[Seven-Minute Semblance] GODSFORRENT & FIMBULWINTER

FIMBULWINTER || Chapter 3 - A Gratuitous Homecoming

Edward Dace.

3. September.
Friday, 5:00 p.m.
Harriet Medical City.

WHY AM I a hacker? Great question.

I was eight years old and I got tired of being Macey's punching bag. Of course I didn't realise how precious those memories were, at that time, and hell I'd give anything to relive that.

I ran away from the playground and I ran until I reached an internet café owned by an Indian fella. He was nice, even though he didn't talk much English or Filipino. I was psychologically unable to talk back then, but for some cosmic reason he knew how interested I was with computers.

He let me use a computer for free, after I stared at the customers for a solid hour. I was curious, you can't blame my adorable childish innocence and wonder. He played an educational video about computers.

I did not understand a thing.

But I was fascinated anyway. It must be something about the narrator's accent or the amazing graphics.

I came back the next day after school and he let me watch more educational videos, some of them in French, German, Italian, Japanese, Hindi, and other languages. I came back to the café the next days, too, until I was there everyday. He let me watch videos about unsolved mysteries, ciphers and puzzles, videos about hackers, and videos about computers and modern technology.

Everyday, for almost five years, I was at that café.

Betelgeuse, the nice Indian fella, taught me everything I know about computers—from programming to hacking—and he taught me how to make a fortune out of my skills. He made me Edward Dace.

He let me join Winter Hexagon. Mum wasn't really happy with me hanging out with them, but I rebelled. I always knew I was a badass rebel.

Mum was always busy with work.

If I worked my ass off, she won't need to work.

If she didn't work, she'll have more time for me. Yay.

But like fuck that happened. It was even worse. We ended up screaming at each other everyday, I'd skip school to be with Winter Hexagon, I'd sleep over at Betelgeuse's café... I did everything to avoid coming home to a battlefield I did not bargain for.

But I earned a lot of money, so it was a win.

At that time, all I knew was that nobody understood me the way I wanted to be understood. Except for Helix Error. Error was the other boy Betelgeuse kinda adopted and accepted into Winter Hexagon. Error and I were sort of like buddies. The two only kids in the group, both with fucked up families.

We bonded well.

Error came from an abusive household, I just graduated from one—from Luciano Lukas. That was friendship and we found it in Winter Hexagon.