Be Brave, Paul

"Leadership is standing shirtless in the dust with a fat dog in your arms whilst everyone around you simultaneously loses their minds in different directions—and pretending you have a plan."

A mumbled voice abruptly halted my internal debate, causing me to spin around.

"Ahh, Beatrix!"

Relief momentarily lifted the weight off my shoulders as I spotted her making her way through the camp, her slow shuffle kicking up small clouds of ochre dust. She looked exhausted — we all did — but she was upright, moving, present.

"What do you want?" Beatrix asked, her voice rough with fatigue.

"I've sent Karen to the lagoon to fetch Chris and Kain," I said. "Hopefully, Joel found his way there, too. You've still not seen him?"

"No."

I'd been hoping for a different answer. Hoping Joel had simply wandered off for water, for space, for any reason that didn't involve the Portal pirate Charity insisted was stalking our camp. Injuries, death and now a missing person... and it's barely been a few days! The thought felt like an indictment of everything we'd tried to build here—this fragile attempt at civilisation that kept crumbling faster than we could shore it up.

"Which tent is Jamie's?" Beatrix asked. "He needs clean clothes."

Her practical concern pulled me back from the edge of despair. Someone was still thinking about the basics. Someone was still functioning.

Practical. Someone was still thinking about the basics while I spiralled through worst-case scenarios. I motioned for her to follow and led her across to Jamie's tent, holding the flap open as she stepped inside.

"Impressive," she said, taking in the space.

"They're ten-man tents. Almost military grade."

A loud grunt pulled our attention downward. Henri sat on the canvas floor, gazing up at us with eyes that seemed to hold all the sorrow in Clivilius. Duke's companion. Duke's shadow. The other half of a partnership that had ended sometime in the darkness of last night while we'd all been too busy surviving to notice.

"He looks so sad," I said, crouching beside him and running my hand through his fur. The gesture felt inadequate—what comfort could a stranger's touch offer against the loss of everything familiar?

"He's hungry," Beatrix replied. "Don't mistake that resting bitch face for sadness. I've seen that gluttonous look in his eyes many times."

Henri yapped—sharp, indignant—and his fox-like tail swept across the floor as if to underscore her point. Maybe she was right. Maybe I was projecting my own grief onto a dog who simply wanted breakfast. It was easier, somehow, to imagine animals sharing our emotional landscape than to accept they operated on simpler imperatives. Food. Warmth. The immediate. Not the weight of loss that humans insisted on carrying long after the practical need had passed.

"I'll feed him," Beatrix said, already heading for the empty bowls.

I found an unopened tin in the bags along the wall and tossed it to her. She caught it one-handed, glanced at the label, and pulled the ring. The smell of beef and gravy filled the tent—rich and meaty and so absurdly normal that my stomach cramped with sudden hunger. When had I last eaten? The question felt distant, irrelevant, belonging to a version of myself who had time for such considerations.

"That almost smells good," I said.

Henri snorted. Agreement or impatience—with dogs, I'd learned, the distinction rarely mattered.

I wandered into the sleeping area while Beatrix dealt with the feeding, my attention snagging on something near the mattress. Several small droplets marked the canvas floor, dark against the pale fabric. I crouched down, studying them with the kind of focus I usually reserved for spreadsheets that didn't balance. Still slightly tacky. Fresh enough to be recent. Joel's throat had been cut. Joel had been recovering here. And now Joel was missing.

"Hey, Beatrix!" I called out.

She appeared in the archway, her expression already sceptical. "What am I looking at?"

"Does this look like blood to you?"

She squatted beside me, examining the droplets with the detached assessment of someone who'd seen far too much violence to be moved by a few stains. "I guess it could be," she said.

"I would have thought you'd be able to give a more certain answer given how much blood you've seen recently."

The words were out before I could stop them—that particular talent I had for saying exactly the wrong thing at exactly the wrong moment. Claire had always hated it, that tendency to let frustration sharpen my tongue into something that cut people I didn't mean to wound. Even here, thousands of miles from home, I was still making the same mistakes.

Beatrix's eyes rolled with eloquent disdain. She stood and moved toward the suitcases without another word, and I knew I'd lost whatever ground we'd gained.

"I'm sorry, Beatrix. I didn't mean it like that."

"It's fine," she said, but the terseness in her voice made clear it wasn't.

Just drop it, Paul. I turned back to the droplets, letting the silence stretch between us while I catalogued the implications of what I was seeing. Blood. Joel's blood, probably. Which meant whatever had happened to him hadn't been voluntary.

"I think Joel's in real trouble," I said. "We're just not equipped to survive out here."

"There's a bunch of camping gear and related shit piled in Luke's living room," Beatrix said, and something in her voice had shifted—not forgiveness, exactly, but a willingness to move past my stupidity for the sake of practicality. "It's where that kayak came from. I think some of it may have got a bit damaged during the shadow panther attack last night, but I can bring you everything that's there anyway."

"That'd be great," I said, feeling a spark of hope. "We'll sort that out once we've decided what to do about Joel."

"And Duke," Beatrix added.

The brief flicker of optimism guttered like a candle in a draft. Duke. Still dead. Still requiring decisions none of us wanted to make.

"It's really sad that we can't give Duke a proper burial," I said.

Beatrix gathered clothes in silence, her movements efficient but unhurried. At the archway, she paused without turning around. "Jamie won't let you cremate him."

Then she was gone, leaving me alone with the bloodstains and the weight of problems I had no idea how to solve.

I followed her out into the harsh morning light. "Charity is right, Beatrix."

"You take charge of it then," she shot back, turning on her heel and walking away before I could respond.

I was left standing in the dust wondering when exactly I'd become the person everyone expected to fix things. I'd never asked for this role. Never wanted it. Yet here I was, shirtless and exhausted, expected to make decisions about cremation and missing teenagers and threats I barely understood.

Glenda appeared beside me with the silent efficiency of someone who'd spent years materialising at bedsides in the middle of the night. I hadn't heard her approach, hadn't sensed her presence until she was simply there, looking at me with that particular expression medical professionals develop—concerned but controlled, assessing but not yet alarmed.

"The dug needs tae be cremated," Charity declared from beside the campfire. She was cleaning her blade on a leather tassel of her skirt, wiping blood from steel with the casual ease of someone performing routine maintenance. The sight should have been alarming. Instead, it felt almost reassuring—here was someone who knew exactly what she was doing, even if what she was doing involved weapons and violence and all the things I'd spent my life avoiding.

I caught Glenda's eye, trying to communicate without words. I'm not arguing with the woman holding the bloodied knife. She seemed to understand, or at least chose not to push the matter.

"Look, it's Karen and Chris returning with Kain," I said, grateful for the distraction.

Three figures emerged from beyond the dunes, moving slowly but steadily toward camp. Karen and Chris flanked Kain, supporting him between them, while Lois bounded ahead with the boundless enthusiasm of a dog who hadn't yet learned that the world contained things worth fearing. Her golden fur caught the morning light, tail a blur of motion that seemed almost offensive in its cheerfulness.

"And Lois," Glenda said, her voice softening as she crouched to greet the approaching retriever.

The group reached us in stages—first Lois, then Karen and Chris with Kain suspended between them like cargo they'd been hauling across difficult terrain.

"The feeling has returned in my uninjured leg," Kain announced, as though this were news worth celebrating.

Had it ever been gone? I found myself wondering, but kept the thought to myself. The man had been attacked by something in the darkness, had nearly lost the use of his leg entirely. If he wanted to celebrate incremental improvements, who was I to diminish that?

"Well, that's a relief," Glenda said.

"Seems to be quite the miracle," Karen added.

Glenda crouched to examine the wound, her fingers probing with professional detachment. I watched her work and found myself running calculations I hadn't consciously initiated. Jamie, Joel, Kain, and myself. Four miraculous recoveries. The healing properties of the water here defied everything I understood about biology, about the body's limitations, about the time it took flesh to knit itself back together. And yet Duke—Duke had died. The waters hadn't saved him. Are animals excluded? Or was he simply too far gone by the time we found him?

"You'll still need to give it plenty of rest," Glenda told Kain as she stood.

"We can make you some crutches," Chris offered.

"Forget making crutches," Karen said with a huff. "Just get Luke to bring us some real ones."

"That's a much better idea—" Glenda started, but stopped mid-sentence, her attention caught by something behind me.

I turned to follow her gaze.

Jamie and Beatrix were emerging from behind the tents. Jamie carried a bundle against his chest—Duke, wrapped in cloth, held with the careful tenderness usually reserved for infants or the irreplaceable. His face was a mask of controlled devastation, the kind of expression that takes enormous effort to maintain and could shatter at the slightest provocation.

You are their leader. The thought rose unbidden, unwelcome, but impossible to ignore. Someone had to take charge. Someone had to ask the questions no one wanted to answer. And apparently, that someone was me.

I straightened my back, trying to project a confidence I was far from feeling. "Jamie." My voice cracked on his name. I coughed, tried again. "I know things are a bit painful right now, but we need to know when you last saw Joel."

He stopped walking. The silence that followed felt physical, a presence that pressed against all of us with equal weight. When he finally spoke, his voice was flat, emptied of everything except the facts. Before the shadow panther attack, he said. Before the chaos. Before Duke.

"And when you returned?" I asked.

Jamie shrugged—a helpless gesture that said more than words could. He hadn't looked for Joel. Hadn't thought to. Had been consumed by Duke's death and the impossible task of processing a loss that shouldn't have happened, couldn't have happened, and yet had.

"Then it's settled," Glenda said, her voice cutting through the heavy air with the clinical precision of a diagnosis. "Joel is missing."

The words hung there, final and terrible. This is all really happening, I thought, and the acknowledgment hit me with physical force, compressing the air in my chest until breathing felt like work.

Charity stepped forward, her presence commanding attention in a way that required no words. When she spoke, her voice carried the absolute certainty of someone who dealt in facts rather than hopes. "I am certain Joel has been taken by the Portal pirate. I will hunt him doon and bring Joel back."

Not this bloody Portal pirate again. As if the shadow panthers weren't sufficient testament to our nightmarish reality. As if we needed additional threats lurking in the darkness, additional reasons to fear what we couldn't see.

"I'm coming with you," Jamie said, his voice cutting through before I could fully process what Charity had said. His jaw was set, his eyes burning with something that looked like determination but might have been desperation wearing a more acceptable mask.

Charity nodded. "Prepare yer things. We leave immediately."

But Jamie wasn't moving. His gaze had dropped to the bundle in his arms—Duke, wrapped and silent, waiting for whatever final disposition we could manage in this godforsaken place. His fingers tightened on the shroud, knuckles whitening with the force of his grip.

Charity crossed to him with the purposeful stride of someone who understood that kindness sometimes required cruelty. She lifted his chin, forcing his eyes to meet hers. "If ye want ony chance o' finding Joel alive, we must leave immediately."

"I need to say farewell to Duke first," Jamie said, his voice breaking on the words, cracking open to reveal the grief he'd been holding back through sheer force of will.

"Life is full o' decisions and consequences, Jamie," Charity said, her gaze unwavering. "Ye need tae make a choice: Joel or Duke."

I closed my eyes, unable to watch what came next. But the darkness behind my lids offered no refuge—instead, it conjured questions I'd been refusing to ask myself. Claire or your children? Or worse—Mack or Rose? What would I do if forced to choose between them? What kind of person would that choice reveal me to be?

The horror of it was almost physical, a twisting in my gut that made me want to double over. I opened my eyes because the darkness was worse, because imagination was crueller than reality, because I needed to see how Jamie handled a choice I prayed I would never face.

He nodded. Silent, devastated, but decided. He handed Duke to Beatrix.

She took the bundle with a gentleness that seemed almost out of character, cradling the wrapped body against her chest. "Duke knows you love him, Jamie," she said, her voice thick. "He won't ever forget that."

Jamie pressed a kiss to the shroud, his lips moving in what might have been a prayer or an apology or simply a farewell too private for words.

Then he stepped back. Let go. Made his choice.

I won't make that choice, I told myself fiercely. The thought of Mack and Rose rose up—their faces, their laughter, the way Rose said "Daddy" like it was the most important word in any language. They were safe on Earth. I had protected them by leaving them behind.

But the voice of Clivilius, that insidious whisper I'd been trying to ignore, answered immediately: You already have made the choice.

"I'll grab my things," Jamie said, his voice steadier than it had any right to be.

He was halfway to the tent when he stopped, turning to look back over his shoulder. "Take good care of Henri for me."

I crossed to where the fat little dog sat watching the proceedings with the confused patience of an animal who knew something was wrong but couldn't identify what. I scooped him into my arms, feeling his warmth against my bare chest, his heartbeat quick and steady against my own.

"We'll keep him safe, Jamie," I said. "You have my word."

He disappeared into the tent with Charity, and I was left holding a dog I'd just promised to protect while the voice in my head refused to grant me peace. Where are your children now? it asked, and I pulled Henri closer as if his small body could shield me from the question. They can't survive here, I countered. Are you certain they can survive on Earth? Claire was alone with them. Shadow panthers could apparently cross through the Portal. Safety was a lie we told ourselves, a fiction we maintained because the alternative—acknowledging that nowhere was truly safe, that we could never fully protect the people we loved—was too terrible to accept.

"Clivilius!"

Glenda's scream shattered whatever remained of my composure. She dropped to her knees, pounding the earth with her fists, the word torn from her throat like something between a battle cry and a curse.

"Glenda, are you alright?" I asked, stepping toward her.

She raised her head, and the transformation in her face stopped me mid-step. Her eyes were wild, burning with something that looked like madness or revelation or both. The grin that spread across her features was equally unsettling—fierce, triumphant, utterly disconnected from everything happening around her.

"My father is alive!" she shouted, her hands reaching skyward as though grasping for something none of us could see.

Chris waved his hand in front of her face, trying to break whatever trance had seized her, but she was somewhere else entirely, lost in a vision or a message or a break from reality that I couldn't begin to understand.

Movement at the edge of my vision. Beatrix, with Duke still cradled in her arms, walking away from camp.

"Beatrix, where are you going?" I called out.

"Home!" she shouted back without breaking stride.

"What? Now? What do you mean?"

"I'm going with Beatrix," Kain announced, pushing away from Karen with sudden determination. He stumbled, crashed to the ground, but was already trying to rise again.

"You need to rest," Karen told him firmly.

"I need crutches," Kain shot back.

"Glenda... Glenda..." Chris kept repeating, still trying, still failing to reach her.

Lois chose that moment to jump up, pressing her paws against my chest, barking with the oblivious enthusiasm of a dog who thought this was all some elaborate game. Henri squirmed in my arms, adding his own protests to the cacophony.

"Lois, down!" I commanded.

I looked up to see Beatrix scaling the first dune, Duke's shroud bright against the ochre dust. She wasn't stopping. Wasn't looking back. Whatever she meant by "home," she was committed to reaching it.

"Oh my God," I breathed.

I closed my eyes, just for a moment, trying to catalogue the chaos that had engulfed us. Joel missing. Jamie hunting a Portal pirate. Beatrix leaving with Duke's body. Kain arguing with Karen. Glenda lost in some kind of trance. And me—standing here shirtless, holding a fat dog, pretending I have any idea what to do next.

Can it possibly get any worse?

The burning started in my chest before I'd finished the thought—not the metaphorical burn of anxiety or fear, but something physical, something real, spreading through me like fire catching dry grass. And with it came a voice that was inside me and around me and utterly alien, speaking with the certainty of something ancient and patient and far more powerful than anything I'd ever encountered:

Be brave, Paul. Now, more than ever, your people need their strong leader.

I opened my eyes.

The chaos hadn't stopped. Beatrix was cresting the dune. Glenda was still lost wherever she'd gone. Kain was arguing with Karen. Chris was desperately trying to reach our doctor. Somewhere beyond camp, Jamie and Charity were preparing to hunt a killer.

But something had shifted. Something inside me.

Clivilius had spoken. Not metaphorically, not as some projection of my own anxieties, but actually spoken—a voice that wasn't my conscience, wasn't my imagination, wasn't anything I could explain or dismiss. And I understood, with a certainty that terrified me more than shadow panthers or Portal pirates ever could, that this world had claimed me. That whatever happened next—whether I lived or died, whether I found my way home or perished in the dust—I would never be the same.

What happens now?

The answer would come. But not today. Not yet.

First, I had to hold my people together.

First, I had to survive.