“No, that is unlikely,” I said. “I suspect the Fighting Breed guild from Galactogon. We have been competing in-game recently and I have received threats from them. These guys are either ex- or active military. It would not be difficult for them to carry this out. You should investigate their leader as well as their accounts.”
“Did they know your name? Your address?”
“No! They could not have known either my name or my address, but they found it out very quickly. Look for any connection between the Breed members and Galactogon’s customer relations department or even developers.”
“Perhaps. But then they should have known that you were not at home. Your connection’s IP address to the game has been the same all month.”
“In that case,” I suggested, “they wanted to get me back for seizing their property in-game. Something like an eye for an eye. I would guess that the casualties were an unforeseen accident.”
“Thank you for the information. We will follow up on it.”
I didn’t want to go so far as to accuse someone of murder, even after my recent episode with Constantine. Eunice, however, was more direct both with her words and her conclusions. Upon learning what had happened, she joined the conference call and began demanding the detective get a search warrant immediately. Even though she had no evidence, she wanted to appeal to the World Progamers’ Association for its support against the Galactogon corporation. After a tense conversation, Detective Sherper asked for 24 hours to deal with the situation before my overzealous wife began acting on her suspicions. Both of us were still trembling from the shock. What if we had been at home? I don’t even want to imagine that. Dantoon — or whoever was behind this — had crossed all possible boundaries. Personally, I was pretty certain that this had been Fighting Breed’s doing — revenge for the lost ships and reputation. The only question was whether they were merely trying to scare us or actually kill us.
“Here,” said Tryd and stopped suddenly. He jumped to the ground. Instead of 1,500 kilometers, we had covered like fifty, if that. The mountains ended, parting onto a green idyll: a thin band of grassland spoiled only by several downed fighters and some ugly Zatrathi buildings with tall spires. Beyond it, the sea glittered away into the horizon.
While Eunice and I got off our hoverboards, the pirate circled a boulder and, straining, rolled it aside.
“Watch out!” he yelled as a blast of dust washed over us to the rumble of falling debris. We jumped away from the entrance and waited until the rockslide subsided and the dust settled. The stone revealed a passageway stretching deep down into the hillside. Tryd disappeared into it so quickly that only the echo of his footfalls suggested that someone was inside.
“What are you waiting for? My death?” the Delvian grumbled in my headset. “Don’t hold your breath! Now come on and climb on down.”
We obediently crawled in after him. The passage was so narrow and low that I had to take off my armor suit and crouch to make it through. The light vanished after a dozen meters and we had to continue by feel alone. As I reached out for the next step, I encountered something metallic. At the same moment, a medgun touched the back of my head, a quiet buzzing sound sounded in my ear, and my body ceased to obey me. An equine dose of tranquilizer saddled me with the ‘Torpor’ debuff for two minutes. I still had my senses, which allowed me to feel how someone stepped on my back, twisted my arms back and put handcuffs on. As I wheezed with indignation, my legs were also bound. After that, my assailant joined the two pairs of handcuffs, forcing me to arch backward. And all this took place in total darkness and silence. The debuff meant that I couldn’t warn Eunice. She had been crawling behind me and by the sound of it, she had suffered the same fate.
A switch clicked and we beheld our attacker.
“That’s better, small fry,” Tryd chuckled and dragged us into a small room with normal ceilings and a door. “You’ll feel better soon and then we’ll have our chat…”
Tryd calmly walked over to the door, raised his paw to the scanner and it blinked green. A click — and perennial dust rained from the open door.
“Look at that. It still works,” Tryd said with surprise and tried to stifle his sneeze. For the NPCs, dust was not simply a particle effect like it was for players. “Don’t glare at me like that, small fry. There’s a bonnie bounty on your head. A hundred million for bringing you in alive and in one piece. And fifty for your location. As a fellow pirate, I hope you’ll understand.”
I was about to curse, but stopped short. Something doesn’t add up. Of course Tryd was capable of betraying me. He doesn’t owe me anything, and yet a betrayal like this would have made much more sense on the moon, long before our descent to this planet. Doing it here, waiting this long, seemed like a contradiction. And why would someone as wealthy as Tryd was — and so utterly unconcerned with this same wealth — go to such lengths over a mere hundred million?
“Drop the act, Tryd! I don’t believe for a second that you’ve lured us across the entire galaxy to this foxhole just to betray us!”
The old fox came up to me and spat at the dust before me.
“What do I care what you believe? A spare coin never hurts.”
“You overgrown rat,” Eunice, who didn’t know the pirate as well as I did, reacted more violently — and it seems like Tryd had been waiting for just this. He broke into a croaking laughter, reveling in our helplessness. It was like our feelings of betrayal were nourishing the prate, making him stronger. Finally, he took out a comm unit and made a call:
“I heard that you’re interested in two pirates named Surgeon and Nurse. My name is Tryd. I have them here with me. Yes, I’ll turn on the video,” the Delvian panned his PDA, recording us on the floor. As he did so, I kicked out at him, barely missing. “Yar, take a look at this rabid one. If you still want him, then I am ready to send you his coordinates and leave him all wrapped up for you until you get here. A mere two hundred million. One half up front and a hundred more on pick-up…I don’t care what you promised! I caught them and I’ll name the price! Want them? Then get your checkbook out. I’ll send you the account number now and our coordinates once you’ve paid.”
Satisfied with the results of the negotiations, the pirate grabbed us by the chains and dragged us to the open door. Tryd waited until the green beam of the scanner passed over us and, heaving, dumped us into a trolley. The weak illumination allowed me to see the railway tracks receding into the darkness, several automatic beam cannons and flame throwers, as well as an old self-propelled trundle rusted from time but still called ‘trolley’ by will of the devs.
Climbing on top of us and utterly unconcerned with our discomfort, the Delvian said with satisfaction:
“Travel with me some more until your buyer appears. It’ll be safer that way.”
My doubts wouldn’t leave me alone. Who knows — what if I had been mistaken about the state of Tryd’s finances and he really did need Fighting Breed’s millions? Although, on the other hand, how would Fighting Breed even make it to this planet through the epic space battle going on above?
Meanwhile, the pirate touched the control console and a forcefield appeared above the trolley, protecting us from the headwind. Bursting into motion, the shaking carriage rushed into the darkness.
We passed five automatic checkpoints. Each time, the trolley would stop abruptly, the green scanner-beams would traverse it from top to bottom and the laser turrets, ready to burn us to ashes, would turn away. With each checkpoint, the scanning took longer and longer, and Tryd seemed to grow more dour. He kept glancing at his wrist. As I understood, the result of the scan and the permission to pass were displayed there. We never made it to the sixth checkpoint. It was already beginning to grow light in the distance when the pirate pulled the brake lever and the trolley ground to a halt with a shower of sparks.
“From here on, we’re going on foot.” With these words, Tryd bent down and quickly released our cuffs.
As soon as I was free, I surged forward, th
rowing my best right hook at the pirate. Yet with an elusive feint, the Delvian ducked aside, spun and came back with a flying roundhouse. The stone wall greeted me with undisguised delight and was disappointed by our brief acquaintance. My trusty body armor blocked all the damage. I rolled to the side, dodging the pirate’s arm reaching for my side. I think there was something in it, but then Eunice joined me. She came flying out of the trolley like a torpedo. My wife did not leave things to chance, having first put on her armor suit, and now slammed into Tryd with her full, armored mass, looking to overrun and crush the traitor. Yet again the fox proved to be faster. Not only did he find the time to dodge but he went into a combat roll and clapped something metallic to the girl’s suit. There was a loud bang and the suit went dead. An EM grenade! That sly little bastard! My desire to get my own armor out of my inventory instantly evaporated. I jumped back into the darkness and pressed myself against the wall, trying to keep an eye on the fox. A blaster appeared in my hands and I moved it from side to side, getting ready to shoot at anything that moved.
“Looking for me, are you, small fry?” the pirate hissed right into my ear. I jumped back, tripped over the rails and began to fall. Instead of breaking my fall, my hands decided to fire the blasters. The tunnel shimmered as the blue plasma bolts from my blasters flew along its length. It was a pity that there was no one in that direction.
“Where is he?” Eunice clambered out of her armor suit and helped me up. We fired in the different directions at the same time, illuminating the tunnel yet again, but there was no sign of Tryd. As soon as the darkness returned, the pirate’s voice sounded right next to us again!
“Have you had your fill, mollusks? Shall we go on or do you want to blow off more steam?”
“Why don’t you just go to hell?!” My wife’s emotions went off the charts. Breathing hard, she tried to regain some semblance of calm, but even I could feel her anger radiating from her body.
“Maybe I will, darlin’, as long as you come with me for company. Drop your pea-shooters. You’ll hurt yourself and I need you alive. On the double, I said!”
A sharp pain struck my leg. Tryd zipped past, slitting my leg with a knife. “You bitch!” roared Eunice and lit up the tunnel with another burst of blaster fire. Tryd had gotten her too.
“I’ll give you a minute. After that, I will smear you across these walls and open the base on my own.”
“What about your client?” I asked, peering for the pirate in the dark.
“I’ll tell him that he should’ve been here sooner,” said Tryd.
“So I was right?” I put my blaster away and signaled to Eunice to do the same.
“Right, wrong…Get into your armor suits. They will come in useful up ahead. We’ll figure out all the moral stuff later.” Tryd appeared right in front of my face. I could even feel his hot breath but the darkness kept me from making out his eyes. “I’ve deactivated the suit lock.”
This was addressed to Eunice, since her armor again flashed its initialization lights. I did not argue. Tryd had dealt with us quite easily when we didn’t have protection. Let’s see what he can do against two well-equipped players covering each other’s backs. He won’t be able to hide from my spatial scanner, that’s for sure.
And yet, as soon as I climbed into my armor, I heard another resounding clang.
“I’ve attached a suit lock to your armor, small fry. If you screw around, I’ll cut off your electronics. Is everything clear to everyone or should I explain it again?”
I could finally see the pirate. Mmm…yeah. We had been searching for him down below, while he, like a spider, had been crawling up on the ceiling, clinging to the various wires and pipes up there. It was at this point that I recalled that Tryd had served as a marine for the Corsican for twenty years and later fought the Delvian underworld on his own. The pirate’s combat experience was insurmountable. We were little more than kindergarteners for him. After making sure that we were going to behave, Tryd pointed down the tunnel.
“The main base is twenty kilometers ahead. But we won’t make it. The Anorxians have begun to attack the security systems. There were problems at the second checkpoint already. That means the first one has been compromised. We need to go around.”
“Three pirates armed to the teeth can’t cope with a pair of cannons?” I asked with surprise — to which Tryd merely grinned:
“This base was built to last centuries. What you see here is just the tip of the iceberg. Even a heavy mech won’t make it down there. The only ones who survive have permission to enter.”
He paused and then added unexpectedly:
“Or their prisoners. The security system annihilates everything else. All right. Move out! There is a second passage over here.”
Tryd left us alone and calmly headed to the next checkpoint.
“Brainiac, what is going on up there — in orbit?”
“The Anorxians have only one Arbiter left. The Zatrathi have lost three cruisers and half of the flying fortress. The remaining forces are in a tug of war. I think the Zatrathi will win. The Arbiters have failed twice already. Some players tried to sneak by in scouts, but the Anorxians and the Zatrathi wiped them out.”
“You old pirate snout. You could have warned us!” grumbled Eunice angrily. “Half that money is ours!”
“A third!” came Tryd’s reply. “I had no chance to warn you. You wouldn’t have played along and they wouldn’t have taken the bait, honey. I half expected Surgeon to figure it out. If he had, sure, I’d have given you half.”
My wallet beeped, notifying me that I had received the promised credits. Tryd had shared his loot with us. It was a good move — he had duped Fighting Breed into paying money to get to us. Of course, it remained unclear why they would set themselves up like this after blowing up my house. Moreover, not only had they lost their credits, but their ships had also gone to respawn. Now our kidnapping made sense. Tryd let us go as soon as he learned that the scouts had been destroyed.
We went on and about a kilometer later overtook the pirate, standing still next to a wall. With my suit’s sensors, I could see much more of the checkpoint. The beam cannons directed in our direction were props. They could not shoot. But the minefields, the cannons secreted in the walls and the plates that could generate EM fields were quite real and effective. And all this was noticeable from afar. What awaited us once we got close, was a bigger question.
“This way.” Tryd had also put on his armor suit and began to smash the walls with his armor-clad fists. “Help me!”
Eunice and I began to help clear the rubble, helping the pirate burrow deeper into the wall The stone crumbled and the falling dust made it difficult for the scanners to work, yet the Delvian went on digging until at long last the rubble caved in instead of falling out. Using his legs to help himself, Tryd widened the passage further.
“Ancient burrows. They existed even before the base was built. Follow me!”
From the passage came a heavy, drawn-out moan, turning into the ghost of a whisper. I couldn’t be sure that it was a voice instead of an echo, but I still got goose bumps all down my spine. Seeing Tryd ready his blaster did not reassure me.
“Onwards! Are you pirates or timid sheep? Have you soiled your trousers?”
With these words, the Delvian disappeared into the passage. Eunice and I exchanged glances and followed him. My spatial scanner rendered a 3D model of the area we were in, and my wife exclaimed in surprise. There was no doubt that the wide passageway, about four meters in diameter, had not been made by hand. Resembling the intestine of some petrified animal, the tunnel looped in on itself, branching into several off-shoots. A stone labyrinth filled with strange rustling and moans. I wanted to filter out this noise, but Tryd warned:
“Don’t turn off your microphones, you need to stay on your guard. The vermin can appear at any time.”
It didn’t sound like the NPC was joking. If a marine vet like Tryd was concerned over some rats, we should probably be concerned to
o. I asked for the sake of curiosity:
“Vermin? Like rats? Moles? What do they eat down here?”
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