B19

Bronwyn stretched her neck and rubbed her temples as she left the tavern. The sun was bright in the clear sky, even this late in the afternoon, and she dearly missed her sunglasses and baseball cap as she attempted to shield her eyes with her hand. She walked down the road towards the Settlement Stone, thinking about the mission she had accepted for the council. She was supposed to start scouting out the Urghat to see where their encampments were, how close to the colony they were, and maybe to get a rough estimate of their numbers. She was pretty sure they were somewhere on the other side of the northern plains, but the mountains in the distance were pretty far off, and she would need some supplies if she were going to trek out that far.

She walked up the hill towards the stone; it wasn’t too crowded at this time of day, and she pressed her hand against its cold surface. She had 12,000 contribution points to spend but intended to save them up to make more significant purchases down the road. Scrolling through some of the clothing options, she opted to buy a heavy dark blue cloak for fifty points; there had been clouds on the horizon recently, and she didn’t want to get caught in a rainstorm without any protection. She also bought some basic parchment and charcoal to make maps and take notes on what she saw. Finally, she bought about two weeks of food, a mix of fresh and dried. She didn’t think this trip would take more than a few days but wanted to be prepared just in case. Altogether, she spent around 200 points.

Bronwyn tucked her new purchases inside her dimensional pouch and turned away from the Colony Stone. She looked to the west, where her tent was, and groaned when she saw the bright sun. As Bronwyn struggled into the glare, she became blissfully aware that her tent was far enough to the west to be in the shadow of the wall, away from the shining orb of death in the sky. She walked down the hill towards her temporary but semi-permanent home, her eyes squinted, trying to block out the afternoon glare.

When she finally got to her tent, she grabbed a couple of logs from the woodpile and placed them underneath her cooking pot. She quickly had a fire going using some dried grass and her fire starter. She had thought about staying to eat with everyone else at the tavern, but the smell of mead had been thick in the air, and she was doing everything she could to not gag during the meeting. She was sad about missing out on Maria’s cooking, though; it would’ve been a far sight better than the oatmeal-like gruel she was about to whip up.

Bronwyn had spent very little time honing her cooking talents both on Earth and since arriving on this planet. Her monthly delivery bill for food back home was quite frankly absurd. Her daily meals generally consisted of eggs and a protein shake in the morning. Some kind of meal prep chicken and rice for lunch, and she would order dinner from one of a hundred restaurants in downtown LA.

She was resting her eyes and daydreaming about her favorite taco spot when the acrid smell of burning oatmeal wafted into her face. “Fuck, shit, goddamn, motherfuck!” her long slur of expletives ran together as she lurched forward and pulled the pot off of the fire. She stared down into it and saw a mess of burnt grains caked onto the edges of the pot. She sighed, “This is gonna take forever to clean.” She ladled some water into the pot from the barrel she kept by her tent. “Just gonna let you soak for a bit, I guess; I think I’d rather die than scrub anything right now.”

Bronwyn sat down in the soft blue grass and leaned back against the log by her fire. She pulled some bread, dried meat, and cheese out of her pouch and made a little sandwich. It was pretty dry without any condiments, but it tasted alright, and she was able to wash it down with some water. When she was done eating, she tossed some water on the fire, took off her boots, and crawled into her tent, where she came across a still passed-out Hops and lay down to take just a short nap. Hops, waking briefly upon her return, made himself a nest in her long red curls and promptly fell back into a deep slumber.

Bronwyn stretched her arms above her head, waking from her nap. She crawled out of her tent and looked around; the colony’s evening activities were in full swing. “Great. Slept so much today, I’ll probably be up all night again.” Her headache was, thankfully, much improved. Standing up fully, she let out a big yawn. She felt Hops crawl up to her shoulder as she did, reaching up to give him a little pat on the head. “What do you say we go for a walk, buddy, stretch our legs and get some fresh air?” She slipped her dark brown leather boots back on and headed down the trail in the direction of the colony center.

Bronwyn walked past dozens of people on the new road; some faces were familiar, others not. However, whether stranger or not, everyone she met eyes with she greeted with a nod or a brief “good evening.” Everyone seemed to be in high spirits, and the colony was a buzz of activity around her. It was incredible to think that, just a little over a week ago, they had been hiding in tents, scared of wolves in the forest. With the influx of contribution points from all the colonists, the council had been able to build a new building or two nearly every day. There were many housing buildings, the tavern/brewery, the bathhouse, and the smithy. Many of the roads around the colony had become paved in large cobblestones. The place was beginning to look less like a tent city and more like a small village every day. Brownyn estimated that there had to be less than a thousand people still staying in their tents; by next week, she doubted there would be any at all. She wasn’t sure when she would move into a house of her own, She’d never owned her own house. She went from living on base with her father to renting an apartment when she moved out. She certainly could’ve afforded a home back on Earth, but it was never really a priority for her.

Bronwyn saw a bright glow in the windows of the smithy, so she stopped and peeked inside as she was going by. She saw a dozen aspiring artificers hammering and heating various metals. Some even looked like they were working on simple blades or linking together chainmail armor. Maybe soon, they’d be able to craft armor and weapons for the colony, and they wouldn’t have to rely on the System controlled shop for all their needs. She wondered if The System took offense to people setting out to make things on their own, did it see them as stealing possible Energy? It didn’t matter either way; the colony had to grow and thrive. If it upset The System, they would simply have to deal with the repercussions.

She was rounding the central hill, ready to head back to her tent to do some meditation or cultivation drills, when she heard her name, “Bronwyn!” She looked around, and a big, bearded guy was striding up behind her.

“Yeah?”

“Hey, Bronwyn,” he huffed, walking quickly, “wait up a sec!”

“I’m waiting; what is it?” When the large man got closer, Bronwyn could feel Hops retreat from her shoulder back behind her neck, wrapping her hair around himself.

“Oh, hey. I’m Reggie Arnold Gandry-Thule.” He reached out a hand, and Bronwyn, wondering what was up with this guy, reached out to shake it. He had a huge hand and a firm grip, but he let go after just a short squeeze. “I’m the top of the leaderboard, you know?”

“Oh, right. I hadn’t been paying attention.” Bronwyn started to turn, but he reached out to grab her shoulder.

“Hey, wait. I wanted to talk to you about the election.”

“What election?”

“You know, for council members.”

“Oh, what about it?” Bronwyn didn’t even really know what had been said publicly about elections.

“Well, I wanna know when they’ll be. The people deserve a voice.”

“Oh, they’ll be soon, I’m sure. Right now, we have our hands pretty full. You know, imminent Urghat invasion and all.”

“Huh? Oh, well, we need to have it soon. The people won’t stand for this. We deserve a voice!” He’d clenched his fists, and Bronwyn could see he was holding himself rigid like he was on the verge of losing it.

“Look, I’m not up for an argument right now. I agree that people need a voice. I’ll talk to Ballard about it ASAP. Now, I gotta go. Nice to meet you, Reggie.” Bronwyn saw his fist unclench a bit, and she turned to walk away.

“You see that you do! I’ll be speaking with Ballard too!” Reggie called after her.

Bronwyn frowned as she walked away from the big man. She wasn’t exactly sure what it was, but something about the man rubbed her the wrong way. For just a second, when he was clenching his fists, she could swear he was starting to activate some kind of ability; she could feel the Energy around him becoming denser. She didn’t find him threatening but was curious if that was his intent. She made a mental note of his name and figured she could ask Arthur about him next time they spoke.

As the night grew darker, she found herself finishing the small circuit she was walking and heading back toward her tent. When she arrived, she inspected her soaking pot and saw the still hardened grains caked onto the sides. The situation had barely improved. “Fuck me; I’m just gonna buy a new pot, I think.” She mumbled to herself as she prodded at the mess with her finger. “Well, Hops looks like it's berries for you and dried meat and cheese for me.” She produced the meager meal from her pack and sat down on her log bench, placing ten or so small purplish berries in a pile on the ground.

After the two had finished their snack-dinner, Bronwyn decided to spend a couple of hours working on her Core. She sat on the ground, legs crossed, and placed her hands, palm down, on the dirt and grass. She focused on the deep breathing exercises, feeling the flow of Energy travel out to the palms of her hands, infusing her muscles, and then pulling it back into her Core. Each time she pulled the Energy back, she attempted to gather more from the cold earth below her. She could gradually feel the temperature of the ground rise as the Energy began to suffuse the area, and she siphoned it into herself. Over the course of a couple of hours, she could feel her Core heating as well, not a painful heat like when she created her channels, but like her belly was filling up with warm soup on a cold winter day. It was comforting, and she felt like her Core was trying to expand to hold more and more Energy. She hoped it wouldn’t be too long until she managed to upgrade it.

When her Core felt full to bursting, she relaxed and let the Energy slowly bleed out of her. She opened her eyes, stretched, and yawned. Even though she’d slept for most of the day, she was still exhausted. She scooped up an already passed-out Hops and crawled into her tent, quickly falling into a deep sleep.