READ NOVEL ONLINE 6
“Well, they’re clearly entertaining, if nothing else,” one of them said with a wry laugh.
Ed gently set me down as we all eyed each other up, and I beat a hasty retreat until I was between and behind my friends. New people were scary.
There were five of them, a tall and ruggedly handsome one in the middle who was clearly their leader. Short brown hair, a bit of stubble and dark eyes complimented his brown leather bandolier and twin pistol holsters, both of which actually had guns in them. He’d gone for the whole roguish space captain look, and he seemed to mostly be pulling it off.
Beside him, the guy who’d spoken was very similar, except he sported long-for-a-guy blonde hair, green eyes and an easy smile that was pointed directly at me. Why was he looking at me? I shifted behind Ed entirely, moving out the other side of him in a way that would keep the pretty boy from staring at me.
Waitno. Now the really really hot blue demon girl was staring at me! She was smiling too, that same wry smile she’d used at the start!
Next to the hot girl was another girl, although she wasn’t nearly as intensely hot as demon girl. She was cute in her own way though, with her long hair up in a messy ponytail and a clip to keen the rest out of her face. She wore a skintight black bodysuit and a leather jacket over the top of it. She oozed pilot girl energy.
“What can we do for you?” David asked, ever calm and self assured.
“Well,” the boss looking guy said, an easy and friendly smile on his face. “My friends and I were thinking of forming a crew, but the ships we could run with five people are a bit small for our liking. We want something that’s bigger, have our own cabins and stuff. We saw you three over here and figured we’d ask if you’d like to come with.”
“Nice offer, but I think we should hold off on saying yes or no until we sit down and chat,” David said, although he used a friendly smile. “If we want to crew together, we should all probably at least get a drink together, see if we fit.”
“Good plan,” the boss guy said, then nodded towards a side street. “I know a place, if you want to follow. I played during the beta, so I have a bit of extra cash to help us get something a bit more robust than your average starter ship, you know?”
“I like the sound of having our own cabins,” I murmured, moving over to tug on David’s sleeve to get his attention.
He gave me a knowing look, “Yeah, I thought you might.”
Then he did something that took me by surprise, he placed a hand on my back, giving it a gentle and reassuring rub. For some reason, that made me feel both small and very happy. Both Ed and David were acting a little differently with me actually, now that I focused on it. I think it was that they were being more gentle with me, which I guess made sense since I was a lot smaller now.
To the other group, David gestured for them to lead the way, “Let’s grab a drink then! I have to say though, starting right out of the gate in a nicer ship would be pretty great, so I’m definitely all ears.”
“Yeah, really need that private cabin as well,” Ed said with a grin and a wink at his boyfriend.
That raised eyebrows on the demon girl. “Oh, I kinda assumed…” she said, trailing off with a meaningful look in my direction.
“No, David and I are dating, she’s more like… a little sister to us,” Ed clarified, pulling me sideways into a hug.
“Hey, Ed!” I complained, wriggling to try and free myself from his grip. Damn guy was too strong though, so I just had to stand there and deal with it all grumpy.
“So he’s David, you are Ed, and she is…?” the hot demon girl asked, her warm gaze finding mine. That look quieted me, sort of holding me there as she smiled at me, and I felt something flutter strangely within me.
My voice refused to work though, which sent my eyes once again diving for the floor. I just didn’t like speaking, even when I sorta wanted to speak, it didn’t work. My throat just didn’t like following instructions when I was nervous.
“Her name is Alia, you’ll have to forgive her, she’s a little shy,” Ed answered for me, giving my shoulder a friendly pat.
“Shy is perfectly fine,” the boss man said, turning to make shooing motions to his crew to get them moving. “Let’s go get that drink. I’m Roger by the way, Roger Walker.”
The bar wasn’t too far of a walk, and when we were all seated around a table with drinks in our hands, we began introductions in earnest, starting with Roger.
“So, I’m Roger,” he said, leaning forward, both hands on his glass mug. “Been playing for a while now, but not too seriously. All my friends here didn’t get into the closed beta, so I was mostly waiting for them before I got into the game. I picked gunnery and piloting ai at the start, but I’ve since gained space combat tactics as my main skill.”
“I’m Jason,” the blonde guy said, beginning where his friend had left off. “I’ve picked power armour and rifleman as my two ai. I totally plan on being our raw muscle when we get into shootouts and stuff.”
David piped up then with a friendly nod in Jason’s direction. “I picked rifleman too, so I imagine I’d be your covering fire. Zero G combat as well. I figure I’ll try and fill any gaps that we’re missing once we know what they are.”
“Sick, I’m keen,” Jason remarked, offering a fistbump which Dave accepted like the suave fatherfucker that he is.
Ed went ahead and introduced himself, talking about his skills and just generally cracking jokes as he did. I spent the time quietly inspecting each of the other people. There was one guy I hadn’t mentioned yet, a smaller looking dude with a quiet demeanour and a calm smile on his face. He had shaggy dark hair and intelligent eyes, and I instantly pegged him as a nerd of some kind.
Speaking for the first time, he said, “I’m Warren, by the way. I think we should make sure we have all the basic shipboard roles filled. Don’t want to find ourselves out there without an important skill.”
“Well, I have piloting covered,” the pilot looking chick said with a little cocky smile. “I’m Gloria, by the way. I have previous experience flying in the real world and in other VR games. I actually didn’t even choose another AI, just went for another piloting one that helps with the technical side. Stuff that I won’t know from outside the game.”
“Smart, makes sense,” David nodded respectfully.
“Agreed,” Roger hummed, placing a finger down on the table. “That’s piloting taken care of. I’ll be captain, I hope that’s okay with everyone. I have the most experience in the game and I have the money to upgrade our ship.”
“You seem like a cool dude, so I’m chill with that,” Ed smiled, then glanced my way with a questioning look. I shrugged.
“I picked navigator and shipboard systems management,” Warren told everyone, looking rather happy with himself. I didn’t entirely blame him, those were roles that not many would be interested in filling. They sounded incredibly boring to me. Graph monitoring in space.
“I have science covered,” the hot demon girl said, her voice mostly feminine, but with a sort of rough undertone. “I have ah… experience outside of this game in science, so I picked some AI that would help me understand the elements of science in this game that are less grounded in reality.”
“Nice, you’ll probably be teaching me a thing or two,” Ed chuckled, giving her a nod of respect. “What’s your name?”
“Ah, apologies,” she said with a sound of amusement that started out as a chuckle but ended very much in a giggle. “My name is Cerridwen.”
“Alright,” Roger said, rubbing a hand over his stubble in thought. “So we have Gloria as our pilot, Warren is our navigator and systems operator, David and Jason are our two beefcakes who shoot things, which I can also help with as well as my captain’s duties. Ed is a gunner and has some science to help out Cerri. Damn, I was hoping someone had picked mechanic. That might be a problem.”
“Hold on, Roge,” Cerridwen said, placing a graceful hand on his shoulder. “You forgot the quiet girl over there. Alia.”
I blinked, then shrank in my seat as everyone turned to stare at me. Too many eyes! Deep breaths Alia, deep breaths. In an effort to comfort myself, I brought my tail around in front and hugged it to my chest. It was also conveniently big enough to sort of hide behind. Gosh, my tail was so great. Great and huge and so very floofy.
“Well, you’re in luck,” David said with a note of pride in his voice. “That tiny fluffy little animal there is a mechanic. Hacker too, if we find need for that.”
“She chose a light craft pilot AI as well,” Ed said, chiming in with a friendly nudge to my side.
“That is a huge relief,” Roger sighed, leaning back and to the side so he could give me a grateful smile around my tail. “You’re small enough for the job as well.”
I nodded and carefully held up my hands, demonstrating how small they were.
It took him a second to realise what I was trying to communicate, but when he did he was grinning. “Nice! Small hands! That’s always a problem when I’m working on my car out in the real world.”
“She also has extensive knowledge with economics and the like, businessy stuff, so if we need ideas for like, investing some of the cash we make, she can help with that too,” David nodded, reaching over to… oh goodness… to pat me on the head. I slapped his hand away, or at least I tried to. Again, I wasn’t strong enough to do more than wobble his arm.
Roger looked more than happy with that news, giving me another big grin. “Our tiny swiss army knife of random skills. Excellent!”
From then on the conversation turned casual as everyone got to know each other, with the exception of me of course. I didn’t say anything and hid behind my tail the whole time, because I’m incredibly lame.
