Covalent Bonds

by Trysh Thompson

  Cassandra looked at him. “Combine Games has a big presence at XP Expo this year. And they have a launch this weekend, too. You don’t think somebody would seriously sabotage an entire launch just to try to get a leg up?”

  “XPO is a pretty big event,” said Adam. “It can set a company’s tone for the whole year. Playmor has been getting a lot more media attention than Combine Games. I can’t say it’s the kind of thing I would have thought of myself, but it’s possible someone else did.”

  “Then then we have to get these games over to XPO,” said Cassandra. “Beat them at their own game, so to speak. Save the day for all those gamers.”

  “But I can’t move the truck without dispatch,” protested Tom.

  Adam shook his head. “As far as the records go, dispatch never told you to stop the truck. You got time to make up.”

  Tom slammed her fist into the palm of his opposite hand. “Damn it, you’re right. Elaine might burn me yet. We’re already too late.”

  Cassandra shook her head. “No, you don’t understand. That’s why Adam and I drove out here. These games have to be on-site by ten o’clock on Sunday morning. We can just make it if we take off right now.”

  “You mean drive straight through?” Tom looked dubious. “There are laws and GPS tracking. There’s no point in me saving myself from Elaine if I cook myself under driver regulations.”

  “Drivers can rotate,” said Cassandra. “And that’s what we’ll do.” She held up a hand as he started to protest. “This isn’t a full semi which needs weeks of training. And I do have my CDL if it comes down to it.”

  “Do you now?” asked Tom.

  “You do?” Adam repeated.

  She nodded. “I got it two years ago to run food pantry donations and also a big passenger van for the hospital. I don’t use it much, but if we somehow get stopped, I’m legal.”

  “Well then,” said Adam, “let’s finish this conversation in the cab at seventy miles an hour.”

  Tom opened the cab, and they piled in. He punched information into the navigation system. “You want before ten a.m.? Okay, we’ve got nine and a half hours to make a ten hour drive plus fuel stops.”

  Adam made a sound of frustration. “I don’t suppose either of you happens to have a TARDIS handy?”

  Tom tapped the screen. “We run five miles an hour over the speed limit all the way back. Just enough to make up time, not enough to attract the cops’ attention, because a speeding ticket costs way more time and we’d never make it up. Traffic should be light overnight. We run shifts, keeps the driver fresher and we can push a little bit harder in traffic.”

  Cassandra nodded. “It’s a hundred and six miles to Chicago, we got a full tank of gas, half a pack of cigarettes, it’s dark, and we’re wearing sunglasses?”

  “Exactly. Let’s do this.”

  Tom took the first driving shift, as he was the only one who had not driven that day. The cab was roomy enough for the three of them to share the bench seat, and Cassandra buckled in beside Adam. “Sorry to be anti-social,” she said, “but I need to get some sleep if I’m going to drive again in a few hours.”

  But she couldn’t sleep. Tom’s old-school country music was a soft drone, not terribly disturbing, and she was tired, but she was not sleepy. She rolled her head back and forth on the seat back, trying to get comfortable.

  “Something wrong?” asked Adam.

  “Too much caffeine,” she said. “And my neck isn’t designed to fit on this curve.”

  “Well,” he said, drawing out the word almost reluctantly, “I can’t do much about the caffeine, but I can ball up a jacket and you can brace it against my shoulder. If, you know, you’re okay with that. Just so your neck isn’t getting a kink before you have to drive.”

  Cassandra hesitated. Was he just being a gentleman, which was okay, or was he offering something more than a pillow, an initial physical contact which might lead to, say, holding hands?

  She was okay with the second option, too.

  Adam was just about to speak, probably some apologetic retraction or a joke to relieve the awkward moment, but she beat him to it. “Yeah, I’d like that. Thanks.”

  He rolled his jacket, taking care to fold the zipper inside, and held it as she settled against the jacket and the seat. “Is that better?”

  “A lot better. Thank you.”

  She felt him nod. “Now ignore those energy drinks and get some sleep.”

  She managed to drowse, her mind swimming with caffeinated dream images of orcs driving nonstop through a medieval village, trying to outrun a Jeep full of underpowered clerics. She woke when the truck stopped. “Where are we?”

  “McDonald’s. Or Illinois. Whichever you meant.” Tom got out of the cab. “I’m going to hit the restroom and get a breakfast sandwich, and you can take over.”

  She nodded and pushed her loose hair back. “Is that a billboard for the world’s largest wind chime?”

  “You can ring it, if you want to,” called Tom over his shoulder as he walked toward the fast food restaurant.

  “No time,” said Adam. “We’re cutting it really close already.” He held up his phone. “If we get out of here in the next five minutes, and stay five miles above the speed limit all the way back, we’re going to hit the convention center about forty-five minutes before game time.”

  “Lemme hit the restroom and get an egg sandwich, and we’ll roll,” said Cassandra.

  Tom was reluctant to turn his truck over to Cassandra, she could see it in his eyes, but he said nothing as she handled the wheel and gear shift. The truck wasn’t so much longer than what she’d driven for the hospital, and once on the interstate itself, the curves were wide and gentle enough that it was fairly easy to handle. After a half hour of gradually decreasing vigilance, Tom finally leaned away and went to sleep.

  “I’m really glad you came along on this run,” Adam said after a few minutes. “And not just because you can drive the truck.”

  Cassandra felt herself smiling. “Yeah, this isn’t what I expected, but I’m okay with it. It’s going to make a great story.”

  “I’m a writer,” Adam said. “I like great stories.” He bobbed his head for a moment, as if trying to decide whether or not to continue, and then he said with an exaggerated drawl, “So, you think a GM and a guy like me could ever….?”

  Cassandra turned and gave him a facetiously stern look. “You’re in danger of reneging on our candy bar deal.”

  “I already ate that candy bar. Right now I’m working on getting you to offer me another.”

  “Manipulative little nerf herder, aren’t you? I think—oh, no.”

  A sea of red brake lights shone in front of them, punctuated by red and blue flashers.

  Tom, woken by the change in speed, reached to punch some navigation buttons. “Take the next exit, if it’s not clear by then,” he said. “There’s a state highway. It won’t be quite as fast, but it’ll move faster than this parking lot.”

  The next exit was twelve miles down the road, and the accident (an overturned truck, Adam reported as he checked Twitter) was blocking all lanes. Tom crossed his arms and leaned back, passive with the well-learned attitude that there was nothing to be done until the road was cleared. Adam fretted quietly, checking his phone and the navigation regularly as if a new route might suddenly appear. Cassandra tried not to think about what this was doing to their schedule.

  Finally a lane was cleared, and they began creeping forward. Adam started recalculating, and once Cassandra was safely through the confusion and the speedometer needle was climbing again, he said, “This is bad. No reason to stop, but we probably can’t make it.”

  Cassandra glanced at him. “You sound pretty level.”

  “I’m still in denial. It’s a character trait.” He tapped the phone screen. “If we keep ten miles an hour above the speed limit and don’t get stopped, we’ll get in about twenty minutes before game time.”

  “That’s a good thing, right?”


  “No, because a truck full of product in a parking lot is not the same as unloaded product in a game hall.” He shook his head. “And really speeding won’t get us enough time to make a difference, even if we could risk time lost for a traffic stop. We can’t just teleport the games into the room.”

  “Drive the truck in,” said Cassandra.

  “What?”

  “Open the loading docks to the vendor hall, clear a path to the Playmor booth, and drive on in. They’re in the back anyway, right?”

  “Yes, the biggest booths tend to be in the rear. But—”

  “They clear a path from the loading dock to the back of the Playmor booth, and then the truck is unloaded directly into the booth and directly into the hands of the event GMs. The GMs carry their own materials into the event room, and they are responsible for checking them back in at the end of the event. You were going to do something like that with the GMs anyway right? That keeps all of the inventory controlled for later sale, but we don’t lose so much time in unloading.”

  Adam looked thoughtful. “I’m sure there are a hundred or so regulations against opening the loading dock and moving a vehicle while the vendor hall is open.”

  “So we say we’re sorry afterward and send the convention center some flowers. Convention centers like flowers.”

  Adam snorted. “Let me talk to Brenda.”

  They were only minutes from the convention center when Adam found it.

  It started with a Twitter mention, when someone had finally tagged his username late in the discussion.

  I guess missing Hellraisers Menace isn’t going to be such a loss—apparently new writer @ASulln is racist, per XPO chatter. WTH, Playmor?

  Adam clicked back to see the ongoing conversation, his stomach suddenly hollow and sinking, and saw more references and mentions. No one seemed to be reporting first hand, they were all quoting what they’d heard, but it was enough. More than enough. This would end him, end his game career and probably a good chunk of his personal life.

  “What’s wrong?”

  He looked at Cassandra. He hadn’t said anything, but he supposed there had to be some visible reaction to finding out your reputation was roadkill. He wasn’t sure how to tell her—but it was very important that he tell her first, before she stopped driving and checked XP Expo social media. “I just found a rumor about me. I’d heard about it before, but we didn’t know where it came from and I was hoping it would just blow over and disappear. But it looks like it’s gaining traction.”

  She frowned. “What kind of rumor?”

  “That I made racist jokes during an XPO panel.”

  She screwed up her face. “What? That’s ridiculous. Even if you were racist, you seem smart enough to keep your mouth shut in public. Not that I think you’re racist, anyway. But surely someone videoed the panel? Seems like it’d be easy enough to disprove.”

  Adam shook his head. “It was a morning panel, made up of people like me. Not exactly headliners, and it’s unlikely there’s a lot of continuous video. Even so, no one wants to watch an hour of video to prove someone’s innocence, not when it’s so much faster to retweet the worst. I love social media, but it’s not always the best vehicle for strict truth.”

  Cassandra took a hand from the steering wheel and squeezed Adam’s wrist. “Games first,” she said. “Shorter time frame. Then we tackle this.”

  He felt a little warm glow of relief through the worry. She was on his side, and she’d said we. She’d taken it on as her challenge, too. She was right; the games had to come first right now. He could fight—might be fighting—the rumor for years to come.

  “Oh, here’s the exit,” she said. “Tom! This is where you take back the wheel. I can do these city streets in a pinch, but I’d rather hand off to an expert, and the convention center’s all yours.”

  “This is where Elaine says I didn’t show but where I actually deliver right into the client’s own booth,” Tom said smugly. “With pleasure.”

  They couldn’t drive to the booth itself—not even Brenda had been able to make that happen—but she had bullied a few convention center workers into opening one of the rear loading doors to the hall, and Tom navigated the narrow space expertly, backing the truck into the enormous room as the crowd of shoppers paused to stare and then started forward, knowing this had to be significant.

  “Stand back for Hellraisers Menace!” bellowed Enrique. “GMs, queue up and have your IDs ready!”

  They’d done a great job adapting, Adam realized. The GMs stretched in orderly fashion from where they were waiting at the Playmor booth to the rear of the truck, where Adam and Cassandra were throwing open the doors and Playmor booth workers were leaping inside with boxcutters. Enrique was checking out game materials and photographing each ID and scanning each convention badge’s bar code. Several con volunteers were directing GMs and their new materials away to a side door, where they would be escorted to the game hall.

  By Palingar, this was going to work.

  “Stop!” called a furious voice.

  Adam turned and saw a man shoving through the onlookers. “Stop this!” he was shouting. “This is special treatment for Playmor and unfair to competing companies!”

  Cassandra stopped passing boxes and looked at Adam. He nodded. “Randy Buczkowski, Combine Games.”

  Cassandra nodded and stepped off the back of the truck as Randy reached Enrique and one of the convention center workers. “Stop this right now,” he demanded, “or I’m suing XP Expo and the convention center itself.”

  Enrique held up his hands. “Randy, please, let’s be reasonable.”

  “Reasonable? Is it reasonable to endanger thousands of con attendees by driving a truck through the building just so you can gain an unfair advantage in product distribution?”

  “What’s unfair about it?” Enrique countered. “You’ve had your product for sale all weekend!”

  But the convention center employee was more rattled by the threat of suit and, by extension, his job. “Now hold on, we can—”

  “Then get this truck out of here!” Randy shouted at him. “And don’t think we don’t know where this is going,” he continued to Enrique and to Brenda, who was rushing to join them. “Everyone knows this is a ploy to draw attention from the fact that one of your writers is a blatant racist who offended an entire roomful of attendees here already. Notice how Sullivan vanished as soon as complaints started going around? Nice try. You think people are just going to forget about that?”

  Adam froze. Randy Buczkowski was speaking loudly; he wanted to be heard by the crowd around him. Should Adam speak up? Would identifying himself make it better or worse?

  Brenda looked exhausted and now more than a little sick to her stomach. She very obviously did not look at the listening shoppers pressing close as she answered, “You know as well as anyone else that we don’t know that, Randy. No video has surfaced from the panel, and we have just a couple of complaints with no names attached to them, and—”

  “It doesn’t matter if there are names on the complaints!” Randy bellowed. “You don’t ask people who are offended to identify themselves! And there doesn’t have to be video, because—”

  “Who’s Elaine Buczkowski?” Cassandra’s voice cut firmly across Randy’s diatribe.

  He wheeled. “What?”

  “Sister? Wife, maybe? Oh, ex-wife, wow.” Cassandra was a few feet away, looking at a phone. “Ex-wife who really needs that child support, and she could either go to court for a long battle or do you a single favor and get all the back payments at once.”

  Randy stared at her. “What—how do you… Wait!”

  Cassandra shook her head. “That’s a dirty trick, Randy. Really dirty.”

  “You can’t prove—”

  “—That you coerced your dispatcher ex-wife into ordering the delay of Playmor products to ruin their XPO launch? Oh, I think I can. I already saved the screencap.”

  Randy stared at her and then, in a moment of horror, reached
for his pocket. His hand came back empty.

  He lunged at Cassandra. “Give me that phone!”

  But she was already leaping onto the back of the truck, where Adam pulled her out of reach as Enrique and the convention center worker blocked Randy’s forward charge. Around them the crowd was gasping and starting to murmur.

  “You guys want to see it for yourselves?” Cassandra called. “It’s right here, all in text messages, pretty clear once you know what it’s talking about. Give me half a minute, I’ll share it on the XPO social app and you can all see it.” She thumbed across the phone’s screen. “Just let me open up the—oh, wow, what is this?”

  Randy surged toward the truck, his eyes murderous. “Give me back that phone!”

  Cassandra looked up from the screen. “Randy Buczkowski, you wanna tell everyone here why there’s a sock puppet account on your XPO app? With a complaint about racist remarks by Adam Sullivan?”

  Adam looked at Cassandra, realization dawning, and then back at Randy, fuming behind Enrique.

  “You made it up, didn’t you?” Cassandra accused. She had been snarky about the text messages and the shipment delay, but she was furious now. “You’re the one who accused Adam so you could discredit him and Playmor Games! You didn’t care what it would do to him. And when legitimate problems get ignored, when real issues get called fake, it’s because of you and people like you. People like you make real social progress difficult!”

  “You have no right to that phone!” screamed Randy. “Anonymous means anonymous!”

  Cassandra grasped the edge of the truck door and leaned over Randy and the crowd, holding the phone facing outward to the crowd. “Look at yourself, Randy—dirty businessman, deadbeat dad, and perverter of social justice. Is there anything we left out?”

  Randy leaped and caught Cassandra’s arm, snatching her down. She screamed and dropped the phone, scrabbling for a grip as she fell toward Randy and the concrete floor, and Adam lunged to catch the back waistband of her jeans. He yanked her back and wrapped both arms about her as he pushed back into the truck and they fell against a stack of cardboard boxes.