New Eden Royale

by Deck Davis

  I tried again, this time finding a cut in the ice wide enough for me to hook my fingers into. With all my strength, I hauled myself up First my head, shoulders and chest, and then I swung my legs around so that I was out of the ice completely. I staggered to my feet and turned, just to see the ominously dark fin gliding where I had been just seconds ago. Phew.

  Instead of hitting the ice and turning back, the fin began to cut straight through it. The shark was swimming through the ice. It must have only been surface ice, maybe a few inches thick. It was still a formidable chunk, but apparently the shark found no problem in gliding through it. The sheer power of the creature made my heart hammer.

  I started to run toward the lake bank behind me. I heard ice crack, and each crack made me wince, and I imagined that it would tear apart like a road built on a fault-line, and that I’d fall into the lake, where the sharks would feast on me.

  As the cracking of the ice grew louder, I neared the lake bank. Just a few more feet now…

  Then I slipped. A slippery, black patch of ice made me lose my balance. My legs buckled, and I felt onto my knees. Smashing into the ice sent a flow of pain through my kneecaps. I pushed it out of my mind, got up, and leapt the final few feet to the lake bank, and to safety.

  ~

  Two hours later, we sat in a natural crevice formed where two hills met, including the one we’d leapt from. We were in a no-man’s land between quadrants. The climate here was cold and icy like the tundra, yet way in the distance we could see a black mist that marked the start of the Shadow Quadrant. What was in there I had no idea, but it wouldn’t be good.

  From here I could see the lake, but it was hard to make out the predatory circling of fins. The crevice gave us a barrier from the wind, and we managed to start a fire to warm ourselves up.

  That had been an arduous task. None of us had any fire weapons or spells, apart from Glora’s traps. Despite how cold and wet she was, Glora had explored the area around us until she found a group of tuskers, which were a particularly aggressive form of seal. She killed enough of these to level up, after which she spent her skill point on acquiring the Hex Igni skill, which allowed her to shoot fire. It was designed for her to shoot flames at her enemies, but we found it produced much better results when shot at the collection of twigs and branches that Rynk had gathered in the jungle earlier, and which he’d assembled in a bundle in the middle of the crevice.

  The crackle of the flames competed with the sound of the wind that tried, and failed, to find a way into our snug hill crevice. Its amber flares of heat were a stark contrast to the unending whiteness around us. As I watched the fire spit and dance, and I occasionally moved different parts of my wet body close to it, I imagined that the flames were a symbol. The tundra was nature at its most extreme. An unconquerable eco-sphere of cold and ice, a place where no man should be able to survive. Yet, with a fuel source and ignition, man could create fire, and that gave us a chance to endure. It was our knowledge and brains that gave us the means to leap over the hurdles that nature put in front of us.

  Fire was technology at its most primitive. It represented mankind taken back to its roots. It was hard not to think about everything that had come after the centuries where early man had discovered fire, leading all the way up to the industries and technologies that had caused nature to turn on us completely. Somewhere along the way, along the road of survival, I guessed, we’d managed to transform nature from an ally and into an enemy.

  Nature wasn’t the only thing to turn on Team Perlshaw, though. I couldn’t shake the feeling that everything that had happened so far. The ambushes hadn’t been an accident. Someone was working against us. The question was, who? Was it just Lucas outside the VBR map, or, even worse, was someone within the map playing tricks?

  Eddie broke me from my thoughts. “Man, what I wouldn’t do for a nice, cold glass of Mulgoon’s Blue Moon right now,” he said, then gave an unnaturally toothy smile. “Only available in the Thirsty Rat, in Perlshaw.”

  I held my hands out and let the heat of the fire warm my palms. “Are you advertising for them, or something?”

  “A beer like that advertises itself,” he said, then added quietly, “and Ivor promised me three barrels of Blue Moon if I plugged it in the VBR. Hey, har, you still haven’t tried it yet, have you?”

  “When the battle’s done, I’ll come to the Thirsty Rat with you Eddie.”

  “Why don’t I believe you? I’m gonna hold you to that.”

  I could understand why Eddie wouldn’t believe me, since I hadn’t been the most sociable of people. The thing was, I really meant it this time. When I thought of Perlshaw, I didn’t think of the howling wind that seemed to be magnified the further up the hill you went. I didn’t think of the way my calves burned just getting to Elder Arin’s house. Instead, I pictured the cozy street lamps that cast a soft glow on the town at night time. I heard good-natured laughter drifting out from the Thirsty Rat, and I heard the shouts of children playing together and doing whatever they could to somehow beat the curfew their parents had set.

  “Can I get a team count?” I asked Glora. I knew I could have just checked it for myself, but I’d given her responsibility for keeping us updated, and I knew from a leadership psychology book I had once read that people liked being given a role, no matter how small.

  “Down to sixty-five,” she said.

  “Shit, they’re falling hard,” said Rynk.

  “Wave two has hit, and the overseers did it without warning. Think about how many people would have been on the outside, looting and stuff. Thinking they had time before the second wave.”

  “They’re thinning the numbers,” said Eddie. “First the bronze sun, then pulling a wave without even a heads-up.”

  The fire had heated up my hands enough now that the sudden change in temperature made my fingertips sting. What I really wanted was to turn around and heat up another part of me. Screw it, I thought. People can think what they like. I stood up, turned around and pointed my ass toward the fire, letting the warm touch of the flames soak the lake water from my clothes.

  “Let’s have a status update,” I said. “How are things looking wave-wise, Ed?”

  “There’s a countdown on the map saying fourteen minutes until the next wave hits, but we all know how much timers can be trusted.”

  “Got it. How are we all feeling? Hitpoints? Mana?”

  “Just check our character sheets,” said Rynk.

  I nodded. “I could do that, but we’re a team, and it’s better that we talk this stuff out. As for me, my hitpoints are okay, but I’m almost out of mana and you guys are out of potions. We’re gonna need to loot and level up while we have the chance. I get the feeling that the next wave is going to push us into the shadow quadrant.”

  I sat back down. As much as I liked the touch of the flames as they fanned my way, my clothes were still sopping wet. similarly, Eddie sat with his knees against his chest, hugging himself, while Glora tried to tuck herself as close to the corner of the crevice as possible.

  “We can’t move out like this,” said Glora, her teeth chattering. “I’m so cold I can hardly feel my toes. We need to warm up before we even think of putting ourselves on the firing line.”

  I stepped further into the crevice. At two meters wide and three meters long, it was a snug fit for the four of us and our fire, and it seemed like a good place to hole up while we dried off. There was just one thing missing. Concentrating on the ground at the entrance of the crevice, I used Terrain Drain. The ground crunched and then began to rise as if some underworld god was forcing it upwards. Once it made a wall tall enough to shield the entrance, my mana spluttered and gave out, and the ground stopped swelling. With our new wall blocking the crevice, we had cover as long as we stayed sat down.

  “Snug,” said Eddie.

  “As soon as we’re warmed up and our blood’s flowing again, we’ll move.”

  “So, let’s play a game,” said Eddie. “Two lies and a truth.”
>
  “Oh, brother,” said Glora. “He’s always trying to get us to play this in the Rat when he’s had a few too many.”

  “Feel free to go if you’ve got somewhere else to be, ‘Lora.”

  Glora looked at the rocky-icy wall that I’d created to shield us from view, and then huffed. “Fine.”

  “I’ll start,” said Eddie. “I’ll give you three facts about me. Two will be lies, and one will be true. Got it?”

  Glora shrugged, I grunted, and Rynk ignored him completely. Undeterred, Eddie crossed his legs. He had a sickeningly enthusiastic smile on his face, despite the chill. “Okay. Here are my facts. One, I grew up in Perlshaw, but I come from a long line of aristocrats who used to have power and money in New Eden, but had it stolen from us.”

  “Aren’t aristocrats meant to have a little grace and, you know, manners?” said Glora.

  “Two,” said Eddie, ignoring her, “my mom invented gelbrellas. You know, the little square patches you put on your coat, and when rain hits them it sprays gel and hardens into a kind of umbrella over your head?”

  “Those things sell like crazy,” said Rynk. “No chance in hell your ma owns those.”

  “I said she invented them, not that she sells ‘em. Her business partner stole the idea.”

  “Still don’t believe ya!”

  “And finally,” said Eddie, “My third fact. A few years ago, I was engaged to be married.”

  Glora sat up. “No way. Bullshit, pupper. I’ve known you, what, eleven years now? I’d have known if you managed to persuade some poor girl to throw her life away marrying you.”

  He shrugged. “I don’t tell ya everything, Lora.”

  To me, Eddie didn’t look like the son of an aristocrat. I hadn’t met his parents, so I guessed it was possible his mom had invented gelbrellas and then had he idea stolen. It seemed pretty unlikely that he’d managed to keep an entire engagement secret from Glora, especially in an insular town like Perlshaw. “Number two’s the truth,” I said. “Gelbrella boy.”

  Eddie gave me the thumbs down. “Afraid not. My mother dearest is a clever lady, but she’s no inventor.”

  “There’s no way that you’re an aristocrat, so I guess that it must be number three,” I said.

  “Correct!” he said.

  Glora looked at him in shock. “You were engaged? And I didn’t know? How??”

  “Remember when a bunch of Edeners stayed at the Thirsty Rat?” said Eddie. “They were geologists, or something. They were taking samples from the slope, and Arin got really pissy about it?”

  “Yeah I think so. You were always sniffing after the girl. The scientist,” and then Glora’s eyes widened. “No way!” she said, with the realization slapping her in the face.

  Eddie nodded. “Only I wasn’t sniffing after her. She came after me, and we started seeing each other, but she said I couldn’t let anyone else know. At first, I thought she was ashamed of me or somethin’, but she said that wasn’t it. It just wasn’t professional for her to get involved with someone. I got a little bit more attached to her than I expected, and I ended up askin’ her to marry me when I was drunk.”

  Glora laughed. “Trust you to do something like that, Eds.”

  “Hold on, partner,” said Rynk. “You said you were engaged. So, this broad said yes?”

  Eddie gave a sad nod. “She told me we’d have to wait until she got her doctorate. That was part of the trip, y’see. She was getting field experience.”

  “But they left after a few months, didn’t they?” said Glora.

  “Yep.”

  “Then where is she?”

  Eddie crossed his arms close to him, as if he was hugging himself. “The second she got back to New Eden, I stopped hearing from her. No messages, no holos, nothing. I tried looking her up…y’know, when Wolfy and I went out before the VBR? No sign of her. Girl’s a ghost.”

  “What a bitch,” said Glora. “Well, there’s always Tina.”

  Eddie shrugged. I looked at my friend and saw that he was genuinely shaken. It was easy to see Eddie as this carefree guy, but I guessed we all had our pains. I knew it had been hard for him to share this, yet he still had. I wondered if there was more to his relationship with Tina. He’d already dumped her when I met him, so I didn’t know what they were like together, but was it possible Eddie liked her more than he was letting on? Maybe he’d dumped her because he was scared of getting close.

  It was a tough thing to share, but if Eddie could do it, then so could I. It was time to tell them about my parents, I decided. They would be the first people I’d talked to about it in years. I didn’t know what I thought I’d get out of speaking about it. Maybe some of the weight would leave me? It was worth a try.

  “My turn, I guess,” I said. “But I’m not gonna do the truth and lie thing. I’ll just tell you.”

  Was I really going to do this?

  Yeah, it was time.

  “So, I already told you my parents are gone, right? I told you a little about Lucas and what happened, but I didn’t tell you everything.”

  “Go for it,” said Eddie.

  “Only if you want to,” said Glora.

  I did. I felt like just getting it out there for the first time in god-knew-how-long would, I don’t know, perhaps be good for me. Holding it all in gave me this feeling in my skull, pressing against the sides of it. Stretching my skin, tweaking my sinuses, making my head throb. I guessed I’d always known that the feeling was there really, but like a smoker hiding a cough, I’d tried to ignore it. Now, it was time to vent a little.

  I looked at the group. I saw two friendly faces, Eddie and Glora, and one I still wasn’t completely sure of, but then Rynk had proven himself a little. I don’t know why, but I just felt like I could tell them.

  “So, after Dad and Mom told the state they couldn’t look after Lucas anymore,” I began, “it didn’t take long until he was adopted by the Helms.”

  “The Helms of Kinohelm fame?” said Eddie, amazed.

  “Kinohelm is only a tiny part of their family legacy. Go right back through their family line, and you’ll find Attie Helm sitting at the top of the tree. She invented prot-gel. I take it you’ve heard of Attie Helm?”

  “We’ve all been to school, partner. I don’t need a lesson in Attie Helm,” said Rynk.

  “Well, Stephen and Eleanor Helm are the current owners of the vast Helm fortune. Only, they couldn’t have kids, so they adopted. The state matched them up with a young boy, a chess prodigy, who needed a home. Stephen and Eleanor Helm met Lucas and that was that.”

  “Lucky son of a bitch,” said Rynk.

  “Yup. They treated Lucas like a god. It was probably them who got him the Overseer post in Eden years later. Is it a coincidence that when Sternbuck replaced Grand Overseer Godyen, Lucas was promoted to third Eden overseer? I think not. Lucas wanted the Eden VBR as his toy, and Godyen wouldn’t play ball. So, the Helm’s tugged on a few strings and got rid of him.”

  “And now they’re giving Lucas free reign in the VBR,” said Eddie.

  Rynk put his hand to his chin. “You’re saying Sternbuck is a puppet?”

  I nodded. “Lucas is the real grand overseer. The only thing he’s missing is the title.”

  “But this is about your parents, not Lucas,” said Glora. There was something strange about the way she said this; she almost seemed to change the subject a little too quickly.

  I sighed. This was the hardest part to talk about. “Lucas didn’t want to admit that he’d made the whole thing up about my dad touching him. Y’know, even though both their feeds proved that it was bullshit. He got his new parents to help make his lies legitimate. Since the Helms worshipped the air Lucas breathed, they used their connections to screw over my parents. Mom found that she wasn’t getting called back after auditions anymore. As for Dad, most of the VBR systems blacklisted him. Kinohelm obviously didn’t want him working on their maps, New Eden was out, and he couldn’t even get a job with some of the two-bit towns. This we
nt on for years.”

  “All this for a little boy’s lies?” asked Eddie. “I’d love to punch the bastard.”

  “Things got bad,” I said. “The ranch has belonged to my family for decades, so there was no mortgage or anything. But prot-layers aren’t free, and you can’t feed your kids or pay for heating or rescue wolfhounds without bits. Dad was so desperate that he took a job patching up an old VBR map down south. This was a gig where they’d give us food, a house, and they’d give Dad a decent salary. They said that they would even let Bill fight in some of the coal ladder matches if he made rank. It was too good to pass up.

  “He, mom and Bill decided to go all the way south to Grimthorpe. They had to take this little plane that the Grimthorpe VBR boss had chartered. The thing was held together by duct tape, it was so shoddy. They should never have got in it.”