The squads were well on their way down the fresh and new Intertown road, nicknamed the AE - 1, after the Attuned Earth's first road. Possibly presumptuous, but I wasn't going to argue with the dozens of people who'd worked to make the trade route happen. Myself included. Not long after the car-wall had left our sight, a quiet spurt of ripples entered the extended range of my vibrosense.

Considering the direction it was coming from, I wasn't particularly concerned it was an enemy, but I settled into a low stance. Samuel quirked an eyebrow, but spun on his heels to draw his Femur Club. Finger wide vines curled around his feet, ready to pounce.

The squad closest to the back noticed my shift, and turned to face the possible threat with practiced ease. A bulky lizardman glared at the packed dirt road from over one of the chitin shields while the rest of his group held Skills and Gifts at the ready. When the steps drew closer and a fiery outline appeared along with a plume of dust, I almost cast right in its path. Thankfully, l recognized the scrunched up face amidst the fire with my much improved Perception.

"Is that...?" Samuel started.

"At ease," I called over my shoulder, straightening and glaring at the approaching form. The squad shared a tense look before opting to catch up with the procession. It had stopped not long after the squad had formed up, but with the number of people it still took a minute for everyone to respond. We'll need to work on that for sure.

A gangly middle-aged man slowed his pace as we came into view. Steam was rising from his body and I could see the flush on his face extended at least down his neck and to his arms. Smoke continued to trail out of his ears for several seconds as Alan gathered himself. "Need. Field. Tests."

"Alan, you know it will be exceedingly dangerous in Lake Weir, right?" Samuel said, releasing a into the man that set his breathing to a less frantic pace.

"Danger is irrelevant. The Purge Protocol will require me to finetune the frequency and amplitude to match the energy signature of the most recently--"

"The thing you were working to deal with the Dreg Entity?" I said, cutting Samuel off before he could protest. We both shared the biggest concern for the man: his unpredictable nature and poor social interactions could lead to him getting in a less-than-ideal pickle. However, if the researcher was close to developing the weapon they needed...

"Yes. With the Categorical increment to the Weirdian Entity, research should continue unabated," Alan said, standing up straight and adjusting his white lab coat and duffle bag. I had no idea what was in the bag, but I was sure it wasn't camping or survival equipment.

Samuel turned me around, giving Alan our back. Our eyes met and a rapid fire conversation took place. Even the power of the comm-plant couldn't compare with the pseudo-mind reading close family could develop. It was mostly in the eyebrows.

He can't stay. His eyes said.

We need him.

Are you going to keep tabs on him?

If I have to. We need this, and if being in Lake Weir will put him closer, it's a chance we need to take.

"Gah! Fine. But you better put a squad in charge of checking up on him. We both know you are liable to go down a rabbit hole of your own. That's if you don't spend the whole time getting knocked on the head beyond the wall, you brute," Sam snapped, disengaging from the conversation entirely.

Alan hadn't reacted at all to our dialogue, but the moment I turned around he just picked up his bag and headed after the caravan of Wild Guards. My eyes landed on the lizardman of the squad that had turned around, the squad leader based on the brooch on his upper back, and a smile crept on my face. I was almost certain that I saw a shiver run down his spine before the green scaled man looked my way.

---+---

Having Alan tacked on to the procession was as much an exercise in patience as I expected it to be. Thankfully, the man only asked inane questions of the poor Wild Guards I assigned as his overwatch. The elf girl in the squad had explicit instructions to find me or contact me with the comm-plant if Alan started to amble or act erratically. No small part of me felt bad for thinking of Alan as a troublesome resource, rather than the brilliant mind that he was, but needs must. It was one of the many hard decisions I'd come to realize were just a part of living on the surface.

Everything was going well on the trip, and our stop at Stonecrest was brief. One of the Stoneshapers was reinforcing the one assigned up north and would ride with us. To my surprise I saw that Patrick Patrick outright refused to go as the small party of Stonecrest's leadership greeted the Wild Guards. He insisted that he had responsibilities to maintain in Stonecrest. Rachael didn't look happy by the public forum the man employed when the towns had been cooperating so well, but the other Stoneshaper, Tara, jumped to Patrick's defense and into the wagon. Due to the pressing nature of our deployment, the arguing was minimal from that point on.

On the shorter stretch from Stonecrest, our group wasn't really concerned about encountering any enemies. Not only did we not have the attraction aura of Wec, but the sheer size of the group made all the creatures wary of approaching us. Many watched us from deep in the woods and pre-Fall ruins. The only thing that made me keep vibro running on full was the possibility of encountering another Cottonmouth. The ambush snake was the only creature that seemed to be able to avoid detection until the caravans were right on top of it.

Just as I was getting ready to relax, we entered the Implant range for the defenders of Lake Weir.

"Support to the east!" a voice called, wide to all people in range of comms.

"There's a deer building a ramp!" a feminine voice called back.

"Got it." Another, more familiar, voice rumbled as Maurice cut through the panicked chatter.

"All forward!" Clara called out and the squads whirled into action.

One of the squads was left behind with the four wagons as the rest of us charged forward. Very quickly, the variances in Attributes were made apparent as me and Sam, as well as the half-squad of the New Hopers took the lead. However, the months fighting and defending, even with the increased requirements of higher Quotients and more participants had pushed the majority of the Guard to Q5, if not the cusp of it. Finally being able to dissociate their kills also made an enormous difference for their power leveling.

Clara quickly took control of the larger scale direction. The most mobile squads, the Dervishes and the Night Whistles, split off to round the wall from southeast and southwest. Tara the Stoneshaper and Igor's Wild Fist cut a hole into the side of the wall and allowed the rest of the group into the town without slowing down. Before we were even through, Clara shot me a meaningful glance that said it all.

As soon as the last person was through, I turned and slapped an to cover the opening. My fine tuning with my Amplified Skills was still rough, so when the rock pinched upward it pushed a bit too much. The top of the wall cracked, and I grimaced. I'll fix that later.

When I turned around, I made a mental note of the various changes that had taken place since my last visit to Lake Weir. Several Towers now rose up along the town's perimeter and evenly throughout the town's territory. Even from the south side, I could see flashes of red, blue and purple coming from the towers built right onto the top of the old school. Connecting those towers and the main building were souped up versions of my covered pathways. Metal glistened, polished smooth by bile, but holding strong. The rest of everything visible in the town was covered in muck and the stench of rot permeated the air.

"Clara, send a squad East and the rest straight North!" Daniela's voice chimed through the comm-plant.

Surely directed by the demoness, Igor and his Wild Fists split off and vanished around one of the school's exterior buildings that hadn't been reinforced by mana-created stone.

Vibro swelled around me, throwing all sorts of ripples from the rushing group around me. It all blended with the signature of the different materials I hadn't familiarized myself with and I missed a step as vertigo tipped me forward.

"Woah there cowboy," Sam said, pulling me back by my vest before I could tip forward.

A , quickly followed by his , flowed into me to clear the sensation. Doing my best to remain in the fight, I suppressed the feedback from vibro as much as I could by focusing on the smell around me. It was a distinctly unpleasant choice, and it almost made me nauseous by itself, but it honed my focus enough to dull vibro.

"I'm good. Just... adjusting," I huffed as we turned to stay under one of the covered pathways.

"Good, because we need some ramps," the blonde said, turning to point to where we approached the stairs up the wall. At the speed the group was going, we would just crash into it. Except for the air attuned, they might be able to clear the new twenty foot walls around the town.

Instead of dealing with all that, it was my turn to act once again.

"Everyone in two lines!" I yelled. The group looked distinctly confused, but the squads of four and five quickly oriented themselves in front of me and Sam, Clara at the lead.

Bracing for the pain that would follow the manipulation I cast , at half power, focusing on height versus width. Just forcing the slight modification caused me a headache, and my abdomen twitched as mana flowed into my Antler Helm before the Amplified Skill triggered. Thankfully, my aim was good. The slab of stone rose up from the ground unbidden, crashing onto the top of the wall for support thanks to the angle at which I'd released it.

The squads didn't slow down at all as they clambered up it, spreading to reinforce the Weirdians on the wall. Already spurts of magic were splashing down against whatever creatures were on the other side. My feet took me to the top of the wall, already taking shape over my palm.

---+---

"This intensity... Something's changed," Clara said, rubbing her shoulder where a Tendril deer had impaled her. The creature had died not long after thanks to inhaling a lungful of her scorching death cloud, but the wound had still knocked her out of the engagement fairly early. It was healed now, but there was only so much the Life attuned could do about the phantom discomfort that followed severe injuries. I was no stranger to it.

"Damn right something's changed," Daniela said, slamming her hand down on the table. "They finally grew a pair and sent that beast after the town!"

"What Ms. Eloquence here is getting at," Devon said, cutting Daniela off before she could go on one of her tirades. He's not being unreasonable. It's an important discussion and we need to stay on topic. Why do I just want to punch him in his chiseled jawline? "Is that Summerfield is now as hunkered down as it's going to get."

"Confirmed?" Ian asked. Maurice stood behind his seat to the right, also nursing a nasty broken arm. It had been healed until he'd crashed from the Overhealed affliction, so he had to ride it out before finishing the treatment.

"Oh, Summerfield is Dreg-ed up alright. It's got some strange plant walls just shy of the ones we've got here," Daniela said, throwing a glare at Devon before it softened on the old man. "No new watchtowers other than the two originally in town, but they've got crows posted up there. Getting close is rough. By our count, there are at least twenty of the humanoids at Q3 and a handful at Q4. We are fairly confident that their Tendril beast horde has been culled severely, outside of a few notable exceptions in the form of those damn birds and their big daddy."

"That's what they are throwing at us?" I asked. The fact that I was squinting at the gathered group had already been addressed, thankfully, but the Weirdians still gave me strange looks. I couldn't care less. After fighting for the majority of the day, my head was throbbing and I'd already puked twice out in the battle field.

Daniela didn't say anything, but she nodded in response. The tension in the classroom-turned-war-room could have been cut with a knife as everyone processed the information. Maurice and Ian started speaking quietly between each other, even if it was perfectly audible for everyone in the room. Five Quotients worth of Perception would do that. Instead of letting the heavy silence and quiet-not-quiet conversation continue, Clara cut right to the point.

"Options?"

"We hold out?" Sam said.

"How are we going to keep feeding Lake Weir?" Daniela countered. "It's only a matter of time before some of the bigger beasts to the west join the Dreg attacks, or just decide that one of the Wild Guard caravans are easy pickings. That's a sure fire way of getting whittled down."

"The town is already getting whittled down." Maurice grimaced. "After that Appendage thing swooped by, not even the Life mages have been able to grow anything edible. Ration projections put us at one month, and by then we'll be right in the middle of Fall. If we can't get situated before Winter..."

"We might as well be shooting ourselves in the foot," Clara finished, getting nods of agreement from Devon, Ian and Maurice. We'd yet to experience a winter on the surface, but everyone we talked to spoke of how harsh they were. We didn't have any specifics, so I opted to trust them on that.

"I could maybe work with the Stoneshapers and create that prototype vertical garden I..." Samuel added weakly. The tired looks he got from around the table had him tapering off, slouching deeper into his chair. "Never mind."

"It could very well be some kind of side effect from the Appendage’s Gift," I said, placing a hand on his shoulder. "If we haven't been able to grow anything on the ground, I don't think building up will give us the solution. It would also highlight it as a target for the crows, which will make it harder to protect even if it did work."

Samuel wanted to drop lower in his seat, probably completely out of sight if I knew him, but I held him firm. "We'll still need you to figure something out. Daniela is right; we can't just rely on Wildwood for this."

The man gave me a solemn nod and turned from the start of his downward spiral into a pensive brooding. Not the optimal situation, but a working Sam was better than a shut-down Sam. Once again, the twinge of guilt for pushing my family and friends burned in my gut.

"What does that leave us with?" Devon asked, leaning forward on his borrowed desk.

"Evacuation?" Clara suggested.

"Fight," Maurice said.

"That's what we are doing! They are just going to keep collecting creatures from the surrounding area to drown us in a sea of bile when we are resting!" Daniela said, heat rippling out of her fire gills. Ian steepled his fingers, looking at everyone present before speaking.

"We cannot afford to lose our foothold in the area," Ian said, his face grave. All the age that had been staved off by his recent rise in Quotient made itself known with just one expression. "Our only redeeming advantage is the distance between Summerfield and the Dreg rot territory. If we fall and these Tendrils fortify here, even Stonecrest's walls won't be able to keep back the attacks."

"Whimpering back to Stonecrest or Wildwood will only prolong the issue," Maurice added, placing his hand on his father's shoulder. "If we run now, we'll be forced to keep running."

Damn. He's right. The truth of the two Weirdians' words settled on us. It was more like a slap in the face, but deep down I was fairly sure everyone present already knew that we couldn't afford to lose. We might save lives, but we would only be delaying. None of the scouts had ever been able to go far to the west, due to the intense insect Territories there, or to the east, thanks to wildly dangerous swamps creatures. The north was just as much of an enigma and according to any of the survivors, the south portion of the state was just straight up underwater. We were in a tiny pocket of safety that we'd slightly expanded, only for the Dreg to clamp their greedy hands on.

"Can we... stop the bleeding so to speak?" Clara asked, leveling her eyes on me. The question was implied.

"Alan isn't done. He's already working, but I have no idea how long it will take him to isolate whatever variables he says he needs to isolate to get that plan to work," I said, sighing.

"Isolate," Devon said, more to himself than as a response.

"Devon?" Clara asked, nudging the elf with her staff to bring him to the present.

"Sorry. Wait, I'm working through something. Ronan, you and Samuel managed to keep that thing dirty Metier Crystal contained, right?" Both of us nodded.

"Sure, but the moment we looked away it called in for a taxi," Daniela butt in. I did notice her use of we even if the only ones able to somewhat keep the Entity contained were me and Sam. In my case, I was fairly sure it was just because the thing liked that I'd defeated Kirby for some perverse reason. She wasn't at all responsible for the prison break, yet she'd still thrown her lot in with us. Way to make me feel even worse for being an ass, Danny.

"That's not the problem. That thing could probably fly from the Death Territory down to Wildwood in, what, a few hours if that? That twisted piece of junk crystal needed to call it. It also had to risk being present when Kirby was going cult-leader on the trainees. If we can snag the crystal, call the bird and kill it, then put the rock in a deep dark hole where no one will find it, then the problem will be solved! No murderous flybys and no more Tendril-creating juice."

"There are so many 'ifs' in there, I don't even know where to start," I said, slicing my hand through the air. Even through the glower Devon threw at me, he deflated. "But I don't know if we can afford not to gamble on 'ifs'."

"Come again?" The elf seemed shocked that I'd agreed with him.

"I don't think throwing the Corrupted Entity in a hole will deal with the problem, but if we can make a better prison for it then it should be manageable. At least until Winter passes and we can figure something out, or Alan cracks the purge technology. Whichever comes first," I said.

The looks around the table were still grim, but there was a palpable lift in the overall mood. Just saying you are going to fight is one thing; driving everyone to survive is the basis of all of our struggle. But fighting with a goal in mind, however unattainable it seemed? That gave purpose.

It was one of the things my uncle had always emphasized. Many people, even before the Fall, just went through the day in a monotonous doldrum. Being confined in the Bunker made that about a thousand times worse, but my uncle made sure that I looked at the big picture. We were still alive, and we could work to be better for the next day. Man, was he smug when Elias agreed to the Implant program. I chuckled to myself as I pictured what he'd be doing were he in this meeting with us. Probably something profoundly silly to lift the mood, followed up by some speech about thinking outside the box. Then, he'd immediately go into one of his retellings of the numerous times he had to pseudo-engineer a fix for the water treatment system.

Purpose. You sure know what you are doing, huh, Dad. I didn't even recoil from the fact I'd thought of Dale as my father. For all intents and purposes, he was. Even if I wanted to call him what he actually was to me now, his lessons and support wouldn't leave me.

The odds were still stacked so high against us I couldn't see the top of them. But if I can't see how high they are, why should I worry any more about it? Gears positively shifted, ideas and plans started to sprout like mana fueled weeds.