Page 1 of Accounting for Drakes

Chapter One

Abil checked her clipboardand clutched her stylus. The life signs of the clients in the suits weren’t supposed to fluctuate like that. The boss came in, and she said, “I am worried about that intensity.”

“Species?”

“Venkin.”

“Scenario?”

“Battle of Crimhollow.”

“Don’t worry about it. They are aroused by violence.”

Abil looked at the readouts and blinked. “Oh, oh.”

Mbrak smiled. “If you want to intercede, they always enjoy another species at the bottom of their pile.”

She blinked. “No. I don’t interact in the system.”

“Anymore. You used to.”

She frowned. “You know why I don’t do that anymore.”

“With Styra no longer on the station, we need someone to troubleshoot.”

“Eckval is better at that than I am.”

“She was on the last shift, Abil. We need someone doing more than monitoring.”

She huffed. There was no other word for it. She scrambled around to find the words but just muttered, “Scared.”

“The Yorathian in pod thirteen needs an assist. They are stressed. No sex in that scenario.”

“Oh. Okay.” She clutched her clipboard.

Mbrak sighed and turned her toward the change room. “Off you go.”

Abil sighed, walked into the change room, got to her locker, stripped, and put on one of the sensor suits with admin capabilities. She checked to make sure that all of the sensors matched up with the right area. If they were in the wrong place, things went bad quickly.

She checked her clipboard for the right lineup of actions to take. She clutched it, moved to an available pod, confirmed her admin status, and settled in the cradle with her face mask scanning her features to project her expression in the scenario.

Abil connected with the system, and then, she was falling end over end into the scenario. She landed in the hero crouch and stood slowly in her long tunic and leather leggings.

Ranger was the description of her clothing, and it let her move easily in most scenarios. She looked down and flinched when she didn’t see the clipboard she had been clinging to over the last few weeks since Styra left. Her memory was unravelling with the loss of her cousin’s mind. Her anchor point was gone, and the others couldn’t hold her up. The pain that Styra had to deal with had made her mind solid. Abil’s small anchor had shattered when her cousin had transformed into a drake.

Abil tried to remember why she was there, but then she remembered she could ask, “Parameters of the program?”

Mountain climbing and cave exploration.

“Where is the client?”

In a cave-in two hundred metres to your left.

“Okay.” She jogged toward the edge of the mountains, stating, “Requesting rescue kit at the cave-in.”

Kit delivered.

She smiled and made her way through the grass and then the brush, and she nearly tipped into the crevasse that led below.

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