Atlas grounded himself with the feeling of solid weight in his hand. The cat was a few ounces at most, barely more than the cell phone he knew was still sitting at the bottom of the river, somewhere. 

Perhaps what a cloud may feel like, if it suddenly floated down to your hand and became something you could touch.

“You’re…my Skill?” 

The cat hummed, and Atlas winced at the robotic sound of it. 

“Why do you sound like that?”

Phoenix's nose twitched. “To put it more explicitly, your Skill woke me back up.” With every word, the tinny, mechanical voice solidified into something much more human. Something feminine. and airy, with a touch of condescension. 

Phoenix flicked an annoyed glance at the dragon, then met Atlas’ eyes. It was like staring into an eternity — there was too much from him to decipher for a place like this. “Maybe you will prefer a more human analogue to speak with. Does this voice suit? It may be mildly familiar to you. I will explain more later. But perhaps we should handle the beast the Others have awakened.”

“The Others?”

“Focus, Atlas. Another thing we can discuss when a dragon is not near. I'm sure the system would agree.”

Atlas didn't have time to ask about the 'system' or his skull or anything else. He and Izar followed along helplessly as the cat darted off toward Charon and the rest of Last Bastion, seeming almost weightless. Her footsteps were so soft they were impossible to hear, even amongst the crunchy leaf litter and between the dragon's roars.

Even like this, solid and tangible and too real to ignore, Phoenix glowed faintly orange — like she was afraid Atlas may forget that she was something unusual. Something unique.

In a moment, she disappeared like a mist. 

“What the hell is this stupid thing?”

Atlas spun on his heel. Phoenix had climbed the length of Charon’s sleeve and perched  — tall, with her ears perked — on his broad shoulders. Charon was whiping the sleeves of his coat around with wild abandon, trying to shake her loose.

“Her name is Phoenix,” Izar said, almost in a daze. “She is Atlas’...Skill? Something like that.”

“We don’t have time for this,” Charon hissed. He scowled and tried to snatch Phoenix by the scruff, but his gloved fingers clipped helplessly through the her body. “Someone get it out of here!”

“Phi, please.” Atlas didn’t know what possessed him to give her a nickname in the moment, but as soon as he said it, the little cat tilted her head happily. Her tail curled into a loose question mark shape, and her ears twitched. Phi, then. “Phi. Can you explain what’s going on before the dragon breaks its bindings?”

“You have three and a half minutes before then,” Phi answered, eyes flashing a bright, unsettling orange. Her pupils disappeared behind a dense matrix of scrolling numbers, before cooling back to an icy blue. “It is an elder, weakened by age and combat. The restraints were reactivated on your entry into the portal. That is why it is so agitated.”

“What is this thing? Why is it talking?” Charon clawed desperately at his coat, but Phi jumped down and trotted back to Atlas seeming, for lack of a better term, smug. “Don’t let it get in the way of us addressing the dragon. I don’t care if you have some stupid useless cat Skill, Atlas. Stay the hell out of our way.”

“Charon, you really ought to listen to her. She was Game —”

In the distance, the dragon let out another great, ear-splitting and thunderous roar. The sound made Atlas’ jaw ache with the force of it, cutting him off mid-sentence. Charon turned away, clearly done listening.

“We don’t have time to play games with your pet project, Izar.” Charon snapped his fingers, and beside him, Heron loaded bullet after bullet into his energy weapon. “Formation, as discussed. We can handle a dragon. We’re the most decorated team in the world for a reason. This is an A-Class beast. Whether it’s in an S-Grade or not.”

Izar’s face bled of color. He reached for Charon’s hand, but Charon snatched his away at the last moment, rubbing an imagined dirt off on his spandex shirt. “No, Izar. Just stay back.”

But Izar was undeterred. “Please, Charon. You should really listen to them. We have to be careful —”

“If either Atlas or Izar try to hinder you, you have authority to engage them as adversaries.” Charon turned to the rest of Last Bastion. “I mean it.”

Beside them, Phi seemed deeply untroubled, using her paw to groom the side of her small face. 

Charon continued. “You have your orders. Incapacitate the dragon and secure the safety of the party.”

“Yes, sir!”

The six of them slunk off through the dense brush at breakneck speed before Izar could say another word.

They moved well, Atlas had to give it to them. 

They were competent, even if they were arrogant. Their steps were sure and organized. They did not make unnecessary noise, or break focus. The the longer-range members pulled up the back, weapons already drawn for any last minute enemies that may emerge before they got to the dragon. Towards the front, the most sturdy members of Last Bastion forged ahead.

“They’re going to get themselves killed,” Izar murmured. He fisted his hands against his sides. “They’ve always been reckless, but this is an S-Grade portal. We should have come up with a plan that included the entire strike team, not just them.”

“He’s always been this way,” Atlas said. “This would have happened eventually. I’m not getting myself killed for their sake. If they want me back here, I’m staying back here.”

Their first attack managed to catch the dragon by surprise.

The sixth and final member of Last Bastion was the one who delivered it. A petite assassin. She scaled its thick scales using her daggers so quickly that it seemed almost not to notice, and plunged one directly into the center of its neon yellow eye.

“She’s smart,” Phi said beside him. Her eyes went orange again. “Her accuracy is impressive, and hindering the dragon’s line of sight before a full assault will give her teammates a chance to utilize its blind spot.”

Another cacophonous roar, and Charon was targeting the dragon’s gums and other soft tissue with lances of bright fire. Heron kept his plasma weapon aimed at its feet as it thrashed and furiously shook its head to rid itself of the assassin.

It was a one-sided fight. With the dragon bound, and old, and already seemingly injured from a long past battle with Game Master, it was easy enough for the six to incapacitate it. They were the best in the world for a reason, after all.

It fell to the ground with a great, loud thud! that shook the trees and sent a hail of leaves and debris raining down onto the rest of the team.

“They’re too comfortable,” Phi said beside him. “It is unwise to get comfortable in an S-Grade.”

But her words were lost to the boisterous, heaving cheers of the rest of the strike team. Izar froze beside him, the unease rolling off of him in thick, roiling waves.

“Something doesn’t seem right,” he said softly. He sounded like Zig when he lost the airs he put on for the Portal Group. “That was too easy. They’re celebrating too early. There’s no way that is the only monster here.”

Charon ripped a talon from the dragon’s steaming corpse, thrusting it in the air victoriously. The cheer grew louder.

Atlas’ stomach dropped.

He didn’t want to die, he realized abruptly. His fingers twitched at his side, and he clutched his knife tighter. The sense of dread was as overwhelming as it was certain. He didn’t want to die!

Beneath them all, something was pulsing. Atlas could see beneath a neatly sliced grid he was sure was visible only to him. Long, thin orange lines that flashed the entire width of the forest floor, stopping at the distant mountains. Beneath Last Bastion’s feet, they filled with bright swaths of color and began to shake.

“Move!” He shouted, but he knew his voice was too faint to carry above the shouts from the strike team. “You’re going to attract other monsters!”

Arrogant, Phi said. She had dissolved back into her transparent form, leaping to sit on Atlas’ shoulder. While much of this world was cleared by their predecessors, it is not safe.

Whatever Atlas was seeing, Izar seemed to pick it up only a moment later. He sprinted towards Last Bastion, his voice high and frantic.

“MOVE!” He bellowed, desperate and rasping.

But it was too late. 

The ground began to rumble. It was even louder than the dragon had been, vibrating Atlas' teeth and sending him clattering to the forest floor.

At the very last second, Atlas watched two of the Last Bastion members flash toward the tree-line.

A third threw something long and flexible over a distant tree.

Then, all at once, the entire space around the dragon’s corpse split in two.

And those who hadn’t moved were swallowed whole.