The Lag (The Game Master: Book #1) Read online

  The upper part of the idol's body kept dissolving. The emerald light grew stronger, almost blinding them. The statue emitted a strong heat which mixed with the waves of cold from the Ice spells showering it.

  "Yanna, quick!" Attila shouted. "It's melting!"

  Crouching, Yanna reached from behind the statue and swung the little door open. The statue was hollow inside. The blue circle of a portal shimmered below.

  The girl bit her lip, waved to them and jumped in. The door slammed shut. Its outline flashed bright blue. In another couple of seconds, the statue melted completely, dissolving into a pool of bubbling liquid on the floor.

  "I've got the Eye working outside!" Attila shouted. "We can use it to get away! Provided we can get to it-"

  A basilisk and one of the zombies jumped into the cellar, cutting the conversation short. Beast kept showering the trapway with fireballs, preventing more mobs from getting in. Attila whipped out his sword. In one clean sweep, he chopped the basilisk's head off. The zombie was a tough one. He kept brandishing his scimitar until Attila managed to chop through his spine.

  The commotion distracted him. When finally he could focus on other things, he saw part of the cellar's floor directly under the trapway disappear in a humming vortex of bright white light. A powerful surge of air came from below, ripping pieces of light off the vortex.

  What kind of magic was that? He'd never heard about anything like this. Two thin threads snaked from the vortex to the Book in Wayfarer's hands.

  "Jump in, quick!" he ordered. "Beast first!"

  "What's that?" he bellowed.

  "Just jump! Mind your head!"

  Beast obeyed. As soon as he jumped in, the vortex spat white light, lifting his burly frame toward the trapway. Remarkably, he still managed to launch fireball after fireball, soaring through the air and screaming in a spent voice.

  "Attila — go!"

  He jumped. A powerful surge of light embraced him. The ceiling rushed toward him, the floor and Wayfarer dropping below. His heart missed a beat. He volleyed through the trapway past the black-clad figures, the mobs and zombies, their heads tilted up, staring at him. He rocketed through the gap in the roof and wriggled in the air flailing his arms until he dropped to the ground next to Beast not far from the hut. Bug-eyed, Beast was shaking pieces of debris from his head and shoulders, screaming,

  "I broke the roof, imagine! Broke it with my head! Some speed! That's why Wayfarer told me to go first: I was the only one with a helmet on!"

  An unnatural, inhuman shriek came from inside. A cleric flew through the roof, squirming like a fat black snake, his teeth clattering under his dark hood. Without aiming, Attila stabbed him through his head. White skin — or possibly, bone — flashed in the ripped hood, splattering Attila with something wet and sticky. The cleric rolled down the roof and thumped to the ground.

  Wayfarer rocketed out next. He landed on all fours, then jumped to his feet. Someone was already climbing up the roof after him, wheezing.

  Huge fingers grabbed at the edge of the gap in the roof. It crunched, caving in under the ogre's weight.

  Attila spun the knob. The Eye banked a steep turn and barely missed Attila's head as it dove toward him. Attila grabbed at one of its long arms.

  "Can it hold three people?" Wayfarer reached for the Eye's opposite arm. Beast followed suit. "Take us out, then!"

  Part Two

  Locked in the Game

  "Do keep ever present in your thoughts, my friend, that an illusion can kill you if you believe in it."

  Robert A. Salvatore "Servant of the Shard"

  Chapter Eleven

  At first Yanna couldn't breathe. Her throat constricted as if strangled by an enormous hand. She sat up and ripped the helmet off her head, sensors and all.

  She took in a deep breath, then exhaled slowly, releasing the terrible nightmare. The helmet felt alien in her hands; she flung it onto the bed and rubbed her running eyes.

  She'd do anything not to ever remember the horror she'd just survived. And still she had to do it. The shots; Healer's legs dangling in the trapway...

  Had it all been for real? Did the lives of all those people stuck in the game really depend upon her? Surely the RussoVirt administration could sort it all out without her?

  Her bare feet touched the cold floor. Get real, Yanna. Calm down. Have a good think. Weigh up all the pros and cons.

  The night was nearly over; the sky behind the window was turning gray. She was back in St Petersburg in her rented two-bed. Her roommate was away in Finland for a weekend with a few friends. This was Yanna's tiny room: her desk, her clothes rack. Her suit was connected to the laptop on the chair by the bed.

  She peeled the suit off and clung greedily to the water bottle left prudently by the bed. The worst thing every time you quit the game was thirst. Every time she closed her eyes, she could see gaming locations, her friends' faces, ghouls' decomposing mugs and mobs' unseeing eyes focused on her.

  Without getting dressed, Yanna pattered over to the kitchen and rummaged through the fridge for a pack of cheesecakes. She ripped it open and munched on one without really tasting it, then came back into the room.

  She had to do something. But what?

  She couldn't think straight. The memory of the game confused her. She had to go to RussoVirt which was in Moscow. And she was in St. P. Was she supposed to drop everything and rush to the railway station?

  No. That wasn't the right thing to do. The right thing had to be waiting for her on the surface, staring her in the face. Think, Yanna!

  But of course! Skype!

  Just as she had stepped into the portal, that funny guy, Ivan or Attila or whatever, had shouted his user's name to her.

  Yanna grabbed her phone and rubbed her temples, trying to concentrate. Was it Ivan666? Or Attila999? Or... yes! Attila666. She was sure of that.

  She fumbled with the phone, opening Skype and looking for the user's name. Got him. The circle next to his name was white: offline, dammit. Or was he just lying low? She had to try it, anyway.

  Yanna typed in a quick message. Attila666 didn't answer. Dammit.

  She grabbed a pair of jeans and a T-shirt and rushed into the shower. She let the water run cold and offered her face and shoulders up to the freezing jets. She could think clearer now. Yanna made the water warmer and poured some shampoo onto her hair, thinking.

  It looked like she'd have to go to Moscow. There she'd have to somehow find the RussoVirt building, then penetrate it like some freakin' secret agent. Yanna squeezed her eyes shut. Oh, great. St. P was her stomping ground; here she knew every nook and cranny, but Moscow? It was huge, people swarming everywhere! Surely the corporation building was packed with people too, all of them wanting to know her business, so she'd have to lie to them pretending she was someone else, trying to talk them into letting her through. Anything but that! She was too timid for that sort of stuff.

  And too blonde.

  She switched the hair dryer on and glanced in the mirror at her mass of fair hair flying everywhere. Her in-game friends would never have thought that her avatar was in fact a carbon copy of herself. Had they known, they would have started drooling all over her just like men did in real life, thinking that a pretty girl had to be dumb by definition. That was so not fair. She studied medicine with the best of them — in fact, she was in the top ten of their college students.

  Having joined the game, she'd been toying with the idea of having dark hair — or even becoming a fat chubby chick for a change. Then she reconsidered. She didn't want to please anyone. So she had pressed "scan", entering her real-life appearance for her avatar.

  Yanna put her hair up in a ponytail and walked out of the bathroom. What next? Her friends were stuck in the game while she was here. She had Attila's Skype but he wasn't available. But what if he'd been killed? What if all of them had been killed: Attila, Beast and Wayfarer?

  Her blood ran cold at the thought. What was she supposed to do? She was scared already as i
t was, but if they were indeed dead, she'd have to confront the mysterious enemy alone. Wayfarer had told her not to trust anyone at RussoVirt. Why? Was it some kind of conspiracy? What if the corporation had taken the players as hostages, about to demand a ransom from their families? What utter nonsense.

  Never mind. Right now she had to go to Moscow. She knew where to find the laptop containing the virus. All she needed to do now was to act methodically. Her job was to get to the laptop and connect it to the Internet in order to plant the virus. In the meantime, Attila and Beast would disable the firewall. And to do that, they'd have to get to the Citadel and penetrate it somehow.

  If they didn't disable the firewall, the virus wouldn't work. But how was she supposed to know the exact moment the firewall was off? They had to act in synch — but to do that, they needed to stay in touch. But they couldn't!

  Walking back to her room, Yanna kept thinking how she was going to penetrate the RussoVirt building, get to Floor 15 and find the laptop. The thought sent a chill up her spine. She felt weak at the knees. She was no freakin' ninja! She was a normal girl, shy and insecure, who couldn't sleep the night whenever she had to give a talk in front of class. And now she had to tackle the guards and the ID checks!

  If she could just crawl back into bed, cover her head and forget about it. Only if she didn't help them, who would?

  This wasn't a game. Not even a Tom Cruise action flick. This was real life, and in real life people didn't penetrate corporation HQs. If they as much as tried, they got caught, arrested and sent to jail.

  All this flashed through her mind as she sat at her computer reserving a train ticket. The nearest Sapsan — the high-speed train connecting St. Petersburg to Moscow — was leaving in just an hour and twenty minutes.

  She paid by card, praising her Mom's foresight. Her Mom could afford helping her out when necessary. It was her who'd talked Yanna into choosing medical studies even though Yanna herself had never considered a career in medicine. But Mom — the chief doctor in their little town's hospital — promised to help her open her own practice and with time even a clinic.

  As far as Yanna was concerned, medicine was a job just like any other and it paid your bills. So she didn't really mind. But was it why she felt so insecure now? Because all her life she'd trusted Mom to make all the important decisions and now finally she had to use her own head?

  Yanna printed out her ticket and sprang to her feet. She was ready. She threw a few things into an overnight bag and hurried out.

  As the taxi took her to the station, she kept checking Skype on her phone. Nothing. No messages from Attila. He was stuck in his Moscow apartment now — or rather, not himself but his body which had already begun to deteriorate slowly but surely, dying with every passing hour. It meant that after RussoVirt, she had to find his place too and try to bring him back to life. But he hadn't given her his address, had he? Only his Skype ID.

  Everything had happened too quickly. This was another reason why she needed to get in touch with them ASAP!

  She arrived at the station fifteen minutes before the train's departure. The platform was quite crowded but Yanna quickly found her car.

  She warily squeezed her way past a group of skinheads dressed alike in camo pants and leather jackets, probably on their way to one of those underground neo-Nazi meetings protesting against migrants. Luckily for her, a police squad happened to walk past. The group dissolved in seconds, leaving Yanna alone on the platform to look for her carriage.

  The high-speed train turned out to be utterly cool, with glass partitions and flat-screen TVs overhead. A brand-new carpet ran along row after row of comfortable seats.

  She quickly found her place and settled down, staring out the window at the bustling crowd. A young couple were kissing their goodbyes; some shady types in gray suits were threading through the crowd looking into people's faces. Once again she pulled out her phone. The battery was almost flat. Yanna rolled her eyes, calling herself all sorts of names.

  Then again, a cool train like this was bound to have plugs to recharge passengers' equipment. Yanna felt in her bag for the charger. She pulled it out by the cable and looked around, searching for a plug.

  Her glance chanced on the window. The burly men in gray were still busy pestering the passengers. They were definitely looking for someone. Four of them surrounded a big man with a close-shaven head and a large baboon-like face. Was he also a skinhead? In any case, he seemed to be the one in charge, distributing sheets of printed paper, gesticulating and issuing orders as he sent his burly henchmen on a new round of searching. Then the man walked over to Yanna's car and stood there with his back to her. He raised the sheet of paper to his eyes. Yanna stood up and craned her neck to get a better look.

  Her blood ran cold. Printed on the sheet was her own picture — or rather, a copy of her avatar which looked identical to her.

  Now who would have access to this information? The admins, the game developers? In other words, RussoVirt workers. So they were looking for her. But how on earth did they know? Had they identified her IP address as she fled through the portal? In that case, why were they looking for her at the station?

  All this definitely had something to do with the game, but what exactly?

  Baboon Face was still hovering under her window. Yanna sank deep into her seat and shrank her head into her shoulders. She plugged the charger in but the phone refused to charge. Was the plug out of service?

  She stared at the charger in disbelief. This was the old one! It had been broken for ages! She must have packed it by mistake in the rush!

  Dammit! Calling herself every name under the sun, Yanna pulled the charger out, wound the wire up and tossed it back into the bag. What was she supposed to do now? The phone had very little charge left.

  She stole another look out of the window. It was only a minute left until departure. The crowd on the platform began to disperse. The men in gray were nowhere to be seen. Only their controller — Baboon Face — kept pacing the platform alongside her car.

  He swung round. Yanna recoiled. Had he seen her?

  With a jolt, the train moved off. Yanna peeked out. Baboon Face was nowhere to be seen.

  Big sigh of relief. Or not?

  The phone beeped in her hand, flashing a recharge warning. Then it went dead.

  * * *

  The Eye soared into the sky, flying away from the hut. Realizing what had just happened, the clerics showered it with ice spells. Too late. Attila and his friends were already out of the spell's range.

  They flew above black patches of land and gleaming expanses of water rippling with fluffy bulrushes. The Eye hummed laboriously, losing speed.

  "Come on now!" Beast pleaded with the steel star. "Please, Eye dear, pretty please don't let us down! Just a little bit more! Look, that clearing over there's perfect for landing!"

  "We've got harpies chasing after us," Attila said. "They're still far away but there're lots of them. A whole murder of harpies."

  "Oh, no!" Beast whined. "They'll claw us to death!"

  The Eye made a sobbing noise and wobbled in mid-air. That was it. That was the end of their journey — but not of the marshes. It was a good job all the ghouls were still busy by the hut.

  Beast's fingers were the first to slacken. Falling, he tried to grab at the Wayfarer but missed and snatched his bag instead. Attila watched him collapse into the mud at the worse possible place and sink quickly.

  The Eye sped up.

  "Noooo!" Beast yelled. "Help me!"

  Attila waited for the nearest spot of land and jumped down. Wayfarer followed, crashing into the bulrushes. By then, the sky had turned sullen again. The Shaard barely peeked out amid the thunder clouds.

  He couldn't see Beast from where they'd landed, but he could well hear his cussing and gurgling sounds. Wayfarer's staff was too short for the job. Attila saw a long dead branch protruding from the water. He grabbed at it and pulled.

  "Get me out!" Beast's voice rang with panic. "
The ghouls will be here any moment! Help! Are you here?"

  "We're coming!" Attila shouted. "Wait! Try not to move! If you move, you'll sink faster!"

  Wayfarer shoved his staff under his arm and got hold of the branch. "On the count of three!" he commanded. "One. Two. Three!"

  Attila pulled hard. With a creak, the branch gave way. They pulled it out and ran toward Beast.

  He was already bogged down chest-deep. He stood motionless with his hands above his head, his face and helmet covered in mud, his eyes gleaming with madness. It was a good job he'd left his heavy breastplate back in Healer's hut.

  Wayfarer held out the branch. "Is my bag okay?"

  Beast reached out. "No, it's not! I dropped it!"

  Wayfarer snatched the stick back. "Retrieve it."

  "You can't!"

  Attila didn't believe his ears, either. "Are you nuts? What d'you think you're doing?"

  "To get into the Citadel, we need the bag," Wayfarer said, pulling the branch out of Beast's reach. "Go and get it!"

  "What do you think I am, a flippin' retriever? I'm gonna die in here!"

  Attila stepped toward Wayfarer, aiming to wrestle the branch away from him, but the impartial expression in the man's eyes stopped him. Wayfarer wasn't cruel: he was doing the right thing.

  Attila stepped back, stunned by the discovery. An avatar's eyes couldn't express anything, they were just part of the cartoon, no matter how expensive the graphics. But Wayfarer had the living, suffering eyes of a human being.

  "You bastards! Murderers!" Beast sobbed. Then, swallowing his indignation, he felt in the mud around him. Nothing. He took a wheezy breath and bent down until only the flat top of his helmet showed. The mud around him bubbled with his energetic groping about.

  "I got it!" he yelled, raising the bag in the air and beaming his toothy orcish grin.