Dungeon Crawler You!

Taylor's trip back to the parking lot took significantly longer than the trip out did. Mostly because he was so deep in shock that he could barely make his feet move.

Some unknown period of time later, he came back to full awareness and found himself in the driver's seat of his ratty old Nissan Altima, a loyal, albeit steadily more senescent, friend since the long-gone days at college. His hands were clenched on the wheel so tight that he was worried it would bend. His whole body was shaking and he was wobbling back and forth between freezing cold and sweltering.

This couldn't be real.

Seriously, this could not possibly be real.

What if it was?

The alien was real, surely. What if everything she had said was real too?

Seven days. That was all the world had. Everything would end in seven days. Look, his phone even gave the precise number of seconds, because there really was a timer running, counting down from seven days. Actually, counting down from 162 hours, 27 minutes, and 13...12...11..10 seconds. Which was interesting, since the timer app had only been designed to accept two digits for hours.

Taylor watched the timer tick down for a full minute. One second. Two. Three. Four. Grinding inevitably towards the apocalypse. Sixty wasted seconds that he and the world would never get back.

No. No, this was too much. His brain couldn't accept the idea of billions of deaths, inevitable and unavoidable.

Except they weren't strictly inevitable. In theory, if he could survive through eighteen floors of violence and blood then he could rescue everyone. Somehow, that made it worse.

How much profit would there be from strip mining a planet? Probably a lot, and every space dollar of it was one more motivation for this 'Borant' to ensure that the dungeon was unsurvivable so that no human could take the planet back from them...granted, a reality show with an octillion viewers probably wasn't chump change either, so the longer they could stretch it out the more money they would make in ads for space thighmaster machines or alien viagra or whatever they advertised over their snuff-film TV show.

Still. Unsurvivable. By Taylor, a poor dumb human who thought that alien technology was magic. If he went into that dungeon, he would die and the hope for billions of lives would die with him. Would it perhaps be better to be safe in bed 162 hours, 25 minutes, and 42 seconds from now? Leave the rescue to someone else, and if no one managed it then he simply wouldn't wake up again. Painless. Granted, he'd almost certainly be too terrified to fall asleep without assistance. Fortunately, vodka was cheap. Or maybe he'd buy a really nice bottle of Scotch, since it would be the last thing he ever spent money on.

He shook his head. This was too much. He was tired, hungry, and shocky. The world could wait for a couple of hours while he got himself together.


It took 41 minutes and 17 seconds of time-remaining-before-the-apocalypse to drive back to town and find a parking place. Then another 9 minutes and 38 seconds in line at his favorite cafe, followed by 3 minutes 22 seconds to wolf down a heavenly turkey and cheddar grinder and slurp down every drop of fresh-squeezed orange juice. The food helped, a little, but he was still out of it.

He bought a mocha and unstacked one of the patio chairs so he could sit. It was November and too cold to be sitting outside, which meant that no one was anxious to argue with him for the seat. It was a violation of social norms to be pulling the chairs from their hidden-away stack around the corner of the building, but fuck social norms. They would only matter for another 160-ish hours.

As the food settled itself in his belly and the winter cold etched itself slowly into the exposed skin of his hands and face, Taylor's brain slowly came online again and he was forced to face one bedrock truth:

He believed.

He believed that the world really was going to end in a little under a week. That billions of people were going to die. And that he was essentially unable to prevent it.

Not entirely unable. Advantages of being a silver-plaque Youtuber: he had a platform. He could speak into a camera and 217,536 (as of 9am this morning) people would hear his words. A little over 217,600 by dinnertime tonight if the slope stayed steady.

What would he even say? 'Everyone, please be outside at 2:23am on Friday because aliens are going to make the world collapse'? He would be laughed off the internet.

Maybe he could be tricky about it? Tell everyone that it was a social thing, like the ice bucket challenge. Some kind of protest, or a bonding experience. Or that there was something cool in the night sky.

Would it even be a good thing to do that? All buildings would collapse. That meant no shelter, no stored food, no electricity, no internet, no tools, no fuel, no medicine. People would be instantly reduced to a neolithic civilization. No, wait, garbage dumps. They would have metal and stuff that could be turned into useful tools. Open-top dumpsters probably wouldn't collapse, so there might be some edible stuff left from when the restaurants and bakeries dumped their overage at the end of the night. That wouldn't last more than a day or two, and then people would be back to the hunter/gatherer stage.

How many people these days had the skills for hunting and gathering, especially in a Midwest winter? For that matter, what was the carrying capacity of this area? Marjorie had pointed out that it would be daylight in large parts of China and India, so there would be a couple hundred million survivors worldwide. How many of them would be alive two weeks later? Humanity was facing a mass extinction event. As were dogs, and cats, and zoo animals. Although many of them probably didn't have ceilings on their enclosures, so they would survive the Collapse only to starve to death without their human keepers.

He snorted, lips twitching in a grim smile. One tiny fragment of pewter lining: this would pretty much fix the carbon emissions problem and stop climate change from getting any worse. Sure, humans would keep burning trees for fuel and that would put some CO2 in the atmosphere, but it shouldn't be enough to matter given how heavily the population was going to be culled.

What if he tried to put the word out and he ended up getting arrested before the week was up? Public nuisance, or making terrorist threats or something.

Taylor shook his head. No. He wasn't going to do that. No public mentions of aliens. He wasn't even sure if the moral thing to do was to let people have the comfort of their beds and wait in storage until they could be rescued, or to 'save' them by convincing them to be outside where they would then need to either risk their lives in the dungeon or suffer through living on the surface. It was all too easy to imagine people cursing his name for making them survive the upcoming Collapse.

Which led immediately back to the question of what to do for himself. Obviously, he was going into the dungeon. Leaving aside the whole 'potentially save humanity' thing, he would much rather take his chances of dying in battle than the certainty of dying on the surface. What was the best possible case if he stayed on the surface? He lived out his natural life, survived another fifty years in grindingly primitive conditions. Far more likely he would die of infection, or starvation, or disease, or the aliens finished strip mining the planet into dust and he died choking in the void of space. No, since he was going to die either way he would much rather get superpowers and die with his spirit unbroken, his neck unbowed, and control of his own fate.

Marjorie had mentioned that the show had a few octillion viewers. A lot of reality shows had some sort of audience participation element—fans could vote to save someone from being voted off the island, or whatever. Taylor was a professional YouTuber with a silver plaque; he knew how to gather and keep an audience. Granted, he wouldn't have the chance to edit and fine-tune his script for maximum impact and appropriate density of wham lines, and he wouldn't have his entertaining intro/outro framing to establish branding. Still, he could make it work.

Marjorie had mentioned that he could bring whatever he wanted without worrying about weight or volume, so figuring out his gear would definitely be important.

He pulled out his phone and checked his bank balance. His fingers were cold enough that the screen had trouble reading them, but scrubbing them on his jeans for a minute warmed them up enough to make it work.

He frowned. That wasn't as much money as he would have preferred. Okay, important thing for today: figure out how to make more money very quickly. Credit cards, definitely. Payday loans? Pawn shops? Sell his identity online? What should he bring with him? Guns, definitely. Weren't there laws about waiting periods? He'd need to get that started today.

Damn, there was just too much that had to get done today.


Turns out, credit card companies are willing to give you a credit card number in under two minutes as long as you can show decent income and an absence of previous bankruptcies. Six of them had been willing to pony up before they all collectively noticed that he was taking out too many credit cards, at which point they slammed the door in his face. Still, that was two hundred thousand dollars worth of credit that he was never going to have to pay back.

At least, he hoped he was never going to have to pay it back. Come Friday, either seven billion people were going to be dead or Taylor's life was going to be absolutely ruined. It was a truly grim thing to realize that even for a moment you had been rooting for the deaths of billions. He shied away from the thought, but the selfish part of his brain had still had it.

By the time that was done it was past four. He eyed the clock nervously even as he started making lists of what to get now that he had essentially unlimited money. Marjorie had said that he wasn't going to be space- or weight-limited as long as he could pick it up, meaning he could go nuts. Guns, natch. Bullets. Tools.

Taylor, aka YoYoYoDIYDude, ran a somewhat schizoid YouTube channel. On the one hand there were the yo-yo videos in which he did show-offs and instructionals. On the other hand there were the DIY videos where he showed and taught the process of building everything from a deck to a tree house with full plumbing and electric. Many people had told him to split his videos into two separate channels, but so far the sheer dichotomy seemed to be working for him. The one thing he had always regretted was that professional YouTubing was enough to cover the mortage and leave a bit to keep the lights on, but not enough to buy some of the tools he would have preferred.

With an essentially unlimited budget and the knowledge that he wasn't ever going to be able to buy tools again, it should be understandable that, after rampaging across the internet shopping sites, he had a slightly manic gleam in his eye as he pulled into the parking lot of Home Depot. He had $216k of credit on his cards, 7630 pounds of payload in his freshly rented Ford F-350, and five hours before the store closed. If he'd been wearing sunglasses he could have dropped a Blues Brothers quote, but instead he dropped his inhibitions.

"Hey there...Rusty," he said to the store rep, quickly checking the man's nametag. "If I buy stuff today, can I put it aside and pick it up in a few days?"

Rusty smiled a customer service smile. "We usually do that for online purchases, sir, so I don't see why not. What are you looking for?"

Wordlessly, Taylor passed over an 8.5" x 11" college-ruled notepad covered in neat pencil marks. Rusty skimmed down the page, eyebrows rising. "Wow. That's...a lot."

"Keep going," Taylor said, gesturing for Rusty to turn the page.


Taylor and Rusty trotted around the store, filling carts and then wheeling them over to a storage area to wait until Thursday. Halfway down the plumbing aisle, Taylor's pocket started buzzing.

He pulled it out and checked, then sighed. "Would you excuse me?" he said to Rusty. "I need to take this."

"No problem," Rusty said with a smile. "I've got the list." He hefted the notepad. "I'll finish up here and meet you in aisle 19."

"Thanks." He turned away and answered the phone, putting it to his ear. "Hey sis."

"Hey," came the frazzled voice of his older sister. "I need a favor."

"Doing fine, thanks. I'm at the store picking up some materials. Slept a little rough last night, but I had a great hike this morning. What's up with you?"

Danielle sighed. "Damnit, Taylor, could you—" She sighed again and her voice suddenly filled with forced and utterly insincere cheer. "Hi there, Little Bit. Sorry to hear about the bad sleep. Something wrong?"

The insincere and pro forma question made the world suddenly turn sideways. What did he even say? 'Yes, something is wrong. The world is ending in a few days and you can either risk your life with me in the dungeon, or wear caveman chic for the rest of your life, or die instantly in your bed. What's your preference?'

"Got a hypothetical for you," he said.

"Damnit, Taylor, I just need...ugh. Fine. What's your hypothetical?"

"Imagine that the world is ending in a few days and there's nothing you can do to prevent it. Almost everyone is going to die and all buildings are going to be wiped away. You can die in your bed, painlessly, or you can live on the surface like a caveman for the rest of your life, or you can fight for your life in an alien arena and if you survive then you get to put everything back the way it was. What's your preference?"

"Seriously? Where do you even get this stuff? Have you been doing LSD or something?"

"No, nothing like that. It came to me while I was hiking."

"Sometimes I think you should see a shrink, Little Bit. This is morbid even for you."

"Hey! I'm not morbid."

Danielle had mastered the truly dismissive snort of older sisters everywhere. "Oh please. The last hypothetical you asked me was if I would choose to take a pill that would make me immortal but no one else could have it so I would watch everyone around me die as the centuries ticked by, but I would have time to do and see everything I wanted to."

"That's not morbid, it's an interesting thought experiment. It makes you confront your priorities."

"Could we confront my priorities some other time? I've got a video conference in two minutes and I still need to ask that favor."

"Answer the question and I'll say yes to whatever the favor is."

"Ugh, fine. Uh...I guess I'd want to die painlessly. I'm going to die no matter what so no point stretching it out."

He nodded, a little sad. "Okay. Love you, sis. So, what's this favor that I've agreed to?"

"I need you to watch Calliope for the weekend. I'll drop her off on Thursday at four, pick her up Sunday at seven. Joe dropped a trip lead on me with no warning."

"Hiking or rafting?"

"Rafting. Some corporate retreat bullshit."

"You'll be staying in the cabins, right?"

"Does it matter? Look, can you take Calliope or not?"

He laughed. "Yes, of course. You know she's fourteen and old enough to stay home on her own, right?"

"It's Calliope. Last time I left her alone was the Zipline Incident."

"Point. Sure, no problem. Seriously though, you're staying in the cabins, right? Not tents?"

"Yes, we're staying in cabins. Jesus, Taylor. Four o'clock on Thursday, right?"

"No problem. I love you, Danielle."

"Yeah, love you too. See you Thursday." There was a click and the line went dead.

Taylor stared at the phone for a minute, then put it in his pocket and went over to aisle 19.


By the time Home Depot closed, the storage area was packed high with carts of tools, parts, empty jerrycans, bar metal, sheet metal, heavy-duty plastic dropcloths, ropes, chains, padlocks, and everything else he could think of that might even possibly be useful. Rusty and four other employees had been variously amused and annoyed that Taylor had insisted everything be loaded into the truck to make sure it would all fit, then unloaded and put back in storage. It didn't all fit, but the truck plus a rented trailer could handle it with a little bit of room to spare.

That was the fun part of the day. Now came the bad part. He stuck his earbuds in and dialed, then pulled out of the parking lot and headed home while the phone rang.

Drew picked it up on the fourth ring. "Yo, Tay. How's it going, man?" His voice was, as expected for after work on a weeknight, blurry from dating Mary Jane.

Drew was the only person allowed to call him 'Tay'. Twenty years of friendship and more than a bit of youthful shenanigans (lighting fires in the woods, exploring where they shouldn't have been, mild vandalism...) had bought him that right.

"I've got a hypothetical for you," Taylor said with no preamble.

Drew laughed. "One of these, huh?" He paused, probably to take another hit on his blunt because when he came back to the phone his voice was tight with breath being held. "Hit me."

Taylor nodded even though he knew his friend couldn't see it. "The world is going to end on Thursday—well, Friday morning. If you're under a roof you'll die, painlessly and without warning—except your brain gets put in storage so you could in theory be revived. You've got three options: die under a roof with a vanishingly small chance that you'll ever be brought back, live on the surface with no buildings, no tools, no trace of civilization, or go down into a dungeon where you'll get superpowers but you'll probably die fighting monsters and this time there's no chance of being brought back. Which do you choose?"

Drew laughed explosively, the smoke audibly rushing out of his lungs. "Oh, man, that's dark even for you. Usually your shit is more like 'you get to create a new society' or 'do you take the immortality pill' or 'what do you do with a trillion dollars', or—"

"I know what I've said before," Taylor said, cutting him off. "Three options. Which do you choose?" He merged onto the freeway, hands tight on the wheel.

"Oh, the dungeon, man. No question. Fuck camping for the rest of my life and with the other two I'm dying either way. Might as well get superpowers, right?"

"Dying under a roof will be painless," Taylor reminded him. "And there's a tiny, tiny chance that you'll be revived."

"Eh. Derring-do and adventure or going out like a cow?" He took another hit and came back with the holding-my-breath voice. "Fuckin' easy choice, man."

Taylor nodded, tension that he hadn't realized he was carrying leaving his shoulders. He wouldn't be alone. "Sleepover. My house, Thursday. Be there at seven and bring all your clothes, including the winter coat."

"The what now?"

"Trust me on this, okay? Just bring them. Suitcase, laundry hamper, tie them up in a bedsheet, whatever. Doesn't matter, just bring them." It wasn't going to be an issue; Drew lived in a cracker box of an apartment and had to do laundry every week because he believed in a minimalist lifestyle.

"Dude, you're weird."

"Yeah, I know. I've got to run, okay? I'll see you Thursday. Do not flake on me, man. I've got something to show you and it's only happening once. Be there by seven, okay?"

"Sure, man."

Taylor hung up and goosed the gas a little. He wanted to get home and back on the computer. More lists to make—tactical plans, inventory of anything he might have forgotten, and so on. Also, he wanted to get to bed early. Tomorrow was going to involve a long drive and then a longer day.


He sighed and turned the car off, letting his head thump back against the headrest and his eyes fall closed. He needed the world to go away for just a minute.

Three seconds later, the imagined tick...tick...tick of the timer on his phone made him open his eyes again.

As a lifetime liberal, Taylor had no experience with guns and therefore had never needed to interact with gun laws. Turns out, Illinois frowns upon the civilian ownership of firearms. Something about lots of kids being shot in the streets, apparently. Regardless, there were background checks, license requirements, and more. It wasn't likely to happen in seven days, especially since he had other things to do.

The solution to this problem, as any good mass shooter or hopeful world-saving badass would know, was to spend five hours driving down to Missouri. In Missouri the gun laws could be written on a cocktail napkin with room left over for the lyrics of 'America, Fuck Yeah!' Basically, if you could see over the counter and you had a fistful of plastic then they were happy to give you all the lethal ordinance you wanted.

Of course, it wasn't quite that simple. If you were a resident of Illinois then your state's government was still going to do their best to throw up roadblocks. You couldn't, as Taylor had assumed, simply drive over to Missouri, plop down your cash, strap up your shiny new killing device, and saunter home to Illinois for lunch. No, you needed to have a background check and then the guns must be shipped from Missouri to a licensed gun store in Illinois where you could pick them up a few days later. Granted, the background check consisted of one phone call that took about three minutes.

"Waste of time," the store owner said. "They pass 92% of these things, so they don't make a damn bit of difference. They should take them seriously, and mandate a skills test before purchase. Weed out the crazies and the idiots."

Taylor looked at the man in surprise. He was forty-ish, wearing a camo shirt, and had a neatly-trimmed black beard. There was a belly but not much of one and his arms had definition.

"You want background checks?" Taylor asked.

The man—Joe, he had introduced himself as when Taylor nervously stepped up to the counter and eyed the displays with evident confusion—smiled. "What, just because I'm an FFL I must be a doomsday-prepper militia wackjob?"

Taylor blushed and didn't ask what 'FFL' stood for.

"I like guns," Joe said. "I like hunting, I like target shooting, and I like knowing that me and my wife can defend ourselves if we get attacked by some knucklehead. I'm glad Missouri puts freedom ahead of government micromanagement. Doesn't mean I want toddlers and domestic abusers to be waving around a handgun in one hand and a long gun in the other."

"No, of course," Taylor said. "Sorry. I just—" He stopped talking before he could dig himself any deeper. "Sorry."

"S'okay. Look, you clearly don't know squat about guns. When somebody who doesn't know squat about guns rolls up and wants to buy, quote all the guns endquote, I get nervous." He gestured to the counter where lay six machetes, six tactical vests ("Not bulletproof. Nothing is bulletproof"), half a dozen semi-automatic shotguns, half a dozen .45 pistols, and enough ammunition to fight a medium-sized war. "You ever fired a gun before?"

"Um...no?"

Joe nodded, unsurprised. "I'm happy to take your money. I'll sell you whatever you like and wave you on your way, but I'm pretty sure you'll kill yourself or someone else within a month if I do. Not deliberately—you seem like a decent guy—but if you don't know nothin' about trigger discipline, safety, handling, or cleaning then you're a hazard to yourself and others. I've got a range out back; how about I have Frank mind the counter while I give you a crash course? It won't be enough—there's no such thing as enough firearms training—but it'll at least ease my conscience a bit."

"That would be fantastic," Taylor said gratefully.


The last days of the world unwound around him, simultaneously racing with skin-scorching speed and crawling maddeningly slowly. The timer on his phone kept counting down, second by merciless second. Sleep was fitful and broken, leaving him more tired in the morning than when he lay down at night. He released videos on schedule but kept them simple; all three were yo-yo show-offs instead of what should have been two DIYs and a yo-yo instructional. He prepared everything he could think of, checked various survival-related forums on Reddit for advice on how to handle the apocalypse, spoke with old friends, had dinner with his mother on Tuesday.

He didn't tell her what was coming. Mom was 72, badly out of shape, and burned up a pack of coffin nails per day. She had, as she had said before, "had her adventures, raised her kids, and now it was time to relax." She would not survive the dungeon and she would not welcome the need to try.

The knowledge that he was making this decision for her left the taste of ashes in his throat throughout the meal. (Store-bought mac and cheese; she had never liked cooking and "had done her time at the stove" while he was growing up, since she thought it was important to model good money management and life skills for Taylor and Danielle, as well as ensuring that what they ate was healthy. Now, the only cooking she did involved a microwave.) She talked for a bit about the neighbor across the street:

"Poor Trish," she said, shaking her head. "When her husband died—Mark, you remember Mark?"

Taylor had a vague memory of the name but with a gun to his head he couldn't have told you even the color of Mark's hair. "Uh-huh," he said. No reason to go down a rabbit hole of reminders.

"Died in his sleep. She woke up and he was cold." She shook her head. "Good thing they slept in separate rooms. He snored. Can you imagine if they still shared a bed?"

Oh, right. The snorer. "Yeah, that would have been awful. They seemed like a nice couple. I remember you had them over for dinner a while back and they were teasing each other about his snoring."

"Right, right. Well, he was the one who always took care of the money, and it turned out that they had been living well beyond their means." She clucked her tongue disapprovingly. "He made some very poor decisions and after he died she discovered she didn't have the money to stay in the house. I told her to get a good agent but she insisted on doing it herself. She thought she was going to have a few months to get organized and get out, but she underpriced it and it sold so fast that she suddenly found she needed to get out that night. Then she didn't prepare anything and the truck she rented was too small. I was over there half the afternoon helping her carry all this stuff into our garage until she can come get it. Banker boxes! Mark's paperwork was so disorganized. He left her forty banker boxes of papers."

Eventually, the neighborhood gossip ran out and she turned her focus to him, drawing out every detail of his life since she had last seem him six days ago. She insisted on seeing 'that new yo-yo thing you were doing'. Taylor had anticipated the request and brought his Skyhawk with him. They went out on the porch and he ran through the routine that he'd been putting together for next year's Regionals. (He had mostly been doing it as a brand-building exercise; he was good but he wasn't good enough to match the people who made a living earning contest prize money and corporate sponsorship deals.) He went into a series of Eli Hops that made her face light up in child-like wonder. Long experience as an entertainer let him sense how long to repeat the series before the wonder lost its luster, at which point he transitioned into a series of boingy-boingies, then finished up with an off-string throw and one-handed whip. She applauded.

"Marvelous," she said, smiling ear-to-ear. "How is your channel doing?"

"Good. Coming up on 220,000 and the views are reliable. Also, I'm getting good crossovers from the DIY videos to the yo-yo work and back."

"Wonderful! When you first said you were going to do it that way, I have to say that I didn't think it was going to work."

He laughed. "I may remember a comment or two to that effect. Oh, and I picked up a sponsorship for my next two videos. They sell template websites and shopping systems. I've been working up a piece about how 'if you enjoy building an extension on the house, you will also enjoy building a website.'"

"I see. Well, I don't really understand all that, but I'm glad it's working for you. I was worried when you decided to do YouTube for a living."

"Yeah, I know, but an English degree wasn't exactly in high demand. I got tired of driving rideshares for drunk people and the barista job just wasn't doing it. If I had one more snotty person demand that I remake their drink because it was too bitter and I had to explain that they ordered an espresso and it's supposed to be bitter and then they demanded that I remake it anyway...well. I dunno what I would have done."

"Well, I'm glad you found something you like. Now, you'll take the rest of the mac and cheese, right? Oh, and I've got some orange juice for you." She bustled into the kitchen and he followed her like an amused duckling; long experience said that there was no point in arguing. Besides, this was the last time she would ever get to fuss over him and he wasn't going to take that away from her.

It took five minutes of rustling through the stack of paper bags in the pantry and then loading one up with random things from the fridge and the cabinets, but finally he was back on the porch and she was holding the door open for him with the beaming smile that said she was proud of her goofy and off-kilter son.

"Goodbye, Mom," he said, hugging her extra tight and burying his face in her shoulder. He was almost a foot taller than his mother and hugging her like this was a strain on his back that he absolutely couldn't care less about right now. "I love you so much."

"Oh! Thank you, sweetie," she said, patting him awkwardly on the back. She had never been much of a hugger, not like Dad was. She showed her love by asking about YouTube stats that she didn't understand and wasn't even vaguely interested in, and by pushing food on him, and by fussing at him to clean the windshield of his car if he hadn't recently because otherwise the glare could be dangerous.

He held the hug extra long and then kissed her on the forehead, not minding the way her gray hair tickled his nose. He breathed in the scent of her grapefruit shampoo and did his best to lock it into his memory.

"Will I still see you Sunday?" she asked. "You don't have to. I love having you over in the middle of the week like this but if you—"

He swallowed the lump from his throat and gave her the best smile he could manage. "Of course you'll see me Sunday, Mom. I wouldn't miss it for the world."

"Good! Maybe we can watch some more Golden Girls? I've been going back through it again and it's still as good as it was the first time through."

"That sounds great. I'll see you then." He kissed her again and then hurried away, brushing the mist from his eyes.


On Wednesday he had dinner with his father. Daniel was 74 with a fivehead and only a bit of pepper left among the salt that was his remaining hair. His eyes, though weakened by glaucoma, were the same bright blue and filled with delight as they had been since the very first time Taylor could remember being swung above his father's head for an airplane ride.

"Taylor, Taylor, Taylor!" Daniel said, coming towards him with arms upraised and fingers wiggling in eagerly anticipated hugs. "There's my boy!" He wrapped his arms around his son and squeezed tight.

Taylor hugged his father back, allowing his eyes to fall closed so that, just for one moment, he could feel that sense of safety and comfort that had suffused his childhood. He was taller than his father by two fingers; growing up, he had frequently made his father stand back to back with him so he could check if he was taller yet. It had been a glorious day in high school when he had finally caught his father going slightly up on tiptoe in an effort to maintain the appearance of stature status quo.

Another thing that had changed from Taylor's childhood: his master athlete of a father, a tennis-playing, expert-swimming, canoeing man of iron, who had done pushups with Taylor on his back when Taylor was small, had always had solid layers of muscle under his skin. When you hugged him he had a solidity, like toughened oak. Now he felt fragile, as though his flesh was directly attached to bird-brittle bones with no cushioning between the two.

Taylor could feel the tears starting, both for the slow failing of this wonderful man's body and for the death that he knew was about thirty hours away. He breathed through the inner pain, discreetly wiped his eyes, and stitched a smile on his face with brutal effort. Only then did he release the hug and step back.

"Hi, Dad."

"What's that? You're sad?" his father said, cupping one hand to his ear. He liked to play up his steadily increasing lack of hearing. "Why are you sad? Wait, I know! Cake to the rescue! Come on, I've got some strawberry rhubarb in the oven next to the pizza." He grabbed Taylor's wrist and started towing him up the walk towards the open door of the house.

"That's pie, Dad," Taylor said, the smile becoming more honest now. He followed along willingly enough.

"Fat fry? Why would you fry cake?! You kids these days, always frying everything!"

"Oh, we are, are we? And I suppose you're not still eating your fried eggs and bacon for breakfast?" He followed his father inside and pushed the door closed with his elbow, already toeing off his shoes.

"Of course not, of course not! That would be against my doctor's advice."

"And you are just wonderful at following your doctor's advice, aren't you, Dad?" Taylor couldn't help but chuckle. In truth, his father was good about following doctor's advice on almost everything. He ate some things that Dr. Friedman would prefer he not, but in compensation he had completely given up alcohol. He took his glaucoma drops and his blood pressure meds exactly on time every day. He willingly, even eagerly, did the physical therapy to ensure that last year's torn rotator cuff healed properly. On the other hand, he refused to take pain meds for his arthritic knees. He never complained about them either, and Taylor knew of the problem only because Daniel moved a little more stiffly than he used to and Taylor had browbeaten him into explaining why. Fortunately, the emphasis in 'moved a little more stiffly' was heavily on the 'a little'; only someone who had grown up looking to Daniel as a model of how a man should behave would have noticed it.

"It almost sounds like you're implying something, my boy. How sharper than a serpent's tooth is the snide implication of an untrusting child!"

Taylor laughed. "I would never not trust you, Dad. Come on, let's eat before the pizza gets cold. Pineapple and bacon, right?"

"Of course, of course! What else would I serve to my wonderful son but the greatest delicacies? The fruit of the tropics and the flesh of the pig! For what more could one ask?" He plucked a dishcloth off a hook and used it to flip the oven door open and pull the pizza out. It was an 18" deep dish pan that Taylor had given him for his birthday six years ago, and the product of that pan was among the prime things that Dr. Friedman would have preferred Daniel cut down on. It was also one of the few lines that Daniel had drawn in the sand; he was not giving up his homemade deep dish pizza.

The pizza was as delicious as always. Taylor had bought an identical pan for himself, same size and brand, and tried to reproduce his father's recipe; he couldn't, no matter how precisely he recorded and reproduced the proportions and ingredients. There was some hidden paternal secret, a subtle essence that suffused the bread and cheese and sauce with a virtue that owed nothing to chemistry.

They ate in goopy silence, strings of cheese stretching from slice to teeth and needing to be raveled up with a finger in order to avert disaster. Taylor normally tried to stop after two slices; deep dish was far denser and more filling than what the rest of the country laughingly referred to as pizza. Two slices was more than enough to leave him completely satiated. Tonight, he indulged shamelessly, glorying in the flavors that he knew he was experiencing for the last time.

"Hungry, huh?" Daniel asked, smiling. "Haven't seen you eat that much in ages."

"If r'ly goo'," Taylor said, sucking air in to cool off a bit of still-hot cheese.

Daniel tsked. "Don't eat with your mouth full, Taylor."

Taylor grinned at the old joke. For a split second he was a child again, back in the Apple Lane house, back when Mom and Dad were still (so far as he was aware) happy together. Dad would say that and Mom would look amused while Danielle rolled her eyes and said "Daaaad!"

Every moment of the evening was like that; a single word or flash of an expression on his father's face would take Taylor back to another time. A different time, when everything was better and billions of people were going to wake up on Friday morning.

Should he ask his father the hypothetical? He hadn't asked Mom because he had known the answer. She wasn't suicidal but she also wasn't particularly closely tied to life; she didn't want to get old (the definition of which was a moving target) and was thoroughly prepared for her death. Burial plot booked in advance, instructions on what to do and what not to do, will made up, discussions with Danielle and Taylor about what they would each get of the possessions, and the house kept in neat order so that it would be easy to dispose of the contents and the building once she wasn't using it anymore. In the meantime she seemed to be drifting, lacking in purpose or direction.

Dad...was an unknown. He had his will on file because he was a sensible person and that was what sensible 70-somethings did. He hadn't felt the need for the morbidly detailed preparations his ex-wife had made. He enjoyed his life. He might want to continue it beyond the Collapse.

The problem was that his health wasn't good enough to survive what it sounded like the dungeon was going to be. There was no muscle left on him, his shoulder pained him if he moved it too quickly, his vision was hazy, his hearing was gone without the hearing aids and only decent with them. His knees were rough enough that walking for miles on end wasn't in the cards, so he would slow everyone else down—'everyone else' meaning Taylor and Drew and anyone else they managed to hook up with once they were down there. His good cheer would be a morale booster and perhaps the dungeon's healing properties would fix some of his issues, but probably not. Marjorie had said that the dungeon would speed up the body's natural regeneration. Natural regeneration wasn't going to fix hearing loss or arthritis or glaucoma. The health potions and any potential healing magic were an unknown; maybe they could heal his ailments, maybe they couldn't. Or, rather, maybe they would or wouldn't. An alien race with the power to cross the stars, use 'altspace' storage for their space phones, and simultaneously destroy every building on the planet? They had the power to rejuvenate one old man.

The final decision was purely selfish: there was a risk that Dad might say yes, he wanted to go into the dungeon, and Taylor could not take that chance. He could not bear to see his father die. It would crush him, utterly ruin him at a time when he needed to be at his best. Knowing that Dad had died in the Collapse would be bad enough, but there was a tiny chance of succeeding and rescuing him; realistically, it wasn't going to happen, but the possibility would suffice to keep Taylor going.

The decision argued itself back and forth in his mind throughout the evening, but when the time came, when the very last second came and he was about to get into his car to drive away for the last time, to never see his father again, he said nothing. Taylor did not offer his father the chance to survive.

"I love you so much, Dad," he said, wrapping his arms around his father and clinging tighter than a child waking from a nightmare. (If only Taylor could wake from this nightmare.)

"Awww," his father said, hugging back just as tight. "I love you too." He stood there, legs braced so that Taylor could lean on him, and held his son tight, rubbing his back.

A tiny whimper, more of a squeak and probably deniable, slipped out of Taylor's throat and he felt the tears gathering. He hurriedly swiped at his eyes and straightened up, letting go of his father for the last time.

"Everything okay?" his father asked, frowning.

No, Dad, it's not. You're going to die tomorrow night. "Yeah, it's fine," Taylor said with a plastic smile. "I'm a little stressed is all. I had a really good time tonight. Thank you."

"I enjoyed it too. You sure nothing's wrong?"

Everything's wrong, Dad. Everyone's going to die. You and Mom haven't spoken in six years. I'm going to die fighting monsters in a dungeon so that aliens can sell toilet paper, or whatever. "Nah, s'all good. Thanks for everything. See you next week?" His gorge rose a little at the last words.

"Looking forward to it." He squeezed his son's shoulder and then stepped back so Taylor could fold himself into the car and close the door. When Taylor rolled the window down, his father kissed two fingers and pressed them to his son's cheek. "Drive safe, okay? Text me when you're home."

Taylor laughed. He was 34 years old and his parents still worried. "I will. Love you. Thanks again. For everything."

"Always. Drive safe!" He stepped back and waved.

Taylor took one last look, storing the memory up for the future, and then he drove away.


It was 3:36:17pm on Thursday. The world was going to end in 10 hours, 46 minutes, and 43 seconds.

The Nissan was packed, floorboards to roof rack. The F-350 was ready for the trip to Home Depot where it would be loaded up. The house was tidied and vacuumed. Sure, it was completely pointless since it would be destroyed in a few more hours, but it provided a sense of closure and a way to keep his mind from skittering off into dark corners that helped no one. In the center of the back yard was a survival cache—tools, weapons, food, chlorine tablets for water purification, a stack of wilderness survival manuals, and maps of the area. Perhaps there would be a handful of survivors in the morning, and perhaps they would find the cache. He would put signs on the lawn when he left. Granted, the cache would be easily visible from the street once the house was out of the way.

Taylor was on the sidewalk, running through the Regionals routine that he had spent eight months developing and now would never need. A bunch of the neighborhood kids were gathered around, oohing and aahing. It was still November, still cold, but there wasn't much wind so as long as you stayed in the sun it was comfortable. His Tibetan Mastiff, Moose, was floomped on the grass while the children petted him.

The door across the street opened and Alice Benning stepped out. She was new to the neighborhood, having moved in only a couple months ago. A brunette somewhere in her mid-thirties, she had made a point of knocking on all the doors up and down the block and introducing herself. She was an excellent listener and immediately found herself being invited for drinks and added to the neighborhood email list.

"Tommy!" she called. "C'mon in."

"Aw, mom!" Tommy called. He was twelve, blond and freckled with a Spider-Man T-shirt. He climbed to his feet with a grumble about 'stupid grounding, totally wasn't my fault' and slouched off to his mother.

"Hi Taylor," Alice called, waving. "Impressive!"

"Thanks, Alice," Taylor called back, unmounting the yo-yo and sending it into a few 'Around the World' spins so as to free up one hand to wave.

"Do the pops!" Sequoia demanded, with all the unshakable authority that only a six-year-old girl can apply.

"The what now?" Taylor asked innocently. "What's a pop?"

"You know!"

"No I don't."

"Yes you do!" all four remaining members of his audience shouted. They ranged from six to twelve, since Tisha recently had achieved the ancient age of thirteen and decided that yo-yos were no longer cool.

"It's the pops!" Sequoia said, waving her hands in and out.

"It's not called the pops, dummy," Bradley sneered. "It's called the Eel Hops."

Taylor frowned. "Actually, it's called the Eli Hops. Be nice to your sister, Bradley. Apologize."

Bradley scoffed, but when Taylor recovered the yo-yo and stood there with it motionless in his hand, the boy broke.

"Fine. Sorry I said you were a dummy, or something."

"It's okay, Bradley," Sequoia said. "Mom says that people only accuse others of the things they're afraid of about themselves. Don't worry. I think you're smart."

Taylor nearly choked but managed to keep the laughter inside. He got the yo-yo moving and went into a series of Eli Hops, shifting direction and magnitude so as to keep it dramatic for the kids. (They'll be dead tomorrow.)

There was the sound of a car approaching; Taylor looked up to see his sister's Taurus pulling up to the curb. He wound up the show and bowed dramatically to his audience, then shooed them away with promises that he would do another show tomorrow. (Liar.)

Danielle and Calliope climbed out of the Taurus at the same time. Danielle was her younger brother's gender-flipped and upgraded twin: tall and thin, with an oval face, but her hair was 'chestnut' instead of 'brown', and it was done in a chin-length bob with layers and gentle highlights. Her body was 'willowy' instead of 'rail-thin on the edge of scrawny', and she had annoyingly perfect teeth with an annoyingly blinding Colgate smile.

"Hey, sis," Taylor said, moving to hug his sister. Moose beat him to it, racing around the car and shoulder-barging Danielle almost off her feet with wigglies of lurrv.

She laughed and scritched behind his ears firmly, ruffling them with her nails. "Hi there, Moose. Miss me?"

"Woof!" came the affirmative.

Taylor carefully nudged his dog out of the way so he could hug his sister. Moose accepted the nudge with poor grace.

"Hi, Taylor," she said, accepting the hug but not allowing it to go too long. If she had been a cartoon there would have been squiggly lines of 'frazzled' around her head. "Thanks for taking her. I'm sorry about the short notice."

"S'all good," Taylor said. He held the hug as long as she would tolerate it, then trailed his hand across her shoulder as she pulled away, sustaining the contact for one final instant. "You know I love having her." He turned to his niece. "Hey, Leo. Got your stuff?"

The young woman in question had hauled a massive duffel out of the back seat of the Taurus and was now crouched down giving Moose an appropriate ear-scritching while fending off his determined attempts at slobbery kisses. "Yup!" She yelped in surprise and laughed as Moose pushed forward, knocking her over so that he could deliver the appropriate face-washing. She eeped in surprise and covered her face but couldn't stop laughing.

Calliope had gotten her nose and jaw from her mother, but the bright green eyes and the straw-blonde hair were straight from her father's Scandinavian-by-way-of-Minnesota heritage. She was fourteen, with coltishly long arms and legs that made her the terror of East Overton High's soccer fields. She was wearing a blue and green flannel shirt and jeans with shredded knees and thighs. Taylor knew that, unlike many teenagers, the tears in Calliope's jeans didn't come from the factory; they were earned the hard way, through vigorous exercise and occasional falls on hard surfaces.

"Did you bring your wheelboard?" Taylor asked.

Calliope shot him an exasperated look from the ground. She pushed Moose aside and stood up so that she could lean into the back seat and pull out a skateboard and helmet. "Unc, you know it's not called a wheelboard."

"It's not?" Taylor looked at Danielle in simulated surprise. "It was called a wheelboard in our day. I'm sure of it."

Danielle snorted. "Why do I always feel like you two getting together without supervision is a sign of the Apocalypse?"

Taylor jerked as though she'd slapped him, then did his best to cover it by quickly grabbing his niece up and spinning her around before setting her back on her feet. She eeee'd in surprise as he did it and stutter-stepped when he put her down, then glared up at him.

"Unc! I'm too old to be spun around like a kid!" Somehow, the expression was not entirely convincing.

"Bah," Taylor said, waving her protests away with magnificent disdain. "My house, my rules. I'll spin you if I want to. And make you watch anime. And have pizza and ice cream for dinner." He looked at Danielle and stage-whispered, "I'm lying. Broccoli all the way."

Danielle rolled her eyes. "Just try to make sure she doesn't die, okay? And take care of yourself. You're too skinny, even for you. And you look exhausted."

"I'm fine," Taylor said. "Thanks for worrying, though." He bit his lip, eyeing his sister. This was the last chance; he could tell her the truth, give her a chance to make the decision for real.

...No.

No, Danielle was too grounded in the 'real world'. She had always been the serious, studious one. Taylor had no proof whatsoever and the claim was so wild that Danielle would simply get annoyed if he pushed it. She had made the decision with enough of the information but none of the pressure; it wasn't going to do her any favors to have to make it again with pressure. Besides, it was too late to save her husband, Charlie. No great loss, though; Taylor had cordially detested the man since first meeting him and could not understand why Danielle stayed with him.

"Make sure she doesn't die, check," he said, smiling. "Safe travels, sis. You're a wonderful sister and I love you."

Her eyebrows went up. "Thanks, Taylor. You too." She hugged him quickly and then opened the door of the car. "Okay, gotta run. Gotta get on the road if I want to beat the traffic. Be good, you!" She pointed at her daughter and scowled dramatically; Calliope rolled her eyes and waved it off. Danielle smiled at the dismissal, blew both of them a final kiss, and then vroomed off.

"So, Leo," Taylor said, slinging Calliope's duffel over his shoulder and turning towards the house, bracing himself at each step as Moose pushed into his leg. "I've got a hypothetical for you..."


Drew rolled up at 7:13pm, meaning that he was early for Drew. His car was the same hinky green beater that he'd been driving for the last ten years, with tires bald as a newborn and what might have been a few extra dings in the right rear quarterpanel. There were so many that it was hard to tell.

"Hey, Drew," Taylor said with a grin as his friend got out of the car amidst a blue cloud. "You know the cops are going to put you away if they ever see you hotboxing like that on the road."

"I am immune to po-po oppression, for my Lord and Savior has wrapped around me the protection of his Noodly Appendages," Drew said, waving the thought aside with a grand gesture. "Leo! You're here! Yikes! Hello to you too, Moose." He delivered the appropriate tribute of patting, scritching, and rib-thumping in order to receive the gracious permission to not be knocked over.

"Hey, Drew," Calliope said with a laugh. "Still baking more than the Brits, huh?"

"Ayyyy," Drew said, shooting her a pair of finger guns. "I love that show! We should watch it."

"No way! Unc said I could watch Die Hard on Prime!"

"Shoot for it! One, two..."

Taylor smiled at the banter and said nothing, preferring instead to collect Drew's two suitcases from the back of the beater and carry them inside, the other two following him automatically. He dropped the suitcases inside the door, then picked up his keys from the bowl and turned back. Moose's ears went up in excitement. He was a sucker for car rides.

"Guys, I hate to interrupt this love fest," he said, "but we have an errand to run. I need to head over to Home Depot and pick up some stuff. I need to talk to you two, so all three of us are going."

"We are?" Drew asked.

"Yup," Taylor 'explained' unhelpfully.

"Why are we going to Home Depot at 7:30?" Calliope asked, but she was already shrugging into her jacket.

"Story for later," Taylor said, mostly because he didn't have a damn bit of clue how he was going to convince them that the 'hypothetical' they had answered was in no way hypothetical. "C'mon, we need to hurry. They close at 10. Moose, you're staying here." With the ease of long practice, he ignored the pitying whine and soulful eyes.

"What? Aren't they, like, twenty minutes away? It's only 7:16," Drew said, sticking his tongue out at Calliope in correction of her earlier statement.

"Twenty-five minutes, but we're going to have to load everything, and then we need to hit a gas station on the way back." He locked the door behind them and led the way to the F-350. "Also, what do you guys want for dinner? Absolutely anything you like, my treat. I've got some great tenderloin in the fridge, pizza is a phone call away, we can stop and get Thai or Indian, whatever. Oh, and I raided the candy aisle at the supermarket. There's literally a couple dozen pounds of stuff in there."

"Mom is gonna kill you, Mom is gonna kill you," Calliope chanted as they climbed into the rental. She buckled herself in before continuing. "I'm shocked, Unc, shocked I say, that you would corrupt a young woman of my virtue with your candy- and steak-pushing ways. You know that us teenagers have poor self-control. What if I eat myself into a sugar coma and end up diabetic?"

"Is it really 'us teenagers'?" Drew asked. "Shouldn't it be 'we teenagers'?"

"Let's just go with 'teenagers'," Taylor said, not wanting to get drawn into a grammar debate. He waited until he had negotiated the five-way intersection at the end of his street, then took the first step towards the most difficult conversation he would ever have. "Hey, you guys remember that hypothetical I asked you, about what you would do if the world ended? Have you changed your minds?"

"Heck no," Drew said. "Chance to get superpowers all the way. Death comes for us all, live as a lion and not a sheep, all that stuff."

"Fighting my way through hordes of evil monsters on a quest to rescue humanity? Dude, sign me up," Calliope said, her grin a thing that had time-traveled forward after first appearing on the face of a Viking, or perhaps a Cimmerian.

Taylor nodded slowly. He merged onto the highway and held the pedal down. "I want you to think about it again, and now take it seriously. Remember that you're going to be fighting living creatures, with real blood and real death." He had been psyching himself up for that all week, forcing himself to imagine the horrors that he expected to face so that he wouldn't be freaked by them when they happened.

"Dude, you're kinda freaking me out," Drew said. "This one is damn morbid, and now you're doubling down on it?"

"I'm still doing it," Calliope said. "Like Drew said: live like a lion, not a lamb. I'm going to die in any of the scenarios, I might as well do the one that's exciting. I mean, it's not like I'm going to randomly murderhobo stuff, right? If the monsters don't bother me, I won't bother them. If they do, well, then they had it coming."

"What she said," Drew said, jerking a thumb towards Calliope who was leaning forward so her head was between the two front seats. "Kid knows her stuff."

"Damn straight," Calliope said.

"Language, young lady," Taylor scolded.

"Yes, Mom."

"In all seriousness, I need you two to listen for a second and take me seriously," Taylor said. "It's not a hypothetical and I'm not joking. See, I went hiking last week..."


It was 2:21:37am on Friday morning and the timer on Taylor's freshly-charged phone was at 1 minute and 23 seconds. He glanced to his right, checking that Calliope was thoroughly strapped in, wearing the motorcycle helmet, and that the stacks and stacks of pillows packed around her were all in place. The F-350 had six airbags, including side-mounted, but they were definitely going to be necessary so Taylor had added a bit of extra padding just in case. Moose was wearing his chest harness and the heavy nylon leash was looped around the headrests as an ersatz seatbelt. There were more pillows in front of the dog.

Taylor licked his lips and pushed the button on his walkie-talkie. "You ready, Drew?"

"Rodger, dodger, O Captain My Captain! Ready and wilco, Blue Five standing by, ready for the insertion! Over!"

Taylor took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Drew was driving the Altima, the Altima was blue, the three of them were going 'into adventure!' and therefore Drew had demanded that he be called Blue Five for the duration of what he also insisted be called 'the insertion'. Calliope had started laughing, Drew had noticed the double-entendre and started laughing along, and the two of them had fed on each other.

"Right," Taylor said into the radio. "Dungeon opens in 90 seconds. Remember, we want to make a grand entrance so that the audience has something to latch onto. Follow close behind me but hit the brakes once we hit the stairs. Jump dramatically out of your car, don't stumble out. Do not point that gun at us. Got it?"

"Got it, Captain! Over and out!"

"Jesus Christ," Taylor muttered, clipping the walkie-talkie to one of the D-rings on his pants. He pulled the pillows into place beside himself so that his head wouldn't hit the door post if for some reason the side airbag failed to deploy.

"You know," Calliope said, the smoked surface of her motorcycle visor muffling the words, "if this turns out to be a joke, you really went all-in." She reached up with gloved fingers and touched the jagged metal where Taylor had used a SAWZALL to remove the roof of the rented F-350. The Altima had received similar treatment, except he'd cut a little too deep and the windshield had been wobbly afterwards. They had removed it for safety and driven over here very slowly, Drew following close behind the larger vehicle with another motorcycle helmet on to handle the wind.

"Yeah," Taylor said, his voice grim. "If it's a joke, it's on me." He put the heavy truck in gear and revved the engine but kept his foot on the brake. It wasn't time yet.

Calliope shifted nervously. "You know, maybe this—"

Elm Street was zoned commercial. The 400 block had a bakery, a trendy thift store, a small grocery store, a place that sold pictures and picture frames, and a few other things that you'd expect on a moderately affluent block of a moderately affluent Midwestern town.

All of those buildings disappeared into the ground, sucked down in an instant and leaving behind nothing but churned-up earth.

"Oh, thank Christ," Taylor muttered. Calliope choked down a laugh.

Surviving humans take note.

The message floated in front of them, written in symbols that weren't any earthly letters but that Taylor understood as though they were his milk tongue. Simultaneously, a masculine voice spoke them in his ear, using words that made his brain split as it simultaneously understood the words and didn't recognize them.

Per Syndicate rules, subsection 543 of the Precious Elemental Reserves Code, having failed to file a proper appeal for the mineral and elemental rights within 50 Solars of first contact, your planet has been successfully seized and is currently being mined of all requested elemental deposits by the assigned planetary regent.

Every interior of your world has been crushed and all raw materials—organic and inanimate—are in the process of being mined for the requested elements.

Per the Mined Material Reclamation act along with subsection 35 of the Indigenous Planetary Species Protection Act, any surviving humans will be given the opportunity to reclaim their lost matter. The Borant Corporation, having been assigned regency over this solar system, is allowed to choose the manner of this reclamation, and they have chosen option 3, also known as the 18-Level World Dungeon. The Borant Corporation retains all rights to broadcast, exploit, and otherwise control all aspects of the World Dungeon and will remain in control as long as they adhere to Syndicate regulations regarding world resource reclamation.

Upon successful completion of level 18 of the World Dungeon, regency of this planet will revert to the successor.

A Syndicate neutral observer AI—myself—has been created and dispatched to this planet to supervise the creation of the World Dungeon and to ensure all the rules and regulations are properly followed.

Please pay careful attention to the following information as it will not be repeated.

Per the Indigenous Planetary Species Protection Act, all remaining materials—estimated to be 99.999999% of the sifted matter—is currently being repurposed for the subterranean World Dungeon. The first level of this dungeon will open approximately 18 seconds after the end of this announcement. The first-level entrances will be open for exactly one human hour and one hour only. Once the entrances are closed, you may no longer enter. If you enter, you may not leave until you have either completed all 18 levels of the World Dungeon or if you meet certain other requirements.

If you choose not to enter the World Dungeon, you will have to sustain yourself upon the surface of your planet, and this may be the last communication you receive during your lifetime. All previously-processed matter and elements are forfeit. However, you are free to mine and utilize any remaining and naturally-occurring resources for your own benefit. The Borant Corporation wishes you luck and thanks you for the opportunity.

For those who wish to exercise their right of resource reclamation, please take note.

There will be 150,000 level-one entrances added to the world. These entrances will be marked and easy to spot. If you so choose to enter the first level of the dungeon, you will have five rotations of your planet to find the next level down. There will be 75,000 entrances to level two. There will be 37,500 entrances to level three. 18,750 to level 4. 9,375 entrances to level 5 and 4,688 entrances to level 6. The number of available entrances to the next lower level will continue to decrease by half, rounding up until the 18th level, which will only have two entrances and a single exit.

Crawlers who choose to enter the World Dungeon must find a staircase and descend to the next level down before the allotted time is up for that level. Once the time has passed, the level will be reclaimed and all remaining matter in the level, organic and inanimate, will be forfeit. Generated loot and other matter that is not gathered and claimed may be placed in the Syndicate market.

Each lower level will have a longer period of reclamation. Additional rules come into play once any crawlers descend to level 10. These rules will be explained when and if any crawlers reach this level.

If you so choose to enter the World Dungeon, it is highly recommended you immediately find and utilize a tutorial guild. Multiple tutorial guilds will be seeded throughout the dungeon on levels 1 through 3.

If you have any additional questions, or you wish to file an appeal, such requests must be submitted in writing directly to the closest Syndicate office.

Thank you for being a part of the Syndicate. Have a great day.

The instant the last word faded away, Taylor shouted for Drew to follow and stamped on the gas. The massive truck threw itself into the traces and lurched forward. It was loaded to the rafters with everything from lightweight tools to a brutally heavy but barely portable gasoline-powered generator, and the rented trailer had more on top of that. Taylor had wanted to bring at least one ATV but there simply wasn't space on the truck for something that would become useless as soon as its tank went dry. There were four jerrycans of gas (one of which didn't count because Taylor had fed styrofoam into it until it changed to napalm) but those were designated to refill the generator, because having a source of electricity would allow for options that could be achieved in no other way, among them recharging the battery-powered SAWZALL and other cordless tools.

The F-350's massive engine rose to the challenge of all that weight, steadily gaining speed as Taylor aimed it for the exact spot that, in another 9 seconds, was going to become a staircase.

The math was simple: 150,000 entrances around the world. 149,999 chances for someone else to beat them into the dungeon. Being first to identify and capture a new media niche was the biggest advantage you could get and Taylor was determined to have that advantage. And thus he was currently throwing himself, his niece, and five tons of gear that included several gallons of homemade napalm, down a flight of stairs at a speed higher than legal for city streets. The trick was to be in motion just as the staircase appeared in front of them so they could slide down it without delay.

He got it almost, but not quite, exactly right; he hit the line early, so the front 2/3 of the truck was in midair when the ground fell away and the stairs appeared. Except they weren't stairs, they were a ramp, and a much gentler one that any staircase would have been.

The truck crashed down, the weight in the bed making it bottom out and scrape the oilpan. Calliope shouted in delight even as Moose woofed his alarm. The trailer came over the lip, bounced twice and slewed slightly, tugging on the truck and making Taylor overcorrect so that the truck's nose went into the wall and out of control. It bounced off, thrashed to the other side, bounced again, and Taylor was finally able to steer into the turn and get them going straight.

"Hang on!" he shouted as the doors loomed ahead. They were massive, stone or perhaps metal, with towering images of fish/men hybrids on riotous display. He had barely a moment to hope that the doors weren't strong enough to stand up to a five-ton battering ram.

The doors flicked open just as the truck would have hit them. They didn't move, they did a sloppy jump cut from 'closed' to 'open' and the truck barreled through. There was a T-intersection on the other side, the leg of the T a dead end that started directly in front of the truck and just long enough that Taylor had time to stand on the brakes but not remotely enough time to halt the vehicle. They slammed into the far end and the engine crumpled inwards. The airbag went off in Taylor's face, Calliope bounced off her entombing stack of pillows, the trailer rammed them from behind, the tongue went under the hitch and popped the whole thing up in the air, and then all was silence.

Two seconds later there was a lesser screech as Drew dragged the Altima to a halt with only minimal contact against the elevated rear of the trailer. Granted, 'minimal contact' still included the tearing shriek of metal being demolished, but it wasn't full-scale destruction.

They had arrived.

---

Voting is open. It ends on Wednesday, Jun 29, 2022.

Note: Your inventories and chat systems are not currently working.

There are two polls for your possible actions:

[] (Gear) No person left behind!
Leave the gear here, take the weapons and armor, all four of you go find a tutorial guild and figure out how to get inventory and chat working, then come back and load up.

[] (Gear) Guard the gear, Drew!
[] (Gear) Guard the gear, Calliope!
[] (Gear) Guard the gear, both of you!
These options are the same except for the person/people who gets left behind. You'll leave the gear where it is with the relevant people guarding it while Taylor and Moose go off and find the tutorial guild.

[] (Gear) Write in

[] (Tactics) Scout the area carefully before fighting anything
Getting views is great, surviving is better. Be careful, move slowly.

[] (Tactics) Murderhobo!
Those viewers likely have the attention span of goldfish. Get out there and kill, kill, kill!

[] (Tactics) Write in

EDIT: Note that Drew was originally named Thomas. I retconned it after I kept confusing 'Thomas' with 'Taylor' and having to fix it.