Chapter 404: He has a gift

"I'm afraid...I can't do that," Blake said, giving Mason a tight lipped smile. Mason stared for a long moment, no idea what the hell is brother was thinking.

"What? Why? Haley tells me there's nothing preventing you from joining my house. Literally right now. It keeps us from fighting."

Blake was well on his way to actually pissing Mason off. The drugs were almost finished smothering the auditorium, every civilian and most of the players all dancing and laughing like they were in a freshman rave.

So far the drug wasn’t touching him, but Mason's senses were getting overwhelmed, his ears practically pulsing with too much sound. Whatever the system was doing was everything Mason hated about clubs and bars. And he was forced to shout over the noise.

That was annoying enough. But if Blake didn't join his house, it meant they could be randomly forced to fight in a one on one at anytime, knocking one of them out of the tournament far before the end. And it meant Blake could do the same against any of Nassau's players.

"Do you have your own House?" he shouted.

"Not...as of yet," Blake answered, tapping his fingers on the table. "But I intend to soon."

"Then join mine and leave it later for all I care. We're just trying to..."

"He can't," Haley explained as quietly as possible over the noise. "At least not without an experience penalty for six months. And it prevents him from creating his own house or joining another for the same duration."

Blake pointed at Haley with a finger gun, which for whatever reason annoyed Mason even more.

"If you knock out a top contender like Carl I'm going to be seriously fucking angry, Blake."

Blake held up his hands like it wasn't his fault, like there was nothing he could do.

"OK," Mason shouted, standing. "You can officially go to your new eastern friends, because I don't want to look at you. You're disinvited from all the things. Except I don't actually know how to do that. Haley, disinvite him. Now go. And if I see you in the arena, you might want to surrender quickly."

Blake sighed and bowed his head like some stupid courtier as he stood. He threw his napkin on the table.

"Well. To hell with you, too!" he shouted, winking at Haley, before turning on his heel and stalking off with a gesture at his girls.

Mason watched him go, clenching his hands into fists. "I swear to Christ. He has a gift. He really does."

Haley stood and stepped into Mason's chest, wrapping her arms around him and kissing his cheek. She gestured for an awkward looking Lexi, and soon both women were hugging him. He was still mad, but it definitely helped.

"I...have to tell you something else," Haley said, her expression of real concern enough to focus Mason's mind entirely. “I should have told you sooner but I hadn’t understood until we came here.”

"What's wrong?"

His beautiful blonde sighed and glanced towards the emperor's party before meeting Mason's eyes.

"There is some kind of civilian equivalent to player killer aura. Many of the emperor's civilians have it. It means..." she took a breath. "His key civilians have killed other civilians. I can't say how many.”

Mason blinked, a bit shaken. He'd known that was possible—that civilians could hurt each other. But he also understood it made them viable 'targets' to player patrons. So it seemed not a great life choice.

Unless you had a rigid enough, complicit enough player system that allowed it. And protected murderers…

"Jesus Christ," he said, not sure what else to say. He thought far back to sending Haley into Nassau back when it was under a tyrant's clutches—when he was trying to rescue Blake.

At the time he'd assumed she was completely safe, protected. But he realized now the players could have had loyal civilians do anything they'd wanted to her. He shuddered at the thought, one fist closing in anger at his own stupid ignorance, or lack of imagination.

"We need to get those people out of there," he said, feeling the burden of those many lives slowly creeping towards his shoulders.

Haley and Lexi were smiling up at him.

"What?" he looked between them, and Haley kissed his lips gently.

"Just admiring our sheep dog," she said.

Mason rolled his eyes. Before he had the chance to fire back some kind of quip, he heard a jet of water or steam, and the unavoidable drug-like mist descended all over his house from above.

"Oh..." Lexi grinned and stuck out her tongue like she was in the rain, giggling as the mist seemed to tickle her skin. Mason hardly felt it, and didn't expect to have to worry. Haley seemed to be holding her breath, and Mason almost panicked when he considered she was pregnant.

But he calmed when he reminded himself this thing seemed more interested in babies than just about anything else. Surely it wouldn't do anything to harm them. This room was almost certainly full of pregnant women.

Haley eventually gave up and breathed, but didn't seem as affected as Lexi. The Brit was already grinding against Mason's leg, her eyes half closed as she swayed to the music. Haley smiled as she watched her, hugging Mason again and mouthing that she was fine.

"Happy, remember?" she said. "We should go mingle. Dance. I’ve put the word out, any western player can ask to talk to any of our people, whoever they want, before they talk to us. And I’ve offered some gifts, explaining we want allies. All the civilians are spreading the word. Or...at least they were going to. Before the roof started spraying...whatever that is."

Mason smiled, shaking his head in wonder.

"What would I do without you?" he said, pulling Haley as close as Lexi.

"Probably live happily in a cave," she said, putting her beautiful face to his. Mason grinned and kissed her.

"But a lot less happily. Let's go wander. I don't agree to dance."

He took a girl in each arm and moved them forward, doing his best to put away the many concerns for an evening. Or at least an hour.

* * *

Maybe an older, wiser man could have resisted a pouting Haley and Lexi pulling his arms, grinding against him. But Mason wasn't either of those things. The girls had him dancing in minutes.

It helped that just about everyone was high as a kite. Suddenly no one seemed to care that the 'Western Warlord' with glowing green eyes was moving amongst them, dancing with two incredible women.

As he watched the girls move and smile, he probably even started to have a little fun. He also spotted Becky and Rosa coming closer hand in hand, and instantly stopped caring about their fiction.

He moved closer and grabbed both, pulling them into their little circle. Rosa's hips and ass were pretty much eye-magnets as she turned and swayed to the beat, her dress doing its honest best to keep in those curves. Becky even slapped him as he stared, then laughed and kissed him full on before pulling back to dance beside Rosa.

"What's this shit anyway? I want some country!" she yelled.

Mason grinned. It definitely wasn't that kind of vibe. If anything he decided the lights were getting lower, the music louder, something like strobe lights flashing as whatever drug they'd been dosed with was probably kicking in.

People were swarming the dance floor now, faces in masks of bliss, bodies pushing up against Mason from multiple directions.

He realized it was at least eighty per cent women. Mason only lost track of his girls for a second before he was surrounded by a sea of done up hair and flesh, unknown women's hands grabbing at him. He wasn't sure when his shirt had been unbuttoned, but some little blonde was literally licking his chest before he realized it wasn't Haley.

Apparently the system didn't worry much about sexually molesting strangers in its Neutral Zone ‘rules’. Not that Mason was too surprised. Or very concerned. He did his best to move away without dragging anyone down or crushing them, tolerating considerable groping along the way.

He found Haley again in the mob, probably as blind as anyone despite his enhanced vision because of all the flashing lights. Fortunately it looked like his girls were still all together and laughing, mostly mocking the particularly drugged up Lexi. The little brunette had stripped her jacket and was grinding her ass into Rosa as the Mexican laughed.

"Enjoying yourself?" Haley called to his ear, her hands moving up his chest. He looked down to find lipstick smudged all over his abs.

"The hunter has become the hunted," he said back, and Haley shook her head as if she couldn’t hear.

"There's private rooms," she called, hand moving a bit south as she bit her lip and gestured towards the side of the auditorium. Mason met her eyes and didn’t hesitate for a second.

"Get the girls."

Haley practically raced over and got their attention, all four coming back in a line holding hands. Mason took Haley's and led them on through the crowd, mostly failing to fight off the continued groping as he went.