Fluff Chapter Seventeen - Entering the Endgame

Chapter Seventeen - Entering the Endga

Her sisters had told her that she'd know when they entered the Endga, but she didn't expect to know it like this.

Between one step and the next, a screen flashed up before her.

Entering Endga.

Two words over a small, semi-transparent blue-ish background. Emily was still trying to parse them when her sisters started to cheer.

That snapped her out of her montary funk. "Okay, okay, calm down. Hey! You don't want the bad... the good guys hearing us, right? Please, we're being stealthy right now."

With a mont of quiet to think, Emily was able to better get her bearings.

She expected the Endga to start within Saint Arie, and she was almost right. They were a few hundred paces from this intersection with an abandoned gas station on it next to a small warehouse. There was a wide road, and then Saint Arie started past that. There was a long road that she couldn't quite see down because of the angle they were at, and further in, so taller buildings that stood out above the town.

Emily crouched down, then glanced around. Her sisters were all around her, and so of them had caught on and lowered themselves too. "Does this warning co up for everyone?" she asked, gesturing vaguely at where the system prompt had been. It had faded soon after she read it.

"Yeah," Teddy said. "Anyone cool."

"Not normal people," Athena said. "They won't know that they're in an Endga unless they start noticing that things are weird."

"Right, okay," Emily said. She glanced back. The house they'd stayed at for a bit was so ways back, but it had only taken them... She glanced at her watch. Forty minutes to get to the Endga's edge? That wasn't too long. They hadn't exactly walked in a straight line, either, and they'd been scouting the area out a little. If they moved in a straight line, they could make it back in about twenty minutes. "I think that ho we were at might beco our, uh, headquarters after all."

"Neat," Teddy said.

Emily looked up. Teddy was... well, she was a lot but she was also the first of Emily's sisters, the one she'd spent the most ti with. So when Teddy sounded a little strange, it felt rather obvious to Emily that sothing was off.

She scanned the area. They were next to a rather deep ditch that ran alongside a road, with a small patch of young forest next to them and plenty of bushes around. It was good cover, all things considered. She didn't see anyone around, or any HRF vans. "What is it?" she asked.

Teddy blinked, then smiled. "I'm waiting."

"For?" Emily prompted.

"For us to move into the Endga proper," Teddy said.

"Oh," Emily replied. Teddy's montary bit of lethargy seed to have passed, and the rest of her sisters seed fine. Was it her imagination?

She licked her lips, then did sothing she maybe should have done a while ago. She used Sisterportation and summoned Maple. The beaver girl appeared between one blink and the next, still positioned as if she was sitting down. She squeaked, then windmilled her arms around, but Emily caught her before she could fall.

"Hey," she said. "Are you okay?"

Maple blinked, then reached up and moved so hair out of her face. "Oh. Hi!"

"Yo, Maple," Teddy said. "About ti you show up."

"You missed a bunch!" Trinity said. "We've been hiking, and we saw bugs, and we ate bark, and Teddy tripped a bunch, and we broke into soone's house and the Boss said it was okay!"

"That does sound fun," Maple said. "Oh, we're next to the Endga already? I just got the notification."

"Yeah," Emily said. "That's why I called you over. Is dad okay?"

Maple nodded. "Grandpa Boss is okay," she said. "He was nice. There were candies in the glovebox, and he told stories about when you were young."

Maple stared up at Emily, eting her eyes. Emily swallowed. She... trusted Maple to keep whatever story she heard to herself. "Well, as long as he's fine. I guess he'll be heading out now. We're probably just going to go a little ways into the city, then pull back out to our, uh, safehouse."

"We're not staying in the Endga?" Teddy said.

"I'd rather not sleep in it," Emily said. She glanced at her watch again. It was just shy of five in the afternoon. Not that late, but not so early either. They'd wasted a fair bit of ti in the safehouse. "Let's keep moving? I'd like to see if crossing that road is safe or not. Then... maybe we can snoop around? How will we know what the Endga expects from us?"

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"We'll know," Athena said.

That was strangely cryptic and nacing, but Emily decided not to poke at it. Instead, she gestured towards the gas station nearby. The lights around it were off. "Let's start by checking that. Food grabbed in an Endga is safe, right?"

"Unless it has anything to do with the Endga, yeah," Teddy said.

"We'll see, then," Emily said.

They could break into a few more hos to raid pantries and such, but that wouldn't exactly give them a lot of food. Maye so canned goods? Fresher stuff would be harder to co by. If the area was evacuated about a week ago... things like bread in bread boxes would be on the verge of going bad, and anything refrigerated was probably inedible already.

Emily took another step forwards, then jumped as a second system ssage popped into existence before her.

Endga Entered.

Group Detected!

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