Another chapter is out!
GAME OVER
Chapter 8 [Alesa Clarks]
~~~~~
Adam walked into the main room. Seto was hunched over that old book again. Adam snuck up from behind and tried to peer at the book. Seto only growled at him and grabbed his staff resting next to him. He angled it at Adam who backed off quickly.
"I'm just curious, no need to get so protective!" Adam had his hands held up in self defense.
"Ever heard curiosity killed the cat? No? Learn it."
"What do you know about the language so far?"
"Did you not hear me? Oh, whatever. I'll give you this at least, you have the potential to be a good scholar--" Seto sat up from his hunched position and turned to look at Adam. He let his guard down, "Why did you agree to participate in one of Jason's crazy experiments, he gave you a contract that should've warned you of the danger, You could be living a normal, peaceful life."
"I thought it would be cool," Adam grinned.
"Should've known," Seto responded by muttering and shaking his head, he turned back to his table and skimmed through what he was writing.
"I suppose it wouldn't hurt to tell you one thing. As seen in the book, the language appears to be a long string of symbols with no spaces, pauses, or breaks. However that isn't true. The one thing I know is there are a total of 52 different symbols, and well a few more, but those are special cases. Ignoring the special cases, half of the 52 are replicas of the first 26, the only difference is an added dot. My theory is that the dots are equal to that of a letter and a space combined. Implying for every letter accompanied by a dot, it is also the start of a new word."
Adam's heard hurt.
Seto sighed, "Come here, I'll show you."
Adam moved closer and looked over Seto's shoulder. Seto grabbed a pen and a piece of paper and wrote a few things down. When he was done, Adam saw a few of the symbols from the book.
"You see this, now I may not know what letter these symbols correspond too, but I am fairly certain they are the exact same letter. Just one is used in the middle of a word, and the other used at the beginning to signify a new word has begun."
"Oh! That makes so much sense! How'd you even figure that?"
"Unimportant. Now does my answer satisfy you?" Adam nodded happily, "Good, now shoo."
Adam nodded again, "Sorry to bother you again, I'm heading to Level A, I'll be back in a few hours."
"Mhm." Seto answered absentmindedly.
Adam left. He was told just yesterday after running a few more errands for Seto that he was going to help out on Level A today. Apparently Ty needed him, at least that's what he heard from Tyler.
~~~~~
"Ty, sir! I'm here," Adam saluted. Ty was talking to a few Players.
Ty finished talking to the Players and waved them off before looking at Adam, "Good, you're going to help me today."
"Yes sir! What are we doing today?"
"I don't handle scheduling here, and unfortunately I was double scheduled to lead a training exercise and handle an import from one of our business partners. You will handle the import, it's simple. All you have to do is any paperwork they give you tell them I will sign it later today. You will gather those papers and later drop them off to my room. While you do that, you will use this card to confirm the shipment that will arrive at the same time. The items are valuable supply of food and materials. Next you will use this card to order out next shipment. Listen carefully and remember this, you will order this exactly: 500 bundles of wheat, 150 compressed coals, 150 carrots and melons, and 300 golden nuggets. Did you get all that?"
Adam gulped, he definitely did not get all that, but if he said no, then Ty would get mad. He couldn't get Ty mad, not him, not his hero. The coolest of them all here, a legend said to have never once died in his entire time here at the AHD. His skills as a fighter and a leader were unquestionable, Ty was just cool.
Adam nodded, "Yes sir! I'll do my best!"
"Good," Ty nodded to him and handed him a card. It read 'All acess.'
Ty left Adam alone. Adam sucked in a deep breath and looked around for where to go. On his side of the ravine was Jason's lab, a field for training and well, a lot more buildings he's never been in. On the other side was more buildings, but they served more of an official purpose.
Adam made his way over to the ravine, but instead of climbing down he headed for the wooden bridge. He was careful to cross, but quick to do so. He saw an office and headed there. This office was the only place a Human could work in the AHD, and originally Adam's plan was to make his way here, but he was glad he didn't have to work here. He didn't think he could sit for hours and not die of boredom.
"Hi, can you direct me to where shipments arrive?" Adam walked up to the first available office booth.
"Sure, just head straight out and look for the building labeled AHD Business, all packages arrive and depart from there," he was answered by a chirpy young woman tapping away at the computer in front of her.
"Thanks!" Adam waved and exited quickly. He clutched the security card tightly in his hand and constantly recited the directions given to him by Ty. He would not screw up, he couldn't screw up. He wanted, no, really wanted to help out around here.
Adam saw the building, it had a small sign with the words he was told to look for. He dashed to it, he wasn't sure when the shipment would arrive, but maybe he could arrive on time, that would leave a good impression.
He arrived inside the building, one of the garage doors were open on the opposite side he'd entered from, a truck was waiting there expectantly.
So much for being on time.
As Adam made his way over he noticed all the items that would've been inside the truck had already been taken out. But there was literally no one around, at least from what he could see from within this warehouse like building. For inside the building held larges shelves holding unopened cargo boxes and the like.
"H-Hello?" Adam called out.
A head popped out from within the truck's back, a young woman with hair as bright as fire, "Hello there! Is there something you need sir?"
"Uh, well," Adam stopped only a few feet away from the truck, "I was sent here in place of Ty, he's a bit busy leading Player exercises."
"Oh! Wonderful, I was beginning to wonder when someone would show up. Give me a second while I unload the last bits of cargo here," She chirped at him and smiled. Adam was taken aback by her overwhelmingly positive personality. Just saying, all he had noticed was negativity in most people.
The woman came out the truck carrying about 2 large boxes with ease, he panicked thinking the weight would make her topple over and without thinking he rushed to help her.
"Don't bother, I can handle this, it is part of my job after all." She'd already set the boxes down nicely and turned to Adam.
Adam had his mouth hanging open, "You're a Player, aren't you?"
"Sure am!" She smiled, "Jobs like this are easy with the heightened strength we Players have."
Too bad Jason's amulet couldn't make Adam any stronger. It only gave him the ability to respawn, nothing else.
Adam hadn't realized he'd still been staring and he quickly diverted his eyes and let out a strained cough, "S-sorry, I just thought it was cool how easily you carried all of that."
She laughed, "You're not used to seeing something like that are you?"
"N-No..." Adam looked down, "I'm just a Human actually, but I am in training as a Player because of," Adam pointed at his amulet, the woman looked at it curiously, "this amulet."
"Hey! That was made by Jason, wasn't it?"
"Uh-r-right!" Adam stuttered, "How did you know?"
"Well--"
"Well, if it isn't Alesa! How are you, more imports, correct?"
Adam jumped nearly out of his skin and was a stiff as stone when he turned around. He saw Jason, accompanied by Ross.
"Jason, sir! I'm quite fine, thank you for asking. And yes, I was just delivering more goods from my family business--Oh! And your special request just came in too! I have it up front with me, just give me a moment."
Jason's eyes practically lit up with joy as he hopped around with glee. Alesa, as she was called, hurried to the front of the truck. Pulling open the door she gently carried out the small box.
"Homemade strawberry shortcake! My mom cooked it just the way you like it!" Jason was quick to reach for the box and practically hugged it, until he stopped himself and cleared his throat.
"Thank you! You'll have to give your mother my thanks for this troublesome favor."
"No problem! My mom treats you like her own son, she didn't mind in the least, in fact she wanted me to ask you if you'd have time for a family gathering. She's planning on cooking up all the main sweets, if you're interested."
Adam watched the conversation with this sense of awe, Jason's eyes looked a little glum before saying, "No, sorry. Unfortunately I'm very busy as of late. That does remind me, how have you been taking care of the AM77.32 C0nN3cT?"
Alesa's hands reached for the pocket of her pants and pulled out an amulet similar to Adam's, only with a pink center.
Adam gasped, "Is that--are you a Human, like me?" Adam looked to Alesa with a sparkling curiosity.
"No, she's nothing like you Adam. She is 100 percent a Player, that amulet works differently than yours. It's actually one of the many complicated factors that attributes to your respawning abilities. When you die, she can feel it, however that is all it is. A feeling, nothing happens to her but the pain you feel--"
"Wait! You mean she'll feel it when I die!" Adam shouted, he looked left and right, to Jason and back to Alesa. Alesa looked a bit startled. He saw Jason nod, "Oh dear Notch! I'm so sorry you have to feel that!" Adam apologized.
"N-no, no, don't apologize, I knew the risks when signing up, plus it's nothing I can't handle," Alesa reassured.
"I promise I won't die that often, I don't want to complicate anything for you!"
"Notch knows that won't work," Ross muttered under his breath.
Alesa held out her hands and placed them on Adam's shoulder. "Don't worry, seriously it's only a small connection, that's all. The pain you feel is only minimized for me, so it's only a minor side effect."
"O-oh--" Connection, did she say connection. Adam went rigid in realization. Oh dear Notch, he was connected to her? Like an actual connection, like from a book. Oh Notch, oh dear Notch, what was he supposed to do. He just realized this is the closest he's ever gotten to a girl.
A real girl.
Oh man, what a hopeless idiot he was!
Adam felt his face heat up a little bit, he started sweating and hardly moved a muscles as his brain moved faster than ever before. Thoughts of him and her, this weird idea that there was this predetermined connection and suddenly fantasies of love--
Wait, hold up, Adam get a hold of yourself, be serious, calm down, don't do that weird thing you do again.
Stop overreacting, stop fantasizing. Remember this is the real world, not one of your books, the world doesn't work in predetermined destinies and love bound by amulets.
"Adam? Are you alright?"
"YES!" Adam shouted, Ross twitched his his ears in annoyance from the sudden loud outburst, "I HAVE A THING TO DO! A LOT OF DO THINGS I DO!"
Adam then hightailed it out of there as quickly as he could without looking back.
~~~~~
"Aaaaaah!" Adam screamed into his pillow.
"Shut up! For the last time!" Seto shouted from the other room, "If you're going to scream do it elsewhere!"
"But I messed up! I forgot to do the job Ty gave me! I'm gonna be dead and--and I looked like an idiot in front of a girl!" Adam wailed and rolled around his bed in agony.
Seto came storming inside the room. His staff pointed straight at Adam and he found himself being lifted up by Seto's magic. Adam panicked more and tried swimming his way back to the ground. Adam was pulled directly to Seto's face while upside down
"I don't care what's going through your head, but if you don't shut up, I will make you."
Adam silenced himself immediately.
"Good, now if you're going to be down here groveling, I'll put you to work. I need you to find a certain book for me. I forgot where I put it."
"Yes sir!" Adam was set down and Seto nodded. The two of them walked out of Adam's room together, "Now which book is it?"
~~~~~
Would you guys like it if I created a book to hold GAME OVER clues? It might be useful, idk.
Anyways, theories???
Thanks so much with all the support you guys have been giving me and this book! :D <3