Gamers

by Cambry Varner

  The man spat foully, the spittle almost landed on Naomi’s foot and guffawed. “Go ahead. I’m used to gettin’ beat bloody. Me pa used to tear open the skin on me back with his damn belt and me mam would sprinkle salt in the wounds to make the lesson stick.”

  Naomi’s face fell, and she gave Sally an uncertain look. “I kinda don’t wanna hurt him any more now.”

  Sally lowered her face into a palm and moaned into it. “Dear God, it was your idea.”

  “Yeah, but was before I knew he had such a sad backstory.”

  Sally took matters into her own hands and collected a second belt from the other dead body and looped it between her hands.

  Naomi gasped, “Oh no! Don’t use his childhood trauma to torture him!”

  “Shut up,” Sally snapped.

  She booted the Cut Throat in the chest, and she secured the belt around his legs tightly. She moved quickly before he got the idea of kicking at her, then she hauled up the prisoner by the collar. His unwashed odor wafted into her face, making her wince in disgust and even his breath was foul with teeth in desperate need of dental work.

  He sneered at her. “Wot? Are you gonna give me a kiss? Sorry, slags don’t catch me fancy.”

  “You’re going to tell us where your hideout is,” Sally began with steel behind her eyes. “Where you keep prisoners, and how to sneak in and out of that place.”

  “Why should I do that?” he snarled, gritting yellow teeth.

  “Because you want us to come back,” Sally said in a calm voice. The words were coming to her, drawing from her +5 Charisma bonus. “We’re going to leave you here with two dead bodies covered in blood. You lived out here in the woods, so you know that wolves, bears, insects, and monsters all love fresh meat.”

  The Cut Throat’s sneer fell back into a pained grimace. Taking satisfaction in that, Sally continued, “And you know what else? You can scream as loud as you want, but no one is going to come. You’re out here all alone in an area that I’m certain no one save for your gang knows about, and I doubt they’ll find you before the wolves do. First, they’ll go for the easier meals, the two dead men over there, but they won’t last long. The best you can hope for is a big bear will come along and bite your throat out clean, but I don’t think you’ll be that lucky.

  “Wolves will come in a pack, and to start with the alphas will eat, tearing into your flesh, ripping back your clothing to expose more meat. That’ll attract the flies and insects who’ll crawl inside you and start on their share. Maybe they’ll rip into something vital, and you’ll die quick, but I don’t think so. No, they’ll want the meaty parts first. Your arms, your legs, and belly, leaving the organs inside to keep you alive long enough for the Omegas to have their turn.”

  The Cut Throat’s face had gone white, making the bruises on his face stand out in stark contrast. “You’re mad.”

  “No, I’m worried about my friends,” Sally dug her fingertips into his shoulder and squeezed hard. “I’m willing to do anything to save them, even if that means leaving you here to get eaten alive.”

  The man looked between them, his eyes bright and wide like a caught wild animal. Naomi stepped forward and knelt beside Sally. “I give you my word that once we rescue them, we’ll come back and release you. You can trust me because I took the Vow of Truth.”

  That seemed to be enough for the man though Sally didn’t know what the Vow of Truth meant. He started talking.

  Chapter 6

  McRando

  Darcy had always wondered what it was like to ride a horse. She assumed it was like riding a motorcycle but from a greater height. In reality, it was like sitting on a swaying bench which chafed her thighs and made her back hurt. Coupled from her lacerations from the beating, she was in pure misery. And, ironically, while Darcy had the power to ease her pain with a Heal spell, her bound hands prevented it. Mina’s bellyaching didn’t make matters better either.

  “How much longer before we get there?” Mina whined.

  “Don’t be in a hurry to get there,” Darcy hissed. “We don’t know what they’re gonna do to us when we arrive.”

  “I thought they were going to hold us hostage.”

  “Yeah, but their boss might have other ideas. Don’t say anything and let me do the talking.”

  For the last hour, Darcy had been eyeing her character screen trying to form plans for all the scenarios they might face. Their best hope involved Mina having a chance to break the ropes. Though she was familiar with the Cut Throats in-game, Darcy had no idea of what they would be like in this world. The Cut Throats were low-level enemies for new players to cut their teeth on in early encounters. They dropped only low-level loot and questline items that would lead the players who followed it to the Cut Throat’s hideout. This zone functioned as the first real dungeon crawl after the Lair of Tears. The boss of the dungeon was the Cut Throat’s leader, McRando, a level 8 Rogue.

  Facing McRando wouldn’t be possible for a level 3 Cleric without her armor and a level 1 Barbarian coward who didn’t know how to Rage. Their best bet was to wait and hope that they would be tossed in a cell together, so they would have a chance to escape.

  The horses broke through a copse of trees into a glade. The open sky allowed enough moonlight to see clearly, but Darcy still couldn’t determine where they were. The men quickened their pace, not from fear, but as though eager to reach their destination. She had to peer hard to realize that on the other side of the glade was the Cut Throat’s hideout.

  Darcy recalled from the Shadow’s Deep Wiki page that the bandits’ headquarters had been a hunting lodge for some local duke or count a few centuries back. The noble abandoned it to an infestation of goblins, and the Cut Throats cleared them out around ten years ago and made the manor their base of operations. The reason it stayed hidden for so long was that the forest had sought to take the building back by growing thick vines and foliage over the wood and stone. It provided the perfect camouflage from any kingsmen or travelers, at least for those the Cut Throats didn’t capture or kill.

  Men opened a second story windows and hailed them. The wide double doors, entirely hidden by a mesh of leaves and vines, were pushed open by four men, two on each door. The Cut Throats took Darcy and Mina inside, horses and all. Hooves thumped on the old wooden floors, long since scarred and filthy from many boots and hooves coming and going over the years. The Cut Throats led the horses into what had once been a parlor where the furnishings had all been removed or stolen.

  Despite her fear, Darcy couldn’t help staring in wonder at the interior of the hideout. She had run through this dungeon so many times that she knew the layout by heart. It was as if a rich fan had built it with lifelike detail. There was a long table covered in loot and food with three golden candelabras casting a dull yellow glow over the whole room. And there was the side door that led to the rooms the Cut Throats used as a barracks.

  Darcy and Mina were hauled off the horse and would have hit the ground if the Cut Throats hadn’t gripped them so hard. Their legs wobbled from riding the horse for so long that they needed time to be accustomed to solid ground again, but the Cut Throats weren’t patient enough for that and dragged them staggering down the hall. Men jeered at them, some making crude comments and deadly threats.

  Clenching her teeth, Darcy refused to let them see her fear, but sadly Mina had no such qualms. Whimpering, she cowered behind Darcy, eyes full of tears, suddenly flinching when a brutish man with a jagged scar across his face lunged at her. The men roared in laughter until they were silent by a sharp cry of “Shush it!”

  Looming at the end of the hall was a large man. He stood over six feet, and his black vest and shirt barely contained the thick muscular frame which seemed to fill the hall. One side of his face was swatch in a crimson cloth where a right eye had once been, and the other eye was black as polished onyx. White teeth beneath a beak like nose were bright in stark contrast to his black beard.

  He regarded the bald man with a disdainful glare. “
Who are these wenches? Did they have the package?”

  The bald man hesitated, clearly unhappy to be the bearer of ill tidings. “They didn’t have it, sir.”

  The single black eye switched to them and then back to his underling. “Then why in all the hells are you here and not out there getting my letters!”

  Letters? Darcy raised her head and quickly lowered to keep them from seeing her reaction. It couldn’t be the letters she was thinking of, could it? If it was, then it made sense why the Cut Throats took the risk of kidnapping them from the village. And that could mean they were in even more danger…and not just from the Cut Throats.

  “I have men searching the forest as we speak, sir,” the bald man said quickly, almost soothingly to the bigger man. “Whoever took them won’t get far, I assure you.”

  “And what am I supposed to do with these birdies, Sikes? One looks mean enough to bite a man’s prick in half, and the other could fight a bear and mother his cubs too.”

  It was debatable to which of them he was speaking about, but Darcy still prickled at the insinuation, whichever one it was. Mina was too scared to react with anything other than a sniffle.

  “This one,” the bald man, Sikes, tapped Darcy on the shoulder, “is singing about being from the Order of Shantra.”

  “And is she?” McRando demanded.

  “Seems this matches her tune,” Sikes said motioning to a Cut Throat who held up a shield with the Order’s emblem of a sun embossed on the surface.

  “Why is a member of such an esteemed order out this far from the cities?”

  “Let’s see if she sings the same song for you as she did for me,” Sikes turned to Darcy and gave her a hard glare.

  Darcy hoped she would meet or beat the Knowledge of Religion roll that had led her to convince Sikes she was an ordinary cleric, but she had the feeling it would be tough to fool the higher level and more intelligent McRando. She opened her mouth to speak, but he cut her off. “Stop. This one sang a song, but I’m interested in what the tall one has to sing. You, wild woman, tell me what you and the little one were doing out in this part of the world.”

  If Darcy could have cursed without giving them away, she would have. Barbarians had low Charisma scores, especially the default builds, and Mina didn’t know this world at all. Casting a despairing looking over her shoulder Darcy saw that Mina was sweating profusely, her brown skin turning an ashen shade.

  “S-s-sir?” Mina stammered. “I-I don’t kn-know…”

  “She’s not that bright!” Darcy interposed. “I found her in the far off lands of Yirn. She can’t read or write, and she barely speaks clearly.”

  “Shut your mouth, or I’ll put a fist in it,” McRando snapped with a flash of teeth. “Start your story, bear woman.”

  So now Darcy knew to whom he was referring earlier.

  Mina was frantic, looking between McRando and Darcy, who could only peer back with wide eyes, trying to communicate with her companion what she desperately needed to know to conjoin their stories.

  “We’re on a pilgrimage,” Mina started at last, with evident hesitation. “I’m converting.”

  With a look of contempt McRando was leaning into Mina, staring at her with his one eye as if he could tell that she was really a small Asian girl and not this Amazonian warrior. “Why would a woman of the plains want to leave her hunting grounds to join the strict and proper Shantras? Did you shame your tribe?”

  “Yes! Yes, I—uh, I killed someone!”

  Darcy gave a slight nod of encouragement; Mina was doing well.

  “Murder? I don’t know many of your people, but from what I hear, murder is a minor offense among your tribes. Who did you kill?”

  At a loss, Mina said, “My husband for cheating on me with another woman.”

  McRando’s eye narrowed. “That’s quite strange for a tribe woman to be jealous of another woman. Do the tribes not practice polygamy?”

  Mina moaned, obviously giving up and resigning herself to the fate of being murdered by bandits in a fictional world. “I don’t know…”

  “The first truth I heard from your mouth yet,” McRando growled looking between them; his face becoming more and more unhappy with what he saw.

  “She speaks well for someone of the tribe,” Sikes commented, staring at Mina with a skeptical glare. “Most of them use broken Common or point and grunt.”

  “You caught that too, eh?” McRando said. His one-eyed gaze took in Mina from her leather boots, hide armor, tanned skin, and muscular arms. “I’ve seen very few tribesmen, but none of them ever showed so much fear as this one does. They were proud, never betraying any emotion save for fury at any slight, real or imagined, or distaste for civilized folks like me.”

  Sikes gave a chuckle that ended abruptly when McRando looked across at him.

  Then the Cut Throat’s leader turned to Darcy and her heat beat faster under the gaze of that skeptical eye.

  “You’re not much different. That’s the armor and shield of the Order of Shantra, but something’s not right. She doesn’t have the …” He looked at the bald man then shook his head. “Discipline. Calm. You know, that kind of control they have.”

  Her back stiffening, Darcy found herself trying to stand straighter and more poised, but it was no use. McRando clearly had a high Perception skill.

  “She’s bad-tempered too. I wonder how could she have gotten her hands on the Order of Shantra armor without being hanged?

  “Was it just the two of them?” McRando suddenly demanded, turning a dark eye on his underling.

  “Pete says there were three with this group,” Sikes said and then lowered his eyes. “An elf, sir, but she ran away with the stranger staying in the inn.”

  “Shame, shame,” McRando said sadly, emphasizing both word. “Elves fetch a high price downriver. Bring her back alive if you find her and kill the stranger once you have the letters. As for these two, throw them into a cell. They’re hiding something, and I aim to find out what it is.”

  ***

  “We should rest,” Naomi said after coming to a sudden halt.

  Having been running to keep up with the girl’s fast gait, Sally almost barreled into her. Bending double, Sally panted through her open mouth, gulping air while her legs burned. Despite how tired she was now, she was impressed by how far and how fast she had run. It had to have been at least fifteen miles or more. Jogging around the block once had been tiresome in her old body. If she had tried running such a long stretch back then, she’d be in the hospital.

  “Alright, we can take five minutes,” Sally managed to say once she caught her breath.

  “I’m gonna need about an hour,” Naomi declared dropping onto the grass into a relaxed position. Both hands cushioned her head and one foot balanced on a knee.

  “We don’t have an hour!” Sally cried.

  They had come to a small clearing where there was a break in the branches allowing moonlight to spill across them. Naomi looked up at the moon and said, “The river’s thirty minutes away, and there are three or four hours before the sun comes up. By then, we’ll be in the caverns, and we won’t need the cover of night to hide us.”

  The Cut Throat told them about an underground river the gang used to smuggle supplies and stolen items in and out of the hideout. The cave was well hidden behind a waterfall and guarded by two or three guards.

  “But what about Darcy and Mina?”

  “They’ll be fine,” Naomi said with a wave of one hand. “The Cut Throats went to a lot of trouble taking them captive. If they were going to kill them, they would have done it back at the stables. And the Cut Throats sell people into slavery, so they might keep them alive for that.”

  It was so strange listening to Naomi speak. She looked like a teenager, but spoke like an adult who’ve seen and done it all. It made Sally feel like the kid in this partnership. “Why an hour? Why not just take five or ten minutes and be on our way?”

  Naomi sighed and rolled her eyes. “Because I need to get
my ki points back.”

  “Oh God,” Sally moaned. This was yet another characteristic of the game she had no idea about since she was a damn newb. “Forgive me for asking this, but what are ki points?”

  “It’s a Monk’s special ability,” Naomi explained, wagging the foot on her knee. “It’s like magic, but instead of spells, I do special attacks. When I knocked out that guy with one punch and fought those guys that tried to jump us, I was using ki points. I’m low right now, but I’ll get them all back if I rest for an hour. Anything can go wrong once we’re in the caverns and I want to have all my ki ready when it does.”

  Sally lowered herself into a crossed-legged sit beside Naomi. “You don’t think we’re going to succeed?”

  Naomi’s foot stopped wagging and after a moment of silence, she said, “I think we can, but it’s going to be dangerous with just level five me and level one you. I wish we could do encounters until you level up a couple of times, but I don’t think we have that kind of time.”

  As much as she didn’t want to say this, Sally felt it had to be said. “I know this is going to be really dangerous and I appreciate your help, but you don’t have to come with me if you don’t want to.”

  “No, I want to. And I have to,” Naomi tilted her head to face her. “I’m Chaotic-Good. If someone is in trouble, then I have to save them.”

  Sally wasn’t sure what Naomi was talking about, but she had a feeling it was more stuff from the game. “If I had known that this was going to happen when I logged onto the game, I never would have bought the damn thing. I only started playing because Darcy kept bugging me to do so.”

  “Darcy? That’s your sister, right?”

  “Yeah, my stepsister, but we’re pretty close. It’s not like what you see in movies or TV shows where the stepsisters are each other’s throats.” Sally hugged her legs to her chest (another feat she couldn’t pull off in her old body) and planted her chin on her knees. “We’re both gamers. I was into consoles and PC games while she was into MMOs and tabletop RPGs. She once ran a campaign that lasted nearly two years in high school. Every weekend she and her friends would gather into her game room and would play all day. Like from seven in the morning to past midnight!”