Northern Osiris
6:00 PM
“What are you looking at?” Eska asked Tantalus who had closed his eyes.
“It’s too early to be drifting off,” Redgrave joked. “You haven’t had a sip of alcohol yet.”
Tantalus opened his eyes. “I was looking at the Map to memorize the location of this place.”
“You think you’ll come back here later?” Redgrave asked.
“Something like that,” Tantalus muttered. He decided that it wasn’t the right moment to inform the two squads of the true purpose of Elysium.
At this point, Mirage sat down. She was the last of Squad T2 to be seated. Pixie and Rachel were whispering about something that Tantalus couldn’t hear.
“Okay,” Redgrave called out, standing up, “now that everyone’s here, we should have a toast. And the illustrious Captain of the West Gate is here to deliver that toast!”
The various other patrons in the bar heard Redgrave’s statement and looked over. Seeing the diminutive man beside the speaker, utterances of recognition and infrequent cheers were emitted by the patrons. Redgrave pulled Tantalus to his feet, who said something unkind about Redgrave’s mother on the way up.
After taking a moment to compose himself, Tantalus spoke. “Tomorrow, we’ll attack the Deluvians and show them just how terrifying we humans can be. Tonight, however, we’ll drink and be merry. To the soldiers of the O.R.D.!”
“Cheers!”
The soldiers of the two squads and most of the bar patrons responded to Tantalus’s toast. As expected, all or at least most of the people in the bar were actually in the Revenant Division. People were always willing to toast to groups in which they held membership.
Tantalus downed the shot that he held in his hand. He almost spat it out when he tasted it. The “vodka” shot was uncannily similar to Old World vodka while still completely different. It had clearly been distilled in the same way as Old World vodka, but the base grain was different.
Upon returning to his seat, Tantalus could see that a much more festive atmosphere had come to pervade the bar. At the center of this new happiness was pride. Being a soldier within the same division as Ashcroft and Tantalus was something to be proud of, and Tantalus reminded them of that.
“Well done, T,” Redgrave patted Tantalus on the back.
“Warn me before you do something like that,” Tantalus muttered.
“How about we play a drinking game?” Pixie suggested. Tantalus groaned inaudibly as he reached for some of the dried jerky he held in his satchel. “Volta, Elias, you two went to college, what kind of drinking game works for eleven people?”
Volta shrugged, but Elias spoke, “Well, if we’re using full shots, I know a game that was big in some of the frat parties I went to. We go clockwise, and the person before you asks you a question. You can choose not to answer, but you have to take a shot. Then, you ask a question of the person to your left.”
“I like the sound of that,” Pixie said. “We’ll be able to learn more about each other that way.”
As Pixie spoke, Tantalus was casually chewing on a piece of jerky. It tasted like beef, but much tougher. “Not to question the wisdom of the drinking game, but we should probably get some food and water before we start.”
Ten minutes later, they all had accrued three shot glasses filled with various hard liquors and a larger glass filled with water. Three plates filled with assorted party foods laid on the tables they were sitting around.
It was decided that Pixie would ask a question first. She was sitting to the right of Eska.
“Tell me something embarrassing about yourself,” Pixie said, starting the game.
Without a change in her expression, Eska reached down and downed a shot of vodka.
“What was that?” Pixie asked with a good-natured laugh.
“I just wanted to take a shot,” Eska smiled after the grimace receded. “All right; it’s my turn.”
Everyone turned to Tantalus, who sat there with an unhappy look on his face.
“Captain Tantalus, how old are you?” Eska asked.
Tantalus seriously considered taking a shot.
“Forty-one,” Tantalus said without a change in expression.
“Wow,” Eska said, “I was sure you would take a shot there.”
“It’s no secret that I’m an old man,” Tantalus said. “Anyway,” he changed the subject, “Redgrave, here’s one I don’t know, why did you drop out of high school?”
Redgrave took a shot. “I dropped out because I wanted to play video games for a living. Also, I was gonna get kicked out anyway. My grades were low, and I had been in too many fist fights.”
“You don’t have to take a shot if you answer the question,” Elias chided.
“Well, I wanted to do both,” Redgrave smiled. “Grim, have you gone to one of those NPC brothels yet?”
“Yet!?” Grim almost spit out the food he was eating. Everyone at the table laughed at Grim’s response. “What? No!”
“Don’t knock it,” Redgrave chuckled. “It’s a time-honored tradition among soldiers.”
“Wait, you can have sex in this game?” Mirage asked.
“God, I hope so,” Elias said.
Redgrave looked at Mirage and opened his mouth to speak, but he was cut off by Tantalus kicking him in the shin. Tantalus sent a one-handed message in battle-cant that he hadn’t gotten around to teaching the new soldiers.
Don’t use that here.
The sign was usually used to warn other soldiers not to use artillery or hand grenades in areas with damaged buildings, but Redgrave got the message.
Tantalus spoke. “Yes, you can, and quite a few have been making significant use of that feature. A good portion of the videos on the BloodNet attest to that fact. Luckily, STDs do not transmit between Revenant and ‘human.’” Tantalus put air quotes around the word human. “Grim, it’s your question.”
Grim asked his question to Synth. “So, where were you born, Synth.”
“Oh, yeah,” Synth said in a heavy Indonesian accent, “I was born in Jakarta, but my family moved to the states back in 2025.”
“Hell of a time to move,” Tantalus murmured to himself. The years 2020 to 2029 in America were almost universally referred to as the Terrible Twenties. Two years of isolation and three years of war within a single decade. It was a historically bad time to be an American.
“Elias, what’s your favorite kind of music?” Synth asked with a smile.
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“Giving me the easy one, eh?” Elias said. “I’m a big fan of rap, pop, and country. I especially like Eminem and Taylor Swift.”
“Dude, that is so uncool,” Grim said.
“What’s uncool about being honest with yourself?” Elias spoke easily. “I like Taylor Swift, and I’m proud.”
Elias looked to Mirage who was sitting to his left. “So, Mirage, how did you survive the Three-Year War?”
Several people gasped in surprise. Tantalus tried to suppress the thoughts that came unbidden when Elias spoke. Elias had clearly crossed a line by asking that question. If there was one thing all Americans could agree on in the 2030s, it was to not talk about the Three-Year War.
“Hey, man,” Redgrave said, frowning, “we’re just trying to have a good time, here.”
“No, it’s fine,” Mirage waved off their concern. “The Three-Year War is a part of the Old World. It can’t hurt us here.” She paused, and then began to answer the question. “I was eleven years old back when the War started. I don’t really remember it that well. My family was living near San Francisco at the time. When Sutton was killed, we had to pick up and leave overnight. I’ve lived in Virginia ever since. Other than that, I don’t remember it all that well. We just hid and tried to not read the news too often.”
Mirage then turned to Persephone and asked her a question. Tantalus didn’t hear this question. His thoughts were occupied with the image of Atlanta, his home, completely engulfed in flame.
It was a dry Summer, and the funeral pyre of President Sutton consumed so much land that it had a measurable impact on the global climate. The political unrest stopped any emergency responders from putting out the fires. A one-hundred-mile-wide wildfire burned in the center of Georgia. The sky was filled with ash, and Vincent Blackwell thought the world had come to an end.
Tantalus realized that his eyes were wet when he shook himself free from the vision.
“So, Pixie, of all the players you’ve met, who do you find the most attractive?” Rachel asked impishly.
Pixie choked down a shot of bourbon without comment. She made a face as if she was being tortured before she managed to swallow the shot with some difficulty. Bourbon was a tough liquor to drink if you weren’t accustomed to it.
“That’s not fair, Rachel,” Pixie said, grimacing. “Okay, Eska, what kind of job did you have back in the Old World?”
“I was a paralegal,” Eska said. Tantalus was able to push away the image of Atlanta aflame as he processed Eska’s statement. That would explain why she was so good at organizing documents and dealing with demanding superiors.
“Tantalus,” Eska looked Tantalus directly in the eye, “I want you to tell me about Vincent Blackwell.”
Tantalus’s breathing suddenly became uneven as he thought of what to do. Dozens of images flashed in his mind one after another before he made a decision.
Tantalus took a shot of vodka. It tasted just as bad as it did the first time, and his visible grimace could be clearly seen. He hadn’t drunk straight vodka ever since he had dropped out of law school in '19.
There was a groan of disappointment by the other soldiers. Most of them wanted to hear more details about their vaunted Captain of the West Gate. Realistically, Tantalus knew, they didn’t want to know too many details. The real Vincent Blackwell was lame, pitiful even. In addition, Tantalus wasn't completely certain that he could go fully into detail about his past without getting emotional.
“Maybe I’ll tell that story after a few more drinks,” Tantalus joked.
The group went through three more rotations. Tantalus didn’t listen to most of the questions as the game continued.
The second time, Eska asked Tantalus, “Where did you go to college?”
Tantalus answered with, “The University of North Carolina. I graduated with a degree in Political Science in 2018. I went to law school at the same place, but I dropped out at the end of my first year.”
The group decided to reverse the direction of the questions, so Tantalus’s third question was from Redgrave. The question was so graphic that Tantalus didn’t even try to formulate an answer in his head. He took his third shot of the night.
At this point, Tantalus was definitely starting to get drunk. In the Old World, he had a significantly higher tolerance. Three shots of vodka would not have affected him so much before. His new body, which weighed one hundred and forty pounds and had never touched an ounce of alcohol, had basically no tolerance.
Redgrave had taken a shot every time he was asked a question, so he was slightly off balance when he asked Tantalus his fourth question. Even Redgrave, with his large body, had not yet had time to build up a tolerance to alcohol. “So, T,” he said, “what do you think of Ashcroft and Mander? Do you like ‘em?”
Tantalus could answer this question easily. “I like both of them. I respect Ashcroft as a warrior, and I respect Mander as a leader. Though, that’s the thing when it comes to Ashcroft: the personality and intelligence that makes him a great warrior also makes him incredibly hard to control.” In the back of his mind, Tantalus realized that he was revealing more than he intended. “Good warriors are aggressive and naturally violent, that’s why so many great boxers and martial artists get arrested for violent crimes. Ashcroft has the same type of disposition as Mike Tyson and Conor McGregor, both of whom have criminal records. Mander, on the other hand, has the opposite problem. His skill in-game has seriously deteriorated because he isn’t a violent person.”
Tantalus blinked and cut himself off. “Right, I probably shouldn’t speak poorly of the other captains. Who’s next?”
The game went in a circle one more time before Pixie decided to call an end to the drinking game. Just about everyone at the table was drunk. Everyone was either out of shots or had only one shot remaining. Volta said she had to use the bathroom, and all six women went to the bathroom as a group, leaving Squad T1 as the only ones at the table.
“Why do they do that?” Elias asked, not expecting an answer.
Synth giggled at the question but did not respond. Grim’s head was on the table.
“So,” Redgrave said with a mischievous grin, “which of the girls are you guys most interested in?”
“I disapprove,” Tantalus muttered half-heartedly as he stared at the ceiling. He couldn’t think of the words to accurately denounce Redgrave’s behavior.
“What’s wrong?” Redgrave slurred his words. “They’re totally talking about the same thing in the bathroom right now.”
“Hmm, maybe,” Tantalus said.
“Pixie seems nice,” Elias contributed to the conversation.
“Oh yeah, she sure seems nice, if you know what I’m saying,” Redgrave said, his tone of voice giving the words an entirely different meaning.
“Shut it, Red!” Elias raised his voice. He turned his head toward where the women had disappeared and continued speaking at a lower whisper, “I’m just saying that I like her personality.”
“I get it,” Grim said. “She’s easy to talk to. Though, her being attractive is definitely a bonus.”
Synth slowly raised the palms of his hands and pressed them to his ears.
“What’s up, Synth?” Tantalus asked, worried that something was wrong.
“I just realized that I can hear the girls talking,” Synth responded. “I probably shouldn’t be listening in.”
“Right,” Grim said, “you have Enhanced Hearing. Oh God, how many people in this city have that Talent? It’s scary when you think about it.”
“Do any of the girls have that Talent?” Elias asked.
“What are they talking about?” Redgrave asked, completely ignoring Grim and Elias.
“I don’t know. I heard the word ‘Tantalus’ before I stopped listening,” Synth said.
They’re probably making fun of me, Tantalus thought. They were probably talking about the old man in his forties out on a bar crawl.
“Sounds about right,” Elias grimaced. “None of us plebs have a chance with them, they’re all interested in the Captain.”
“What the Hell are you talking about?” Tantalus asked.
“Oh, yeah, I totally get it,” Redgrave said. “Political power, intelligence, fighting skill. I bet they view him as a perfect man.”
“Yeah,” Grim removed his face from the table and looked directly at Tantalus’s face. “He also looks like one of those k-pop singers. Women are really into that stuff.”
“Stop blowing smoke up my ass,” Tantalus said. “I’m a surly old man who’s twice the age of all those girls.”
“Some women are into that kinda thing,” Redgrave said.
"If I hear the word 'daddy' leave the lips of any..." Tantalus began to whisper angrily, but he stopped when he saw motion near the women's restroom. He saw the group of girls returning from the bathroom. He quickly checked his watch. They had been gone for less than five minutes.
“I think the music’s about to start,” Pixie said as she approached the table. It was about seven o’clock. Tantalus was not aware of anything happening at seven o’clock.
Redgrave closed his eyes before saying, “Wow, it’s seven already. Yeah, we should go outside.”
“What are you talking about?” Tantalus wondered as everyone stood up from their seats.
Tantalus had a strong aversion to wasting anything unnecessarily, so he downed his last shot before leaving the bar. As he was leaving, he witnessed about a dozen other bar patrons leaving as well. They must have all been going somewhere specific.
He followed the other members of the group to see that a rather large crowd had formed around the stage in the center of Elysium. Tantalus pulled up his hood in order to minimize the likelihood of him being recognized in such a large group. There was another group of ten wearing grey cloaks off to one side of the crowd. Redgrave led Tantalus’s group to the other group of people in grey cloaks, and Tantalus saw that the other group was the night watch of the West Gate.
FullDan pulled his hood up slightly to reveal his identity. “Is that you, Captain?” FullDan whispered. “How are you?”
“Drunk, mostly,” Tantalus said evenly. “What’s going on here?”
“Cordelia’s going to perform a few songs,” FullDan said.
A few seconds later, the cheering in the crowd increased significantly. Tantalus and FullDan turned toward the stage to see that ConcreteBeats, the YouTuber lauded for her musical talent, had taken the stage.