As it happened, Beer Pong wasn’t dead, and only required a single Nano-Healing Injection to put him right after the fall damage. He was all laughs two minutes after we’d healed him up. My boys all gave him pats on the back, and congrats for slaying the beast. The same went for Chad and frat boy 3, whose name ended up being Chad also.
But since they couldn’t do that, and his name was Chadwick, they called him Wick. As a result, he carried around a stuffed dog everywhere he went. Wick’s pup was for the moment sticking out of his backpack, appearing to look over his shoulder with tongue lolling.
They took their time recovering from losing half their people, and fighting off a gigantic mutant lizard thing, and I didn’t blame them. It had been hard enough to lose Stayin and I’d only known him for a short time.
But they weren’t stupid. They knew the score and they put away their losses to deal with on their own time. They started recounting the fight with Gojira, and then their looted items started appearing.
Introductions were made. Wick and Beer Pong had a good long laugh over the names my boys had picked for themselves. We then had a round of beers in remembrance of Stayin and their three fellas who hadn’t made it. Even Calamari looked properly respectful and sullen from his place in the beer cooler, clutching his tentacles like he was folding his hands in prayer.
“You guys really want to join?” I asked.
They exchanged a quick glance, then threw back their heads and laughed.
“You bet your ass,” Beer Pong said. “But there’d better be beer.”
“We got beer,” I said.
“And chicks,” Chad said.
“I think I have one or two in mind,” I said. “Putting chicks aside for a moment though, you’re going to have to take up crafting or security if you want to stay on board. We can’t just have people freeloading.”
Which put me in mind of Doug. That frickin guy.
“We just hit level 5,” Chad said.
“Almost to eight here,” Dragon told him.
“Good, hold onto that. You’re going to level up hard and fast on my crew, and you’re going to get some nice cards. Now, let’s get back and I’ll show you guys your new home.”
We sauntered back with a second round of beers, grieving and feeling invincible at the same time. It’s complicated, having all that going on inside at the same time. On one hand exhilaration over the thrill of victory, and chastened by the knowledge your people aren’t coming home. There was talk of hitting up the clubs, meeting some club rats and hitting on anyone with boobs and a pulse, but I told them there’d be time for that once we got them settled in.
I had a Doug to discipline.
We were maybe a block east of the arena when Sug veered off, said he was fixing to take a leak and just leaned up against the building. The other guys razzed him about it, and two of them launched their empties against the side of the building, where they shattered and tinkled to the ground.
The window of the second floor went from opaque and glassy black to completely clear, and the light came on in the apartment. The others were already jeering at whatever buzzkill was about to lean out of the window and tell them to keep it down, when I caught sight of her face.
“Ah crap.”
YOUR REPUTATION WITH HINA OWARI HAS FALLEN BY 100 POINTS. CURRENT RATING -400.
The window opened and a furious anime-haired Japanese girl's face leaned out.
“Shut yer face!” Dragon and Beer Pong both shouted simultaneously, then caught each others’ eyes and collapsed onto the street in laughter.
YOUR REPUTATION WITH HINA OWARI HAS FALLEN BY 100 POINTS. CURRENT RATING -500.
“You!” she screamed. “Are you pissing on my building!?”
She was in a nightie that barely covered what it needed to, and showed off entirely too much of her delightful legs. Her pink fuzzy slippers had ears, and, I’d be willing to bet, googly eyes. She bent down and pressed a button on a box the size of a storage locker, which soon extruded a gun at least four feet long.
I started a continuous stream of swearing that didn’t let up. Sprinting to where my minions were presently screwing everything up for me, I yanked back on two collars and shouted in their faces. “Go, you idiots!”
Wick gave me a weird, confused look, but a glance up at Hina’s apartment turned that to horror. Yeah, she’d appeared with another of those oversized BFG’s, this one already glowing with pink plasma energy and humming annihilation at us.
“Go!” I screamed, and got Sug before he’d even finished his piss.
“You shoot my dad, and now you piss on my building!? Is this the thanks I get? Corporate told me I have to try and upsell, okay?”
A burning ball of pink death whizzed by and went vormph! into the street behind me.
“What a freak!” Dragon remarked.
“You’re dead, Dirk Stone!” Hina screamed in pixie-ish fury. “You hear me? Dead!”
The others had stopped laughing, but were in the process of turning and hobbling out of there. Half of them looked like they were about to faceplant into the dank pavement.
Another few plasma blasts went by, and blasted the pavement or nearby buildings, but we were in the clear a minute later. Panting, terrified, some of us with scraped up knees, but in the clear.
By the time we reached home, I was dragging ass. Every day here was a hell of a day, thanks to this Deus Ex system and its convenient placement of anything related to the story it was crafting for me. This thought popped on the lightbulb above my head.
I couldn’t believe we’d get so unlucky as to piss on Hina Owari’s building by complete coincidence. No, everything in this place was built around the living PCs, and that meant screwing with us at every available opportunity.
I needed additional alcohol.
It turned out that East Gojira-X had muscled in on a couple more buildings while I was gone. I met Eric and a pair of security NPCs waiting for me on the ground level. We exchanged nods, then I pulled up the E. Gojira-X building map and set to work.
It didn’t take long.
I marked out spots for Beer Pong, Chad and Wick. They were near enough to the Griefers that they could hang out and play video games if they had free time, or drink together, but far enough away that maybe my new frat recruits wouldn’t bother the hell out of my main guys.
Beer Pong was going to take Stayin’s place eventually, once the shock had worn off and they would accept replacing one of their own. While it wouldn’t take long, I didn’t want to shove Beer Pong in with a group of hardened badasses and expect him to fit in immediately.
“You two,” I turned to Chad and Wick. “We’ve got spots open in security or with the crafters. They run in shifts, shorter for the security guys and safer, longer shifts for the crafters.”
Chad was fine taking on security, while Wick was hesitant. He had the haunted look of someone who’d just seen their entire life go up in flames, which we all had. Wick was dumb enough that it hadn’t hit him until the arena.
Crafters it was. Hopefully that wouldn’t be an issue.
We also got out an assortment of cards that had been piling up. Between the levels the Griefers had gained, the levels the frat boys had gotten, and the loot from the arena, we had quite a pool to look at and strategize over.
We did this, of course, in my apartment and with the fridge open. I didn’t know of any other helper programs like Calamari, so I had the fridge open and the beer continuously coming. And Calamari being his old relentlessly cheerful self.
“DIRK STONE, we meet again! Are you making friends? That’s such a great sign! It is good to make friends of your own species for a change. Might I suggest some ready-made party options for your SHINDIG!” He screamed the last word, almost as if he were taking a big shit when he said them, and I wondered if Deus Ex wasn’t facing some difficulty somewhere.
“Thanks, buddy. Can I ask you for a favor?”
“Favors generally cost, user DIRK STONE, but I’m happy to assist, provided you can pay.”
I assured him we could pay for information regarding the game rules, and set about looking through our cards.
