Rebirth Online

by Michael James Ploof

  “Hey, I need the fucking doctor!” I screamed out the bars again.

  A human guard came striding down the hallway, and I breathed a sigh of relief. But the doctor wasn’t with him.

  “Save your breath, you’ve made bail,” said the NPC as he unlocked my cell door.

  “Bail?” I said as I walked out. I glanced down the hall and found Cecilia, arms crossed, hip cocked to the side, and wearing a mean-looking scowl. Her long bushy tail rose a foot and a half over her head and slowly moved side to side, like a cobra ready to strike.

  “Where’s the doctor?” I asked the guard.

  “Take it up with an admin,” he said lazily and guided me down the hall.

  Cecilia watched me expectantly as I walked toward her. She didn't look very happy to see me, but then again, I had just escaped from her magical tower.

  “I thought we had a deal,” she said with a cocked brow.

  “Let’s talk outside,” I said, and glanced over at the room full of guards going over scrolls at their desks. “You going to give me my shit back?”

  My gear appeared in my inventory, and I swapped out the jailhouse garb for my trollhunter robes.

  “You are expected to return in exactly one week to answer the charges against you,” said the guard who had let me out. “If you do not, we will—”

  “Yeah, yeah,” I said. “I know the drill.”

  I walked out of the jailhouse with Cecilia close behind and found the warlock and the big troll waiting for us. And to my surprise, they stood beside a huge red dragon.

  “Well?” said Cecilia. “What the hell is going on? Why did you leave the tower? Hell, how did you leave the tower.”

  “Sorry, Cece, but I’m on to your game,” I said, warily eyeing the dragon.

  The town was bustling with activity as low-level players went about their business. Some of them stopped to gawk at the dragon, and I began to feel very naked.

  “My game?” she said with amusement. “And what exactly is my game?”

  “You’re playing both sides. Tell me, how much were you going to get from Kincaid for selling us out?”

  Her tail straightened and the red hair running the length of her back stood on end.

  “So,” she said, looking to try and wrap her mind around what I had said. “You thought that I was going to sell you to Kincaid, so you break out, go to Aeorock, make a scene asking around about Tweak, and then fight Kincaid on neutral ground, get your girls kidnapped, and get arrested? That’s a hell of a plan.”

  “What was I supposed to think?” I asked.

  “Uh, that I was your friend. That I was trying to help,” she said, arms wide. “Now he’s got your guild mates, and I’m seriously reconsidering our agreement. Why the hell would you think that I would sell you out to the guy who blew up my pub?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “We tried to leave the tower and your butler attacked us. What were we supposed to think?”

  “Why the hell were you trying to leave in the first place?”

  “The girls were suspicious,” I said. “We wanted to see what would happen if we tried to leave, and when the tower came alive and chained us to the walls, that was proof enough for us.”

  “The tower is programmed to keep you safe, so is the butler, and obviously you were all safer staying put.”

  “Yeah, well, where do we go from here?”

  She scoffed and walked away from me shaking her head. Then she turned back around and pointed a finger at me.

  “Well, you can start by thanking me, you ungrateful asshole. How much do you think your bail was?” Before I could make a guess, she screamed the answer. “10,000 gold! I paid it gladly to get my friend, no, my lover out of jail, and what do you say in return? Not a thanks, not even a fucking reach around. Instead, you accuse me of plotting to sell you out.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “And thank you. I didn’t know it was that much, but I’ll pay you back.”

  “Second!” she interrupted. “You can start trusting me. This is going to be hard enough to pull off as it is. Shit, maybe I’m better off selling you to Kincaid like you said, but I’m not going to. Do you know why?”

  “Because you’re a good person?” I said sarcastically.

  “Yeah, asshole, because I’m a good person. You think I want someone like Kincaid ruining the game? He needs to be stopped, and I thought that maybe you were the one to do it. I guess I was wrong.”

  She turned from me with disgust and started marching toward the dragon. I glanced around, wondering what the hell I should do. The doctor hadn’t answered my call, which was unsettling, and I had no other allies in game besides Cecilia.

  “Cece, wait!” I called to her and ran to catch up.

  The warlock and troll blocked my path, and Cecilia stopped rather reluctantly and turned around.

  “I’m listening,” she said, and folded her arms.

  “Look, I’m sorry. I don’t know who to trust. But you’re my only shot at freeing my guild mates. Will you give me another chance?”

  “I don’t know, are you going to trust me this time?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you going to follow the plan?”

  “Yes.”

  She let out a slow sigh as her tail slowly swayed behind her. “Fine then, get on.”

  She turned toward the dragon and climbed a rope ladder hanging down from a big saddle, and I carefully followed and took the seat behind her.

  “Follow me to Tweak’s place,” she said to her goons, and they both nodded and produced their own winged mounts, though neither of the small dragons came close to the red’s colossal size.

  She slapped the reins, and the big red dragon suddenly stood to its full height. When it did so, I felt like I was sitting on the edge of a three-story building.

  “You’re going to want to strap in, and put these on,” she said, and handed me a pair of goggles.

  I put on the eyewear and hurriedly strapped myself in with the leather straps. Once I was ready, she slapped the reins again and the big red dragon took three quick steps and leapt into the air. My stomach turned as we began to quickly climb into the air, and I glanced down at the increasingly distant ground, instantly wishing I hadn’t.

  “You better not puke on my new mount,” Cecilia warned.

  Two seconds later the dragon banked right, and I gripped the saddle horn in front of me and squeezed my eyes shut tight. It took a little while for my stomach to settle, but the ride became bearable when the dragon leveled out and gently glided upon a warm airstream.

  “How are you holding up back there?” Cecilia asked over the wind.

  “I’m alright,” I said. “Thanks again for bailing me out. I tried to contact my doctor, but for some reason he never showed.”

  “What do you mean, your doctor?”

  I told her about my condition, and how Dr. Marks was supposed to be looking into Arthur for me.

  “Are you nuts?” she asked. “You think you can trust someone who works for corporate?”

  “He seemed pretty concerned with the allegations,” I explained.

  “Of course he is, but that doesn’t mean that he’s going to want you to take this public. Did you tell him anything about our plans?”

  “No, I didn’t tell him anything. There wasn’t time. He appeared in the tower to inform me of an emergency. He brought my mother, and she told me that my father had been the victim of a hit and run in the real world.”

  “You think it was Kincaid?” she asked.

  “That’s exactly what I think.”

  “Shit, Sam, I’m sorry to hear about your father, is he alright?”

  “Yeah, Mom said that he’s doing well.”

  “This is getting out of control,” she said worriedly. “If he’s targeting people in the real world, then none of us are safe.”

  “I’m sorry that I dragged you into this,” I told her.

  “You didn’t drag me into anything,” she said with a glance back and a kind
smile. “It’s not your fault that Kincaid’s a psycho. But don’t worry, we’ll get the bastard.”

  The world spread out beneath us, and for the first time I saw the true grandeur that was Rebirth Online. I could see for miles as we sailed upon those warm currents. There were winter lands, deserts, jungles, vast plains, and mountain ranges speckled from horizon to horizon. I had heard of a few of the lands, but there were dozens that I had yet to venture. The colors of this digital world were brighter than those in the real one, but aside from that small detail, this world looked as real as any.

  And now, thanks to Kincaid, it had real world dangers as well.

  We flew over the Beartooth Mountains, and to my surprise, a large green jungle spread out before us. Cecilia steered the red dragon down into a steep dive that felt like the world’s tallest roller-coaster. I screamed until my voice was hoarse, and mercifully, the dragon finally leveled out. The tips of its long red wings skimmed across a placid river, but the beast dove again when the smooth waters gave way to a two-hundred-foot waterfall. Once again, my stomach hit my throat and I held on for dear life. We fell into the foggy spray at the bottom of the waterfall, leveled out, and then shot across the river like a crimson arrow. The jungle waited to swallow us whole, but Cecilia pulled up at the last moment and steered for the tallest tree in the forest.

  At the very top of the tree, spread across the expanse of its entire canopy, there sat a large three-story house. Crooked chimneys stuck out of the lopsided building, which reminded me of something that the Weasley’s from Harry Potter might live in. Hammocks hung about the boughs below, and to my surprise and delight, I saw little purple monkeys lounging in them while they drank from fine china.

  The red dragon seemed much too large to land on the roof of the house, but Cecilia didn’t seem to share my apprehension. She brought the dragon around as we slowed and guided it to the rooftop. The dragon barely touched down, flapping its wings so that it was hovering above the treehouse.

  “This is our stop,” said Cecilia. She unstrapped herself and tossed the rope ladder over the side. I followed her down, grateful when I touched down on the large green leaves that covered the roof.

  “I will call you when I’m ready,” she instructed the dragon.

  The beast squawked before lifting off and disappearing to the south.

  “Yo yo yo, what’s up Cece?” came a voice behind us, and I turned to see a large purple ape poking his head up from a trapdoor in the roof.

  “Hey, Tweak,” said Cecilia. She gestured to me. “This is Samson, the guy I was telling you about.”

  “Oh, right! Awesome, come on down,” said Tweak.

  I followed Cecilia through the trapdoor and down a ladder that led into the wide-open main room of the treehouse. The place was awesome, and looked like something that an eccentric millionaire from the 1800’s might live in. The pad was aptly jungle themed and made mostly of bamboo. Stuffed panthers, tigers, snakes, giant rodents, spiders, and other weird creatures were set about all over the place. Maps, paintings, and banners littered the walls, and there were a few suits of armor and primitive looking weapons lying around as well. Wicker furniture offered many places to relax among the stacks of leather-bound books, and the little purple monkeys were chilling on most of the furnishings.

  “They’re harmless, unless you steal their fruit,” Tweak told me with a big apish smile.

  “I like your avatar,” I admitted.

  Tweak spread his arms wide and regarded himself with a small laugh. He looked a little ridiculous because he was wearing a full-on Indiana Jones outfit.

  “It’s custom. I call my kind HomoTweakus,” he said proudly.

  “Tweak here is a regular wizard,” said Cecilia.

  “I’m not going to argue with that,” he said affably, before spreading a long arm toward the kitchen. “You want something to drink? I’ve got coffee, espresso? I’ve got some awesome Hindi Islands roast too. Picked it up from a couple pirates in Evermoon City.”

  “I’d love some. Black please,” I said.

  “Same,” Cecelia told him.

  Tweak offered us both two big thumbs up and went to work happily. He made us both a steaming cup of Joe and waited while we tried it.

  “This is wicked,” I said.

  “Hit the spot,” said Cecilia.

  Tweak straightened proudly, then led us into a room beyond the kitchen. When I stepped into the room I let out a slow, “Daaammmnnn!”

  “Not a bad setup, eh?” said Tweak as he took a seat in one of the computer chairs set before the most impressive computer setup that I have ever seen.

  There were over a dozen screens, and stacks upon stacks of computers.

  “How do you have computers in game?” I asked.

  “Well, they’re basically just mirrors of my setup at home in the static world,” Tweak explained. “I hacked into the game and added the reflections here. Totally unnoticeable to the novice programmers.”

  “Really cool, dude.”

  “Thanks.”

  “With his wizardly powers, Tweak should be able to hack into the system easily and broadcast your GoPwn feed to every looking glass in the game,” Cecilia told me.

  “Shouldn’t be a problem,” Tweak admitted with a monkey grin as he squeezed a headset over his furry dome. “But the price is going to be steep.”

  “How steep?” I asked.

  “Because you’re a friend of Cece’s, I’ll do it for a cool 100k,” said Tweak.

  “100k gold, or 100k USD?” I asked.

  “Gold, man. Pretty soon the Rebirth Economy is going to go crazy. I expect gold to be worth ten times as much as the US dollar within a year.”

  “Well, it just so happens that Kincaid has the 100k I started the game with, but I won’t have it until he’s dealt with.”

  “Hmmm,” said Tweak. “That could be a problem.”

  “I can vouch for him,” said Cecilia.

  “Good enough for me,” said Tweak, and he turned to one of his keyboards and began typing furiously. “It’ll take me about an hour before I can get through. But after that, I’m ready when you are.”

  “Great,” said Cecilia. She turned to me and took a good long look at my body. Her tail danced alluringly behind her, and she bit her bottom lip. “Wanna level up while we wait?”

  Chapter 18

  When Cecilia and I finally emerged from one of the many bedrooms in the treehouse, I was level 17 and she had reached level 14. She went to the bathroom to freshen up, and I tapped on my interface to check out my new stats.

  As I scanned my interface I let out a slow whistle.

  “Was that a cat call?” Cecilia asked with a sly grin as she returned from the bathroom.

  “No, I was just reading my new spell stats,” I said. “But you do look great, Foxy Lady.”

  “You’re not so bad yourself,” she said as she sauntered over to me and gave me a soft kiss on the cheek.

  “You two going another round?” Tweak asked as he peeked his head out his door. “Because I’m all set.”

  Cecilia shrugged and cocked a look my way.

  “There’s time for work and time for play, babe,” I told her.

  “Fine,” she said with a playful pout.

  We joined Tweak at his workstation, and I couldn’t help but notice that I could see him on one of the screens. I waved my hand over the ruby GoPwn pendant on my necklace, and as expected, my hand appeared on the screen.

  “I see you’ve got my live feed working,” I noted.

  “Oh!” he said, nearly falling back out of his chair with his white box of ramen. He sucked in a long noodle and pointed at the screen. “Uh, yeah, just came online like two minutes ago.”

  “Uh huh,” Cecilia said with a cocked brow.

  Tweak brought up an image of a big castle set on a cliffside overlooking an ocean. The castle was shiny, black, and menacing. Tall spires that jutted out from the main body of the spear-like castle like jagged teeth. Upon each of the spires t
here sat a dragon. Some as black as the castle, others with hides of deep red.

  “This is Ebone Castle,” Tweak told us with an apeish laugh. “Get it, ebony, ebone? What a toolbox this guy is.”

  “Looks like a hell of a stronghold,” I noted.

  “It’s located in Forrencia,” Tweak said and zoomed out on the aerial view. “About two-hundred miles from here.”

  “Where is here?” I asked with a shrug.

  “We be in the Zion Jungle mahn,” he said with a long slow laugh. “But I can conjure you a portal there easily enough. The only question is...are you ready?”

  “No,” I said with a nervous laugh. “But that never stopped me before.”

  “Here,” said Cecilia as she handed me the vials we had filled at her place. “You should take these now, so they kick in by the time you’re captured.”

  “Thanks.” I popped the tops and guzzled the potions, which tasted like fruity kid drinks.

  Tweak rose from his computer chair and led us into the larger main room. He cleared his throat, waved his hands, waggled his fingers, and said, “Zammo!”

  A portal suddenly grew out of a point of light, and on the other side I could see Ebone Castle in the distance. I took a deep, steadying breath and let it out slowly.

  “Come here, you,” said Cecilia, and pulled me down to give me a long, passionate kiss. “You be careful, you hear me?”

  “I will.”

  “Once you get the confession I’ll portal your ass out of there,” said Tweak. “Anywhere specific you’d like me to put you?”

  “Uh, Aeorock will be fine. I want to watch that asshole’s expression when you stream the playback on the big looking glass in the middle of the market.”

  “You got it,” said Tweak.

  “Almost forgot.” Cecilia waved a hand over my necklace, said “Argenhold”, and it suddenly became invisible. “There, you’re all set.”

  “Thanks, both of you. I couldn’t have done this without you.”

  “Don’t thank me,” said Tweak. “Just pay me on time.”

  “You’re welcome, Sam,” Cecilia replied.