by Arthur Stone
“You helped.”
“Of course, I was the bait,” his comrade agreed. “But you were the main attraction. I just made your actions shine brighter. So this head is no trophy. It’s a memento.”
“So unforgettable a fight, in fact, that you’re going to drag a 150-pound head around for the rest of your life so you don’t forget it?”
“Nah,” Clown snorted. “I’ll throw it away soon enough. It’ll start reeking before long. If I do forget, the gap will be filled up with new memories, I’m sure. Even more fascinating ones. I have no doubt about that.”
“Is that so? Well, we’ve nearly reached my personal cache by this point. There’s a lot for me to carry. I’ll be too weighed down to help you with that thing.”
“I’ll have to carry it on my own?”
Cheater nodded.
“Well then, I hope I see something exciting very soon.”
“Oh look, an old strip club!”
“Come on. Not like that. I mean new memories. Of things I’ve never seen before in my life.”
“So a strip club is perfect! But first, let’s get to that stable. It’s not far. It doesn’t look like a troublesome stable, either, so I wouldn’t go tossing that head away just yet, if I were you.”
“Oh come on. I know you. You’re one of those rare types that can walk into a deserted stable and find some crazy adventure in under a minute. Remember the last stable? And the one before that? And the one before that?”
“Yeah, ever since that duel they dragged me into.”
“Someone challenged you to a duel?”
“Yes,” Cheater nodded.
“Why?”
“No reason. It was my first stable. I was ogling everything, having never seen it before. Like I had just hatched. This guy named Glock set me up. His favorite activity was provoking newbies into attacking and then sniping them in the resulting street duel. And I was clearly a newbie.”
“What did you do?”
“Killed him.”
“As far as I’ve seen, Cheater, Glock never had a chance of escaping alive. But I need details. Give me details.”
* * *
The stable they reached was pathetic. Only the most peaceful, boring clusters could have settlements like this. No defenses were seen—after all, there was nothing worth defending. The permanent local population consisted of a single howling cat, and in the event any threat came and knocked at the door, that resident much preferred to flee rather than to defend its turf. It could return once the danger had passed. And even if it found that its foes had razed its home to the ground, it wouldn’t mind. There was nothing to raze, really.
Here, too, there was only a doubled-up wire fence around the perimeter and some fortified positions built with bags of earth. Inside, some large army tents, RVs, light modular buildings, and ordinary trucks stood. The trucks had been refitted into sleeping quarters, shops and even places of entertainment. Nearly everything was on wheels, ready to evacuate at the first sign of danger. It was a cross between a gypsy camp and a military camp.
The entrance was an opening in the wire fences. Although it was the only entrance, no one was standing guard. Or so it seemed, at least. If anyone was keeping secret vigil over their ingress, he showed no outward interest towards it.
He should have. They were an unusual-looking pair. They wore unremarkable civilian clothes. Only newbies wore such garb by choice. The skin on their faces had peeled off and left fresh pink blotches beneath, as if due to sunburn or in cases of radiation blasts and treatment by regeneration core. One was dragging an incomprehensible but obviously heavy contraption behind him and carried two massive objects on his back: a huge sword and an even larger rifle. Neither were particularly uncommon here on veteran players, but not as a bundle, wielded by the same person. In addition, the melee style of play suggested by the sword was sorely contraindicated by the existence of the sniper rifle. Cheater might well have been swimming underwater while dressed in fencing garb.
This incongruity would fade as the hypothetical observer’s eyes moved to the head of the manmincer Clown was dragging. It was covered in flies, which did not seem to bother its new owner at all. Cheater had almost begun praying to the System for some new conflict so that he could be rid of his companion’s head. Clown’s tolerance was inexplicable, and the bugs’ buzzing was getting to Cheater.
If any pair of players were to deserve attention, it would be them.
Once inside, they saw an execution square. The residents’ preference for mobile structures did not, as was apparent, extend to their gallows. They were constructed in the standard fashion, their posts planted deep into the rocky soil. A light breeze made their ropes and joints sway. Under each rope, the earth was dark. Not with blood, but with the dust that players became when they died. Those grains of post-human sand did not last long. In a matter of hours, they would decompose to dust that was lighter than air and quickly scattered with the faintest of winds. So the gallows has been used recently. Most likely during the night, or even early this morning. If the killings had occurred even as long ago as the evening before, the evidence would have likely been swept away by now.
Clown wearily shifted the pole on which the manmincer’s head hung to his other shoulder. “I’d bet my left eye they hanged someone here not two hours back. Maybe three. But no longer than that. And not just here—over there, too. And there. We’re late for the show.”
Cheater did not want to think about it. He was exhausted, and the long and boring road into the stable settlement had lulled him deeper into his weariness. He nearly fell asleep right on the road. When he asked the question, his voice sounded dumb and lifeless. “Why’d they die?”
“Because they were hung, of course,” Clown replied.
“Maybe we shouldn’t have come here.”
“Maybe not,” Clown agreed. “But we’re here now, so let’s keep going. I suggest we head that way. Looks like everyone’s over there. I wonder what’s up. Hopefully it’s something a little more cheerful than a mass execution.”
Even without using his Flash of Omniscience, Cheater had concluded that people were gathered together beyond the double row of tall tents just before them. The characteristic noise of a crowd wafted over the shelters and towards the tired travelers. He strongly suspected that the excitement was over the trial of the next candidates for hanging. Or over some other equally gloomy event. He was very wrong.
They were just having fun.
And in ways that were peculiar to residents of the Continent.
Abilities came in all kinds. Some were very useful, and others were useless. Some were harmful, and others healing. Some were buffs, and others were debuffs. Some abilities were so odd that they defied all categorization.
The person holding the crowd’s attention had one of these abilities. Cheater had heard of such people, called Traveling Theaters, Cinemamen, Projectors, and so on. As was usually the case with the System, the essence of this class of ability was the same among all those who had it, but the details varied.
This person could mentally capture any moment from his life and then show it to others, in crisp quality, after the event. Even several months after the event. It was like a video camera, though without a microphone. All he needed to project was a suitable surface and one or two eyes open. Plus whatever way he used to project the images out from within his skull. But that would be a very personal thing, and it was hardly too complicated since this particular individual didn’t quite come across as a man of genius.
A wall of one of the entertainment establishments served as a screen. The sign above suggested, in hieroglyphs, that food and drink could be found within, along with an atmosphere characterized by an unlikely degree of fun. Yet no one appeared to be left inside. Everyone was out, to watch. People from the whole surrounding area had come, too, forming a semicircle around the spectacle.
The cinemaman stared and pointed at the improvised screen, hastily commenting, “See that? That sign in the
corner? That’s where the best girls of the region were kept. Not all of them were first class, of course. Only a few. The rest were trash. But those top girls, they were perfect. You could lose your load just looking at them. I dropped more money on them than the whole stable was worth. And they... what they did to me... I’m sorry, guys, I can’t show that out in the open. Come to the private show this evening, and it’ll be worth your while, I promise. A hot montage of scenes the likes of which you’ve never seen! Many love them so much they come back a second time, or even a third.”
“The hell you think we’re here for?” One of the spectators mumbled. “To look at some cheap hoes from the West? You said you could show us this Cheater fellow. Well, show him!”
“I’m not sure if this is the Cheater who destroyed the Devils’ base,” the projector explained. “There are many Cheaters in the world. It’s a popular nickname for idiot players.”
“Well, show us and we’ll figure it out,” the viewer demanded. “Everyone here has heard things about him. We won’t mistake him for some noob.”
“As you wish. Look!”
A new image lit up the green tent canvas.
Cheater saw himself.
The first thing he did was grimace. The picture that was displayed had been taken recently, really. But the difference between that Cheater and him was stark. As if years had passed, or even decades.
The stat boosts and abilities provided him by the System were not the key differences. He felt like he was a fully grown lion, looking at the helpless cub version of himself from long ago. At a glance, it was clear that this was a typical noob frantically trying to learn and survive in the harsh realities of the Continent.
And frantically failing.
The traveling theater pointed at the image. “That man, there. But I am not sure it’s the same Cheater. I heard he decided to trek across the whole world, all for some girl. This man had the nickname Cheater. But no, I’m not sure—he certainly seemed too dumb for feats like our Cheater. And not nearly stealthy enough. I caught him mistreating a girl. One of those hot girls I promised to show you later, in fact. She was a real beauty. Come by and you won’t regret it. So I reprimanded him, and he had the gall to go for his gun. This was a strict stable, and everyone around beat him into submission. I challenged him to a duel.”
“So what happened? Show us!” another spectator inquired, arms folded.
“I did not take any more pictures,” the man noted with great regret. “My ability has a long cooldown. Better to save the shots for naked women than some random noob. But I remember everything well enough, so I’ll tell you. The people lined up in the streets. I had my Glock. A real man’s weapon, you know? He had some girly ammo guzzler with a flick safety. Decorated in mauve. I didn’t even loot it afterward, that’s how awful it was. But we lined up and prepared for the countdown, when he just opened fire, right then and there. From eighty paces away.”
“Before the duel even started?” the viewer asked in disbelief. “But his face looks so similar. Our Cheater is the one who crushed the Devils and won the hero achievements. Not some bastard who, well, cheats in a duel.”
“Do I look like a liar to you?”
“You don’t look like anyone to me.”
The man guffawed. “Yes, perhaps the System doesn’t display messages about me for the whole world to see. But do you remember the stories about Gibbon? The System kept silent about him. Not a peep. And everyone who ever met him as an adversary regretted it. So, anyway, I calmly approached this Cheater. Once I was thirty paces away, I got to work. I could have shot him from fifty, but I had to hit him square in the balls, you know. Better chances at thirty.”
Clown was listening with interest and jabbed Cheater’s side. “That is you in the picture, you know.” He whispered softly—but it was enough. The closest spectators turned to face them. Some stared at Cheater in surprise. Others cocked their heads back and forth, comparing the man to his photo.
Cheater, who was calmly listening to the continuation of the spurious story of the drawn-out duel, calmly asked, “Would you guys please point me to the nearest popcorn stand?”
“I’ve got some popcorn,” one of them said, turning and pointing towards the entertainment tent. “Salt OK?”
Cheater looked at Clown. “Salted OK with you?”
“Sounds fine,” his friend nodded.
Cheater turned back to the tent’s apparent owner. “Yes, please, and lots of it. My friend really needs a bite.”
The chattering cameraman did not yet suspect a thing. He was in a rage, now, extolling his vicious acts of violence against the noob on the wall. By this point, he had emasculated Cheater and shattered both of his knees with three clean shots. He was now reloading. Ten paces away from the legend, he somehow easily dodged the return fire that came his way. This sounded improbable, but the inexperienced members of the audience listened willingly. Only those close to Cheater and Clown suffered bouts of inattention to the tale. Yet their numbers were growing. More and more people turned, staring in amazement at the man who seemed to have stepped out of the movie shot—and at his companion, who carried a manmincer’s head on a pole over his shoulder.
Cheater finally began making his way to the center of the scene. The crowd hastily parted, letting him pass.
His heavy hand rested on the movie man’s shoulder.
The fibber was finessing the fictional Cheater at five paces, somehow still dodging his opponent’s bullets as he closed the gap. And close the gap he did, but not in his story. Cheater still somehow remained unnoticed by the man, but the touch on his shoulder made him flinch. The picture flickered out.
The projector turned and stared at Cheater, as if he were a ghost.
Smiling, but without emotion, Cheater greeted him. “Hi, Glock. It’s been a long time. How are you? Good business, I see? You know, we were just talking about you on the way. It’s a small Continent, isn’t it?”
“Well... I... uh, yeah. Yeah, it is. Hi.”
Cheater pointed towards the local approximation of a town street. It was a long, wide corridor that ran between tents and vehicles, leading to the exit from the village.
“Run that way. Don’t look back, or we’ll just have some salt for our popcorn. In forty-five seconds, on the dot, I’ll take a shot. Run straight. If you try veering off or taking cover, I won’t wait. I’ll just shoot your balls off. They’re a much smaller target than mine, but I never miss. You remember that, right? I never miss. Or have you started believing the lies that you tell everyone?”
“I... well, I...”
Cheater made his voice sound benevolent. “Say what you want, do what you want, but time is ticking. Your time, which I’ve given you.”
“Wh... “What!?” Glock stumbled for words, his face as drained of blood as a piece of school chalk.
“Forty-one seconds left,” Cheater replied calmly.
Popcorn crunched appetizingly behind him. One of the quicker viewers voiced a piece of obvious advice. “Get out of here, you moron. Time is running out!”
Cheater was not even hinting at drawing his weapon, yet Glock made no attempt to out-draw him. He had tried that once before, and despite the fibs he was spreading, it was clear that he remembered the truth.
Whirling, he rushed, and the crowd let him by. Once he was free, he made for the exit, moving in unpredictable zigzags. His speed was impressive.
One of the spectators shook his head. “Nothing motivates a man like protecting his privates. He’ll make it to the gate, at that pace. No way anyone can make that shot.”
Another viewer seized the opportunity to make some money. “I’ll bet you fifty that the shot hits!”
“I’ll bet a hundred!” another added.
“Oh go to hell! You really think I’m dumb enough to bet against Cheater?”
“Then why did you say he’d never make the shot? Dammit—I’ll take the bet, boys. One-fifty!”
Judging from what Cheater heard, the odds in his
favor were very good. He had a reputation here.
Glock really could run fast. Not only did he reach the gate—he made it a dozen paces beyond.
Cheater raised his heavy rifle and pulled the trigger, taking no time to aim.
The recoil slammed into his shoulder. It would have knocked him back if he was a noob, but he shrugged it off. The System was happy to bend the laws of physics for its more advanced players.
