Chương 182: CDM 3, Chapter 58: Civil Disobedience

We spent another four days on the road before we slept in a hotel instead of on the side of the road or in an empty parking lot. The combined cloud of funk wafting off of six people confined to an ice cream truck made the aroma of the D-Wagon, my old car, seem like potpourri. Finally getting to shower with mostly warm water was absolute bliss.

With my head leaning against a motel shower with questionable stains, I checked my system profile: Class: Archer Level: 13 XP Progress: 88, 619 / 409, 600 Str: 10 Dex: 19 Con: 14 Int: 9 Cha: 3 Abilities: Piercing Shot Dual Nocking Multi-Shot Vengeful Arrow Splintering Arrow Traits: Ranged Accuracy Improved Reload Sharpen Momentum Swift Hands Bloody Hands Battle Hardened Improved Recovery Steady Hands Spells: (none) We culled our second tribe of bugbears earlier that morning, but this one was so much smaller that we wondered if it was a scouting party rather than the entirety of a bugbear group.

We couldn't find evidence of other bugbears nearby, so we probably would never really know either way. We were certain, however, that another five bugbears were dead. And my level progress had barely moved. The system was an asshole for all sorts of reasons. Filling an unprepared world with man-eating monsters was the biggest reason, but for me, wild monsters giving functionally zero XP was in the top 5, at least. Wild monsters were more difficult to kill than their dungeon counterparts.

In my early days of hunting, I thought that conclusion was more my perception than any kind of fact. I believed that, perhaps, wild monsters seemed harder to slay because the battlefield environment was new to me. At this point, I believed it was fact. Wild monsters were greater challenges than dungeon monsters, and a reasonable system would account for that in the XP I earned. But it didn't. I looked at my progress again: XP Progress: 88, 619 / 409, 600 Jesus. Level 14 was years away with this kind of progress.

Enforcer McDouglas promised to level me to 20, but he never said when that would happen. I stepped out of the shower. Nathan and I were sharing a room so de Saint could share with Megan instead of one of the guys. She didn't seem to care all that much, but this was still a CDM-sponsored op, so we had the stipend to spend. Besides, one of the hundreds of CDM training modules I sat through probably had a few slides about what was and was not appropriate for work trips.

"Pizza just got here," Nathan said.

"I'll try to save you a piece or two," I replied.

"Don't do that to me, bro, not even in jest."

"I wouldn't. The water wasn't hot from the start, by the way. The pressure kind of sucks too."

"Any kind of shower beats the hobo baths we've been taking. I'll be down in a bit." This motel advertised in-room air conditioning units, which was technically true. I wished, however, that they had mentioned that none of them were actually functional. Setting up chairs next to the truck and eating outside was far more comfortable, so I joined Megan and Giago in sharing greasy pizza. Like Nathan, de Saint and Hornby were still washing up.

"Where are we headed next?" I asked, gently tipping my pizza to the side to release grease pooled in the pepperoni.

"Near a town called Red Jacket," Megan answered with her mouth full.

"Two hours south of here. That bugbear sighting is less than 24 hours old, and de Saint found a few posts via Domestic Dungeons about them too. Seems like a good lead."

"You good, Gray?" Giago asked.

"Yeah, that name sounds familiar to me, though. Can I see the map?" Megan lifted her hands to show that they were far too greasy to handle anything but the toppings sliding off her crust. I retrieved it myself and looked for Red Jacket. Megan helped with a pinky point while still avoiding touching the map itself.

"Oh, now I remember. Red Jacket is near Matewan," I declared.

"My grandfather would have slapped me upside the head for forgetting."

"Go on," Giago encouraged.

"We've got time for a story."

"A few of the battles of the West Virginia Mine Wars happened there. Coal companies used the concept of company stores and company towns to turn miners into indentured servants, basically. They got paid in scrip that was only good at the company store, which set up a system where they never really got ahead and also couldn't easily leave if they wanted. That was on top of coal mines being crazy dangerous.

You risked your life and destroyed your body for a company that bent over backward to pay you as little as possible. This was all pre-unions, by the way."

"Was it a real 'war' or was that just a catchy name?" Megan asked. If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

"The Matewan Massacre happened when the coal company–sorry that I don't remember the name–hired private detectives to evict families from the company town for attempting to unionize. A bunch of miners ambushed them on their way out and killed several of them." I turned the map to Megan and Giago and pointed to Blair Mountain, northeast of Matewan.

"The way my grandfather told it, over 10, 000 miners united to form 'the Redneck Army,' all wearing red bandanas to show their solidarity. A lot of them were WWI vets, so they had the skills and knowledge to set up on a ridgeline to face a private army, blocking their way to Matewan. Coal mining families came together behind the scenes too, donating supplies and giving food to the miners. Few hundred miners died in the effort."

"Wow," Megan said.

"I've never heard any of this. Is that where Red Jacket got its name?"

"No idea," I admitted. Giago wiped his mouth.

"Ever hear about the Battle of the Overpass?" Megan and I shook our heads.

"Ford didn't like the United Auto Workers attempting to unionize their people, so he sent Pinkertons and local police in to beat the shit out of them."

"I've never heard that story either," Megan admitted.

"I think that's just a local history thing," Giago explained.

"I'm from Michigan, so people talk a lot about the heyday of car manufacturing. Can't avoid talking about union busters if you're rambling about the history of the automotive industry. If you didn't grow up around it, I'm not surprised you never heard about it."

"That was definitely not part of the Henry Ford unit we covered in sophomore history class," Megan said.

"Right?" Giago replied through a big bite of cheese pizza.

"Oh wow, he invented the assembly line. Let's just ignore the part where he hired hitmen."

"If you don't fight for yourself, no one will," Megan said.

"That's my takeaway from stories like those. Is that how pap-pap Carmino felt?"

"He compared mining companies and workers to the Egyptians using Israelites as slaves. He sometimes talked about Jesus trashing a temple because he was angry about money changers being there, but my grandfather preferred the Egyptian comparison. He liked that the evil Egyptians were properly punished."

"Sounds like quite the hard ass," Giago observed.

"That's the kind of old-timer that enjoyed getting out the belt when kids fuck up."

"He had a wooden paddle hanging in the kitchen that he preferred, actually." As I risked sleeping under the covers of our questionable accommodations, I took advantage of the barest amount of reception to savor mindlessly scrolling. Beth was doing well. Pittsburgh had a crawler convention coming up in the summer, and she convinced Frank to get a table there. She was excited to learn how that side of marketing worked and to attend her very first crawl-con.

The only negative news she had to share was the growing belief among Dungeon Divas fans that we were all not, in fact, hot babes. For the first time, our subscriber numbers went down instead of up, and the comments from people leaving called out the gender deception as their reason for unsubscribing. Whatever. If the CDM kept paying us for hunts, we would make up for any ad revenue we might lose. The rest of the news was more of the same. New York City was still attempting to evacuate all of its citizens.

Many refused to leave their homes behind in the wake of rampant looting, and the people who did leave ended up in refugee camps in upstate New York or northern Pennsylvania. What was the ultimate solution to the bright slime crisis? No one had one yet. More dungeons surged, which meant more civilian deaths. Speaking of civilian deaths, supporters of George Baker were planning a massive march on Washington to protest his recent arrest.

Federal prosecutors argued that Baker was still liable for CKs committed before the passage of the Baker Bill, and that upset Baker's increasingly rabid fanbase. The Kingdom of Assam threw a few spells at a Royal Air Force helicopter hovering over their home as a warning for it to leave. When the Brits came back the next day, the spells didn't miss, marking the first casualties in what was looking like a new conflict. Active mana levels continued to rise.

A few scientists argued that we hadn't proven the connection to Stage 2 gates, but most people broadly accepted that more active mana meant more gate activity. A werewolf attack in Texas turned into a witch hunt. Reporters had yet to verify if the people they killed in retaliation were actually werewolves. A Dutch metal band proudly celebrated becoming vampires and invited fans and concertgoers to join them. I sighed and put down my phone.

"You alright, man?" Nathan asked from his bed. He lay on his back with only his head propped up by a pillow so he could see his phone. The angle pressed his chin against his chest.

"I liked when the internet was mostly dumb, funny content," I answered.

"Instead, it's like mainlining the worst of everything all at once." Nathan texted me a link, giggling to himself as he tapped and pecked.

"I don't understand your obsession with this subreddit. What is so funny about cars hitting buildings?"

"How does a Corolla in the window of an Arby's not make you laugh?" Nathan countered.

"Every time I see the yinzhittinbilldins label next to a crash like that, I fucking die."

"I think I'm just jealous I don't have something like that."

"The yinzhittinbilldins subreddit is always accepting new members."

"Is that all you're doing? Looking at car crashes?" Nathan shook his head.

"Nah, that was just my appetizer. I'm deep down a hole on new moon research."

"Anything interesting?"

"JAXA believes their samples prove that the moon was volcanic at one point."

"That's a wild thing to picture," I said.

"Did they find any kind of life?"

"Nope, and the early conclusions say they won't. So far, they haven't found organic compounds or any evidence of minerals being influenced by water. Without that stuff, probably no life to find. I signed up for the Mars lottery, by the way. You should too."

"What are you talking about?"

"There's a new startup that wants to establish a colony on Mars ten years from now and are making a list of volunteers who are willing to go."

"I read that kind of thing would be a one-way trip."

"Sure is," Nathan replied.

"But the chance to be one of the first humans living on another planet? Holy shit, bro. That'd be so freaking cool."

"What if they don't let you take Lil' Dorion?" I asked.

"Don't joke about things like that."

"Does Megan want to go to Mars too?"

"I assume so."

"Bet you she doesn't." Nathan scoffed.

"Who wouldn't want to go to Mars?" He typed a quick text and read a reply an instant later.

"Oh, she doesn't want to go."

"Told you." Still reading from his phone, he added, "And she thinks it's interesting that I would make such a massive life decision without talking to her about it. Bro, I think you just got me in trouble."

"I'm not the one who wanted to abandon my Earth girlfriend."

"Shut up." I laughed. Sighing, Nathan set his phone down.

"They said the Mars mission would be hard on us. I didn't know that started immediately."