Barry shrugged. "It was just an idea."
As much as she wanted to ignore the rift and head home, Ellen said, "We need to check the area."
Her friends groaned.
She led them towards the rift. It was a short walk, and she planned to make their search even shorter.
She reached the edge of the dirt road and froze.
Monsters started pouring out of the rift. They were black creatures with lanky bodies, white heads and dark eyes. Their backs arched forward, their upper halves supported by long scythes attached to their arms.
Five popped out at first, then five more soon after. They lingered in place, seemingly unaware of their surroundings, until Barry cast a sword at one. He split the monster's head in half. It collapsed to the ground and bled out into the dirt.
"At least my aim is getting better," Barry quietly boasted.
Ellen took out her knife and waited. It was a large group of monsters, but her friends had stood up to the giant staff wielding monster without issue and she had confidence they'd stand up to this group as well.
The monsters raced forward, and her friends immediately ducked behind her and stayed there. Ellen glanced back at them. The innocent smiles they gave her made her want to turn her knife on them, but there was no time.
She faced forward and summoned her shield. A slew of magic scythes was coming for her. There was at least a dozen, or maybe two or three, but it didn't matter. Her shield sent them all away. It sent the next two waves away as well, and the others after that.
Where her friends would be without her Ellen couldn't imagine, but she enjoyed their company too much to think about it.
"What are we waiting for?" Barry asked. "It's like Kilroy said: they're not going to hesitate to kill us, so we can't hesitate either."
"Her shield isn't going to hold forever," Ludendi said. "We need to do something before they break through it."
"So let's do something," Trevor said.
They didn't do anything. Ellen wanted to shout at them, but her shield didn't let her move.
Six more monsters dropped out of the rift. They quickly regained their balance then joined in the assault.
"They're not looking at us," Ludendi said. "We should pick off a few while they're distracted."
Barry and Trevor both agreed.
But still, none of them moved, and still, Ellen wanted to shout at them. Monsters had numbers and power but not much else. They could kill a dozen or more before the horde noticed them.
The assault continued. Between the thick stream of magic weapons and the flickers of energy her shield let off each time it repelled a scythe, she couldn't see anything.
"Are you sure they're not going to turn to us?" Trevor asked. "I doubt they're completely blind."
"We should be able to surprise a few of them," Ludendi said, "but... who knows they'll do after they see us."
Four more monsters dropped out of the rift. Ellen tried to frown. The existing group was already inching towards her. It was only a matter of time before one moved in close enough to take a swing at her, then she'd have to drop her shield. Their mission was going to come to an unfortunate end of her friends didn't act soon.
"We have to do something," Barry said, his voice tense. "Let's just pick a few off then hide. Ellen probably isn't going anywhere."
He stepped out into the open, his shield raised up to his face, and blindly casted a sword into the horde. It bounced off a scythe in midair. Both sailed off course and hit nothing.
Barry leaned towards cover, but he didn't hide. Instead he kept attacking. Ellen would've smiled if she could move.
Ludendi and Trevor joined Barry, and together they casted wave after wave of swords and knives and poleaxes into the horde of monsters. Most of their weapons crashed into other weapons and exploded into broken chunks of metal, but some reached their target, and slowly the monsters started dropping dead.
When only six remained, the monsters stopped casting weapons and darted forward.
Ellen dropped her shield and inched backwards. The monsters had much better reach than her. A melee battle would not end well for her. It was all up to her friends now.
Her friends backed away as well, but they kept casting weapons at the group until only one monster remained.
The last one approached Ellen head-on. It raised a scythe at her, but Barry cut its arm off before it could swing. Trevor hacked off the other arm a second later, then Ludendi jammed both her knives into its head. The monster collapsed dead to the ground.
Her friends collapsed right after.
"Get up!" Ellen told them. They weren't safe. If the rift could spit one horde of monsters out at them, it could easily spit another out.
Her friends leapt back to their feet and joined her side.
But the rift stayed calm, and after five tense minutes where no new monsters appeared, Ellen concluded, "I think it's over."
Her friends let out sighs of relief.
"Monsters aren't very smart," she added. "They usually focus on the first thing they see and chase it until its dead. You should've started attacking them as soon as they noticed me."
"Thanks for the lecture, Kilroy," Ludendi scoffed. "I know Kilroy was your first crush, but you don't have to talk like him."
Ellen turned away in embarrassment. She didn't have a crush on Kilroy. That whole incident was just one of several misunderstandings between her and Ludendi.
Her eyes landed on Barry, who also looked quite embarrassed, and she kept turning.
"I was just kidding!" Ludendi said. "That was the first horde we've ever fought together. You have to give us a break."
"We'll embarrass ourselves less in the future," Trevor promised. "Do you still want to search?"
Ellen shook her head. "I don't think we'll find anything. Somebody probably tried to open that rift to escape, but they didn't make it in time."
"Let's go home then," Ludendi said. Barry and Trevor both agreed.
Ellen led them forward. She walked fast. The sky was getting darker by the minute and the fortress was still a ways off.
"I never knew monsters could use rifts," Trevor said. "It makes sense, but I wasn't expecting it."
"What was your trip here like?" Ludendi asked Ellen. "Did any monsters ever chase you across dimensions?"
Ellen described her journey to the Monad Fortress while they walked. Her friends listened intently, until she explained how most of her days were spent opening one rift then resting until she could open another, at which point they lost interest. They looked like they might fall asleep on their feet when she started talking about how she ran away from just about every monster she came across.
Nighttime set in near the end of her story. The fires atop the fortress's towers provided a tiny hint of light, but the plains were nearly pitch black.
"I hope there's nothing out here now," Barry said with a nervous chuckle. "How do you fight monsters in the dark?"
"You don't," Ellen said. "We shouldn't be walking around right now... but the fortress is really close."
"It would be an awful shame if we survived all that just to die out here," Trevor said.
Ellen watched the dark plains for any hint of movement, but no more monsters appeared, and after an hour of treading through darkness, occasionally drifting off the road and stumbling into the grass, they reached the fortress.
Two soldiers outside welcomed them back and urged them inside. Two more just passed the entrance did the same.
Aside from the groups of soldiers at the entrance, neither of which Ellen remembered being there when she first arrived, the fortress looked the same as always.
Kilroy's face lit up when they entered the training hall. "I'm so glad you made it back! Just set your supplies down anywhere and I'll take care of them later."
Ellen took off her scarf and placed it back inside Barry's backpack. She was sad to see it go, but she had no doubt there'd be more scarves in the future.
"Did you see any other tea
ms while you were out?" Kilroy asked.
"I saw one on our first day," Trevor said. "They were ahead of us for a while, but I lost track of them after a few hours."
"They probably had a different route than you," Kilroy said. He leaned outside the training hall. "Give me a minute. Someone from the special forces wants to hear your story. This is... standard."
It didn't sound standard at all, but Ellen didn't say anything.
Her friends looked uneasy. They probably felt the same.
Brendon entered the training hall. "So one team finally returned." He looked to Ellen. "It makes sense."
"Are there teams that didn't make it back?" Ludendi asked.
"We have one or two new teams that haven't returned yet." Kilroy quickly added, "It's their first time in the wilderness. I'm sure they just wandered off course."
"Let's hear your story," Brendon said. "I want to know what it was like out there."
Ellen gave him an overview of their mission. They had a peaceful first day, they found a dead man's body on their second day, they were ambushed by a monster during lunch on their third day, then they faced a small horde of monsters on their fourth.
Kilroy covered his mouth with his hands as she spoke. Afterwards he muttered a quiet "Oh no."
"I wouldn't expect to see your other teams return," Brendon told him. "The Fortress Brigade has to change. Don't send any new teams out until you hear from Galvin."
Ellen felt uneasy. The dread that had been coming and going over the course of their mission returned. The dimension wasn't completely safe, she knew that already, but now it was starting to kill off whole teams of its inhabitants.
"How many others were out there?" Ludendi asked. "Are they all... are they really dead?"
"I thought it was strange how that other group disappeared so suddenly," Trevor said. "I didn't think they were..." His eyes shot open. "We followed the same path they used. If we'd left a few minutes earlier-"
"What's going to happen to us?" Barry asked. "Are you shutting down the Fortress Brigade?"
"It probably won't be shut down," Brendon said. "If anything, we'll start placing newcomers with experienced groups instead of sending them out on their own." He grumbled, "It's what we should've been doing since the beginning."
"I do have another mission for your team lined up," Kilroy said cautiously. "It starts the day after tomorrow. You'll be working with a more experienced team to protect a group of miners. Normally I'd give you more time to rest, but we've had a lot of-" He gulped. "We've had a lot of early retirements lately."
"It's going to be harder than your last mission," Brendon added. "If you don't like danger then quit now."
Ellen stayed quiet. Apathy crept through her body, numbing her all over. The danger she thought she'd escaped from, the danger her guardian had wanted her to avoid, was catching up to her. It was only a matter of time before something truly awful found her.
"How much worse can it be?" Ludendi asked. "We handled that horde without too many problems. If we have a more experienced group with us, it should be even easier."
"It's never going to be easy," Brendon said. "If you think you're safe it's only because you're not paying enough attention."
Ludendi startled, then frowned. "I'm going to stay! There are a lot of evil things out in the wilderness. We saw them ourselves, then we chopped them up without taking so much as a scratch. We can do the same thing again!"
Brendon gave her a nod of approval. "And what about you other three?"
"I'll stay," Barry said plainly. "We made a lot of mistakes and we still managed to make it back alive. Things will get a lot smoother now that we've figured out what we're doing."
"I feel like we've had this conversation before," Trevor said. "I'm sure we can handle this mission, especially if we have help."
"Of course, we'll need our shield if we want to survive," Ludendi said.
Ludendi was referring to her, Ellen knew. She hoped her friends of all people would call her by her name rather than her talent, but given that her shield had saved them all earlier, she couldn't blame them.
"I'll stay," she said, her voice depressed. "This is still the safest dimension anywhere. I want it to stay that way, even if it's impossible."
Brendon gave her a pat on the shoulder. It was a strangely gentle pat. It caught her by surprise.
"It's a shame things turned out this way," Brendon said. "Do the best you can, and the peace will last a little bit longer."
It was very strange hearing him sympathize with her after all the times he'd made fun of her, but regardless, his words were comforting.
"Don't forget their advances," Brendon said. "And give this a read through. It's a report from a consultant Lindsey and I hired. It'll make a few things a lot more clear." He handed Kilroy a folded up note then left.
"I'm sure this is the part of your mission you've been waiting for," Kilroy said with a grin. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out four jingling pouches.
"No, not really," Ludendi said. "Those coins are pretty useless. I gave away the last ones I had."
"I haven't found a single person who wants them," Barry said.
"We might not be able to spend them anywhere," Trevor said, "but they should make good trophies-"
Kilroy shushed them and shoved a pouch full of coins into their hands. "Your next mission starts the day after tomorrow. You'll have to meet with another team before you leave, so try to get moving early. In the meantime, make sure you rest up."
Ellen stuffed her coins into her pocket. There was only one place she knew of that accepted them, and it was a place she didn't plan to visit again.
Ludendi shot her a wicked grin. "I already know where you're heading later."
"Are you coming with me again?" Ellen countered, and Ludendi immediately shut up.
She was exhausted, and so were her friends. They separated and she returned home.
The smell of smoke woke her up the next morning. She rose out of bed to find Ludendi with a dozen candles already made.
"We wouldn't have survived our last mission if you weren't there," Ludendi said. "I'll buy you as much monster meat as you want."
Ellen waited while Ludendi packed up her candles, then walked with her across the fortress. All but one section of the sky was clear and blue.
"I really hate that thing," Ludendi grumbled, glancing up at the dark tear. "Why can't it give us a break?"
They had more than enough opportunities to worry about the sky. "Let's get something to eat," Ellen insisted.
She let her nose guide her to the monster meat vendor. "I thought you'd been eaten by monsters!" he greeted her.
"They weren't big enough to eat us," Ellen said, "but they did try really hard to cut us apart."
The man gave her a curious look, then smiled. "I have plenty of meat today!"
After the trading was done, Ellen ended up with four full skewers of meat. It tasted even better than she remembered. Her first bite caused her eyes to water up.
"It does taste good," Ludendi said, "but you don't have to cry. Or maybe you're sad because we won't be able to eat like this for another week."
It was some of both, but Ellen was too busy devouring her skewer to speak. She finished the first one in just a few seconds and the next three soon after.
"We have the rest of the day off," Ludendi said afterwards. "You have plenty of time to finish what you were about to start with Barry."
Remembering that incident left her feeling uneasy. "We weren't about to start anything," Ellen mumbled. "I'm not sure what he was planning."
"I saw him pressing his hips against yours," Ludendi said with a snicker. "I think it's pretty obvious what he was planning."
Ellen's face warmed up. Had Ludendi and Trevor been spying on them? She hoped not.
"You should at least talk to him. He spent our whole mission sweet talking you, and I didn't see you telling him to stop. Besides, what's the worst than could happen?"
Nothing came to mind, and before Ellen could argue, Ludendi started walking away.
"I still need to get some supplies," she said. "I'm sure we'll run into each other later."
Ellen drifted towards Barry's house. Already her heart was speeding up, and she couldn't imagine why. They were simply going to talk and nothing more. There was little reason for her to be so anxious.
A figure darted out from a nearby alleyway. It was quicker than any monster she'd seen before. It had its hands on her before she could blink, then it spun her around and embraced her.
"It's been so long since I've seen you, Ellen!" Mareem said. "I was starting to think you didn't make it back from your mission."
She kissed Ellen once on each of her cheeks, then held her close.
"Were you planning on visiting me again? I thought you really enjoyed yourself last time. I'd be awfully sad if I never saw you again."
"I m-might visit," Ellen stammered, hoping to appease her. Mareem had such a sweet and charming attitude that the mere thought of turning her down made her feel awful.
"Don't tell anyone I said this," Mareem whispered, "but you're one of my favorite customers. I might let you stay the whole night next time."
She released Ellen, handed her a coin purse Ellen only now noticed had been lifted from her pocket, then gave her a wink and wandered off.
Ellen hurried off with her head down. There were others on the street who'd stopped to watch Mareem hold and kiss her. She didn't know what sort of ideas Mareem's display had inspired in them and she didn't care to find out.
She reached Barry's house after a short walk. Him and his parents lived in a small wooden house surrounded by other small wooden houses in the northern part of the fortress.
Her heart had steadied while she spoke to Mareem, but it sped up again as she approached the front door. She raised her hand to knock, then paused.
Her and Barry were friends, and while something more could emerge in the future, right now they had a mission they needed to focus on. On top of that, the future of the Monad Fortress was very uncertain. The only thing she knew for sure was that she'd soon be facing a great deal of danger. She couldn't afford to be distracted or encumbered.
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