"Well. I suppose now is the time for me to say something... profound... Nothing comes to mind, let's do it." -Jack O'Neill, Stargate SG-1-

  _____

  James had kind of forgotten that it was November, but every time he stepped outside this far north, he was reminded abruptly that the ambient light level was going to be ‘pretty darn dark’ or ‘pitch black’ with nothing above that level. Despite being late afternoon, it was already a strange twilight with a sky lit from an unseen sun and the local streetlights doing a lot of work.

  He didn’t let that bother him. He also fought through the cold, and ignored the rough texture of all the stuff that he was pretty sure wasn’t actually salt strewn on the sidewalk to deter ice. It wasn’t an alien environment, exactly. But it was a little unsettling how quickly his brain had started using the same tactics he approached new dungeons with for adapting to foreign cities.

  All of that was background though. Barely thought about. Because James was putting on a casual and innocent smile as he took long strides to catch up with the group leaving the bar and grill.

  ”Ed! Hey Ed!” He called out, and watched as the man halfway across the small gravel parking lot turned with a disinterested raising of his eyebrows. James closed the gap, waving a hand over his head as he got closer. “Hey man! Holy crap, it’s been so long! What’re you doing here?!” He said with a boisterous laugh.

  “Ed?” One of the two younger humans with the man quirked a smile.

  ”Edgar.” The bigger man insisted with a blunt lack of tact. “And who the hell are you?” He addressed James.

  James pulled up in front of them rolling his shoulder as he adjusted his jacket. “Hey man! It’s been, like, a decade? Wally!” He waited a moment, before letting his smile slip a calculated amount. “Wally Goalman? Arizona? Come on, I know we mostly ran into each other at parties, but you were never a heavy drinker.” He laughed. “I was Mandy’s friend, but we talked, like, twenty times at least.”

  Edgar narrowed his eyes, before something clicked and he leaned back. “Wally?” He sounded mildly surprised. “You look different. What are you doing here?”

  ”Yeah, well.” James chuckled, dusting off his sleeves sheepishly. “Turns out when you stop drinking and hit the gym you can get a lot done. And then…” he flicked his ponytail off to the side with one hand, “grew this out after I quit my last gig. Which is why I’m here. Work. But what about you man? You look pretty good too! Oh, shit, sorry, I’m interrupting.” He reached out to offer a handshake to the others. “Wally.”

  ”Beth.” The woman took the handshake. “This is Chip.” The other kid gave a shy nod and didn’t reach for a handshake, so James let it lapse. “We’re just… uh…” she glanced nervously at Edgar.

  The older human leaned back against the driver’s door of the car he’d been standing near. “I work with an ecological protection group. We were just about to go visit our community.” He craned his thick neck sideways, eying James carefully. “What kind of work brought you here?”

  James nodded at the words. “Protection. Shit, man, that’s great.” He sighed, showing off embarrassment. “Yeah, I put my degree to work being a shithead for a logging company. I thought…” he trailed off before waving a hand. “Eh, forget it. Doesn’t matter. Hey, it’s good that you’re doing something important.” He said with as much earnest respect as he could infuse the words with.

  There. He’d opened up the door in the conversation. Now, either the man gave him an invite, capitalizing on the opportunity, or James would have to ask directly. Asking was worse, because it didn’t feel organic and would raise suspicion, but it was still valid. Being asked was ideal.

  And a second later, Edgar, who clearly remembered nothing of value about Wallace Goalman, gave James what he needed. “Why not ride along?” He asked, jerking a fat thumb at the back seat. “See what we’re up to. Get a little fresh air.”

  James didn’t bother to try to sell his resistance to the idea. He mostly just hesitated for a moment to think about it, before shrugging. “Yeah, you know what, sure. I’ve got nothing going on. Is this a day trip or are you guys camping around here?”

  ”It is… like camping. Don’t worry, we have extra gear.”

  James had no idea how someone would hear that and not think it was a sinister plot to entrap them. But he put a goofy grin on and threw his arms wide. “Well shit, sure. Let’s go for it. Heck, maybe I can get a job with you guys if you’re looking for a human resources guy!”

  ”Maybe.” Edgar said with a bland tone as he opened the car’s doors and invited the group to pile in. “You’ll have to ask someone else when we get there.” He said before pulling them out of the parking lot.

  James spotted JP standing in the shadow of the bar’s doorway on the way out, his friend watching the car with raised eyebrows. And, honestly, James agreed with the unspoken incredulity. This was way too easy. And not only that, but who in their right fucking mind would get in a car to go camping in the Alaskan forest in winter without preparation? What kind of recruiter for a militia group would just let someone like James ride along?

  He’d like to say that he’d just mastered the lessons in social pressure and adaptation that he’d been put through. That his orbs and training had combined to give him a toolkit that let him seamlessly slip into this backseat.

  But that wasn’t even close to true. This was wrong. James just didn’t know how yet. He’d have felt more comfortable if it had felt like a trap, but it didn’t. It just felt dumb, in a way he didn’t yet see the whole picture of.

  But there wasn’t much to do right now except let himself go along for the ride. So he spent the trip making small talk with the guy in the backseat with him, swapping humorous stories as James slowly got Chip to open up a little. And soon enough, Edgar pulled them off the road, down a dirt trail, down a rougher dirt trail, and into a muddy clearing with a handful of other vehicles in it.

  And that was when James was told they’d be walking the rest of the way.

  _____

  Edgar had parked them with the car pointed back toward the main road, next to an open backed farm truck that James suspected was used to move supplies.

  With the polar night, this place was far enough from the main road that even if there were no trees at all, it would have been impossible to spot without heat vision. It had required a lot of driving downward to get here, the highway built at a high elevation and mostly safe from the endless ups and downs of the land. But that extra height wouldn’t help anyone see this place. It was lit only by the pale sky, and a couple camp lanterns that Edgar brought out of the trunk.

  It was also, James noted, concealed. Not perfectly, but deliberately. The foliage was rearranged, clearly on purpose, to form a screen that would keep the light from being a beacon.

  The two each shouldered hefty backpacks, their own personal supplies because they hadn’t been recruited spur-of-the-moment, and all of them were motioned to follow Edgar out of the mud. And onto what was still wet earth, but at least the rich soil wasn’t as sucking as the ‘parking lot’ was. The roots of trees and plants held their path together as they were led into the night, seeming to follow nothing except for ruts in the ground left by wheels of…

  James guessed some kind of ATV. Nothing else would fit through the trees here. But trees were all it would have to contend with; despite having to navigate around a few fallen moss-coated trunks, there wasn’t a lot of ground cover that counted as obstacles here. James was used to tangles of blackberry bushes, or masses of coniferous shrubs that were like politely but firmly determined spear walls. This part of Alaska was different; not that it was empty, but a lot of the stuff growing from the ground were flexible brown shoots or flat leafy plants covered in red berries. Nothing that would stop a motor vehicle, and nothing that impeded their hike much either.

  No one else asked how far they had to go, so James kept quiet on that front, just so no one started questioning too much if bringing him was a bad idea.

  James didn’t know know long they walked before Edgar spoke up. His watch said it was about two hours, and the sky’s pale light dimming as ‘true’ night fell supported that. So maybe five to eight miles? They weren’t exactly moving slowly and methodically. Combined with the drive, that would put them about as far as JP had said the camp was from Fairbanks. Either way, the words were sudden, emerging from the head of the group where the man held an electric lantern. “Look around you.” He said.

  James did so, wondering if they were about to be attacked by wolves or something. But there were just the dark silhouettes of the trees, and the pale sky and its explosion of stars overhead. “Uh…” He stopped himself from saying anything sarcastic, remembering that he was supposed to be ingratiating himself before he slipped into his default mode of speech.

  ”Nature. Simple, isn’t it? Just some trees and birds.” There was something off about Edgar’s voice that James narrowed his eyes at. The man was talking like he was reciting a script. A script that he’d written passionately, but gotten bored of somehow. “But it feels so right to be out here.”

  ”It does.” James heard the woman behind him mutter.

  ”This is what people are killing.” Edgar said as they continued, the light cast from the lantern highlighting tiny white patches of snow that survived up against the base of the passing trees. “This is what we stand to lose. This world. Not the world of concrete and cars. Places like this, where you can see the stars.”

  James listened sharply, trying to draw meaning out of the words. It wasn’t especially inflammatory language; he agreed largely. What was bothering him was just how bland it sounded at all. They were miles from civilization, the nearest road was at least five miles distant at this point, this was not somewhere anyone casually wandered without already mostly believing in either this particular cause, or the hobby of camping. And yet he sounded bored.

  The hike continued, and so did Edgar. “Protests don’t work. Not enough people understand. No one stands up. Asking nicely doesn’t work. The people killing the planet don’t have a conscience, they don’t care. It was worth trying, but it’s not helping much is it?”

  ”Hard to tell out here.” James mumbled. He was listening, but the one place Edgar’s voice lit up like he was really alive, was in talking about the world itself. And the stars were impressive.

  If anyone heard him, they didn’t show it. The speech, or maybe recruitment pitch, continued, and James glanced back to see the other two focused on it like they were already deeply invested. “No one asked permission to destroy the natural world.” Edgar said, the anger in his voice muffled. “So we need to stop asking permission to protect it. When does violence become self defense? How far should someone go to protect our homeworld?” He stopped just before the treeline seemed to open up ahead of them, and turned to the group. “We have answers. And they aren’t hypothetical.”

  James felt like it was reasonable to ask some questions at this point. He did so in a low murmur to the man walking next to him. “Is he just straight up telling us that they’re planning to fight the government?” He asked Chip.

  ”Ssh.” Was what he got in reply. “I mean, maybe?” The man wavered suddenly, eyes blinking as he looked toward James.

  But then Edgar kept talking, letting them approach him. “You’re here because you know you want to do something that matters. You’ve got your priorities right.” Well, James pretending to be Wally wasn’t here for that, but Edgar seemed to have forgotten that detail entirely. “This is an invitation to come join us, and protect our world.” He finished, turning and leading them out of the trees.

  The other two followed without hesitation, and James, frowning at the weird mix of emotions in the speech, walked after them. He was prepared for a lot of weirdness here, and he had a lot of conflicting opinions both personal and political about Priority Earth. But no matter what he ended up believing, he somehow hadn’t been prepared for just how eerie it was to watch someone recite a speech about fighting for the planet, while it looked like they were idly thinking about what they were going to have for lunch.

  Everything about this felt wrong. Abrupt, impersonal, distant. It was very far from what James had studied about either cult or terrorist group operations, and it was quickly becoming obvious in a practical sense why JP and the other rogues had trouble with this.

  Isolated in the middle of nowhere, there was no personal seam to pry into. No one to ask questions of. It was frankly a miracle they’d gotten listening devices into the first camp, though invisibility probably helped.

  And now James was just going to walk in. He was frowning as he followed the others, partly wondering if he’d be recognized by any of the Wolfpack, but mostly just worried that the farther into the woods they’d gotten, the more it had felt like the group was almost sleepwalking.

  Then he emerged from the trees onto the top of a shallow grade with a cluster of buildings, tents, vehicles, and one US Navy anti-missile intercept gun all set up in the middle of a chain link fence perimeter arrayed below him.

  And all of a sudden, James stopped worrying about anything. Nothing felt quite that urgent anymore, but the others were getting away from him, and he wasn’t one of the ones with a lantern, so he shrugged and followed after them as they traced the path of the ATVs that had been used to haul supplies and people back and forth from here to the little clearing closer to the highway.

  _____

  Passing through the gate on the chain link fence, past a small shelter with a couple of sentries holding rifles, James felt very little of what he sort of intellectually knew he should be feeling. He was kind of hungry, maybe. Not bored exactly, but he needed something to do, and he didn’t have a clearly defined task. This was… disappointing. Yes, that was the right word for it.

  ”Alright, this is fucking weird.” Zhu’s voice was faded in his head, as if from a long distance. Navigators had a very hard time communicating in language if they weren’t manifested, or synced up with their host from some kind of shared journey, and neither of those were options right now. Still, Zhu had the strength and energy to bridge that chasm right now, and he did so. “You are absolutely being mindfucked. But it’s so boring it’s making me not care about it. So…” there was a moment of quiet from the infomorph, while James crunched his boots across the path of wood slats laid down through the center of the camp. “Yeah, here.”

  Suddenly, James had a purpose. It was bizarre, because he knew this was a little bit of how Zhu felt when they were moving toward a destination. But he wasn’t a navigator, and he also wasn’t used to having the sensation of an open RPG quest tracker while in real life.

  And yet it helped. Immensely. James still felt like his emotions were displaced and dulled, but since he had needed a job to do anyway, this one conveniently took the spot. All he had to do was not blow his cover, and ask a few people some questions.

  “So, uh…” James spoke out loud, and watched as their guide’s head tilted back suddenly. “You have buildings here. What’s up with that?”

  The two others blinked slowly, and Edgar paused himself before speaking. There was no suspicion in his voice, nor any sense of urgency. ”This is our home base.” He said. “Don’t worry. It’s all in tune with nature.” Again he used that reading a script voice.

  That was also the least helpful answer James could have gotten. Though… it wasn’t like the emotional pressure kept him from thinking, so he pushed himself into making connections. If the answer was at least honest, even if it was incomplete, then that meant they believed their magic was natural. Or of nature in the same way as, like, an ecosystem. Which was fair, in his own experience magic did tend to be just like the natural world in that it had a lot of hyper-specific niches, and an equal number of very stupid corner case interactions.

  Before he could think more about it, Edgar stopped in the center of the camp. They weren’t alone here, though it was hard to make out exactly how many people were in the dark here. The camp had lights, but mostly on the fence and near the building entrances. Edgar pointed at some of those lit buildings. “These four are cabins. When we are done, find an empty bunk, it will be yours while you are here. That one’s the showers. The largest is the meeting hall, and also kitchens. Report there each day to get assignments.” James nodded in appreciation. Having consistent tasks would be helpful in not feeling like he didn’t have a job.

  Though, he mused, he did have a constant job. So maybe he wouldn’t put that much effort into the new one.

  Edgar continued, though he sounded less enthusiastic now. Almost confused, if James had to place the tone, but that wasn’t really accurate either. “It’s good that you joined us. The planet needs us now more than ever. If you need anything, talk to the quartermaster. Oh, and don’t bother the soldiers in grey. They’re helping, but they aren’t like us.” He nodded one more time, and then turned to leave.

  And that was it. James was left standing with two strangers in a camp that would have been hostile if he’d just walked in. But he kind of had walked in, and it was fine. And then he wasn’t even standing near them as the two newcomers moved to eagerly but silently find a bunk.

  Just like that. James didn’t care exactly, but he had a task to complete, and because Zhu kept nudging him into the complex job of ‘investigate’, that meant he needed to pay attention to details and put information together.

  Just like that. They weren’t long term acquaintances of the group, they had no particular loyalty, from the conversation in the car James knew that neither of the two newbies were involved already. They were interested, yes, and they weren’t blind to what they were getting into, but they had never been here before and weren’t trusted confidants. But they were left to their own devices almost instantly.

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

  That wasn’t normal. That wasn’t normal for working a job as a shelf stocker in a grocery store, much less for joining a resistance cell. So James took that and added it to his mental list of clues. Right underneath ‘emotional suppression field’ and ‘they let me into their camp and I barely had to ask’.

  It would probably be useful to find out what else wasn’t normal. Yeah, Zhu’s directive was definitely pointing James toward trying that. He could work with this.

  James did actually go grab a bunk before leaving, picking a room that was musty but had clearly been cleaned up recently. It was… uncomfortable… to be in this particular building again. The main room of it with the low polished wood table and scratch couches was normal, but of the pair of hallways that led to bedrooms, he recognized one of them. And when he’d walked halfway down it, he’d been able to look back to recognize the point on the floor where he’d shot someone in the head a while back.

  The room itself was empty now. Well, emptied of everything personal that had been here the first time around. Instead, it was just bunks, a few sturdy pine wood desks, and the personal effects of people who were clearly actively living here. That meant something, James was sure.

  He found someone else already in the room. A young man with tangled long hair sitting at one of the desks, writing in a notebook. “Hey there.” James greeted him. “I’m supposed to grab a bunk. Any of these open?”

  ”Sure man, sure. All the ones at the back.” The reply was easy, and unconcerned. James actually began to wonder if he could have gotten away with just walking in.

  Instead he just picked one, sitting on the edge of the crinkly mattress. “So, you new too?” He asked.

  ”Nope.”

  James knew, in his heart, that there wasn’t going to be more information forthcoming unless he asked. So he did. “Soooo… there’s a lot of guns around here, huh?” He prompted.

  ”Yup.”

  If James was capable of feeling exasperation, he’d be buried in it. Especially at the irony that this was probably how he would respond to this kind of questioning. “You comfortable with that? You don’t seem like much of a fighter.” He pressed, angling for information like he was supposed to.

  The guy paused in his writing and looked up, staring at the framed photo of a mountain on the wall before turning to look James’ way with bright eyes. “It doesn’t bother me.” He admitted. “We’re supposed to fight, right? Can’t fight without weapons.”

  ”Fair.” James frowned. “How about you, do you fight?”

  ”No, I’ve never been assigned to anything like that.” The kid didn’t sound disappointed or anything, which, if nothing else was wrong, would have been a warning sign for James that something weird was going on. No one in their early twenties who joined a group of environmentalist radicals would truly be fine with not being involved in ‘anything like that’.

  James just kind of let the information process, and asked his next question without any hurry. “How often is there fighting? Like… with loggers or something?” Playing dumb was a tactical challenge when he couldn’t exactly feel out the right way to be dumb. The only upside was that James knew his opponent in this conversation was under the same constraints as he was, if the slow replies and slow changes in expression were anything to go by. It wasn’t that this guy was stupid, or even particularly problematic. He was just, James assumed, not feeling normally, and so not talking normally.

  ”I don’t think there’s been any real fighting since I got here.” Came the slow reply. “Weapon training, though. And sometimes planning.”

  ”Huh. Okay.” James nodded. “But you’re not new. How long have you been here?”

  The kid shrugged. ”Six or seven months.”

  That was bizarre. That meant that he’d been recruited after the first encounter Priority Earth had with the Order, but that… there had been no operations in that whole time? It wasn’t like the Order had perfect round the clock surveillance on these guys. And they were clearly active before that, in multiple ways. So what had changed?

  James started to ask something else. ”I-“

  The kid shook his head. “I can’t talk, I have an assignment tonight.” He said as he shut his notebook and stood up.

  ”Oh, yeah, sure.” James let him leave the room, sitting motionless on the edge of his new bed as his vision unfocused. The room was quiet, and empty, and the smell of wet dirt and vegetation all around him was relaxing. He could sit here forever.

  But he had a job to do. Which Zhu kept reminding him of, in a series of mental nudges that would have been very annoying if James could get annoyed right now. He heard Zhu swearing at something inside his head, and felt like he hoped the navigator wasn’t in trouble. His feelings weren’t gone, exactly, it was just that some of them were smashed down, and others were smoothed over. Though that might not be a scientific analysis. He only bothered to analyze it at all because that was his task.

  ”This is going to get really frustrating, isn’t it?” James muttered out loud, and felt a vehement explosion of agreement from Zhu.

  James added ‘Zhu not affected’ to his mental map of this situation as he headed outside for someone else to question.

  It was difficult going. Not because of the effects he was rapidly finding ways to work within, though losing half his motivation was a nuisance. But instead, by a whole new emotion; or maybe it would be more correct to say that it was an emotion unfettered by whatever was going on here.

  He experienced it as he stepped between buildings. A brief moment where the brackish dark sky was clear, and there was a vision of stars like someone had spilled confetti across the cosmos. In the middle of all of those pinpoints of distant light, a wedge of darkness was carved out. A mountain. A mountain James had never seen before except up here, a part of the world that was as impressive as it was imposing, cutting a hole in the night sky without even trying.

  There was a gnawing sense of awe in his chest. Full strength, the part of him that was an educated delver melding seamlessly with the part of him that was a scared little mammal staring up at something he’d never be able to best in any way that mattered.

  So some things weren’t affected. James added that to his investigation too. After staring at the silhouette for a while longer, breath coming out in foggy gouts in the rapidly chilling air.

  Eventually, James managed to draw his focus away and go say hi to one of the guys on guard duty. The guy was probably mid forties, and like many of the people James had seen moving between the outdoor lights here, had a beard that was less of a deliberate statement and more of a lack of willingness to shave.

  He said hi, and the conversation started just as slow as his last attempt. It also went about as well. How was it here? Alright. Did he like his job as a guard? Nice to be outside. What was he guarding against? Intruders. Okay, James had walked into that one. Anything ever intrude? Not recently. What was up with the cabins? Look, he had to be paying attention to the perimiter, and could James kindly fuck off.

  Well, nice to meet that guy, James supposed, glad that sarcasm was unaffected by whatever was doing this to him.

  His next attempt was with someone in the main hall’s kitchen. There were other people there, but they were watching hockey - they got ESPN out here, apparently - or very studiously pouring over maps. James felt like that might be relevant later, but his current job was to gather information, and also not blow his cover, so he homed in on someone who was more isolated.

  The chef of the day gave him a little more information on some things that probably didn’t seem like they were important in a vacuum. The timing on resupplies, the schedule for meals, the way that everyone had jobs to complete and sometimes that changed around but usually you got a consistent task, that kind of thing. The most important thing James learned was when he inquired about how the current row of hefty pots seemed to contain chili, and if that was a problem out here in the wilds. In response, he was informed that they had good plumbing in the cabins. Really good, he was assured.

  While no one used the word ‘magic’ to him directly, it wasn’t in a conspiratorial kind of way. It felt more like he was being hazed, a prank on the new guy. Soon enough, the curtain would pull back, and they’d go ‘ahhhhh, yeah, we’re wizards!’, and James would have a good laugh with everyone.

  Well, it seemed like one possible outcome anyway. James found that he was really interested in the magic of the structures still, which meant there was another thing not blanketed. He started a sub-list in his thoughts. Nature, magic, and… that was it so far. Things he could feel about.

  ”This is abysmally annoying.” Zhu’s faded and distant voice echoed, not quite heard, but never ignored either. “Hey, I’m giving you a tertiary ‘job’, since that seems to work. If this gets to be too much, teleport out, okay? Thank fuck they didn’t search you.”

  ”I think no one instructed anyone else to search the new people.” James muttered in a low voice as he left the lodge, pausing briefly to scan the profiles of the people sitting in folding chairs around the big TV with a hockey game on. Was the laughter and cheering artificial, or was this something that was permitted under the mental compulsion that was running this place?

  That actually raised a much more important question. Important in that it seemed central to this whole mess, not important in its urgency, since urgency was no longer a reliable metric. Where was the effect coming from? It didn’t actually stop James from asking, it just made asking not important. Except it was important to him, because he had to figure it out.

  There were three basic options, he figured. Person, place, or thing. If it was a place, then it was an abstract place in that it was ‘this camp’, and it followed the camp when it moved. That would be tricky, but possibly handled by breaking the camp completely. If it was a thing, then James knew how to handle that; get Zhu to help him break the thing. It was if it was a person that problems began to emerge, because that implied intent.

  It could also be some kind of brain eating fungus, actually. That would be bad. So James fired off a cast of Rot Eyes, regretting it as the cold polar night got even chillier around him. He could confirm, though, that there was no brain fungus. Just some cool mycelium in the dirt he was waking on, which was both a vital part of the ecosystem, and probably worth five points to his biology Lesson to learn about.

  So person was the most likely. Putting aside why someone would want this condition, James decided to get to work trying to pinpoint if there even was a central person at all. Not just for the effect, but for Priority Earth in general.

  So his next round of questioning was all about going around and asking people, including a bored looking Edgar, who they got their assignments from. Only a couple people had asked him why, most of them had just answered. When someone did ask, he just said he’d been given a job to check, and they nodded before sharing. For now, James was steering clear of the Wolfpack members, but while their group was inside the camp’s boundary, they were separate enough that it wasn’t hard to avoid them. But that was also fine because none of the links of command went back to them anyway.

  Within a couple hours, James had a headache, a deep appreciation for his purple orb that gave him better short term memory, and a partial map of who was telling who what to do. And that map was… a mess. Just a fucking mess.

  Basic camp chores got done almost on autopilot, but more complex stuff, like supply runs or recruitment, had specific people ordered to take care of it. There was a set of people who were the only ones that ever left the camp, including Edgar, and James suspected there was some specific reason, but none of those people were the ones giving high level orders. So they probably weren’t engineering the whole situation. It took him a while to figure out, but a lot of the daily tasks had a built in assumption that they should be then assigned to someone else afterward. Which meant that there were gaps in things like the patrols and sometimes hunts that took place around the camp, but also, they were self-sustaining as people would tell other members of the group to handle it the next day, before the sequence continued. It meant that, due to schedules, a lot of the activities sort of happened in loops.

  Or at least, that was what it looked like. James needed a big board and some red string to start making a real map of it all.

  Some people, though, were working on planning operations. And James had no specific feelings on that. He just knew that it was larger and more involved, probably disrupted by the constant change of who was working on it, and also a change from the fact that Priority Earth hadn’t had any operations for a while. Or maybe this was why they hadn’t; this was not a condition that plans could be created under.

  At one point he decided to try tracking down a central ‘node’ through a different method, asking around about why they’d moved and how they’d managed to get the entire camp, buildings and all, to this new location. And that was when James met Hugh.

  ”So… is it magic?” He asked, trying to seem innocuous. So far no one had replied to that specific question with more than a laugh, so James felt it was safe to use on the man currently having a smoke by the corner of the fence. “The buildings I mean. We’ve got cable and electricity, but there’s no generator or dish, right? And Ed said you guys just moved camp here.”

  Hugh’s head had turned toward James with a more predatory motion than anyone else had used so far, and for just a moment, James wondered if he was going to have to start fighting. He could probably get pretty far, even unarmed; his own magic would carry him through a short skirmish, long enough to get away and fill his task of teleporting out. But then the man spoke in a low voice, placidly enough that James let himself relax a fraction. “Something like that.” He said.

  James nodded like someone who was pretending to understand. “Got it, got it. So hey, when did you guys get over by Fairbanks?”

  ”Recently.” Hugh said, his coat rustling as he shifted the hunting rifle strapped over his shoulder and moving to keep walking. James followed, boots pressing into the packed wet dirt around the edge of the camp. “Why?”

  ”Oh, you know. Just wondering if we’ll be moving again soon. I’ve got a storage unit back in town, stuff like that.” James shrugged as he lied. “But yeah, who would I ask about that? If I’m even allowed to know.”

  Hugh paused in his walk, stopping about twenty feet from the covered shelter with a few folding chairs and a pair of halogen construction lamps where two other members were ‘standing guard’ by sitting and reading copies of the same book. He turned again, and James got that same sense of being focused on that he hadn’t had since setting foot here. “Follow me.” He said, voice firmly phrasing it as a command that was not allowed to be ignored.

  And then he walked out the gate in the fence, waving silently at the other men as he led James through the chain link fence, away from the light, and over the ruts in the wet earth left by the vehicles that had been driven to and from the group’s staging area.

  James felt like he was walking into a trap. But… at least it was a trap with a direction.

  So he followed, chasing after Hugh to catch up as the man began striding at a shallow angle up the slope of the hill around the camp’s front side. Hoping that he’d get something resembling a straight answer.

  _____

  ”This should be far enough.” Hugh told James as they were halfway up a hill dotted in greenery. Trees and short bushes, rough and durable vegetation for a part of the world that loved its cold weather and sometimes nights that never ended. It wasn’t pitch black right now, more like a form of twilight that never ended, but it was dim enough that the only way James could clearly make out the colors of the natural world was because he had an eyeball borrowed from it. “Let’s talk.”

  ”We were talking.” James offered easily. He’d walked a long way so far today, but he’d also reinforced his body with repeated dungeon delves of equal length, maximally effective exercise routines, and also Endurance. So he wasn’t surprised that his legs weren’t aching, just pleasantly content with his progres. “But you mean something else, right?”

  Hugh pushed back a branch of a sapling as he passed, holding it until James cleared the spot before letting it whip back into place. “You’re stubborn.” He said.

  ”I’ve heard that before.” James shifted his path sideways, not wanting to let Hugh walk at his back, nor show his hand exactly. “It’s cause I’m right so often.” He leaned into the slight arrogance of the person he was playing.

  There was a grunt from his hiking partner as they continued up the game trail toward a heavily forested hilltop. “You could feel it.” He said.

  ”Feel what?” James played dumb.

  ”Don’t.” Hugh didn’t sound angry. Just determined. But in a way that James found out of place. Like he was determined and only determined. “Don’t lie to yourself. You felt something. What was it?”

  Lie to himself, not to Hugh. That was interesting. James stopped walking, letting the older man get ahead of him a few steps before he turned back and looked down at James’ form watching him. James cocked his head to the side, like he was thinking. “Well…” he started. “Your camp sure has an atmosphere to it. Very… very chill. Very relaxed.”

  Hugh untensed, his shoulders dropping slightly. “So you do feel it.” He said with a long breath. There was quiet, except for the sound of steady wind shifting trees around, and the rustling of wildlife that wasn’t cowardly enough to find a hole to wait out the winter. “It’s easier out here.” The man said suddenly. “To think. To remember.”

  ”Wait,” James was having a hard time figuring out what his fake self would ask, so he just asked what he wanted but played into being out of the loop, “you mean everyone feels that? All the time? Is it some kind of… drug or something? No, there’s no way… what is it?”

  “I don’t know.” Hugh said, and James wanted to scream. “It’s not even really important.” He added casually, before shrugging and turning to continue their walk.

  That wasn’t right.

  Nothing had exactly changed, but James could tell something wasn’t right. Hugh had just gone from concerned, to relieved that someone else validated his concerns, to… bored?

  ”Guess it’s not worth talking about.” James said, and realized that he felt that way for two parallel reasons. It really just wasn’t worth talking about. But also, talking about it seemed to invite it in, which meant it really wasn’t worth talking about, because it would cause the first reason to amplify. “…Huh.” He grunted in surprise.

  Hugh led him farther up into the hill under the endless Alaskan twilight. “Huh is right.” He said, and James got the impression that his thoughts were shared. “You’re stubborn. Or maybe you’ve just got more willpower than everyone else. That’s useful.”

  ”It’s not on purpose?” James asked. “You aren’t mad that it’s not working on me?”

  ”I’m never mad.” Hugh said. “Not anymore.” And just that sentence gave James the sense that there should be some kind of emotion. Regret, or fury, or something. But instead it was almost nothing at all. “You wanna ask about that?”

  James did. And he wanted to in a way that felt like it was a small, self-contained ember in his thoughts. The sudden intellectual realization hit him that curiosity, one of his red orb ranks from at least a year ago at this point, was spinning itself in contrary resistance to the suppression effect. All his resonance ranks were, they just weren’t active when he wasn’t feeling those things. It was a huge part of why he could empathize with Hugh; multiple ranks in sonder letting James hold on intently to the sensation of knowing that this other person was a complete individual even though something was trying to wear away his ability to even start to care.

  It was hard to explain that though. Also it would blow his cover entirely, and Zhu was doing a good enough job repeatedly prompting him with his task that James didn’t want to blow his cover. Also the information was taking a back seat to everything else as the surprise wore off and his emotional protection there faded. Maybe he could just be angry about it all the time, that would be pretty easy.

  ”I think I want to ask why we’re talking.” James said with casual neutrality. A benign prompt digging for more information.

  ”What did ol’ Ed say that got you here?” The reply was a pivot.

  James shrugged. “That you folks were environmentalists. Protestors. Maybe kind of like a militia, but I think he waited until we got there to say it.”

  ”That doesn’t bother you?”

  ”Should it?” James asked. And then, because he felt like he might know what was being hinted at, added, “Shouldn’t it? It should, shouldn’t it.”

  Hugh continued his deliberate hiking pace, even as he crested the slope and the ground evened out. “I think we should.” He answered. “We’re far out from the camp now. Do you want to stay?”

  ”Of course.” James answered on autopilot before grabbing at his own impulse and choking it back. “I mean… no, I just… came to stay for a few days. Didn’t I? A little camping before… oh that’s really creepy.”

  The other man gave a grim nod. “Creepy isn’t the half of it.” He told James with an unhappy growl, the most emotion he’d really showed so far. “And the worst part is I don’t know the other half at all.” Eying James carefully, Hugh made his own quick decision. “You’re the first person in a long time who’s like me. Who isn’t just wiped out by it. Help me.”

  It wasn’t really a request. “Help you what?” James asked. “Shouldn’t we be running? If that place is messing with people’s heads, we can just drive off, right?”

  ”It’s not the place. It’s us. And it’s not that simple.” Hugh seemed to grapple with explaining anything to James. Not out of mental manipulation, but out of simple rugged lack of trust. “You’re resisting. Good. Keep doing that. And report everything you think is weird to me.”

  ”Or I could start running.” James pointed out.

  Hugh looked down at the rifle he was wearing on a sling, then back at James, who, admittedly, had forgotten that was there. “I wouldn’t even need to shoot you. Where are you gonna go, city boy? You’ll freeze, die, and get eaten by a bear before you figure out you’re running the wrong way.”

  ”Touche.” James shrugged, unbothered for a different reason than normal. “So… you want me to spy on you guys, look for anything suspicious, figure out what’s going on that’s turning everyone’s brains into pudding, and in exchange I’ll get to hang out and be a member and you’ll feed me?”

  ”Pretty bad deal, huh?” Hugh didn’t laugh, but James felt like his wry wit had won the man over by the way the gun never even got touched.

  James nodded. “Yeah,” he said with complete honesty, “I think I can do that.”

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