72 - Back To Moulding

After her friends left, Lexie managed to map out the logic tree that combined <A Compelling Argument> with <Shut Up and Dance>. Unfortunately, as they were two cards from different decks, testing the combo out would be difficult, and according to Elvira 'probably impossible'.

"Adding cards from a different deck into another one is already not a great idea under most circumstances," she said. "Because all cards in a deck must be tied under the same general intent, and the system will reject any card that isn't under that umbrella. Outside cards are only added to a certain deck if the deck is short a card because a card got destroyed, or if the deck is undergoing maintenance to find better-suited cards. But other than that it isn't typically done.”

"But you said it can work if the intent is close enough," Lexie said. "And in this case, it's going to be under the same intent. It's all going to be a part of my new defense deck."

"A defense deck?"

"Uh-huh," Lexie explained how she wanted her starter deck to be a combination of things she could use to defend herself and also cards she could use to experiment with.

Once she was done, Elvira looked thoughtful.

"That is probably not going to work," she said plainly. "Does your father know what you're doing?"

"Yes. He's cautiously supportive."

The blonde woman gave another moment of silence. "No, I really can't see how you would feasibly make such a thing. Defensive attributes are not what cards are made for."

"No one knows that," Lexie countered. "Because cards aren't what they used to be. You told me that on the first day you came to my class. Cards used to be made for all sorts of things but then the system took that away.”

"Yes with good reason. Because it was dangerous. And the system won't let you create a deck full of high-powered, potentially dangerous cards."

"I'll figure my way around that," Lexie said. "Just let me know how to test out these cards to see if it will work."

"Again, that's also probably impossible. Lexie, when I spoke to you about combining cards I meant in case one of your deck cards got destroyed. Not for creating a forbidden smorgasbord of a deck.” She sighed. "I told you how we create decks at the college right?" 

Lexie nodded. One of the senior projects of the card department was for groups of mage-scholars to create a single deck. Once they did and the deck was approved by the system it could then be bought and perfected by experts at the different card companies. The mage-scholars would also often be hired by those companies. 

To create a deck, just as to create a card, one must start with the intent and lay out the purpose of the deck. Once that was approved by developers, then you could build the cards off of that.

“We sometimes combine cards from different decks to test theories,” Elvira said. “But that requires more equipment than you have, to test the compatibility of the card pair before you run the simulation. It also probably requires oversight from the [developer] who approved your deck. But you want to start testing cards with an unapproved deck. That's not happening, Lexie."

Lexie thought about it. “When will you be a Developer?”

Elvira shook her head. “At least not for another few years.”

Lexie sighed. So it looked like she wasn’t going to create her dancing zombie effect any time soon. Still, she managed to tweak the trap card such that it no longer required her to talk as much for it to work, simply by skipping a few nodes and reconnecting others. She worked on that most of the night and only slept for a few hours.

Aiden was gone by the time she woke up that morning, and she headed straight to Max’s place for their trip. 

He looked annoyed and groggy when she knocked on his door, but she put on her best smile.

“Ready to go?”

He grumbled something that might have been a yes or might have been a curse. Either way, he went to get ready. 

They took an airbus to Moulding since the train was packed. The bus only floated a few feet off the ground, but the reduced friction bumped up its speed. It wasn’t as fast as Dewie’s mom’s road rocket, nor was it as smooth at avoiding other things in its way. But it would do for now. 

The bus was nearly full when they boarded but they managed to get a nice couple of corner seats, mostly because Uncle Max bullied his way into it. He snapped his fingers at the teen boy who had been sitting there and jerked his thumb over his shoulder. 

They got the hint standing up immediately. 

“That’s bullying, Uncle Max,” Lexie whispered out as he sat, and pulled her in the seat next to him  “You’re not supposed to do that to children.”

“And you’re not supposed to call out my bad behavior,” Max said in response as he leaned his head back on the seat and closed his eyes. “That’s rule number two of spending time with Uncle Max.”

Lexie shook her head and glanced back at the teens as they grumbled and headed to stand at the front of the bus. She felt bad for them. 

As the bus began its floating ride, which was slightly bouncier and faster than any other bus she had been in, Lexie people-watched. It was pretty early and so most of the people here were mundanes who worked in factories in Moulding, and staff who had worked a night shift at some of the businesses and fancier homes in Arcadia. 

She met their tired faces and blank eyes and felt an uncomfortable squirming in her chest when she watched them, almost like guilt. They're probably mostly mundanes and part of the only thing that separates us is that I didn’t get the ‘bad’ combination of both of my parents. 

Lexie, of course, knew it wasn't that straightforward. There were certainly mundanes who were doing quite well for themselves and it wasn't like all mundanes were downtrodden or something. But they didn't get access to the same opportunities Lexie did, through no fault of their own. And Lexie was a part of the system that disenfranchised them.

It bothered her.

She sought a distraction. 

She didn’t want to play with her cards here cause that was almost like rubbing it in their faces. So instead she turned back to her Uncle Max who had his visible eye closed but wasn’t sleeping.

“Hey Uncle Max, do you know all of my dad’s old friends?” 

He didn’t respond at first. His eye didn’t move, but he wasn’t breathing slowly enough for her to be convinced he was sleeping. 

“Uncle Max?” Lexie tried again. “Did you hear me?”

He sighed, his eyepatch bristling with annoyance. “Remember rule number one Lexie?” 

“Yeah, but I just have one question.”

“And then that one leads to another one, and then another…” He grumbled but his good eye opened to regard her in annoyance. “What is it?”

“I wanted to ask you about one of Dad’s old friends.”

“You mean from the hero association?"

“No, I mean from alien planets.”

“The Fae?”

Lexie bit her lip, shook her head, and said, “Darker.”

Understanding dawned and his lip twitched. “Oh. You must mean Naem.”

“You know him?” Of course, Max would know him. He was a criminal alien, two things Lexie's uncle liked. 

Or so Lexie thought until he answered.

“Not really. Met him once. He gave me the creeps so I wasn’t inclined to meet him again.”

Same here, Lexie thought and she felt a little less bad about her prejudice since her uncle felt the same way. 

“Do you think…he and my dad…I mean… do you think he’s like mind controlling him or something?”

Lexie had tried to look into contracts with the Eldritch and apart from warnings that were basically a big fat “DON’T DO IT” and horror stories about mind control and soul possession, there wasn't much. The eldritch were also seen as shady djinns, promising to grant your wish but doing it in an underhanded way that took more than you gained. Plus they had mild powers of compulsions which they could use on whoever had signed with them. 

Since she met Naem, Lexie had been somewhat concerned that her father was being mind-controlled. She wasn't sure about bringing it up to Max, but once she told him he laughed.

“Nah,” he said. “Even as a mundane, Aiden would be a difficult man to mind control. Plus I don’t think that’s how it works. If not the fae and the eldritch would mind control all of us.”

That made sense. "Why don’t you like him then?"

“I told you. He gives me the creeps.”

“Just that?”

“Yup.”

Lexie settled into thought again. Maybe she was being judgmental. After all, Aiden had said that Naem had helped him revive his daughter. Except for some reason, he’d put a completely different soul in Aiden’s daughter’s body. 

Was it an accident? Or was it intentional? If it was the latter what was the purpose?

And how exactly did ISTS factor into that?

“Did mom know about him?”

“Who, Naem? Of course. Aiden didn’t really hide much from your mother, especially his less savory side. She was pretty open-minded. More so that even me and Aiden.”

“I think you're pretty open-minded. I mean, you date aliens.”

“Eh.” He shrugged. “I date aliens that are as close to humanoid as possible. Not aliens that give you nightmares.” 

"Do you guys…do stuff?” It occurred to Lexie that since they were different species, mating might be a touchy subject. While there were rumors of some half-alien children running about, she hadn't actually seen any. Except for the Fae. They’d been able to mix with humans at a point but Lexie wasn’t sure that sex was involved in that. 

Most people on Earth 9 seemed to have a pretty lax view of interspecies dating but she didn’t know how it worked.

Max smirked at her. “Did you eventually get that birds and bees talk from your dad?”

“There was supposed to be a birds and bees talk?” This was the first Lexie was hearing of it.

“Yeah. At the beginning of the year, Aiden told me he had to do it before you turned twelve. And he practiced and practiced but then he got so red-faced and sick-looking that he probably just called the whole thing off.” He snorted. “And to answer your question, no I’m not bumping uglies with them. Well most of them anyway.” He waggled his eyebrow and she made a face. 

Ew.

Uncle Max grinned at having gotten to her. 

“What do you do with them then?” Lexie asked. 

“We just…hang out. Talk about dungeons, trade techniques, and secrets. That sort of thing.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it. Most creatures are far more interesting than humans but funny enough they’re always eager to befriend us. Seemingly, we’re a novelty, even as aliens.”

"Huh." Lexie knew, from a previous conversation with Uncle Max, that sometimes he would go into dungeons and find some other creatures on different floors too. He would often befriend them or buy tools from them. Or steal from them on occasion. 

Lexie wanted to ask more about that but she didn't want to go off tangent and waste her questions because her Uncle would eventually get annoyed enough to stop answering. 

The bus lurched to a stop and a few people standing stumbled forward. The bus stop was crowded with people so Lexie knew that it was about to get real stuffy in here real soon.

“Anyway, back to my original question. Naem. You don’t think he’s a bad guy?”

“Your father likes to say that it’s dangerous to judge aliens by human morality standards,” Max responded. “I don’t know if he’s a bad guy or not. But he’s probably not mind controlling your dad.”

“Probably?”

Max shrugged. “Nothing in life is a hundred percent certain.”

Great. How comforting. 

In any case, she didn’t have enough information about the Eldritch to know for sure how to feel about her father’s friendship with one. But she would find out more once she got access to the Undernet.

Hopefully, Naem wouldn't tell her father about her little soul secret before then. He still hadn’t. She now made it a point to activate <Charades Champion> every time she saw her dad, just to check if maybe he knew or suspected something. But all she would read from him was regular affection and love.

It made her feel guilty for suspecting him. For lying to him. 

But she kept doing it anyway. 

Hours later, after Uncle Max got his nap in, they arrived at the busy Moulding station, with most of the people already clamoring to get on the bus before the bus touched the ground and the metallic retractable steps had even been let down. The driver ordered them to wait until passengers dismounted and they were doing just that.

But then Max frowned and put his hand out to stop Lexie from dismounting while he was on the step down. 

“Wait,” he said and surveyed the area. His eagle-eyed gaze swept across the empty streets and uncovered the corners. His tense stance showed he was ready for anything. 

Of course, his cautiousness drew attention both from the annoyed driver and the annoyed patrons wanting to get on.

“Are you moving or not, Cyclops?” one person called out and snickered while nudging his companion in the elbow. That was until Max’s eye trained on the guy. 

Then he swallowed and looked away uncomfortably, shifty under the dangerous gleam and Max’s shark-like grin.  

“Cyclops,” Max said thoughtfully. “I like that.”

And with that, he retreated his hands and set off, gesturing for Lexie to follow him. She threw the patrons an apologetic smile as she dismounted and passed through them.

“Is it that uncommon to find Eldritch creatures in dungeons?” she asked him while they were on the move. 

“Is there a reason why you aren’t bugging your dad with all these questions instead of me?”

She pursed her lips. Things were still a little awkward between Aiden and her, and their conversations had been stilted as of late. Not due to lack of effort on Aiden’s part. He was charming as always and always eager to talk to her. But the whole thing about him potentially finding out she wasn’t his daughter soon made her want to detach. And she also didn’t trust him entirely to tell her the whole truth about Naem.

And Aiden seemed to sense that she needed space, and so he’d gotten quieter. Yesterday, before bed he’d said, “Don’t feel like there’s anything you can’t tell me, Lex. No matter what happens, I’m still your dad. And I’ll love you regardless.”

Which of course, only made Lexie feel even ten times worse about the fact that she was a big fat imposter. Avoiding him didn’t feel good either, and it hurt her every time she thought about how he felt, which was probably why she was trying to distract herself by bugging her Uncle with questions.

Of course, she didn’t tell Max any of this. Apart from the fact that it was a secret, he didn’t often want to be bothered with mushy talk. So she simply said, “I don’t think Dad knows all that much about dungeons.”

Max snorted. “He knows a lot more than you think.”

She frowned. “What do you mean?”

But he simply looked at her, smiled, and looked away silently.

The further down they went, the worse it began to look. The roads had more cracks in their pavements and the walls appeared more dilapidated. The air quality wasn’t great either, the stench of smog and garbage choking out the oxygen.  Anxiety started to race through her and she stuck close to Max’s side trying to keep an eye out for the boys. 

As they turned the familiar corner, she activated her <All Eyes on Me> card, and felt a faint prickle on her neck. 

They were here. 

She was about to warn her uncle when he suddenly pulled to a stop. 

Faster than she could even blink, Uncle Max shoved him behind his body with one hand, while the other flashed out with a gun in hand pointing straight into the air. 

Except it wasn’t air at all. As Lexie focused, she saw that there was a slight shimmer to it, and the light refracted around it too. 

“You keep that up and I’m going to paint that wall with your brains, kid,” Max said. “Deactivate. Now.”

And to prove he was serious, he cocked the gun and a slight whizzing could be heard. The gun looked like a flintlock pistol but had a barrel like a cannon. 

“The trigger is time-sensitive,” he said. “And the more of my time you waste, the angrier it gets. Which means the worse it will hurt when the bullet enters you.  And you’ll die slowly but certainly. ”

The gun clicked again, like a latch being opened, and it started whizzing at a higher register. 

Lexie wondered what the point of that timing mechanism was. Knowing Max, he’d probably just added it for the sole prospect of psychologically torturing whoever was at the other end of the barrel. She had to say it was pretty effective because if it was aimed at her, she would be pissing herself right now. 

The target must have attempted to run because the gun shifted suddenly and he shot a silent bullet that exploded in the air.

Lexie gaped at it. That was incredible. The explosion was almost entirely quiet but it rippled with a heat in its wake that would have probably melted someone from the inside out. 

Luckily, there was no blood or guts attached, so Lexie figured her Uncle had just fired a warning shot.

“You get that I can see you, right?” Uncle Max continued to speak in that mild tone. “Now turn that stupid shit off before I get mad.”

“Okay, okay.” The trembling voice came a second before the shimmering glass unclicked loudly and retreated like Iron Man’s suit back into a bracelet around the trembling arm of a boy. He didn’t look any older than seventeen, with freckles on his face, and red hair shorn short. He also had tanned skin with a scar on his cheek and bumps where he had been nicked shaving. Plus a bulbous Adam’s apple.

Oh, also, his eyes looked wide and terrified as he stared down the barrel of the gun.

“Please don’t kill me,” he pleaded, his voice cracking. “We weren’t going to do anything.”

“Save the act, I wasn’t born yesterday. Call your friends down here or, we’re gonna have that brain-painting session real soon.”

“They won’t come even if I call them. Not even if you sh-shoot me,” he stammered and swallowed. “In our gang, it’s…it's everyone for themselves. We don’t give ourselves up when one of us gets caught. No negotiations. It’s part of the order. And we don’t know any personal information about each other so that it can’t be tortured out of us.”

It was kind of wild and sad to hear such a young boy talking about stuff like that, but Uncle Max seemed more bored by it. “Sucks for you then.”

He activated the trigger again and the boy squeaked and threw his hands up closing his eyes. 

Lexie also grabbed Max’s arm to tell him to stop. Was he going to murder this kid out in broad daylight?

But then a whizz echoed all around them, and suddenly she felt the pressure of bodies surrounding her, like all of a sudden the wind wasn’t reaching them anymore. 

“Aww, see. They do care.” Uncle Max glanced around at the still air. “Nice of you to join us, boys. Now whose kneecap do I have to shoot to get some answers around here?”

“We’ve got you surrounded.” One of them said. “And we've got guns too.”

The forced confidence in the voice told me that that statement was not entirely true. 

And Max must have thought the same thing because he smiled. 

“We’ll shoot you and your daughter.” The voice came again. “So don’t do anything stupid. Remember, we outnumber you.”

“That’s cute.” Another click came from his gun. “How much do you wanna bet that I can take out all of you with one bullet?”

“Max?” One of them suddenly said and once again the glass and metallic glass armor retreated to reveal a brown-haired stout twenty-something-year-old. “Max Devereaux ?”

Max's smile dropped. “Who told you my government name sasquatch?”

“It’s me, Lenny.” The man looked excited grinning.  “I remember you. You used to come to Red Street all the time for weapons and stuff. My dad told me you two went to school together.  His name is Giorgio Valdam."

He frowned. “Your’e Giorgio’s kid?”

He nodded. “Yup. This whole time I thought he was shitting me when he told me that he knew Mad Eye Max the Dungeon Delver. I didn’t put two and two together that you were Max Devereaux.”

“No way.” Three other boys appeared out of nowhere to gape at Max 

The one with a mop of curly blonde hair had pure adulation in his voice when he said, “You’re Mad Eye Max.”

The one with a shaved head that had captured Xena the other time, peered at Max his eyes hovering over the eyepatch. “You really are him. You look different in video. Angrier."

“And you’re Foster’s kid aren’t you?” Max asked. “Yeah. I remember you. What the heck are you trying to do robbing people?”

“We weren’t going to rob you,” he scoffed. “Robbery is for wimps. We were going to knock you out, take you hostage, and demand a ransom."

“And that was how you were going about it?” Uncle Max looked almost disappointed. “How many times exactly have you succeeded so far?”

They blushed. Not many Lexie was guessing.

She was remaining quiet still gripping the back of Max's shirt when someone said. 

“Wait so this is your daughter?”

“God-daughter.”

Shaved Head looked entirely chagrined by the discovery. 

“Dude,” Curly Top stage-whispered to him. “You tried to kidnap his goddaughter.”

“Shut up. It’s not like I knew who she was.” He cleared his throat and tried to pretend like he wasn’t mortified by his gaff. “Anyway, I’m sorry about that. Believe it or not, it was one of the first times we’ve tried that and if it makes you feel any better she gave us a hard time.”

“She did?”

“Yup. She somehow managed to reverse our magnet or something. I didn’t know she had a field reverser.”

“She probably doesn’t,” Max said with a tinge of pride. “She’s just really damn smart. Although not smart enough to avoid this place.” He looked down at her and Lexie gave him a weak smile. She could only hope they would keep secret the pesky detail of her coming here with only Xena before.

“Don’t tell Dad,” she said.  

He smirked. “Now you owe me a favor, scamp.” He turned back to the boys and continued. ”I’m going to have to knee-cap one of you for attempting to kidnap my goddaughter. No hard feelings, just to send a message to other potential kidnappers in the area. Which one of you wants to take it?”

They gaped at each other, horror filling their eyes.

“We said we’re sorry,” Freckles stammered.

Uncle Max cocked an eyebrow. “If you were really sorry, you wouldn't mind losing a kneecap for atonement."

“It’s fine Uncle Max,” Lexie said because she really didn’t want to see anyone’s kneecap get blown out.  “Let’s just go.”

Shaved Head seemed to sense that getting on Lexie’s good side was the key to appeasing her Uncle so he smiled. “You’re heading to the Genius Bar again, aren't you? We’ll take you.” He sounded a little overeager as the rest of his gang nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah, we’ll walk you there. It’s not safe to travel alone around here. Lots of pervs and bad guys around.”