The entrance to the stronghold was a chaotic mess, repurposed construction materials were loaded up in large piles, carted in by large trucks, and off loaded by what she identified as dwarves, though that fett like a misnomer. 

They were massive, short by human standards but so thick they might have weighed three times as much. A single one lifted a metal pipe that had to weigh half a ton and tossed it, almost casually, to the ground.

People with cat-ears and wolf-ears brought bundled sacks, with all kinds of supplies, and laid them out on the floor.

A couple of haggard looking elves moved around the mess, categorizing and cataloging, trying valiantly to bring order to it all. A red haired elf man with large emerald eyes looked up at them as they rode in and did a double take, staring at Coco, specifically.

They stood in line for around ten minutes before he got to them, Erica was impressed at how quickly they managed to get through all of it.  He signaled for the other elf, a blonde woman, that he was attending to them and approached with what might have been a bit of shyness.

Like Coco, he was beautiful to an inhuman degree, his face perfectly symmetrical, without a single blemish to his skin. “You’re the first one of us I’ve seen with wings.” He remarked without preamble. “I’m curious if that makes you a different species.” He wondered out loud.

“I guess it depends on if we are even genetically different from regular humans.” Coco remarked with raised brows.

“Oh, we are, I managed to check, before my lab went dark.” He boasted somewhat sheepishly..

“That’s interesting.” Coco replied, seeming genuinely intrigued.

Erica attempted to ignore the pang of jealousy she felt springing up due to the inhumanly beautiful red headed elfman doing what sounded a lot like nerd flirting with Coco. “We need a place to stable our horses, we were told to sign up for chores to do that.” Erica said.

“Oh. Good. Very good.” The elfman said. “Go ahead and take your horses into the stronghold proper, I’ll be with you in just a few minutes, I need to finish up here.” He waved them on as he said this and went straight back to helping the other elf before they had time to answer.

“”What’s the stronghold proper?” Derrick asked.

“Probably just the inside.” Erica said as they moved out of the entrance yard, past a second, large, fence. The enclosure was large, seeming to cover perhaps a mile from one end to the other. It was still mostly forested but there was work being done to build several large buildings within. They were all impressed by the scale of what they had managed to build in such a short period of time.

The red haired elfman joined them around a half hour later and gave them a brief tour of the area. “I’m glad you want to help, we could use the extra hands. There’s plenty of jobs that need to be done.” He said with a smile.

“So does that mean you’re in charge?” Derrick asked.

The elfman laughed. “No one’s in charge of this place, that’s half the problem, if I’m being honest. We all just sort of gathered here when Kevin, he’s a…” He hesitated. “Is it ok for me to call him a dwarf? Not like, a little person but like, in the same vein that you might call me an elf, you might call Kevin a dwarf.” He fumbled.

“Yeah, we get it.” Derrick interjected.

“Anyway, he just started building this thing a couple days ago out of broken up building pieces. Next thing you know, Amanda starts organizing things, she ropes me into helping her, Maria appoints herself head of security, and a bunch of orcs start hanging out front with billy clubs, calling themselves our protection. So far, they’re just extorting us for food and supplies, though. I guess I have to hope they never have to they’re actually useful for something.” The elfman continued.

“Oh, by the way, my name’s Jeremy, Jay, for short.” He finished.

They all introduced themselves and continued exchanging pleasantries and gossip. They told him where they were all from and how they had all gotten there, as he also confided his story to them.

He had worked in a research laboratory, studying genetic markers for childhood diseases, at John Hopkins. Coco asked him what he had seen about his own DNA that was different from normal humans.

“Oh, well I didn’t have time to look into it for very long, obviously, but I did find out that I have forty-two chromosomes.” Jeremy confided. “Which is four less than what a human has.” He explained, looking at Derrick.

“I don’t even know what a chromosome is, man.” Derrick quipped dryly.

“Let’s skip the biology lesson for now.” Coco interrupted before Derrick could answer. “Why exactly are you building this place?” She asked

“Oh. Well, if I had to keep it to a short and simple answer, I’d say it was for protection.” Jeremy replied.

“From zombies.” Derrick said.

“From zombies?” Coco questioned more pointedly, noticing Jeremy give an unusual reaction to what Derrick had said.

“Well, no. Not really.” Jeremy admitted. “Actually, I found out zombies aren’t even especially dangerous, at least not to, well, us. Their bites don’t seem to infect us  the same way they do on humans.” He said.

“I’m genuinely interested in that but please tell me what it is you all are seeking protection from then.” Coco pressed.

Jeremy took a furtive look around. “There are signs of hostility towards people like us in more densely populated areas. Some of it’s getting organized. The military took over Rutland and people like us started to go missing, eye witness accounts say soldiers took them. In those conditions, running around alone in the forest seemed like a distinctly bad idea.” He half-whispered.

“So, what's the plan with building this place?” Eric asked.

“Well, for there to be a plan, there’d need to be leadership.” Jeremy said with a sigh. “This is mostly just out of desperation because no one has any idea what else to do, I guess I’m just hoping it works itself out.” He said with a nervous laugh. “Now, if you’re staying, I really need to put you in for a chore.”

“Scouting.” Erica said quickly. “All of us.” She added looking at them both while she said it.

“We do have horses.” Coco pointed out.

“I don’t really need a horse.” Derrick volunteered.

Jeremy smiled somewhat nervously. “Well, that’s probably one of the only chores we don’t really need anyone else to do, as you can probably tell from that mess in the front gate.” He said “We really need people to help with internal organization.” He said.

“Sounds like a personal problem.” Derrick said.

Jeremy rose his brows at this in exasperation and seemed about to retort before Coco interjected. “I noticed the area outside is littered with tied up zombies. Why don’t we take care of that?” She said.

“I don’t know that that’s really what I would call a necessity.” Jeremy replied, looking slightly testy. “They’re pretty much neutralized.” He pointed out..

“Well, that’s what you can mark us down for.” Derrick said, adopting a slightly aggressive posture. “We hope that won’t be a problem.” He finished.

“There’s something I want to show you.” Erica interjected. “I’d like you to keep it to yourself, for now.” She whispered, making pointed eye contact to Coco as she reached into her coat, who shrugged.

Jeremy looked at her with an expression of piqued interest and she pulled the crystal out of her pocket. “Do you have any idea what this is?” She asked him.

He inspected the crystal thoughtfully for several moments before replying. “I don’t. He admitted, finally.

“They seem to come from the bodies of cremated zombies.” Coco explained. “We need to collect more of them.” She said.

“If they prove to be useful in some way, you could  shunthe admin stuff onto someone else to help us look into it. You could find yourself working on something realy groundbreaking.” Coco pointed out.

“You’d be in history books, probably.” Erica added, as she put the crystal back in her pocket. “Besides, you’re kidding yourself if you think your zombie problem isn’t really a problem, they’re still aggressive towards you, right? So, a swarm of them ripping you apart is still a concern.” She pointed out.

“Well, I’m not particularly interested in fame but, if these really do come from zombies then researching them could lead to a vaccine.” He said, thinkinking out loud, suddenly very serious. “Fine, I’ll give you the space you need to run some preliminary tests to confirm your initial hypothesis.” Jeremy told them.

“What’s that mean?” Derrick asked.

“It means he’s gonna let us cremate some zombies to see what turns up.” Coco answered him.

“You catch on fast.” Jeremy said appreciatively.

“Thanks. So do you.” Coco said with a smile.

They sat in silence for a moment, Erica too afraid to say anything that would give away the returning pang of jealousy she was feeling.

“Alright, let’s get to it then.” Derrick said. “Where should we put the horses?” He asked.

“Just let them run free, there’s no danger of them roaming off or getting eaten in here.” Jeremy told them. “You can wait until tomorrow, if you’d like. There’s a wash room over there , I’d use it now, before they get overrun.” He said, pointing to one of the half-finished buildings.

The day passed into night in relative quiet considering the dysfunction of it all. The wash house was quickly overrun and raucous sounds of laughter and rough housing echoed into the night.  The forested area was quickly taken up as various groups as tents were pitched and sleeping bags unrolled. 

Derrick managed to access deodorant and body wash, at Erica’s insistence, and ran off to the washroom to clean himself. There were more normal humans than Erica had been expecting but still a definite minority. She thought about the crystal in her pocket and wondered if she had not slipped up when deciding to tell Jeremy about it.

“Don’t stress too much about it.” Coco said, breaking her out of her reverie.

“About what?” She asked.

“Telling Jeremy about the crystals.” Coco answered. “I think it was the right call, given the circumstances. I trust your judgement.” She told her.

“Oh. Thanks.” Erica replied, wondering how Coco had known what she was thinking about.

Derrick returned from the wash house with a small bag of scavenged food from the supply tent, Erica rooted around for vegan products and settled for a jar of preserved mandarin orange slices and a can of chickpeas.

She ate in silence then handed the debris to a young girl with cat ears who deftly navigated the dark forest as she gathered everyone’s trash into a bag. She stayed awake to keep watch until Coco climbed down from the tree she had climbed to rest in, then went inside her tent and fell asleep.

She took the crystal out of her pocket as she undressed and sat cross legged to look at it. The feeling it invoked in her was still full of frustrating incomprehensibility. She thought of the feeling within her the first time she had unconsciously used ‘Magic Sense’. She asked herself what it would feel like if she could somehow make sense of it all in as a sudden feeling of inspiration hit her.