A Hard Reckoning: The System Integration Chronicles Book 3, page 13
I laughed. "You're the one who started the relationship talk during watch. You're going to be trouble, aren't you?"
"Probably. But the good kind." She settled against my side, head on my shoulder. "The kind that makes everything else worth fighting for."
We sat in comfortable silence, her warm against me. The stars were still visible, the camp still quiet.
"Em?"
"Yeah?"
"Thank you. For pushing me to talk about this."
"Thank you for letting me."
The rest of watch passed quietly, Emily against my side while my mind raced. I kept thinking about what she'd said—wanting a real relationship. The emotional connection felt right, natural.
But the other part, the physical intimacy she was clearly talking about, had my heart doing gymnastics. Thrilling and terrifying in equal measure. I had zero roadmap for this, no experience beyond the kisses we'd shared. What if I didn't know how to be what she needed? What if—
"Movement," Emily said quietly, tensing. "Northwest."
I had the Sharps up instantly, scope to my eye, all anxiety evaporating. Through the scope, I caught a deer's tail disappearing into darkness.
"Just deer," I confirmed.
Behind us, Tommy was stirring—his internal clock was better than any watch. Shift change. Emily squeezed my hand once before standing, stretching like she'd just been keeping me company.
"All quiet?" Tommy asked.
"Deer to the northwest, nothing else," I reported.
"Got it. Get some rest."
I made my way to my bedroll. Emily was arranging hers close enough I could hear her breathing.
For the first time in months, I fell asleep thinking about something beyond survival. About Emily. About us. About a future that suddenly felt possible.
And if my dreams were more interesting than usual, nobody needed to know that but me.
* * *
You know what hit me first about what used to be Terrell? It wasn't the collapsed houses or the bombed-out roads. It was how quiet everything was. Not forest-quiet, where you've got birds and bugs doing their thing. Dead quiet. Like the whole town was holding its breath.
Which made me want to fill the silence by talking. About anything. I'd already told three completely pointless stories about pre-System Terrell (which I'd only passed through on the way to Dallas) before Emily gave me that look that meant please stop. So I stopped. But the quiet made my skin crawl.
Half a year. That's all it had taken for a functioning East Texas town to turn into something out of a zombie movie. The outskirts were basically rubble—houses that had just given up, lawns turned into twisted walls of vegetation that looked like they wanted to strangle you. The street signs were gone. Just rusted metal bits sticking out of the weed choked ground.
The roads were what really got to me. These had been actual streets six months ago—places where people drove to work, took their kids to school. Now they were craters connected by more craters, with gaps where entire sections had just disappeared.
"This is depressing," Randy said. Kid wasn't wrong.
We'd crossed the creek yesterday morning without drama, made decent time following what used to be I-20. Now, looking at what was left of Terrell, I could see why Thompson had sent a team to check this place out.
The main street was different though. While everything else looked abandoned for centuries, someone had been keeping a path clear through the center. Tommy spotted it first.
"Someone's been maintaining this," he said, pointing toward what used to be downtown. "Trade route, maybe."
"The Auction House is a goldmine if you're selling," Jayden said, "but buyers get crushed by the bidding wars. Merchants come out here to find local sources they can lock down cheap before the goods hit the system auction house."
"Guaranteed supply at a fixed price," I added, thinking of Kellor wanting to corner my ammo market. "Which means we might run into people."
"Probably traders, but—"
That's when I saw it.
The Terrell State Hospital squatted on the eastern edge of town like something that shouldn't exist. Windows glowing with sick, pulsing light. Sections that seemed to shift when I wasn't looking directly at them. The whole thing radiated wrongness so hard I could taste it.
"Dungeon," Brian said quietly. "Active one. High level, from the look of it."
"Why is it always hospitals?" Jayden muttered, hand going to his sword. "First that nightmare outside Fairview, now this. What does the System have against medical facilities?"
The area around the hospital was a perfect circle of dead ground. Not brown grass—nothing. Like someone had salted the earth and set it on fire. Past that dead zone, the forest was pushing out, growing thicker the further it got from the hospital's influence.
"Is that what happened to the Hidden Valley team?" Emily asked. "They came to scout this and something went wrong?"
Before I could answer, movement caught my eye. Not a stumble or a branch snap—just a shift in the shadows that shouldn't have been there. I focused, and the forest resolved into four figures standing perfectly still.
They hadn't just arrived. They'd been watching us, maybe since we entered town, and I'd only just noticed.
That's how I knew they were pros.
"People," I called out softly, hand moving to the Sharps without drawing it. "Left side. They've been there a while." Their gear was quality stuff from successful dungeon runs. They moved like a team, weapons ready but not threatening.
The leader was maybe thirty, leather armor reinforced with metal plates. He stepped forward from the group—finally moving after standing statue-still for God knows how long. His sword was positioned for a quick draw, and he carried himself like someone who'd led people through dangerous shit and brought them home alive.
"Travelers," he called out. "You're heading toward active dungeon territory. Might want to reconsider your route."
I urged my horse forward, trying to look like I knew what I was doing. "We're looking for information about a missing team from Hidden Valley. Five adventurers who were supposed to be scouting this area."
His expression shifted—more interested now. "Yeah, we know about them. I'm Sergeant Marcus Rodriguez, Mariners' Guild out of the Lakes Barony. Mind if we talk? Might be we can help each other."
Sergeant. An actual military rank talking to a fifteen-year-old with a System-generated title. My brain immediately supplied an image of me trying to salute and falling off my horse.
"Caden Taylor, Junior Commander out of Columbia," I replied, and yeah, my voice definitely went up on 'Commander.' Rodriguez's eyebrow twitched—he noticed—but he didn't laugh. Professional courtesy.
Behind me, Jayden made this tiny snort-laugh that he turned into a cough. Asshole. He knew how awkward I felt saying my title.
Rodriguez gestured to his team and they relaxed—still alert, but not ready for immediate combat. Good sign. "Good timing. We're here on a maintenance contract, keeping that hospital dungeon from overflowing. Been doing regular clears for the past month, and we've found some things that might interest you."
"What kind of things?" Emily asked, moving her horse beside mine. Close enough that our knees bumped. Not an accident.
"Personal effects. Weapons, gear, medical supplies scattered in the lobby." Rodriguez's expression went grim. "Quality stuff—professional equipment. Could be your Hidden Valley team made it inside, but they didn't make it back out."
And there it was. Not just missing people anymore. Dead people. People whose families were waiting for them to come home.
"What are you proposing?" I asked.
"Joint operation," Rodriguez replied. "We were planning to clear the hospital today anyway—almost two weeks since the last full clear, and we're seeing early signs of overflow. You help us clear it safely, we share whatever intel we find about your missing team. Plus you get to see the dungeon from inside. We split loot equally."
I looked back at my team. Emily was already nodding—that thing where she saw three moves ahead. Tommy looked thoughtful. Randy seemed nervous but determined. Brian was studying the hospital with professional interest.
Jayden was fingering his sword hilt and trying to look like he wasn't excited about a real dungeon fight. Pure Jayden.
"Give me a minute to discuss it with my people," I said.
"Take your time."
I wheeled my horse back toward the team, keeping my voice low. Emily moved with me, and when we stopped she was close enough that her thigh pressed against mine. New thing since last night—these casual touches that said we're together without making a big deal. Except my brain made a big deal about every single one.
"Thoughts?" I managed.
"Good opportunity," Emily said, and her hand briefly touched my knee. Just for a second. Just enough to scramble my brain completely. Jesus, how was I supposed to make command decisions when she kept—right. Rodriguez. Dungeon. Focus.
"What do we know about the Mariners' Guild?" Jayden asked. "Reliable?"
Brian said, "Heard traders in Canton talking about their operations. They honor their contracts."
"And they're offering to share intelligence," Tommy added. "More than we'd get investigating on our own."
Randy was quiet, then: "If Thompson's team is in there, shouldn't we try to help them? Even if it's too late, their families deserve to know what happened."
That settled it. Randy was right.
"Alright," I said, turning back to Rodriguez. "We're in. What's the plan?"
"Glad to hear it." Rodriguez gestured for us to follow as he started toward the hospital perimeter. "Medical facility theme means tight corridors. Not great for a long gun like that or my team's ranger."
As we got closer, I could see what he meant. The main entrance was a narrow bottleneck, maybe wide enough for two people. Unlike everything else in Terrell, the hospital looked solid—the System preserved whatever it converted into dungeons while letting the rest of the world rot away.
The smell hit us fifty yards out. Bleach and old blood. Like someone had tried to clean up a massacre and failed.
"Normal spawns are medical-themed undead," Rodriguez continued, stopping at that fifty-yard line like it was a boundary he respected. One of his team—a woman with twin daggers—was already scouting the perimeter. "Patients, staff. But watch out for the equipment."
"Equipment?" Randy's voice went up half an octave.
The dagger woman jogged back. "Gurneys that try to ram you, IV stands that whip around like spears. Sarge found that out the hard way last month. Nearly took his eye out."
Rodriguez grimaced. "The deeper floors are where it gets weird though." He pointed to the upper windows where shadows moved independently of any light source. "Started about three weeks ago. Things that don't match the medical theme. Shadows that whisper, failed experiments..."
"Experiments?" Brian got that look that meant his medic brain was firing. "What kind?"
Rodriguez grimaced. "The surgical kind. We found a goblin fused with a crash cart on the second floor. It wasn't wearing the equipment—the metal was growing out of its flesh. Still trying to use the defibrillator paddles as weapons when we put it down."
My breakfast—iron rations and regret—threatened to make a reappearance.
"The timing matches when adventurers started going missing," he continued. "Your Hidden Valley team wasn't the first."
"Equipment check first," I said, falling back on preparation routine. "Everyone ready for confined space fighting. This isn't outdoor combat."
"Agreed," Rodriguez replied. "Take fifteen minutes to prep. We'll brief you on spawn patterns and hazards."
As we started checking gear, Emily caught my eye while testing her rapier's balance—that little nod that meant she was ready. The same nod she'd given me before kissing me last night, which was absolutely not something I should be thinking about right before entering a death dungeon.
Get it together, Caden.
"Ready?" Rodriguez called out.
"Let's go find some answers," I said, trying to sound confident instead of like someone whose voice had just cracked on 'answers.'
The hospital dungeon loomed ahead. Five experienced adventurers had died in there. What made us think we'd do better?
We had the Mariners' Guild with us. Professionals who actually knew what they were doing.
But Thompson's team deserved answers. Their families deserved to know. If I had to walk into nightmare hospital hell to get those answers, that's what we'd do.
Even if my hands were already shaking and we hadn't reached the door yet.
Chapter 11: UDS Day 191
The broken automatic doors should've been our first warning. Not broken like something smashed through them—broken like they'd been trying to close for days but kept getting stuck on something invisible. But we walked through anyway because that's what Junior Commanders do, apparently. Lead people into nightmares and pretend we know what we're doing.
The smell hit me first. Not monster-smell—I knew that stink by now, all rot and predator-musk. This was different. Like the building itself was sick, sweating out something foul through its walls. The fluorescent lights flickered overhead with an irregular rhythm that made my skin crawl, and my brain immediately went nope, absolutely not, we should leave right now.
"Jesus," Randy whispered beside me, crossbow ready. "This place gives me the creeps."
"Stay focused," I said, trying to sound like Wesley would've sounded. Calm. In control. Not like my skin was trying to crawl off my body.
The hospital lobby was every waiting room I'd ever sat in, except twisted. Same beige tile, same motivational posters about washing your hands and knowing your numbers. Except here the posters were peeling at the edges like something underneath was trying to get out, and the tile had dark stains between the grout that definitely weren't from normal foot traffic.
Rodriguez moved up beside me like he owned the space, and for a second I almost said "you want point?" The words stuck in my throat—Wesley would've never given up command that easy. But Wesley was back in Columbia, and I was here pretending I knew what the hell I was doing.
"Junior Commander," he said, giving me that once-over soldiers do. "That’s not a standard class. What’d you do to unlock that one?”
"It popped up after we took down Armadon," I said, the words coming out defensive. "System reward, I guess."
He nodded slowly, like that explained something. "must be a rare leadership class. The System doesn't hand those out for nothing." His eyes flicked to my team, then back to me. "Means it thinks you can handle command decisions the rest of us can't make. Or won't make."
I wanted to tell him the System was wrong, that I was just a kid from Columbia who got lucky. But his team was already falling into formation behind us, deferring to my position without question.
"Quick introductions before we go in," Rodriguez said, gesturing to his team. "Marcus Cole—we call him Brick. Guardian class, our tank." The big man nodded—easily six-three, built like someone who could actually stop a charging orc. He shifted his riot shield, the metal showing serious use.
"Paige Dawson, Frost Mage." A girl about Emily's age, maybe seventeen, with that thousand-yard stare that meant she'd seen too much too young.
"And Caleb Thorne, Paladin." The young guy with a simple wooden cross wrapped in glowing silver wire gave us a quick wave. Couldn't have been more than twenty, but he carried himself like someone used to being the last line between his team and disaster.
"This is where it starts," Rodriguez said, shifting focus back to business, pointing at the floor near the reception desk.
Scattered across the dirty tiles were half a dozen crossbow bolts.
My stomach dropped. The bolts weren't just dropped—they were perfect. No maker's marks, no imperfections. System Store ammo. The kind you only bought if you had money to burn or were desperate.
But the boot was what really got me.
Just one boot, sitting by itself near an overturned chair. My chest went tight when I saw the leather work—that double-stitched welt, the specific reinforcing on the heel. Tyler craftsmanship. I recognized the style immediately because Emily had bought a pair from the same cobbler after we took the city.
This wasn't some random scavenger's gear. This was the specific, high-quality kit a professional team from the Tyler region would carry.
I picked it up, turning it over in my hands. Recently worn, judging by how clean the leather still was under the dust. But we hadn't passed anyone on the way in. Rodriguez's team hadn't mentioned seeing anyone else.
You don't leave a boot behind unless you're running too fast to stop.
I set the boot down carefully, that uneasy feeling in my gut getting worse.
"This is a Combat Medic's potion kit," Brian said, kneeling beside scattered medical supplies. His voice had that careful tone he used when things were about to get complicated. "Their healer dropped his pack here. Either they were moving fast, or..."
"Or they weren't in any condition to carry it," Tommy finished.
I picked up one of the perfect crossbow bolts, turning it over like it might tell me something useful. But all it told me was that the Hidden Valley team had been desperate. System Store ammo wasn't something you bought for a standard dungeon run—you bought it when you were in serious trouble and needed every advantage you could get.
And they'd still run.
"Shit, we've got company!" Jayden called from near the corridor entrance. "Bunch of them, coming down the hallway."
They came around the corner and my thoughts just scattered. Patients in torn hospital gowns, their skin tinted green like the mist, moving in jerky puppet-steps that were somehow purposeful. Not shambling. These moved like they had jobs to do.
The orderlies behind them were the real problem. Still wearing scrubs but their hands ended in yellowed claws and their eyes—their eyes tracked us with actual intelligence. They spread out as they approached, trying to flank us, and my brain finally kicked back into gear.
"Patients are the grabbers," Rodriguez called out, sword already in hand. "Not real people—just the dungeon's idea of what belongs here. Slow but they hit hard. Orderlies are the real problem—they'll try to separate us."
