The Arena

by Drew Seren

  “Everyone knows you don’t care about anyone at work.” Left hefted the sword high and started to bring it down on Horc. “It’s just weird.”

  “No, Dude, it’s not weird.” Horc dove out of the way and again came up inside Left’s guard and slashed him hard across the right arm. He was down to half health. “It’s called not dating in the work place. That’s not cool.” He wasn’t bothered by the fight talk, and it was helping keep Left distracted.

  “We’re supposed to be finding ourselves women so we can have children and keep the house of God going strong.” Left let go of his sword and punched Horc in the face. The damage flashed red on his screen but didn’t even knock him down by a noticeable amount.

  “Our world is over populated in case you failed to notice.” Horc swung hard at the same spot on Left’s right arm he’d hit before. Blood sprayed his face.

  Left stumbled away from him, down to nearly a quarter. “Damn it. That hurts.”

  “This game does that.” Horc pressed his attack, swinging his sword, slicing for Left’s head. “Come on, Dude, give up.”

  “No.” Left managed to get his sword up to block part of the blow, but Horc scored at nearly the same spot on Left’s cheek as he had with his arrow.

  Left’s health flashed orange.

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake.” Baladara’s Fireball caught Left in the side of the ear. His head exploded as his health bar went red and then disappeared altogether.

  Around the stadium the crowd whose noise had disappeared as Horc concentrated on defeating Left, roared its approval of their victory. The sound of the cheers made Horc’s heart race and he got light-headed. He wasn’t used to hearing admiration from fans. The most he normally got was a good report on a monitored phone call.

  Horc wiped the bodily fluids off even as they began to pixelate and disappear. “I think you overdid that one.”

  “Maybe, but these guys are a bigger pain than even they realized.” Baladara shook out her hands like they were cramping.

  “Yeah, they were,” Tufkakes agreed, limping toward Horc. “Those damned swords don’t need to be all that agile, all they have to do is land a good hit and they can do some major damage.”

  “You okay?” Horc went to lend Tufkakes a shoulder.

  “Sure. Nothing a bit of food and time off my feet won’t cure.” Tufkakes health bar was under a half. It was the worst Horc had seen since Greensleeves had died and been captured.

  Out of reflex, Horc glanced up at Rothand’s box. Their large tormentor had only just turned away to leave. It was the longest he’d stayed to watch a fight. Horc wondered if there was some significance to that or not.

  With a shrug, he turned toward the rising gate where Bo’ stood waiting for them. He hoped Rick got some useful information from the decimation of the Righteous Band. It felt weird to make-believe kill co-workers, but it was also somewhat cathartic. Since the others didn’t work with the guys, he doubted they’d feel the same, but he figured if Mike had been driving Baladara, they’d have high-fived after Lefthandofgod’s head exploded.

  20

  Horc stared at Rick’s message.

  We’re still analyzing the data we got to try to figure out what it means, but there’s definitely a split second at the time of resurrection that everything on the account is normal.

  If someone is ready when they die, they might be able to log out? Horc hoped that was right. Not that it helped him, but it would help the others trapped in the game.

  I don’t know if they’d be able to do it by themselves. But I might be able to pull them out, or one of my team. We’re going to set up someone to try next time the arena starts up again.

  Bo’ said we’d get the night off, which is good. Tufkakes was hurt pretty bad, but he’ll recover. Horc hated the idea that another of his team might end up in Rothand’s menagerie.

  That’ll give us more time to work, and maybe time to sleep. Game time is a little faster than our time. It helps keep the global game from bogging down for anyone that way.

  Don’t kill yourself with this. We need your brain at its peak functioning just like we need us working at top performance. That’s the only way we’re all getting out of this.

  Right. Miranda wanted me to tell you she’s got a hardware team trying to diagnose your pod’s problems, but there’s a bug there too.

  Horc chuckled as he replied. No kidding.

  “Is Rick being funny?” Baladara asked.

  “Not exactly.” Horc muttered as Rick ended their connection and he stretched. At least they were going to get a little down time.

  “What in the bloody hell did that woman do to my controls?” Baladara’s shouts woke Horc.

  He yawned and stretched feeling like it had just been a few minutes since he’d stretched the last time. His neck was sore from sleeping against the wall, but he was still fairly sure it was probably more comfortable that way than laying down on the straw mattress.

  “Sounds like Mike’s back in the driver’s seat,” Tufkakes said before yawning himself.

  “How long were we out?” Horc asked, easing off the bed so he could bend and get his back to pop.

  “Long enough,” Baladara replied. “Did neither one of you care enough to keep her from playing with my tool bars? I mean geez, she’s got everything laid out by casting time, longest to shortest. How’s a guy supposed to get his spells off like this. I hate it when she plays with my hotkeys. ” Her hands were flailing around like crazy.

  “It wasn’t our idea to let Lisa slip you a mickey and then take over. Hope you’re up to a few more rounds in the arena.” Tufkakes walked over to the table with the container of water. There were some fruit and rolls on it next to the water. “Looks like Bo’ or someone came in here while we were out and left us breakfast.”

  “At least something around here is working,” Baladara muttered and suddenly stopped gesturing. “Okay. I think I’ve got everything back to normal. Geez. I don’t think I’m ever letting her drive my toons again, or at least not while I’m not in the room watching her do it.”

  Horc picked up a piece of fruit, still surprised at how real it felt in his hands. It was red like a pomegranate and when he pulled out his knife and cut into it, the flesh inside smelled like he expected. As he started scraping out the seeds and flesh, the door opened and Bo’ walked in. Horc really wished the Goblin understood basic courtesies like knocking.

  “Ah, again yous are up and ready to fight.” Bo’ beamed in obvious delight. “This is good. The boss was very impressed with yous defeat of the Paladins last night. He’s asking for insulting of yous foes today. The way Horc verbally laid into Lefthandofgod made the boss laugh, and the spectators too.”

  “Let’s just say we don’t always see eye to eye at work,” Horc said as a bit of fruit juice ran down his jaw.

  Bo’ laughed. “I totally get yous there.”

  Tufkakes yawned again. “So how long do we have this time?”

  “Thirty minutes like always. Is there anything else yous all need before the fight?” Bo’ seemed to study each of them for a moment. “Looks like yous all recovered for the last battle.”

  Horc did a quick look at the party stats, everyone, even the ones grayed out, were good on health and mana. “I think we’re good.” He took another bite of his fruit.

  “Good, good.” Bo’s turned back to the door. “See yous guys soon.”

  Horc finished his fruit and returned to the spot on the bed he was beginning to think of as his and rubbed Wolf between the ears. For good measure, he opened his bag and pulled Wolf out a chunk of meat. “You’re doing good, Boy.” Then Horc sighed. “Okay. Let me check with Rick and see if he’s got anything for us. If we’re going to be fighting soon he needs to know.”

  “Definitely. I hope I get some good data for that epic fight I missed out on.” Baladara went for a piece of fruit too. “I’m not going to tell them, but I was hoping for a chance to kick those mailroom guys while we were in here, and what happened?
I missed it.”

  “It was fairly gratifying.” Grinning at the memory, Horc opened up the chat window and sent Rick an inquiry.

  Hey Alan, you about ready to get the day going?

  I guess. What did you programmers find out on your end?

  Good news. Looks like that window might be what we’ve been looking for. Drawback is right now I’ve only got me and one other tech standing by to grab people as they resurrect.

  Horc sighed and rested his head against the wall. So, we’re not going to be able to even get a team of three out at a time.

  Depends. If you do it the way you did last night with the bible boys, you could. Kill one off fast and draw the other two out. That would give us time to yank the first one as they rez and then be ready for the others a couple of minutes later.

  If we do it close together then, it’s bad. Horc was hoping for something a little easier than trying to time the deaths, and time the rez grabs. That was an awful lot of timing for pulling people out of a game.

  Not exactly bad, we’ll still be able to get them out, just not that time. You’ll need to kill them again.

  An idea hit Horc. Okay, question. Are you only going to be able to catch people who die close to us, or will you be able to catch anyone who dies in the arena?

  There was a pause in the response.

  Right now, we’re having a bit of difficulty trying to get a wide view of what’s going on in the game. We can watch you and the people you’re interacting with because it’s a focused view. Trying to keep track of everyone in the arena would be a no go at this moment.

  Then you’re saying we’re going to have to be a good enough team to take down everything they throw at us? A sense of dread settled into Horc’s stomach. That means our own people.

  We’re working on getting a wide view of what’s going on.

  The door opened and Bo’ came in. “Okay yous guys. It’s time to fight again.”

  Gotta go. It’s show time.

  Not waiting for Rick’s response, Horc hopped off the bed and walked with his friends out of the room and down the corridor toward the arena and the start of the contest for the day. If they were going to have to take out all the captive players, he hoped it was going to be a good day and not one that sucked big time. Although he felt like he was walking into a meeting with upper management with mustard on a red tie and grease stains on his shirt and not wanting to ask what more could go wrong.

  21

  When the gate across the arena opened, Horc’s heart nearly stopped. Steelmaiden stood there looking grim. Her armor was dented and scuffed worse than he’d ever seen it. She was always right on top of keeping her armor and weapons repaired and ready for battle. The woman standing across from him wasn’t the same woman who was part of their party, she was something rougher, meaner, almost desperate. Her appearance was so bad, Horc only caught a glance of the number of people filling that stands. It seemed like nearly every concrete seat was filled.

  “This doesn’t look good,” Baladara said grimly.

  “I’ve never seen her, except through the bars of a cell, but she looks like hell,” Tufkakes added.

  Horc nodded. “That she does. First goal, somebody get close enough to her to let her know about our plan. She needs to be ready to attempt to log out when she rezs.” He wasn’t sure he could be the one to take her down. The idea of hurting a friend, even for their own good, didn’t sit well with him.

  “That might not be so easy.” Baladara pointed to the two huge bears flanking the Barbarian woman.

  “Yeah, that looks even nastier.” Horc tried to study the bears and determine what they were and how powerful, but there was nothing above their heads. “Looks like they might’ve gotten another Beastmaster.”

  “Or the same one,” Tufkakes said. “I’ll find him and take him out. Hold off on Steelmaiden until he’s down. It’ll be easier that way.” He stepped back into the shadows of the wall and disappeared from view.

  “Sounds good.” Horc notched an arrow. The ones Tufkakes had found were diminishing to short supply. He was going to have to make every one count.

  Focusing on the largest bear, Horc let a Fire arrow fly as the distant gate fell with a clang. Since the bears didn’t have to be herded into the arena like the cymeras had been, he presumed they were easier for the Beastmaster to control, or they faced a different foe, one who was more powerful than the previous one.

  The bear roared as Horc’s arrow caught it in the eye and set its fur on fire.

  Horc quickly readied another arrow and let it fly as Wolf hit the same bear he’d injured.

  Baladara’s first Fireball hit the other bear, knocking it over backward as it surged onto its hind legs. That bear also caught on fire, but it got back to its feet quickly. The flaming bear then roared and charged the Elven Mage.

  Horc managed to get off two more arrows before the bear closed on him. Wolf was doing his best to distract the bear, but it seemed to be useless as it focused its efforts on getting to Horc. Without a health bar, it was impossible for Horc to tell how much damage he was doing, other than the numbers scrolling past his vision indicating that his efforts were having effects. He wished he could see more and know how close to down the bear was as he drew his sword and set his feet in preparation for the thing to hit him.

  The charging bear hit him hard, forcing him back a couple of feet and taking a chunk out of his health points.

  Horc swung his sword as hard as he could.

  A critical hit notification flashed on his screen showing a hundred points in damage. Then the beast stumbled.

  Taking advantage of its obvious weakness, Horc cleaved it again. Another critical hit scrolled past. The bear dropped to the sand and pixelated. The crowd in the seats above him cheered.

  “I don’t want to do this.” Steelmaiden hit him hard in the face with the pommel of her sword.

  Horc stumbled backward, trying to get his sword up as his head spun with the blow. He was down under three quarter’s health.

  “Then don’t.” Horc circled away from her as Wolf hit her from behind.

  Steelmaiden reached back for Wolf, but he was already gone, doing his best to stay out of reach.

  Horc took the distraction, lowered his shoulder toward her chest and charged. He hit her hard, carrying her down and landing hard enough on the sand to send up a plume of dust.

  “Log out when you rez,” he said softly, hoping she heard him.

  She hit him hard in the shoulder, again with her pommel.

  Rolling away, Horc staggered to his feet. His shoulder felt numb, and he was thankful it hadn’t been his sword arm.

  Rushing him, she brought her sword down in a vicious cut that he only barely blocked. Their blades rang out and she leaned in close to him. “Won’t help. No time to log out.” She shoved away from him.

  Wolf dashed behind her and Horc shoved her back over the companion just as a Fireball shot across the arena.

  Steelmaiden fell hard, just as Wolf scooted past her with the barest yelp when she landed on the tip of his tail.

  Horc frowned as he pounced on her. “Be ready. You have to log out as you rez. Rick’s standing by to grab you and get you out.”

  His gloved hand throbbed from impacting the steel of her helmet.

  “Worth a try.” Steelmaiden shoved Horc away. “Give me your best shot.”

  “Horc, look out!” Baladara shouted.

  Some instinct made him drop to the sands and roll. A heavy thunk sounded above him as Horc came to his knees.

  In the list of party avatars, Steelmaiden’s began to flash bright red.

  Wolf hit her hard, knocking her back into the sands.

  Horc glanced at his own health bar as hers went out. His was down to a quarter.

  Steelmaiden shimmered, then pixelated out of existence.

  A dagger flashed toward Horc as he dodged out of the blade’s way. He looked in the direction the dagger had come from. Seconds later, Tufkakes and a scrawny man in
black leather armor rolled out onto the sands looking like they’d just fallen from the wall that encircled the arena.

  “That’s got to be the Beastmaster,” Baladara moved a little to the right, as if to get a clearer shot as Tufkakes drove another dagger into the player and got a drop in his opponent’s health for his efforts.

  After the bears, whose health he couldn’t see, it was nice to watch a health bar drop as Horc fired an arrow and caught the man in the side of the head. Another critical hit flashed on the screen as the Beastmaster’s health dropped to under a quarter and turned orange.

  Baladara’s Fireball also caught it in the side of the head. There was a flash and gray matter splashed out on Tufkakes.

  “Warn a guy about that next time.” Tufkakes swiped at the gook even as it digitized and vanished.

  “Sorry. Didn’t realize he was that low.” Baladara shook out her hands as the crowd roared its approval and stood.

  The cheers went on for a solid minute. Horc had never had so many people ecstatic about something he’d done. Even though he wanted to get back to the cell so he could eat and drink to bring his health and mana back up, there was something about the admiration of strangers that made him want to stand there for a while and just soak it in.

  As the gate they entered through came up, the spell of the crowd died down.

  With a heavy sigh, Horc turned to where Bo’ the Goblin was waiting for them to clear the arena so the next match could begin.

  “Wonder why they didn’t send both Slasher and Steelmaiden after us?” Baladara muttered as they headed for the gate.

  “No clue,” Horc replied. “I just hope she managed to get out. If we have a way to help people, we’ll have to spread the word.” It would make him feel better if at least someone was making progress in escaping the game.

  When they reached their cell, a large tray of food and drink was waiting for them. It was full of various fruits, breads and meats. The smell of the warm breads and roasted meat made Horc’s mouth water.