JESSIE : LEVEL 13+3
DAY 257 : A-DAY, FIRSTWEEK, AGNI, YEAR 2
WATTOPIA 1 : TERMINAL 1 : DESTINATION BEFORE JOURNEY
After two days on the fastest-moving, slowest-seeming train I’ve ever ridden, we arrive at long last.
If the thing finally slowing wasn’t enough of a clue to where I was, I would’ve gotten it from the view of the station. That being an ornate techno-greek affair that brought to mind Ghost in the Shell. Or maybe Psycho-Pass. Or Bladerunner or Robocop or one of those other old dystopian things that imagined a post-apocalypse involving an excess of building materials. Not to mention construction equipment. And whatever else you need to make offices that huge.
We didn’t have any of that after the Collapse. The largest buildings on Earth were either flooded, or blown up in the aftermath of the flooding. Regardless of original elevation, they’ve been inaccessible since long before I was born. I don’t think I’ve ever even been in a building over ten stories tall. I mean on Earth. Not here.
Here, hundred-story skyscrapers stretch as far as the eye can see from the train window. Or at least they would if my new world curved downward like the old one. This place doesn’t quite measure up to Central. But I’ve seen old pictures of Tokyo. This puts that to shame in every single way. From scale, to population, to just the sheer number of neon lights that would make the place shine like a beacon from space. Whatever ‘space’ even means anymore…
And in the center of the supercharged metropolis is… A temple? It has to be, right? I don’t know how or why anything would be that tall and lightning-themed unless it was the Vatican for the Religion of Electricity or whatever. I’ve been able to see this thing out the train window for most of the past day.
At first, I thought it was a loose string of neon spaghetti. Don’t ask me why. It looks weird from a distance and nothing else seemed to fit. Except once I got closer, my impression changed to that of a frozen lightning bolt. What it lacks in actually reaching the clouds, it makes up for in absolutely towering over everything like a thinner, brighter version of Central’s own eponymous Tower.
Any and all trepidation is dashed as I spot a few key people getting ready to depart as the train approaches the sprawling station. Like me, they boarded in Central to come get an Attunement. And unlike me, they’ve been loudly talking about that fact for the whole trip.
Apparently, people have made comprehensive rankings and tier lists and breakdowns of all the different potential Blessings. There are also apparently a limited, well-documented pool of what each Attunement can grant. And just as apparently, if you go in wanting a specific one, you definitely won’t get it. So why would anyone bother?
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
Well, these guys did.
And once the train doors open for the first time in days, I get off with them. I even crack a smile at them as we walk together through passages and halls and escalators, finally arriving at the station entryway, the temple beyond, and the first step of the rest of our lives. Or lack thereof.
It’s in pondering the correct grammar of a phrase I pulled out my ass that I smack into thin air.
Give or take a few seconds, everybody I got off the train with does the same thing at the same time.
Except one lady, who’s clearly trying not to laugh as she edges past the rest of us.
Looking at each other in consternation, most of us hesitantly try again. Basically everyone but me.
Meanwhile, I’ve spent the last subjective hour doing all the research I really should’ve done before I got here. So I know how futile their efforts truly are.
Still, in the interest of not going solo, I wait for the rest of them to get the same clue before we all join in a walk-of-shame back to the train. Except there’s so many of us that it’s really not that embarrassing. Just as I spent the last hour-long half-minute planning…
Turns out, the train is waiting for us. As I now know, this happens with practically every train that arrives from Central. And, this being Heaven, the automated schedule is set up to accommodate people mistakenly getting off way too early. And at a station they can’t even leave.
Which we definitely can’t. Not until we complete the Attunement Quest. It doesn’t matter which one, we just need to be fully Attuned to access any of the Kingdom Capitals.
Most of the crowd seems to have a sense of humor or something because we’re just a blushing mess of self-effacing laughter by the time we make it back.
A guy does point and laugh at us as we pass.
I flip him off.
He doesn’t seem to like that very much.
So yeah, that’s one fun distraction before we make it back into a pointedly different train car than the one we left.
As soon as we re-board, everybody in the new one toasts us anyway. Some have a drink. Others lift the closest cylindrical object to them.
Surprisingly to apparently no one but me, it’s not malicious. At least everyone is smiling.
And I guess I’m starting to learn that the further we get from Central, the nicer everyone is. Maybe we’re all just less tense? Maybe Attunements are the line at which people chill the fuck out and realize they can’t actually be a dick to randoms and get away with it like in MMOs? Or maybe I’m just feeling the distance from Brown.
I settle back into my seat and order a goddamned drink already.
Matters of consent aside, Heaven tends not to care how old anyone is. Which explains the lack of liquor laws.
The rainbow-layered crushed ice drink tastes like a fruit slushie, but it’s apparently like half alcohol. And just as apparently, alcohol isn’t chemically addictive in Heaven. Go figure…
I’m already drunk by the time the train departs.