As they made the climb up the series of decks Blackbear could feel his dread slowly starting to rise as he imagined what he might find when he caught up to the war band.


    Jax could sense his friends mood and caught up to him and whispered, “Bear, are you OK bud? You seem a little distracted.”


    Blackbear rolled his shoulders to try and release some tension. “Did you know 15 of our men died with us today Jax? No, make that 15 of MY men. They came here because of ME, not us. I asked them to come help clear the dungeon and now their wives no longer have a husband. Now their children no longer have a dad.”


    Jax grabbed him by the shoulder and spun him around. “You can’t think that way brother. It wasn’t you that changed this world into this shitty apocalypse. Those wives and children however, they have a safe zone for some peace of mind. That IS because of you. You didn’t force anyone to come today. Hell, we had to turn down thousands of volunteers.”


    “I know that Jax, but...”


    Jax started to scowl actually getting a little angry now. “No buts man! We are building an army in case you have forgotten! Do you think people don’t die when they go to war? Every single man here knew what was happening when they accepted the invitation to come. All we can do is help to prepare them and keep as many alive as possible. Now enough of this looking back over your shoulder and look ahead to see what we can do to help!”


    Blackbear tried to straighten his shoulders a bit thinking that he didn’t want the warriors to see him so distraught. “Of course you’re right Jax. I realize everything that you have said is right. I just can’t help thinking that I am not the right man to actually lead all of this. I am going to have to find us a group of real soldiers and put them in charge of the war bands. I will come along for the ride with the War Chief buffs and play the role of leader.”


    Jax shook his head in disagreement. “No man is the right person to lead us through this shit storm because it has never happened before Bear. We will have to play it by ear and just make the best of it. Just know we are here for you bro.”


    Jax pulled a strange looking object from his inventory and showed it to Blackbear. “We took in a ton of loot down in the hull. Most of it we gave to the Chief to hand out to the men as he saw fit. This thing is different. Onida says it’s so rare that she has never seen anything like it. Came off of the boss.”


    Blackbear took the artifact into his hand. It was the size of an apple and shaped like a roundish pyramid. A twisted platinum chain was attached to it. It had a circle inset in the middle of it that was swirling with a dark silver mist. When he focused on it he saw:


    Call of the Void


    Summon a horde of beasts to do your bidding.


    Duration and quantity directly tied to the amount


    of total willpower attributed to your party or raid.


    Usable once every 168 Earth hours.


    Jax nodded. “I get the feeling I will end up with a lot of little trinkets. I have a lot of downtime being ranged damage compared to you guys. Oh, one other thing. Jane want me to marry her. I thought that with you being War Chief and all you might possibly conduct the ceremony?”


    Jax had an embarrassed look on his face as he replied. “Well, it seems that Jane has been receptive to my advances for quite a while now. I just hadn’t been umm… aggressive enough for her. She has been waiting for me to have the guts to actually date her for over a year. In her own words, “You haven’t had enough balls to take me on until the apocalypse happened!”Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    Blackbear laughed. “Did you ask her why she never told you this over the last year?”


    th</sup> level they could hear fighting taking place at the other end from where they were located. Lots of warriors were all over the place and one filled them in on the current situation.


    th</sup>. That deck is half open with a olympic size swimming pool that has been turned into an Octo habitat and there are a LOT of them there. This floor is almost wrapped up. There is a giant gym at the other end that they barricaded.”


    Bear thanked the man and turned to his crew. “Let’s help clear this deck and take the rest of the men up on the other side. We may be able to flank or pinch them, who knows. I’d rather not have fighting behind my back though.” He turned and started jogging towards the fight.


    The warrior didn’t even glance back and said, “I’m a little busy right now if you can’t tell. Come back in thirty and I might have a better idea of how long this will take to clear.”


    Blackbear looked back at Jax who raised his eyebrows and nodded as if to let Bear know that he liked this guy. “I’d like to know what’s going on right now if you don’t mind...”


    The man turned and got a look at Blackbear. He had a momentary look of shock as he noticed who he was speaking to, but shrugged it off quickly and grimaced at Blackbear. “Oh, sorry about that Chief. I didn’t know that you had gotten up here.”


    Bear raised an eyebrow. “Delta Force? Wow I’m impressed. Anymore of you guys here?”


    barely lost anyone. I think about 25,000 of us are coming here.” He smiled. The Chippewa family is quite large and healthy!”


    Blackbear shook his hand noticing the man’s hand engulfed his. The guy had at least three inches and 40 pounds on him. “Well Sarge I cannot tell you how happy I am to meet you. When we clear this up I want to have a serious one on one with you. I am going to need to grab every soldier I can to get this war band organized. Now can you tell me what is going on at the moment?”


    “Well, we could mount a full frontal attack. We would lose men that way, however, and I do not want to be in charge of that happening!”


    ten super stun of the sonic/light variety. “Think you might be able to come up with a plan with forty grenades?”


    Bernard had an evil grin on his face as he said, “We might be able to soften them up a bit with those...”


    skirmish just like this. They marked out the areas where the grenades where to be thrown. Five stun grenades would be lobbed first followed by five frags and then five blast. Rinse and repeat and then the charge was on. Bear’s party and Bernard’s would be in the front.


    He cast the buff and was able to see it settle over the warriors all crowded around him. He nodded to Bernard who silently tapped the shoulder of the man in front of him who stood with five men and they all lobbed grenades into their targeted areas and the chaos of war started.


    next round was offensive blast grenades and they somehow seemed even louder.


    Blackbear took a peak after the last round and held a fist up calling out, “HOLD!”


    The Octos never had a chance to recover and were quickly put down...