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Using the time advantage, Maxi and Lus3rs were able to arrive back in their world about seven minutes after they left, which was about the amount of time Terry had predicted it would take them to track where the group had fled, plus another minute or two to mobilize a team to retrieve them. That meant a slew of PIs were about to enter Bobby’s world, where Belinda had left a little trap for them.
In the workshop where Maxi had woken covered in crispy ooze, she helped Belinda create a device that would attract the gurglesnorps. Not that she was of much help other than holding tools. The machine emitted a scent the slime couldn’t resist, much like the way they had hunted her when she had been there. Luckily, Maxi had showered since she was last in the world, and the slimes no longer had a way to track her.
The trap was simple. Belinda timed the modified air fresheners to release the scent at intervals to not only block the escape path to the elevator, but force the PIs through the building, keeping them tied up long enough to buy the Lus3rs the time to enact their plan.
Hopefully, the PIs would be about as equipped as Maxi had been when she had dealt with the creatures, and none of them would have a flame unit. Considering the PIs thought they were going after humans and not little critters immune to Psychic attacks, even ones that conjured Psychic heat and mundane weapons, Maxi was confident Belinda’s chase would keep them occupied long enough, even with the time dilation effects.
The group used separate elevators because Maxi’s plan involved them all arriving in separate locations at the same time, using Terry to coordinate their actions. Belinda had rigged up a solution for that. Terry downloaded his core programming into a laptop, the code that for all intents and purposes made him conscious. The portal computer was ancient by Maxi’s standards, being a clunky brick of plastic compared to the slender and sleek models she was used to.
In fact, there wasn’t even enough memory to run Terry on the thing, but Belinda dealt with that as well. She daisy-chained a bunch of memory chips from any computer they could cannibalize into what amounted to a backpack supercomputer that Farhad slung on his back, with an arm and a platform securing the laptop so he could type.
Since Farhad was the Hacker Class, Maxi decided he would be the one to carry Terry around. The rest of them would be connected to Terry via Bluetooth headsets and glasses, as all their other devices were zapped on the bathroom floor when Belinda had saved them from the PIs.
Even though Bobby’s world was outdated as far as technology was concerned, the Company had some standard tech throughout all the worlds, and wireless communication technology was one of them. While the technology interconnecting them wasn’t technically Bluetooth, she used the word because it was the only one in the English language that matched the function of the tech. Whatever the real name, it functioned in a similar way, and what mattered most was that they all had to do their part at exactly the same time.
What Maxi had to do was probably the most dangerous of all, but she was the only one who could do it, because her uncle was too powerful to defeat in a direct confrontation. She had to distract him.
The elevator dinged, and the door opened to Lo Key’s office. She stepped out and said, “Greetings, Lo. Where’s your friend?”
To her surprise, her uncle, who was normally impeccably kempt, was disheveled and pacing when she arrived. He was clearly worried about something, and Maxi’s arrival didn’t seem to alleviate that worry. He merely glanced at her and said, “It’s too late.”
***
FARHAD AND BELINDA exited their elevator into their Office Pool, where a couple of the low Level PIs had been left to sort through the mess. The PIs saw them and sent out Psychic attacks that bound Farhad’s arms and legs, and equally paralyzed Belinda. But they didn’t need the use of their limbs. As soon as they were in the room, Terry was busy waking up more of Belinda’s mechanized critters. A porcupine and hedgehog emerged from the debris, along with the cat, all having survived the blast that had blown the contents of the room to the edges.
The porcupine and hedgehog rolled toward their targets. The latter clunked one of the PIs on the head, and he went out because he was still weak from the previous encounter. The other was stabbed in the leg by hundreds of metal quills. The man screamed, and the cat pounced, piercing the guy with its knife paws. As soon as the pair were taken out by the minions, Farhad could feel the invisible barrier restricting his movement lift. He and Belinda ran to the debris that had once been his cubicle and dug through the pile for his computer.
***
FLAV EXITED THE ELEVATOR wearing a brand-new plate of armor they had looted from the armory of Bobby’s world. It was +10 compared to his measly +2 they had left at the Office Pool. Not only that, but it was “of lightness,” which meant the movement and sneaking restrictions that would normally apply to the heavy armor didn’t affect him. Not that they needed to sneak now. He and Patti were about to do what a tank and a healer did best—make as big of a ruckus as possible.
They entered the cafeteria to a room full of employees, most of them wearing yellow shirts, eating their lunch. Despite his size and his ability to wield weapons twice his reach, Flav was actually a very gentle man. The kids in his neighborhood used to run away from him. They feared him, even though he didn’t like hurting people.
Despite his non-confrontational nature, people were always picking fights with him, as if beating him up would prove their worth. Flav hated his reputation and eventually found a way out of his neighborhood in the Company. As the Porter Class, he usually went on quests that involved hauling items, sometimes through dangerous territory, and the armor was mostly a deterrent. Still, he felt that plate armor matched him perfectly—he looked hard on the outside but was really a big softy on the inside.
His part to play was unnatural for him, but something not out of the realm of the Porter Class, who were known for always wanting to prove their toughness. He was going to pick a fight and divert the building Security to his location. The problem was, he didn’t know who to fight. It felt mean to disrupt someone’s lunch with a macho contest.
That was when he saw the mailroom clerk sitting with buddies. This particular clerk was an asshole, and often treated legitimate requests to do his job with disdain, and had even told Flav once, “If it’s so important, why don’t you come back here and do it yourself?” All Flav had asked for was a delivery receipt. To top it off, during the last raid, he had heard the guy say that everyone beyond Tier 9 was fat and lazy, and, “Maybe it’d be better if they culled the trash.”
Normally, Flav didn’t like picking fights, but in this instance, there would be some satisfaction he’d take in it. He walked up and dumped the guy’s food tray on him, saving a cup of gravy for his head. Hopefully, when the swords were drawn, Security would come running. Patti’s healing would keep him up long enough, even though the jerk was higher Level, which irritated Flav even more because the guy was all smiles to anyone higher Level than him. This was going to be fun.
***
DAISUKE SKULKED THROUGH the hallway with his katana at the ready, a Toaster Waffle of Giant Strength giving him an hour of boosted Ambition well beyond his Level. Yancy trailed behind him. They were wearing gas masks Belinda had fashioned and were marching through the thick yellow haze. The gas was something Yancy had acquired after doing a mission for the Chemist branch. It wasn’t the most pleasant way to die, but fully resurrectable.
Considering most monsters didn’t think twice about whether they were making people comfortable when they slaughtered them, Company policy didn’t specify just how painful a death could be, outside of “excessive torture,” which was forbidden even if the person could be revived. Despite the policy being nebulous, all the employees they had killed so far were in player kill zones, except for the PIs who had invaded their Office Pool.
The factor that would be considered if they were going to get the hammer brought down on them when this was all over was whether they could prove Maxi’s conspiracy theory. While Daisuke wasn’t entirely convinced it was true, he was loyal, and since Maxi had proven herself, he’d back her play.
It also helped that the PIs were a bunch of pompous pricks who thought they were the only branch that meant anything at the Company. There was a fair share of Sales who were also pompous pricks, so that was why he had never joined a Sales-only Office Pool, but at least they only took credit for what they did. PIs took credit for everything. Daisuke hated people who thought they were better than everyone else, and he had thought Maxi was that person, too, until he realized she was just covering her self-confidence issues with bravado.
They passed several bodies of people in the Security Class who had succumbed to the gas. While there were still quite a few of them, the overall number was reduced because of Flav’s distraction in the cafeteria, which was several floors away from where they were. Farhad had hacked the elevator doors to jam them, so even if Security was mobilizing, it would take them a while to get the doors working. Yancy had tossed his other two canisters into the stairwells, to hinder the guards’ efforts there too. Hopefully, it would be enough time.
Once they got to the end of the hallway, the door for the server room waited for them. The bodies of the two guards always stationed outside were slumped on the ground. They had choked to death like everyone else in the basement of IT who was in their path.
Daisuke covered the hallway in case there were any guards they missed who also had the right equipment to protect themselves from the gas, but no one was coming. Yancy crept up to the door and placed a charge on the handle. The guy had always been a big fan of the gadgets in the James Bond films—he spent most of his spare credits and miscellaneous ability points on spycraft.
It was all coming in handy now, as Yancy was able to blow the lock on the door with a small explosive. Daisuke charged into the room and saw a lone IT guy with his hands up, who was now sweating bullets. The man was a short, thin guy with glasses.
“Please don’t kill me! I can’t afford the death penalty!” he pleaded with them. “I never raised my combat stats.”
While all Classes had some combat abilities, as they were in the business of fighting monsters after all, certain Classes like IT could spend all their points on other attributes that made them better at their day-to-day job. There was no shame in being a good Accountant or IT Professional, because somebody had to keep the place running, but most people chose to train in combat because all the lucrative quests involved a monster or two.
Even Yancy once had to face off a Tax Demon that had possessed a CPA’s software, causing auditing headaches, and his mission had included not only tracking down where the demon was hiding by following the audit trail, but slaying the thing. People that just buffed their IT skills did things close to home, like hunt for a rogue AI on a server.
“We aren’t going to kill you,” Daisuke said, sheathing his weapon. “As long as you do what we say.”
“I could lose my job,” the man said. “I got medical expenses. You know how much it costs out there.”
“You won’t have to worry about medical bills if you’re permadead,” Daisuke said.
The man’s eyes widened. “Okay, fine. But can I at least keep my analysis software running? I’m looking for a rogue AI, and we all know how dangerous those can be.”
“As a matter of fact,” Daisuke said, with a gleam in his eye, “that’s exactly why we are here.”
The guy’s face went white as Daisuke approached him.
***
“TOO LATE? WHAT DO YOU mean, ‘too late?’” Maxi asked.
Before her uncle could answer, the elevator door opened with a ding, and a wave of Psychic energy engulfed her. It was exponentially more powerful than anything she had encountered. Even Swami Robinson had wielded only a fraction of the raw power.
An astral tendril constricted around her and froze her in place. Cassidy West casually strolled into view next to the disheveled Lo Key, who sank into his desk chair, his face pale and his hands shaking. Cassidy’s lip curled as she glanced over Maxi in much the same way a slaughterhouse technician might look over a bovine before firing a rod through its skull.
The tendril wrapping around her body prevented her from talking, even blinking, so when Cassidy got too close for comfort, she was helpless to do anything but simply wait for the woman to make up her mind about what to do next.
“The famous Maxine Key,” the lead PI said after a moment, when all the air seemed to be sucked out of the room. Her voice was like velvet, yet commanding—the voice of a person who knew they were in control and always had the upper hand. “I remember when you were still in diapers, but my, you have grown.”
Maxi forced air through her frozen mouth in a futile attempt to talk.
“What?” Cassidy asked, and the tendril loosening around Maxi’s mouth.
“Breakwaters,” Maxi corrected her. “But you can call me Office Maxi.”
“You kept your father’s name, I see. It’s a shame. Did you know the Key family were the most powerful people in the world back in our dimension? Your father was the son of a school bus driver and the lunch lady. It caused quite a stir when he married your mother.”
“My ma lives in the Bronx. I don’t think anyone would care.”
“True, a curious choice for someone who could have anything.”
“Okay, so, other than living off of my ma’s leftovers, how exactly do you fit into all of this?”
The tendril squeezed her again, forcing the air from her lungs. The pressure was so intense, she couldn’t breathe. After an uncomfortably long time, it loosened up again, and she gasped as air flooded back into her body.
“Do not take me for a fool, girl,” Cassidy said. “I know what you’ve been doing.”
“Oh, yeah?” Maxi said. “What’s that?”
“Your little excursions off grid, recruiting an Inventor who was considered lost to the Company.”
“It’s better than killing the employees.”
“Death is a small mercy compared to what the multiverse has in store for them.”
“I see you swallowed the pill, too. I don’t blame you. Hard to get that high in rank without being a corporate lackey.” The tendril restricted her breathing again, but before it cut off her airway, she added, “Check your email.”
“What?”
The grip loosened, and Maxi blurted, “My colleague Farhad is sending over some analysis. It seems there are some employees who aren’t as invested in the Company as you are.”
Cassidy turned to Lo Key. “What’s the meaning of this?”
Farhad’s analysis began appearing on Maxi’s glasses and no doubt inside of Cassidy’s implant. A list named all players who weren’t pulling their fair share on the last raid. Maxi didn’t have enough time to figure out who had legitimate excuses for not doing enough damage during the month, but there were enough names that would get anyone questioning, including a few of the prominent PIs, notably one team lead named Trevor, who seemed a little eager to put her down.
To her surprise, other people stood out, too, like the Customer Care Advocate named Benson, who had given her a tip on the first day, and a mail clerk who had it in for Flav. Luckily, the manager of the Generalist Branch wasn’t there, because Maxi didn’t want that job.
That’s when another name popped up on the bottom of the list. She watched it scroll all the way to the top and disappear. Her heart sank.
Yancy...