by Natalie Grey
“Argued against what?” Jay asked carefully. His voice was impressively even. Probably too even, truth be told.
Sam swallowed. “They’re banning that woman from the game,” he said finally. “For ranking manipulation.”
Chapter Seventeen
“Jay, think about this,” Sam pleaded as Jay strode down the hallway. “They left ten minutes ago. You’re probably not going to catch them anyway, and it’s better that way.”
“Oh, yeah?” Jay spared him a glance. “That’s why you didn’t tell me, huh?” His voice was bitter.
“No,” Sam said. He cleared his throat. “I may not play the game much, Jay, but I know better than to interrupt someone in the middle of a boss fight.”
Jay gave a grunt. Sam had made a good point, but he hated to admit that right about now.
Dan was still in the lobby talking to one of the higher-ups Jay didn’t know so well, and Sam made a last futile grab at Jay’s arm. “Please, man, just go home. Sleep on it, and if you’re still angry tomorrow—”
“Tomorrow, after she’s logged in and her character’s already gone?”
“Jay—”
“No. This is wrong.” Jay ran his hands through his hair. “I can’t believe I have to explain this to people! She didn’t engage in rank manipulation. You know that. They know that! So why are they throwing her under the bus?”
“We’re not,” said a new voice. Jay stiffened, and Sam’s eyes closed briefly. Dan came to stand next to them. He looked at Jay somewhat owlishly.
“You’re banning her,” Jay said. “A permanent ban.”
“Yes.” Dan said nothing else.
“Forgive me, but how is that not throwing her under the bus? You’re going to make a statement about it, right? She won’t be able to play anymore, right? And she didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Do you know that for a fact?” Dan asked.
“Yes!”
“Really? How?” One might have mistaken his interest for something genuine—except, of course, that he knew Jay couldn’t prove it. When Jay said nothing, Dan said, “You’ve spent some time in-game with her. That does not prove she isn’t working with Harry.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake, she’s not working with Harry!”
“You cannot possibly know that,” Dan said simply. “We have a character we cannot delete, hooked into a quest we cannot find or control, wreaking havoc on our ratings and throwing our sponsorships and game mechanics into doubt. Do you know what happens if people stop trusting that, Jay? It’s very simple: we lose the sponsorships. We become another failed, corrupt company.”
Jay said nothing. The blood was pounding in his ears and he wanted to say something, but he was finding it difficult to do so in the face of Dan’s earnest, quiet demeanor.
“The whole thing reeks of Harry,” Dan said. “You know that as well as I do. It’s why you suggested to us that he might be responsible for it in the first place. Frankly, I think it’s a tossup whether she’s his accomplice or just an unwitting pawn, but either way, we have someone taking advantage of an opportunity others don’t have.”
“That’s not true,” Jay pointed out at once. “Any player could have turned in that quest. She was just the first one to do so. I told that riddle to a lot of players.”
“Yes, and we’re never going to figure out who edited the Hill Warden script to put that in.” Dan dropped his head into his hands and scratched his scalp despairing. “God, this is a mess.”
“A mess with someone involved who didn’t do anything wrong—”
Quick footsteps sounded nearby. Sam grabbed Jay’s arm to cut him off, and a moment later, Dhruv appeared. He looked surly.
“I can’t delete the account,” he said. “There’s no way to ban it. It is hooked into the game.”
Jay tried to hide a snort and didn’t manage to do so. Dan and Dhruv both rounded on him, furious, as Sam gave a despairing groan.
“Oh, come on,” Jay said, annoyed now. “What do you want me to say? You were going to take the quick, dirty way out. Turns out you can’t. It’s hard to act like this is some great tragedy and you’ve been wronged by the universe.”
Dhruv’s face went cold.
“Uh, Jay?” Sam cleared his throat.
“What?” Jay looked at him. “You want me to act like I’m sad about them not being able to delete this account and ban her for something they know she didn’t do?” He held up a hand before Dan could start. “I know, I know, I can’t prove she didn’t do it. But you can’t prove she did, and I think you know she didn’t.”
Dan said nothing.
“You’ll help us,” Dhruv said abruptly.
“Excuse me?” He couldn’t have heard that right.
“You found pieces of the quest before,” Dhruv said. “We couldn’t have duplicated that research. You can figure out what’s wrong with her character. Fix it, or if you can’t, make it go away.”
There was a pause. Everyone stared at Jay expectantly, and he stared back with the realization that they actually expected him to say yes. This was unbelievable.
“No.”
Dan rubbed his forehead and sighed.
“Jay.” Sam gave him one last chance. “Why don’t you want to do this?”
It was an offering, and Jay took it—but not the way Sam clearly hoped. “Because I don’t think this is a glitch,” he said far too honestly. “I think this is a world with myths and legends where doing the right thing is rewarded, the way it should be. And now there’s a quest that does that. I’m watching someone bring people together, forge a community, and help this world—and I like that. Not only am I not willing to punish her for something Harry did, but I also don’t even think I dislike the quest.”
If he had hoped for a receptive audience, he’d hoped in vain.
“Then you’re fired,” Dhruv said unceremoniously. “Give me your badge.”
“Whoa, now,” Sam started. He cut off when Jay put a hand on his arm.
Jay unclipped his employee badge and held it out. “Oh, and one more thing.” Dan and Dhruv looked at him warily, and it was hard for Jay not to smile. “You ban her, and I’ll spill all of this.”
“Your employment contract specifically forbids—”
“Yeah, so you’ll sue me,” Jay said. He couldn’t stop the grin now. “But you won’t be able to get that genie back in the bottle, gentlemen, so think carefully.”
He strode away without another word to Sam, but a few blocks away, he stopped to send a text:
Sorry to dump that on you and leave without a goodbye. You deserve better than to get tarred and feathered for my mistake. Just throw me under the bus, okay? You did tell me not to do it.
Sam clearly started typing and then stopped again more than once. Finally, the message came back simply:
Tell me if you need anything, Jay.
I will. Jay put his hands in his pockets and kept walking, trying not to let doubt creep in.
It wasn’t long into her shift before Vince showed up. Gracie scanned the area for potential players before looking at him.
“What can I do for you, Mr. Wallace?” She kept her tone irreproachable, but she knew there was a bite to it.
“We received a complaint about you,” Vince said. His face didn’t flicker when Grace’s jaw dropped.
“Not possible,” Gracie said at once. “The only people who leave my table angry are the really belligerent drunks, and everyone has those—and I have fewer than other people!”
“It wasn’t a customer,” Vince said. “Precisely. It was someone from the Bellagio, who passed along as a favor to us the fact that you were advertising your association with the Torrino and behaving inappropriately in public.”
For a moment, the sheer inanity of that choked Gracie silent. The cocktail waitresses at the Torino wore skirts that qualified more as belts. There were burlesque shows in some of the halls. This was Vegas, for crying out loud. Complaining about it being inappropriate was patently absurd.
/> Then it hit her.
She knew exactly who had filed this complaint. “You mean Kyle Johnson, don’t you?”
Vince gave a nod. “Apparently, you were very rude to Mr. Johnson the other night. Now, he’s prepared to let this go with an apology. In fact, made it very clear that he was not asking us to fire you.”
“Of course he wasn’t,” Gracie said. “Which neither of you believes, but which allows him to plausibly play the part of the reasonable, gracious man when we all know a gracious man would have asked for an apology in public—”
“Ms. King—”
“I’m not finished,” Gracie said. “A gracious man would only have asked for an apology where one was warranted, not stood me up. Not insulted me multiple times. If you want someone who is behaving inappropriately, look at Mr. Johnson. All I did was refuse to put up with him.”
Vince looked at her; just looked. Gracie lifted her chin and looked back. If he thought he was going to wait her out until she cracked and said she was wrong, he was badly mistaken.
She won…after a fashion. Vince sighed. It was delicate, far too delicate for a man of his size. Clearly a fake sigh.
“I hoped I would not have to explain this to you, Ms. King. An adult should know there are certain rules in the world. One of those rules is that social status confers certain benefits. Mr. Johnson is a well-respected member of—”
“Oh, please.” Gracie shook her head. “Spare me the, ‘I don’t make the rules’ speech, Mr. Wallace. I got that the other night from Mr. Johnson while he was defending the fact that he was insulting me. You don’t actually have to take the easy way out and do the wrong thing. You know that, right? You’re choosing to.” She cleared her hands for the camera and unclipped her badge from her waist. “So let me demonstrate for you. Kyle has put together a lovely catch-22 where I’d have to either lie and humiliate myself or get fired. I’m choosing not to lie and humiliate myself. Walk me out.”
She hoped she saw a flicker of something in his eyes, but she knew that was just wishful thinking. Vince wasn’t going to feel bad about this. He probably wasn’t even going to remember it.
As Gracie walked out into the sunshine, divested of her badge and her brocade vest, she squinted at the fountains she so loved to watch, then set off determinedly in the other direction.
Somewhere along the way, the glitz and glamor had worn off. This city wasn’t anything but—
But the real world. The real world looked like this everywhere. Gracie realized, to her horror, that her eyes were prickling with tears. She hated crying.
It wasn’t that Las Vegas had stopped being the city she genuinely loved. It was just that it had decided to spit her out.
Well, fuck life. She would beat life inside a virtual one or die (probably lots of times) trying.
Chapter Eighteen
“Gracie?” Alex looked worried as he came out into the lobby. “What’s going on? What’s up?”
“I…” Gracie felt the tears starting to break through. When she’d left the Strip, she’d been full of purpose, but as her anger bled away on the drive toward home, she’d wanted anything other than to go back to an empty apartment.
An apartment she probably couldn’t afford anymore, truth be told.
She wished she hadn’t come to see Alex, of all people, but she hadn’t managed to make any other real friends since working here.
“Gracie?”
“I thought you might want to go to lunch.” She wasn’t going to fall apart here.
“Yeah, I saw your text right before Jen told me you were here.” Alex nodded at the receptionist, a perfectly-coifed woman with equally perfect makeup. Gracie had no doubt that she was intended to warm up the Vegas higher-ups who did their taxes here, but when Gracie arrived, Jen had seemed to understand that Gracie was about five seconds from bursting into tears and had given her a smile that was jarringly genuine.
Now she smiled at Alex. “She’s a lunch meeting,” she said meaningfully and pointed at her computer.
“You’re a dream, Jen.” Alex gave her a nod. “I’ll bring you something back.” He held the door open for Gracie to go out into the sunshine, and led her along the sidewalk for a bit in silence.
“I got fired,” Gracie said finally. At her side, she saw Alex stop, and when she looked up at him, she saw that he looked worried. “All right,” she admitted, “I quit.”
To her surprise, Alex’s face split into a grin. “That’s my girl.” He clapped her on the shoulder. “That calls for a proper celebration, then. Let’s go get a beer.”
“A celebration?” Gracie scrambled after him. “Alex, I was already not going to make rent this month, and that was even before I gave that douche $100—”
“I got a bonus the size of Chuck Norris’ balls for my work on that one project,” Alex said, unconcerned. “Plus, last I saw, you were making a tidy amount per day by having that rank.” He opened the door to a dimly lit restaurant, and they followed the host to a table. As they sat, however, Alex raised an eyebrow. “But what’s this about $100?”
“Ugh.” Gracie gave a brief recap of the date, only to have Alex laughing by the end of it. “It’s not funny!”
“Okay, it’s not funny, but can you imagine how he felt?” Alex grinned at her and took out his ID. “Come on, pick a beer.”
Gracie scanned the list. “Ever heard of Surly Brewery?”
“Nope.”
“Well, I like the sound of Todd the Axe Man right about now, so I’m gonna try that.” Gracie fished out her own ID as Alex flagged down their waitress, and they both ordered. “And about Kyle—”
Alex guffawed. “Bet it stopped him in his tracks. He’s used to throwing his money around and having that work for him. And it usually does, but man! What does a guy like that do when it stops working?”
Gracie tried to smile, but she couldn’t quite bring it to the front. “Use his contacts to file a complaint with her work, demanding she either apologize or get fired?”
Alex’s face went still. “Gracie, he didn’t.”
“He did.” Gracie wished she had that beer. “And Vince pulled the exact same, ‘I don’t make the rules’ shit, so here we are.”
The waitress put down their beers. “You need another minute?”
“Oh.” Gracie looked at the menu. “I’m so sorry. I, uh…”
“Want me to?” Alex asked, correctly interpreting the look on her face as I Can’t Do One More Fucking Thing Today. At her nod, he looked up at the waitress and rattled off their order: “Two Cowboy Burgers, medium rare, and an order of mozzarella sticks.” To Gracie, he added, “That sort of fuckery necessitates melted cheese.”
The waitress snorted quietly with laughter and gave him a grin as she left.
“She liiiiikes you,” Gracie said in a sing-song voice.
“Does she?” Alex looked over in interest. “Now, there’s something. Huh.” He shook himself after a moment. “What were we talking about?”
Gracie snickered as she took a sip of her beer. “Oh, this is good. Why the hell couldn’t Kyle take me someplace like this? Beer. Burgers.”
“You know the rules, Gracie,” Alex said mock-seriously. “If you allow yourself to like lower class things, you’ll start a downward slide that crushes all your hopes and dreams of owning a tiger and being cryogenically frozen when you die.”
Gracie paused to raise an eyebrow. “Real expenses you’ve seen on tax returns?” she guessed.
“I can neither confirm nor deny that.” He took a sip of his beer. “Oh, that’s good.” He turned to her. “Look, Gracie, you gave it a shot. I’ll bet you really did. But I’m glad you didn’t apologize.” He held up his beer for her to clink. “To better dates with non-douches.”
Gracie clinked with a grin, then smiled at the waitress as she brought the mozzarella sticks over. “Thanks.”
The woman nodded and left with a shy smile at Alex.
“She so likes you,” Gracie said. She jerked her head at the woman. “
Leave her your number.”
Alex grimaced. “Ughhhh, too much effort.”
“Lazy.” Gracie rolled her eyes.
“I’m talking about divorces.” Alex raised an eyebrow as he downed the beer.
“Uh-huh, and I should never date again because the world’s full of douches, right?” Gracie saw him open his mouth to protest and grinned. “See how crazy you sound? Checkmate.”
“I hate it when you make good points. Eat your fried cheese.” Alex took another sip of his beer.
“So…” Gracie took a bite of her mozzarella stick. “Oh, you were right. The cheese does make it better somehow. Anyway, guess I’ll go home and job search.”
“Nope.” Alex shook his head.
“Listen, Alex—” she started before he held up a hand.
“I’m not saying don’t get a job.” He laughed. “But my last roommate stank up the place with weed, and the one before that stole the fridge. You’re actually nice to be around. I don’t want to go looking for another roommate. And frankly, Gracie, you’re going to get a job. I know you. So just…take the day, okay? Take a day, and maybe play some Metamorphosis.”
Gracie toyed with a mozzarella stick. “You want to hear something weird? I think that game is kind of to blame for me quitting.”
Now he gave her a curious look.
“It’s just… Who was I before that, right?” Gracie hunched her shoulders. “Some random trash bag with a terrible job. But I log in there, and suddenly people listen to me. I’m actually someone who matters. I make a bad call, I get pretty instant karma for it. I make a good call, things work out and people respect me.” She took another bite and chewed contemplatively. “It made going to work so much harder, you know? I nearly got written up the other day for helping this sobbing woman over to the bar. Literally for being nice and doing a nice thing. What kind of bullshit is that?”
Alex nodded reflectively. “I guess I hadn’t thought of that. I’ll want to be careful, then. People don’t treat us quite as badly as your bosses treated you, but I don’t want to find myself running my mouth and getting fired. At least, not until you get a job.”
