Elusive Prey

by Cheek, Jason

  Silently shaking my head, I began to explain the plan that I’d come up with for pulling Domenic out of this mess. The specifics on how to manage this had been slowly forming in my head for days now, but it wasn’t until I’d seen exactly what we were up against and the resources we had available that everything had come together. By the time I caught Mike and Domenic up to speed on how I wanted to go about doing this and we’d hammered out the specifics, it was nearly half-past nine. Meaning, we were already a half-hour late logging in for the multiple guilds that were waiting on us. Promising to be logged in by ten, I hung up and got moving.

  A half-hour isn’t much time to do anything, especially when I still had to void my bowels and take a shower. Why was a shower a must? Because when I went to sit down on the toilet, I could barely stand my own stink in the enclosed bathroom as I hurried about my business. Seriously, I smelt like a sweaty, two-day-old judo gi left in a clothes hamper. What can I say? I guess I shouldn’t have been too surprised after exercising in a neoprene-like bodysuit for hours on end, but, in my own defense, there were no warnings about that in the manual.

  This whole situation just made me wish I’d utilized my time better when I was on the phone talking everything out with the guys. Thankfully enough, I was off the toilet quicker than expected. I guess protein powder doesn’t affect the body as much as frozen dinners. Glancing at the ripped look of my body in the mirror as I grabbed my toothbrush and hopped in the shower, I realized I had to get my ass to the grocery store sooner rather than later so I could get some high-calorie foods or I was going to be in some serious trouble.

  Ten minutes after hanging up the phone, I was air-drying in the kitchen as I made up a protein shake for breakfast and refilled my Camelbak with its protein mixture. The shake was a mixture of vanilla whey protein, the last of my milk, and peanut butter. It was the best I could come up with for a quick, high-protein breakfast with the time limit I was under. Heading to the bathroom still guzzling the thick shake, I grimaced as I took down my still damp gaming suit hanging across the curtain rod. Ignoring the dampness and the smell, I began the process of wiggling into the Stillsuit.

  Have you ever tried putting on a still wet wetsuit? That was what it felt like getting back into my gear. On an uncomfortable too much information (TMI) note, I’m sure the suit wouldn’t have stank so much if it could’ve had a chance to fully dry out. Next time, I’d have to hang it up in the computer room and leave its internal fan running to dry it out quicker. Better yet, maybe they had something in the directions on care and cleaning. I guess I’d have to check that out when I had more time. Thankfully though, once I got my arms and legs through their appropriate holes, it went on easily enough. Chasing my shake down with a large glass of water, I hurried to the computer room and sat down in my Egg as the suit’s fans powered up. Ignoring the slight chill going down my body, I strapped my headgear on and triggered the log on sequence right at ten o’clock as my vision turned black.

  Running Pod Diagnostic – Complete

  Synchronizing controller units - Complete

  Neuro Synchronization - Complete

  Initializing virtual environment …

  Chapter Five

  (Second Assault Group: Startum and crew in Domenic's Area)

  I heard a ruckus as soon as my consciousness registered that it was synced with my avatar. Opening my eyes, my vision was immediately blocked by a system window pop up that was quickly followed by the golden glow of a level up as I urgently sat up, dislodging Helgath and Neysa, who were fast asleep on my chest, in the process. Their mental confusion at having me logged back in so early momentarily filled my mind as they clawed their way back to consciousness, while I paused to study the system message.

  Congratulations! You have reached Level 39!

  You have 5 Attribute Points Unspent!

  The fuck! I excitedly thought, as soon as I realized that meant I’d gained four levels, or five, depending on if you counted the last time I’d taken the time to go through my Character Sheet. Hungrily, my eyes read through the scrolling text as I completely ignored the argument that was going on around me.

  Congratulations! You have reached Level 38!

  You have 5 Attribute Points Unspent!

  Congratulations! You have successfully completed the secret quest, Going above and beyond for the humanity of it! For your efforts in resurrecting all of the victims that were slaughtered by the Chaos Storm Alliance after taking control of the city of Telrain, you have gained 50,093 Experience Points and 5,093 points to Reputation. Due to taking the time and effort to resurrect everyone from the lowest commoner to the highest noble and not just completing the objectives of the quest, you have gained the survivors as vassals.

  Congratulations! You have reached Level 37!

  You have 5 Attribute Points Unspent!

  Congratulations! You have successfully completed the secret quest, the true enemy revealed! For discovering that Prince Lekroth Isolde had not betrayed his sister or the Kingdom of Kader and was in fact a prisoner of the Chaos Storm Alliance, you have gained 10,000 Experience Points and 1000 points to Reputation. Due to not prejudging the situation and your efforts to discover the truth, the Royal Prince Lekroth Isolde’s life was saved, his reputation restored, and the honor of the House of Isolde left unblemished. In honor of the life you have returned to him, Prince Lekroth Isolde has sworn fealty to the House of Kayden.

  Congratulations! You have successfully completed the quest Evacuate the townsfolk from the city of Telrain and bring them to safety!

  Objective 1: Evacuate eighty percent of the city of Telrain’s population before Princess Reeva’s execution. Completed

  Objective 2: Get the survivors to safety or as many as possible to safety in the coming invasion. Completed.

  Objective 3: Remove the scroll of Meteor Strike from Chaos Storm's arsenal. Alternate Completion: You forced the Chaos Storm Alliance to use the scroll of Meteor Strike on the city of Telrain destroying the city in the process thus removing it from their arsenal. Bonus Objective: Chaos Storm used the scroll after most of the citizens were evacuated mostly killing their own people.

  Objective 4: Stop the Kingdom of Kader from falling. Completed: You have broken the hold of the Chaos Storm Alliance on the Kingdom of Kader, rescued the Princess, and brought her to safety.

  Reward: You have gained 10,000 Experience Points. You have gained 5000 to Reputation. For rescuing the citizens of the capital city of Telrain, you have earned the title, Protector of the Kingdom of Kader. From your actions, the surviving citizens of Telrain have sworn allegiance to the House of Kayden, and you now have the option of purchasing additional Humans in the NPC Recruiter. In addition, as long as you hold to your oath of protecting the Kingdom of Kader and rebuilding the Isolde Line, then all units of the Royal Forces in the Nordic Region will swear allegiance to the House of Kayden. Lastly, due to your status of Feudal Lord of the Human Kingdom of Kader, the Sea Elf Kingdom of Tak'Ula'Kastadar, the Centaur Clan of Ilyrall, and Lord of the House of Kayden, you are the first player to achieve the title of Overlord.

  Congratulations! You have successfully completed the quest Rescue Princess Reeva from Telrain so she can take her rightful place on the throne to rule over the Kingdom of Kader! You have gained 10,000 Experience Points. You have gained 1,000 to Reputation. For rescuing Princess Reeva Isolde of the Kingdom of Kader and placing the rightful ruler on the throne, you have earned the title, Champion of the Royal House of Isolde.

  Congratulations! You have reached Level 36!

  You have 5 Attribute Points Unspent!

  For these last two quests to register as complete, it meant that the Telrain survivors must have reached Darom and that Princess Isolde’s party made it to Palnisdale to take command of the garrison. I wasn’t sure which was the greater load off my mind. Knowing that the newest members of the House of Kayden were safely tucked away in Darom with the rest of my people or that there was nothing stopping the Princess from taking co
mmand of Palnisdale. Both were essential in their own ways, and I’d been concerned that the Chaos Storm Alliance had taken over the Citadel too. Feeling much better at pulling off my plan for the Isolde Line, I went to read further only to have a new quest pop up.

  New Quest! Do not allow Palnisdale to fall to the Northern Orc Tribes invasion! (Evolving Quest)

  To keep the title of Overlord, you must swear in the remaining Royal Forces in Palnisdale to your cause and not allow the fortress to fall into the hands of the invaders. If the Citadel falls to the Northern Orc Tribes invasion, you will lose your title and the Kingdom of Kader will cease to exist.

  Objective 1: Do not allow Palnisdale to fall to the northern hordes.

  Objective 2: Restore a third of the fortresses on the Isolde Line.

  Difficulty: Nightmare.

  Reward: Unknown.

  Accept: Yes / No

  Reading over the quest, I chose “Yes” without hesitation. Not having another pop up immediately block my vision, I continued reading to make sure I’d caught up on everything. Level 36 had come during the raid’s fight against the high-level mobs of the pass, which I must have missed during the battle. Seeing the next blocks of text were the information on my new spells for reaching level 35, I swiped the system window away and looked around to see what the commotion going on around me was all about. Blocking the sun from my eyes, I focused on the angry words being thrown around as my bleary eyes adjusted to the bright light. I swear, it was almost like my avatar’s lack of sleep was affecting me in-game as much as it was affecting my body in real life.

  “What the fuck do you mean we’re still going to help that fucker out?” Kenzie angrily demanded of Mike with her disgruntled guildmates at her back. “He blew me up and then treated Star like he was an asshole after everything he’s been doing for him!”

  “Dom just overreacted about how Jay and I handled the fight between the two of you,” Mike tried to explain as Kenzie exploded in outrage.

  “He told him to take his three hundred gold and to piss the fuck off!”

  “Ha,” a new voice I hadn’t heard before exclaimed, “I bet that went over like a lead weight!”

  “He did what?” Several voices I recognized asked in unison.

  “What the hell was the three hundred gold for?” Thomas asked Kenzie in confusion.

  “Something about paying off the mercenaries he owed money to before he could pull out,” Darkhorse explained to Thomas as another voice spoke up.

  “Drink a cup of cement and harden the fuck up!” Dangas growled in exasperation at everyone. “You’ve seen what the poor cobbler has been dealing with for the last week and a half. Cut the guy some slack.”

  “Da, being target like this is der'mo,” Dmitry agreed in a deep voice, backing up the Aussie Guild Leader. “Situation like that makes best of us tupoy ... err … I mean, dumb.”

  “That’s bullshit!” Sarka argued, angrily cutting into the discussion. “I can’t believe we came all this way to save this asshole only to have him throw a temper tantrum about being evacuated.”

  “I think it was more about being attacked in his own keep,” Darkhorse tried to explain, as Sarka threw her hands up in the air in anger.

  “He blew everyone up!” Sarka snarled back at the Devil Dog Rogue. “Who wouldn’t be pissed off about that?”

  “It’s cool, Sarka” I called out, as I tiredly climbed to my feet. “Like Dmitry said, shit happens and it really was an accident.”

  “Yo, Jay!”

  “About time you logged in!”

  “Morning Star!”

  “You’re an hour late!”

  “Morgen søvnig hode!”

  I acknowledged the chorus of greetings with a wave as I helped a groggy Helgath to her feet. At the same time, Neysa rolled to her paws easily enough to stand up next to me as I felt both of my soulmates begin rummaging through my mind as they tried to understand what was going on. Yeah, I should’ve given them a rash of shit about that, but honestly, there was just too much going on and not enough time to deal with it all. As if to emphasize that point, I heard the sounds of a thunderous barrage echo off the mountains in the distance as the siege against Domenic’s fortress started up again in earnest.

  My new friends being upset at Domenic’s attitude wasn’t any surprise. They hadn’t had the time to form a bond with him yet and had come here solely to give me a hand. On top of that, we were all feeling pretty beat up. The schedule we’d been running was beating me up and I was a hardcore gamer. It had to be even tougher on my new friends who weren’t used to playing at this level. After talking to Mike and Domenic this morning, it helped me to keep that in perspective. I was just about to explain that to Sarka, when it hit me that the new people were talking Norwegian.

  “Søvnig hode?” I asked, turning towards the new group of three Wolf-Kin with interest. “Is that you, Anders?”

  “Hey, Star!” The large black Wolf-Kin with silver highlights bellowed. My quick cast of Identify gave me the name, Arcturus Borknager, level 38, before I was engulfed in a furry hug. “It is good to see you!”

  “Gah!” I gagged, getting a mouthful of coarse hair in the process.

  “Oh yeah, sorry about that,” Arcturus apologized as he stepped back. “I’m still getting used to being a walking carpet.”

  “It’s cool, man, you just caught me with my mouth open,” I said between sputters, trying to get the leftover fur out of my mouth. “Seriously though, thanks for traveling over to give us a hand against these Chaos Storm asshats.”

  “Shit happens?” Sarka demanded, interrupting our greeting as she traded an incredulous look with Yun, Tinyr, Unalia, and the Devil Dogs. “I don’t know why you’re acting so calmly about this. We spent a week and a half getting here to help your friend,” she emphasized the word making air quotes, “and this is the thanks we get?” Sarka finished, looking around at the group for support.

  “What, you pissing off Domenic again by warping him back into a dungeon without his implants or armor?” Arcturus asked, more reminiscing about some of the old times we’d had together than being serious.

  “Not quite,” I agreed, rolling my eyes at his lack of support. I’d met Anders when he was in a competing guild in Chaos Online. Even so, we’d worked out a relationship based on mutual respect and had become friends during that time.

  The joke with Domenic was that my old Engineer class had the ability to pull teammates to wherever the avatar was located. I’d caught Domenic sneaking out after dying to replace his armor and implants with a higher version of each. It only became a problem because we were waiting over forty minutes for him to return after dying. When I’d yanked him back into the dungeon, he was basically naked. Even worse, we made him play the rest of the dungeon that way as punishment for lying to the team and making us wait. Arcturus had been in the team with us on that run and had laughed his ass off at our antics.

  “Honestly though, last night ended up being a lose-lose situation all the way around,” I said, chuckling in spite of myself.

  “Oh, so you pissed everyone off instead of coming up with a new solution?” Arcturus asked, instantly understanding the situation as he let out a bark of laughter at the guilty look on my face. “So, same old Star!”

  “I don’t get it,” Sarka commented with a frown on her face, interrupting our banter. “Why aren’t you being more pissed off about this?” Looking around, I saw the same unspoken question reflected in many of the Devil Dogs’ faces.

  “Because people fuck up,” I said, letting out a deep sigh as I met my friends’ eyes. Seeing that Sarka still wanted to argue the point, I held up my hand for her to listen.

  “Look, Dom has been being griefed almost since he started the game by my ex-girlfriend and has good reason to be on his last nerve. I expect that if any of us were in a similar situation that our tempers would be flaring at the drop of a hat. Did he kill a bunch of us by accident? Yeah. Did he deserve to be attacked for the mistake?” My eyes went
to Kenzie who promptly looked away in embarrassment. “Probably not. Did he handle the situation well? No, but then again, who would’ve with everything going on?”

  “All that I can ask is that you give Dom the benefit of the doubt,” I said, as my eyes scanned the circle of my friends, new and old alike. “I hope you’ll get to know him once he’s not in the middle of this shit storm,” a smile came to my lips, “besides, I have a feeling he’ll be looking some of you up to apologize for losing his cool.” That seemed to put the Devil Dogs at ease, as Kenzie gave me an understanding nod, even if that didn’t change the looks on Tinyr, Unalia, Sarka, and Yun’s faces.

  “Right now, we are at the cusp of completing everything we set out to do, when you agreed to give me a hand a week and a half ago in Delonshire,” I meaningfully said, as Mike gave me an encouraging nod. He knew as well as I did how hard it was to get so many different people to work together, especially in stressful situations like this. “We have one more end run, and then we can go back to our normal game play back in BrokenFang Hold.”

  “You mean, normal shit like taking on things like the massive Hobgoblin army headed our way?” Thomas asked with a laugh, as I flipped him off. Surprisingly enough, that seemed to break the tension as everyone chuckled at our antics. As the laughing died down, I nodded to everyone.

  “So are you guys and gals down with shoving our collective foot down these asshats’ throats?” I asked, raising my voice to be heard by everyone gathered around.

  Thankfully, that earned a resounding shout of defiance. My friends, the Uten Syn, Aussies, Russians, Norwegians, and even the Devil Dogs were more than down for a good fight. I’d been somewhat worried about that. It only seemed like Tinyr, Unalia, Sarka, and Yun that were less than thrilled about going to Domenic’s aid, not that I couldn’t understand why. No one liked it when someone they cared about was unjustly smacked down.