Parker was having a very bad day. Today must have been the longest of his life.

  The sequence of events that led him here required he make decisions and push forward despite not knowing what to do.

  He was tired—so very tired. Not physically strangely enough. Even with the dune's strange heat and the constant running and baiting they did, they couldn't kill much.

  The Sand Swimmers did not fall for their fire traps. The traps weighed too little, so the creatures ignored them.

  The Salamanders—their current nickname for the fire-breathing lizards—were nigh unstoppable. They had no ranged weapon to combat it, and they couldn't get wood or water from the groups in the dark forest, so they were stuck with only one kill, that being the Wall Crawler.

  Worst of all was the annoying thug that Vasilis had sent to observe them, who found endless avenues to berate and annoy them. His name was Yohan, and he seemed to compensate for his small stature with exaggerated bravado. His cinnamon-blond hair was curly and bushy, and his brown eyes always jumped around with malicious glee.

  They all sat around a dark cave that had a fire pit illuminating it's wall.

  Asha swung a big nylon bag around, catching air before sticking it down another hole a couple meters away from the small cave and pressing the air out to stoke the fire.

  Asha smiled, satisfied. "Never made a fire pit before. This is so cool," she gushed to Paul.

  Paul, who had suggested it, blushed. He explained, "My dad took the whole family camping a lot. Always hated sleeping out there, but the fires and camp songs were always fun."

  The fire pit was fueled by dried Sand Swimmer dung, paper, and a linen shirt to keep them together.

  Asha had also insisted they use fat from the dead Wall Crawler to fuel the fire, but Paul had disagreed, saying they didn't want to attract Salamanders.

  The fire was also built in a small rocky cave to trap smoke and heat, the meat hung above the fire pit on a net.

  The dunes themselves were already hot enough—they only needed the fire to cook the Wall Crawler's meat and a massive grasshopper creature that they had found nearly dead

  The grasshopper that had come from the deeper cave was caught briefly by a Sand Swimmer but escaped, later dying from its injuries near them.

  They had carved the creature up but found no spirit essence. One of the Loadbearers had remarked, "We probably need to kill them ourselves to get rewards."

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  Their other spirit essence was hidden from Yohan and the Messengers when they returned.

  They simply lied that they had found the Wall Crawler dead. Asha was allowed to absorb her rewards, and the Wall Crawler giving out four spirit essences put her very close to level two.

  Parker watched the meat roast while everyone argued about how to hunt the Sand Swimmers.

  Someone suggested carefully, "Let's use Blue Trick to cut some heavy rocks down. If we can trick it into coming up… maybe we could tie a rope around the rock?"

  "To get it up from the sand? Can we really pull it out?" a guy questioned as he struggled to enjoy the coarse, dry meat of the Wall Crawler.

  There was another few seconds of thinking before another person announced, "What if we tie the fire bomb around the rock?"

  The fourth Messenger shook his head indifferently. "It will just explode around the rock before the Sand Swimmer swallows it."

  "How are you sure about that?"

  "It's an educated guess based—"

  "So you don't actually know?"

  Paul stepped in before an argument started. They were all hungry, angry, and beyond tired.

  Parker himself was having trouble keeping his eyes open as his eyelids became heavier than rocks. He stood, tired of feeling useless and having nothing to contribute to the conversation.

  "Gonna take a walk," he mumbled as he left.

  He swung his feet hard and shook his head vigorously. His body was worn from running, crouching against rocks patiently, and really just sitting around.

  His older brother had never liked moving around and always compared Parker to a faulty car that couldn't stop.

  He had always taken it as a compliment, but now it was rather a reminder that there was nothing they could do.

  He walked up to the Messenger of his group, who was watching the perimeter, and tapped him on the shoulder. "Sub out, get some food. I'll keep watch."

  The boy smiled and gladly took his offer.

  Parker watched the strange spiraling tunnel with displeasure. The ground rose and fell unpredictably—certain sections were sand while others were brown rock.

  They had theorized that the sand went under walls and even the hard rock sections they stood on, as the Sand Swimmers sometimes passed through places where sand seemingly stopped.

  The beasts also knew when things were close to the edge of the sand and could jump out to try and drag things in.

  It was likely they swam under hard rock and observed the vibrations before waiting at the edge.

  Throwing a rock wouldn't work—if it was heavy enough, they would have to get close to the edge.

  Parker sighed and once again felt dumb.

  He heard footsteps but didn't turn. He quietly hoped it was Asha and not someone else coming to complain about the situation and how they missed home.

  He was still angry at the short Indian girl, but he would swallow his anger and forgive her if she could come up with a plan that would save them.

  He finally turned, and it was Yohan, stalking towards him smugly smiling.

  Parker gave him a cold glare, but the pompous boy was undeterred by the obvious displeasure at his presence.

  Parker wondered if the boy could even take a hint. He was annoying and would say things out of turn, interrupting others without even caring about the obvious hatred everyone in the group had for him.

  His high-pitched, scratchy voice cut into Parker's ear, indifferent to Parker's obvious desire to ignore him. "I was wondering where you went. Coming here to slack off when everyone's working?"

  Yohan, maybe not consciously, knew how to press Parker's buttons in a maddening way.

  He held his tongue, forcing the fiery rage in the pit of his stomach down, but Yohan continued talking.

  "When are you guys going to do anything? At least that Matthew guy looked like he's someone who gets shit done. I really wanted to go with them, but Petyr, that crazy bastard, has such a short fuse."

  "You can leave anytime. We don't want you here," Parker grumbled.

  Yohan sighed, he sat beside Parker. "But can I really? Vasilis, that crazy bastard, is so scary I don't want to piss him off."

  Parker turned to the shorter boy, inquisitive. "If you're so scared, why work with him? He shot someone!, and his first thought when thrown into this place was, 'Hmm, how can I make things worse for others?' How does that make sense?"

  Yohan tutted at him disappointedly. "Obviously because he's someone who gets shit done. At least he is now, is what I feel. He's kind of like you."

  "No, he is not!" Parker replied forcefully.

  Yohan rolled his eyes at him. "Your ways of doing things may be different, but it's the same ideology. 'Things must be done, and I'm doing it.' People like me or Asha worry about the technicalities and little things, so we can't make decisions. Right now, Vasilis is stronger than you, so I'm simply making a logical choice."

  Parker clenched his jaw, realizing what his first mistake was.