Kantala had brought Rygor back to bunker to be treated. His blood covered her armor and she had smeared some of it through her hair. She carefully laid him down in one of the empty pods. Looking at their real bodies lying next to him, Linca wondered how they all might have the same bloody pools beneath them should they fail in their mission to defend the bunker.

Linca looked at her wounded friend and the one who had saved him with sympathy. Rygor wasn’t dead yet so it was time for her magic to shine. Calming herself for the task at hand she pulled out the scepter and touched it to his still chest. His chest continued to rise and fall as she slowly pulled the healing magic out of the magical device and into their wounded comrade. You had to be careful healing the nearly mortally wounded like this. When they were at or near zero health a large blast of healing could actually wound them sending them to their death. Linca let out a breath as she saw his health bar slowly rise out of the danger zone.

She released more of the magical pressure within her and her hands began to glow pure white. Kantala stayed there the entire time watching her and she could tell that her friend’s concern for Rygor went deeper than just guildmates. Perhaps they were close friends in real life or even lovers. She sensed his health bar reaching full and reduced the healing power to just a trickle before ceasing it all together.

Linca knew she needed to conserve as much mana as possible and not let anything bleed off. Deathberry and Seona were still outside the cave keeping Drak’s armies from destroying their real bodies. She needed to get back to the fight soon before their meager forces were overwhelmed. However, her entire soul seemed tired. She had used a lot of magic on the field already today and then healed Rygor. However, looking at their bodies in the pods again she knew that the fighting couldn’t end yet. Even if they were overtaken she would not fail her friends and would die with them on the battlefield, having given every ounce of her she had.

She looked down at Rygor. He still wasn’t awake. “Why hasn’t he returned?” Kantala’s question echoed the same one inside her head.

“His soul probably took some shock. I’ve never seen it before in an MMO; however, ARO is more realistic than most. He may need some time to recover,” Linca explained, hoping that she wasn’t misleading her friend. Secretly, Linca was less sure. Healing ought to bring Rygor back immediately. It had even worked on NPCs. “I’ve never had to bring someone back who’s been this close to death, but I think he will return to us if we give it time.”

Kantala nodded, accepting her words as a healer. It was one of the burdens of healing, Linca realized. While it was fantastic to be able to save your friends with a wave of your hands, the truth was it was much more difficult than that. It took a lot out of her to always be the savior. However, the worst was the blind faith that your friends built up over time – like you could bring them back from anything, even death. While it was true she did have the power to resurrect avatars, healing the mind was something outside her control. Silently, Linca prayed that Rygor’s soul was not wounded beyond his own body’s ability to repair it. While his real body wouldn’t die of course, being separated from your Gear this way could have a tremendously negative affect on psyche based on her discussions with Seona, who had originally been brought on by Mr. Tiel to ensure the Misfits’ mental health while in game.

A text message interrupted her chain of thought:

***You’ve Entered Raid Chat***

Deathberry: If Rygor is healed, I could really use both of you out here right now.

Kantala: We’re on our way.

The two of them left Rygor’s sleeping body and rushed to the cave exit. Outside the war raged on. One of the other Survivors was manning the gundam and it looked like between it, the dwarves, and Seona’s elementals, the raid had a pretty good handle on things. The undead were being pushed back, finally.

“Thanks for returning so quickly,” Deathberry said. The smile on his face probably meant trouble, Linca thought. Their strategist had come up with a plan. “I need your help pushing the remaining forces far enough away from the cave that they can’t easily see it.” That would take a lot of doing considering how flat the Outback was. They might need a mile or so and right now it looked like they’d pushed the army back perhaps a few hundred feet at most. See the concerned look on both of their faces, Deathberry continued explaining, “We don’t need to push them back as far as you think. It was maybe another hundred yards or so. I’ve got a spell I’ve been modifying and the game plan is to hide the cave with it.”

Linca nodded and saw Kantala’s face relax a bit. She’d been holding a lot in trying to save Rygor and now with her friends back in the fray it seemed like they could possibly win this thing – or at a minimum get a temporary reprieve. “Sounds good,” Linca responded.

With that they pushed towards the undead army. Most of the skeletal warriors had been cleared. Their brittle bones made them easy prey to Seona’s elementals who were masters at bludgeoning things to death. The gundam was keeping the fat zombies occupied so it was down to the two of them to clear out the smaller mass of lesser skeletons and zombies.

Running ahead Kantala blasted the first zombie in front of them with her powerful bow. As an engineer she’d been able to work with Deathberry to devise a new compound weapon that fired explosive arrows. Fire and zombies definitely didn’t mix well. She turned back to Linca and shouted, “That’s one down. Let’s get a contest going.”

Linca laughed for the first time in a while. She was glad to see her friend in better spirits. After losing Smash to Drak and being nearly overwhelmed by the near death of Rygor as soon as they got back, she felt like her entire face had been flexed the entire time, taught with worry. “What is this, LOTR? Whatever, I’m totally going to beat you, so look out,” Linca replied. After that the two of them got a pretty good count of zombie and skeleton bodies going. She had lost count but was pretty sure she was winning when they both received a system message:

<> Rygor has left Raid chat <>

What the hell? Maybe he had just woken up and decided to log for a bit. However, that didn’t make any sense at all. Linca looked over at Kantala and texted:

Linca: Any idea what’s going on?

Kantala: No, but I’m sure it isn’t good. He wouldn’t just log like that when we’re in combat. Something has happened.

Linca: Do you need to go?

Kantala: Let’s finish things up here real quick and I’ll think about it.

Linca: kk

After that was a whirlwind. Linca unleashed more of her magic through the Scepter of St. Magnus and lit up the zombies and skeletons with numerous healing auras, blasting the trash mobs into oblivion. Kantala’s attacks took on a new urgency as well as they fought to get everything cleaned up so that Deathberry could finalize his spell. After what seemed like an eternity the received a message:

Deathberry: Everyone can fall back now.

The two of them wasted no time returning to the base to see if there was any sign of Rygor. As expected, he had logged off and was nowhere to be found.

“Do you know where he lives?” Linca asked.

Kantala replied, “Yeah, he lives in Japan. I’ve been to his place once before.”

“You can use one of the portals and go there right away,” Linca replied, trying to sooth her friend.

She nodded in a stupor and replied tremulously, “I really hope he’s ok. Some of us in the guild had heard rumors that undead were wandering the streets there in Japan. Apparently, they are looking for survivors like us.” Kantala left a few minutes later. As if it wasn’t bad enough that they were being attacked here at the base, now it seemed like Drak’s minions were even hunting for the remaining Survivors.

Deathberry and Seona returned a few minutes later. “Where did Kantala go?” Linca brought them up to speed on the situation.

“At least I’ve bought us a little bit of time,” Deathberry replied afterwards. “Hopefully she can get to Rygor in time. I’m not sure why he didn’t just use a portal to return with his avatar. Sitting at home without his Gear is going to make him a sitting duck.”

Linca nodded, still lost in thought. If she had to guess Rygor probably had to log off quickly. If that were true it was an emergency. He hadn’t said anything before leaving and Kantala had mentioned that wasn’t how they did things in their guild. Hopefully the undead hadn’t already found him.

“I hope they are both alright. The good news is that you’ve bought us some time,” Seona said looking at Deathberry.

He nodded back. “Right, there is no point in worrying about what we can’t fix. Let’s get some new Gears up and running and I’ll check in with Lyan to see if he’s on his way yet.” While Deathberry and Seona got to work on the Gears, Linca made her rounds with the remaining Survivors and dwarves. When she could she brought them back to full health and where she could not she said a prayer and tried to sooth the dying. While she was deep in prayers she also gave a shout out to her friends across the globe: Cheezus, Thag and Sean all trying to escape Drak’s torture palace as well as Kantala and Rygor. They and their friends all needed to come together and fast if they were going to survive another day.