Country of Champions 9

Jacques said, "Now wait some cotton picking minutes! You're not thinking clearly on this. He doesn't even have the artifact anymore. He says he lost it right before the UTF handed him over. He's not some hero for accidentally destroying a device you were a victim of."

The equipment guy wanted to say something about the awful use of the colloquialism but thought better of it.

The young mage railed. "No. I couldn't be any clearer. Have you thought about it at all? Why you were laughing, did you think about how it would feel to find yourself in some strange place, separated from all you know?

"Did you think about how you would feel if just because your artifact defended you from something chewing your life away, you were pressed into a possible thirty years of facing deadly threats. How about what you would be feeling if you already died once and by some fluke coincidence, practically a miracle, you were brought back. Oh, but let's not forget you're still facing down another possible fifteen years when you hadn't even survived your first."

Jacques' face softened some as he said, "I can respect that you have a heart that's in the right place, Orison, but this isn't-"

Fighting down a little edge of panic, the young mage knew that this new instructor of his wasn't going to bend at all. "I'll pay it. I'll pay it all. Just get him out of whatever hell hole he's shoved in and bring him here."

"Forget about Rio over there. How are you going to pay for it all and still be able to prove capable of supporting yourself and your new subordinate?" Dr. Odd's apprentice said, trying to project calmness and assert reason.

Orison said, "I can draw a temporary debt maximum of 2,000,000. Then I'll shuffle a few things around. I won't lose much and we'll just have to live frugally until I can secure some more resources."

Getting agitated again, Jacques said, "You think it's that easy? A 2,000,000 debt is only a single million away from being an Irregular yourself. When you're that far in the hole, it's a lot easier to get there too."

The young mage said, "I'm not some idiot who thinks he can save the whole world. I'm also not some simpering b*tch hiding in a whitewashed tower thinking positive thoughts alone makes me a good person while there's a beggar dying on my front porch. I'm willing to get my hands a little dirty and put my merits where my mouth is when I see a wrong that I want to right and have the ability to."

Jacques laughed angrily. "So after you save that first beggar, what about the five who will be dying on your front porch the next day? Will you save them too? How about the twenty after that?"

Orison said blandly, "F*** that. I already saved my beggar. It's someone else's turn. When there's enough to go around, I'll share but I'm not a saint."

The equipment guy snorted from trying to hold in a chuckle, earning him a glare from Jacques. "I'll indulge your little insanity but don't come crying to me when your milk is spilling everywhere."

Orison sneered. " And if my rotten piece of wood turns out to be a diamond in the rough, don't you dare try to take an ounce of credit for it or you won't be able to hold your head up in Avalon for the rest of your natural life. It's already going to be hard enough when everyone finds out your student has more heart than you... and can beat you in a foot race, chicken legs."

LeStrange took a steadying breath and said, "First of all, I may accept your little back door way of roping me into apprenticeship because I was somewhat tempted to do it anyway but we're not close and we certainly aren't friends. Call my legs chicken again and I'll break one off in YOUR back door. Then we'll see how small you think they are.

"If you want to walk a tightrope over this passion project to save this... unfortunate, that's on you. I would've done everything in my power to keep you from wasting my merits on it but feel free to dump yours into whatever bottomless hole you want to. I wasted what little damns I gave about you trying to talk your ignorant a** out of doing this. So don't expect any guilt or sympathy from me. In truth, now I look forward to you messing up so I can wash my hands of you."

Pulling up the shreds of his dignity, Jacques walked out with his hawk nose just shy of being upturned high enough to be cartoonish.

Seeing that the two geared up guys were taking off without a word too, Orison said, "Hold up. I believe I owe you two a thousand merits. Don't take our talk too seriously. I'm not going to be missing out on anything by tossing a little drinking funds your way. After this crap, you deserve it."

After a polite but rather insincere refusal, Orison gave them a some merits and in the process learned some names he could use later.

Turner, the brawny soldier guy of the two said, "Don't take Frenchie out there to be all silk boxers and no bite or he's going to make you suffer."

Roy, the equipment specialist said, "You ruffled his feathers hard. Best find a way to unruffle them. Underneath all that bluster is a good guy but he's got pride for miles and he's a bit of a tightwad. He's a little lazy and a bit of a slob-

"Roy! The recording devices are still on in here," Turner warned.

"No they're not," Roy smirked and then said to Orison, "You're welcome. If you need to let off some cursing, you might want to do it down here from now on."

Orison thanked them both and said, "Once I get my finances straightened back out again, I'll treat you guys properly."

As they were walking out, Turner added, "Look at this kid taking a 2,000,000 debt lightly. Listen up, Orison was it? You get too many, they try to bleed your merits away. They get you buried, the system's more likely to keep you there."

Once they were gone and the doors were closed, the young mage helped Rio to circulate sluggish channels in an effort to get the boy up faster.

As Rio started coming to, he mumbled, "No, dad. I didn't get in your drink cabinet. It... was friend's bike n stripping to paint... Fumes."

When the teen's eyes focused and his brain caught up with reality, for a brief moment, Orison saw a kind of desolate loneliness flicker across the teen's face before it was quickly hidden away.

In a chipper voice, Rio said, "Hey, that thing with your eyes is pretty cool. Were you born like that?"

In confusion, Orison said, "Born like what?"

"There's like blue and green kinda spilled across each other in there," the teen said.

Orison nodded. "It's heterochromia. Most of the time, it can't be seen that well because I have my spirit sight on."

While Rio finished focusing back in, the young mage filled him in on everything that he thought the boy should know. He especially emphasized how their merit situation would be like for a little while.

Latching on to what mattered to him, Rio said, "Does this mean that I won't have that allowance?"

The young mage started laughing. "No, you're good. Just don't pop any costly surprises on me or things could get dicey."

To himself, the young mage thought, "I just need to figure out how far I can trust Liberty and not mess up the goodwill I've built with her."

He finished up by breaking some news about luxuries that would be temporarily suspended and said to the teen, "I'm sure you've realized just how dangerous being caught with a slight advantage someone else can rob from you is. Keep your best stuff a secret and always hold a little back unless your life's on the line. Make no mistake, that focus set I gave you might be crumby looking but it holds a few decently valuable secrets. Until you've mastered what it holds for yourself, don't risk losing them. And what happened here today, it didn't happen."

The teen nodded with a serious and decisive look, replying, "You're not mad about it, are you? Those holes... you made them, right?"

Orison sighed. "Some things aren't meant for you. This wasn't an opportunity that was mine. At least not directly. There's nothing to be mad about."

Looking a little unsure, the teen said, "I don't know if I'll ever get the chance but if I do, I'll make it up to you."

The young mage chuckled. "The biggest help would be if you can at least pretend to not be a trouble maker for a little while."

"Yeah, I can do that for 'a little while'. Maybe I can start making it up to you by finding someone to help you deal with that puffy ball of fluff on top of your head. In a week, will I be able to make a wish and blow it off?" the teen said with a mischievous smirk.

Orison gave him a saintly smile. "Oh, you got jokes? Lets take this to the gym upstairs and see how long you can pace me before a limb falls off."

"I'll have you know. I earned my letters for wrestling, track and swimming. Good luck with that, dandelion," Rio smirked.

He wasn't smirking two hours later and he was trying hard not to amble around the house like an old man the next day. Taking some pity, Orison ran a little healing over the kid before Rio shoved off to school. It was a place the young mage had another acclamation day before he'd be attending himself.

As much as he wanted to relax and enjoy his last day before being saddled with unpleasant remedial learning and redundant training, he needed to make the most of his time. After exchanging a few text messages with Liberty to set up a meeting a little over a week away when their free time would next line up, Orison started flipping and cutting some fringe budget. After an hour, he was finished and rubbing an annoyance wrinkle out of his forehead.

He thought, "So that's what Justice meant. I finally saw some of the ugliness behind all the glitter of this merit system. C-Class 25% yearly tax for savings over 10,000,000 and matching interest for debts every three months. Thank goodness I'm a provisional B. I only have 10% to worry about. Hopefully, I won't have to worry about it at all."

While he waited to hear back on estimated times after clearing the merit bill on Gan's delivery, Orison received the go-ahead to visit his alchemist tutor a little early. She was a sweet old lady but her scheduled exercises were so basic that it scared the young mage to consider how long it would take before he could log some lucrative ones. He spent the rest of the midday and afternoon displaying his level of expertise only to find out that there were some fine differences that tripped him up right past the magic concoction line.

It irked him that his material resource upgrade package was actually overpriced much like everything dealing with students. Tacking on his tutor's cut of anything she approved for sales and he would be lucky if he was doing little better than breaking even before he spent his first month with her. He shuddered to think about the trials of average students.

He briefly revisited the idea of picking up enchanting certification but if the system's inhibitions on alchemists outside of the League's production line were scary, enchanter's restrictions and fees were outright terrifying. Those were the bad sides of the system, though. The good sides weren't shabby either.

As much as it discouraged hoarding of wealth and resources, as much as it punished the accumulation of debt, it really did insure that people had what they needed. Poverty was associated with laziness and irresponsible behavior in any society but it was actually fairly true in Avalon. Even the disabled and disadvantaged where given far more access to resources in attempts to find meaningful and satisfying ways to be not only productive but appreciated.

There were flaws and some of them were obvious but they were ones any society had and not easily addressed without fighting the very nature of humanity or any other kind of group minded higher life form. Effort could be seen and that counted for something in Orison's eyes. That counted for the way Avalon addressed the darker elements of society as well. Prostitution, gambling and recreational drugs were illegal but there were avenues that they could be accessed in more publicly acceptable ways and most funneled people right into the Irregulars if they did more than danced at the edges of indulgence.

"Come on, Orison. Why are you getting so distracted over a little setback. What good is years of comfortable contingency anyway? Focus on the now for a little bit and be happy you're going to see your best friend after all this time," the young mage thought, shaking himself out of all his mental wandering.

On his walk back home, he received a message on his personal portable touch screen, he'd set up that morning. Gan's station was on some kind of portal rotation that would delay return to Avalon for a couple of weeks. He WAS relieved from active assignment and relegated to camp duties until that time came.

Processing that bit of dim news, the young mage flopped on the couch and saw Rio as glum as he'd ever seen the teen. "Okay. What's got your normally chipper mood on the chopping block today?"

Rio said, "My acceptance to the Rowdies accelerator program was announced today. They have some kind of bench rule for the bottom ten. Anyone on that reserve list can challenge anyone not and swap them spots. I mean... not even a single day on active and someone on their last month of bench just swooped in and snatched my seat away. Now I'm on the reserve list without so much as talking to a personal trainer.

"I have three months to beat someone with a seat or I lose my accelerator program status. All the while, I only have the general trainers and equipment while the active seats are getting supplements and one on one instruction. I was challenged back to back! If I won the second, there would have been a third possible!"

Orison said, "What are the rules on this challenge system? Avalon doesn't do dumb. That bottom ten is a way to motivate the rest and give a little humbling to beginners but what's with this back to back challenging?"

Rio laid out what he understood. To the young mage, it sounded like the program heavily favored mutants and magic augment. Small exceptions for healing magic were included but the first three months of a person's time in the program were centered on unassisted physical combat only. As unfair as that sounded to pure magic users, there wasn't an easy fix. Physical prowess would only grow more disparaging with time but it had to have its place in the evaluation process.

Then it dawned on Orison. The challenge system was a mage's best friend, not enemy. Strategy was a part of combat prowess and a mage that wasn't strong or cunning had no place so close to front line action anyway. He explained as much to Rio. He also had no doubts that there was some kind of safety net for people with exceptional talents the Rowdies wanted.

To help give Rio a leg up while he finished working out the alchemy changes, Orison had the teen drop the degree shift application study on the wand and immediately start on the healing application. The young mage explained that he understood degree shift was easier that's why it was okay to save for later. Healing was hard but the wand was a cheat sheet and with Orison's help on a daily basis for a little time, it wasn't impossible for the boy to grasp it before a month was over. Rio had another two to study whatever he wanted for offensive applications.

"It's all about strategy for the pure mage. Magic isn't helpful for your first three months but select boosts and healing. Healing is what we got for now." Orison offered.

Rio scowled. "You know what they call healers? Milk maids. They aren't looked at very nicely because-"

The young mage interrupted. "Strategy. You think you have it rough now, wait til team fights later. You know who'll have it rough then? Pure physical mutants and one trick ponies. Showcase your talent to a pure mutant or a powerful one trick pony. "They'll help you get through this part in the hopes you'll get them through another. Actually honor that expectation if they're good peeps. Ditch them if they're a**holes. If they plan on doing nothing but using you, treat them the way they treat others. Just don't become an a**hole yourself."

Rio looked exasperated. "Why can't you help me that way? We're going to be in the same class!?"

Orison sighed. "Remember how I told you to always hold some back unless it's life or death? Even me holding back is going to be a life or death for your classmates. I'm going to be escalated before three months are done, no matter how hard I try not to. That means I won't be able to hold your hand through this rough patch."

"Couldn't you hold back just a little more?" Rio half pleaded.

Orison shook his head. "Getting used to fighting people too much weaker than yourself is bad practice. It might be good for the ego but your skills will stagnate and regress. You'll pick up bad habits too. Bullies almost always suck in a fight with an opponent that should be an equal match. You'll see exactly what I'm talking about tomorrow... maybe. Life likes to throw surprises."