“What have we here?” I said, suddenly stopping. It caught my new companions off guard. After the martial arts exhibition, we had set off for Crazy Sadie the Food Cart Lady’s food cart and had been walking for less than a minute when I saw a Player with some excellent abilities. I’d stopped to check him out.

Jason Towers Affinity: Earth - Novice Gifts: Is This Tough Enough For Ya? - Enhanced toughness Powers:

Build The Wall - Novice: Move earth

Look Ma, No Hands - Novice: Telekinesis

Skills:

War Hammer - Novice

He was dressed in simple leather armor and I saw him just as he was entering a weapons shop. We decided to head over and wait for him to come out again.

He emerged a few minutes later, now carrying an enormous hammer, and the women went to work. Sigrid took the lead and slid into a conversation with him like they were siblings, chatting just long enough to get an idea of his personality before getting into the team talk.

“I’m flattered you want me,” he said, “but I’m afraid I already agreed to join another team.” He did look genuinely sorry as his eyes flicked back and forth between Sigrid and Jane.

“Oh!” Sigrid said. “That’s disappointing, but we understand.”

“If I can ask, why did you single me out?” He gestured around the street. “There are lots of people, why me?”

Sigrid tagged out and Jane took over. “Well I have this power,” she said, and I was in even more awe at Jane’s ability to slide into the conversation so smoothly. “I can read people’s auras and you stood out as someone nice.”

“I see. Well thanks again and good luck, I guess,” he said.

“So Jane,” I said as I watched him continue on his way. “What’s with the lie about auras?”

“I couldn’t tell him the truth about your power, could I? And he’s right, it does seem a little weird to pounce on someone the moment they exit a shop. I’d ask why too.”

“That makes sense,” I said. ”I wish I was as good on my toes.”

“Besides,” Jane said, “he did seem like a nice guy, even if he spent a bit too long looking at our boobs. I figured I could earn some good karma to send him off feeling good about himself.”

“You definitely could use some of that,” I said.

She made a hurt face. “Keep bullying me like that and you’ll be the one in need of some good karma to balance out all the bad mojo you’re building up.”

“Not me,” I said. “I've got so much good karma in my pocket, I can pretty much cruise the rest of my life.”

She laughed. “Come on, dude. If you’re gonna come up with a lie, at least make it believable.”

I laughed too. “Maybe I’m just going to have a very short life.”

She stopped laughing. “That’s not funny, Daniel.”

We set off again for the old woman’s food cart. Unfortunately, we never made it. Soon it was Sigrid's turn to stop us abruptly.

Jane stumbled, bumping into her back. “Oof. What now?”

“My spidey sense is tingling,” Sigrid said, then I heard a familiar voice call out from behind me.

“Ohhhhhh, Danieeeeeeel.”

I groaned.

“Someone you know?” Sigrid said.

“It’s Kiki.”

"Who?"

"The slag," Jane said.

"Ah," Sigrid said, gritting her teeth. "Her."

We turned around and saw her striding toward us, her pair of lackeys close behind. She’d also picked up two more companions, and when I saw them I groaned again. They were our old friends, Greg and Chuck: the Iceman and Mr Lighter. Then I saw one more person behind them: Jason, the Player we’d just tried to recruit.

Kiki was still wearing the private high school uniform, the beige cardigan tied around her hips swaying in the breeze as she wiggled toward us. Her sly smile told me I was in for some public harassment.

“Heeeeeey!” she shouted in a loud sing-song voice, and many heads turned to see what was up. She grabbed Jason’s arm and clung to it possessively. “My little birdie here told me you went and tried to steal him from me. Naughty Daniel.”

Once she got to about twenty feet away she and her posse stopped. She looked at us, clicked her tongue, and in a voice still loud enough to draw attention from others on the street she said, “Lookie what we got here, seems our boy’s nabbed himself some hotties. Poor Daniel, no real woman would have him so he had to hire NPC hook—”

She stopped mid-sentence and her smile faltered as her eyes traveled between my friends. She had clearly just checked their Statuses and discovered they weren’t NPC hookers at all.

“Go on,” Jane said with more than a hint of threat. “Finish what you were saying.”

“Yeah,” Sigrid said. “NPC what?”

“These had better not be members of your team, Daniel,” Kiki said. “I thought my warning was quite clear.”

“And what if we are?” Jane said.

“If you are,” Kiki said, “then after we’re done finishing what we started with him, we’re going to leave you two in such rough shape even the brothels will turn up their noses at your ugly faces.”

Sigrid raised her shield and hefted her spear, stepping in front of me. “Go ahead and try something,” she said. “I bet things will be a bit different now it’s not three on one.”

“So he told you about last night, eh?” Kiki said, chuckling. “How does it feel knowing you’ve joined up with someone who’s got a death wish?”

“Just walk away,” Jane said. “You’re being stupid.”

Kiki’s expression immediately flipped from amused to angry. “What did you just say?”

Jane laughed. She turned to Sigrid and said, “Seems someone doesn’t like being called stupid.” Then Jane turned back to Kiki. “Isn’t that right, Stupid?” she crooned with strong emphasis on the last word.

“Seems to me like someone else has a death wish,” Kiki growled. She snapped her fingers and at once Jonah’s hands did that turning-into-metal trick and a knife appeared as if from nowhere in Derek’s hand, ready to throw. A little slower on the uptake, Chuck and Greg took a second or two to figure out what was happening before drawing their fancy-looking swords and stepping up. Greg also made a little ball of fire, about the size of an apple, appear in his free hand. Jason, the new guy we’d tried to recruit, stood back and did nothing, eyes wide as he watched his companions prepare to attack us in the middle of the street.

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At the same time, Sigrid crouched behind her shield, covering both of us, and lowered her spear. Beside me, Jane frowned as she drew her rapier and whispered to us, “This is bad. I didn’t think she’d actually start something in public like this. She really is stupid.”

“Don’t worry,” I said. “We can do this.”

Jane held up her sword like it had cooties. “But I’ve had, like, all of about a half-hour of stage fencing training for a play I was in and that’s it. I don’t know how to use this thing.”

“Yes you do,” I said. “It says so right there in your Status. Under Skills.”

“Oh yeah,” Jane said. Her thin blade whistled through the air as she swished it a few times in front of her. Her face lit up, back to the usual Jane. “Yes I do.”

Kiki turned to Derek and hissed, “Quick, go for the one with the red hair.”

“Watch out, Jane!” I shouted, but it was too late, Derek had already thrown his knife. I saw it whiz through the air toward Jane, then there was a blur as Sigrid moved from in front of me to in front of her, followed by a metallic clink.

I turned to see Sigrid with her shield protecting Jane, Derek’s knife resting harmlessly on the street’s paving stones in front of her.

Shield Maiden indeed.

“Don’t just stand there,” Kiki shrieked, “go!”

At her command, Jonah rushed forward, iron fists clenched and raised. Chuck followed close behind him, his sword shaking slightly, his knuckles white on the hilt. Grinning, Jane rushed ahead to meet their charge. Greg stayed back, hurling the ball of fire in the palm of his hand at Sigrid. It bounced as harmlessly off her shield as Derek’s knife had and fizzled on the paving stones in front of her.

I really, really wanted to show that jerk how it’s done, so I made a fireball of my own, channeling every bit of focus I had into it until it swelled to the size of a large melon, and threw it with all my might at Greg.

System: Your mastery of Affinity Control has evolved

System: Your mastery of Fire has evolved

It hissed through the air and struck Greg square in the chest. It blossomed into a cascade of flame and sparks that sent him reeling backward, a large scorch mark marring the front of his shiny new armor’s chestplate and smoke rising from his singed eyebrows. As he fell, the back of his head smashed against the ground with a clunk. He seemed down for the count.

That felt so good.

Then it felt so bad when my arms were forced against my sides and my legs stuck together. Derek had used his shadow ropes on me again.

“Oh crap,” I groaned as I began to teeter, struggling to retain my balance. It was no use, though, and I toppled over to the side, falling hard. I only just managed to keep from smacking my own head into the paving stones.

Meanwhile, Jane was keeping her two attackers at bay by using her power to teleport short distances. She’d blink away, then reappear on their blind side and jab them with her rapier. Chuck and Jonah were starting to get peppered with small wounds from the point of her sword. They kept swinging their fists and sword at Jane, but only ever met empty air because every time she blinked away before they could hit her.

Sigrid didn’t notice my predicament until she almost tripped over me as I lay bound and helpless on the street. She looked down and saw me wriggling.

“What are you doing?” she said, like I was doing it on purpose.

My arms and legs might have been useless, but my mouth was unbound. “The guy who threw the knife, take him down.” I told her.

She nodded once, then tossed her spear straight up in the air and caught it again, shifting her grip on it from overhand to underhand so she could throw it. And she threw it. Hard. It sailed through the air and hit Derek in the shoulder. The tip pierced him and sank in deep, and he was thrown back with several feet of metal and wood sticking out of him.

I felt the shadow bonds release.

“We need to get you some extra spears,” I said from the ground.

Sigrid barked a short laugh and drew her sword. “I did enjoy that.”

“Jesus H Christ, do I have to do everything myself?” Kiki bellowed. She lowered her hands then raised them, palms up, as though lifting something. Out of nowhere, twin flames appeared on the ground, one on each side of her. She thrust her hands out as though pushing something, and two big fiery snakes uncoiled from within the flames.

The fire serpents slithered hastily forward, stopping behind the boys to act as a sort of shield to prevent Jane from using her blink and hit and blink again tactic.

“Jonah you dumb brute,” Kiki hissed. “Don’t just stand there, hit her!”

Jonah grunted and took a few steps toward Jane, swinging his iron fists. Jane used her heightened agility to dance back, luring him away.

“Come on,” she taunted, “that all you got, big boy?” Once Jonah had advanced far enough that the snakes were no longer protecting his blind side, she blinked behind him and stabbed him again, laughing the whole time.

System: You know Sword

Nice.

“We can’t keep this up forever, we need to end it,” Jane said, taking charge like a real protagonist. She was breathing heavily and her movements were starting to slow down. The Status screen listed our abilities and gave vague descriptions, but it did not provide much detail, such as how much mana it cost to use them. Judging by the way Jane was starting to lag, all that teleporting had almost used hers all up. “Sigrid, you deal with these jokers. I’m going to take out Kiki.”

“You got it,” Sigrid said, and advanced with her shield up and sword ready.

“I’ll see what I can do about the snakes,” I said, clambering to my feet.

I figured that a fireball wouldn’t do much against the flame serpents, so I used my affinity with Water instead. I held my hands out and squirted jets at them. Steam hissed and rose from the snakes and they started to wither, but my measly hydrant effect wasn’t enough to douse them altogether.

Jane vanished. One moment she was there with Chuck and Jonah, and she was gone the next.

She reappeared instantly right beside Kiki. “Surprise,” she said, and stabbed her in the arm.

Kiki cried out in pain. The snakes disappeared. So did Jane. She reappeared instantly back behind Sigrid.

“This is so much fun,” she said, pressing the point of her sword into the ground and resting on the hilt. She looked exhausted, but happy. It’s a shame da Vinci had never seen the grin she wore. If he had, it would be Jane’s face behind the glass in the Louvre and we’d all be saying Mona who?

A small crowd had formed, both NPCs and Players, and they were almost all rooting for our side. I noticed Kiki gaze around venomously at them after a few of the watchers cheered Jane when she stabbed her.

“Alright, alright, alright, that’s enough,” Kiki yelled. Her troops withdrew. Derek was still on his back with Sigrid’s spear sticking out of him, and once Jonah had retreated he unceremoniously yanked it out. He held the wooden shaft in both hands and looked directly at Sigrid as he brought it down over his knee, snapping it in half. He tossed the pieces onto the ground and glared at Sigrid, but she just smiled and waved.

The new guy, Jason, hadn’t done a thing during the entire battle.

“God I feel so tired all of a sudden,” Jane said.

“You gotta be careful not to overuse your powers,” I said. “But great job, you really made the difference for us.”

“Totally,” Sigrid said.

“Hey, I think we all did pretty good for our first fight,” Jane said. “Even though Daniel spent most of it lying on the ground like a useless turd.”

I called out to Kiki. “So are we done here or what?” She had Greg fussing over her bleeding arm while Chuck rose groggily to his feet and Jonah supported Derek, who was bleeding considerably more than Kiki was, thanks to the gaping spear wound in his shoulder.

“Yeah,” Kiki replied sulkily.

“How’s your arm?” I said. “And the guy who got hit with a spear, is he okay? Do you need medical attention?”

“Screw you,” Kiki yelled back. “We don’t need anything from you.”

“Meh, suit yourself,” Sigrid said, then turned and started walking away up the street.

Jane laughed. “I guess we’re going then,” she huffed, and started after her blonde friend. “So stupid,” she added loudly to make sure Kiki could hear her.

I was about to go with her when I noticed Sigrid stiffen in that way I was starting to associate with her danger sense being triggered. I looked back and saw Derek, unsteady on his feet and bleeding from his wound, holding the tip of a long knife between his fingers, ready to throw. I had to give him points for tenacity, but he loses even more for being a backstabbing prick.

It sounds cliche, but the next moments really did seem to happen in slow motion. I saw the hand move forward and could tell the moment the knife left his fingers that its trajectory would take it straight into Jane’s back. I took one step forward then leaped at her. The knife and I sailed through the air together, and it was impossible to tell which of us would reach Jane first. Depending on how you look at it, I may have won because I got to her before it did, knocking her aside with my shoulder, or I may have lost, because it struck me instead.

System: You know Knife

I felt the tip of the blade pierce my chest, pain exploding through my body as it sank deep into my heart. Of all the things to flash through my mind at such a moment, all I could think of was that I wish I’d worn my armored coat after all. I’d never imagined this kind of pain existed, but mercifully it did not last long.

I was dead before I hit the paving stones.