I didn’t want to have a conversation about this morning, and from the look she’d given me earlier, maybe throwing in the high heels wasn’t as funny as I’d thought. I looked for a way to divert attention.

“You guys cut a deal with the village?”

She snorted. “Not hardly, the only thing they were interested in was where we found the clay deposits. I didn’t bother telling them they were standing on it. All they offered us was a break on back taxes if we wanted to rejoin the village. I don’t think they believed me when I told them we had no interest in coming crawling back.”

“Sounds like a waste of time then.”

“Not quite.” She stood up and waved her hands over her head. “Kenny, over here.”

A virtual giant waved back from the other side of the crowd and started in our direction. He was fat, but not grossly so, it was more like a thick layer of cushion around his entire body. He had short black hair and a deep permanent tan, with tribal tattoos running all over his massive bare shoulders. He was wearing an open vest and a pair of flower print shorts and I pegged him as Samoan or at least some kind of pacific islander. He came over and spoke in a voice a lot higher than I had expected.

“Hey guys. How’s it going?”

“Kenny, glad you could make it.” Debbie turned and gestured at me. “This is Jack. Jack, Kenny has decided to leave the village and join our company.”

“Not to sound too mercenary here, Kenny, but everyone else kicked in to buy shares in the company. What are you bringing to the table?”

“Man, with the XP tax on villagers it ain’t like you can build up a nest egg. That’s why I want out. All I got is these.” He held up two massive ham sized hands and Debbie tapped me on the shoulder.

“We’ve worked it out, Jack. He kicks in labor and a percentage of the XP he earns going forward until he’s matched what everyone else kicked in in the beginning. Don’t be a dick.”

I shrugged at Kenny in apology and Debbie started introducing him around. John made his excuses and headed out, the first of us to visit the XP store. We all sat around, shooting the shit with Kenny and discussing what we should spend our points on and how much we thought John would be able to get. We traded one of the oil lamps and a couple of homemade arrows for a stew with turnips in it. I thought they’d been potatoes when the lady showed us the pot, and I thought we might have overpaid for it. Allison got offered 5 thousand XP tokens for one of her bows, but the tax bite would have taken it to 2500 so she passed on it. The market stayed pretty busy the entire time. Most folks came and went, us and the chick with the still seemed to be the only ones who kept our spot the entire day. I guess everyone else was coming in and setting up on their down time. A couple times I got up and walked around to see if there was anything good on offer, but I always returned disappointed.

John came back while I was out and Steve headed up to the XP store. I sidled up next to John eager to see what he’d bought. He had a wheelbarrow with a piece of canvas tied over the top and I nudged at the corner of the cloth and he brushed away my hand.

“What’d you get?”

“I ain’t sure folks around here are above robbing a feller, so I’d appreciate it if you left the cover on. I got a ton of stuff. If I’m anything to judge by we all got a boatload of XP. I bought a little bit of everything.”

“I need you to be more specific than that if I’m kicking in on a working farm. If you don’t tell me what you got how do I know what I need to buy?”

“I could make you a list?” He chuckled and shook his head. “I’m just messing with you, Jack. It ain’t a secret. Most of the bulk is grub. Meat and rice ain’t gonna do it for this next go round, I’m wasting away as it is. I bought some tools and such to make life easier, but more importantly I know what we need for the farm. I bought just about every type of seed they had available, because seeds are cheap and I don't know what kind of soil chemistry we’re looking at. I also bought this, which is where you come in.”

He looked around and eased up a corner of the canvas before pulling out a cat carrier. He handed it to me and I took it by reflex, but I looked at him sideways.

“I think it's a little early in the relationship to get a cat together. That’s a big step, John.”

“Try and control yourself, Jack. That there is what the game calls a magical livestock trailer. You wouldn’t believe me if I told you how much it costs. You can buy livestock in the XP store and regardless of size they go in the crate. They stay alive and healthy for 72 hours and then you have to let ‘em out or they come out dead. There’s a limit to the amount of biomass you can fit inside, but it’s several thousand pounds. Your job is to fill the crate.”

“Fill it with what?”

“Livestock, genius. I don’t know if the grass here is compatible with their digestion and what’ll make it and what won’t, and I don’t know how much XP you’ll have so I can’t be too specific. Most of the animals are pretty pricey. Shoot for a variety, mating pairs at least, and buy what you can. The more you get the better our odds something will work out.”

“Shit, so now you’re a rancher not just a farmer.”

“Nope, I’m still the farmer, now you’re a rancher.”

Our conversation was interrupted when Debbie called us over to talk to Allison’s friend Sheryl. She’d come to the market to try and hawk some handmade wicker baskets and Allison had introduced them. After they’d got to talking Debbie had a proposal for the group. Sheryl was going to take over the rest of our pottery and trade it on consignment. She’d set aside half of the stuff she made from selling it while we were gone, and if we liked what she’d built up when we got back she’d do it again. Steve had come back and Jeri had left in the meantime, but Hunter voted her proxy. It didn’t matter too much because nobody voted against Sheryl. I think we were all a little disappointed in how much our pottery had brought and no one was that enthused about the prospects.

A wiry little black guy with a shaved head that was about 5’4” and a big Amazon looking red head who was probably 6 inches taller than me came up and started checking out Allison’s bow. They both had on jeans and t-shirts instead of the coveralls that seemed so common, and they were an odd enough pair I drifted over that way to listen in.

“What you asking for the bow?”

“I’m barter only, what have you got to trade?”

The black guy rubbed his bald head in what I’d later come to recognize as an almost nervous tick and looked up at the Amazon before replying to Allison. “We’ve got meat and hides. We tried splitting off from the village and both respawned, so we haven’t been able to come up with much in the way of XP.”

The redhead silenced him with a hand on his shoulder and made eye contact with Allison, “Look, we could work something out on payments if you would. I’m Helen and this is Sam. We’re both good hunters but we lost most of our gear when we respawned. Ran into some kind of reptile things way over east of here that wiped out our whole party. With the bow we could rack up some serious XP in short order, buy stuff to pay you back and then some.”

I moved in a little closer to the conversation and Allison stopped whatever it was she was about to say to see what I wanted. I could tell she looked a little annoyed but I shrugged at her.

“Why’d you guys want to leave the village?”

“Cause we were tired of getting raped with taxes.” Helen put a hand on Sam’s shoulder again and he shut up right away and I was guessing it was some kind of signal they’d worked out. Helen smiled at me and raised a hand in a calming gesture. “Sam gets pretty worked up sometimes. We weren’t happy with all of the village's decisions, but we didn’t have adequate resources built up to make it out on our own. We’re looking for a second chance here.”

I turned to Allison and held out a hand, “Don’t want to fuck up and cost us a sale here, but I think they should talk to Debbie. You okay with that?”

“Sure, you two come with me. Jack, you stay here and try to sell something will you?”

I flipped her the bird but I sat down in the grass in her spot to watch her stuff while she led the other two over to talk to Debbie. A little while later Jeri came back and after a heated discussion with Hunter he left to the XP store. I looked over at Jeri who was now wearing a pair of BDU pants and a vest covered in pockets kind of like Hunters.

“What was all that about if you don’t mind my asking?”

“The book that’s getting passed around? I bought our tree house. The upgrade options are amazing. I spent like all my XP points on these clothes, plus lights and functional plumbing in our tree house. It wasn’t how Hunter and I had agreed to spend things, but I couldn’t pass up the opportunity.”

“What counts as functional plumbing?”

“I’m not exactly sure, I think that’s part of the reason he got so pissy.”

I kind of saw his point, but I wasn’t dumb enough to say so. I just nodded my head sagely and kept my silence. Jeri wasn’t a sit in silence kind of girl and after a few moments she nudged me with an elbow and pointed to Steve.

“You know what he bought?”

“Didn’t come up. John got a bunch of farm stuff though.”

“Steve spent almost everything on the character screens for magic. I guess he’s trying to become a wizard or something.”

“Huh, it sounded cool but the single spell I bought I never use. I’m not wasting any more XP on it.”

“You bought a spell? What’d you get?”

I told her about obsidian skin and why I had decided it was a waste of money. During the course of the story Hunter came back and Debbie left for the store. Hunter came and sat down next to Jeri. They started a low voiced conversation and I got up and moved away so I wouldn’t intrude. I wandered over and sat down next to the three new members of our party.

“So do you guys all know each other?”

Kenny shrugged and answered first. “We’ve all been introduced. We were just kind of catching up on the plan. What can you tell us about the new village.”

“It’s not really a village, more like a trade outpost. We’re up against a cliff right next to a little lake and a waterfall so it’s pretty. We’ve got a solar shower, a smokehouse, and a single communal building we call the keep. We mainly do half days of work then you’re left to your own devices. A couple of folks have been working on their own place outside of the keep, but you're on your own for work and materials if you go that route. Debbie’s the boss, John’s running a farm to keep us fed, and the rest of us just kind of kick in where ever. Any of ya’ll got any special expertise you can offer?”

Sam snorted, “I’m a toolpusher on a welding rig back in the real world, so it don’t exactly translate. I been camping all my life so I can get by in the woods I guess.”

Helen patted his knee. “I worked as a physical therapist and I’ve had some medical training, but I’m not a doctor or anything. What about you Kenny?”

Kenny sighed, “I’m a florist. I know I don’t look the part, okay, but the shop’s been in my family for years. I kind of just grew up in it.”

I couldn’t help but smirk at the idea of the big tattooed guy in a tiny apron assembling bouquets for hours on end, but I didn’t say anything. Helen looked over at me and turned the question around.

“What’d you do for a living, Jack?”

“Combat engineer, we dug ditches and built roads to win hearts and minds, that kind of thing. Not nearly the same over here without Uncle Sugar dumping endless loads of supplies and dirt cheap labor willing to hand scoop sandbags for hours if you give them a dollar.”

Sam leaned forward and gave me a fist bump, “I was an 88 mike, and hell yes you guys got a ton of shit delivered.”

I grinned at him, pleased that there was another veteran in the group. I didn’t know much else about them, but now I could assume at least Sam had his shit together. I saw Debbie coming back and I made my excuses and cut the conversation short, curious to see what she’d bought. Allison took off before Debbie had made it the whole way to us and I realized I was gonna be the last guy to make it to the store.

“How was the shopping trip, Debbie? Did you bring me anything?”

Debbie gestured down at the little cart she was towing. It looked kind of like one of those radio flyer things kids used to use, even painted the same red color, but its sides were higher. “I bought tons of stuff, and I was this close to getting you a nice pair of heels, Jack.”

“Oh, come on. It was barter, Debbie. I took him for everything I could get, the heels were just part of it.”

“Hmmmn, we’ll see. Joking aside, I did buy some stuff you guys should know about.” She got everybody else’s attention and held her hands up in a calming gesture. “I hope you don’t mind, but I ended up buying the keep, smokehouse, and shower. Somebody had to and it wouldn’t let me assign ownership to the group. I also bought them each an upgrade that lets us transfer XP directly to the buildings and upgrade them without the store. I have to be there for it to work, but this way when we all get back we can all kick in occasionally and buy upgrades for them.”

Everyone seemed to agree it was a good idea, and nobody complained. I wondered how it would work if Debbie ever decided she didn’t want to share, but it didn’t seem likely so I kept my mouth shut. She nodded at us and everybody else kind of went back to their own thing, but Debbie caught my attention.

“I also got some stuff I wanted to talk to you about.”

“What’s up?” I stepped around her and looked down at the wagon. She swatted my shoulder until I looked back up at her.

“Mostly those are personal items. I spent quite a bit on making life back at the keep a little more pleasant. What I wanted to talk to you about was these.” She shuffled some stuff around in the wagon and held up what looked kind of like a chainsaw. I picked it up and turned it over. Instead of a pull string on a two cycle engine there was a battery pack clipped into a metal cylinder, and the chain looked like crystal instead of metal.

“Some kind of electric chainsaw? Those don’t work worth a shit, Debbie. Not enough power.”

“Try a magic chainsaw, Jack. They feed off the operator's mana, so the charge only lasts for a limited time but the chain never needs sharpening and is supposed to be almost unbreakable. I bought two. One for taking down trees and I thought you could figure out a way to mount the other one on a stand and make some kind of sawmill so we can turn out lumber.”

“That actually sounds like a really good idea. I’m pretty sure I can do that.”

“Don’t sound so damned surprised, Jack.”

Allison came back and rescued me from having to respond, and I sat out for the XP store.