Bodega Cat (System Apocalypse, Deck Builder, Litrpg)

Once the mayor and his goons departed, Bagel received a massive stack of paperwork. In retrospect, they could have sent it digitally and spared the printer. And what did they expect him to do with a stack of paper's half his size? He didn't have thumbs! .

Hopefully, Janet would be able to scan through it and provide him some answers. His feline upbringing had not prepared him for this at all.

"Now boss, I need to remind you that I am not a lawyer bot and I cannot represent you in a legal capacity nor do I have any requisite legal training for any New York City, New York State, or Federal law statutes that I can cite. I can read this, and I can tell you what it says, but I can't interpret it legally for you. At least that is what the system is telling me to tell you."

It was rather strange how the system was asking Janet to interpret things.

"So you can't tell me whether I should accept this?" Bagel asked.

Janet blinked, her entire body shifting from purple to blue, then back again. "I can't tell you, but no one will be more thorough than me. And also that there are basically no lawyers qualified to look at this kind of thing, and there have been none since the 1940s."

Raul held up his complementary drink. Bagel, being able to restock things, would always let the man take whatever he wanted. It was one of the numerous privileges for being his official human translator.

"Bagel, I'm going to head back home and see my family and talk to them about this. It's been the heck of a day, but if I time this right, then I'm going to avoid getting stuck in the mob jam. I was hoping..."

He trailed off, his gaze drifting back to the collection of cards that people had been consistently updating all day, creating a more diverse set. When police officers got a card that they couldn't use or had too many of, they donated it to him, and Bagel put him in the general use pile. Police officers from other precincts or those off-duty used those cards.

"Officer, if you can have a deck, take a starter deck and see how that works for you. Consider it a business expense. If you kill any cards on the way home,sell us those you do not need."

Janet beeped.

"It's understandable if you want to give those to your family or something, but we're not giving out starter decks for free."

"I'm all on board with that," Raul said. "Do you mind if I just pick the ten now and give it a shot?"

Neither Bagel nor Janet could find a reason to not offer the boy the had told him throughout the day. They have been checking on some card website with updates same opportunity that they had been freely giving every police officer that stepped in that afternoon into the late evening.

Just like the many men that have passed through before, Raul looked at the cards, and Bagel wondered what was going through his mind as he picked up the most of the set of cards that they could imagine.. With only five mobs in his deck, Raul got a pretty even split between pizza rats, concrete lizards and items that they could use. With the increase in frequency of drops of mobs, there was a correlating increase in frequency of drops of non-summon cards. Those were are becoming more and more important to fill out decks, as Janet and Raul to the current meta, whatever that meant. They were hard to get..

Raul put the card into his chest and did a little dance. His mood was infectious, and Bagel grinned from ear to ear.

"We'll see you tomorrow," Raul said with an extra pep in his step as he left.

And just like that, it was evening. And despite the police officers patrolling the streets in shifts, and the ominous map of the dungeons drawing locals to their window, things were quiet.

It was unnerving to be in a quiet shop after all that had happened, but Bagel realized that he needed to get some sleep. He was far short of his normal nap schedule.

He took the time to summon two of his workers for the overnight shift plus a cook. They would hold the fort while he slept.

Past the deli counter and around the back of the grill, there was a small room that was used as the break room.At Janet's insistence, Bagel had his little bed over there so that he could relax in relative peace.

He dreamed of a world where nice people patted him on the head and gave him hugs and let him chase lasers all day.

For him, that would be the best day ever.

---

Ashley couldn't believe that she was once again at work during the apocalypse, selling comic books to people. As she stood behind the counter, somebody pulled up a copy of Berserk and asked her opinion on it.

"Honestly, I think it's fine. You should get the first big one, though, if you're going to do that."

"So with all this stuff that's going on here, why are you here at work?"

The woman in front of her looked scared out of her mind, but the normal combo of scared and bored that many people now wore. It was like the new cycle had just become so terrible that people were lashing out for no reason.

Ashley gave him her best glare. "I'm here because people keep coming into the comic shop and buying stuff. If nobody bought stuff, they wouldn't be able to pay me."

"I figured it was something like that."

The woman kept browsing as Ashley slowly spiraled. How was she going to pay rent? Her landlord was only taking cash. That wouldn't be changing anytime soon...

She was so fucked.

The city wouldn't shut down; Broadway had. She wasn't going to get another audition. Too many people had died.

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

So she just did her normal morning shift and got off in the afternoon to see how many dungeons she could run. Maybe there, she could escape this endless rat race.

Kate had taken to texting her, and for the first time in a while, she was having almost pleasant thoughts regarding the woman. They had worked out a distribution of the spoils that favored their deck builds. If a card worked better for one of the decks they would get that first pick. If it was between two people they would flip a coin.

They would of course try to drag some friends along, but unfortunately, none of Ashley's friends had gotten decks, and Kate said that all of her friends lived in Hoboken, New Jersey City. That was bewildering, given she never took the time to visit those places. She was from here, unlike Ashley.

She guessed that just because something was very close, it didn't mean that it was convenient to travel there. Or even enticing. Even if there was an entire busing and train apparatus that would get you there in a very reasonable amount of time, going all the way to Jersey seemed like a bother. Plus, that cost money and Ashley needed it for rent.

She was hoping to actually see her tiny apartment from time to time. She didn't need to be there all the time, but she was going to use it.

She got a text from Kate right before she got off.

Kate: The cops worked out the frequency of the dungeons. They expect another one to spawn about every hour in the five-block radius. But the news is saying they're not the same on the inside. Either way, would you get off work? We can go head to one immediately.

Ashley: I would definitely like to change really quick. You can meet me at the 45 deli.

Kate: There are a lot of police officers there.

Ashley could not grasp what the girl really wanted. Was she saying that there were too many and that she didn't want to be near the dungeon, or was she just being obtuse? Either way, they wanted Bagel to come with them. Even if he didn't, saying that you ran dungeons with a cat was something that every cat lady thought about

She took a second to imagine

Did she feel ownership over the cat? He had a childlike glee to it. In a very real way, she felt responsible for him. Just because a cat could talk didn't mean that it was smart.

Bagel was like someone had given a child adult morals and understanding of a language, but then kicked him out to try and make their way into the world. She somewhat pitied him. The poor cat probably had more problems than her.

The clock turned three. She made her way downstairs to greet Kate, and the two of them walked to the corners of 2nd and 45th. It was a two-block walk, and they stopped by the police station so that Kate could give an update on the newest dungeon.

"Hey, it's Kate again. I've got the location of a dungeon. It's going to be where Walgreens used to be, on the corner of 44th and 3rd, Southwest side."

The police officer dutifully wrote it down and handed her a piece of paper. Then the two of them held their hands out to transfer credits between them. There was a brief soft light as the transference happened.

Kate took the paper as if it was a treasured item that she would give to her children. Ashley tried to sneak a peek and see what it was, but it had already disappeared. It looked like she'd been given a dollar, but it was twice as large and it looked official and blue.

"So what was that?"

"What was what?" Kate asked, tucking the thing into her pocket. Kate was, of course, wearing combat fatigues, giving Ashley the exact level of envy that Miss Piggy would have if Kermit was seen talking to another female puppet.

"That, oh... That's the NYPD. They have a strategic credit reserve, so I can draw some when I'm ready. Every time I tell them where the dungeon is, they give me ten credits. This seems off, but the people that can find the dungeons without having to stumble upon them are very limited, so they really value my services. Also—" Kate turned back. "We're potentially running that dungeon with Bagel, so we'll let you know when it's closed up."

The woman manning the little information booth nodded.

Ashley shook her head. How had things changed so quickly that there was a little pop-up booth next to a large command center trailer just outside of her apartment and this was just normal? At least her apartment was the same, smelling of a delicious hot sweet aroma.

"If we finish early, I'm getting some Chinese food. If you want to come with me, I mean... I'm not going to stop you," Ashley said.

"It smells very spicy."

"It is spicy, if you order it that way. I had to work with them to get them to understand that just because I look white does not mean that I don't like a little spice. And now, whenever I come down, they know I want five out of five chilies."

Kate closed the door behind them as they exited to the first floor. She unlocked her second-floor apartment at the end of a small hallway.

"Oh, you can see right out on the street right here, huh?" Kate asked. She peered out onto 45th Street as Ashley stripped out of her day clothes.

Ashley still had on one of her sports bras, not seeing the point in wearing anything else in the current situation. She was going to have to fight at a moment's notice. She was not wearing her best lingerie and that shouldn't have annoyed her as much as it did at this moment.

Kate turned to look at her. And Ashley saw a flicker of something in her friend, as if Kate was undressing her with her eyes. Ashley paused and then grabbed a fresh shirt and put on some deodorant, because no one wants to smell their armpits while they're fighting monsters in an instant dungeon. Then she abandoned her pants.

"Girl, do you go commando at the comic book shop?" Kate asked, having not looked away for a second.

"Just because the nerdy boys think I am interested in them doesn't mean I am," Ashley said.

Kate was not busting her ass to be a taller, dominant woman. That had to be coming naturally. Ashley was here for it.

She could just imagine how good it would feel to sit in her lap, and she realized she kept stealing glances as she searched for the right pair of pants for a dungeon dive.

"I need a dress like yours. Something good for dungeon diving. Something that has pockets. If I'm not going to have what I'd prefer , a bulletproof armor vest, then I need something to protect my torso."

"Do you want like boob armor or something? This isn't a fantasy video game, just because the cards have video game rules doesn't mean that you're going to look good wearing it."

"I'm not trying to look good wearing it. I'm not showing off for anybody. I'm just trying to survive in another dungeon. I have all these guys here in my swarm to help me, but God forbid I take a little damage."

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that," Kate said, actually looking apologetic for the first time. The grin afterwards did not fully sell that transition. And was she biting her lip?

Ashley found an old bad band t-shirt that screamed for men to ask her if she knew any songs by the artist, followed by a pair of thick battle leggings, and to top it off, she rocked some work boots that had definitely been to a punk shower too. They were utilitarian in their expression, but they could definitely kick a fascist.

"Honestly, the thing I'm going to miss the most about the apocalypse?" Kate said. "I never got to punch a fascist."

"We're all going to miss that. Fuck those guys."

"Yeah, fuck those guys," Ashley said, doing upper laces. "So what kind of dungeon do you think it's going to be?"

"It's in a Walgreens so maybe it's a healthcare and beauty themes. Dungeon? Maybe that will be enough beauty for us to get some great cards."

She surveyed herself in the mirror, puffing her chest out and looking exactly like the beast that she was.

"Yeah, let's go get the cat and his mount. He's going to want to help us raid this Walgreens. After all, it is his competitor."