Top Level Player by Joseph R. Lallo

Author:Joseph R. Lallo [Joseph R. Lallo]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Joseph R. Lallo
Published: 2021-10-27T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 9

“We’re here,” LP said.

Jazz snorted awake. She rubbed her eyes and looked around. She didn’t remember dozing off, but evidently that “exhausted” status effect packed quite a punch.

“Wow,” she said groggily. “If you’d asked me a week ago if I would be able to fall asleep in the back seat of an open-air military vehicle, I’d have given you a strange look and not dignified you with an answer.”

She blinked her bleary eyes a few times. The last thing she remembered was a seemingly endless stretch of procedural highway. Now it was evening and they were parked beside a raging river flowing through what looked to be a desert landscape.

“Where is here?” she asked.

“About halfway to the drop box. Still in Procedural Space.” He yawned. “More importantly, we’re at the point where someone’s going to take over behind the wheel. You and Leet caught a couple hours of Zs. And while I’m sure Doodad here would be just thrilled to take the wheel, he’s really more of a last resort driver. Someone’s going to have to take over for me and for Didi so the whole crew will be rested. Which do you want to drive? Louse’s car or the Warthog?”

“Dibs on the Warthog!” Leet said.

“You can have it,” she said.

She hopped out and stretched.

“Can someone please tell me why getting cramped up from being on the road too long was one of the things they chose to include in the simulation?” Jazz asked.

“Look at the bright side,” he said. “At least they turn off fuel requirements in Procedural Space. Here in the simulation, every car has infinite highway mileage.”

“At least there’s that. Did you come up with a next step while I was out?”

“You two were snoring and I was trying to keep my eyes on the road, so there wasn’t a whole lot of plotting going on,” LP said.

Jazz nodded.

“Probably for the best,” Didi called. “Seems like you and me are the masterminds of the group.”

She was busy rummaging through the nearly empty trunk of Louse’s car.

“Hey! I can plan with the best of them,” Leet said, taking the wheel. “You just wait. One of these days, you two will be like, ‘I’m all out of plans’ and then out comes DJ Leet Motif with the brilliance. But split up like this is no time to be planning. Let’s just get where we’re going, get the rest of our paycheck, and then we can come up with something good. Napster! Driving music!”

The boombox deployed and, after some station scrubbing, settled on “Radar Love” by Gold Earring.

“See you at the finish line!” he shouted before peeling off.

Jazz paced over to the town car and slipped into the driver’s seat.

“Oh…” she purred, shutting the door. “A girl could get used to this.”

Didi opened the passenger side door and climbed in.

“I know. Not exactly all the modern conveniences, but you’ve got to love the luxury yacht feel of these big old cars.”

She started the engine and pulled out behind the Warthog.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.