ELEVEN: Last and Least

“Look at what you’ve done to me,” Alden said pitifully.

It was evening, he was sitting in the cricket-filled lobby with Gorgon again, and he was picking chunks of tofu and pieces of lettuce out of a naan wrap that had been incorrectly labeled vegan at a food truck he’d passed on the way over.

“Do you know why the bread at that place tastes fabulous? It’s because it’s grilled in butter. Do you know how I know that? It’s because my brain now has an anti-joy narc living in it.”

“How long do you think you will complain about this particular topic?” the alien asked, licking coconut curry sauce from his own fingers.

“How long is the narc going to be in residence?”

Gorgon shrugged.

Alden eyed him suspiciously. “I’m not gonna grow horns, am I?”

“Perhaps if you try very hard.”

“Ha ha. You’re a comedian now.”

“You were telling me about your ambitions for your future,” Gorgon reminded him. “If you don’t plan to continue, you can ride up and down the elevators again. Preferably in silence.”

Alden slumped against the cushions of the sofa he’d chosen for himself tonight. “So you’re a bossy alien now that you’ve drunk my blood? That’s just my luck.”

But Gorgon had a point. Alden had been whining for a while.

He sighed. “I’ve pretty much told you everything, though. Hannah was a big influence. What happened to my parents was, too. I think battlefield support is a seriously important and underrated job. Plus it’s cool. As for more specific ambitions…I’d love to be a frost-focused Adjuster or a trap Meister or maybe something that was heavy on the buff abilities. But it’s all just idle wishes. Even if the System does choose me, it’s not like I can pick exactly the class I want.”

“The pre-affixation trade is always an option,” Gorgon said. “No doubt it will be a necessary one in your case, since you seem to have an uncommon vision for yourself. I’m sure you’ve realized that most classes lean strongly toward improving an individual’s personal offense or defense. Classes that do otherwise tend to be ill-suited to spontaneous combat.”

Alden felt his eyebrows lift. When the System called you, there was a grace period of around three months before you had to accept your class. During that window, a selectee could trade classes with another willing person of equal rank who was still in their own grace period. It was the only time class trades were allowed.

“That’s all true,” he said, popping a cube of tofu into his mouth, “but nobody trades good classes, do they? Isn’t it just a bunch of unhappy people swapping the garbage classes around? That’s what the internet says anyway.”

Gorgon made a humming sound. “A reasonable percentage of new Avowed make trades. It’s skewed heavily toward the lower ranks, of course, but it’s not rare.”

“Wait. You can tell me stuff like that?”

Gorgon shrugged again. “People who want to trade must do so with an approved witness at hand. I’m the witness for this region. It’s my job to tell selectees this kind of thing.”

“Oh. But no specific class advice?”

“None beyond what should already be abundantly obvious.”

Alden grimaced. “What do the Avowed need a witness for anyway? What do you witness exactly?”

“It’s a safety measure to confirm that someone who agrees to a class trade isn’t suffering from undue outside influence. Many selectees have superhuman parents with strong opinions about their offsprings’ class choice. Sometimes they attempt to manipulate the situation.”

“You mean the parents of island-born supers? Their kid gets a class they don’t like, and they…what? Threaten or mind sway someone into trading with them?”

“They attempt to. Sometimes. It’s not the norm, but it happens.”

Alden didn’t doubt Gorgon, but he was surprised. He’d never heard so much as a whisper about something like that. You’d think it would be all over the place if heroes got caught bullying teenagers into giving up their powers for worse ones.

“What’s the most traded class? Can you tell me that?”

“It’s Brute. Obviously.”

“Oh, yeah. That is obvious. Sorry. Numbers matter.” Roughly thirty percent of those chosen by the System were a Brute type, which was a much higher percentage than any other class. Of course it would also be the most traded one.

“Of the Brute classes, longsights seem to be the least popular variety. They are often offered up for trade and rarely accepted,” Gorgon added.

“Well, yeah. Having a superpower that lets you see really far away isn’t very special. Binoculars exist.”

Gorgon made the clicking sound Alden had decided meant he wanted to say something but couldn’t. He waited for a minute, but the alien didn’t offer up any further comments on the subject.

Alden considered the different classes. Only an idiot would trade Healer of Body, and a person would have to be an absolute moron to trade the super rare Healer of Mind. Even Alden would shift all his future plans in a heartbeat if those were offered.

Sure, you were no good in a fight. But you could still help loads of people, and the class perks were the best.

Any healer above D-rank automatically received a passive that reduced the mental and physical effects of stress and a blessing called Twice Life. Which was exactly what it sounded like…

A doubled lifespan.

Combined with the fact that you could fix any normal disease that might want to take you out, it was a first class ticket to living for an extra century. And at the highest ranks it was even better. There was an S-rank Healer of Body on the island who’d been chosen in the first year the System went into effect; she was nearly eighty, and she still looked sixteen.

So yeah. Nobody was going to put that class up for trade.

“Hannah said once that almost none of the people who grew up on Anesidora would take the Sway class if they could help it. She had a friend who wanted to trade hers when she got it, but it was S-rank and there was no one willing to trade for it at that level during her pre-affixation period.”

Gorgon nodded. “That’s true. Sway is the class that is the most frequently successfully traded. Almost always from the children of Avowed to those who are not as intimately familiar with the class’s drawbacks.”

Alden understood how that could happen. Being a mind controller sounded really impressive until you realized that you would get great power in exchange for life as a social pariah and near-prisoner on the island. Someone who didn’t have that realization in time would get suckered into it.

“Do people ever trade Adjuster?”

“Yes. But not often. The class is so flexible that it can be built in ways that would satisfy all but the pickiest user.”

“What about unique classes?”

“Ah,” said Gorgon. “Those…are different. They can’t be traded.”

“Really?”

“They’re automatically affixed. No grace period.”

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“Seriously? Why?”

Gorgon shook his head.

Alden sighed. “Whoever bound you with such overkill restrictions should be kicked in the ’nads.”

“That would be impossible for a number of reasons,” said Gorgon. “But I appreciate the sentiment.”

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