[] Gabriella Merlo [] You are fresh on the beat, an honest farmgirl eager to see a world you have known only from reading the farmer’s almanac. Your natural skill as a pilot makes up for flying refurbished farming equipment. [] The Caproni Archipelago : Beautiful seaside beaches and gleaming white seaside towns cover a darker side beneath. Underneath the beautiful facade, Caproni is a pirate’s paradise, its prosperous Castor oil plantations owned by a variety of crime families.

With practiced ease, you pull the frame out of the sea. You relish the cold as the seaweed engulfed frame drips water down on you, a welcome relief from the autumn heat scorching your skin. Carefully, you put the frame down. It slots neatly into the two divots prepared for it in the deck, allowing you to step back and admire your harvest.

Like all the frames you pulled out of the sea that morning, the seaweed on it is swarming with snails. The purple shelled creatures cling to each of the frame’s rungs, some examples as large as your fist. You spot dozens of them on first sight alone. Possibly the best result you had all morning, and on a frame you assembled no less. Dad would be proud. With a smile on your face, you set to harvesting the snails, tickling each one on the back of the shell to get them to release their grip, then dropping them in the bucket, or back into the sea if they’re not large enough. After a few minutes, you judged the frame clean, and put it back out to sea. Another job done, the next one waiting at the buoy just ahead.

You were hauling the frame into your boat when it suddenly shifted underneath you, a load splash coming from the stern behind you. Startled, you turned. Too hasty, and too fast. The frame, seaweed wrapped wood on a slick deck, shifted as it’s feet slipped away, and the whole thing tilted towards you. You braced as well as you could, but your footing was unsteady. You felt yourself begin to fall.

A body pressed against your back, hands reaching around you to catch the frame before it could fall on you. From behind, a voice spoke into your ear. "Careful now, those snail bites won’t look as good on you as they do on me."

You pushed the frame firmly into it’s slot. It fell in with a reassuring clunk. You turned around. "Ileana", you admonished.

She flashed you a many-toothed smile. The cocky fisher was dripping wet, her clothes transparently clinging to her skin, revealing the many spots where the mottled fisher brown was replaced by the common pink of the graft. Shame sent a blush to your cheeks. You looked away.

"Why are you dripping all over my boat? " you managed.

"Because I swum here, you dummy. " She put a hand on your forehead, the cold a refreshing relief that vanished all too soon. "No sunstroke. And I didn’t see any sirens on the way over."

You gave her a friendly elbow in the ribs. "If you’re just going to waste my time, then get back in the water. We still got enough work to do before the festival."

"Yeah", she shucked. "Your festival. The one you’d forget to attend if you didn’t have me reminding me of things. I had to swim all the way over here just because you don’t listen once you’re busy with something." She nodded upwards.

Only then did you realize that the soft puttering you’d been hearing for the last few minutes wasn’t the prattling of your little outboard motor, but the noise of a very familiar aircraft. Circling above you in bright yellow and blue was your uncle’s plane, a lovingly maintained König-Werke S4. Some people scoffed at your uncle’s decision to fly one of the occupiers planes, something to which he always replied that it wasn’t the Fokker’s king’s plane, it was his once, and hadn’t the fella been gassed 2 decades ago. As you waved, the plane waggled it’s wings back at you, and turned towards the bay.

You watched it fly, then turned back to your frame to pluck snails.

"What do you think you are doing?" Ileana questioned.

"My task", you answered, a hint of annoyance in your voice. Just because she found every excuse she could to get out of work didn’t mean it didn’t get done. "The sooner I can be done with this", you started.

"No", she interrupted. "you go to your party. I’ll finish up here."

"Ileana", you started. You had to help. Everyone in the commune did.

"I’ll manage. The snails will be here tomorrow, you won’t be. We can do things without you. " A pang of guilt went through your stomach, the old familiar guilt about the people you were betraying.

A piece of seaweed hit you in the face. "I can tell when you’re starting you mope", your assailant said. Now go, or I’ll ensure neither of us gets anything done.

"Okay, okay", you held your hands up in mock surrender, and walked to the stern to turn the boat around. "Let me at least drop you of at your own boat first."

Illeana flashed you another smile, then dove into the water.

You sighed. Any excuse.

—​

The docks of Idrodoana were bustling with activity. Besides the little boats like yours bringing in the snail harvest and the fishing catches, there were two larger ships docked at the pier, dwarfing all the others. One was a common motorized barge, the mass produced metal hulled vessels that had once carried armies across the islands now carrying every kind of good that didn’t require the speed of airplane or the reliability of a cargo airship. The one besides it was leaner, colored in an odd array of black and white stripes that made it appear to hold far more guns than the fearsome sextet you knew it possessed. Both were flying the black and gold flag of the Golden Rose. The Castor oil transport, and it’s escort. You waved the soldiers on the deck as you passed into the harbor, and one waved back with his gun to allow you to move along. It felt good to know that your village would be safe and protected while you were gone.

Contentment made way for excitement however, as you passed the ship and spotted your uncle’s plane moored at the next pier. You turned of, hurriedly secured your ship, and all but ran to greet him.

"Gabriella, so good to see you? How has life on the island been. Anything worth for me to write about ?" he smiled.

"Good, and no. Well, Illeana swears she saw Castle Sturmherz in the clouds last month, but I’m pretty sure she just said that because she didn’t want to go run out the lines. Good thing she did, the weather got pretty gnarly that afternoon." You paused, looking over your uncle. He looked tired, more tired than usual. "And with you?" you asked "Everything okay out in the dangerous, outside world."

"Same old, same old. Work’s keeping me busy, but I had to make time for my favorite niece. Besides, I wanted to give you this." He bent over his plane, popping open the forward cargo containment and retrieving a small package. "Now, careful, don’t got dropping it. You’ll need when you get to the office."

"What", you say, "I can’t just tell them the great Wolfram Fiero send me." The package feels heavy in your hands. Expensive. You want to put it down somewhere safe, but there’s nothing not wet or covered in seaweed.

"Fierro gets you in the door, young lady. But you’ll need to actually work to get paid. Not that I believe that’ll be a problem with the way your parents raised you. Speaking of the devil". He looks behind you, and you turn around to see mom and dad walking up the pier.

"Wulf, don’t tell me you’re already corrupting my daughter with expensive gifts. Next she’ll want to take on another ridiculous name, like you did." The two men hug one another.

"That name paid for that package, and for the plane. A great pen-name is worth it’s weight in gas." Uncle answers.

"Oh no, we’re not having this whole debate again", you mother steps in before father can respond. "You can discuss the merit of tradition and wealth some other time." She turns to you. "Shouldn’t you be getting ready, young lady. You still got to get dressed."

You look around. The sun is already much closer to the mountain than you thought it would be. Had you really squandered all that time Illeana had bought you. You hadn’t. You were nearly finished anyway. But you did need to hurry. The snails needed to be put in the basins before they dried out, and you wanted to scrub the salt and seaweed of before you got dressed for the party. No point in ruining the dress your mother put so much effort in the first time you got to wear it.

With a smile, you lifted the bucket filled with big purple, pulsing snails, and walked towards the future.

---

Votes :

Your uncle has gifted you an expensive piece of equipment to support you in your journalistic ambitions, what is it? (Pick 1)

[ ][Gift] A portable typewriter, rugged, light, and compact : A recognition of your writing talents, you expect that you will be writing many an article on this device. (Gabriella has a portable typewriter, and the Writing Vice (addicted) [ ][Gift] A small film camera, ideal for quick shots, equipped with canisters of cutting edge self developing film. A recognition of your talents with photography . (Gabriella has a small camera, and the Photography Vice (addicted) [ ][Gift] A compact recording device, equipped with some kind of reusable storage. A recognition of your interviewing talent. (Gabriella has a rewritable recorder, and the Interviewing Vice (addicted)

You are getting a cool party to celebrate your departure, what will you be doing that actually prepares you for the wild world tomorrow? (Pick 2) [][Vice] Drinking [][Vice]Cannabis [][Vice] Pulpy Fiction [][Vice] Hunting [][Vice] Brawling [][Vice] Casual Sex [][Vice] Gambling [][Vice] Daydreaming [][Vice] Write-in

You’re taking a lot of useful items on your voyage. One thing however, stands out. You’re not quite sure why you took it, but you can’t quite bring yourself to leave it behind. (Pick 1) [ ] A letter from a long-lost relative. [ ] A packet of seeds from the family farm. [ ] The deed to land in a far-away place. [ ] A well-worn musical instrument. -[ ] Which one?

Lastly, there’s one little detail yet to be addressed, because if you’d brought it along, it would have eaten your snails. Your adorable companion (pick 1) [][Dog] Yes, and his/her name is [write-in] [][Dog] Well actually, not a dog but [species (anything except a horse)] and his/her name is [write in] [][Dog] You never had a dog, nor any other animal companion