by Yuli Ban
Soon, I approached the limestone mesa and saw that vulva-esque opening. I huffed, licked my lips, and prepared to get chewed out by Maria. But the two girls weren't waiting for me. When I popped my head in through the cave slit, I saw the stoner art and posters. There also smelled an absolutely amazing aroma of cooked sausages and bacon which brought me further in by my own volition. Volition? That reminded me of that game and that was enough to get me to take a step back.
'Maybe they ditched me. Or maybe they got kidnapped.' I wondered if I should leave, but I didn’t want to lose Ana. If anything, I wanted to spend more time with her. Speak of the devil, she came. The beads clattered against each other, but the sound that caught my attention more was her much more professional intonations as she spoke into a yellow industrial walkie-talkie.
She said, "Okay?…. Yes, understood…. Of course…. I’ll direct this information to the proper channels, sir. Copy, over and out." That businesswoman manner of hers turned the diamonds into graphene. Who was she talking to and why had that fool denied me the privilege of hearing more of that voice? "Why hello, Boss." Augh, that kitten voice was just as good. And her tail ran across my face, the motions slight and deliberate as she rubbed my cheek and upper lip. "Are you up for another mission?"
I smiled and rubbed the back of my head, though my smile felt hollow, "Not really. I kinda need a place to rest and collect my thoughts. Maybe shoot myself and drop acid."
Maria stormed out because she was Ms. Hardass, and she said, "You. No punishment. Not yet. Back on bike." Didn't look like I was going to rest any time that day. What’s more, she kept trying to wag her thighs at me. At least, that’s what I thought she was doing. Her femto-sized skirt made no effort to cover her crimson ass. As much as I didn’t want to focus on it (because I’m a gentleman with a lot of newly-found emo issues and burgeoning neurotic depression), she kept thrusting that holy T at me. Then she dug her claws into my forearm and dragged me back to my scratched-up bike before I could even take off my helmet. Her devil's tail laid low to the ground, lashing from side to side.
Making some attempt to not be a total beta male, I asked my question too slowly and got cucked.
She said, "Two more girls are being held in captivity.” She wrapped a black bandana around her head, her horns perfectly popping through two holes. Then she stuck round bifocals onto her nose and shifted them up with her thumb over her eyes in a way that made my graphene-hard dick soften back to diamonds— not really into girls with glasses. Not even those Lennon Osbourne shades. "They're at the home of a notorious Rocket 88 scumlord. Just outside Yancy.”
"Oh really." Because I knew who or what Yancy was supposed to be. Rather than bitching out loud, I said, “Well, if it’s a mission that can help me beat these guys…”
Ana said, "Even though you completely and utterly failed without doing a single lap, you did good out there, banging up those bangers. I knew you weren't useless." She winked and gave me the peace sign.
"Gee." I felt a vein throb in my forehead, struggling to pump enough blood to restrain my amygdala from going full chimp. "Thanks. How encouraging." You know on that note, humans aren’t much more than beautiful hairless chimpanzees. And I needed to let out a few screeches and tear off some more faces. That would be fine, as long as it was still in the game and not real people. Oh boy oh boy, if I could tear off some Nazi faces for the rest of time, that would be like Valhalla.
Maria grinned and added, "Indeed. You leveled up faster than anyone I've ever seen. You're perfect for this mission.” Then she folded her arms under her breasts that didn’t need any more support and stuttered, “Not that it actually means anything, of course."
I reached out for her, panicked that she just showed a tsundere trait, and knew that if I didn’t put a stop to this, I’d be punched into orbit by midnight just for doing something stupid, like falling over on my bike and letting gravity pull the tip-most atom of my pinkie brush the air molecules near her boobs. "Wait, so—"
Because being ignored is my fetish, they tore off on their own bikes. I wanted to sit there and wait for them to come back, or better yet, take my bike and drive a hundred miles in the opposite direction. Oh, but what did Ana do earlier? Didn’t she skewer four men onto a katana shish kabob no sooner or later than fifteen seconds after being sexually assaulted? That was one bad side I did not to be on. Ana was just too dangerous for me to ignore, so I shrugged, hopped onto my hog, and rolled out myself.
Well, that and she was cute.
Luckily, they hadn’t gotten far, but from the way they sped up once I caught up, I deduced that they had been waiting for me. Yet even though they knew I was near, I heard Maria yelling over to Ana with a certain timbre of finality, "He clearly likes you better."
I blushed. Were they already arguing about me? We hadn't known for more than an hour. A sixtieth of that for Maria. Why was I suddenly at the center of a burgeoning harem? And if I was about to rescue two more ladies...
As we rode along the open road, we passed that tortured skeleton again. Right after we did, Maria said to me, "You're probably wondering what's all this going on."
To which I replied, "Yes fuck yes fuck fuck yes fuck."
Ana giggled loud enough to hear her over the engines. I wonder if she only heard half of my words.
Maria twisted the handlebars and pushed her glasses back over her eyes with her thumb. "We're part of a new collective, what you outsiders might know as a ‘guild’. We're trying to wrest power away from Hurricane Corporation. They own this entire region. And what's more, they are paying off these Nazi bikers to do their bidding."
"So you're outlaw bikers?"
"Road pirates, more like. We find shipments and steal them. But the Rocket 88s crimped our territory and they work for the Hurricanes."
I didn't know if I should tell her, so I decided to first ask, "Is this a video game?" and let her ease my worried mind.
"Yes, of course it is. You currently playing Violence Online. Were you not aware?"
"But that game closed down, didn't it?"
"The servers are clearly still running," she said. "You are probably the only outsider in the game right now." When she said that, I felt my heart stop. I was the only player? They were NPCs too? Was I all alone? What if the servers had indeed been shut down but I was now trapped in some sort of cyberlimbo?
And then there was the case of the Hurricanes. Everything fit. Violence Online, the Hurricanes, the outlaws, the Nazi bikers, everything except that one goon whose gun vanished when I obliterated him.
"About the Hurricane Corporation," I shouted. Maria and Ana both turned to me, but I looked at Maria first. "Out in the real world, they're real there too. They exist on both sides for money laundering purposes."
Ana gasped and said, "No way! Are they evil landgrabbers on the outside?"
I looked down and sighed as the road’s many white lines flashed by. "No. They're... They're a neo-fascist party that took power not too long ago. They got a lot of their funding by exploiting this game. That’s why they control everything. They rigged everything to gather as much money from this game as they could."
"Jesus..."
"Oh, that's awful..."
"Yeah, and it gets worse." I looked up and down the road. Slowly but surely, I began to overtake Ana and Maria. "Those bastards killed my best friend and took my sister. The last thing I saw... was her face, telling me to be free."
"That's hard, little man. But that sounds exactly like the Hurricanes."
"I guess we should've known all this time that this was gonna happen and it's no wonder that the Hurricanes would use Nazi bikers."
“Wait, why this game?” Ana asked. I was going to give her an answer, but then I killed it when I realized she had actually stumped me. What was it about this game in particular that allowed the Hurricanes to draw so much money when there were about a hundred other MMOs and online multiplayer games that would give them just as much funding, if not more? They only ever used Violence On
line. Not only that, but they only ever used one specific region in Violence Online.
Eventually, I said, “Plot convenience.” Both nodded as they accepted this at face value. I looked at Ana and said, "About that. Why were you with them earlier back in Victory?"
She and her boobs perked up and said, "Oh! You mean at the brothel? You'd think that was obvious." I blushed and looked away. She then said, “I was selling drugs! Why do you think my eyes were so red?”
Not that I didn’t believe her, but I didn’t believe her. Then again, she did get me with the red eyes. I could tell from the moment I saw them that those were not victim’s eyes. "Okay, well why were you at the cave then?"
Maria rolled her jaw and exhaled and said, "We had a pact going. Whenever one's out, the other stays back to protect the cave. We've already lost two fellow sisters to the Hurricanes."
The way she said that brought a new question to my mind. "Wait, are you two not actually sisters?"
"I'm a succubus and she's a neko, little man. That should be obvious."
I paused to consider this. Then I unpaused, unsure how I had managed to do such a thing in an MMO, and said, "Will I be a brother if I join?"
Both gawked at me as if I had said something dirty. The funny thing is, I meant to say ‘bother’ but the meme was already in my head and out of my mouth so it was too late to take back my mistake.
However, Ana said, "You're really gonna join us? Oh thank you, Alex! Thank you!"
I gave her a stunned look and, rather than explain myself like a rational person, I said, "I didn't know I even had a choice in this. I don't know where we're going right now, you all but kidnapped me, and I was being shot at by a bunch of Nazis for what reason exactly?"
"And why do I keep leveling up so easily?"
Maria actually answered this one, saying, "You might be a special account. Maybe someone artificially boosted you. In which case, you should do whatever you can to exploit your overpoweredness. Considering that you're about to become an anarcho-road-pirate, I think you'll definitely need it."
"A what?"
Let me break the narrative flow to infodump a bit: an anarcho-road-pirate. Violence Online was a fantastic game and I played it a little bit back in the day. It was advertised as being as if Dungeons and Dragons met Grand Theft Auto. There were loads of huge regions, each with their own unique biomes. There was a fully functional economy and climate system. The world was a mishmash of typical fantasy and pop cultural races as well as set pieces put into a bizzaro parody of a dystopian early 21st century America. What’s more, the game took liberties when it came to realism so that you could go from riding jet-powered Chinese dragons and battling native American demons to engaging in a gritty character drama while holding a bank hostage. I think some litRPGs were written based on experiences in the game. At one point, about one hundred and fifty million players were active and the game had all but become a virtual social network, but I missed the heyday because I just wanted to troll people with rocket launchers. All I really remembered was that it had some of the most advanced artificial intelligence on the planet in use for the NPCs. So advanced that my sister sincerely believed that the company behind it had created the world's first artificial general intelligence and simply hadn't told anybody— to exploit the stock market. That was one reason why the world was so naturally varied. Why I was living this wannabe outlaw biker-movie with a tabby catgirl in leather and a succubus with planets for breasts, I didn’t know. Maybe my sister thought my sexual inexperience in real life needed to be rectified.
But that didn't explain why I was driving to some Nazi's home to rescue some girls. I didn't really care what was in it for me. I just felt like killing Nazis. They're Nazis and they worked for the Hurricanes. That's all the reason I needed. If my friend and my sister wanted this for me, I wouldn’t let them down, for there must have been a reason they sent me to this place.
I was filled with determination, actually, because I saw my little crusade as being a festival of raw vengeance to make up for what I had lost.
"Hey, Alex!" I turned to Ana, immediately getting a stiffy. Can I just take a moment to talk about how beautiful women's legs are when they're sitting down? Looking puffed up, squished against a seat, and with leather folding on the back of her knees and by her groin— it's the little things like that. And no, I wasn’t holding myself back anymore. Too much determination. If I could accomplish anything before finding my way, I needed to tap that. That’s even what I was thinking at that moment, ‘Please let me tap that.’
"So whatcha think?" The engines roared and I blinked. "Hello?" She waved her tail.
I snapped out of my daze. "Oh, what? Sorry. I was listening to my engine. I think something's wrong with the exhaust or something. What did you say?"
"I was saying that there's a whole sexual skill tree you could use to level up your health and mana quickly, so we should try it out when we get back." And she was more perked up than before, her eyes lit up like the stars above.
Oh fuck me. Literally. She wasn't even going to wait. Just straight up, 'Fuck me later.' And to add to the titillation, she tapped her fingers right over her lower groin, practically rubbing the seat, and giggled again.
Oh boy oh boy oh boy, was I starting to feel it. I'd still need years of therapy to get over that day, but a little bit of casual sex with a catgirl was a good way to break the tension.
Maria shouted, "Focus. And by the way, I'm going to break him in first anyway." She tossed something at my head though I didn't see what it was. When I turned to her, rubbing the back of my head from that pinching little feeling from where I had been struck, she said all deadpan, "You have to see how I feel first before you run yourself with Anastasia. Especially since you're clearly only level 1."
I chuckled, then frowned. "Wait, what do you mean by that? I-I've had sex before. Tons of it!"
"No, you didn't," Ana said, her fingers gracing her lips. "I can size you up right now— you are a virgin from Virginia living on Virgin Boulevard. You just reek of virginity."
I smacked my lips. "Man, how can you even tell?"
"Level 69 sex witch. Hence our group’s name. I can see these things easily. It's like reading right into your stats."
Oh my. That was my best Anastasia Steele impression— oh my. Oh my and something about my inner god.
“Wait, what is your group’s name? I don’t think you ever told me.”
“The Wytches Crue.” She pointed to Ana, who lifted up her sleeve. There, tattooed on her arm, was their name in an icy biker’s font. It certainly seemed cheesy enough. Who else but biker girls would call themselves the Wytches Crue, with that many misspellings at that?
After a bit more of riding, we passed an 18-wheeler. I saw virtually no details, so the girls quizzing me on its appearance confused me more than that one time I woke up to my sister speaking perfect Cantonese.
"Did you get a good look of that mast?" Maria shouted. "That's the sort of carrier you'll be looting soon. Perhaps even as soon as the next book."
I paid no attention to the thing and said so to the girls. Ana told me to keep my eyes peeled while Maria scolded me for not focusing on the road because now they were just being hardasses harder and assier than all those purged high school teachers.
I shouted, “Why not just go for the parked ones?”
“The parked 18-wheelers are the easy targets, yes, but them being parked usually means they don't have a lot of good loot, so they aren't likely going to be in a rush. You always want to take them when they’re moving, little man.”
"How do you do that? I'm not James Bond!"
"Keep your eyes on the road; I'll show you soon enough. First, we just have to free Rebecca and Dawn from the clutches of the Scumlord."
On top of the fact they knew the girls’ name all this time and never told me, I had to rant a bit about: "Wait, why was scumlord capitalized in that last line of dialogue? That's not actually his name, is it? That's a stupid name. It's the most
obvious one that could be made." I nearly lost control of my bike with all the hand motions I made. “Stupid. Stupid! I just can’t believe that’s…”
Maria said, "Take out your rage on his face." Then she shouted, "Ana!"
"Attention!" She saluted and took her eyes off the road.
As if staying on the road wasn’t a concern, Maria said, "Prepare the heat-seeking nuclear missile launcher. We're going to give Scumlord fireworks." Wait, what?
"Nuclear missile launcher?!" And it didn't disappoint. While using her feet to keep her bike steady since the concept of roads and watching them was some sort of bourgeois detail, Ana pulled out a rectangular rocket pod that was about the size of her own body from I don't even know where, her asshole I guess. And she flipped up a targeting screen and aimed it right at the horizon.
Maria added, "We only have one rocket remaining, so make sure it counts!"
"Aye-aye, capitana!"
I watched the whole thing unfold with my face feeling like it was scrunching up. How neither of them fell off their hogs, I still don’t understand. Maria get throwing her finger out to Ana to get her to follow specific directions while Ana fumbled about in hammerspace.
“Keep your eyes on the road, little man! You could get hurt.”
Those words triggered something in me, a primal atavistic desire so pure and perfect that it exploded from my chest down through my legs because I stepped down on the pedal so hard that I blasted off at three hundred miles per hour. The whole time, there was a scowl on my face so brutal that it threatened to snap my muscles apart.