Vaudevillain

"Looks like more of us like Menagerie," Thomas said.

Riptide shrugged, "Sorry, dude, but Revue didn't feel right."

Thomas shook his head, "It's fine, I'm not about to get upset over it. And it means I can use the name for something else later. Right, now it's time for Menagerie to make its first decision. How are we forming leadership?"

"Dude, I thought you were the leader?" Riptide said.

Thomas shook his head again, "See, I'm going to be roleplaying Dextra almost all the time. That doesn't make for a good guild leader. But since this whole thing was my idea, I'm fine with running everything behind the scenes."

"It should be a committee," Sweet Dream said. "We need both heroes and villains leading, or else we won't hear both sides. I'm thinking, get four people. Two heroes, two villains. Heroes elect their leaders, and villains elect the others."

"Should be two for now," Rampart said. "We don't have enough people for four people yet."

"If we're choosing now, I vote Ram," Merla said. "He's already our planner and leader."

"I don't have a problem with that," Oro said.

"Yeah, I'm all for Ram as the hero leader as well," Titan said.

"Um, we don't have to decide now," Rampart said.

"I think your side is already chosen, dude," Riptide said. "And I think Dex should be the villain's leader. You probably know more about the game than we do."

"Alright, anything else to discuss?" Thomas asked.

The room replied with nos and nopes.

"Great, let's get that video up and figure out what to do next."

"I still think we should do the tsunami bomb, dude," Riptide said.

"I saw one of the cities had this giant cake statue," Sweet Dream said. "I was thinking of doing something with that."

"I think I'm going to sit around and plan out the buildings," Dylan said.

"Dude, can you make me an aquarium?" Riptide begged.

"Oh, I want a giant chocolate shop," Sweet Dream said.

"Hold up," Dylan replied. "I was going to focus on the basics first. Like the villains and heroes quarters. After that, I can expand to making us different buildings."

"Sigh, fine," Sweet Dream said.

"Did you just say the word sigh?" Nikola asked.

The woman turned a sharp eye to the electric villain, "Yeah, you got a problem with that?"

Nikola backpedaled, "No, no."

"While you jokers keep playing around, we're going to go do a few more quests," Rampart said.

"Seems grindy," Shizuka said from her perch next to Cass.

"God, don't get us started," Merla said. "I can see why players pick villain over hero most of the time. All we can do to gain reputation is patrol areas and hope a villain appears. I think we'd have a better shot if we reached out on forums for PVP."

"Why not do that?" Dylan asked.

"Well, we're hoping that one of these quests leads to something interesting, like a group of villains secretly playing hero or something. But right now, all we're getting is unpowered gangs and escort missions."

"That sucks."

"It's not all bad," Oro defended. "Some of the gang members can fight well, and we know a lot of the other cities have powered villains. So when we leave Haven City, we should be fine."

"Speaking of leaving, when are we?" Nikola asked.

"How about now?" Thomas said. "We have everyone here."

"Yeah alright, I'm sure we can wait a bit while we travel," Rampart said.

"The question is, where do we go?" Sweet Dream inquired.

"While you guys decide, I'll be in the villain's quarters drafting buildings," Dylan said.

The group waved goodbye and turned back to their conversation. For Dylan, it didn't matter where Dr. Zlo went next. Though, it seemed Riptide's plan would be the next major crime for the villainous doctor, which suited Dylan just fine.

Sitting down at another folding table, Dylan prepared to brainstorm ideas for both buildings. A hero's hall was easy. There were plenty of drawings, plans, and sketches of bases to use as inspiration. The villain lair was much harder. Villains didn't tend to have hideouts in conspicuous locations unless they were characters like Dr. Zlo.

Most of the evil lairs Dylan remembered in comics rested underground, out of sight. Hero buildings were the center of attention. The contrast between the two piqued Dylan's creativity. What if he designed the hero building to sit on top of the villain building.

Hands scrambled to grab a notepad from Dylan's inventory as the idea rushed into him. A sketch of the concept quickly appeared. Since Skyline didn't have to worry about digging into the underground, Dylan didn't have to worry about it either. He could create this whole dualistic theme with villain lairs hanging under the city's shining upper portion.

With the sketches done, Dylan went to work drafting up a more concrete plan. The OOC Lounge would sit as the first floor and be the entry point for both sides of Menagerie. Players could take the elevators up to reach the hero's skyscraper or down to reach the villain's lair. Dylan drew a symbol to represent each side at the top (or bottom for the villain lair). Standing atop the skyscraper was a caped crusader, posing valiantly in defense of truth, justice, and liberty for all. Dylan shaped the bottom of the lair into a skull; the symbol used almost universally for evil.

Engrossed in his work, Dylan didn't even notice when Sweet Dream left to upload the videos to the channel. He worked through the night, roughly sketching out the materials required to build the dual tower. Once he finished up, Dylan went to work designing the rest of the city.

The skyscraper would be the centerpiece of Skyline, both a heroic beacon and an evil pit. The rest of the city should mimic the duality, which meant every building Dylan placed held a basement that emerged as its own building in the villain's territory. Sweet Dream's chocolate factory and Riptide's aquarium would sit underground as lairs. Above them, Rampart's monastery and Merla's wizard tower would match.

Dylan worked through the night, inspired by his favorite comics and novels. While he did so, the rest of Menagerie shared their videos. Thomas reached out to his old guild friends while Rampart shared the story with a few friends. Riptide and Sweet Dream posted on the forums. Soon, people watched the news of Dr. Zlo and Dextra, villains who did the impossible.

Sweet Dream's edits of the mothership theft cut out most of the tedium. Dr. Zlo announced his plan, which then cut to him gathering the aliens for the heist. The video cut again to the group starting the distraction but shortened the actual fight with tons of editing. Viewers watched with rapt attention as Dr. Zlo snuck inside right under the aliens' noses.

And then Wonderman arrived with the heroes, and viewers caught the first glimpse of trouble. But with Dr. Zlo's quick thinking, the crew rushed toward the mothership and used the controlled aliens to beam themselves up. Only to find themselves captured by the Quli.

Watchers sat on the edge of their seats, laughing at each antic the team pulled out. The audience clenched with worry as Riptide barely avoided the chasing mechanical monsters. They chuckled at Sweet Dream berating the surfer's stupid antics. It all culminated into a brilliant fight with two Quli and ended with Dr. Zlo controlling the mothership.

The new fans of the trio sat ready to see what happened to the mothership, and many started searching for the name of the game. But the voice of some random guy in the video stopped everyone in their tracks. Apparently, the company in charge considered the theft a bug. Apparently, the entire heist wasn't supposed to happen. And all that Vert promised was some monetary compensation.

All that work to have the game company stop you! It was by far the most annoying thing they'd watched that day. People everywhere commented on the video, complaining about how stupid it was for the company to take away the group's success. Others chimed in to point out how problematic it would be for other players if one group stole an entire piece of the game. Those few calm heads found themselves drowned out by the outrage.

Players in World of Supers caught wind of the video, and many shared the channel with their friends. Gamers worldwide watched as Dr. Zlo and Dextra crafted insane and brilliant plans only for Vert to come in and rob them. Players complained all over message boards while others silently clicked on the video linked in the description.

The new video compiled Vert's responses to the plans, and later showed Dextra Black sitting in a posh chair.

"If you clicked on this," the woman started, "you're curious about what we plan to do with this whole situation. Well, this is our answer. Dr. Zlo and I love this game and the free choice it gives. Yet, it seems like Vert is going a different direction with the game. This might not be a bad thing, but we believe their decision contradicts what makes World of Supers great."

Dextra took a breath, "The joy of this game is the freedom given to players. The way players can pick powers is revolutionary, and the interaction with NPCs is the most realistic experience I've ever found in a video game. But this new arc, and Vert's response to our playstyle, has shown the company isn't looking for a game that gives everyone free choice.

The scripted events with the alien invasion show that Vert wants us to play the game like a traditional MMO. But World of Supers is so much more than that. It doesn't need a reputation system based on our rankings. It doesn't need scripted events to make it enjoyable. That is why we're forming our guild.

Our goal is to petition to Vert to open up the world. Players should be allowed to create their own history. Characters like Dr. Zlo should be able to steal gigantic alien spaceships and take them on a joyride around the world. Someone like me should be allowed to scheme and plot a takeover of the city. And all players should be allowed the chance to succeed in whatever they try to do. We don't think Vert should force the game onto rails."

A link appeared over the video as Dextra finished. "If you're someone who holds the same values as us, we've made a petition for anyone to sign that would ask Vert to allow its world to develop organically. Hopefully, with enough signatures, we can attract the attention of someone important."

The video ended after a few more words from Dextra, "We are Menagerie, and our goal is to grant freedom to all players."

Incensed gamers rushed to click on the petition, signing it in support of Menagerie. Others signed with troll names, never one to treat anything seriously. Gamers sent the videos to their friends, the friends sent them to more friends, and soon Menagerie's videos garnered hundreds of thousands of views. Over the week, players signed the petition, reshared the footage, and complained on World of Supers forums.

Once the video reached a million views, small news sites reported the outrage. Larger sites picked up the piece, spreading it out to the general populace. It seemed everyone had something to say about Vert's new game.

And as they say, no press is bad press. Vert's announcement of the partnership with consoles and Menagerie's video of World of Supers combined to bring even more publicity to the small company. Now, more people took a look at this new VR system. Some started to realize the device for what it could be, and Vert saw investors pile in.

Dylan heard about most of it in passing, as people reached out to join up with Menagerie. Dextra and the rest loved his blueprints and immediately went to work purchasing all the materials needed. Dylan kept drafting, his mind a whirlwind of ideas now that he had full creative freedom. But soon, the itch to play Dr. Zlo returned, and Dylan had to go out into the world. It was time to work on the tsunami bomb.