Whatever the artist was creating was bound to be something incredible.
While we waited we discussed the game and plans for future sessions. We were both skeptical about finding any other players to group with for the undead dungeon and planned to try it with just us two and Amenhotep and see how it went.
Her added DPS and off-tanking could be all we needed to deal with the more powerful undead, and if that didn’t work we’d start looking for another body or two.
I told her about the temple quests and meeting the high priest, and she expressed some interest in that quest-line.
The available boons for elves were more like old school dungeons and dragons feats, granting actual character abilities or stat bonuses instead of questlines.
She'd taken ambidexterity for her character so she could dual wield swords like her favorite Forgotten Realms character.
The artist clearing her throat brought us back to the present. “Are you ready?” she said.
She turned the page around and I was stunned by her work. She had managed to blend me and my character into a single being on her page, and Kimiko as well.
The right side of the page was me, decked out in my armor and weapons with the ghostly form of the jackal headed god of death gazing down on me from above and to the right.
My character’s face was set in a warm smile looking left, to see the return smile of the artists rendition of Kjara/Kimiko.
Above her and to the left was a brilliant full moon shining down on her, its light reflecting off her twin swords.
“Beautiful,” Kimiko said, and I agreed wholeheartedly. “That is amazing, you managed to blend us and our characters, and you haven’t even seen our characters.”
The artist beamed. “The two of you have a light about you, I just put it on paper. Now… I wanted to make this for you two to keep, but I find myself unable to let it go. The call to paint this is just too much. So, take pictures of the sketch for yourselves, and leave me your contact information and once I have completed the painting I will send you a print.”
“Of course!” I said, pulling out one of the business cards that I had made for my stream. Kimiko pulled out a pen and small notepad and wrote her contact info as well.
“Thank you again, Ms. Baladhi. It has been an absolute pleasure to meet you. And to be drawn by you,” I said.
Kimiko added, “I am honored to be the subject of such talent. I look forward to seeing what magic you can work with a brush,” and bowed.
We walked around the hall, looking in on the other artists and display pieces, discussing each one and trying to determine where in the world they were so we could visit them one day as our digital selves.
We were admiring a painting of a volcanic landscape when my stomach let out a large growl.
I looked down in surprise and pulled out my phone and saw it was almost 1:00PM. The next panel I wanted to get to started at 1:30 so it was time to grab some food.
I turned to Kimiko, offered my arm and said “Care to join me for a bite to eat? I hear the food court here may possibly have some decent food.”
She nodded, took my arm and we headed towards the food court. We perused the various options but eventually settled on a place that made custom grilled cheeses.
I got a triple decker sandwich with five different types of cheese, with bacon of course. Kimiko opted for something less exotic, getting a standard cheddar with a side of tomato soup.
We ate in silence, trying to finish quickly so we could get a spot at the next panel.
Things were going pretty well until the expression on her face changed mid bite. Her look of enjoyment and contentment transformed into borderline panic as she stared off behind me.
I glanced over my shoulder and saw who she was staring at. Spiked hair, Minmei T-shirt, yup, it looked like her ex had found her.
Kimiko was frozen in place, so I dropped my sandwich and gently lifted her arm. “Let’s get out of here.” She shook off her paralysis and stood, and we started to walk away.
Her ex was persistent though, and after ten feet or so she was yanked backwards as he roughly grabbed her by the arm and turned her to face him.
He was screaming at her in Japanese, spittle flying from his mouth.
She yanked herself away and muttered something back in the same language, eyes downcast and obviously scared.
I stepped between the two and said, “Okay guy, the lady obviously doesn’t want to talk to you. How about you go enjoy the con and leave her alone.”
“Mind your business, loser,” he spat. “This is between me and my girlfriend.”
Kimiko seemed to regain a little fire and yelled back, “I'm not your girlfriend anymore, Kaji, and this bullshit is exactly why. Go away and leave me alone.”
This seemed to enrage him. “You are mine, woman, and you will learn your place once we are married,” Kaji said, a deranged look in his eyes.
“I will never marry you! You are insane!” she yelled back.
By this time a crowd was forming, and I could see the con security guards coming in our direction.
I turned to Kimiko. “Let’s go, security’s on the way. They'll will handle him.”
“Crazy?” Kaji spat. “You are the crazy one if you think you will be anyone else’s!”
He reached a hand behind his back and pulled out a handgun, pointing it at Kimiko.
The crowd erupted in screams and fled in all directions. The incoming security guards were pressed backwards by the rush and were struggling to get through.
I should have been afraid, but instead found myself strangely calm.
I stepped between Kimiko and her psycho ex and tried to diffuse the situation. “Woah there. Calm down a minute. I’m sure we can talk this out. No need for this,” I said, gesturing towards the gun.
Kaji stepped closer, looking past me to Kimiko, not even acknowledging my existence. “Last chance whore! Come to me on your knees like a proper wife and I will let you live!” he shouted.
Barely three feet separated us. Close in distance, but an eternity when firearms were concerned.
Security finally broke through the crowd and began shouting for Kaji to drop his weapon.
The security guards were unarmed, so I had no clue what they were going to do but this was New York City, so I was sure the armed police weren’t far behind.
Their calls distracted Kaji for a second, and as he looked away something came over me.
I leapt forward and tackled him, grabbing for the gun as I wrestled him to the ground.
My hands latched onto the gun as we fell and wrenched it downwards, but the fall shifted my grip and he managed to put it between us.
My world erupted in searing pain as he fired point blank into my stomach, two shots ripping into my guts.
My vision began to fade, and he pulled away, but I had managed to keep my grip on the weapon so when he regained his feet and ran towards Kimiko, he was unarmed.
I dropped the gun and pressed my hands against my stomach, blackness creeping in from the edges of my vision.
I lay on my back on the floor, my strength seeping out of me as I clung to my wounds.
Kimiko knelt over me, crying and pressing her jacket against my wounds in an attempt to stop the bleeding.
I looked up at her and smiled weakly, whispering, “This hurts a lot more in real life,” as I lost consciousness.
Chapter 31
I regained consciousness briefly several times over the next few hours.
The first was just a flash of Kimiko’s tear streaked face and the feel of her hand clenching mine as she whispered over and over again to stay with her.
The next was a brief glimpse of paramedics through a clear plastic mask that kept me breathing as I was loaded into a helicopter, and then a brief view of my mother and sister through the glass window of a hospital room, my mother’s tear-soaked face speaking to a familiar Japanese man and a doctor while signing something.
The final time I awoke was th
e most confusing of all. The pain of the gunshots were a ghost of a memory and I felt, whole. I opened my eyes, expecting to see a hospital room but instead was greeted with Kjara’s elven features looking down at me.
I blinked in confusion and began to speak but was promptly silenced by her lips pressing against my own in a fierce kiss.
She pulled back and began to cry. “I’m so glad you’re not dead you big idiot!”
I just looked at her stupidly, not knowing what the hell was going on. “Uhm… how am I here? What happened? Oh gods, please don’t tell me I’m dead and uploaded to the game world or something?!”
Kjara wiped away the tears as she started to laugh. “Of course not, don’t be silly. You’re still alive, just… not quite in any condition to be awake.”
“What happened? Last thing I remember I was bleeding to death on the floor of the convention hall. Then it all gets hazy with flashes of paramedics, a helicopter, you, and my mother signing something. SHIT! My mother is going to kill me. Is she doing okay? My sister? Do they know where I am?”
“I can explain all of that if you will relax,” a voice spoke from the side of the room and I almost knocked Kjara off the bed as I bolted upright.
Standing on the side of my bed was the Toshiro Kabishiyama dressed in a modern real-world suit.
“Woah, how did you… what’s going on? Was that you with my mother in the hospital?” I said as I finally recognized him.
“My apologies,” he said. “Let me first formally introduce myself. I am Toshiro Kabishiyama, CEO and President of Kabishiyama Holdings,” and bowed.
I froze up for a second but then quickly shook it off and returned the bow as best I could.
He continued, “Your body was badly damaged by the gunshots. The doctors said that they had to resuscitate you twice before they were able to stop the bleeding and stabilize you. In order to repair the damage, extensive surgery was needed, and luckily for you, my company’s latest medical pod technology is the perfect tool to perform it. Your mother, as next of kin gave her consent to the process.”
“Woah, hold on a minute,” Isaid. “What are you saying? I'm in a medical pod or something? Complex surgery? And I almost died? Twice?”
“Three times actually,” the CEO said. “The paramedics had to resuscitate you at the scene as well. But all that is behind you now. Your body is in the best of hands. And if you wish, you may communicate with your parents and sister through video chatting software we have added into your game client.”
“Okay... I'll need to do that as soon as possible. How long is the surgery going to take? When will I be able to get out?”
I looked to Kjara and she looked away, so I turned back to the boss man and asked, “How long?”
“The damage was extensive, and the ‘surgery’ is more akin to a rebuilding of your internal organs than a simple mending. Our medical experts tell me that the procedure should be complete in approximately six months.”
“Are you shitting me?!” I gasped. “Six months! Won’t my brain melt or something?”
“That is not a danger with the medical pods. The recreational versions are not as complete and thus have a limitation on usage. There is no such limit with our medical technology,” he said.
The cost of this process must be astronomical. I was likely going to be in debt for the rest of my life for this.
I hung my head and said, “Thank you Kabishiyama-san. I appreciate everything you have done on my behalf and will do my best to begin paying you back for the procedure once I am fit and able to work again.”
The CEO looked a little confused and looked to Kjara and said, “Kimiko, did you not tell him?”
She looked a bit uncomfortable as she responded, “I didn’t have a chance to yet.”
I looked between the two of them in confusion. “Told me what?”
The CEO said, “There will be nothing for you to pay back James-san. You have already given me more than any man could ever ask for.”
I looked back to Kjara as she took my hands in hers. “James, my full name is Kimiko Kabishiyama," she said. "That’s my father.”
My eyes widened in shock and I looked back and forth between the two of them, speechless. “Oh,” was all I could manage to get out.
The CEO bowed deeply to me and said, “Thank you for saving my daughter, James Jacobs. I am forever in your debt.”
He looked to his daughter with a meaningful look and continued, “I will leave you to fill him in on the rest,” and his avatar faded.
Still a bit dazed by it all, I turned back to Kjara for answers, and then remembered her most recent greeting and chucked a little. “So…uh… did your dad see you kiss me?”
The look on her face was so priceless that I lost it for a minute, laughing so hard I could barely breath. It was contagious, and she joined in once she got over her initial shock.
Once we both calmed down, I sat back on the bed and said, “Lay it on me. I’m ready.”
She filled me in on what had happened, covering in the gaps in my memory.
After I’d tackled Kaji and took away his gun, getting myself perforated in the process, the little shit had gone after Kimiko with his bare hands.
Security was able to stop him before he could reach her, tackling his ass to the ground, and weren’t too gentle when they took him into custody.
An off-duty paramedic was in the crowd and kept me from bleeding out until an ambulance arrived. Like Mr. Kabishiyama had said, it was close one.
There were tears in Kjara’s eyes as she told me how she used her coat to put pressure on my wounds and help the paramedic keep me alive. I reached out and wiped the tears from her cheek and gave her a warm smile.
After that, I was airlifted to the Kabishiyama medical research hospital where they got me stable.
According to the surgeons, my innards were a mess. The first bullet had torn through my guts, obliterating my spleen and pancreas, and did quite a number on my intestines.
The second shot had added some additional holes to my intestines and clipped my spine on its way out.
Luckily both bullets had missed my kidneys, or I would have bled out on the floor of the Javits Center.
Traditional medicine could sew up the tears, repair the damage and restore some semblance of function, but the damage to my spine would consign me to a wheelchair for the rest of my life, and my damaged digestive system would likely never be able to handle more than the most bland of diets.
But luckily for me, traditional medicine wasn’t the only option. Kabishiyama was a leader in multiple areas of technology and had numerous advanced medical programs using their nanite technology.
It was a long process, but they were pretty sure that they could repair the nerve damage in my spine, and even reconstruct the damaged organs.
She started to go into the science of it all, but I zoned out.
Once she realized her explanation was falling on deaf ears she stopped and nudged me. “You okay Kheph? I know it’s a lot to take in, but you’ll be up and at ‘em before you know it.”
She gave me an encouraging smile and I returned it, saying “I think I’m still in shock. Waking up here was weird enough. And then you were kissing me, then the CEO of Kabishiyama Holdings was in the room, but he was still him, and then he turns out to be your dad, and I’m not dead, but my body is trashed and I’m in a super-pod somewhere being rebuilt by tiny doctor robots…. Did I miss anything?”
She blushed a little and looked down. “That’s pretty much it in a nutshell,” she said. “I apologize for the kiss; I was just so happy that you were okay. Never had someone do something like that for me before.”
I reached out, lifting her chin until I could meet her eyes. “As I said before, I wasn’t complaining about the kiss, it was quite nice, just unexpected. And as for the rest… it was the right thing to do. That asshole had lost his mind and I couldn’t let him hurt you or anyone else. It was pretty clear he had already done enough damage in that regard. I h
ave no clue what came over me when I jumped on him, I just saw an opening and took it.”
I dropped my hand and she looked down again. She began to shiver and then her shoulders began to shake as tears began to fall. I reached out and put my arm around her shoulders and she sunk into my chest and began to cry even harder.
I wrapped her in my arms and stroked her hair as she let out all of the emotion that had been building for however long it had been since the attack.
“I’m sorry” I said, “I’ve been going on and on about myself and this whole situation and didn’t even bother to think of how fucked up this whole thing must be for you.”
I could feel her tears soaking through my shirt and gave her another squeeze. “I hope they lock that asshole up and throw away the key.”
She pulled away slightly, looking up at me with a small grin, her tear-filled eyes heartbreaking. “He..he’s in jail now. No bail… My f..father says he will never s..see the outside of a cell ever a..again.”
I gave her an encouraging smile and gently kissed her forehead. She smiled back and then rested her head back on my chest, her body gradually relaxing as the tears slowed and eventually stopped.
She sat up and dried her eyes, looking at me and said, “Thank you. I needed that. I thought I had it all together and then it just hit me all at once. Talk about shock.”
“Any time,” I answered, and reached out, placing my hand near hers on the bed. She took my hand and gave me a squeeze before releasing it.
“Where was I…” she began. “Ah, yes. Your ‘super-pod’ as you call it has some modified software to let you make video calls from inside the game. You can access them by mentally commanding the VidChat software to open and then select the contact you want to call.”
I did as instructed, and saw the interface pop up with a very limited contact list.
==Technical Support
==Medical Support
==Home
“Okay, I see the contacts. So how will this work? What will they see? Is there a camera or something I should look at?” I asked.
Crimson Sands Page 42