MMORPG: How a Computer Game Becomes Deadly Serious (3 page)

He continued to watch for a while until he got bored. Leaving the television on with the sound muted, he moved to his computer and started to work on his notes of the day.

Twenty minutes later, he was totally engrossed in his work.

He was interrupted by a knock on his door. He shook his head to clear the cobwebs away.

“Come in!” he yelled.

The door opened and admitted Andy carrying a bottle of red wine.

“I’ve heard enough depressing news for one day. Are you ready for another drink?”

Robert smiled and pushed his work aside. In answer, he swivelled his desk chair around and wheeled it to the tiny cupboard that held ‘two of everything’. He took out two wine glasses and rummaged for the corkscrew. Finding it, he tossed it to Andy.

“I already had enough of it over an hour ago. Any interesting development I missed?”

Andy grunted while he wrestled with the cork. With a loud plop it finally came free. Robert held out the glasses, and Andy filled them to the brim.

“Not really, just confirmation of what everybody already thought. It was the work of some Muslim group.”

“Really?” Robert sniffed the wine, which made Andy laugh. It wasn’t good, but it would certainly do.

“And mister connoisseur, where do you think this fine wine comes from?”

Robert started to laugh too as he realised how snobbish his sniffing probably looked. “Chateaux soix-cente neuf du Pape,” he replied smiling. More seriously he continued: “And how do they know the attack was the work of a Muslim group?”

“Because the bastards left a fucking painting on the scene, with the burning station on it. Proof enough for me that they did it!”

“Okay, but how do they know that they’re Muslim fanatics?”

“I don’t know. The breaking news right before I left was that they found a painting, which showed the station in flames. Somehow that told them it was some Muslim group.”

Robert glanced at the silent television screen. It showed three people talking, but judging by the images, they were discussing the abysmal prospects of the American car industry. He took another slug of the cheap red wine and held out his glass. Bad wine tended to improve with the amount you drank of it, so he’d better get on with it.

They sat chatting for a while, each asking questions of the other. After an hour Robert opened one of his own bottles of wine. At his home in England, the art of drinking wine was taken seriously. His father was the general manager of one of the better restaurants in Leeds and a professional connoisseur. On the spare nights he was home for dinner, the food was chosen to suit the wine, instead of the other way around. Endless knowledge and trivia about grapes, suitable soils, and humidity in ageing cellars had been absorbed by Robert and his younger brother while they grew up.

One of the first things Robert had done upon arriving in Leiden was to search out a good wine shop. He’d bought a selection of promising bottles, always on the lookout for bargains of less known chateaus that should offer quality above price.

Even though Andy obviously didn’t share this finer passion for wines, Robert was pleased to see that the Dutchman did take notice of the improved quality of the drink in his glass. They toasted again and resumed their conversation. When Andy finally stood to leave and they shook hands, Robert had the pleasant feeling that he was making a real friend. He liked Andy a lot. He was unpretending and uncomplicated, but also intelligent with a sense of humour as sharp as a Swiss kitchen knife.

Alone again, Robert fruitlessly tried to finish his notes. He simply wasn’t up to it after drinking so much wine. His watch told him it was almost nine o’clock. He decided to go out for something to eat.

Close to his house was a huge self-service restaurant for students called the Mensa that offered fast, edible food for ridiculously low prices.

He arrived at a closed door. He looked at the week menu stuck to the window to discover that the restaurant closed at seven o’clock. No haddock or vegetarian cheeseburger with carrots for him tonight.

Walking back, he passed Barrera. Through the window he saw the nice Scottish girl in the black polo shirt behind the bar. The place that had been so busy in the afternoon was nearly empty now. On an impulse, he went inside.

He walked up to the bar and sat on one of the high stools. The girl smiled, recognizing him.

“Hi. I walked by and decided to come in for a drink.”

“Good idea, because I’m being bored to death by polishing these glasses.” She held a wine glass up to the light, inspecting it. Satisfied, she put it away in the rack over her head. “What kind of drink did you have in mind?”

“Do you have any decent red wine?”

She walked over to the other side of the bar and returned with a bottle. It was half full. She handed it over to him for inspection. He studied the label for a few seconds and smiled.

“This is better than some of the wine I had earlier today.”

With a rueful smile, she retrieved the glass she’d just cleaned from the rack and filled it. It gave Robert a chance to study her for a few seconds. She wasn’t so much beautiful, as attractive in a spontaneous way, he decided. She had long jet black hair that hung down on both sides of her face in careless curls. This wasn’t the kind of girl who spent half an hour in front of the mirror each morning. She wasn’t even wearing any make-up.

He saluted her with his glass of wine. “I’m Robert,” he introduced himself.

“Hello, Robert from England. I’m Rebecca.”

He searched for something to say and came up with the obvious. “That was quite something, don’t you think, that bomb of today?”

Rebecca finished another glass, stretching to put it away overhead. “Yes, reminds me of my time in London. These poor Dutchies are totally unprepared for this kind of thing. I mean, did you know that they actually have a minister in the government who goes to work each day on his bicycle? And do you believe that I saw one of the princes walking all by himself in a busy street last week? I could have shot him on the spot, if I wanted to!”

“You must be kidding!”

“No, really, one of the sons of the Queen, no less. Just by himself. I didn’t even see a guard or anything.”

Robert was about to remark that this could actually mean that the prince’s security was so good that it was virtually invisible, but decided to drop the subject. “Well, let’s hope that these Al Qaida types don’t get the same idea.”

She sighed. “I don’t understand why people have to kill each other over their stupid religion. It wasn’t Al Qaida, by the way. It was some other group. A new group. Hammer of Righteous Justice or something. It was on the news just now.”

Robert furrowed his eyebrows. “That’s not a new group, is it? I’ve heard that name before.”

She made a dismissive gesture. “No, they said on television that this was a first appearance. They also said that it looked like the work of a professional organization, so who knows. I mean, you don’t get experienced and professional in anything without practice, do you?”

Robert handed his empty glass over. “Still, I have the feeling that I heard that name before. Maybe it’ll come to me if you give me some more wine.”

She took the glass, refilled it, and handed it back. “So, which need-to-knows do you want me to share with you before I vanish in ten days?”

Taking an appreciative sip of the wine, Robert smiled. “Anything you can tell me. I’ve been here for nearly two weeks now, and I still have the feeling that everything is new and foreign to me.”

“Isn’t that exactly why you decided to live in a foreign country? Living here is easy. Nearly all Dutchies speak English. Apart from German and French, by the way. They all like to show off their skills in foreign languages, so you’ll never be short of people to talk to. The second thing you need to know is that drugs are legal here, so you can blow your head off as often as you like.”

“Sorry but I’m too dull to use drugs. I try to make up for it by drinking too much.”

Rebecca laughed. “Good for you. I only smoke a joint now and then when I’m doing long and hard raids on WoW.” Seeing his uncomprehending look, she exclaimed, “That you don’t use drugs is one thing, but how can you fail to know what WoW is! I mean, which planet have you been living on?”

Apologetic, Robert raised his hands. “I’m really sorry. Clearly not in your Milky Way. Now tell me what I’ve been missing.”

She took a quick look around to check for other customers. They were alone, save for two elderly women at a table in the corner. They were progressing so slowly through their drinks that it was going to take at least another fifteen minutes before they hit the bottom of their glasses. Satisfied, she sat on her side of the bar, making herself comfortable. “WoW stands for World of Warcraft. It’s a MMORPG, which means Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game. World of Warcraft is not just a game; it’s the mother of all online games that ever were, or ever will be. It’s played by more than twelve million people around the world, and that number is growing each day. For many people, this is not a game; it’s their life. No, not just their life; it’s their life and their religion in one!”

Robert was a little taken aback by this fierce speech. “Okay, maybe I’m not so stupid. Actually, I heard about it a few days ago. I even saw something of it. One of the people at my house was playing it.”

She gave him a triumphant smile. “You see, everybody knows about it. Even you!” Then, seeing his pensive expression, she asked, “What’s the matter? You seem a light year away suddenly.”

Looking back up at her, he shook his head. For a second he was unsure whether he should share his thought or not.

“I suddenly remember where I heard that name of the Hammer of Righteous Justice before. I saw it on your World of Warcraft.”

“What do you mean?”

“Okay, listen. The day I arrived, I went into the room of someone who lives at my house. He’s in the room right across from mine. I wanted to introduce myself. This guy was sitting behind his computer with headphones on. Saying that he wasn’t happy to be disturbed is putting it mildly. Still, he had the decency to tell me that he was playing World of Warcraft and that I should come back another time.

We talked for maybe a minute and I could read some messages in a text box. First, it seemed as if someone was calling him, sending messages. He didn’t see them, because he was talking to me. Suddenly he noticed, and he quickly typed something. I don’t remember what. Some abbreviation. Right after that, a text in capitals appeared and I’m absolutely sure that it read THE WORLD WILL TREMBLE FOR THE HAMMER OF RIGHTEOUS JUSTICE.”

Rebecca stared at him for a few seconds. “That doesn’t mean anything. I mean, it doesn’t
have
to mean anything.”

“I know. I don’t know. I mean, I’m thinking. There was more; it’s just that I can’t remember what exactly. You see, we were talking, and he seemed to try to block the screen from me. The text was scrolling in a box in the bottom left corner.”

“What was the color of the text?”

He thought for a second. “Blue.”

“Blue means Party Chat.”

He nodded. “Yes, because it also said ‘Party’ at the beginning of each line. What does that mean?”

“It means that they were having a private conversation. When several players join together, that’s called a Party. Those players can communicate in a Party channel, which is private and invisible to all the other players.”

“So if you’re not in a Party, everybody can hear what you’re saying? That must be confusing.”

With a theatrical sigh she shook her head. “Of course not. That would mean chaos. You have to know the game to understand. The basics are the same as in real life. If you say something in WoW, only the people who are close to you will hear you. If you yell, a little more people will hear it. And there are certain channels where a lot of people will hear you. But that’s what those channels are for.”

“So, is what I saw suspicious or not?”

Rebecca made a dismissive gesture. “No, not at all. Most people are in private channels. Parties, guilds, raids; there are several kinds. Even if it had been an open conversation, nobody would have given it a second thought.” She brushed a hand through her hair, pushing some curls behind her ear. “I mean, in WoW people are constantly talking about killing and attacking things. A lot of people use bombs to do that, by the way. If you were looking for people who say suspicious or even violent things, you could arrest nearly everyone.”

Robert thought for a second. “You’re right. For a while I used to play Hitman on the X-Box with a friend. If people overheard us talking about it, killing people with all kinds of weapons and such, they’d have called the police and we would’ve been arrested on the spot.”

“That’s what I mean. Now, would you like another glass of wine?”

Robert smiled. “Yes, I would.” He shrugged the conversation about Khalid and World of Warcraft off. He wasn’t living next to a terrorist, was he? Of course he wasn’t. He would do better to get some useful information about life in Holland out of this girl; this nice and attractive girl.

“So, what have you been studying here?” he asked.

~~~

CHAPTER IV

Robert
woke up with a sharp headache that wouldn’t go away. He stayed in bed for nearly an hour, but that didn’t improve things. In the end, he dragged himself to the small bathroom at the end of the corridor to take a shower. Even that didn’t help.

Cursing himself for drinking so much wine, especially mediocre wine, he went downstairs in search for food.

The student house had a large communal room on the ground floor furnished with large sofas that looked as if they were the cast offs of a shelter for the homeless. Apart from the stains, they were actually quite comfortable. There also was a large dinner table surrounded by battered but sturdy wooden chairs. At the far end of the room was a door that gave access to the kitchen. On it was a large paper that held the rotation roster for the cleaning duties. Robert knew he was due in two days.