Richard finally learned how to shave with his dagger. It felt like its own moment of accepting his new life. It was also something that didn’t involve farming, because farming had taken up everything.

  That first morning after the attack, Richard got a report from Elwyndor about how they needed to gather all the rotten plants out before the end of the day if they hoped to stay on top of the corruption. There was also a report about how Dmitri’s health hadn’t changed, but Lucy was still hard at work. Richard knew he should trust Lucy, who knew infinitely more than him about health, but he couldn’t help but remember how dead Dmitri looked. He was happy that it was Lucy and not him that was tasked with this impossible job. Then again, since it was Lucy, Richard had a flicker of hope that she might actually pull it off. She was driven enough. He had seen Amrynn loading up two trays of food at mealtimes and leave for the healers’ building. Richard didn’t see Amrynn return because he was back at the farm by that point, but he assumed Amrynn stayed long enough to make sure Lucy ate something.

  Richard waited to hear good news about Dmitri. He worked on the farm, pulling out plants and gathering the black muck into a pile. He slept on the floor of the silo with everyone else. Richard did everything Elwyndor asked. It was on the fourth day after the attack, when Elwyndor reported things would slowly return to normal, that Richard realized they hadn’t gotten an update on Dmitri since the first day. He also asked Marcus to teach him how to shave with a dagger. He didn’t realize how badly he wanted to leave with Marcus, Savannah, and Elias until he saw them slipping away in the dawn light to gather supplies. Things might slowly be going back to normal, except for his actually taking part in the class he chose.

  Elwyndor still required Claw to change into a bee for half an hour every time he could. Despite no plants to pollinate, Elwyndor clearly wanted him to strengthen his ability. Richard got horrible flashbacks hearing Claw’s buzzing noise, as any bug noise made his skin crawl at this point. But he forced himself to get over it. Claw’s bumblebee noises didn’t make nearly the aggressive noises that the locusts had, nor as long or as loud. Claw would buzz around near everyone’s head so as not to get accidentally stepped on, practicing his quick zipping patterns.

  Richard felt Dmitri’s absence. He hadn’t realized how much he had been expecting to tell Dmitri about his strange situation until the man was no longer available. Even though Richard still could not banish from his mind the image of Dmitri’s body on the ground, Richard hoped that the leader of base two was still alive. No one else seemed to make any moves toward campaigning to be the next leader. Order took leadership of base two as something all inhabitants should vote toward, then she gave the leader the fourth skill tree. Richard wondered what would happen if someone like him tried to be a leader. Someone who already had a fourth skill tree. Considering Order gave the impression that she wanted to kill him, he doubted she would give Richard the opportunity to become leader.

  If Richard had thought that he would eventually help with farming more than his chosen scavenger class, he would have grumbled. The reality, though, was that everyone was once again in survival mode. Eddie was right. They got their physical numbers cut in half, then their food. They could not afford another incident of bad luck.

  Richard gathered the muck into a pile, wondering what they were planning on doing with it all. He assumed muck like this couldn’t be picked up and buried anywhere because of how dangerous the spreading factor was. Amrynn was deep in her own potion making trying to neutralize this somehow.

  The days blurred together, and Richard began counting them by how long it had been since he had heard updates from Dmitri. Then, one morning, Felix gave a soul-ripping scream, and everyone quietly watched as Britanny carried Felix to the healers. A day after Felix had his Callro experience, Richard was given a new job. Other farmers were gathering goo from buildings and putting it in piles, and Richard had to carry the goo and add it to the enormous pile in the center of the farmlands. Richard had a wheelbarrow, filling it up as much as he could before wheeling it away. It was monotonous work, and yet Richard could not deny its importance. He was working mostly with Walter, and they were quietly getting their work done.

  Richard, though, was falling behind. He knew he shouldn’t feel bad about it since Walter was at a much stronger level, but he saw it every time the pile grew while he left to drop his measly wheelbarrow load into the other pile. Richard brought the empty wheelbarrow up as Walter straightened, studying the sky. “Alright, I think we’re at a good stopping spot for lunch.” Walter glanced at Richard, then froze, his eyes widening. “Whoa.”

  Richard frowned, checking what was left in the pile. Sure, it seemed like he had hardly put a dent in it, but he was certain it would have looked so much bigger without his help.

  “Scratch that, you better go see Lucy.”

  Richard’s frown deepened. “What? Why?”

  Eddie walked past, glanced at Richard’s face, then started chuckling as he walked toward the mess hall. Richard reached up and touched his face, then immediately pulled back as his face felt like it was burning.

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  “What the hell?” Richard asked.

  “Sunburn. It is summer, after all,” Walter said.

  “Is it?” Richard assumed he had arrived during the springtime, though he couldn’t feel the weather getting any warmer. Perhaps that was another benefit of the system. A sort of benefit that made it hard for him to realize his face had gotten burned.

  “Yeah, better go get your face checked out before the pus leaks.” Walter gestured toward Richard’s face before he turned around and left for the mess hall.

  Richard sighed, then went toward the healer’s. The closer he got, the more concerned he felt. He was going in for a sunburn, while Lucy was busy trying to save Dmitri’s life and care for Felix. This was such a small problem. Just to be sure, he touched his face again and felt the heat radiating off it.

  Was he supposed to knock at the door? He didn’t remember what he had done the other times he needed Lucy’s help, mainly because he was too injured to notice what anyone did. He was pretty sure knocking wasn’t necessary, so he opened the door and walked in.

  “Lucy?” Richard asked. It seemed like the right thing to do. He didn’t hear her answer; he just walked further in. It was a bit too quiet. “Lucy?”

  He entered the main room with the beds. Dmitri was in the bed closest to Lucy’s desk, with Felix sleeping in the far bed. The leader of base camp two still looked as dead as when Reggie brought him in after the attack. Lucy lifted her head and saw Richard, and she gave a start.

  “Dammit, Richard, you scared me.” She clutched her heart, closing her eyes as she took a few deep breaths.

  “Oh, I’m sorry.” He had tried to speak louder, but he wasn’t sure what that would have done to Dmitri. Lucy placed her thumb and finger over her nose as she breathed in deeply, closing her eyes. Richard studied her closely. “You okay?”

  “Fine, fine.” She dropped her hand and opened her eyes. She raised both eyebrows as she studied his face. “You? You got a sunburn before the newbies? What do they have you doing?”

  Richard shrugged. “Gathering muck and putting it in a pile.”

  Lucy focused on the papers on her desk, trying to organize them. “That’ll do it. How would you like to restore your skin? Shower? Or a soaked cloth on your entire body for ten minutes?”

  “Uh, shower, please.”

  “Good choice.” Lucy tapped her glasses and examined him. “Sun got you good in your neck and shoulders. Make sure the water hits your face the longest. Can you set up the shower?”

  “Yeah, I can figure it out.”

  Lucy was already heading to the back room. “Good.”

  Richard moved a bed over and got to work building the shower. Lucy returned, placing a bottle on her desk as she went back to her notes. Richard couldn’t help but study Dmitri again. He had a blanket covering his lower half. His chest wasn’t rising or falling, and his lips were still tinged blue. Lucy had her glasses on, pouring bottles into a larger pot.

  “Is he, um…” Richard didn’t know if he should break Lucy’s concentration, so he trailed off.

  “His brain is still lighting up with activity, so I am taking it.” Lucy pulled out a cloth from the pot, soaking wet, and draped it over Dmitri’s chest. Richard watched, eyes wide, as Dmitri gave one steady rise and fall of his chest before he went back to not breathing. Lucy was taking fast notes, her hand flying across the paper as she kept studying Dmitri and the information her glasses gave her.

  Richard finished putting the shower together and didn’t dare interrupt Lucy’s note-taking. He simply waited on the bed next to the shower as she finished up the notes. It wasn’t until he stopped hearing the pencil scratch that he glanced over and noticed Lucy’s head was bobbing, her eyes closed and her mouth slightly open. Richard cleared his throat. “Lucy?”

  Her head dropped, and she breathed in, her eyes opening. She stared at Richard, then rubbed her eyes. “Right. Here you go.” Lucy lifted the bottle. “Stick that in the water portion.”

  Richard stood up and walked over to her, taking the bottle. “Do you need help?”

  “No.”

  “I don’t believe you. When’s the last time you got any sleep?”

  “Just now. I’m fine.”

  “That won’t be enough.”

  Lucy raised a hand as though to stop Richard’s concerns, but it was her glare that stopped him from speaking. “I don’t accept help from people. Call it a curse, but it’s simply who I am. Thank you for waking me up, but I’m fine.”

  “I can stay here while you slee—”

  “No!” Lucy sucked in a deep breath, then let it out. “Absolutely not. I can’t sleep around people. I don’t know why.” Lucy’s hands shook as she pinched the bridge of her nose with her fingers again. She winced, giving her head a quiet shake. Richard stared, his brows furrowing. Lucy was taking deep, steadying breaths, forcing her fingers to trace the edge of an empty bottle. It took Richard another moment to realize she was calming herself down from a panic attack.

  “Ghost of the past?” Richard asked.

  “Yeah.” Lucy grabbed her elbow, giving her shoulder a roll. “I don’t know why, but waking up from a deep sleep with someone else in the room makes me—” She forced herself to stop. She almost looked guilty for saying this much to him. Richard’s heart sank as he remembered what Chaos had said. Lucy had been murdered in her past life. Chaos admitted to sometimes lying, but that also meant he sometimes told the truth. As Richard prepared himself for his shower, he wondered if Chaos had told the truth about Lucy. And if she had been murdered…

  Richard watched Lucy again as he turned on the shower. She had her hand stuffed in her hair as she picked up where she had left off writing her notes. It wasn’t healthy what she was doing to herself, but Richard also knew that the other leaders were looking out for her. He finished his shower, and Lucy gave him the clear to go back to work. Before he left, he tried to give her a smile.

  “I’m… really glad you’re here.”

  She studied him like she had missed diagnosing some disease in his body. Richard smiled again before slipping out of the room. Would she benefit from knowing someone might have murdered her in her past life? It didn’t matter because Richard couldn’t tell her. There was no way he could explain how he knew that without a full-on investigation.