17 – Voice

“This can’t be real,” Eduardo was saying as Andy approached the gate. “That means something like three billion people died yesterday! Three billion!” He threw his hands up and turned to stomp toward his trailer. He wasn’t the only one freaking out. Andy saw several people in tears, and even Bernice was sitting on the gravel, her head cradled in her hands.

He didn’t blame them; he’d spent a few silent moments furiously rereading the System message, trying to find some indication that his initial understanding was wrong. It didn’t look like it, though. Unless the System was flat-out lying, it sounded like things were just as bad or worse in the rest of the world as they’d been in the trailer park on the first day. As he’d finally wrapped his head around the number of deaths, Andy had been forced to confront the second part of the System’s message: it was going to allow other species to settle on Earth.

As he approached the gate, listening to the conversations, it didn’t sound like everyone had come to grips with that second fact. They were all hung up on the thirty-seven percent reduction in population. Again, Andy couldn’t blame them. Many were missing loved ones, and the odds weren’t good that they’d all be found. If that many died on the first day, how many would be dead after a week? He supposed the death rate would decline. The mutations the day before had meant that a lot of people had suddenly found themselves confronted by hostile monsters.

People were catching on now, though, right? Like the trailer park—they’d secured it and knew they only had a few days to prepare for wandering, hostile people or creatures. With luck, the people alive in the park would still be alive in a week’s time. It had to be like that in other places, didn’t it? He wondered what Tucson was like. What about the air force base? Had the military fared better? Thinking about the city, he wondered if there were rampaging groups of monsters. Were all mutated people monsters? Were all “monsters” hostile?

Andy had nothing but questions and no answers. He saw Lucy leaning against the gate and walked through the crowd toward her. He’d only taken a couple of steps before Tucker grabbed his shoulder. “Andy! Man, did you read that shit? What do you think?” To Andy’s dismay, the group of ten or so residents grew quiet, waiting to hear his answer.

“Um, I don’t know.” He raised his voice a little and looked past him to the crowd. “I think the first day will probably be the worst, but hopefully, other people are getting a grip on things like we are. Our park is safe for now, so we just need to keep figuring stuff out. We need to prepare. Lucy and I are going for the kids at the school. Hopefully, some of the missing parents and, you know, other people who were at work will make it back today.”

Tanya, a woman in her thirties whose husband was missing, pointed over Andy’s shoulder, and he turned to see thick columns of black smoke rising into the morning sky on the horizon. “The city’s burning.”

Andy couldn’t argue with her assessment, so he didn’t try. “I guess we’re lucky we weren’t in a population center. Your husband will be trying to get back to you, Tanya, so don’t focus on the smoke; he’s probably already on his way, well out of those fires.” Andy looked past her to the group. “We have to try to stay positive, you guys; otherwise, we might as well lie down and give up. I’m not ready to die.”

Tucker shook his head, his eyes full of despair. “Man, but what about—shit, man! My family’s all in fucking Seattle! How the hell will I ever see them again?”

Andy sighed and shrugged. He didn’t have a good answer. Everyone was still staring at him, though, so he tried to say something positive. “My mom’s in Florida. I get it. She might be dead, but I’m going to choose to believe she found some neighbors like you all. I’m going to choose to believe she’s surviving, and I’ll find her eventually.”

Lucy stepped away from the gate and approached him with her notepad. She held it up, and he read a single word: Magic.

Andy nodded, and as he took a breath to speak, he realized more people were approaching. Eduardo had come back with his wife, and James was leading three others up the lane. He turned and saw another five or six coming from other directions. He couldn’t wrap his head around why they were all listening to him. He’d won the System’s stupid competition, but that didn’t mean they had to consider him the leader. He was only twenty-three. Most of these people had a decade or more on him. Nevertheless, there they all were, staring at him, waiting for his words.

He took hold of Lucy’s wrist and held her hand with the notepad high. “Lucy just reminded me of something. We’re suffering. People are dying all over the place. Some damn invasions are coming our way in about a month. Despite all that, we’re living in a new world. There’s magic now. In one day, I became an expert spear fighter. James is learning how to craft things. I know many of you have gained levels and learned skills and spells. Think of that! Spells!

“So, yeah. Shit is bad out there. The System did a number on Earth, and it’s unfair and horrible that so many people have lost their lives, but we aren’t without hope. I know we can survive if we can rally and learn everything possible. Now, I don’t know what happened to that group of parents who went to the school, but those kids are waiting for someone to come and bring them home. Lucy and I will work on that. What can you all do to help our community?”

To his surprise, Tucker spoke up first. “I’m going to dig some channels for the spring. I’ll make a sluice gate to divert water to gardens or out to the wash when we’re not using it.”

“Oh, excellent!” Eduardo said, clapping him on the shoulder. “I’ll help.”

“I’m gonna keep crafting spears and shit,” James announced.

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

No one else spoke immediately, so Andy nodded and thumped his spear on the ground. “Everyone needs to have a weapon. Make a spear or find an axe or a bat.” He looked at Bernice, and when he caught her eyes, he asked, “Can you organize a group to go around to the empty trailers? We need to gather food. I hate to say it, but for now, don’t you all think we should have a central stockpile and do some rationing? Just until we find more supplies?”

Brian, the guy with the missing wife, nodded. “Yeah, we should. I’m going to walk down to Redington Road and head toward the city. If survivors are trying to get home, I want to help.”

Andy stepped closer to him and put his hand on his shoulder, knowing better than to get between a man and his missing wife. “Take a weapon and see if you can get anyone to go with you.”

Andy wanted to get out of there, not for any good reason, though he had some of those, but because he was feeling weird about standing there, telling people what to do. “Okay, Lucy and I are heading out. Keep an eye on the gate. Maybe someone can make a watch schedule.” After a brief pause, he added, “Please.”

“We got you, Andy,” Violet said, smiling as she pulled her long black hair into a ponytail. “Lucy, be careful out there. Don’t be afraid to use that bow.”

Lucy nodded, ducking her head and pulling her hood up. Andy followed her through the gate, then led the way down the long gravel road. He tried not to look at the smoldering bonfire, but he did, and that was when he realized Omar was out there, feeding more branches and dried brush to the flames. He was making sure the bodies were thoroughly burned. Andy lifted an arm, waving as they passed, and the older man nodded, removing and waving his blue University of Arizona baseball cap.

“He’s a good guy,” Andy observed, glancing at Lucy to see if she had anything to say. She just nodded, her eyes focused on their surroundings, scanning the road ahead and the desert on either side. Andy felt himself start to perspire, but now and then, a cool breeze would kick up out of the desert to the east. “It’s too cool. I mean, it’s hot, but it’s too cool for Tucson in June.”

Lucy didn’t respond, but she took an arrow out of her quiver and nocked it, holding her bow loose but ready. “You hear something?” Andy asked. The sun was bright, and he had to squint, looking around, but he didn’t see anything moving—not even the little rabbits he often saw as he rode his bike up and down that road. In fact, the world was quiet—quieter than he could ever remember it. On even the laziest days, you could usually hear the traffic humming down Tanque Verde or off to the west on Catalina Highway.

Lucy stopped walking and pointed into the desert to the east. She readied her bow, so Andy crouched into a fighting stance, peering past the creosotes and cholla cacti. He didn’t see anything, but after a few tense seconds of silence, he heard the pounding thuds of hooves on dirt. It was faint, and he was impressed that Lucy had picked up the sound so much earlier than he had.

The thuds grew louder and louder, and then Lucy’s bow twanged. A tremendous roaring bellow tore the silence to shreds as a black-furred minotaur exploded through a cholla, sending its spine-covered segments flying in a hundred different directions. The creature—could it really be a minotaur?—bellowed again, its torso utterly plastered with cacti as Lucy fired another arrow. Andy watched it hit home in the minotaur’s stomach.

The creature—a damn man-shaped bull—fixed its bloodshot eyes on Lucy, kicked the dirt with its hooved feet, and charged. Andy stepped in front of her, putting his spear between himself and the eight-foot-tall monster. Lucy’s bow twanged again, another arrow sprouted from the minotaur’s chest, and then it was on them, barreling like a berserking, rabid linebacker.

Andy’s spear training asserted itself, and he planted the shiny, razor-sharp spearhead into the center of the monster’s chest and let its momentum do the work for him. As the spear punched through its thick furry hide, the impact drove Andy back, but he used his feet almost automatically, maintaining his distance, keeping the length of his spear between them. Meanwhile, the large, double-bladed spearhead did its work, opening a hole the monster couldn’t ignore.

Its rage was palpable, and its furious charge drove Andy backward, his feet sliding in the gravel as he continued to try to brace himself. Something in his weird, dreamlike memories of spear training came to him, and he remembered learning about just this sort of thing—trying to kill a beast that was far more powerful than yourself. With the spear in the creature’s body, you had to be smart and use its strength and momentum to guide the point into something vital.

So, as the minotaur charged, Andy stepped to his left and jerked the spear haft that way, pivoting the embedded blade to the right, slashing through the monster’s innards in an attempt to cut something that would slow it down. The creature bellowed, and hot, saliva-laced breath washed over Andy, but then it stumbled to its bovine knees, and Andy’s backpedaling drew the spear out of its flesh. The minotaur gasped, wheezed, and toppled, great gouts of thick, bright-red blood pumping out of the wound.

Lucy came running, another arrow ready, but the monster was done for. Its breathing was shallow and ragged, and its blood was still flowing out like water from a hose spigot. After just a few seconds, it gargled a final, weak gasping groan, and then it was still.

***Congratulations, Andy! You’ve slain an elite enemy and gained another level in your Umbral Warden class. You’ve been awarded an improvement point!***

Lucy tugged his sleeve, and Andy looked at her. She held up her notepad: Thanks!

“Nah, thanks for noticing it.” He shrugged. “If I didn’t know it was coming, I would’ve been toast.”

She wrote something else: Teamwork.

Andy smiled, nodding, then turned and looked back the way they’d come. How far had they gone? A mile? The school was probably five miles further to the northwest, and they’d go through at least one suburban neighborhood. How many more things would they have to fight off?

Speaking of things—Andy looked at the corpse. Had it been a man or a bull before the mana mutated it? Lucy’s vacant expression distracted him from his musings, and he asked, “Did you level?”

She held up a finger, nodding. Andy looked at his status page while he waited, wondering if he should spend some of the four points he was holding. That damn minotaur had been strong. With a mental shrug and the reassuring thought that he couldn’t really go wrong by improving himself, he put two of his points into strength, raising it to eight.

“Ack!” he gasped as all his muscles seemed to contract at once. “Oof!” He stumbled forward as his thighs spasmed and his glutes convulsed. “Oh, damn!” he groaned as his back arched and his shoulders seemed to swell, stretching the fabric of his T-shirt taut. As the crazy, painful, awkward spasms faded and he began to get control of himself, Andy heard a soft, raspy laughing sound, and he spun to glare at Lucy.

She was leaning forward, hands on knees, laughing at him. He was embarrassed and a little annoyed for a second, then he realized something: he’d never heard Lucy make a sound, even when she’d been crying. He stepped toward her, noticing that his jeans were definitely tighter around his thighs, and when she looked up, he couldn’t help grinning as she continued to laugh—her joy was contagious. “Hey, I’ve never heard you laugh before.”

She gasped for breath, then, standing up straight and inhaling deeply, she looked him in the eyes and whispered hoarsely, “I found my voice.”