Gamers

by Cambry Varner

  Something about Mina caught her eye and Darcy’s fury abated. The Barbarian wasn’t trying to be difficult to be contrary, she was actually frozen with terror. She was nearing the point where the fight or flight instinct would take over. If Mina ran, it would give them away just as surely as Darcy shouting would. And if she fought, like Darcy wanted, it would sloppy, without thinking or strategy which would be dangerous and counterintuitive to any plans for escaping with their lives. She needed to bring Mina away from that edge and being angry with her wouldn’t help with that.

  “I know you’re scared. I am too,” Darcy said gently. “We can save ourselves, but I need your help. If I could, I would take the point, but I don’t have your health points or Strength. It has to be you, but you won’t be alone. I’ll be right there beside you healing you, okay?”

  Mina remained frozen for several heartbeats before she slowly reached across for her ax. “Okay, I’m alright. I…I can do this.”

  “Good.” For a brief second, Darcy checked her character screen and eyed her +7 in Perception. Had her previous, real-world experience let her see how close Mina had come to panicking and to choose the right words to calm her? Or had being in the game helped? Darcy felt that there was no way she could have played it so cool in the real world. The game was affecting her just like Sally.

  Darcy picked up her mace, both hands squeezing around the knotted handle. “Alright, we wait until they’re at the stall and then we beat their asses and run.”

  Mina nodded with tight lips. Darcy waited, hoping the Barbarian had her fear under control, and listened to boots crunching on dry straw and dirt. Mina went still, tensed, exuding terror in waves. Darcy made a note to stay low in case Mina’s attack went wide. It wouldn’t be good to have her head lopped off by her own fighter. That is, if the barbarian woman took any action at all when the right time came.

  Darcy chanced a peek from around the edge of the stall. There were three men, all of them wearing familiar bandanas across the lower half of their faces: Cut Throats. She stared in awe, struck by the thought that they looked like professional cosplayers at a convention. Darcy drew back and held up a hand at Mina and raised three fingers.

  Mina narrowed her eyes perplexed. She mouthed, to the count of three?

  Darcy shook her head. She shook three fingers at her and mouthed, three men.

  Mina looked more confused. Women?

  Darcy shook her head, baring her teeth as she mouth again, three men!

  Again, it didn’t click for Mina. She shook her head, and her mouth open in a “what?”

  Darcy bit her lip to keep from screaming. She thrust one finger, then two fingers, and then three fingers in Mina’s face. Then she mouthed: One. Two. Three. Motherfuckers. Out there. Then she waved her hand towards the doors.

  Mina gave her an offended look. Darcy was about to hit her when a voice came from overhead.

  “Well, ain’t this a tantalizing conversation.”

  They looked up to see a man leering at them from over the top of the stall. “If you ladies would just come out, we have some questions…”

  He never got to finish that sentence as Darcy smashed the side of his head with her mace. With a grunt, he slumped out of sight. Both Darcy and Mina barreled from the stall, nearly knocking down one of the men who had hidden around the corner.

  Mina yelped as a knife slashed her arm, and in response, perhaps by reflex, she floored the offender with a solid punch across the nose. Darcy’s opponent fared much better when he grasped the wrist of her hand that held the mace. In return, she grabbed the hand that held his knife. Her back thudded against a wooden post, and the dagger came dangerously close to her eye. Wrenching her head away, she twisted, almost breaking the grapple, but he shoved her hard enough against the post which knocked the wind from her.

  Just as her strength would have given out, and the dagger would have found its mark in her face, Mina grabbed the Cut Throat from behind. She flung him away from Darcy as she would a raggedy scarecrow. His body arced through the air until he landed on a pile of feed bags and tools. He lay stunned, giving them precious seconds to flee.

  Darcy grabbed Mina’s arm. “Out the back! Hurry!”

  The doors ahead were closed. Mina grabbed each one and threw them apart as if she were opening shower curtains. The doors nearly hit the men waiting outside.

  Darcy realized, too late, they were running into a trap. The men inside the stables were sent in to flush them out into the waiting crowd of Cut Throats. Darcy counted nearly a dozen men with weapons and dangerous glints in their eyes. Their best bet was to fight their way through and run. She gripped the mace and realized she had foolishly left the shield behind.

  Mina uttered a belated warning cry as a net fell over them, bearing Darcy to the ground. The heavy metal sewn into the net weighed her down, making it impossible to maneuver under it. Mina managed to remain on her feet, but the net prevented her from doing anything more than that. Then the men descended upon them. A cudgel smacked Mina across the back, and she fell when the back of her leg was kicked. Darcy curled into a ball against the kicks and punches that rained down upon her.

  So this is what an asskicking feels like, Darcy thought sourly as a boot heel ground into her shoulder. Then she began to panic, fearing the men intended to beat them to death.

  A sudden shout stopped the beating, and the men pulled the net away. Darcy was too hurt and sore from the beating to struggle as hands hauled her up and tied her wrists behind her back. Darcy was bleeding from the nose and mouth, and Mina’s right eye was turning red and would be swollen shut soon.

  A bald man was looking between them with dark eyes as hard as pieces of flint. “Did they have it in their bags?”

  “No sir,” a voice behind them said.

  “Search them.”

  Hands pawed through their pockets and clothes with rough disregard for their injuries or modesty. Whatever it was they were after; they didn’t find it.

  “They don’t have it, sir,” another brute muttered.

  “Damn. Boss won’t like that one bit,” the bald man said coldly. “Especially after we lost the elf too.”

  Darcy closed her eyes in utter relief. Sally was safe and away from these bastards. But where was she? No, right now she had to focus on getting the two of them out of captivity. Shoving down the waves of panic threatening to send her to into tearful hysterics, Darcy thought more quickly than she believed herself capable of.

  C’mon, think, dammit. You know this world better than your own apartment. You know this game better than your own life. If this happened in-game, what would you do? The better question is, what can I do?

  She summoned her character screen and looked at her status. Her health was down by 10 from the beating, which brought her to 17. Darcy frantically studied her character sheet and moaned at herself for her stupidity. She had put her highest score into her Wisdom for spellcasting. If her hands had been freed, she would have slapped herself. How could she have forgotten that she could have cast other spells to that of Heal? A Fear spell might have made these men run away in terror, or a Commanding Will spell could have forced one of them to attack the others. With her hands tied, she couldn’t cast any spells now.

  Stop focusing on what your characters can’t do, and focus on what they can do. That’s what Darcy had lectured during her tabletop sessions when players facing a tough situation complained about the skills their characters lacked. So, taking her own advice, Darcy eyed her highest ability score, which was an 18 in Wisdom. Wisdom factored into her spells’ magical ability and put points into her Perception (+7). The former had let her see Mina’s state of mind and how to help her find courage: but how could it help her now?

  A tiny bead of sweat was rolling down the bald man’s temple. His breathing was short and quick and he kept glancing at them furtively, as if hoping what he sought would suddenly appear in their place. Darcy noticed all of this with near a tunnel vision focus and realized that the leader of thes
e Cut Throats was afraid to return to his superior empty-handed.

  “What should we do with these two, sir?” one of the men asked.

  “Do away with them. They’re useless to us…”

  Mina moaned in terror, but Darcy swallowed hers back. “No, sir, you don’t want to do that.”

  Both men looked at her with bemusement as if surprised by her ability to speak. The bald man sneered, “And why is that, dearie?”

  “I’m Sister Korra, a Cleric of the Lady of Shantra. Killing one of Her clerics will rain down pain and death upon you.” Her voice rose in vehemence, but she quickly dampened it to continue more calmly, “And the temple will pay handsomely to see my companion and I returned safely.”

  The bald man spat on the grass and fixed her with a sharp look. “A Cleric of Shantra, huh? And why, pray tell, would a cleric of such an esteemed order be traipsing these backwoods with a half-breed and a heathen?”

  “They’re converts,” Darcy snapped arrogantly. Her heart was racing. Her Charisma score wasn’t particularly high at 12, granting only a +1 in most social-related skills, but maybe game-mechanic would allow her Knowledge of Religion skill to come into play. “They saw the Holy Light of Shantra and wished to pledge themselves to Her service. Attacking a cleric comes with dire consequences, but if you let us go, I’ll pray for forgiveness on your behalf.”

  The bald man gave her a contemptuous glare. “Oh, you’ll pray on my behalf, eh? We’d rather have the money. Get the horses. We’re taking these two with us. The Boss will decide what to do with them.”

  Darcy maintained her straight back posture even though she wanted to fall weeping in gratitude. Mina was goggling at her, but Darcy refused to make eye contact, lest she lose her self-righteous mien. She had saved them for the moment, but their salvation was very fragile right now, and any sign of weakness on her part could shatter it.

  Horses were led out from the forest and both Darcy and Mina were hauled up onto the back of a formidable destrier. They were tied together at the waist with Darcy at the front and Mina behind her. With the barbarian woman being nearly two heads taller, this made Darcy feel like a kid riding with an adult.

  While the men mounted up, Mina hissed, “What the hell was that?”

  “What do you think?” Darcy whispered, keeping her face forward. “I had to give them a reason not to kill us. The Order of Shantra is a religious military group that even the Cut Throats don’t want to cross. Thank God, I chose Shantra as my character’s deity.”

  “What happens when the Order of Shantra says they don’t know a Korra?”

  “Maybe we’ll have escaped before that happens.” Darcy scanned the trees, hoping to see a blonde figure watching. “Sally’s out there somewhere.”

  “Will she come to save us?”

  “What can she do alone with these assholes by herself? She doesn’t know the game rules, and she’s only level one,” Dary said. “I want her to stay somewhere safe until we get out of here and find her.”

  “Can we get out of this?” Mina looked fearfully at the men.

  “I think so, but listen, we don’t have much time. When you get the chance, break the ropes.”

  “With what?”

  “With wishful thinking,” Dary hissed. “No, with your Strength. You’re a Barbarian, one of the stronger classes and you have a Strength of plus three. It might be enough for you to break the ropes if your character rolls high enough.”

  “I don’t think I can…”

  “If you can’t break the ropes, then Rage, it’ll boost your Strength bonus from plus to plus seven.”

  “You-you want me to try now?”

  “No, not with all these bastards watching us. I’ll tell you when the time is right.”

  ***

  Sally couldn’t move. It was like her insides and bones had been replaced with unmovable rock. Her mind was screaming at her to run, attack, or shout for help, but her body wouldn’t obey. Never before had she experienced such paralyzation. This immobility was more than shock and fear, and the Cut Throats were surrounding her with daggers gleaming almost wetly in the moonlight.

  With a cocked fist, Naomi shot past her like a comet. The punch sank into the man’s solar plexus with the force of an angry bull. With a low, airless groan, the man doubled over, and Naomi’s other fist met his chin in an uppercut, throwing him off his feet. The other two men stared in astonishment to see their leader felled by a girl barely half his weight.

  Again, Sally tried to move, but couldn’t. What was wrong? Had a dart dipped in paralyzing poison hit her like in the movies? She could only watch mutely as Naomi took on the other men by herself.

  The second man attacked and the blade sliced through empty air as Naomi spun away. The third man tried to grab her, his fingertips dotting her sleeve, but the girl did an elegant flip backward, her foot connecting with his chin mid arc, sending him stumbling back with a bloody jaw.

  And just like that, whatever was holding Darcy place was gone. The second man was going for Naomi’s exposed back. Without hesitation, Sally shoved a knife into the man’s back, between the ribs, and thrust upward. Hot blood seeped over her fingers. With a choked squawk, her opponent went limp, falling back against her. She shoved him off the knife in time to see Naomi grappling with the last man. Her legs were wrapped around his waist and hooked at the ankles. She wrenched his head back with both arms around his neck and chest.

  Immediately, Sally shoved the knife deep into the exposed chest of the bandit, piercing his heart. The man’s eyes rolled up in his head; death claiming him instantly. The body hit the grass with barely a sound. It wasn’t until Sally could hear her own breathing that she noticed the sticky blood congealing on her hands. It reminded her of elementary school when she would smear Elmer’s glue on her hands just so she could peel it off after it dried. Then the detail of the recent violence came back to her and just like Mina had done after the fight with the kobolds, Sally threw up on the grass.

  God, she hated this body that made her do things she would never have done in the real world. She had acted without thought, killing the men as casually as she would draw breath or blinking. When she recovered, she noticed Naomi digging through the pockets and belts of the dead men.

  “Stop that!” Sally barked rounding on her. “What the hell are you doing?”

  “Looting!” Naomi announced filching several coins from an inner pocket. “What’s wrong?”

  “I just killed them!” Sally cried, shocked by the girl’s nonchalant attitude.

  “So? They were gonna kill us,” Naomi said as she palmed the coins and stood. “What did you think they were gonna do to us? Ask us for directions?”

  Sally looked down at her hands, covered in sticky blood and almost wiped them on her legs, but stopped herself before she soiled the cloth. She needed soap and hot water, and even then she doubted she could wash it all off. Her hands would always be covered in blood.

  Naomi held out two Cut Throat weapons for her. “Here. Now you have a sword and a dagger. And we get XP for this encounter too.”

  Sally summoned her character screen and sure enough the bar had changed with 87 of 300 at the top. How was the XP distributed? Was it per Cut Throat or for the entire encounter? She wished Darcy was here to answer her questions.

  “This one is alive. He’s just knocked out.” Naomi pointed at the man she was rendered unconscious. “He can tell us where the hideout is.”

  “Oh, so he’s just gonna tell us, the people who killed his friends?” Sally said, bitterly.

  “We’ll beat it out of him,” Naomi said exasperated. “Why are you making this so hard?”

  “Why are you taking this so…so casually? We just killed two guys, and you’re talking about torturing another.”

  “To save your friends!” Naomi cried, standing up on the torso of one of the dead men, so she was almost nose to nose with the taller Sally. “If I could push a button or click my heels three times and “poof” they’re rescued, I would
! But this is the only way to save them. So I’m sorry that your moral sensibilities are offended by all the blood and violence, but I’m going to ask you to be a big girl and shelve it until we get your friends back, okay?”

  Sally closed her eyes, pinched the skin between them, and swallowed back the torrent of anger she wanted to unleash. Naomi was telling the truth, and Sally hated her for it. “Alright. Let’s do what we need to do to save Darcy and Mina.”

  Naomi stared hard at her, clearly unconvinced and Sally glowered back before bending down to undo the dead man’s sword belt. It shouldn’t be so easy to steal from the dead, but there was no resistance as she pulled the belt free. She put it around her waist and thrust her sword into the sheath and slid the fallen dagger into the belt on the other side. The kitchen knives were dropped on the ground and forgotten.

  Satisfied, Naomi stepped off the dead man and hauled the unconscious Cut Throat to a tree and tied his hands behind his back with the other dead man’s belt.

  “So how do we do this?” Sally said, feeling a little sick to her stomach, but she was swallowing it back, thinking only of Darcy and Mina.

  “Wake him up, of course!” Naomi declared. Before Sally could stop her, she gave the man a resounding slap across the face. When the man didn’t stir, she delivered another one that made Sally flinch.

  “Dammit! You’re going to end up killing him!” Sally caught Naomi’s wrist just as she was winding up for a third slap.

  “Look, it’s working,” Naomi said, pointing with her free hand at the stirring criminal.

  “Oh, bloody ’ell,” the man muttered rolling his jaw. “What did you birdies do? Stomp me face in while I slept?” It took him seconds to realize the state of his hands behind his back, and he glared at him, made all the more heated by his red cheeks from being slapped. “’Ell ’appened to the others?”

  “Dead!” Naomi declared, shaking her hand loose from Sally’s grip. “And you’re gonna wish you were too if you don’t tell us where your hideout is!”