Training had gone better, but in every match, Rick’s empty mind had given out, and the stress from going back and forth from empty mind to reCon had piled on until he’d had to beg Alex to bow out early.
Kristina-Anne had given him the same concerned looks she had hours before. When Rick looked in the mirror, his eyes were sunken, and though it may have been the growth of his stubble or that he’d not been in the sunshine for a while, he didn’t look healthy.
Kristina had cooked teriyaki beef with noodles, and as it had before, the food had bolstered his strength. At four in the morning, he showered and ducked back into the bedroom for a nap before the moment of truth later that day. Kristina promised she’d wake him if his alarm malfunctioned or he turned it off without thinking about it.
When he woke, there was an email on his phone from someone who claimed to be from Dokutan. Spam. He shook his head and went to the bathroom to brush his teeth.
After he’d awakened more, he couldn’t shake thought of the email, so he checked it.
To Rick Prophet or his representative,
My name is Dan Wasslinger, and I’m a talent scout for Dokutan Games Publishing Group. This isn’t official Dokutan business (not yet, anyway,) but I wanted to let you know that you’ve got some of us who saw your public performance a few weeks back keeping our eye on you.
I’ve been keeping tabs on your tournament performance and personally, I think you have potential. I don’t want to get in your head before a match, but I did want to encourage you. If you continue to do well, we may have a spot for you. No promises.
Dan Wasslinger
Talent Scout, Dokutan Games Publishing Group
+26944411818
[email protected]
It had to be spam. Rick had gotten a few messages shortly after his performance in Branches when he’d first found Iron Fist, but mostly they were congratulations or hate mail. He’d been lucky few people had found his email address, and he’d shortly thereafter paid to have his email address and phone number unlisted.
Talent scout? For Dokutan? The company had a few official players, but that seemed so far out of his league it had to be a phishing scam. Maybe opening the email had infected his phone with malware.
He ran a quick check, but his security software found nothing unusual.
Hmmm…
He had a few hours. He ate and had a morning beer for his nerves, then checked his AR for Dan Wasslinger.
He got a few pings. One for a seventy-two-year-old crime fiction author. Another for a pudgy engineer with a goofy smile that weirdly made Rick feel good about what sort of guy he was. He searched for the email and that returned an “about” page, but there was no photo and nothing but a boilerplate about his role at Dokutan. Whatever else he was, it seemed he existed, and he was associated with the producer of Ruckus Online.
“Hey babe.”
Rick jumped at the sound of his wife’s voice, then took a deep breath. “Hey baby.”
She looked at the beer. “Nerves? Or is your implant—”
“Implant’s fine.” He softened his tone and reached for her hand. He kissed her wrist and held her hand against the stubble on his face.
“Ooh. Sexy man.”
He smiled. “I love you.”
She put her hand on his head and played with his hair, and he swayed his head under the weight of it. “Whatcha looking up? Trying to get the scoop on a competitor or something?”
He shook his head and disconnected his implant, then leaned back and turned so he wasn’t facing away from her. “I got an email from someone at Dokutan. Talent scout. I thought it might be a scam, so I was looking him up.”
“He’s legit?”
“Seems so.” Rick yawned and stretched his face, then stood. He drew her close, and they moved back and forth like they were slow dancing to music that wasn’t there. She leaned into him.
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“What’s he want?” She pressed her head into his chest.
“I don’t know. I have to get my head into the game.” He held her at arm’s length, then kissed her quickly. “I’m gonna get another beer,” he said, but when she frowned, he added, “I’m stopping at two.” When he was two paces away, he said, “Good beer, by the way.”
“Only two,” she admonished.
***********************************
Alex greeted him in the server room, as had been their pre-tourney tradition from the beginning. Rick had stayed true to his word; he stopped at two beers.
“You get enough sleep?” she asked.
“Yeah. I might need to take a disco nap when I’m done, but”—he shrugged—“what’s the alternative? This is my job now.” He smiled. “Better than running packages, anyway.”
The smile she gave him was typical, but Rick thought he saw sadness there, too. “Are you okay?”
The sadness was gone quickly enough that he wondered whether it had been there. She took a deep breath. “I have my struggles, too, but let’s save that for another day. You’ve got a tourney to win.”
He made a “hold up” gesture with his hands raised in front of his chest. “Place. I have a tournament to place.”
She nodded. Two minutes later, the call to fight flashed on the server wall, and the only game-world available popped up. Rick pressed the button and let the darkness take him.
***********************************
Dried yellow weeds brushed against Rick’s legs as he dashed away from the starting point to which he’d been assigned.
It was a place from which he’d begun before, but not as frequently as many of the other opening areas. Dust rose from his minimalist shoes—a concession he’d allowed from his bulging cosmetics storage—as he jogged. Barefoot travel wasn’t as comfortable, and the bigger boots he’d worn in earlier matches had weighed enough to tire him out faster. Maybe it was all in his head, but that was the whole process, now that he had to deal with the reCon again.
The first enemy stepped out from behind a boulder near the road and approached the path.
The bot was a small Asian man with short black hair. It wore a silk jacket and loose black pants, and its’ hands were wrapped. Had he to guess an age, Rick would have pegged the bot at late twenties, but he’d long ago learned a bot’s appearance was only minimally useful in setting expectations.
Rick edged closer, imagining the yellow light at his solar plexus, then the green light of his chest, but he didn’t close his eyes. The gravel crunching under the man’s feet was the only he warning he got before the small man rushed him.
Rick pushed down the nausea, and tried to roll with the dizziness, stepping aside as the bot’s slight figure rushed by, then twisted, firing a right elbow that extended into a full swing at the end. It smashed Rick’s ear and he winced, then blocked a the follow up high knee.
He scurried back as the bot, who seemed to be using a style of Kenpo, followed up the first knee with a second. Rick had barely made it out of the way, and the fast movements disturbed his balance until, like a lightning bolt, the yellow light glowed in his mind’s eye, then faded to empty mind.
He smiled and threw two hard jabs at Kenpo, then a knee that Kenpo blocked, but Rick tapped his foot down and rocketed his knee back up again. That one got the Asian bot, though Kenpo was fast enough to swing off and around the force, spinning to Rick’s left. The bot completed the turn, showing Rick his back briefly before coming back around with a capoiera-like spinning elbow, followed by the man’s hard right straight right behind it.
Rick blocked the straight, then leg-blocked Kenpo’s knee before scraping the heel of his minimal shoe down the Asian bot’s inner shin. That made Kenpo hop back. Rick’s stamina bar was over half, so he pursued with a jab and a hard right hook to the man’s head, staggering the bot and making it drop its head. Rick slammed his knee up, then came down to stomp the bot’s toe. Kenpo was too fast, though. The bot took advantage of Rick’s overcommitment and slipped a hard kick into Rick’s balls.
He folded in, but the bot missed when it tried to punch downward at Rick’s exposed head and neck, whiffing outside as Rick tumbled forward and out of the range of the bot, who didn’t pursue.
Rick panted as his stamina slowly rebuilt, though the bar disappeared after a few seconds, then flashed briefly again when it had refilled. Though he was nauseated, it wasn’t from the reCon. He hobbled backward and waited for the pain to subside.
Kenpo rushed him again, but this time, Rick blocked his straight inward, across the vertical center of both of them, then slipped behind the bot and cracked its neck.
Victory!
Rick dropped the bot and it dissolved into boxes, then icons.
Boost Points +2
Active Skill Acquired!
Punching and Throwing: A successful power-straight that stuns your opponent, allowing you to grab and toss the opponent to the ground. Two-minute Cooldown.
Rick frowned as he let the empty mind go and looked at his stat sheet. He hadn’t carried any points forward from the qualifier, so all he had were the two he pulled forward before he collapsed in Hector’s office.
Strength: 2
Speed: 2
Stamina: 1
He added one point each to stamina and speed.
Strength: 2
Speed: 3
Stamina: 2
The switch from reCon to empty mind hadn’t taken as long that time, and he was less tired, now that he’d dropped the clear mind. He imagined his chakra, then let it go again. He needed to conserve his concentration.
The path tracked downward into low, rolling fields, and the ground beneath him became softer, winding through shorter, green grass.
He was halfway through a field, not an enemy in sight, when Ditto’s disembodied voice echoed in his mind.
Rick, something’s wrong with your avatar.
What? he asked
You’re being hunted, Ditto said.
By ZizzSL12? he asked.
Undetermined. Seeking.
Rick sighed, Look, I expected he’d try to even the—
Ditto’s voice became more urgent. Shit. You’re being hunted by the anti-cheat protocol.