Slooky stumbled out the door of the building, rolling across the dirt and chucking a rock at the teleporter’s hand, that held a swinging blade, causing it to fall. Sarah stumbled back discarding the cracked and broken pieces of her weapon before joining Slooky in racing over to the others. They gathered into a tighter circle, empty-handed.

“I saw it! It’s inside! It’s the box – didn’t open!” he huffed out.

It didn’t take long for the Captain to make the call in the stalling of battle, only it wasn’t the one they were expecting.

“We’re retreating,” they announced out of the blue.

“What?”

“Hold up! We know where it’s at!”

“But the box–”

They glared at a flaming arrow as they cut it down and stomped twice on it before it started a blaze on the ground at their feet.

“Forget it.”

“Cap–”

“I said retreat!” they said firmly, cutting the protest off. “Past the boundary! Don’t stop for anything. Understood?”

“Yes, Cap.”

“Understood.”

“Sarah. Crater.”

A united front, they broke through the circle of warriors, and the moment they were through, Sarah turned around, holding out her hand, using Crater.

The damage was immediate, and large. A diameter of easily 300 feet and more than that at the depth in the center. At the other end of it, the Halla village leader, standing without a word, watching them go. They grabbed out that paper again, tearing it to shreds with a smile.

“Slook. Smoke.”

The Captain, having lost a bit of the sharp edge in their voice, met the eyes of the leader. As the seconds inched along, time seeming to slow as the canister Slooky threw hit the ground and hissed, they held each other’s gaze until the last possible moment, when everything was engulfed in gray smoke.

And they ran.

Into the woods, and past the boundary, the Halla not feeling the need to chase away a small animal with its tail tucked between the legs.

Once they got past the barrier, even the Captain seemed to let out a breath of relief along with some of the tension.

The Ghosts couldn’t bring themselves to speak as they worked to treat wounds on each other. Of course, waking up would mean there wouldn’t be a wound any longer, but they didn’t need anything hampering the next mission. Treating it in Fallacy first was always the better option, minimizing pain in both worlds.

They didn’t have failures.

They didn’t make mistakes that cost them missions.

They had…

Never failed a mission once.

Never retreated until they faced the Halla.

It was like a gifted child being told they weren’t as special anymore. Someone who was constantly praised for being right… now feeling the bite of getting something wrong for the first time.

It was brutal in their minds.

Not one of them uttered the words of thanks, of gratefulness for being alive.

By your hand I live. And by your hand I die.

As Lott got her arm wrapped from a stray strike, saved by Magnice’s quick reflexes, as the Captain fixed up a cut along Sarah’s neck, as Slooky helped Exel bandage his leg…

Each of them had been saved by another in the group, more than once as the battle had raged on. They all knew mortality, in one way or another. And as a cat licking its wounds, they tried not to focus on their numbing failure.

They were all saying those words inside, knowing that without one of them there, it could’ve been the end of the Ghosts.

As they were recounting the most intense moments of that day for Bue, Sarah and Lott had taken note of the pantry room, the supplies, and a neat little button on the wall that Grams showed them.

“When this is hit, a barrier cuts across the room.”

“A barrier?”

“There’s a timer,” Grams explained. “When the timer is done, so is the barrier. It’s in case of an attack. There’s a back door out this way, takes you to a series of tunnels, and then out through a hatch in a cave nearby.”

“Can anyone come in through that hatch?” Lott asked. If someone could enter without their knowledge, it wouldn’t be safe. They’d have to block it off somehow.

Grams shook her head.

“No. It’s got a heavy lock on the inside and is under several inches of dirt in the cave.”

“Ah. Okay.” Lott nodded, satisfied with that explanation.

“If it’s alright with you,” Sarah questioned slowly. “Could you take us to see it? The hatch and lock?”

They wandered off down the tunnels.

By the time they returned, the story in the other room was nearing the end. As the two of them came into the room, they heard Bue’s voice.

“Wait, so you never went back for it? At all? What about the box?”

“Don’t know?” Slooky said, shrugging.

“I’ve been thinking it for a while, but I am almost certain it was a test of some kind.”

“A test? Are you serious?”

“What?” Exel tapped his finger down on the armrest. “It makes sense, doesn’t it? Like they were prepared for us to come, like they were testing our abilities as a group.”

“And then what? We failed?”

He shrugged. “Well, it could be that they had some other mission planned, but since we weren’t able to complete that, they scrapped it.”

“Or?”

“Or,” he added, looking over to his left. “That’s why they got us another member.”

Everyone followed his line of sight, over to Bue, who’d joined their team shortly after.

“I mean,” Slooky tilted his head. “I guess that makes sense.”

“I have something else that we need to figure out.” Sarah interrupted, ready to switch the conversation topic over to something a bit more urgent.

“What is it?”

“In short, we don’t have enough food here.”

“What do you mean?”

“A couple days,” Lott supplied concisely. “We’ll be out.”

Together, they explained the situation in the bunker. The pantry itself wasn’t well-stocked. There were cans of random contents, of beans and fruit, of mushrooms and soup. Most of them, as Slooky added sheepishly, were probably far too old to eat, as they’d been here before he left.

And, as food from ground crops became unattainable, a new solution was found combining the resources and technology of both worlds. Plants, much like the planet had seen before, but in a new environment.

Underwater.

Like a fruitful lake, tomato plants and beans, wheat and rice. They could be seen, waving gently with the gentle current that kept the water pure and warm, a box at the end keeping algae from being formed across the top. Fish could be kept in the same water as a source of food for humans and nutrients for the plants.

With the drastic weather changes, the lack of rain showers, the cracked dry soil… they prevented the growth of plants out in the open.

Though, with those considerations, it was hard for lakes to remain in constant.

The bunker had an indoor lake, just as they described.

But with the variety, the number it produced, it might be enough to sustain her alone… yet for seven? Eight?

Lacking.

Severely.

“So, what you’re all saying.” Exel sighed, leaning back into the chair, slouching with a resigned look. “Is we can’t stay here.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“It was heavily implied.”

“We just need to find some pods and head back in, or we search out more of those animals we ran into before.”

“No. Not doing that second one,” Slooky said, shaking his head vehemently.

“Okay.” Exel lifted a hand. “If we can find pods, we should all go back in, right?” He looked around at them all, one after another. “Switch our inventories out.”

“Not necessarily,” Magnice countered, tapping his finger on his wheelchair.

“We have to make the assumption that someone might be waiting for us to in-pod,” Slooky added onto his words, understanding his train of thought.

Magnice readily agreed with the explanation.

“Our information is out there.”

“But, it’s not like they’ll know our location when we drop in,” Bue questioned, looking around. “Right?”

“If they spread out, one of them spots us, they’ll all be able to message and converge on location.” Lott folded her arms across her chest as she concisely added onto Slooky and Magnice’s words.

“There’s a chance they can find out. Fast,” Sarah concluded. “So, we have to be faster. Stay away from populated areas unless necessary. Disguise ourselves. Every measure in place. Do not engage unless necessary.”

If they showed their skills, it was more likely to gain notice by others. Not just anyone could take out people the way they did. They all nodded in agreement with their leader.

“That’s understandable, but we don’t even have pods.”

Everyone fell into silence at the words of their youngest, hitting the biggest problem on the head.

Slooky glanced around at the group, all in deep contemplation. He cleared his throat awkwardly and looked off to the side as he habitually did a fake itch behind his left ear.

“About that…”

“What?”

“Grams? Where’s the key?” He tilted his head back rather than turning it.

“Which one?” she called back to him from another room.

“I know you’re listening to us, so you know the one I’m meaning.”

“And you aren’t going to ask nicely?” she replied, appearing in the doorway with a key on a chain, dangling from her fingers.

“Can I have it, please?”

She laughed and moved her fingers to the rest of them, gesturing for them to follow her. They stumbled over themselves and the furniture as she turned the corner. Slooky was poking his tongue into his cheek as he lagged behind the rest of them. He already knew the way, knew how many were in that room. One for each of them… that is, for the original inhabitants of the bunker. His was always the one the farthest from the door.

“You… have pods? How?”

“Oh… that’s a long story,” Grams said, chuckling as she led the way.

“Care to share?”

Grams looked at Exel silently for a few seconds and then shook her head.

“No. I don’t think so.”

She smiled mysteriously as she unlocked the door and let it swing open, revealing three of the older style of pods. They looked to be originals, some of the first released.

Grams showed them the power source of the bunker, one that had enough spare energy to run the three pods simultaneously. It was the same sort of energy source used widely, even across the facilities, so they were familiar with it. Like a battery that could power a small town.

Their discussion reached a new peak as they began to speak about everything regarding a return in-pod. Bue traced the symbol for Fallacy on the side of the pod, the checkmark bisected with a line. They all called it an x-check.

One set of eyes watched the movement, feeling as though time were slowing, a sinking feeling in their gut, weighing them down as everyone else grew excited by the prospect of sustainability in connection with the pods.

They could barely hear a word that was being said.

Uncharacteristically quiet as the conversation evolved, they hung back, staring at the pods as if they would come alive and attack them. As the others were talking about taking shifts and the pairings of who should go in together, skills that complimented one another, they opened their mouth slowly.

Words flowed out, drawing the attention and alarm of everyone in the room.

“What?”

“Slook?”

“I said I’m not going back in,” Slooky said again, looking up defiantly, meeting their eyes with an expression of equal fury and fear. His words were resolute. “I won’t do it.”