Author's Note: Although this is a sequel to an earlier story, it has been written to be understandable to someone who hasn't read the previous entry.

On a logistical note for newcomers to this website, I recommend using the options bar above this note to adjust your margins and text size. I wrote and edited the story along these parameters and I hope that readers can find a comfortable reading experience.

Enjoy!

Gregor had let his guard down the moment they had stepped into Central Park. Even in the middle of the night, he knew there were few dangers in the city that rivaled the scene they had just left.

Large-scale war was being fought in the Underland for the first time in ten years, breaking the peace that had been found with his destruction of Sandwich's sword. The cutters and other toxic creatures from the jungle and beyond had finally acted on their eternal hate of the warmbloods. Although the warmbloods and their allies were now fighting as one against the foreign threat, the situation in the Underland was perhaps only marginally better after Gregor had intervened.

Faced with a large force of ants, bees, and snakes amassing near Regalia, Luxa had used her role as Queen as a distraction for the army's last-ditch assault. By splitting the enemy between attacking the Regalian Queen and the unified armies sent to destroy the cutter nests, she had massively improved the chances of the Underland's survival.

She had kept Gregor in the dark about her sacrificial plan, a task made easy because he arrived only the night before the armies marched out. After using his experience in military demolitions to drown the cutter nests with the Waterway, he and Aurora flew back to the palace as soon as the secret had been revealed to him - that Luxa and the Regalian palace was swarmed with enemies seeking her death.

Gregor had almost been too late to assist, but he came in time to shoot his way through a horde of giant bees- and then was attacked by an entire army of twisters right outside of the royal chambers.

Hacking his way out of the hundreds of snakes had been difficult, but now the both of them were here, in Central Park. Luxa had been ordered by Ripred and her council to seek refuge in the Overland while the situation at home stabilized - there had been too many attempts on her life after the forces of Poison entered direct conflict with the allied forces.

Luxa knew the consequences of those assassination attempts more than anyone else. Only a few weeks before Gregor had arrived, she had been blinded and lost many of her royal guards during an ambush near the Font. The rest of them had made a last stand at the palace just a few hours ago. Gregor had seen their bodies lining the hallways as he rushed to her chambers, thinking he was too late.

Whatever resentment had grown in their ten years apart disappeared on reuniting, and Aurora had evacuated them to the entrance beneath Central Park. Leaving most of their things behind, they had climbed together to the surface, Luxa supporting Gregor on his injured leg while Gregor directed themselves without her sight.

It was past midnight, and Gregor was surprised to note that none of the lamps around the entrance were switched on. Even still, there was enough of a glow from the rest of the city to see flakes of snow as they drifted down from the sky.

One settled on Luxa's forehead, and she shivered, reminding him once again that she was here, and that she was real.

Gregor intercepted the question on her lips.

"That was snow. It's snowing."

And just before Luxa turned and cocked her head at him, bright lights burst on, and his vision blanked out into white.

Gregor's eyes snapped shut and his tongue clicked, displaying the men that surrounded them. They were armored, some with long-guns, maybe rifles. Others with batons. If they were cops, there wasn't much he could do, but he still tensed up, reaching for a sword that wasn't there.

"Stand down, everybody," somebody called out in an authoritative tone. "That's not human blood on those two, or at least we better hope not."

Gregor opened his eyes to see a very familiar face. The mustachioed Dr. Parry, in front of the ring of armed men.

"How?" Gregor asked.

"Now, now," the British man cautioned. "This is no time for story-telling. It's too cold out."

Gregor still didn't understand, but he trusted the doctor after the man had helped him months ago in the Overland. Without the doctor's kindness, Gregor was sure that both his mental and physical scars would be far more visible.

After making sure that everybody knew that the new arrivals weren't threats, the older man ushered them through the lines of troops in body armor and black uniforms and to a first aid tent. Gregor looked for patches or lettering, but the people who had surrounded the only open entrance to the Underland were entirely unmarked.

"You look knackered," Dr. Parry said, inspecting Gregor's eyes one-by-one with a penlight and then checking all over his body.

"You've got cuts, contusions, and quite a few calluses," the doctor said. "But you'll be all right, after- Oh, what's this?"

Dr. Parry had found Gregor's left knee. It was swollen and obviously painful to the touch, the combined results from a rockslide and a snake attack.

"We'll need to visit the clinic for this one, but other than the knee, you've a simple case of what we doctors call 'really bloody tired' syndrome."

Gregor couldn't help but laugh. It let off the tension after what had been a really terrible day.

"And how about you?" Dr. Parry asked Luxa, who had been absolutely silent up till then. "Any complaints?"

"No, I can not complain."

The doctor nodded dismissively. He didn't meant to be rude, but what the patient reported was only part of the examination. The next part was physical.

"This extreme lightness of the skin... near transparency. And before this business with your eyes, you had purple pupils? No, more accurately described as violet. Pale hair as well. You fit the description, to the letter."

"What description?" Gregor asked, but Dr. Parry waved him off.

"I shall explain at the clinic. Just one point of clarification first: How long ago were those peepers of yours damaged, Miss Luxa?"

"A matter of weeks," she responded, confused at the question more than offended.

The doctor pondered for a moment.

"We may in fact, be able to restore their function. But I can't promise anything until we arrive at the clinic."

The man gave them both thick, heavy blankets to wrap around themselves before they exited the first aid tent and continued out of the small cluster of tents that had popped up next to the Central Park pedestal.

The blankets were necessary for the few yards in between them and an unmarked white van because the windchill threatened to pierce all the way down to the bone. Underland clothes were not built for New York in the late winter.

The van was nice and warm already, and Dr. Parry sat in the same row of seats as them. The drive wouldn't be long, according to him. They talked hastily about a few things on the way there. Gregor explained what he and Luxa had just been through to while Dr. Parry explained how he had been ordered to New York a few days ago. Luxa was quiet, but Gregor got the sense that she was just trying to listen as hard as possible to the sounds of the city, comparing them to what Gregor had told her long ago.

There was the deep gasoline purr of engines, the gentle squeaking of brakes, the classic over-eager horn-honking of his hometown. They passed one or two bars that had live bands playing, and brief snatches of music passed through the otherwise quiet interior of the van. Gregor noticed Luxa's right hand stroking the fuzzy surface of the seat, and let his hand rest upon hers reassuringly. She turned her hand over so that their palms were touching, and squeezed. There would be a time for words later.

The clinic was in the basement of a multilevel office building, but they didn't go through the lobby. The van proceeded down a wide, well-lit alley. To the right of the loading dock, a ramp led down to windowless metal doors. Gregor knew they weren't going to be dissected in a mad scientist's secret lab or anything like that, but the thought couldn't help but pass by his mind. He hadn't called anyone back home yet, so he hoped he wasn't about to be 'disappeared'.

They entered through the back door and found that the clinic was just a cozy group of medical rooms. Nodding to a sleepy-looking man at a desk, Dr. Parry brought them to a small room filled with diagnostic equipment, including an X-ray, where he took quick exposures of Gregor's knee. They weren't meant for his own use though, because he merely placed them in a folder while Gregor tried to explain how X-rays worked to Luxa.

"In a similar manner to the camera you brought, but with a special coating that only shows a reaction to these 'X' rays?" Luxa tried to guess.

"Yes," Dr. Parry interjected. "That would be pretty accurate, but this one actually uses digital sensors. Where did you hear about the 'coatings'?"

"There is not very much glass-sand in our area of the Underland, but certain inventors have famously tried to capture light using alchemical means."

"That's fascinating," the doctor said. "They really should have more of that kind of thing in the documentation."

"You keep mentioned that you 'read about' things," Gregor pointed out, trying to keep the doctor from evading any longer. "Did somebody write a secret book on Regalia? What were all those guys doing there? What is this place?"

Dr. Parry raised a hand, as if to slow him down.

"That's a lot of questions, there. It'll be easier just to explain how the Underland came to be known to us. As I told you, it is a long story, but it begins in the last century."

The threat of nuclear war in the last century demanded ways to keep the citizenry safe. Massive shelters were excavated under New York, large concrete boxes extending just off of the subway lines. One of these passages had an entrance near Central Park. As time went on and the bombs never dropped, maintenance crews began seeing things. Rats larger than men, giant cockroaches, and more.

The reports were passed up the chain of command until someone got the FBI to check it out. Using state-of-the-art sonar equipment, a very extensive cavern system was discovered. When lethally-hostile creatures were discovered as well, the surviving FBI agents refused to investigate further, on the grounds that supernatural occurrences were not in their jurisdiction.

Fortunately, there was a quasi-governmental unit just coming into existence who found the supernatural very much in their jurisdiction. As the world became connected through telephone lines and radio waves, it became clear to multiple influential people that Earth was not as mundane as we thought it was. Certifiable proof was being found of portals between worlds, forgotten creatures under New York City, superhuman abilities, and more. Elements from across NATO soon formed a group that would catalog and control these events and keep them safe from Soviet control. By 1991, the group had expanded to more than a hundred countries, expanded by the falling Iron Curtain.

Operating in utter secrecy and almost entirely independent of each other, small cells of personnel keep the daily illusion of the normal world going by monitoring abnormalities and shielding them from the public eye in the interest of civic peace.

"You're saying people in New York know the Underland exists?" Gregor asked.

"Some people, surely," Dr. Parry said. "And more than that, they shared diplomatic connections for some years."

"Never have I heard of such things," Luxa said. "Although the secrecy of my family no longer can shock me."

"I don't think they've communicated with any of the humans for a long time now, but we have a fellow who exchanges notes with a rat quite frequently."

"Ripred?" Gregor asked.

"That might be its name, though I can't say I've met him. All I know is that he's the first rat they caught that didn't try to gnaw their faces off on sight."

"Yeah, he's special like that," Gregor said.

"In any case, this now brings you two up to speed on why, exactly I was waiting for you. Your friend passed a note along the usual channels to expect you at the surface. But may I ask what brings Ms. Luxa above with such haste?"

"She's a refugee," Gregor blurted out, trying to get a good story out. "She's a queen who had to flee for the safety of her and her people."

Dr. Parry nodded. A request for asylum from a political official was sufficient, even if Luxa hadn't said it herself. But he turned to her anyway.

"Anything to add?"

"Regalia has no quarrel with the Overland," Luxa said. "But the two worlds must remain separate."

"I don't think the suits upstairs would have it any other way," Dr. Parry said. "A place for everything and everything in it's place. I'm sure the fellows at Central Park have already secured the entrance behind us."

Gregor felt like the odd one out for wanting to mix the two lives. He didn't want to choose between one or the other. But he kept his mouth shut. He was truly a third party here, not entirely representing the Overland or the Underland.

After documenting Luxa's request for asylum, the doctor began with full medical evaluations, starting with Gregor. His knee just turned out to be severely sprained, so Dr. Parry advised a routine of rest, cold compression, and elevation until it got better.

Inspecting Luxa's eyes, Dr. Parry clucked his tongue.

"Corneal scarring and blanching in the conjunctiva. There are a few things we can do for the short term, but surgery will most likely be needed."

Gregor looked at the Underlander. A bunch of words that she probably didn't understand had been thrown at her, but it looked like 'surgery' clicked.

"Chirurgy?" she asked. "Will it be painful?"

"Quite the opposite," Dr. Parry said. "Medicated drops should provide much relief for now, and then the surgery will use local anesthetic."

Because Dr. Parry seemed to be the only medical guy around, he did everything from getting the two changed into hospital gowns to enclosing Gregor's knee in a frozen wrap.

"Good to see you in one piece, Gregor," the doctor said after he applied the drops into Luxa's eyes.

"You, too, man."

"I'm glad to see you've found her," he added, softly. Although his bristly mustache was stretched into a smile, something seemed very sad about him. Back when Gregor had been recovering in a field hospital for a week, Dr. Parry had shared a similar story of young love lost. It seemed like he hadn't the luck of rejoining yet.

"I'll see you in the morning," Will said.

He turned out the lights as he left, leaving the tiny glow underneath the door as the only sign there were still people awake out there. The doctor had pushed the two hospital beds closer together, and so Gregor reached his hand out from under his blanket, palm up. There was no response from Luxa. It took a while to him realize that she wouldn't be able to see him reaching out to her. He felt stupid all the way until sleep took him.

It was a patrol like any other, weeks after Gregor had killed his first man. This was before the sharpness had really come out in him, but the rest of the platoon was already starting to spread rumors about his 'killer instinct'. He had taken point- the position at the head of their formation- while they proceeded down a dry riverbed. They were halfway down their route, the furthest they would get from base and the furthest they would be from support. He was switched on, watching every movement from the brush around them. He thought he saw something glint for just a split-second, gunmetal reflecting sunlight.

An eyeblink, and the riverbed is gone. It's the Jungle, and not the one from the Overland. Even so, he's with the rats again, Lapblood and her mate- he can't remember his name anymore. It's too late to do anything, to say anything as the vines shoot out and seize them all. Gregor is lifted in the air above the flesh-eating plant, its mouth opening wide. But inside, there isn't the pooled acid. It's even worse, a giant white paw swinging a set of claws at him.

He feels the black leather rip aside, the metal plates knocked off as the sharp sinks into him. He shuts his eyes in an eternal wince- he's back in the riverbed, back in a more recent war. He tastes dirt in his mouth but doesn't have the time to spit. He can hear the sound barrier broken right beside his ears- the crack of bullets nearly missing him. He was already returning fire, his finger pulling the trigger before he could even think. He would have held it down, would have let the gun keep spitting hot metal, but his rifle didn't have full-auto. To his horror, he realize that his fingers couldn't move at all. Gregor looks at his hand- he's not holding the gun anymore. Its frozen in a death grip, clenched around some object. Without forcing his digits open, Gregor knows what he's holding onto so tight. The single black claw. The only thing that was left. Tonight, the dream ends with that. Not the explosion.

Gregor woke up at six in the morning and realized he had forgotten to do a whole lot last night. He reached down to where his backpack lay on the floor and found his phone. The first time he had gone down to the Underland, cellphones were unheard of for kids at his age. In the time since, the prices had dropped and the things had become a lot more useful. He activated the plastic-and-glass rectangle, hoping for the best...

And he didn't get it. Ten missed calls from Grace Kent, better known to him as Mom. Thankfully, she stopped leaving voicemails after the first three. He tapped out a message to each member of his family, and made a note to call Mrs. Cormaci.

Until his family woke up and read the messages, Gregor thought he might as well try to fall back to sleep until he caught a glimpse of Luxa's eyes.

The drops had done something to the scarring, but the strange opaque effect still persisted. More importantly, because they were open, Luxa was awake.

"Good morning," Gregor said, relishing the idea that he could wake up and say those words to the woman next to him. Never mind the fact that they were in two separate beds, or that 'good morning' had a different meaning in the Underland, a place without the Sun. It felt like something had returned to him, even if it was unfamiliar and awkward.

"Good morning," Luxa replied. Her voice was a lot like he remembered from long ago, but deeper, and maybe even richer.

She held her lids open with her fingers as Gregor followed Dr. Parry's instructions with the medication. One drop per eye every hour. They had only slept for three hours since their close escape from Regalia, so they were already nodding off the minute after the drops were done. Gregor's mom called at 9 in the morning, rousing him from any more sleep.

"...Hey" he greeted sleepily.

"Gregor, honey, where are you?"

"A clinic in New York. I got back last night."

"Are you hurt?"

"I'm fine. I don't know when I'll get back," Gregor said honestly. "We're not going back the Underland, though."

"We?" his mom asked. "Who are you talking about? Dad and Lisbeth got back yesterday."

"Luxa," Gregor said. "She needed to leave for a while."

"Oh, Luxa? How is she?" Gregor's mom asked, a certain suggestion hidden in her tone.

"She's... blind right now."

Gregor explained how war had broken out from the Poison forces, and Luxa, as Queen of Regalia, had been a prime target. He left out most of the fighting that led to their escape but all the other details were there.

"So I'll be in New York at least until she's back to normal, at least."

Surprisingly, his mom wasn't let down by that at all. Had she been waiting for Gregor to spend some time away from home? He had to admit that he had spent a lot of time moping around the house after getting back from the war.

An aide of some sort brought in two trays of food, took some vital signs, and then disappeared back into the clinic. After showing Luxa how to use the remote to get the hospital bed into an upright position, Gregor identified the various things that were in breakfast.

"Yogurt is a kind of fermented milk. You're making that face, but it's a lot better than it sounds. Especially with refrigeration."

"Refrigeration?"

"I guess you could call it an electric coldbox."

She took a cautious spoonful of the fruit yogurt into her mouth, and tasted it.

"It is not bad. Not at all as I expected."

"What'd you expect?"

"Rotten milk and bitter fruit."

Breakfast made Gregor realize how much Luxa still had to learn about the world. He had been lucky in Regalia because it was just one city and he was there as a V.I.P, but he was getting the feeling that whatever shadow agency was running the show here probably didn't care enough to manage them too closely.

"What is the Sun like?" Luxa asked suddenly.

Gregor had to think about that for a bit. It was another one of those things he took for granted.

"It's pretty sweet, having a source of light in the sky like that. It can get too hot sometimes, though, or it can burn people's skin after a while."

"Their very skin?"

"More of those invisible rays. Because they're at a high intensity, they get absorbed by the skin and it hurts."

"The Sun does not sound like such a 'sweet' thing after all," Luxa pouted. "I expect I will burst into flames the moment I step outside."

"During winter, it's less direct, but I guess you could use some sunblock or wear a big hat or something," Gregor said. More than burns, he worried about how Luxa might get stares. From far away and with strong light, the veins of her face and arms could be mistaken for tattoos. He didn't want her to feel alienated during her stay in his homeland.

"And what are you staring at, Overlander?" Luxa asked playfully.

"I... uhh..." Gregor stammered, then caught himself. "Wait a second, how could you tell where I was looking?"

"It was mere conjecture," she said, before she started laughing. "And you admitted to it!"

Gregor was about to ask about what made him looking at her such a funny thing when there was a knock on the door.

A woman in a white lab coat and a ponytail walked in, followed by Dr. Parry.

"And you told me this was a clinic, Will!" the woman said to the doctor before turning and greeting the patients.

"It is," Dr. Parry tried to explain. "I mean, most of of time. When we have patients."

"I am an ophthalmologist, or 'eye doctor', if I'm talking to my younger patients," the Doctor greeted. "Dr. Parry thinks he can fix your eyes, and I'm here to make sure that he can."

The woman spoke quickly and with a wide smile. She came off entirely natural.

"You would not perform the chirurgery yourself?" Luxa asked.

"I perform many procedures, including certain eye surgeries. But believe me, Will Parry has a magic touch. They ask for him around the world."

Luxa nodded in assent and an extensive process of measurements began, as well as questions about how the injury happened and how quick treatment occurred.

It apparently all mattered, but the memories were painful for Luxa.

Gregor reached out and this time Luxa took his hand on reflex, squeezing it as she tried to remember exactly how often they had rinsed out her eyes. Then, the doctors tried to identify the chemical used in the attack.

"It sounds alkali to me," the eye doctor said. "What did you see, Will?"

"A solution like lime or lye, processed over countless days inside one of these ants and then used. Definitely alkali."

Gregor didn't know what difference the chemical would have made, but it didn't bother him, so long as Luxa got what she needed from the treatment.

There were a few more measurements taken, but Dr. Parry and the eye doctor left soon afterwards, saying that the operation could actually be performed the next day.

In their shared room, Gregor and Luxa talked about little things for a while, just the elements of polite conversation. They didn't mention the kiss back at the palace, or the hundreds that must have been killed in the newest war that was still ongoing, or even what Gregor had been doing for the past few years as a Marine. In some ways, those thing couldn't matter at the moment.

Luxa talked about Hazard and how he ran the Peace Council between races almost by himself. As a Halflander, many considered him an embodiment of even-mindedness, seeing as two heritages ran in his blood. In previous times, halflanders had served on tribunals as judges and Hazard was respected for his cool head and his ability to empathize and communicate equally among the races.

Gregor tried to explain how Boots had changed, now that she was 13. It was hard to explain it to someone that had only met her at that very young age, but like many children, she had outgrown some things while keeping others. The curiosity and lack of caution stayed strong with her, along with her absurd tolerance for new things.

Just like she had recognized each living thing in the Underland individually and treated them like friends, Boots knew everyone at her school. It was interesting to see which particular group were invited over to their house each day. She had friends from all over.

Other than bathroom breaks, the two of them were practically stuck together, although Luxa spent some of her time out of bed, cautiously feeling her way around the small room and inspecting the pieces of technology that lay around.

Dr. Parry returned that evening with a pizza, carefully holding the steaming box away from his white Oxford shirt.

"The cafeteria upstairs closed down at five," he explained. "So I decided to bring us supper from outside."

Gregor watched as Luxa's eyes widened at the first bite. She had heard about it from him, during the quest for the Bane. They needed to take their mind off of seeing Howard's bond eaten alive in midair by a horde of mites, and Gregor had told her practically every single thing he could remember about his life.

The current situation was nothing like that somber, desperate moment on the boat. He knew it would sound weird, but Gregor just felt good as he watched her. He didn't know why something as basic as seeing her try a food seemed to fill him with delight.

Dr. Parry chuckled, and Gregor broke his eyes from Luxa's face. He was obviously, impossibly, infatuated with her, and it made him feel vulnerable to keep that much in the open.

Dr. Parry pushed on to explain the procedure for tomorrow. Around noon, Luxa would be taken to the operating room, where the damaged, blocked off tissue at the front of Luxa's eyes would be removed and where 'a graft of amniotic membrane would be applied to help recover the cornea'.

"Wait, by amniotic membrane, do you mean..."

Gregor was surprised. He had never heard about anything like that...

"Yes, Gregor. The graft is a heavily processed product derived from donated placentas."

"I have no objections," Luxa said. "In Regalia, great care is taken not to waste certain parts of the afterbirth."

That was also a previously unknown bit of trivia for Gregor, but it also reminded him that he should introduce the concept of 'TMI', in case Luxa was talking with someone who wasn't as professional as the doctor.

"We'll need to keep you under observation for a day afterwards, but you two are free to go after that, just as long as you come for weekly checkups."

Later that night, when the lights were off and they were meant to be sleeping, Gregor felt the fear return. His brief moments of being scared were only minor hindrances since the Underland. He had learned all sorts of tricks to close off those weak emotions, to turn himself to stone or ice and push through the anxiety. It wasn't a healthy way to deal with his troubles, he knew. He could be fearless and stoic but there were also times where it wasn't enough to create a mental barrier. Sometimes it seemed like there was too much uncertainty around Gregor sometimes, as if the very ground he stood on didn't exist.

The danger of giant bees and bugs was gone for them right now, but thousands in the Underland could still be in danger. They didn't have any news on the people who remained behind, but there could still be a lot of fighting going on. How did Luxa feel, knowing that her city was still immersed in war? Come to think of it, he didn't know much about how she felt at all right now. In a way, they were still strangers to each other after 10 years apart. There were things they would keep hidden from each other.

She seemed eager to heal, curious about New York, and somewhat affectionate towards him, but that was only what she showed. They hadn't talked about their feelings or their intentions after they had gotten into a bitter argument the night of his arrival.

It was probably a mutual decision that they remained so ignorant of the truth of themselves for now, contented with wordlessly holding hands. When they talked about the most mundane and superficial elements of their life, they were edging around the giant pit that surrounded Luxa's role as Queen. With just a careless word, they would fall into the tired old problem that had been hounding her: the procurement of an heir. It was so much easier to hold hands and chatter about their own families, to talk about pizzas and taxicabs or the new changes to that one ballgame the Regalians would play on the backs of bats.

He wasn't that scared of the surgery. Dr. Parry had operated on Gregor, and came recommended by experts. He was more scared of how he would look to her. Luxa would run her hand lightly down his face now, but he knew there was an overwhelming weariness in him, a tortured, pained look that he had seen before, in Ripred and Mareth and Hamnet and dozens of other fighters. Maybe it had never left him after Ares.

Lying on his back, staring at the gray ceiling, Gregor had too much time to think. His worries were punctuated only by the sad little murmurs that escaped from Luxa as she slept. The time on his watch wound further and further, from midnight to one to two in the morning. At some point, he fell into sleep.

It was Gregor's first time in a jungle since he was a kid, but this somehow would be far safer than the Underland's jungle. He wasn't with Recon anymore, his new unit was tailored for different kinds of operations. On paper, the unit was there to train and advise a foreign government's federal police.

In reality, they had taken the job into their own hands, heading on the hunt themselves. There were guerrillas tucked into every corner of the country, from the highest mountains to the densest thickets. This particular experience came from the densest thickets. Gregor had not taken point this time- the older guys had sharpened their eyes and ears with years of experience and knew the signs better than him.

There was reliable evidence that the enemy was operating out of a indigenous village along a river, the information being provided by a resident herself. Gregor's unit had moved out in the deep of night, so as to ambush the enemy at their change of guard. For hours, the world had been shades of night-goggle-green, so when the sign came to hit the ground, he almost couldn't see the enemy patrol ahead of them.

What happened next didn't stick in Gregor's head as much. There was some killing, but what was more important was the sight that awaited them after the enemy was dispatched. They approached the village carefully, hoping that there weren't any more threats waiting for them. And there wasn't.

Instead, a still-smoking pile sat in the center of the village, charred forms that were unfortunately familiar to him. He had seen gnawers burn at the walls of Regalia, and they had smelled like this. Again, some had sliced. Again, some had poured. And again, bodies were set alight.

The enemy had suspected an informant in the village. The survivors explained that the men had lined the entire population up in the center of their home. They shot one out of every five villagers, asking each one if they were the spy. And then, they had burned the dead as an example to the rest of the town.

The rest of the squad was disgusted by the sight, but they all looked to see Gregor's reaction. They needed the rookie to show them how to feel, they had been in the shit too long to remember. But Gregor's expression was flat. He had seen it all before, it turned out. He felt all of it as if it was secondhand to him now.

But his arm was shaking. He looked down to his hand, and saw his clenched fist. Again, he knew what was held within it, and again, he found that he could not let it go.

When Gregor woke up, the bed next to him was empty.