Initializing (Somnia Online Book 1)

by K. T. Hanna

  Her vision remained black for about thirty seconds after she did. It took a conscious effort to push herself up and force her eyes open, which immediately connected the system to her augmented reality implant and began booting up her usual pages. She blinked, noticing Harlow was already up, because the water in Wren’s shower was running. It was dark outside, and she glanced at the time realizing it’d be around midnight in-game when they logged back in.

  Wren’s stomach rumbled and cramped.

  “Shit,” she muttered and made a dash for the bathroom, calling out to Harlow as she did. “Sorry hon! I couldn’t wait.”

  A peal of laughter echoed through the room, dampened by the rising steam. “You act like we never shared a bath when we were kids.”

  Wren chuckled to herself, washed her hands, and smiled. “Not like we haven’t recently either!”

  “Touche!” Harlow yelled out. “Fuck, Wren. I’m so tired.”

  “I’ll go make us some food. I reckon one more session and we need to sleep for a good dose of hours, but I just want to get a decent jump before we do.”

  “I get it. I’ll be down shortly.”

  Wren closed the door behind her and padded down the steps. She heard hushed voices coming from the kitchen and stopped, trying her best to hear what her parents were saying.

  “I’m not sure what’s going to happen, but I can’t help thinking she’s not coming back.” Her mother’s voice hitched, before she took a deep breath. “I’m probably just stressed.”

  “It’s a big launch. There’s so much riding on this, of course you’re stressed.” Her father, ever the soothing voice of reason. “It’ll work out. You’ll figure it out, and I’m right here too.”

  She could hear her mother sigh. “It seems to be going smoothly, besides the glitches that seem to occur every once in a while.”

  “Glitches?”

  “It’s hard to explain. Like a line of static gives a break in the line of data. Not a whole heap, but a line or two. I didn’t mean for it to be visible like that.” Her mother stretched, and Wren flattened herself against the wall, counting to three before continuing down the stairs like nothing had happened.

  “Evening! I think?”

  Her father laughed, his smile wide. “There’s my little princess. Been kicking the crap out of snot-nosed kids?”

  “Dad.” Wren rolled her eyes and grabbed bread and lunch meats out of the fridge. She was famished. “But I have been kicking the snot out of the game.”

  “That’s my girl!” He ruffled her hair and then leaned down and whispered loudly enough for her mother to hear. “Is the game worth me playing?”

  Laria laughed, her eyes following Wren as she moved about. “Thanks.”

  “Definitely.” Wren smiled at her mom and winked.

  A surprised look on her face, her mother walked over and hugged Wren tightly, lingering a little longer than usual. “Just be careful in there, okay? Time has a way of disappearing when you play.”

  “No kidding. I couldn’t believe how long we were in there just now.” Wren slapped mayo and mustard on eight slices of bread, lettuce, tomato, onion, cheese, and chicken. She paused, and frowned, opened the freezer, grabbed out a packet of fries before opening the pressure oven. “Hey Mom. Something weird happened.”

  Her mother glanced at her, but refused to maintain eye contact with her. “Like what?”

  “I got these new skills, and overused them a bit, and it well, it kind of half knocked me out, in-game.” Wren waited, hoping she hadn’t inadvertently caused her mother more stress.

  “Like knocked you out in-game, as in your character lost consciousness in-game?” Her mother sounded it out, obvious surprise etched into her expression.

  “Yep. Mostly, anyway. I couldn’t focus or anything, I could barely hear. I mean I was fine after a bit, just sort of hesitant to use that ability again.”

  “Strange. I’ll see if I can look into the coding. Could have been a glitch.” Her mother smiled at Wren, but Wren couldn’t help the feeling that she wasn’t being told everything.

  Harlow came down the stairs, and grabbed a drink from the fridge, her red hair curly and wet. “Food?”

  “Cooking.” After a few minutes, the oven beeped and Wren grabbed out the fries, cooked to perfection. She slapped them on the plate with two sandwiches each, grabbed ketchup, and banged it all down on the table. “Eat up fast. We have like an hour before we meet.”

  “You’re not going to sleep yet?” Her mother looked a little concerned, the furrow in her brow deep. “I think your mind probably still needs some rest, love.”

  “Nope. One more session and we’re taking a nap for a few hours.”

  Laria sighed, and Wren couldn’t tell if it was with relief or not.

  “Fine. Just be careful, okay? Make sure you’re taking enough breaks and eating, and keep in touch with me.” Shifting her eyes for a moment, Wren’s mom picked up a cup of coffee and began to make her way to the stairs. “My shift again. Have fun!”

  Wren chewed her food, wondering how she could broach the subject of what her mother wasn’t telling her. Beside everything else, her mother had never been at home for a release of anything before. But the dilemma was solved for her when her father gave her a kiss on the forehead and headed wordlessly into the living room. Gulping down the rest of a sandwich, she made a mental note to talk to her parents next time she logged out.

  “Need to shower. I smell.” She crinkled up her nose and ran up the stairs while Harlow continued eating her food at the pace of a snail while she leafed through whatever had her attention on the web.

  “Sure, sure.” Harlow waved Wren away.

  Fifteen minutes later and finally clean and refreshed, Wren pushed the tiredness away and set her headgear back on just as Harlow came flying into the room. Waiting for her friend, Wren squeezed her hand when they both lay down.

  “I’m really glad you’re here with me, Harlow.” Wren smiled, feeling warmth in her belly. They’d been friends so long, she couldn’t imagine life without Harlow.

  Harlow gulped, raised herself up on one elbow and gave Wren an awkward hug again before laying herself back down. “You know, it’s so good to be able to see you again, and hang out every day. I’ve missed you.”

  Wren laughed. “We don’t live that far away.”

  Harlow’s smile was soft and her voice low when she spoke. “I know.”

  Wren squeezed Harlow’s hand again. “Ready?”

  “You know it!”

  This time the transition to the Ululate bind point was so instantaneous that Murmur fell to her knees and had to steady herself on the ground. Except it wasn’t steadying herself—the ground was shaking. Managing to stay on her feet, she saw a stream of people heading toward the back of the town. She grabbed Sin’s hand and tugged her up, urging her to follow. “What the hell?”

  Another rumble shook the ground, and they finally made it to the lookout at the back of the city, silhouetted by the red sky of the rising sun. Characters lit up on her party side bar before blinking away into nothingness. Murmur managed to coax her way to the front of the mass of people, by exuding her charm and Thought Projection to make people move for her.

  Finally, standing at the edge of the railing she felt the blood drain from her face. The castle was a good distance away, shrouded on its rocky outcrop, with specters floating along the ramparts. If she squinted she could make them out.

  But there was a new creature between them now. It stood nearly as tall as the castle itself, a gaping maw showed several lines of perfectly serrated teeth. Its body coalesced in and out of solidity, giving the impression that it was already dead, and yet partially solid all at once. And every time it stomped, the city shook.

  Sinister voiced what everyone watching was thinking. “What. The. Fuck. Is. That.”

  Murmur could barely stop herself from squealing with excitement. “It’s a fucking contested mob, that’s what it is!” She whispered it ecstatically, like all he
r dreams had come true at once.

  “Look.” she pointed, conning the creature. “It’s not just red, it’s freaking black. No one is killing that thing for a while, but damn. It’s just sitting there.”

  Sin frowned. “That’s really not fair.”

  “It’s a carrot.” Somehow Havoc was standing next to them, a frown on his face. “This is a carrot. It’s a world boss mob. Anyone can kill it, but only once they’re leveled, and it’ll probably need a full raid or so.”

  “We’re taking that thing down as soon as we can.” Murmur’s face shone with excitement, her eagerness leaking over to infect her friends entirely without her noticing it.

  “Not if we beat you to it.” Jirald stood behind them, a smirk on his face, a guild tag over his head.

  Murmur glanced at him and opened her mouth, but Havoc stepped in and spoke instead. “Exodus. Well, that explains a lot. I thought you mannerisms seemed familiar. You wouldn’t happen to be Giralt would you.”

  Jirald scowled. “It wouldn’t let me take my usual name. Someone already had it.”

  “Oh.” A light went on in Murmur’s head, a vague memory. “It’s you.”

  She paused for a moment, studying his angry face. Locus were pretty scary when angry—their teeth showed, and the way their brows furrowed gave their faces a feral tinge. Then she remembered some of the incident that had led to Fable’s feud with Exodus, and had to stop herself from laughing. “Wait. Are you seriously still holding that grudge?”

  “That weapon should have been mine!” His alien eyes flashed angrily, a brief shadow encasing his form. “You had no right to take that before me!”

  Murmur blinked. “I didn’t take it; I earned it. Our guild beat that mob fair and square, it’s not our fault you didn’t make it there before us.”

  A dark flush suffused Jirald’s cheeks. “Only because Fable never let anyone else near any contested mob. No one else in that game had a damned chance. How is that supposed to be fun for anyone but you?”

  “Other people’s fun is my problem now? We played to beat the game, which is our way of fun. All anyone ever had to do was play as hard, and they’d have had their pick too.” She scowled, hands on hips. “Damn it, it would have been fun if we’d had some competition to get to world bosses.”

  Jirald practically screamed at her to stop her speaking. “You’re such a little diva! Just because you’re a girl, your guild carries you.”

  But he didn’t finish, because Beastial, being the congenial fellow he was, butted in with a huge smile on his face. “Murmur has never once been carried by the guild. As a healer, she kept us alive, even when we were stupid. As an enchanter even now, she keeps us alive, even when we’re stupid. So back off, buddy.”

  The locus rogue glowered at the beastmaster. “Your cleric didn’t deserve that mace. It should have been mine, or Masha’s.”

  “Hey, no dragging me into this.” A dark elf cleric piped up from behind Jirald. “Come on, stop irritating Fable.”

  Even though the cleric tugged at Jirald, the locus wasn’t finished. His next words came out as a low guttural sound. “We’re not letting you get away with that sort of shit in this game.”

  “Get away with beating you to a contested boss and killing it before your raid party actually arrived?” Beastial smiled again. He stood, arms crossed, tiger growling at his side. “I can get behind that. Give us some competition, we’re up for it.”

  Jirald spluttered for a moment, and then a cruel expression traced over his lips. “You’ll need to be. You won’t see us coming.”

  Murmur shrugged, not letting him ruin her excitement about discovering contested bosses. “Well, we’ll see, won’t we? Different game, different rules.”

  “Yes. Different rules. We’ll be the top guild on the server, just you wait.” He finally turned around, giving in to Masha’s incessant tugging.

  Devlish walked up, blinking after them. “I missed all the fun. Only got to catch the tail end of it.”

  “Didn’t miss much,” Havoc murmured, his eyes narrowed.

  “Really?” Dev shrugged. “Hey, I uploaded the charter. Our guild has a nice fame count. We can build a guild hall soon. But we’ll have to decide where we want it. It becomes a secondary bind point for us.”

  “Say what?” Murmur did a double take. “I don’t remember reading anything about that.”

  Sinister laughed. “You were so pissed off about your class change, Mur, you barely read anything.”

  About to rebuke that, Murmur realized she couldn’t. “Good point.”

  Maybe she should have researched more. She pulled up her in-game map and frowned. “Not too sure where to go. I mean, I know where I want to take us once we hit fifteen, but right now—”

  “Technically shouldn’t we be going back through those caves?” Havoc asked, leaning against the railing. “I mean we’d probably rip through them now, but there’s so much more to explore.”

  “Man has a point.” Merlin stretched his arms up and folded them behind his head.

  “Since it’s dark, if we go somewhere with a forest or swamp, we might get some higher level undead to spawn,” Beastial added matter-of-factly.

  “Yeah, but what to do until then...” Dev sighed.

  “Well,” Beastial ventured. “Himmel Lake has a weird little island on it with a sort of broken down castle. It’s near a twelve to seventeenish sort of area. We could try our luck.”

  “Excellent. I even have a breathing under water spell I think I can cast on everyone.” Murmur closed her map, and poked Beast in the chest. “Lead us onward, oh fearless one.”

  Sin laughed and threw an arm over Murmur’s shoulder. “Never change, Mur, okay?”

  “Wasn’t planning on it.” Murmur quickly shot off some messages to the guild.

  Go hit 15. I want to head to the dark elf haunted castle place once we hit 15. I don’t know the name. But it’s supposed to be 15-20ish.

  Rashlyn: Hazenthorne you mean?

  Sinister: If it’s that one on the small outcrop where the swampland is, then yes she does.

  Rashlyn: LOL Okay. Roger that. We’ll go level now. First one to 15 wins!

  Before they left town, they stopped in at the mayor’s office and picked up the gear that was there. Murmur was surprised to receive her necklace and tucked it away carefully with a grin for when she could use it at level thirteen. The silver filigree chain with a deep red stone gave it just a touch more weight than she’d expected, and added twenty-five to her Mental Acuity.

  They took a left out of Ululate. The wind whipped the tails of Murmur’s hair, dragging on her head in an uncomfortable way. Cold crept into her body and sat in the pit of her stomach, waiting with the silence of her mind.

  She felt uneasy. From her conversation back with Belius, to her current skill levels in both Thought Sensing at thirty-nine and Shielding at forty-two, she knew she would hit the second tier of Mental Acuity shortly. Tentatively as they walked, she pulled up her Thought Projection data and gasped out loud. It was sitting at twenty-one.

  “You okay, Mur?” Havoc fell back to walk with her and Sinister.

  “Yeah, just wasn’t expecting one of my skills to have increased so much.” She wanted to add, didn’t realize I was using it, but thought better of it. Was that the crux of the skill? Something she’d use with little to no thought? Something that came naturally to her?

  “Typical Mur,” Havoc’s tone was fond. “Always pushing those boundaries.”

  She laughed. “At least I’m amusing.”

  They walked quietly for a while, Murmur wishing she could get her hands on a cloak, and Merlin merrily pulling his tightly around himself and gloating. She probably shouldn’t have asked for a necklace.

  Beastial stopped the small procession and pointed. “That’s it. That’s Himmel Lake.”

  “And that tiny toppled castle is where we’ll find enough mobs?” Devlish raised an eyebrow, the skepticism rolling off him in waves.

  “Just wa
it until you’re closer, it’s got multiple levels, and it’s bigger than it seems.”

  Breath of Water helped everyone swim across and not drown, which was good since there were a few level twelve piranhas that were trying their best to eat their shoes. Finally, dragging herself up into a cove on the island, Murmur brushed off the bloody leftovers of one of the fish that was caught in her robes and scowled.

  “You know, who the hell decided casters get to wear robes? They’re freaking annoying, archaic, and provide no protection whatsoever. What’s wrong with leggings and a tunic?”

  Sin squeezed her shoulders in a one-handed hug. “It’s okay, Mur, just let it all out.”

  “Also, don’t make too much noise. The enemies in this game could hear a door creak at the other end of town.” Merlin’s whisper was barely audible, and Murmur groaned, but stepped back and sorted her own line up out, automatically pulling her stronger spells to the fore, and relegating the weaker ones to the back of her spell book.

  And then she remembered Allure. Excitement stole over her. “Is there a singular mob on lookout?”

  Merlin snuck to the side slightly. “Yeah, why?”

  “Can you tell what class he is?”

  Merlin raised an eyebrow but inched closer anyway before coming back. “Seems to be a warlock, I think?”

  “Can you line of sight it to here?” She tried not to be overeager.

  Merlin shrugged. “Sure I can try, but I have to get the timing right or else the others will hear or even see.”

  Murmur just watched him expectantly. “Don’t DoT him please, just a single shot to get his attention and bring him to me.”

  “Sure thing, Boss.” He said, his footfalls heavier than usual as he stomped toward the lookout. Murmur could tell by the tension in his shoulders that he was annoyed.

  She didn’t get it. She’d said please, and while Allure sounded fantastic on paper, the thing was, she had no idea how well it would work in practice. That being the case, she didn’t want to be all gung ho about it and end up with a disappointing result.