“You’re getting quicker at that.” Maya said. They walked through back toward the center of the dorm. Soraya had completed another two hallways on their level. What had started as doing it for her family spread first to their hallway, then the ones on either side. She wondered if the other floors would begin asking for her help, but neither Elias or her mother said anything. She was thankful that it was only their dorm for the moment and none of the others. If she had been running around the dorms, she may never get to the other parts of the compound that needed her help before she left for patrol.

  The compound had no formal designation, but she knew most people called it Byblos. The reality was that Byblos was just as faded of a city-state as their capital Tyre, but with less supplies after having been picked bone dry over the last decade. The compound rested in the base of a mountain, on the western edge of the peninsula whereas Tyre sat at the tip.

  Solar panels and some magical contraptions littered the cliffs, gathering what energy they could while they could. From Elias’s complaints, the solar panels were down a noticeable percentage from the previous year, but the magic converters were up. Having maintained the set at the forward post, Soraya understood how inefficient the converters were, but they were a necessary substitution in the face of losing power.

  Most people lived in the mountain compound, much like her own family. The yearly census identified roughly a thousand people huddled in the growing dark in Byblos, with only a small portion being immigrants from other failed compounds and city-states.

  “Did you guys learn anything fun this week?” Soraya asked as pushed open the door. A burst of crisp morning air greeted them as they stepped out into the courtyard.

  Partially covered by the mountain and structures, the courtyard was simply an open-air, cleared ground for the children to play in. Toys were still left in the strung about from the previous night. One of their balls had rolled up against a wooden horse, likely kicked to get out of someone’s way. Soraya shared a smile with her mother as she had to tug Fiona’s hand to get the young girl to stay at their side. Francis kept walking, leading the way out of the courtyard and into the main complex.

  “They taught us about cards,” Fiona said.

  “Really?” Soraya glanced at the still peaking sunlight over the treetops to the east. She needed to stop by the agricultural unit first, but it likely would be busy with workers preparing for harvests and planting. She would rather not be bothered by the farmers this early in the morning. Or ever. The infirmary also required a stop but was closer to her launch point. They at least let her in and out without much fuss. Usually.

  “Yeah, cards are the way magic ma-man-mafests,” Fiona said, struggling to come up with the word.

  “Manifests,” Francis said. He had stepped beside her, not taking her hand, but he did lean into her for some warmth. Wind picked up through the complex and brought a chill that cut through their coats. Despite the rising sun, it would be a colder one. Not necessarily an early winter, yet. It certainly made it easier to head toward the closer agricultural unit. The temparture was controlled there and would help keep the children warm on their morning excursion.

  “Manifests. Right,” Fiona said, repeating the word several times under her breath as if to memorize it.

  “What else did you learn?” Soraya asked, keeping them talking and focused on a task rather than letting their thoughts wander to the sparse accommodations. This may be the only place they knew, but even the fictions shared in the compound told a story of how bleak things were. It wasn’t work or being busy, but having something to focus on, a task or an activity, made it easier to move forward.

  No one never truly accepts living in the end of the world, but they all at least tried to make do.

  “Cards come in three types: Gene, rune, and circuit,” Fiona parroted. “Gene are people-based. Rune-cards are magic-based. And circuit are...are...”

  “Tech-based,” Francis finished.

  “I knew that!” Fiona said, nearly stomping her feet as they walked. “I knew that.” She twisted slightly to look up, Maya who nodded.

  “Your brother was just helping.”

  Fiona was not wrong. Magic did indeed manifest into a useable form as cards. Not in the same way that magic converters worked. They kept magic as a form of malleable energy that could be utilized by any technology properly retrofitted for it. Cards were ways people could use magic. The simple sounding axiom was inherently complex.

  Cards were a physical representation of the strangeness that the altered energy some long-gone media outlet labeled as magic. The energy was actual a form of extraterrestrial anima radiating out of the ever-darkening skies above them. Magic or energy, or anima really was just their way of making sense of the strangeness now plaguing their world.

  Cards worked off a system that was the reason why the scientist called it anima in the first place. Someone from some research center before the world had fallen figured out that the physical representation of the energy was broken up into five parts: Attunement, Nexus, Infusion, Manifest, and Ascendence, or ANIMA. Why it was coded that way was never full explained to her, and Soraya wondered if anyone understood.

  What scientists remained were still testing things about the cards and anima, leaving the rest to deal with the strangeness and terrors the new energy brought to their world. Monsters, or what they called the things altered by anima, erupted from somewhere and were first to attack. The world resisted for a long time with conventional ballistic weapons, but as years passed with lost ground, cards became an acceptable method of defending against the attacks. By now, almost everyone had at least one card imprinted onto them, even if they were scarce.

  Soraya guessed the scarcity had less to do with the cards and more to do with the dwindling population, but she kept that pessimistic thought to the rangers.

  She possessed two cards, the rune-based Wellspring and the source of her power core, a circuit-based Nurstone:

  She received the Nurstone first, when it became clear that everyone needed at least one card above a certain age to help the compound in some way. The Nurstone was why she was assigned to the rangers. In addition to powering her own abilities, she could also utilize specially modified equipment easier than almost anybody else. Instead of using anima batteries, she powered the equipment with her core.

  She also was the only one in her family with two. Elias had a single circuit-based card, Walls of Uruk, that shared the alignment with hers. They had pulled the cards from the same type of pack, Foundations. It was the most common one in the compound and found in the wild from slain monsters and fauna. Something about the surrounding areas influencing the outcomes. There were rarer ones, but when operations first started to hand packs out, the Foundations packs were all that were shared.

  “When can I get my card?” Fiona asked. The question brought her out of her thoughts.

  “When you’re older,” she said, glancing at her mother.

  Maya had a simple gene-based card, Tools of Building. Where Walls of Uruk allowed Elias to bolster defenses, Tools of Building was just a similar conjurations card. She could use it to replace tools that did not require too many moving parts or assembly. Neither of them used the cards as much as Soraya did, but neither were quite in the position she was on a regularly basis either.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  “Do you think I’ll get something cool? Like yours? “ Francis asked,

  Soraya laughed. “Maybe you can get something better.”

  “Hardly think of anything better,” Maya said, knocking her daughter’s hip with her own. She stood solid at the contact. It didn’t even disrupt her stride as they walked toward the ag-unit.

  “I just make water,” Soraya said. “The other rangers can do much better. Raj shoots lightning.” It was mainly used to disrupt any of the corrupted fauna they say, but it was much more useful than some water conjuration.

  “Yeah...that is cool.” Francis studied his feet, as if they had the answer to what is cooler. Soraya shared another smile with her mother before opening the doors to the agricultural unit.

  Despite being called a unit, it actually consisted of several plots attached to a greenhouse partially submerged into the mountain, protecting it from the elements and anything worse. The outside plots were seasonal crops, rotating and bolstered by the few useful cards between the farmers. Currently, they were planting mainly root vegetables, carrots, beets, and some type of tuber they cross-cultivated called raqina. Personally, she preferred the beets, but the raqina wasn’t too bad baked over a fire.

  A stout man glanced up from behind a desk where he was bent over a series of tablets. “Ghosen, why am I not surprised to see you.”

  “Just making my rounds before I head out.” Soraya rolled her eyes at Alejandro. The man was about the same age as her mother, but seemed to be the only person she knew in the compound who even approached overweight. Maybe had something to do with his position as head of the agricultural unit.

  “Don’t let me hold you up.” The man waved her off as if her appearance was perfunctory. It was, and she appreciated the lack of ceremony.

  Inside the greenhouse proper, a wave of heat washed over them as Soraya pushed open the door. Rows of fruit trees filled quarter of a kilometer long greenhouse. Most of the fruit was processed into something, but the hardy red apples Elias barter were amongst was looked like the sixth row of trees. “I want to be a farmer.” Fiona’s exclamation brought Soraya out of her contemplation.

  “We could always use more farmers,” Soraya said. She walked down the center row, following the main pipe above them to the tanks in the back. She was thankful at least her niece didn’t want to join the rangers. Francis just saw it as an adventure. To most boys in the compound, it probably was.

  “You should ask your teacher about it tomorrow,” Maya said. The statement got Fiona off on another tangent about her next day in school. She gave Franics a smile as the little boy rolled his eyes. She recognized Elias completely in him because he used to do the same thing when she or…. She shook her head at the memory and motioned forward. Francis ran ahead to get the door for her.

  Behind the door sat two large reserve tank that held several thousand kiloliters of water. These were not the only tanks the agricultural unit had, but these were the reserves. Something supposed to be kept ready in case of emergency. Unfortunately, it seemed like every time she visited more and more water was needed.

  “At least they left a snack this time,” Soraya muttered. A small table had a few protein bars wrapped in clear film. The agricultural unit made them for the rangers out of some type of bean, oat, and fruit combination. They tasted awful and in a pinch, it worked as a decent fire starter. But she was not complaining.

  “Just give me a few minutes,” she said. Maya nodded and grabbed Fiona and Francis by the shoulder. Not that they needed to be told to stand back. This was a familiar dance for all of them.

  Soraya unclipped her backpack, dropping it to the ground with a thud that reverberated through the room. Fiona’s giggled followed her as she climbed a ladder up to the top of the first tank. Pipes in and out of the tank forced her settle uncomfortably leaning over the lip of the tank. She sighed at the near empty tank, but bit her tongue. Things must be getting worse if the tanks were down that much by now. She left them filled three weeks prior when she had last visited.

  Two deep, centering breaths gave her the focus to draw upon the power core in her chest. With each breath, the pale blue of her power core grew brighter along the spectrum, shining through her jacket and shirt. Warmth followed the light as the energy reached outward. She guided her Wellspring along with the wave the wave of anima and released it as a torrent. Her wrist snapped upward, spraying water across the tank. She had to brace her hand with her other one, grasping tightly to maintain an angle that got most of the water into the tanks.

  What started as hollow reverberation and solid plunks against the tank shifted to muted slosh. Water rushed around the tank, pressed forward by the energy she pushed outward. The shift from impact to movement was a heavy, but welcome one. It meant the hard part, was almost upon her and would pass.

  More and more anima was fed from her core into the Wellspring. The energy melded inside of her. It grasped something the rune-card created, an unseen, but metaphysical component of her body. The power core pushed her past the point when she should have stopped, would have stopped without it. Past the point of attention. She focused not on the power or the energy, or even the pain pulse from her chest. Instead, her focus shifted to somewhere deep beyond her where the water was drawn from. All that was left was just her and the rush of water hitting water.

  She knew when to stop, trained herself to, if only to not pass out and waste more water on the floor. One lecture was enough.

  As the water reached past the midway point, the echoes of the water swirling in the tank shifted from a muted low-pitch to something almost quiet. Less air escaped as the tank filled. More water refused to budge when introduced. As the water crested to just splash back against her hand, the sound had faded almost completely.

  Soraya reeled back her anima, wrapping it back upon itself. Her chest felt heavy, heaving from the gasps of air. The powercore burned in her sternum, but the pain faded as it rapidly cooled. The lack of energy pushed from it gave her a chance to let that silent part screaming to stop inside of her to relax.

  “You okay?” Soraya glanced over at her mother through the forest of pipes.

  “Yeah,” she said with a sigh. “Just need to take a breather.” She dragged herself out of the uncomfortable position and slowly back down the ladder. She leaned against it, the cool metal a balm to her heated face. She probably had sweated through her shirt, and she considered changing it, but would only have to wash it later.

  A cool hand pressed against her neck. She recognized the palm, the wrinkled fingers pressing a soothing pattern into her skull. “Omri.”

  “I’m fine mom,” Soraya murmured to the tank, but she did not move. The combination of the tank against her forehead and the patterns at the back of her skull almost lulled her to sleep.

  “It’s my prerogative,” she said. Her hand finally drew back after an eternity of comfort. It forced Soraya to stand up. “Just finish up so you can get checked out. That’s always the last thing you do anyway.”

  “I fill the infirmaries’ tanks last,” Soraya said, groaning at the ache in her back. She twisted, her jacket flaring outward and upward slightly. She sighed and undid it as well before dropping it to the floor. Already the air felt cooler against her damp shirt and skin.

  “Well, you’re getting checked out too today,” Maya said. She bent over slowly, picking up her jacket from the ground and stood beside her cradling it. “Like I said, it is my prerogative. The sooner you finish, the sooner I can stop.”

  “You filled the whole thing?” Francis’s voice was filled with awe. Soraya turned to look over at her nephew and gave him a small smile.

  “I guess I did,” she said, and then pushed off the tank to stand upright. “And I’ve got to do another one.”

  “You don’t have to,” Maya said, but they both knew she would. “You have a few hours until you have to leave, yes? You’re resting after this.”

  “After the infirmary,” Soraya said, compromising as much as she could. Not that she would really have time. She needed to check her pack and maybe barter or gather what she could for the forward post. But if she didn’t do that, and honestly, she wasn’t sure she would be able to if she had to fill another tank.

  Fortunately, luck was on her side for once, and this one was only half full. Instead of blasting Wellspring at full, she released it in a steady, controlled pulse. Less of a fire hose and more of a faucet. It still was painful, but more manageable. It took nearly twice the time, which was a luxury she could not afford. Her body disagreed though, and she let the powercore do most of the work.

  Once back down from the tank, Soraya sat on the lowest rung and leaned her head down. She took several deep breaths and tried to settle her heart. There was a pain deeper in her, settled in the powercore. It reached out, grasping both the core and not surprisingly her eyes.

  When people slotted cards, there almost always was a physical manifestation of it in the person. For Elias, he gained his height and a reasonable amount of strength from the Walls of Uruk. Obviously the Nurstone gave her the powercore embedded in her chest, but her eyes reflected her Wellspring. Everyone else in her family had dark green or brown eyes. Hers were a deep, but bright blue, like a crystal-clear lake on a sunny day.

  The not quite migraine was from the strain of overtaxing herself. It faded, with time and energy, which her powercore helped her offset. When she pushed both to their limit like she with the agricultural tanks, then the backlash could knock her off her feet.

  “Auntie Aya?” She glanced up to see Fiona holding one of the protein bars left for her. “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah.” She smiled at the little bit of light in her world. She made it worth it - they made it worth it. “I am.”