Breck whirled around, sword in hand. Transmission forgotten. He and Reef scrambled through the foliage to where a huge beast was wreaking havoc, a hulking black mass of bristles. Six-foot spikes protruded from its back, thick needles from its arms and legs. Its glinting black eyes, clustered like a spider’s, were almost lost in the nest of bristles covering its face.
It chased them down a rusted catwalk that felt like it would give way any moment. Olly drew it down to the main floor where there was space to get at it with swords.
“That’s you, Breck,” Reef shouted. “Make the kill and I’ll grab the scepter the Bristle Beast drops.”
A bank of dials on the wall came to life, needles pulsing frantically. The white dragon hives towering over them began to hum. For one terrified moment Reef wasn’t sure if it was all part of the game or if the old turbines had come back to life. He ripped off his goggles to find the turbines still and silent in the moonlight. The dials on the wall were rusted over, dead.
“Reef, what’re you doing,” Olly shouted. “Put your goggles on.”
Reef jerked them back over his eyes to find a chaotic scene. Breck was doing clumsy battle with the wounded Bristle Beast, who was trailing sticky purple blood. The hives had broken open and dragon fledglings were shooting out, thin and whip-like and enraged. They circled overhead, dipping uncertainly as they flew with their new wings, shrieking like banshees, blinking blind, white eyes.
Reef shot out spells like crazy, pulling blindly from Breck’s inventory. The alien was doing the same, but with fluid motions that suggested he faced dragon hordes every day. Olly had pulled out a crossbow. Aedric was nowhere to be seen.
Until he was at Reef’s back, hissing, “The disc.” Reef passed it to him with one hand while dealing damage with the other. Aedric pocketed it, turned to go. Reef thought, That’s it, it’s done, he won’t know it’s blank until it’s too late. But then Aedric stopped, jerked on Reef’s arm so that a spell slammed into the concrete beams overhead and fizzled out. “You pick up the scepter,” Aedric said. Then he slipped away, the blank disc in his pocket. Reef’s heart slid back out of his throat.
“Where’s Aedric going?” Breck shouted, still fending off the Bristle Beast’s attacks with Reef’s sword.
“Just get the beast,” Reef shouted back. He was desperate now to have all this over so he could get his goggles back and get away before Aedric came looking for him. Aedric could be stopping even now, checking the disc, finding it blank—“Olls, help him.”
“No, I want to make the kill myself,” Breck cried.
Olly was busy with the dragons anyway. They dove at him with snapping jaws while he aimed with his crossbow. His armor was scorched and battered. Reef knew he should stay and help, but he ran to Breck instead. The drug had taken its full effect now. Reef took in too many things at once: the whip of wind from dragon wings, the vines that furred every surface, the slippery feel of Bristle Beast blood under his shoes. The blood—he hated that most of all. The steam plant’s smell of rust and old steam was like the metallic smell of it, and he had to fight off visions of black oil on white sheets.
He searched Breck’s inventory for the strongest spell he had.
The Bristle Beast aimed a spiky paw at Breck, ready to knock away his sword. Reef sent a bolt of crackling blue magic at the cluster of eyes buried in the bristled face. The monster howled with pain. Breck drove the sword home. A fountain of purple blood spurted out and the beast dissipated. Reef’s jerking vision took in the sight twice: The beast vanished, it flickered back into existence, it vanished again. In its place the silver scepter gleamed, clean and bright against the vanishing blood and banded with cold, clear sapphires. Reef stepped to retrieve it.
“Reef, wait—” Olly called.
And at the same time Breck said, “No, no. Your sword, your treasure.” He jumped forward and closed his hand around the treasure, and three things happened at once:
Olly shouted, “No!”
Reef realized that it hadn’t been some effect of the drug that had made him see the Bristle Beast vanish twice.
And Breck jerked his head back as though Reef’s goggles had given him a mighty zap.
“What happened, what’s going on?” Reef asked him.
Breck clutched at the edges of the goggles. “Oh shit oh shit.”
“What?” Reef cried.
“It’s a leech,” Olly called. “Didn’t you see the edit?”
“It’s not a leech,” Breck said.
Reef ripped the goggles off Breck’s head and shoved them down over his own eyes. He had just enough time to see his screen scrambled into a mess of random pixels before the display went dark.
“It was a virus,” Breck said. “Not a leech, a virus.”
Reef felt cold cement slam against his knees. Everything was dark. He pulled off his goggles to see he had fallen.