Eternal Game of the 106 Chapter 16: Gainful (Patreon)

I collapse on my tiny bed feeling like I’ve aged three decades before getting run over by a pack of American tourists. Embers glower under my skin where all my muscles are supposed to be. I guess. I can hardly move them. The strangest thing, I think, is that it’s not that bad. By all rights I should have collapsed six hours ago, but the frequent pauses, meditation, and steady supply of energizing food has kept me going. I suspect there is some form of accelerated healing at work there as well.

I laze about for all of fifteen minutes before remembering that I’m supposed to save the station at some point, and that’s going to take some effort. It doesn’t take too long for Krane to pick up my call, though I have to spend half a credit to connect because he’s in another district. This is going to get old quickly.

“Yes?”

“Hey Krane, it’s me. Steve.”

“I thought I might have imagined our first conversation,” the rumbly man replies. “So tell me about this explosion that threatens us all.”

I do, summarizing everything I learned the first time from the location and timing of the explosion to the methods we found to fight the abominations. And then since I started anyway, I mention the coming of War. Krane remains silent for a while after that.

“It is a lot to take in,” he says.

“Yeah. It was a lot to go through as well, if I can complain.”

“Well, our first priority should be to prevent the detonation. I assume you've tried to warn Law before?”

“No, this is the first time I’ve survived long enough to see the explosion.”

There is a pause.

“Someone sends an assassin after me literal seconds after the start of the loop,” I helpfully explain.

“Founder…”

“And I don’t think the Templars would believe me anyway. I come from a manaless planet on a distant branch of the galaxy. Nobody listens to the unawakened. They’d just ignore me.”

“Time certainly chose a… peculiar candidate. Regardless, Law has truthseekers.”

“It’s not because I’m telling the truth that they’ll listen, assuming they even dedicate a truthseeker to verify my claims. They’ll just assume I’m a deluded hobo with a price on his head. You, however…”

“Listen, Steve was it?”

“Yes.”

“I’m on trial for accusations of dishonorable warfare. You have been in Enderlith for how long?”

“Bit above a cycle?”

“Then I shall inform you that, ah, my star is at its nadir if the expression translates.”

“Ok, so we would both be laughed out of the gate.”

“Not necessarily. I will be clear to leave tomorrow. Where did you say the bomb detonates?”

“Actually, it might be better if I just message you over the Endernet.”

We hang up. Fortunately, station blueprints are almost public domain, and when I say almost I mean I merely need to pay another credit to pull what interests me with no guarantee that the map would still be accurate. A notice informs me that Enderlith sometimes reshuffles its innards and the deeper one goes, the more frequently this happens. I still find what I want, circle it using a software with scandalously bad UI, and then send it to Krane who promises to check it out. I’m tempted to accompany him but… stick to the plan, Steve. I need to make progress. I can’t keep living like this all the time. 

When the lights turn down and I fall asleep, I feel like I’m finally making some progress. More importantly, I’m no longer completely alone.

***

“This is a quarterstaff,” Xan states.

On the mat, Tavor chuckles.

“You finally found a poor sod to pass on the art of the stick onto?”

It would help if the quarterstaff were, I don’t know, thicker and reinforced with steel bands. It is not.

“What my foolish friend says is partially true. The quarterstaff is essentially a stick,” Xan continues with a smile. “and that makes it one of the most versatile weapons around. It can be used as a polearm also known as long form…”

Xan walks through complex forms I can barely follow. It looks to me like he’s using it more like a spear that can also strike from the side.

“Short form.”

He holds the staff in the middle, striking with short and powerful attacks mostly from one end. Further in the room, one of the visitors chuckles. I cannot blame him. 

Xan is fast though, and graceful for a man his size.

“And pike form.”

Suddenly, the staff hums as it moves through the air as Xan performs wide swings and powerful thrusts. As far as I can tell he is using the staff as if it were some sort of massive claymore. The flight of the tip of the staff hypnotizes me. 

“And mixing all of them of course.”

Xan dances. This is the best equivalent I can think of while the titan melds from one form to another, hands sliding on the staff, swapping position, the guard sometimes close and sometimes far. Short, snappy attacks follow sudden thrusts that use the entire length of the weapon so that I can never predict exactly how much range he’s using. All the while, his feet stay grounded and yet mobile. He’s not even using the speed a third rank is capable of. This is merely a show of technique.

“Look at him. You have found a disciple,” Tavor laughs.

Xan doesn’t reply, very pleased with himself.

“As my tall and foolish friend said, I am indeed a staff master, however I do believe this is the best weapon for you for several reasons. One, it is a foundational weapon. Should you find a spear, or a sword, or other basic weapons, your understanding of the quarterstaff will still serve you. A sword is a short pointy stick. A spear is a long pointy stick. A mace is a pointy stick with a weight at the end. If you are good with the stick, you cannot be entirely bad with all the modified sticks. It is therefore a good pick for a beginner. The second reason, and more personal, is that you are quite short.”

Oi. 

“Do not make that face for it is meant as an insult. My family has gene mods, obviously. My size is not a question of merit but of engineering. It does not change the fact that you can always use the reach this weapon will provide, at least until you purchase your own mods and the flesh crafter to apply them to yourself, I suppose.”

Tavor laughs.

“Of course, right after he purchases his own spaceship, yes?”

“The third reason is that the staff is an unassuming and humble weapon, just like you.”

No comment from the peanut gallery this time.

“I checked your soul awakenings yesterday. When we met, you conveyed a full sentence with perfect clarity and without the help of an implant.”

He tapped his own neck.

“You do know I have one, yes?”

“You mentioned a telecommunication implant the first time we met.”

“It’s a short-range com implant. Officers like me receive one as part of their gear. You don’t have one. I checked your neck.”

I nod.

“You can also feel people approach before they enter the gym. That gives you a passive range of, what, fifteen paces? More?”

That feels a bit personal. Xan doesn’t wait for an answer though.

“You’re not just a soul awakened. You’re a second ascension.”

He dares me to object. Behind us, Tavor swears softly in Sallurian. 

“Yes.”

“And yet you take Tavor’s jabs with consistent calm. You could be working for half a dozen corporations with that profile. The army would kill for someone like you.”

I actually didn’t know that, but it’s nice nice to hear and the confirmation of this fact by a veteran opens a few potential doors in the future. If I think the army can teach me something, I can always negotiate it in a future loop. 

Really, the thing I needed the most right now was still information.

“That is humility, is it not?”

“It’s mostly that I worked hard my whole life to be fit and with some ability to defend myself, and now I’m back to square one getting called a cripple which stings. And even if I protested, the truth is that anyone in the city could lay me flat on my ass in half a second without breaking a sweat. So I don’t want the injury on top of the insult, yeah?”

Ok maybe that just came out harder than I intended.

“We do not look down on you, Steve.”

“Maybe you don’t,” I jeer, “but why then, is the staff pink with cute little bows on it?”

Xan looks down on the weapon he used for his demonstration. It looks ridiculous in his scarred hand.

“Ah, it was the only one we have that matches you. I see your point.”

“Yeah.”

“Which does not change the fact that you show humility and self-control rather than aggressively fighting back like our Momo would.”

The woman freezes mid-rep. 

“She would strike your manhood,” Tavor comments from the side.

“I am not criticizing either approach. I am implying that your mindset is to play the long game. You are patient and humble with some hidden depth, if only because you perceive yourself as weak right now. It is, again, not an insult, only one more reason why I believe the staff suits your style. In appearance, the staff is the simplest thing there is, and yet it offers endless combinations.”

“Ok, ok, I’m sold.”

I cross my arms, still a bit miffed I guess.  I hadn’t realized but it’s true. All those people looking down on me are starting to piss me off. 

“Good. Then we will begin… after I have wrapped some proper leather onto this weapon.”

***

I fully expected to be hitting a target a thousand times with the staff and certainly there is some of that, but Xan first has me ‘get used to the feel of it’, which mostly means fucking around as far as I can tell. He encourages me to twirl it in front of me and above my head, has me toss it and then catch it and a multitude of other games that are supposed to make me grow more familiar with the length and weight. I don’t think this matches the methods used on Earth, and this leads me to another fundamental difference between Enderlithians and what I used to know: these fuckers have time. Oh sure, they still have pressure and everything, but their projects are counted in decades, not months. They see things in the long run. I hadn’t realized before but now I can imagine how traumatizing the Year of Judgement must be for these poor sods. It makes me feel selfishly better. They might be stronger than me on almost every level, but they also lack that urgent drive Earth humans possess that makes, well, us, both more resilient and driven. I guess. The station probably isn’t that monolithic.

The second day is spent much like the first one except for more staff wielding. That night, I head home feeling equally exhausted but also not in any sort of pain. I could get used to this.

The same night, Krane has a message for me, just an update really.

‘I checked in with the Depths guild. The sections under Elysion are both well-mapped and frequently patrolled. I had to ask for gate access codes, which must be first validated. Keep in touch.”

Hmmm. I don’t get it. Time for some research and since it’s still early, I decide to drag my sorry carcass to the ‘cafe’ where I first stopped. The massively muscular woman is still there.

“You’re one of Xan’s, yeah?” she asks me without preamble in heavily accented So-Sah.

I switch to the low common immediately as a gesture of respect. It’s been getting easier to use accents since I arrived, so I give myself the barest dock inflection.

“Yes ma’am.”

“Right! Where are you from, even? You don’t look like a Patrician.”

I give her an apologetic smile. That makes her laugh.

“Fair enough, man. Good luck to you, and let me know if you want any extra practice. Free of charge.”

“That’s very kind but right now I have the energy of a recently diseased rodent so I think I’ll pass.”

“Then have something!”

The cafe is not deserted at this time of the day. I expect the entertainment district keeps to different times. I pay cents for a sort of tea that won’t mess with my strict regimen, according to Muscle Woman herself. Once settled, I open my datasheet for some research.

It turns out that the Depths Guild is an organization that keeps track of Enderlith’s deeper layers. Their website boasts ‘competitive pay’ and a ‘familial environment’ as well as a few other terms that raise all manner of red flags in my mind. These guys must have some pretty bad attrition to be recruiting so aggressively.

“-paid for half the pads there and they’ve been deserted for ten cycles! They must be insane,” a heavily tattooed woman told my hostess. 

“Someone could be making a move,” the other replies.

“Here! Hah! Nothing will get better for at least a year. What are they hoping for?”

My great great grampa told me about the previous Year of Judgement, once,” Muscle woman said, gaze distant.

It was subtle, but the rest of the cafe fell even more silent. All the souls around me were more alert.

“When the Archon made his move… well, he was only the avatar of Retribution then, but when he made his move, he destroyed that massive cartel that controlled the food plants at the time. Real ugly business, to hear it told. Enderlith went hungry for an entire week, even the Patricians, before Nature stepped in. Lots of things changed then. I expect lots of things will change this time as well.”

You have no fucking idea.

“But listen to me ramble. How’s your kid?”

“Aya don’t talk about him. I am going mad.”

I tune out the rest of the conversation. Muscle Woman is right. Things are moving fast, and I expect they won’t stop even if… when. No, after. Even after I’ve stopped the bomb. Anyways. The depths. I search for information and find entirely too much of it. Mostly rumors. Several local news sources mention expeditions returning with resounding success, mangled, or not at all. It’s only when I check out the guild website that I find a sort of guide to the depths. Apparently, the deeper one goes and the more ambient mana there is, but also the more sections tend to shift around, cutting communications and rerouting logistics. The higher energy concentration is not just hard on the unawakened, so children here, but there are apparently plenty of greater dangers in the kilometers upon kilometers of ruins and abandoned sections extending under us and to the other side, the one occupied by the ‘traditionalists’ factions: roving monsters, maddened machines, even entire tribes who haven’t seen the light of a star in generations. They make up for in raw power what they lack in technique.

A part of me starts thinking that I could grow faster near the center of the station, but I’d probably get pulped by some giant worm long before I reach the third awakening with how my luck has been going so far so whatever. Maybe I’ll try later. Stick to the plan. I also finally understand what Krane means about access codes. The local golems have, at the request of the surface dwellers, locked the deeper sections behind sealed gates to make it harder for passing creatures to snack on little Timmy and his dog. They don’t just unseal it for anybody, especially the tunnels under Elysion. On a hunch, I look for more general guides on Enderlith and I find… very little. There are a lot of specific guides on certain churches or businesses, but that’s the difference between the internet and the Endernet. The Endernet is simply too fragmented, with most of the content gated behind one community or another. People here just don’t share. Or rather, they don’t share online. As I look up to find yet another bit of gossip being exchanged here, it seems Enderlithians transmit most of their information by word of mouth. It’s weird how they can be so advanced and yet so feudal at the same time. Or we. I keep forgetting I rank among these anachronistic spacefarers as well now.

Guess thinking like that is going to take me some effort. With the hour growing late, I pack up and leave.

***

It has been five days since I started training here. I don’t know how I can be so exhausted, yet feel so little muscle pain at the same time. The food must be something special. I don’t feel like I’m making much progress, but at least Tavor got off my back now that it’s clear I won’t flake out on them within three days as I suppose he predicted. I settle down into my spot in Muscle Woman’s cafe — her name is Orva. 

I feel lonely.

I guess working for Sethri derelict was lonely as well, but there was so much to learn and discover and I was so happy to be alive that I didn’t really notice. I miss more than my cello now; I also miss basic human connections. All my friends back home must have found out by now that I disappeared. I wonder what’s happening to them. Hopefully they will be ok.

It’s a bit crass to say but I miss Saanvi most of all because I’ve lived like a monk for over a year now. In perceived time.

Weirdly, I miss complaining about the weather too.

Before ennui can claim me, I realize Krane sent me another message. 

“I have successfully scouted the place and returned. There is nobody yet, so we cannot reasonably call for reinforcements. I am back home now.”

I resist the urge to call him. The cafe is too quiet and I’d rather not be overheard. I also realize Krane might be reconsidering his options.

“Do you believe me though?” I plainly ask.

The answer is almost immediate.

“Yes. I left two surveillance drones there, but there are no active network nodes and no way to recover the footage unless I go back down there and retrieve them. There are positive implications, however.”

“Whoever sets off the bomb must have moved it there somehow. Unless whichever of Enderlith’s technicians determined its placement made an error in their calculations.”

“We will know soon enough. Our priority should be to find out more about who they are, what they do, and where they come from.”

It’s true that they must have a base somewhere, whoever ‘they’ are. I don’t think a soul bomb can be improvised, especially not one of that magnitude.

“Ok, it’s progress,” I type. “Let me know if you need any help.”

“You must focus on your own path,” Krane replies immediately. “Despair will come with repeated failure. You must make progress if you want to save the station one day. Accept in your heart that it will not be this time.”

I rebel a bit at that.

“Hey, maybe you can take them out with an ambush,” I protest.

“May Redemption grant us this mercy,” he finishes. 

Impressive how someone can convey disbelief in so few words. He’s probably right, of course, but I can hope. It’s time anyway. I say goodbye and stand up.

Time to earn my keep.

***

Night has fallen. The district has come alive. Those neon lights, so dull and faded under the false radiance of the ceiling lamps, have roared to life some time ago. They paint the streets in garish colors. Strange musics merge into one another now that the different nocturnal establishments rouse from their slumber to attract fresh batches of clients into their nets. It smells of grilled food, of perfume, of fresh sweat, of burnt leaves promising molecular joy for a few hours. Tomorrow, my new home will return to a tired partygoer recovering from a hangover, but now it is gloriously alive. The mana of the station pulses with it, mirroring the bass I can hear through the walls. The crowd of desperates come to enjoy this week night is as eclectic as can be: lesser Patricians slumming it, workers trying to relax after some corporate event, sect members and soldiers recognizable with their matching tattoos, dockers and space sailors, all those people mingle and though there is tension, and the occasional fistfight, they mostly form a harmonious whole. They are all here for fun. To forget the coming year and the deaths it will bring. Our little haven doesn’t match the magnificence of Elysion’s palaces, or Indolence’s pleasure dens. It doesn’t matter right now. The night is alive and we are all for it.

Well, they are all for it. I had to stand next to a food store because hanging out in front of a nightclub waiting for something bad to happen would be stupid, first, and second I’m already getting a headache. There are just too many people there, and if I didn’t stand aside pulling my zone of control as close to my body as possible, I’d go bonkers in ten minutes. There is only so much second-hand sexual desire and disjointed thoughts I can handle. The souls around me are almost electric in how intense and bare they are. I feel burnt just touching them.

My target is a fine establishment called the Splendor, an ancient and tacky place that nonetheless has a good reputation throughout the docks. Or rather, it will keep it for another twenty minutes unless I do something to stop the stabbing incident that will lead it to close its doors for good. I cast my soul over the crowded first floor one more time and find him: a murky, agitated presence. Time to move. I step towards the entrance, ignoring the line and instead facing a bouncer who immediately reaches for a pocket. I open my hands as a plea not to get sprayed or punched.

“Sorry to bother you. I have something to show you I believe you will find useful,”

I close my eyes and share the impression I have of the interior of the nightclub. I never actually went there so it’s all emotions. The bouncer flinches.

“What the fuck was that?’ he asks, aghast.

Ok so maybe I should have given it more thought? I can feel from his soul he’s only a second awakening. Maybe higher awakenings can process it better? Xan didn’t seem to have the same issues. 

“I am a soul awakened. I am showing you someone inside who is going to stab somebody.”

“What?”

God dammit he seems to be struggling. I try again.

“I am here to warn you that unless you act, someone is going to stab someone else in your fine establishment. Look I can feel the perpetrator going up, climbing stairs I suppose?”

“You got that Sefer?” the bouncer says in his earpiece.

Obviously I don’t get an answer but now I realize I am, once again, fucking things up. The bouncer obviously has no idea how soul awakening works. We’re wasting time. If we keep wasting time, I will lose my most reliable job opportunity. More importantly, how the fuck do people not know how awakening works at all? Xan knew and he made it look like everyone did? Sethri did too! I’m going to fail this loop because I’m talking to a complete rube. Ah, who am I kidding? I am failing because I don’t know how people fucking work here. I don’t even know what’s common knowledge. There probably isn’t common knowledge in this spacefaring shitehole. But just as I think I’m ready to give up and close the communication, a powerful soul approaches the would-be stabber.

“He asks if it’s that one? The bouncer asks me without much conviction.

‘

“Yes, in —”

“Nevermind found the knife,” the bouncer interrupts. “Ah, my boss wants to talk to you?”

Well that was fast.

“I was hoping for that. Lead the way?” I reply.

The bouncer leaves the line. I follow him but not through the front doors. We walk around a bend in the road where people are drinking, smoking, and placing patches on their skins I assume do not contain doliprane. I’m pretty sure the moaning girl at the end is getting fingerbanged which, well you do you, I’m not the fun police. The bouncer ignores all of that, using a keycard on a massive metal door which clicks open after a few seconds. I think there must be some sort of universal constant that if the front of a fine establishment is gaudily decorated then the back must look like an abandoned nazi bunker. Honestly they could have at least painted the damn walls. The bouncer’s soul oozes worry. He looks back every three seconds to check that I’m still following. It takes all my self-control not to reply with ‘nice weather we’re having’ just to exorcize the unbearable awkwardness of the situation. At least it’s short. Another door opens in yet another barebone storage room, this one with a table with a chair in the middle that had clearly just been put there. Two people wait behind it, one of them standing. This is obviously not an office.

The bouncer pushes me inside when I falter. I feel violence coming before it happens.

“There is no need for th —”

I notice the alcohol kegs and crates on my way to almost crash against the metal table,which is apparently nailed to the ground. A surprisingly fat man with smoothed black hair sits behind it, only first awakening as far as I can tell. He’s the brain. The massive pale man with long locs standing by his side in a shirt with the Splendor’s logo must be the muscle. I cannot read his soul but I’d bet he was the one who prevented the stabbing.

“As I said, there is no need for this,” I insist, mildly miffed.

The bouncer plants me in the chair. The old, animal fear of being cornered slaps my mind with the bitter taste of fear, the urge to bend my back and lower my eyes because I may very well die here and even if I don’t, it might still hurt.. I fight it off. I need to unlearn fear. I need to remember what I am. It is easier said than done but something helps me, really. For all of their intimidation, there is one emotion coming from the brain and the bouncer.

They’re almost as scared as I am. I breathe deep, push back my mounting exhaustion. I need to do better. I need to trust in myself. Xan reminded me of what I am: a soul awakened. It’s not because I’m weak that I’m not valuable. And they don’t know who I am. I can use that too.

Fake it till you make it. Alright, I can do it. Slowly, I force myself to relax on the chair. And it works. I feel their fear mounting. They’re scared of me. 

That is very weird but not entirely unwelcome.

“Go on,” I dare, “Ask your question.”

“Who are you working for?” Brain asks with a smoker’s voice. First one I hear in Enderlith.

“No one for now, which is the reason for my visit.”

The bouncer slams me against the table. I felt it coming so I turned aside. My cheek hits cold metal but it doesn’t hurt much. They don’t dare. And I think it’s at that point, with the uncaring metal cool against my skin and a flickering lamp above me, that I manage to stop caring. I know it won’t last but I do it, because what the fuck is my life at this point? I’m just a cello player thrown into a region-sized space station filled with people who can punch at the speed of sound. I’m trying to save millions of people from themselves which has thrown me, at this moment, into a bad scene from some B-series mafia movie where otherwise honest businessmen are trying to play it tough. I almost expect them to break out the hammer but no, they’re too hesitant for that. And I know it because that deep unease is still oozing out of their souls like blood from a congealing wound, and I can’t tell them because it would be counter-productive but I feel it. I know they’re lying to me, and to themselves, in this grand farce where I’m still just a victim doomed to die again. Because of this, I can’t care anymore. There is just so much more at play and this is just a pathetic prelude to a long road of suffering. I need the job. Because I’m broke. I worked so fucking hard to hoist my sorry arse out of the gutter mother dearest left me in. I even bought my own home arguably in the arse end of Croydon and arguably with a loan but fuck, I really was looking up to life, and all of this means nothing now because I’m just a homeless fuck with an assassin after me. 

“Stop that,” I hiss in the man’s mind.

He lurches back. With the barest effort, I extend my sphere of control to all three, with the muscle man allowing it almost out of reflex. Ex-military, probably.

“You guys are being cunts,” I inform them. “And I am finding this rather aggravating.”

“You expect me to believe you came into the club just as the stabbing would occur by coincidence? You think I’m stupid?” Brain asks, face hiding a mounting fear.

“Of course it’s not a coincidence. I was waiting outside for something to happen,” I patiently explain.

The bouncer shakes me again.

“I’ll make you regret it if you keep doing it. Maybe not today, but I will,” I send with absolute confidence, anger lapping at his soul like a wave.

They must have felt it because Brain gestures to the other. Muscle leans forward, then whispers something I cannot hear in Brain’s ears.

“Explain yourself,” he eventually orders.

“I am a second stage soul awakened looking for gainful employment,” I say, this time with my real voice. “I waited for something to happen to showcase my abilities. You’re welcome, by the way.”

Brain scoffs.

“You expect me to believe a second level awakening would want to be hired —

I drown his voice with telepathy.

“I do not need you to believe anything but your soul. I can speak to you as a group, therefore I am second level awakened. This is not a matter for discussion.”

He doesn’t reply. I can feel the gears of his soul grinding and I realize: he really didn’t know. He didn’t know what a second level soul awakening should be capable of.

I need to remember that information is completely fragmented here.

“I prevented a knife murder and the closure of this fine establishment. I believe this is enough credentials for you. Unless, of course, you have neither gratitude nor the acumen to see how useful I could be. In which case I will leave and find people who understand business.”

“Hold on,” Brain interrupts.

He mulls the situation over for a while. I pretend to look at my nails. They’re clean.

“This is all very unusual,” Brain starts. “First things first, I am informed you are apprenticed with Xan? The retired officer?”

“One and the same,” I reply.

Obviously I shouldn’t be surprised seeing as how everyone here is a gossip first and foremost. It’s still shocking to realize a perfect stranger knows about me. 

“And you are one of Orva’s regulars. It is said she has taken a liking to you. Would they vouch for you?”

“You do realize they’ve known me for all of six days, surely?” I curtly reply. “But yes by all means ask them if you think that’s a good idea.”

Brain and Muscle share a glance. There is something about reading souls that’s making me reconsider human interactions. I just told them they shouldn’t trust me so easily and yet they feel more confident, at least Brain and the bouncer do. So their fears faded alongside their suspicions. The thing is, I haven’t offered any evidence I’m telling the truth, and the intimidation is proof that they cannot easily get information out of me, or they would have used it. That means nothing has changed in the past five minutes yet with just a few words they went from scared and aggressive to… almost hopeful. I know on an intellectual level that words can trigger wars, of course, but feeling, sensing the way their souls shift from second to second makes me feel weirdly powerful, despite the major physical disadvantage. I really need to remember this feeling of control. I need to stop being scared.

So I act impatient, then because I can, I convey part of my annoyance to them. Brain speaks next.

“What can you do? Can you find people who want to start a fight before it happens? Can you find people who mean harm?”

“It doesn’t work that way. I can find and filter souls with strong negative emotions, but it doesn’t mean they will act.”

“But you can point them out.”

“Yes. I can, however, feel when things get out of hand. If someone is about to do something bad, their souls spike and I can find that too, however…”

“What about those who feel no remorse?” Muscle asks with a strangely calming voice. 

“Those who are calm and focused also feel out of place in a nightclub, though there is a limit.”

“Which is?” Brain asks.

“Anyone at third physical awakening and higher have a mental barrier, a sort of control that I can only read through when their composure breaks. For example your muscle here,” I say, tilting my head towards the aforementioned lad. “I can use telepathy to talk to him, but I can’t feel his emotions.”

Weirdly, Muscle shifts his posture and a hint of worry bleeds through. I would have expected him to feel, I don’t know, pride maybe?

“Most of our patrons come from the docks. It should not be an issue,” Brain mumbles.

Ah? Looks like I’m hired.

“You can point out the third awakenings to us,” Muscle adds. 

“Can’t you feel it?” I ask with genuine curiosity.

The bouncer behind me stiffens, but Muscle doesn’t take offense.

“Not always. Boss, a word?”

I wait while the two assholes exit the room. My bouncer friend stands there like the world’s most clueless gargoyle.

“Any chance I could get something to drink? Cup of tea maybe?” I ask without much hope.

“Hmm, wait. Please,” he adds at the end. “The, uh, the boss will be back soon.”

And indeed I am not made to wait which is a refreshing lack of power play, honestly. Brain drags his chair to me, then sits opposite the metal table so now we’re on equal footing. He acts more friendly.

“Look, little buddy…”

I allow myself to radiate annoyance. I’m not your little buddy, you breathing oilspill. 

“...friend,” Brain smoothly amends. “As we discussed with Sefer here, we could indeed find a need for a soul awakened in our employ. Let’s explore our options.”

“Someone with my set of skills could ask for a hundred credits a week from any sect,” I start, and watch Brain’s face turn sour in an instant while Bouncer freezes at my back. “But obviously this isn’t a sect and a sect awakened would bring additional skills, so I’ll ask for ten credits a week with two days of rest per week.”

Which is about the salary for a qualified worker, so less than what Sefer would make but more than Bouncer’s salary. Same for the rest days which are per ten-days week. I’m being generous here because I can’t be arsed to search around for better, and also because they’re probably not rolling on credits to begin with. This isn’t Indolence’s den in Elysium. Brain smiles with the ‘it’s difficult’ face.

“I can offer 8 with an added bonus. I understand you are trying to awaken quickly, yes? We happen to have a good amount of mana foodstuff on the menu. I could make a full meal available to you every time.”

A burst of something familiar comes from Bouncer’s soul: envy. Tempting.

“There is foodstuff and there is foodstuff,” I still reply. “I’m going to need some form of guarantee.”

“Of course. And when are you available?”

“Hmmm, three weeks from now, one way or another.”

Even if I fail the physical awakening thing, I can still get practice with meditation so I can perform better next time. And there is information gathering to be done, not to mention I have more languages to learn.

“You must start tomorrow,” Brain replies on the spot.

They need me.

That’s the only thing I can conclude from the sudden urgency. I don’t know why but they need me. I recognize some of the veiled despair Sethri showed when I first met him. The only major difference is that Sethri at least had a job opening. Is it good news? For my wallet it is. Will I enjoy a peaceful year?

Not bloody likely.

“Can you?” Brain asks with authority.

“I’m sure I can make the time.”