David was struggling to catch up, despite the haze of drink he had an awful sinking feeling and Camila’s parting line reminding him that, unlike him, many of his raiders were not drinking and doing the rounds but standing guard.

  He abruptly twisted to break Candy’s grip on him and set her on the ground.

  “Ow, you’re hurting me! Davey! Why are you mad?”

  David shook his head to clear it. Then addressed his ex, using her full name, which he knew she hated.

  “Candice, you are not my girlfriend. You made that abundantly clear when you broke up with me. You broke up with ME remember? So, what the hell was all that?”

  “Davey, didn’t you get any of my messages? Babe, I mean surely you didn’t expect me to stay away after all this,” she gestured vaguely “happened?”

  “Candice, you made it abundantly clear that I was no fun and not someone you wanted ‘killing your buzz’ wasn’t it. Then whenever you got your buzz on and presumably didn’t find a willing partner you would send me harassing texts and call me even though you know I get up early for work.”

  David was feeling more and more sober by the second and a glance at his status showed that for some reason his system was responding to his situation now and his stamina and health were dropping steadily as his body started to combat the booze in earnest.

  Candy had pulled herself together and after a flash of guilt when he mentioned willing partners was now going on the offensive.

  “Davey, my cute silly man. You have this all wrong. I reached out to you, the fact that you didn’t reply doesn’t invalidate my feelings. So yes, I really do expect that you will do me the courtesy of responding. You certainly didn’t object to me pressing up against you…”

  Here she paused to look him meaningfully up and down.

  David just groaned. He was being reminded, again, of why he had been able to convince himself that Candy blowing out of his life was one of the two best days of their relationship.

  She was still his type, and she knew it, slim and curvy with bottle blonde hair and wide brown eyes you could lose yourself in. The appraising, almost challenging, look she used was one of the things he liked about her. She knew she looked good and had no compunctions about making it very clear when she wanted something. Which was flattering when you were that thing…

  Shaking his head now it was a lot clearer he growled.

  “Dammit Candice. You had to come bouncing up presenting what you want as a fait accompli. Again. You just fucked things up for me.”

  Here Candy got a dangerous expression on her face. “You mean with that skank? Don’t think I didn’t see what was going on. You are my boyfriend Davey, not some skinny Latina bitch’s plaything.”

  David had had enough at this point.

  “Fuck you Candice. I am NOT your boyfriend and behaving like that won’t change my mind. Quite the opposite. As for insinuating that, even if it were true, it would be none of your business. For your information Camila is a friend and someone I’ve risked my life fighting with. She just reminded me that I have responsibilities here beyond drinking and partying. If you need shelter, you can stay here but don’t expect me or the raiders to give you any special treatment.”

  He then turned and marched off in the direction Camila had taken. Candy snorted disbelievingly behind him but was wise enough not to push things even as she watched him go with cool appraising eyes.

  She spoke quietly so he barely heard her.

  “This isn’t over Davey, you mark my words.”

  By the time David had stormed clear across the fenced area he was calm enough and sober enough to stop and think. Nobody had spoken to him as he marched and given the number of people who shied out of his way he guessed he wasn’t doing a good job of keeping his emotions off his face.

  He was pissed.

  He needed to explain to Camila what was going on and he should, as she had implied, be making sure that the people on the perimeter were swapped out. That made his best bet to head for the gates and talk to the group there, as Camila was likely doing the same.

  To his mild surprise she wasn’t there, they also hadn’t seen her. It also turned out that they had all had a chance to eat and mourn their companions. In fact, none of them had been on duty when the celebrations started!

  Carl had been efficient in his absence it seemed. The older man was off in the crowd doing something now, so without anyone to speak with, he plunged back into the party and started looking for his friends.

  The first one he found was Charlie, who was sitting drinking with a group of people all around his own age. They had got their hands on a fifty-gallon drum from somewhere and had a fire burning inside it, despite the warmth of the night.

  Charlie spotted him and waved good naturedly as he approached. The whiff of pot from the circle combined with the large number of discarded empties showed everyone had been partying hard.

  “Hey dude! You should meet everyone! Uh, everyone this is David. He is our super badass leader I was telling you about. Uh David, this is everyone!”

  Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

  There were a chorus of greetings from the rest of the circle before the people who had been interrupted resumed their conversations. Which all focused on the system and potential builds. Given the goofy grin on Charlie’s face and the way he seemed to fit in David wasn’t surprised that was what the group was talking about. Another night he would have been all too happy to pull up a chair and join them. Instead he followed through on his recently remembered responsibilities.

  “Look, I don’t know if you thought on this, but we will need to relieve the guys on watch at some point, so don’t party too hard, OK?”

  “Sure man, after the toasts, I’ve just been having enough beer to keep things on a nice even level. You know?”

  One of the others gave a too loud stage whisper.

  “Don’t forget to tell him about the bud, it was loud!”

  The speaker giggled and David wondered with no small amount of worry if they might have indulged in something stronger. Shaking his head he addressed the group.

  “I’m not judging, do what you need to so you can unwind.”

  Then something occurred to him and he reached out and gripped Charlie’s shoulder as he chatted with the group, triggering an ability he hadn’t used before. As he did, he continued to listen as their conversations slowly resumed as he didn’t go all weird at the mention of weed. He didn’t join in as he had prompts to deal with.

  [SYSTEM RESOURCES ACCESSED. GRANTING MEDITATION SKILL. SUBSIDIZE ACQUISITION?]

  [SUBSIDY APPROVED SKILL ACQUIRED BY TARGET IN TEN SECONDS]

  [SUBSIDIZE INITIATION?]

  [SUBSIDY APPROVED. SKILL INITIATION COMPLETE IN TEN SECONDS.]

  David felt a rush of something, then his spiritual hearing detected a murmuring buzz, sounding almost like it was related to the Nath only crossed with the sort of sounds the barrier made. As the process finished

  “Just know that the raiders have some more powerful, let’s just say, magical… tools to deal with that sort of problem.”

  As he spoke, he felt Charlie tense then relax as his eyes unfocused. David was pretty sure he had a notification now too.

  “Dude! This is awesome. You didn’t say that you levelled your skill! You must have levelled your skill…”

  David nodded. “Yep, It seems that there is another benefit to maxing out the title as well. I can access the XP pool now. Still only a fraction of it but…”

  Charlie grinned. “Cool, I’ll definitely try this out and let you know how well it works. You just saved me like a thousand XP dude! Cool.”

  That last comment drew the attention of all the others gathered around the fire and started a round of questions. Before they got into things David excused himself though he did ask Charlie one last question.”

  “Have you seen Camila or the others? I’m looking for them.”

  Charlie nodded, clearly thinking David wanted to hand out goodies. “Umm. Yeah. I think I saw Carl heading over that way about twenty minutes ago…”

  Charlie gestured vaguely towards the back entrance they had cut in the fence.

  “Maybe try to find Katie over by the food, I think Sarah might be there too…”

  Nodding David headed off, deciding he should probably give the others Meditate too.

  David failed to find Sarah and Katie at the cooking area, though a helpful young man did tell him that they had gone off with some other girl who had walked up to them and wanted to talk.

  He found Mark helping in the food prep area and quickly discovered that he had no idea where the others had gone. He gratefully accepted Meditate and promised to tell the others that David was giving out goodies.

  After that David managed to track Carl down, still not having any luck finding the girls. The older man was with a full Radio team who had been positioned at the improvised gate between the mill and the streets surrounding the safe zone.

  “What’s up, man?”

  “Hi Carl, a couple of things. Well three, now I think of it. You have a minute?” David’s reply tumbled out as ideas outpaced words, maybe he wasn’t quite as sober as he thought...

  Carl nodded then spoke seriously.

  “I can spare you a minute, but you need to know that the Reverand will be saying some words for the fallen shortly. I imagine you will want to be there. We also need to light the pyres. Don’t know if Charlie can, or indeed should help with that but…”

  David nodded seriously. “I’ll be there. Have you seen the others?”

  Carl nodded. “I saw the girls ‘bout ten minutes ago. They were headed into the safe zone for something; told me they would be back but needed a little time and not to bother them.”

  The older man looked piercingly at David as he said this. “Seems something might have happened. You want to talk about it?”

  David just groaned. Gossip it seemed travelled at the speed of light.

  “Bloody hell,” David was distracted enough that he didn’t even notice Carl’s brief look of disapproval as he continued “look, that was the other thing I wanted to talk to you about, well one of them.”

  Carl just waited.

  “So, something stupid happened this evening. You know I’m single right?”

  “You mentioned something to that effect once I think.”

  “So, that was relatively new. My ex ended our relationship a few weeks ago, I was too boring apparently, she still used to drunk dial me though. So I ignored her, ended up blocking my phone at night, which is how I missed all the madness the night before everything happened.”

  “Yeah, why do I get the feeling that this isn’t ancient history?”

  “Because it turns out my ex is here. As in somewhere at this gathering right now. She kind of jumped me, literally.”

  “She jumped you as in she attacked you?” Carl’s face cleared for a moment then a new frown appeared.

  “No, as in jumped me and shoved her tongue down my throat. Claimed to all and sundry that we were still together. That our breakup was ‘all a misunderstanding’”

  Carl’s face went through a range of emotions too fast for David to interpret.

  “Ugh, let me guess. This scene was fairly public…”

  “Yeah, in front of Camila and probably dozens of other people. So, I need to make sure that the raiders don’t get the wrong idea. We are NOT together and I’m pretty sure she is just panicking about the whole end of the world. She’s hot, very hot in my opinion, but she really expects everything to be her way. She didn’t like it at all when I wouldn’t go out and blow all my money partying with her. That’s what led to the breakup.”

  “You want the raiders in general to know this isn’t a thing? Son, you are so screwed, best thing to do is tell everyone, not sure it will stick but go ahead and do that.”

  “What do you mean? I just don’t want her using a false connection to me to exploit everyone’s hard work. It took a while, but I guess I realized she wasn’t someone I really liked, well, because she isn’t the nicest person and I don’t want that kind of selfishness being part of what we build. You know?”

  Carl just shook his head.

  “David, you’re an idiot. Though if you can get all of that out, and there really isn’t anything else you want to say or do about the situation, I guess that will work. I’ll spread the word that this woman, what’s her name?”

  “Candice, though she goes by Candy.”

  “This Candy, isn’t related to you and that if she tries that crap on people are to treat her as a liar. That’s all I can really do for you.”

  David nodded, relief washing through him.

  “That’s perfect. Thanks Carl! Oh, before I forget I have something for you as well. Remember me mentioning Meditate? Well, I bought up all the stuff, and I can basically give it to a few people for free, then a lot at a discount.”

  Carl looked at him, then nodded his head as David transferred the skill, again using the safe zone resources to pay for the full cost.

  Once they were done, they chatted for a little longer before moving off to join the gathering at the pyres.