The Bathrobe Knight: Volume 2 (48 page)

              Robert removed one hand from cradling his head long enough to point a finger at Kass and then point it behind him as far as his arm would allow towards the coffee pot. "You, child. Coffee. Now."

              "Wow, you really are fiending this morning. Well, hang on, junkie. I can't just wave my magic wand and make the coffee brew any faster."

             
Magic. Wand.
Last night's events and all of yesterday suddenly came crashing down on him together at once. Robert lifted his head and sat up looking at Kass. He suddenly felt a hollow pit form in the bottom of his stomach and roll over on itself. His mind quickly began pushing back at the blanket of fog that seemed to have descended upon it.

              "I might be getting old," Robert said as he stood up, "but with age comes experience." Robert walked the few steps to where the coffee was just starting to percolate. "And with experience," he said as he removed the pot from underneath the drip and replaced it with his own coffee mug, "comes the first cup of coffee."

              "Touché, Father. But don't you think you should let your wonderful and loving daughter have the first cup? After all, she has an appointment to keep today that might actually make her some money."

              Robert raised his eyebrow as he stared at her through red-rimmed eyes. "The same wonderful and loving daughter who offered to put her old man out of his misery just a moment ago? Nah, I think I'll pass on that one."

              "Hmpf." Kass put on her best pouty face and simultaneously tried to look innocent.              

              Robert simply chose to ignore her as he removed his mostly-full cup from underneath the drip and placed the pot back to continue filling up as he resumed his usual seat at the table.

              "So what do you have lined up for today?" Robert asked as he took his first sip of coffee. "Did you finally manage to land an interview?"

              "Erm . . . Something like that," Kass tried to dodge the question as she suddenly made herself unusually busy looking for a coffee cup in the cabinet.

              "'Something like that?' Either it's an interview or it's not."

              "Well, it's not exactly a job interview, but it will definitely give me a tidy little paycheck that should hold me over for a while longer."

              "So . . ." Robert pushed for the answer she was avoiding.

              "Well . . ." Kass began as she finally chose her usual coffee cup from the front of the cabinet and turned to face him." You know that radio station that caters specifically to gamers? G.O.R.N.? They put out a notice that they were looking for anyone who had any information about the girl who was riding the Hydra during that giant battle--"

              "And you're that girl," Robert finished for her.

              Kass was obviously caught off guard and it showed. Robert took a rather large gulp of coffee waiting for her reaction. It felt like hot lava pouring into a metal bucket as it hit his stomach, but it was helping to wake him up.

              "Yes . . ." she started slowly, obviously unsure of how she should proceed.

              Robert noticed her hesitancy and decided to play into it. "Did you think I wouldn't find out, or did you just not want your old man to know you bought a new pony?"

              Kass made a face as she answered, almost like a scowl that was never finished. "No, I suppose I should have expected it. It's not like it was a big secret, anyway. I just wasn't sure how you would react. I know you guys have been so busy at work and--"

              "And you didn't want your dad to worry about you while you were off gallivanting on a giant Hydra?"

              "It's a game, Dad. It's not like anything could actually happen."

              Robert finished his coffee in a single gulp and stood up to pour himself more. After he had finished filling his mug for the second time, he reached out and filled Kass's as well.

              "That's true." Robert replaced the coffee pot but didn't sit back down, instead choosing to remain standing as he spoke to his daughter. "But I also have the sneaking suspicion that you know you were doing something you weren't supposed to be. Like, for example, using an in-game mob in a manner other than directed--and as a personal transportation system no less."

              Robert hoped that he had wrapped his point in enough levity that it would soften the blow. The last thing he wanted to do right now was put Kass on the defensive.

              She took the bait. "'A manner other than directed,' Dad? The Hydra didn't exactly come with a warning label."

              "Well, maybe it should have," Robert said, scratching his chin thoughtfully. He was made aware of the fact that he was going to need to shave today as he did so. "I remember how much trouble you had just passing your test to get your learner's permit, and you did that in a sedan."

              "Must you always bring up that?" Kass finally took a seat at the table across from where Robert had previously been sitting. Rather than sitting down himself, however, Robert continue to stand, leaning back on the counter instead.

              "Hey, I'm just looking out for you. How would you feel if your account were to be suspended because you were exploiting mobs in the game? And even using it to kill other players." Robert paused to take a sip from his new cup of coffee. "I may work for the company, Kass, but that doesn't make you bulletproof. Even I couldn't do anything to save you if that were to happen. Then, just maybe, you might actually have to find a real job instead of hiding your head in that game and trying to avoid the unemployment issue."

              "Aren't you guys expressly forbidden from involving yourselves in the game?" Kass asked, clearly grasping at the first straw that came to mind in the hopes of saving herself. "Besides, I told you, I'm doing the interview today. They offered to pay me five thousand dollars just for talking about it on the radio."

              "So you knowingly exploited the game, and now you're going to go on public radio and talk about it to a bunch of other people playing the same game? Don't you think that might be a bad idea? You're openly admitting to everyone that you've been cheating. How soon before they start questioning everything else? I know you were rather proud of being one of the highest level frost mages, but don't you think that everyone else will accuse you of cheating to do that too?"

"It wasn't cheating, Dad. Darwin used a skill to turn the Hydra into a pet so he could control it. Then, he just had it fight for us. He did the same thing with the Turtle-Wolves."

              "Kass," Robert spoke carefully, trying to take any accusatory tone out of his voice, "there's no skill in the game that would let you control a high-level mob like that. You can tame certain types of monsters and use them as a pet if you're playing as the correct class, but never so many at once. As soon as you go on the radio and start talking about it, people are going to cry foul play. Think about it: have you seen anyone else in the game who could do that?"

              Kass looked back at her father, obviously trying to decide how to answer the quandary Robert had presented to her. "If it weren't part of the game, he wouldn't be able to do it, Dad. Darwin is a much higher level than most of the other players on the server. Just because they can't do it yet doesn't mean that they won't be able to later on when they unlock the skills."

              Robert began shaking his head as soon as Kass started talking. "No, I don't think you're understanding me. It's not part of the game at all. No one should be able to control that many creatures at once--not ever. A skill like that would be incredibly powerful and create problems for a wide variety of reasons. If you were able to control an entire army of monsters, think about the effect it would have on the game. You could clear entire dungeons without ever having to fight. The natural conflicts between the in-game races and the NPC armies would be meaningless since players could theoretically just create their own and do whatever they wanted.

              "Not to mention that, from a back-end standpoint, the load on the servers would be incredible. Just imagine if hundreds of players all showed up to the same spot simultaneously, all controlling their own private armies. I can't even begin to imagine how much strain it would be on the AI to have to sort out and control that many units in the same area at once. It would literally be attempting to execute millions of calculations and commands every second just to sustain them. Our systems are pretty amazing. I have to admit that even I have been impressed with their performance so far, but there's very little likelihood it could handle something on that scale. We would never intentionally program something into the game that was going to set us up for failure."

              "Then you must have made a mistake somewhere in the coding," Kass said accusingly. "There must be a hole, a loop or whatever it is you call it, that's letting him do it."

              "No," Robert responded flatly. "You told me before that Darwin was a fighter, right?"

              "Yes," Kass said, nodding her affirmation.

              "There's no parameter or condition anywhere that would allow a fighter of any type or level to have control over monsters. The function is specifically reserved for another class entirely; and, believe me, there is no point where even that class could ever control a creature as strong as the Hydra."

              Robert paused, taking another sip from his cup. He wanted to give her time to process what he was saying before he continued. "Right after you first started playing, around the same time you first told me about Darwin, you mentioned that he was wearing a bathrobe, right? That he was using a spoon as a weapon?"

              "Yes, I suppose so."

              "Didn't you find that a little strange? Don't you still?"

              "Well, I guess so. I've actually gotten pretty used to it at this point though. I don't even really think that much about it anymore.

              "Well, I thought it was a little strange as well. I asked around at the office and had some of the guys go through the object databases. There's no equipable version of a spoon in the game. Don't get me wrong, they exist of course. You could pick them up, move them around, or even eat food with them. There's no way, however, you could attack another player or a mob with one. There's no damage stat associated with it. Even if you were to try and stab someone with one, it wouldn't do anything. As for the bathrobe? That object doesn't even exist. To be quite frank, we have no clue how it's even in the game, much less functioning as an equippable piece of armor. Not to mention the fact that he's playing as a race with a character design that's completely alien to the game world. How many pale-skinned, red-eyed guys have you seen besides him?"

              "Dad, what's the point of all this? Darwin isn't a bad person. He's not a hacker, a cheater, or an exploiter like you're trying to make him out to be. He's not the kind of person who would ever do any of those things, believe me. He's a nice guy." Kass was getting defensive, and it showed in her voice.

              Robert found himself shaking his head again. "How much do you even really know about this guy, Kass? He's just some random guy in a virtual world hiding behind the guise of a fictional character. He can pretend to be anything he wants and justify it because he's playing a game. He's no different from the people who go around in video games killing anything and everyone 'just because they can.' Do you think those people are really mass murderers in the real world? Serial killers?" Robert was hitting very close to his point without ever actually trying to just outright say it. He knew that Kass would never actually believe the truth of it or how ironic his phrasing was. "I'm willing to bet that most of them are just teenagers living at home with their parents or adults who have ordinary, boring, everyday office jobs."             

              "I really don't have time for this right now," Kass said coldly as she finished her coffee and stood up. "Like I told you, I have an interview to get to."

              Robert sighed. It was clear that he wasn't going to get anywhere by directly attacking Darwin. "You're making a mistake, Kass. I haven't had to tell you that many times in your life, but right now I'm going to say it: you're making a mistake. If you go and give this interview, it's going to backfire on you. You're completely ignoring the backlash that's going to come from it. I'm asking you the exact same questions that they're going to ask you at the interview. I mean, let's pretend, just for a second, that you're either vague or unwilling to answer their questions. What's going to happen when they find out that you're my daughter? How's it going to look when the lead programmer's daughter can mysteriously do all these special things no one else can and that she has access to all these amazing skills that no one else does? How do you think that's going to look for me, Kass? Don't you think this is going to have an effect on my career? That no one at work will start asking the same questions?"

              "So that's what this is about," Kass accused. "You're just worried about protecting yourself and your job."

              "No, I'm worried about protecting
you
, Kass. You're my daughter. My primary job
is
to protect you."