Firesign 1 - Wage Slave Rebellion

by Stephen W. Gee

  The teacher grasped the boy on both shoulders, and though the barrier hissed as it fought against him, he held on. The boy panicked, but the teacher shushed him into silence.

  “There there, don’t worry. Do you remember what I told you about mana pools?”

  The little boy nodded, sniffling. “There’s mana everywhere, but we can only use what we can hold inside us. That’s our mana pool.”

  The teacher nodded as his hands sizzled. “Yes, right. And how much mana you can hold in your mana pool is set at birth. Raedren, did you know you have a very large mana pool?”

  Raedren shook his head.

  “It’s true. That’s why your Personal Mana Barrier—this barrier around you,” the teacher said, patting the eight-year-old’s shoulders, “is so dark. Your MPB marks the edges of your mana pool, and helps you keep the mana in. Now you won’t have to collect mana before every spell. Isn’t that good?”

  The little boy wiped at his tears, then nodded. “But—”

  “Don’t worry,” said the teacher. His hands were still sizzling where they held the boy’s shoulders. “Your MPB also protects you. You just have to learn how to control it. When you do, it will be invisible, and will only react to whatever you don’t want to touch you. You’ll still be able to play. It will just protect you if you fall.”

  Raedren looked up at his teacher, no longer crying.

  “Class, do you see how my hands are just barely touching Raedren, even though the barrier is pushing me away?”

  The rest of the class, who had been silently watching, crowded around. “But your hands—”

  “Don’t worry. I’m pretty tough,” said the teacher. He pressed against Raedren’s barriers, his hands brushing the boy’s shoulders. “See?”

  The class said they did. “That’s because MPBs are soft, flexible barriers. They only stop part of any damage, not all of it. They won’t protect you completely, but they’ll make everything hurt less. That also makes them harder to break, so they should always be there for you.”

  There was a surge of mana, and Raedren’s barrier shattered around the teacher’s hands. The teacher held the boy’s arms, squeezing gently.

  “They can break, though, if they’re worn down in the same place. And it takes a long time to restore them, so be careful. Hours in most cases.”

  “But—”

  “I know, Raedren. I’ll teach you how to control it. First, hold onto your mana before it leaks away. Do you have it?”

  Raedren nodded. “Yes.”

  “Can you tell whether you have the same amount of mana you used to?”

  Little Raedren frowned as he concentrated. “There’s less.”

  “That’s right,” said the teacher. “Your mana pool plus your MPB make up your true mana pool. You can make your MPB stronger or your mana pool larger by moving mana from one to the other. Try to keep about a fifth of your mana in your MPB, though. That’s the sweet spot.”

  Raedren looked at his teacher, perplexed. The teacher laughed.

  “Sorry, that’s too much right now. You’ll learn how to estimate your mana later on. Let me teach you how to control this. I want you to close your eyes and focus….”

  *

  It was the next afternoon, and Mazik, Gavi, and Raedren were walking through the city together. All around them were people and buildings aplenty, all of them packed shoulder-to-architecture like sardines in a tin half as big as was needed. Houk was a large city, but there was never enough room for all the people who wanted to live there. Wasted space was a luxury it could seldom afford.

  Usually. At the end of the street, tall wrought-iron gates opened into a luxurious scene. A vast garden dominated their view, filled with lush grasses and flourishing trees, their boughs shot through with blossoms of crimson, purple, and royal blue as the flowers gradually awoke from their winter slumber. On the exquisitely laid-out paths that crisscrossed these gardens, people strolled. The sweet scent of cherries and magnolias wafted through the air, temporarily overpowering the pungent smells of the city and wrapping the trio in nature’s loving embrace.

  “It’s been a while since I’ve been here,” said Raedren. “And even longer since I’ve entered through the front door.”

  “I feel out of place,” said Gavi, fidgeting. She ran her hand down her long tunic and worn trousers. “Everyone else is wearing nice robes. I stick out.”

  “Eh, I wouldn’t worry,” said Mazik, who looked sharp in his work clothes, Gavi couldn’t help but notice. “Most of them are probably only wearing robes because they didn’t want to think about what they were going to wear today. I bet a lot of them are naked under those things. I know I usually was.”

  Raedren put a hand to his lips, and his cheeks ballooned like a distressed puffer fish, complete with oddly fishy barfing noises.

  “You know you like it,” said Mazik with a wink. Raedren shook his head.

  As the three of them bantered back and forth, they reached the front gates. There, on the arch overhead, shaped out of iron and warped by over two hundred years of Houk’s schizophrenic weather, were the words AIN & NAROUFF UNIVERSITY23.

  After Mazik spoke with the guards, they proceeded onto the university grounds.

  “I wish I could have gone to a college like this,” said Gavi. Despite her earlier protestations she was taking in the scenery, trying to absorb as much of it as possible before she went back to the crowded cityscape of Houk proper. “Or, you know, any college at all.”

  “Shit, me too,” said Mazik. He reached up and plucked a blossom from a tree branch as they passed, twirling the orange-and-yellow flower between thumb and forefinger. “Say what you will about the stuck-up pricks who go here, this place is waaay nicer than Telman24. Speaking of…”

  Mazik spun his ring around, hiding the stylized T from casual inspection. He clenched his hand, feeling the cool shape of the light blue gem embedded in its face.

  “The people aren’t bad either,” said Raedren, as he watched a pair of women wearing conservative robes cross the path further ahead. He had already spun his ring around.

  “You only say that because you like nice, innocent girls who would rather spend their time researching magickal theory than get drafted,” said Mazik. He grinned. “But yes, they are nice.”

  “I was about to say, I thought we were going to meet your girlfriend,” said Gavi. She slowed down as they approached a split in the path. “Which way?”

  “This way,” said Mazik as he turned left.

  Winding their way through campus, Mazik and the others skirted the main building and headed toward a smaller one on west campus. Compared to the main building, whose elaborate tower stuck out like a tribute to the god of unnecessarily opulent architecture, their destination was little more than a box of brick and windows. It only had one attempt at ornamentation, a statue in the front courtyard, and it wasn’t even a good attempt; it looked like someone had started out carving a naked god, only to get drunk halfway through and decide it should be a flamingo instead. The result was confusing, unsettling, and vaguely non-Euclidean. People’s eyes watered if they stared at it for too long.

  “By the way, did you call ahead to tell her we were coming?” asked Raedren as they walked up the steps. He reached for the door, and held it open for his companions.

  “Uhm,” said Mazik.

  There was silence for a second, and then Gavi sighed. “You didn’t call her, did you?”

  Mazik shook his head. “I did not. I thought we’d surprise her!”

  “And if she’s not here?” asked Gavi as they entered the stairwell.

  Mazik waved his hands, fingers splayed. “Surprise!”

  Gavi glared at him, but it only made him smile wider. Two flights of stairs and one hallway later, the three of them arrived at their destination.

  Imagine what would happen if a magician’s workshop had sex with a scientist’s laboratory. Now stop that, because it’s weird, and not helpful at all. The room was closer to 70 percent labor
atory and 25 percent classroom, with the only concessions to magick being a pair of badly singed target dummies in one corner and a few dribbly candles along the back wall. Everything else was cold tile and colder pizza, white lab coats and coats of arms, and research papers piled on top of half-written dissertations draped over stacks of textbooks in various states of reading and/or writing. In the middle of it all, perched on top of a lopsided stool and with her face mere centimeters away from the page she was scribbling on, was a woman.

  Holding a finger up to his lips, Mazik stealthily tiptoed toward her, a humongous grin on his face. He enveloped her in a bear hug. “Hey, darling!”

  “Eep!” squeaked the woman, her shoulders seizing up as she jumped. Papers scattered across the floor as she nearly toppled from her seat.

  “Aww, don’t worry, beautiful. It’s just me,” said Mazik, his voice full of honey and chili peppers. The woman stopped flailing and really looked at him. Mazik smiled. “Hi.”

  “You!” she said, beating her fists against his chest. Mazik shook with laughter, until he could take it no more and drew her into a kiss.

  “I think I’m going to be sick,” said Gavi.

  “I know what you mean,” said Raedren, duplicating his earlier faux-vomiting expression. He cleared his throat, and the two separated.

  “It’s great to see you all again,” said Kalenia Jiun’Westyark, Graduate Researcher of Applied Geosocial Magicks at Ain & Narouff University, and Mazik’s girlfriend. A lithe woman with delicate cheekbones and lips that seemed designed to hold a graceful smile, she looked like a noble’s daughter dressing up as a nerdy graduate student. She was the real deal, though, complete with single-minded focus and a complete disregard for anything that didn’t interest her. Mazik liked to joke that sometimes she got so absorbed in her work that she would pass out from forgetting to eat, which, unlike most of what Mazik said, was actually true.

  Smoothing out her black and purple robes, which had become creased from hours of diligent studying and seconds of hysterical laughter, Kalenia bowed. “It’s been too long.”

  Gavi and Raedren bowed in return. “Yes, it has. It’s nice to see you as well,” said Gavi. “Sorry we didn’t tell you we were coming. We thought your boyfriend was going to tell you, but, well…”

  “Surprise!” said Mazik.

  “Oh, it’s no problem. I was just doing a little research,” said Kalenia, waving at the table. “I was actually about to take a…” she started, and then trailed off, because that’s when she noticed all of the papers scattered across the floor.

  “Oh shoot!” said Kalenia, scrambling to collect them.

  Cute, thought Raedren with a touch of jealousy.

  She’s cute, thought Gavi, with a touch of a more complex kind of jealousy.

  Mazik laughed. “Here, I’ll help you.”

  Once the four of them had collected the papers and put them back in order, they sat. “So,” said Kalenia, folding her hands demurely on her lap. “What brings you all here?”

  The three of them looked at each other. Then, by mutually unspoken agreement, Gavi and Raedren clammed up and turned to Mazik.

  “Ah, yes. Looking forward to this part,” Mazik said to himself. He took a deep breath. “Okay, well. We, uhm, need your help. With something.”

  Kalenia cocked her head to the side. “Oh?”

  “Well … right. So you know how I complain about my job a lot?”

  “Oh, yes. All the time,” said Kalenia, though her voice made it sound like this was the most natural thing in the world. Gavi and Raedren nodded emphatically even as they marveled at her patience.

  “I’d be more annoyed at that resounding agreement if it wasn’t so true,” muttered Mazik, loud enough for everyone to hear. “So yeah, me and Gavi and Rae came up with a plan that might let us quit our jobs and start doing something else. Uhm.”

  Kalenia cocked her head to the other side, her face still politely curious. “Yes?”

  “Wait, he hasn’t talked to her about this yet?” said Gavi.

  “What a bad boyfriend. He should be ashamed,” said Raedren.

  “I was scared so I kept putting it off, all right? Now shhh!” hissed Mazik. He turned back.

  Mazik took a deep breath, and then let it all out in one go. “We want to become adventurers and catch those kidnappers who have been going around kidnapping people and use that to help us get into a guild and,” he took a breath, “and then we’ll be able to work when we want to and won’t have bosses that yell at us and we’ll actually be doing something important and well Rae is already doing that but ignore him he’s bored out of his mind anyway and we won’t hate our lives and then I’ll stop complaining so much and maybe drink less haha okay probably not that and it would be a lot better and sunshine and roses and something et cetera. What do you think?”

  Kalenia blinked, absorbing all of this.

  Idiot, thought Raedren, shaking his head.

  What an idiot, thought Gavi, likewise. Though that was kind of cute.

  Gavi blinked.

  Kalenia looked off to the side. She massaged her temples for a minute, thinking. Then she turned to Mazik. “This will be dangerous, won’t it?”

  Mazik nodded. “Almost definitely certainly.”

  Kalenia took this in. “And you’ll have to hurt people,” she said. It wasn’t a question.

  Mazik grimaced, but nodded. “Yes, probably. We’ll certainly be trying.”

  “But you’ll be able to quit your current jobs?”

  “If we’re successful, yes,” said Mazik. “Hopefully.”

  Kalenia pursed her lips. “And … you think you can do all of this without getting killed?”

  Mazik pointed to Gavi and Raedren. “That’s what they’re for. Rae to keep us alive, and Gavi to keep us from doing anything too stupid to live through.”

  “Somehow it feels like I got the hardest job,” said Gavi.

  “Trade ya?” said Raedren.

  “Eh, I’ll pass.”

  Kalenia took this in too, filing it away like the diligent honors student she was. “And,” she started, quietly, “will this make you happy?”

  Mazik hesitated for a second, then nodded. “Yes, I think so. Just having the freedom to work when we want to would be fantastic, and we might even be able to do some good.”

  Kalenia examined her boyfriend’s face. “Okay,” she said finally. “If you think it will make you happy, I certainly won’t stop you. It’s fine with me.”

  Mazik sagged forward, letting out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding. Even Gavi and Raedren breathed a sigh of relief, and promptly felt embarrassed for doing so.

  While everyone was distracted, Kalenia leaned forward and gave Mazik a kiss on the cheek. “You’re silly,” she said with a gentle smile.

  “Can’t argue with you there,” said Mazik tiredly. His voice softened. “Sorry for not talking to you first. I didn’t want to … well, it’s just that the whole idea is so crazy, I didn’t really think I’d go for it for the longest time, and once I decided to I talked to Rae and Gavi almost immediately. So I, uhm…”

  “It’s fine,” said Kalenia, squeezing his hand. “It’s your decision, not mine. I’m just glad you talked to me now.”

  Mazik was almost overwhelmed. He straightened up. “By the way, do you want to join us? You’re welcome, if you’d like.”

  Kalenia considered it for a long minute, and then shook her head. “I don’t think so. I like it here. Besides, I’m not good at flashy magick.”

  Mazik had expected that answer, but was disappointed nonetheless. “That’s a shame. You’re the best caster among us.”

  “I don’t know about that,” said Kalenia, with a faint blush. “Mas Moro has a bigger mana pool than me, and I can’t—”

  “Hur hur hur.”

  “—cast very fast,” finished Kalenia.

  “If you’re going to go for the obvious euphemism,” said Raedren, smoothly slipping back into the conversation, “you sho
uld probably be glad mine is bigger than hers. The other way around would be … problematic. Especially for you.”

  “Please, spare me,” said Mazik, clenching his eyes shut. Raedren chuckled while Gavi shook her head.

  “Anyway,” said Mazik, recovering. “Thank you for understanding. I’ll try not to make you regret it,” he said. He squeezed Kalenia’s hand. “Now, we have a favor to ask.”

  “Sure. What do you need?” asked Kalenia.

  “We need information,” said Mazik. He turned to Gavi. “Gavs, you want to take care of this?”

  “Sure,” said Gavi. She pulled a waiter’s pad out of her back pocket and flipped to the right page. “You’ve heard about these abductions that have been happening lately, right?”

  Kalenia stared at her in quiet incomprehension.

  “She, ah, spends a lot of time doing research,” said Mazik, slightly embarrassed for what seemed like the first time in days. He turned to Kalenia. “Okay, so…”

  Once Kalenia was filled in, Gavi went over what they were missing.

  “Here, maybe it’s easier if you can look at them,” said Gavi as she tore a few pages out of her notepad. She handed them to Kalenia. After the conversation last night Gavi took the liberty of writing down everything they knew or were missing, along with a few more questions of her own.

  Kalenia looked through the pages. “But shouldn’t you start with something smaller? This seems awfully—”

  Mazik held up a hand. “No. There are … well, there are reasons for that. I’ll tell you about it later. Rae has to get back to work soon.”

  “Ah, okay,” said Kalenia. “Let’s see here….” She spread the pages out on the table in front of her. Had she been wearing glasses she would have adjusted them; as is she just brushed a lock of hair away from her eyes and continued reading. Gavi wasn’t sure she ever saw her blink.

  After a minute of intense silence, Kalenia looked up.

  “Give me some time to work on this. I still feel like I’m not fully up to speed on the situation, so I don’t feel comfortable making any guesses yet. Plus, there are a few people I’d like to talk to about this. Is that all right?”

  “Great!” said Mazik, pulling her into a hug. “I mean yeah, sure, that’s fine. Have I ever told you you’re the best? Because you are.”