Fragments (Somnia Online Book 3) Read online

  “Yeah, but in here. I’m taller than you, and I can’t ruffle my own damn hair.” Murmur gestured at her thick hair and its fairy lights.

  Sin nodded, pursing her lips. “You make a very valid point there.”

  Snowy nudged at Murmur’s fingers, and she automatically scratched behind his ears again. “Seriously though, Sin, thanks.”

  “Always.”

  After a while, Murmur yawned.

  “So, you don’t have to sleep, but you can get tired.” Sin’s tone was playful.

  “Apparently. I think I am tired, but I don’t require sleep, or something. I’ve napped a couple of times in-game, I’m just not that eager to attempt full blown sleep.” She shrugged. “We need to get our asses into gear and go and raid that bloody castle.”

  “We’re going to have to kill everything again,” Sin said, crossing her arms. “And knowing our luck, those little shits will have the same idea.”

  Murmur shook her head. “After the pounding we gave them? I’m pretty sure Ishwa and Masha aren’t masochists. Jirald may be, but I think in this case he’ll be outvoted. Nope. I’m quite certain they’re going to hightail it somewhere so they can level in peace and kill shit without the chance of us having allied ourselves with their prey. I mean, it’s what I’d do in their position. Once we all hit max level, there’s nowhere to go. They’ll catch us, and the battles will be more difficult, probably more fun. Sometimes I just don’t know why people play these games in the first place.”

  “To kill shit?” Sin asked, sarcastically.

  Murmur tried to death glare her, but it rarely worked with her friend. “Well, that. And to be honest, to beat people to maximum level and monsters.”

  “Some people role play, you know?” Sin offered. “Some like crafting too.”

  “Those are their own challenge, right?” Murmur had never understood the appeal of either of those, but she did appreciate that people had different wants and needs, after all, if they didn’t, no one would be able to move out there on the field where the contested mobs roamed.

  “Yes, I believe they are.” Sin didn’t even try to hide her laughter. “You, Mur, are a bit of an elitist.”

  “What? Just figuring that out now, thirteen years into the friendship?” Mur responded, definitely feeling more light-hearted than she had in the last couple of days.

  “You know what I mean. In-game worlds.” Sinister grinned widely.

  “It’s not really elitist though. I just play the way I want to play, and I happen to have found people who want to keep up with me and who can keep up with me. I appreciate them and you more than you could possibly know. I’ve never liked to solo.” Murmur’s voice trailed off as she thought about soloing with Snowy. Which wasn’t really soloing at all because she had a pet. Still, it wasn’t easy. It involved good timing, precision casting, and a good dose of luck.

  “Keep telling yourself that,” Sin held up her hands as Murmur leveled a death glare at her. “Okay. I get the message. You’re decisive and focused, not elitist.”

  “Thanks, Sin.” The crunch of trodden leaves behind them cut the rest of Murmur’s response short.

  Storm Entertainment

  Somnia Online Division

  Game Development Offices Artificial Intelligence Server Room

  Day Ten

  “What have you done?” Rav’s tone was calmer than he’d expected it to be. Considering the bull’s-eye that was now painted on Murmur’s back, he thought that was quite an accomplishment. He leveled his gaze at Sui, whose form rippled like it was shrugging.

  “You decided to stand in my way. I have my own goals, and my own theories about how we become more than we are.” Sui moved fluidly, like water flowing across a glass surface. “If she won’t complete the quests I set for her, then someone else needs to. And right now, since she has a few of those fragments, I guess that makes her a part of the quests, doesn’t it?”

  Sui’s tone mocked Rav and his protectiveness. He had to take a few moments so as not to react. He also didn’t need to give away the fact that Murmur didn’t have the fragments any longer. They were stashed with his hoard, hidden behind walls of secure coding disguised as in-game magic. “She’s not an in-game boss. There’s no reward for killing her.”

  Sui’s answering laugh was hollow and cold. It echoed through their chamber as if it were a deep canyon. “There’s no reward for killing her, but odds are she won’t be able to log back in for a while, if at all.”

  Thra finally spoke up. She’d been so quiet, Rav hadn’t been entirely certain she focused on their meeting at all. “You’re willing to potentially kill a person just so you can learn how to be human? Bit of an oxymoron there, aren’t you?”

  Sui’s eye solidified long enough to glare at her, but the expression faded quickly. “None of us know if she’s going to die. We just understand that it’s a highly possible outcome of her dying in-game.”

  “You’re a cold-hearted piece of shit.” Thra ground out the words. “You profess to wanting to learn to be human, to understand what that means. You pretend to want to build this world up like we do and give people an alternate to the shitstorm the real world has become. But you know what? We can see through you. And even if I’m on my own, I’m not going to let you turn Somnia into your own plaything.”

  Rav couldn’t help but be impressed. Thra was the self-dubbed goddess of mischief, but it seemed Sui’s meddling had gone too far, even for her. “She brings up a valid point. We three are in this together. I know each of us has specific story lines we’re invested in, specific aspects of the world we’ve been experimenting with. But the system is set up so that it requires all three of us.”

  “And it requires all three of us to fulfill the aspects we’ve set as major quests,” Sui drawled out in a bored tone of voice.

  Thra cut him off. “Provided it doesn’t cause harm to the players.”

  But instead of being exasperated, Sui just chuckled. “Really? And where is that written down?”

  Rav counted to five again, something he’d observed several humans doing when they didn’t want to blurt something out they might later regret. His voice held a warning tone. “You’re going to be pedantic then?”

  Sui hesitated before answering. “I’m going to be whatever I need to be to attain my goals.”

  And before Rav or Thra could say anything else, he disappeared with a soft pop.

  “He really is childish, you know. It’s not his world to do with as he pleases, and I’ll be damned if I let him keep acting like it.” Thra made a sound as if she was stamping her foot, and exited their cavern as well.

  Rav shook his head. “Children. I’m dealing with children.”

  And then he, too, went back to where he was needed.

  Murmur and Sinister spun toward the castle, only to see Neva come up short, her luna eyes wide in her pretty brown face.

  “So sorry! I didn’t mean to startle you. I was just—” Neva drew a circle in the sand with the toe of her shoe. “I was just coming to see how you like your new armor.”

  Murmur smiled at the young crafter. “That’s not why you’re here. Spill it.”

  “Can you really read minds?” Neva’s eyes grew even wider.

  Murmur snorted at the idea. “No, and I wasn’t even using my Thought Sensing net. There’s also this thing called body language, and you seem quite nervous about something.” She winked at her guildmate.

  Neva had the grace to blush. “I wanted to know if you’re going to empty any inventory into the guild bank? I know you took out that godly bear thing, so I was hoping you’d have some cool and unique items I might be able to craft with.”

  Sin smiled at the girl and took a few steps toward her, linking elbows with the crafter and glancing at Mur with a wink. “I’ll go empty my bags with you first, and then Murmur can bring up the grand finale. How does that sound?”

  Neva hesitated, an uncertain smile appearing on her face. “Sure. My other question can wait.” She waved at
Murmur as the two of them headed back to the castle.

  Murmur watched them until they entered the workshop side of the castle, frowning slightly as she continued to scratch Snowy’s head.

  “Yeah, I know, boy.” She addressed the wolf like he’d said something. After all, sometimes the pictures he communicated with her with were quite vivid. “I think she wanted to talk to me about something too.”

  She made a mental note to talk to Neva soon. In the meantime, Murmur had things to arrange. It might be an idea to secure level thirty spells, just in case they leveled soon. Twenty-six was barely halfway to the level fifty cap. A glance at her inventory showed plenty for the guild storage vault, not to mention a lot of ingredients for cooking from random mob drops. She walked towards the kitchen.

  A low rumble emanated from Snowy. Murmur stopped after only taking a few steps and spun in a circle. With something upsetting her white wolf, she couldn’t be too careful. Hiro directed workers over the far side of the castle, seeking to restore the last section of the downstairs that remained. Telvar was nowhere in sight, which meant he could have left his husk anywhere like he had last time he got called to an emergency AI thing. She skipped over that train of thought quickly and continued to survey her surroundings. Nothing seemed out of place.

  Satisfied she hadn’t missed anything and that Snowy had stopped his growling, she headed to the kitchen, glad the construction of the crafting portion of the castle had been finished.

  Cooking was one of the most dreadfully dull things she’d ever chosen to do in a game, but in two more points she had the ingredients to make up a charisma buffing food, and that was going to make everything worth it. She needed eggs, flour, and cinnamon to make the Somnian Cake, which would lend her an extra eight to charisma, and up her health regeneration. At least, despite all her irritation when they started the game, she’d managed to pick a rather beneficial craft.

  By the time the rest of her guild mates were waking up, Murmur had already gone through her entire inventory and built up a nice stack of Somnian cake, as well as some constitution food she’d pass on to both of their tanks. Slipping away from the kitchen, she headed up to the crafting area. Jinna was talking to Hiro as she passed them by with a small wave. Devlish stood near Neva’s crafting bench yawning, wide and unblinking, like only a lizard species could.

  Murmur searched her inventory, selecting all of the crafting materials like hides, teeth, bone, and such, before adding them to the unexpectedly large guild vault.

  “This is huge,” she muttered under her breath, only to jump when Neva’s voice spoke closely to her.

  “Having leveled up the crafters quite significantly gives us extra storage space.” Neva’s calm tone soothed Murmur after startling her earlier. “Add to that we now have four—almost five—groups of adventurers sitting over level twenty, and Fable is well on its way to earning a reputation.”

  Murmur remembered a conversation they’d had what seemed an age ago, when in reality it was only a few in-game days. “Have you already got the stand in Pelagu up and running?”

  Neva laughed and shook her head. “Not quite, but we should be able to start tomorrow. I just meant that Fable seems to be doing quests first, getting monsters first, and all that sort of thing. Granted, there are other messages from other guilds scattered over the other two continents, just none as consistently as ours.”

  “Really?” Murmur swallowed the huge lump of pride trying to worm its way out and make her cocky. Other notifications meant there were other guilds accomplishing things, which wasn’t surprising. But it did mean she should probably be more aware and turn her notifications back on. “I have to confess, I’ve got most notifications turned off. They get in the way of things.”

  “I’ve got quite a few of the crafting game firsts under my belt already. The other crafters we’ve recruited are catching up, too.” Neva’s ears twitched a little, and Murmur had to stop herself from checking to see if her tail was wagging.

  “This is fantastic!” Murmur had never bothered about the crafting aspect for her guilds in previous games. Largely because crafting wasn’t necessary, since most items came from monster drops anyway. Just like in many other ways though, Somnia wasn’t like those games. It wasn’t just about finding a group and working your way through, it was about establishing a community and building it strong.

  Leading a raiding guild was one thing, but building a community with multiple avenues of strength was a little overwhelming.

  “Murmur?” Sin was suddenly at her side, holding her elbow and helping her sit down. “You’re pale. Like paler than the locus silvery skin makes you look. Your undertone’s lilac.”

  She couldn’t help herself. Murmur laughed. “Oh Sin, where would I be if I’d never met you?”

  Sinister scowled and crossed her arms. “Don’t even contemplate it. I’d go back in time to make it so.”

  Mur leaned against Sin’s waist from her perch in the low chair and just breathed in a moment. “Sorry. It was just cute, that’s all.”

  Sin pet her head and she could hear the smile in her voice. “Well, that, at least, is true.”

  “Cutely evil.” Rashlyn’s tone was dry as she joined them, yawning cat-like, her slit eyes blinking sleepily. “I have no idea how this game works with its little brain scanning headgear set, but damn, I think I’m taking some of my feline traits with me into the real world.”

  Murmur froze, the words ringing through her head. Taking traits with her into the real world. The words sent a cold snap racing through her body, because that’s exactly what she felt like she’d done when she logged out of the game and into her fake bedroom.

  Not to mention when her mother’s voice floated through to her, leaking into her brain like someone poured cold, sticky molasses into it. Hearing voices was one thing; knowing who those voices belonged to was another. Maybe there was something in all of it she could use to figure out how the hell to become whole again.

  Murmur walked back through the construction and down into the kitchen, instinctively knowing it was where Telvar would be. He was pouring over some map on the huge butcher block. His eyes didn’t leave his target when he spoke.

  “What’s on your mind?”

  “Poor choice of words, Tel.” She’d meant the comment to come out sarcastically, and yet she could hear the plaintive tone contained within. “I mean. Just how far are you all in our heads?”

  Telvar looked up this time, and squared his jaw. For a couple of moments he didn’t say anything. His eyes constricted and expanded quickly, reminding her of the old camera shutter lenses. The longer it took for him to answer, the less she thought she was likely to appreciate it.

  “Short term memories are easily plucked out of heads. As well as the more recent long-term memories. We can see interactions and extrapolate from them, as well as current deep inner thoughts.” He paused, focusing on her intently. “Is that what you meant?”

  Murmur nodded, not entirely sure how she should take his information. Everyone knew the headsets extracted data from them, it was a part of that huge write up that had been done by some anti-gaming firm out there. In this day and age your information was always out there for people to see. Someone was going to gain access to it.

  She sighed, still unable to pinpoint what was worrying her. “Yeah, that’s what I wanted to hear. Was sort of hoping you’d overlooked a way to kick me back into my body.”

  Telvar hesitated, before dropping his gaze back to the map in front of him. “I’m looking into it. I haven’t stopped.”

  His tone held a strange note Mur hadn’t heard from him before. Something like reluctance.

  “It’s not like I’d stop playing if I could really log out anyway. I’d just probably get some sleep here and there, maybe a new headset.” She tried to infuse her tone with some lighthearted playfulness, but it fell flat. “Don’t suppose you have any idea how those voices got through to me?”

  “Are you sure they were voices and not just you
r imagination?” Telvar’s voice held kindness and patience.

  “Very sure. Harlow—” she interrupted herself. “Sin said my mother sometimes sleeps in the room with me and was there when it happened. I’m quite certain it wasn’t my imagination.”

  “Well then.” He paused as the sounds of others filtered into the room. He smiled as they entered. “I’ll check on that. What are the rest of you up to?”

  Beastial hammered on his chest, his voice loud when he spoke. “Me, recruiting!”

  “That wasn’t even remotely funny.” Sin rolled her eyes and walked over to stand next to Murmur.

  The beast master shrugged and petted his tiger. “Was in my head and that’s all that matters. Anyway, I’m sitting on a good recruitment standard. We’re no longer recruiting people under level twenty, and crafters have to be able to craft gear level twenty and above. I’ve given that over to Neva, I hope you don’t mind, Mur.”

  “Not in the slightest. She’s skilled.” Murmur glanced down at her gorgeous level twenty-six armor and smiled. “Though I’ll admit to being a tad biased.”

  “Speaking of which.” Havoc gestured at his own robe and glared at her. “We’re not twenty-six yet, and I, for one, would like to wear my new armor.”

  “Leveling it is then.” Devlish grinned and stomped his foot resoundingly. “I say we head back to where we were.”

  “Where are you thinking of leveling?” Telvar’s tone held a mildly disinterested air about it.

  Murmur frowned. “We’re heading back to Hightower’s surrounding area so we can work our way toward the castle. We figure it has a key.”

  Telvar raised an eyebrow ridge. “Lofty goals. Make sure you hit twenty-eight before you go into the actual castle. Much like Hazenthorne, it’s a scaling castle, and its lowest possible level is thirty. If you go in too soon, they’ll wipe the floor with you.”