“Thank you again, Danielle.” I tried to keep working while I talked. “I’m sorry I didn’t have time to ask. But I was afraid for you.”
“It’s okay,” she said, struggling to get her fingers through her hair. Fortunately the blood hadn’t had time to dry much and it was coming out quickly. “This is so gross.” She stopped talking for a second, then asked, “Why am I not more grossed out? I should be puking my guts out.”
“Cats are predators,” I said with a small laugh.
“I’m serious,” she said with exasperation. “I mean, I’m not a girly girl, but I just ripped out somebody’s throat and got his blood in my hair and I’m barely queasy anymore. That’s not normal.”
I stopped working with the shampoo and concentrated on getting her hair rinsed out. “I understand,” I said with a more serious voice. “I don’t know either. If I had to guess, I’d guess the System did this to us.”
“What?” She lifted her head in surprise and started blinking as the water ran into her face. Ducking again, she went on, “What do you mean?”
“If it wanted us dead, we’d all be dead,” I said. “I don’t know what it does want, or if it wants anything other than to watch us suffer. But most people couldn’t deal with this. With the world going to Hell in a single day. The ones who didn’t die would go crazy. So maybe it did something to us so we could deal with it.”
“That’s terrifying,” she said in a small voice. “What else did it do to us? What else could it do to us?”
Before I could answer, something happened.
SYSTEM MESSAGE: Progress on the “Secret of the System” quest! You’ve learned a little bit about what the System isn’t. 44 XP awarded. Continue to learn more about the System to attain further rewards.
SYSTEM MESSAGE: Level Up! You are now Level 4. 1 Free Attribute point awarded. 1 Level to next Class Skill selection.
I gasped and almost fell over. Danielle, whose hair was nearly soap-free, looked up with concern. I noted, abstractly, that the cold water was having its usual effect.
“Are you all right, James?” she said with concern.
“I’m fine,” I said slowly. “I just got credit for a quest.”
“A quest? What quest? How do you get quests? Did you get a reward? For what?” She stood there, the water flowing over her. If I hadn’t been reeling mentally from the quest notice, I’d have been reeling for a different reason. I reached down and turned off the shower.
“Let’s leave a little for others to wash,” I said. “I’ll tell you while we get you dressed.” I took the towel I’d found and gave her a little “come here” gesture. She stepped out and I started drying her off.
“I asked a question about the System in my head this morning, you know, talking to myself,” I said. “And it gave me a quest called ‘Secret of the System.’ Quests are like in movies, you have to find something or do something, and you get a reward. In games, they’re how you do a lot of your progressing. This quest wants you to learn more about the System. When I realized it wasn’t just trying to kill us all, I got a progress notice and just enough XP to move me to the next level.”
Danielle gasped, almost exactly like I had a moment before.
“It’s offering me the quest,” she said with shock. “It says, ‘Accept to join the quest at the same level as the person who revealed it to you.’ Should I accept?”
“I think so, yes,” I replied. “I mean, there’s no penalties. Some quests in games, if you don’t take them, or you take them and then quit, you get punished. This one just wants us to do something we need to do anyway.”
“Okay,” she said. “‘Accept.’ There. It says ‘Accepted. No XP awarded for portions of quest completed before acceptance.’” She frowned. “That’s not fair.”
“You’re right,” I said, “but I bet we don’t get any credit for realizing that the System isn’t fair.”
SYSTEM MESSAGE: Progress on the “Secret of the System” quest! 0 XP awarded. Continue to learn more about the System to attain further rewards. What did we tell you about being stupid?
“Goddamn smartass System,” I said, returning to scrubbing Danielle dry with the towel. She giggled. It more than made up for the irritation of the 0 XP award.
“I saw that,” she said. “And you’re right. That was a smartass thing to do. But at least we’re together.” Her voice suddenly became shy. “I’m glad we’re together.”
“Me too,” I said without hesitating. “You’re amazing. And you’re so cute it should be illegal.” I gave her a little tweak and she jumped. “But we better get you dressed.”
“You’re lucky I don’t have my claws,” she said severely. “I’d give you a pinch you’d never forget.”
“Note to self,” I said to the air above her head. “Always turn Danielle human before pissing her off.”
That got me another giggle.
Chapter 9
To The Victors, The Spoils
After getting Danielle dry, we wrapped her dirty clothes in the towel and she got dressed with some spares from her bag. I didn’t want us to use all the water washing her clothes when there were people who probably wanted to at least rinse off themselves. I hoped we could find some water outside and rinse them out. For the moment, we consolidated my stuff in her duffel bag and put the towel-wrapped bundle in my grocery bag.
“This is getting heavy,” she said as she lifted the bag. “I can feel how much faster I am, even as a human, but I’m tired of feeling weak.”
“Put a point in Strength,” I said. “If you’re going to use your claws, that’ll be good anyway. They do much more damage than your knives. When we get you some System blades, maybe that’ll be different.”
“I’m not sure how I feel about clawing things to death all the time,” she said. “But that’s still a good idea.” She blinked. “Done. Nothing else seemed to change on my Status, but the bag feels much lighter.”
“I think I’ll put mine in Constitution,” I said. “That gun didn’t really injure me, but I bet it hurt so bad because it knocked off a big chunk of my health. I’d like to avoid that if I can.” I added the point, and both my HP and Stamina went up… but none of my regenerations did.
We really need to figure that out. Later. Maybe tonight.
Opening the door, we walked down a narrow hall to where the others were waiting in a small living room. A few people were eating and drinking.
“If anybody else wants to wash, go for it,” I said. “I don’t know how much longer the water will last.”
Anthony was looking at Danielle intently. “You’re human again. How does it feel?”
“Normal,” she said. “I feel much better.”
Mandy and Joe got up and headed for the bathroom. “I want to get him cleaned up,” said Mandy.