“What?” I asked.
Lady C. nodded up at the ceiling. “There’s grass…”
I glanced upward and laughed. “I guess there is, isn’t there?”
“Interesting,” she said as she skimmed through information on iNet. “I did not know this was a thing.”
“I say that almost every day in New York,” I told her. “But anyway, let’s talk about what we’re going to do next.”
“You already said that we are logging in to meet Iris.”
“No, I mean what are we going to do with Aya and Iris.”
“I didn’t tell Lady Aya,” she admitted. “I just wanted to see if it was going to happen first. And now look at me,” she said as she raised her hand, showing me her palm. “Real, at least in your world.”
“And I am real, at least in your world,” I reminded her.
“Strange, right?”
“It is definitely unorthodox. How about this? What if we call Aya here now, and get that part out of the way?”
“Sure…”
“Hold up.” I scanned through some of the information that they had provided us at NPC and Me. Rather than look through all documents, I simply did a quick search on the humandroid being able to see digital avatars. “I figured as much, but yes, you will be able to see her if I’m the one that summons the NPC.”
“This could be kind of funny,” she said, her lips lifting into a devious smile. In that moment she was all Lady C., regardless of what body she was currently in.
We hadn’t been quite intimate yet, just holding hands, but in that moment I wanted to kiss her. Instead, I placed my arm on the table, turning my hand up. Lady C. responded by placing her hand in mine.
“Let’s do it; let’s call Aya.”
“Done,” I told her as I activated the Monster Hunt app.
“What is the meaning of this?” Aya said as soon as her form took shape. She stood next to the table in full battle regalia, her legs spread wide as if she were just about to launch into an attack.
She narrowed her eyes at me.
“Hey,” I told her quietly, trying to remind her that we were in a public place, that there were other people around.
“What has happened to Lady Cassandra?” she asked. “Why is she dressed like one of you?”
“Please, sit,” Lady C. told her.
“Is this some type of joke? Goblin trickery? Iris is waiting for you, you know,” she told me. “She logged in twenty minutes ago, maybe thirty.”
The way Aya said this made me chuckle.
It was meant to be somewhat condescending, but it came off as kind of cute. And I knew Iris had logged in. It had taken Lady C. and me over an hour and a half to walk from Union Square to our current location, and in that time, Iris had contacted me, letting me know she would be logging in to train.
“Aya, relax,” I told her as she placed her hand on the dragon-faced hilt of her sword.
Lady C. smiled at her. “I’m real, Lady Aya, that’s why I’m wearing this stuff.”
“Real? Pfft! Lady Cassandra, I challenge you to a duel, so you can account for the sin of lying to a dear friend!”
“I’m not lying to you,” she said, “and I’m flattered that you think I’m a dear friend. You never expressed anything like that before.”
“Damn Unigaeans…” Aya drew her buster sword and held it at the ready. “Enough trickery. I will not be deceived by the likes of you!”
“What kind of proof do you want?” I asked her. “She’s real.”
Aya smiled. “Hmmm… okay then, throw that water into Chase’s face.”
“This water?” Lady C. asked as she raised the glass.
“Wait a minute…”
The water hit my face and Lady C. started to laugh, Aya quickly sheathing her sword and laughing alongside the Metican. It wasn’t long before the Thulean was on the ground, on her knees, laughing so hard that she was finding it hard to breathe.
“It was worth it! It was worth it…” she said until she was hoarse.
“Wait… you two planned this?” I wiped my face with my arm. A pair of teenage girls sitting next to us looked over at me. One of them scoffed as she turned away, the other one gave Lady C. a thumbs up.
“I’m encouraging you too,” Lady C. told the girl, making the thumbs up gesture back to her.
“You guys are lucky a manager hasn’t come over,” I told them as I finished wiping my face with my napkin.
“It was too good,” Aya said. “And to answer your question, Lady C. didn’t tell me that you had actually given her a robot’s body, but we had talked about it before. So there.”
“And what do you think Iris will say?” I asked, my voice lowering. I didn’t know why I was suddenly feeling guilty, aside from the fact that I usually shared everything with Iris.
“I think Chase has some explaining to do,” Aya said with a casual shrug. “But before you go, are you really going to have her wear this dress around New York?”
“We have some new clothes now.” Lady C. nodded to the bags she had sitting next to her. “I just haven’t changed yet. I wish I could just wear my armor,” she said, dropping both hands to her breasts and squeezing them. “They just don’t feel right without armor.”
“I agree, Lady Cassandra needs armor to shield her oversized mammaries. And what if she has to protect you?” Aya was leaning on her sword now as if it were a cane, which was totally not the way a weapon of such power was supposed to be handled.
“She isn’t going to have to protect me. Let’s just…” I nodded, settling on my decision. “Let’s just go to Iris’ place and surprise her.”
“It is going to be quite the surprise,” Aya said.
“I’m sure she’ll be cool with it.”
Chapter Seven: Flaming Hot Sauce
Just to get revenge on Aya and Lady C., I took the UberLyft rideshare over to Iris’ flat. Lady C. sat up front and since this was a self-driven vehicle, I actually sat in the driver’s seat, a passenger in back next to Aya.
She didn’t like the guy either, calling him every Thulean curse word in the book.
The vehicle landed and we got out. I made my way up the stoop to Iris’ front door and let myself in, tiptoeing even though it didn’t matter if I was quiet or not.
Iris was clearly logged in, lying on her futon, so I decided against telling her about my latest purchase, not until after the tournament.
“She’s going to figure it out anyway,” said Lady C. “She’s probably wondering where I am, and why I’m not training with her.”
“Wrong,” said Aya. “She is training right now, or at least she was before I left, with Fujin and Sun Wukong. They are not going light on her either, which is good, the little guitar playing girl rocker needs to toughen up. Also, I’m not saying she is little, I’m saying the guitar she plays is little. But she is little too.”
“It is called a ukulele,” I told her. “But that is beside the point. We need to focus on the tournament, and we can go from there. I will tell her before we log out later.”
“It sounds to me like you really don’t want to tell her,” Aya said in a teasing voice.
“It’s not that big of a deal, well, I guess I do mean it like that. I just don’t want to bother her right now while she’s getting into the zone. If it comes up, I’ll tell her; if not, I’ll tell her before we log out.” I looked to Lady C. for some type of support, but all she offered me was a shrug.
“I’m sure it’ll be okay,” the Metican said as she sat in one of the dining room chairs. “I can send myself back, unless you want to.”
“Send yourself; it’s fine,” I said. “I have to get ready to log in anyway. Bye, Aya.” And before the Thulean could come back with something snappy, I sent her to the Proxima Galaxy.
Once Lady C. deactivated, I went to the restroom, took one look at myself in the mirror, and ran my hand through my dark hair.
After a deep breath in, I stepped back into the main room and went over to Iris’
futon, where there was a space set up for me, as well as an NV Visor.
I laid down next to her and brought the visor over my eyes, all geared up and ready to go. I knew things were about to get interesting once I heard the Brian Eno tone, and it wasn’t long before my avatar took its form in EverLife.
“It is about time you joined us,” Aya said, giving me a playful grin. She was leaning on her sword again as she had been back at the restaurant. Lady C. was next to her, both blades drawn, striking them against one another and creating sparks.
She flourished her blades and sheathed them, her arms coming over her chest.
“That was awesome,” I told her as I waved to Iris.
My counterpart fired her ukulele at a few dark clouds over our practice field. In the distance I could see the meadow, cast in purple light emanating from the top of the Steeple, and beyond that the body of the world serpent that wrapped around our dojo space.
“What did I miss?”
“Lots of training,” Iris said, sweat on her brow, “but it’s okay. I finally got the tournament details,” she said as her ukulele disappeared. “Ready to hear them?”
“Definitely.”
Spew Gorge approached in a heated argument with his uncle (or father).
“Fick you, Hiccup, I’m not fickin’ sticking anything up there, especially for your fickered addict ass, you fickered, ficked up, fick-faced ficktwat!”
“Fick-faced ficktwat? Fick, Spewy, fick!” The goblin with the mechanical arm and the pink topknot threw his arms up, letting out a squealer in the process. “Copyright fickin’ infringement over here, fickers. That’s my fickin’ phrase and you fickin’ know it! Fick. You know what? Fine. Fickin’ fine. If you don’t want to store a couple of dime bags of wizardous in your fickhole, fine, I get it. Fick! But when I get that shit smuggled here, and I fickin’ sell all of it out of the back of the dojo, all that shit is mine. Got that? All the money!”
“I don’t want your fickin’ money!”
“Like fick you don’t!” Hiccup spotted me and his eyes went wide. “Fick, the weird ficker with the emo haircut and the glasses is back. Not Marbles, that’s his name. Okay, play it cool, Spewy, there is nothing suspicious about our conversation. Totally legal, totally fickin’ cool.”
“Hi,” I started to say to the goblin.
“You come back from Tokyo and all you can tell me is ‘hi?’”
“Tokyo?” I exchanged glances with Iris.
“Fick yes, Not Marbles, fickin’ Tokyo. Remember? I’ve been there before.”
“Not Marbles?” I asked the cantankerous goblin, whose tunic was a size small, revealing a hairy green gut with a barbeque stain beneath his belly button.
Iris started to laugh. “Marbles… Marbles… Ryuk, right? You mean Ryuk, from the Mitherfickers? That’s who you used to call Marbles.”
“I fickin’ came up with that name, lady!” Hiccup’s eyes glazed over. “Shit, I mean, fick. Where the fick am I? Why are the stars all twinkly and purpley? Who the fick let Liz Squared join our guild?” he asked, nodding at Aya. “What would be a fickin’ good nickname for Glasses over here?”
“Good for nothing goblin,” Aya said, lifting her blade. “Riptak jatla blanktakh boomboom morrha!”
“Weapons up, Spewy, the lizard called my mom, your grannie, a fickin’ whore and them’s fighting words!”
A short battle ax appeared in the goblin’s mechanical hand, a shield on his other arm. He smacked the axe against the shield, growling, spitting and hissing in Aya’s direction.
“No fighting,” I said as I stepped between them. “Hiccup, we were about to go to a tournament, so if you have something useful to share with us, um, go ahead and do so. If not, we need to get back to training.”
Hiccup shot me an incredulous look. “I see what’s going on here. I see. Your little group here is plotting to overthrow the Kingdom Ignis government.” He offered us a satisfied grunt as his axe disappeared. “Then I am fickin’ in! Fick yeah!”
“What? We’re not planning anything like that.”
Fujin and Sun Wukong came forward, Sun twirling his staff once before it disappeared.
“What in the wuxia-fick are these two xianxia fickers doing here? Say, isn’t one of them the chef?” he asked Spew Gorge.
The younger goblin approached me, pulling me off to the side as Hiccup continued to ask crazy questions.
“Sorry, Alpha,” Spew Gorge grunted, “he has been suffering from fickin’ dementia my entire fickin’ life. It comes and it goes, but sometimes it is fickin’ annoying.”
“That’s fine,” I told the smaller goblin. “But why did you two come over here in the first place? Just checking out the action?”
“Fick, no. He wanted to tell you about his idea.”
“What idea is that?” I asked loud enough so that Hiccup would hear me. I looked to Iris for an answer and she shook her head.
“Fickin’ right I have a good idea,” Hiccup said, a look of cognizance coming over his face. “Now what the fick was it… Ah, fick, that’s right! I see that you are creating a troll army. And let me guess, you have some fickered chicklefick you plan to sic your trolls on, right?”
“Actually, yes,” I told him.
“Good,” he grunted as he scratched his balls, “good. And that shed over there can fickin’ replicate shit, right?” He pointed his mechanical finger at the shed.
“That’s right.”
Hiccup started pacing, stroking a beard that he didn’t have. “Okay, let me handle this then. Wait, fick, before we make a deal, do you promise to make a deal?”
“Come again?”
“If I fickin’ scratch your chalupa, you’ll fickin’ scratch mine, right?”
“Right, um, sure,” I said, ignoring the snarky grin Iris was giving me.
“Good, then fickin’ check this out.” A small bottle of hot sauce took shape in his grimy hand. He showed me the bottle, proud as ever.
“Goblins,” Aya told Lady C., “you really can’t trust them for anything.”
“I’m going to ignore the fickin’ racism while I show you what this shit does,” he said, uncapping the bottle. “Long story long, there was this fickin’ orclin chef named Og Lemon, and he invented this hot sauce, called HotAzz Ballz sauce. Also, fick that guy.”
“HotAzz Ballz sauce?” Iris asked. “You’re being serious?”
“Of course I’m serious!” Hiccup said through gritted teeth. “Just a quick fickin’ swig of this and…” He glanced around in a conspiratorial manner. “No one’s listening, are they?”
“We are listening,” I told the goblin.
“I am listening,” Aya said with a groan.
“I can hear you, Hiccup,” said Lady C.
Both Sun Wukong and Fujin nodded.
“Great, Warrior Barbie, Crouching Tiger and Hidden Dragon, and Liz Squared…” He snorted. “Good, good. Okay, that’s okay. Look, kid, one swig of this and shit gets real fickin’ ugly. Stand the fick back, Spewy.”
Hiccup took a quick swig from the bottle and paused a moment, his cheeks turning flush. He turned to his right and burped, a great ball of fire coming out of his mouth, nearly igniting Spew Gorge’s tunic.
“Fick, Hiccup!”
“Fick!” Hiccup burped, another ball of fire spraying from his lips and burning the grass. “Get me some... yoy! Yoy! Get me some fickin’ water, Liz Squared, use your fickin’ ghost limbs! Potion!” He coughed up another fireball. “Yoooouch!”
Eventually, he quit burping up flames, and once it was safe to approach us, he did so proudly, holding his bottle of HotAzz Ballz sauce in one hand, a healing potion in the other.
“So my plan is simple,” he said, his voice a bit scratchy now, “I mean our plan. We give each of the trolls a bottle of this, they go on the fickin’ attack, and boom! Now we have a hoard of fickin’ fire breathing fickboy trolls, if you get my fickin’ drift. It’ll be fickin’ great!”
I turned to Iris. “Actually, that is pretty fu
nny. A little evil, but funny. Where is Altsoba?” I asked Aya.
Sun Wukong’s form melted away, revealing that he had been Altsoba all along.
Of course, this startled Hiccup, causing him to jump backward and let out one more burp, the flames scorching the ground in front of me.
“Fick! I fickin’ told you the wuxia guy was in the kitchen!” Hiccup told his counterpart.
“He has a fickin’ name, Hiccup!”
“Fick me,” Hiccup said, chugging his healing potion. “Fick me in the bloody fickhole.”
“Come with me,” Altsoba told the two goblins, “and we will start replicating this bottle of hot sauce. Then we will distribute them to the trolls. Fire-breathing trolls sounds like a brilliant idea.”
“Fick yeah!” Hiccup said as he walked away.
Aya sighed deeply once he was gone. “Why did we let him join the Guild?”
“Because we are all at a higher level now, and he has dementia, so be nice to him,” I told the Thulean.
Lady C. started to laugh. “I seriously thought he was going to set you on fire there for a moment, Chase. That would have been terrible. But I’m sure I could have put you out with my Bomb Cyclone spell.”
“Thanks for not casting a spell on me,” I said as I returned my attention to Iris. “Sorry for all that. You were saying that you now have the tournament set up, right?”
“Right. I’ll go over it briefly. It is a little confusing how they have it set up,” she explained, “but basically, they can’t use a classic bracket because of the fact there are twelve kingdoms, so what they have us doing first is a test match. This will pit us against one of the kingdoms, but whoever loses doesn’t actually lose. They just gain a disadvantage in the actual first round.”
“Okay. That sort of makes sense.”
“Basically, we want to win the test round because that will give us an advantage in the actual first round.”
“Okay test round, first round, second round and a third round. So four battles, right?”
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