by Natalie Grey
"Maybe. But I've beaten him before, and I'll do it again. I'm not going to turn into a power-hungry maniac in the meantime." She shrugged. “Happy?"
"Eh." Dhruv shrugged back.
Gracie rolled her eyes. "Do you want some food?" she asked with excessive politeness.
Dhruv gave a sound that might have been a laugh. "No, you have a good feast. It was nice to meet you as a queen." He disappeared without any more fanfare, logging out with a little bloop.
"Argh." Jay rubbed his forehead. "I hate that man.”
"I see why he did it," Gracie said. "Better it was him who tested me than some random jackass.”
"Oh, he did mention," Jay said, "that he wouldn't mind if you banned Harry.”
"Good," Gracie replied. "Because I plan to."
Chapter Twenty
"Anyone want to tell me where we're going?" Grok asked on the main channel.
Harkness shushed him, but not before Thad looked over his shoulder at the Ocru. In reality, Grok was about 5'4" and incredibly thin, the sort of person who could gobble down a whole pizza and ask for more an hour later. He tended to hunch his shoulders and make himself look even shorter, and he was doing that now as their transport zoomed across the desert. He turned away first, and Thad looked back to the desert ahead of them.
No one else said anything on the main channel, and he had the suspicion that they were talking behind his back.
They didn't like Yesuan. The new Piskie healer was the subject of considerable speculation. They'd noticed that he was on one of the team accounts, and they'd also noticed that Thad seemed to take his orders.
And he gave a lot of orders. Yesuan didn't seem to give a damn if people liked him. Sometimes, Thad even thought Yesuan wanted people to hate him. He was certainly behaving the right way if that was what he wanted.
Right now, for instance, Yesuan was the one steering the transport. He'd come into the guild's morning practice, announced that they were going somewhere, and left without waiting to see if anyone would follow him. He'd led the way to the far end of the transport docks and taken one of the ones that was already there. As far as Thad had known, those were just ornamental, but Yesuan seemed to be able to drive them.
If Jamie were still here, he'd be asking worried-sounding questions about all of this.
Thad crossed his arms over his chest and tried not to growl his annoyance with his former healer. He'd built Jamie up to what he was. Sure, Jamie had shown natural talent, but it was Thad's investment of resources and gear that had allowed Jamie to level so quickly, and it was Thad's offer of a job that had gotten Jamie into the guild when Thad was first approached by Brightstar. Thad had taken the time to court healers and the very best DPS there was. He gave them his time. He gave them leeway. He gave them perks.
And this was how Jamie had repaid him.
Yesuan looked at him now. "They don't like you," the Piskie said.
Thad stiffened but did not look over. He checked that he was on a private channel before responding, "Do you have a point?”
"They shouldn't like you," Yesuan said. "You forget that. You want to be their leader and have them be your friends.”
"No, I don't." Wanting to win a popularity contest was like grade school all over again, and he was definitely past that.
The transport shuddered to a halt, and the Piskie looked at Thad coldly. "I have no patience for lies and self-deception," Yesuan said. "And I don't have time for fools who can't understand basic logic, either. Stop acting like a child, or I will leave you all here and find another guild to serve my purpose.”
Thad looked at him furiously. The rest of the guild, noticing that the transport had stopped, was coming over, and Thad gestured for them to stay away.
"Are you sure about that?" Thad asked venomously. "You wanted good players who knew how to follow orders, and you've got them. Who else are you going to get to do this without asking questions you don't want to answer?”
For a moment, he thought Yesuan would call his bluff, but then the Piskie nodded. "Interesting," Yesuan said. "So you do have a backbone after all. But you're still lying to yourself.”
Thad rolled his eyes and sighed. "Can we not do this? I don't want to have a philosophical discussion right now.”
"Of course not," Yesuan said. "And it doesn't matter anyway.”
With that, he started driving again, and Thad frowned at him. What did that mean?
It meant that Yesuan was insufferably pretentious, that was what it meant. Thad had seen enough by this point to know that. He rolled his eyes and went back to watching the desert. There was nothing out here, no plants or scrub brush, and the dunes and sandstone bluffs were steep enough that people would not have been able to get here by foot or mount. Then Harkness shouted and pointed, and the whole group hurried over to one side of the transport to get a look.
Thad frowned. Yesuan was guiding them in a lazy circle around a full replica of Saladin's Keep. Or was this Saladin's Keep?
"It's a real place in the game," Yesuan said, sensing Thad's stare. "The instance is different, of course, but the place exists.”
"Son of a bitch." Thad had not spent much time doing PvP, but he had to admit that he’d enjoyed Saladin's Keep. There was something appealing about running around abandoned buildings, especially the ruins of former splendor.
With the verdant oasis in the center of the keep, the place had an amazing feel to it, clearly a desert without feeling too bright or too dry. The game's developers had really gone all out in the keep, too. Sometimes gold coins or jewels winked in the sunlight, and people claimed they saw ghosts and heard courtly music on nighttime runs.
He turned to Yesuan as the Piskie deposited them near one of the gates. "What are we doing here?”
"Getting ready," Yesuan said simply. "I gave you the instructions. You'll run skirmishes against each other while I watch—and explore the ruins. There are things here I need to find.”
He hopped off the platform and disappeared into the ruins, and Thad stared after him with a frown.
He did not like this dude, whoever he was—but he'd be lying if he said that the man's absolute, uncaring arrogance wasn't at least a little bit interesting. After all, Thad had been lying when he said he didn't care if his guildmates liked him. Of course, he cared. Who wouldn’t?
Yesuan, apparently.
Thad turned to his team. All of them were here, not just the first-string players he brought into the dungeons with him. Yesuan had insisted that everyone come to these practice sessions. That meant Thad was looking at twenty-eight players since Brightstar refused to sponsor a full-sized guild of fifty.
"We'll be running skirmishes," Thad said. "Even numbers on the roster will start in the dining hall, odd numbers will start in the library. Yesuan's not on anyone's team. Harkness, you do invites for the even team. I'll take the odd team.”
They partied up, and Thad nodded at all of them. The teams were a little unbalanced, but it would be an interesting exercise that way. "We focus on AoE and snares," he told them. "I don't want either flag carrier to go a single second without being under some negative effect. That means I expect you to arrange your defense and protect your flag carrier. Yesuan will be observing.”
”Why—“ Grok began.
"The skirmish begins in two minutes," Thad said. "Teams, get to your bases.”
He didn't want people asking questions, particularly ones he couldn't answer.
Thad led the way to the library. Their team had none of the healers, which annoyed him—but it made the other team comparably less deadly. He'd take it. He checked his team as he ran. They had Preacher, the guild's highest-ranked rogue, and Kala, a summoner who specialized in demons. She already had her amarok out, the ice-wolf's white fur glinting blue in the sunlight.
Demon Syndicate's off-tank, AreTee, was on the other team, as were two of the mages, Harkness and Anubis. Thad had DreadPRoberts, nicknamed Deep, and Blast, and FaceMelt, known as Face.
They could
make this work.
"I want Preacher and Deep on defense," he said. "I'll run offense with Kala, Face, and Blast. Kala, feel free to peel off if someone needs snaring.”
"Roger," Kala said. Like most female characters in the game, Kala was played by a man. She had dark brown skin and spiky bright-blue hair that Thad was beginning to think should be changed. PvE bosses didn't care what players looked like, but a noteworthy target was easier to select in a PvP game.
He'd mention that to Jack, her player, later.
"Everyone else," Thad directed, "make yourself useful. After this game, we'll give specific feedback.”
The timer Thad had set dinged, and he ran out of the library toward the oasis, not waiting for any of the rest of the team to weigh in. He had the vague sense that some of them were spreading out across the keep, and he shook his head, annoyed. The keep's setup was a trap, with the long, open corridors not easy to get in and out of, and considerable time lost with running the long way around.
He'd be giving them a talking to about that.
Or Yesuan would. A tight knot of anxiety formed in Thad's chest. He didn't like the idea of Yesuan giving feedback while the rest of the team stared at Thad and wondered why he wasn't in charge anymore.
But he'd been looking, and there were no other healers to be found. If he didn't want to use Yesuan, he was fucked. And if he did, he had to put up with this.
As he ran past the oasis, he saw a flash of pink hair. Yesuan was lurking amongst the trees, presumably to watch all of them without being seen. Thad swore silently. He didn't like being watched by someone who seemed determined to find fault. When he stole another glance, however, he saw that Yesuan didn't even seem to be watching anyone. Instead, he was pacing between bushes and plants, peering intently at the ground.
What was he looking for?
Thad didn't care. He wanted all of this to be over, and there was only one way to do that: get ready for the next month-first and pay whatever price Yesuan was asking. He had also been reaching out to other prospective funders, wondering if they might pay for him to run one of the other sponsored guilds. It was possible. He had options, he told himself.
He had options.
For now, he would just get through this. Whatever Yesuan wanted, Thad didn't care. If it meant getting back at Callista and Jamie, he'd do it.
Chapter Twenty-One
When Jay arrived at work the next morning, he was not surprised to see a summons to one of the conference rooms. When he got there, Dan, Dhruv, and Sam were sitting next to a somewhat smaller spread of donuts and coffee.
Jay was going to need to spend whole nights running dungeons at this rate.
"That was a dirty trick," he said to Dhruv as he picked out a donut.
"We thought you liked donuts," Sam said, sounding confused.
"Not the donuts," Jay said. He got himself a cup of coffee and shot a glance at Dhruv. "You going to explain or should I?”
"I want to see how you sum it up," Dhruv said, after a moment’s consideration.
Jay reflected that he really should have known better than to expect Dhruv to have any shame about his actions. The man was immune to normal forms of social pressure. He sat down and gazed at Dan and Sam, both of whom looked intrigued.
"Dhruv wanted to know whether Gracie was going to turn into a tyrant," Jay began, then took a bite of donut. "So, naturally, the way he decided to do that was to see how hard he could poke the bear before he got banned.”
Dan gave a deep sigh and looked at Dhruv.
"I used what I knew of her to see if I could get under her skin," Dhruv said, entirely unconcerned. "And I did get under her skin, and I do still have some concerns—but not big ones. She's able to hold her temper. She hasn't caved to the temptation of muting people or banning them. We're lucky, as far as things go, that she's the one who found the quest.”
"What did you do?" Dan demanded, not at all distracted by Dhruv's explanation. "Seriously, what did you do?”
"He made an alt and followed Gracie around, insulting her," Jay explained.
"I also sent her emails," Dhruv admitted.
"You what?" Jay demanded at the same time Dan said, "You realize that's actually a legal liability—“
"Okay." Sam tapped the flat of his hand on the table. Everyone looked at him in surprise, and he gave a tight smile. "Long story short, Dhruv's concerns are put to rest and Jay's not incandescently angry, so I assume everything resolved itself, and we actually do have work to do today. We need to focus on that.”
Everyone nodded, chastened. Sam rarely asserted his authority, but when he did, you tended to go along with it—even if you were technically his boss.
"We're looking at anything vaguely related to PvP," Sam told Jay. "We know that last time, Harry hijacked dungeons and inserted himself as the boss. What we don't know is how he intends to confront Gracie this time, beyond everyone's general suspicion that it will happen on one of the battlegrounds.”
Jay nodded. "There are a few main possibilities, right?" His mind was running ahead, and he let the words out with no filter, hoping he wouldn't say anything ridiculous. "So, it's possible he's doing the same thing he did with the quest: eventually, she'll go into the right battleground, and he'll be there waiting. But that's tricky.”
"Especially because he shouldn't be able to make a character," Dan said. "We blocked him from doing that, and to my knowledge, he hasn't gotten around it.”
"That's one hell of a block," Jay exclaimed.
"Didn't you wonder why he hadn't shown up to claim that quest?" Dhruv asked. "It's why he went into the game as the bosses. He could still do that; he just couldn't be there as a player. As far as we know, he still can't, but none of the battlegrounds have NPCs in them that he could inhabit.”
"Quarry Ridge has the potions master," Sam said, surprising Jay with his knowledge. He took their surprised looks in stride with a small smile. "Once we started focusing on PvP, I thought it would be prudent to do my research.”
"Okay, so Quarry Ridge has the potions master," Dan said. "Do we focus there, then?”
There was a pause while they all thought.
"No," Jay said. "We focus on how he's going to force the confrontation. That's more important. It'll be something like a duel mechanic, right? Something she can't ignore.”
The other three nodded. Dan was taking notes in scrawling longhand that looked like it was filled with symbols.
"And is it going to be one on one?" Jay asked. "Or as teams? I'm guessing one on one because he was so crazy about that last time—“
"Crazy?" Dhruv raised an eyebrow. "Because I would have guessed teams, but I wasn't able to hear anything he said in the last dungeon last time, only Gracie's responses." He looked at his watch but made no comment on why.
"He basically challenged her to a one-on-one fight," Jay explained. "He was a boss, so that would be stupid as hell to do, but he kept calling her a coward. Much like you did," he added whimsically.
"Yeah, yeah," Dhruv said. "Die mad about it." He gave Jay a grin that conveyed the friendliest “Fuck you” Jay had ever seen.
Out of the corner of his eye, Jay saw Dan and Sam exchange looks. Sam shrugged slightly, and Dan shook his head with a sigh.
"Anyway," Dhruv said, "Harry was never good at PvP, so my guess is that he'll have a team. Whether or not he'll let her have one."
"That, I think, depends on when whatever mechanic it is was built," Dan interjected. "As Jay pointed out yesterday—Dhruv told me about your list, Jay—he didn't write the quest until we started trying to boot him. Was this written at the same time, or is he utilizing some other mechanic we don't know about? Something he put in there before? The earlier it was put in, the fairer I think we can assume it is." He gave Jay and Sam a tight smile. "Harry loves to think of himself as fair," he explained. "And then someone wins, and he makes things less fair. So, you can tell how fair an encounter with him will be depending on whether or not you're at the first stage of the con
flict.”
Despite himself, Jay laughed. He could just imagine that: Harry, determined that he knew best, wanting to rule by right of strength—and then later wanting to rule by right of winning, no matter how much he had to slant the encounter in his favor to win it.
"Okay," he said a moment later. "So, here's my guess: whatever he's going to do, it's something that was already in the game. He envisioned a world with kings and war. You two have been pretty cagey about it, but it seems like there's the possibility for factions to form and war to break out. That's basically a forced PvP encounter, right? So, I'd bet there's something already in there." Then a thought coalesced: "Demon Syndicate.”
"Huh?" Dhruv asked. He exchanged looks with Dan.
Dan settled his face into a blank customer service smile. "I don't think it would necessarily be wise to reach out to Demon Syndicate," he said blandly. "Certain...situations have—“
"No, not us reaching out," Jay said. "Harry." Everyone stared at him blankly, and Jay wanted to beat his head on the table. "Harry needs a team, right? That's where we're going. So he needs a bunch of people who are willing to side with him against the game's creators and some goddess-queen hybrid thing. They have to be good, and they have to have some animosity he can use. He's all about that, isn't he? About getting into people's heads and making them want to do things for him?”
Dan's mouth opened and closed twice. "Oh, dear God."
Dhruv didn’t waste time processing the idea emotionally. He looked at Sam. "Do we still have the link into Demon Syndicate's feed?" he asked.
"Yes, but that was just to the account they were using for watching Red Squadron," Sam said. "I don't actually know how they set it up.”
"We can make another one," Dhruv said, "it would just be quicker to go through a channel that was already built. We'll want to look at what they're doing now.”
"I can check." Dan stirred to life and opened his laptop. "Give me a character name. No, never mind, I'll go through the guild lookup." He tapped his fingers on the trackpad as he waited for things to load, then began searching. He murmured to himself as he did so, checking and cross-referencing, and after a few searches, he started to frown.
