System Message: The Outreach Guild is now available in Hungry Eyes.

Donut harrumphed. “As much as I would like to see how your wife is doing, Carl, I think I will skip this one.”

We passed Dwight, who remained sleeping in his vine. I took the opportunity to toss a timed sticky explosive into the back of the vine, but it just popped right out. Dwight snorted, woke up, and started to look around, bewildered.

“Fuck you,” Dwight whispered at us before turning into spot number one.

“This is ridiculous,” Donut grumbled. “What’s the point if the thing is just going to drive itself? Cheaters. Everybody is cheating.”

Dr. Metcalf beeped.

That’s what happens when you keep winning. You get upgrades that make it so you can’t lose. And they’re going to get more. And now it’s too late for me to even get a good upgrade. I agree with the unicorn. Fuck you.

“I swear to the gods old and new,” Pontiff rumbled as we eased into the crowded garage, “it’s a miracle any of us are still alive.”

Nester was turned around in her chair, looking toward the apartment building, which now loomed in the background. “I can’t believe we made it through.” She shivered.

Florin: None of the NPC teams were given mandatory gates. That’s why we lost so many.

Elle: Of course, typical dungeon fuckery. The good news is, it’s convincing more of the people on the fence to jump into the Outreach Guild.

Carl: Do we have numbers yet?

Imani: I’m compiling them now. A lot of people didn’t make it. I think we’re under a thousand left.

I felt a numb chill. We’d started this floor with fifty-five hundred people. A little over two hundred had gone to the Cabaret. More than 80% of us hadn’t made it, and we still had one race to go. And when you compared it to the millions of people who had entered the dungeon in the first place?

Silence filled the chat for a long time.

Florin: I’m trying to talk Lucia into going into the guild. Wish me luck.

An announcement came over the system. This was a new male voice I’d never heard before. He didn’t identify himself, but both Pontiff and Nester jerked at the announcement. This did not sound like a kua-tin but was more humanlike.

Hello, Crawlers.

I hope you’re all getting properly settled. Just a reminder that safe room access is not available while you prepare for the final heat. I have a few updates for you about this last heat and the next floor.

“Carl, who is that?” Donut demanded. “Where’s Zev?”

Pontiff snorted. “That’s Damien. Must be running low on employees. He’s one of the few that’s always around, no matter who is running the season. Does a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff.”

Donut: ZEV, ARE YOU OKAY?

While all this was happening, Damien continued.

The Outreach Guilds are now open. They will close once the final heat starts, so if that’s your plan, get going now. Despite rumors, I assure you that it’s completely safe to take a deal, and you are very much encouraged to do so. Remember, all former crawlers who aren’t deemed terrorists are given center system citizenship post-indentureship. This is an opportunity very few in the galaxy are afforded, and you should consider yourself lucky for the privilege.

Also, I have been asked to directly address this so-called Pineapple Cabaret exploit many of you are using to shirk your duties as a crawler. We, the showrunners, do not endorse any such methods and we are not responsible for anything that may happen to crawlers who venture into unauthorized areas of the World Dungeon infrastructure.

Now, onto the business at hand.

For survivors of this next heat, your garage and the contents will transfer to the 11th floor. Because of this change, special dispensation has been made for just this level. Any hired NPCs that you wish to keep for the 11th floor will transfer with you if they are in your garage or your vehicle when you descend. Furthermore, once the heat begins, safe room access will open back up.

Upon arrival at the 11th floor, you will have 90 minutes to create a themed parade float using the resources within your garage and safe room.

Donut gasped. “A parade float!”

That is all. Good luck, crawlers. And seriously, between you and me, I’ve been doing this a long time. Take a deal. You will not survive this next heat. There are a lot of those bugs in that building right now. Yes, things are fucked. But trust me on this. It’s better to get shuffled away into pre-indentureship.

“That guy is a little bitch,” Pontiff said. He opened the door to the truck and stepped out.

I shook my head. A goddamned parade float.

Hedy was standing there with her tablet along with several mercenaries, plus Samantha, Bigs, Jamal, Rosetta, Bucket Boy, and even Tipid. Only Mordecai remained inside the safe room, and I realized belatedly that we’d never had a chance to say goodbye to him for this floor. Which, honestly, was a relief. I did not like his strange form.

Carl: Who has keys to the other garages? Make sure you steal the other vehicles!

Donut: STUPID DWIGHT HAS TWO, AND I DON’T THINK HE USED THEM.

Zev: Sorry, Donut. I’m fine. Things are a little chaotic here in the headquarters. Cascadia “accidentally” took too much of her medicine, and when the AI intervened, a goddess nobody has heard of appeared inside the submerged wings and caused an uproar. I’m currently on lockdown, waiting for it all to be sorted out. One of the satellite headquarters on the surface is temporarily in control of everything.

Donut: OMG, BE SAFE.

“Okay, so no Golden upgrade for the last heat,” Hedy said, all business, as I pulled myself out and stretched my back. “What’s your pleasure?”

Donut released Mongo as gremlins swarmed. I held up my hand as more updates came in. Imani was in the chat coordinating our response to this final heat, taking note of all the heats that currently had more than one crawler team. There were several.

Imani: Did you place the explosives? Unless it gets changed again at the last minute, it sounds like your Tower of Power plan might work.

Carl: I have them all in place, mostly in a vertical line. Unless they’ve changed the integrity of the apartment complex itself, it’ll work.

Everyone who was taking a deal was first upgrading their vehicles and then allowing those of us with Thief class upgrade engineers into their garages to steal as many upgrades as possible. It was a massive, complicated effort being spearheaded by Imani, with Mistress Tiatha, Rosetta, and Tipid helping.

I wondered, once again, how we would’ve gotten any of this done without her. Without Imani.

That alien had been correct to target her for assassination. As much as Donut and I were figureheads in this, it’d become clear since the beginning of Faction Wars that Imani and Katia were the true bedrocks of our ability to stay organized. Without them, none of this would’ve been even remotely possible.

Look for the helpers. It was a goddamned Mr. Roger’s quote, told to a child to comfort them during times of upheaval. But damn if it wasn’t true.

It had been clear for some time now that the system wasn’t allowing any heats to exist that didn’t have at least one crawler team, going as far as having heats with one team too many to make it work. I didn’t understand the math, but if a certain number of teams left us, most of the final heats—not including ones that already had more than one crawler team—would be one crawler team versus two NPC teams, which was the most desirable outcome.

As it was, we still had several final heats with multiple crawler-on-crawler battles, and it was almost pointless to talk one team into taking a deal if all that would happen was that they’d just be replaced with another set of crawlers. That is, unless we had enough crawlers take deals and more than 66% of the remaining teams were NPCs.

The thing was, Osvaldo was correct. Especially now. Despite what this Damien guy had just announced, with every day that passed, it sounded like taking a deal was more and more of a dangerous idea. Even forgetting the offered job itself, there was a very real chance those who took deals were going to step into stasis and never wake up again.

But was it more dangerous than staying?

All of these were impossible choices. But one thing was for certain. The dungeon was going to follow its own rules, and for this last heat, three teams would enter and only one would exit.

Carl: Is Elle talking to Louis and Britney?

Imani: She’s over there right now. I’m going to talk to Chris and the Erins. Florin is working on Lucia.

Louis had become crucial to the team. But everything past this was going to be all but impossible, and the odds of any of us surviving were very, very low. Louis couldn’t exit the dungeon via the Pineapple Cabaret because of his gills, but he would be able to survive in the indenture system. That was his only realistic choice.

I took a breath, and then I sent it.

Carl: And what about you? You know what’s coming next. Elle already said she’s not going anywhere. But you’ve done enough, Imani.

Imani: Oh, fuck off, Carl.

Carl: Why? You know what we’re about to do on the 11th. Even if we survive, everything afterward is completely fucked. You also know Chris isn’t going to take a deal if you don’t. What about him? You’ve gotten us so far. You can rest now. You don’t need to go on.

Imani: I can’t run from this any more than you can. What about Donut? Are you going to try to talk her into a deal?

Carl: Yeah, I already brought that up and it went about as you might expect. She’s already pissed enough about me leaving the party.

Imani: I thought so. Carl, I know we’re fucked. But you know what? I think this is the right call. If we’re going to lose, I want to go down fighting.

I pulled back from the chat to see Hedy glaring at me.

“Okay. Sorry. We need a jumping upgrade,” I said to Hedy. “We’ll need to rocket up from the first floor all the way to the roof.”

She nodded. “That’s easy, then. For your final upgrade, we can improve your existing rockets to the Golden upgrade version. Better maneuverability can be used to increase your speed on the ground and can be on the whole time. Can launch the truck into orbit if you let it.”

“Okay, good. Unless you have a better idea, let’s go with that.”