Eyes came to the Café early, about seven o'clock in the morning. Gerald was still in the process of setting up for the breakfast crew, and told Eyes it would be a few minutes before his eggs were ready.
"Your pal Devon is still in the back, probably passed out from staying ip all night. Cherry didn't have the heart to kick him out last night."
"I'll go check on him." Eyes slipped through the curtain that seperated the private room. Devon had retreated there the previous night, saying that he needed to focus in order to finish Ikasi. Apparently Solana, the coworker that Eyes had never met, had dumped a bunch of work on him at the last minute. Eyes had caught glimpses of a half-assembled character creation menu while helping Devon shift his stuff from the booth where they normally camped.
Devon was indeed passed out next to his laptop, which had decided to enter sleepmode. Eyes laid a hand on Devon's shoulder and gently shook him.
"Hey sleepyhead, time to wake up."
Devon groaned, then slowly raised his head from the table.
"It hurts. My face. So uncomfortable. What time is it?"
"A quarter past seven. You want me to grab you a coffee?"
"Yeah. Please."
Eyes returned a few minutes later, cofee and water in one hand, plate of eggs in the other.
"Here you go," Eyes said as Devon accepted the proffered cofee. "When does the Alpha launch today?"
Devon looked at him blankly for a moment, then comprehension and a growing alarm began to dawn on his face.
"9. I have to be at the office by 8:30 for the pre-launch meeting." He checked his laptop clock quickly, and took a series of deep breaths. "Eyes, I need a favor. Can you drive me to work? I have a critical error in the loading program for the start zone. I need the half-hour in the car to fix it."
"Sure, I can drive you. but I want you to show me that model of Verngar you keep in your office."
"Fine. I'll let you see Verngar. But we need to leave now."
"At least let me finish my eggs." Eyes wolfed down his breakfast as Devon tried to drain his cofee as quickly as possible without burning himself. As soon as they were finished, Eyes took his plate to the counter and followed Devon up the stairs and across the street to a nearby parking garage. Devon's nondescript silver-grey Chevy Impala was on the second level. Devon settled into the passenger seat, keued up the navigation system to guide Eyes to Devine Enterprises LLC, and burrowed into a codung problem on his laptop.
Eyes took a moment to adjust the seat and mirrors-slight adjustments, better safe than sorry. He pulled out onto 3rd and settled into the simple task of following directions.
Somehow they ended up in front of a building that Eyes hadn't seen before, a towering office-block with narrow windows. Eyes pulled into the eployee parking basement, having to drive down a level to find a spot. They sat in the car for a minute while Devon finalized his edits, then made their way to the elevator bank.
As they rode in the elevator, Devon cleared his throat.
"There's a chance, a slight chance, that you might meet either Solana or my Boss. In either case, please don't say anything about the laptop I had you use. You're simply a friend who drove me to work and wanted to see Verngar. Solana has a tendency to appear distracting. Boss has a tendency to shovel his problems on underlings. Please don't irritate either of them, and whatever you do, don't offer to participate in the Alpha. They'll rope you into an inescapable contract that'll have you wishing you'd never been born."
"How come you were able to hire me with that at-will agreement?"
"The NDA had a memory blocking spell written between the lines, and the pay amounted to settling your tab each week at the Brick."
"True. I wasn't making all that much. I need to get a better job," Eyes chuckled. The bit about the memory blocking spell he just took in stride. The world he lived in didn't use magic.
But Devon made references to Ikasi lore all the time, and Eyes had even found himself quoting the lore in casual conversation. Enough time spent together, and some of the strangeness that was Devon had started to rub off on him.
The elevator finally dinged and halted on floor E&16. There was a sort of annex, home to some ambrosia vending machines, and then row after row of office cubicles stretching out like a vast sea of bureaucracy. Devon led the way Eyes trailing a little behind, awed at the incongruity of the super laid-back Devon in his rumpled plaid and denim and the numerous office-workers that looked like they'd stepped out from the pages of a magazine. What was more, he was pretty sure saw several wearing various animal masks. A lion with glasses looked up and glanced his way. Eyes used his trick of skilfully avoiding eye-contact and instead took note of a walrus barking into a phone in inuit.
Devon's cubicle was just as crowded as Eyea had imagined it to be. It wasn't that the area itself was cramped, it was the fact that every available square inch was taken up by models. There were pieces from Ikasi lore, like the sword Verngar, but there were also an assortment of x-wings, tanks, and ships, ranging from the modest sailboat to the aircraft carrier, and even a few starships like the USS Defiant and the Enterprise-E. the cubicle nameplate read D. King, and the one next to it read S. Angel. Solana wasn't in it, which only slightly disappointed Eyes. He'd been curious just how hot this legend was.
Devon wasted no time docking his laptop and checking for messages. after firing off a few replies, he handed Eyes Verngar, ushered him to an empty break room, and hurried to the pre-launch meeting.
Eyes, for his part, after poring over the skillfully crafted and embellished Verngar, which truly had the appearance of a legendary blade, set to work reading a book.
All was going well, until he went to the bathroom. When he opened the door after soing his business, it opened into a stone corridor, not the breakroom where he'd left Verngar and his laptop.
Eyes shut the door, waited a moment, and opened it again. A stone corridor still remained beyond. Eyes took a moment to process, then went back to the toilet and tried calling Devon. Devon's phone went to voicemail. Eyes tried calling the Cafe. No signal.
"What?" Eyes thought. Calling Devon went to voicemail, but everything else claimed no signal. Eyes left a voicemail explaining the situation, then took stock of his resources.
/Equiped/
glasses (prescription: eyesight+1)
t-shirt (red:luck-1, condition:clean)
Cargo jeans (blue, condition:clean)
Leather belt (condition:slightly used)
socks + underwear (condition:clean)
running shoes (white/grey: speed+1 condition: worn)
pocket knife (slash,stab,cut, condition: sharp)
phone (battery:65% connectivity: limited, condition: slightly used)
Eyes had left his wallet in the messenger bag in the breakroom. He wasn't sure whether that was going to be a good or a bad thing. Deciding that exploring would yield more rapid results than hiding in the bathroom, Eyes equipped a roll of toilet paper in one hand and stepped out into the hallway.
###