System Architect

When the snow stopped later in the day, Dad dropped me off at Mom’s. Part of the deal for the extra couple of days was that Mom would get me over New Year’s. I wasn’t sure why they cared so much about splitting the time perfectly, but I imagined it had something to do with the ongoing divorce between them. I was doing my best to ignore everything that was going on with that—and I’d been pretty successful thus far.

My parents—at this point in their lives—didn’t have much to fight over and the whole custody thing was a bit of a moot point given the whole time travel thing. I was hopeful that the process would be more smooth this time around. At the same time, that the two were rigidly sticking to the 50/50 agreement filled me with some doubts that I chose to bottle up. That was the easier thing to do.

They had their lives and I’d reset it all again at some point in the future, so I found it hard to care. They were my parents but not the same ones that I’d take into the apocalypse with me. I pushed those thoughts out of my mind. I decided that I would much rather focus on the present—for the time being. That meant baking cookies with Mom.

“Can you measure out the oil?” Mom asked while she hunted for the mixer.

“Sure,” I agreed.

I found a measuring cup in a drawer. The oil I took from the pantry cabinet. I carefully poured the amount the boxed cookie mix called for into the measuring cup. I also retrieved the egg and cracked it into a ramekin.

Mom placed a bowl on the kitchen table and plugged in the mixer. Following the instructions on the side of the package, she dumped in the dry mix while I dumped in the rest of the ingredients. She started with the mixer before handing it to me. It was hard to hold and jumped around like an unbroken horse. Batter splattered the sides of the bowl and threatened to make a bigger mess. Thankfully, Mom stepped in and grabbed the mixer from me before that happened.

“Sorry, Mom,” I said. “It got away from me there.”

“It’s ok,” she said. “It’s pretty strong and you’re still so little.”

I gave her a flat look.

“Ok, ok, you’re not that little, but you’re still my baby boy.”

Mom finished mixing the dough. We spooned out portions of the mix onto a greased tray—and some into our mouths—before putting the tray into the oven. I got to lick the bowl clean and it was as delicious as I remembered—maybe even moreso. My tastebuds were much more sensitive than they were when I’d been an adult so the flavors were just more intense.

That made me stop and think. Since I had returned to my younger self, I’d been changing. Not only because of the pressures of the end of the world—good job, past me—but because I was young again. Being six again was rubbing off on me a bit. It had taken me a while to realize it, but I was doing things that a child would do not just because they were fun—and they were fun. Rather, I was doing them because I was in a child’s body. At least, that was my running hypothesis.

I influenced my younger self and, in turn, my younger self influenced me. I was not sure what I thought about the implications of it. On the one hand, it made some sense. I was the body I was in. On the other, I was a bit scared of how going through puberty—again—would be. I was thankful that it was far away because I was definitely not looking forward to that. I still had my emotional maturity, and I hoped that would last. In case it didn’t, I decided to keep track of these potential changes going forward.

When the timer dinged ten minutes later, I bounced on my feet while Mom carefully extracted the sheet pan from the oven. She let them cool where they were—she did not have a cooling rack. I tried to sneak a bite of the still-lava cookies, but she dissuaded me and convinced me to go do something else while the cookies cooled to temperatures that wouldn’t singe my mouth.

I sighed and dramatically stomped off to work on some of the daily and weekly quests that remained. When I had done so, I reviewed the features I had discovered. As far as I could tell, getting Quests I—and subsequently the ability to refresh quests—was my first target. For that, I needed 225,000 experience, or 175,000 experience if I decided for one free refresh instead of unlimited. If I had unlimited refreshes, I could get a lot more experience not only in the current loop but in subsequent loops, so that is what I decided on. I could always earn 50,000 experience back if I needed it for something else at a later date or if the unlimited didn’t make that much of a difference over the one free time. I’d need to try it to know.

As it stood, I had 58,511 experience. That felt quite far away from my goal. I was gaining around 7,000 per month—more if long-term quests were counted—which meant that I would have enough in about two years if my math checked out. After buying those features, the math got too murky for me to reliably forecast. Even if activating them changed nothing, I would have around a million experience to play with—including whatever I was going to spend on Restart I and its related features.

A whiff of the cookies brought me back to reality. I wondered how long it had been and if they were finally ready to eat.

“Mom!” I called out.

“Yes Dear?” I heard her voice echo from below.

“Are the cookies ready?”

“Let me check,” came the reply.

I waited a minute and then heard the answer.

“Yes, and they’re delicious!”

I cursed her and rushed downstairs and into the kitchen. Thankfully, Mom had only taken one of the cookies and left a large stack of them to be put away. I took two. One got stuffed into my mouth while the other I took upstairs all while feeling smug as if I had gotten away with something. I shook the feeling away and facepalmed.

Ugh, why am I acting like this? I thought I grew out of being a little shit a long time ago!

I took out my frustrations on my pillow. I punched it, screamed into it, and cried as well. I knew I should probably talk to Mom about it, but my own pride got in the way. I’d been alive for nearly forty years and I was going to handle it on my own. Like the adult I was, damn it!

I settled on a form of meditation. It worked to calm me down and center me. I felt grounded and—though not at peace—it was a step in that direction. An hour—and a cookie—later, I felt much better.

By the time New Year’s Eve rolled around, I felt like I had a handle on what was going on with me. While imperfect, I was in control of myself enough to counteract the majority of the childish impulses I was feeling. More importantly, it was New Year’s Eve, and that meant I could hang with Mom until midnight.

I was excited. Even though I could have stayed up until the middle of the night at any time, this was the first time I would be doing so intentionally. The only other time had been when I was awoken by a notification at midnight. I shuddered at the memory.

Mom and I sat in chairs in the living room with the TV showing a livestream of Times Square while we waited for the ball to drop. There were entertainers of all stripes. None of it was particularly interesting—especially as I was reminded of some later scandals that involved some of the celebrities performing. They had been more on the evil side of the criminal spectrum than on the stupid side. I gossiped with Mom about what I remembered, but I couldn’t remember anything more than vague dates—which I explained and she accepted.

As the evening and then night wore on, the performers changed and my eyelids grew ever heavier. With about an hour to go, I woke with a start.

“You were falling asleep there,” Mom said with a hand on my shoulder.

“Yeah, sorry,” I yawned.

“Are you sure you want to stay up until midnight? You’re having a har—“

“Yeah,” I said, cutting her off. “I’ll be fine.”

I yawned again.

I started employing every method I could think of to stay awake—splashing water on my face, having another cookie, rolling around on the floor, and even running outside into the cold air. They all helped. Still, by the time the ball began to fall, My eyes were barely open. I was laying across Mom’s lap watching the TV.

‘10!’

‘9!’

The crowd on the TV began chanting as it got closer. I tried to count with them but I was too far gone. I closed one eye and kept the other half-open.

‘3!’

‘2!’

‘1!’

‘HAPPY NEW YEAR!’

“Happy New Year,” Mom said quietly.

“Happy… New… Year…” I managed to get out.

“Alright,” she said while trying to get me onto my feet. “Time for bed. I’ll help you up to your room.”

I nodded, too tired to speak.

Mom held put one arm around me and carefully guided me up the stairs. I nearly fell on the way up, but her arm saved me. Step by step I climbed. By the time I reached the top, both of my eyes had closed. It was only through her guidance that I made it into my bed. I pretty much fell asleep—my consciousness disappearing before my head touched my pillow.

I woke later in the morning than I was used to—and I was feeling a bit groggy from the loss of sleep. I sat up, stretched, and yawned loudly. As I did every morning, I looked over the available quests. There were two interesting entries. I’d seen a yearly quest before—there was one when I’d unlocked Quests III, but it had been impossible to complete. One of the two was easy enough to complete. The other one looked like it should be possible as well even if it was a bit more difficult.

Yearly Questing

Complete 365 quests: 0/365

Success: 1,250 Exp

Failure: N/A

Expires: 364 days 15 hours 22 minutes 43 seconds

Yearly Earning

Earn $10,000: 0/10,000

Success: 1,250 Exp

Failure: N/A

Expires: 364 days 15 hours 22 minutes 43 seconds

I accepted both quests as well as the normal daily ones. The yearly quests were decent value but not quite worth as much as an equivalent number of daily quests—around a third. Still, one big quest was somewhat easier to work towards as there was no guarantee that I would be able to do every quest. I was looking forward to the ability to reroll quests that I couldn’t do as well as accept a new one after I’d finished one. That it was a couple years off irked me.

It was a frustrating grind that I would have to do. Burnout was an ever present issue just waiting in the wings for me to slip up. I knew I needed a break of some kind—especially with the next semester only a week away. I also had to consider what my next sewing project would be now that I had a bit more cash to work with. I’d decide after consulting Elizabeth.