The light of the sun was just starting to come up when Terry had the group stop for a rest. They had been traveling since they left the store and it had to have been a few hours, at least. Though not even Sam was complaining when they were moving through the city in the middle of the night.

Taking out the map he looked around to get his bearings and find out where they were in the city. Finding an exit sign nearby he looked at the map and was glad to see that they had made it a good way to the edge of the city. By his estimations it should only take them a few more hours and then they would be out of the city all together.

Looking around at the group though they looked tired and a bit run down, from not getting much sleep the previous night. “Come on guys, it’s only a few more hours’ worth of walking and we should be able to get out of the city and then we can rest.”

Just as he said that they heard a screech off to their left but it sounded close. That got the group moving. As they ran from the noises Terry moved over to the edge of the highway and looked down. They were about a hundred feet above the ground and he could see monsters roaming around down below though none of them seemed to notice their passing by.

He had the group continue on for the next few hours, moving fast, since there weren’t monsters on the highway, at least that they could see. They did have a couple close calls as they got closer to the edge of the city but they were taken care of swiftly by Katar and Izzy.

As Terry looked at the map as they were moving he found their location and it was just a mile and a half to the edge of the city and their safe resting place. Well safer. That’s when he heard it. A growling sound coming from in front of them. The smoky haze still obscuring their vision, they slowed down and came to a stop.

“What was that?” Izzy whispered as Terry moved to the front of the group.

“I’m not sure but let’s keep moving, maybe we can bypass it.”

He then moved the group off to the right and they moved along the rail on that side. They could still hear growling every once in a while and it seemed to be moving as well. After what felt like an hour of slow moving, there was movement off to their left. Motioning for the group to stop he sent one of his skeletons to check it out.

He watched the thing walk out towards the middle of the road and then get swallowed up by the smoke. It wasn’t long after that that they heard a crash and the skull of the skeleton flew out of the smoke and landed five feet from the group.

They were all shocked but it was Gantar that pushed them and got them moving again. Leaving Izzy to lead the group Terry moved to the back to make sure no one got left behind. He could hear the blood pumping through his body in his ears which was why he got blind-sided.

He was knocked into the barrier they had been following and had the wind knocked out of him. Though he was able to command his skeletons to stop and come back to him. They got there just as the thing bent down to sniff him.

The skeletons jumped onto the things back and started attacking, which made it rear up and roar. It was loud and sounded like the T-Rex from Jurassic Park. Terry looked up at it and quickly inspected it. It said it was a Rock Troll, level 35. It stood about nine feet tall, with extra-long arms and shorter legs and was covered in what looked like little pebbles.

Terry jumped up and drew his sword planning on jumping into the fight with the thing when he stopped and listened.

“Ow, ow, ow, ow. Get off me!” The voice sounded older and feminine.

As he stood there, he watched as his skeletons scrambled up and down the things back and around it’s legs stabbing and cutting at it. Looking carefully at the thing and watching it’s face as best he could in the haze and while it was moving he saw that it did seem to be speaking.

Ordering his skeletons to back off but keep the thing in a circle he watched the thing stay on its guard and watch them. “Were you just speaking?”

The troll turned towards him at the question and looked at him like it was trying to decide what to do. “Y..Yes, that was me.” It said again in that old feminine voice. It reminded him of his grandmother.

As they stood watching each other, he glanced down at its legs and saw the cuts his skeletons made heal right before his eyes. Sheathing his sword, he reached out his and said, “I’m Terry, sorry for attacking you, you just startled me.”

“Ha, you think I startled you? You’re the one wandering around in this haze with a sword.”

He looked down at his sword and agreed with her. It? The troll. “I guess but aren’t you supposed to be a monster? Or at least something that attacks humans?”

“Humph, it’s not nice to call people monsters. So rude.” It said and folded its arms across its chest.

“What are you then? I didn’t think trolls could talk.”

“Most trolls can’t, at least the ones I’ve ran into in this new world. Though where I come from, we’re just normal trolls. Talking, building, creating arts and music. It was such a beautiful world. But now here, they aren’t even intelligent, they just roar and attack you.”

Terry thought about what the troll had said, “What did you call your world, the one before coming here?”

“We had many names for it but the most popular one was Gaia.”

He thought about that, another non-human creature mentioning Gaia as their world.

“Oh, and by the way you can call me Tabitha.”

“Tabitha? Really?”

“Yes, it means brave one in my language.”

“Okay, Tabitha, where are you heading to in this haze?”

“I’m not really sure, it’s been like this since I got here and I’ve just been wandering around looking for any others of my kind that made it through. But like I said all the ones I’ve come across so far have just been savage beasts.”

He wasn’t sure how he really felt about having a rock troll join his group but he always was one to give someone the benefit of the doubt. “You can join me and my group if you’d like. We’re heading North.”

Tabitha turned and looked around at the skeletons and then out further like she was trying to search the city in a short amount of time. “I suppose I could join you, though is it cold there? I don’t really like the cold; it makes my joints grate together.”

“At this time of year, it’s nice and warm, usually.”

“Alright then I’ll join you” she sighed. “But only if you promise me they won’t attack me again.”

Terry laughed at that, “they won’t attack you, unless you attack me or one of the others in the group.”

“Fair enough.”

“By the way, how did you get to level 35 already?” Terry asked as he got his skeletons and Tabitha moving to catch up to the others.

“Huh? Level, what level?”

“Do you see bars in your vision? Red, blue, green ones.”

“Huh, yeah I guess there is.”

“Well if you think or say status, you should see a screen pop up with your stats.”

“Status.” A look of surprise came to her face. “Wow, what is all this stuff?”

“That screen will tell you your level, your class, your health, mana, stamina, and stat points.”

“Huh, it does say I’m level 35. But my class just says Rock Troll.”

“Interesting. Maybe it was picked for you, like based on your race? And if you’ve been fighting a lot since you got here, that would explain your level.”

“Yeah, there were creatures all over the place when I got here. Even things like you that were running around screaming and getting eaten. But every time I tried to help one of them they just screamed some more and ran off.”

“Yeah, before all this we thought we were the only things in the Universe. So, it’s not really surprising.”

“It still hurt though. I was a beauty queen back where I came from.”

“Really? How many times did you win?”

“Four!” She exclaimed before looking embarrassed. Or at what Terry took to be embarrassment.

The two of them walked the rest of the way to the edge of the city without incident but the haze seemed to get thicker as they got closer to the edge. When they finally broke free from it, it was like stepping out into a whole different world. Or stepping out of a whole different world.

They moved off a few hundred yards down the road to get out of the way and find a place to rest for a bit. Terry took out his map and looked at it, there were a few spots that the group might have gone to. As he was looking over the map he remembered that they had added each other as friends. Opening up his messages window he started a new message and addressed it to Izzy.

Izzy,

Made it out of the smoke and am alright. Where are you guys at?

Terry

He sent it off and then sat back to wait for an answer. He didn’t think they’d be too far ahead of him so he wasn’t too concerned but there were a few spots they might be and it would take them a while to search them if he didn’t get an answer back.

After about twenty minutes he stood up and motioned for Tabitha to follow him. Since he didn’t get an answer back they would have to do it the old-fashioned way and search each spot.

It took them about half an hour before they got to the first spot. It was a group of trees that stood in a circle. The two of them checked around but didn’t see anyone or any signs of movement around the trees. They had to move to the West a bit to get to the next spot but they just found the same thing as before.

Heading back to the highway they moved onto the next spot on his map. A farm house about a hundred yards off the road. As they turned onto the driveway for the house, he could see that it was white with a brown roof that seemed to be in good condition and a red barn off to the side with a silo behind it. The house looked to be two stories and as they got about fifty yards from it, he felt an arrow smack into him which knocked him back into Tabitha and broke his chest plate, making it disperse.

“Hey, watch who you’re shooting.” He shouted at the house while raising his fist and shaking it.

“Sorry.” He heard someone shout back. Then he heard some commotion in the house as he got closer, this time he was being more cautious, just in case it wasn’t his group. He didn’t think he would die from a direct shot though he didn’t really want to find out. Dying hurt.

The door smacked out, which made him jump a little and out walked Izzy. “About time you made it…” she trailed off as she took in his company. “Umm, what’s that?” She asked pointing at Tabitha.

“Oh, this is Tabitha, she’s a rock troll. Tabitha, this is Izzy. She’s like my second in command.”

“Hi.”

“Umm, hi.”

“Don’t worry she’s friendly, she got transported here like the elves did.”

“There’s elves here?” Tabitha asked, surprised.

“Yeah, twelve of them.”

“Wow, that’s so cool. I’ve only heard about them in legend. Are they tall?”

“I guess a little, but not as tall as you. The women are just a bit shorter than me while the men are a bit taller.” He gestured with his hand as he told her.

“Aww, I heard they were as tall as an ogre but thin like a stick. They could shoot a moving target at three-hundred yards away.”

“Well, we can do that. We just aren’t as tall as you.” Katar spoke as he walked up to meet Terry and the new comer. “My name is Katar.”

“Wow, so cool.” Terry could almost see the awe in her eyes. “Um, I’m Tabitha.”

“Wait, you can understand him?” Izzy asked.

“Yeah, can’t you?”

“No. The only one in the group that can understand them is Terry, or was.” She crossed her arms and pouted.

“You just need to practice their language, or until they learn ours.” Terry said, trying to counsel her.

“Even still you guys are lucky to not have to go through that.”

“Maybe we can continue this conversation inside, away from prying eyes?” Katar said and started walking back into the house.

The trio followed him and when they entered the house Tabitha stopped and looked at the small door then at her body and back at the door. She closed her eyes and concentrated, her body slowly started to glow white and after a few seconds she shrunk down to about four feet tall with wrinkly grey skin, black eyes and white hair. She looked almost human.

Terry watched her transform and was amazed by what he saw. “That’s pretty awesome, I didn’t know trolls could do that.”

“Well, we can’t always be nine feet tall, that would take a lot of building materials and we just stick out too much like that. That’s just my combat form.”

“I can see that.” Terry said and motioned for her to follow them inside.

Once the group was back in the house Terry made the introductions to the rest of the group and Tabitha to them. She was excited to see all the elves and meet them, she immediately began asking them questions and talking so fast he thought she might forget to breath. Though in her excitement it looked as though the elf women were starting to get uncomfortable, but just as they were about to run away, Gantar went up to her and they began talking back and forth asking each other questions.

Terry left the two to their conversation and went to join Izzy, Tamara and Katar. “So, you guys made it out of the city alright?”

“Dat we did, doe we ran most of da way.”

“Glad you made it out without incident then, though I know you three would’ve been able to handle it.”

“Yeah, we’ve leveled up some since our last big fight. I can’t wait to run into more things to kill.” Izzy said with a giant grin on her face.

“Calm down, I think from here on out, we’ll have plenty of things to kill. Though that’ll slow us down as well. Have either of you talked to the rest of the group to see what they’ll do as we go further North? Also, why didn’t you answer my message?”

“You sent a message?” She got a far-off look for a bit, “Oh, sorry I didn’t see it. And from what I’ve heard a few of them have some family a bit West so they’ll probably head off that way once we get closer. Sam’s one of them.”

All three humans let a quiet mumble of thank god.

“Okay, good, that’ll make things easier after that.” Pulling out the map, he spread it out before them. “Okay, I think we’re about here” he pointed to a spot on the map just North of Des Moines. “It should only take us a few days to get to the border and then a few more to get up to Minneapolis.”

“We’ll have to watch out when we get there, since there’s a lot more suburbs around that city.”

“True, but I think if we go around it on 494, we should be able to avoid most of them, or at least cut through them faster.”

They spent the next fifteen minutes going over the best way to get to the border and where they might be able to spend the nights or find shelter if needed. Just in case they got separated again.

Once the four of them were done planning they went back to the rest of the group and found Tabitha and Gantar still chatting away, while the rest of the group was in two groups, the elves and the humans, each doing their own things. Terry laid out their plans for the group and then had them get some rest as the light was already fading.