by Charles Dean
“You could kill a bunch of random players?” Mclean suggested. “If you want people to think you’re evil, random killing is definitely a good choice.”
“What about Peh-Ting Zhou?” Kitchens asked. “Their king is dead, their army is crippled and half their players just deserted to join us--not to mention they have a nice armory and aren’t far away.”
“So we kill everyone in Peh-Ting Zhou?” Darwin asked.
“No, we don’t have to kill everyone. We just kill the council and anyone who disputes our claim. There are a few ways we could go about it, but if cut off a few heads and toss them down some stairs, your image as the devil will be set in stone,” Kitchens said as he nodded to himself again.
He really does have a habit of agreeing with the things he says, Kass observed, chortling a bit. Then she remembered the subject that had started the conversation. “Wait, before we get too far off topic, what do I do about the Charles situation?”
“Oh . . .” Darwin paused as if considering. “Just pretend like you took the deal. Get the money. Enjoy it while it lasts.”
“You’re not worried he’ll use whatever information I give him against you?”
“No, I’ll tell Stephanie what he asked you to do tonight. We can change plans in the future if we need to, but feeding bad information at the perfect time is sometimes more productive than preventing good information from leaking.” Darwin scratched his chin as he reflected upon the nature of espionage. “Well, at least that’s what you always hear in the movies, and it sounds really cool when they say it. That said, I don’t know how or what we are going to disseminate to Charles to give us an upper hand in this little scheming war our two benefactors are engaged in.”
“So . . . taking the money is okay with you?” Kass double-checked. She wanted the money--she needed the security it afforded her--but she wasn’t going to take the cash without Darwin’s approval. After all, it was his neck on the line if his plans came crashing down.
“Yeah, just take it. Stephanie will help us figure things out.” He bit his lower lip for a moment. “Even if we don’t know what to do, she will.”
Is she really that dependable? Can you really trust her? Kass’s heart pleaded, half from a tinge of jealousy, half from sincere doubt about Stephanie’s character. “Okay, you’re the boss,” she said, giving up the notion of arguing. It was the outcome she had secretly wanted, but, even if things had turned out well, the end result, Darwin relying on Stephanie to solve her problems, felt rather unsatisfying.
“Now, back to that idea,” Darwin turned to Kitchens. “Do you think that, if we kill the council and claim the city, it will just fall into our hands? There aren’t game mechanics to stop that from happening?”
“Well, theoretically, there might be. They may have it set so that no player can claim the city, but, even if that is the case, cities still changes hands a lot. I noticed it with the politics on the boards. A lot of kings died and the councils took over, meaning the rulership of a town isn’t fixed. So, with that in mind, there are two possible scenarios: either we can take the city as players or an NPC has to be the one to inherit the throne. If the second is the case, then we can use Alex to take the throne, and the whole city should slide into your domain as a town owned by the StormGuard Alliance,” Kitchens reasoned.
“So either way we get the town?” Darwin smiled. “And we get to have a bit of fun at the same time?”
“If you want to look at it that way,” Kitchens said, nodding.
“Alright, let’s plan this out then so there won’t be any mistakes. I have to kill a bunch of councilmen, but I can’t die either, or it’ll be bad for the guild’s reputation. Shall we start the planning process, or do you three want to go level?”
“Plan the stabby stabby? Nah. You do that, I’m going to go find Minx and Daniel and tell them that we have people that need killing. You two old farts will hopefully have something put together by the time we get back.” Mclean ducked out before Darwin or Kitchens could even respond.
“No, I’m going to ditch out on both. I need to logout and test a few things in real life,” Valerie said, half-way bowing her head and half-way just leaning forward, before she disappeared.
“Umm, I probably need to report back to Charles and tell him I’m his new mole,” Kass said, cringing a bit. This whole thing might feel slimy, but everyone is okay with it, and I’m going to get a lot of money, she reassured herself as she walked back to a safe spot for a temporary log out. She wasn’t sure if she had Charles’s number, but she knew her dad would know how to reach him if need be.
Darwin:
“Darwin, it’s times like these when I can tell you’re a real gamer,” Kitchens chuckled.
“Huh?” Darwin asked, not entirely sure what he was talking about. They were both living out virtual lives in a virtual world, and he didn’t quite understand how this particular moment was different than any other.
“As soon as you start talking about game stuff, all three of the ladies vanish like a gambling addict’s paycheck on Friday,” Kitchens snickered.
“You’re saying that women don’t get all doey-eyed over gamers talking numbers?” Darwin laughed, but the joke had been an all-too-familiar reality for him for a long time.
“Well, it’s why I tried to get my daughter into the consoles at a young age: I heard none of the nerds ever hook up, and the stereotype persisted well enough through my high school and college experience to believe there was some merit to it. I should have done my homework though. It’s only the males that struggle. Now I have to buy ammunition every week and hope Minx’s stupid act works well enough to keep the dogs off the trail,” Kitchens continued to chuckle.
Darwin, not entirely sure that Kitchens was joking about the ammo line, forced out a fake laugh. “You didn’t do your homework when it came to Minx’s future? That’s surprising.”
“The signs were in bright neon lights. How I missed them baffles me. I don’t think I even have the right to be upset or surprised given how well it was foreshadowed. If I did act shocked, it’d put me in the same group as those silly people who had no idea smoking would be bad for them: ‘Oh, you’re telling me that breathing in smoke isn’t good for you?’ Right?” Kitchens shook his head.
“Right . . .” Darwin simply agreed as he pondered where to take the conversation from there. Rather than continuing down that potentially dangerous road, he decided to change the direction to something less life threatening than discussing Minx’s dating life in front of Kitchens.
“We need an audience,” Kitchens said.
“For the killings or for your daughter?” Darwin joked, drawing an icy glare from Kitchens.
“I will kill you if you joke about that again.” Kitchens stared at Darwin menacingly for a moment before relaxing. “But, as far as the actual killing of the council, that plan requires an audience. People will fill in the details they don’t know about anything with the worst- or best-case scenario. If they want to believe that someone is a wicked devil, all we need to do is give them the blank canvas and a frame. They’ll paint the picture and fill in the details.”
“So we need to keep the actual murder mysterious but make sure we have an audience for it at the same time?” Darwin thought the two statements seemed a bit contradictory. “How exactly does one pull that off? Just have them watch the shadows?”
“Well, that’s not a bad idea, but I think we can do better.”
“Going back to the old rolling-the-heads-down-the-stairs routine, what about doing just that? If we drag a body out in front of them right as they all show up, won’t that give them enough horror to feed their imaginations without ruining the mystique?”
“And how do you plan to get an audience there for the mayhem?”
“The same way every boss gets his employees to show up for the eighteenth pointless meeting on pointlessness: make it mandatory.”
“Don’t remind me. I used to hate the oh five hundred formations where we just stood ar
ound for forty-five minutes or the briefings about the briefings about the briefings about a problem that only one guy in a different unit had.” Kitchens winced at the memories.
“Well, the same principle should work. We just have to make sure that they have incentives to show up since we aren’t paying them with real cash or anything,” Darwin said, trying to think about how to lure people to the theater--or rather, the town--where he planned on beheading some councilmen.
“Haven’t you already done it?” Kitchens asked, looking over at Alex, who was still issuing out gear with Daniel and helping the parties break into teams.
I didn’t realize that picking your ten closest teammates would be such a big deal or take so long, but at least they aren’t doing things in a haphazard fashion, Darwin thought. “You mean to say, the initiation requirement of killing other players will force them to show up at the gates of Peh-Ting Zhou since they’ll need prey to fill their quotas?”
“Something like that,” Kitchens answered. “I’m thinking more along the lines of putting together an event and structuring it the way we want. Have Daniel or one of the others lead it, and we can probably get them to all show up at the right place and at the right time. The tricky part will be making sure we get to kill the bosses and look great without actually upsetting them by stealing their prize, so to speak. If we were to sneak into the living quarters and only take out the head honchos, then the rest of the players in the city would still be alive and still be fair game for our newly arrived minions.”
“I see. That’s not a bad idea. Even if we take over the city, we can claim that the players who didn’t join us had already naturally decided to be our enemies and then order them butchered on the spot. No NPCs will be killed in the carnage, and it’ll definitely solidify the reputation we’re after.” Darwin found himself liking the idea more and more as he mulled it over. Even the thought of him being a devil was slowly growing on him like the taste of a brand of beer after years without other options. It wasn’t the first choice he would have taken--after all, he often liked to consider himself the valiant champion of justice in most games--but it also wasn’t the last choice either.
“There you go. Now we just need to pull Daniel aside and let him know the game plan. We can’t have the entire event organized directly by you, or it will be suspicious when you’re not a part of the actual entry crew. You’ll need to have him put together the order on your behalf, as if you didn’t sanction them to do the operation, but you want it done, and you won’t have an issue when they show up to do it,” Kitchens counseled.
Since they needed to get Daniel’s attention and let him in on the plan, Darwin had unconsciously started to move towards where he guessed he could find Justin. It wasn’t like there weren’t other Demons around who would be equally effective at pulling someone away from a busy and tense group, but Justin had proven to be more than adept at handling any task that came up in a quick and expedient manner. Regardless of any complications with the task, Justin so effective that Darwin had started to rely on him for these type of tasks in spite of the myriad other capable people. It would also help solidify him within a position of authority in front of the new recruits.
“You know, he might be a good one to bring with us for the actual assault,” Kitchens said, as if he already knew who Darwin was seeking out.
“Oh yeah?” Darwin was a bit surprised. Kitchens wasn’t often the type to rely on others.
“He’s got a good sense of direction, has probably already mapped out the city better than us and he can sneak in and out of almost anywhere undetected,” Kitchens said, listing off Justin’s resume. “Unless you want to try the stealth game on your own?”
“We don’t have to be too stealthy, do we?” Darwin grinned. He remembered that last time they had visited the city, no one had even noticed him until his horns popped out. “After all, sometimes it’s just about being confident, right?”
“Yeah, that’s a fair point. I think he’d be a good tool to add to the team before we move out, but it’s on you, boss,” Kitchens said, deferring to Darwin’s preference.
“Nah, let’s have him help Daniel and them.” Darwin didn’t want the NPC to be caught up in the frontline fight if things went awry. He was okay with him and Kitchens taking the risk, but not adding in someone whose death would be permanent. “How about we just handle this between the two of us . . . unless you don’t think it’s possible?”
“Don’t let your ego get in the way of the mission,” Kitchens quickly retorted. “But you are right. The two of us should be sufficient for the job. We can do it without him if you insist. It only means it’s going to be more difficult given that we will have one less weapon in our arsenal.”
“Great, I like to hear that.” Darwin felt reassured. It wasn’t that he didn’t think that he could handle it even by himself if need be, it was just comforting to have that opinion reinforced by someone who seemed to have a lot more experience with these types of things. “Justin!” Darwin shouted out as he saw his target in view. “Justin, we need a favor of you,” he called out to Justin.
“Yes, Great Lord Darwin, how may I be of assistance?” The scout immediately dropped everything he was doing and rushed over to Darwin.
I hope he wasn’t busy with something too important. I’d hate to think us calling him over caused him to stop bringing medical supplies to a doctor or something. Darwin felt slightly off at how quickly Justin had abandoned his duty to come over. “Well, see, the thing is, we need to talk to Alex and Daniel without being seen by the new recruits. Is there any chance you can bring them over?”
“Yes, Great Lord. Wait just a moment.” Justin sprinted away before Darwin could add anything else to the order.
“You sure you don’t want to bring him along?” Kitchens chuckled at how fast Justin disappeared. “We could just tell him to do it for us, and he would probably come back with the task completed and decorated with a bow tie before you could finish a cup of tea.”
“You think we can find a way to kidnap the cookie baker from Peh-Ting Zhou?” Darwin asked, remembering the delicious snacks as soon as tea was brought up. The tea was okay, but those cookies were divine. “By the way, in a town where there very well might be a cow-like humanoid, where do they get the milk?”
Kitchens’ face paled for a moment. “It’s sometimes best not to know how they make the sausage . . . if you catch my drift.”
“You’re not even a little bit curious? I didn’t see any farms with cattle on the way here or in the town at all, but milk and cookies . . . Just saying,” Darwin responded, continuing the line of speculation.
“Imported. They have to have been imported.” Kitchens seemed determined not to entertain any additional possibilities.
“Whatever, but if you see a bull walking through town, know that there were no cows in the field,” Darwin couldn’t help but laugh at the idea.
“Hmm, speaking of bulls . . .” Kitchens hesitated for the span of one breath as he stared at Darwin’s horns before quickly dismissing whatever idea had just popped into his head. “Never mind.”
“You needed us?” Daniel said as he and Alex walked over.
“Yeah, how is the item distribution going?” Darwin thought. “Have you dismissed any of them to go on their bloody rampage?”
“No, not yet. Even if I did, most of them would probably hover around. They are having a bit of trouble deciding on what groups they are going to break into. When you mentioned that it was a collective effort with team score counts, it was like they suddenly turned into a group of thespians stuck on the opening line of Hamlet’s nunnery scene. For the life of them, they’ve spent what feels like thirty minutes trying to figure out what team they want ‘to be’ or ‘not to be’ on,” Daniel groaned, facepalming. “I swear, it’s not rocket science, but the little villain wannabes in this game apparently have about as many friends as the only white guy in a school for self-proclaimed social justice warriors.”
“So we hav
e another hour or two before they get their stuff together and head out?” Darwin asked, trying to nail down a time frame.
“Maybe two at max, but more likely thirty to forty minutes more. Once one group gets going, the rest will fall into place like musical chairs, and we’ll just sweep up the remainder into a final team,” Daniel clarified.
“That might not be enough time if they leave after only thirty minutes.” Darwin knew he was faster on foot than many of them, but he also knew that he didn’t know the city and might have trouble hunting one or two stragglers down. “Before letting any of them depart, could you round them up and give them a boring speech about killing and maiming stuff? Drag it out like the opening ceremony at a high school's orientation. Try not to make them suffer as much as that, but definitely stall it like a principal who thinks he is cool enough to wing it with a few anecdotes.”
“Oh, man, I remember how bad that used to be. Do you need me to torture them with anything else?” Daniel chuckled a bit.
“Yeah, lead them to the gates of Peh-Ting Zhou. Tell them we’re going to war and that all the kills in this event will count double. Don’t let them know, but have Alex’s scouts trail them and count the kills so we know how the groups are doing.”
“That won’t be necessary, Great Lord Darwin,” Alex interjected. “We will do that, but for some reason, when I assigned the quest, the gods have blessed me for my obedience to your orders by giving me a special method to track groups and kills. The magic box’s group section is still blank since no one has signed up, and, as a result, there are no kills attached to it yet, but I have confidence the method granted to assist me will work.”
“Didn’t your people abandon the gods?” Darwin scratched his head, remembering the conversation they had a long time ago back on noob island.