Quest for Justice (7 page)

“Look, kid,” said Crazy Steve, “I realize dat ya may not think much'a me since dat whole QPO thing, but I've been on this server a real long time. I'm level fifty-four, da highest in da village. I've got a whole lotta knowledge worked up
about da server, who runs it, and how it works. Do me a favor and remember dat as I talk to ya, okay?” Stan nodded, unsure of where this was going.

“Like I said, I've been here a real long time, and frankly, da server's never been in worse shape than it is right now. Don't interrupt,” he added as Stan opened his mouth to ask what Crazy Steve was talking about. “Dem in Element City, dat run da government, dey don't like people like ya. Freshies. Beginners. Noobs. Ya get it, don'cha?”

Stan nodded, his gut knotting at this revelation, and asked, “But why? Why do they not like us? And what does this have to do with me?”

Crazy Steve's reply was cut off when an arrow sunk into his temple.

Stan's shock vanished immediately when he heard the twang of another arrow being fired. He rolled off the fence and grabbed the iron hoe that Crazy Steve had dropped. He threw it in the direction of the arrow. The hoe connected, and Stan saw a player with a black ski mask, bare muscular chest, and black pants and shoes stumble backward, holding his face.

Stan used the time it took his attacker to recover to look at the player beside him. Crazy Steve had fallen to the ground and now lay unmoving, bleeding from the arrow in his head. All of the items that he carried were strewn on the ground
about him. There was no doubt about it—he was dead.

Stan's brain did not have time to process this horrific turn of events. He grabbed Crazy Steve's iron axe and looked at the murderer just in time to see him send another arrow flying toward Stan's head. He deflected it with the axe and then charged his assailant.

The murderer was now on the run. He had pulled out a piece of flint and an iron ring, and he was striking them together to create showers of sparks, setting fire to anything in his reach. The melons, the fence around the pigpen, and the logs of cocoa beans were instantly set ablaze, and the fire was spreading fast, quickly blocking off Stan's pursuit of the murderer.

Stan's brain went into emergency mode. Without hesitating, he shoved all of Crazy Steve's items into his own inventory, grabbed the old farmer's body, and bolted toward the exit, yelling for Jayden. Stan burst through the hedge archway, which was already burning, and saw Jayden running back, a look of horror on his face, closely tailed by Kat and Charlie.

The second Jayden saw the burning farm his eyes widened in shock, but it was the sight of his dead brother that made him go completely berserk. He grabbed Stan by the shoulders and shook him back and forth, yelling, “What happened?”

“A player with a ski mask killed Steve, tried to kill me, and
then set the farm on fire!” choked out Stan. He found it hard to breathe due to the smoke and his horror at Crazy Steve's untimely demise.

A flash of recognition showed momentarily in Jayden's eyes, and Stan could tell that this . . . this . . . Griefer, with the ski mask, had struck before. Jayden yelled at the top of his lungs at the sky, cursing the Griefer, his eyes and veins bulging. Stan, Kat, and Charlie stood beside him, looking terrified.

Stan stood there numb for the longest time. He was vaguely aware of Jayden breaking down sobbing next to him, of Adoria's voice yelling, of people running past him with water buckets. He realized that the inferno was gradually dying down. Before long, there was no more fire to brighten the dark night that had fallen in the midst of the firefight.

Stan snapped out of his trance when he heard Sally's voice next to him. “You all right, noob?” she asked gently.

Stan looked at her. He wanted to tell her that he wasn't all right, and that Crazy Steve could never return to the server due to his banishment, and that he couldn't understand why someone would kill another player if they knew that eternal banishment was the consequence . . . but instead he looked her in the eye and said, “I'll be all right.” Her eyes were full of tears, and he didn't want to seem weak to her, not after she had believed in him.

“Sally, we have a big problem!” Adoria exclaimed as she rushed over to them, panic in her voice. “I think that there's a possibility that this attack may not be isolated. We need to get all the lower-levels into the mine, but there won't be room for all of them down there. The mine wasn't meant to hold the number of people we have now. Any more than two-thirds of the current population would make it too susceptible to accidents. I'm out of ideas, Jayden's still distraught, and Archie and G are still busy preparing to evacuate the lower-levels. What do you think we should do?”

The panic in her voice led Stan to speak. “We'll leave,” he said. Sally and Adoria both stared at him. “We'll leave, Charlie, Kat, and I. If there's any chance at all that there are more Griefers coming, we'd stand the best chance of survival. We've finished the program. Send us out, ask for other volunteers to leave, and you can stay and defend everyone left in the village.”

Adoria opened her mouth to protest, but Sally cut her off. “That's actually not bad thinking. Those who've completed the program will have the best shot at surviving, and we upper-levels will have to stay here and defend the village. We can send volunteers who have completed the program into the forest, toward the city.”

Adoria protested, “But what if they run into Griefers along the way?”

“They won't,” Sally responded. “The Griefers avoid the main road in case they come across well-armed travelers. They're cowards, all of them. And besides,” she added, smiling at Stan, “that Griefer didn't run away for no reason. Am I right in thinking that you fought him off?” Stan nodded.

“Okay,” Adoria said, and she ran off toward the mine, skirt billowing in the wind, to make the announcement.

Stan looked at Sally and said, “Sally, I—” but he was cut off by Sally kissing him on the cheek.

“Come back and visit someday,” she said, and she ran off to join Adoria. “Oh, and take some weapons and food from the storehouse!”

I
knew it! I knew it! I knew she likes me! Oh, man, I am definitely coming back to this village as soon as I can! Wow, I don't know what I expected from this game, but that was not at the top of my list! Wow . . .

These were the thoughts that filled Stan's head as he sprinted out of the Adorian Village, tailed by Kat and Charlie, as the rain started to fall. They had not been thrilled when he told them that they had to leave, but they were very excited at the prospect of new weapons.

Kat now ran right behind Stan with a bow slung over her back, a quiver of twelve arrows and a gleaming iron sword dangling at her side. Rex was dashing along at her heels. Charlie was close behind the dog, with an iron pickaxe in his hand, and a whole mess of watermelons in his inventory. He held the group's food. Stan was in the lead, holding an iron axe in his hand and a crafting table, furnace, and some coal in his inventory. They were well trained and on the move. In their minds, any enemies that they encountered out here, in the light rain that had started, were dead meat.

In due time, they stopped to take a breather. While they caught their breath, Charlie said, “Wow, what a day, right?”

“Yeah,” replied Kat. They certainly were in no mood for laughter, but they had recovered from the
initial shock of Crazy Steve's death.

“I still don't get it, though,” she said. “Why did that guy pick Crazy Steve out as a target? He was a farmer! He helped lower-levels!”

Something connected in Stan's mind as she said this. Crazy Steve's last words came back to him.
Them in Element City, that run the government, they don't like people like you. Freshies. Beginners. Noobs.

“You don't think that the assassin was with the government, do you?” asked Stan.

Charlie and Kat looked at him in shock. “Why would the government send out assassins to kill people that gave food to their lower-level citizens?” Kat asked skeptically.

“That's just it, though,” said Stan, standing up. “He gave food to lower-level citizens.” He told them about his conversation with Crazy Steve and what the old farmer had said about the government.

This left Kat looking bewildered, while Charlie asked, “Why? How does that make any sense?”

“I don't know,” Stan replied. “Crazy Steve was just about to tell me when . . .” He sighed, looked away from the other two, and sighed again. They got the message.

“It's certainly a weird theory,” said Kat, also standing, “But we'll think about it later. We need to get going!” She had to yell to be heard over the sound of the rain, which was
falling hard now. Stan saw a lightning strike in the distance, which Rex barked at. In the illumination from the lightning, he noticed a tower a ways off, right in the middle of the path.

“What's that?” he asked, gesturing to it.

“What's what?” yelled Kat.

“That, the tower up there!” he yelled back, and another lightning strike illuminated the sky, letting Kat and Charlie see the tower as well.

“Maybe it's a shelter! Or another player's house!” yelled Charlie.

“Maybe! Let's go there, because we need to get out of this storm! This lightning is getting dangerous!” screamed Kat over the whistling wind and pounding rain.

The thunderstorm
was
beginning to get dangerous, with the bolts extremely frequent now. Once, lightning struck a tree right next to Kat and it caught fire, causing her to give a screech of surprise. Fortunately it was immediately extinguished by the rain.

As they approached the tower, they noticed that it was actually a pyramid, and that it covered the entire road. Stan was suspicious. Something felt wrong. As he walked closer, his suspicions were confirmed. The entire pyramid was made of stacked blocks of TNT.

“Why would someone put this here?” asked Kat.

“I don't know, but I don't feel safe near it,” replied Stan.

“Why?” asked Charlie, walking up to the pyramid. “What's the worst that can happen?”

As if on cue, the worst thing did happen. Lightning struck the top of the pyramid, and the powder in the block was ignited. It began to flash dangerously.

“RUN!” screamed Stan as the block exploded. As the three players and Rex ran for it, the entire tower exploded from the top down, with each explosion sending lit TNT blocks flying everywhere like lava spewing from a volcano. Luckily, they escaped the range of the explosions with top-speed sprinting. As they gazed at the exploding pyramid it became clear that the explosives were underground, too. They could hear the explosions continue on for about sixty seconds before the tumult finally stopped.

The rain had died down, so they could talk in normal voices again. There was dust in the air now from the explosion, just like the Creeper explosion in the mine on the way to the Adorian Village. But this explosion was much larger, and it had blown a huge fissure in the middle of the road. They were cut off from the other side.

“The woods, then?” Stan said in an unnaturally high voice. They looked at each other. They remembered what Sally had said. The Griefers avoid the main road in case they come across well-armed travelers. Straying off the road would lead them directly into enemy territory.

“Oh, don't be ridiculous, we don't—” started Charlie, but he was cut off by Kat.

“Don't kid yourself, Charlie. Stan's right.” They could tell from her trembling lip that Kat was making a determined effort to keep her cool. “Come on,” she said, and she started into the woods, Rex at her heels, growling in a low tone. Charlie made a high-pitched squeal, but he forced himself to follow Stan into the forest.

It was dark. Stan could barely make out the neon orange of Kat's shirt. Every now and then, there was another flash of lightning, and Stan could make out a Spider web, a tree trunk, a Zombie lumbering in the distance.

Suddenly, there was a rustling to Stan's right. There was something in the underbrush, and it was running straight toward him. “Run!” he yelled, and he started running, hacking branches out of the way with his axe. Kat and Charlie looked confused for a second, but when they heard the rustling they followed suit.

Stan burst out of the forest and into the light, now on the other side of the giant crater. Kat burst out right after him, closely followed by Rex and Charlie. Stan whipped out his axe and raised it above his head, Kat drew her sword and dropped in a fighting stance, and Charlie held his pickaxe in trembling hands. Then, the thing that had been chasing them burst into the clearing.

“Are you kidding me? You were scared of this little guy?” laughed Kat as she walked up to the pig and stroked it behind the ears, which it seemed to like. Rex came up to the pig and started sniffing it.

“Honestly, Stan, don't do that!” said Charlie, his eyes wide, holding his chest. “You almost gave me a heart attack!”

“I'm sorry, all right?” said Stan, but he was smiling. It was a cute little pig. “Kat, get Rex away from that pig. I could use some meat.” At Kat's command Rex left the pig alone and sat at her feet. “Bye-bye, little guy,” said Stan, and he raised his axe and brought it down on the pig, just as lightning struck.

His axe was countered by a golden sword.

Kat's jaw dropped, Charlie gave a yelp, and Stan nearly fell back, eyes wide, as he saw the monster that the pig had transformed into upon being struck by lightning.

It was like a player in form, and it had the general color of a pig, but the flesh was rotting off all over its body, and part of its skull was showing through the side of its head. Its ribs stuck out of its stomach. It wore a brown loincloth, and in its hand was a golden sword that was locked against the steel of Stan's axe. It appeared to Stan to be some king of pig-Zombie hybrid. And it looked mad.

The Pig-Zombie pressed the attack. It swung its sword in complicated patterns and drove Stan backward. Stan tried to counter with his axe, but the attempts were futile. The Pig-Zombie's
golden blade dodged an axe blow and severed the axe's blade from the handle. Stan's weapon was destroyed.

Stan danced backward, trying to avoid the sword slices, when a pickaxe flew through the air and embedded itself in the Pig-Zombie's exposed skull. The attack did no damage whatsoever, but it had the intended effect. The Pig-Zombie turned his attention from Stan and now set its sights on Charlie.

Charlie might have thought through the desperate attack a little better, though. The Pig-Zombie was faster than he anticipated, and Stan watched in horror as the undead warrior rushed in and slashed Charlie's leg and forehead. Charlie yelled out in pain, falling to the ground and grabbing his damaged limb and temple. The golden sword rose for the deathblow, but before the inevitable strike, a white blur connected with the Pig-Zombie and it was knocked to the ground.

Rex, at Kat's command, had tackled the Pig-Zombie. There was a moment when the two animals wrestled with each other, attempting to tear out the other's throat, until Rex was finally overpowered. The dog was thrown to the edge of the crater, where he lay whimpering, unable to get up.

Upon seeing Charlie and her dog in such pain, Kat's eyes blazed with fury, and she rushed the Pig-Zombie. The iron and golden blades clashed, and the two warriors began to
fight. Kat's skill was incredible, but was matched equally by the Pig-Zombie. And Kat was at an obvious disadvantage. She managed to slash the Pig-Zombie across the stomach once, but all that did was make some of its flesh fall off, not slowing it down in the least.

Stan felt hopeless. His axe was broken, Charlie was on the verge of death, and Kat was beginning to wear out as she fought the Pig-Zombie. It was clear that it would take an incredibly powerful attack to finish off the Pig-Zombie, like an explosion of some sorts, like . . .

Stan suddenly felt something, like the air was static. He looked toward the source. A little ways down the road, a figure was emerging from the forest. It was as tall as he was, but with four squat legs. A Creeper. But there was something different about this one. It had little lines of electricity dancing around its body, and it was giving off a current that Stan could feel even from such a distance. It was as if the Creeper had been struck by lightning. Stan could sense that an explosion from a Creeper charged with so much electricity could be . . . fatal.

He knew what he had to do. He yelled, “Kat! Toss me the bow and arrows!”

Kat was tired from fighting the Pig-Zombie, and she knew that it would overpower her soon. As the Pig-Zombie slashed, she feinted back and gave an almighty attack with her sword, as if she were brandishing a baseball bat. The undead being
flew backward and slammed into a tree. She threw the bow and arrows to Stan, and took the opportunity to catch her breath.

Stan took the bow, positioned the arrow, took aim, and fired.

He hit his target. The arrow sunk deep into the Creeper's head.

The Creeper looked at Stan. Its eyes glowed red, and the electric activity around its body increased significantly. Then the monster charged, full speed, toward them.

“What do you think you're doing?” yelled Kat, but she had to turn her eyes back to her own fight. The Pig-Zombie was back on its feet, and it gave her a cut across the back that sent her tumbling. Her sword flew high into the air.

Stan knew that he couldn't allow himself to think of his two fallen friends until he completed the task at hand. He caught Kat's iron sword and rushed at the Pig-Zombie. The swords collided, and the two struggled to overpower each other. Stan stared into the beast's face, noticing that one of its eyes was nothing more than an empty socket, and he saw out of the corner of his right eye that the Creeper was almost upon him. Stan feinted back and used all his remaining strength to thrust the sword into the Pig-Zombie's stomach. Before the undead fiend had time to react, Stan flung the Pig-Zombie over his head, and it collided with the hissing Creeper.
Stan dived out of the way just as he heard the tremendous explosion behind him.

Stan was badly rattled from the blast, and he knew that he'd been injured during the fight, but he forced himself to get up and survey the scene around him. Charlie was lying on the side of the road, the cuts on his head and leg bleeding. Rex lay on the edge of the crater, still whimpering. Kat was nowhere to be found. In the place where the two monsters had collided there was a crater, three times bigger than a normal crater caused by a Creeper explosion. The Pig-Zombie was gone, and all that remained was a pile of rotten meat and a bloodstained gold sword.

Wasting no time, Stan started to walk to the crater. Each step was excruciating, but he had to save his friends. He scooped up the golden sword and put both swords into his inventory. He held the rotten flesh in his hands. This he fed to Rex, whose tail instantly shot up, and he became the same dog again, licking Stan's hand.

Stan hobbled over to Charlie next. He wasn't moving at all, and his wounds looked worse up close. Fearing the worst, Stan reached into Charlie's inventory and pulled out a watermelon slice. He stuffed it into Charlie's mouth, hoping for a sign of life. To his relief, Charlie slowly started to chew the watermelon and then gave a sigh. Stan sighed, too, now sure that Charlie would be all right if he could find the right
treatment quickly enough.

That left Kat. Stan had no idea where she was. He couldn't see her anywhere. He was just starting to panic when he heard a raspy, female voice calling his name from within the crater made by the pyramid explosion. He looked into it and saw Kat lying spread-eagle on a ledge about five blocks down. As Stan punched his way through the dirt to get down to help her, it became clear that Kat had had the wind knocked out of her. Her breathing was shallow and raspy.

With great difficulty, Stan and Kat made their way out of the colossal crater and then, without a word, both fell to the ground, unconscious.