Rule 2

Learn Your History & Learn Their History

Statement: People don’t share anymore. They keep their secret lives tightly bound as though they might shatter if anyone found out the truth. Callisto, as an example, never once spoke of who she was before the change. A high school girl, going out of state to college come Fall. She had plans and I’d been a hindrance.

This is interesting to me. I wonder if it’s second nature to be closed off. Indeed, I’ve disguised who I’d become. If anyone knew my secret, they did not share. Callisto should have been able to establish I was Lance, because she knew Kent, my father. Yet, she did not say anything. Why?

On one side of the brier wall sat a half-forest half-park. Crossing the wall to the other side revealed a broken town landscape where looters had pillaged everything of value a dozen times over. There were boarded up windows, and car frames without doors, tires, or even padding on the seats. Most of those items, that weren’t transformed into alternate materials, had been picked over.

Couch stuffing became fuel for fire. Leather seats became outdoor chairs. Glass was melted down by two people on our compound and turned into new windows. Doing so proved pointless because mini-orcs would throw rocks through the windows a few days later.

Nearly every piece of flammable material a mile from the park had been stripped clean. Once they got desperate enough, the few people brave enough to act as scavengers would probably start dismantling the buildings. There’d been talk of waiting until we cleared city hall.

A lot of the other groups bought the story Mayor Kent sold them. He’d preached, repeatedly, that taking over downtown before anyone else would help take back the town. His plans to do so halted when he didn’t have enough power and ran into the immortal monster currently claiming the throne.

“Hawthorn!” Allegra’s sharp whisper broke the silence. “You’ve healed, right?”

“He’s not here.” Callisto sputtered. The cart shook as everyone’s weight shifted. “How long have you been sitting there?”

She must have noticed me. “Too long, and affirmative,” I answered the questions in the wrong order. That didn’t count as lying.

“Good. Last time, I swear he’d broken all your ribs,” Allegra whispered.

Admission: All my ribs had been broken. It hurt more than words could say. Even trying to write here about how badly having my chest caved in felt, would be a joke. So, I’ll say I needed to crawl into a dark hole and heal for three days, before I could even dare to make it back to the park house.

There were downsides to fighting monsters. When they saw me, it often resulted in pain. Being sneaky only worked until I attacked. Leon said I functioned like a rogue in video games. Sneaking around didn’t get an enemy’s attention, but if they saw me attacking their minds would wake up.

I found it odd, since I didn’t feel the slightest bit sneaky. He implied I turned kind of hazy until he couldn’t focus on me without working hard. Callisto found it easier. Allegra used her parchments instead. She drew pictures of the current scene, including my hidden location.

“We’re here,” Callisto said.

The ride hadn’t taken too long. Most of the nearby roads were clear save for a few roadblocks designed to obscure the way to the park. Those had been set up in advance of my arrival. The piles of cars weighed more than I could move myself and I hadn’t met anyone in the park strong enough to flip them over.

It might have been done by someone who left or died. A super strong human could be walking around out there. These possibilities remained unanswered so far.

“Where’s beer?” Arson said. “I haven’t had a good beer in four months. Lord knows I’m thirsty.”

“Amen,” Leon said.

Arson hummed in agreement and nodded. His eyes were heavy lidded and a dreamy smile crossed his face. I knew where to find liquor but didn’t feel like sharing. Hiding items from the constantly scavenging mini-orcs proved difficult and keeping items inside the park fortress took real work. Few places were safe. Most were behind decoy items like trash, broken picture frames and furniture, or in attics.

I’d been getting better at finding treasures, but not good enough.

“You all wanted this place right. The dungeon?” Arson asked.

“Yes.” Callisto exaggerated her response with a nod.

Arson rolled his eyes. “Well, I’ll be here another few hours. After that, I’ll assume you’re dead.” He got down from the cart and checked over the horse.

I couldn’t figure out what sort of creature the horse had become. She didn’t look like a normal horse. She was too tall to be a donkey. Arson cared for her and the cart more than he’d ever shown concern for the rest of us.

Callisto pulled up two medium-sized blades. They weighed more than she did, which I knew first hand because Callisto and I had spent many nights together. Their size and mass didn’t stop Callisto from treating them like stage props or wielding them with insane speed during battle. If Leon was our tank, and I somehow had become a rogue, then Callisto served as our battle plan maker, and sword wielding murder machine.

“Come on, we’re headed down the back alley. It should bring us to the city hall,” she said. Her black hair bounced as she shook her head and sniffed the foggy air. “This place still has the side effect of muffling sound, right?”

“Yeah. But I hates it. Its got rats.” Allegra shuddered. She drew her robes tighter and redid two belts to keep it secure. She grabbed a satchel full of papers out of the back. Allegra took the role of healer, and used her paper powers to track buffs and other intangibles.

I didn’t entirely understand her skill. The words that appeared were in gibberish, but Allegra could understand the ones generated by her papers. She might be able to understand other words from books, which would be useful, but I hadn’t inquired about that yet.

As with my father, I preferred to learn without needing to ask. It helped ensure she wouldn’t ask for favors, or money, or anything else in exchange for a simple piece of knowledge. Being in someone’s debt would cause conflicts of loyalty beyond my promise to Callisto and the need to keep Stella safe.

“Are you paying attention, Thorn?” Callisto asked.

“No.”

She rolled her eyes. I smirked at being able to make her exasperated. She rolled her eyes harder and groaned. “Come here. You need to know the key points.”

Callisto motioned me over to an unrolled paper Allegra held. It was a crude pencil drawing of our entire area. One side was grayed out and Xs were everywhere. That indicated downtown and the region the ogres had walled off.

Some markers were noted as fall back points. Those were for the other three. Arson would escape with the smoke driving away monsters. I probably wouldn’t be seen by anything. Leon and Allegra needed the escape route. Callisto could probably preform her swift blur of movement and get to safety.

We were headed into a long alleyway that went underground, then aboveground, and apparently across rooftops. I felt conflicted over how this might be a dungeon, but these places defied logic.

“We’ll come out here. This promenade, right inside the entrance, should be a safe zone. If it’s like every other dungeon we’ve done, even the ogres won’t be able to get inside.”

“Unless they blow up the walls,” I said, feeling strangely cheery.

Callisto paused and nodded. “If we clear every monster between these two points, then we’ll have an easy escape route. It should take an hour, more if we’re focused on sneaking.”

The idea that Leon and his clinking armor could be quiet made me giggle. The three of them glared at me. I swallowed and reined in my maniacal thoughts. My eyes wandered again to the map.

Recap: Each power I gain seems to have side effects. Or maybe it’s simply being in a crazy world. I’ll admit this here but never out loud (unless someone asks)—but I’ve probably suffered a psychotic break. It is hard to self-diagnose this affliction.

Admission: This is a frightening thought. What if I’m merely in a padded cell somewhere playing out a delusional fantasy? Worse still, what if this is reality and I’ve been stabbing real people while smiling. This last bit must be impossible. Surely the police would have shot me by now.

I’d been down in this part of town both before and after the change, multiple times. A long line of storefronts used to be here that were locally owned. A few years ago they redid the sidewalks and street signs to make the area more welcoming. This dungeon Callisto wanted us to go to, had been one of the unmodified streets. Time had worn it down, and homeless people used to roam the area.

“What’s the boss?” I asked our would-be-leader.

“There’s three, or four depending on what shows up. We could get a set of giant rats that leech health, an alley cat, or the beggar,” Callisto answered.

“The beggar makes the toy aisle look friendly. And he always does something new.” Allegra frowned and fingered her bag of scrolls.

“The toys are just cleaner. The meat aisle and him.” Leon shuddered. “He’s terrible, and has this soapbox he beats me with. Screaming about the end of times and how God is judging us all. God left. All who remains is our lord and savior, Mayor Kent.” Leon’s nod caused the visor to fall shut. He propped it back up and banged his sledgehammer onto the ground.

Callisto frowned and Allegra shrugged.

Leon cast his eyes down. When he finally looked up, he stared at the alleyway across the street. “Let’s go.”

Leon had a riot shield that glowed around its edges. The sledgehammer was far less impressive. I glanced at my own summoned dagger and the book on my side. In the last month, I hadn’t learned one new spell or ability. This bothered me.

“Come on, Hawthorn. These always go faster with you.” Allegra smiled.

I found the two women strange. Allegra had a direct kindness to her manner that Callisto didn’t. Callisto cared more about the group as a whole. Their actions were in line but their attitudes were not. These three companions were a puzzle, and solving their attitudes kept me busy.

It was that or go mad.

Post Note: To be more accurate, it was study my companions lives and see how much I could glean without asking, or spend time gazing inward and realize I’d gone mad. This is like asking if it’s better to go forward or stop and break down.

Leon took the front. His shield faced ahead of us. His shoulders tight and high. I found the fact that he could hold that shield up for hours to be impressive. Strength would have been a useful gift. I wondered if there were monsters I could kill for an ability that gave me muscles.

Callisto stayed next to Allegra. Of the three of us, she had been the weakest. Though I’d also seen her use pieces of paper like disposable armor.

“I’ll be scouting ahead,” I said.

Allegra held out a piece of paper and chalk. The chalk lit up on her maps. I’d use that to mark monster locations because her abilities would be stretched thin and Leon might not be paying attention.

The others probably responded. Their words weren’t worth listening to. I had the map from Allegra in my head and could cover ground far easier than they did. I checked a nook and found strange green rats sitting on a pile of trash. They dug through it.

They would be easy enough to kill. I marked the wall near them with two long lines then moved on.

Five rats were bunched together. A side alley wove around the back of an old movie theater that housed black birds picking at trash. They would be harder to kill. Each one got marked. Scouting ahead like this kept me busy and made it easier to handle being in a group. My first few adventures with the others hadn’t gone as smooth and I’d come close to knifing my companions.

The spell book hung at my side using drawstrings stolen from sweatpants. On the first page, between thick mirror surface pages, was my explosive spell. I stuck my fingers in and felt tingling energy pool on the tips. As always, with the rune’s activation I felt a strange narrowing of focus. The world became my arm. It pulled as the energy left me.

Post Note: If I had to equate it to a modern feeling, I would say it’s like rolling a latex glove off my hand. Only at high speeds, and it’s burning.

Crows were too hard to kill and weaker than the rodents. Down went the rune, a dozen feet away from the rats. Lines etched between five glowing points that became deeper holes. I ran my fingers over the edge of the pattern and felt the freshly indented ground. It flashed as the spell finished forming. Nearby I chalked a jagged circle that my group recognized as a bomb symbol.

There had been a few minor improvements to my existing skills. The black spell that let me summon items made of starlight could be used on multiple objects. Two, to be precise. It let me summon my knife to lay into people, and also a fine netting I’d found in a sporting store’s fishing section.

We would need it for the crows.

I made it back to the group as Callisto’s blade dug into a rat from the first, smaller group. It squeezed and hissed out a cloud of green. My blade sank into a second one’s eyeball. My starlight knife withdrew from the creature and I used my free arm to lock its mouth shut, forcing the death rattle of gas to stay inside.

It hadn’t even seen me coming. Callisto barely batted an eyelash. We’d been through this before.

“What have we got?”

“Five, then birds. I marked them. Once the ravens are clear, I’ll scout again.”

“Still having trouble with birds?” she asked.

I nodded.

Birds had an easier time seeing through my sneak abilities. While I understood, the reason did not make sense to me. Leon had told me that game logic meant birds and dogs would both be used as scouts, so they could see through stealth. This sounded like babble by a man trying to make sense of the world through his video game tainted logic.

Before the five rats, Leon walked to the front. Callisto stood to the side. Allegra held a rock to draw the beasts in. I readied my blade and watched Callisto’s rear in wiggle in the chain mail, then thought entirely unwholesome thoughts that fit right in with a seedy back alley.

Allegra threw the rock. It bounced near the rats. They squeaked in unison running straight for her. She backed up. Raging rodents veered over my explosive rune and went boom. One vanished in a puff of green. The others staggered until Leon’s shield flashed with a white and yellow mixture that failed to be gold.

Three remaining critters slammed into Leon’s shield. They were too idiotic to go around or his ability made them dumber. Sometimes his abilities baffled me with how well they worked and shouldn’t have.

Callisto swung her blades at one of the distracted rats. I launched an attack at another. In seconds the boring fight ended with one and half exploded rats, and three and a half remaining, but certainly dead critters.

The bodies collapsed into small glowing orbs. They would sort themselves accordingly based on contribution. So far the rankings were me, Callisto, Leon, then Allegra. This was fairly standard. Honestly, I’d stopped keeping track of my points because there was little to spend them on.

Reminder: Each of us has a ‘debt’ card. These cards listed full names, a point value, and titles. Mine included [Runed Rogue], which seems to be my class. At one point the card had temporarily included one for killing a hydra. The Hydra respawned last week, so the title went away.

Points are received by killing monsters. They can be spent, so far, at vending machines or exchanged with certain beings for favors of information. This makes as much sense as anything else, and sadly lends credence to Leon’s claim of this being a game world.

Callisto checked her blades and nodded to herself. I studied her rear and nodded as well.

The hardest part about Hawthorn wasn’t the killing or working with others. It wasn’t dealing with my supposed father. The hardest part is that sex, especially around women, always wormed its way into my thoughts.

But I couldn’t stop being Hawthorn. Then I’d have one less secret, and that mattered.