Zoe sat across the wooden table from Ivy, who loudly sipped her drink cased in a glass bottle through a straw while staring at something shiny in her hands. The wind from the ocean below them blew both their hair into a frenzy.
Usually, the chairs and tables closer to the docks would be taken. Luckily, they found one perfectly shaded by a large tree. Its spikey purple leaves slowly shook from the wind.
Zoe carefully stirred the rainbow concoction in her glass. Staring over Ivy's shoulder, watching Colson through the big glass window into the shop he worked occasionally. Next to him, Herald paced back and forth, talking.
The two girls had been let out of class early that day, as a kid had run into the classroom and threw a wasps' nest inside, causing everyone to disperse—jumping out of windows, sprinting for the door, and hiding under desks.
Herald glanced back, noticing both Zoe and Ivy through the window. Nodding in their direction, "Yo, so I gotta ask you something," he said.
"Yeah, what's up?" Colson said, handing a drink to someone over the counter.
"The new one, Ivy. You guys hang out a lot?"
"Sure."
"Ah, so you're going for her."
Colson pulled a face, "Hey, man, that's all you."
Herald laughed, "You don't like her?"
Smiling and waving to a couple across the shop, "It's not that; I mean, look, she isn't even a colonist, for one."
"Yeah, she is. She wouldn't be here if she wasn't."
"You know what I mean. She's not...she wasn't born here."
"Fair enough. I guess I've never really paid much attention when they were talking about that stuff. But, I don't really care about all that."
"Look, she's alright to hang out with I guess…" he trailed off. "She's not us, ya know?"
"Not really. Why do you even care, though?"
He spoke slowly, measuring each word, "I try and think for the future. I want my grandchildren to look like me. I want my grandchildren to grow up in the same colony that I grew up in, with all the same benefits and all the beautiful things that me and my ancestors created for them.
"While I understand the importance of individual uniqueness, I think you have to understand that we all have our families. All of our families came from somewhere, right?" He smirked, "To think that we're just gonna wipe out the bloodline willy nilly as though it's a trivial and arbitrary construction…I think it's a mistake."
The loud horn of a watercraft carried over the water as it docked. The workers on board started to unload all of its cargo.
Herald thought for a moment; soon enough, the grin returned to his face, "Oh, so you want Zoe, huh?"
Colson rolled his eyes so hard that it almost hurt, "The point. You missed it," he laughed.
"No, but I'm serious, though. You guys are always hanging out, I mean-" He stopped, an idea popping into his head, "Was the squirrel incident too much of a turn-off?"
"Dude- I don't know. It's not even like that, anyways. In a few years, her parents will probably arrange a marriage for her. That's what they all do, apparently."
"Arranged to you?"
"Probably not, no," Colson said.
"I thought they liked you."
"They do—I mean, her mom probably wouldn't mind. It's just that, you know, her dad and my dad...Yeah, no."
"Ah," Herald said. "Yeah, that makes sense."
"But man, you've gotta give it a rest with Zoe and the squirrel incident, alright?"
"Why? It's funny." Herald cackled.
"It's so shiny," Ivy said, her eyes fixated on the ID card in her hand. It was the size of a credit card, thin, light blue steel with streaks of wavy red shimmers going across the front and the back. A portrait of her face was printed in the middle with her name on top. An ID number was placed vertically on the right side.
"So now we just need to go to a computer and set up the wallet function of it," Zoe said.
"Will it have any money on it?"
"I think they put a few CCs on it, but it goes pretty quickly."
"Say, am I the only one to come here?" Ivy asked abruptly. "Like as a new person? Everyone seems really surprised when I tell them; like it's never happened before."
"Well, as far as I know, you're the only one who's just kinda shown up. There are people who get invited to join for one reason or another, but as far as just wandering in, I don't think it's ever happened—or maybe it's so rare that no one knows it can happen. Since most people aren't going to just stumble upon this place without having prior knowledge of its existence, you know what I mean?"
"Oooh, okay, well, that makes things kinda annoying. Do I get CCs by doing this?" She gestured behind her at Colson.
"That's one of the ways, yeah. I learned that there are ways you can passively collect CCs without having to do much of anything. All you'd need is a computer. I can show you it sometime."
"Why is he doing this? Wouldn't a mission be better?"
"Well," Zoe said, thinking, "Doing what he's doing is better for general income. I think it's better to be somewhat selective when doing missions instead of signing up for every contract you see. Also, the missions available to us aren't very lucrative. A few CCs per person. Also, I think he just likes making money."
Ivy turned, watching Colson work for a bit, trying to imagine herself doing the same thing. "The library has computers, right? Let's go there!" She got up from the wooden chair.
"Yeah, okay."
Zoe sat down next to Ivy, staring at the computer screen. "Let's see…." Zoe murmured, using the mouse to click around until finally finding what she was looking for. "So we need to create your Crater account. Just make up a username and password, then type in your Crater ID."
"Alrighty," Ivy did as she was instructed. "Okay, so now what?"
"Um," Zoe skimmed through the terms and conditions. "So basically, the currency here is called CraterCoin, or CC. It's backed by the accomplishments and assets in the colony platform's account."
Zoe explained to Ivy the ins and outs of the currency system. CraterCoin was valued and traded at one US dollar when it first launched. The technology behind the colonies made it possible to anonymously exchange it between financial institutions, small or large businesses, and people as easily as sending a text message to another device. If someone used the card in an area that doesn't take CraterCoin, it would convert to something the seller can use. Currently, a single CraterCoin is equivalent to 35.76 USD, with a total supply of one hundred billion.
Ivy's head felt as if it were about to explode. She had to check the computer screen's reflection to ensure her ears weren't spewing smoke.
"It's pretty much set now. But I'd say you should open a digital wallet and keep all your money in there. It's annoying to do, but a lot safer."
"How is it safer?"
"Well, a digital wallet keeps your coins safe and only accessible by you. If you decide to make one, you'll be given a private access key, which proves your ownership of your digital assets, and you can use that to send assets from one address to another. Using a wallet is the safest option to hold your stuff. There are three types of wallets. A paper wallet—I don't recommend doing this as it's confusing, and if you don't completely understand how to use this, the odds are pretty high of you losing everything. A cold wallet—the safest wallet, in my opinion; you store all your stuff in an offline thumb-drive device that you keep, but again, no offense, but you seem like you'd lose that. An Online wallet—your key is stored in a software or application."
"Um…right," Ivy said, staring blankly at the screen.
"Basically, if you use a wallet instead of the main Crater bank, you're the only one with access to it. So if anything happens, you won't be affected," she continued scrolling through the website, "Alright, so they automatically put 2.8CC into your account."
"Oh wow! That's a lot!"
"Well, think about it like this. Every time you go to the lunchroom, an all-you-can-eat pass is .28CC, about ten dollars."
Ivy looked down at her hands, counting with her fingers; eventually, her eyes widened at the thought, "wait, so…in ten days, I'm gonna starve? How does everyone else afford food?"
"Well, most people's parents pay for theirs, or they do random missions around town."
"So your parents pay you?"
"I just pay for myself now; I haven't needed to do any missions to earn money either. I just kind of generate money. Kind of an infinite money glitch—like a video game"
Ivy's face radiated with awe, "Oh, I've never played one of those."
"Really?" Zoe gave her an odd look.
Ivy looked around nervously, "You're not gonna get arrested?"
Zoe laughed, "well, it's a hundred percent legal. It's called 'staking' and a few other ways. The base understanding is that you earn rewards for holding certain currencies. When you send the minimum amount of the currency, a node in the program deposits that into a network as a stake. The size of that stake is proportional to the chances of the node being selected to build the next block. If it's successful in that, you will get a reward back."
"Uhh," Ivy rubbed her temples, and her eyelids lowered, feeling as if her brain was about to overload.
"The whole wallet system, as well as staking, was made by one of the Hounds, Keigh. I'd love to meet him one day; the guy seems so smart. A total genius…Well, anyway, do you want to put your stuff in a wallet?"
"Sure," Ivy said it more as a question than a simple reply.
"Which wallet do you want to make?"
"Uhhhhhh," Ivy said, staring blankly at the screen.
"Did you listen to a single word I said?" Zoe said a little too loud, even for her, causing many people to send them dirty looks and one person to violently shush her. "Oh!" she said, putting her hands over her mouth, "sorry!" she whispered loudly. "The online wallet is the easiest one," she said in a hushed voice.
Ivy threw her hands up in the air, "I don't know what to do!" she said, exasperated, which invited more hushes and angry looks from those sitting around them. "Oh, quiet!" She snapped, getting up to her feet and glaring at everyone around her.
"Ivy!" Zoe grabbed her arm, pulling her back down into her seat, putting a hand over Ivy's mouth this time, "Shut up!" she whispered harshly, looking around to see if anyone working there was looking at them.
"Why all of this instead of your parents paying for you?"
Zoe stared at Ivy for a few seconds, judging whether or not to tell her. "When I was younger, my parents had to help me with a lot of things. Things they shouldn't have had to."
"Oh…okay," Ivy said, her eyebrows scrunched in confusion.
"I don't want to be a leech or make things harder…Just don't tell anyone, alright?" Zoe pleaded, instantly regretting saying anything.
"Yeah, okay."
"Aight, that'll be 0.1CC."
Ivy eagerly ripped open the wrapper; inside was a chocolate bar about six inches long and one inch thick. She broke off half the bar and handed it to Zoe, who stared at it warily. Feeling her stomach churn and twist. "I need to eat this. She bought it for me," she thought. Quickly, she sunk her teeth into the chocolate.
"So, who's that statue of?" Pointing to a five-meter tall statue of a muscular man wearing nothing but yellow garments, his right hand with his index finger and thumb connected, making a circle, holding that hand symbol to his right eye as if he were looking through it. In his other hand, dragging along the base of the platform, he held a Gada—a bronze club mace. Scattered around his feet were the decapitated heads of five men.
"Orion." Zoe said. "That's the same guy who's in all the paintings in the lobby of our dorm. He's the head administrator for this colony, as well as the others. Effectively, our king."
"He looks strong," Ivy observed, looking at the plaque at the base of the statue, reading, 'The five I slay.'
"Yea, the statue there is showing how he became the leader here."
"He killed the old Hounds?" Ivy guessed.
"The story is that long ago, before Orion was our king, Crater was controlled by corrupted oligarchs, bad-faith actors, carpetbaggers, false capitalists, and degenerates who would profit from its economic collapsed—the sin of usury isn't tolerated here. Back then, the colony was run completely differently. One day, he comes for them, wielding the Gada and kills every single one of them, then decapitates and lays them by his feet."
"Wow," Ivy's eyes glimmered with awe at the story.
"Yeah, he made a group of five called the Hounds, which were his right-hand men; he chose them since they were the most powerful people in the village at that time. They still might be the strongest, but now strength isn't the main thing that qualifies you. He used them to eliminate the rest that identified with the people who controlled Crater then. Within a few months, he changed Crater to what it is now. Then he expanded Crater, making it self-sufficient and then going to other continents, annexing, and making other colonies there."
"How many colonies are there?"
"Including Crater, there's four," Zoe said between bites. "We're in the one in America; there's one in Australia, and two overseas. I think the one in Australia is called Outback."
"There's none in Zhang-Mei-Ge?"
"No, the ZMG dynasty barely associates with the rest of the world."
"Have you ever been to any?"
"No, I've actually only left Crater twice in my life."
"To do what?"
"Honestly, I don't remember exactly why my parents brought me out, but the last time was a couple of years ago. We sat in a circus tent, and at the end of the show, a magician came on stage. It was the first time I've ever seen anything like it. Calling people up to perform card tricks on them, and things like that. I was one of the ones they called up."
Ivy turned to Zoe, a big grin across her face, bits of chocolate stuck in between a few of her teeth. "Well, today is going to be your third!"
Zoe let out an exasperated sigh, "I don't want to go to another creepy house."
"We won't be. We're going to get an actual mission this time!"
"How do you know?"
"Alright! Two ideas! So you know the beast Colson was talking about. Let's go see it!" Ivy said.
"You realize that they won't just let us see it, right?"
"Why not? Plus, I know where it is!"
"Several reasons; one: It's a dangerous animal. Two: it's a dangerous animal that they don't want kids around. Three-"
"I get the point!" They stood in silence for a few seconds.
"Okay, I'll bite. How do you even know where it is?"
"Someone told me."
"Okay…where is it, and who told you?"
Ivy gave Zoe an odd look, "How do you not know where it is? Everyone is talking about it."
"I never heard about it, I guess."
"Do you just not talk to people besides me and Colson?"
"No, Ivy, clearly I don't. Can you just tell me?"
"Everyone's saying it's in the stables by the corral. I bet it looks wicked!" A mischievous grin crossed Ivy's face.
Noticing Ivy's smile, Zoe asked, "what?"
"Oh, it's nothing," Ivy said quickly, her smile growing even more.
"Ivy!"
"I'm just saying that we should, like, go mess with it."
"Is this why you wanted to see Colson? So you could mess with a dangerous animal."
"Yea," Ivy monotoned.
"Ivy, I'm sorry, but that's just dumb. How is that gonna get us a mission?"
"It's not. Just something fun I wanted to do."
"What's your other idea?"
Several minutes later, the trio stood in front of the mission board. A splintery thing; lots of flyers and nails stuck to it.
"I told you, girl, nothing over here is gonna be worth much," Colson said.
Ivy clicked her tongue deep in thought, eventually asking, "Is this the only place where missions are? Who puts these here?"
"Well," said Zoe, "They're sent to Neph, who's the 'manager' of the colony, and he approves them and puts them up here."
"Idea number two!" Ivy shouted as she turned towards Neph's cabin. "We go in there and camp there, so we'll be the first ones to get one."
"Ivy," Colson said with a slight laugh, "that's not how that works."
"Why?"
"Do you listen? Like she just said-"
"You guys are really going to give up that easily? Come on, pleeeeease?"
After more prodding, the two relented and followed her to Neph's cabin. Knocking on the door, they heard no answer; it was not surprising considering the lights were off and the usual jazz music playing had been turned off.
Trying the doorknob, it creaked open, and Ivy nonchalantly walked inside, yelling, "Hey Neph! I wanna ask you something!"
Zoe and Colson's jaws dropped. "What are you doing?" Colson looked around, but no one seemed to notice. "You can't just walk inside someone's house without permission! Especially Neph's!"
Reappearing back at the doorway with a puzzled look on her face, "Why?"
Zoe shook her head, "we really shouldn't have to explain that to you."
"Okay," Ivy said with a shrug and walked back into the house.
Colson cursed, "that girl is gonna be the end of us, I swear." He looked at Zoe, whose face had broken into a cold sweat, and she started fidgeting with a couple of cards in her hands. "Alright. I'll go in, you stand watch if anyone asks, just say...uh, I dunno, just think of something." He jogged in after Ivy.
"Ta-da!" Ivy yelled, almost making him jump out of his skin.
"You tryna give me a heart attack or something?" He hunched over, putting his hands on his knees. He had just rounded the corner of the doorway and came face to face with the shadowy figure of Ivy; the only thing visible had been her bright white teeth and her eyes.
Stepping into the light, she held out two stacks of paper, "these were the coolest ones I saw." Walking out the door, she saw Zoe's relieved face, which lit up with surprise at seeing the two stacks in her hands.
Once Colson made it outside, they walked to a nearby tree to get some shade; that's when Ivy explained the two mission choices.
"Alright, the coolest quest," she cleared her throat loudly for dramatic effect, "there's a terrorist cell in the middle east who-"
"NO!" Zoe and Colson yelled in unison.
"Okay then," she set aside the papers, "This is only a rank-c, but it's a welfare call to a farming village on California Island called Cassius. I guess Crater gets a lot of its food from there? We just need to go down there, figure out what the issue is and come back and report it, easy!"
Colson took the stack from Ivy and read it over, "hmm, seems simple. We just need to go there and come back."
Zoe looked back and forth at the both of them, "Guys! We still can't actually accept the mission! It needs to be approved for us by Neph, which he won't do."
"Zoe does have a point," Colson mumbled while looking wistfully at the papers in front of him.
"Why won't he?" Ivy had an incredulous look on her face.
"Well, for starters," said Zoe, "you just got here less than a month ago; he's not gonna send you out on a mission. Another thing, we have no way of getting there. Thirdly, I'm twelve years old; he's not going to let me go across country."
"Huh," Ivy said with disappointment.
"Ivy, I'm just being realistic; I've been wanting to do a mission like this for years now; it just isn't that easy."
Picking up and looking over the papers again, Ivy noticed something, "I think he already signed it."
"What?" Zoe leaned over and looked at the paper, not believing what she saw. On the dotted line at the bottom was his signature.
"Yea, so we just need to put our Crater ID numbers in and give this to the quest master, and she'll let us go, right?"
Colson's face broke out in a big smile, "I knew something about your arrival was special!"
"Well...yeah," Zoe sounded unsure, "but we can't just…lie about it."
"It isn't lying!" Ivy said, "If we don't do this, who knows if we'll get another chance. I thought you wanted to become a double-star. This is how we'll do it."
"I do, but…."
Ivy leaned in, looking deep into Zoe's eyes. "We can't do this without you."
"Uh," Zoe's eyes shifted away.
"I hate to say it, but she is right, Zoe. This is probably going to be our only chance to get a mission anytime soon. Especially after the whole house incident."
"One of us!" Ivy chanted.
"One of us!" Colson followed.
"Yelling isn't going to-"
"One of us!"
"One of us!"
"One of-"
"Okay, fine!" Zoe snapped, "but if we get in trouble, I'm telling them you guys kidnapped me."
Ivy grinned, "this is gonna be so cool!"
Zoe tried to hide it, but Ivy's infectious smile got to her.
"Hey, when do we leave?" Colson asked.
Ivy leafed through the pages until she reached the last one, "early tomorrow morning!"
'They never said how this isn't considered lying…'