Tale 1 : Goby Town
“What’s you here for?” the nomad asked a young man with dirty blonde hair and goggled eyes.
“I’m making a delivery,” he responded before taking a bite out of some jerky, “You?”
“Goby Town got ’em good fish. Know how to cut up Muddies real good.” They both looked out to Lake Michigan, to the floating mass of ships that was Goby Town. After many years most of the settlement had become more of rafts with all of the old world boats at the center. As the sun finally came up over the lower peninsula, Goby Town began to slowly turn towards the shore. A long cable connecting the bank and the settlement, began to rise out of the water. Then a raft drifted towards the coast, using the cable to guide it. After thirteen minutes, the raft finally ran aground. A short, pale, hunched over humanoid woman with lanky arms and skinny legs, hopped down. A Kaitin guard watched vigilantly as she walked towards the nomad and young man. She pulled out a log “Name?”
“Isaac, Isaac Aaron…” the young man responded.
“Ten Tabs to cross” the Sloucher held out her hand.
“Does a Crosser get a discount?” Isaac asked, smiling, pulling out his Cross Company ID. the Sloucher pondered for a second.
“Eight tabs then,” she held out her hand. Isaac pulled out a string of can tabs from his pocket. Taking off some and handing them to the ferrywoman, then she nodded over to the nomad, “He with you?”
Isaac thought for millisecond, “Yeah,” he answered, giving the nomad he had only known for about an hour a smile of gratitude.
“Eight tabs from you too,” she asked the stranger while Isaac picked up a few bags and hopped up on the boat, making sure not to gain the Kaitin guard’s insectoid ire.
Another twenty minutes passed, the raft finally boarding Goby Town. The docks were filled with fishermen, ready to go out and gather more food. A multitude of fish hung from hooks, even a couple of giant Mud-Stalkers. Isaac looked around for whoever was the dockmaster, eventually finding a gruff old man, wearing a blue fishing hat, watching his domain from a beach chair. “Hey, do you know where I can find Doc Rogers?” Isaac asked.
The old man looked to the young man, tilting up his fishing hat. “He’s past the inn, left from the Bonesman.” he turned back to his docks.
Isaac headed to the inner part of the settlement. One gate led to a dozen of large boats, all of which have been built off of and transformed. The place was filled with human, kaitin and robot merchants, all having stalls from simple trinkets to weapons. Multiple holes between the trading setups where kids were fishing with rods and crab catchers. Isaac finally saw the Inn, with a makeshift sign made of lightbulbs, spelling out the name The Bugden. After passing that, he found a building with a rusty Doc Rogers. He opened the door up to a small facility with a few beds and lots of tools and bottles lining shelves. “Hey Doc, you here?!”
“I’m upstairs!” the doctor yelled back. Isaac shrugged and headed up. He came into an office with a small desk and an old world laptop. The doctor in question was a corpoid, a sentient machine, who was typing at particularly high speed. He was a thin robot with an unbuttoned lab coat around his skeletal frame. “You must be the crosser…” he said without turning away from the screen.
“Um yeah, I got your order here… straight from the Neo-Xandrian Library.” Isaac set the bag on the floor and began to pull out medical books. The corpoid closed his laptop and began stacking the books he was handed on his desk. In total, a tower of three books, all filled with medical knowledge from the old world. Doc Rogers finally stood up helping Isaac up off the floor. “If there is anything else you need, there is an Order Office southwest of here,” Isaac pulled out a digital pad from his backpack, “Oh I need you to sign here as proof of a complete delivery.”
“I will sign it tomorrow when I give the books back,” Rogers shook his head. Causing Isaac to give off a sigh of slight disappointment.
“Well, is there a guest room I can stay in?” he asked.
“Sorry but I need to keep the medical beds clear incase of an emergency,” then the doctor pointed to himself, “and of course I don’t have a bed…”
“It’s alright, I’ll just stay at the Inn tonight,” Isaac said, picking up the small empty duffel bag off of the floor.
“Be careful not to make trouble, friend!” Doc Rogers yelled as Isaac walked out.
Isaac stood in front of the Inn, eying it suspiciously. After walking around the town for the better part of the day, he gave up and went inside the Bugden. It was rowdy with a bunch of fishermen back from a day’s work, most of them surrounding a single table. He ignored it for now heading straight to the bar where a Kaitin woman was cleaning off a glass. He sat and looked up to her. “One glass of Rice Wine.”
She made a clicking sound, “that will be ten tabs.” She held out her three fingered bug hand. Isaac complied, handing her one string of tabs.
The crowd behind him was getting louder with someone screaming victory at the center of it all. “What’s going on over there?” he asked the bartender.
“Arm wrestling competition,” she replied, looking back down to Isaac.
After a few sips from his drink, Isaac saw as the crowd cleared up, showing the main player everyone was cheering for. He was just a normal guy, no bigger or more muscly than Isaac. This piqued his interest. With curiosity, he lifted the goggles off of his purple eyes for only a second. “Fuckin’ knew it,” he mumbled under his breath. He got up from his seat at the bar making himself a part of the small crowd. The player had just won another match, with most cheering while a few groaned with disappointment. bets were exchanging people’s hands, making Isaac quietly excited.
“Who wants to challenge him next, the man, the myth, THE MAK!” the self-proclaimed announcer yelled to everyone.
“I do!” Isaac yelled back calmly, causing the small crowd to split. A few fishermen laughed as he strode past, sitting down in the chair adjacent from Mak.
The announcer looked slyly at the crosser “Really? You sure want to play?”
“Why not I’m feeling lucky!” he yelled to everyone around while taking off his jacket and shirt, showing off the physique of a normal working man, nothing compared to the muscle heads that tried before him.
“The rice wine must have gone to his head,” another heckled aloud causing most of the crowd to begin laughing.
“Bets are happening here right?” Isaac asked the announcer.
“Of course that’s the only way to play…” he chuckled back at him.
“In that case I wanna bet 30 strings on myself…” Isaac nonchalantly replied.
The announcer did a double take, “Excuse me, what was that? I don’t believe I heard you correctly…”
“No you did, 30 strings on me!” He began to take the tied together Tabs out of his bag, and place them on the table.
The announcer gained a deep grin that he tried to hide from Isaac. “The rice has indeed gone to his head my friends!” Everyone began to laugh and place their two String bets against him, “Alright I accept your 300 Tab bet, friend,” he looked over to Mak, “Put him out of commission…” the opponent grinned while the announcer put both player’s hands together, “Alright, gather one, gather all, the match starts in 3,” the crowd counted down too, with all prepared to make a small payday, “2,” Isaac’s grip tightened, “1,” Mak muscles began to bulge, “GO!” The match started and almost instantly, Mak’s muscles shrank, preventing him from nearly ripping off Isaac’s arm. Mak’s eyes widened in confusion as they were both evenly matched. He wasn’t used to this lack of strength, causing him to start losing. “What the fuck are you doing Mak, you can’t let this rando win.”
“Get the hell out of me ear, Lars!” Mak grunted with gritted teeth. He looked over to Isaac who was grinning, “how the hell are you winning!”
“It’s simple Mak, you never had any strength to begin with.” Isaac gritted. Isaac was getting close to winning, making Mak yell with rage. Muscles regrew, nearly throwing off Isaac, dragging both arms quickly back to the middle. A bloody streak dripped from his nose onto the table. Everyone was cheering their hardest, louder than any previous match. Isaac just smiled intensely, “So that’s how you want to play it huh?!”
A bloody line fell from Isaac’s nose as he also yelled. Mak’s muscles shrank only slightly this time, as both players were competing on a plane not seen by normal humans. With one final bout of strength, Mak’s muscles shrank back to what they were at the beginning, while Isaac forced Mak’s hand to the opposite side of the table, winning the game. Everyone fell silent, realizing that most of them had lost their Tabs. Isaac laid back into his chair, wiping away the blood that was now trailing from both of his nostrils. “H-H-How?” Lars the announcer asked.
“I believe I am owed the Tabs of every person who bet against me,” Isaac tiredly told the announcer, “So if you could give me those, then I’ll be on my way.”
Everyone eyed him with suspicion, some wanting to yell and berate him, but no one wanted to mess with a guy that just won an arm wrestling challenge with the strongest man in Goby Town. The announcer complied, giving Isaac his winnings of over five hundred tabs in addition to his own. “Here’s your earnings outsider…”
“Thanks!” Isaac turned to the barlady, “Hey can you get a round for everyone here!” Everyone blankly stared before erupting in cheers for the winner.
“That will be 28 strings,” she happily stated, as Isaac began pulling out 4 strings at a time while the bartender started pouring glasses for everyone other than Lars and Mak, who were still dumbfounded by their loss.
“Oh and can I get one room?” he turned back to her.
“It’s on the house, for making a fool out of that jackass…” she smiled back to him before tossing Isaac a key.
Next day came by quickly, as Isaac slept like a rock for sixteen hours straight. He woke up, gathered his stuff and walked outside to an afternoon sky over the floating town. Isaac strode off to the doctors once again. This time Rogers was modifying some surgical tools. “You’re back!” he said ecstatically, before picking up the books from a nearby table “Here you are good sir! And I believe you need me to sign something?”
“Yeah right here boss…” Isaac pulled out the tablet again, now pulling off a stylus and handing it to Rogers “Both your name and signature,” he said, holding up the pad while the doctor gave his John Hancock, “Alright and that should be it.”
“Oh, and for the trouble of waiting,” the corpoid pulled out a tip of twenty tabs.
Isaac eyed it for a few seconds, “I’m fine Doc!”
“You sure?” the robot insisted, “I’d feel bad if-”
“Trust me, you say this trip was enough of a tip,” he began to walk away, “Have a good life, Doc!” Isaac finally walked out of the door and towards the ferry out of Goby Town.
“Any new Orders?” Isaac asked as he tilted the stool he sat in.
“Well there is one… but I don’t think you want to do it?” The Cross Commissioner spun in her chair away from the computer.
“It can’t be that bad…” he persisted.
“It’s for a known crime lord in Garden City,” she elaborated as she turned back to her terminal, “He’s made a down payment for a priority 1 delivery from New Madison…”
“What’s my employer’s name?” Isaac asked with a smile on his face.
She looked back up to him, “Metal Finger Harken.”
