David woke to the sound of barking feeling like he had barely fallen asleep. Then he heard a shout of "Hello the Camp!"

  Groggy from sleep he felt a rush of something as he staggered to his feet. His body was stiff from sleeping on the ground and he saw others emerging from tents. Some he recognized as fellow raiders, including the members of his team.

  Bessie's barking continued, sharp and insistent. Billy was already up, one hand on her collar, speaking in low tones. The sky overhead was still dark, leaving the dim glow of the barrier as the only illumination, brighter than a full moon and casting almost no shadows.

  David tried to shake off the fog of exhaustion. His muscles still ached from Camila's enthusiastic training session with the switch, but his mind felt clearer than it should.

  The rush he'd felt upon waking seemed to be persisting as he gradually became more alert. Was that the system compensating for fatigue?

  "Over here!" the voice called again, the middle-aged man was waving. "We just walked over, what are all of you doing camping here?"

  David jogged toward the voice, his body protesting with every step until it wasn't protesting anymore. The stiffness melted away as he moved, replaced by an artificial alertness that felt both helpful and deeply wrong. He pulled up his status with a thought, checking his stamina.

  STAMINA (2,3) 71%

  As he watched the stamina level dropped to 70%. So, the system could burn stamina to push through fatigue. That was... useful. And terrifying. How long could someone keep going before they collapsed? Was it curing his fatigue or just plastering over the problem?

  Another variable to track, another way the system changed basic human limitations.

  He filed that away for later discussion and focused on the commotion ahead.

  A small group had walked into the park and, having passed the mess of vehicles without meeting anyone, approached the tents.

  In the dim light cast by the barrier it was hard to make out details. Then someone who had charged their phone turned on the flashlight behind him. The flood of artificial light increased as somebody found and switched on a battery powered lantern.

  The people who had crossed the barrier moved with the hesitancy of people whose whole world had been turned upside down while they slept. People who didn’t really understand how there could be a camp in the neighborhood park, let alone magic glowing barriers and messages from a system. Newly awakened, looking around with wide eyes at the transformed world.

  As David arrived Carl was already there, rifle in hand but lowered, speaking in a calm voice. "Y'all doing okay? You're safe here. This is a protected area."

  The lead figure was joined by a middle-aged woman in business casual clothes, rumpled and looking like they had been slept in. Her hair was messy and a few other signs showed she had risen in haste.

  "Is this real? The messages, the... what happened?"

  "It's real," Carl said. "Come on through. We got water, food, people who can explain things."

  David watched as they approached in a cluster. The last of them, a mother with a kid who looked like he belonged in elementary school tugged her son’s hand to keep up.

  Most looked shell-shocked, moving on autopilot. One man kept muttering something under his breath - a prayer maybe, or just the same question repeated endlessly.

  Camila materialized at David's elbow, already moving to intercept the newcomers. Cattily he thought

  Where were the self-appointed council now?

  They could have been useful but no, they were comfortable in their beds somewhere in the surrounding houses.

  He supposed his grumpiness was mostly due to sleeping on the ground, again.

  Camila was all business as she too arrived, almost bouncing with energy despite the hour.

  "OK, OK, let's get you all settled. You need water? When did you wake up?"

  The businesswoman focused on Camila with obvious relief at finding someone taking charge.

  "Maybe an hour ago? We were in my apartment, watching the news to see if the Aliens would do anything. Then everything turned white and I was somewhere else staring at this pattern. Then I woke up and it was dark except this glowing box telling me I had a new quest like in a video game. I thought I was going mad, Gary wouldn’t wake up, so maybe it was all a dream. Then suddenly he did and he saw the box too. The lights didn’t work so we came here…”

  She continued “we bumped into Jenny and her Silas then these others as we walked towards that…”

  She gestured vaguely to the glowing beacon rising from the top of the barrier.

  “When nothing else happened, we decided to come in and it didn’t hurt us. Just gave us another load of messages telling us to find an Obelisk…”

  The chaotic explanation was consistent with David’s own experience, before she could start asking questions Charlie spoke, he was awake and while bleary eyed perked up at his favorite topic – all things System.

  "There is a lot to take in. Some of us have been awake for a day or so. The most important thing right now is to get you to the Obelisk, it can help you get your system set up. I can explain a few things first to help if you like…"

  Charlie continued, his eyes bright with excitement, despite crow’s feet and unkempt hair. He got involved in explaining how the world now had a system and magic. He finished up with something that he obviously thought was an exciting positive, though David wasn’t so sure.

  "You talked about Aliens, well during the tutorial you’ll get to see a recording of one! It helped you to wake up safely and can explain some things. Then we can answer all your questions."

  Then they were all caught up in handling new people. More people were coming in and somebody had clearly gone back out and started letting people know that it was safe to come in.

  Carl nudged David and pointed. The steady stream of people arriving, all on foot, was going to change things again.

  The commotion was gradually waking people up, mostly those unlucky enough to be camping rather than having houses to stay in.

  As they weren’t the only ones awake and interacting David started to feel less overwhelmed.

  There were small groups and a few individuals, all with the same dazed expression, all wandering inside the safe zone trying to find the Obelisk or someone to answer questions. Gradually people were getting them organized and had started to use the sitting area to address larger groups.

  The noise was still waking people and David started to see a few emerge from the surrounding houses.

  He couldn’t help but notice that quite a few seemed disgustingly alert for this time of night. A quick check of his phone showed that he had barely two hours of sleep and the sun would be coming up soon.

  Sarah, Mark and Katie all joined Camila focusing on getting people settled, while others were organizing groups and getting them to the Obelisk.

  Most of the other campers who were awake had given up on sleep. A few were going back to bed and asking people to keep it down, which seemed futile to David.

  He found himself continuing as part of the impromptu reception committee, mostly serving as someone to ask complicated questions. As the sun began its slow climb toward dawn the stream of people showed no signs of abating.

  Things became louder and more chaotic despite the soothing beat of the safe zone in his ears. People who had walked in having been at home first saw, then started mixing with, people who had been rescued and woken in a strange park.

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  Some survivors were grateful, others demanding. One woman burst into tears when she couldn't find her husband among the sleeping forms. An older man got belligerent when Sarah tried to explain the tutorial process, insisting he needed to "talk to whoever's in charge."

  Dr. Chen, clearly summoned by one of her volunteers emerged from a building by the park, Thomas appeared soon after that and before long all of the self-appointed council were up and helping.

  As much as he disliked it David was forced to admit that the arrival of Phil, Thomas and Dr. Chen had given a lot more structure to proceedings. The physician was triaging, and Phil was making sure that people were grouped together and organized for their initial briefing. He also seemed to have anticipated likely next issues better than David and his friends as he was getting people to form orderly lines for food, drink and Obelisk time.

  Which was becoming a problem, people needed to touch the stone structure to undergo their tutorial, which took significant time. While the rune covered pillar had seemed large to David and his little group, easily able to accommodate all of them touching it this was now a problem with people crowded around it trying to make contact.

  The reverend provided comfort where medicine couldn't help. His focus seemed to be on the most disoriented and upset people, and he had volunteers sitting with them away from the noise.

  As dawn light crept across the park, David found himself less and less needed as the council organized and residents got up.

  Drifting past one of the lines waiting for access to the Obelisk he overheard snippets of conversation that made his earlier observations click into place.

  "Where are the ambulances…"

  "…My mother was in assisted living not far from here, she picked it to be close to the grandchildren..."

  "Have you seen any National Guard…"

  None of them mentioned zombies. None of them talked about the mutants or the dangers outside the safe zone. They'd woken in their homes or nearby buildings, drawn to the Obelisk without encountering the horrors that lurked in the city.

  There was one grim recurring theme though far less than he had feared.

  “…Old Mrs. Aiken was just dead…”

  “My wife is over there talking to the pastor, her mother, who lived with us passed…”

  “I don’t know how we will arrange the funeral, it was his time, so it wasn’t unexpected…”

  There were deaths, but it sounded like the very elderly and those already dying rather than the wider more brutal culling he perceived from his harrowing run through the silent city to get here.

  David caught Camila's eye as he drifted past her. She was talking to a group of clearly upset parents, all carrying babies or small children who were clearly still comatose. He could see her talking calmly to them.

  “…it’s OK, we have rescued children just like yours. They have ALL woken up if they made it to the safe zone. It will just take a little time.”

  All of it led to only one conclusion. The safe zone was the smallest area of the Obelisk's influence. It was stabilizing and accelerating awakening on a larger scale. It was also repelling the zombies, or more accurately he expected the Nath.

  That made him wonder if maybe the mutants were the result of a different type of spirit? There were no reports of them nearby either…

  Seeing Camila breaking free of the group who were going over to the triage area he approached her.

  "We need to talk," he said quietly his thoughts on how this changed their plans from last night.

  She nodded. "After this calms down. Get Billy and Carl, the others too."

  It took another hour before things settled enough for David to slip away without guilt. He had found Carl and Billy watching the chaos with arms crossed, Bessie sat at their feet calm.

  "Interesting morning," Carl observed as David approached.

  "Carl, how do you feel?"

  The older man's eyebrows rose. "Doing alright, why?"

  "Check your Stamina. I think the system's been burning it to keep us going."

  Carl pulled up his status, and David watched his expression shift from curiosity to concern. "Well, shit. That's down by nearly half and I've barely done anything."

  Billy nodded slowly, clearly checking his status.

  "I’m sure now, fatigue is something stamina fights well." David said. "I didn’t have Stamina yesterday and struggled, but today it seems to have fixed being woken early."

  "So we can keep pushing past normal limits," Carl said. "Until we can't."

  "Until we collapse. Based on my stamina dropping like a rock then stabilizing I’m hoping it fixes fatigue and lack of sleep is just serious fatigue, probably." David ran a hand through his hair. "Add it to the list of things we need to figure out."

  Charlie joined them a few minutes later. He looked a bit crestfallen, and his next words confirmed why.

  “Camila told me to find you guys, said I was just confusing the new people and that I should leave the explanations to the grownups…”

  Then he perked up.

  "Dude, I am so curious about your spell, we didn’t do any training with spells really last night it was all about the physical stats and helping get a handle on the half-step evolution. Let’s head to the training ground and properly figure out this magic!"

  The others nodded, each for various reasons no longer needed in the rush of people and who wouldn’t be curious about magic, or invested in finding the limits of a spell that they now relied on to get out of trouble...

  They moved to the secluded area outside the park and the safe zone they had used last night. David felt nervous, energy building as he faced his friends.

  "So, fair warning - I have no idea what this will do exactly but it shouldn’t hurt you. I want to use you all as targets to learn about Halt. It stopped that cocoon thing, and it worked on the zombie when I first tried it, but..."

  "It don’t hurt so you can try on me first," Carl said. "I won’t use my skill but see if you can stop me drawing my gun…"

  David nodded to the others eager to get started.

  Then gathering his focus he prepared. He could feel the word sitting in his mind, ready to be spoken with intent behind it. "Ready?"

  Carl braced himself. "Do it when I draw."

  "OK."

  Carl moved, smoothly reaching for his pistol.

  “HALT”

  The word had power but came out flat, lacking the resonance that locked down the zombies. Carl’s motion slowed, stopped, then he blinked seemed to shudder and started moving again, fast. In total it might have been a second or two.

  "Not enough. I could push through it with my skill. You might be limited to what you did before, changing the tempo of a close fight or mowing through zombies. Wanna try again?”

  David frowned. "Let me try..."

  This time he reached for that deeper place where his spirits resided, without even thinking he used Convert to feed them a trickle of power. The sensation was like flexing a muscle he'd never known existed.

  "HALT."

  This time the word carried weight, and David felt a spirit leave his reserve and rush to Carl somehow reinforcing the spell, making it resonate. Carl froze mid-breath, his eyes going wide. For three heartbeats he couldn't move, couldn't speak. Then the effect shattered and he staggered.

  "Jesus. That was... yeah, that worked better."

  Carl shook his head as if clearing water from his ears.

  "Felt like trying to move through concrete. I couldn’t break it without my skill and even with it felt hard."

  “My turn dude!”

  Charlie was grinning, David just knew he had a plan.

  “HALT” The word flowed from his mouth and engulfed Charlie who responded by having flame bloom in his hand as he blasted the ground to David’s left.

  Next David used his spirits to lock Charlie down, again the young man was able to break it by casting, though he admitted it was harder.

  After that they tried using multiple targets, though David went straight to a full power casting as his mana reserves were not looking great. He also asked all of them to start using their skills.

  “On Three! One, Two, Three!”

  “HALT!”

  The blast of magic engulfed all of them with David committing every spirit he could motivate to keeping them still while Bessie watched with doggy enthusiasm.

  The attack worked, far better than he had expected. Their attacks all collapsed and like the zombies arrested movement led to Carl toppling over before he could break free. It was almost ten seconds before Charlie managed to break free with his body engulfed in flames.

  As soon as he could move he shared his experience.

  “Bro! That was scary. It didn’t just stop me and make it hard to continue, it kinda ruined the spell and I struggled to get it to cast again. Had to use a different spell in the end.”

  A few moments later he spoke again.

  “Uh, dude you might have to release them. I’m not sure they have another skill they can use to break out…”

  Flushed David withdrew his spirits and after a bit of trying managed to free the others.

  “OK, that was terrifying!” Carl spoke slowly. “I, uhh guess the skill I was using couldn’t work. I wasn’t injured so I couldn’t use regenerate and I don’ even know if it would help. That was a problem. Or…”

  Here he grinned savagely “…exactly what we need to handle the asshats with delusions of grandeur.”

  With his reserves exhausted David sat down to recover some Magic. Focusing on Convert he started burning his Stamina and Health to rebuild mana for more practice. Checking his status he flipped his focus to the other skill and continued.

  After over an hour of brief periods of intense experimentation and longer periods of rest to rebuild resources David had learned a lot, though the news was mixed.

  Charlie had really helped to flesh out the idea that a new skill that actively used your resources was best to break Halt early.

  Everyone had confirmed that it was devastating if you interrupted a skill use as it seemed to take time for the skill to reset after it was interrupted.

  The effect itself was transient and minor, working best on Billy and worst on Bessie.

  It was a different story when he used his spirits. The more he used the greater the effect but even one was enough to put real pressure on the others. Oddly, the spirits seemed faded afterwards, it took them a while to recover.

  He soon fixed that with Convert finding he could revive them, then finding that he could even supercharge them. It didn’t make them stronger but seemed to allow them hold on for longer.

  Billy had been watching and participating with obvious interest, especially to find out how Bessie was affected.

  "Bessie seems more resistant than us but if you do get her she can’t break free as easily without a skill. She don’t like it so please could we stop testing on her…”

  David immediately nodded in agreement and went to pat the mutt on the head, a sort of wordless apology for not considering how she was taking things.

  "Animals might be different," Charlie suggested. "Or maybe it’s that she's not actually got a system, but from what you said has mana infused into her. She is a good girl but I wonder if she is more like the mutants than us. I don’t mean temperament; you’re the best girl!"

  He said the last part directly to Bessie, who thumped her tail.

  They kept training until Sarah showed up to tell them that people were gathering for the meeting David had called.

  By the time they headed back, David had a better grasp of his skill's limitations and a good degree of confidence in locking down someone with a gun. He needed to recover his magic but the training had got him another couple of important milestones. Halt had levelled and he had a much better idea of how to combine his toolbox of skills.

  Powerful when properly fueled, but he needed a follow up.