by Terry Schott
He opened his mouth to speak, but she held up one hand. “Not yet. You must say the words only if he needs major prayers.”
Sebastian closed his eyes and nodded.
“Do you want me to heal your burns as well?”
“No!” Sebastian’s eyes widened as the word flew from his mouth.
Mercy considered him for a second and then stood. “Perhaps that is what Aleron would say as well, were he given the choice.”
“I can suffer yet contribute. Aleron needs to be able to do the same. There is no choice where he is concerned. We need you to attempt this.”
She nodded. “It’s your call.”
He closed his eyes. “How lucky for me.”
“Give me a few minutes to prepare.”
43
“I don’t get it.”
Kara rubbed her eye with the heel of a palm. “Get what?”
Isaac leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. “The longer this experiment goes on, the less control we seem to have over the game environment.”
“Is it degrading?”
“No, it’s strong and stable.”
“Then what do you mean?”
His brows furrowed. “The reality is ... too real.”
Kara laughed. “The virtual reality game you created is too real?”
“No.” He scowled. “The simulation that we built is no longer behaving like a constructed and controllable simulation.”
“You can’t control it?”
“Less and less, as time goes on.”
“Isn’t that what Sebastian intended?”
“I don’t think so.”
Kara laughed. “What?”
“You knew the guy.” He shrugged. “Not many could really follow him once he started babbling about his technical ideas. I sure as hell couldn’t.”
“I can’t believe he ever intended for the simulation to become uncontrollable. He made a serious commitment to make the place his new home. What good would it do for things to get so out of hand that it would need to be shut down?”
“Well, that’s another issue. We can no longer shut it off.”
“You tried?”
“Of course not. Not with the beta testers inside.”
“Then how do you know it can’t be turned off?”
“The overrides and protocols that would enable such a thing are no longer responding. We issue commands for the system to report data, and they don’t reply.”
“That doesn’t sound too bad.”
“Trust me. It’s not good. The broken function that concerns me most is the ability to influence NPCs. We are no longer able to access the AI and alter NPC thoughts, actions, you name it.” He spread his hands. “Can’t influence them at all. And that was certainly never part of my plan.”
“The occupants of Blades VR are now making their own decisions?”
“One hundred percent of the time.” He spread his hands. “Any suggestions?”
“Can we still put new players in?”
“Yes.”
“And if a player’s character dies, do they come out?”
He nodded. “As long as they have not entered the Dryad’s Heart instance.”
“Not a single player from that instance has come back to us?”
“Correct.”
“Something’s fishy, there.”
Isaac laughed. “You’re right. Why didn’t I think of that?”
She rolled her eyes. “Don’t.”
“Couldn’t resist.”
She held a finger up. “Want to hear a crazy thought?”
“Why not?”
“What if someone has hacked into the system? Sabotaging things so we fail.”
“A competitor?”
“It could happen, right?”
“Of course. I’ll put a team on it.”
“Good idea,” Kara said. “And since you accepted that theory so easily, let me throw another one by you.”
“Fire away.”
“What if someone is messing with things from the inside?”
Isaac stared at her for a long moment and then groaned. “If it is, then I can only think of one person doing it. Is that why Sebastian went in like he did?”
“Could be. Or maybe there is someone else in there causing problems.”
“No way.” Isaac shook his head. “It has to be Sebastian.”
“Or a group of NPCs.”
Isaac laughed. “Something like that isn’t even inside the realm of absurdly possible. I like your theory about Sebastian, though. Let’s look into that, too.”
44
Mercy bowed her head and positioned her hands palm-down and a few inches above Aleron’s bare upper torso. She closed her eyes.
Sebastian’s eyes met Shale’s. She glared back, her opposition evident. Everyone had argued against the idea, but it needed to be done, and Sebastian had pulled rank as group leader. His gaze shifted back to Aleron’s unconscious form, and he bit his lip, fighting the urge to yell out and stop the Death Stryker from what she was about to do.
Her whispering began: harsh, guttural sounds dripping from her lips, the vibrations resembling angry insects more than words. A black, oily liquid formed on her hands, so dark that it looked more like the absence of light than an actual colour. She tilted her hands downward and the substance travelled to her fingertips, pooling and growing into fat, heavy droplets. The tone and cadence of her chanting grew in volume, the syllables sounding angrier. The drops on her fingertips began to swirl and vibrate back and forth. Sebastian thought he could detect a tiny hum coming from her hands.
Mercy touched the droplets to Aleron’s skin. As they made contact, the fluid moved from Mercy’s hands and began to spread over the Scout to form a thin covering. Heartbeats later, the solid sheet dispersed into tightly packed clumps, each flowing toward a different pink line—the traces of the original wounds sealed earlier by Shale’s spell. Reaching their targets, the clumps of blackness rushed into healed cuts and pushed their way beneath his skin with a greedy eagerness, as if the substance was a living serpent.
Aleron’s eyes opened wide, and he screamed. It was so loud that Sebastian feared the stone walls would collapse around them.
No one moved. All they could do was watch helplessly as the scream—which lasted for less than twenty seconds—seemed to go on forever.
As suddenly as it began, Aleron’s mouth and eyes snapped shut and he collapsed back onto the ground, the fully rigid muscles of his body now entirely limp.
Mercy withdrew her hands, folded them in her lap, and looked down at Aleron. “It is done.”
“Did it work?” Sebastian asked.
“I cannot be certain until he wakes.”
“How long will that take?”
“Not long. The nightmares will wake him.”
“Nightmares?”
“Part of the process. Minor in most cases. The memory of them often fades over time.”
“But not always?”
“No. Not always.”
Sebastian looked at Shale. She held his gaze for a few seconds and then looked away, hugging her knees together.
Sebastian moved to sit beside Aleron. As the others prepared to sleep for the night, the leader reached out and held the young elf’s hand.
45
Joel’s eyes flew open and he gasped, breathing deeply as he tried to sit but failed.
“Easy.” A man’s voice spoke from the right. “You’re safe. Stop trying to sit up. Lie there and get your bearings for a second.”
Joel frowned, remembered where he was, and relaxed. Then he swore. “You’re kidding me? I’m back already?”
“Yes.”
He swore again, tilted his head forward as much as possible, and bashed it against the table.
“Don’t do that.”
“I just went in!” He shouted.
“I know.”
Joel closed his eyes and groaned. “How can I suck at this game so badly?”
The medic
al tech leaned over Joel’s face, pulled an eyelid open, and flashed a light back and forth across his pupil. “It isn’t only you.”
“It’s not?”
“Nope.” The tech repeated the process on his other eye. “We’re getting a lot of bounces.” He stepped back and wrote on a chart, a smile on his face. “See? It’s happening so much that we’ve even come up with a name for it. Bounces.”
“Someone’s put a bounty on new Travellers inside the game.”
The tech frowned. “That’s a disturbing theory.”
Joel laughed. “It’s not a theory, it’s fact. I was in a market chatting with another player. We must have said something odd to an NPC, because a second later three of ’em were pointing at us and shouting to ‘kill the Travellers.’”
“Ouch.”
Joel laughed. “I ran as fast as I could, but they were relentless. Cornered me and slit my throat.” He shuddered. “Better check your programming. I thought the NPCs were supposed to love Travellers.”
“They are.”
“This is insane.” Joel shook his head. “I log in, barely equip my character, and then die. This is, what, the third time now?”
“Fourth.”
“Fourth?” Joel shook his head. “How come I only remember three? I swear to—. I did not sign up for this crap.”
***
Kieran entered the room and moved to the empty chair at the head of the table. Forty pairs of eyes stared back at him as he sat. “Any problems to speak of?” No one spoke. “Good. I’ve read the reports and it looks as if we are doing better than expected with our initiative. NPCs have become overwhelmingly hostile toward new Travellers, chasing them down and taking them out as they are discovered.”
“That won’t last,” a woman said from halfway down the table to his left.
“Of course not, but it will make their stay more difficult. New players are most vulnerable upon entry. Any tiny slip-up now brings a heavy price, hopefully their lives.”
“Rates of discovery are already declining,” a man reported. “Which indicates that they are either not re-entering or are getting better at hiding who they are.”
Kieran smiled. “We’ve been able to guess at their numbers. Four to six thousand sounds about right.”
The woman nodded. “Those numbers indicate either beta testing or limited server capacity.” She paused and shook her head. “Or else they were testing the waters to see if we would reveal ourselves.”
“I promise you,” Kieran laughed. “No one suspects that we exist.”
“They’ve gotta be trying to figure out what’s causing this interruption.”
“That’s the beauty of having Sebastian here,” Kieran grinned. “The blame will rest on his shoulders. If anything makes sense, it is that he is the one behind any problems.”
“What about Sebastian?” A Scout at the far end of the table raised his hand. “Is he still inside Dryad’s Heart?”
Kieran pursed his lips and nodded.
“They should have failed that instance by now, like all the others.”
“I know.”
“How many players did we manage to trap that way?”
“A little over 1,200.”
The man tapped his chin and nodded. “I think that’s the best way to deal with them all.”
“I disagree.” Kieran opened the book he had brought and glanced at the figures. “Those inside instances are now frozen and removed from play, but we will have to eventually release them.”
“Why? I say, keep them locked away forever.”
Kieran shook his head. “That won’t stop new players from coming here. The better way is to frustrate them, make it so that playing is no fun.”
“You’re right,” another woman said. “Kill interest during beta and the game never takes off. I say we keep our efforts focused on that strategy.”
“All in favour?” Kieran raised his hand and waited for the majority to follow suit. “Then it’s agreed. We keep trying to kill new Travellers until they stop coming back.”
46
Sebastian leaned against the wall with arms crossed, fighting the urge to scratch the torturous itching that pulsed in waves as his skin slowly healed from the burns caused by the thraze.
Fen joined him, sitting and holding out a loaf of conjured bread. “Time to chew on flavourless mush. If you have trouble choking it down, I’ll share some of my stale, flat water to help.”
Sebastian accepted the food and placed it on his lap. “Thanks. I’ll work myself up to taking a bite in a few minutes.”
Fen laughed. “How’s the skin feeling?”
“Itchy beyond imagining.”
“That sucks.”
“It’ll pass. I was worried it would fester and get infected.”
“Then congrats on the healing, itchy though it is.”
“Thanks.”
“How’s the kid doing?”
Sebastian glanced over at Aleron. The Scout lay on the ground, his breathing normal, a peaceful expression on his face. “Looks like he’s doing okay. Fever’s gone and the cuts don’t look angry or infected anymore.”
“Wish he’d wake up.”
“Yeah.”
They sat quietly for a few minutes. Sebastian raised the conjured bread to his mouth, took a bite, and began to chew.
“You know,” Fen spoke softly, just above the volume of a whisper. “A lot of things impress me about what you’ve created here.”
“So you’ve said. I’m glad. Your recommendation carries a lot of clout with the gaming community.”
“I’m pleasantly surprised by one trend that I’m seeing more than others.”
“What’s that?”
“You remember when massive-player online games began? People grouped, met strangers, and played co-operatively.”
“I do remember. The good old days.”
Fen snorted. “Exactly. New games became easy to play without relying on help from others. And then, when grouping actually was necessary, no one communicated in the party.”
“The birth of rage quitting.”
“Rage quitting.” Fen made a hawking sound and spit off to one side. “One of the worst things to come from online games. Players form a group, try and fail once—maybe twice—then they freak out and leave the group. I miss the days when a group failed, learned from that failure, and then tried again. And again.”
“Until they succeeded.”
“Right?” Fen laughed. “Just as bad was the delete and re-roll. Players try a character for a few hours, decide it might be too difficult, then log out and make a new character.”
“Rage quits and character re-rolls. Both are very sad trends in gaming.”
“From what I’ve seen, I think you’ve addressed and fixed those problems with Blades.”
“Yeah?”
“Absolutely,” Fen said. “Take this instance, for example. It’s hard.”
“Impossible.”
“Maybe.”
Sebastian laughed. “Weren’t you the one whining that we are going to wipe?”
“Maybe once or twice, but that doesn’t mean I ain’t trying my best or fighting hard as hell to prove the hunch wrong.”
“Very true.”
“It seems to me that spending time learning how to play the characters here helps the player bond and become attached to it. Very few of the players I encountered before meeting up with you guys spoke of deleting their character and starting another.”
“That’s interesting.”
“And accurate, because I asked each of them. And despite our occasional mention of wiping, no one has suggested failing on purpose just so we can escape this dungeon the easy way: by dying and re-entering with new avatars.”
Sebastian took another bite of bread.
“Maybe it’s the fact that all beta testers are diehard gamers, but I think this trend will continue with the public when they start playing, too.”
“And that’s important?”
Fen smiled. “It is, because if people stick with their first or second character, they are going to level up faster than if they are changing out for first-level avatars every few days.”
“Ahh.” Sebastian chuckled.
“Designers are going to have to bust their arses to create higher-level content to keep up with demand.”
“Trust me, there will be no worries in that department.”
“Good.” Fen handed Sebastian a flask, and he took a drink.
Sebastian wiped his mouth with a sleeve. “I really hope Aleron doesn’t require more healing from Mercy.”
“About that.”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Aleron’s not gonna be happy that he was healed by a Death Stryker when he wakes up.”
Sebastian lowered the loaf of bread and let it sit in his lap. “As long as he doesn’t need more, I think he’ll get over it.”
“But the price.”
“Like I said. As long as he doesn’t need more.”
Fen drank from his flask. “Between you and me, what kind of odds do we have to make it out of here alive?”
“Ezref has an excellent plan.”
“He does?”
Sebastian nodded. “I’d say that if Aleron wakes up and we are still alive at the halfway point of this dungeon, then we actually have a chance of seeing the exit.”
47
Aleron opened his eyes. Something cool covered his forehead. Shale looked down, smiling.
“Hey.”
“Hi.”
“I’m happy to see you awake.”
He licked his lips and shook his head as the dryness of his tongue did nothing to moisten them. “I’m not sure how long I’m back for.”
“Stop it.” He felt her arm grip his and shake gently. “I was afraid—”
He saw tears in her eyes and smiled. “Don’t do that. You’re right, I’m back. Few more hours and I’ll be good as new.” He began to cough. When it passed, he spoke again. “Where’s everyone else?”
“Some are sleeping; the others are roaming around doing a bit of reconnaissance.”
“How long have I been out?”
“Not very.”
He frowned. “I thought you said my wounds were bad.”
She nodded.
“Would have taken some time for serious damage to heal naturally. Unless elves have accelerated healing, which would be news to me.”