Janine had to spend more time in the tent than she would have liked. Maxence ignored her protests and made her sit down and eat a cusack’s weight of nutrient paste, while he cleaned her injuries, pushed the dislocated bones and joints back into place, and sutured the wounds.

“You know this isn’t needed, right?” Janine grumbled in-between stuffing her mouth. “I once…”

“… survived an entire month eating nothing but licking moss off rocks.” Maxence rolled his eyes at her confusion. “I read your file, Janine. Listen, how about you shut up about teaching me how to do my job, and I won’t nag you about Anissa’s behavior?”

“She is a good girl,” the warlord growled defensively. “Loyal. Gentle. Smart. Would gladly give a life to save you.”

“And she added us more work,” the doctor said, swallowing a pill to stave off the exhaustion and closing his bloodshot eyes. “Never thought I’d say it, but thank the Planet for Ravager’s headache. We can use a rest.” His arms, encased in the military-grade exosuit’s sleeves, ran over her legs, tapping at tendons to check reflexes and moving a scanner over the injured knee. Maxence was one of the few people Janine didn’t feel ashamed of her short legs. Even tired and annoyed, the man somehow managed to be gentle. “Hm, surprising. Despite the torn muscles around the upper tibia and behind the cracked articular cartilage, an elastic layer of muscle fibers stretching from the pelvis down to the toes allows you to walk with ease. There wasn’t a mention of this in your file, and Ashbringer lacks this unusual phenomenon.”

“The Blessed Mother’s gift changes us in unique ways,” Janine said, satisfied with her superiority over her named sister in at least something. Ashbringer’s bone density was greater than hers, and she anguished about the inability to catch up with the woman, despite training just as rigorously.

“Mutates, you mean. Visit me later; a scan is needed to keep your medical records up to date. This is not a request, Janine,” he told her.

“As you command, Max,” she sighed. The doctor took off the oversized sleeve, rubbing his biological wrist with his metal hand. “Listen. Ravager never apologized…”

“There’s nothing to apologize for,” Maxence cut her off and tapped on a bottle, reminding Janine to drink water. “I was well briefed and chose to ignore the danger. I would have done the same choice today. The commander is not at fault; in a less fucked-up world, she would have received medical help in a mental institution instead of being forced into slaughter after slaughter. I will never blame a patient for lashing out due to the condition. But I wouldn’t mind knowing more about the circumstances that led to such sporadic outbursts of aggression.”

“Not my secret to tell,” Janine told the inquisitive doctor. Maxence meant well. He desperately wanted to know why Ravager hated most scientists and medical personnel and even tried to talk things out. But the Blessed Mother kept him at arm’s length, both for his and the tribe’s safety. 

The Wolf Tribe weren’t human. Only the warlords, the supreme shaman, and the Dynast knew of this. Although the liege had offered to let everyone know this fact and swore his protection, the Blessed Mother had refused the idea. The stigma against biological weapons permeated the world since the things birthed in the laboratories of the Old World haunted the planet to this day, often leaving desolated ruins in their wake. Ravager and Lacerated One encouraged the Wolfkins to think of themselves as humans, while Alpha tried her best to safeguard this shameful secret. There was no way the citizens could ever forgive such a tainted lineage, and existing under the Dynast’s protection was no way to live.

Legally, the Wolf Tribe wasn’t in any trouble. The Dynast’s dreadful intelligence agency, the Investigation Bureau, regularly cracked down on the racist groups, be they Normies, New Breeds or mutants. All living under the Reclamation Army’s rule are humans by law, and those trying to divide people by appearance or birth faced severe punishment. But the stain remained. That filthy Chak had to go above and beyond to earn his rank, and no one knew how the Oathtakers or the blasted Iternian scumbags would treat the Wolfkins’ prisoners if the truth came out. Memories of the Culling, a genocidal act carried out by Iterna, had fortified the resolve to conceal the unpleasant information about their origin from any outsiders.

Janine thought nothing of it. She believed Alpha and Ashbringer to be stuck-up bitches, but saying so to their faces would spell uncounted pain for her. The same principle applied to the knowledge about their creation. Some things are better left unspoken.

Once she satisfied Maxence’s insistent requests, she left him dotting over the wounded and left the medical bay, wearing a proper jacket of rough cusack leather and similar pants, brought to her by Impatient One. The shaman herself led a small prayer, asking the Spirits to bless the medical personnel for rescuing tribesmen and to help the injured recover and grow stronger.

Janine found her sons in another tent, the one meant to house those whose lives weren’t in danger. They shared the space with the burned New Breeds from the work crews, who played cards, glancing amusedly at the furiously arguing wolfkins. Bogdan was out of his armor, standing in a green sleeveless shirt and simple pants. Ignacy lay on a bed, wrapped in a blanket to the waist. The nurses had bandaged the stump of his arm tightly, and the surrounding area had been shaved of fur, revealing his tanned skin.

“Warlord!” Bogdan stood at attention, and even Ignacy tried to jump to his feet.

“At ease, both of you. It’s just Janine for now.” She waved her paw and put her axe down. Janine hugged Bogdan and squatted before Ignacy’s bed, still towering over him. “Ignacy. I know it might go against your beliefs.” She clenched her paws, trying to find the right words to calm and persuade him without implying that he was weak. “Son, our tribe has somewhat unique views about metal and the sanctity of flesh.” Ignacy tilted his head, and she hurriedly continued. “Yes! The soul is important! How could it not be? It gives us emotions, love for our duty, and love for the people bequeathed to our protection. But the steel… It isn’t bad, Ignacy! You see me wielding an axe in battle instead of relying on my claws. You use a shardgun yourself, for it helps you fell a greater prey. The implants are the same!” She took him by the paw when a spark of something appeared in his gentle, amber eyes. “Your family will never abandon you, no matter what, even if you choose to become a Crippled. But, please, consider…”

“Mom, I already agreed to the augmentation,” Ignacy said casually, and Janine’s world cracked from relief.

She stood up, trying to be dignified and presentable. Had Impatient One been here, she would’ve rightly reprimanded the warlord, potentially ordering some flesh punishment. Family, no matter how much you love them, always takes a backseat when it comes to matters of the tribe. To avoid favoritism and weed out any possible seeds of corruption, warlords were expected to cut their families off and treat them like everyone else. No one forced a female to become a warlord; if she was unwilling to follow certain rules, she should not have taken the rank in the first place. In practice, however, most warlords maintained close ties with their families, often setting higher standards for their offspring. The shamans didn’t fight this, believing it to be one of the many changes the future had brought to the tribe. Adapt and keep living, or struggle in vain and perish. Change was inevitable, and the shamans steered it in a positive direction rather than tearing the tribe asunder in a pointless struggle.

Janine’s heart raced happily. Her son won’t be a Crippled! He won’t turn into someone whose only goal in life is to eke out an existence and sacrifice himself to save the tribe in times of need. Relief had washed over her, banishing her hatred for herself. Her son will be fine! And given time, the rest can be fixed.

“Check this out.” Ignacy struggled a bit to scroll to something on a portable terminal before letting his brother help him. Its display flashed an image of a steel limb, causing Janine’s eyes to narrow. Spirits are her witnesses; she wasn’t the brightest lass when it came to machinery, but even her knowledge was enough to spot a strange tube in this limb, connected to a large container storing flammable material near the elbow. “It took some pleading, but the technicians had agreed to test my design. Well, not really my own; I blatantly copied and adapted it from books we got from that bunker we stumbled upon a year ago, but that’s beside the point! The idea was to install a generator powerful enough to emit plasma from my palm, but the logistics officer had shut down this idea…”

“Because it would be too expensive.” Bogdan rolled his eyes and pressed a button on the terminal to show Janine the initial design. Janine only whistled, reading about the damn thing’s cost and output. Once fully charged, it could eat its way through an entire mountain if needed. “My thoughts exactly. There’s no way the state would give this experimental tech to grunts like us. And thank the Spirits for it; Ignacy would’ve blown himself or others up while trying to wield it.”

“Lies!” Ignacy snapped and returned the image. “I calculated everything! From recoil to an emergency shutdown in case of… Know what? It doesn’t really matter anymore, and I will not spend a second trying to convince laymen otherwise. Anyway, the downgraded model can unleash a stream of heat that can melt through a diamodite alloy upon prolonged exposure. Just imagine me jumping on a tank, pressing a palm against a hatch, and burning…”

“Slowpoke!” Bogdan stretched the word. “You deal with the tanks by ripping off their hatches, dropping welcome gifts in the form of grenades down, and leaping onto the next one to repeat the process. Your method sounds like unnecessary extra steps.”

“Listen to the voice of reason, Ignacy.” Janine studied the schematic, examining the gripping strength and reaction and response times of the new arm, as well as the materials used in its construction. Seeing that it was comparable to a power suit, the warlord relaxed. “I am proud of you. No, really,” she added as Ignacy hummed incredulously. “You said you copied the design, but it was you who adapted it to our bodies. This is impressive, son.” She ruffled his hair and asked worriedly. “Is there any way to attach claws to this arm? Girls might start to ignore a clawless male. If it costs too much, just tell me; maybe I can find some tokens…”

“It is fine,” Ignacy said, looking triumphantly at the image. “Fyra caster is perfect as it is!”

“Flame caster,” Bogdan corrected him. “What kind of name is fyra, anyway?”

“I heard it from a game! Mom… I mean, Warlord Janine, this is my first major project!” Ignacy beamed, forgetting about his missing limb. “Can you imagine? I actually created something of value! I am not useless!”

“You are never useless, Ignacy.”

Just don’t end like your brother. Janine bit her tongue. This was a high moment for her boy. No need to dwell on the sorrows of the past. The implants studding her flesh were the results of her firstborn, a somewhat unruly cub who shared Ignacy’s passion and pushed far ahead in becoming one with the steel, dreaming about a day where his technological prowess would let him dominate a scout or even a wolf hag. His youthful naivete and eagerness to improve himself through the steel was so great that even Lacerated One couldn’t find a heart to reprimand him. Oh, how wrong they were.

What happened to her firstborn was Eugenia’s and Skulltaker’s fault, not a flaw in his knowledge of technology. But the strained squeals of her precious boy, the way his veins bulged beneath his skin shortly before rupturing, the agonized contortions of his limbs, and the despair in his beautiful amber eyes caused by his implants going awry and cooking her boy from within plagued her dreams.

For that, she hated the fake saint and the precious little land of lies, Iterna. The Reclamation Army had a long history of rivalry with this mythical country.

The Iternians, the bastards who survived the Extinction unscathed, proclaimed unity and friendship to the ruined wastes around them. In an attempt to win some goodwill, Iterna invited the brightest youths from around the world to attend their universities. They even provided convoys, and many countries sent soldiers to escort their children, losing some troops along the way during delivering their wards to Iterna’s care.

Zero accepted the proposal despite Ravager’s advice. And lo-and-behold, Iterna’s government had changed while her named sister was there, and they backstabbed her and the other youths, kicking non-Normies students into the Ravaged Lands without alerting their countries. No guides, no supplies, and the attack of a sand reaper, a most dangerous predator around the lands, have left hundreds of students dead and far more injured. And once the students turned back to the Iternian bastion, begging the guards for help, the Iternians left them to rot. Ravager’s arrival prevented further tragedy.

In the aftermath, Iterna suffered a major revolution and ostensibly tried to make amends, offering vast sums of money and free medical care to the victims of this atrocity and their families. Some agreed, but Zero saw through their lies and warned the tribe never to trust Iterna again. Then, a few years later, the entire world got exposed to the horror that was the apocalypse class, and the two countries came to blows once more.

Amidst the painful birth of the new world, some people gained powers—unnatural abilities granting various things. These powers, ranging from being able to foretell a disaster to being able to turn one’s body into steel or summon fire from hands, were as numerous as they were varied in strength. Iterna, the Oathtakers, and the Reclaimers, the three strongest nations in the world, had agreed to rank these powers in order to track the whereabouts of the most potentially dangerous individuals.

And among them, the strongest is the apocalypse class. These individuals are fully capable of destroying the entire world, sometimes by mere accident. The Reclaimers first experienced this horror when a wave of nightmares spread across the world, tormenting humans and animals alike. Superstitious tribes brought bloody sacrifices to their callous gods. Scientists tried various methods to stop the horrors, but even drugs that induce a dreamless sleep couldn’t prevent demons from sleeping into a mind.

Not only that, but these nightmares had also caused sand reapers to go on a rampage, killing thousands. An unfortunate mutant trapped alone on a mountaintop, unaware of the full extent of his power, caused all of this. He didn’t even know he had power.

The pack, including Janine and her son, set out to capture the mutant. Led by the young Blessed Mother, the pack arrived at the snowy heights, fighting through the groups of competitors who sought to find and control the mutant to achieve the world’s unification. At the top, outside the mutant’s house, Janine and her son faced off against Skulltaker and the damned Eugenia Mylli. In the ensuing combat, a lucky blow overloaded the implants of her boy before Eugenia left, taking the mutant with her at Ravager’s permission when the rest of the vultures descended upon them. It sickened Janine to the bone, but she obeyed the order and fought beside the Iternians against the mad and ambitious.

After the victory, Ravager forbade settling the score against the Iternians, and both groups descended. Janine ignored Eugenia and laid her precious boy into the pyre, prepared by Lacerated One herself. The mutilation of his body influenced the shaman; she embraced the teachings of the elder shamans, forbidding the males from tinkering with the technology to preserve them.

Janine vowed to exact a blood price from Eugenia for her son’s death, but in their next encounter, the false saint easily disarmed the wolf hag, refused to kill any member of the Wolf Tribe, and tried to make excuses, treating the prisoners amiable when the captured Janine roared her grievances into that angelic face. Unassailable Elite, the strongest soldier of Iterna, the wicked witch who murdered her son. Ravager was the only member of the Wolf Tribe who could match this bitch in battle. A most cursed and unattainable prey for Janine.

“You are great, Ignacy.” She hesitated and kissed his forehead, abandoning the dreams of vengeance for a while. Janine straightened up and flicked a finger at Ignacy’s head, gifting him a tiny bruise. “Never dare to call yourself useless again, silly cub. You risked your life to save lives on both sides today and were a loyal comrade. You have a family who cares for you and a keen mind. Is this not enough to satiate your sense of worth?”

“It is, warlord.” Her son bowed his head and laughed. “I have allowed the shamans’ chastisement and occasional mockery to cloud my mind and warp my words.”

“You are a good boy, Ignacy. So what if you have different tastes in life? I can live with it, and so can you. To the Abyss with anyone thinking otherwise,” Janine assured him. “Yes, even the shamans; they don’t own you, merely guide you. Change is constant. Obey the orders in war, but pursue the path you wish in life, as long as it does not bring evil to the weak.” These were the hardest words she spoke in a long time. A mother in her shouted to discourage him, but as a leader, she had no right to hinder the growth of her troops. Of course, she didn’t believe in Zero’s delusions that males of the Wolf Tribe could ever be equal to females, but to shrink from a challenge was unworthy of a Wolfkin. “Bogdan, a Trial of Failure is about to begin. Will you attend?”

“With your permission, I would rather stay with my brother, Mother.” Bogdan bowed gracefully. “The operation to install his new arm will begin in an hour, and I would like to cheer him up when he wakes.”

“And to tease me up, no doubt,” Ignacy mumbled with a smile.

“That comes without saying, dear brother,” Bogdan agreed eagerly, causing his brother to groan from embarrassment.

“Ignacy, you have ten days of leave to recuperate. Bogdan, I give you a day of leave to help Ignacy adjust to his new paw. No female is to dominate either of you during this period. Any who dares will find death at the tips of my claws,” Janine announced.

“Capital!” Bogdan clapped and pulled cards from his pants, addressing the workers. “Okay, lasses, lads, pardon the scene; let’s get to know each other better. Who’s up for a round? Loser pays in nudes or rations…”

“Don’t push it, soldier.” Janine grabbed his ear and looked at the grinning workers. “Behave yourselves.” She let go of her son and stormed out to deliver herself to the pack’s judgment.