Chapter 6

Thursday when Cameron logged on to his e-mail he found a message from Leia with several attachments. Even with a high speed link they took a fair amount of time to download. After ditching the inevitable spam and responding to messages from a study partner and his folks he returned to Leia's note.

"Cameron, I want to know what you think of the attached "rules" from your point of view as a gamer. Take your time, we can talk about it when you come down next. - Leia"

"Rules for Heroes," "Rules for Caretakers", "Rules for Companions," and "Rules for Crossroads."

Cameron opened "Rules for Heroes" first and started to read. He was stunned, the rules purported to be guidance for a "hero" on a mission to rescue a "damsel in distress" on a world called Chaos. These were presented as real girls in real trouble but the hero had constraints. Modern weapons were not available. Some of the local wildlife was protected and above all, the natives were restless. Some were homicidal maniacs, frequently the source of the damsel's distress. The hero's reward was unique, an opportunity to impregnate the damsel after her rescue in a place referred to as "Crossroads." Apparently the hero had the assistance of a female "Caretaker" on Crossroads for mission selection and post-mission recovery if required.

"Rules for Caretakers" looked like the longest document of the batch so Cameron skipped ahead to "Rules for Crossroads." Crossroads, it seemed, was literally a place where "gates" of a sort allowed passage between Earth and Crossroads, between Crossroads and Chaos, and between "Cassandra", the world of the women, and Crossroads. The facilities all appeared to be self contained suites as there was no mention of any "outside" or common area between them except for the gates. The Caretakers evidently had very large latitude in commanding their facility, the Heroes and Damsels, very little. Once a Damsel's pregnancy was confirmed both she and the Hero were required to quickly leave through their respective gates. With an 8 o'clock class coming up, Cameron decided he better hit the hay as the rest of this would keep.

At about the same time Leia was thinking, "Well, Toto, this isn't Kansas anymore, much less Wenatchee." Back when she had been growing up in her family's apple orchards life was pretty simple. You got up, you did the day's chores, you went to bed. One day was pretty much like another except for minor variations in the weather, sunny - or not, hot - or not, rain, snow, whatever. There were a lot of good things about this lifestyle, safety, predictability, satisfaction in seeing the fruits of your labor. Leia was bored.

It was still assumed by the local culture that the boy you went to the prom with was the man you would marry to carry on the family round. This was also a culture with "issues." The owners of the orchards and most other businesses were anglo and protestant. The folks who did a lot of the work were latino and Catholic. There was more than a tinge of the forbidden about socially stirring that pot. Ricky Hernandez was, in Leia's opinion, a hot hunk so she was thrilled to accept his invite to the prom. Nobody else in either family was thrilled. After the prom Leia eagerly succumbed to Ricky's advances. Afterwards she was somewhat shocked to find out that Ricky didn't believe it was her first time and gave that as his excuse for dropping her like a hot rock. Leia was depressed for a week, then came to several conclusions - she had liked sex, she didn't need Ricky, likewise didn't need the sympathy, much less the smug satisfaction, that various acquaintances and relatives spread around. Her sense that Wenatchee was too small a town for her was reinforced.

Shortly thereafter her cousin Malcolm came home on leave from the army. He reinforced her thinking about getting out on her own so she seriously started planning to go to college. She stayed in sporadic touch with Malcolm through college, using him as a sounding board for her plans and her relationships with men. He hinted at having found the greatest adventure going but never provided any details. Leia casually mentioned Cameron to Malcolm after their first encounter and then again when he transferred to WWU. Surprised by Malcolm's calling her up and pumping her for just about every detail of her knowledge of Cameron, her own interest increased. The investigative inquiry reinforced her curiosity about Malcolm's interest.

The "Rules," presented by Malcolm as if it were a role-playing game, amazed and puzzled. Leia was familiar with several genre of games and these rules fit no style she knew. They read as if the author expected them to be taken at face value, rather like traffic regulations. As requested, she forwarded the rules to Cameron. The request to ascertain his ring size just added frosting to the puzzle cake. Over the next couple of days she read each of the rule books twice, then e-mailed Malcolm:

"Mac, this really happens and you have really been there - right?"

"Leia, I neither confirm nor deny. Just find out for me what Cameron thinks please."

Four days later Cameron put down "Rules for Caretakers" after completing it for a second time. "If this is a game it is the most poorly written game I have ever run across. Absolutely none of the material that a game master would need to administer the game is included. Only a little bit more is provided to a prospective player and essentially none of that provides any information on how to develop a character to play. On the other hand - what if it describes a real situation?"

The next Saturday Cameron again had a date to meet Leia at the bookstore after her shift. During Cameron's call setting up the date they had by some sort of mutual intuition stayed away from a discussion of the Rule Books. Instead -

"Can we do something besides a movie and dinner date?" asked Leia.

"Sure, do you have anything in mind?"

"Well, the dinner part is going to be needed somewhere along the line but I would just as soon skip the movie so that we can sit somewhere and have a conversation about those rule books my cousin sent us. I have also been asked to ascertain your ring size so we might stop by one of the jewelry stores here in the mall."

"Ring size? Who wants to know?

"Malcolm asked me. I suspect that it is somehow connected to the rule books."

"Lead on." It didn't take long to find a jewelry store and find out that Cameron's ring size was an 8.5. A brew pub in the mall provided a quiet corner booth to use as a conversation nook.

"I want to hear what you think about these rule books my cousin sent," began Leia.