In the basement of Goldfish City’s city hall was a secret conference room. It was in this room that the city’s leadership discussed their most sensitive plans. No one in the public knew of the room’s existence, and the room itself was protected by a robust number of magical and mundane security measures.
Yet, Tyrek Decker was only slightly surprised when he saw his daughter Mikaela slip past the guards and through a heavily-armored door like it was nothing. No one knew why the gods allowed the existence of the special-systems. Some rumored that the special systems were something that were included in the grand kit that was used to create the Nebbian Nebula and the immortal powers-that-be were simply unable to do anything against them. Whatever the case might be, all who knew of the special systems knew without a doubt that they were more unbalanced than a one-wheeled tricycle.
The rest of Decker Patriarch’s companion reacted with more shock and anger. One getting up and calling for the guards. The others rose out of their seats and armed themselves in preparation for an attack. Others still simply sputtered and made appalled faces.
“Hi, Daddy!” said Mickey. Her voice sing-song.
“Hello, daughter of mine…” said Tyrek. Using that moment to calm the frazzled nerves of his peers.
“Just what can I do for you this evening?” said Tyrek. Sighing inwardly.
“I just got a visit from that poopy butt, Jay-Jay. He came to warn me about some bad stuff that’s going to be happening soon. Apparently, the city doesn’t survive to see tomorrow,” said Mickey.
Tyrek frowned, unable to remember the name. He didn’t have any children or associates named Jay-Jay….but knowing his daughter it might just be a nickname. However, it wasn’t one he could remember her using. Then there was the mention of the city not surviving what was coming. How did this “Jay-Jay” know what the city was planning? Was it possible he was in like with the Three-Note Corporation and he was trying to threaten them into giving up their plans? The questions bounced in Tyrek’s head and as if to prove that he was indeed his daughter’s father, he simply pursued the questions as they occurred to him.
“Remind me...Who is this Jay-Jay again?” said Tyrek.
Mickey pouted, her cheeks inflating.
“Come on, Daddy...You know...Jay-Jay. He was the kid who used to stay with us and help out around the estate. Granny liked him, but the mommies liked to call him 'street rat',” said Mickey. Effectuating a snooty accent as she said the last bit.
Tyrek blinked as it suddenly clicked. He felt something that could only be described as a forehead flick from beyond the grave. The momentary pain was followed by the beginnings of a headache.
“Oh... 'That’ one,” said Tyrek. Remembering exactly who his daughter was talking about, because his mother, the former clan-head, had taken him aside one day, when he was about to give in to one his mother demanding wives, and told him that under no uncertain terms should they make that boy their enemy. He asked why, and Miranda Decker cryptically warned her child against asking about the affairs of the ancient and undying. Tyrek’s skepticism remained even now, but the ear boxing he received that day had become a lingering memory.
“What did this Jay-Jay, say exactly?” said Tyrek.
“He said that he’s leaving town, but since me and Granny were nice to him, he wanted to warn us that something bad is gonna happen,” said Mickey.
Tyrek nodded. Stroking his chin.
“Did he say anything else?”
“Nope...Then he just disappeared, like I can disappear, but like...different. It was actually pretty awesome, I’m always all ‘woosh’ but he was like...bwow...except super silent...Anyway, I’m gonna take the kids out of the city for a bit, but I’m afraid the older cousins and big sisses and the mommies aren’t gonna come along if you don’t say something,” said Mickey.
Tyrek gave his daughter a sidelong look. Her tone was playful but there was something stern and determined in her gaze. He remembered when a young woman in front of him could do naught but cry, not here she was not-so-subtly telling him of his intentions to collect and move all of the clan’s younger generation by force if necessary. Since that was the only way the other adults in the clan would allow her to take all the children. Seeing Mikaela’s determination helped Tyrek make up her mind.
“Very well...You can go tell the rest of the family that this little...excursion is on my orders,” said Tyrek. Quietly hoping that all this was just a flight of fancy on the part of his daughter and not some dark omen heralding the failure of his and compatriot’s ambition.
“Okie-doke, daddy...Do your best to come out of this alive. The mommies might be kinda mean to each other but they all love you, so I think it’ll probably be pretty bad if you don’t make it out of this,” said Mickey. Losing her playful tone and saying that last bit with a disconcerting graveness. Reminding Tyrek that his poor choice in spouses could lead to the clan splintering if he fell at this juncture.
Suddenly the girl was gone and the men and women who ruled Goldfish City were left in stunned silence.
“Just what the hell was that, Councilman Decker?!” said one woman, the matriarch of one of the city’s bigger families.
“That...was, my daughter, Councilwoman Olivier,” said Tyrek. Sighing. Feeling a growing dread and unease as he heard his Mother’s words echoing in his ears. Making it harder and harder for him to play his daughter’s actions off as a joke.
“Yeah, we got that much….We’re asking about the rest of it,” said another member of the City Council.
Tyrek sighed again and then shook his head.
“That...That was perhaps a timely indication that things might not go as smoothly as we'd initially thought. Ladies and gentleman of the Council, I’m not sure about you but I’d like to vote for a shift from initiative A to initiative C. It might be too hasty to evacuate the whole city, but I’m starting to feel that reducing the amount of potential damage and lowering the amount of loss we might face in the case of the fall of this city, might be for the best,” said Tyrek.
“A shift from Initiative A to Initiative C?! Have you lost your mind and gone as cloud-headed as that daughter of yours?!” bellowed one of the Councilmen. A man with the surname Richards.
Tyrek ignored the insult to him and his daughter. His focus on persuading the rest of the council. The back of his mind satisfied with the knowledge that if he was very lucky, Richards would continue to be stubborn till the very end, ultimately taking himself out of the equation when whatever was coming, finally came and wiped out the city. An event that Tyrek found himself feeling strangely sure would come to pass. As if his mother’s stern, ice-cold, glare was coming down from the divine realms, killing off any of his usual tendency to hedge.
“My fellows of the Council...I’m not going to try and tell you what to do. And if that’s what you’ve decided I will stand by you, as we’ve all agreed...All I’m saying is that...I’d like to call for a fifteen-minute break, and during that fifteen-minute break I’m going to call my family, allies, and associates and advise them to leave the city’s vicinity…”
“But on what grounds?!” said a Councilwoman with the surname Li. An old friend and ally of Deckers.
Decker shrugged.
“I couldn’t rightly tell you...Those of you here, who know me, will know that I am a man who believes in reason and logic, yet our world, our Nebbia, is neither reasonable nor logical. Ours is a world where all stories are real. Curses and Favors can and have come back to make or break dynasties. Ten years ago, my mother, Miranda Decker, the former head of this council, took in what I assumed to be an ordinary youth, but warned me that there was something special about him. To this day I don’t know exactly what it is, but we all know what my mother used to be called,”
“Treasure Hunter…” mumbled one councilman.
“Goldwitch…” whispered another.
“Grandniece of the Lords and Ladies of Luck and Fortune…” said a third.
“Five years ago, that youth disappeared...Now on this night. This very night, on the eve our City’s biggest operation, to overtake and push out the Corporations that have been keeping the majority of this Channel under their heel, that ‘boy’ returns warning us of a bad outcome...I don’t know about you, but I don’t mind looking a bit foolish to make sure my loved ones and legacy are safe.”
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Despite the warning they’d been given, no one was willing to postpone the secret war that was coming. Too many preparations had already been made. The costs that had been paid were far too onerous for the call for blood to be ignored. The best Tyrek, and those who like him still believed in lessons of the legends, myths, and folklore, could do, was a call for extreme caution on the part of the city’s people, while doing their best to quietly shuffle out as many of the common-folk as they could without giving away the game.
Goldfish City was a Live-Site that was secretly at war with itself. The Corporations held control over the majority of the channel, but the families, the sects, and the guilds sought to topple their rule. The moment they were finally able to keep a Corporate representative from joining the City Council their plans of rebellion began. Initiatives A-D were attack plans that the City’s Rulers had formulated for finally ousting the corporate Tyrants.
Initiative A was the most aggressive of the attack plans, it was a full-on assault with all the assets that the city’s internal factions had at their disposal. The initiative grew more cautious and more reserved from there. Made with a mindset of responding to the surety of victory and their awareness of all the factors in the coming conflict. Despite
If initiative A was like a full-body tackle, or some kind of all or nothing flying drop-kick, where everything was thrown into a single attack, the other initiatives were more measured. Initiative B assumed that some factors were still unknown and held a portion of the resources in reserve. Initiative C was like quickly stabbing or shooting someone with the intention of running if they got up and prepared to give chase. It wasn’t quite guerilla fighting, but it came with the same run and gun mindset, that assumed the presence of a stronger enemy.
Thus as morning came the headquarters of the largest corporations in Goldfish City was swept into by the stealth-classed elite units of the various non-corporate factions. The hope was to kill as many of the corporate enforcers and corporate soldiers as possible before the Corporations could retaliate.
Everyone‘s breath was held for whatever unnamed doom that might come. Assuming it to be some kind of superweapon, or secret high-classed, high-level, fighter. What no one expected was for one of the Three-Note Corporation’s mages to try and fail in casting a summoning spell. Instead causing a ripple in the channel’s time-space continuum that woke up something that honestly would have made all parties postpone any ideas of hostilities if they knew it was there.
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Over on a hill, roughly a hundred miles away, Mickey Decker used a spyglass to observe the city from a distance. She had the best of views as two-thirds of the city was swallowed whole by a massive pair of jaws, and a humongous, unfathomably, large, human-faced megalodon emerged from the ground as if it were water. The coloration of the human-faced shark’s scales looked similar to the uniform of an average office-worker, complete with a button-down shirt and tie.
The creature swallowed a large portion of the city. Then the beast leaped through the air and “splashed” back down into the depths. Creating waves of dust, soil, and flame that devastated everything within and around what was left of the city.
“Oh, no! D-, Daddy!” said Mickey. Her cries were echoed by tens of thousands of the voices below her perched, as others gasped in horror and confusion over what they’d just seen. Dumped into despair by the knowledge that the thing they’d just seen was something that no one could ever survive.
