Page 6 of 10 |
|
| Even without their players using a walk-through, the characters Igor and Alilshy made good progress on the Lost Shaman Quest that night. But more to Jeff's liking, their budding friendship continued to grow. This is why I play Sword Dynasty, he reflected that night in bed. Meeting people like Alilshy and Hack- master. Over the months he had been playing, Jeff had learned a lot about his friend Hack-master. They had even swapped Hotmail addresses and kept in touch outside the game that way. Hack- master was the same age as Jeff, but married with two little children, so he turned to Jeff for a sympathetic ear when facing life's little bumps and bobbles. Jeff was hoping that time would evolve a similar relationship with Alilshy. So far, most personal details had been guarded — just the safe thing to do — and their delightful off-game talk had been rather global: favorite places in the world, favorite foods, likes, and dislikes. That was fine with Jeff, and seemed fine with Alilshy's player too. Jeff fell asleep very satisfied with his new friendship. The next morning, at work, Jeff ran into Doug in the break room. It had been Doug who introduced Jeff to Sword Dynasty. "Hey Jeff." Jeff nodded and scanned the offerings of the vending machine for the Trail-mix Bars without the chocolate chips. "Did you see that spaz memo from the office manager about turning off lights?" Doug commented offhandedly. "I saw it," Jeff answered. "I was here late last night and went around. There are only four people in the whole office with incandescent lamps on their desks." "Only four?" Jeff replied punching "C-11" into the machine. "I told Maddie she should have just emailed the guilty parties directly and not yelled at the rest of us . . . what's that . . . about a hundred and eleven people get yelled at for what four people are doing?" "That's how it goes sometimes . . . " Doug said. He shook his head and moved toward Jeff. A noticeably degree quieter, he added. "Hey, I know you are in the middle of Lost Shaman, but when you get out of the cave, do you think we can meet up? I have about two dozen buyers lined up for the Enchanted Dynasty Swords. All going to pay top dollar. My commission on the sale alone is going to make me rich." "Sure thing. So that Sword Dynasty auction web site you built is working out?" "Dude, I get about 50 emails a day!" Jeff smiled. "That's crazy." "Man, you have made me famous! Just knowing Igor and being your exclusive seller has made Death Lance famous. You know that new girl in the other wing? The Unix sys-admin for the Ops-Research group?" "Tall? Blond hair?" "Yea, real pretty . . . The kind of girl that would never give a dumpy guy like me time of day?" Jeff frowned and shook his head, as if to say for Doug not to put himself down. "I know who you are talking about." "Well, she plays SD too, and someone told her that I was Death Lance. She walked all the way down here to find me yesterday at lunch to ask me if I had got her email from the web site about the sword." "No kidding?" "Jeff, I never thought selling swords would make me a babe magnet." "Oh brother!" declared a female voice from the doorway. It was Carol, the four-on-four team's nominal point guard (though everyone knew that if the defense was too hard to throw the ball to Jeff). "It's going to take a lot more than some RPG to make you a babe magnet!" Doug and Carol were best friends, so her insult was only fodder for a good laugh. "You watch," Doug said. "You just watch." Jeff smiled and shook his head. "Well, we better get back to work." "I just walked in," Carol protested with a smile. "Not you . . . us." Jeff returned her smile. "Oh, sure, leave me all alone. You're going to sneak into the wiring closet and kill some dragons in that game, I bet." Jeff and Doug knew she was kidding and that, coffee cup filled, she'd be back in her cube in half a minute, so they walked on, ignoring her remark. "So you're selling the sys-admin one of my swords?" "Yea, she said she'd get it in a few days. I have three in storage, and I told her I'd save her one." "A few days? Is she getting up the money?" "No, she's doing Lost Shaman. Hey, you two should hook up! That would be cool." "She's doing the Lost Shaman quest? What's her game-name?" "Umm . . . Well, now, I forgot. I have the email. I'll tell you later. Her real name is Janis. Extension 4547." "She gave you her extension number?" "Shoot no. I looked it up! Later boss . . . Oh, I'll have the new application's CPU hits down about two hundred percent by lunch. I found some really bad logic in one of the routines we imported from the Interstate Logistics group that can be cleaned up pretty easily." "Great. You should do a White Paper on it and send it up channels. Help the whole company, and get some credit for your skills." "Yea, I'll think about doing that." Driving home that night, Jeff's thoughts turned away from CPU efficiency, memos about desk lamps, and almost all things to do with DynaServe. Almost all things. At one particularly long red light, he recalled Doug's mention of Janis, the sys-admin who was a Sword Dynasty player and was in the middle of Lost Shaman too. What are the chances? Jeff mused. Having an analytical mind, Jeff, unlike most asking themselves such a question, went on to answer it. If she is actually doing the quest that means she was playing last night. There were about 10,000 people on-line, so that makes the chances one in 10,000. Jeff shook his head. No way. It couldn't be. Then again, I already beat 10,000 to one odds just meeting Alilshy in the demon chamber. He smiled at his luck as the light changed. When Jeff got home, he went through his ritual of getting ready for a night of gaming, but suffered a momentary panic. For some reason, his wireless router was not working, and he was frantically looking for an Ethernet cable long enough to allow him to sit on the sofa before he had the thought to reset it. That worked, and he logged in to find Alilshy on line and waiting for him. Alilshy: Hi. I thought you had put me on your block list and used a |
|