Later, when they were on the docks and Mom wasn’t around, Dad said, “Thanks for doing this for your mom. I know you’ve done all this before, but she’s worried. She doesn’t want you making life decisions based on the crushing realities of life.”
Mark groaned.
“There are so many crushing realities,” Dad said, nodding in approval as Mark groaned, like it was some lighthearted thing.
… Maybe it was some lighthearted thing?
Mark didn’t think so right now, though.
Devon, a big brawny with a 3.5-times Awakening, hauled a net over his shoulder that weighed about 500 pounds, laughing as he walked by, saying, “Little Marky is an old hand at this crushing work!”
Trace, a smaller brawny with a 2.7-times Awakening, worked the machine that angled the ice crane over the ship’s hold. With a simple button press, ice began to stream into the hold, rumbling loud, crashing. Trace called out over the noise, “Bah! I’d rather be in here than out there with the monsters. And the people ain’t that great either!”
Dad and Devon laughed. Mark did not.
Trace smiled. “Brawny is a good life!”
Dad chuckled as he held up a handful of very strong, but rather small metal clips that were shaped like fish. With a deep breath, Dad kinetically lifted the fish into the air and grabbed onto the other net, picking the net up here and there while other metal fish pressed down into the docks, providing leverage. He lifted the second net onto the ship, counterbalancing himself with a few different metal plugs stuck here and there into fulcrum points.
Mark didn’t know exactly how kinetics worked, but he did know that Dad’s fish-centered telekinesis was more like an extension of his body, using ‘mana muscles’ and ‘mana bones’, and Dad was more ‘physically picking up the net’ than he was magically moving stuff around.
But that was just Mark’s layman understanding of it all.
Devon saw Mark looking at how Dad’s fish-clips were indenting into the wooden dock, and laughed. “Fish-pull is shit magic!” He kicked the net he had already moved into the ship, saying, “It took me 20 seconds to load my weight, and now I’m just waiting for your dad to pull his own weight!”
Dad moved the net into the ship just fine, calling out, “Don’t listen to him, Mark. Telekinesis is great!”
“Fish-pull!” Devon called out. And then Devon made a double bicep pose, showing off, saying, “Look at this brawny power! All the ladies love it!”
Trace chided him, “You get more men looking at you at the gym than women.”
Devon nodded seriously, saying, “I have a following online and it pays some bills, for sure!”
Dad smiled as he defended his power, “I’m the one that actually hauls in all the meat. All you do is look pretty and stand around waiting to club the overeager sharks.”
Devon stood tall and proud, grabbing his club from where it was stowed on the ship’s deck, saying, “All the mages are jealous of us brawnies, Mark. Look at his fishy tricks! Look at how he has to gather small powers to mimic the strength of a real man!”
Dad scoffed.
They eventually got onto the boat and it was a pretty normal day.
Mark got to drive the boat between fishing tanks. Usually Trace did that, but he foisted the job off to Mark.
“You know how to read the readout, yeah,” Trace asked, as he stood to the side.
Mark adjusted the throttle and held onto the wheel. Yes, he knew how to read the readout. It was dead simple. Scanner screens sitting in holders around the captain’s seat told him everything that was happening below the waters, while imagers scanned the waters for anything and everything. But saying that would be petulant, and could actually be truly dangerous, so instead, Mark said, “How does it work?”
Trace said, “See that blue on the screen? That’s the water. The black is the bottom. Green stuff is moving stuff, like fish and such— Oh! See that one. That big green one. That’s verging on red in the middle, which is how you know it’s actually a monster. That red indicates a positive mana signature. I’d say that is a half-woken beast, so not a real monster at all. It’s a small one, too, and we’re not food up here, so it doesn’t care.” He smiled. “Just don’t go swimming.”
Mark rolled his eyes. “That much is obvious.”
Trace smiled wider and chuckled, and then he pointed to the map readout. “We got the tanks marked on the other side of the bay. Just pilot to the nearest one.” He slapped Mark’s shoulder, adding, “And I’m gonna help with the nets.”
“Sure sure.”
Trace spoke seriously, “But for real, though. If you see a red monster of any kind, you yell out, and fast, you hear?”
“Heard and understood!” Mark said, equally seriously.
Trace nodded, satisfied.
Mark drove, and Trace went down to the deck with Dad and Devon to organize whatever it was they were organizing. Mark looked down and back to see if he could see… Ah. Dad was repairing holes in the nets with some spot welding and new wire, and Devon was saying that he didn’t see the breaks in this net, otherwise he would have gotten the other one. Mark turned back forward—
He heard Dad call out, “Who’s dri—! Oh. Mark is driving.”
And then Dad’s voice was lost to the rumble of the engine and the whistling of the wind. The boat didn’t go fast, but it sure did plow through the smooth waters of the bay.
Soon enough, they had crossed out into the middle of the bay, and the scanning readout started to show some pink-bordering monsters under the waves every now and then. They were deep down, though, so that was fine. Trace didn’t tell Mark about which size was dangerous —just the color— but Mark already knew. Anything actually-red needed to be warned. That’s why there was a big red button among all the scanning equipment that would send out a warning chime across the boat that a big monster had been sighted.
Mark ended up pressing the button twice, but just short bursts. Everyone raised their heads and looked around. Mark called out what he had seen, including depth and size and he even tagged the scanners to focus on those threats, but after a minute of the monsters just going on their way, Mark told everyone that, and then turned off the alarms.
Devon, Dad, and Trace seemed good with that.
Everyone went back to doing whatever.
And Mark drove a boat.
It was kinda nice. Mark loved being out here because this was as close to the real world as he could get, and yet, even with the monsters down there, all of this was pretty artificial.
When the oceans rose 23-ish meters in the years following the Reveal, most of Florida had been drowned. People rebuilt, of course, and now it was ‘The Floridas’, with Orange City being the main city, because Orange City had a great big bay. Largest bay in the world, even! Biggest producer of fish foods in the southern half of the East Coast Union cities, too.
Mark looked out across the waters, to the largest bit of architecture on the water.
The Bay Wall.
The ‘Guardian of Orange Bay’ was hundreds of 25-meter-thick silvery pillars, each with a half-meter of distance between them, set like a ribbon of high-rises across the entrance of the bay. It gleamed in the morning sun. It was the most patrolled part of the entire city wall, because the waters of Orange Bay were some of the most productive fishing spots in all of the Floridas.
Kaijus had sometimes threatened the Bay Wall, but that was a rarity. Just like the sky whales that Mark had failed to see this year, Orange Bay was proactive about turning away threats before they got close enough to threaten actual damage.
Mark couldn’t remember the last time he actually worried about monsters inside the bay, but actually looking at the Bay Wall reminded him that there were still dangers out there, and he was still just a baseline, out here on the waters with his dad and dad’s employees, on a very, very small boat.
He didn’t want to be baseline anymore.
Soon enough, they reached the fish tanks.
The individual fish tanks that grandpa’s dad had commissioned were pretty much like the bay wall.
The pillars of the fish tank were meter-thick silvery-metal bars that ended in domes. Each pillar was a good 30 meters tall, with most of that buried into the bottom of the bay, and only 3 meters sticking out into the open air, above the water. There was lots of living space inside that area, for the pillars formed a ring wall a good 100 meters across. Each pillar had some very basic runic enchantments on them that literally ‘could not go bad’, according to what grandpa had once said, so they’d last forever, and they’d always let in the good fish and deter the bad fish. Most fish hung out inside of the tank for that reason, and when they grew too big and they couldn’t escape, those were the ones that got harvested, like they were going to harvest them today.
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Mark was not allowed to know how the tanks’ magic functioned before he went through the Tutorial or chose magery, because that would be learning magic, otherwise he’d be curious about all that stuff. (He was still a whole lot of curious.) As it was, he just parked the boat next to the first tank, next to a platform that had been attached on top of the tank wall later, while the guys started lashing the boat to the tank.
He glanced at the monster scanner and saw nothing strange except for the solid black vertical lines of the fish tank barrier, sticking out of the solid black line of the seafloor way down below. Green dashes flitted back and forth inside the barrier, indicating a lot of fish. Not much fish outside of the tanks. No monsters, either.
Dad telekinetically hauled a net off of the deck, and positioned himself on top of the fish tank platform. Once positioned, he used his little fishy clips to grab the net in a few locations, and other fishy clips to cement his solidity upon the fish tank platform. And then he tensed his body. The fish net, which was a bundle tied onto a cable, went flying out into the tank, opening up as it flew, like a parachute deploying. The net opened to maybe 20-meters-across of strong netting, before it crashed into the water like a sudden rainfall, moving a lot faster than gravity could make it move. Dad was forcing it to move fast.
Devon held on to a harness that Dad had tied around his waist and chest, and Dad kind of fell forward a little, but Devon was there to hold him secure. Devon wasn’t secured to anything, and he didn’t need it. Devon had to hold onto Dad’s harness so Dad could stop holding onto the platform with his fishclips and fully extend out into the waters, with the net itself.
Mark wasn’t aware of everything Dad was doing, but he could tell more than enough. Television liked to lie about what magic could do, but this was real shit right now, and Mark could tell Dad only had so much ‘telekinesis length’, or whatever they called it.
Mark glanced at the scanning screen and watched as the net sailed through a whole bunch of green dots. Dad had his own little scanning readout on a wristwatch, so he was probably watching the whole thing. Trace had one, too, and he was certainly doing the same thing—
Trace called out, “Enough!”
Dad focused on the waters ahead, and Mark watched as the screen showed a bunch of green dots all gathering together. Dad winced, and Devon gripped his harness, preparing to pull. Dad nodded, and Devon pulled back.
It took a stressful few minutes, but Dad got the fish-filled net back up to the surface, and then Devon grabbed the cable for the very-full net and started brawny-ing it up and out of the waters. Devon didn’t have Tactile Telekinesis, not really, but he secured the net better than Mark imagined he should have been able to secure it. Mark tried not to think too deeply about whatever Talent Devon probably actually had.
Trace helped from the deck.
All the while, a large variety of fish wiggled, splashing. Water got everywhere. Some blood, too, but that was normal. They tried not to damage the fish but incidents happened.
The whole fish platform was set above the ring of tank pillars to allow for what Dad and the others were doing right now. Devon and Dad pulled the net up most of the way, all wriggling with fish, and then angled the opening of the net against the platform. Dad opened the net with his fish-clips and then the fish started pouring out of the net, down a slide, right into the ice-filled storage in the middle of the boat.
There were a lot of fish. Most of it was just plain silver fish, but there were some colorful varieties in there. They’d probably get picked out at the market and tossed…
There were a lot of fish.
Mark actually wondered if it was too much.
Monsters sought large sources of gathered life to eat. The larger the gathering, the more tempting of a target it made. A bunch of fish in a school wasn’t a tempting target, but a bunch of fish laying on each other in a boat’s hold was another matter entirely, not to mention that there were four people already on the boat… it was a little concerning.
From the looks Trace was giving Dad, and the small words Devon was saying to Dad, on the fishing platform, maybe this many fish had been too much.
When the fish dump was over, Dad plucked the last few wiggling fish out of the net, washed off the net, and, with a cheerful voice, ‘suggested’, “Let’s go dump this load at the market and then make a second run at the next tank.”
Trace acted like this was a fine idea, and not a matter of life and death to dump this many fish as fast as possible. Mark saw that the tank was half full just with that one dump. Devon ‘joked’ about how Dad would have to pay them overtime for the extra travel time, and Dad responded with words about salaries and how they’d be getting more money based on hauls, too; not ‘overtime’.
Trace politely kicked Mark out of the driver’s seat and took over.
Mark looked at them all and said, “So that’s a lot of fish and we’re monster targets now. How much of a problem is this?”
Silence.
Trace said, “It’s fine. We’re close to the market. We can dump. There won’t be a problem.”
Dad smiled again, saying, “Trace is right!”
Trace ended up right. There wasn’t a single incident at all.
The rest of the day ended up with smaller catches, and two more trips to the market, because Dad didn’t pull as deep as he did that first time.
Fishing was fucking boring when it was done right.
Mark took it as a heavy reminder that he did not want to pick the safe route at all. He did not want this life that Mom and Dad wanted for him. And they knew it. Dad didn’t bring that up, though.
He also didn’t talk about how this fishery had been in the family for three generations so far, not including Mark, and that it had provided them with a good life. They weren’t rich, but they had a great house and everything they wanted. And wasn’t that good enough?
It was a good day of ‘fishing’, and that’s what they called the job, but it was really more like ‘catching’ when done professionally and in curated waters.
On the final ride back to dock, with everyone knocking back a soda and sitting around the pilot’s seat while Mark drove, Dad told his guys, “We can haul in fish like that first catch. The tanks let more fish go than they catch, and we always grab shallowly, but I can absolutely make big grabs if we get more men to help guard the catch.” He glanced to Mark. “And if Mark wants to join us as another brawny after his Tutorial that’s another guard for the pot, but if you want to learn telekinesis and take over the family business, that’s just a one-year course at arcanaeum and it’s easy money to work this job. Safe money, too.”
… Ya know? Mark actually considered it, for real.
Those little fishclips could be pretty deadly, though Dad hadn’t used them like that at all.
Yes. This was a boring day on the water and they all smelled like fish now. But… But Telekinesis was pretty damned good. And a backup plan of working the family job? Well…
Mark really considered it.
The guys watched.
Mark countered, “But what if I want telekinesis and not fish-yank.”
Dad smiled wide and truly happy. “Then that’s a 4-year course.”
Mark instantly tried to temper Dad’s enthusiasm, “I don’t think I’d be able to come home for a long time if I did that, Dad.”
Dad was still grinning. “I know. No plans need to be made yet, anyway…” He looked to the guys, “But maybe we can make plans for bigger catches?”
Devon wasn’t sure. “I need to think and monsters are no fucking joke at all, Markus.” He said, “Let’s talk about it tonight.”
Trace said, “I don’t need to think. I know we’re doing enough. We could do more, but we’re doing enough.”
That put a bit of a damper on the whole thing.
Mark asked, “Couldn’t you enchant the boat with anti-monster enchants, or something? I know there’s something like that on the fish tanks… Eh. Curtain Protocol. Nevermind!”
Devon shook his head. Dad said nothing.
Trace deigned to say, “That’s not how magic works.”
Mark mumbled, “I saw it work that way on television.”
Devon burst out laughing, and so did Dad.
Trace smiled as he drove the boat back to home dock.
When they pulled up to the pylons that led into their canal, Dad swung his badges at the guards, and the guard pressed a button behind their booth. Mark was pretty sure the guards didn’t even look up from their television show to see the badges. The pylons just sunk deep into the canal, and they waved the boat on through.
Mark was the only one who watched the pylons go back up after the boat passed.
Soon, Trace locked the boat next to the dock, and everyone got out and started final cleanups. It didn’t take long. They had made everything ready to take off or stow away while they were driving back to dock. Dad used his little fish clips to grab the nets they had used, putting them into the lockers by the dock, but he left one out. That remaining net had gotten eaten through by something in the third fish tank. No one saw what it was, or maybe Dad killed it with his fish clips and no one thought that Mark needed to know what had happened out there, but that didn’t matter. The net needed repair.
Dad held the torn net up, asking, “Devon? Your turn, right?”
“Shit. I guess it is. Give it here, Markus.”
Dad floated the hundred-kilo thing into Devon’s arms, saying, “Thanks.”
Dad locked up the boat, while Trace waved and walked away, carrying a cooler of fish, and Devon walked the other way, holding on to the net over one shoulder while holding a cooler of fish in that same hand. It looked like it was too much to carry, but Devon was a brawny, and he had strength to spare. He probably had a little bit of tactile telekinesis, too.
Mark tried not to analyze the magic he saw, though. He’d do that later, when Curtain Protocol wasn’t hanging over his head.
Mark held on to a crate of fish for dinner using both hands, and it was pretty heavy. He almost set it down onto the ground, but Dad was almost done with final boat checks, so Mark just held onto it.
As they walked toward the old truck, Mark said, “I think I do want to do the telekinesis-thing, Dad. I’m going to call the Arcanaeum tomorrow and start looking into scholarships for that. They said I didn’t qualify for any based on the readout, but I’m going to look more. Really do some digging.”
Dad was exhausted from working all day long, sweat coating his shirt and both of them smelled like fish and the ocean. But upon hearing that, Dad turned almost radiant with joy. He smiled, and Mark felt so much better about his choices now that he had actually made one. And then Dad pulled back a little bit, trying to be serious.
Dad said, “If you want to explore the world you’re gonna need the actual telekinesis spell, and that means 4 years of hard work. It won’t be as good as Awakening to Telekinesis, though. With some hard work you might be able to do half-magic. Be a halfer. You can certainly be stronger than me, though. I only did it for a single year. I…” He paused as the words backed up. “I really wish I could talk to you about that year, but… I can’t. I know you can do better than me, though. I think you’ll do really well in arcanaeum.”
Mark smiled as he loaded the cooler full of fish into the back of the truck, saying, “It’s just like college, right?”
Dad paused. He wanted to say something, but he didn’t. He pulled back, saying, “I can’t tell you anything about magic.”
Mark rolled his eyes, saying, “You can’t even tell me if it’s like college?”
Dad smiled again and grabbed him in a hug, slapping his back, saying, “Your mom is going to be so happy!”
The perfect non-answer, then. Mark chuckled on Dad’s shoulder, and then they broke up, and got in the car. Mark smiled a lot on the way home.
Mom turned out to be very happy with Mark’s decision, just as Dad had said.