by Charles Dean
Cold. There was no other way to describe the twisting feeling that struck her gut. She was cold, violently so, as her senses flared and the feeling of danger pressed against her like a sheet of wet metal on a chilly day. “What do you mean?” she asked, her eyes darting around the room. What is going on?
“I do hope you enjoyed the meal, but I can’t have you working for me anymore. You’re unreliable. When you were avaricious, it was comforting. Your acquisitive nature gave you a price tag complete with purchase instructions so visible and well-marketed that even cable television companies couldn’t push a product better.” Charles stood up.
Kass tried to do the same, but the terror had somehow weakened her legs and left her shaking. She was forced to sit and watch as he smugly walked over to the cash register and threw down a few hundred dollar bills. “I . . . I didn’t have a price! I wasn’t some greedy woman trying to sell out my friends! I wouldn’t have even done the interview if I had thought for one minute Darwin would’ve been hurt by it,” Kass protested. She realized that she was angry, and it gave her the vigor she needed to regain command of her motor functions. Not only did she manage to stand up, but she stamped her feet as well.
“Hmmm . . . a misunderstanding on my part,” Charles said with a shrug. “That just means you were always unusable. You also could have believed in our goal. That would have been helpful too, but sadly, you think Darwin is the protagonist--not me.”
“What are you going to do?” Kass suddenly realized that everyone had left the room but two guards. There were no other customers, the blinds had been pulled down, and, whoever or wherever a Lester and staff were, it wasn’t at their restaurant. It was just a big empty room with tables, two bodyguards, Charles and Kass. She really regretted not bringing her pepper spray. Well, not that it would have helped me here. Kass began searching for a way out of the building.
“Do you need to ask? You’re a liability, a side character, and, as unfortunate as it is, I am going to have to dispose of you. There really isn’t another way around it,” Charles replied coolly.
“How . . . How did you know?” Kass asked. Were we monitored through game developers? Did he personally watch the character? If that’s the case, why would he have needed me at all? What tipped him off? Kass’s feet pressed against the wall, and she reached out for the blinds, opening them so that passersby on the street would have a view. It wasn’t the best method of protection, but she couldn’t think of anything else.
“You really don’t think anything through, do you? I suppose explaining anything would be a waste. I hope you enjoyed your last meal. I know my plate was delicious. Later.” Charles patted the shoulder of one of the guards as he moved towards the door. The large man proceeded to pull out a pistol and point it at Kass.
“Wait! Wait just a--” The guard interrupted Kass’s plea with three well-placed bullets in her abdomen. It was a sharp, fiery pain that Kass had never felt before. It didn’t just hit, it didn’t just hurt--it pushed. It pushed her away, out of her body, as if the first thing it meant to kill was reality. She was still watching the world through her own eyes, but it was as if she were suddenly in a first-person shooter where she wasn’t in control. All she could do was watch and feel the empty pit in her stomach grow as her hand moved on its own to hold one of the wounds. Then the guard that had shot her turned around and left too.
“You shot her in the stomach, didn’t you?” Charles knew it was true without even having to look at Kass for confirmation. “Can you never just shoot them in the head?”
“I’m sorry, boss. It’s too messy that way. Have to leave something for the casket,” he apologized. “I’m really sorry, boss,” the murderer lamented again. He turned for a brief moment to admire his handy work before leaving with Charles.
As soon as the door closed behind the three men, Stephanie appeared from behind the counter and jumped over it. “Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh, dear. Look what they’ve done.” She rushed over and grabbed Kass, stopping her inevitable collision with the floor. “Look what he’s done to you. That monster . . . That monster did this to you.” She stretched Kass out and cradled the young girl’s head in her lap with one arm. The other was kept busy fiddling with something Kass couldn’t see.
The whole thing was too surreal for Kass. She couldn’t find the strength to even say the words on her mind. The cold spread from the wounds in her belly to her legs, then moved up and started circling her heart. She couldn’t quite fully believe yet that she was dying. She stared upwards at Stephanie, but just looking at the now-black-haired woman felt a bit silly. She expected a regal queen when she thought of Stephanie, one who never lost her composure for even a moment, but here she was panicked and distraught, with bloodshot eyes and flailing hair, as her free hand kept searching for something. What is she looking for? Kass wondered.
“Am I going to die?” Kass finally choked out the question. She couldn’t see the wounds, but she knew the feeling. It hadn’t happened to her before--she didn’t remember dying before at least--but it was still an unmistakable sensation that her body knew without question and without having to be answered. Kass only bothered asking because while her body knew, her mind still didn’t want to accept it. “Is this it?”
“Well . . .” Stephanie stroked Kass’s hair. At any other time, Kass would have reeled from having Stephanie touch her, let alone stroke her hair gently like a mother caressing a daughter, but this time it felt nice. It was comforting and warm in a way that she needed. “The good news is you’re not dead yet. The bad news is the gunman wasn’t an amateur. The bullets are very well placed. I can’t think of a single human who could live through the injuries you’ve got. I mean, at this rate . . .” Stephanie kept talking, but Kass couldn’t hear. She had only wanted to close her eyes for just a moment, but now they felt too heavy to open again. Even breathing became difficult as she lay sprawled out in Stephanie’s lap. I just need a little rest. It’s okay if I--
Darwin:
“So . . . What’s the plan?” Darwin asked Kitchens as the two of them approached Peh-Ting Zhou.
“I would normally say we just storm the gates, murder everyone in sight who’s pointing a weapon at us and then go from there, but I imagine we need to be quick, don’t we?” Kitchens looked at the gates as he replied. “Drawing attention will slow us down, and if we get slowed down, we’ll end up failing to accomplish our goal before the crowd arrives.”
“Yeah, we should probably treat it like it’s a sold-out venue and assume that they’ll be showing up early. Even if Daniel does a good job of stalling them out for a bit, Alex is expeditious and efficient in everything he does. He’ll cut right through that forest like a knife through butter.”
“Don’t you mean a hot knife through butter?” Kitchens corrected his simile.
“Really, Kitchens? Your sword goes through people, monsters and armor, and yet you’re worried that if your knife isn’t warmed up, it’ll be slowed down by the butter?” Darwin chuckled.
“That's . . . You do that to people a lot, don’t you?” Kitchens observed.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Darwin said, feigning ignorance.
“You leave out bits and pieces of sentences to bait people into verbal traps,” Kitchens elucidated.
“So if we can’t use the gate, do you think we should try the whole sneaking in on a caravan thing?” Darwin asked, changing the subject.
“You don’t think that would take too long?” Kitchens looked at a few of the caravans going through the gate. “It would work, the gate is understaffed and crowded, but that also means we’d end up having to wait half an hour to an hour just for the caravan to get permission to pass, assuming they didn’t catch us.”
“So it’s a risk that could put us behind schedule and push us back to your Plan A an hour late?” Darwin summarized Kitchens’ explanation.
“Yeah, it is. Do you have any other ideas?” Kitchens asked without turning his head from the city.
“Well, how about that wall? I don’t know how much you weigh, but . . .” Darwin looked up at one of the walls. How exactly do the strength and speed stats work in this game? I can carry a sword that should weighs 20 pounds like it’s a feather, so what about a person? If I can toss a spear hundreds of yards, how far can I--
“One of us could try throwing the other over the wall?” Kitchens finished Darwin’s thought.
“Yeah, it doesn’t sound too ridiculous, does it?”
“Not too much, but it will be noticed. You will be noticed. Once we get over--assuming we can actually get over--what’s your plan?” Kitchens asked.
“Well, we can’t just go with your door plan on the roof?”
“You mean kill everything?”
“Yeah, it seemed good. It had a solid lack of thinking that I really appreciated.” Darwin laughed as he struggled to actually plan past the initial landing.
“Except that it would still put us back to being bogged down in the time consuming task of killing everyone in the town before we make it to the council chambers,” Kitchens pointed out.
Logic. Annoying and pestilent logic. “Alright, you know what? We’ll just wing it and try to sneak in. I’ll toss you up, you silence the guards and then toss me down a rope, and we’ll go from there.” Darwin was annoyed with the fact that a better strategy just wasn’t coming to mind. I’m usually a lot better at thinking up a quick tactic, but how am I supposed to put a game plan together when I don’t know the first thing about what security is even going to be? Darwin frowned. This was either going to be a really tough or a really easy day; but, no matter which of the two it ended up being, it promised to be a long one.
“If you say so, boss,” Kitchens stressed the word ‘boss,’ as if he were only going along with the half-cocked plan because Darwin had ordered it.
Darwin, sensing that twinge of insubordination, grumpily grabbed both Kitchens’ arms, did a spin and hurled him. They weren’t exactly close to the wall, and it wasn’t exactly like Darwin had taken the time to carefully calculate the trajectory in his head beforehand. He had moved so quickly that even Kitchens looked surprised as he rocketed towards the top of the wall. Darwin could almost make out Kitchens’ attempt at waving as the cat-man flew up and actually landed--most likely on his feet as Darwin guessed all felines should--on the other side, disappearing from sight altogether. Darwin waited a few minutes and then a coil of rope shot over the tiled mud and plaster wall that topped the massive, stone barrier.
Darwin grabbed hold of the rope and started to pull himself up. Kind of wish we had brought Daniel or Mclean. They would have been able to just carry us to the top and that would have been that.
When Darwin got over the side of the wall, he wasn’t met with a gruesome scene of corpses, severed limbs and a wall sprayed with enemy entrails like he had expected. Instead, the only thing he saw was Kitchens holding onto a rope, the one Darwin was using to climb up, and an armored Feline next to him giving a slightly impatient look.
“So is that all you need it for?” the guard asked as Kitchens handed the rope back to him.
“Yeah, thanks a lot for the help.” Kitchens gave the other Feline man a smile and a shallow bow as the soldier took his rope.
“No problem. When I heard that our kind was part of the group that did it, well, you can imagine how happy I was.” The guard gave Kitchens a pat on the back and then turned to start leaving.
“That was strange, wasn’t it?” Darwin observed as the sentry disappeared.
“Yeah. When I first came up here, he looked more shocked that I didn’t take the front door than the fact that I had apparently leapt over this ridiculously tall obstacle. He didn’t even seem to consider for a moment that I was an invader trying to conquer his kingdom.” Kitchens looked a bit disappointed.
“There, there, buddy.” Darwin patted him on the back in the most overly exaggerated manner he could pull off. “There will be plenty of other guards to use your blade on in the future. Let’s get a move on.”
“It wasn’t that. It’s just . . .” Kitchens gave Darwin a strange, concerned look that he couldn’t quite make out.
“Something feels off?” Darwin guessed at the other man’s concern. To an extent, he felt the same. The guard hadn’t just been complacent and incompetently trying to ward off invaders; he had even helped the invaders by lending them a rope so they could climb up.
“Yeah, you could say that. This feels like we’re taking a Trojan horse.”
“It might be a trap, admiral, but what are we going to do about it? Actually, I have a serious question: Why didn’t you have rope?”
“Why would I carry around a rope?”
“Why wouldn’t you? I mean, what if we were in a dungeon with a super-steep wall, or we were trying to invade a town full of beasts with really tall fortifications? Did you never play board games? Always carry a pole and a rope. It’s not like it would eat inventory space with Tiqpa’s storage system,” Darwin shook his head in dismay. How does he play an MMO without knowing the golden laws of the original dungeon games?
“A rope and a pole?”
The two of them descended the flight of stairs to the ground level of the city, walked past two guards as if nothing were out of the ordinary and continued on through the marketplace towards the capital. Not a single person seemed to notice that the giant, horned man was out of place or in any way noteworthy, which was quite odd, given that Eve’s quest should still be active, and Darwin had forgotten to raise the hood on his outfit.
“Yeah, a ten-foot pole, to be exact,” Darwin specified.
“What would you even do with a ten-foot pole?” Kitchens cringed, his mind likely farther in the gutter than maple leaves from three autumns back.
“The uses for a ten-foot pole are . . .” Darwin paused. He knew at least a hundred, but he also knew that, in most MMOs, there wouldn’t be any. Creativity had dropped off in the gaming world ever since things were standardized by gaming scripts. Trying to explain how a ten-foot pole could be used as anything but a weapon in most videogames would be as fruitless as explaining the differences in red wine to someone who refuses to drink alcohol. “Never mind.”
“If you say so.” Kitchens accompanied his concession with a shrug. “By the way, you didn’t bother with a disguise?”
“Well, I’m a nearly seven-foot-tall, humanoid guy with horns and red eyes. Not much you can do to cover that up,” Darwin answered and frowned. “I’m just surprised that none of the guards have even bothered making a move to stop us--or none of the players for that matter.”
“Yeah, does this mean that the quest is no longer in effect?” Kitchens’ brow furrowed he squinted his eyes as he looked around suspiciously, likely trying to find a clue as to what could be causing the lack of defense.
“So, I know we planned to come in acting like assassins, sneak around and murder the council, but . . . what exactly are we supposed to do if this keeps up?” Darwin nervously looked at one of the guards who waved at him as he passed through the market on his way to the center of town.
“If they keep acting like it’s a quaint country town, and we’re here to drop off pie for the new neighbors?” Kitchens asked as one of the town’s trusted defenders gave the two of them a little bow of the head.
“Yeah, that.” Darwin sighed. It’s much easier to go around maiming and butchering hateful attackers than it is to do it to the friendly, pie-wielding neighbor. “We could ask them what’s going on.”
“Ask them why they aren’t attacking us? You’re not concerned that might make them actually attack us?” Kitchens laughed. “It’s like asking your girlfriend why she is still dating you. Even if she has plenty of reasons, you’re making her reconsider it with every inquiry.”
“Hmm . . . That’s a good point, but we don’t have to ask one of the guards. We could ask a townsman?” Darwin looked around. “We could even ask one of the players. Since neither of us read the forum that often, maybe we are missing out on s
ome information?”
“And deal with what might happen when the players remember the quest reward and gang up to kill you? Stick with an NPC trader. Traders will look at a dangerous pair that they should, under all law-abiding and nationalistic notions, attack or apprehend and instead try to barter with the deadly duo. We’re much less likely to encounter any problems if we go to one of the vendors to find out what’s happening,” Kitchens suggested.
“Can we not refer to ourselves as a ‘deadly duo’?” Darwin asked and then remembered that previously Kitchens had kept calling him ‘fire’ after some elemental affinity and cringed. I really hope he doesn’t go around referring to me as a flamer with the usual serious and unaware mentality of most fathers have, he grumbled to himself. “That said, a shopkeeper does sound like the safest option. Let’s go with that one,” Darwin said, quickly agreeing with the suggestion in hope of the name-calling situation being forgotten.
“Whatever you say, boss.” Kitchens stressed a condescending tone into the last word this time.
His feelings didn’t get hurt about me rejecting the title ‘deadly duo,’ did they? Darwin sighed as he walked up to the closest shopkeeper. It was a rather tall Reptilian that was yelling around to every passerby that his ‘wares’ were the best in town. His wares, of course, were oils, specifically beauty creams. Does this make him a bonafide snake oil salesman? Darwin mused to himself, trying to decide if he could actually get away with that loose interpretation of race and occupation. He's not actually a snake, but it's close enough to call him a snake oil salesman instead of lizard man oil salesman, right? He assured himself of his pun, only to hear a chuckle from Kitchens.
“Snake oil salesman. This stuff just writes itself.” Kitchens’ face showed the effort he was putting into suppressing a louder laugh.
“Let's just hope that none of his beauty creams are labeled salacious secretions or exotic excretions,” Darwin said snidely.