The Card Job Read online

  He found himself flushing at the amount of skin showing and memory of that old date, even though he knew that this was the point of this. He still found it hard to keep himself composed. He was almost grateful to be torn away from the grating discordant screech, “Master Granger! Master Granger! You’ll never guess what happened.” Angels voice came with the same awfulness that he had still hadn’t grown used to.

  The sound wasn’t coming from the speakers, and when Hermanos realized that he inhaled deeply. “You didn’t?” He accused Sasha, who only returned a smirk.

  The humanoid body more hobbled than walked into the room. Hermanos recognized it as a modifiable melee unit, designed as a poor replacement for a human teammate and able to be run by AI of varying ranks. It was a monotone army green monstrosity at close to eight feet tall and could be either male or female. In this case, it hadn’t been modified either way and had both male and female features, Curves top and bottom, with a package and a square chin, yet delicate nose. In many ways, it entirely matched the voice that came out. “Sasha Bear got me a body!” It announced with the awful sounds that only Angel could produce.

  Hermanos stared at the Unit and then at Sasha, then back to the Unit before settling at last on Sasha. He then said the only thing that could come to his mind. “I hate you.” Sasha’s grin only widened.

  Angel, in its new body, acted oblivious to this exchange. “A body, I have a body! Isn’t it amazing!” It rushed to Hermanos, giving him a tight hug and then lifting him and spinning him around with the ease only an advanced strength machine could.

  Starting to feel dizzy, Hermanos managed to squeeze out a command. “Put me down, Angel. I’m glad you finally got a body. Why don’t you test out how well it can perform maintenance tasks. No slacking at your chores either.”

  Angel let out a grinding “Wheeeee!” after setting its master down and taking off down the halls towards whatever maintenance was in the queue. The shuffling slightly improved as it got more integrated with the unit.

  “Did you have to do that?” Hermanos asked Sasha after Angel, and its sounds were out of earshot.

  She took a seat at a now cleared off table, crossing her legs and leaned forward to show off what she’s got. “If you had gotten Angel a body like you kept on telling it way back when we were dating this would never have been an issue. I made a gamble that you hadn’t gotten around to it yet. It seems to have paid off.”

  He sighed; she was right. “I was going to get around to it. Did you finish your out of game stuff, make any decisions on what kind of crew we should get for this heist?” Hermanos didn’t actually know what she did out of the game, and he never told her what he did out of the game. He was pretty sure Sasha was a she outside as well, but he wasn't 100% sure. He just knew she was an addict like him, but played even less than he did as evidenced by the three days she had been away since the meeting by the cafe.

  She nodded, pulling up a screen, “I made a list of people I know who might be interested in joining us in this endeavor, though many of them will need some in-game encouragement. I feel we’ll need people who are at the level cap or close to it.”

  Hermanos nodded. He had done some research as well. There were several active but unsuccessful quests relating to the Banque Morte. “I agree. There is no record of anyone being successful in stealing anything from the Banque. Someone had done an orbital bombardment of it, destroying the place once, but that just left everything unusable in the area until it reset. There were a lot of pissed off players who lost some gear they had stored there, who then made a retaliatory hunt against the team who organized the strike. So we should do nothing with too much collateral damage unless you want other players going after us. We should get players who have done in-game Heists before to help with the planning.”

  Sasha made a face, showing she didn’t like this answer. “I’m great at planning. My class is basically a rogue who can break into systems, get information, and unlock chests.”

  Hermanos rolled his eyes at this. “If we were to switch to a fantasy style, you would be more a bard than a rogue.” He eyed her out-there outfit. ”You’ve never been one for subtle.”

  “A bard! A bard!? If I recall correctly in most games, that class is almost useless.”

  Hermanos shook his head, “It’s more that bards are decent at many things, they can do a little magic, a little fighting, they just are not great at those types of things. They got one major thing is that they are good with lore or languages. Like you and your puzzle and translations skills.”

  “Well if I’m a bard, what does that make you in this team-up?”

  “Useless.” There was no denying it. “At best I’m the banker who will be funding all of this, or a leprechaun giving out luck and random events, I’m the Oprah of the team. You get a ship, you get a ship, and you get a ship.”

  It was a moment before Sasha replied. “That’s old, but I get that reference.”

  Hermanos shook his head. “Sorry, I hang around a lot of old people. My point is that if we want to be successful, we need to get someone who has done this type of job before and go from there. I’ve managed to make a list of people we can approach or get the contact information for.”

  The next three hours were spent discussing who was on the list and who they would talk to about doing this job. More than a hundred players in the online record had succeeded in big heists that they had to go through. It was more of figuring out who they wanted to ask and what it might take to convince them. There were times during the conversation that Hermanos was finding himself forgetting that they had even broken up or why.

  In the end, they had settled on eight players they wanted to see if they would be interested in joining their team and quest.

  The top two had friends and teams and epic quests they were involved in and didn't want to leave. Hermanos and Sasha were not worried about if any of them had too many real-world obligations that might get in the way. You had to spend a lot of time in Changing Worlds to be at or near the current Level Cap for players. Dealing with the game sucking you into some long term bit of fun and making you unavailable was a whole different monster.

  Third on the list was a Captain Cobra. The news on him was that he was a famous solo player. They were primarily using a whole crew artificial intelligence like Angel or Nav to help him accomplish daring raids and thefts against larger more fortified targets. You would think managing AI and NPC’s in Changing Worlds would be easy, but the game tended to give them numerous hiccups, or quirks, or ulterior motives which made dealing with even a few at a time difficult. The fact that Captain Cobra had managed to work well with reportedly over a dozen of them was one of the most impressive things about his profile. He was also available at short notice and only about twenty minutes away via ship.

  Hermanos had Angel using it’s new body load a peace offering onto the Discordant Fortress, while he and Sasha got ready for the trip. Hermanos wasn’t quite sure when this happened, but Sasha had moved some of her things into one of the guest rooms aboard YDMG, mostly clothes. While Angel was loading up the other ship, Sasha was changing into a more conservative, less distracting outfit. Both of those were a relative thing, as she came onto the Discordant Fortress in a skin-tight blue bodysuit. While it did cover almost all of Sasha’s skin, it did not hide anything as well. A belt with her favorite gun and two bracers with gizmos attached completed the outfit.

  “Let’s get this baby going!” She declared with a short laugh as Hermanos pulled out and punched in the coordinates of the meetup. They both logged out immediately after to take care of real-world concerns like food. No one really wanted to wait on the ship during transit time unless they were interested in maybe triggering some kind of space battle/quest event.

  Chapter Five

  "Role players get a dirty name in video games, but we all truly want to escape the harshness of reality."

  - Anonymous downvoted comment.

  They had made sure to be logged back on a few mi
nutes before we reached the destination. The meet was at a small cluster of asteroids, the kind most players used for mining and resource gathering. The game even gave out a notification.

  [Now entering Captain Cobra’s claim, Player designation: the pirate islands.]

  What came on the viewscreen was not what they expected. Sasha squeezed herself into the tightly-spaced piloting area, mostly pressing her body against Hermanos before finally settling for half-sitting, half-laying on him to get a better view of the display. “Are those palm trees?” She asked.

  Hermanos moved his arm to have the ship evaluate the structures on the asteroid. Sasha had it mostly pinned against her form, making him brush up against most of her body and the smooth latex-like material covering it. “Modified defensive structures made to look like coconut trees.” Much of the surface of the asteroids had been carved out and colored to look like tropical islands. “The man’s certainly got a theme going on.”

  It was a sight to take in, the floating islands in space. Sasha stayed on top of Hermanos throughout the flight as they made it to the meeting spot. Once close enough they got to see mining robots modified to look like monkeys wearing little pirate hats as they worked the islands adding details. The ship turned a corner to get to the other side of one of the makeshift islands. Hermanos blinked, briefly impressed at what he saw, but for only a moment before Sasha leveraged herself so she could view the entire scene herself, while sitting on Hermanos’s lap, blocking out his view with her chest now pressed crosswise over his face. “A pirate ship!” She said with a little awe in her voice.

  “Flying here!” Hermanos declared his voice muffled by her assets. She was always touchy-feely while they were together, but never this much.

  “Sorry.” She said in a tone that implied she wasn’t but moved out of the way anyway. Hermanos set it to auto-dock and looked at the ship. It was large and designed to look like an old galleon. Similar to the islands, it was not in its original form as a Brigade destroyer. If you squinted, you could still make out the original form underneath all that modification. The hull shape wasn’t quite right for a real sailing ship. The whole process to transform it with such detail in-game had to have taken months and substantial resources.

  The ship shuddered as it finally docked across from the pirate ship and Sasha finally gave Hermanos breathing room to get up and grab the large case that he had Angel fill with miscellaneous things he had won at the card tables. The technical instructions he gave it was, “a good scoop from the petty treasure vault in cargo container six.” Mostly because it was the farthest container and would take Angel the longest to do the task. Angel was more than excited enough to keep on using its new body. Maybe due to Angel's new size, it ended up being more than he expected.

  Sasha led the way. Hermanos suspected it was so he could get a good look at her from behind and see what he had been missing out on. He suspected it would only make it worse to point out that she was the one who had left him with such finality.

  The door to the pirate ship still had a comm unit in it, though the button had been changed to look like a skull. Sasha pushed it. “Sasha Bloodlilly and Hermanos Granger to see Captain Cobra, we are expected.”

  The door slid open, and a skinny, almost stick-looking android in a pirate costume including a hat with a feather in it was waiting. “Arrrr. The Master Codebreaker and the Collector. Me captain will be waiting on deck for you. I’m to lead the way. Arrrg”

  Hermanos bristled a little at being called the Collector. Sure, he kept everything he won, and items, deeds, ownership rights were just as frequent if not more frequent collateral as in-game coinage. It was a habit from when he was low-leveled and wasn’t as good a player. You never know when you would need more funds. It was also easier to leave it for Angel to handle after a night out as well. He knew this whole advanced Change-Set card goal was going to cost him a bundle. The Invitationals attendance fee was astronomical on its own as well.

  The android led them through the ship whose interior had been modified to look like a real old-timey ship as well. The walls and floors were patterned and textured to look like real wood, and it didn’t even have that lazy repeatable copy and pasted look.

  They climbed up some stairs and through a hatch into bright light. Hermanos and Sasha had to blink before their eyes could adjust. The deck wasn’t the outside deck as seen from space, but it was certainly done up to look like it. A bright blue sky and sun projected out like they really were at sea. There was even some salty smell in the air.

  Captain Cobra stood amongst his artificial crew dressed as a full pirate captain patterned after a seventeenth-century design. His red and black jacket had a snakeskin pattern stitched into it to go with his rapier and gun that had been modified to look like a flintlock pistol. “Ahoy, ahoy guests. I hear you be wanting my plundering skills and be offering me loot to do it!”

  Did the man have to talk like a pirate? Hermanos wondered before speaking. “Ah. Yes, we are looking to hire someone to help us break into a certain safety deposit box at Banque Morte for a quest. Your name has, ah, come up as someone who can get plundering done.” Hermanos felt a little wrong actually saying the word plundering.

  “Me hearties and I have plundered many a place for doubloons. “

  The robot/android crew all yelled “Doubloons!” in response to Captain Cobra saying the word.

  The Captain continued, ignoring their outburst. “There was mention of treasure as a sign of good faith for this meeting.” The crew yelled the word treasure as well.

  Hermanos lifted the case, opening it. Stacks of coins, gems, gilded daggers and guns, a few shiny orbs, as well as data chips and paper documents almost overflowing out in the case. The game thankfully didn’t let it overflow and showed it as a collection of what was inventoried in the case. He closed it again before handing it over. “This should pique your interest and should be enough to get you to tell us how you would do it; before we talk terms for the job.”

  “Arrg, an impressive bit of booty you brought to me.” He gave Sasha a leering look. “Not the most impressive booty either. Have you ever ridden a seadog?” He asked her.

  Hermanos immediately rubbed the spot between his eyes, trying to fight off a headache. Sasha’s response was a giggle, which just made it worse. He mentally checked off all the times she had giggled and the bloody ends that had come of it.

  “Oh, aren't you just a big strong pirate.” She replied as if she had suddenly dropped fifty IQ points. She took a small thumb-sized item off her bracers with a click and Hermanos braced himself for trouble, using this [Analyze] skill and having it radiate out. The ability didn’t provide any combat information, though much of the crew had tags saying they were enslaved, hardwired, or mechanical, which lowered whatever positive impression the Gambler had of Captain Cobra’s skill with androids and AI. All those things lowered their functionality in return for obedience and response to simple cues. Only two seemed to be named as well. Captain Cobra had the achievement of Pirate King, so he guessed it wasn’t all talk. Similar to seeing the Bluffing notification, he saw one that said Aroused over the Captain and immediately felt that that was too much information and something he didn’t want to know.

  She handed the item to the captain and when it didn’t explode Hermanos let out a breath that he didn’t know he was holding in. “This has my private messaging information on it. Be careful not to lose it. We will, of course, be working together if we do agree on the job.”

  Captain Cobra took the item and her wrist twirling her like she was in a dance before giving her a dip. “A beautiful lady like you will never have to worry about me not contacting you.”

  Hermanos saw the brief flash of unhappiness on her face while Captain Cobra handled her and found himself tensing again, only to be surprised when she calmly and gracefully untangled herself from the man. “Now tell us how you would plunder this bank.” He wondered if maybe his ex-girlfriend had grown up some during the time they were apart.


  Then Captain Cobra started to talk. Two things became clear. First was that the man would not stop talking like a pirate; this included nautical terms and saying things like “The landlubbers would never know what hit them.”

  The second was that his plan would never work. He was used to mostly quick and dirty raids, swarming places with his crew, blowing something up and then having his robots grab what wasn’t nailed down to take back. Hit and run with the subtlety of a hammer to an egg. Nothing that could work against the fortified high-level storage building like Banque Morte was. Sure, the captain robbed banks in the game before, but like with everything in the game, there were different tiers to them.

  Hermanos wanted to tell the man this. But Sasha spoke first while he was only starting to open his mouth. “What a wonderful plan! We have to go and see if we can even afford your services. I know I want to work with you. We need to discuss this for a little bit, and then we’ll get back to you. You also have my private contact information for when you need it. We’ve got to get going soon anyway. Things in the real, you know. Toodles.”

  Hermanos shrugged and let her lead him away back down the hatch and towards their ship. He knew enough not to say anything out loud until the door locked behind them on the Discordant Fortress. “Okay, what was that about? It’s clear he’s not what we need. Do you want to save him for a distraction?”

  Sasha now let herself look annoyed, “It’s clear you were going to argue with him, and who knows how long that was going to take. Go pull us out of the dock.”

  With a sigh, he detached the ship and started to pull away. “I suppose that’s not un…” Hermanos didn’t see the explosion that rocked the spaceship but felt it as the discordant Fortress bucked wildly. Damage indicators flashed on the ship. He looked to Sasha whose lips curved slightly at the ends in a suppressed smile, mostly unaffected as she had braced herself before the explosion.