The creature reeled back. Gnashing sounds faded. I barely heard it.

Only one head had eaten the rune marked explosive. My eyes closed and I struggled to retain consciousness. My body was healing, sure, but the tax was eating away all my other energy. I couldn’t help but wonder if that creature would give an ability when killed. Part of me feared it would cause extra heads to grow.

“Oh! All right, boys, tie up our guest,” the leader said.

The sleepiness drifted away for only a moment. I panicked and struggled for the truck’s edge. A gaggle of hands pulled me back. They bound me. The sound of zipping was followed by pressure on my arms.

“Turn him around,” the biggest man said. My body spun away from the sight of a fleeing monster. It made me upset not to be able to toss another dozen explosives into its craw.

Our truck violently rounded another corner.

The big man pressed a finger into my chest. It hurt. He said, “Only one boy I know with that stupid chin and an arm like that. Tell me it ain’t you, Little Dick? You made it?”

I held still. That nickname could go to hades.

“Oh come on, we’re the walking damned, boy. There’s no being shy after rapture. Not with old pals like us. Tell me you know who I am, boy! Tell me.” His eyes were wide and white. He smiled and it made my body chill I was luckily California nights were warm.

I did know him. His excited grin had been warped by madness. That baseball cap and tall stature were familiar. The excessive muscle mass was new. But only one man I knew had that voice; one that had disturbed me even as a little boy.

“Coach Madison,” I muttered.

“That’s right, Little Dick. Get it? Because you’re Richard’s brother. Lance Underwood made it to the apocalypse. Now ain’t that a kick in the head.” He smiled. I swallowed as a foul wind blew over me.

It was probably best that my arms couldn’t move right. I said nothing and focused on blinking. Honestly, even that was difficult. The hour long crawl through the supermarket dungeon, being banged around by a boss, explosions, and kicked in the head; all left me weak.

“You know this kid?” another man asked. He was old too. Most people in this crew were. They reminded me of a military movie with completely mismatched gear. We were in a messed up sort of APC with a dozen jarheads. Two were women, we had no room for anything. And my brother’s old high school baseball coach was in charge. That felt disturbingly weird.

“We’re near the forest. Stuff it,” Coach Madison said.

Everyone immediately went quiet. The man driving ground out his cigar and slowed down. The car rolled on in silence. The only sounds were heavy breathing and rough pavement beneath the truck’s tires.

I felt more confused than ever but my other purpose had been achieved. My right hand glowed with the black lights and no one showed any signs of noticing. We traveled on to destinations unknown, and I prepared myself to learn what this black spell did.