I marveled at the way that the system was able to compress incredibly large objects into incredibly small spaces. Or, perhaps, it was that the storage space of my inventory was in some sort of pocket dimension that was sufficiently large, and that I was merely looking at the stored objects through a perspective lens that made the objects seem smaller when I examined them through the inventory system. Or, perhaps, it was that a stored item itself did not truly exist as an object, but merely the concept of that object was stored in excruciating detail, and the system replicated it from whole cloth when I pulled it out of my inventory.

There probably was a help entry that explained the fine details of how the inventory system worked, honed over the course of all of those iterations to form some sort of transcendent truth about the nature of physics that I could only guess at. I really had no interest in delving into the system to find out, though; there was work to be done ahead of us.

Jen and Artemis were waiting for me by the gates and I offered a wave as I approached. I hadn’t slept well, and the signs of that exhaustion were writ upon my face. I knew because I had checked my face in the mirror before coming down, and the bags under my eyes were all the more prominent. The long hours of the night sang in my bones, the nightmares only barely remembered, the stress building. I had gained some understanding of what I was expected to do, but I didn’t want to linger on it too long.

I handed out the gear I had made and we went over the details of what we needed to do. The plan was pretty simple, all in all, I would break my way into the town square, while Jen and Artemis came around closer to where the civilians were quartered. They’d blast a smaller hole and get everyone loaded on the truck, while I had eyes on me. Once everyone was out, they’d send me a signal and I’d get out of there as fast as I could and meet up either on the road or back at the factory.

Simple.

While Jen and Artemis got used to their new gear, I took the time to get familiar with my own. The power armor core hummed at the small of my back, hooked into my battle harness and sending thrums of power throughout the entire frame. After spending some time measuring this new power source, I realized that my various tools attached to the frame would be up to three times more powerful. Spending some time at the research lab last night had yielded an upgrade to the spikethrower that incorporated the auto-loader. I was eager to try it out, but a live fire test would have to wait.

My drill, meanwhile, positively hummed with that fresh surge of energy, felt ready to break through anything. The rest of the power was channeled to my legs, where the travel heels were ready to deploy. The travel heels, as it turned out, were small wheels that could pop out from the heels of the harness’ feet, and would allow for much faster overland travel. The artificial muscle fiber there was also enhanced, and the leg armor had been replaced with air-attuned armor plating, which would hopefully allow for even greater mobility.

Finally, I checked my inventory one more time, nodding at its contents. I had off-loaded almost everything from it, I didn’t want to have any hesitation in accessing the inventory, and keeping the list short and simple was necessary. With that set, I deployed the truck from my inventory, though really it was more of a bus, had to be in order to hold the dozens of people we were evacuating from the town.

“Either of you know how to drive?” I asked over to Jen and Artemis.

The pair had changed out into their gear. Artemis wore a large color-shifting cloak that hid her lanky form beneath it and that blended in with her surroundings with surprising ease, making it hard to keep track of her as she seemed to blur when viewed anyway but straight on. Her rifle was strapped to her back, surprisingly normal looking for something of the system’s creation, though it had a revolver cylinder instead of a more traditional clip or magazine. Considering the caliber of the bullets, though, it made some sense.

Jen was less concealed by her new gear. Braces were strapped to her legs, in the light blue of air-attuned material, but with some rubber parts also incorporated, designed to help her jump and land with greater ease. Her arms were also covered in braces, which led to a set of brass gauntlets that fit neatly over the top of her hands, but had a tube on top, ready to spring on command. That tube would send a sharp spear forward, capable of crunching through most armors.

Jen lifted one of her hands slowly. “Yeah, I had my permit, which should be good enough. Not like we’re going to be expecting any other traffic.”

“That should work.” I patted the side of the bus and looked out over the road that they would be driving down. “Alright, I guess we’re all ready to go then.” I bounced on my heels, trying to bleed out some of my nerves, as Jen and Artemis took their seats in the front of the bus. I opened up the back and took a seat on the floor. After a moment, the bus took off towards the town. The pace was slow compared to highway driving pre-system, but it was still far more restful than any other form of locomotion.

This, of course, was when Teldin decided to start up a conversation with me. “You are going into battle.”

Fortunately I could communicate with the vestige resting in my mind via thinking very pointedly at em, rather than via talking. I’m sure that Jen and Artemis would understand the process of talking out loud, but I had the feeling that this conversation would not be one that I wanted to share.

“Yes.” I kept my response simple as I tried to find some degree of calm.

“You are not prepared.”

“I’m as prepared as I could be.” I frowned a touch and thought a moment later. “But you’re not talking about the sort of preparation that I have actually done.”

“Correct.”

I frowned more deeply, the thoughts drilling into my mind, the nightmares that had haunted me. “I don’t know why people just can’t be better.”

Teldin’s voice came a little softer in my ear then. “Because the end of the world is a trial and a test. Some rise, some fall, some break, and some….” Ey trailed off then, waiting for me to complete.

“Some are mended.”

“Some are mended.” Teldin repeated. “But the trial comes in part from those who break under the pressure. Those who choose to believe that strength alone gives them the right to rule. The right to take command over the wills of others, out of some self-serving prophecy of the necessities of survival.”

“The right to rule derives from the consent of the governed.” The maxim came to me instantly. It was, in theory, the foundational principle of democratic modes of governance. That so many instruments had been installed in democratic states to deny that maxim proved not the failure of democracy, but the failure of states.

Teldin’s response, though, was a soft laugh. “That is a very nice way of saying it.”

“One of our political philosophers came up with it, a refutation of the divine right of kings.”

“These men who claim to power do not have a trace of divinity to them, they simply have the gifts of this system, this wretched system that grinds us to the finest dust. They are tyrants empowered by power itself.”

I nodded slowly, opening my eyes then heaving out a breath. “Which is why I have to fight.”

“You are not the only one who needs mending.” Teldin’s voice faded away with that and I drifted into further contemplation of our conversation.

My head fell back against the chassis of the bus and I stared up at the ceiling. I might have to fight people today. I hadn’t been in a fight since I was a kid, and that was just schoolyard tussles, not life and death. I looked to the drill strapped to my arm; I remembered the gorey mess it had made of monsters and I imagined it doing that to a person. A shudder of revulsion passed through my body and I shut my eyes again.

Chad was essentially keeping these non-combatants prisoner and forcing them to perform labor for him, under the threat of external violence. It didn’t really matter that he believed that he was justified in doing so, he was still keeping these people as, essentially, slaves. Violence to overcome slavery was absolutely justified, but perhaps he could be convinced by words alone that he was wrong, that some other way of doing things was viable.

Yet, Chad had kicked out Artemis and Jen simply for speaking against him. Sure, the two could have been lying, but the pattern fit too well. I have read too many stories, both fictional and otherwise, about men thinking that their strength gave them allowance to do horrible things in the supposed name of security. Chad would see any question of his authority as dangerous to not just his authority but to the safety of all within the town.

Hell, enough of the combatants were probably simple yes-men for Chad, thinking that he was justified in his actions and supported him full-throatedly. Hopefully, though, there were some amongst the combatants who could be convinced that Chad was wrong. If this was down to murder or be murdered on both sides, it would just be a bloody mess.

I was just circling around the problem, though. I would certainly start with dialogue if the option arrived, but if that failed, I needed to be ready to escalate in order to enable the plan to continue, and I needed to not hesitate. From what Jen and Artemis had said, Chad was a very powerful combatant and the others were not much weaker. Any hesitation and they’d tear me to pieces. Honestly, they were also probably strong enough that my drill wouldn’t have as gorey of an effect on them as it did on monsters.

And while it may have started with political philosophy, this ultimately wasn’t a philosophical issue; the ethics were very clear here, I was eminently justified in doing violence in the process of freeing the non-combatants from bondage. The question here was more one of capability, of whether I could bring myself to enact violence against another human, even if it was the ethical thing to do. Before the ending of the world, it was not something that I ever had to worry about, as violence remained almost entirely in the hands of the state, with the cases where that violence was used by non-state actors being so rare that they weren’t worth worrying about.

Not that the state was above reproach, and its near-monopoly was concerning for a number of reasons, but that wasn’t important now. What was important now is that I needed to allow myself to do this. I needed to quiet the roiling in my stomach that told me that what I was going to do was unconscionable. I needed to break free of the pre-apocalypse model of thinking I had been inculcated in. Sometimes the right thing to do was to punch a person in the face hard enough that they go down.

I would do it. I had to do it.

Artemis called from the front seat. “We’re here.”

I nodded towards her and stepped out of the bus, looking at the walls ahead. It was time, no more opportunities for questions. After taking a steadying breath, I pulled a demolition grenade from my inventory.