No, I’m not super thrilled with the route Sophia’s chosen for us, but thought of putting the kibosh on that traitorous scum Veenure never strays far from the forefront of my mind. We need her location. Sure, we could trounce her here in Tritania, but we need to get her out there, in the real world. That’s where it counts.
Our path takes us into a genuine crop circle, and Aiden bristles and pulls his Scissorsword. “We’ve got company.”
Two figures push their way through the corn to confront us. On the left is a frickin’ mummy in tattered western garb and a black cowboy hat with a silver concho hatband. The other one is some bloated, undead-looking piece of work with slick black hair, great big sideburns and a ripped white jumpsuit studded in rhinestone eagles, complete with douchebag popped collar.
Doc skitters back, gets his o-wakizashi up and yells, “Crap!”
The battle trumpet tootles its little tune, and our new opponents’ handles appear.
Sophia reads their handles. “Bubba Ho-Tep and Zombie Elvis? Zombie Elvis I get, but who’s Bubba Ho-Tep?”
Doc explains before I can. “Googleface Joe Lansdale later. Right now though, eyes front and weapons up; they’ve got the advantage.”
Bubba Ho-Tep palms his cowboy hat and blades spike out of the brim. He cackles and gnashes his teeth as he frisbees his weapon.
~Cowboy Boomerang!~
The hat sails towards us, hits Aiden, freezes him in place and knocks his life bar down by 5%. Not super bad for Aiden, but having him temporarily out of action ain’t exactly to our advantage.
Sophia’s eyes light up. “I get it! I get it! That one used his hat to steal Aiden’s turn. That’s why Aiden can’t move.”
“I can move my mouth!” he shouts.
“Well, then you’re in charge of color and play-by-play,” I tell him. “Hey Sophia – when does Ace Bandage get to go again?”
Bubba answers my question as he stiffly stalks towards me in approved monster movie style, his empty eye sockets fixed right on my face. They do apparently serve beer in Hell, as the mummy’s mocking grin sports garish Grillionaire-style Johnny Dang dental appendages.
He pivots and turns to Doc.
Doc holds himself ready; he quivers like a man who wants to run but knows that he must not; like a man who has forced himself to choose fight instead of flight. I see his lips move, and I barely catch his words.
“Blessed be the Lord, my rock,
Who trains my hands for war and fingers for battle.”
Bub comes in as close as he can and gets right up in Doc’s face. He shows him his diamond encrusted grill and laughs a gritty, dusty laugh. Unblinking, Doc meets his eyeless stare, puts the tip of his blade just under the mummy’s chin and quietly whispers, “Bring it.”
Elvis’ well-wrapped buddy lifts a single finger and flicks Doc between the eyes.
~COW TIPPING!~
Doc falls backward as if his personal gravity had just rotated ninety degrees. He struggles to right himself to no avail.
“Bastard!” he shouts as Bubba makes his way back to his side of the battlefield.
ZombElvis cartwheels, handsprings, and flying spin-kicks his way over to the cursing, prostrate, combat faun. For a fat, dead dude, he moves with surprising agility and grace, lands on Doc’s chest, and goes all Riverdance. Bubba Ho-Tep claps and stomps his feet as his counterpart increases his speed, his blue suede shoes kicking out right and left.
~BOOT SCOOTIN’ BOOGIE!~
Insult is definitely added to injury as Doc’s life bar drops by 18%.
“I got this, Doc,” I say as soon as our turn begins.
“My Fuzzy Goat ASS, you do! You let me finish this!” he cries from the ground. “YOU LET ME FINISH THIS!”
“You’re on the ground, which puts you at a disadvantage,” Sophia says calmly. “You’ll have your chance. What are your plans, Steamboy?”
“It’s Quantum,” I tell her, “and just cast embiggen when I ask give you the signal.”
“Embiggen again?” she sighs. “I’m getting tired of casting this spell.”
“Okay, why don’t you cast the rust minnow thing then, and we’ll let Mummy Mum Muggy and Costello the Zombie hammer on us while we wait for your lame-ass spell to nibble them to death.” She narrows her eyes at me, and fairly radiates irritation.
“No? Good. I have something I want to try.”
I equip my two rabid alley cats, item 317 and my Kra-Zee Puss-ee Katnip, item 119.
Frances Euphoria: You’re joking.
Me: Kra-Zee Puss-ee Katnip is made from a special genetically engineered nepeta cataria strand, known as Cat Salts in the most notorious nooks and crannies of Devil’s Alley. I tried it once and ended up gnawing a guy’s face off, Florida style. Grim stuff.
Frances Euphoria: Eww!
I pick the two cats up and tuck one under each arm like a football – American football – and smile at them. They hiss and make that sub-sonic growl. “Hiya Tuck, Hiya Buddy.” Tuck is either an extra-large Garfield or a very small Bengal tiger; Buddy is two yellow eyes set in a black hole full of malevolence, with ears and a bobbed tail. I set them down in front of Sophia with the same care you’d give a pair of live grenades with the pins pulled. She makes no effort to conceal her irritation, lack of enthusiasm, and general ‘not-at-all-happy-about-having-to-do-as-Quantum-asks’ attitude.
Frances Euphoria: Just looking at those cats makes me want to sneeze!
“Embiggen them after I give you the signal.”
I mosey on over to Bubba and The King and give them plenty of time to posture and snarl and snap their teeth at me. I wish there were a way for me to take Bubba’s blade-filled hat, but c’est la vie.
There’s plenty of room behind the double-eagle belt buckle of Mr. boot scootin’ karate guy’s jumpsuit for a big handful of Kra-Zee Puss-ee, and once I’m finished with him, I stuff as much as I can in the mummy’s various wrappings and bandages. Tuck and Buddy are extremely interested, and watch me most intently.
“Alrighty then,” I tell Sophia as I walk back over to our side. “Commence with the cat embiggening!”
A muttered phrase or two in Thulean – of course – some elaborate hand-jive finger waving, and Holy Heartbreak Hotel! Two VolksAudi sized felis-not-so-familiaris launch themselves at jump suited zombie dude and his de-crypted compadre.
If DisNike’s direct-to-the-bargain-bin-at-WalMacy’s remake of Honey, I Blew Up the Kid had featured giant furry chainsaws and wood chippers with teeth and claws shredding the undead, it might have generated just a teensy bit more revenue – but who am I to say?
The trumpet lets us know we’ve won the battle, even as Elvis leaves the building. We didn’t score any loot from those two either, which is bullshit.
“What did you think, Doc?”
He shakes his head as I help him up. “I certainly must admit that it wasn’t without its entertainment value, but I still could have taken them both.”
“Doc … ”
How to delicately put this?
“I … um … never … uh … ”
“ … never expected me to be a big ol’ fraidy-cat?”
“ … um, yeah, but I wouldn’t put it quite that way.”
“Son,” he puts an arm around my shoulder. “Ain’t no other way to put it. Everybody gets scared; don’t believe ‘em if they tell you otherwise. It’s what you do with your fear that makes the difference.” He sighs, hesitates, continues. “Kinemortophobia – fear of zombies and the undead, can you believe it? With all the real-world scary shit goin’ on, I gotta be afraid of that. And I don’t even know why. But hey, what can you do?”
“So what about your dives to ZOMPOC World?”
“We’ll talk about that later.”
Chapter Fifteen
“Time to cammie up,” Doc snaps his finger as we approach the town and he’s clad in a gray-black-white digital urban camo vest and matching shorts. He taps his dome and his face is suddenly zebra striped in black-white-gray grease
paint.
“Pfft. That’s your idea of concealment?” Sophia asks. She shakes her hair out and her body fades into translucence. “This – this is concealment,” says the pompous, earnest lacuna that stands before us. “And if you want to see how really amazing this effect actually is, equip your Reaper mask.”
I do as instructed and find absolutely nothing before me aside from a smug, self-satisfied invisible vacuole and the stone pathway that leads past to the entrance to Chrono’s village.
“Not bad at all.” I hand the skull to Doc and he takes a peek. A faun with a skull mask, just another day in the life.
“That’s impressive; way better than mine.” he concedes. “Can you do all of us like that?”
Shimmy shimmy ya, shimmy yam, shimmy yay. My life bar flashes white, or effervesces, or something like that to indicate that the Knights are now incognito. The four of us are still semi-visible to each other, but not so visible to the commoners and NPCs around us.
A scruffy anklebiter playing nearby, garbed in the obligatory peasant’s rags and tatters kicks a leather ball in my direction. I kick it back to him, much to his dismay.
“A ghost! A ghost!” he screams to his friends, who are having a desultory game of dodge-rock and disturbing the flocks of ducks who live by the lake that’s Kayi’s only tourist attraction.
The kids scream, shriek, and fleetly beat feet – all reet? Good riddance.
Frances Euphoria: That was cruel!
Me: Sometimes an NPC needs a nightmare or two to remember they’re living in a dream.
Frances Euphoria: That was almost poetic.
Sophia: More like pathetic. How’s Rocket?
Frances Euphoria: He’s killing giant worms, a lot of them, too.
Me: And the others?
Frances Euphoria: If you mean Dolly and Burly, I don’t know. I haven’t been watching what’s happening with Rocket, just getting occasional updates and obligatory screenshots. Come to think of it, Dolly was naked in one of the shots. Every time she has a brain freeze she wants to take her clothes off.
Aiden steps out a slit in the air. He points in the direction of Chrono’s place, flashes two fingers at me.
“She got Reaperzilla with her?”
He shakes his head.
Doc moves up close. “You can talk as long as you keep it low; I don’t think we’re in earshot of Chrono’s place yet.”
“She’s alone.”
“Then why two fingers?” I ask.
“Chrono is there too.”
Doc mumbles something about enrolling the Knights in a remedial combat counting course as he moves past us.
“It’d be best to attack her with advantage on our side.” Sophia says after she has caught up with Doc. “Unfortunately, I don’t have any charms or enchanted items that will give us any particular advantage. Veenure might have some of her own, which means that you must … um … ” She stops. “Where are you?”
“Here,” Aiden appears at her side and she startles big time. I’ve got to admit, it is pretty darn amusing when it’s not me he’s doing that ‘appear out of nowhere’ thing to.
“Aiden, you’re worse than Nightcrawler on Pervitin with a Jolt Cola chaser.”
He winks at me and regards Sophia with a distinctly unfriendly gaze as she gives him her orders.
“Aiden, you have to block any algo attacks she produces. Got it? We don’t want to get stuck in the OMIB; we don’t want for our NV Visors to fry.”
“I get it. I wasn’t spawned yesterday you know, and you don’t need to talk to me like I’m your bitch.” Aiden is gone before she can formulate an indignant reply.
Frances Euphoria: He does have a point, Sophia. Your interpersonal skills could use a bit of work. I trust him, so don’t worry.
Me: We trust him; otherwise he wouldn’t be here. And what she said about the interpersonal skills.
~*~
Mum’s the word for the next few minutes as we weave our way through the town. Personal invisibility is actually tougher than you’d think. If the other person can’t see you, they make no effort to avoid you; all of the responsibility for all of the getting out of the way falls squarely on you. It took a couple of near misses with oncoming NPCs to figure that out, but fortunately there’s not a lot of foot traffic.
It’d be nice to actually enjoy a VE dreamworld for once, to actually get something out of it. I’m not saying I’d cast a line into Lake Kayi, or whatever it’s known as, or that I’d spend more time drinking Horse Piss and gambling with Pit, Pat, Pot, and Holler at Gallows End Tavern, but I’d do something other than constantly risking my life to thwart the foul machinations of super villains and evildoers.
HA! I kid, I kid. There’s no place I’d rather be and nothing I’d rather do than be moments away from putting the kibosh on Veenure.
“Stay frosty,” Doc says as he moves to the side of the lane that twists down to Chrono’s place. I can tell he’d like to stop and admire the goats, but he moves past them anyway, gun in hand just because. Sure, he won’t be able to use it without the life bar penalty, and he probably won’t actually fire his Pokerizer for this very same reason, but if holding it gives him calm, I got no qualms.
Aiden flashes onto Chrono’s thatched roof. He’s in and out in seconds, his form moving vertically.
Me: He’s going to ruin our cover.
Sophia: Not with my spell of occlusion he won’t, as long as he doesn’t disturb anything or make any noise.
Me: I say we bust down the door and be done with it.
Sophia: For once, I have to agree with you.
~*~
I equip my BlackAgua Monoshock Ram Dynamic Entry Tool, item 512, and approach the door as ‘Bad boyz, bad boyz, whutcoo gonna do, whutcoo gonna do when they come for you’ loops endlessly in my head – damn earworms. The other three stack up behind me and I finger count a silent ‘three, two, one’, then I swing with everything I have.
Holy Hardest Metal in the World, Batman!
My rammer strikes the door with a loud, hollow BOOM, bounces back and takes me flying. I hit the ground with a whuff, rammer lands on top of me and my life bar takes a small beating. I should have expected Chrono to have some Adamantium ligna door, or whatever crazy custom mythic metal it’s made from.
So much for stealth and surprise.
There’s no time to shake off the stars and planets and tweety birds swirling around my head; Sophia does her best ‘I am not a crook’ impression and the door flies off its hinges. She tents her fingers together in front of her and surveys her handiwork.
Cue the battle trumpet.
The courtyard expands – I’d say something about real world physics here, but again, time is of the essence – the goats disappear as does the fence and the shanty cribs on either side of the lane. The clouds turn dark as Veenure floats before us, her green eyes shooting flares and her purple pigtails floating above her head.
“Betrayer! You double-crossed me,” she spits at Chrono, who isn’t part of the battle but is only a spectator at its side.
I snort. “Talk about a pot calling a pot a pot! You betrayed us, you murdered Zedic, and we will prosecute you in the RW!”
“You’re even stupider than the last time we met,” she says as a custom Reaper mask forms on her face. It is similar to the others, with Thulean script on the cheeks and the green lenses.
My golden goosinator forms on my arm and symbioses up to my shoulder.
She lifts one finger in the air and a swirling black cloud appears between us. Red and white sanpaku eyes form as a chiseled face takes shape in the dark cloud and its handle appears: Festering Fester.
“You gonna cast Cousin It next?” I ask her.
“What the hell? You’re summoning new creatures now?” Sophia throws her hands at her side. “You’re … you’re worse than the crap I took last night!”
The three of us turn to her.
“What? I’m trying to talk shit like you guys always do!”
Doc:
Okay, good effort. We’ll work on it later, but for now, focus on not getting fried or OMIBed by She’s a Dick Arnold over there.
Sophia floats even higher than Veenure. “Your hairstyle is wrong for your face and your tattoos are grammatically incorrect! Oh, and bring it, bitch!”
Me: Better!
Frances Euphoria: Get her, girl!
A dim light forms in the center of Festering Fester’s dark, translucent body. It expands up the cloud’s gullet and stops behind its lips. The cloud demon treats Sophia to a fang-toothed grin, and a blue-white bolt of lightning zaps into Aiden, who materializes in front of her, as directed. It zaps his life bar right down to 40%, stands his hair on end, and discharges static from his eyes and ears and fingertips.
“Holy CRAP!” I shout.
Aiden is bent over, hands on knees, but at least he’s still on his feet when Veenure floats over for her attack. She stops a good three yards away from Sophia and the Thulean tattoos on her mask sparkle and shine. As she charges up, her pigtails lift into the air, antler-like. A pair of neon serpents twist up her legs and her upper body runs and flows.
~*~
“What the hell is she?” I ask.
Doc is wide-eyed – we all are – as Veenure’s upper body morphs and shapes itself into a mammoth gun barrel.
Doc: She’s a mutant hack! How … Frances ask Rocket if he’s ever seen anything like this. Sophia?
Me: Wait, even you’ve never seen this?
Frances Euphoria: Maybe it’s like Quantum’s Dick Hertz mutant hack, only she’s also a PC. Talking to Rocket now.
Sophia: No, never – not possible.
A pair of cable-like veins pulsate as they extend up the barrel of the weapon and curve into Veenure’s back to form two large Quasimodo humps. Green circles on the side of her barrel-body light up as they indicate its charging point. The discharge whites out my vision pane as once again the Morning Assassin intercepts.
He flashes red-yellow-white, and for a moment an Aiden-shaped manikin of ash stands there motionless before the merest breath of air scatters him.
The Mechanical Heart: (Book Five) (Sci-Fi LitRPG Series) (The Feedback Loop 5) Page 14