If it weren’t for the after-work crowd bunched up on the sidewalk, jostling each other as they rushed to the next train or the nearest taxi rank, Chase might’ve skipped all the way home.
He was a Guild Leader. His Guild had members. That ill-fated encounter in Gramps’ old apartment had changed his life. All it took was a quick(ish) appointment at his local GRA office and an emptying of his hard-earned Credit balance to pay for the registration fees. The rate at which he was coughing up money at the moment was rather alarming.
Necessary business expenses, he told himself.
Once home, Chase sent messages to his members, letting them know that all was well, and they were now gainfully employed. Jamie and David had been on board from the get-go, but it had been difficult to entice Jamie’s buddies to sign-up to the scheme. In the end, he’d paid them a small ‘signing bonus’ and promised a glowing reference letter if they chose to move to bigger and better things later on. If it all went the way he envisioned, they would only be there to fill the required numbers, anyway.
Now that he’d hammered the final nail into the coffin and committed to his plan, he had the unenviable task of leaving Majesty’s clutches. He’d heard horror stories of how difficult it was to resign from the guild; rumours of two-month notice periods while they ‘found a replacement’, or a so-called ‘termination fee’ that some gullible ex-employees had actually paid. The worst of the rumours was about a Raid Manager named Heston who mysteriously disappeared three days after giving notice. There were many different versions of what came next, but the common theme was that various pieces of Heston started showing up in waterways and garbage dumps not long after.
Luckily, Chase wasn’t as valuable to the guild as a capable Raid Manager. There were plenty of able-bodied young folk ready to take up the reins of a Hauler, and it wasn’t difficult to train them in the art of Monster-Retrieving. He wasn’t expecting the ordeal to be easy, but the chances of a couple rough’n’tough Hunters showing up on his doorstep with a set of pliers and a distasteful plan for his fingernails and toenails was relatively low.
Of course, if they worked out what he was going to do with his final days at the guild, that would be a different story.
Ballistic was open for business, and that meant recruitment.
The next day’s Raid was a prime hunting-ground. Conditions were awful — the Hunters had blasted through the Dungeon in record time, which meant the monster’s mangled remnants were given extra time to really stink up the place. Whoever had led the attack team was obviously some kind of explosive-wielder; they’d painted the walls of the dank caverns with a dystopian mural of blood and guts. Marla was halfway up a ladder, retrieving a gelatinous lump of Ghosthorn tongue when Chase approached. He craned his neck up, laughing at the stream of curses Marla echoed around the Dungeon.
“Enjoying yourself?” he asked. “Those Hunters really like to make our lives difficult, don’t they?”
Marla stopped and glanced down the ladder, swaying slightly. “Don’t get me started. I told Jenny I’m scared of heights and the bitch just pointed me to the ladders and told me to conquer my fears.” She took one hand off the rung, placing her thumb and forefinger a tiny distance apart. “I’m this close, Chase. This. Close.”
He grinned. “I get you. I’m right on the edge, too. In fact, I might have even gone a little further, if you know what I’m saying.”
Marla frowned, not in the mood for games. “What are you yapping about? I’m busy here.”
Chase looked around, checking for prying eyes. “Well, let’s just say that if you really didn’t want to spend another second on that ladder, there’s an opportunity at a different, er, establishment that might suit you better. Nothing serious, you know, just better hours, more autonomy, higher pay…”
Marla scrambled down the rungs, the monster tongue making a wet splack splack splack on her shoulder with each descending step. “What’ve you done, Chase? What’s going on here?”
He leaned in, cupping his hand to Marla’s ear. “I started a guild, Marla. And I need Haulers.”
As he stepped back, he saw her eyes widen. She caught a gasp before it exited, slapping a palm to her mouth. It didn’t seem to bother her that it was the same palm that touched the Ghosthorn tongue.
“Are you crazy? Where’d you get the money for that?!”
“Shhhh,” Chase gasped. “No one knows yet. I’m telling Jenny at the end of the day in case she kicks me out.”
Marla looked around, staring down the few Haulers who’d stopped to see the commotion. Some of them were newbies, others were those with longer tenure who wanted Chase’s Supervisor job for themselves. They’d rat out him out to management in no time, and his chances of poaching a couple Majesty Haulers would disappear.
“If you’re serious about the offer, I’ll take it,” Marla said. “But this is huge. And risky. Is this why you never come out and drink with us? Because you’ve been saving money?”
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Chase laughed. “Yes and no. I’m mainly just antisocial. But now that’s come back to bite me in the ass, because I don’t know any of these people outside of work. I don’t know if they’re trustworthy, if they can keep a secret, or if they even like working at Majesty. I got nothing.”
Marla interjected. “Typical Supervisor. All high and mighty cause you wear a different coloured safety hat.”
“Trust me, Marla. If you help me pick some winners, you can wear any hat you want. Rainbow, fluoro-pink — I don’t care if it’s one of those ones you put beers in then suck ‘em down through a straw.”
That final bribe hit the spot. Marla told him to get back to work and watch her weave her magic. The next time she took her cage of monster-parts back to the Gate, she stopped and spoke to a few of the Haulers. About half an hour later, Chase received a flurry of messages from her through his System. He willed the screen to enter the corner of his vision, glancing at it while he worked.
[Lamonsoff is on our side. Great guy — sometimes late to Raids ]
[Robin too! Solid worker, best of the newbies]
[Asked Matty and he grunted. Pretty sure that means yes]
Chase sent a hurried message back, telling her to stop recruiting before they completely gutted the Majesty workforce. Marla didn’t seem to appreciate that he’d actually have to pay these people if he hired them.
At the end of the day, he presented Jenny with a neatly folded resignation letter. She opened it up, read the first few words, then slammed it down on her desk.
“Really? You’re doing this to us? Majesty is your family, Chase!”
He’d been prepared for this, but he was honestly hoping it would come from his Raid Manager, or some higher-up. When she wasn’t enforcing someone else’s directives, Jenny was actually quite nice.
“I know, Jenny. I’m sorry, but this is what’s best for me.”
She pouted and made a face that looked like it required training to pull off — something straight out of ‘How To Guilt Trip Your Employees 101’.
“How am I going to tell Brad! He’ll take it out on me, you know. Last time we had a Hauler Supervisor leave, he told me that my comfy office chair went missing in transit.” She shuffled back and forth in her chair to accentuate the dire situation. “I had to sit on a wooden stool for three weeks!”
That actually did make Chase feel bad, because he didn’t doubt that she was telling the truth. He took a breath as he prepared to blurt out his prepared response, but halfway through, he realised he’d forgotten about a very crucial role in any guild’s operations.
“Well, Jenny, there is something you could do about that, actually. You could leave Majesty as well.”
A look of extreme shock crossed her face. “No way! Where would I even go? What would I do? Don’t be ridiculous.”
Chase pretended to think about her questions for a moment. “You know what? I think I might even know of a guild that would really appreciate your services.”
Jenny thought for a moment, then hopped out of her chair and guided Chase away from the collection bins, out of hearing distance from other Majesty members.
Chase repeated much of what he told Marla and answered Jenny’s questions.
Twenty minutes later, Ballistic employed its very first Raid Manager.
*******
Two days passed in a blur as Chase battled through the administration requirements of running a Guild. He did paperwork on his cramped desk at home, signing contracts and approving something called a Guild Charter. He had to invent and then practice writing his signature.
Finally, he was able to assemble the members of Ballistic in front of a whirling, billowing Gate in Seven Town. The grimy walls of a dark alley rose high on either side of their party, the wind sighing as it was corralled through the tight gap. The Gate had sliced a couple garbage bins in half when it appeared, and now pink and yellow trash bags spilled their contents out onto the cold cobbles like gross pinatas.
It wasn’t the prettiest scenery, but it couldn’t ruin their excitement.
Chase stepped up in front of their small team. It was a few hours earlier than his usual wake-up time, but he was acclimatising well enough.
“Hi, everyone. Uh, thanks for coming. Thanks especially to Jenny for ‘finding’ those resignation letters that we definitely handed in two weeks ago. She took some heat from Brad on our behalf, so thanks again.”
There was a light smattering of applause from their little band, and Jenny bowed.
“Also, thanks to our Haulers — Marla, Lamonsoff and Robin. They won’t be able to do their jobs until we’re done, but they were still nice enough to come out early and be here for Ballistic’s very first Raid.”
There were a couple cheers from Jamie and his friends, after which one of the apartment windows above them flew open and an old man shouted something. Whatever he said was caught in a gust of wind, so Chase just gave him a wave and continued.
“Um, I want everyone to be really careful — the clerk at the GRA said he’d be keeping an eye on us, so everything needs to be done right. That means all the Haulers need to listen to their Supervisor—” he nodded at Marla— “and the Hunters need to listen to me and Jamie.”
He eye-balled David. The C-Rank smiled and nodded, no doubt remembering how his brashness nearly cost him his life not too long ago.
“Obviously, we don’t have Monster-Retrievers or any of the huge collection bins, so the Haulers are going to load everything into wheelie-bins which we’ll cart to the nearest Exchange. Jenny’s going to check the market and tell us what prices to set for each item. Everyone will just go into the Exchange with their bin, pull up Jenny’s list, then put everything up for sale. She’ll organise your pay after we’ve sold some stuff.”
There were lots of eager nods, and Marla fist-pumped the air. Chase had promised her quite a healthy signing bonus as thanks for bringing across the other Haulers.
“Other than that, thank you so much for being here, and let’s do this!”
They cheered as the Hunters stepped forward. Chase tapped at his belt, feeling the comfort of the holstered Luger hidden under his shirt and jumper. He’d returned to Darryl and Mary’s hunting shop to see if they had spare magazines, but he was told the Luger was too ancient. For this reason, both his pockets were laden with loose bullets.
Since Jenny and the Haulers didn’t know about the Luger, he was entering the Raid under the pretence of guiding the young Hunters and identifying monsters for them. He knew he’d have to spill the beans at some point, but that was an issue for another time.
“You alright?” Jamie asked.
“I’m good. Just feels weird to go in with the Hunters. I’m normally still asleep at this time.”
Jamie laughed. “Well, you better get used to it. I’ve seen what you can do with that gun. You’re a Hunter now.”
Chase nodded, replaying the words in his head and feeling a warm flush of pride.
You’re a Hunter now.