Chapter 49

A Monkey and His Boots

The name was familiar even to me with my large gaps of Interverse knowledge. Everyone knew of the User Killers, they were like the boogeymen of the Interverse. They were notorious for showing up when you absolutely didn't want to be bothered. Just finished a big quest. Stumbled on tons of loot. That's when they would strike, taking half of your spoils.

They were actually worse than boogeymen cause there was actual proof they existed. Tons of undeniable proof. From what I knew, they started similarly as these Blue Masked freaks. Simple stuff, petty—more like practical jokes than full on crimes. But as time went on they became more and more vicious in their attacks. No longer jokesters but the scum of the Interverse. I'd always wondered if maybe the original creator of the group lost control and was ousted or something.

I continued reading the post, noticing a familiar username.

[ {BootLickerKicker72}: Hear me out. When was the last time you've heard of the User Killers striking? They've been awfully quiet, yeah? Well... what if that's because they are rebranding or something, as these Blue Skulls. Where are the big boys in the group? It's like they've completely vanished. When was the last time there was a report of Tiny Tim crushing someone between his pinky fingers? I'm telling you guys, it's weird. It's like the memorable members have vanished and these faceless Blue Skulls have taken their place. ]

There were very few replies and none of them terribly interesting. What were the odds of this User popping up twice in my searches? And he had been right about the tournament existing, so, maybe...

But if he was right, how did that help me? The fact that the Blue Skulls could be connected to the User Killers just made them even bigger, scarier, and even further out of reach.

I sighed. But it was my only lead. The dude seemed like a lunatic from all his posts, but... I think I needed to contact him.

I sent him a message.

[ Hey! You don't know me but I've seen your posts a few times and they kind of helped me? Once with the tournament, you predicted that being announced way before it came out officially. And now, someone I know was taken by those Blue Skulls. Do you have any other information on them? A way I can contact them, a base of operations—ANYTHING? I'm really desperate here. Thanks in advance. ]

Even before I could finish the message, my eyes started drifting and I yawned every few seconds. It had been a long night and, as much as I wanted to keep up the search, I had to call it quits.

Now that I thought about it, it was pretty odd that Stephen was meeting with Kenzo so late. Was he really there for therapy and not to train? I think late night mental training made more sense than late night therapy but, hey, what did I know.

And I probably never would know. It didn't seem like Stephen and I were any closer to making up. I tried not to think about that.

I got off the couch and touched the fishbowl glass. "Night, Percy. Thanks for your help tonight."

He was already asleep, but little bubbles came from the skull, either an acknowledgement or a fish snore.

I walked to my room and collapsed into bed...

DING! DING! DING!

[ An unknown User is sending you a voice call request! ]

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#

An "unknown User"? I couldn't remember ever seeing something like that in my life. Did I dare answer? I tried to be rational. I'd just sent a message to the conspiracy theorist dude, it was late, but I'm sure loonies like that would be up at this hour, so... it had to be him.

... but what if it wasn't? What if it was the Blue Masks? The User Killers? That scared me for a half a second before I realized: so what if it was? That would save me a lot of trouble finding them.

I tossed aside all my doubts and answered the call.

"RaeDarz?" An obviously edited voice said. It was robotic, but not deep. Kind of high pitched actually, but it went up and down with each word.

"You know it is." Wrong numbers were kind of a thing of the past nowadays.

"Yeah. Well. In my line of work, you never know."

I wondered what work that would be but resisted asking. "You're BootLickerKicker?"

"Affirmative."

This guy was gonna be annoying to deal with, I could already tell.

"Got a simpler name for me?" I asked.

"No."

"Okay, then I'll just shorten it to BootLicker, that's fine with me."

There was a long silence where I could just picture him screaming with his voice muted. But he came back. "Mr. Boot is fine."

"Okay, Boots." I changed my mind, talking to this guy was EXTREMELY entertaining. "You know anything about where I can find the Blue Masks?"

There was a silence again, likely losing his mind at me not giving him an ounce of control in this conversation.

"Why do you care?"

He knew. But I guess he was so paranoid he had to double and triple check I was who I said I was. Whatever.

"Like I said in the message, they stole my friend."

"I've never heard of the Blue Masks kidnapping someone. Who was it they stole?"

"Uhh... well... his name is Sam. And he... he's an NPC."

Silence again. I couldn't begin to imagine what his reaction was this time.

"Was it a pet or something?"

I had to be careful with what I said or he would bail out on me. "Uh, yeah, something like that. A uhh, fish monster? He was handed down to me from my mom, he's real special."

Nice, I threw in some of my mommy issues, surely that would rope him back in.

"So they've stooped that low, huh? Stealing people's pets. Those slimy fucks."

Whoa. The pet thing actually made him more invested in helping me, wasn't expecting that. Maybe he was an animal lover. I imagined him hunched over in an old school gamer chair, in a dark room, surrounded by cats.

"They're awful. Any idea where I can find them? Where would they have taken Sam?"

"Their base, for sure. But I dunno what you'll do with that information..."

My eyes lit up. "You actually know where they are?"

"I mean, I haven't confirmed it for myself... but I know where they've been sighted the most. Their base is probably somewhere in that area."

"Can you tell me where it is? Please." I tried not to sound too desperate but I didn't think it really worked.

"It won't do you any good. There's no way you'll get anywhere close to wherever they've got your pet. You would need a whole ass army for that kind of rescue."

"I need him back. I have to try. What's the worst they could do to me? They've already stolen the most important thing from me and I don't really care about money or have a whole lot."

There was a creepy sounding chuckle. With the voice disruptor it made it sound like an explosion. "You don't understand. If they're connected to the User Killers... they can do a lot worse than all that."

"But User Killers do the same kind of shit, right? Attacks to steal items or money or experience. If I don't care about losing any of that what more can they take?"

Silence. For so long I thought he hung up.

"You don't know the rumors, huh?"

"Clearly I'm not as well versed as you."

"Clearly." I could almost see the smile. He loved talking about all this crap and I doubt he had too many people to tell it to who weren't in as deep as him. "They say that the reason the User Killers have vanished... is because the Blue Masks took over."

"You kind of hinted at that possibility in the post I read."

"Yeah, but that was outdated. There's been new developments since then. What they're saying now..." I was so tempted to ask who "they" were but I didn't want to distract him now that he was actually telling me what I wanted to hear. "Is that the Blue Masks can kill, whoever they want. Whenever they want. Wherever they want."

"I mean they did get into my apartment but that was my bad for not keeping the security updated. They can't get to people anywhere."

That laugh explosion again. "That's not what I mean. What I'm saying is... they can kill, for real, outside of No Respawn zones."

Now that was a rumor.

"How could that be possible?" I asked.

"I dunno. Just what I heard. People say it's only the leaders with that power, none of the lackeys, but, still. It's scary for that power to be out there."

I thought back to the lumberjack. His blood red mask. Was he holding back on me again? Did I narrowly escape real death just because he felt like it?

"The User Killers," Boots continued. "...they say they were wiped out by the Blue Masks now. Not just in a 'haha your territory is mine' kind of way but in a they went and completely killed them all, for real."