Pandora's Box

Chapter 16: Clara

3 hours after The Sealing

***

Clara took the limited supplies from Zee as he began to speak. Sam had asked for him to start with bad news rather than worse news, although Clara wasn't particularly excited for either option.

"Bad news is that the town is basically in shambles. The streets are littered with bodies, and just about everything useful has been ransacked already. It seems like most of the players have left the city; those who remain are grieving. Well, everyone except for that one guy we saw."

That last sentence piqued Clara's interest, and it seemed to have piqued Thomas's as well, as they interrupted before she could.

"That one guy?" Thomas asked. Zee nodded and proceeded to look towards Alexandra, as if to beckon her to continue.

"That's the worse news," Alexandra continued. "Towards the center of the town was this crazy muscular guy wearing a lion skin as a cloak. He saw us and told us to bring 'our entire party' to him to receive our first quest."

Clara couldn't help but groan. The last thing their group needed right now was an in-game quest. Then again, if the voice was to be believed, then that quest would be necessary to escape Pandora's Box.

"Sounds like Hercules," Sam's face showed a mixture of excitement and fear as he spoke. "He was one of the quest NPC's that we had designed but I thought that he was scrapped in the end."

"So we need to go get this quest from the Hercules guy?" Jessica asked. "And then we get to leave once we finish that quest?"

"I doubt it would be that easy," Clara responded. She looked towards Thomas to see how he was reacting to this information, but they seemed to be lost in thought. Feeling impatient, she continued. "It's a step in the right direction though. We can probably find out more once we speak to him."

Thomas, stirring from his thoughts, voiced his agreement. "Clara's right. We should start making a plan to accept the quest from Hercules." Thomas then began to list off the various things that would need to be taken into consideration, and Clara couldn't help but tune it out. Getting to her feet, she began to move towards her injured friends.

"Did you not want to stay and plan with us?" Thomas asked, seemingly unaware of Clara's disinterest. Clara could feel herself glaring at him for that comment, but she made her best effort to recompose herself before answering.

"Not really, Thomas. I'm exhausted and my brain just can't handle that as well at the moment. I've been working my ass off for the last 72 hours to make sure the launch of this game went well just for everything to go to shit. And since going to shit, I've spent hours running around and playing doctor to everyone," Clara felt herself rambling, but she couldn't help it. "I'm going to go tend to our friends with the supplies we just got because I know that I have the capacity to do that. Just make the plan without me and let me know what you all decide."

Clara went to turn away again but was stopped by Jessica's hand on her shoulder. "Clara, give me the supplies. You're right that you've been working overtime for a while now. I'll take care of our friends; you just go sit and relax some."

Not having the energy to fight, Clara mouthed a thank you to Jessica and handed off the medical supplies. She then walked over to where August was sitting and took a seat next to him. From this spot, she could see Jessica crouched near Jasper and Cassius.