That Wasn't the Plan

by Jason Cheek

  “Plan for the worst.” The Devil Dogs chorused.

  I couldn’t help but grin at my friends antics as I surveyed the keep. Krishna had reported that there were four separate gates on the outer wall. One facing each cardinal point, while the keep only had one entrance on both the east and west sides of the structure. The ten-foot wall wasn’t particularly tall, but it was enough of an obstacle to slow down our blitzkrieg.

  Well, that and the two hundred yards of open fields between us and our goal. One warning from the newfar on guard and the central keep would be sealed up like a vice. While I’m sure we could breach the door, I had no idea how long it would take and what kind of a quick response force might be in the area.

  Besides that, I wanted to make a point. Having your forces completely overwhelmed within minutes made players nervous, especially when they thought they were safely tucked away behind defensive fortification. All that they could report was that an overwhelming force had taken them out and completely removed the defensive structure if they had someone on hand to scout us out. Oh, I know they’d figure it out in twenty-four hours if they had their people watching my stream, but by then I planned to have evacuated Domenic and be on our way back to Darom.

  “Why haven’t we beat these biatches down yet?” Hefe called out, as all three-foot six-inches of him strode up like he owned the place. Everyone just stopped to stare at him as AJ chimed in beside him.

  “Seriously, what the fuck is up with the holdup?” AJ demanded, as he clanged the oversized axe head in his hand against his kite shield. “We outnumber these assholes twenty to one at the very least.”

  “It’s not going to help much if they seal the keep’s outer door,” Thomas said in an annoyed tone, “now is it?”

  “That shit ain’t no problem.” AJ said, taking on an exaggerated country hick accent. “We’ll just toss Hefe up through the second story window.

  “You’re joking right?” Sara asked in a snarky tone, as everyone turned to look at the Dwarf.

  “Does it look like I’m joking?” AJ asked, as Hefe puffed out his chest. “Hell, that’s how we usually start off most boss fights.”

  Before anyone could think of a snappy comeback, a bright red, flying squirrel came to a hover in front of Assault Leader Dell’s face. Nodding his head, the old swordsman’s eyes caught mine. “Lyle reports that he’s ready.”

  “That means we’re a go.” Thomas said, instantly turning all business.

  “Gnome tossing for the win!” Hefe shouted out, holding up his tiny fist as AJ gave him a fist bump.

  “I’ll mark that down as Plan C.” I said rolling my eyes. Not that I was serious. Still, it wasn’t a half-bad backup plan and a perfect example of the boys’ style. Besides, after yesterday’s drama, I wanted to toss his ass myself. I’m sure I’d get the window on the second or fifth try.

  “Plan C?” They both exclaimed in outrage.

  “Actually, maybe we should bump it up to the A plan,” I said, a nasty smile forming on my lips as I caught Thomas’ eye. “Think we could hit the window from here if we built a catapult?”

  “I’m sending Blackhawk in to let Kenzie know we’re starting our attack run.” Thomas announced, pointedly ignoring my comment about the catapult as Hefe shifted uncomfortably at my words. Even Webby peaked over the Gnome’s shoulder to eye me warily. Taking Thomas’ point, my voice turned serious once again.

  “Assault Leader Dell, inform the graveyard groups to take out the newfar guards and prepare to advance.” I ordered, as I stepped to the front of the main assault’s line with my friends following behind me. Instantly, Blink, Dell’s flying squirrel, took off in a blur of wings as the veteran swordsman’s gruff voice echoed across the woods, “House of Kayden troopers, dress the lines and prepare to advance!” The command was repeated up and down the line as I slipped my shield off my back. Drawing the Dark Blade of Lord Kayden, I held it above my head as Assault Leader Dell, my friends, and the various Team Leaders of the main assault drew their blades, copying my stance as I paused, waiting for Blink to return.

  “This is so cool,” Hefe exclaimed beside me, nearly jumping up and down in excitement, “it feels like we’re in a war movie or something!”

  “We’re so going to kick their asses!” AJ said, glancing over at my in real life friends in surprise as the Dwarf chimed in. “I’ve been dying to get some PVP in!”

  Hefe looked hard as nails with a buckler shield strapped to each forearm and katar-style punch daggers clenched in each fist. With his rough-cut long blond hair hanging free down his back and his boiled leather armor, he looked like a Viking berserker going into battle. Add in Webby clinging to his back and he looked like a mini-Conan the Barbarian. Well, that is if you ignored his three-foot six-inch size.

  Now that he had his armor on, AJ looked like a bulky, mean fighting machine walking tin can as he gave me a salute with his oversized axe head, before clanging it against his kite shield. He couldn’t have looked more like the proverbial Dwarf with his long chain mail coat, leather armor pants with iron thighs-guards, knee-high iron-toe boots, and matching shin guards. And, if that wasn’t enough, more plates of iron covered his chest and back. On top of all that, he wore an ornate leather vest and a Viking-style iron helm with eyes and nose guard protection.

  Next to me, Thomas’s serious face cracked for a moment as he shot me a grin while holding his two-handed Butcher Sword over his head with the Cobra Kai twins. They were all grinning like a bunch of idiots holding the Luke Skywalker pose. Looking past them, I nodded to Thompson and Sara who gave me a knowing look. While the swords looked cool, the real battle would begin with a bunch of magic blasts at range.

  On my other side, Neysa stood next to me with Helgath on her back, both ready to move out at a moment’s notice. Beyond them, were Krishna and Lyeneru with serious faces and their manifested pets at their sides. Both nodded that they were ready to move out. All around me, glowing spells were flashing in the twilight as everyone did their last buffs while I waited for Blackhawk to return. Enhanced Mage Armor, Holy Shield, Bone Shield, Bone Fangs, and Lights Blessing, I hit myself and my friends with every barrier and upgrade spell that I had.

  “I’m starting to feel stupid,” Terry said, still holding the Luke Skywalker pose. “Are we moving out or not?”

  “Wait for it,” I said, watching the hazy sky.

  “Wait for what?” AJ asked in annoyance.

  A fluttering filled the air for a moment as Blackhawk came to a rest on Thomas’ shoulder. There was that blank moment on his face as he concentrated on the message, before turning to me with a nod. “Kenzie says they’re at the entrance to the keep.” There was another fluttering sound as Blink settled on Assault Leader Dell’s shoulder

  “The graveyard groups are attacking, Lord Ironwolf.” The veteran swordsman reported as soon as he processed the message.

  “House of Kayden troopers advance!” I shouted out and slashed my sword down to point at the Global Brutality players guarding the outer wall. At once, the message was repeated up and down the assault line by Assault Leader Dell and our Team Leaders, while I started forward down the slope with my friends at my sides. As soon as we came out of the forest and hit the tilled field, I broke out into a jog as everyone followed me.

  I can’t even begin to tell you how awesome it felt to head into battle with hundreds of hard-faced troopers at your back. On either side of me, there were five bound tree trunks being lugged by the breacher teams. These men and women troopers led the way with the rest of the main force behind them ready to scale the walls. The plan had only my friends and me hitting the newfar guarding the gate. The rest of the troopers would scale the wall. Half would carry the attack to the newfar inside the courtyard while the rest would join us in taking over the inside of the keep.

  My heart beat in my chest as my eyes locked onto the group of five Dark Elf newfar talking casually and leaning against the open gates as I tucked the Dark Blade in with my shield hand to free up my
casting hand. We had to clear a hundred yards to be in range for our Nature Magic attacks and a hundred and forty yards before I’d be in extreme range to lock the asshats up. No one said a word as we closed in on our targets, but the jingling of equipment, the heavy footfalls on the packed earth, and the clank of armor of over eight hundred troopers moving forward was a staggering noise in and of itself in the fading light.

  The timing had worked out perfectly. It was mid-twilight. The sun had set but was still lighting the horizon, while the moon was just rising. Luckily, neither were high enough to light up the field we were racing across. Even so, together both orbs gave off enough light to mess with Dark vision and yet make it difficult to see with normal vision in the half light.

  You actually had to concentrate on changing over to your Dark Vision when it wasn’t dark enough for it to do so naturally. Either you chose to keep the distance that came with normal vision or you were reduced to the range that came with Dark vision which had a limit of a hundred yards in low light. All of this would only be a problem if any of the newfar had taken the time to learn how to manually switch vision modes. It wasn’t exactly an innate skill. Now, knowing which one the Global Brutality guild members had chosen to use was the thousand dollar question, I thought, as I did my best to breathe silently.

  That was the funny thing about distances in The World. Unlike other games, lighting and distances became important factors during a fight. Similar to Dark vision, spells could only work at set distances, but it wasn’t like Nightmare players had a built-in distance indicator to let them know when they were in range. The best I could do was select my target and continually recast my spell until something took, which was why my fist was glowing black every second as I held my hand out towards the enemy and concentrated. It was like watching the countdown for the virus upload in Independence Day or waiting for the radio contact that the mission was complete in the movie Armageddon.

  In all honesty, this was the part of PVP that I loved, especially with a sneak attack like this. It was the execution of a well-laid plan, it was the feeling of overwhelming of a deserving enemy, and the excitement of the unknown. What Nightmare profession did the Global Brutality players have? Did we take everything into consideration or had we missed something important in the pre-planning stages? Combined, it made the adrenaline pump all the harder through my veins while I did my best to mentally count down the range. We were still a good twenty yards out of max spell range when one of the guards suddenly spun around to look in our direction.

  Chapter One.Twelve

  (Wednesday, May 7th / Day 17 of The World.)

  Kicking a chair out of her way, Nykii Flores stomped out of the main hall as the rest of her quick response team currently on break dully watched her go. None of them were happy about being stuck on the punishment detail, but Dante, their glorious guild leader, was pissed off that they’d lost to some loner scrub. ‘You’d think that losing ten levels would have been punishment enough,’ she sourly thought, as she headed down the outer stairwell to the bottom level. ‘But no, they were all assigned to take over this country hole.’

  “Who the fuck picks flowers in a damn video game?” She savagely swore, kicking a clay pot down the stairwell in frustration. Everywhere she looked, there were dying flowers hanging from every surface. They hung from little clay pots that had been jammed between the stones of the keep’s inner wall or trampled on the stairs where numerous pots had been knocked over. That was the other thing. Calling this oversized watch tower a keep was a misnomer if she’d ever heard one.

  The bottom floor was a mess of dirty bedding, broken furniture, and left over food that had been left strewn out on the stone floor from the various guard shifts. The combination of unwashed bodies and rotting food left a potpourri of stank that was reminiscent of some of the worst college bachelor pads that she’d ever had the misfortune of waking up in. Thankfully, there was no drunken stupor to go along with it this time. Although, if she had to spend another four days waiting around to take over this castle, she’d have to get her hands on something alcoholic and fast.

  Coming to a stop in the center of the human pigsty, she looked around pissed. Speaking of assholes, none of the current duty team were present and the iron-bound door to the keep was left wide open. Not that she could blame her people on one level, but if they were really that upset about the smell, they could always clean up the godforsaken mess. Striding out the doorway, she found the twenty-five Global Brutality members in question shooting the shit and drinking beers.

  “Evening Nykii,” Tomeo said with a leer. Sliding up next to her, he casually flipped his greasy hair over his shoulder. “I didn’t expect to see you slumming it down here with the rest of us grunts.”

  While the comment itself wasn’t a problem, the way the unwashed Rogue constantly eyed her marked him as a major scuzzball in her book, regardless of how good he played. Even more annoying, the little bastard thought he was god’s gift to women, which meant he was always standing a little too close to her whenever they talked. You’d have thought by now that the shithead would have gotten the message she wasn’t interested, but the man was as dense as a rock.

  At first, Nykii had slammed him down hard whenever he’d started hitting on her, but doing that had just made the problem worse. She swore, he thought she was flirting with him or something. She’d complained to their idiot guild leader, Dante Lynne, about the overt sexism, but he’d just shrugged off the problems she was having with his brother as if it were nothing. Yeah, that’s right, his brother. What more needed to be said there? After that, she’d just taken to handling the slimy asshole in her own way which mostly seemed to be working.

  “What part of keep the door closed and guard the fucking keep was too difficult for the lot of you to understand!” Nykii barked irritably as the rest of the team shifted uncomfortably at her words.

  “Now don’t be like that, Babe,” Tomeo said, gripping her elbow as if that would calm her down. “We’re just taking a break before the night shift arrives.”

  “I’ll say this one last time,” Nykii forced out the words through clenched teeth, while pointedly looked at the offending hand and reaching for the hilt of her long sword. “Move it, or lose it, Limp Dick!” This time, Tomeo backed off in a hurry as he held both of his hands up apologetically. Last time they’d done this dance, she’d taken the offending limb off at the elbow and kept it as a souvenir.

  “Chill out, Nykii,” Tammy said, giving Tomeo a nasty look, before handing her friend a beer. “Give us a break.” Her voice unconsciously took on an edge as she continued. “At least you’re still over level 30 unlike the rest of us.”

  “Besides, look around us,” the toned Priest said, nearly snarling in pent-up frustration as she flung her arm out towards the silent valley. “Who the hell is going to mess with us all the way out here in the middle of nowhere? Hell, we can’t even hunt the Orcs because they’re on our side!” The other woman spat using air quotes, before taking a gulp of beer. Belching loud enough to get an echo, she pointed at Nykii with her beer flask. “Are you afraid the blind sheeple are going to suddenly grow a spine?”

  “I still don’t think we should’ve beaten up on a guild of visually impaired players,” Islas grumbled unhappily as the rest of the team looked at him like he’d grown two heads.

  “Really?” Tammy sneered nastily as the clean-cut Rogue shifted uncomfortably under her stare. “Who the hell do you think you are, Captain Politically Correct? That didn’t seem to stop you from camping the hell out of those flower picking noobs when we took this place over.”

  “That’s because I didn’t know we were picking on a bunch of handicapped players!” Islas snapped back defensively.

  “You’re such an idiot, Islas!” Sarunas, the Arcane Mage of the group, snarled angrily. “You don’t know who any of these people are in real life. They give you a sob story about being blind and now you’re turning all soft about taking them out. You seriously make me sick.” The
Mage raged at his teammate.

  “If they’re in the game, they’re fair game, plain and simple.” Sarunas said, looking around at the rest of the team for support. “Those are the rules we’ve always played by. If it’s too much fucking reality for them to handle, they can go play My Little Unicorns and stay the fuck out of the hardcore games. Did you at least tell your little girlfriend that?”

  “She’s not my girlfriend!” Islas shouted back at the top of his lungs, his face flush from being berated.

  For a long second, the two men just glared at each other while everyone else fell silent. By now, this was an old argument. One that they now had several times a day ever since taking over this valley. While Nykii usually subscribed to Sar’s perspective, this time she wasn’t so sure. She could see where Islas was coming from, but that didn’t mean you didn’t take out the enemy. Even so, the disagreement had left a rift in the team bigger than Tomeo’s mouth.

  “Besides, her whole guild is logged in and she’s acting all weird,” Islas said, breaking the uncomfortable silence and getting in the last word, or so he thought.

  “What do you mean the entire guild is logged in?” Nykii demanded, ears perking up as her head whipped around in consternation. “Did that start tonight?”

  “Naw, the whole lot of them have been logged in since early this morning,” Islas explained, somewhat uncomfortably. “I wanted to talk with Angie, but there were all kinds of strange screams and grunts coming from behind the closed door.” The large man paused, looking down at his feet uncomfortably before continuing. “It was almost like they were purposely hurting each other.”

  Nykii’s eyes studied her subordinate for a moment as a cold shiver ran down her spine. She didn’t like surprises. Let alone surprises from players she’d put down hard. From the looks on the rest of her teammate’s faces, none of them shared her concern. They were too focused on being forced to babysit instead of joining in on the main assault that was going on against Vengeance Burnslinger.