I rapped my fingers on the steering wheel. It was the night of our big robbery and I was waiting outside Angelo’s apartment building waiting for him and the others to come down. Even though I was the one who’d come up with the plan, my nerves were starting to get the better of me. I couldn’t help worrying that something would go wrong. No plan was perfect. There were always things that you couldn’t account for.
If you’d told me a couple of weeks ago that I’d be the mastermind behind an elaborate con like this, I’d have called you crazy. Was this a good idea? Sure, I’d get some XP and hopefully some extra money for the crew, but was it worth it? I thought back to the feeling I’d experienced when I used Mean Mug for the first time. It was like becoming a completely different person. I’d never felt so powerful and in control in my entire life. I hated to admit it, but if the ring granted me more abilities like that, I’d probably go along with any quest it gave me. Still, I felt on edge. I saw the crew exit the building and waved to them. Angelo was going to be the getaway driver, so I got out of the car and went into the passenger’s seat. Joey and Mello sat in the back.
“Hey, did you guys bring everything?” I asked.
Joey pulled out the Daffy Duck mask he’d bought the day before. “Yup. We have the masks and the toy gun that we spray painted black.”
“Cool. Hand me a couple of the business cards,” I said.
Mello reached into his pocket and slapped a couple of cards into my hand. I looked them over to make sure there weren’t any mistakes. The cards were printed on gold-colored paper with black ink. One side had my name on it in big letters with the job title “personal bodyguard” underneath it. On the other side, Divine Protection was written in bold with the tagline “You’re in good hands” underneath it with my phone number and a new email I’d made. I thought it looked very professional.
“Okay, let’s go over the plan one last time,” Angelo said. “First, we find Gary Xtreme.”
“Uh, It’s Harry Xtreme,” I interrupted.
“That’s what I said. After that, we follow him and wait until he’s alone. Then Joey and Mello will pull the “gun” on him and get him to fork over any valuable stuff he has on him. That’s when Nico runs up, disarms you, and fights the two of you off. Harry is grateful and now that his life has been threatened he’s open to the idea of hiring a bodyguard. Did I miss anything?” Angelo recapped.
“No, that was it. Thanks for summing it up,” I said.
“I still think we shouldn’t do this,” Mello said. “I don’t see it turning out well.”
I sighed. “Look, how about this? if we can’t find him or we can’t get him alone then we can just call the whole thing off. Sound good?”
Mello crossed his arms. “I’d rather call it off now. But fine.”
That was probably as close as I would get to making that guy happy, so I took it as a win. I looked at Angelo and Joey. “What about you two? Any other concerns?”
“Yeah, I just thought of something,” Joey said. “What are we gonna do if Harry sees the license plate for your car? If he talks to the cops, they could easily trace it back to you and then we’re all screwed.”
“Simple. Just don’t let him see the plates,” I said. “After we find Harry, Angelo can drop us all off somewhere close by and then park further up the street. As soon as we finish our fake fight, you guys can run up the block to the car and drive away. I’ll just stand in front of Harry and block him so he doesn’t get a good look at the car.”
Angelo shook his head. “I don’t know, man. That seems kind of half-assed. Can’t we think of something better than that?”
“We probably could if we had more time. But we already decided to do this now. Don’t worry about it. Harry will be so shaken up he won’t know what’s going on,” I said.
Angelo’s indecision was written on his face as plain as day. I got the feeling that he was close to canceling this job. Before he could say anything else, I cut him off.
“Do you trust me?” I said.
He did a double-take. “What? What kind of question is that?”
“I’m being serious. Do you trust me? Yes or no?”
“Yeah, of course, I trust you.”
“Alright, then trust me when I say that I’m going to do whatever it takes to make sure this all works out. Alright?”
“Alright,” Angelo said.
He put the car in drive and we headed out. I pulled up Harry Xtreme’s Twitch stream on my phone. Sometimes he and his friends would go around town and stream themselves pulling stupid pranks. Other times, they would do dangerous stunts inside their mansion or in their backyard. They’d done a lot of streams at their house in the past month, so it seemed likely that they’d be doing some pranks this week. The plan would fall apart if they didn’t leave the house. Whenever they streamed pranks, they made sure to keep changing locations quickly so that they didn’t get mobbed by fans. It would be tricky to keep up with them, but I was sure we could do it.
The stream started a few minutes later. The Xtremers were dressed like tourists and asking people for directions to places that didn’t exist. It was a lot tamer than their usual pranks. Maybe they were running out of ideas. I could tell that they were somewhere in the Wynwood neighborhood, so I told Angelo and we headed in that direction. Since The Xtremers had gotten more popular in the past few months, their public streams usually didn’t last that long anymore before fans found them. Sometimes they let the fans join in, but when too many people started approaching them they usually ended the stream. If we wanted to pull this off then we needed to find them fast. Joey was watching the stream on his phone too and we tried to look up the addresses of the stores that they walked past. It only took us a couple of minutes to get a lock on their location.
We drove down the streets as fast as we could without getting a ticket. The way that Angelo managed to weave through traffic was masterful. He hit the gas pedal hard every time that he saw a yellow light. We made it to Wynwood in record time and started scanning the streets for Harry and his friends. They were starting to get mobbed by kids who watched their videos in front of a pizzeria. We found them right in the nick of time because the stream ended a couple of minutes later. Now came the boring part; waiting. The Xtremers spent at least twenty minutes talking to their fans and taking pictures before they finally managed to pull themselves away and get into their SUV.
“They’re on the move,” I said, pointing.
“You sound like you’re in a bad cop movie,” Angelo laughed as he put the car in drive again.
We followed after their car but it wasn’t as easy as movies made it seem. It was hard to strike the right balance between following too closely and staying too far back. There were a couple of moments when it looked like we might’ve lost them. After about half an hour, the car finally pulled to a stop in front of the famous Xtremer’s Mansion. It looked even bigger in person. I couldn’t believe that a group of guys who were the same age as me were able to afford something like this. Kev Xtreme, Steph Xtreme, and Manny Xtreme got out of the car and headed into the house, but Harry drove away.
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
“Where’s he going?” Mello said.
“Harry always goes out for burgers to unwind after the streams,” I said.
Everyone turned to stare at me.
“What?” I said. “I saw it on his Twitter. He posts about pretty much everything that he does.”
“You sure you don’t have a thing for him or something?” Angelo teased.
I rolled my eyes. “Just shut up and drive.”
After another prolonged game of Follow-The-Leader, Harry finally slowed down his car near a restaurant called Benny’s Burger Bistro. I’d never heard of the place, but there was a long line out the door and there weren’t any parking spaces on the block. Harry drove down a couple of blocks to find a place to park. He finally found a spot on the left-hand side and pulled into it. There weren’t any people walking on the street, so the timing was perfect for us.
“I think you should drop us off here,” I said to Angelo. “He’ll have to walk back this way to get to the restaurant and that’s when you guys can get the drop on him.”
“Sounds good. Good luck. And stick to the plan,” Angelo said.
We quickly jumped out of the car and Angelo immediately drove a bit further up the street. There weren’t any open spaces, so he was forced to double park the car while he waited for us. I ran down the block in the opposite direction and stood near the corner so I could watch everything go down. Mello and Joey hid behind a car and put their masks on as fast as they could. As soon as Harry walked past them they jumped out from behind the car. Mello got in front of him and pulled out the toy gun while Joey stood behind Harry, blocking off his path of escape. There was no way he was getting past that giant. I was too far away to hear what they were saying, but I saw Harry take off his chain quickly and hand it over to them.
QUEST “JACK HIS SHIT” COMPLETE
300 XP AWARDED
I smiled. It looked like the system awarded points the second that the conditions for a quest were met. That was good to know. Mello yelled something and Harry tried to back away, but Joey shoved him forward. I saw Harry pull out his wallet after that, which was my cue to step in.
I took a step forward and a middle-aged man jogged past me. He had graying hair and wore a white tank top with camouflage cargo pants. I saw the man pull something out of his back pocket and my blood froze. He had a pistol. The man clicked off the safety and continued moving briskly. Shit! I kicked myself for not thinking about what would happen if a passerby tried to interfere in our robbery. This was Florida after all. Everyone and their mothers owned a gun. But I’d have time to reflect on my shortsightedness later. Right now, I needed to stop this gun nut before someone got hurt.
I ran after the guy before I even knew what I was going to do. My mind was racing at a mile a minute. Think, Nico. Think. It felt like time slowed to a crawl and then a flash of inspiration hit me. I quickly brought up the Skills menu and spent 100 XP to buy the Brawler skill the system had offered me earlier. If there was ever a time that I needed fighting skills, it was now.
The man heard me running behind him and whipped around. Before I even knew what was happening, I jumped up and kicked the guy in the head as hard as I could. I’d never kicked anyone before in my life, but the man was unconscious before his head even hit the pavement. His gun clattered to the ground. I picked it up gingerly and tossed it into a nearby sewer drain just in case he woke up and tried to use it on us again. Crisis averted.
Mello saw the whole thing go down since he was facing my direction. He froze up. Joey and Harry followed his gaze and saw me running towards them.
Mello recovered from his surprise and pointed the fake gun at me. “W..Who the fuck are you?! Stay back!”
I tried not to laugh at his bad acting and kept running. Joey was closer to me. We locked eyes and got ready to put on a show. He threw an extremely telegraphed hook at me. I dodged it and threw a couple of quick punches into his gut. Joey doubled over in pain. I moved past Harry, who seemed to be in shock, and knocked the toy gun out of Mello’s hand. He tried to hit me with his other hand, but I was easily able to block his punch. It felt like Brawler had turned me into Neo from The Matrix. No matter how many times Mello tried to hit me, I was able to either block him or evade his blows. I kicked him in the chest and he fell on his ass.
“Had enough?” I said. The fight had gone on long enough and it would be better for us to wrap this up quickly.
He seemed to get the hint. Mello quickly got to his feet and started to run to my car. “Let’s get out of here!” He called back to Joey.
Joey bolted after him and they hopped into the car. Angelo peeled off and they disappeared into the distance. Harry was still standing there in shock. His eyes were wide as saucers.
“Um, are you okay?” I asked him.
“Yeah… Yeah, I’m good. I just need to catch my breath,” Harry said, still looking dazed. “Holy shit. That was insane!”
“Yeah, I can’t believe that just happened,” I said.
“You saved my ass, dude. If you hadn’t stepped in I could’ve been ki-,” he shuddered, without finishing that thought. “Seriously, thank you.”
I gave him a smile that I hoped looked modest. “It’s no big deal. Anybody would’ve done the same thing.”
“I doubt it. You took those guys out like Batman,” Harry grinned. “I’ve never seen anything like it before. Where’d you learn to fight like that?”
“I’ve been working in security for a while now, so I’ve had a lot of training. Sorry that they got away with your stuff though. Any idea why those guys targeted you?” I asked.
Harry shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe they recognized me from my videos.”
I gave him a blank look. “Videos?”
“Yeah, I’m pretty famous online. Maybe you’ve heard of me. I’m Harry Xtreme,” He said, extending his hand.
I gave him a firm handshake. “I’m Nico Moretti. Nice to meet you. So you’re a vlogger or something like that?”
Harry nodded. “My videos are pretty wild. Check ‘em out if you get a chance. My manager has been warning me that I could get in trouble if I kept showing off so much. Looks like he was right.”
“Well, at least you got out of this without any injuries,” I said. “You might want to take more precautions in the future though. There are a lot of desperate people out there these days and things might not turn out so well next time. See you around, Harry.” I turned to walk away.
Harry put his hand on my shoulder. “Wait! You said you work in security? Would you be interested in working for me? I don’t want anything like this to happen again and you seem pretty good at your job.”
I rubbed my chin. “I don’t know. The company that I work for has a lot of clients. I’m not sure if we’ll be able to fit you in.”
“If this is about money, don’t worry about it. I’m willing to pay whatever it takes to stay safe,” Harry said.
I smiled. He’d fallen for it hook, line, and sinker. I pulled out one of my business cards and handed it to him. “I’ll tell you what. Here’s my card. I think I might be able to convince my boss to let me work for you. Give the office a call next week on Tuesday and we’ll try to get this straightened out.”
Harry breathed a sigh of relief as he looked over the card. “Thanks. Divine Protection, huh? You were like a guardian angel tonight, so it’s a pretty fitting name.”
“My boss came up with it. I’m just an employee,” I chuckled.
Some groans coming from behind us grabbed my attention. I turned around. The man who’d tried to interfere earlier was starting to wake up. I didn’t think he’d be happy to see me.
“We should get out of here,” I said to Harry. “He was working with those other guys who tried to rob you. If we stick around, he might try and go after you again.”
“You don’t have to tell me twice,” Harry said, breaking into a full sprint.
I ran behind him. If Harry had stopped to think about things a little more, he might’ve realized that calling the cops would have been the better option. From his perspective, the camo pants man was one of the men who tried to rob him. Restraining him or at least getting a picture of the guy for the cops could’ve helped him find the people behind the robbery. I was glad that he didn’t want to stick around because it would’ve caused me a lot of issues.
We ran a couple of blocks until we were sure that the man wasn’t following us. Both of us were panting heavily by the time we stopped. After we caught our breath, we said our goodbyes. Harry promised to call the number on the business card and we went our separate ways. Mission accomplished.