Wide eyed, Yeung-Sung gritted his teeth and asked, “What do I do? How does the fighting work?”

“Ah, relax,” Von Martin said. He had come back too, but with drinks for everyone spread out between his fingers. He rolled his eyes. “The game is turn-based.” He dealt each drink to grateful, nodding heads and sat back beside Mamba. “All you have to do is select a target and -oh, the armour thing.”

Yeung-Sung took a sharp breath and nearly downed the entire pint before him. Gasping, he prepared himself and looked at the screen. His avatar switched his weight from foot to foot. The barbarians raised their dirt-packed weapons and hollered, but stood in their spots respectfully, waiting for Yeung-Sung to make his move.

“Oh.” His pint glass was rattling against the table from the careless way he placed it down. He scrunched his face up.

“It is a tutorial, Yeung-Sung,” Wil chuckled. “Not sure what you expected.”

The camera panned out, the tutorial highlighting the first enemy. He drew a line from his avatar towards it. “I guess I took the realism too seriously,” Yeung-Sung said, watching with a blank expression.

Unstoppable, his avatar dismembered each barbarian one by one. Severed limbs dropped like heads of corn to his sickle. When one fell, another got the chance to retaliate but their blades didn’t even pierce his bare, golden chest. Pausing in astonishment of his own power, Yeung-Sung’s character shouldered on, following the hair-like path that led his way until only he remained. When it was over, the camera shrunk back down to focus on the avatar, who stared out determinedly from the middle of the screen. Then began to run.

But Yeung-Sung watched, mouth open in horror, as the dehumanized corpses faded into the background. Unlike the logs and stone did earlier, nothing was collected; it was simply a scene of slaughter, quickly forgotten in favour of a text box that popped up, reading:

[The people of these lands have forgotten the past, forgotten who you are.]

Wooden buildings rolled in at the sides. His avatar had entered a town.

[ Soon, you will make them remember…]

Shirley applauded, giving him a tight smile.

“Right, so that’s the tutorial. Now the game opens up,” Wil said, happily guzzling between sentences.

He pointed at the stubs of tabs along either side of the screen. Yeung-Sung dragged one of them out. Its emblem was a market tent.

“This is your hub,” Wil continued, “From here you can go and do what you like; farm, craft, trade. But most importantly; challenge the Gauntlet.” He took a dramatic pose and projected his voice. “The next fight our golden gods have against the heathens of this world.”

Yeung-Sung blinked in surprise. He put his phone down and rubbed his eyes.

“It’s pretty minimalist storytelling,” Sykes admitted.

“The first Gauntlet was just beaten earlier,” said Shirley, “which kick-started the economy.”

“Yeah, but how?” Yeung-Sung asked, “This is a neat little game -the cut-scenes are well made, and it seems cool, but where does the money come in?”

“Beating the Gauntlet,” Wilhelm repeated with his same aggravated tone. “Each one you defeat awards you with a medal.”

“That’s the name of the currency,” Shirley added.

Yeung-Sung squeezed his head. “I know. I get that part, but…how? How does this translate into real, everyday spending money?”

Before anyone could give him any other answers, the door of the Joint Wick burst open.

A woman wearing a perfect ratio of red:blue clothes shouted from the doorway.

“Leave me alone, Shane!” She ducked as she came in. Smiling around at everyone, she looked back every few seconds with a frown. “Hey guys. Happy reset and all that.”

“Those commies keeping yeh back from us, lassie?” asked the old man at the bar. Steph, that’s his name. At the same time, others chimed in with their own greetings, but none more so than Mamba, who took her firmly under her arm to immediately chat.

Wilhelm and Martin elbowed Yeung-Sung, winking. Yeung-Sung took his eyes of her, swallowing.

“Anita, “Wilhelm said, leaning up close, “She’s a bartender. Well, the only other bartender we have apart from Darnes.”

Martin covered his mouth with his hand and whispered, “Honestly, she does te-rrible job., but she keeps the men drinking, eh?” He nudged Yeung-Sung in the side again, pointing at the suddenly alert men at the counter -Steph, Hans, Fenrick.

Wrinkling his forehead, Yeung-Sung gave a slow nod. Wilhelm craned over and brought his voices down. “Mamba hates her, secretly. Despises her.”

“What?” said Yeung-Sung, “Doesn’t look like it.”

“Yup, secretly they despise each other. Light and Dark,” he shrugged and upturned his glass on the table. “It’s kind of funny though.” When Anita left the Mamba’s clutches, Yeung-Sung observed her as she strode behind the bar, greeting her patrons.

She sticks out like a berry in a bun. Most of the residents wear clothes that betray who they were on the outside: Darnes’s business suit; Han’s dark greaser jacket; Fenrick’s woolly pullover. Hmm. But she struts around like a punk Statue of Liberty. Red top, denim jeans, left and right leggings in a crosshatch design partway between fishnets and Spiderman.

Everything about the symbolism makes me want to gag but…damn! She’s really beautiful.

She put on her apron. Partially obscured by the taps, she spoke with her boss, taking a sweeping look around. It was only when Anita’s gaze fell upon Yeung-Sung in his own purple shirt -and as he bowed his hello- that he realised that she had her loyalty to the colony plastered all over her.

“Try it for yourself”.

Yeung-Sung turned his attention back to the booth “Huh?”

Shirley was crossing his arms again, flexing them as he gave him a judgemental look. “If you’re finished looking, try buying a drink for yourself.”

Wilhelm coughed out a laugh. “Actually, you’re gonna grab the next round. Right? It’s only fair. Besides, look at the top here, you’ve got a hundred minims to spare. Not like you have rent to pay, is it?”

Von Martin grinned at the idea and soon enough Yeung-Sung was forcibly ushered off the couch. Shirley handed him his phone from the table. “You’ll need this.”

Yeung-Sung hesitated, looking at his balance. “This was for doing the tutorial?”

“No-no”

“Are you kidding me?” Wilhelm laughed, spitting out his drink. “For that?”

Sykes waved Wil away, saying, “Mate, that’s a global reward from beating the first gauntlet.” He spread out his arms and swivelled, looking up. “It’s why we’re all here. Because we can spend money now, even -even Shane. How’r’ya Shane!”

Waving back, a wiry, unkempt beard covered Shane’s smile. Clapping Yeung-Sung on the shoulder, Sykes joined the rest of the bar in greeting him, filling the bar with cheer and banter once again. Carefully holding his phone, Yeung-Sung made his own way up too. The cheers grew louder as he approached, with Steph, Wil and Von Martin clinking their empty glasses together above their heads. Moving through them, he met Shane at the bar, exchanged nods with him, but then he promptly slipped out the gap Yeung-Sung made, excusing himself.

Shocked at how quickly he abandoned their introduction, Yeung-Sung watched him ducking away in his crumpled jean-jacket, in a creased posture, peering back with bloodshot eyes.

Turning to Wil, Yeung-Sung said, “He looks tired.”

Wil cocked his head. “Huh? Ahh, that’s just the way he is.”

“Don’t judge,” Martin warned before he had a chance to say anything. “The colony is a fresh start for some of us.”

Sykes took a spot shouldering him. He finished a gulp with a satisfied Ahh and said, “He’s colony old guard.” He motioned behind the bar. “Been here even before our lad Darnes. If it wasn’t for his suggestions to GLI, we might not even have a bar.”

Steph sat upright, eyes wide like heavy moons, “The ‘orror!”

Pressing his lips together, Yeung-Sung nodded, but he couldn’t help but track the bedraggled man once more out the corner of his eye as he was closing the bathroom door. Still, compared to everyone else -who feels genuine- this Shane guy seems different.

“Don’t mind him, sugar. What’ll you have?”

Yeung-Sung faced the counter to see Anita swaying herself from side to side.

Wait a moment… Yeung-Sung thumbed in the direction of the bathroom. “Did he do something to you?”

Anita stopped mid swing and rolled her eyes “Nah. He’s always been a bit of a creep.” She gripped the edge of the bar noticeably harder. “Trying to get any kind of attention he can from me.”

From around the bar some of the older regulars came to her defence;

“And would you blame him?” chuckled Hans.

Fenrick rubbed his fingers together. “Maybe if he paid up a bit more,”.

Yeung-Sung noticed Wil hide his face in his pint and turn elsewhere.

“Let’s just say,” Steph said as he stretched his arm and back, creaking like bamboo, “That there’s a bit of history there.”

Not meeting their eyes, Anita coughed sharply. “Anyway, he’s old news.” She broke open a new face, suddenly cheery. “You’re the good news we need around here,” she said and began to pour.

“Hey, I didn’t order yet,” Yeung-Sung exclaimed.

She sighed. “A round for the booth? Honey, I know.”

“And one for Shane,” Darnes added behind her.

Frowning, she ditched her cheeriness and focused her attention on the taps. “And one for Shane,” she muttered.

Impatient heads bobbed al around Yeung-Sung, who was giving Anita a narrow look.

“In the meantime,” Anita continued, “you can tell me about yourself, Pak, love. Oh… and your total is 60 minims.”

She pushed out a square scanner that in front of him. Taking it, Yeung-Sung held the device in the centre of its palm. It’s tiny. Inspecting it, he noticed that the same filaments grew out of the top of the device as the lettuce he found in his store. As they were squirming in a strangely organic way, Yeung-Sung scrolled through pesticide brands in his mind while he hooked the back of his phone into them.

[Spend 60mm at JNTWCK?]

[ACCEPT] [DENY]

He accepted. It then asked him for identification, so he brought his fingertip up behind the sensor on his phone.

“No, up here, honey,” Anita said, gesturing to the wormy till.

His neck bulging as he swallowed, he forfeited the index finger of his left hand. A pulse of fear went through him. The filaments felt like receiving a metallic lick.

[CONFIRMED], a prompt displayed, and faded. Yeung-Sung exhaled. “That wasn’t so bad.”

A wave of cheer rang out from the booth. Even the fellows at on the stools gave him a respectful nod. Anita handed her his first, frothy glass which Yeung-Sung gleefully gave to Steph. He waited for Yeung-Sung to get his own and then, together with the rest of the bar side, they raised their drinks in a toast; “To another reset!”