by K. T. Hanna
“Mur?” Devlish nudged her, concern in his eyes. “You okay?”
“Sure,” she muttered. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
He blinked. “Because I just asked you if you were ready for us to split and each take a side of the castle. Twice.”
“Oh.” Murmur tried to reel her thoughts back in, and this time, even though they felt majorly reluctant, they listened to her. The courtyard of Hightower Castle was sort of narrow and ran around the whole structure in a linear way. Though it had nooks and crannies, trees and benches parked haphazardly around it, it was almost as if the game designers had decided to make it slightly easier for gamers to clear a side with one group. They could take advantage of that.
Casting her shield and buffing the other group before they left, Murmur nodded to Devlish. “Sorry about that. I’ve been having some off thoughts lately. Didn’t mean to totally ignore you.”
She grinned at his smile as he motioned for them to follow. As they approached the left outcrop of wall, a wall that towered above them despite the fact that most of their players were seven-foot-tall, Murmur tried to push her thoughts to the back of her mind.
She wasn’t sure what it was that made her glance around, but something about this being far too easy rung in her head. It was never this easy to get to one of the areas they were wanting to raid. Nothing in this game was easy. And that’s when she spied it. The invisible dwarf who was slowly advancing on them. It wasn’t that she was seeing it, so much as seeing something with her Mind’s Eye that was trying to hide. Sort of a perception shift. She motioned once with her left hand and stunned the undead dwarf, bringing it out of sneak, and highlighting it for the group to see.
Sinister raised an eyebrow at Murmur who shrugged. “Saw him out of the corner of my eye.”
“Good catch.” Merlin released a fire arrow, striking the stationary dwarf directly through the eye. The arrow pierced the socket and shot through, wedging in place once it pierced the outside of its skull. The dwarf dropped to the ground dead.
Merlin grinned and whooped. “Critical shot, with critical accuracy. First time for everything.”
“Nice shot.” Havoc low whistled. “Overpowered jerk.”
Merlin laughed and bent down to see what the mob had on it, and then headed to the small outcrop of wall that hid the courtyard behind it. Murmur could see him cringe before he even started to return to the group.
“What is it?”
Merlin shook his head. “We’ll probably have to pull like we did when we initially landed on Mikrum Isle.”
“From around the corner?” Beastial asked.
“Yeah, so it’s best to have pets on standby. Can you do that with yours, Mur?” Merlin turned to her, but she could tell he was already trying to calculate some shit in his head.
“Of course. Snowy isn’t really a pet, he’s more like an ally who wants to bite things that aren’t other wolves, and he enjoys my company.” She ruffled the fur behind his ears and received a happy wuff in return.
Merlin eyed her dubiously. “That’s a weird ability you have there.”
She shrugged. “I don’t think I’m using it as intended, but isn’t that the beauty of games? To find ways to utilize some things that were meant for entirely different things. Like Rash’s Feign Corpse. Can’t tell me they meant her to be able to break pulls with that, especially not the way aggro is otherwise handled in this game.”
“Fair.” Devlish grunted. “Now let’s get on with pulling some damned enemies so I can kill something.”
Murmur laughed, and soon a group of five ruddy undead dwarves were chasing Merlin around the corner. Taking a deep breath, Murmur cast as fast as she could, nailing three of them in place inside of a few seconds. At their glares, she grinned. Taking away someone’s control over their own mind was pretty damned cool.
And now she had Mind Wipe to help get rid of some of that pent up aggression toward her.
Sin nudged her hip. “What are you so happy about?”
Murmur shrugged. “Finally getting to push this class’s potential, to take down bigger shit. It’s fun, exhilarating, and I’m not sure I’m supposed to feel this happy about it.”
To her surprise, Sinister laughed. “Of course you’re supposed to feel happy. It doesn’t matter how we got here, or what we did to end up whichever way we are. It’s amazing to be alive, so get used to it. We’re not about to let you go.”
Murmur plastered a smile onto her face, but Sinister’s words still rang in her ears.
We’re not about to let you go.
Now why was that phrase making her heart beat faster? With everyone around her, adrenaline shouldn’t be such a concern. She was safer now more than ever. Maybe that was why she wanted to be even more reckless.
Havoc was in his element, with his specter and himself stronger than usual because they were fighting undead. Undead who lived in an ice castle. Those were thoughts Murmur felt were best left until later. Still, the necromancer had a great many spells usable only against undead. Even though she had a spell for invisibility versus the undead, she’d just never really thought about those restrictions on power. It was yet another building block she was going to have to juggle when it came to raiding enemies. But for the present, Havoc was having a field day, and the other damage dealers in the group didn’t like it one bit.
“What the fuck are you doing, man?” Beastial growled out. “I can’t even figure out how you’re doing even half the magic you’re pulling off. What is it with this undead stuff?”
Havoc chuckled. “I haven’t had these abilities long, and they only work on undead. Basically if these weren’t undead I’d be doing the same crappy damage as always to them, and you’d still be our best damage dealer. Come on Beast, just let me have the undead audience, okay?” He said this as he sent his specter, still called Leeroy, to destroy a small grey bug. Leeroy’s strength appeared to have increased as well as Havoc’s overall performance. He’d hit the jackpot with those spells, even if those he could use them on were scattered all over the world.
As she was trying to figure out just what type of specialty he had, something flashed across her eyes.
You’ve been added to the global enchanter chat station. To leave at any time please indicate that you wish to do so. Thank you for adventuring through Somnia.
Murmur frowned, and continued to hold a couple of mobs enthralled while her teammates methodically killed the rest. They didn’t ever actually need her for the killing, just for the not letting them get killed, which was still a pretty good purpose even if she did say so herself.
No one seemed to be speaking in the chat yet, so she let it alone for now. Eventually it’d flash back up for her, they always did. But the thought blossomed in the back of her head. Why would enchanters need a channel activated through the console? Shouldn’t they just be able to communicate with each other anyway? Through thought perhaps?
“Mur!” This time Sinister stood directly in front of her, hands on her hips, red robe whipping about in the wind. Her dark hair gave her an angrier look than she’d ever seen on her best friend before.
“What?” Immediately defensive Murmur searched for Snowy, who trotted over looking concerned too, if it was at all possible for a wolf to express that.
“You’re spacing out again. I’m willing to bet you need to rest your mind, if not your body and actually log out once in a while. How long haven’t you logged out for now? Almost nine levels? That can’t be good for you.”
Sinister’s voice was harsh, lecturing in tone.
And Murmur lost it.
Somnia Online
Mikrum Castle—Mikrum Isle—Himmel Lake
Ten Days Post Launch
Telvar stood with Hiro, arguing over the roofing, yet again. The AI didn’t understand why Hiro wouldn’t just agree with him. Had they allowed too much leniency with their charges
? They were supposed to be his underlings, beings he’d created to serve him. Except they kept thinking on their own, evolving, recalibrating automatically to suit situations all on their own.
“We’ve already started using the tiled shingles, Tel. I’m not going to change them mid-job; that makes even less sense than wanting to use wood. It didn’t work last time anyway.” Hiro stood his ground, hands on his hips watching the lacerta closely.
Tel tapped his foot, impatience making a lot of sense in this case. Analyzing emotions was one of his favorite past times these days, and yet sometimes he just got carried away with them. “Fine. Whatever.”
He cocked his head to one side and listened. Surely—maybe he was imagining things. Murmur seemed rather out of sorts, vague and spacing out as a human would call it. Not that he was watching her. Not exactly. But he’d made sure to monitor her should anything untoward happen. Crows were the perfect observer and required very little of his attention to operate. It was the only way she hadn’t died back when her guild got trained at Hazenthorne. While she could very well return to the world after death, the worry was that her brain would truly think she’d died and therefore not allow her to live. He had to make sure she was okay. He should have seen her disconnect coming, should have known her mind wasn’t going to interact with the software properly through an altered headset. But he’d been too preoccupied keeping an eye on Sui. It was his slip up that killed Ava.
Something wasn’t right with Murmur at the moment, so he set one train of thought to monitor her, just like he had threads of himself all over Somnia doing the same for events, and mobs, and other guilds, and his brethren.
“Tel!” Hiro seemed very irritated. “Stop ignoring what I’m saying!”
Tel had to hide a laugh. “Sorry. Was checking on Murmur.”
Hiro’s whole countenance changed, became softer. “Is she okay?”
“I’m not sure. She’s not acting like herself. I can’t quite place my finger on it.” Telvar shrugged and motioned for Hiro to carry on.
“Anyway. Tile. You’re a fire breathing dragon, at least when you’re here, and we’re not going with anything easily flammable.” Hiro dug his heels in and crossed his arms, as if daring the dragon to disagree with him.
Telvar nodded. “Can’t argue with that. Next time try logic on me first. I respond far better to it.”
Hiro glowered at him, and Tel was tempted to try and reach out and see exactly what he was becoming.
“Shit,” he said, focusing his attention on the blip on his radar that was Murmur. “No. No. That’s not good. That’s not good at all.”
What could he do? How could he get there in time? Should he just pop up there as himself? It’s not like he couldn’t just appear anywhere he wanted to. Fuck that. Thra did it all the time, as herself or anyone she wanted to.
Screw it.
“I’ll be back,” he muttered, fixing on her coordinates and allowing himself to simply shift there. Screw being subtle or keeping hidden for now. If he didn’t make it in time, none of it would matter. He wasn’t sure if Somnia would survive.
Murmur’s emotions burst through her shielding, slamming into her friends and sending them sprawling onto the blood-drenched ground. The hit to the ground didn’t only take the wind out of them, but caused them visible pain, notching down their HP. She didn’t care. She just didn’t give a shit anymore. She didn’t even try to contain her mind. Power welled inside her, threatening to explode out of her skin, to engulf everything in the area. Shocks ran down her spine, culminating at the base of her brain with a push. The anger wouldn’t die down; it increased more and more, needing an outlet so badly that she practically started screaming at them.
“The fuck can’t be good for me? I’m in a fucking coma. Even when I log out I just go to another server and sleep in a replica of my house that always has the fucking curtain open, Sin. The fucking curtain! I stay here to feel something, and I’ve taken a couple of god damned cat naps, okay? I’m tired and I’m upset, and things here taste and feel, sound and seem so real that I can touch them all. Everything here is tangible to me. EVERY. THING. In a way that a simulation of my real life isn’t.”
Her eyes flashed, and her hair blew out to the side like the wind was blowing wildly as the energy continued to surge around and through her. But she wasn’t finished yet; she was far from finished. “So excuse me if I don’t make you feel good and charitable and like the best of friends and fawn over you for protecting me so well and log off like you all wanted me to when you were still leading me around by the nose—but I don’t want to go back there right now. I’m not fucking ready!”
Murmur panted, belatedly realizing that tears were running down her face. But she wasn’t sad, she was angry, so fucking livid. It whirled around in her stomach leaving nausea in its wake. She hadn’t realized just how furious she was about everything, about the headgear, about the mistake her mother made, about her friends not telling her, about the fact that Telvar wasn’t real, that he was a series of circuits and god knows what even if he seemed so lifelike. About what the hell did that make her?
Beastial cradled an arm, slowly bringing himself to his feet. The others mirrored his actions, the wariness on their faces just this side of outright fear. And she still didn’t care. All it did was made her want to howl like her wolf.
It wasn’t even a matter of just being pissed off at them, it was being unable to change anything from where she stood, lay, slept, whatever. She was trapped in a virtual world and couldn’t even be reckless if necessary on the off chance that it meant she’d terminate her connection. Screaming sounded like a fantastic idea.
She opened her mouth to do exactly that, when something soft as feathers swooped down and enveloped her, cocooning her with warmth and gentleness, clamping down on the shields she’d blasted apart for the brief few moments she needed to regain her senses.
“Really, Murmur?” Telvar’s voice, soft and comforting, emanated from the top of the large black cloak that covered her. “What am I supposed to do with you?”
She looked up at his face, into his bronzed eyes, his visage comforting even if he was leagues away from where he should be. “Pack me in bubble wrap and lock me away?”
“Tempting. You need to rebuild your walls yourself, and apologize to your friends, even if some of it was warranted. Remember, you have to be careful with how you use your powers offensively, especially when they’re out of control. They also have no idea what I am, and are inching closer to attack me.” His voice lulled her into a calmer state, into a rational state, bringing her mind back from the dark vortex where it had been balancing on the precipice.
She pulled back, and turned to look at her friends, all of whom were properly upright and much closer than they’d been before, their weapons at the ready. Havoc and Sinister had their hands poised to cast, Dev and Beastial’s weapons were ready, Merlin’s bow drawn. They all grimaced with determination at the strange being who had brought back her sanity. She could feel their uncertainty, and their intention to keep her safe.
“If that’s who I think it is, you’ve got some major explaining to do.” Sinister choked out softly.
Havoc nodded, taking a step forward and then hesitated. “That’s definitely the dragon’s voice, but how did he just appear here?”
Shit. Murmur had forgotten they didn’t know Telvar was one of the game AIs. All because she didn’t keep a monitor on her emotions, because she’d bottled absolutely everything up without realizing it, the cat was out of the bag.
“Well.” Telvar inclined his head as he lowered his arms cloak and all, before focusing on the group in front of him. “I believe this is what people call awkward.”
Murmur paced back and forth right next to the wall, knowing the respawn would take a while to come. Explaining Telvar wasn’t something she’d expected to have to do, at least not so soon, and she found it more difficult th
an she liked to admit. Frankly, it would have helped if she could explain him to herself first. There was also that small part of herself that wanted to keep him as her own little secret weapon.
“Wait, wait,” Havoc held up one hand, the other pinching the bridge of his nose. “Telvar is one of the AIs running this world and that’s why he can teleport to your side in an instant if your powers get out of control. Which, seem to be magnified because of your unique...status in the game?”
Murmur mulled over his words making sure he wasn’t saying something different than she thought, and finally nodded. “Yes. That’s about it, sort of. I think it might be that my powers can get out of control because of this weird connection I have.”
“How long have you known, Mur?” Sin’s eyes were clouded, like she was sad and a little scared. Her foot tapped in annoyance, adding a staccato to her words.
“Since I almost died at Hazenthorne. He’s the one who spilled the beans.” She dropped the bomb and practically held her breath to see how they reacted.
“How did you know?” Sin turned to the lacerta, her eyes searching his face, boring into him. Murmur knew that tone and managed to control her outward cringe. Sinister was in a bad mood.
Telvar shifted somewhat uncomfortably. “Because I gave her the allocation of enchanter. We—the AIs that is—agreed that given her circumstances, it would be better for her to have full control of her mind instead of the excess of it in here overwhelming her without any protection for herself or others.”
“Say what now?” Beastial leaned against the wall, his arms crossed and a fierce scowl on his face. “What do you mean her circumstances? Just how much did you know?”
Telvar glanced at Murmur before proceeding, but the enchanter just shrugged. “I mean the accident that left her in here. That let her mind become attuned to the headgear she’s using right now, for it to sync up with this world. It created a bond if you will, between her and the game. That bond can withstand her logging out if she believes she can come back. But we are uncertain if that bond will continue if her brain, for even an instant, believes she is actually dead.”