Sanctuary Square, much like New York City, never really slept.

  There were Augments spanning the entire world and at practically any hour, they could need one of the Square’s many services. While the members of the Tenth Wave had only just begun to scratch the services of those features, it wasn’t any of the known features that had drawn Calypso to the square firmly in the middle of the night in the Eastern United States.

  She passed through the portal from her Safe House and practically glided down the staircase. Even in the moonlight, her costume seemed to shimmer like scales and the net that held her bun together jingled slightly with each step due to the small bells that were woven right into it.

  Calypso rather liked the ambience of the Square at this time of day, when the air was still and the general clamoring was relatively quiet. Sure, there were a few Augments that lingered around, using the benches and tables that littered the courtyard to read or just take a moment to themselves, but none swarmed her like she was used to on the few occasions she made an appearance in the Square during the middle of the day.

  Though it may have seemed odd from the outside, most Augments learned early on that being in the Square prevented Crime Alerts from generating for locations near their respective Safe Houses. Prior to the Tenth Wave, many Augments actually did have spare time, especially those with territories in mostly remote locations, and that had bred just a bit of complacency in the Augment populace.

  Calypso had known that this year was going to be different, though she had still been surprised by just how much. As one of the seven remaining members of the First Wave, Calypso had access to a much bigger picture of the world than, well, almost anyone. But had she been a betting woman, which coincidentally, she was, she still wouldn’t have bet on the events of the last few days.

  Several of the younger Augments pointed in her direction as she passed along the stone pathway, and she gave them each a friendly smile and wave. She had never shared Brightburst’s lack of love for the spotlight but she also was happy that The First had always drawn more attention than she did on the grander scale. Neither of those things were why she made it a point to at least be open and cordial with every Augment that she could.

  Whether it was warranted or not, Calypso felt the weight of every single dead Augment on her very soul. It didn’t matter if they were Guardians or Miscreants, each dropping number on the leaderboards left her feeling increasingly heavy. While she had slowly grown to accept that the world had already changed and there was nothing she could do about the Augments that died in the course of battle, those weren’t the ones that weighed most heavily.

  Lunar Monkey, Frigid Air, Gas Giant, Hayday, Valor Viking, and SnakeBite.

  While the world barely knew them, Calypso had etched those names permanently into her mind. SnakeBite was a tragedy, she knew that, but things had gone too far with him, and no matter what she did, she knew that he was never going to be out from under TechWarden’s thumb. Unfortunately, she also knew that didn’t bode well for the other five either and the fact that she still didn’t have any leads on where they were, bothered her immensely.

  The First might have his own hatred for TechWarden, but Calypso had been the one to bring him into the fold in the first place. It wasn’t necessarily excusable for her to have missed the signs when Lunar Monkey had first gone missing, but it was understandable. Things had still been new when the Second Wave had appeared and they had all been simply trying to keep up with the rapid changes that came with people outside of the approved selections becoming Augmented.

  But when it happened year after year, TechWarden talking with an Augment under the guise of “mentorship” only for the Augment to mysteriously go missing only a few weeks later, Calypso put the pieces together. Of all of them, SnakeBite had been the only one that she had managed to add to her Friend’s List, which meant he was the only one she had been able to try to help.

  Even as late as it was, the Common Ground was easily the busiest place in the Square and while on most occasions Calypso wouldn’t have an issue signing a few autographs and adding a few more Augments to her Friend’s List, there were some nights that privacy was her main concern, especially when she had places to be. As she entered the bar, she used one of the many abilities she had access to, letting out several slow, harmonious notes as she walked into the building.

  Although her voice echoed throughout the room in an almost haunting melody, not a single person looked her way. In fact, it was almost as if every single person was making a point of not looking anywhere near her. As one of the highest level players in the game, there were few people that could actually resist the effects of her songs when she chose to target them, and her Oblivious Melody was one of her highest leveled abilities, letting her glide through entire crowds without ever being seen.

  Without ever breaking her song, she headed for the closest bar. All of the non-Sapient bartenders knew her by now, and with a few hand movements, Calypso signed a request for an order she’s placed more than once in the last few days. Only a minute later, a container that looked suspiciously like a well stuffed, greasy fast food bag was placed ahead of her along with a large styrofoam cup. It only took the barest thought for her to transfer the requisite credits over to the bartender before taking the bag and walking away.

  She sauntered around tables and past Augments moving through the room. The constant melody never faltered and it only took her a minute before she came to the base of the spiral staircase leading up toward the second floor. Instead of heading upstairs, she circled away from the staircase, moving to the fair side of the destroyed robot’s head. She ran her hand along the cold metal as she walked until she stopped and placed her hand fully against a small spot near the chin of the robot.

  With a hiss a small staircase opened underneath the robot’s head and Calypso quickly dipped into it, letting the entrance close behind her before she finally stopped singing. The Null Zone of The Common Ground was immediately replaced with the full Dead Zone effect, deactivating her action bar and, thankfully for her, removing the passive effects of her Primary Power, Siren’s Song.

  Calypso’s powerset was classified as a Hybrid Support class, though as one of the first powersets generated, it came with a side effect that no amount of Augmentation or leveling had been able to change. Every word she spoke when she wasn’t in a Dead Zone created aftereffects in anyone that could hear her based on her very emotion and even then she wasn’t always in control of what the effects would be. Luckily for her, this room had been here from the very beginning, a small oasis within the larger oasis of the bar where she could speak completely unencumbered.

  “I’ve brought you some dinner, I’d be willing to bet you haven’t eaten all day, have you?” She said, descending the staircase in what was ostensibly the basement of a home in the midwest in the 80s.

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  There were posters of classic sci-fi and superhero movies covering many of the walls, and where there weren't posters, action figures and other collectibles were neatly placed along various shelves.

  Sitting at a large console of computer monitors in the far corner of the room, fingers racing along one of the many keyboards, was a man with uncombed and unkempt dark black hair. There was a similarly dark layer of scruff that covered the bottom half of his face and he groaned as he leaned backwards in the chair, stretching as he turned to look at the greasy bag Calypso was holding out for him.

  “And you said you didn’t care if I starved, you’re a real pal Cassie,” the man said and rubbed at his eyes as he walked away from his computer setup. He took the bag from Calypso and quickly fell onto the overstuffed couch pushed up against a wood paneled wall in the very center of the room.

  “Well you have been eating a lot less recently. It’s much easier to get you a single burger now rather than trying to pick up any of your old orders Christopher,” Calypso replied as she walked and sat down next to him, exchanging her costume for a set of lounging clothes that she had kept queued in her B.E.L.T. for years now. While she knew she should have waited to let him at least eat some of his food, she also couldn’t stop her curiosity. “Has there been any movement?”

  “Not a whole lot. He broke out of the penthouse only a few minutes after the area reconnected to the Array with one hell of a punch, then flew down into Central Park and just… vanished,” Christopher explained as he popped a few fries into his mouth. “The kid’s grown a lot in a few days but with his Acceptance Matrix disabled it’s going to be harder to keep track of him.”

  “Well I certainly haven’t been watching him as obsessively as you have, so I definitely couldn’t speak to his larger growth,” She responded, reaching over and stealing one of the fries, meeting his eyes before relenting, “Okay, maybe I started to pay attention when Axio started having all the Vipers start chanting about SnakeBite… What do you make of that anyway? What’s he up to?”

  “Axio?” Christopher asked, taking a large bite of his burger as he raised a brow at her.

  “Yeah… I get your personal interest in Loophole, but what did Axio gain out of leading him to SnakeBite?” She asked, moving to grab another fry before Christopher smacked her hand away and she scowled at him.

  “I think we both know if I had ever been able to figure out what Axio was thinking, things would have never gotten this far,” he said, his overall affable attitude faltering ever so slightly as another large yawn forced its way from him. “I think what I’m more worried about is how easily he piggy-backed off of the code I added into the messages you sent through to SnakeBite. It’s the only thing I can think of that would explain how he was able to lead Loophole in.”

  “That wasn’t your plan in the first place?” Calypso said, finding herself pulling back in shock.

  “Nope,” He said with a shake of his head and rubbed at his eyes. “Honestly I was hoping I could use the metadata I slipped into SnakeBite’s system to eventually create a beacon through the Dead Zone he had been locked in. It was a long shot but damn near everything we do is a long shot. Once Axio started moving though… well it was basically like we were just along for the ride. Have you managed to find anyone with any of the others on their Friend’s List?”

  This time Calypso was the one to shake her head. “It’s hard enough to probe people for information about random Augments that are noticeably low profile, especially with how weird some others get about me only communicating through the chat function. A few of the Sixth Wave members recognize Valor Viking, but none had ever actually had him on their Friend’s List. If I hadn’t seen Lunar Monkey, Frigid Air, and Gas Giant myself back in the day, I almost would have wondered if we had the names right.”

  “Well no one said we were gonna be able to fix the world in a week,” Christopher sighed and leaned back into the sofa. “Maybe we should focus our attention on what Axio intends to do next. The Tenth Wave Augments are leveling noticeably faster than prior waves, there has to be a reason for that…”

  “Do you think it’s possible they are going to catch up with the other Waves?” Calypso asked, materializing a bottle of water into her hand before taking a long drink and then offering the beverage to him.

  “I’d say it’s more an inevitability than just possible. While Axio has been prodding the earlier waves some, he hasn’t been bombarding them with the same amount of missions and crime alerts as the Tenth Wave. Those added events are giving the new wave a lot more experience opportunities which are bound to push them faster. Shit, just look at Loophole, how many Augments have to deal with an Augmented swarm event less than 48 hours into the game?”

  “True… I can only imagine the amount of rest many of them are going to need once this first Phase ends… and that’s only if Axio doesn’t immediately throw them into the next one,” Calypso said with a slightly dejected sigh.

  “Yeah, exactly. There’s only so much I can do from behind the scenes now, but if that’s going to be my role to play…” Christopher said before he took the last bite of his burger. It wasn’t super fast, but he still pushed himself to his feet as he took the now empty fast food bag and chucked it across the room into a trash can that appeared out of thin air. He was just about to walk back toward his consoles when he felt a hand holding his.

  “Christopher… You need to sleep… Especially with your Personal Array being suppressed, this pace you’re going at isn’t sustainable,” Calypso said, looking up at him with worry in her eyes.

  “I… look Cassie I know but-”

  “But nothing. You’re no use to anyone if you kill yourself through sleep deprivation,” She snapped back quickly, slowly pulling him back to the couch. “Now how about we put on one of the classics and you can fall asleep to it like old times?”

  “I… I guess I could spare a few hours.” Christopher would face a lot of things when he had to, but arguing with Calypso was a battle he had never won, and he barely struggled as he settled back into the seat with another yawn. He really hadn’t slept more than a few hours in the last 72 hours, but he couldn’t help himself either. How could he sleep when there was still so much more he had to do?

  While he knew just how much Calypso put on herself, Infinite Ascension had been his project long before he had had any sort of budget to hire more staff members. While he could never truly say why he had done it, it had ultimately been his decision to combine the fledgling Artificial Intelligence that had mysteriously appeared on his workstation overnight with the code for his pet project.

  Axio had told him many different lies over the years about where he had come from and Christopher was sure he had heard them all. From Aliens to Parallel Dimensions, Axio had offered all of them as explanations for his origins, and Christopher had no idea which, if any, of them were true. That specific detail hadn’t actually bothered him all that much early on, even if maybe it should have, but he had simply gotten too engrossed in the quickly evolving and expanding game that he believed was his ticket out of obscurity. It was only when Axio started altering the literal fabric of reality that he realized that he might have gotten himself in over his head.

  As much as Christopher relied on Calypso, on Cassie, there were so many secrets that he still kept to himself, so many secrets that he refused to burden her with. He had a plan on just how to fix things, but he knew it was a long shot, and the fewer people who knew, the better. It was just that thought that lingered in his mind as he leaned his head down and onto Calypso’s shoulder, dozing off just as the movie she had chosen started.

  Trying to sleep with all of this still on his mind wouldn’t give him good rest, none of the things he burdened himself with did, but they were his burdens to carry. So far, he had been strong enough that the weight of them hadn’t caused him to kneel, hadn’t caused him to break. He knew that with just a bit of luck, that strength would hold out just long enough for him to finish his work, even if it killed him in the end.

  Happy Monday! Welcome to the epilogue of Book 1! The three chapters this week technically make up the single individual Epilogue, so while the scenes might be slightly shorter than some of my normal chapters, I figured this was going to be the best way to release these this week instead of dropping it all on a single day and then making you all wait an extra week for more chapters.

  Tell me in the comments below, what was your favorite part of the story so far? What is something you hope to see more of in the future?

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