A group of friends streams their gaming on Wednesday nights. But not all the action is on the dining room table.

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Chapter 29 -- Three's A Crowd

"...and as you stack the last of the corpses on the bonfire, you hear the approach of heavy, largefootsteps."

I whimpered and looked around at the rest of the crew nervously. I was almost entirely out of magic power, and with us being on the way to the Hold of the Fire Giants, that was a dangerous situation to be in.

"From the gloom beyond the firelight emerges a shadowy form, tall as a tree, the red tones in its skin matching those of the flames."

Oh shit.

"The figure bends down and grins at your party, its head full of wild smoke-like hair billowing in the draft from the fire. 'Greetings, little ones,'" Maria said, shifting her tone of voice as she got into character. "'Mah name's Mato, and Ah'm here to help.'"

"Help?" I asked, a bit more panicked than I'd have liked, and jumped as once again Maria's play bell rang out.

"And that's where we're stopping for today," Maria said, receiving a mixture of clapping and disappointed catcalling from the audience. "Hey, if I were to push on, we'd be here all night!"

"Go for it!" A guy's voice came from the audience, followed by laughter and cheers from a number of folks.

"We would," Maria responded, "but we're all tired, and thirsty, and hungry."

"And sleepy," Deidre added, yawning. I felt myself involuntarily yawn with her, realizing just how drained I truly felt.

'Plus," Maria continued, "if we stayed up all night playing, there's not enough caffeine in all of Austin to keep everyone awake for the con events tomorrow. We'll be back here tomorrow evening at six. For now, we love you, we thank you for coming, and good gaming."

More cheers came from the crowd as the curtains fell once again, though not before the auditorium lights came on, and I had a chance to see just how many people were watching us.

Holy . . . .

"Mics are off."

"Place has a capacity of about eleven hundred people," Sydney said, hugging me from the side. "Todd texted me at half-time, said we had the place at about seventy percent capacity. I hear they're considering having the crew move our stuff to the main show hall for tomorrow night's game, just in case."

"Seventy... that's over seven hundred people!"

"Hits a bit different than when they're on the other side of a computer, don't it?" Maria said, hugging me from the other side.

"...Yeah."

We continued staring at the back of the curtain for a few more moments, just thinking about all the people who had been on the other side.

"Is this a private love-in, or can I join too?" Brian asked, wrapping his arms around my shoulders from behind once again.

Sydney laughed. "You can have my spot. Anyone seen Jonah?" She asked, stepping away from me.

"He's talking to the camera crew about tonight's footage," Maria said, also letting me go.

"Probably making sure at least half of it's focused on him."

"He did that once," I pointed out, not sure why I was defending him given he'd been just as surly during the game as usual. "And to be fair, that was that time his warlock critical killed that bandit leader who'd slaughtered your character's family."

"True," Syd admitted, shrugging. "Still."

As she walked off, I looked around to see where the rest of our crew had gotten to.

Deidre was off to the side, sitting in a folding chair and sipping at a bottle of water while talking to the hands about something to do with the set decorations, and I just caught Aaron's back as he walked off the set, cell phone to his ear, probably talking to someone about one of the youth centers. Our film crew was bustling about adjusting this or moving that.

"Five minutes, and we'll gather near the makeup area for a post-action review," Maria said, giving Brian's arms wrapped around my shoulders and neck a delighted grin. "I think I need to call the office at ATG: I'm pretty sure tonight's audience response was the bargaining chip I need on my monster."

"All right," Brian answered for us, squeezing me gently. I smiled and waved at her as she walked away, leaving the two of us standing there. We were in the middle of all the action, but in another way, very much on our own.

"What time is it?" I asked, leaning back against Brian and closing my eyes.

"Almost eleven."

"Really?" I wasn't sure whether I was more surprised at how late it was, or that it wasn't even later.

"Yep."

"How--"

"Photos at four, pre-game meeting at five, position marking at five-thirty," he rattled off, tapping out each point above my right breast as he did. "We got the session started on time, took a break a bit after eight. We started again about eight-thirty, aaaand... yep."

"I didn't think we'd go that much over," I mumbled, suddenly feeling even more tired.

"Yeah, well. 'S why they don't have anything else booked for the stage."

"And when we get out of here, there'll be people waiting," I whined, just a little bit, thinking about how much longer I'd be on my feet. I liked our fans, for the most part, but I could live without that for the evening.

"Not tonight," Brian assured me, squeezing me again before letting go, then taking my hand and pulling me toward stage left. "The con's got security set up to keep that down, remember?"

"Oh, yeah." I nodded as I followed him, recalling the plan. "Meeting with fans tomorrow before the game."

"And after, if we want," he agreed. "The con's officially over at ten tomorrow night, but we've got dispensation to go 'til midnight to wrap things up."

I thought about that. "We're not getting out of bed until at least noon tomorrow," I decided.

"Fine with me," he agreed with a lecherous grin.

I blushed and stammered, "I-I-I didn't mean--"

"Pizza?"

"Huh?"

"When we get back to the room," he said as we reached the makeup stations, where our friends were already waiting for us. "Medium pineapple and bacon, medium chicken and mushroom?"

"Sure," I agreed, dropping into one of the makeup chairs and finally letting go of his hand.

Or was it him finally letting go of mine?

Aaron was still on his phone, and so was Maria, though she mouthed 'two minutes' at me when she saw me watching her. Sydney and Deidre were both checking out something on a tablet and Jonah . . . .

Jonah was glaring at me.

Sigh. Of course, he was.

Maria finished her call, and as if on cue, Aaron closed his only a hair's breadth after.

"All right, folks, post-game discussion time!

"First off, great work making use of the stage! I think that really helped keep our audience interested, and it was a lot of fun watching you act out -- more than usual," she added, which got the expected laughs. "Next time we do this, we need to figure out a better way to handle the dice, though. And all of you need to give the stagehands a big thanks when we get home for stepping up and rolling for you, especially you, Leigh."

"Umm," I started, but didn't know what else to say, so just nodded. I had gotten a bit too into the whole on-stage part of things, I guess.

"Don't worry about it, I think people loved it."

"They did," Sydney interjected, holding up the tablet so the rest of us could squint at the social feeds she had displayed. "Comments went wild the moment one of us stepped out from behind the table and started acting things out. There's questions about if this is our new full-time format, with a lot of interest in seeing more of it."

"Our studio isn't big enough."

"I don't have the energy."

"I need tacos. Oww, what?" Brian complained when I pinched him, though his eyes were twinkling when he did so.

Maria rolled her eyes. "I agree with Leigh, our studio isn't big enough, and we have too many other projects needing the space as-is. Maybe in another few years, if we keep growing, we can get a bigger space and consider it. I do think this is a good reason for us to do more conventions if we can book them, though."

"Agreed," Syd said, tapping at her tablet again. "We're getting almost three times the normal post-game engagement, thanks to a lot of our audience members live-posting about things or sharing their experiences after."

"Fan art server's getting inundated with new content too," Deidre added while looking at her phone, cracking a rare smile. "Some of it's even safe for work."

"Sure," Jonah huffed, kicking one of the makeup tables. "Get the girls out there dressed like sluts and of course people're gonna be hanging on every second of it."

"Hey!" Sydney objected, standing up so she could glare down at Jonah. "I'm not a girl, I'm a woman,bub!"

Jonah flinched but didn't step back. "You three hogged all the attention tonight, especially the princessover there, with her theatrics!"

"I was just--"

Jonah cut me off. "You were showing off for everyone. 'Oh, look at me, star of the show,' making the rest of us look bad."

"I didn't--"

"Not her fault you stayed behind the desk and acted like a stiff," Deidre said, giving Jonah the coldest glare I'd ever seen from her.

"Yeah," Aaron said, standing up himself. "I was nervous about the whole thing too, but it was all for fun, and it's our job to entertain the audience. That's all Leigh was doing."

"It's our job to play the game," Jonah argued, "and all of y'all got so caught up in the acting part, that was forgotten! I coulda been sneaking ahead, scouting things out. I coulda seen that ambush before it happened if y'all hadn't been hogging the play!"

"All right!" Maria yelled, busting out her play bell again and ringing it loudly enough to set my head ringing too. "Enough! Jonah!"

"I'm not--"

"You're right."

"--you can't... what?"

Maria took a deep breath, taking advantage of the temporary stunned quiet in the group. "You're right. You were trying to chip in during the gameplay leading up to the ambush, and I was focusing on the others instead of you because of the acting they were doing."

"I... yeah," Jonah agreed, sitting down. Sydney and Aaron sat down too, both looking a little chastised. "I'm a rogue, that's what I'm there for."

"Uh-huh." Maria nodded. "But with you at the table and the rest up and moving, it was difficult for me to keep switching my attention back and forth." She was quiet again for a moment, and to my surprise, nobody tried to say anything else. "I know that you don't like the acting bit."

"At all."

"Right," Maria agreed, just a hint of annoyance creeping back into her voice. "But... maybe tomorrow, just get up and move around with them. You don't have to act things out," she clarified when Jonah looked ready to object, "but having all of you in front of me might be easier to track than shifting my attention back and forth between the table and the floor."

Jonah opened his mouth, a sneer on his lips, then closed it again. "I'll try," he finally said, almost whispered, as he looked at the rest of us with a mixture of anger and, I think, a bit of embarrassment.

"Okay. Is there anything else we need to cover tonight, or are we good until the meet and greet tomorrow afternoon?"

"I need a smoke." Jonah stood up and walked out, as usual, but the rest of us stayed there a little bit longer.

There were a few minor things the others wanted to cover, but it was mostly pretty standard accounting for ammunition and items, and a desire to catch a little more rest before risking any run-ins with people on the way to our rooms.

Soon enough, things were truly wrapped up, and a good thing, too: I was almost falling asleep, only Brian nudging me with his shoulder keeping me awake. We stayed seated while the others filed out, Sydney giving me a thumbs-up on the way through the door and Maria winking at me.

We really had some stuff to figure out.

"Pizza in the room?" Brian asked again.

"Pizza in the room," I agreed, dragging myself up. "After I've changed," I added, looking down at the still milky-white dress I was wearing and contemplating the chewing-out I'd get for pizza stains.

"Deal," Brian said, holding the door open for me, and once again taking my hand as we left the makeup tables behind.

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Notes:

*hugs*