Hero

by Dan Sugralinov

  Out of the ten thousand rubles I’d had on me this morning, I’d spent three on a guest card to the gym, about a thousand on transport around town and another thousand on my generous attempt to support Tural, the desperate migrant worker.

  I’d be lying to you if I told you that the ring was in any way different. I sensed no waves of heat; no runes had appeared on its rim when heated. Just an ordinary ring which you could only pawn by weight.

  The fact remained, it did work. My own interface profile was proof enough:

  Luck: 12 (+12 from the Lucky Ring of Veles)

  In total, that had brought my Luck to 24: almost two and a half times than that of an average person.

  Was it a lot? Time would tell... provided I had it. The fact remained, nothing bad had happened to me on my way back to the office. The cab had arrived within minutes of my call. The driver was polite and sober, he had neither raced nor rammed any cars. To top it all, not a single brick had fallen from the roof of the business center. As I’d climbed the stairs up to the building, I’d even allowed myself to take them three at a time without stumbling even once. And when I’d come across Gorelik on my way to the office, he’d been too busy talking to Vazgen to actually notice me.

  One person I did meet was Kesha. Without going into details of our upcoming partnership, I just made sure he was morally prepared to try himself at sales.

  “I really don’t know, Phil,” he heaved a sigh by way of answering. “If it brings in some additional income, why not? I can always leave someone in the print shop so I might find some time to do it, I suppose. But of course I’d like to know more about it. What do you want me to sell? And to whom?”

  “Let’s discuss all the details tomorrow, okay? I’ve been away from the office all morning. The guys have just called me to say it’s pandemonium. They want me back to sort it out.”

  “Not a problem. I’ll pop in tomorrow.”

  As I reached our floor, I was confronted by a huge crowd in the corridor — and somehow I didn’t think they were lining up for the latest iPhone. As I entered the office, I mouthed to Stacy so as not to put out the clients,

  “Are they all here for us?”

  She nodded.

  I set to work...

  NOW IT WAS way past six in the evening. The last client had just left. Finally, I could speak to everyone I’d originally planned to.

  ‘Phil, have you finished?”

  It was Veronica.

  “Yes,” I nodded, enjoying the delicious cup of tea offered by Stacy.

  “Have you got a minute to step outside? I want to talk to you in private.”

  I nodded my agreement while still thinking about a theory I’d just had, impatient to check it out. What if I used the interface to search for any stat-boosting items? Something to boost my Luck, maybe? Or a watch with +10 to Speed? A fountain pen with a bonus to Intellect?

  Still, I didn’t want to rush it. This was serious business which demanded concentration and the meticulous wording of search queries. I’d better do it once back home.

  Dammit! I had Gleb coming to see me tonight!

  I checked my phone just in case but he hadn’t yet called. Good.

  I got up from the desk and stretched, cracking all my stiff joints. “Outside?” I repeated.

  “It’s probably better to get a breath of fresh air,” Veronica said. “The walls have ears.”

  “How mysterious. Let’s go, then.”

  “Phil, do you want me to wait here?” I heard Mr. Katz’s voice who’d by then completely merged with the furniture.

  I slapped my forehead. I’d completely forgotten the old brief, snoring on our couch!

  “I’m so sorry, Mark,” I turned back to the redhead. “Veronica, can you wait a while? We only need to discuss a new contract. We won’t be long.”

  She rolled her eyes, suppressing her impatience. “Okay, Phil, I’ll wait. Stacy, what have you got there, coffee? Can you pour me some as well?”

  Grunting and trying to smooth-talk his arthritis into showing some mercy, the old lawyer scrambled to his feet. I took him helpfully under his arm, led him to the desk and helped him sit. “Would you like some tea, Mark?”

  “No, thanks. I think I’ve already overdone today’s caffeine limit. I can already feel I won’t be able to get any sleep tonight. How can I help you, Phil?”

  “We need a contract template which we could use to offer our sales outsourcing services to other companies.”

  “Really? Okay, spit it out,” the old man said with curiosity. “Tell me all about it.”

  We spent almost an hour talking. Finally, I felt sorry for Alik and Stacy who must have had plans for the evening. I wanted to let them go but they refused and said they’d wait for me. Veronica had already wandered off somewhere but was now back. And the old lawyer was still busy showering me with questions and demanding more details, revealing the kinds of pitfalls I couldn’t even have envisioned.

  “Well, I got the full picture,” he finally rubbed his withered hands, “although I don’t think I’ll be able to make out a draft contract by tomorrow. I need to check a number of documents. I might have it done by Friday in which case I suggest we meet up and discuss what we've got. I'm pretty sure, by then both you and I might have some adjustments to make.”

  “That’s excellent. Thank you so much for waiting all that time.”

  “Don’t mention it!” he tittered. “It wasn’t all that difficult. Makes no difference to me where I sleep. And the tea’s good.”

  “You should come more often,” Stacy said, apparently eavesdropping. “You don’t need an excuse to come. You can have all the tea you want.”

  “Thank you, my darling. I’d dearly love to but I’m afraid Rose will be jealous,” he guffawed.

  Jesus. The girl was only working her first day and she was already friends with everybody. Gorelik’s bookkeeper had given her the potted plants; she was already good friends with Veronica — and now the old boy was calling her his darling!

  Alik helped the old lawyer over to the stairs. Stacy began preparing to shut the office down for the night.

  Veronica heaved a sigh of relief, “Finally! You know it’s not fair, don’t you? I was the first to set up a meeting with you. Yesterday you were with your wife — or girlfriend, whoever; then this morning you had a meeting with the teapot, then you just disappeared , then you saw all those clients and Mr. Katz and only after that — it’s finally your turn, Veronica! And to tell you the truth, you need this conversation more than I do.”

  “Whoa, easy!” I said, slightly taken aback. “No need to get mad at me. Had you told me that this was urgent, important, whatever, I’d have spoken to you a long time ago.”

  “Oh really? Thanks a bunch, Mr. Punctuality. You’re just trying to come up with excuses, that’s what you’re do-”

  My phone rang, interrupting her emotional albeit not quite deserved rebuke. I apologized and took it.

  “Phil, is that you?”

  “Gleb? Oh, hi. Are you on your way?”

  “I’m at your place but it doesn’t look as if you’re here. I’ve got a crate of beer with me and some snacks.”

  “Stay there. I won’t be long.”

  “Wait a sec. There’s been a funny old boy here. He’s a bit weird. He was fishing, asking how long I knew you and what I wanted from you.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I told him to go stuff himself,” Gleb replied, impassive as usual. “Nicely, of course. Okay, I think I’m gonna wait for you on the bench outside. I might play a bit of CoC[29], if you know what I mean.”

  “Okay. See ya.”

  I uttered the last words in the dark as Alik had already switched off the lights. We walked out of the office, and he locked the door behind us.

  We left the building. All the other guys bade their goodbyes and went their own ways, leaving me and Veronica alone on the street.

  “Sorry, Veronica, I’m afraid I’m a bit pressed for time,” I said.
“I’ve got a friend waiting for me. I completely forgot we had an appointment.”

  “I’ve totally gathered that. Still, what I need to tell you might take some time. I could give you a lift and we could talk on the way.”

  “It’s only a couple of blocks down the road. Not enough time to start discussing whatever it is.”

  “And what if I join you?” she suddenly asked. “I hope your girlfriend — or your wife, whatever — won’t mind?”

  Her open smile glowed white in the thickening dusk. Her eyes glistened with an emerald light.

  Her words reminded me of the fact that I was free again. I hadn’t told anyone about me and Vicky splitting up and still I had a feeling that this girl — Veronica? Vera? Nica? — knew it somehow. No idea how girls do it but they do. They seem to sense this sort of thing. It’s as if the ex-girlfriend sets her man’s counter back to zero as she leaves, deleting a marker from his forehead that says in a language known only to women, “this male is already taken”.

  “I don’t think so,” I finally said. “Some other time, sure. But it looks like my friend has some kind of problems we might need to discuss in private. So we’d better discuss it now.”

  “If you say so,” she replied. “In any case, I’d rather give you a lift. At least that way your friend won’t have to wait for you outside.”

  Judging by her Interest bar, she was seriously into this conversation — or me, even. All kinds of thoughts flashed through my head, from the raciest fantasies to some crazy parallel-world theories.

  I managed to squeeze myself into her tiny Kia tucking my legs under me. She leaned against me unabashedly, feeling for the gear stick. When I finally buckled up and made myself halfway comfortable, I activated Lie Detection and gave her the address.

  “I’ll get you there in a tick,” she nodded at two cans of soda sitting between the seats. “Water, Pepsi? Help yourself!”

  “So what is it you wanted to talk to me about?”

  “And what do you think? Any ideas?” she turned her head and flashed me a smile, her ginger hair fiery in the lights of an oncoming car.

  “None whatsoever. And the few that I might have had are pretty irrelevant as they don’t require privacy.”

  My throat rasped as I spoke, so I had to help myself to some of the water.

  “Okay. I’m not going to pussyfoot around,” she said. “You don’t happen to be looking for a PR director, do you?”

  I choked on the water. “What did you say?” I paused, trying to take her suggestion in. “A PR director? For us?”

  “Why not?”

  “Veronica, you seem to forget we’ve only been open for three weeks. Not even. And we’ve only just started getting customers.”

  “You are expanding, though, aren’t you? You did hire Stacy.”

  “Bah! Stacy hasn’t really asked for much. She seems to be pretty undemanding. But she brings us a wealth of good...”

  “I’m not asking for much, either. I only want to help.”

  “You?”

  “Why not? I have a college diploma in PR. I graduated with honors.”

  “Veronica, I don’t want to blow my own trumpet but we seem to get business without any PR efforts. Why would we waste money on advertising?”

  “Phil, I know you’re smart but you’re so stupid sometimes,” she almost growled at me. “Don’t you understand you need to move to a new level? You know why, don’t you? The way you work now, you’ve hit a ceiling. Can you tell me how many clients you see each day? Even if you work 24/7 finding jobs for everyone — which is technically impossible — and even if your clients start to line up around the block, it’s still a maximum of what, fifty to sixty customers a week? How much are they gonna bring in? You might eventually train Alik to find jobs for them as effectively as you do but... you know what I mean?”

  “Sure. We can’t bite more than we can chew. So what do you suggest?”

  “You could sign up with recruiting agencies. It’s common practice. You send them potential candidates, and if the agency’s happy with them, it’ll pay you five or ten — up to fifteen even — percent of their annual salary. Annual, Phil.”

  “Okay. But you shouldn’t think I didn’t consider this kind of practice. I just wasn’t going to adopt it at this stage. In any case, what’s a PR director got to do with it?”

  “I’ll tell you now. The thing is, I personally know at least half of all the city’s companies. I could help you. You don’t even have to do anything. If you agree to what I’m saying, I’ll be on their case tomorrow morning, talking to all their HR girls. Would you like to give me a trial period? That way I could show you what I can-”

  “Could you stop the car here, please,” I interrupted her spiel as we’d already arrived at my house.

  She killed the engine and waited for me to reply.

  I knew she was right. She spoke from the heart, too. The only thing that worried me was the fact that I wasn’t used to strangers offering their help so openly. Also, expanding didn’t sound like a very wise thing to do at the moment. In this I completely agreed with Vicky.

  “So what do you think?” she finally said.

  “Give me a couple of days to mull over it, okay? It does make sense what you’re saying. I’d love to take you up on your offer but I’d like our cooperation to be mutual — and I still don’t know what I can offer you.”

  “Okay. Mull it over, then. See you tomorrow?”

  “Sure. See you,” I reached for the door handle but paused. “Why did you want to speak to me in private? We could have discussed it in the office with the other guys, couldn’t we?”

  “Where did you see a company director holding interviews or meeting partners in front of the staff?”

  “I’m not really a director, am I?”

  “Who are you, then? You’d better get used to it...”

  Someone knocked hard on my car window. I swung round.

  Vazgen was peering into the car, his face grim. With a nod of his head, he gestured to me to get out.

  Veronica heaved a doomed sigh. “Unbelievable. He tracked me down.”

  She rolled down the window, letting in the disheveled head of the PVC window vendor.

  “I knew you were with him, da?”

  Today his voice was especially melancholic.

  “Let me get out and we can talk,” I told him, then turned to Veronica. “Thanks for the lift. See ya!”

  She tried to protest but I’d already swung the passenger door open, pushing the hot-blooded Caucasian male aside. “Let’s go and have a talk... Othello.”

  “I can bury you right here and now,” he said without much enthusiasm.

  “Let’s go and talk, and then we’ll see about it. You might have no reason to bury me at all.”

  “Phil, don’t!” Veronica’s anxious voice came from the car. “Don’t bother!”

  Oh yes, I did have to bother, if only to sort this out here and now. Also, for some reason I really wanted to reassure the guy. Not to avoid any confrontation but just to help him get this corrosive jealousy out of his system.

  I peeked through the half-opened window. “Stay in the car,” I warned Veronica.

  I walked off and stopped by an old gnarly oak tree.

  Vazgen followed after me. “And?”

  “Nothing. Why are you being such a drama queen?”

  “What? Who? Me?” his eyes opened wide as his initial surprise gave way to fury.

  “Yes, you. You saw something, came up with a story around it, drew your own conclusions and got all upset about it. What’s Veronica got to do with it? Or myself, for that matter?”

  “Don’t you ever speak to me like-” his mouth quivered, preparing to shower curses at me.

  “Stop it, now,” I stood my ground even though his face was now within inches from mine. “Just stop it. Do you have something to charge me with?”

  He was so close I could see every blood vessel in his inflamed eyes. He flared his nostrils as he breathed in
fast shallow gasps, either with anxiety or indignation, I couldn’t really tell.

  Which was exactly why I’d decided to let him vent here and now. In people like him, any pent-up resentment had a tendency to accumulate and ripen without the need for any extra encouragement, maturing like a good wine.

  “Did I tell you not to get anywhere near my girl? Did I? I told you that, da?” he kept repeating as if winding himself up.

  “You did, yes. So I didn’t. Even though she’s not your girl and definitely not your property. There’s nothing between us. I’m telling you this only to put your mind at ease.”

  “Who do you think you are?” he grabbed at my lapels. “Speak up! I’m perfectly calm!”

  “Get your hands off me. Now.”

  He didn’t. Instead, he pulled me toward himself, then threw his head back and head-butted my nose.

  Tried to head-butt it, rather.

  A thought played in the back of my mind: how exactly had the Vaalphors tampered with our reality to allow Vazgen to notice me get into Veronica’s car and decide to track us down?

  With my mind still busy pondering, my body swayed sideways slowly and almost melancholically, without releasing any hormonal surges but simply obeying my knee-jerk reflexes. My shirt buttons flew everywhere as I escaped his grip, leaving thin air in place where my forehead had just been. In the meantime, my left hand performed a left hook to his liver, knocking the wind out of him.

  You’ve dealt critical damage to Vazgen Karapetyan: 285 (Punch)

  I automatically followed with a right hook to his head but stopped it within an inch from his cheekbone. This was plenty to cool him down for the time being. I had no intention of beating him up. I knew how he felt. I held no grudge against him.

  “Now listen to me, da?” I whispered to his ear, locking his neck in a choke hold. “There’s nothing between me and Veronica. None of the things that seem to worry you so much. You’d better believe it. We’re workmates, that’s all. Do you understand? Or do you want me to explain it again?”

  No idea what it was: his humiliation in front of Veronica, the physical discomfort or my Power of Persuasion skill, but he stopped struggling and slackened in my grip.