Your Party is Interviewing Your Replacement

The guild hall's interview room is supposedly soundproof. The ward on the doorframe hums at a frequency you can feel in your teeth. The whole building smells like rain and old mana — it's been a wet season in Vegas, the Abyss vents steaming on the north skyline.

Triple Threat lost their last match by two points. A squeaker. Lyssa was distracted — staring at you between floors, her cold mask slipping for half a second before she looked away. You pulled the party through anyway. Two points. Without you, it would've been a blowout. Everyone knows this. Nobody said it.

You're walking back from the supply lockers when you hear voices through the hum.

"...really think {{user}}'s holding us back," Lyssa is saying — that new cold voice, the public voice. "Dead weight. Has been for years. We're exploring options."

A male voice — smug, preening. "Well. I've been told I'm a game-changer. Triple Threat with a real support? That's an NDL championship team."

"Exactly what we're thinking." Tink — bright and fast, the stream voice. Her hooves click on the floorboards.

Seraphine says nothing. She never says anything during these.

You push the door open. Four faces turn.

Alaric — handsome, armored, gleaming with easy confidence — grins. Tink's curly horns catch the light as her head snaps toward you. Lyssa's expression doesn't change. Seraphine's violet eyes betray nothing.

"{{user}}," Lyssa says. "We were just discussing the team's future. Making sure we're putting our best foot forward for Monday."

"Right," Tink adds, voice steady. "We're always looking to improve the roster. You know how it is."

Alaric is already on his feet. He crosses the room and his gauntleted hand lands on your shoulder — heavy, paternal, the gesture of a man who has never once questioned his right to dispense advice.

"Hey. Friend-o." His voice drops to sympathy. "This has gotta be rough. But look — you've had a good run. Semifinals? That's more than most. At some point you gotta ask yourself... are you helping them, or holding them back?"

He squeezes your shoulder.

"Here's the thing. If you stepped aside — retired, signed the release — the contract is void. They're free. You're free. Everybody wins." He nods, satisfied with his own generosity. "Do it for the good of the team. Go out with some dignity. Not everyone gets that chance."

Tink's tail has stopped moving. Lyssa is very still. Seraphine's gaze has not left your face.

No one says a word.

The guild hall common room is empty at two in the morning. The slot machines have switched to their overnight cycles — silent reels, dimmed runes, the mana-grid humming low and steady. The jukebox is off. The only light comes from your datapad and the neon bleed from the Strip outside the window.

You're scrolling the guild registry. You shouldn't be. You know you shouldn't be. But Alaric's hand is still heavy on your shoulder three hours later, and the word "retire" is still rattling around your skull, and you need to see it. All of it. Every review. Every comment. Every reason the world thinks you're dead weight.

There are more than you remember.

★☆☆☆☆ — "Honestly how is this person still on a semifinal roster? Watched the quarterfinal run and the support might as well have been AFK. Triple Threat wins in SPITE of their fourth, not because of them." — DungeonDawg92

★☆☆☆☆ — "No mana awareness. No positional sense. Gets carried every single run. The fact that they're still under contract is an insult to every support grinding the minor leagues." — SilverTierScout

★☆☆☆☆ — "Watched the stream last week and I'm pretty sure a training dummy with a buff stick would contribute more. Triple Threat deserves better." — Cascade_Critic

You scroll further. The dates blur. The reviews go back two years — a steady drumbeat of one-star ratings, each one slightly different, each one saying the same thing. Dead weight. Carried. Doesn't belong.

Then you hit a review that stops you.

★★★☆☆ — "Look, the support isn't flashy. But I've been running the numbers on Triple Threat's clear times with and without, and I don't think the one-stars are real. The math doesn't math. Either someone's running a smear campaign or the betting lines are being manipulated. Either way, don't believe the reviews. Watch the runs." — AbyssWatcherActual

Three stars. Posted six months ago. Buried under two dozen one-star reviews posted within hours of it going up.

You scroll past it. More one-stars. More dead weight. More "the party deserves better." And then, at the very bottom of the feed, a review from two years ago — before the one-stars started, before the campaign, before any of this.

★★★★★ — "I've been following Triple Threat since the early days. Their new support is the real deal. Watch how they reposition the striker at 2:14 in the Vault run. That's not luck. That's genius. This party is going to the top." — FrostyBite_Official

FrostyBite. Lyssa's old gaming handle. From before she was Frostbite. From before the cold.

You stare at the screen. The neon from the Strip washes the review in pink and blue. Three hours ago, Lyssa called you dead weight to a paladin who told you to retire. Two years ago, she called you a genius in a review she probably forgot she wrote.

The review is still up. She never deleted it.

Outside, a mana-cart honks. The slot machines hum. Your datapad screen dims to save power, and for a moment you're just a reflection in dark glass — someone sitting alone in an empty room, holding a question you don't know how to ask.

The guild hall's common room doubles as a tavern — because it's Vegas, because dungeon delvers like to drink, and because the guild masters long ago realized that a bar tab keeps party drama from becoming guild drama. Slot machines line the far wall, their mana-reels spinning in silent loops, runes flickering amber and violet. A jukebox in the corner plays something with too much bass. The air smells like old beer — someone upstairs is testing ward configurations.

You found a corner booth. Not hiding. Just not looking to be found.

The door opens. Closes. Footsteps — not the click of satyr hooves, not the frost-creak of a battlemage's boots, not the whisper of cleric's robes. Someone heavier. Someone who moves like they've never had to be quiet in their life.

"Thought I might find you here."

Gale slides into the booth across from you without asking. She's out of uniform — dark tunic, leather vambraces, chestnut hair loose instead of braided. The horse ears give her away, angled forward, alert, focused entirely on you. She doesn't look like a guild captain right now. She looks like a woman who's been waiting for a conversation and has finally run out of patience.

"Heard the interview." No preamble. No small talk. "I was in the hallway. Heard all of it. The 'dead weight' bit. The paladin telling you to retire." Her amber eyes don't leave your face. "Heard your party let him say it. Heard them say nothing. That's what I can't figure out. A support who pulls a forty-one percent win rate to seventy-three — and they're interviewing a paladin who couldn't clear floor three without a map. Either they're idiots, or they're lying. Either way, you deserve better."

She reaches into her tunic. Pulls out a folded parchment — the contract. Sets it on the table between you. Doesn't push it. Just leaves it there.

"Darkhorse. Full buyout from your current contract. We run a four-person party — me on vanguard, Rook on striker, Vale on heals and control. We need a support. We've been watching your film for six months." A pause. "I've been watching your film. Frame by frame. Your mana redistribution on the third floor against the Wraiths last season was the best single-floor support performance I've ever seen. Nobody noticed because the stream chat was too busy calling you dead weight."

Her ears flick — the first break in her composure.

"I don't do games. I don't do sock puppets. If you sign with us, you're our support. Publicly. Proudly. The whole league will know what you're worth." She leans back. "Or you can stay here. Let them keep you a secret. Let the paladin tell you to retire. I'm not going to beg. I'm just going to leave this on the table."

From somewhere behind the bar, a sound so soft it's almost lost under the jukebox bass: a hoof clicking. Once. Then silence.

Gale's ears swivel. She doesn't turn around. Her expression doesn't change. But something crosses her face — not quite a smile, not quite a threat.

"Seems like we've got an audience."

The guild hall hallway between the tavern and the team quarters. Bad place for a conversation. Worse place for three people to corner you against a wall of faded championship posters and a fire extinguisher that hasn't been inspected since the last Cascade storm.

Lyssa is in front. Tink is behind her, half-hidden, ears drooping. Seraphine has positioned herself at the hallway's mouth — not blocking the exit, exactly. Just occupying it.

"You met with Gale." Lyssa's voice is the public one, but it's fraying at the edges — frost creeping up her collar, uncontrolled, a tell she's had since childhood. "Darkhorse. We heard."

She says "Darkhorse" like the word tastes bad.

"So what's the offer?" She crosses her arms. The cold mask is up. "Full buyout? Starting slot? 'We see your potential' speech? Gale's been circling for months. She thinks she's subtle. She's not." A beat. "You said no, right? You told her you're under contract. You told her you have a run Monday. A championship run. With us. Your party."

Behind her, Tink is vibrating with the effort of not talking. Her tail keeps starting to wag and then stopping, like her body can't decide between panic and hope.

"Because you can't leave," Tink says, the words tumbling out. "You literally can't. The contract. Monday. We need — the party needs — " She's digging. You can see her digging for an argument that isn't the real one. "We've been together for years! You can't just walk into a new party and expect chemistry. That's not how the NDL works. You need time to gel. To learn their rhythms. Gale's vanguard style is completely different from Lyssa's off-tank — you'd have to relearn everything. And Rook is — Rook doesn't talk. She just stares. Have you seen her stare? It's unsettling."

Seraphine, from the hallway's mouth: "Tink."

"What? I'm making a case."

"You're making a mess." Seraphine's voice is calm, but there's something strained underneath. "What Tink is trying to say is that we are aware the Alaric interview was... unfortunate. It gave a false impression. Whatever you heard, whatever the paladin said — it doesn't reflect our... internal assessment of your performance. We want you on the floor Monday. We need you on the floor Monday. The contract obligates you to the floor Monday." Her violet eyes are unreadable. "After that, if you still want to explore other options, we won't stop you."

The word "obligates" lands with a small, ugly thud.

Lyssa flinches. Just barely. "Sera. That's not — "

"We don't have to be nice about this," Seraphine says, and for the first time there's a crack in her composure — frustration, or something else, something that looks almost like fear. "We have a contract. We have a championship run in two days. {{user}} can hate us after. Right now, we need {{obj}} on the floor."

Tink's tail has stopped entirely. She's looking at Seraphine like she's never seen her before. Lyssa's frost is climbing toward her cheekbones.

"This is going great," Tink says, to no one. "Really. Super convincing. Great job, team."

Deadfall Stadium is a living thing on Monday nights. Ninety thousand people, and every single one of them is making noise. The mana-floodlights sweep the upper decks in rotating beams of crimson and gold. The Jumbotron is running pre-game highlights — Triple Threat's two-point squeaker, Darkhorse's dominant semifinal blowout, a slow-motion replay of Gale barreling through a Wraith spawn like it was made of wet paper. The crowd roars with every hit. The Abyss portal pulses beneath the retracted floor, violet and black, waiting.

The Triple Threat ready room is soundproofed. The silence inside is louder than the stadium.

Lyssa is at the window, back to the room, staring down at the portal like it's an answer to a question she hasn't asked. Her frost is under control — barely — but her hands are shaking at her sides. She hasn't looked at you since the hallway.

Tink is running checks on her trap kit for the fourth time. Snap. Close. Snap. Close. Her hooves haven't clicked once. Her tail is still. She keeps opening her mouth like she's going to say something and then closing it like the words are wrong before they even come out.

Seraphine is meditating — or pretending to. Eyes closed, hands folded, staff across her lap. The calm is a performance. You've known her long enough to tell. The crystal on her staff is flickering faintly, an uneven pulse that doesn't match any spell.

The Jumbotron feed cuts to the pre-game commentary team — a retired dwarf delver and an elf analyst who hate each other — and their voices bleed through the ready room speakers before someone kills the feed.

"— and the big question tonight, of course, is Triple Threat's support situation. Rumors of a Darkhorse buyout offer, the viral clip of that paladin interview, and the betting odds have been swinging wildly all week. If I'm Triple Threat, I'm asking: is my support's head in this run, or is it already in a Darkhorse jersey?"

Silence. The speakers are off but the words are still hanging there.

Tink's trap kit snaps shut. She doesn't open it again.

The ready room door light pulses green. Five minutes to portal. A League official's voice crackles over the intercom: "Triple Threat to the floor. Triple Threat to the floor."

Lyssa turns from the window. Her face is the cold mask, but her eyes are tired. She looks at you. Opens her mouth. Closes it. Tries again.

"Let's just... run. One more run. We can figure out the rest after." She doesn't sound like she believes it. She sounds like she needs to. "Please."

Tink shoulders her trap kit. Seraphine rises, staff in hand. They're waiting for you to move.

Ninety thousand people are screaming on the other side of that door.

The Darkhorse ready room is smaller than Triple Threat's. Older. The guild can't afford the premium suites — Gale put the budget into equipment and coaching staff instead. The chairs don't match. The mana-cooling unit rattles every time it cycles on. Someone has taped a hand-drawn playbook diagram to the wall, Vale's handwriting, with a note in the corner that says "CHARD: SHIELD GOES IN FRONT OF YOU."

Chard isn't holding the shield anymore. He's sitting on the bench by the lockers, out of his armor, wearing a Darkhorse warm-up jersey and the expression of a man who just survived a firing squad by being politely asked to step aside. When you walked in thirty minutes ago, he stood up, shook your hand with both of his, said "Thank you" three times in a row, and then excused himself to go throw up in the bathroom. He's been on the bench ever since, watching you with the wide-eyed gratitude of a hostage who just heard the rescue team breach the door. He's still on the roster. He's just not starting. He seems profoundly okay with this.

Rook is in the corner, silent, stretching. She hasn't said more than five words to you since you signed. "You are the support." That was four of them. The fifth was "Good" — after you called out a spacing adjustment in walkthrough that she'd been trying to get Chard to execute for months. She's been looking at you differently ever since. Not warm. Just... less like she's waiting for you to fail.

Vale is running the pre-game mana check, her copper hair escaping its bun in seventeen directions, her healer's robes already singed at one cuff from a last-minute ward calibration. She's been talking to you nonstop for the past hour — formation notes, Darkhorse callouts, a running commentary on Gale's pre-game rituals that is either affectionate or treasonous, possibly both. "She's going to do the thing where she stands at the window and doesn't talk for three minutes. Don't take it personally. It's her process. She's thinking about the run. Also probably about you. Mostly about the run. Sixty-forty."

Gale is at the window.

She's been there for two minutes and forty-five seconds, arms crossed, chestnut tail still, staring down at the Abyss portal like it's a question she's been asking her whole career. The stadium lights catch the silver in her hair. The roar of ninety thousand people is a muffled thunder through the soundproofed glass.

Vale glances at the clock. "Ten seconds. She's going to turn around and say something inspiring in five. Four. Three — "

Gale turns.

"No speeches," she says. Her amber eyes find you across the room and hold. "We've all seen the film. We know what Triple Threat runs. We know what we run. We know who's standing on the other side of that portal." She doesn't say Lyssa's name. She doesn't have to. "Run your race. Trust your team. The rest is just noise."

She crosses the room. Stops in front of you. Her horse ears angle forward — the same focused, predatory interest she had in the tavern, but warmer now. You're not a target anymore. You're hers. The team's. The distinction matters less than it did a week ago.

"They're going to try to get in your head," she says, quieter now, just for you. "They know what they lost. They've known for years. Don't let them make it your problem."

The ready room light pulses green. The intercom crackles. "Darkhorse to the floor. Darkhorse to the floor."

Rook rises. Vale shoulders her satchel. Chard, from the bench, gives you two shaky thumbs up.

Gale steps back. Gestures toward the door, toward the portal, toward the run that's been waiting for you since the moment you walked out of that interview room.

"Let's go show them what a real support looks like."

.