Chapter 21: Preparing for War - Part 1
POV: Alec Morgan
The Grounder scouts came daily now, probing our defenses with professional persistence that spoke of systematic intelligence gathering. Each encounter was a lesson in the gap between my growing combat awareness and the reality of fighting people who'd spent their entire lives preparing for war.
I could see their attacks coming two seconds before they happened, could predict movement patterns and strike sequences with supernatural clarity. But prediction without physical capability was like knowing the answer to a math problem without having the tools to solve it. My body was learning, adapting, building muscle memory through repetition and desperation, but the gap between awareness and execution remained frustratingly wide.
Until today.
The border patrol had been routine—Miller, Harper, myself, and two others checking perimeter markers and looking for signs of Grounder encroachment. We found signs, all right. Three warriors materialized from forest cover with the kind of coordinated assault that spoke of extensive training and tactical sophistication.
My combat prediction exploded with overlapping attack patterns—spear thrust from the left, blade work from center, flanking movement from the right. For the first time since arriving on Earth, my enhanced awareness painted a complete picture of simultaneous threats and my body actually responded with movements that matched what my mind could see.
I flowed left to avoid the spear thrust, redirecting its momentum with precise leverage that sent the weapon wide while my own blade found the gap in his leather armor. Not a killing blow—I still couldn't bring myself to murder someone defending their territory—but enough to disable him temporarily.
The second attacker came from my blind spot, but my prediction had already shown me where he'd be. I spun right as his blade whistled through empty air, using his forward momentum to throw him past me into the third warrior's strike pattern. They collided in a tangle of limbs and weapons while I stepped back to assess the tactical situation.
"I'm actually doing this. Actually fighting multiple opponents and winning through skill rather than just luck and regeneration."
"Where the hell did you learn to fight like that?" Miller demanded as the Grounders disengaged and melted back into forest cover, their intelligence gathering complete.
"Pattern recognition," I said automatically, but the deflection felt different now. Less like desperate concealment and more like professional modesty about capabilities I was finally earning through practice and experience.
"That wasn't pattern recognition," Harper said, checking her weapons with the nervous energy of someone who'd just witnessed something beyond normal human capability. "That was... I don't know what that was. But it was amazing."
The praise made me uncomfortable. Not because it threatened my cover—that ship had sailed weeks ago—but because it highlighted the fundamental deception underlying my existence here. I wasn't earning these abilities through training and experience. I was revealing capabilities that had been downloaded into my consciousness along with transmigration and impossible knowledge of future events.
But as we returned to camp, I realized the source mattered less than the application. However I'd acquired combat prediction, I was using it to keep people alive, to protect the family I'd found among these impossible survivors.
"Alec," Bellamy called as we reported back. "Need to talk to you about something."
He led me away from the main camp to a clearing where several people were practicing weapon drills with the kind of desperate intensity that comes from knowing your life depends on skills you haven't mastered yet. Their movements were enthusiastic but uncoordinated, brave but tactically unsound.
"They're going to get themselves killed," Bellamy said bluntly. "Good hearts, willing spirits, but no training for the kind of combat they're about to face. Three hundred Grounder warriors don't care about enthusiasm."
I watched Jasper swing a sword with form that would get him disarmed in the first exchange, Monty trying to use a spear like a club, others whose courage exceeded their capability by dangerous margins.
"What do you want me to do?" I asked, though I suspected I already knew.
"Teach them," Bellamy said simply. "Whatever you know about combat, whatever patterns you've figured out—share it. Help them survive long enough to matter."
The request was simultaneously flattering and terrifying. Teaching meant exposure, meant demonstrating capabilities I couldn't fully explain. But it also meant multiplying my protective instincts across the entire group, helping people I cared about survive through knowledge they could actually use.
"I can try," I said. "But I'm not exactly a professional instructor."
"You're alive and they're not dead yet," Bellamy replied with brutal pragmatism. "That qualifies you for the job."
Over the next three hours, I worked with groups of four and five, sharing simplified versions of combat awareness that didn't require supernatural prediction to be useful. Watch their shoulders, not their weapon—shoulder movement telegraphs intention. If they shift weight left, strike right—basic physics and leverage. Groups fight predictably—identify the leader and disrupt their coordination.
"Think of it as pattern recognition," I told Jasper as he struggled with spear work that looked like random flailing. "Everyone moves the same way when they're trying to kill you. Once you see the patterns, you can predict what's coming and respond accordingly."
"How do you see patterns in something this chaotic?" he asked, gesturing at the complexity of simulated combat.
"Because I literally see them painted across my vision like a heads-up display. Because I have supernatural capabilities that let me predict attacks before they happen. Because I'm not actually human in any way that matters."
"Practice," I said instead. "Start with single opponents, learn to read individual patterns, then work up to multiple attackers. The fundamentals are the same—people move predictably when they're trying to hurt you."
It was true as far as it went, and it actually helped. Not supernatural prediction, but enhanced situational awareness that kept them alive longer than untrained flailing would manage. By evening, most of them were moving with something approaching tactical competence rather than desperate courage.
"This is good," Bellamy said, watching Monroe successfully counter an attack pattern that would have gotten her killed that morning. "Really good. I'm making you combat instructor officially. Whatever rank that carries, whatever authority it requires—you've got it."
The promotion should have felt like recognition and validation. Instead, it felt like another layer of responsibility I couldn't afford to fail. These people were trusting me to prepare them for war against opponents who'd spent their entire lives learning to kill efficiently.
"How many of them will die because my teaching wasn't good enough? How many lives am I responsible for when the real fighting starts?"
"Alec." Raven's voice cut through my spiral of self-recrimination. "We need to talk."
She led me away from the training area to our shared shelter, her expression mixing pride with worry in ways that made my chest tight with affection and concern.
"You're taking more risks," she said without preamble. "Fighting more. Taking point positions, volunteering for dangerous assignments, throwing yourself into combat training like you're preparing for your own execution."
"Someone has to—"
"Don't." She cut me off with gentle firmness. "Don't give me tactical justifications for what feels like suicide by increments. I know you heal fast, but that doesn't make you invincible. And it doesn't mean I want to watch you test the limits of your capabilities against people who kill for a living."
The concern in her voice was everything I'd never expected to find in this world—someone who cared enough to worry, who valued my survival beyond my usefulness, who saw me as worth protecting rather than just using.
"I'm not trying to get myself killed," I said, which was technically true even if it understated the calculated risks I'd been taking.
"Then what are you trying to do?" she demanded, stepping close enough that I could smell her scent mixed with metal shavings and electrical components.
"Keep you alive. Keep everyone alive. Use whatever advantages I have to tip the odds in our favor when three hundred warriors come to kill us all. Prove that I'm worth the trust and acceptance you've given me despite knowing I'm not what I claim to be."
"Keep people safe," I said simply. "All of you. Use whatever skills I have to make sure as many of us as possible survive what's coming."
"We're partners," she said firmly, taking my hands and forcing me to meet her eyes. "That means sharing the danger, not carrying it all yourself. If you're going to risk your life protecting people, I'm going to be right there beside you."
"Raven—"
"No arguments," she interrupted, then pulled me down into a fierce kiss that tasted like determination and love and acceptance of whatever impossibilities made me different from everyone else she'd known.
When we separated, her eyes were bright with unshed tears and absolute certainty about her decision to stand with me regardless of the cost.
"Promise me," she whispered against my lips. "Promise you won't try to protect everyone alone."
"I promise," I said, meaning it even though we both knew I'd still sacrifice myself if it meant keeping her and the others alive.
As night fell around our camp, distant sounds echoed through the forest—drums beating in rhythm that spoke of coordination and preparation, voices raised in what sounded like war chants, the organized movement of large groups preparing for assault.
The Grounders were done with intelligence gathering and surgical strikes. Tomorrow, or the day after, they'd come with overwhelming force designed to eliminate us as a threat to their territorial control.
But lying beside Raven in the darkness, listening to her steady breathing and feeling her warmth against my side, I realized something had fundamentally changed in my approach to survival. I wasn't just trying to keep people alive anymore—I was trying to preserve the family I'd found among these impossible survivors, the connections that made existing as something other than human feel worthwhile.
War was coming, but we'd face it together. And maybe, just maybe, that would be enough.
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