by David Petrie
"That's right; you didn't think," Max said, sounding like his father. He backed off a moment later. He didn't like how he sounded. "Sorry, I'm just worried."
"I understand that. I am too. It's thanks to your team that we even have a chance here; the last thing I want is to put any of you in any danger."
Farn took a step forward. "What did the download do?" she asked, bringing the conversation back to what was important.
"That's the part we don't know. On top of running a large update, it locked us out of her rig. We can't access the system files to investigate. All we can do is monitor her vitals."
"Can we log her out and use a different rig?" Farn asked.
"No, her avatar data has been linked to it for now."
Max swallowed a lump of dread. "Is she going to be okay?"
"As far as we can tell, she should be fine. The system can't do anything to her other than affect how she connects. So it doesn't have a way to actually hurt her."
"Maybe you should wait until she's in the room before talking about her." Ginger appeared in the doorway, a wide grin on her face as she stepped into the room.
Kira followed behind, her demeanor in extreme contrast from before. She looked at the floor, saying nothing as she moved toward the group. She almost seemed more embarrassed after finding something to wear.
The merchant below deck didn't have much in the way of equipment for her race, just the starter gear that Max had only seen her wear in their first few days online. She had replaced it as soon as she could back then. It provided almost no actual protection as armor, but that was true of most fairy gear. Besides, Max didn't think that was why she had ditched it anyway. She had never actually explained her reason, but he had always assumed she'd gotten rid of the equipment because it was completely and utterly beautiful.
Thin spaghetti straps clung to her shoulders, connecting to a well-fitted bust of an empire style dress. Its pure white fabric ruffled around her knees, almost floating as she moved. Her shoulder blades were exposed by a low cut back, just enough to free her wings if the need should arise.
With the new outfit combined with the shining amethyst pendant and matching eyes, she had become a sight to behold. Hell, to call her breathtaking was no exaggeration, considering the hush that fell over the bridge as the crew took in her transformation.
She stood at the edge of the party, arms in front of her, holding a new journal, having lost her old one, her head lowered.
"Well isn't anyone going to tell her she looks nice." Ginger leaned forward, gesturing toward her like a mother showing off her daughter before being picked up on prom night.
Max approached, forcing the fairy to look up, her eyes shining with a depth that one would have to have seen to believe.
She looked back to the floor. "I know I look stupid."
He laughed a little and placed a hand on her head, feeling her tense on contact. His mind raced to find a comment that would adequately make fun of the situation without making her feel bad. To his surprise, all he could come up with was a simple, "You look nice." He’d even kept his tone gentle and honest.
The fairy took in a sudden breath and made eye contact with him before looking away. The corner of her mouth twitched up toward a smile for an instant before she shoved it back down and covered with an annoyed snort.
It was actually a better reaction than any Max might have gotten from a joke.
"You do look pretty amazing," Farn added stepping up to admire her.
"See, I told you it wasn't weird," added Ginger as Kira let a goofy smile have its way with her. The Coin took the opportunity to run her fingers through the fairy's hair, separating out three of her silver locks.
Kira pushed her away. "Cut it out."
"Oh, come on. Wren doesn't let me do this anymore. At least give me this.” Ginger continued to braid her hair.
Kira rolled her eyes and submitted, then grew serious again. "So, what's the verdict here? Should I be worried about this?" She held up the pendant that hung close around her throat. The fact that it had no clasp on its thick chain made it impossible to remove without decapitating her, which probably wouldn't work even if they tried, since the item's description only listed one thing, that its ownership was bound to her.
Alastair reiterated what he had told Max before continuing. "We don't know exactly what the update did, but judging from your connection, the techs are pretty sure you're being monitored by someone outside the system - obviously Carver."
Max scoffed. "It's not enough just for him to put us through this? Now he has to watch, too?"
"I don't think he can actually see any of you. The connection doesn't seem to be sending that much data. In fact, I'm now rethinking the entire purpose of the mission. I don't think he wants to take down the system at all. I think all that stuff on the video about not wanting to see the Somno system used for games was all bull. I think he's putting you all through these impossible tasks because he wants to make you stronger. I think he wants you to win this."
"Well, that makes sense. He didn't seem like he was motivated by revenge in the second video we saw," Max said, missing the larger point.
Alastair started to speak, but Kira beat him to it, "So what's the point of all this then? Just one big experiment?"
"That's what I'm thinking. He probably doesn't care about getting fired at all. He just wants to force us to run one of his trials for him. It makes a lot more sense than trying to get back at me anyway." Alastair shoved his hands into his coat pockets.
"I suppose that means I'm the guinea pig then." Kira pointed to her eyes with two fingers.
"Yes and no," he answered, leaning his head from side to side. "He seems to be using you as a back door."
Kira shoved her new journal behind her to cover her rear. "What's this about my back door?"
Kegan and Farn let out a laugh.
"Not that type of back door." Alastair groaned, taking a hand out of his pocket to rub his forehead. "No, he seems to be using you as an entry point to view information on the whole party, so by that, I assume you're all guinea pigs."
"That's not creepy at all," she added through a heavy layer of sarcasm.
Farn jumped back in. "What do you mean by, ‘He wants to make us stronger?’ I mean, we're not getting much experience from any of this. And you've seen Max fight, right? How much stronger could we possibly get."
"Yeah, I am pretty badass." Max rested his hands on his guns.
Alastair nodded. "That's true; you are living proof of how much a person can grow when training for combat on a nightly basis. By now, your reflexes might be pushing the limit of what the human mind can do."
"I wouldn't go that far." Max stepped back from his previous boasting.
"I'm not exaggerating. The game doesn't give you any help when it comes to movement and combat other than increasing your weapon damage and your physical defense in accordance with your stats. Everything else is all you. And you must have noticed by now that it carries over into reality. In theory, you should be able to handle a gun the same no matter which world you're in. Same goes for the melee classes. I can only imagine what would happen if Ginger got in a knife fight," Alastair said with a straight face.
Ginger glowered in his direction. "What kind of places do you think I hang out in?"
Max tilted his head to the side, considering the possibility of what they might be capable of, then shook off the thought, getting back to the point. "Okay, but unless Carver is trying to turn the world's nerds into an army of combat specialists, how does that help him?"
Alastair laughed. "It doesn't. He's not a supervillain. Neal doesn't care how good a fighter you are. In fact, I don't think he cares about the conflicts that go on in the outside world at all. That's not a priority for him. All he ever cared about was this." He pointed to his head before continuing. "He wants to make your mind stronger, and I think that's why he's making you do these impossible fights."
Max nodded as if he understood the explanati
on. Then he shook his head. "Nope, I'm not following any of this."
The others agreed.
"Okay, let me give you a visual." Alastair took his inspector from the back of his journal and held it so that he could see Max through it. He tapped the pane of glass once, then did the same to Kira, followed by the rest of the team. He tapped it a few more times and swiped his finger toward the ships main window, where each of their status screens appeared in a grid.
Max focused on his, reading it off in his head. Most of his stats were pretty well balanced, the only one of real importance being dexterity, since it was what his gun's damage scaled off. He had been dumping every other level's upgrade points into it, and for the most part, spreading the rest across his constitution, defense, and skills while adding a few to luck every now and then.
He glanced at the rest of his team’s stats. Farn had built her character around constitution, strength, and defense. Kegan was a strength and dexterity build, which made sense, since bows worked off both. Ginger had gone with dexterity and luck, and Corvin had gone with intelligence and focus.
Overall, everyone had balanced their characters well without neglecting anything. The exception being Kira since her race had been designed to be a glass-canon type build with some of her stats being soft-capped from the start.
Alastair stepped up to stand in front of the screen and gestured back to it with one hand. "Okay, so this is how you see your character."
"Yeah, and?" Max leaned against one of the railings and folded his arms.
"And this is how the game sees your character." He tapped another few commands out on his inspector, and the screen changed.
At first, Max wasn't sure what was different. Then it was obvious. Decimal points appeared at the end of each stat, some of which actually contradicted what had been chosen. Max noticed that his luck was a little higher than what he’d set it at, making him more likely to get an item drop and less likely to get an ailment like poison. On top of that, the decimals fluctuated up and down as if they were always changing. He looked back to Alastair, who continued.
"Obviously things are a little different, but what I want you to focus on are the two new stats that appear at the bottom of each of your sheets."
Max dropped his eyes to the lines that now read willpower and resistance. The first stat, willpower, varied significantly between each party member. It also fluctuated more than the rest of their stats, jumping up and down several digits at a time one second while hovering somewhere in the middle the next. The second value, resistance, seemed to mirror the first.
"Alright, what the hell does that mean?" Max spoke the words that he assumed everyone was thinking.
Alastair stepped back to the team and lowered his voice. "Okay, this isn't really a secret or anything, but it's not common knowledge, either." He paused as if thinking of how to explain things. "So if you want a beer online, you simply go to a tavern and order one off the menu, and the NPC at the bar gives it to you. Right?"
Max nodded, unsure of where he was going with it.
"But that's just how you see it. From the game's perspective, all it knows it that you ordered option number whatever off their menu and how much it costs. It can load some less complicated items or ones that have a full profile of characteristics in its database, but other than that, the system has no clue what to do. It can't tell you how a drink tastes or smells or how it feels going down your throat. The game can't just create sensory information. It doesn't understand that stuff. But, it does understand that you do. So to find out more, the system asks your mind to fill in the blanks." He gestured to the party. "You expect a beer to come in a frosty mug, so it does. You expect it to be cool and refreshing, so it is. You expect to get a pretty good buzz after a few, and there you go. It understands beer. It will then merge the data it gets from everyone around you to form a consensus so that everyone sees it the same way and it will use that data to fill in any gaps. So if you've never had a beer, it will just ask others and then pass on that information to you.
Corvin held up one finger. "Unless you're underage."
"Of course. If you're not old enough, it filters out the effect of the alcohol, but that's beside the point because for all that to be possible, the system has to allow each of you to influence it. And your willpower stat is the measurement of how strong your mind pushes to control the dream. If left unchecked, you could potentially do anything, like turn water into wine or move objects with your mind."
"Or turn yourself into Mothra and destroy Valain," Kira suggested.
Alastair nodded. "Pretty much. So to keep that from happening, the dream pushes back, balancing its resistance against your will so that you can give it what it needs without giving you too much control. And for the most part, that works."
"What do you mean, for the most part?" Max asked, assuming he wasn't going to like the answer.
"Well, sometimes when you put a player in a situation of high emotional stress, their influence can fluctuate a little too much and the system can have trouble keeping up with that. It doesn't usually create a big enough gap to fully overpower the system or anything. But it can alter the dream in more subtle ways like increasing your stats temporarily. So there are moments where players have stayed alive or dealt more damage when mathematically they shouldn't be able to. Not only that, but the more a user does it, the harder your mind pushes. Like working a muscle, it gets stronger the more you use it. This gives the system a harder time keeping you in check."
"And that's why Carver created the Nightmares." Corvin rubbed at his eye patch.
"Yes, and since some of you have been punishing yourselves by fighting them, it's like you've been training for this quest for years. That's why your willpower stat is so high, Max."
Max compared the values. "Nice, I'm kicking all of your asses," he bragged, his value as it holding steady at around fifty-five.
"Great, like his ego wasn't big enough," Kira groaned.
In second place with forty, Corvin seemed to stand a little taller than usual, while Kira and Farn high-fived to celebrate a tie as theirs both wavered close to thirty-seven. Kegan and Ginger brought up the rear, looking disappointed but explaining that it must have been because they hadn't fought as many of the Nightmares.
Max folded his arms across his chest and let a smug grin spread across his face. "So how high would my will have to get to overpower the system and be all godlike and what not?"
"Pretty damn high."
Max’s grin fell. "That's unhelpful."
Corvin raised his hand before speaking. "Has anyone ever done it before?"
"Not that I know of." Alastair looked at the ground and shoved his hands into his pockets before falling silent and creating an awkward lull in the conversation.
Eventually, Max shook his head. "Well, this is all well and good, but some of us need to log out and rest before doing anything else. We can talk more outside."
"Agreed," Alastair said.
Kira stretched and let out an unnecessary yawn. "Yeah, I better get out before I pee my pants." She froze as soon as the words left her mouth, then looked at Alastair with a worried look. "I haven't peed my pants? Right?"
He didn't answer. Instead, he grew quiet and looked back down at the ground.
"Oh god! I feel so gross now." She flailed both hands while Max burst out laughing. "Oh really, you're gonna laugh at me, mister eat-seven-tacos-before-logging-on-for-ten-hours? How did that work out?"
Max shut up without another word, not wanting everyone to hear the rest of the story.
"That's what I thought.” She pointed at his chest.
Alastair started laughing as well, before adding, "Don't worry. No one has peed their pants."
Kira shook her head at him. "Not cool. Not cool at all." She ignored his continued chuckling as she navigated through the menu on her forearm to find the option that read ‘sign off.’ Then her face dropped.
Her amethyst eyes flicked back up to Max, then shifted to Alastair,
who was still enjoying his joke longer than he should have. Her words came out with a quiver of fear. "How concerned should I be that my logout option is missing?"
Chapter Thirty-Six
Corvin struggled to think of something to say.
Beside him, Kira sat in the captain’s chair. She looked like a patient at the doctor's office waiting for a life-changing diagnosis.
Max and Farn had tried to stay with her, but she had insisted that they at least log out to use the bathroom before they regretted it.
Corvin wasn't sure why she had sent them away. The fairy looked like she needed a friend now more than ever. Although, no one knew what kind of risks they would be taking by skipping breaks when they were available, so it was for the best that they didn't stick around. Kira probably wouldn't be able to live with herself if something were to happen to them because of her. That was just the type of person she seemed to be. At least, that was what Corvin assumed when he saw the look on her face as the others vanished back to the real world. She had put on her bravest face and smiled, letting it fall as soon as they were gone.
Of course, Corvin was there with her. The recent dose of sedatives that he'd been given had left him stuck in there as well for the time being, but thanks to his short break during the last fight, he was good to go for several more hours. Although he didn't feel like his presence was doing much for the fairy other than making the silence that they sat in more awkward than if she had been alone.
He glanced down at her every now and then as she sat with her hands in her lap, waiting for Alastair to log back in to tell her if there was any hope of getting her out from the other side.
She kept checking the mission clock as if noting the passing of each minute as they stacked onto her total play time. That must have got old quick because she stood up.
"I can't sit around anymore. I'm going for a walk. Wanna come? Get some fresh air?"
"Yeah, sure," Corvin said, his pulse speeding up, not really sure what else to say before following her out of the room.
