Dream Park

by Larry Niven;Steven Barnes

  The natives fought to the death, every one of them. Spears, knives, and corded muscles glistened in the torchlight as the battle raged.

  Oliver the Frank moved in a cautious circle around his, opponent, native spear matched to glowing broadsword. The spear’s luminous tip grazed his stomach as Oliver twisted aside, thrusting his own weapon in the next instant. The native’s spear jerked up, and Oliver had to acknowledge a deflection. The two men withdrew to the ready position, attention focused totally on each other. Oliver faked high and went for the knees. As the native warrior tried to block he overreached and Oliver looped the blade up and into the ribs. Howling, his foe went down holding his stomach.

  The battle was almost over, natives lying dead and broken everywhere. Suddenly the Lore Master yelled for their attention. He pointed to the roof of the church.

  Lurching along its edge, knife projecting from the hollow of his throat, tottered the priest. His eyes were glassy, and half-dried blood shown on his chest as he looked down at them.

  His lips twitched back from his teeth in a ghastly caricature of a smile, eyes alight with a hatred stronger than death. He opened his mouth, and gurgling whispers bubbled forth.

  “Back, everyone!” Chester screamed unnecessarily. They retreated from a patch of air shimmering in the square. “Get the girl and let’s get out of here!” Chester, yelled, but by that time it was far too late: the shimmering patch cut the girl off from everyone but Eames and Leigh, who stood over her alertly.

  “What do you think, Chester?” Gina asked, panting.

  “Reveal Barrier!” he yelled. A bolt of green flashed from his hand into the glowing area and dissolved it.

  “Illusion! It was a stall—”

  The jungle behind them shook with the sound of branches snapping and popping. The ground shook with an ominous rhythm, and Eames swept the girl into his arms, carrying her to the center of the Gamers. They formed a ragged half-circle facing the jungle, and waited.

  There was a collective gasp as the thing lumbered out of the trees into the clearing. It was huge, the size of the church building, with a snakelike head attached to a greyish, roughly spherical body. It had dozens of short stubby legs that moved more like cilia than jointed appendages, and carried it toward the Gamers with frightening speed. The mouth was strange, shocking. It was no bigger than a man’s mouth. It was lost on that vast face.

  Chester watched its approach cautiously. He saw the thing glide up to one of the fallen natives. Its mouth expanded like an awakening Morning Glory, exposing gums lined with row after row of small sharp teeth. It hunched over the body and slurped it in halfway, and chewed.

  Chester backed away. “We don’t want any part of that thing. Let’s clear out of here.”

  Fortunato called, “Chester?” and waved the heavy revolver he was carrying.

  “Try it,” Chester commanded. “The rest of you, get going!”

  The Gamers began an orderly retreat. The creature finished the native and glanced up. Its mouth pursed hungrily. It followed, fast.

  Fortunato/McWhirter stood braced with his legs apart, arms stiff, both hands wrapped around the gun butt. He fired twice, quickly, and paused to observe the effect.

  Two small pucker marks on its smooth front were not bleeding; in fact, they were closing. It hadn’t slowed at all.

  Tony fired again, more carefully, aiming for its eyes and mouth. He fired until the gun was empty, then ran like a Thief, with the creature too close behind him.

  The orderly retreat became a rout. Kasan Maibang led them to a path through the bush wide enough to travel double-file, and the wave of Gamers stretched out into a line. Tony McWhirter’s sprint had cost him; he was exhausted. He ran like he was about to fall over at every step.

  Chester ran with Maibang. “What is that monstrosity?”

  The little guide’s reply was wheezed between clenched teeth. “It is called a Nibek. Our enemies called it to avenge themselves.”

  The Lore Master looked back. The trees weren’t slowing it. Timber was smashed into bits by every shrug of that massive body, and still it gained, a disturbingly human snarl decorating the tiny mouth.

  “Damn it!” a voice screamed from the rear. He looked again, and saw who it was, at the tail of the column: Mary-em, her legs too short for real speed. Another few, seconds and the tiny mouth would expand to swallow her—

  “Leave her,” Maibang said urgently. “In the time it takes to eat her, we can be far up the trail—”

  “I should feed you to that goddam thing,” Chester raged. “She’s mine, damn you, and that Nibek can’t have what’s mine without a fight.” He pivoted and raised his.. arms. “Hear me, O Gods—” The green glow surrounded his body, and when he yelled the sound was like roaring thunder. “Gather to my side, my children of light and darkness. This spawn of Hell shall not have us.”

  Fortunato was hugging a tree, gasping. To Alex he wheezed, “Acacia says . . . Thieves don’t fight well. Better hang back.”

  Eames had joined Mary-em, and the Nibek drew up short, hissing. Its scaly head weaved slowly to and fro; and one eye was missing, shot away. Panthesilea and Oliver joined them, blades out and ready. Behind them, Gwen knelt in prayer, casting a sparkling white aura around them.

  Gina and Bowan the Black slipped to the right, flanking the thing. Chester went left.

  It attacked. On its first pass Mary-em stabbed at its remaining eye, diving out of the way so that its answering snap only grazed her. She had missed. Eames slashed at it, and the Nibek swung its head around too swiftly for the Warrior to escape. He stumbled back as his aura flashed red. The monster’s mouth began to expand, and only Oliver’s blow to its legs turned it back around. Oliver backed up until he was against a tree, and the Nibek’s mouth smiled as it came in for the kill. The white protective field around Oliver glowed more intensely, and the thing gave its warbling cry of frustration when it couldn’t get through.

  It turned its attention to Gwen, who still knelt in prayer. She kept her eyes closed until it was almost upon her, then turned her palms outward, and the full power of her inner strength blasted into its face. It reared back, blinded.

  From his side angle, the Lore Master unleashed a bolt of such intensity that the night became red-tinted day for an instant. Draeger tried to bat the Nibek with a large branch, and as the monster recoiled from Chester’s blow, it smashed into the Engineer. Draeger’s aura went bright red, fading to black.

  But now the Gamers were better organized. The Nibek bit at Gwen while Bowan seared it with flame. Tony had reloaded and was firing into the beast. The brush itself crackled and smoked, but the Nibek’s hide only crinkled under the assault. Griffin hurled his captured spear, and it went through the creature’s head completely. Though greenish blood pulsed from the wound, it lived on.

  “Its brain must be in the body! Magic users! Closer in now!”

  Gina stood almost in the midst of the smoking brush and hurled her power into the creature’s side. It struck a tree in its agony, and a mass of flaming branches fell, striking Gina squarely. She yelled her rage as her aura, went red and then drained to flickering black. Chester saw, it, and his face went sick. “Bowan! This is no good! This, thing is too strong, it’s killing us! I’m going to try for a split attack!”

  Bowan set his balance and redoubled his efforts, a, fountain of flame pouring from his fingertips.

  Chester threw his arms wide and intoned:

  “Hear me now, oh Lords of Light!

  Knowing that I fight your fight.

  I care not what the spell may cost,

  Let your servant pour forth—frost!”

  From the tips of Chester’s fingers gushed a stream of white particles that struck the Nibek opposite the side bathed in fire. The thing’s mouth quoited out and it screamed as its skin split down the spine, exposing bone, and red meat.

  Now the Nibek was in real agony. Bowan changed his attack and sent his fire arcing over directly into the wound. It crawled in dim
inishing circles like a half-crushed beetle. Now the warriors moved in, slashing and stabbing. It was eyeless and nearly legless, and still trying to run, when the Gamers hacked it apart.

  The survivors leaned on each other or against trees, panting, looking around them.

  “Auras!” Chester yelled, and they flashed on. There were six red-tinged glows, and three black. Two black auras were solid; Gina’s still flickered.

  Chester sounded exhausted. “Gwen. See what you can do for Gina. We’ve lost the others.” The Cleric nodded, touching Draeger sadly on the shoulder as she trudged past him to Gina’s side.

  Draeger was incensed. “Just what do you mean, ‘lost the others’? Aren’t you even going to try?”

  Chester extended his hand in sympathy, and the angry Engineer knocked it aside. The Lore Master said, “Listen, Dreager. Gwen’s only got so much power, and she’s already used up a lot of it protecting Eames and Oliver. If she tried to help all three of you, she’d run out of juice. She couldn’t help anyone then.”

  Draeger snorted, his reddish complexion growing ruddier. “Well, then only one of us can be saved, right?”

  “One,” Chester said quietly.

  Draeger walked up close enough to rub belt buckles, and stuck his nose almost into Henderson’s mouth. “So how is it that she gets to live? What’s the matter? You don’t play fair to anyone who isn’t laying you?”

  Chester’s voice wasn’t loud, but everyone heard him. “Draeger, you are dead. All the way dead. Didn’t you feel the jolt? Your tindalo is standing right behind you, see?” The stout Engineer turned and looked, and shuddered as he saw his misty-white translucent twin crook a spectral finger at him. “If you were as much a gamer as the other man the Nibek killed, who had the class to quietly bow out we might have been saved this. Since you ask, though, give I Gina consideration because she is a competent Magic User, while you are a second-rate Engineer without enough sense to leave the fighting to the fighters.” Draeger sputtered, trying to get out a reply, but Chester cut him short. “And, Draeger, in answer to your implied question suspect that if I had spent last night with you instead Gina, I’d be even happier to get your dead ass out of the Game.”

  Draeger looked about him at a ring of unsympathetic faces. He spit into the dirt. His ghost was moving away and he followed a few steps, then stopped, his fist clenched. “You’ll be sorry for that, Henderson. I swear God you’ll be.” Then he ran into the darkness.

  Chapter Sixteen

  REST BREAK

  Gina sat on her bedroll with her knees drawn up to her chest. The campfire popped. Ham and beans simmered next to the flames; the smell was delightful, compulsive.

  “We had a couple of serious accidents and three fatalities today,” Chester said. “We’ll need a replacement Engineer, and we need another Cleric to take up the slack for poor Gwen. I know where we can get both of those in one package, so we’re set there. I’m worried about our points, but the Nibek was no pansy monster, and the I. F. G. S. has to give me credit for that, so it should balance out.” Gina nodded. She seemed half asleep, but Chester didn’t notice. He sighed and rubbed his eyes with the palms of his hands. “I think we’re running a little to the good right now, and in a Game like this, that’s the best we can hope for.” Gina rested her head against his knee. “I’ll bet we see Dreager again, though. As a zombie. Even so, how much damage can he—”

  Griffin watched and listened, unobtrusively, leaning against a tree trunk with his arms folded. Strangely, he was tired. Real fatigue, as if he had spent the day fighting real monsters instead of holograms.

  Like the others, he had stripped off his backpack and collapsed to the ground, whooping with delight. And why not? It was all good fun . . .

  He shook his head. Business. Stick to business. He looked around at the fifteen people in the camp. Twelve were Gamers; the others were the Rescued Maiden and the actors who played Maibang and Kagoiano. Unobserved, he faded back into the trees until the campfire was barely visible.

  The transceiver in his wallet hummed as he punched it on.

  “Griffin here. Marty? You there?”

  “Right on it, Chief. We’ve already interviewed the three Gamers who got killed out. We’ve even voice-stressed the first one . . . what was his—oh, yeah, Garret. The other two have agreed to do it tomorrow. And they’re all staying on as guests of Dream Park.”

  “Your sunny personality, no doubt.”

  “Oh, no doubt. The unlimited Experience pass might have had something to do with it. I mean, not only go to the head of the line every time, but free too? Garret says he’s going for the Guinness record on the Gravity Whip.”

  The laughter felt good, a release after the day’s tension. “I’ve picked up some interesting things myself. I think we can clear Alan Leigh. He was busy last night trying to seduce Eames, one of the warriors.”

  Alex wasn’t particularly surprised at the short pause, and then the discomfort in Marty’s voice. Bobbick, like Melissa and much of California, was a product of the post-quake religious revival. Sexual conservatism still was less the exception than the rule. Though Gamers made their own rules . . .

  But Marty was a professional, and he asked a professional’s question. “Can we scratch Eames too?”

  “No. He hasn’t done much Gaming, so he’s not high on the list . . . but he turned Leigh down. He could have been alone at least part of the night. If Leigh came after him, he could find that Eames had moved his bedroll to avoid a sticky situation. But Leigh wouldn’t have started a seduction if he wasn’t planning to stick around and enjoy it. I suspect that we can rule out Henderson too.”

  “Why?”

  “Think about it. We never took the Gamers seriously as a threat because they’re so into make-believe. Henderson lives and breathes for the Game. It’s his whole ego, and it pays off well in terms of power and fame. He strikes me as the kind of person who wouldn’t risk that for money. This is mostly hunch, but as long as I’m out in left field, we might as well exclude Gina too, because they spent last night together. I’m inclined to think of this as a solo job for now. Of course it could have been a team effort, one partner plying an alibi for the other. Hmm . . .”

  “What is it, Griff?”

  “More grief. Check the Alternate waiting area. It’s as close to the edge of Gaming Area A as R&D is. Could one of the Alternates have gotten into ‘A’, then doubled back through the service duct? It does seem we’ve got a blind spot for Gamers. Psychologically, we just never considered them to be any kind of threat.”

  “I’ll cover it.”

  “Good. Now let’s give me something more to look for. Have you got a map of Gaming A”

  “I’ve got a dozen. We’ve been marking them up.”

  “You’re ahead of me, then. Okay, mark out the killer’s easiest routes to Gaming Area A service shaft 18—”

  “He only had one good path. He had to go around a piece of papier-mache mountain. Griff, we should put TV screens on these transceivers. I could show you.

  “One path: good. Now get Lopez or somebody to tell you what the killer had to see on his way to G.A. 18. Something he knows about that the rest of us don’t.”

  “Lopez may not be happy about giving forewarning to a Gamer.”

  “Dammit, we’ve got a murd . . . yeah. Be as persuasive as you can.”

  Marty sounded skeptical. “Sure.”

  Millie’s voice came on line. “Chief, I’ve got some information for you.”

  “Anything earthshattering?”

  “Shattering, no. Interesting, yes. Rice apparently died of suffocation some time after he was tied up. We think he regained consciousness before dying.”

  “Why?”

  “The bandages on Rice’s thumbs and wrists were heavily abraded. He must have been rubbing them against th concrete floor, trying to get loose. The gag blocked his mouth, and evidently his nose was stopped up.”

  “Whew.” Griffin shook his head in the dark, feeling a tremor run
the length of his body. “That’s a hell of a note. Killed by a cold. That’s really crazy.” He ran his hand. through his hair, trying to focus. Fighting dragons was exhausting. “What else?”

  “Well, that missing statue was either stolen, or is in the hands of someone outside of Dream Park. No one knows anything about it. Rice made it in his second year at the University of Oklahoma. One more thing. Kokobun, the lady who tried to buy it from him, said that it felt hollow.”

  “Hollow. All right.”

  “This gets even trickier, Chief. Skip O’Brien did a check on Rice’s psych profile, and the computer record has definitely been tampered with.”

  “In what way?”

  “O’Brien says that the original report he filed when Rice first came to work here indicated that Rice was too much of a loner for office work. He just didn’t fit into a team effort. Now the file shows him as having highly developed communication skills, a higher frustration tolerance, and his military IQ has been upped ten points.”

  “Well well. This is definitely getting strange. Somebody was grooming Rice for a desk job. Maybe an important one. Millie, find out if Rice put in for a transfer to another department, will you? Or if anyone requested his transfer. Keep working on any leads you can, and thanks, good work, people. I’ll be back in touch. Beep me if anything urgent comes up, but remember, I might not be in a position to answer.”

  Bobbick’s voice came back on the line. “By the way, Griff. We’ve all been following the adventures of the infamous Griffin, and I must say that you looked great out there against them savages.”

  He laughed, and Millie joined in. She said, “When you chucked the spear at that monster, you looked so serious, Chief. Have you been leading a double life, maybe? By day a meek, mild-mannered security honcho, by night an avenger of evil—”

  “Let’s not go overboard, gang. I’m glad you’re enjoying yourselves, but we’ve got business. I’ll ring you tomorrow.”