$22/$50

Profane shouts filled the restaurant.

The lunch crowd at Blakely’s Chicken hadn’t been paying much attention to the overweight young man in the corner. After all, he was wearing headphones and had a tray next to him. Obviously he had already ordered. He was intent on whatever his computer was displaying anyway. Such a sight wasn’t uncommon. After all, Blakely’s Chicken had premium wireless Internet access with bandwidth north of 20 megabits when it wasn’t crowded. He was wearing jeans he hadn’t changed in four days and a taco sauce stained T-shirt decorated with a cartoon duck, but none of the restaurant staff had connected the dots. Yet.

When the rifle-shot-like sound of the word that shall not be uttered in public made everyone in the restaurant turn to look, the manager decided to speak up.

“Crowd control!” he screamed. “Stop him! He’s killing us!”

“Sir, I’m going to have to ask–”

Another shout. The customer swerved his mouse and knocked the tray out from under his drink. The manager jumped back, trying to avoid the extra-large cup of soda and ice. He wasn’t successful.

“Sir, you’re going to have to leave!”

The customer neither heard nor saw the manager trying to get his attention. In the game, his lovingly shepherded level six character was in a fight for its life against a masterfully executed scheme of pixelated robbery and murder. He had joined the dungeon party based on the fact several relatively high-level characters were in attendance. None were below level four. The deceptively poorly-equipped “thief” character, which was really only a conveniently engineered combination of stealth, surprise attack and poison use skills, was level seven. That should have been a red flag, but the promise of quick wealth overcame prudent observation. The kicker was that everyone had voice chat, so he could hear and speak to everyone in real time.

“Block him! Block!”

The thief had strategically avoided most of the potentially hazardous combat during the dungeon run. As a result, it was practically unhurt and at full strength, even after the fight with the final boss. The other characters weren’t so fortunate. In fact, they had been drained of health, mana, rage, and most of their advantages. After all, they had defeated every opponent in the dungeon.

Except one.

The thief had waited until everyone was weakened to spring his trap. Both spellcasters were murdered by single thrusts of his knife. By the time the warrior character realized he was under attack, his face had been torn to ribbons by a razor-sharp claw weapon. He swung his sword wildly, but failed to connect with anything. Blood was pouring into his eyes when the poisoned knife plunged into his neck.

The lone survivor was the archer character, which was being controlled by the Blakely’s Chicken customer. It was out of ammunition. It had minimal armor. All it could do was attempt to hold the thief off by using its bow as a makeshift club. Its owner hadn’t been even partially prepared for this kind of treachery.

Another barked four-letter word echoed in the restaurant as the archer was disarmed. The other real-world people in the dungeon party were all screaming profanities over voice chat, which was chief among the reasons the archer player’s discretion left a bit to be desired. For everyone else, the chicken restaurant was just a pleasant place to eat. For the archer player, it was a burning building full of dead bodies, shrieks and bleeding corpses. His next punctuation-optional tirade drew the attention of a police officer in line to pick up an order of spicy wings.

“Why can’t I move?! What is this?! MOOOOOVE!”

The other players shouted protests, but their characters were far underground in a game world location where nobody could come to their aid. The archer stumbled over broken bodies, desperate to escape.

“I spent two hundred dollars on this character! Heal! Heal! HEAL ME! They’re all dead! We’re dead! You suck! You SUCK! NEVER QUEUE AGAIN—!”

Uproarious laughter filled the voice chat channel. In the dungeon, skin and hair sprayed in all directions, splattering the bodies of the two pale spellcasters once again. Their shocked dead expressions stared straight up as blood pooled around them. The warrior character slammed into the stone floor, cracking its head on the hard surface. Its armor shattered and tumbled in all directions.

While the stunlock timer ticked, none of the game controls worked at all. The archer character was being brutally stabbed in a manner that would have shocked seasoned homicide detectives. Gore splashed across the screen. It was an effective graphics effect. The chicken restaurant player yanked his laptop computer into the air and smashed it against the table over and over again. Plastic, electronic components, mustard, sugar and picnic utensils shot in every direction. The soda-covered tankard-like drink cup tumbled across the floor. The police officer ran to the manager’s assistance.

“Sir, I need you to step out of the booth! RIGHT NOW!”

The customer looked up just as his archer was stabbed through the face. In the game, his character fell to the ground. A large taunting banner rose from the handle of the knife protruding from its head. It read “EASY PK.”

A trembling combination of tears, flushed face, annoyance at being interrupted and frustration all combined to elicit a double-chin-flapping howl of outrage and despair from the defeated player. “YOU DISTRACTED MEEEEEE!”

Having lost all sense of self-control, he threw his nearly 300 pounds into a poorly advised grappling contest with the police officer. His headphone cord, laptop, mouse, power cable, mouse pad and charging mobile phone became a whirling, tangled snare. The officer twisted the customer’s arm and nearly dislocated his shoulder. He then grabbed a handful of hair and dragged the screaming player out of the booth in a most undignified manner. Several well-built men in the restaurant went to the cop’s assistance. After a blubbering frenzied tantrum which involved at least two slips and falls in the half-gallon of soda on the floor, a wild haymaker that connected with nothing and a kicked-off shoe deflecting off the drink machine, the former owner of a level six archer was slammed against the table, swiftly handcuffed and frog marched out of the wreckage and into the parking lot with his headphones clattering along behind him.

In the game dungeon, where there was no police response, the thief rifled through the belongings of his victims and then carefully looted the boss and its henchmen. He rapidly collected the lighter weight treasures consisting of two magic weapons, four medium-sized opal jewels, 121 silver coins, a gold bar, two vials of powdered ivory, a large pearl, sixteen pieces of fine silk and a ceremonial jeweled dagger. His combination of player skills, characteristics and quests produced an experience bonus of nearly two thousand points, which brought him within single digit percentages of progression to level eight. He vanished into the darkness, laughter echoing.

Seconds later, only the Internet knew the Blakely’s Chicken customer had been streaming the session. The entire incident had been caught on live video and broadcast to more than sixty thousand viewers.