by Rick Scott
“Hey, Aiko?”
“Yeah?”
“Is playing Thief how you were able to afford that Scroll of Shadow Copy?”
She pauses at the admittedly oddball question. “What?”
I shrug. “Just curious. I remember you saying you get major drop bonuses from Thief.”
She starts off again, with a small shrug of her own. “I suppose so, yes.”
“How long did it take you? To save up that much? Eight million was it?”
“Close to a year.”
“Wow.”
She laughs. “I don’t think I ever worked so hard for anything. There was this one dungeon I used to solo. I got it down to a science. 13 minutes 42 seconds per run. I used to do it for ten hours a day.”
“Yikes.”
She chuckles. “I was young and dumb back then so it barely fazed me. I just kept my eye on the prize. I knew the next Scroll of Shadow Copy that went up for auction was going to be mine.”
I nod appreciatively. “Looks like you made it happen. How does Thief play by the way? Hit and run mostly?”
“Pretty much. Traps like you saw, as well, depending on your set-up. I always went for the spike damage build myself. I used to take on bosses and kill them just like how I showed you with those dockworkers back in Swifttide.”
I think back to my first every lesson from Aiko and grin.
“Man that feels like ancient history now,” I say. “I suppose it must be even more so for you. That’s like more than ten years ago, right?”
She rolls her eyes. “You’re making me feel old, Reece.”
I chuckle. “What was the game like back then? Was it pretty much the sa—”
“Hold on,” she says, cutting me off. “Do you hear that?”
I stiffen as I strain my senses, but all I hear is the soft whisper of the wind. “Is it the Salamander?”
“No,” she says, still cocking her ear and shifting her eyes in discernment. Finally, she looks upward. “I need to get a better vantage.”
She aims for the nearest tree and scales it quickly, using something that looks a bit like Wall Run but not quite. I follow after her and once again we’re stuck up in a tree together. Aiko squints, peering back in the direction we just came. The ground slopes away from us, forming a gentle valley that’s miles across and remarkably, the visibility has cleared so much that I can easily see the snow-topped trees on the other side.
“What is it?” I ask.
She’s silent for a moment, still studying the landscape. Finally, she points. “There.”
I trace her line of sight and catch a glimpse of a tree top moving. No…not moving…falling.
What the…?
A moment later another one goes down. Then another.
“They’re cutting a path to us,” Aiko says.
“Who?” But I think I already know the answer, even though it doesn’t make any sense.
She stands on the tree limb for a better view. “Braxus.”
My heartbeat quickens.
“No way,” I say. “How could he be here so quickly? The storm just stopped and the Vale is like twenty miles away.”
I stand to peer as well and to my chagrin, through the opening made by the fallen trees I see a line of mammoths and giants. “Holy crap. Did he march through the storm?”
Aiko grimaces. “Followed behind it is more likely.”
“What?”
“It’s why I went scouting. I saw the direction the storm front was heading. It was headed east away from the Vale. While we were still in the storm it had already passed them.”
The realization hits me like a brick to my chest. “So while we thought we were safe, Braxus was already on the move.”
Aiko sighs. “It was a possibility I’d thought of, but at least we’ve gotten this far out to confirm it.”
“How much time do you think we have now?”
Aiko looks over her shoulder in the direction of the keep. “A few hours maybe. If Braxus made a push like this, we might also have to assume he knows about the keep. Otherwise they’d probably have stopped to make camp by now.”
Crap…“What’s a few hours?”
She shrugs. “Four, maybe five, by the looks of their pace.”
“That means we’ll be attacked tonight.” My stomach drops through the floor as my heart rate spikes. “What do we do?”
She looks at me and frowns. “Can you run?”
* * *
I’m gasping and wheezing by the time the keep comes into view. My side feels like it’s about to explode and I can taste blood in my mouth. Aiko runs next to me and I have my arm around her slim waist again, limping as she helps me along. It’s been just a couple of miles I think, but for me it feels like I just ran a marathon.
I try sending a PM to Val Helena.
Me: Val. We’re back. But we got trouble headed our way.
Val Helena: What? Where are you?
Me: Just outside the walls. We’ll be there soon. Aiko’s with me.
Val Helena: I’m coming!
As we near the opened gates I spot Val Helena running towards us in her shining Paladin armor. Before we even reach her she stops and casts a spell.
Val Helena casts Heal II
You recover +150 HP!
Val Helena casts Heal II
You recover +150 HP!
A flood of warmth rushes through me as the glowing white light surrounds my body. She keeps casting until I’m topped up to full and to my relief, my ribs finally stop aching. Just behind her I see my brother, who drops a bundle of logs and runs in our direction.
“What happened?” Val Helena says when we get close enough to talk. “What attacked you?”
“A big salamander,” I say.
The Half-Giant looks down at me incredulously. “A what?”
“Don’t mind that,” Aiko says. “It’s not important.”
“Not important?” Val Helena says, then she focuses on Aiko and her tone becomes accusatory. “What did you do out there, Aiko?”
“Relax, Val,” I say. “She was only scouting. If not for her, we wouldn’t even know Braxus was coming.”
Her big gray eyes go wide. “Braxus is coming? Already?”
“In a few hours we think,” Aiko says. “They’re a few miles away.”
“What?” Maxis says, storming up to us. “How?”
Aiko explains her theory with the storm direction and both Val Helena and Maxis mutter curses.
“We need to get to building this outer wall fast,” I say. “How’s Gilly doing with the stone?”
“It’s only been an hour, man,” Maxis says. “I doubt she has much.”
“We might have to resort to using wood,” Val Helena says. “We can gather that faster.”
“I’ll come and help,” I say.
“No,” Maxis says, stopping me. “You’d better go and help Gilly with that escape tunnel. If we only have a couple of hours before that army gets here, she’s going to need to kick into high gear and start drilling like hell.”
Chapter 36: Puzzle Piece
“I’ve got good news and bad news.”
Bruce huffed with chagrin at the miniaturized image of Carl hovering over his comm device. His day was already going to crap and he guessed it didn’t make sense bucking the trend.
Behind the closed doors of his office, Bruce had three holographic screens opened on his desk, each one a subtle and sustaining source of stress.
The first displayed a metric of the city’s nano reserves with multiple line graphs depicting the current usage. The total was now slipping below the 36% mark. On his center screen was a half-typed email to the maintenance superintendent, directing him to cannibalize one of the already decommissioned air handling units, just in case unit number 57, which was giving off a high-pitched squeal every now and then, decided to finally give up the ghost.
On the final screen was his worst source of stress of all. Several prominent vid-casters, what amounted to the Citadel’s version
of the free press, were live streaming footage from the HUB, where a mini-riot was breaking out at one of the medical centers.
No doubt someone had probably tried to order a medical treatment which their bank account could—but hard nano-reserves couldn’t—afford. He sighed when he saw the comm request blink from Dr. Evelyn Munroe.
He’d have to go down and sort it out eventually.
“Give me the good news first, Carl,” he said already dreading his trip to the HUB that would see him fending off verbal and physical abuse while fighting back with lies. “I need something to cheer me up.”
“Good news is,” Carl said. “I found a way to hear that voice Dennis was speaking to.”
Bruce chuckled.
“Yeah that sounds way too easy,” Bruce said. “What’s the bad news?”
Carl grinned. “I need something to make it all work.”
“And that is?”
“A sample,” Carl said. “Of Dennis’ hearing.”
Bruce’s mind stumbled for a moment. He furrowed his brow. “His what?”
Carl laughed, as if he expected that reaction from his odd request.
“I need a sample of how Dennis ‘hears’.”
What the heck?
“How are we supposed to get that?” Bruce asked, his mind conjuring up ridiculous images of placing a microphone to his ear or something.
“That part’s on you,” Carl said. “But it’s crucial. I created a filter that will simulate exactly what Dennis is hearing in that cubicle. I use cubicle figuratively, of course. The truth is…there is no cubicle, it’s just a—”
“I got it, I got it,” Bruce said. “So a sample will help you calibrate it or something, right?”
“Bingo,” Carl said.
“So how do I get this ‘sample’ then?”
“I need you to have a three-minute conversation with Dennis.”
That didn’t sound too hard. “Okay.”
“In the Shards,” Carl said. “In a construct that I will create. Basically I’m going to use the same trace program I made to monitor Dennis while you have your conversation. By comparing your input with what I get back through my trace program, there should be a slight frequency difference that I can use as a constant for my interpretation algorithm. That will give me the primer to fine-tune that recording and hear exactly what he heard.”
Bruce took it all in. And then let out a scoff.
“Are you kidding me?” Bruce said. “You know what kind of relationship I have with that guy now? I’m sure he’d rather chew my guts than spend time with me in the Shards. No scratch that, he probably would like to get me in the Shards, cause then he’d probably kill me for real.”
“Hey I didn’t say it would be easy,” Carl said. “Bad news, remember?”
“Tell me about it.” Bruce shook his head. “He knows I hate going in there too. How am I supposed to convince him to join me for a meeting, ‘in the shards’? That’s something we’ve never done before, much less in some custom place that you design. I mean…won’t he be able to tell something is up…instantly?”
Carl gave a sympathetic shrug. “Hey, I’m just the man with the criteria. You’ve got to figure out the plan.”
Bruce exhaled deeply.
How the heck was he supposed to do this? Lure the master of the Shards…into a trap…within the Shards???
His insides roiled with tension just thinking about it.
“It’s all on you, man,” Carl said and then added with a grin, “that’s why you get paid the big bucks.”
Bruce guffawed. “Tell me about it.”
“Let me know when you come up with something,” Carl said. “I can incorporate it into the construct design.”
“Okay,” Bruce said. “I’ll give it some thought.” He then blew out a long sigh. “Right now, I’ve got a riot to deal with.”
Chapter 37: The Crisis before the Storm
I run through the open keep doors and pause in the center of the courtyard for a quick update of the camp’s status. The resource stores scroll onto my HUD and I eagerly check the new numbers.
Resources:
Gold: 0 units
Food: 5 units
Wood: 876 units
Stone: 190 units
Iron: 70 units
Darn, that’s not a lot of stone at all—maybe only a couple hundred or so more since I checked it last. But that means Gilly is making some progress, at least. I check the requirements for the outer wall.
Outer perimeter wall (Stone): +150% security +100% morale
Labor: 1000
Stone: 1000
Crap! Not nearly enough. But maybe I can start building part of it. I check the build queue and see that it’s empty. Makes sense, I guess. Everyone is busy with gathering and we weren’t expecting Braxus to be only hours away. I might as well get things going before heading down to Gilly.
A nervous energy flows through me as I bring up the options for the keep’s build menu. It’s strange. I feel anxiety for sure, but a bit of excitement as well. Maybe it’s the gamer in me, but I have an immense sense that I can puzzle through all this. So long as I spend our resources properly we can win. Like the set-up for a strategy game, picking the right equipment and defenses is key. Of course the opposite is also true. The decisions I make now will determine if we even survive this thing or not.
And I can’t screw up.
It’s a huge responsibility and I almost feel the need to share it, but we can’t stop to have a team meeting to decide the details of what we need to do. Besides, I have a pretty decent idea of what’s required from our meeting earlier. I just need to put things into play.
First things first. If we’re going to defend the walls, even the inner ones, then we need something to stand on up there. I go through the menus and find what I’m looking for: sets of wooden stairs leading to an elevated walkway attached to the wall to form a rampart of sorts. It lets me adjust the height of it too. How much wall should be above the platform? Too little and the wall becomes worthless as cover. Too much and then we won’t be able to attack over it. I think something that’s slightly above chest height will do, and set it for four and a half feet below the top. It won’t be chest height for Val Helena of course, but I think it’s going to be Rembrandt mostly up there and shooting, so it should be fine, I guess. I trigger the design to produce a quote for the construction cost and it spits out a value at me to cover one face of the inner walls.
Wooden Rampart: Grants Aerial Attack Bonus +30% Range +20% Accuracy
Labor: 300
Wood: 200
Man, more materials than I thought to build that thing. But I suppose it is pretty high up there. I can’t afford to build a platform for all four walls. Chances are they’ll be trying to attack the wall with the door anyway, so I set the queue to start building against that one.
I check the nano reserves and pop a few shards from my own inventory to top that up as well.
“Hey, you’re back.”
I look away from my HUD to see Rembrandt dropping a pile of logs into the lumber pile.
“Glad you found Aiko, mate.”
I smile at him and note that it’s actually one of his clones and not the real him. “Yeah, you heard the word, right?”
He nods. “Bloody Braxus. Tricky one. We need to be ready.”
I pause and consider getting his input. Rembrandt is a thinker and he, unlike everyone else, has the ability to have a conversation while still working in several places at once.
“I’m building some platforms for us to attack from behind the wall,” I say and point up at it. “Anything else you think we should be building?”
Rembrandt gazes at where the nano is already building the wooden steps against the walls. “Good one. Don’t forget the Ballista. One at both corners of that wall and we should be able to cover most of the keep.”
“Should I make one at each corner?”
“Do we have the iron for it?”
I c
heck.
Ballista: Attack: 300 Range 500
Labor: 50
Wood: 200
Iron: 30
Resources:
Gold: 0 units
Food: 5 units
Wood: 876 units
Stone: 190 units
Iron: 70 units
“Looks like we can only build two.”
“We can survive with that until we mine some more.” He then grins. “And you know what that involves, mate.”
I groan. “Don’t remind me…Anything else?”
He pauses a moment and looks around the courtyard. “Can you build a trebuchet?”
“A what?”
“It’s like a catapult,” he says and then gestures to the courtyard. “They’re mostly made of wood and we can get plenty of that. If we can build one here in the center of the courtyard we can hurl stuff over the walls at them.”
“Great idea,” I say. “And we’ll be protected too.”
He nods. “Val could probably man it easily. Load it all by herself, even. So long as we have stuff to chuck.”
“To chuck?”
He laughs. “Throw, mate. I mean throw.”
“Ah… Maybe if we have some spare stone.”
“Or some of that worm meat. Or dung.”
I laugh at the thought of that. “That’ll get them running for the hills instantly.”
But it’s actually not a bad idea, if I could stomach getting the stuff up here.
“Okay, I’ll get on it. Thanks, Rem.”
Rembrandt’s clone trots off and gets back to work. I check my interfaces again and bring up the build menu. Scrolling through the list of options, I look for the catapult or trebuchet. I find both; one is considerably more expensive than the other.
Catapult: Attack: 500 Range: 750