Zaa, apparently. She grimaced as she sat up on the couch and yawned. The glare of LED street lights pushed through a gap in her blinds, casting a bar of light across her kitchen. Shuffling to the cabinets, she pulled open an interface to message Emerson. The messaging window appeared, a translucent projection across her vision. That, at least, was nice. They no longer had to hide their communication from E-Squared—the showdown with Penelope had brought the whole thing with Zaa into the light, absolving Emerson of the misunderstanding that had led to his forced "vacation." Confining their communication to old-style devices had been inconvenient.
She raised her eyebrows to see that he'd left her a string of messages during her play session. With a pang of guilt, she recalled having suppressed notifications from her messaging app before logging in. There was enough to worry about with Relic Online without notes from her programmer friend reminding her of the dangers.
Hey, Devon? How's your schedule looking?
You there?
Sorry, I saw you listed as online, but it doesn't seem like you're getting these.
Hey, so...okay, sorry for the spam. But when you see this, can you let me know your availability?
Tomorrow I mean.
That's Tuesday.
Still spamming. Stop it Emerson.
Uh, did I send that last one? I was talking to myself. Okay. Let me know.
Laughing, Devon subvocalized a response.
"As in, when am I planning to be playing versus sustaining my physical body with whatever I can scrounge from my pantry? I don't have any solid plans. Why?"
She hit send, eying the kitchen cabinets and counter. Unfortunately, scrounge was a rather good description of her foraging status. As usual, she'd botched her grocery order, forgetting to get it in by the deadline, and the sad remnants of her stock weren't very appetizing. She pulled a box of stale cookies from the "treats" cabinet and nibbled one while searching the fridge.
Another message came in while she was prying the lid off a container of cottage cheese. She grimaced. Scratch that. She clamped the lid back onto the container of what had once been cottage cheese.
We've got some clarity on next steps with Zaa. Can I buy you lunch?
She wrinkled her nose as the smell from the revolting contents of the container belatedly reached her face, and nudged the fridge shut with a knee.
"Lunch? You mean here?" she muttered into the interface.
Well, not at your house unless you prefer takeout. Want to go back to that noodle place?
"Where you gave me the job offer? Can you back up a second? I’m confused. Are you coming to St. George?"
Yes. I'm in the Vegas hyperloop station now.
Devon aimed the cottage cheese for the trashcan and threw.
Unfortunately, she often forgot that even her mediocre in-game Agility score was better than her real-life super-klutz status. She groaned in dismay when the container hit the wall, opened, and splatted moldy curds and fetid water over the paint. Clumps of furry cheese started sliding toward the floor.
"Sure. Lunch is good."
Okay then. I'll see you. 12:00? Oh, and nice chat.
Bye.
Let me know if 12 doesn't work.
She sulked to the sink and wet down a rag. Maybe it was time to get a housekeeper or a cleaning robot or something. "Twelve is fine. See you then."
***
Standing outside Tamara’s parents’ door, Devon fought the guilty feeling that she should be in-game. Between this visit to her friend and the lunch meeting with Emerson, Stonehaven would be left to fend for itself or something like thirty-six in-game hours. It was a relief to know that Hailey and Chen were back and would surely jump in and help with defenses, but she still would have felt better being there to deal with anything that came up.
Tamara’s mother, Lillian, opened the door within seconds of Devon’s knock. Her face lit up to see Devon on the doorstep.
“She’s out back. Walking laps in the yard.”
Devon shook her head. Laps. That was just like Tamara. Following Lillian through the family home, Devon glanced at what had to be two or three dozen framed photo montages armoring the walls. Tamara’s parents had every school photo from kindergarten to high school graduation tiled along the corridor door leading to the back door. What would it have been like to grow up with someone waiting at the door when the school bus dropped her off? To have someone snatch away the folder of overpriced portraits sent home by the teacher, ready to slip the newest 8x11” print into a matching frame to reverently hang with the others?
Devon’s mother had always curled her lip in disgust when the school had sent the price sheet home. When it came time for picture day, Devon had always lined up to file into the gym-turned-portrait-studio empty-handed while the other kids fanned themselves with the order forms filled out and sent in by their parents. The school had insisted on taking her picture anyway for their records, so she hadn’t even been able to skip the prolonged humiliation by hanging out in the classroom. She’d had no choice but to stand there and broadcast to everyone around that no one loved her enough to want her picture.
She took a shaky breath. Tamara’s family had accepted her with open arms, inviting her to dinners and treating her like a second child when she was visiting. Sometimes, the understanding of everything she’d missed made it harder to avoid feeling bitter and betrayed by her actual mother. She was grateful all the same. It was nice to be accepted.
“Hey!” Tamara said as Devon stepped into the shade of the backyard. A six-foot privacy fence surrounded an area landscaped with crushed stone, flagstone paths, and hardy desert plants. Oxygen bottle in a small backpack, Tamara appeared to be walking a sort of circuit along the paths.
“Didn’t the doctors say you should limit activity?” Devon took a seat on a small polished-concrete bench.
“This isn’t activity. This is sanity maintenance. Anyway, I figure if I give what’s left of my lungs a bit of a workout, it will make them stronger.”
Planting her hands on the cool surface of the bench, Devon shrugged. “If you say so.”
“How’s life?” Tamara asked. Aside from the oxygen-holding backpack, she wore her usual outdoorsy-person uniform. Climate-control tech fabrics, hiking boots, and a beanie as a nod to the December temperatures. Even late morning in Utah’s banana belt, the temperature was brisk at best.
Devon shivered as the cold from the bench started to seep through her pants. “Pretty good, I guess. Just working mostly.”
Tamara smirked as she reached an intersection of the flagstone paths and turned to patrol in a new direction. “You know, after all this time, I still think it’s weird to hear you call what you do a job.”
“Well, to tell the truth, it feels weird to say it. Mostly it feels like living my other life. Seriously though, Tam, are you sure it’s a good idea to be out here wandering around?”
“You sound like my parents. I’m twenty-five, and the most over-protected person in St. George.” She smiled to show she wasn’t upset. “But yes, seriously, I do think it’s the best thing. I’ve been thinking a lot about your suggestion that I get the implants and try out Relic Online. I may never get healthy enough to ride a bike again, but if I get my lungs in better shape, I’ll at least become a better candidate for implant surgery.”
Devon hesitated. “I thought you’d gotten some good news about stem cell therapy to regrow the tissue you lost.”
The shadow that crossed Tamara’s features was such a rare expression compared to the woman’s usual optimism that Devon immediately wished she could take her words back.
“Given my reaction to the nano surgeons, the doctors don’t think I’m a candidate.”
“Shit. I’m sorry.”
Tamara shrugged. “Yeah. Sucks.”
Winter silence hung in the yard while Tamara’s crunching footsteps approached another intersection of paths. She turned onto one that headed toward Devon’s bench. U
sing Devon’s shoulder as a crutch, she lowered herself to a seat. A little actuator in her oxygen system clicked as it delivered another little burst through the tube that ran to her nostrils.
“I appreciate you coming to visit,” Tamara said after a while. “It’s kind of weird living back in my parents’ house. People aren’t as keen to hang out here as my old apartment.”
“Of course. Your parents are great, but even if they were total jerks, I’d still want to come see you. Did you start work again yet?”
“Just one shift a week. It’s nice to be doing something, but everyone tiptoes around me like I’m in mourning. It’s like they don’t want to speak too loudly for fear of setting off tears. I get it. Working in a mountain bike shop pretty much means the main thing you care about is riding. My situation is pretty much their worst fear.”
Devon nodded. “Think you’ll stay there?”
“I don’t know. I don’t want to go back to the Annie Oakley gig. Not sure I could pull it off with an oxygen rig anyway. I know my dad wants to retire, and even though my mom will probably want to keep writing until she keels over, I can’t stay a financial burden on them.”
Devon leaned closer to her friend, offering unspoken support.
“But I did have an idea,” Tamara said quietly, almost as if shy.
“Oh?”
“I’ve been thinking about it ever since you mentioned the implants.”
Devon felt a pang of worry, hoping Tamara wasn’t going to ask for a job as a professional gamer. Devon figured she had a minor amount of pull with E-Squared after helping track down the issue with Zaa, but she doubted it would cover the company hiring a full-on newb as a salaried player.
Tamara glanced at Devon as if waiting for a reaction. It took everything Devon had to keep a straight face.
“Here’s the thing,” Tamara said. “Your mention of crafting some kind of mountain bike and making the first bona fide crossing of a continent got me thinking. My sponsor has actually been pretty cool with the injury. There’s no reason for them to send me any more bike hardware, obviously, but they’ve been tossing down a few T-shirts and fleeces. I think they’re keeping me on due to guilt more than anything, but I’m not complaining.”
Devon smirked. Yeah, she could imagine that. Just a few months after adding Tamara to their list of sponsored athletes, she’d gone off the drop that had left her with a shredded lung and ruptured spleen, which had then led to an adverse reaction to the infusion of nano-surgeons the doctors had given her for organ repair. It wasn’t the sponsor’s fault that Tamara had pushed herself too hard too fast. But if nothing else, it made for good PR to keep her on the roster for a while.
“There’s some unpleasant stuff going on in the game world right now,” Devon said. “It might be a while before a continental traverse is feasible.”
“Well, obviously I’ve got a while before I’m shipshape for surgery anyway. But I thought I could start putting out feelers with my sponsor. I don’t know that much about gaming, but isn’t sensory streaming a pretty big thing? I think they might foot the bill for the implant surgery and maybe even give me a bit of cash in exchange for streaming my experience.”
Devon gave a quiet laugh. “You should meet my friend Hailey. I think you guys would hit it off.”
“Is she here? In St. George, I mean?”
“Nah. More of an inside joke anyway. I got pretty pissed at her for streaming something that was supposed to be a private adventure a while ago. But that’s her thing. Streaming.”
Tamara nodded. “Got it. Anyway, I was thinking the plan would work best if my sponsor and E-Squared had some kind of partnership for marketing the stream. You know, benefits both of them and such.”
Devon clasped her hands together, a bit unsure what to say. She had no idea whether the gaming company would go for it. This sort of thing, using people as marketing assets, was way outside her realm of thought.
“You think you might be able to feel it out?” Tamara asked.
Devon took a deep breath. “I…I’m not sure I’m the best person to propose something like that. I mean, I would probably still be running tours at Fort Kolob if Emerson hadn’t approached me.”
“Yeah, but you have the connection now.” Tamara held herself stiffly, expectant.
Devon swallowed. Tamara needed this. She’d just have to figure out how to do it. “Okay. I’ll start feeling it out. But it will go better once we resolve this issue with the demon invasion.”
“A demon invasion, huh?” Tamara laughed. “The kinds of things you do for work…”
Looking away to keep her reaction from showing, Devon nodded. Her friend had no way to know how serious the problem was, and she couldn’t exactly blab about how Zaa had invaded players’ brains. Even Tamara might accidentally spill the story to someone who would take it public.
“Speaking of work,” Devon said. “I have a lunch meeting.”
“Perfect! Let me know how they respond about the dual sponsorship thing.”
***
“Different scene this time of day, huh?”
Emerson jumped when she spoke. His fork went skittering off the table. After recovering, he stared at her, frozen for a moment, before seeming to snap out of it. A smile flickered and died. “You startled me. Obviously.”
Devon laughed. “Well, it’s good to be on your toes I guess. You never know when the assassins will find you.” She glanced again at the empty restaurant, the clutter of Southeast Asian decorations looking a little shabbier in the daylight. The place needed a good dusting. But the food smelled just as delicious as it had on the evening nine or ten months ago when she’d nervously pushed through the glass door and sat down to hear Emerson’s pitch about bringing her on as a salaried player.
Sometimes it was hard to believe how much her life had changed since then.
Emerson managed to collect himself, then he took a napkin off of his lap and stood. He clapped his hands against his thighs in that “well, here we are” gesture that people made when they didn’t know what to say. After that, he spread his arms like maybe he was going to hug her but quickly shifted his pose and stuck out a hand.
“Good to see you too,” Devon said with a smirk.
He cleared his throat and scratched the back of his neck and sat down. “Lunch is on Bradley Williams, by the way.”
Devon’s lips stretched in a wide grin. “In that case, there’s a really nice steakhouse up on Bluff Street…”
His eyes widened. “I’m sorry, do you want to go somewhere else?”
She shook her head. “I’m just kidding. You must have had a long trip. How was Las Vegas?”
“Fortunately, I was only there long enough to catch the autobus to St. George and watch that place fade into the distance. Hate all the noise.”
“Wait,” she said as she took a seat opposite him, “I thought you were arriving this morning.”
He shook his head. “I stayed in a hotel about a block away last night.”
“Oh. I didn’t know. You should have dropped a line.”
He looked surprised at that, but maybe that was her imagination. Abruptly, Devon realized that might have come out wrong. Had it sounded like she was inviting him to stay at her place? No. Even if she had been, Emerson never would have taken it that way. He didn’t really seem like the kind of guy who made assumptions about female attention. In fact, it was kind of hard to imagine him on a date. Of course, given the direction of her love life over the past few years, anyone who knew her would likely say the exact same thing.
She dragged her thoughts back to the conversation. “I mean, we could have talked last night, and you wouldn’t have had to hang out in St. George all morning waiting for me.”
He fiddled with the Asian soup spoon beside his place setting. “It’s okay. I…” He shrugged. “It’s nice to get out of Arizona anyway.”
“So,” she said, opening the menu, “any suggestions on something expensi
ve that doesn’t have mystery meat? After seeing Bradley’s office furnishings, I’m happy to spend his money.”
Emerson grinned, apparently relaxed by the comment. “Not a clue. I usually just pick at random.”
“Roll a d20 and order whatever number comes up?”
“Huh?”
She laughed. “Never mind. It’s a gamer joke, but I’m honestly not sure where it came from.”
Understanding seemed to dawn on his face. “Actually…d20. I think I know. It’s from pen and paper RPGs. Some of the datasets we used to seed Veia’s world generation included rules and game content available through Creative Commons for some of those old games.”
“Oh, like Dungeons & Dragons.”
“Yeah, exactly.”
“Huh…” Devon said. “I always wondered but never bothered to google the whole d20 thing. Thanks!”
He blushed a bit. “No problem.”
Slightly raised voices from just inside the kitchen caught Devon’s attention. An older man wearing a chef’s apron spoke sharply to a teenage girl who, judging by their appearances, Devon guessed was his daughter. The girl sighed heavily and shuffled toward Devon and Emerson’s table. When she drew near, she dragged a tablet and stylus from pockets on her apron and fixed Devon with a bored expression.
Devon picked up the menu, starting a quick scan for something pricey.
“When is your surgery scheduled?” Emerson asked casually.
“Huh?” Devon asked.
“Not you. Her.”
Devon snapped her eyes to the man, somewhat aghast. That wasn’t really the sort of question you asked a stranger. Moments later it dawned on her to wonder why he would know such a thing about the server anyway. Apparently, the young woman was wondering the same thing because she stood there blinking in confusion.
Emerson reached up and touched the back of his neck, then lifted the short fringe of hair that covered the subdermal ridges and exposed circuitry of his Entwined implants. Finally understanding, Devon glanced at the girl’s neck and noticed tattooed lines where the biocompatible precursors to the final implants had been injected beneath the surface of her skin. All at once, her heart went out to the young woman. If she were to guess, the father disapproved of the girl’s plan, and was possibly even trying to prohibit the final installation.
Citadel of Smoke: A LitRPG and GameLit Adventure (Stonehaven League Book 4) Page 7
