“Closing in on a group of three, one seems to be injured,” Kai gives instruction from below. “Approaching fast. Launching preliminary attack.”

One of Kai’s spheres zooms ahead of us. There’s a brief flash of yellow light followed by the sound of a quick explosion. If I know Kai he’s used a laser to destroy something in the area or he’s used the drone as a shrapnel grenade. We arrive on the scene and spot Kevin, Ashley and Yara trying to recover from the shrapnel. I rush in, not caring about their kinky family but Daamin stops me.

“We can’t fight them,” Daamin says.

“Why not,” I ask.

“Because they’re friends. Friends are hard to come by in this game and we never know when we’ll need them.”

“Do you just go making friends with everyone I dislike? First Kay not these kinky weirdos?”

“We’re not Kinky,” Ashly says seemingly shocked.

“You’re a little weird,” Kai says still hovering on his drones.

“You’re a man in a dress,” Yara shouts at Kai.

“Why are you still wearing the dress,” Daamin asks.

“First of all, it’s a skirt. Second, both of you are homophobic. I’m just smashing gender norms,” Kai is quick on his feet.

“Why are you pretending to be a family as if you weren’t all the same age,” I ask.

“Why are you so boring,” Kevin asks me.

“You don’t know if I’m boring, you don’t even know me.”

“I know you’re the least interesting person in your group.”

“I’m very interesting.”

“No,” Kevin shakes his head. “He’s a giant lizard man carrying three swords. That guy is dressed like he could have been in Prince’s band The Revolution. You, you’re just boring by comparison.”

“Shut up.”

“No you shut up.”

“Don’t tell me to shut up.”

“Enough,” Ashley yells.

“Do you guys have a drive still,” Kai asks.

“We don’t have just one drive, we’ve got two,” Yara holds up both drives.

“I’m going need you guys to give us both,” I equip my shotgun.

“We’re not giving you anything, we earned these,” Ashley argues.

“We don’t need to fight,” Daamin says. “I’m sure if we just explain the situation they’ll agree to help us. There’s going to be multiple winners of this thing. Both groups can get a copy of the sword. We can help each other.”

“There’s the problem,” Kevin interrupts. “We don’t need help. We’ve already won. We just have to turn the drives in.”

I aim my shotgun, “You don’t win if I shoot you.”

“Don’t hurt my daddy,” Yara rushes forward holding a small knife.

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

Several of Kai’s drones begin to fire on her instantly with several lasers turning her into turret target practice. Even after Yara’s body drops to the ground the drones continue to fire until there are no health points left. There’s nothing but silence for a moment. During the time I can feel the air making my lips dry as my mouth is agape. The synthetic opium must be doing it’s job because I can only think about the ringing in my ears. I’m wondering if it’s from the sound of the explosions or I have tinnitus. They say tinnitus doesn’t go away if you plug your ears so I put my fingers in my ears. The ringing goes away, so I guess it isn’t tinnitus.

“My baby,” Ashley shouts rushing to Yara’s body. “My baby never hurt anybody. My baby never did anything wrong. This senseless violence has got to stop. They put my baby in a corner,” Ashley cries.

“I didn’t mean to do that. The drones, defense mode. She shouldn’t have rushed with the knife,” Kai starts to apologize.

“Hey,” I shout, “Get your hands out of her pockets.”

Ashley smiles and backs away, “just had to make sure we got the drives.”

After Kai killed Yara like that, I knew I was going to have to deal with Kevin. The drives are just too important. I never thought he’d stand silent like this for so long. It’s just funny like that sometimes. You never know what’s going to happen or when. We’ve come too far to just leave without the drives now. My grandpa asked me once time if I care whether I live or die. Yeah, I do. Now is the time to prove it.

“Are you doing an internal monologue,” Daamin whispers in my ear.

“I think so.”

“Cool, that’s some real anime protagonist stuff. I hope it’s about the power of friendship bringing us together in moments like this.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Alright, movie villain it is,” he laughs.

“Ashley,” Kevin shouts. “Give me my black coat.” Kevin dons a black coat and draws two swords; one made of black metal and another of greenish crystal. “It’s time to meet The Black Swordsman of Astro City.”

“You’re The Black Swordsman,” Daamin seems excited. “I love your whole playstyle bro.”

“Are you a fan,” Kai laughs.

“He’s not even Black so how is he going to be The Black Swordsman,” I ask causing everyone to look at me. “I don’t know why you’re all looking at me. That man is clearly of Asian descent.”

“It’s because he wears all black,” Daamin says.

“Yeah, that makes sense,” I nod.

“It’s time to die,” he rushes forward.

I grab one of Daamin’s swords and rush forward to meet him. Kevin laughs and easily side steps me causing me to fall. Why did I grab a sword? Guns always beat swords, I’ve got lots of guns. I roll as Kevin brings a sword down towards my head. No going to get me that easily. I manage to get to my feet and toss the sword to Daamin before drawing my shotgun.

“You can’t just throw an unsheathed sword at people,” he shouts back.

“Sorry, I was in the moment,” I apologize.

Kevin rushes towards me, I take aim and fire, but he rolls to the side and rushes forward. I step back to get a better shot and realize, I have made a serious mistake. The soil behind me is not soil, it’s mud. I feel myself instantly falling backwards. Kevin and I seem to realize I’ve slipped in mud at the same time. He laughs, but I manage to grab his precious black coat dragging him down along with me. The two of us struggle for position and throw punches in the mud. We pause as the ground below us shifts and our friends start to shout. I look around to realize that we’re slowly sliding down a hill. I didn’t expect a mudslide in a cyberpunk themed game, but here we are. I try to quickly get my footing and grab Daamin’s hand as he reaches out to me. My legs fly from under me as Kevin pulls me down, using my body as leverage to get up the hill before we’re too far gone. I grab his leg, but he kicks at me with his free foot causing me to roll. I don’t let go and suddenly the two of us are tangled and sliding down what seems like an endless hill.

When we finally stop I’m laying on my back resting my head against Kevin’s chest. Glancing up at the hill, I could probably climb back up, but it’ll take some time. I should finish Kevin off right now. Otherwise he’s going to keep me from making it back up. I get to my feet and aim a handgun at him, but there’s tears.

“Why are you crying,” I ask. “You don’t actually die. You just respawn 48 hours later with no memory of recent events. Happened to me and I’m fine.”

“That’s not why I’m crying,” Kevin says.

“Then what?”

“It’s none of your business.”

“Tell me or I’m going to make your digital brain go boom.”

“I never got to give Ashley my real world contact info. I really like her, and now my ankle is broken and I’m losing HP. I’m never going to get a chance.”

“You are so lucky that I drank PoppyTearsEx earlier. The two of us are going to get to visitor center and you’re going to give me both drives, in my hand. No funny business.”

“Deal. I promise.”

I put my gun away, but kick him in the side really hard. I call Kai who picks up right away, “Hey, head to the visitor’s center. I’ll meet you there. I don’t think I can get up the hill.”

“Alright, no problem. See you soon and be safe.”

“Yeah, you too.”

I pull another PoppyTearsEx from my inventory and toss it to him, “you better not get addicted on my watch.”