Holy long time to write this chapter, Batman! Yeah, I knew this one was going to take me a little longer to write because there is A LOT going on so I apologize for how long it took me! I'm finally able to work from home now, so hopefully, I'll be able to update every other week versus every month! (hopefully) But I'm really excited about this one! I hope you enjoy it!
Also, RATING CHANGE WARNING! I did change this from T to M to be safe. Things get a little violent towards the end of this chapter and the cussing has increased. Also, I naturally have a dirty mind so there might be some raunchy humor later on in the story!
TtTtTtTt
Chapter Five: Volunteers
"Ok, so what is the one rule you boys are going to abide by tonight?" Karen asked the group of boys who were currently riding the elevator with her up to Kory's apartment.
Roy let out an exaggerated groan. "Karen, do we have to do this every time?"
"Yes, I do," Karen said. "Because the rule never seems to be followed."
Roy rolled his eyes. "To not make any moves on Kory."
"Good job Roy!" Karen playfully punched his arm and then looked down toward the twins that were accompanying them. "Mas? Menos?"
"No coquetees con la reina." One of the twins said sadly and both of them cast their eyes to the floor as if they were being scolded.
"Exactly!" Karen said. "At least I think you are in accordance with the rule."
The elevator door opened and the Titans East in their civilian personas stepped out.
"You don't have to worry about me!" Garth told the group. "You remember that guy I was talking about in Atlantis."
"Yeah, yeah," Roy said. "You don't have to keep reminding us how you recently just came out of the closet."
As they approached Kory's apartment door Roy said. "I don't see what the big deal is. As far as I know, Kory is currently available. Dick's not here yet, so I won't have to worry about the wrath of him."
Karen rang Kory's doorbell. "We went over this. Kory has a lot on her plate right now. I really don't think she needs a bunch of desperate and thirsty boys simping over her."
"I'm not a si-" Roy started to say and then the apartment door opened. "Hey, Kory!" He greeted with a scarlet face.
"Friends of the east!" Kory greeted in her most Starfirey manner. "I am so glad that you were able to make it!"
"You know we wouldn't want to miss out on all the big wedding shenanigans!" Karen told her.
"Nuestra diosa!" The twins rushed to hug each side of her waist.
"Hola Mas y Menos!" Kory giggled at the boys' enthusiasm and then motioned for the rest of them to join the party. "Please, do come in! Roy, I need your bartending expertise to make some drinks. I am not the greatest with the spirits."
"I was hoping you would say that." Roy winked at her. "I was experimenting with some holiday-themed cocktails, especially for this occasion." He paused to look around to see if Karen was nearby. "So how lit are you wanting to get tonight?" Roy whispered in Kory's ear and then immediately felt his legs give away underneath him as Karen kicked the back of his knees.
"You didn't even last five minutes of the promise you made!" Karen scolded him.
"I don't remember making any promises!" Roy exclaimed as he picked himself up from the floor.
Karen turned to Kory. "I'm sorry about them. I know that's probably the last thing you want to deal with."
Kory laughed. "Do not worry about it, Karen. Boys will be boys."
"You can say that again!" Karen told her and called after Roy as he approached Kory's fully stocked bar. "Yo Roy! Make me a drink!"
"Yes, master!" Roy said in his best personation of Igor.
At that moment, Kory felt a great sense of contentment from seeing all her friends together in her apartment. It's been a long time since she felt that way and she was going to do the best she could to enjoy every minute of it before she had to face reality again. She was pleased that everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. Especially Rachel, and that's all that mattered to Kory. This party was for her and Gar, and she was happy to see that they were happy.
It was a successful and bustling party and Kory managed to pull together a delicious holiday-themed spread that her guests were all impressed by. Earthly cooking wasn't one of Kory's strong suits because she insisted on adding her Tamaranean flair to it. Which, inevitably would always send someone to the toilet. However, Kory really wanted to show her friends how much she has adapted to Earth culture. Therefore she looked up some traditional hor 'd oeuvres on the internet and watched plenty of cooking videos and shows to learn the Earthly cooking ways. Her friends were also impressed with her decorating abilities. Some even asked her if she hired a professional to decorate her apartment, but she said no, it was all her.
Everyone she invited was there. Including Sarah who was overly ecstatic to be invited to Kory Ander's home. Kory was equally as ecstatic to see Victor with a lovely lady friend. Knowing that all her friends have arrived, Kory poured herself a glass of wine and then gently tapped it with her fine cutlery. She had seen in movies that humans would often do this to capture the attention of their audience before giving a speech.
Her friends hushed down and Kory told her home ai to turn the music down. "Friends, may I please have your attention for a moment?"
"You're not about to recite a 10,000 versed poem on love and friendship are you?" Gar teased as he wrapped one arm around Rachel.
"No, I am saving that for my maid of honor speech for the reception of the wedding," Kory said almost too seriously. Gar's face went pale at the thought of having to sit through one of Kory's hour-long poem recitals. Kory caught his expression and laughed. She was finally catching on to Earth's sarcasm. "I am joking with you Gar."
Gar let out a sigh of relief.
"I will make this short because I want to save the good speech for the big day and I know all of you probably prefer to get 'lit' as Roy would say."
Roy made a sound of approval and gave her a double thumbs-up. "Offer is still on the table."
"Roy shut up!" Karen's voice was heard. He narrowed his eyes at her.
Kory cleared her throat. "I just wanted to say thank you all for coming tonight to celebrate all the wonderful events that are about to take place in the next couple of weeks because of Gar and Rachel's beautiful love for one another. I know a few of you traveled some distances to be here tonight and I cannot express enough how appreciative I am of you all. You have been my closest friends for so many years and once again, I thank you for accepting me into your family."
"Siempre tendrás un lugar en nuestro corazón, reina!" One of the twins bowed to her.
"Gracias mis amigos." Kory acknowledged them and returned her attention to her party guests. "I am raising a toast, to the friendship that we have built throughout the years, and all the memories that we will continue to make together. Salute!"
"Salute!" Everyone chorused and raised whatever they were drinking at the moment. As the party guests took their sips, a new voice presented itself as everyone turned to the apartment's entrance door.
"You all are taking shots without me?"
Kory nearly dropped her wine glass when she heard that voice and everyone went quiet. Only the poppy Christmas music was heard as a few made side glances at Kory to see how she was going to react to the newcomer. Sarah looked extremely confused.
"Dick!" Rachel broke the uncomfortable silence to run toward her surrogate brother and wrapped her arms around his neck.
Dick was taken aback and tentatively wrapped his arms around her waist. Rachel was not known to be a hugger, but it had been a while seen he's last seen her. "Hey, Rae! It's good to see you too!"
Rachel broke away from his embrace. "I'm so glad you're here! Gar and I were hoping that you would come earlier!"
Dick laughed. "You know it's kind of weird seeing you this excited about something!"
"Dude!" Gar greeted their friend next. Almost tackling him on the ground with his excitement. "It's been way too long! Wait, why are you wearing sunglasses inside?"
"Yo Dick!" Victor said while clapping him roughly on the shoulder. "I'm glad you made it man!"
Most of the party guests surrounded the former Titan leader to welcome him. Sarah continued to look confused. Roy stayed back experimenting at the bar. The twins were fuming at their newly arrived competition and Kory was more interested in what was in her wine glass and doing her best to reign in her fury at the moment. Deep breaths. Kory mentally coached herself. Just as long as we stay on opposite ends of the apartment and he does not try talking to me…
"Hi, Kory." The mental coaching failed her.
"I thought you were not coming for another two weeks." She said. Refusing to greet him properly.
"Yeeeah," Dick said slowly. Carefully choosing his words so she would stay and talk to him. "Gotham was getting kind of boring. So I flew over here earlier to spend more time with our friends."
Kory continued to look into her wine glass. "How did you find my apartment?"
"Vic invited me. He said I could be his plus one." Dick winked at her but he forgot that he was wearing sunglasses so his attempt to lighten the mood was in vain.
"Sarah is his plus one," Kory said matter-of-factly and crossed her arms.
"Ok, so I'm the third wheel."
"I am surprised you do not have that Babsy girl hanging off your arm right now." Kory pointed out.
Dick made a sound of disgust. "I think she would rather rip my arm off now than…"
Kory wasn't listening. She walked away from him to visit Roy at the bar. "Roy please make me something stronger than this." She told him while placing her wine glass on the bar.
"You got it, Kor!" Roy said while taking her wine glass to finish it off himself before grabbing another glass for her.
"Hey, Roy!" Dick slid to the bar next to Kory. "I'm going to have what she's having. It's been a long flight from Gotham."
Mas and Menos suddenly appeared out of nowhere in between Dick and Kory. In strange unison, they began speaking in rapid Spanish threateningly. Roy must have understood what they were saying because he snorted slightly while mixing Kory's drink.
"I still don't understand a word you guys are saying," Dick said. Noting they have grown to be the height of his shoulders now.
"They are saying if you try to make any moves on me they will chop off your balls and feed them to the chupacabra." Kory translated.
"Yikes," Dick said. "You can speak Spanish now?"
Kory took a sip of the drink Roy handed to her. "Please stop talking to me."
"Who did you learn that from?" Dick couldn't help himself but ask. He knew it was probably wasn't the smartest thing to be asking, but his jealousy took over. Her ability to learn different languages through lip contact was something he always had a difficult time with. Granted she learned English from him, he wanted to be the only one she would "learn languages" from. "Did you have a boyfriend who spoke Spanish?"
Kory growled and grabbed her drink to stomp away, Dick stopped her by grabbing her arm. "Wait! Look I'm sorry...that was a little uncalled for. But I just want to talk. I know things were kind of shaky the last time we saw one another but I brought this peace offering to rebuild our friendship."
Dick held up an expensive-looking bottle of champagne to her and Kory was wondering if he had that with him the whole time. "It's one of the finest campaigns imported from France and I thought I would give it to you as a housewarming gift since this is my first time in your apartment which is really nice by the way. Looks like your game has been extremely successful."
Kory took the bottle from him because she knew he was going to continue talking and wanted him to stop. "Enjoy the party, Dick. But please do it away from me." After saying this she strolled over to where Rachel and Sarah were currently chatting.
"You look amazing by the way!" Dick called after her. Not really sure why he said that when she clearly didn't want to talk to him anymore. "Yeah, that went well."
Roy snickered. "Dude. That was the most desperate word vomit I have ever witnessed."
"Shut up Roy."
"Nice to see you too!" Roy laughed. "Well, I think you will need something stronger than what I gave her.
Meanwhile, Kory handed the bottle that Dick gave her to Sarah. "This for being our newest friend!"
"Whoa!" Sarah exclaimed while admiring the bottle. "Everything is in French on this label! This is probably super expensive!"
"Yeah probably." Kory faked a smile.
"That guy seemed really into you over there," Sarah noted.
Kory grunted and continued to take sips from her drink. She wished she would get buzzed faster, but she had a high tolerance to alcohol, so it was going to take a lot more of Roy's drinks to make her feel tipsy.
Rachel let out a weird giggle that was not normal for her. The alcohol was starting to get to her. "You have no idea!"
"Wait a minute..." Sarah studied Dick intently. She heard their friends call him Dick, but it didn't register who that was until now. "That's not whom I think it is, is it?"
Rachel smirked. "The one and only..."
"That's Dick Grayson? One of the adoptive sons of Bruce Wayne?"
"Yep," Kory confirmed unenthused.
"Girl! You have one of the hottest and richest guys on the planet who appears to be into you!" Sarah paused, and then another realization hit her. "Unless you two were a thing and he was..."
"Oh, they were more than a thing." Rachel said.
"Rachel! Please!" Kory told her slightly tipsy friend. "Can we please talk about something else?"
"What's up, ladies?" Victor draped his arms around Sarah and Kory's necks to pull them in toward him. "Are we gossiping about Dick? Because I want in!"
Kory has currently throwing daggers at Victor with her eyes. "Victor, may I speak with you?" She asked him and with her super-strength, she dragged him by his arm to her bedroom and slammed the door behind her.
"What the actual fuck, Victor!" Kory yelled at him.
Victor was very shocked. He had only heard Kory use that word once and it was when Dick was in town a few years ago. She was pissed.
"Whoa," Victor told her. "I didn't think that word was part of your vocabulary."
"It is when a certain someone gets invited to my apartment without telling me!" Kory fumed. Coming very close to revealing her powers from her fury.
"What was I supposed to do?" Victor tried to defend himself. "He just arrived in Jump earlier today and was wondering what everybody was up to so I told him about your little gathering. I meant to text you but it was kind of last minute and I got busy..."
"Victor, there are so many other things you could have told him other than my party!" Kory said.
"Everyone here are his friends as well. Do you really think I was going to lie to him about where everyone was tonight?" Victor asked her.
"I would have preferred that, yes,"
"Come on Kory," Victor said, trying his best to calm the very irritated Tameranean. "It's really not going to be as bad as you think. Dick is just here to see his friends that he hasn't seen in a while, and if you are not ready to talk to him then don't. He's got plenty of people to keep him occupied right now. But you will have to deal with the fact that he's going be in town for a while eventually."
Kory crossed her arm and pouted. "Fine. He can stay."
"You're not going to pout in your room the whole night are you?" Victor asked.
"It is my party and I will pout if I want to!" She said and lifted her nose in the air for a second and then smirked at Victor.
"You have developed quite an attitude little lady!" Victor said while ducking out of her bedroom door.
"I told you Kory Anders is the dark side of Starfire." She told him as he left to join the others at the party.
Kory shook her head and glanced at her reflection in the mirror of her vanity. She took a deep breath and tried her best to give herself a pep talk. "I guess I will just have to 'deal with it' for now."
She left her room and actively searched for Rachel among her friends and not the newcomer. Kory was relieved when she was surrounded by Karen and Sarah and no other males. At that moment, she really only wanted female companionship.
"This is a killer party, Kory!" Karen complimented her as she joined the social circle. "For a girl who's not from around here, you sure know how to put on a party!"
"I am pleased you are enjoying yourself!" Kory's face brightened a little. "My friends deserve only the best!"
Kory and Rachel's phones both buzzed as their Titan alerts went off. Rachel glanced down at her phone and groan. "Why does there have to be a call now?"
"Can't the new Teen Titans handle it?" Sarah asked.
Kory gave Sarah a confused look. "You know who we are?"
"Oh yeah," Sarah blushed. "I kind of signed a non-disclosure with Vic so that I could help him with developing new technology for the Titans. Don't worry though! Your secret is safe with me!"
Kory tilted her head amused by the fact that Victor trusted this young woman enough to share his deepest darkest secrets with her. He was clearly more interested in her than he was leading on.
"Who is it?" Dick asked Victor with boyish curiosity. Even though he was no longer part of the Titans network. His instincts were still spot on when there was trouble afoot.
"It's only Gizmo attempting to rob a bank," Victor said in a bored tone while reading the alert brief. "He must have broken out of jail again. I'll send the new Titans to take care of them. He shouldn't be a problem for them."
"It's Gizmo?" Dick asked with excitement. "I want in! I haven't seen that little punk in years, and I can only imagine the look on his face once he sees Nightwing in town."
"I'm sure the new Titans would be stoked to have you fighting with them!" Gar said.
"I say we should get as many Titans together on this and destroy this guy!" Roy contributed to the hype.
Kory rolled her eyes and sighed. Of course, her party would have been ruined by the man who essentially wrecked her life. "Are you all even sober enough to go out and fight tonight?"
"I know I'm not!" Rachel admitted while raising her hand. "I'm sitting this one out."
"I've only had like one drink. I think I'm good!" Garth told the group.
Karen grabbed Kory's hands in her. "Let's just all takedown Gizmo together and then we'll come back here to party some more!"
Kory gave a hesitant smile. "Very well then."
Karen let out a whoop. "Come on boys! Let's kick the shrimp's ass!"
All the Titan boys followed Karen out the door to go on their adventure. Talking excitingly as they were looking forward to teaming up with one another again. Dick stayed back for a moment once he realized Kory wasn't following them.
"Aren't you coming?" Dick asked her.
Without looking at him and trying to focus on the drink she was holding, Kory said, "I am going to stay back and keep Sarah and Rachel company."
"What?" Dick asked, bewildered on why one of the Titan's powerhouses wasn't going to tag along. "This isn't going to be a proper Titan battle without Starfire."
"I said," Kory snapped with a sterner tone as she repeated. "I am staying back with Sarah and Rachel."
Even with the sunglasses on, the look of confusion on Dick's face was evident. Something he said most have upset her, but he wasn't sure what. He thought his question was innocent enough. But then again, at this point, anything he tried saying to her would probably set her off.
"Ok…" Dick said, still unsure of what he did wrong. "I'll catch you gals later…try not to have too much fun without me!"
Kory let out a sigh of relief when he left. The urge to scream at him about all the pain he had caused her over the last couple of years was getting harder to resist with each second.
TtTtTtTt
"Come on…come one!" A very short man, no larger than an average-sized child eagerly tapped his fingers against a tiny laptop that was hooked up to the largest safe he was trying to break into at the bank he choose to try his luck at robbing that night.
Banks these days had used digital locks instead of the old fashion mechanical ones thinking that it would keep their client's money safer and more difficult to break into. Mere child's play for Gizmo. He was a tech genius with the hacking abilities that made him one of the most wanted villains in Jump City. It was a title he prided himself in and has been able to get away with his prizes from his successful hacks on several occasions without being caught in the Titans radar.
Tonight he knew that he might not be so lucky with getting away with his loot so easily. He was breaking into a bigger bank with more intense security, so he knew he had limited time before the bank's security system picks up someone was trying to enter one of the safes and the Titans would be alerted. The challenge of breaking into the safe before the Titans got there gave Gizmo quite a thrill and was excited to outsmart the group of vigilantes once again. Higher the risk, the higher the payout.
However, his laptop was taking a little longer to release all the locks on the safe than he intended He calculated how long it would take to break into the safe and how long it would take the Titans to arrive on the scene in order to time everything perfectly. But tonight, he was running a little behind schedule, it was starting to make him a little nervous. Only a little, since he hacked into most of the older Titans' schedules and they were going to be preoccupied at a Christmas party and the younger Titans would be the ones to be sent out to go after him. Those kids never really scared him. They were still green to the crime-fighting scene and he knew he could most likely get away from them if he needed to.
The locks were about 80% released and Gizmo's fingers started to tap even faster on the laptop. Sweat started to drip from his shiny bald head. But he wasn't nervous! He was confident that money will soon be within his grasp!
"Hi, Gizmo! Did you miss me?" A voice said right beside Gizmo and startled him enough that he fell over on his back from being jump scared.
"Ah shit, it's you!" Gizmo cried and then quickly scrambled to get back on his feet. "I thought you were in Gotham back being a stupid sidekick for Batman."
"Ha! As if!" Nightwing told him. "It's more like I'm going to sidekick you back to prison."
Gizmo groaned. "God, your catchphrases are still stupid!" He then pressed a couple of buttons on his chest that released his metal spider legs from his backpack so that he could attempt to make his escape.
"See ya later bird brain!" Gizmo flipped Nightwing off as he began crawling away from him, only to back into Cyborg who towered over him.
"Hiya Gizmo! Do I need to redirect you back to your padded cell again?" Cyborg asked him as the Titans East suddenly appeared behind him.
"Really? You losers are all here too?" Gizmo was starting to sound a little desperate now, but there were other ways of escaping. They may have him surrounded on the ground, but there was always up, and there were only two people there that could fly. Therefore, flight was going to be his next best option.
Gizmo pressed a different combination of buttons on his suit to activate his jet pack. He made a beeline to the glass ceiling, but a gold rope was lassoed around his waist to be dragged down. Shit, even the kiddie Titans were there. He was not expecting this at all.
The fight didn't last longer than five minutes, but each Titan had a turn serving justice to the little techie psychopath. At the end of the fight, Wonder Girl's lasso was wrapped around Gizmo's tiny body while he watched the stars pass by his eyes from the fight he hopelessly lost.
"Yo! I can't believe we just took down a bad guy with the Nightwing!" Blue Beetle exclaimed excitingly. "Granted Gizmo wasn't that hard to take down, but this fight goes down to be in my top five of favorite Titan battles."
"I've made it only to the top five?" Nightwing challenged. "I should definitely be ranked at least top three!"
"Ah yep!" Cyborg said while slinging a babbling Gizmo over his shoulder. "Your cockiness has not changed at all."
Nightwing shrugged. "I'm just saying…what do I have to do to be number one on Blue Beetle's best fight's list?"
After the police arrived on the scene and drove Gizmo away back to jail, Nightwing pulled Cyborg aside to talk about the one thing that was concerning him. Since Cyborg was the big brother figure for all of the Titans, he thought he would be the one to ask.
"So what's going on with Starfire?" Nightwing asked. "Why wouldn't she fight with us today? She seemed a little defensive when I asked her to join."
"Oh…you don't know do you?" Cyborg replied. Only confusing Nightwing more.
"Know what?" Nightwing suddenly got worried. "Is everything ok with her?"
"Night…" Cyborg began to say but wasn't sure how he was going to form his next couple of sentences without making it blatantly obvious that she wasn't ok. "Starfire hasn't used her powers since you left."
Nightwing's jaw dropped. "What do you mean she hasn't used her powers?"
Cyborg sighed sadly. "Our girl hasn't been the same since…the fallout. I don't know if it's her emotions that are getting in the way of her powers or if she's just refusing to use her powers at all. But we all think it might be the latter."
Nightwing's face remained passive as he processed everything. There was only one time Nightwing remembered when Starfire couldn't use her powers, and that was when he was Robin and they were both stranded on a strange planet together. He was embarrassed when Cyborg teased him about 'messing around with his girlfriend' before they started dating. This led to Robin defending himself by stupidly blurting out Starfire wasn't his girlfriend and in turn, led to Starfire's feelings getting hurt because she thought Robin wasn't her friend for not fully understanding what 'girlfriend' meant on Earth. Thus making the whole situation confusing and awkward for them both as they struggled to find their friends powerless since Starfire's emotions were messed up due to the confusion of their relationship.
"How can she just refuse to use her powers?" Nightwing asked. "That's a big part of who she is! She can't just ignore that because of what happened to us!"
Cyborg shrugged. "I don't know man. But she no longer wants to be called Starfire anymore. She's made that clear to all of us and only wants to be seen in her Kory Anders persona. The only time she wants to be Starfire is in Bad Omen."
TtTtTtTt
With every good role-playing game, one can create camps or spaces to show off their collection of treasures to other players or have a space for workbenches to upgrade their armor and weapons. Bad Omen has a similar feature. Players can buy cottages if they grind hard in their quests and save up enough coins to do so. These player-owned cottages or spaces were often used for friends to come together from all over the world to just connect and hang out. Some players use this space for party meetings to come up with strategic plans to take down certain bosses. However, a few cottages owned by more devious players were used to plot ways to ruin the experience for others.
These players were infamously known as leaches. Leaches had the reputation of purposely killing lower-level or less-skilled players for fun and then taking everything they were carrying afterward. They were parasites that thrived off the power trip of stealing rare loot and weapons to either sell or use for their own quests and PvP events. This was not tolerated in the game at all, and if reported and investigated by the moderators and found the reported actions to be true, their accounts would be banned immediately for a selected duration of time.
This is why the leaches would often meet up in cottages in the furthest corners of the map or areas that were particularly harder to get to if you were a lower level. A group of leaches were currently meeting in one of the cottages and going over how they were going to raid one of the upcoming multiplayer events that were coming up for the holidays. As they were plotting and punching each other for no reason there was a strange knock at their door.
The group of bandits instantly quieted their rambunctious activities and looked at one another in confusion. A knock on the door was a strange action to take place in-game as one usually would just enter the building without the common courtesy.
"Who is knocking on my door?" WreckItZeek, the cottage owner and leader of the group asked out loud as the banging on the door continued.
"You want me to blow his head off, Zeek?" EchoKill asked and cocked his pistol. "Teach em' a lesson for trespassing on our property?"
"Save your bullets, Echo." Zeek told him and stood up from the table where his party members were all meeting. "I first want to see who has the balls to knock so loudly."
Zeek approached the entrance to the cottage and opened the door to meet the fool who was about to lose their entire inventory. To Zeek's surprise, the player he met at the other side of the door didn't look like a player at all. If anything, it looked like an android from a low-budget sci-fi film.
"Who the fuck are you?" Zeek welcomed his guest.
"I understand this is a house of killers. Is it not?" A female's voice was heard from the strange android. No mouth was seen to be moving as it spoke. Just a black screen with six red dots that could be its eyes.
"What kind of question is that?" Zeek asked. Standing his ground as he sized up the figure.
"I am looking for volunteers for a little project I am working on." The android said as it walked toward Zeek and pushed its way through into the cottage. Zeek was slightly offended by being pushed around, but at the same time curious of who or what may be speaking to him. "I need testers who are not afraid to shed blood. I have heard of your group, and I heard you are some of the most ruthless players in this game. We need players like you?"
"Who is 'we'? And what project are you supposed to be working on?" Zeek pressed.
"You do not need to worry about who we are. You just need to worry about the fame and power we can provide you all within this game and potentially real life." The android walked around the room slowly. Scanning each face it came across. Getting pictures of bewildered and slightly frightened faces. "This project is for…an update for the game. I am here to scout for only the best fighters who are wishing to make a name for themself here. As you know, this virtual reality is the future and it can only expand from here…I am sure you all want to be kings of that future, correct?"
"Why don't you just get to the point robot lady?" Zeek said. "We don't have all day to listen to 'what if' monologues."
"Straight to the point, I see," The android turned back to Zeek and took a few steps toward him. "I like that in a warrior." The android voice turned sultry, and Zeek felt himself getting warmer at the tone. Was he seriously getting turned on by a robot?
"Very well then." The android said as it inched closer to Zeek. "It might be best if I show what could be your future if you are willing to…" It lifted its metal fingers to stroke Zeek's face. "help me."
Zeek gulped. He had no idea why he was allowing this to happen. Normally if any player got in his face like that, they would find themselves on the ground with their health bar drained and all their items taken from them in an instant. But that voice…whoever was behind that avatar sounded extremely sexy.
The android lifted its hand and moved its mechanical fingers in a 'come hither' fashion. "Follow me, boys." The android then left the cottage, and the rest of the party, including Zeek, eagerly followed.
Once everyone was outside in the snowy simulated forest, the party noticed two random players hanging from their wrists on one of the branches of a tree. They were clearly scared and whimpering as a cloth was tied around their mouths to muffle their cries. There was a "What the fuck?" that was heard from the party.
"Behold…our test subjects!" The android presented the pitiful players. "What I am about to show you is the potential power you can have in this game, and the chaos you can cause here."
"Enough talk," Zeek said. "Show us."
"Very well then…" The android said simply and lifted both of its arms as if it was in a meditative state. When it did this, it stayed eerily still as the sound of rustling leaves started in the distance and quickly made its way to the group. The cries and whimpers of the test subjects intensified as the sound got closer. From the thick of the forest, a giant spider-like creature jumped out toward its prey and began feasting on the unfortunate players. Tearing them apart as they screamed in agony as if they were in actual pain. Health bars slowly dropped until they were dead. Once the victims faded away from the game, the android dropped its arms and the spider-like creature stopped moving as if it was being turned off like a machine.
There were several faces of pure horror and interest after what the group of leaches just witnessed. The woman controlling the android from the cockpit of her ship smirked. She had won them over. "This power, this fear, this terror could be yours, my friends." She said as she moved her android to showcase the creature. "Image what you could do if you were able to control the fear in this game. Anything you want could be yours."
She paused to let that all sink in for her potential volunteers and future henchmen. "You do not need to decide now, but I have left my contact information in each of your inboxes if you wish to let me know that you like what you see."
"I'm in," Zeek said almost instantly.
She turned to look at the leader and muted herself so that she could chuckle wickedly. "Yes, I shall have the most fun with you." She then unmuted herself to say. "Of course you are."
"We will be in touch," Zeek told her. "But for now, we have a raid to plan."
"Very well then. Expect to be contacted by us within the next couple of days." She said and watched her new prey enter back into their cottage. She was feeling quite smug with herself as her plan was going just as she intended it would.
When she was about to sign her android out, a bullet zoomed past her avatar's head to lodge itself into the tree directly behind her. She looked around the area of who shot at her, but she saw no one, even when she turned on her movement and heat radar, there was no player to be found. However, when she turned around to examine the bullet buried in the bark of the tree, she noticed a blinking light that hovered over where it was. Curious, she touched the blinking light and a message popped up in the center of her view that read:
"I never miss. That was a warning shot. If I see you in this game again…that bullet will be in your skull. Android or not."