Chapter 80: Prism and Soda

By then, I had managed to get a little bit of intel on all the races in the competition. It wasn’t that hard. I was a craftsman, and so were almost half of the shopkeepers. There was a rapport there. We were the same kind of people, same kind of jobs, and same kind of history dealing with combat classes who wanted more out of us than they deserved or were willing to pay for.

The shopkeepers weren’t universal in their hate for all of the different competitor species, but there were enough of them that I was able to mix-and-match and get a pretty good idea of who we were dealing with.

The rotten luck of it all was that Eike’s people were the most hated. At first, I was hopeful that would give us an edge against them, that we might be able to sow some discord, get some alliances going, that kind of thing.

But it turned out part of why people hated them was that they had the power to back some of that arrogance up. Every one of the offworlders had paid dearly to buy their way into the competition, but for Eike’s people, it wasn’t even that expensive. It was a given. An afterthought.

This time, with Earth, they were trying something new. None of the shopkeepers had any idea that their behavior was different or how they had spent far more on this expedition. And we didn’t get the full implications of what that meant until much, much later.

The Big Book of Brett, Page 51

—

“Your prize?” Sean said, incredulous.

“His prize, actually. I wouldn’t rob him of his victory.”

It took Sean a little while to find the hint of emotion in Eike’s face he was looking for. Overall, the offworlder’s face was dominated by expectation and impatience, as if he really believed that Sean was going to hand over the loot. Like that was expected and normal. So typical that Sean not handing it over already was an unwelcome delay, like a cashier trying to make small talk on a purchase someone needed to make in a hurry.

Eventually Sean found the glint of feeling he was looking for. Eike was somehow not only sure that he was going to hand it over but also pleased. Though he showed his annoyance that it was taking so long, he was glad to be bullying Sean and chuffed that it was going so well. There didn’t seem to be a hint of doubt in his mind that he was going to get what he wanted.

“So all I have to do is give you the loot and you go?”

“Well, yes.” Eike smirked. “Until the next time you take rewards from my people, that is.”

“I understand, I think. I did have an alternate deal to offer you, though.”

“And that is?”

“That you fuck off with your weird galactic-aryan bullshit and leave me alone. It’s lunchtime, you blonde, uncanny valley space chode.”

Sean didn’t realize how many of the people milling around the square were listening in with their stat-enhanced senses and skills until ten or so of them gasped at his last comment. If they were surprised, Eike was gobsmacked. Sean was several full, happy strides away before the swordsman gathered his wits and turned, screaming at Sean to stop.

“How… how can you say that?” Eike’s face was red and blotched from the sheer strain of keeping his voice to a normal volume. “Do you know what I can do to you? What my people can do to you?”

“See, that’s the thing. You’ve already told me you plan on killing me. Remember? You were going to make an example of the native Earthling. So there aren’t a lot of threats left for you to issue, Eike. You didn’t really leave yourself a whole lot of room for escalation.”

Eike opened his mouth to retort, then closed it when he realized he really didn’t have many threats left. “I could torture you. Sic my family on you, when we get out.”

“But you certainly can’t do shit right now, Eike. And the damndest thing is I was all ready to be friends, before you couldn’t control your own people.” Sean then started yelling to the square. “You guys did know that, right? He was employing at least one psychopath who he couldn’t keep in line, despite all the fear his family is supposed to wield, or whatever?”

“BE QUIET!” Eike boomed. “I will make you pay.”

“You know what?” Sean had just about had it. “Try. Please do. Give it your best shot. And in the meantime, I’ll keep making all your boys look stupid until I have a sack crammed with enough prizes to beat your ass with them.” Eike turned red, then spun on his heel to leave. Sean called after him, “Good. Get. Go brush your hair in the mirror to calm down, you unbelievable asshole.”

Sean watched as Eike left then looked around for Brett. He didn’t have to look far. He had been distracted enough during his little slap fight that Brett found time to sneak into a supportive wingman position behind him.

“Do you think that was a good idea? Picking a fight with the big boy on the block?”

“Is he really that? There aren’t any other ringers hanging around?”

“Ringers, sure. But not to that extent, at least according to the other shopkeepers.”

Sean motioned Brett to walk with him towards the hamburger stand, where he ordered a couple absolutely massive meals before sitting down to stress eat.

“I don’t know if it was a good idea or not. I honestly don’t think it makes that much of a difference.” Sean popped a couple fries in his mouth before getting to work on his root beer. “He was either going to get my prize or he was going to kill me. There wasn’t a lot of gray area to work with. And I’m not giving him my loot.”

“Is that because the loot is just that good, or more of a principled stand?”

“You know what? I really don’t know. One second.”

Prism Stat Ring

The prism stat ring looks like simple glass. That’s because it is. If you hold it up to the light, something magical happens. It captures the single fastest force your pocket universe has ever known, breaks it apart, and makes a beautiful, sublime rainbow on some lucky surface behind it. If you tilt it just right, you might even get two of them.

The Apocalypse System thinks this is the neat part. It’s not going to lie about that. But you are a pragmatist, right? You don’t care about natural beauty. You want a prism to mean something different, something better for your petty, petty violence and games.

It’s okay, I don’t judge. It’s sort of me doing the violence anyhow.

As a first-place prize in a group competition, this ring won’t disappoint. Get ready for your first truly impressive piece of loot.

Effects: +10 to all stats and beautiful rainbow projections in direct sunlight.

“So, turns out its worth it.” Sean tossed the ring to Brett, who used his merchant skills to appraise it before widening his eyes in shock.

“Shit. Sean, you know what this means, right?”

“Yeah. I’m a fuckload stronger. Even just in terms of how it shores up my dump stats, it’s a big deal.”

“Well, yeah, that. But think about it. I can use this ring too, Sean. It’s not bound. We can switch off.”

Sean almost spit out his soda.

“Is that as big of a deal as it sounds like it is? For crafting?”

“Yeah. Bigger, honestly. I have some scaling issues with a few of my skills that this fixes. I’m going to go over your armor tonight, I think, just in case I get it juiced a little more.” Brett tossed the ring back to Sean, who immediately slipped it on his finger in place of his MAG enhancement ring.

“Is this useful to you? It’s a slight MAG bump.”

Brett took the ring and looked it over.

“Nope. And they sell better in the shops, so we probably can’t sell it just yet. We can maybe do something different with it. I’ll think it over.” Pocketing the ring, Brett started tucking into his meal. “Congratulations, by the way. Must have been some pretty screwy stuff if you won that right off the bat.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence. It was dodgeball, for what it’s worth.”

“My point stands.”

—

After lunch, Sean met briefly with Spike, who promised to relay the vital bits of the day's events to the other humans. With his immediate responsibilities covered, Sean had a date with a particularly large amount of base upgrade credits.

The worst bit about trying to figure out what to spend things on was the sheer amount of available options. There was comfort available, as long as he had enough funds. There were home-defense options ranging from literal baseball bats all the way up to very, very expensive laser grids that would sweep hallways and slice-and-dice any annoying invaders who made it past his doors.

And the utilities available were endless. Brett had several items on his wish list, ranging from big pots of chemicals he said were a dream for working with leather to high-end toolboxes that would make various kinds of work he was handling with the workbench even faster.

After doing the math, they pinned down a short list of must-haves on the comfort and security front that they had both been eyeballing for a while. They weren’t all especially practical, sure, but they were affordable enough that they decided to blow a little bit of money on them anyway.

Soap Generator

The soap generator generates soap of various kinds. Dish soap. Body wash. Commercial-grade deodorizing detergent for cleaning up the most stubborn pet stains. Whatever you want, it makes, and plenty of it. Only the most esoteric needs will challenge the sheer, sudsy output of this bad boy.

Mad scientists should note that the product this generator creates won’t break down into component parts and actively resists being used as anything but soap. If you were counting on this as a never-ending supply of ingredients for weird bombs, you might want to look elsewhere.

Deluxe Bed of Sleeping

Beds are, frankly, priced to move. The most basic cots are only a few credits, and the most expensive bed in the system is still affordable. Why? The Apocalypse System wants you well rested. Nothing interesting happens when people are safely sleeping in their well-guarded beds. If it takes a steep discount to get back out on the town in the absolute minimum amount of time, then that’s what we’ll do.

The Deluxe Bed of Sleeping is a marvel of System engineering, taking into account everything it could gather from online reviews of mattresses, the mattresses themselves, and several nights of world-wide sleep data it gathered while things were slow at the beginning of the Apocalypse era.

This thing is comfortable, is what we are getting at. It’s the most comfortable bed possible for the average human. It doesn’t do magic, it doesn’t inject you with sleep hormones, but in the sense that a mattress and absurdly high thread-count sheets contribute to quality sleep, it does the absolute maximum possible.

“I get the soap and the beds. I really do. We are getting those.” Brett said, looking in the catalogue. “But is this really necessary? We already have water.”

“For 50 credits? Just trust me on this, Brett.”

Gas Station Soda Fountain

Do you like big foam cups? We have them. Do you want sugar or some kind of sugar substitute? Hold on to your taste buds because we have that too. You want straws so good at doing their jobs that mere ownership of them carries the death penalty in California? Gird your loins because these suckers don’t melt AT ALL.

The Gas Station Soda Fountain produces up to six gallons of ice and any soda that was available at the average mainline convenience store in the ten years preceding the onset of the Apocalypse.

Special Effect: Unless the user tries to game this system, every drink dispensed has a 5% chance of proccing a random bag of chips.