It was snowing now, and the air was starting to feel like the middle of winter. He shivered, teeth clattering. The other gamers must be wishing they’d brought parkas. The plants around them were shriveling, browning and curling up. So… they were seasonal… if the Moon had twelve seasons a year. Or did every month have four seasons, which made a total of forty-eight seasons…
His mind was drifting. The cold was getting to him. Jesus! Was this Dream Park’s doing?
“I’ve got it!” Asako called out, and they ran to her side as her pod emitted an ear-shredding squeal, a higher-pitched version of…
“The mooncow sound,” Angelique said.
“Brilliant,” Wayne said, shivering.
The sound wavered then swooped low. The instant it hit the same tone that the mooncow had used, the door beneath them shivered and began to slide open. They had to scramble for safety, but the slab slid only a third of the way open, perhaps awaiting another mooncow call.
“Let’s get in there,” Angelique said.
And not a moment too soon. The sky above them was filled with snow, and blackening as they watched. Nothing would survive on the surface for more than another few minutes. The gamers jumped down into the darkness.
17
0837 hours
Angelique landed in a crouch, alert and silent. The ramp ran all the way to the lip, so she supposed she could have just walked down, but it was more satisfying, and certainly more theatrical, to jump.
The tunnel stretched down into the lunar depths for what looked like miles, with side tunnels branching off. Its brassy ridged sides reverberated with faint echoes. Selenites and mooncows, humping away into the distance? Possibly… but that implied that sounds carried well down here. Not necessarily a good thing. She held up a flat hand, signaling for silence.
One at a time, the others gathered around her, and as they did, the circular lid slid shut. BOOM.
So. They were in the meat grinder again. No way back. They had two assignments now: To find their ship, and to find Cavor. One might lead to the other.
“Quietly,” she said. “I’ll take lead. Wayne, you take the rear. Asako… stay with me.”
The woman in the bubble nodded, and off they went. Angelique noticed that the bubble’s treads compensated for the terrain effortlessly, lurching up and then back down as they passed the first tunnel ridge. The tunnel looked as if it might have been constructed from preformed sections.
“What’s this?” Mickey Abernathy called from up ahead.
“You’re the psychic. You tell me,” Sharmela said, but when she squinted into the dark to see more clearly, her voice fell silent.
There in the middle of the tunnel was a pile of brownish muck half as tall as a human being. Broad coarse tufts of moon grass jutted out of it, and the consistency was a lot like peanut butter. Warm peanut butter. And it stank.
Wayne howled and wiped his hand on the tunnel floor. “It’s mooncow sh- dung!” he said, correcting his language for a family audience. That bald-headed son of a bitch! Some kind of joke? Hoping to bump them out of character?
If audiences back home were enjoying Wayne’s discomfort as much as his companions, this game was going through the roof.
Just as he finished wiping his hands on the ground, the walls around them began to hiss. Steam gouted forth, three streams from each side and the ceiling, focusing on the pile of mooncow excrement. The gamers scrambled away as the pile melted, shrank, finally sluiced away into grates in the floor.
The vapor hung in the air, dissipating so slowly that it might have been smoke. Ali, the skinny African magic user, backed up with one hand on his sword. “There’s something in the mist,” he said.
Angelique stopped laughing instantly, and dropped into a crouch. “Alert!” she called. “Ali. Sharmela. Can you dispel?”
Sharmela ran up to stand at Ali’s side. She was a little shorter than the kid, twice his thickness, with a forceful bearing that led Wayne to suspect she could break him into pieces.
The pair might have been practicing for a month. In tandem, they raised their arms as they stood before the growing, billowing cloud. Not steam now, but some kind of smoke.
“By the bones of my ancestors-” Ali said.
“By my mother’s blood-” Sharmela chanted at the same time.
“Dispel!” they both called. A wind swept down the tunnel, punching into the mist like a fist into a cotton cloud. For a moment, they could see clearly. Perhaps two dozen Selenites stalked toward them, their carapaces vaguely warlike, as if they had been born in armor and battle helms. Each of them gripped a staff with a crooked head. Their faceted eyes glowed red as the mist dissipated. They howled, and charged.
“Ali, Sharmela. Back to second position! Wayne, front and center!” Angelique drew her sword and charged.
Regardless of his years in gaming, all his experience and skills, for the first hours of a new game it was impossible for Wayne to totally turn his mind off, to stop noticing the glitches, stop trying to second-guess the Game Master.
But… there was a moment, there came a time. When the illusion of the game, the effects and the scenario and the players all melded together and overwhelmed the part of his mind that knew he was Wayne Gibson, nobody, current address Las Vegas. When the adrenaline started to run, he became Wayne Gibson, thief and warrior.
The slithery whisper of steel on leather as sword left sheath was music to his ears. The sword balanced like a willow wand in his hand.
His sword was a Mitsubishi FlexMax 80, designed for close-quarters impact work. Eyepieces recommended. (And he noted the faceted goggle-eyes of the Selenite masks. Protection for NPCs.) No sharp edge, and a telescoping point. While not suggested for use against bare skin, the soft plastic surface above a foamed metal core would generally produce about as much damage as a willow wand while simulating the deadly appearance of any sword imaginable. To all but the most discerning eye, the FlexMax resembled a British army officer’s sword with a brass handle and snakeskin grip.
Dream Park’s computer system would eventually augment the localized holograms, improving the images for discriminating Earth-bound consumers. Wayne couldn’t care less: In his mind, he was fighting for his life against an entirely convincing alien horde, and a moment’s hesitation meant death.
For Queen and country! Wayne Gibson was out for alien blood.
Angelique stood to his right, guarding his flank as he defended hers. From the corner of his eye he caught Griffin backing them up. He was a thief, yes, but a thief with a sword. And he looked as if he knew how to use it.
Game fencing was different from competition saber or foil. You could be an Olympic saber champion, and without IFGS points your thrusts and parries simply wouldn’t register. Meanwhile, a relatively unskilled opponent with gaming experience would cut you to ribbons. So the fact that Griffin appeared to have a bit of genuine sword skill was irrelevant. What were his points? In some games you knew everything there was to know about your teammates. In others, like this one, you learned as you went along.
But as the gamer part of his mind took over from the logic, all he thought was My sides and back are covered. Let’s get it on.
The first Selenite stepped into range. Sword crossed staff. A blue light at the tip of the staff glowed violently, and a brief, sharp tingle ran up his arm. Damn! He slid his head to the side, and a flare of blue fire boiled out of the tip, missing him by an inch. Those behind him would just have to fend for themselves.