Page 9 of The Dauntless (Spy Girl 5)
Once we are through eating, I resume my spot on the sofa, the agents setting up a row of chairs directly behind us.
Daniel turns on the camera and says, “Hmm. You can see the back of your head. Do you want people to know who you are? I mean, it will dispel the legend.”
“I think I’d prefer not,” I say, although I’m not sure why. Mostly because being good at a game like this doesn’t fit with my Huntley cover. Or my life. Whichever it is. I get up, grab a ball cap out of Daniel’s bedroom, tuck my hair underneath, and throw on one of his long-sleeved athletic jerseys.
Once everything is set up, we start playing again and get dropped off at the same place. Daniel follows my character as I carefully avoid the mines, leading us to the tent city.
When we get to the city and enter a tent, we find it empty and take the loot inside.
“What the heck?” Daniel says. “All you got was a stupid Band-Aid, and all I got was a dumb glove.”
“Maybe one of us is going to get a cut,” I fire back. “I mean, who knows? It could save your life or something.”
“Doubtful,” one of the agents comments behind us.
“Okay, let’s see what else we can find,” I suggest, leading us into the next tent.
“Ah!” Daniel yells out and then curses as a man engages him in hand-to-hand combat.
I rush over to the center of the tent where I pick up a brick and a piece of wire from the ground. I have a flash of déjà vu but ignore it. It’s silly to think that this game could have anything to do with my past missions. I’m sure it’s just a coincidence.
I run over to Daniel, who is currently in a choke hold, and hit the guy in the back of the head with the brick. He crumples to the ground, and Daniel breaks free.
“Let’s go!” He rushes out of the tent, only to find a Jaguar pulling up. “Sweet,” he says. “Let’s take this car.”
But it doesn’t go down that way. The man driving the Jag rolls down his window and shoots Daniel’s avatar dead.
“Are you kidding me?” he yells out, frustrated that he can’t keep playing. “Let’s start over again.”
“No!” I yell back, knowing where this game is going. “Let me keep playing.”
He crosses his arms in protest and makes a little humph sound, but he doesn’t restart the game. Instead, he scoots closer to me and starts giving me advice. “Sneak around the car and throw the brick at him.”
Instead, I run to Daniel’s dead avatar, steal the glove, and do what I did when Intrepid pulled up next to me after Lorenzo and my brother were kidnapped.
I hop in the car.
“Why didn’t he kill you, too?” Daniel yells.
“I don’t know. Sometimes, it’s best not to engage maybe?”
“Whatever. This game is stupid,” he says but sticks by my side.
The man in the Jag drives me away from the tents and to a warehouse area. When he stops the car, I know what to do. I drive the heel of my palm into his jaw, causing his head to snap back and knocking him out cold.
“Sorry,” I whisper, just like I did back then as I take off running.
I’m a little freaked out by this. Not many people know all this, which means Black X is either testing me or this key will tell me something they want me to know. But why go through all the trouble? Why not just tell me?
Maybe because I quit?
I get out of the car, now at a warehouse by the water. Two men are guarding the perimeter, each only armed with a pistol. I double-check the roof and, like before, see no signs of activity.
Dim light filters from a window. It flickers as figures pass by. More than happened in real life.
I inhale slowly then put the glove on my avatar and take the wire out of my cache. I find a guard on the corner of the building and quickly throw the wire over his head.
The guard twists and struggles for breath, but I hold tight, and soon, he crumples into a heap—dead. I steal his loot, which is just a pistol.
I run around the corner of the building, grabbing the brick, and hurl my character through the air to take the other guard out. It’s quick and easy. Much easier in the game than it was in real life. He also has a gun. Although, in this game, you can typically have only one weapon at a time, I am able to put a gun in each hand.
“How did you do that?” Daniels yells. “You can have only one gun at a time!”
“I know, but I thought I would just try,” I explain. “Somehow, it worked.”
“You are not following the rules,” one of the agents behind us adds. “It’s probably why you’re the best.”
I ignore his comment and focus on the task at hand—entering the warehouse. I peek around a corner and see a man wearing a crown, tied to a chair.
“Um, is that supposed to be a prince?” Daniel blurts out while I’m thinking, WTF?
“Probably a king, but since he’s royal and clearly in trouble, maybe that means, if I save him, I’ll get some major loot. Hush now. Let me play.”
There are two men guarding the captive.
I push the barrel of the gun around the doorjamb and fire a single shot that takes down one of the guards. I quickly fire again, killing the second.
A guard comes out of a room, sees me, and fires. I make an evasive maneuver, dodging behind a stack of pallets and causing him to miss. I take aim, but he runs behind the captive for cover and is preparing to fire again. Since I’ve been there and done that, I take off, running up the captive and catapulting myself into the guard, knocking him down and then finishing him with a round to the head.
Two more men come out of the room, and a shot rings out as one shoots his pistol toward the ceiling and says, “Stop where you are.”
Okay, this is really getting weird.
Daniel echoes my thoughts. “What is going on with this game? They never tell you to stop. What, are you going to dance the Macarena and become best friends?”
“Maybe I’ll braid his hair,” I tease back, causing Daniel to grin at me as he hops off the couch, races into the kitchen, and grabs a couple of beers out of the fridge.
“Get me one,” one of the agents says and then quickly adds, “I’m officially off duty.”
In the game, when the guard’s shot doesn’t have the desired effect, only causing ceiling tiles to rain down on him and his partner, just like it did in real life, I wonder how Black X knows all these details. I suppose Intrepid must have put how he killed the men in his report. But then why did it work to knock him out? I suppose my brother could have told them that.
Daniel comes back to the couch and sets an open beer on the coffee table in front of me while I duck down behind the captive, grip one pistol in each hand, and then somersault out, twisting and firing a gun at each of the two next targets.
Bang. Bang.
“Oh! Sweet move!” the off-duty agent behind us yells out. “I didn’t know you could tuck and roll like that!”
“Cheers,” Daniel says, clinking his beer against
mine.
“You’re underage,” an agent says from behind us, probably because Daniel is recording this.
“Only for a couple of more days,” he replies.
“When’s your birthday?” I ask, taking a pull off the beer as a guy appears in the game, pulling a gun from his jacket and pressing it against the royal’s temple.
“Drop your weapons, or I’ll kill him now,” the game says.
“July fourth,” Daniel replies.
“How very patriotic of you,” I tease, turning to look him in the eyes. And I don’t know why I do it, but I take the hat off, let my long blonde hair out of the hat, lean over, and give him a quick kiss. “Happy early birthday.”
“Thank you,” he says with a grin. “Are you gonna shoot that guy or what?”
“I don’t think I can,” I reply. “If I shoot, he’ll shoot the king. He could have the special key.”
“Which you can take off him when he’s dead. I’d just kill them both,” the agent suggests.
“Remind me never to have you guard me again,” Daniel quips, causing all the agents who have been gathering behind up to laugh while I place the guns on the floor in front of me and hold up my hands.
“I’m not sure if I like this new update,” Daniel says. “Although, since you now have no weapons, you’re going to die soon, so that means we can start over together.”
“Shut up,” I tease, shoving my shoulder into his as I pull up my loot.
“I doubt the Band-Aid will heal you after you get shot,” the agent says.
It doesn’t take me long to realize the Band-Aid in the game is actually an exploding pore strip. I make my avatar leap forward, first knocking the bad guy’s gun to the ground and then slapping the pore strip on his forehead, wondering why this person is male and not female when she should have represented Ophelia.
“What the heck is that going to do?” Daniel and one of the agents shout in unison.
I don’t reply. I make my character jump up to the ceiling, grab the exposed metal pipe above, and swing. My avatar connects, kicking the bad guy across the room as the strip explodes and blows him back into the nearby window.
When the dust settles, I check my position and walk over to the dead body to collect his loot, which is strangely a new skin.
