“Woozle, I want you to use your hunting skills to track down any and all soap they have here.” She was capitalizing on Woozle’s want to hunt to get the soap, he ran off. He had not come near the grim and stayed outside, but by getting soap, he was helping now.
Jennifer took her mop and concentrated on cleaning piles of the dark brown stuff. Each push of her mop moved the goo closer to her goal. All of the muck needed to be moved. She imagined she was a knight in combat. Each stroke of her mop was the stroke of a warrior fighting great evil. The water was getting deeper, but it was not enough to slow her or her two knights of the deep. Soap bubbles forming as well.
After hours of work, no more large piles of crud left, thanks mostly to the ice lobsters creating so many water waves. The water was brown with soapy bubbles.
She moved to the center of the stable and told the two lobsters to let the water drain out of the sewage spillway at the back of the nearest booth. Then she instructed each lobster to go to one end of the flooded area and make water waves to push the muddy water toward the gutter until the water flowed cleanly from tap to drain. She stayed near the drainage point to break up any large pieces with her mop, keeping the drain open and flowing.
It worked. After nearly eight hours, the dinosaur side of the stables was clean. Once all of the muck was defeated, she used her mop and the water wave attack to clean the walls of the stable.
She was exhausted. Her arms hurt from her exertion, her legs were barely keeping her up, and her eyes felt heavy, but she needed to keep going. still light in the sky, and this was a timed quest.
On the other side of the wall stood the area for standard mounts. She began flooding the regular, horse-sized stalls next. Knowing this would take some time, Jennifer found a bench to rest on. She took a seat and looked out on the small town. She could see both entryways into the town from here. The one that was falling down was the one she came through. The other entryway looked far larger, thicker, and well maintained wall, that stood straight for some distance.
Her mind kept returning to the red You Are Here flag on the back of the turtle. It was right next to where the segments of the turtle shell met. If that were true, the border should be between the segments with the segment the town bordered on next to where the dinosaur ruled kingdoms must be.
She was lost in thought and must have nodded off because when someone poked Jennifer, it startled her awake. Instinct had her swinging her mop.
When she realized it was the clerk she saw the mayor order to go door to door earlier and she had struck him. Jennifer removed the mop from his face. “Sorry, I was asleep.” Not wanting to explain the brown muck still clinging to the mop, she moved the mop behind her. If the mop was out of sight, it would not be on his mind, she hoped.
A trickle of blood trained from his nose downwards. Jennifer handed him a healing potion. After a few minutes of apologizing and sending her lobsters to clean up the other side of the stable, she concentrated on the clerk.
“It’s fine. This is the first time I’ve been hit with a mop, and the healing potion you gave me cleaned up the damage. The mayor wanted me to check on all of the projects,” the clerk said while staying outside of mop range.
Fighting back a yawn, Jennifer raised her hand to cover her mouth. “I should be able to get through the first floor tonight, take a nap, then start on the bird cages tomorrow.”
“The mayor needs the whole stable to be clean.” The clerk said, with an edge in his voice. “This is very important to the town.”
She made eye contact with the clerk. “To me, tomorrow is just a Tuesday.” She was tired, grumpy, and glaring at the clerk. “This is a side quest to me.” Making eye contact was something she was unaccustomed to, it was not as far as taboo, just frowned on.
Not only did she not care if breaking this unspoken rule was what made him visibly taken aback, or the glaring in general, the clerk took a step back, but his voice rose with every word. “You are a fragment. All quests you get are a gift.”
Jennifer smirked at him. “My quests are, one, to become a student at Bishop’s University; and two, take what I have learned to make the world a better place. When I say make the world a better place, I don’t mean make a barn cleaner because someone was too lazy to clean it in the first place. I’m talking about making sure fragments, parallels, and all others will be treated the same and given the same opportunities.” She took in a breath before continuing, “Or something, but I don’t know. This is like my second day here, and people keep calling me ‘just a fragment’, and I am getting sick of that.”
By the time she was finished, the clerk was looking down at his hands. “I remember going to the University of the Gilly and Lilly for law. I wanted to help the innocent to get the justice they deserved.” The clerk’s voice was low, and face was filled with sadness.
“Why are fragments treated worse than parallels?” asked Jennifer, she wanted to know, and changing the subject might make it easier on the both of them.
The clerk kept looking at his hands for a long moment before a can with a red moose with wings logo appeared in his hand. The clerk handed the can to Jennifer. She was thirsty, she was tired, and this seemed like a piece offering. She popped the top and took a sip. The drink was overly sweet but made her feel better and more awake.
“The drink cancels the tired debuff out for a bit,” the clerk said before continuing, her head tilted, “Right first days. Um, you see a debuff makes you weak. In the, humm, other world, people need sleep or they get weaker. The same here, you get weaker, you lose intelligence, and what not. The drink cancels those out, but only for a short time. Parallels respawn, they can never die, they just stop showing up.” His confidence built as he continued speaking. “They can do more than anyone else and take the craziest of risks. Have a dragon stealing livestock? Send a parallel. They’ll kill it just for fun. Need a castle built? They’ll pull one out of their inventory. They’re stronger, faster, and even smarter.” Sadness in his voice as he spoke. “I once saw a boy no older than eight years old. He had a flaming sword and the most glorious armor. He simply threw down a castle. Not a small castle but one of the really big castles that could keep out a million goblins without showing a crack. Why? Because it was better than setting up a camp for the night. He left it there in the morning. Just walked away from something that was worth more than I could make in a thousand years, as if it was nothing. He was, or if he is still in this world, better than I could ever be. That kid never came back. The town ended up selling the castle as materials.” As the clerk spoke she turned away from him, the eye contact made her feel uncomfortable, but The clerk turned to Jennifer. “That’s how this tiny town ended up being able to afford our museum. The mayor won some award or unlocked an achievement and wanted to show it off. For a while it was the only thing in the bloody thing. Then we got that great fisherman to donate so much to the town, and the museum.”
Panicked, Jennifer glanced at her two borrowed lobsters and back at the clerk. “I’ve seen the museum. It does seem kinda empty?” She spoke quickly as she recast the Force Field over the two undead workers and gave an awkward smile before taking another sip from the can of the red moose.
“The dinosaur lands are known for conquering each other. None of them have ever attacked another part of the shell, but we think they may be looking for targets. That’s why the mayor is so concerned with their upcoming visit.”
Mocking the situation, she stretched her words out like she was confused. “So, if the stables are not clean, it will show weakness, so they will invade this small town?” She could not see the connection between the stables and an invasion.
“Exactly, if they see weakness, they will take advantage of that weakness. We are a small town, we can use every advantage we can get.” the clerk replied without a hint of irony. “I am sorry, there are other projects in the works I need to check on.” leaving her to continue her fight against the mess.
Jennifer checked on her borrowed undead minions. Both lobsters were showing cracks in their carapaces. Just small hairline cracks here and there, but her heart was beating faster. She was going to be returning these almost meter long undead creatures back to the museum. Now that they had damage, they will notice that they were borrowed without permission.
She looked over her character sheet for options, knowing she only had one. Jennifer tried to cast Mend. At first, the power did nothing. Then slowly, her mana bar went down just a hair line. Her heart was beating too fast, nothing had happened. She felt a pang of sadness in her heart. She had already taken them, now she was going to return them damaged, someone was going to find out and then she was going to end up in jail. She lifted one of the lobsters, petting its carapace by way of an apology.
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Chapter [6?] break
The world has a way of challenging our perspectives. Is the glass half full or half empty, how far can one go before they are no longer human?
Jennifer gaped as wires descended from the palm of her hand that was petting her undead, blue ice lobster. The wires moved on their own, shooting small sparks that welded metal into the hairline fractures.
Multiple wires descended from a small open port in her hand that she had not known she had. Her eyes were as wide as they could be when she said aloud, “Techno necromancer.” The name made a lot more sense now. She heard the scream. It was coming from her own mouth.
Woozle shot toward her with rockets glowing, yearning for release, teeth bared, and ready to attack anything that endangered his human. She screamed until all the air in her lungs was used up, leaving her mouth open and frozen in silent dread. She looked back and forth between Woozle and the wires. The rockets on Woozle’s back stopped glowing, and his head tilted as he stared at her hand. With air returning to her lungs, she needed to convey what was going on, but her mind raced, unable to get the words to form.
She watched in fascinated horror as the wires moved intertwined, separating, and moving. The sparks at the end of the wires may as well have been feet. The movements of the cable was a couples dance, each moving on their own but in sync with one other. Paired but separated. Moving from her hand, but not under the control of the hand. Things that were not alive, could not be alive. They swayed, whirled and twirled by way of her command. Without her commands.
“I have a garage door in my hand, and there are living wires coming out of it.” Jennifer nearly screamed that she could not look away. Something from her body was taking action for her, better than she could do, without her.
“Kid,” he was speaking low with a gentle voice, “I have boosters coming out of my back.”
The wires advanced on their task, skipping, prancing and bobbing around, mending the lobster while Jennifer stared open-mouthed at her lynx-shark familiar as his words sunk in.
When she felt that the repair was done, the tiny tendrils of her receded back into her hand. The door in her hand closed. She put down the first lobster and automatically picked up the second.
“What should I do,” bits of water formed on the edges of her eyes. The other lobster was beside her. It was motionless. The repaired lobster moved back to its task.
Silence too deep for her to think hung in the air. “Am I happy with my body?”
Not a question, not a statement, just the mimicry of words her mind fell on.
“I need to repair the other lobster.”
Emotions churned as the realization set in that she was no longer quite human. That someone had not only kidnapped her and dumped her into this world but turned her into something that was not whole. The wires coiled out from her palm, they had something to complete.
“No.” The words flitted through her mind, but she was unsure if she had said them aloud or just moved her lips. “No.” She did not know when she had finished repairing the second lobster or when the lobster left her lap, it was gone now. “I refuse.”
“What do you refuse?” Woozle asked, going from a laying on the ground to sitting at attention with his signature head tilt.
She turned her head to her familiar. “I refuse this world. Not only am I a second-class citizen due to me being me but I never ask to be here. I never asked to be taken away from my friends and family, and I never asked to be made into a . . .” needing to pause, she needed to find the words to express what she was feeling. she spat out the next word, “machine. I never asked for any of this. I just had this thrust on me.” Her voice grew cold, lacking emotion beyond the word machine.
“I did ask.”
“I asked to be accepted into university. With learning I would transform into something more. By going to school I would need to leave.” Her palms clasped together, she needed to say this, “to leave my friends, my family.”
“I was happy with what I was when I woke up, I may not like the job I am doing, but it is helping others in a way.” She forced her eyes to close and open. Her head facing forward, to nothing.
“This was my choice, I’m now a second class . . . person. I was going to be a freshman in an amazing university, find my future love, get a job, and make my parents and grandparents proud. Now I’m here.” She had remained calm and collected until the last sentence when her voice broke and turned shrill. “There’s no going home, and all I have are the clothes on my back.”
“You have me, a spider, and a mop, too.” Woozle was looking down, unable to meet her eyes.
She faced her familiar. “I have an amazing rocket-powered lynx-shark.” She reached out her hand, picked up Woozle, and rubbed her face against his. “And a trapdoor, gathering spider, and a mop. But without that lynx, I would be even more lost.” Her face softened, a smile grew on her face with affection at the lynx-shark as she spoke. “I need to keep going. I will not let this world stop me. I have the power to choose my own way, and I have my own wants and needs, but the world always feels like it’s in my way. There is another copy out there somewhere who did choose her own classes, who will finish school, who will have her parents there with her at graduation. I am here now. I have a dream of going to school and graduating.” Raising her hand to look at it, “I am who I am. I am what I am. I do not need to fully understand my body to accept it.” closing her hand in a fist. “I like who I am” She recognised she was speaking her way through processing her situation.
“Woozle, can you tell me why there are welding wires coming out of my hand?”
“Do you remember when I said you were an incomplete fragment,” her familiar asked.
“Yes, but I thought that meant I just forgot stuff like my fourth birthday or other little things?” She was not sure she wanted to know where this conversation would go.
“Memories are one thing, but the human body is complicated. Like, what does the human appendix, liver, or spleen even do?”
“Those organs filter toxins from the air, water, and food.”
He continued as if she had not spoken, “Why does there need to be so many intestines or so many hairs on the head?”
She reflexively reached up and touched her hair. It was there and felt fine. “What’s wrong with it? My hair feels like hair.”
“Yes, but to save room, every fragment, and some parallels have some things…” He trailed off, and she assumed Woozle was trying to be diplomatic. “They have some things, not all things, but a few, for the most part. Some things are simplified. What is not transferred gets replaced with standard parts.”
“I’ve had my liver swapped with an off-brand replacement?” Her eyes went wide, and her voice rose to eleven again.
“Well, no. It’s on brand. Magic users all get the same magic-based replacements, tech-based get tech-based replacements, and pure bios get bio-printed replacements. So, everyone has the same stuff. You are magic-based and you get a magically made liver. I’ve heard some timelines have between eight to twelve different blood types. People with AB positive blood can use all the other blood types, but O negative types could only take O negative blood. But here, everyone has turtle-worlder blood. I think they did this as a time saver, or to save space maybe”
“So, because the system gave me future defense tech, I was forced to be tech-based, I now have wires and machines in me doing what my body did on its own before I was so rudely and improperly copied?” Her mood grew darker as she spoke.
“The simple answer is yes, and because you are tech based, I am tech based.” Woozle wiggled the rocket tubes on his back.
“What would have happened if I said I was from the magical land of fairies and unicorns?”
“No idea, maybe I would have gotten wings and a unicorn horn? All of this is way above me. I am here to help the fragments. I have no idea how they copy people over.”
“They really need to work on their copying skills,” she said with anger and frustration stepping into her words. “And I don’t care. What I want to do is make the world better. I was going to go to school before this happened, and I am going to go to school while I am here. I have a reason to keep going, so that’s what I am going to do. This quest gives me land to build on, and on that land, I am going to build a house to live in. Maybe run a bar or something. With games and dancing.[SD6] ”
She spent the next few hours using her anger to clean the other side of the stables. Her anger and frustration at the world drives her to clean better and faster. The two ice lobsters helped her clean the first and second floor of the stables. The third was clean enough, in her opinion, and most of the blue birds that carried messages were asleep with only a few stopping in now and again.
Jennifer felt rather than saw when her quest was complete because she sensed the rewards being added to her inventory, including the letter of recommendation. Curiosity had her viewing the letter of recommendation. “Dear person, Jennifer is good, and I recommend her. Signed, Jim The Mayor.”
She laughed and moved towards the inn marked on her mini map.
The sky showed hints of blue in the sky as the sun was following its trail. The sun would soon be peeking over the horizon. The two ice lobster skeletons held their own spots in her inventory, she felt so exhausted that walking was like moving through mud.
By the time Jennifer reached the door of the inn, she was yawning with every step. In her menus, she could see a debuff icon under her status bar marked with a few zeds. As she was only a few meters away from the inn’s door, Jennifer mentally clicked on the icon.