When they walked into the White House, it didn’t differ much from the first time Colt had entered. There was a pristine sterileness to the air, one that reminded him of the other government buildings he’d been in his entire life. Oppressive and dull by design, from the rows of seats before the receptionist to the fact that the lady was even now reading a book and barely gave them a glance as they entered.

  Out of everything that might carry over from the world before the System, the humdrum bloated feel of a government building was the last thing Colt would’ve wished for.

  Colt strode up to the desk and reined in his growing concern. The changes in New Nashville he’d seen were getting under his skin; though he didn’t owe loyalty to any particular place, he felt like these people deserved better than they were currently getting.

  “We’re here to see Denny. We’ve just returned from clearing a dungeon,” Colt said. The guard who’d escorted them in gave a small wave as he heard him issue their business. He then turned around and returned outside, his work done.

  The lady frowned as she looked at Colt and his whole squad.

  “Please take a seat, we’ll call you to his office one by one. I expect it might be a wait, our new governor is quite busy.”

  “We missed the election,” Colt crossed his arms and didn’t move to the seats at all.

  The lady gave him an annoyed look—and pointed at one of the drab, uncomfortable wooden chairs.

  Colt still didn’t move, and taking his lead, neither did the other three of his party. Though Julia was still wiping at her face and giving the occasional shiver, she lingered with Sarah, drawing on her strength for support as she still wrestled with returning to reality.

  “There wasn’t one.” She said, and then pointed again at the seats, “Sit down.”

  “We just returned from clearing a dungeon to find out a man has elected himself from mayor to governor in a place that has been screaming about being a reborn land of the free since I first got here weeks ago—but no, please tell me to go sit down and politely wait quietly for my turn.” Colt rolled his eyes and then looked at the stairs past the lady.

  At his level, only a few people in this city could rival him. Denny for one, last he’d see the guy he was sitting at level 53. Maybe his wind lieutenant and a couple more.

  So, Colt reached a decision: Fuck bureaucracy.

  If those in power wanted to abuse it to their benefit and obfuscate what they were doing behind the scenes, as they had in the old world, he would simply cut through it. It would no longer shackle him and hide secrets behind those curtains.

  The lady made one more gesture for him to return to his seat; Colt walked right past her and up the stairs. She yelled, and guards began to pull in from behind, asking for him to stop. But he wasn’t alone. Walking in stride behind him were Nick, Sarah, and Julia. Their cumulative power made the guards hesitate to make them stop, and where the only real barrier to entry was polite requests for him to hold up, Colt wouldn’t bend his will and rollover.

  They went up the drab steps—the first floor was a set of dull, uninspired offices painted with eggshell white walls and decorated with those soul-crushing cubicles that businesses loved to use. The lighting was the type that found a place in all offices: a boring overhead bar-light which gave a headache after spending too long under it.

  The next floor was a little less drab. It consisted of wooden paneling decorated by finer offices. It was the place where the new regime of minor city officials was to be housed. The upper class on the hierarchy—some of them were in there now, in business suits, talking to one another. Their jaws dropped as Colt stalked by, hounded by a group of guards telling him to turn around. They weren’t too happy with gawkers here, and were even less happy with the angry group of guards following Colt.

  They too, joined the parade up the steps.

  Kind of sad, really. Even here in this new world with Stats and growing powers, these people still found a place to set up and spin red-tape.

  It was on the fourth floor that they finally arrived at their fated land. A big white door sat at the forefront. Within it was the former mayor's office, now turned governor's office.

  Colt kicked it open.

  Denny sat at a larger, finer desk than last time. His hands folded neatly on the table, and he had a smile on his face; that big oversized black cowboy hat of his was on said desk—revealing the balding hairline beneath. Behind him was the Wind Mage Colt had seen before; the first thing he did was fire off an Inspect on both.

  The Wind Mage’s name was Albert—level 52, and Denny had gotten to 62. How the guy was stacking levels while working as a governor and taking more and more control of this city was beyond Colt… With an epic class, Denny had a little more than sixty raw stat points over him, but…

  Well, Colt didn't know the skills and Edicts part. All Denny had was his one Edict, Lead, still at Lesser rank.

  “Didn’t feel like waiting in reception? Ya gotta have a bit more patience than that, my boy. Running a city is a hard job.” Denny leaned back with a fake smile; he looked past Colt at the gaggle of guards following like baby ducks. “You boys can go and head back to your posts; I’ll take our dungeon diving group in for a chat they sorely want.”

  The guards looked confused among each other, and one more hand wave from Denny finally got them to head back on out.

  Colt folded his arms and stared at the two men. Albert leaned against the window, almost looking bored as he took in their invaders.

  “Well, lots changed. Congratulations on taking out another D-; Think by now you’re the only dungeon divers I’d trust with that. Rest of them aint growing as quick. Might say you’ve a natural talent for growing in this new world.”

  “You have Citizen Classes’ now?”

  “Mhmm. And finally, now, we’re issuing our dungeon divers the rank of Special Soldier—A class ‘A’ Citizen with lots of perks to go with it. House in the stands; just now building them, they’ll have quite the view, based on our architect designs. Private chef. Private everything—as our top soldiers and the ones taking on all the risk to clear the outsides for us, y’all have to be rewarded properly.”

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  Nate stepped forward, his eyes harsh as he looked Denny up and down. “You want us to be your soldiers?”

  “Well, now, of course. We need soldiers to face the dungeons. And outside of it… There’s going to be enemies who want what we’re building here—New Nashville is special. I’ve sent some scouts further, and we’re starting to hear back about other places… Atlanta’s broken down with constant bloody battles between warlords; a religious nut and his cult lead St. Louis… Memphis—anyone I sent over there ain’t come back. It’s a dangerous world now. We have to be primed to deal with it. So, y’all will be rewarded richly, and y’all will be expected to fight for our freedoms. Should you accept my offer.”

  Nate ground his teeth; “My days of being a soldier for someone else are over. I’m not fighting anyone else’s wars.”

  “It’d be your wars for your freedom,” Denny waved away the argument and sat up straighter, his eyes flickering to Colt.

  “Why are you governor?” Colt asked.

  “Necessity. We can have an election once things are settled and when my term ends.”

  “I don’t think you’re willing to give up your power.”

  Denny smiled pleasantly. “I’m a man looking out for the freedom of my people. Think of me like George Washington. Work with me, Colt. I see you have the drive that’ll getcha far in this world; we can free this great nation together, and at its end, we’ll be reunited again. That’s my vision.”

  “And what about our lower class citizens—what is the lowest rank?”

  “Not worth worrying about. Temporary measure. A controlled populace is an easy populace. We got things hard enough with what we got going on outside our walls—gotta keep it easy inside, to quote, ‘united we stand, divided we fall.’ I know how to manage people, Colt. I worked in human resources. It’s my thing. We’ll just keep them in line, grow our numbers, and the wrinkles will solve themselves. Truth is most’em won’t amount to anything—being a lower class citizen—that’s just the place they wanna be. If they wanna make something of themselves, they can join our military and show us. Earn their rights.” Denny rubbed at his forehead, and for the first time, Colt saw something in that mask slip. Annoyance.

  “That’s not very free,” Colt replied.

  “They can make their choices. How ain’t that free? They wanna grovel on the street and chase after pennies instead of dealing with the real world? That’s on them, not me. We have to be intentional with what we got.” Denny’s teeth were showing wider, and that fake smile was vanishing more by the second.

  He didn’t like that he was having to play nice.

  “I have two more questions.” Colt said, feeling the ‘warm welcome’ wearing thin. Soon, Denny would turn on them if he saw he wasn’t getting their way. They could fight it out in this office—Colt was tempted—but this was larger than them.

  Denny leaned back and sighed, “Shoot, soldier.”

  I am not your soldier.

  “The first thing: when we finish a dungeon, we get the message, ‘Rewards distributed to associated Faction.’ What does that mean?”

  “Need to know info. Earn your way into my cabinet through efforts and show you’re a better breed than the rest, and it’ll become clear. Until then, just know that your work is providing safety for the people of New Nashville, and you’ll be rewarded appropriately.” Denny’s lips went tight, and he gave a look to the Wind Mage near him.

  Sarah scowled at that.

  “Fuck you and your need-to-know bullshit—we almost died twice—what are you getting?”

  Colt felt a heat burn in him, too, but he made sure to hide it away, not giving Denny the satisfaction.

  Denny didn’t respond, his face slipping into a practiced bureaucrat mask. “You don’t like it? Then, you’re welcome to renounce your citizenship and leave our fair city. Go play around with the warring gangs in Atlanta, or maybe you can head up to St. Louis and have fun joining their cult. We’re a fine city, the best city, and only growing better by the day.”

  “Sure you are.” Sarah snorted; Julia gave a sob, and her expression softened, morphing her anger for the new ‘governor’ back to making sure their broken party member was fine. Honestly, what the girl needed was a day or two to sit and recover; not that Colt was sure they had that.

  “Second is this, how many people have you killed and forced out of New Nashville.”

  “You mean the lawless gangs? It don’t matter and I don’t know. We don’t have a tolerant policy for people unwilling to fall in line under the government. We rescue the people that need it. People that are stealing what belongs to us, well, they need to ship out or die. Not too complicated.”

  Denny stood up and stretched his arms, taking in a big puff of breath. Colt felt his Edict begin to boil to the surface, wrapping around him like a bubble. Then it stabbed outward toward the Wind Mage, and instantly, he felt it wrap around Albert, a protective cocoon.

  With another moment, Denny cracked his neck, grabbed his cowboy hat, and put it on his head.

  “Well, are ya joining or not? Afraid for you lot, it’s either your soldiers or you ship out too. A little too much for us to manage stirring up trouble in our town without real direction.”

  Fall in line or get smothered. Colt saw it for what it was, and now Denny was getting ready for a fight. A confidence shone off him, along with a vicious smile. He almost smelled the desire running off the man for it to turn into a fight, all the coiled power beneath his skin. For whatever Denny said, he was too eager to let that power loose to hurt others. Colt sensed it.

  That's why he knew that, with the power of a city or a government beneath him, Denny wouldn’t give that up. No. He’d be just as eager to exercise that kind of might as well. Power over people and personal power were the same thing.

  Colt checked his allies—it was etched into their faces, he didn’t need to ask them what they thought. From the way Nate gripped his hammer and set his jaw to the way that Sarah clutched her fist tied with the red band.

  They wouldn’t fall in line under Denny.

  “We’ll be leaving. Just let us talk to Jimmy first.”

  “Afraid I can’t do that,” Denny replied.

  “Excuse me?”

  “He’s a busy man, helping a budding city. Aint gonna waste his time with some riff-raff we’ve gotta kick out for the best of all.”

  Colt bristled—his hand going to the dagger tucked away at his side. Denny’s Edict flared, and his grin grew brighter. He wanted to fight them here, right now. Wanted it bad. That, maybe more than anything, was his goal—provoke a fight and then use whatever card he had tucked away that made him so confident he’d win and justify it to New Nashville.

  In a flash, Colt saw the way the cards were being laid on the table, the trap that Denny had set up for them.

  His eyes scanned the room, trying to detect what the trap was, other than the overconfidence Denny had in his levels. If they fought here, it would be contained in the White House… Probably.

  But the way Denny was smirking, there was a trick hidden, and it was better to choose the right ground for a fight like this.

  Though he was sorely tempted, with Nike’s quest lingering in his head.

  And he refused to play into it.

  “Fine. Then we’ll leave right now. We understand.”

  Colt didn’t like it. The thought of leaving Jimmy here for another hour more made him sick to his stomach. But… They would be back for Jimmy.

  Denny frowned.

  “You aint gonna see that boy again, and you won’t be hanging around Nashville either. You got a day, and then if’n my scouts spot you lingering around our fair city, I won’t have no choice but to think of you like the rest of the lawless scum out there stealing what belongs to me.”

  Colt didn’t dignify that with a response, instead turning on his heel and heading to the door. Denny barked an order at Albert to see them out—but Colt wasn’t going to contest that.

  They could be kicked out New Nashville. Denny could give them whatever commands he wanted, but at the end of the day, Colt knew two things. One, Denny wasn’t his governor, and he wasn’t about to listen to a word the wannabe dictator had to say. Two, regardless of whether he chose to stay in Nashville or not—he wouldn’t be leaving Jimmy behind unless that’s what his friend wanted. Let them escort him out of this city. And he’d let them see just what real freedom was.