Gameprey

9

By the time Maj reached the Eisenhower booth, the crowd was already a dozen deep.

Without fanfare, a young man in a crisp white suit, white turtleneck instead of a shirt and tie, stepped up onto the nearest table and faced the crowd. Immediately the holos around the Eisenhower booth altered, carrying the image of the young man.

He was clean-shaven and athletic looking, no more than twenty or twenty-one. His black hair was worn long enough to hold the hint of curls. A little-boy smile turned his lips, and he looked at the crowd as if amazed. “I didn’t expect this.” His amplified voice filled the nearby convention area. He looked up at the hidden speakers. “Or that.”

The crowd laughed.

The young man gazed out at them, his sea-green eyes filled with obvious wonderment. “In fact, I didn’t expect any of this.” He cleared his throat. “My name is Peter Griffen, and I want to introduce you to my game.”

Maj studied Peter, trying to imagine him on the back of a dragon. It wasn’t hard at all.

Time passed in a whirling maelstrom of cleaving blades, hoarse shouts of pain, and thudding horses’ hooves. Matt didn’t know how much time actually passed, but it couldn’t have been more than a handful of minutes. He felt winded, bone-tired, but the uploaded reflexes kept him in the game.

The Burgundian line broke, shattered into pockets.

Joan of Arc rode to the top of a nearby hill. “Sound the retreat,” she ordered in a loud voice. The man at her side unlimbered a horn and blew the notes.

Immediately the defenders broke from the conflict, riding their flagging mounts toward the town.

Matt took a moment to watch, seeing the two groups disengage as the Burgundian commander tried to get control over his men. Then he put spurs to his horse and rode after the retreating warriors. Dust coated his lips and the inside of his mouth, making it hard to swallow. His teeth ground grit and his lungs burned.

The defenders wound through the trees and scrub brush, staying with the dirt road that led to Compiègne. The incline grew steeper as they neared the town.

Glancing over his shoulder, Matt saw that the Burgundians had recovered more quickly than he’d thought they would. Dozens of dead and wounded from both sides lay under dust clouds in their wake. The drawbridge was set into the high town wall. Even as he watched, another wave of arrows sped from the wall, looking like long, skinny birds with folded wings.

An instant later the arrows descended in a deadly rain. They rattled through the trees and plunged into the ground. Some of them hit the defenders in full retreat, pitching them from their horses.

Matt raised his shield over his head and heard two distinct impacts. He felt the horse stretch out its stride as they neared the town. Then, only precious seconds from the gate, the drawbridge started up. A sinking feeling filled Matt as he watched the heavy, ironbound edifice ratchet up in small jerks.

Howls of disbelief tore from the throats of the defenders, who suddenly realized they were being abandoned to their fate. Metal rang on metal as the armor pieces beat against each other.

Joan rode in the lead, flanked by Andy.

Then Leif stood up in his stirrups, bending his legs so he could steady himself. He lifted a crossbow to his shoulder, paused, then fired.

The quarrel sped from the weapon and jammed into the chain winching the drawbridge up. Men rushed from the fortification and started trying to free the lodged arrow. Before they could do it, the defenders were upon them. They pulled the drawbridge back down, forcing the archers on the ramparts to defend their retreat.

The Burgundians withered under the concentrated arrow fire, but some of them rode forward. Warriors fought brief battles at the back of the group, then the drawbridge dropped to the ground. Joan of Arc led her troops inside the garrison, turning quickly and taking command of the manual effort to raise the drawbridge.

In seconds the Burgundians were locked outside Compiègne, kept outside arrow range. Matt dismounted his horse and followed Joan, Andy, and Leif up the narrow stone stairs to the ramparts.

“We did it!” Andy crowed. He shook a gauntleted fist at the Burgundians. A few arrows thudded against the stone wall beneath the ramparts where they stood in reply. “I love this game!” Impulsively he reached out to Joan and hugged her tight, then kissed her on the cheek.

“You know,” Joan said, pushing her way out of Andy’s embrace, “the real Joan of Arc would probably have had your head for that little display.”

Andy stood back in shock.

Matt couldn’t help himself; he laughed out loud. Joan’s not a character. She’s another person playing online.

Instead of being mad, though, Joan grinned. Then she said, “Hi, Leif.”

“Hey, Kris,” Leif greeted. “Looks like the game’s really shaping up.”

Joan blew a loose strand of hair from her face. “I think so. Another month or two of development and we should have it all. By that time your dad is going to know he made a good investment for himself and his clients.”

Leif shook his head. “Dad already knew that or he wouldn’t have gotten involved.”

“I couldn’t have done it without him.” Kris looked around and pointed at Andy, who was red-faced with embarrassment. “Do you know him?”

“Yeah. Andy Moore, this is Kris Emerson. She’s the lead designer of Maid of Orleans.”

“You could have told me,” Andy grumbled. He focused on Kris. “Look, I’m sorry—”

“Don’t be,” Kris said. “I haven’t been so flattered in years.”

“And this is Matt Hunter,” Leif said.

In years? Matt thought. That meant the Joan of Arc look was a proxy. Around him, the survivors settled down to the business of tending the wounded and getting the defense better organized.

Kris led the way around the ramparts. “So what brings you here? Checking on your father’s investment?”

“No,” Leif responded. “We’re on our way to the gaming convention and thought we’d scope out a few of the demos available online.”

“I’m glad you dropped in,” Kris said. “If you hadn’t, I’d have been spending the next few hours in chains, hoping someone had enough gumption to mount a rescue attempt. Maid of Orleans is based on the historical data of the period, but the story flows in a lot of different branches for the clever player. That was a nice shot with the crossbow, by the way. Not many people are going to figure that one out without being tipped.”

Leif shrugged. “Seemed like the thing to do at the time. When I actually made the shot, I knew I was on to something.”

“The game’s set up that way,” Kris said. “If a player attempts that shot, they’ll make it ninety percent of the time.” She halted and looked out over the battlefield. “So what were you looking for when you dropped in?”

“A dragon,” Leif answered.

Kris shook her head. “You won’t find any dragons here.”

“I thought maybe you’d included one in a total fantasy mode for the game.”

“No. I made the decision to do this game real. Except for the actual flow of events. There’s a lot of gameplay involved there.”

“Do you know anyone whose game has a dragon in it?” Matt asked.

“You haven’t cruised through many demos yet, have you?” Kris asked. “Dragons are big in the games. You can hunt them, fight them, ride them, and — in some games — talk to them or even be them.”

That isn’t very hopeful. Matt considered the online brochure they’d gone through. At least four hundred games were coming out and on display at the convention. Some of them they’d been able to rule out immediately due to familiarity with the gaming product.

“I don’t mean to be rude,” Kris said, “but I’ve got to get back to the game. The people playing this demo are going to expect me to put on a show for a while. If I’d gotten captured, I could have relaxed in a Burgundian prison. Now I’m going to have to dip into my bag of tricks and stir up some more intrigue.”

“Sorry,” Leif said.

“Don’t worry about it. I spent a lot of time imprisoned during the testing phase of the game. This will be stressful, but it’ll be fun.”

“Will you do me a favor?” Leif asked.

“If I can.”

Leif opened his hand and swirling green lights coalesced into a coin. “This icon has my e-mail address. If you hear of any games that are really big on dragons, can you drop me a note?”

“I’d be happy to.” Kris took the coin, then turned and marched away, bellowing orders to her troops while full dark settled over the town, demanding to see Guillaume de Flavy.

Andy fidgeted and paced restlessly. “Let’s blaze. I’m done here.”

Matt grinned at his friend’s discomfort, but his mind stayed busy with how they were going to find the dragon and the dragonrider.

The gaming convention menu appeared ahead of Matt when he opened his eyes. The fatigue from the jaunt through Maid of Orleans quickly left him. Icons representing various games and gaming corporations spun against a backdrop of star-lit space.

Andy and Leif stood on the electric-blue sheet of crystal that oriented up from down. Andy swept the rows of icons with his eager gaze. “As I recall, it’s my turn to choose.”

Staring at all the selections, Matt felt totally lost.

“You look frustrated,” Leif observed.

“I’m getting that way,” Matt admitted. “There’s no way we’re going to be able to sample every game.”

“We’re not sampling every game,” Leif said.

“Right,” Andy added. “Only the cool ones. And I’ve got one here called Goblin King. It promises a fantasy setting and lots of combat action.”

“We need a way of narrowing down the field,” Matt said. “But I’m fresh out of ideas.”

“Until you get one,” Leif pointed out, “I’d rather stay busy. I don’t think sitting and worrying — even in first class — is going to be beneficial.”

Matt let out a long breath. “No. I just wish I knew for sure what Maj and I entered was a game.”

Leif shook his head. “From the way you describe the environment, it couldn’t be anything else.”

“I know. But why did we get caught in the bleed-over interface?”

“I don’t have an answer for you, buddy. I think we’ll know that when we find the game we’re looking for.”

“If those guys in the black suits haven’t found it first.”

“That’s a lot of negative energy to carry around.” Leif smiled. “Remember, we’re the guys who just saved Joan of Arc from the Burgundians.”

“I’ll try to keep that in mind.”

“While you guys are flapping your lips,” Andy pointed out, “we’re burning daylight. Let’s hit it.” He touched a whirling red icon in the shape of a gargoyle, and red sparks spread over him, whirling him away in a sudden tornado.

Leif and Matt touched the icon and followed him.

Bitter cold soaked into Matt’s body in the next moment. He blinked his eyes open and found his head encased in a round clear bubble. The air inside the helmet tasted stale.

He was also in orbit in a space suit around a slow-turning planet. He gazed up at the world, knowing that way was actually down. The planet was predominantly the blue-green of oceans with only sporadic splotches of red-brown earth. Scanning the curvature of the planet, he spotted three satellites, much closer than he would have figured possible with the gravity well that existed. Two of them were true green while the third was purple.

“Rhidher!”

Matt experienced a sharp, stabbing pain between his temples, then realized the voice came from inside his head. He twisted and spotted a huge shape bearing down on him. When he saw the bat wings that flared out on either side of the gigantic creature, he thought for a moment that they’d found the great dragon.

But the shape wasn’t long and sleek like that of the dragon. Despite its enormous size, the creature’s body was squat and man-shaped, possessing two arms and two legs. Blue-silver armor covered it, showing great hinged joints. Even the wings looked too stunted for its size.

“Rhidher! Sit!”

The great creature came to a stop in front of Matt with a flurry of bat wings despite the fact there was no atmosphere in space. The thing dwarfed him. A seat, built along the lines of a cockpit console, was strapped across the thick, broad neck. Long, tubular weapons occupied areas on either side of the seat.

“Rhidher!” The great beast looked at Matt imploringly with manhole-sized brown eyes that held glints of cyberwear. “You must sit! Enemy come!”

The voice inside Matt’s head didn’t hurt as much as it had. He reached out and caught the edge of the seat, pulling himself in. Belts automatically stretched across his chest and shoulders, locking him down.

Andy’s face blurred into focus on the screen at the front of the console. “Welcome, Rhidher Matt.” Like Matt, he wore the bubble helmet and bulky space suit.

“These aren’t the dragons we’re looking for,” Matt said.

“We’ll look around for a minute.”

Before Matt could reply, a triangular-shaped aircraft attacked. Pink lasers strafed the darkness. The sizzle was even audible. The gargoyle beast he rode dodged automatically.

“Oh, yeah,” Andy said. “Meet the enemy.”

Maj peered up at Peter Griffen as the game designer held court on the table he’d climbed up on. In spite of the fact that he had a reputation for shying away from publicity, Peter seemed at home in front of the convention crowd.

HoloNet reporters stood in the forefront of the crowd with their equipment trained on him. “Why was there so much secrecy involved in this game?” one of them asked. Maj didn’t know the man’s name, but she’d seen him reporting on the up coming gaming convention over the last few days.

Peter smiled shyly. “To get you to ask questions like that.”

The crowd laughed.

Well, he has a sense of humor, Maj thought.

“Seriously,” Peter said. “There were a lot of reasons not to talk about the game until now. How many times have we heard about a game’s release date pushing out a month or three? Or even a year?”

The response from the crowd was a grudging acknowledgment of the industry’s primary pitfall. Even with all the technology available on the Net, designers fell behind on delivery dates.

“I look around today,” Peter went on, “and I can name six different games I can point to from here that were supposed to release six months and more ago.”

“If you’ve found a way to fix that,” one of the reporters commented, “you’re going to make a mint.”

Peter shook his head. “I haven’t fixed that for anybody but me.” He paced on the table, showing nervous energy instead of a planned attack to get more attention. “I’ve been in this business for four years. Luckily, I’ve gotten the chance to work on a number of well-received games.”

“It wasn’t luck,” someone in the crowd said. “The guy has a real gift for picking the right property.”

“I’ve written code, game designs, worked with art, done finished as well as concept treatments, written dialogue, and everything else it takes to make a really good game,” Peter said.

Maj remembered reading that from the text files available over the Net. Peter Griffen had been a true Renaissance man in the gaming industry. There hadn’t been any aspect of computer-based gaming that he hadn’t touched.

Some of the articles Maj had read that were taken from top game review magazines had lamented at the loss of the crown prince of the game scene. But that had been then, eighteen months ago, right after the launch of the Promethean Directive, a game based on politics and economics that had rocketed up the sales figures in the gaming industry.

“Eighteen months ago,” Peter went on, “I quit my position with my last software developer. I had an idea for a world, and for gameplay that would be so cutting edge that no man, woman, or child could resist picking it up. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Realms of the Bright Waters.” He waved his hand and the holoprojectors behind him filled with dazzling color that took the crowd’s breath away.