Todd hobbles over to join the circle that forms up around the crystal. The shape of the leadership group has turned into a paired set of rings, one primary and a little oppositional offshoot. The group leaders and ranking cultivators form the core of the gathering, which Todd mentally classifies as divided into the solutions squad and jerkwad jamboree.

The discussion falls apart as Todd squeezes into an open position. Walter holds point at the joining link between the two circles, and he throws up his hands in frustration as the two groups seem to try to hold the same conversation, at the same time and through him. As the conversation momentarily breaks down, Todd greets a distracted Business Jenny on his left, and then grunts an uncomfortable hello to an unexpected Driver Larry on his right.

There are in fact a surprising number of new participants in the leadership circle, to the point of becoming unproductive. The wide ellipse is flush with both frightened low levels and pride-bruised mid levels, and they raise their voices as they speak over one another until they spiral off into a half-dozen side arguments.

“Yo, Drips,” Joe acknowledges. He jogs across the circle with his head ducked slightly down. “You okay? Your leg is looking,” he hesitates, “kinda the opposite of good.”

“Oh, no. No it’s fine. I’ve basically spend the last three days in some kind of base minimum level of pain, so this is no big… deal…” Todd squirms a little under Joe’s burgeoning concern, and laughs it off nervously. “It’ll be fine once I wizard yoga on it for a minute. Really.”

Joe hums a distrustful tone and narrows his eyes. “You gotta take care of yourself. Don’t overexert, it’s like the number one way to self destruct.”

While Todd tries to cook up a more persuasive argument, Jenny and Larry close on Joe from the sides.

“Hey y’all.” Joe reaches out and pats Larry and Jenny on the shoulder. “Glad to see you’re holding up. Hope you got more sleep than I did,” he grins.

“Have we figured out what we’re going to do about those bugs yet?” The woman asks.

“I can do it, I’ll come,” Larry offers.

Joe pads wardingly with his hands against inquest and offer. “We don’t know yet, and I don’t know about that. Larry, I know you’re keen to help but we’ve got a couple level eights now; Drew might even be nine.”

Larry mumbles.

“Are you at least at the seven count?” Joe asks gently, to which Larry doesn’t answer.

“I’m not sure that –” Todd speaks up once and goes unheard, so he tries again louder. “I don’t think the bug quest is what we’ve got to focus on, Joe.”

“Naw Drips.” Joe chuckles and crosses his arms to make an X. “I’m feelin’ the energy buddy, but you’re not coming. Sit your butt down and stop dying for a minute. It’s okay to let us handle this.”

“Joe, you’re not listening. I think we’re really not ready for tomorrow.” Looking for an example, Todd appeals to Jenny. “Jennifer, sorry to put you on the spot, but on a scale of one to ten, how ready are you to hike around on an alien monster planet? Ballpark number?”

Jenny takes a second to consider it. “Uhhh, if I had to guess I’d say I’m at a strong three? I have technically been camping. In a tent, and with trees – you know – adjacent.”

Todd raises his hands, bobs his shoulders and puffs out his cheeks. See, he motions.

Jenny admits to Joe, “I’m actually feeling more confident about fighting giant bugs than finding food, or not having a tent.”

“Ah, gotcha,” Joe ruffles his hair in exasperation. “You’re right. Damn it. Dude, how you think we’re gonna do this.”

“The food situation seems like it’s solvable,” Jenny suggests. “It’s just going to be a matter of making sure everybody’s got a meal token.”

Todd nods enthusiastically. “Yea. That’d be a good start. These are all solvable problems, and there are smart people here who can figure them out. But first somebody’s got to take charge. I was really hoping the Doc would do it –”

“Or Andrew,” Larry grumbles.

“Less… thinking Andrew, but sure.” Todd gives Larry the side-eye. “But now that Donnellson’s gone, we need someone to step up and take charge.”

“And you think it should be me?”

“Well you are tall,” Todd shrugs. “From the day we crawled down from a tree, from time immemorial. The measure of kingship is altitude.”

“Jeez Louise, Drips,” Joe laughs, “you’re such a cynic.”

Todd smiles and raps his knuckle on Joe’s shoulder. “Yea well, that’s why it can’t be me.”

Weaving his way to the center of the group, Joe raises his hands to clap over his head and calls out loudly. “Listen up, rock stars! I know we’re all edging on saving the world here, but we’ve gotta start thinking about tomorrow too. Our brainiacs are thinking it’s gonna be rough out there, and I don’t know about y’all but I trust their big ol’ noggins.”

He pivots on his heel and makes sure that the side arguments die down a little.

“I’m gonna start calling out names. If you’re dead set on a bug hunt, or you don’t like the job I’m giving ya, this is your chance to say so. But let’s get this sorted now and save the hassle later.” Joe waves off Marketing Mike. “Questions’re fine but after. Doctor C!”

Abhigjna steps forward.

“We got a lot of folks who need to tighten up that cultivation base. Lot of people are still soft in the magic department,” Joe explains. But it’s clear the doctor isn’t having it though.

“I keep telling you people. I am a medical professional. I am not qualified to be teaching magic, I’m not even a good teacher,” she complains.

“Don’t sell yourself short, Doc. We all know you’re killing it in the Cultivation department. But if you’re worried, that’s why Drips here is gonna help you.” Joe spins again and points out Abigail Fletcher. “And Brainigail, you too.”

Doctor Chowdhury accedes to Todd’s and Abigail’s help and steps back reluctantly.

“J-Business, I need you and Naya on logistics I think.” Joe looks to Todd for affirmation. “I know we’re running low on meds, and we need a handle on the food situation.”

Nayira crosses over to Jen and offers a hearty handshake which surprises the other woman. “Well, look who voted his self goddamn king of Wonderland,” she chortles. “Aye aye, sir captain! We on it.”

“Yea? You find a crown ‘round here you let me know,” Joe smirks, parting the divide between the two groups and passing Walter with a touch on the back. “Drew-drew wrecking-crew, we need’ja boss. You wanna round up some volunteers and mulch those bugs for us?”

A rising tide of order and enthusiasm follows Joe as he crosses over into the rival camp and in that moment Todd sees a real chance at reconciliation.

“You seem to have this under control,” Drew icily responds. “Let’s see you deal with it.”

Todd reminds himself of an important life lesson. The worst place to keep your hopes is up.

But luckily Drew’s little band of admirers have less patience for being petty. Walter and Teo pull him aside to plead with him to reconsider, and in that time Officer Bernice steps forward.

The officer awkwardly cradles the handle of a sword at hip level, but instead of a blade the sword sprouts like the vane of a feather. The plume is a mottled white and brown, and it spans long enough to rest over her shoulder and just past the crown of her head. Carefully, she cranes her head away from the edges of the feather’s barbs as if she fears being cut.

“Andrew, what is your issue?” She exclaims. Walter gestures an agonized apology before turning back to his argument with Drew, so Bernice rolls her eyes. “Whatever. I’ll run the quest. Don’t worry, we’ve still got this.” She carefully points a thumbs up signal with her free hand and steps into a more vacant space.

Joe puffs out a breath in relief. “Awesome. Okay, the rest of this is gonna be rough and dirty. Everybody level seven and over, raise your hand.” He pauses as ten hands go up. “Oh nice. Okay, level six and over.” A few voices echo Joe’s question across the larger crowd and after a minute, the count widens to nearly fifty. Joe cups his hands over his mouth and shouts. “Y’all are now officially team leads. Your job is to grab a group of… I dunno, five other people –”

Todd leans in towards Joe. “Seven might be closer. Ish.”

“Seven people level five and under! Form groups of eight! Folks gotta be ready for some wilderness, so y’all scout master now. For now, you’re helping Jennifer and Nayira. That’s number one priority, and in an hour we’re gonna regroup and figure out cultivation and combat training.”

Todd raises two fists and presses them together. Strong showing. Others across the small circle murmur their approval, or gesture that they have a question which can be delayed.

“Oh and I guess, some kind of wilderness survival?” Joe guesses as the thought strikes him. “But for now – Team leads! Form teams! Quest volunteers, form up on Officer Bernice.” He glances perplexed at her giant feather. “AKA Emperor Tickles. Everybody got it?”

Joe coughs.

“I’m gonna lose my voice,” he rasps before trying again. “Por favor, hold questions for like five seconds while we sort out some stuff!”

The next few minutes are chaotic, but directed. The level cutoff isn’t necessarily the best standard for organizing groups under, but a system that needs fixing is better than a perfect nothing. Joe stays to facilitate, but by this point Business Jenny and ER Nayira have recruited Soup Nina and the conversation steers to practical matters of supply.

Excusing himself, Todd wanders towards Officer Bernice and finds himself joined by Candra. “If that doofus gets elected President someday, I’m blaming you,” she reports.

Todd attentively monitors his gait as he walks to minimize his limp. “You going on the mission?” He asks.

“Nope, I’m just making sure you don’t.”

Todd scoffs as he raises a finger to get Bernice’s attention and squeezes past the eager group of volunteers. Most of them are poorly equipped or leveled to participate, and Todd can’t understand what they’re thinking. She recognizes him and frowns.

“You can’t come, Todd.”

“Why does everybody think… I was just gonna tell you. I think the quest is meant for three people. I dunno how many you’re taking, but the quest rewards are divisible by three and that makes me feel…”

Bernice considers it, and then yanks away from a man who’s gotten too close. She glances at the edge of her feather with brief alarm before turning back to Todd. “I guess that makes sense. So we should take four just in case. Is Joe coming?”

Todd glances inquiringly at Candra. “I guess not?”

“Sounds like his power sucks for cramped spaces,” Candra suggests. “You might want to keep that in mind.”

“Bah. Powers,” Bernice grins.

“Compared to…” Todd looks over her weapon again. “A turkey feather?”

“Whatcha gonna do, write on them… in big cursive…” Candra trails off. “Ugh, the tickle joke is the only one that works, isn’t it?”

Todd charitably drops a chuckle, then nudges his chin to point at the sword again. “Where’d you get it?”

“You’re laughing, but this thing is crazy. It’s called a [Roc Pinion] and it’s got a ‘doo’ of sharpness. This thing tore up a dummy yesterday, an iron one; almost won me the three strike.”

“Damn,” Candra reconsiders.

“I got it by redeeming my weapon token, you got one right? That’s actually something everybody here should consider doing. The weapon tokens need cosmic energy to activate, so you have to figure out how to channel it into an object. But there’s a trick past the first one. You can kind of cultivate the token while you’re touching it, and it’ll actually level up a little before you have to cash it in.” She rubs the tip of her nose and sniffs. “Aefore says the final item’s less random the more it gets a taste of your energy.”

Todd and Candra share a surprised look. Clearly overlooking the token had been a mistake. It had been the same thing with the nexus crystals. Everything here seems to have a use, a shortcut, or a hidden trick. Having delivered his message, and having a hyperbolic million things still to do, Todd wishes Bernice good luck.

“Alright,” Candra sighs, adjusting her trousers to compensate for the way her [Mercury Rod] is causing her trousers to droop. “Looks like you haven’t got a hard-on for suicide today. So –”

Todd’s eyes widen as he chokes out a cough.

Candra pats him gently on the shoulder. “Catch you later, yea?”