“Eight,” a whispered voice counted up the seconds, just loud enough to be heard by the other two. “Nine. Ten.”

The remaining three in the square left through the smoke in the direction of the gates, sprinting in a triangle formation with Sarah at the lead. They dashed toward the thick of trees that lined the forest at the edge of the town.

“After Cap didn’t show up, I thought exercise was off the table today,” Exel joked exasperatedly as they ran, but without his trademark grin. It was an acknowledgement of the serious situation they were in.

Sarah, the temporary captain of the Ghosts, thought over the decision she’d made, despite knowing it was too late to change it if she wanted.

On location alone, to complete the hook, distract the whole of the enemy while the rest get out, needed the two people who were in a facility with someone else. Exel and Lott could out-pod and make the first move in the real world. One on one, or even three on one was something they were certainly capable of handling with ease.

Since everyone was headed to Magnice’s location, and he was adamant about buying an item, he wouldn’t need to make the first move at Yellen. As the resident genius of getting everyone out of a pinch with limited time, space, or items, she trusted his judgement. If he needed this particular item, then they needed him to have it.

Alone, Sarah needed to find her own way out of Amest.

But more than that, it was Slooky and Bue in charge of the hook. The fastest, the sneakiest. The best at throwing smaller weapons. Dodging came easier to them than to Lott or Exel, whose best was shown in head-on confrontations.

If this was a normal mission, Sarah wouldn’t have been so worried. But they were up against trained killers rather than espionage agents, as she’d determined earlier when blade to blade with them. The mob they faced before, about a year ago, was not this experienced. If the ones they just faced were ready and prepared to kill, then they’d also have to be prepared to die. Her mind slipped to Bue. Slooky wouldn’t have a problem eliminating them, but Bue…

She is always one to incapacitate over kill. If she has to make that choice…

Sarah wasn’t entirely sure what would be the result. But this set-up was their best shot without the Captain there.

When their small group reached far enough, without any sign of followers, they each tapped into their menu and went out-pod, sparing glances back toward the town in the distance, thinking of the three others who remained in Fallacy, hoping for the best.

Exel, the last to hit his button, paused for a moment, typing into his messaging system, sending a quick message out before leaving.

For the next half-minute, the locations of their pods hovered in the air, as it always did whenever someone left that world. If someone were to approach the area and tap the words in the air before time expired, it would show their exact details of longitude and latitude, making this mission one of their lives in the real world too.

The three of them getting out this way was easy. The others would endure the increasing difficulty in not being located for those thirty seconds while they moved out-pod.

Using the flight skill, as she had earlier, Bue raced down a street, pursued. Kicking off the ground to race up along the wall, she landed up on a bridge between the buildings, sending them all into a frenzy of throwing everything they could her way. The hasty attack failed, the weapons clanking harmlessly in her wake, as she was already off, racing along the rooftop, leaping onto the next one over with ease, feet landing lightly.

Keeping to their agreement earlier, she stuck to her side, the left, while Slooky took the rest down the right. To Bue, this wasn’t just survival, it was a feeling of importance. Doing her job well here, meant the others could get out safely, it meant they needed her.

After being born into this failed world, the one where Fallacy was a relief and a savior, there was a part of her that felt sub-par. She was the youngest in their group, and someone else might’ve seen that as an achievement, but these people had endured a different life than her. Some of them, like Lott, deeply experienced the world before it fell, had been old enough to see and know its destruction. It was easy to feel less than. Everyone entered Fallacy, some for glory, some to live on.

Bue’s purpose…

She wasn’t sure if she had one.

Just this. Just her team. It was her whole life.

There was nothing else.

To do something for her people was everything to her.

Doing a somersault through the air to the next roof, Bue used everything she had to the best of her ability. While upside down in that brief second, facing that mob against her, she reached into pocket after pocket, threw each weapon with precision, dealing blows that weren’t fatal, but took nearly ten of them out of this fight. She grinned as her feet touched down again.

But it faded when she saw the next obstacle in her path.

Farther away, down on a busy street of people, walking quickly, but still blending in, was Magnice. He slipped back into the crowd seamlessly, as if he’d never left. Heading directly to the stall he knew the item was in, he grinned, stopping and turning to the vendor with a perfectly peaceful and contagious smile that put the seller into a good mood.

“Hello.”

“What can I get you?”

Items sold inside Fallacy markets were extremely varied. From handmade goods made using materials of this alternate world, to preserved items of the old world, before the wars. There were many who also sold the things they received upon completion of an achievement, as with each new personal upgrade, of any kind, an item was bestowed upon them by the world. It was the latter that Magnice was looking for. It came from a simple milestone inside Fallacy, like travelling to enough places or spotting and collecting enough colorful things. The item looked like an ordinary kaleidoscope of the old world, but it wasn’t.

On his free time, he’d tore it apart, finding out what it could do, or rather, what an inside piece of it was capable of.

He quickly picked up the item and held it up for the vendor to see and tell him the price before searching through his inventory for a bar of gold that covered the cost. Turning his head as he looked through the hovering screen of items near his lifted wrist, he glanced at the faces within the crowd.

One had him pausing. A familiar face, looking to the other side of the street, coming from the same direction he had. He tapped a different item first, draping the red cloak over his shoulders casually.

When they had been surrounded as a group just moments earlier, Magnice had taken note of many faces within that crowd of attackers.

She’s one of them. She followed me.

It was evident from the way she searched through the people, looking for something. Someone.

Him.

He scrolled through his inventory as if nothing was wrong, keeping an eye on that woman as he did so. He tapped on the gold bar, waiting until she made her way past him. If she was looking for someone out of place, it wasn’t going to be easy for her, he thought to himself. A red cloak stood out among the crowd, didn't it? But only when someone was looking for a person blending in, did it go unnoticed.

Counting up to ten, he took the most discreet glance to his right, seeing her scanning the crowd, walking toward a minor disturbance curiously.

“Here.” Magnice, with a smile, handed the vendor a bar of gold he’d uncovered in the mountains a few years back. Before they could say it was far too much, he pulled a dagger from his waist, hopped the table cleanly, ducked down underneath the cloth that covered it and brandished the weapon at the person holding the gold bar in their hand. The aim lowered until it was pointed at an extremely sensitive area.

The vendor gulped.

“I’m not here,” he whispered. “A second bar for the trouble.”

They nodded slowly, putting the gold bar quickly into their storage, their gaze drawing back up on Magnice’s orders. He lowered his weapon and they quickly fell back into a normal behavior, tending to the next customer at their table with ease.

Fear wasn’t a good long-term motivator, as it could quickly become desperation. But a reward was the same way. If someone else were to reward them greater, a new allegiance could be bought. However, for a quick moment, something like this was just fine.

The vendor didn’t know what was going on, didn’t know of the sides or which one they’d agree with, but to get far more in rewards for a measly little item? Just to not do anything and pretend they were alone?

It was so easy.

A gold bar like that could buy things and bring them into the real world. It was food and water. Security. It wasn’t just the means to survive, but to live well.

Magnice peeked out through the cloth draped over the table, in the manner that it would move if someone walked by too fast. Timed well with the footsteps past the table, he noted that the woman was wandering down this side of the street, gaze taking in as much as possible.

Keeping calm, he waited.

As Magnice, Bue, and Slooky were still on edge in Fallacy, the others were waking up in their pods.

Sarah opened her eyes to the familiar ceiling in Amest. Jumping up, she quickly packed a bag and headed to the door, taking a deep breath to calm herself, preparing mentally for anything on the other side. Her hand didn’t tremble as it gripped the handle and pulled down.

The door didn’t open.

It didn’t take a genius to figure out it was locked. She tested the handle a few more times before setting her bag down and examining the whole of the door. Getting out was going to be harder than it seemed.

Over in Carver, the third one out, was Exel, stuffing his things into his own backpack. He picked up his watch from the counter, the one that told them of their meetings and times to enter Fallacy. Part of him debated over bringing it with.

Is there a tracker in this? What else has trackers? Do I chance it?

He weighed the small item in his hand for a moment before zipping it up, final decision made.

In Fallout, Lott, having already had a bag packed, set her helmet down on the pod carefully. As much as she wanted to break it with the frustration boiling in her, she’d never truly given in to such things. She sighed. Almost instinctively, she could tell there was trouble all around them the past couple weeks. It wasn’t even a change within the group; it was as if it were in the air they breathed. She just didn’t think it would be this bad.

She was the oldest of them. Though they’d never specifically gone over their ages, she could tell. The Captain was close, and so was Sarah, but the rest of them had too much of a kid in them all that time ago when they first got started. She’d watched them all mature over the years they worked together.

 All of this made her like the older sibling, the unofficial caretaker of the group. She’d experienced school life, though it had been tainted by the threat of bombs flying through the air. Family life, though it hadn't lasted as long as she hoped.

She knew enough from listening to get a read on the lives the Ghosts used to live. There weren’t family in the picture. And if there was, they were hiding them, pretending they didn’t exist in order to protect them.

Lott had a family once. Was helpless enough to not be able to save them. They were all dead by the time she got home from school that day.

From then on, it was just her. Alone.

And then it was the Ghosts.

They were her new family.

She turned the handle on the door, a pack with both straps over her shoulders rested against her back, light as a feather to her.

When the door opened at her touch, there was something quite unpleasant on the other side.

“Hm…”

A barrel of a pistol aimed at her head, Lott stared with a frown at the one holding it, backed up by a second on the other side of the hallway.

Guns were quite a rare find on a guard at a facility.

It was a wonder why they had them here.

Their fingers hovered over the triggers, prepared to fire.

Oh, she thought to herself, I get it now.