I wake in a sterile white room with a bright, uninviting array of fluorescent office lights beating down upon me. I’m in a bed, not surrounded by monsters, and I don’t think this is heaven or one of the many hells, so I have to assume I’m still alive.

  I trigger the impulse within me to bring my Status window to the forefront, confirming that all of my stats are as they should be. Except for my [Strength], which is suffering a -5 penalty for a reason I don’t understand. I sit up and immediately realize the problem. My right arm works perfectly. My left no longer exists, severed two inches below the shoulder.

  I mutter a train of expletives under my breath, prompting the door to open and a worried, sobbing Chloe to rush in and tackle-hug me back onto the pillows. Her arms wrap around my chest, and I do so as best I can, wrapping my one remaining arm around her and gently rubbing her back as she sobs into my chest. I say nothing, letting her spill her tears in the relative privacy of what I have to assume is a local hospital ward.

  If I were a betting woman, I’d wager good money that Lindsey is just outside, keeping an eye out for any signs of trouble that might befall us. I don’t call to her, instead enjoying the time with just Chloe, as well as I can with only three limbs. Strange that there’s no lingering pain. A bit of phantom tingle though, but no pain. I attribute that to the healer currently lying on top of me.

  “You… reckless idiot!” Chloe says. She smacks my face, not hard enough to injure me or lower my [Health] by even a single point. Just hard enough to get her extreme displeasure across. “What were you thinking, pulling a stunt like that?”

  We both know the answer to this question. I was completing the mission, prepared to sacrifice an arm to ensure the survival of the people of Ft. Still. But that’s not why she’s asking. She’s angry, concerned, and worried. She knows I’ve been reckless. Reckless in pursuit of goals, willing to take risks, and acknowledging that not taking risks is, especially now, a risk of its own. But she needs to vent that frustration and concern, and this is how it comes out.

  “I’m sorry, Chloe,” I say. I look into her eyes for the first part of it, then lower my gaze in deference to her as I say her name. “I was attacked, and rushed to get the spell completed before I lost control completely.”

  She shakes her head and buries her face back in my chest. Tightly enough that I’m not sure if it’s merely a concerned hug between friends or an indication that she’s still wanting something more from me. Something I’m still not ready to give, if indeed, I ever will be.

  “I didn’t mean for things to end up the way they did. I also don’t plan to let this slow me down.”

  “Slow you down, Sera? You’re down an arm, and still you want to go back out there and fight? I’d call you daft, but–” Her face turns deadly serious. “Nope, not happening, healer's orders, you are going to stay here and.” She gives more groans of disapproval as I slowly sit up and take a drink of water.

  “How long have I been out?” I ask.

  “Nearly a day. It’s morning the day after the battle. Thankfully, no trouble since then, and people are doing their best to pick up the pieces and continue to go about their daily lives.”

  I smile. Proof that I’ve matured, at least to some small extent, though maybe that’s just me aggrandizing myself. When this all started a month or so ago, I was angry at people who were trying to go back to the old world. Now, I feel only a gentle comfort that no lives were more upended than absolutely necessary.

  “How many deaths?”

  “Two. Civilians. I didn’t get their names. I’m… I’m glad you didn’t have to see it yourself.” Chloe pauses for a bit, chokes on her words some. “I don’t want to try to describe but… It was bad.”

  “You were out there, healing people, all day yesterday, weren’t you?”

  “Until my [Ether] ran dry, my muscles grew too sore, and Lindsey literally dragged me off to bed. But it was rewarding. I felt a sense of calm and purpose as I was doing so. Like–”

  “It was what your very soul was telling you that you should be doing?”

  Chloe nods.

  “I think it’s the same for me. Except my class wants me to experiment, to study, to hypothesize, and to understand. It’s why I can’t stop pushing forward with [Glyphcasting] and building Ethertech and everything else. It’s what I want to be doing with my life. What I would have wanted to do before the System came. But now, coupled with my class, that compulsion is almost impossible to do more than simply forestall.”

  “But your arm–”

  I cut her off. “Is gone. It’s a setback. But I am a [Mechanist] through and through, and building solutions to my problems is what I do. Plus–” I trail off, not wanting to mention my whole reincarnation thing when there’s very likely a powerful [Ranger] not five feet out the door listening in on every word the two of us share. Chloe seems to get the sentiment.

  The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

  “So what now?”

  “Lindsey, do you have any suggestions?” I call out.

  Sure enough, she emerges from just to the right of the entryway and gives a wave. “Was I that obvious?” She adds a barely audible ‘I must be losing my touch’ under her breath.

  “First–” I flicker on my [Ethersight], causing my teal irises to lightly glow. “–my [Ethersight] isn’t stopped by these walls. And more importantly, as I’m sure you overheard, I’ve suspected you were here since the moment I woke up. There’s no guarantee someone wasn’t going to try something, and you’re not the type to trust guard duties to another.”

  Lindsey chuckles. “Okay, fine, you got me. I’m here. So, what do you want to do?”

  “Check out the robotics program here at the university. Get a prosthetic of some sort. Build a new arm for myself. Then, once that’s good and done, get back up and into action.”

  “Hey, Sera,” Chloe says. “What about that robot arm from–”

  Lindsey grins at us, pulling my robot arm out from a pouch behind her back. “You mean this?”

  I rush up to try to grab it, momentarily forgetting my lack of a left arm as I rotate my little shoulder stump around. I eventually grab it with my arm, singular, and pull it close to me. Although there’s one thing that’s still troubling me. Or maybe three.

  “Wait!” I say. “When, how, and why?”

  “When? Yesterday afternoon, once the dust settled. How? I asked Alana to fly back to base and get it. Absolutely amazing ability she has, by the way. Being able to fly nonstop for twenty four minutes straight with that kind of speed, and being able to do so every hour? I have to feel a little bad for her. She’s going to be a logistician’s best friend and a glorified pack mule for high command once word about her abilities gets out. And why? Because it seemed like the sort of thing you’d be interested in. I mentioned it to Nicholas, and he agreed and gave the commands.”

  “So, why can’t she just say no?” Chloe asks.

  “Because unlike you two, who are nominally working with us as a matter of convenience much like contractors, she’s an enlisted soldier, signed and everything. She’s legally obligated to obey the lawful orders of her superiors, lest she be subject to court martial and–”

  I interject. “As though they could, or would, hold her back.”

  “That’s not–” Lindsey gives me a glare. “In any case, you said that this doohickey was supposed to help get you back to fighting shape?”

  I nod. “It’s the best chance we have right now. And considering the only option is to remain cooped up in a cage for the rest of my life, well, I’m going to do what I can to make this project a success.”

  “You really are something,” Lindsey says. “Most people would have hung their hats and jackets up and called it quits after losing an arm. But you’re not just willing to get a prosthetic and see about rehab. You want to just keep blazing forward, limitations and injuries be damned. Part of me wishes that things would have been different for all of us. I know your sentiment about authority, especially police and military, but you would have made one hell of a ranger.”

  I demur for a moment. I don’t know about all the others. Nicholas is an officer, and a fairly high ranking one, at least by the standards of the people I personally know. And I haven’t interacted enough with the Morris siblings much, though they seem nice enough.

  Alexey and Brent? I guess I respect them as people, but it’s different for Lindsey. She was there with us in the dungeon. She came on her own to help us defeat Oneiros. Came back with us and showered at Chloe’s place, offered to buy us dinner on her own dime. I might not trust everyone else, and maybe this is a terrible idea, but I decide I need to trust someone. And the woman before me, I think, deserves the honor more than anyone.

  “Lindsey, how much does your [Identify] Skill tell you about me? And please, be honest.”

  “I can see that you have a [Mechanist] class, that you’re level 25, and what your main attribute stats are. I can’t see your Skills or anything else.”

  “The specific name of my class is [Planetouched Mechanist].”

  “Like an airplane?”

  “Like, different planes of existence. Lindsey, I hope you can respect why I didn’t feel comfortable telling you this until now, but I’m not from around here. I have it on good authority that I’m not human. Not from Earth, not from the solar system, and probably not even from this galaxy.”

  “You’re an alien?”

  “An alien… biomechanical cyborg, if my memories are correct. And while I know memories are prone to error, some other part of me knows them to be true. Some event caused me to be reborn as a human eighteen years ago, and I think the System has something to do with the reason why I’m here. I want… I need to find out who I am, what I was created for, and what I should do with this second life I’ve been given. And the only way I’m going to do that is to keep moving forward. To advance in levels, develop my class, and… maybe see if there’s anyone else like me out in the cosmos.”

  Lindsey laughs. “I’m sorry, Sera. I’m not laughing at you. It’s just that on the one hand, it all seems so patently absurd that you can speak so forcefully about being an alien and there being life on other worlds and universes outside our own. And yet, a month ago, the idea that Earth would be transformed into a world just like the games I used to play when I was a kid was equally absurd.”

  “You… believe me?” I say, still not quite convinced that she’s sincere and not just humoring ’us kids’.

  “Whether or not I believe you doesn't matter as much as the fact that you genuinely and sincerely believe what you’re saying is true.” She gives me The Look. “Don’t try to hide it, Sera. You’re not a good liar, and you’re not a good actress either.”

  I roll my eyes at her.

  “Please don’t tell anyone else? I’d rather not have my secrets shared with the whole world. Not yet, anyway.”

  “Sure thing. Now let’s get a move on, both of you! I’m sure Sera’s hungry and everyone else wants to see how the two of you are doing.”

  My stomach growls. Because of course it does.