One by one, the slaves had their collars unlocked. However, they chose to stay behind until everyone was freed.
“Miss Shaska, we cannot thank you enough. Please, what do you want as compensation?” asked an elderly man, tearing up with gratitude.
Shaska wiped the blood off her hands, though it stained her fingers, a reminder of the cost of business in a world like this. "Normally, I’d ask the mayor to open a Smoky Mart," she said, her voice hard, though the corners of her mouth twitched. "But that ship’s sailed." She flicked her cigar, watching the ash fall. "Still, I’ve got a new venture in mind, something... cleaner. And it’s not for your thanks, understand? I hate slavers. Always have. No one owes me a thing.” She rolled her eyes and cast her gaze downward. “I’d be no different than a damn gangster if I charged you for freeing you.”
The other freed slaves started getting tears in their eyes.
“Please, Miss Shaska,” began a young woman. “There’s still more slaves in the carnival. There are trucks stuffed with slaves that could leave at any minute!”
“Hmm…” Shaska mused, turning to her employees. “Look alive, Worldwide Smoke! We still got some more slaves to free!” she exclaimed, holding up the key. “Who wants to do the honors?”
Schwarz grabbed the key and resolutely said “on it.”
He warped out of the tent and into the air above with his potentia and saw what the slave had described: trucks revving up to go without even packing up the carnival rides and equipment. And in less than ten minutes, Schwarz reappeared, covered in blood. His face was a blank slate, but his hands trembled slightly as he wiped his sword clean. "All done," he said, his voice quieter than usual.
Shaska raised an eyebrow. "Pretty boy’s losing his stomach," she teased, though her eyes flicked to the blood splattered on his clothes. "Still, good work."
Schwarz didn’t meet her gaze. "It’s not the killing. It’s the waste." He looked at the group of freed slaves behind him. "No one should have to live like that."
Shaska nodded, tossing him a small wad of cash. "Here’s a hundred losas. You earned it." She then turned to the slaves and said “alright, everyone, back to your lives. I’m sure your friends and families miss you.”
One by one, the freed slaves thanked her and the rest of Worldwide Smoke. They begged to repay her in any way they could, but Shaska continued to refuse.
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As Worldwide Smoke left the now-empty carnival, Prince Samudra spoke to Shaska. “I must say, Lady Shaska, you are nothing like what the newspapers portray you as. I read in the papers that you are a rather cutthroat businesswoman who would rather die than spare a losa. They call you–”
“Yeah, yeah… ‘Shaska the Greedy’ or ‘Shaska the Squeeze’. That’s how I was when I was young. I freaking earned that name, too. But I came to realize that you need to incentivize people properly to get them to work better. Your real mistake was believing anything printed in the papers. Bounty hunters like me get a bad rap for doing the jobs that the feds or the Global Federation are too scared to do. Then, when those jobs get done by a bounty hunter, they can’t get credit for it.” She flicked the ash off her cigar and finished with “not like you can trust a word the feds say anyway.”
“What do you mean, Lady Shaska?”
“Slavery is supposed to be illegal. Not just in the provinces either, but it was one of the sweeping changes that the Federation of the Globe brought around after it was instituted in the aftermath of the Great War five years ago. Yet, I’ve personally broken up two slavery rings in under a week. Something ain’t right, here, is what I’m saying. Those fancy pants foreign nobles think they can do whatever they want and–”
She paused when she realized who she was speaking to. “N-not you of course! Right, prince?”
“Oh, by the gods, no, Lady Shaska. We have no need for foreign slaves in Panipuri.”
Shaska cocked an eyebrow at his phrasing, but chose not to press the matter further. She shook her head and continued with “anyway, I can’t stand slavers. Owning another person? It just ain’t right. Damn those rotten feds for turning a blind eye to this.”
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Worldwide Smoke headed back to where the Robinson was parked, walking alongside a decently wide river flowing through the town, but had to cross through the downtown of Mazurka City first. They were greeted by throngs of cheering citizens.
“SHASKA! SHASKA! SHASKA!”
“Oh. A cheering populace,” she responded dryly, puffing on her cigar.
“Miss Shaska, you seem bored. Is this a common occurrence for you?” asked a confused Zinnia, cocking her head to the side a small bit.
“Oh yeah,” Schwarz, Andy, Roxanne, and Lulupo replied in unison.
The mayor of Mazurka City, a middle aged, orange-haired man in a top hat with a goatee, stepped forward. “Madam Shaska, on behalf of the citizens of Mazurka City, I cannot thank you enough for–”
“Nuh-uh,” Shaska interrupted, leaning down to the mayor’s level and blowing smoke in his face. “Let me just stop you right there, mayor. My employees here told me the rumors about this carnival traveling around the country and kidnapping people to be sold as slaves in Rioja. hat carnival? The one smuggling people across borders, selling them into slavery?" She leaned down, her breath hot against his face. "There’s no way you didn’t know. You’re either blind, stupid, or worse."
The mayor stammered, sweat beading at his temples. "N-now, Miss Shaska, I–" The crowd fell silent, save for a few murmurs here and there.
“Now, the feds aren’t going to do anything, because you’re probably giving them a cut of whatever those human traffickers gave you. So here’s what you’re going to do. You know what happens to people who cross me, right? Let’s keep this civil. You’re gonna open up a franchise of my new restaurant chain and give Worldwide Smoke all the profit.”
The murmurs among the crowd grew louder.
“Did she just save us, then threaten the mayor?”
“She’s no different than a mobster!”
“But… if the mayor knew…”
“I told you those damn fish freaks are brutes!”
“Don’t think I didn’t hear that!” Shaska shouted as she looked up. She shook her head, then cracked her knuckles and turned back to the mayor. “What’s it gonna be?”
Sirens wailed in the distance before ten black squad cars appeared with the branding of the FIIG on their sides, their engines roaring as they barreled down the main road. The crowd parted, people gasping and whispering as the federal agents poured out of the vans, guns drawn. Red and blue lights reflected off the windows of nearby buildings, casting an ominous glow over the scene.
"Ah, crap," Schwarz muttered, his hand instinctively going to his sword. Shaska stood her ground, unfazed as the feds formed a perimeter around them.
"Let’s see how they plan to play this," she growled.
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Back at Ren’s shop, Kowalski looked through his binoculars at the cars and vans that pulled up in the town square and at the Humo Robinson. “Good. The feds are here to collect the gangsters we caught.”
“Wait, th’feds’re here?” Ren interjected, looking up from her work.
“What’s the problem, Ren? We called them hours ago to pick up those violent gangsters, as usual.”
“But, Shaska’s a wanted woman! They’ll catch her!”
“Again, what’s the problem?” Kowalski asked. “I thought you didn’t like her.”
“Ah mean… ah don’t… but…”
“You want to sail the skies with her, don’t you?”
“Ah…” Ren stopped and thought for a moment. “Ah want to see th’world, ah–”
“Ren, it is just us… there’s no need to do your fake accent,” Kowalski said with a smile.
“Kowalski…” Ren said, thinking over and over about her decision.
“You are still young, Ren. Barely an adult at all. It’s a big decision you’re making.”
Ren thought about all the grand adventures she read about in her novels and comic books. She thought about all the tall tales of adventurers she heard when they came to get their airships repaired. She thought about what kind of treasures could be found in places yet unexplored, and all the strange, alien cultures that could be visited now that the war was over.
She thought about her business… and her parents.
The sharp scent of sawdust hung in the air, mixing with the acrid tang of the ship's metal. Ren’s hands, covered in dirt from climbing the scaffold, gripped the edge as she watched her father hammering away with precise, steady strokes. "Will I get to see the world one day, Dad?" she asked, her voice barely louder than the rhythmic clang of metal on metal.
“It’s a wide, wonderful world out there, Ren!” said her father, banging nails into an airship. Maybe when you’re older after the war is over! Maybe one day you can be a mechanic on an airship that travels the world!”
"Kowalski, this place… it's all I’ve known. But every day I wonder—what's out there for me? I want to keep Mazurka safe, but how can I stay when the world is moving on without me? My parents dreamed of seeing the world too… if they could see me now, would they want me to stay here and settle, or would they want me to live the life they couldn't?"
“Are you sure, Ren? She’s a wanted woman, after all. A merwoman, at that,” Kowalski replied. “Sounds like a recipe for someone you can’t trust.”
“As abrasive and as fishy as she is, she wants me. She sees talent in me. Men in the feds or some other airship wouldn’t take me seriously because I’m a girl…”
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Tears started welling in Ren’s eyes. “Kowalski… please take care of the shop and Mazurka City while I’m away. I’ll be back someday. But now… now I wanna see the world!”
Kowalski chuckled, the kind of laugh that came from years of watching someone grow up.
“What’s so funny?” asked an incensed Ren, angrily wiping away her tears.
“It was just earlier today that you were so adamant about not leaving. Now your true colors show,” Kowalski replied, still smiling, tears forming in his own eyes.
Ren stood still, staring at the ground. Her mind raced through memories, dreams, and doubts. But then, as if something inside her clicked into place, she looked up with a determination in her eyes that Kowalski hadn’t seen before. “This is it,” she whispered to herself. "I’m leaving."
Kowalski opened his arms, and Ren ran in for a hug, tears pouring down her face.
“Ad-adventure is all I w-w-w-wanted! I’ll m-m-miss you, K-K-Kowalskiiii!” she cried.
The gunshots started to ring out.
Ren pulled herself away from Kowalski, trying to keep her tears under control. Ren’s heart pounded in her chest. She’d turned down Shaska. She wasn’t a part of this madness. But still, her hands moved on their own, reaching for the rifle. The feds were the real enemy, she told herself. And if anyone was going to protect this town—her town—it would be her. No matter who stood beside her. “Th’feds! They must be shootin’ at Shaska!” she exclaimed, putting her drawl back on. She grabbed her rifle and ran to the tower for a better view.
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In the town square, a woman of about Shaska’s height and a bit younger than her in a women’s federal officer’s uniform with long, orange hair and a sword at her hip clapped her hands sarcastically.
“Very impressive staff work there, girl,” she said to Zinnia, who had deflected the gunfire with Meilong.
“I am not a girl, I am twenty-three years old…” Zinnia muttered.
“Are you crazy?!” Lulupo shouted at the woman federal agent. “You’re supposed to be an agent of justice! You could have shot one of those townspeople!”
The officer smiled a crooked smile. “The federal government doesn’t mind if one or two innocent bystanders get mowed down in the pursuit of justice. See, this new world order after the Great War was amazing for people like me. I get to actually bring in criminal scum like you lot instead of being stuck behind a desk because I’m a woman.”
“Who are you?” Shaska growled, blowing smoke.
“My name’s Deputy Chief of Staff Izmena,” the officer replied. “The office in Troyde was called a few hours ago about some uppity gangsters that needed to be brought in. Looks like we got a little bonus, too.”
“Happy couple, get back to the Robinson. If we’re not back in thirty minutes… crap, you guys don’t know how to fly, do you?” Shaska attempted to order. Andy and Roxanne fled anyway, not being able to fight.
“And just where do you two think you’re going?” Izmena asked coyly. She pointed at Andy and Roxanne and ordered her men to fire.
Lulupo jumped in front of them with his hair out, stopping the bullets dead.
“You’re insane!” Shaska exclaimed. “Those two can’t even fight! They’re harmless!”
“But they’re clearly working for a wanted criminal. Their lives are already forfeit in the eyes of the law. I’m sure they’ll enjoy their bounties,” said Izmena. “Besides, my men are already tearing your airship apart looking for stragglers.”
Shaska grimaced. “Doctor kid!” she thought.
“Oh ho!” Izmena chortled. “That look says a lot! Looks like there’s someone there you don’t want me to know about!”
“Dammit!” Shaska thought. “If we fight them, not only will my bounty go up, but everyone else is gonna get slapped with a bounty, too!”
Ren stood at the top of the tower, looking through the scope of her rifle. At the other side of the town was Carne in front of the Humo Robinson being put in nixanium handcuffs as feds searched the airship. But in her more immediate vicinity was the town square, where Shaska was squaring up with Izmena.
“Alright…” she thought. “If I’m gonna work for Shaska, I gotta make this shot count!”
Ren's hands trembled on the trigger. Her heart pounded in her ears, drowning out everything else. This was it—her chance to prove she belonged with Shaska and Worldwide Smoke. She got Izmena’s head right in her sights. “Alright, Ren, you can do this. This is the most important shot of your life!”
As she pulled the trigger, though, Izmena stepped forward, and the bullet only grazed her shoe.
“What the?” asked a confused Izmena. She looked around and saw the tower, along with the figure of someone holding a gun in the distance. “Hm. So you have a sniper, eh, Shaska?”
“Dammit! Of all the times, mechanic girl!” Shaska shouted in her head, her grimace growing ever wider.
“Shit!” Ren exclaimed as panic seized her and she descended the tower.
Izmena pulled her leg back with a smile. “An Aether Razor technique will put you down nicely…” she said before kicking the air in Ren’s direction as hard as she could. A blade of compressed Aether flew out of Izmena’s leg at the tower.
The blade flew at a blinding speed and sliced the tower clean in two, causing Ren to start falling from over ten stories high. The entire town witnessed as their heroine began screaming as she fell to her death. As Ren felt the air rush around her, she closed her eyes, bracing for impact. But instead of the hard ground, she landed softly—strong arms cradling her. Blinking up at Schwarz, her face flushed with heat. Schwarz had materialized a portal by the tower and one right above and in front of him, drastically reducing the distance she fell, allowing her to land safely in his arms.
“You…” said Ren, blushing. “Ya saved me…”
Schwarz gave her a quick nod, his eyes scanning the area for threats. “Just doing my job. Try not to fall again, alright?”
The top part of the tower crashed into the shop with an unbelievably loud noise, though, thankfully, no workers were crushed.
“Worldwide Smoke! Everyone get back to the Robinson! We need to retreat!” Shaska ordered. “Mechanic girl! Are you with us?!”
“Ah am!” she responded as she left Schwarz’s arms.
“Oh oh… what part of ‘my men are at your ship’ did you not understand?” Izmena asked, drawing her sword. She began to shapeshift, becoming larger, her skin becoming incredibly thick and gray, and her nose growing into a thick rhinoceros horn. “Don’t tell me the mighty Shaska can’t handle a little confrontation?”
“Grrr!” Shaska growled as she pulled her fist back. She punched the air, creating a massive shockwave in the water vapor that knocked over the fed grunts. Izmena pushed all her Aether into her legs to seemingly teleport behind Shaska, and slashed the merwoman’s back open with her sword.
The shock of this made Shaska drop her cigar, though she quickly picked it up and took another puff. Everyone else took off for the Robinson.
“You’re cute, deputy, real cute,” Shaska responded as she pulled water vapor from the air to do her water drill technique.
“I’m adorable!” Izmena shouted as she started bouncing off the Aether in the air. She bounced around Shaska seemingly at random. She propelled herself at Shaska’s chest, horn and sword first.
Shaska, for her part, felt the disturbance in the Aether around her, dissipated the water around her fingers, and instead sidestepped. She grabbed Izmena right out of the air and slammed her into the ground, horn-first.
Izmena howled in pain, as the force broke the tip of her horn off. Shaska backed up several feet and crossed her arms, holding her cigar in one hand. All the while, the feds got back up on their feet and trained their guns. Shaska glared at them, then smiled a bit.
“Hey! Fed dog! Wanna see my potentia?!” she shouted, holding up her hand.
Shaska’s fingers twitched as she reached out toward the river, her potentia drawing in the water like a magnet. The liquid rippled unnaturally, forming a towering pillar that gleamed under the sun. For a moment, everything was silent, the townsfolk staring in awe as the water hovered midair, a force of nature under Shaska's command. The ground trembled as the wave built, towering above the town’s rooftops. “What are you idiots doing?! Shoot her!!” Izmena ordered, about to blow a gasket.
Shaska punched the air, and the water from the river blasted the feds and their vehicles in a massive torrent, flooding the town square and pushing with enough force to send fed agents through the walls of nearby buildings. People screamed as the water crashed down, engulfing the streets and sweeping away market stalls and cars in its wake. Shaska stood at the riverbank, her arms outstretched, guiding the torrent with the precision of a maestro. Buildings groaned under the weight of the flood, their foundations crumbling as the water tore through them. She then immediately hopped into the river and began to frantically swim toward the outskirts of town where the Robinson was located, all while Izmena scrambled to her feet and to rally her men.
“AFTER HER! FATHER ABOVE DAMN IT, I WILL HAVE HER!!” Izmena called at the top of her lungs.
Back at the Robinson, Worldwide Smoke managed to knock any fed agents off the airship, and Lulupo used his hair powers to unlock Carne’s cuffs.
Shaska poked her head out of the river to call out “snake girl! Get us out of here! I’ll be there in just a minute!!”
“Yes, ma’am!” Zinnia called back as she fumbled her way to the bridge to figure out how to make the ship fly, though Schwarz was quick in helping her out.
“I’m in enough trouble as it is. Might as well make sure they can’t chase us…” Shaska thought as she began pulling up more river water.
With all her might, she pulled the water out of the riverbed and created a massive wave that flooded Mazurka City, crashing over the town and flooding every street, even knocking over certain small buildings. Miraculously, nobody drowned. Shaska then used all her leg strength to leap from the ground to the Robinson, a rope having been dangled out of the gondola to get her to safety.
“That. Bitch,” Izmena managed to choke out as she stood up and watched the Robinson fly away. “Ooooohhhh…”
She seethed. She felt her blood begin to boil as she returned to her human form. The townspeople got back up to their feet in shocked silence, unsure of how they should feel as they stood there, soaked by the river. The feds returned to formation in front of Izmena.
“Dammit!” the deputy chief of staff shouted. “Dammit, dammit, the FATHER ABOVE DAMN YOU, SHASKA!!”
“Furious” and “enraged” didn’t even begin to describe what Izmena was feeling. Izmena stood still, watching the Robinson disappear into the sky. Her breathing was heavy, her mind racing. Failure… again. All those years of pushing, of being told she wasn’t good enough because of her sex… and now, in front of everyone, she had been made a fool. “No… I’ll never make FIIG director at this rate!!”
She stood there for a moment… and then she got an idea. An astounding idea of how to get back at Shaska for making a fool of her in front of an entire town. She grinned, the glint of ambition returning to her eyes.
“Deputy Vryzk!” she ordered.
A buff man with his suit sleeves ripped off, revealing a bomb tattoo in his right shoulder, along with spiky black hair and a surgical mask ran up and saluted. “Ma’am!”
“Round up the townsfolk…”
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The Robinson’s infirmary was large, comparable to a small country hospital. There were over a dozen beds for the Smoky Merchant employees to rest in, should they be scarred by battle. Due to her size, Shaska lay prone on a table, completely topless, revealing her bulging muscles and numerous battle scars. The feeling in the air was cautiously optimistic.
“Ow, ouch…” she whined as Carne stitched up her back. “Don’t you have any anesthetic?”
“Hey, it’s your ship. I couldn’t find any immediately… wow, she really got you good, didn’t she?”
“Shut up and keep stitching,” Shaska responded, lighting up a new cigar.
“What happens now?” Schwarz asked.
Shaska exhaled a cloud of smoke, her eyes narrowing as she stared forward. “We’ve pissed off a lot of powerful people. The feds will double my bounty, maybe even put out a shoot-on-sight order. And the prince’s civil war? That’s just the start of what we’re diving into.”
Schwarz frowned. “You sure this is worth it?”
“I didn’t get this far by playing it safe, pretty boy. We’ll figure it out as we go.”
“Lady Shaska, thank you,” replied the prince.
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The next day, as the Robinson was en route over the open ocean to the continent of Orientalis, home of the Panipuri Kingdom, far to the east of the United Provinces, a delivery bird for the Manha Times flew by and swooped onto the gondola where Roxanne was standing. She gave the bird a losa coin, and in exchange, the bird (who was wearing a hat and carrying a bag full of newspapers), relinquished a copy of the day’s Manha Times. Roxanne took it; her eyes scanned the front page—and then froze. The blood drained from her face, her hands trembling.
“Everyone!” she called as she ran to the promenade. “Everyone, look!”
The crew gathered around her. One by one, their expressions darkened as they read the headline”
TWENTY THOUSAND DEAD IN MAZURKA CITY MASSACRE. SHASKA AND “WORLDWIDE SMOKE” TO BLAME