MMORPG: How a Computer Game Becomes Deadly Serious by Emile van Veen Page A

feeling that she was getting irritated. The moment passed quickly, however. She brushed some curls behind her ears and answered patiently, “When you go anywhere in the regular world, any other player can be there as well. You would see each other, and he could pick the thing you came for, from right under your nose. If the player was from the other faction, say from the Alliance while you’re Horde, he could attack you as well, of course. Instances are different. When you enter an instance, it’s created especially for you or your group. Other players can’t enter and can’t interfere. If another player enters an instance at exactly the same moment as you, all that would happen is that the game would generate two separate instances.”
    “So it’s like a parallel universe?”
    She smiled warmly at him. “Very good! That’s exactly how it works.”
    He smiled back, proud of her praise. “So you couldn’t follow them?”
    “No. I waited for them to finish, just out of curiosity. I must admit, they did very well. They finished in under an hour, which is fast for that set of instances. Quite an accomplishment.”
    Robert thought for a minute, looking out of the window at the rain. “At least that means that they weren’t doing anything they shouldn’t. And what happened after they finished?”
    “Nothing, really. They broke up. Drimm went to Ogrimmar and bummed around the auction house for some time. He logged off after half an hour.”
    “So what are we going to do now?”
    “We’ll keep our eyes open. We must find out whether they’re terrorists who are using WoW as their secret place, or if they’re just innocent players with an unfortunate guild name and some strange behavior.”
    He looked at her, softly tapping on the table with one of the peanuts that came together with the beer in a miserable little plastic container. “This means we’ll have to maintain around the clock surveillance. That’s quite something. There’s just the two of us!”
    She looked unflinchingly back at him, holding his brown eyes for a second too long. “Yes, I realize that. You forgot to mention that I’m leaving for Edinburgh before long. This means that you’re going to have all the fun, because he’s your neighbour. We have to follow them in WoW, but also in the real world.”
    That thought had occurred to him as well, but he hadn’t followed up on it until now. “Do you really think that’s necessary?” He heard the denial in his own voice and answered his own question. “You’re right. This is going to have consequences for my study, though. I mean, we’re talking about 24/7 surveillance, in and out of the real world.”
    Suddenly he felt Rebecca’s hand on his own. He looked up. Her eyes were on his, carrying a serious look. “In a few days we’ll know whether our suspicion is correct or not. We saw them at Raynewood Retreat. We know something strange was going on there. This isn’t going to take months.”
    He moved his head slightly to indicate his agreement. “I hope so. If what they were doing has any impact on reality, we’ll know soon enough. I’ll try to follow Khalid when he goes outside. Maybe we’ll learn more that way.”
    “Just promise that you’ll be careful. If these are the people who blew up an entire train station, killing twenty people just to make a point, they’ll not hesitate to kill one more.”
     
     
    At that moment the bartender approached. Rebecca hastily removed her hand and smiled at him. He was carrying Robert’s beer and also one more for Rebecca. Robert was quite sure that she hadn’t ordered another drink. He felt a flicker of jealousy and arched an eyebrow at her.
    “Yeah, I know, I come here too often. Let’s just say that they anticipate my wishes.”
    He laughed and raised his glass to her. “Here’s to anticipation and to wishes!”
    Rebecca touched his glass with hers. “To anticipation and wishes!”
    She drank deeply, draining the glass for one