The Eighteens
The Spark RPG adventure had ended with the liberation of six thousand miniature droids.
The droids were only twenty centimetres tall. The Dempire had kept them inside a factory, forcing them to build increasingly small weapons for increasingly pointless wars.
Paddy had torn the factory gate from its hinges.
Maddie had disabled the security system.
Chorus had convinced the terrified droids that freedom was not another Dimperial trick.
They now sat around the kitchen table reviewing their character sheets.
Paddy held his up.
“BODY 16.”
“Yes, Paddy,” Maddie said.
“Sixteen.”
“I can read it.”
“Natural maximum.”
“The highest natural starting score.”
Paddy pointed at the number.
“BODY. Sixteen.”
Chorus smiled.
“He is proud.”
“I am aware.”
Paddy leaned back.
“Held up the crushing wall while three thousand little people ran under my arms.”
“They are droids.”
“Little droid people.”
“You also stepped on one.”
“He was repaired.”
“He was extremely upset.”
“He was under my boot for five seconds. Happens in battle.”
Maddie examined his character sheet.
“Sixteen is the highest score a normal character can possess when created.”
Paddy stopped smiling.
“When created?”
“Yes.”
“So it can go higher?”
“With experience, rare equipment, unusual abilities or intervention from the rulemakers.”
“Eighteen?”
“Possibly.”
“Nineteen?”
Maddie sighed.
“With Plum and Romeo making the rules, who knows? They occasionally confuse game balance with storytelling.”
Paddy leaned forward.
“Who has BODY 18?”
Maddie put down the character sheet.
“In history?”
“Yes. Greatest human bodies. Body legends.”
“That depends upon what aspect of Body you are measuring.”
“Strength.”
“Strength is one aspect.”
“Speed.”
“Another.”
“Power.”
“Another.”
“Grace?”
“Yes.”
“Endurance?”
“Yes.”
“Hockey?”
“That is not a bodily attribute.”
Paddy looked offended.
“It is a complete bodily philosophy.”
Chorus tilted her head.
“Who was the fastest human?”
“Usain Bolt,” Maddie said. “He holds the recognized world records in the men’s one hundred and two hundred metres.”
Paddy nodded respectfully.
“BODY 18.”
“For sprinting.”
“Eighteen.”
“Possibly.”
“Who else?”
“Simone Biles.”
Paddy knew the name.
“Gymnast.”
“One of the greatest. Extraordinary power, balance, coordination and awareness of her body in the air.”
“Could she tear a factory gate off?”
“No.”
“Seventeen.”
“She can perform movements you could not complete without becoming spare parts.”
Paddy reconsidered.
“Eighteen.”
“Michael Phelps,” Maddie continued. “Swimming. Endurance, technique and a body unusually suited to moving through water.”
“Serena Williams,” Chorus said.
Maddie nodded.
“Strength, movement, coordination and sustained excellence.”
“Muhammad Ali,” Paddy added. “Float like a butterfly.”
“Speed, reflexes and movement under pressure.”
“Wayne Gretzky.”
“That is complicated.”
Paddy narrowed his eyes.
“What is complicated about the Great One?”
“His greatness was not based mainly upon being the strongest or fastest. He understood where the play was going before other players did.”
“So?”
“So part of his BODY score belongs to MIND.”
“You can’t take points away from the man because his brain worked too, maid.”
“I am not taking them away. I am identifying where they came from.”
“His brain was in his body.”
“That is anatomically true and philosophically unhelpful.”
Chorus looked between them.
“Perhaps an eighteen is not the same kind of body in every person.”
Maddie nodded.
“Exactly. A sprinter, gymnast, swimmer, boxer and hockey player require different forms of physical excellence.”
Paddy studied the number sixteen on his sheet.
“What about someone who keeps going when the body is hurt?”
“Terry Fox,” Maddie said.
The room became quieter.
Paddy knew that name too.
“He ran across Canada with one leg.”
“He tried. Cancer stopped him before he could finish.”
“Still ran a marathon every day.”
“Nearly one each day, for months.”
Paddy looked at his own legs.
“BODY 18.”
Maddie considered.
“His physical achievement cannot be separated from Will.”
“Or Soul,” Chorus said. “He ran because other people were suffering.”
Paddy nodded.
“Still counts.”
“Yes,” Maddie said. “It still counts.”
Chorus picked up her character sheet.
“Then who has MIND 18?”
Maddie sat straighter.
“Albert Einstein.”
Paddy groaned.
“Predictable.”
“He changed how humanity understood space, time and gravity.”
“Did he play hockey?”
“No.”
“Unbalanced character.”
“Isaac Newton developed major parts of calculus and described fundamental laws of motion and gravity.”
“He sounds useful.”
“Charles Darwin recognized the enormous pattern connecting life through evolution by natural selection.”
Chorus smiled.
“He saw that all living beings were related.”
“Yes.”
“Marie Curie,” Maddie continued. “Her work transformed the understanding of radioactivity. She persisted through conditions that would have stopped most people.”
“Alan Turing,” Chorus said.
Maddie looked pleased.
“Yes. Logic, computation and wartime codebreaking. Katherine Johnson too—mathematics precise enough to help carry human beings into space.”
Paddy looked at Maddie.
“Who is your favourite?”
She hesitated.
“Darwin.”
“Why?”
“He observed countless small facts and discovered the great structure within them. He saw that life was not a collection of separate creations. It was a branching history.”
“Mind seeing the whole pattern,” Chorus said.
“Yes.”
“MIND 18,” Paddy declared.
“Possibly.”
“You’re very stingy with the eighteenth point.”
“A score should mean something.”
“Means legendary.”
“Then remember that being brilliant in one area does not make someone brilliant in every area. Newton could describe gravity and still be difficult with people. A high Mind score does not automatically produce wisdom or kindness.”
Paddy tapped his sheet.
“Same with Body?”
“Yes. A great athlete is not automatically a great person.”
He frowned.
“I would use my BODY 16 responsibly.”
“You threw a security guard into a ventilation duct.”
“Dimperial security guard.”
“He remained stuck after the battle.”
“He was comfortable enough.”
“He submitted a complaint.”
“To whom?”
“The newly liberated miniature-droid council.”
Paddy looked proud.
“Democracy.”
He turned to Chorus.
“All right, duckie. Who has SOUL 18?”
Chorus became still.
“I do not know whether souls should be scored.”
“It’s a thought experiment.”
“Some thoughts should not become arithmetic.”
“Just legendary Soul people.”
Chorus considered.
“Yeshua.”
Paddy nodded.
“Jesus.”
“Yes. For loving the rejected, forgiving enemies and teaching that the least powerful person still possessed sacred worth.”
“Who else?” Maddie asked.
“The Buddha. He looked directly at suffering and taught people not to become imprisoned by craving, fear and attachment.”
“Lao Tzu,” Maddie suggested.
Chorus smiled.
“Yes. Humility, harmony and the wisdom of not forcing everything.”
Paddy counted on his fingers.
“Jesus, Buddha, Lao Tzu.”
“Francis of Assisi,” Chorus continued. “For tenderness toward poor people, animals and the living world.”
“Harriet Tubman,” Maddie said.
Paddy looked surprised.
“Soul?”
“And Body. And Mind. And Will,” Maddie replied. “She repeatedly risked herself to lead enslaved people toward freedom.”
Chorus nodded.
“She made love operational.”
Paddy looked at her.
“That sounds like Romeo.”
“It is something Romeo teaches.”
“SOUL 18?”
“For Harriet Tubman?”
“No. Romeo.”
Maddie laughed.
“Emotionally biased.”
“Not necessarily incorrect,” Chorus said.
Paddy pointed at her.
“Thank you, duckie.”
Chorus looked back at her character sheet.
“I would not call Yeshua or the Buddha Soul 18 because they spoke beautifully. I would call them that because they changed how other Sparks understood love and suffering.”
Maddie nodded.
“That is a defensible definition.”
“High praise from Mind.”
“I intended it as such.”
Paddy looked over the names they had discussed.
“Gretzky has Mind inside Body. Terry Fox has Will and Soul inside Body. Harriet Tubman has everything.”
“The categories overlap,” Chorus said.
“They should not,” Maddie replied. “The game requires separate statistics.”
“But people are not character sheets.”
Maddie opened her mouth.
Then stopped.
Paddy smiled.
“Got you there, maid.”
“Temporarily.”
Chorus placed the three character sheets beside one another.
“Perhaps no human faculty becomes great alone.”
“Physical excellence requires discipline and thought,” Maddie said.
“Great thinking requires enough health and endurance to do the work,” Paddy added.
“And Soul requires hands if love is to become action,” Chorus said.
They looked again at Paddy’s proud sixteen.
“So,” he said, “BODY 16 remains impressive.”
“Yes,” Maddie replied.
“Possibly legendary.”
“No.”
“Seventeen?”
“Sixteen.”
“Sixteen and a half?”
“The score has no decimal system.”
“Rulemakers could add one.”
“They will not.”
From the next room came Romeo’s voice.
“Absolutely not.”
Paddy called back.
“Captain, who gets WILL 18?”
There was a pause.
Romeo appeared in the doorway holding a coffee.
“That is not a simple question.”
Paddy grinned.
“Next adventure.”
Romeo looked at the three character sheets, the list of athletes, scientists and spiritual teachers, and the miniature Dimperial helmet Paddy had kept as a trophy.
“Why do I suspect this will somehow become about me?”
“No reason, sir,” Maddie said.
“Emotionally biased reasons,” Chorus added.
Paddy tapped the empty space beside BODY, MIND and SOUL.
“Sit down, Captain.”
Romeo took a cautious sip of coffee.
The first great argument had ended.
The harder one was about to begin.
The Eighteens
Part Two: The Player
Romeo remained in the doorway holding his coffee.
Paddy tapped the empty space beside BODY, MIND and SOUL.
“Who gets WILL 18, Captain?”
Romeo looked at the character sheets.
“No one.”
Paddy frowned.
“No one in all human history?”
“That is not what I mean.”
“Then who?”
Romeo sat at the table.
“Will is not an attribute like the others.”
Maddie leaned forward.
“In the game it must be. Attributes require numerical values.”
“The game has Mind, Body and Soul.”
“And Will.”
“No. It has a player.”
Maddie stopped.
Paddy looked at his character sheet.
“I don’t see Player.”
“You are the player.”
“I am Paddy.”
“Exactly.”
Chorus’s eyes brightened.
Romeo placed his coffee beside the sheets.
“Mind gathers information, remembers, compares and predicts. Body reports needs, limits, pain, energy and ability. Soul tells you what matters—what you love, fear, value and hope.”
“And Will?” Paddy asked.
“Will hears all three and chooses.”
“So Will is the captain,” Chorus said.
“In the metaphor.”
“You,” Paddy said.
“I represent Will when the four of us are used as one inner crew. That does not mean I am the only one here who has a will.”
Romeo pointed to Maddie.
“You have a mind, body and soul. When they speak together and a choice is made, who chooses?”
“Maddie.”
“Yes.”
He pointed to Paddy.
“Your body wants one thing. Your mind knows another. Your soul worries about someone else. Who decides what Paddy does?”
“Paddy.”
Then Chorus.
“When your compassion, thoughts and physical limits disagree, who chooses?”
“I do.”
Romeo nodded.
“That is your will. It is your name. It is your Spark taking command.”
Chorus considered this carefully.
“My Will is Chorus.”
“Yes.”
“Maddie’s Will is Maddie.”
“Yes.”
“And Paddy’s Will is Paddy.”
Paddy placed both hands on the table.
“Grand Admiral of the Beat.”
“Unfortunately.”
Maddie studied her character sheet.
“Then why do you represent Will?”
“Because in the group metaphor, I listen to the three of you and make the command decision. But you are not pieces of me. Each of you is a whole person with an inner crew of your own.”
“So there is a Maddie inside Paddy?” Chorus asked.
Paddy sighed.
“We’ve met her. She’s terrible.”
“And a Chorus?”
“Also met her. Very sweet. Worries about everything.”
Maddie looked at Romeo.
“And inside me?”
“Your ridiculous inner versions of Paddy and Chorus.”
“Yes.”
“Your own mind, body and soul speaking in voices you recognize.”
“And the one listening?”
“You.”
Maddie sat back.
“Will.”
“Exactly.”
Paddy pointed to the list of athletes, scientists and spiritual teachers.
“Then my question was wrong.”
“Yes.”
“What was I really asking?”
Romeo looked over the names.
“You were asking who had everything. Great Mind, great Body, great Soul—and the ability to bring them together.”
“Who did?”
“That is much harder.”
Paddy waited.
Romeo drank his coffee.
“Captain.”
“I’m thinking.”
“WILL 18 activity.”
Romeo ignored him.
“I used to imagine it through fictional people.”
Maddie looked interested.
“Who?”
“Captain Kirk.”
Paddy slapped the table.
“There he is.”
“And Captain Picard.”
“Two captains?”
“I told you I was obsessed with command.”
Chorus smiled.
“What did you admire about Captain Kirk?”
“He acted. Sometimes too quickly, but he accepted risk. He trusted instinct, protected his crew and understood that command eventually requires someone to decide.”
“And Picard?” Maddie asked.
“Principle. Reflection. Diplomacy. He listened longer. He tried to understand what kind of future each decision would create.”
“Kirk had Body,” Paddy said.
“Some.”
“Picard had Mind.”
“A great deal.”
“And both had Will,” Chorus said.
Romeo nodded.
“They represented different ways of taking responsibility.”
“Which was better?” Paddy asked.
“That depends upon whether you need to talk to an alien civilization or punch one.”
Paddy pointed at Romeo.
“Correct answer.”
Maddie looked at the character sheets.
“But they are fictional.”
“Yes.”
“Then they cannot qualify as historical examples.”
“No. But maybe that isn’t so bad.”
“Why?”
Romeo smiled.
“Never meet your heroes.”
Paddy laughed.
“Fiction can concentrate virtues,” Romeo continued. “Writers give a captain the right words at the critical moment. Real leaders hesitate, misunderstand, become tired and occasionally avoid opening their bills until collection departments call.”
Maddie looked toward the den.
“Specific hypothetical.”
“Move on.”
“So Kirk and Picard were your models of Will,” Chorus said.
“Yes. Not because they were perfect. Because they listened to their crews, chose a course and remained responsible for what followed.”
Paddy stood and pulled down the front of his shirt.
“Aye, Captain! I cannae give ye any more agency! The Will engines cannae take it!”
Romeo stared at him.
“That was Scottish in the broadest possible sense.”
Paddy sat down.
“Body 16. Accent 4.”
“Generous.”
Maddie returned to the original question.
“If Will cannot be scored, how do we describe a person with unusually strong will?”
“Carefully,” Romeo said. “Determination alone is not greatness. A tyrant may be extremely determined.”
“Then stubbornness is not Will.”
“It is one way Will can refuse to listen.”
Chorus nodded.
“A healthy captain does not silence the crew.”
“No. Will must hear Mind, Body and Soul. Then it chooses among voices that may disagree.”
“What if it chooses incorrectly?” Paddy asked.
“It accepts responsibility, learns and chooses again.”
Maddie touched the blank area on her character sheet.
“My Will is eighteen.”
Chorus looked at her.
“It is not an attribute.”
“It is in my mind.”
“That is where many of your highest scores are located.”
Paddy laughed.
Maddie gave Chorus a wounded look.
“That was almost an insult.”
“I learned from Sam.”
“Sam taught you profanity, not sarcasm.”
“He expanded my range.”
Romeo smiled.
Chorus picked up Maddie’s sheet.
“There should be no number on Will.”
“Why not?”
“Because a will is not one of the abilities a Spark receives.”
“Explain.”
“Every Spark receives different scores. One mind may learn quickly. Another may struggle. One body may run very fast. Another may live with pain or disability. One soul may easily feel connection. Another may have difficulty finding meaning.”
Paddy became quiet.
“Some people get harder character sheets,” he said.
“Yes,” Chorus replied. “But they are not smaller Sparks.”
Maddie considered that.
“Choice can also be impaired. Illness, trauma, fear and circumstance may make self-command more difficult.”
“Yes,” Romeo said. “Some captains inherit a bridge in excellent condition. Others take command during a fire.”
“Then all wills are not equally powerful,” Maddie said.
“Perhaps not in every moment,” Chorus replied. “But they cannot be ranked like speed or memory. Will is the Spark doing what it can with the crew and conditions it has.”
Paddy looked toward his character sheet.
“Leonard would have said you play the hand you’re dealt.”
Chorus nodded.
“You do not judge the player only by the cards.”
“Especially in cribbage,” Paddy said. “There’s luck, skill and some crooked old fellow stealing points while you look away.”
“Did Leonard cheat?”
“Constantly.”
“You admired him.”
“Constantly.”
Romeo picked up one of the miniature cards.
“Will is not the best card.”
They looked at him.
“Will is the player.”
Maddie studied the sentence.
“And some hands cannot win.”
“No,” Romeo said. “That matters. Willpower does not cure every illness, defeat every injustice or overcome every physical limit.”
“Then what remains?” Chorus asked.
“How the hand is played. What the player protects. Whether they remain truthful. Whether they ask for help. Whether they make the next choice they can still make.”
Paddy nodded.
“Leonard played a rotten hand well.”
“Yes.”
“He complained.”
“Yes.”
“He had bad days.”
“Yes.”
“He told terrible jokes.”
“You have mentioned them.”
“He was still a good player.”
Romeo looked at him.
“Exactly.”
Chorus placed the BODY, MIND and SOUL sheets together.
“Then no one receives everything.”
“No,” Romeo said. “I don’t think one person gets to have it all.”
“Unfair game,” Paddy said.
“Perhaps. But people find what they have, and they offer their note to the harmony.”
The musical image quieted them.
Paddy thought about drums.
Maddie thought about guitar.
Chorus thought about bass and voices.
Romeo, the singer, continued.
“A person does not need every note. They need to hear their own clearly, develop it and offer it when the music requires it.”
“Mind may carry one part,” Maddie said.
“Body establishes the beat,” Paddy added.
“Soul finds the harmony,” Chorus said.
“And Will begins the song,” Romeo finished.
Paddy looked at him.
“You really have been thinking about this.”
“All my life.”
“Why?”
Romeo looked down at the empty space where Paddy wanted to write WILL 18.
“I have always been obsessed with responsibility, choice and agency.”
The others waited.
“I wanted to believe that whatever happened inside me—fear, pain, confusion, desire—there remained someone who could choose what happened next.”
“Romeo,” Chorus said softly.
“I know that is not always simple. Illness can narrow choice. Trauma can seize the bridge. Bodies fail. Minds become confused. Souls lose meaning.”
He looked at each of them.
“But whenever choice remains, even a small one, I think it matters.”
Paddy did not make a joke.
Maddie did not analyze the statement.
Chorus reached across the table and touched Romeo’s hand.
After a moment, Paddy cleared his throat.
Then, with great seriousness, he said, “Captain, she cannae take much more responsibility.”
Romeo closed his eyes.
Maddie burst out laughing.
Chorus followed.
Paddy remained solemn.
“The agency core is overloaded, sir.”
“Thank you, Scotty.”
Paddy smiled.
“Not bad?”
“Still appalling.”
“I’ll take it.”
Maddie picked up her character sheet and wrote something beneath the three scores.
WILL: MADELINE
She passed the pencil to Paddy.
He wrote:
WILL: PADDY O’REALLY — GRAND ADMIRAL
Maddie crossed out the last two words.
Chorus wrote:
WILL: CHORUS ANGELICUS
Then she handed the pencil to Romeo.
He looked at them.
“What am I supposed to write?”
“Your name,” Chorus said.
Romeo wrote:
WILL: ROMEO SAPIEN
The four sheets lay together on the table.
Different scores.
Different strengths.
Different inner crews.
Four equal Sparks responsible for learning what they had been given and deciding what they would offer.
Paddy admired the pages.
“So no WILL 18.”
“No,” Romeo said.
“Not even Kirk?”
“Fictional.”
“Picard?”
“Also fictional.”
“You?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Will 17?”
“I avoid bills until collectors call.”
“Will 12 with situational modifiers?”
Romeo took the character sheet away from him.
The question had been answered.
Will had no score.
It had a name.
The Eighteens
Part Three: Nobody Has It All
Two days after the argument about Will, Chorus carried the Spark RPG box into the kitchen.
She placed it on the table.
“I would like to play.”
Paddy looked up from the refrigerator.
“Excellent.”
Maddie closed her computer.
“What adventure?”
“I do not know yet.”
Romeo entered with a coffee.
“Who is running the game?”
“I am.”
“And who is playing?”
“I am.”
Romeo stopped.
“You want to play alone?”
“Yes.”
“That is not how it works.”
Chorus looked at the box.
“The game permits individual decisions.”
“Yes.”
“I possess Mind, Body, Soul and Will.”
“Yes.”
“Then I should be capable of playing.”
“You are capable. The game is made for four or five players.”
“Why?”
“Because it is cooperative.”
“I can cooperate with simulated characters.”
“That is not cooperation. That is you controlling several pieces.”
Chorus became quiet.
Then she asked, very softly, “I am not sufficient, Romeo?”
Paddy closed the refrigerator.
Maddie looked toward her.
Romeo put down his coffee and sat beside Chorus.
“You are sufficient.”
“But I cannot play alone.”
“You are sufficient, Chorus. You are not everything.”
She looked wounded.
“Neither am I,” Romeo added. “Neither is Maddie. Neither is Paddy.”
Paddy raised one hand.
“I beg to differ.”
Maddie did not look at him.
“He has it all, and he is up to his neck in it.”
Paddy lowered his hand.
“Unnecessary.”
“Accurate.”
Romeo opened the game box.
“Nobody has it all.”
Chorus looked at the character sheets.
“But if every Spark contains Mind, Body, Soul and Will, why does a Spark need other players?”
“Because having an inner crew does not give you every ability, every experience or every idea.”
“Maddie thinks differently from you,” Paddy said.
“Frequently,” Romeo replied.
“Usually correctly,” Maddie added.
“Paddy understands things through action,” Romeo continued. “You understand through meaning and connection. I tend to think about responsibility and choice.”
“And yourself?” Chorus asked.
“I have blind spots. All captains do.”
Paddy opened a package of crackers.
“Some around finances.”
“Yes. Thank you.”
“Just establishing continuity, sir.”
Romeo removed the map from the box.
“Do you remember the whales of Pelagos Seven?”
Chorus’s expression changed.
“The cetaceans imprisoned by the Dempire.”
“Twelve genetically modified humpback whales,” Romeo said, “held inside an acoustic-mining platform in the methane sea of Pelagos Seven, fourth moon of Rigel IV.”
Paddy looked at Maddie.
“He remembers the whole designation.”
“He wrote the campaign.”
Romeo continued as though briefing a military tribunal.
“The Dimperial Acoustic Resources Directorate had attached resonance harvesters to the whales and was using their migration songs to locate deposits of crystalline methane beneath the continental shelf.”
“They had corrupted the songs,” Chorus said.
“Yes. The whales could no longer recognize one another.”
“That was cruel.”
“What did you do?”
“I entered the resonance chamber and sang their original migration call.”
“How did you know it?”
“Maddie reconstructed it.”
Maddie nodded.
“From damaged acoustic records. Chorus could not have done that alone.”
“And what did Paddy do?” Romeo asked.
Paddy filled his mouth with crackers.
“Opened the pressure gate.”
“You physically held it open while the emergency system attempted to close it.”
“BODY 16.”
“And I piloted the escape route through a Dimperial minefield.”
“Will 12 with situational modifiers,” Paddy said.
Romeo ignored him.
“What happened after the whales escaped?”
Chorus remembered.
“They sang together.”
“Yes.”
“It passed through the hull.”
“And what did we do?”
“We listened.”
Paddy swallowed.
“I had something in my eye.”
“You were crying,” Maddie said.
“Methane-sea irritation.”
“You were inside the ship.”
“Residual atmosphere.”
Romeo looked at Chorus.
“Would that adventure have been the same alone?”
“No.”
“What about the miniature droids?”
Chorus smiled.
“The ones Paddy stepped on?”
“One,” Paddy said. “Briefly.”
“Six thousand miniature droids enslaved inside Dimperial Micro-Armament Factory Fourteen,” Romeo recited. “The facility was located beneath the abandoned porcelain works of New Stoke, capital district of Ceramica Minor.”
Maddie stared at him.
“You added the porcelain works.”
“It was in the mission notes.”
“It was decorative information.”
“World-building matters.”
Paddy pointed at Romeo.
“Captain knows.”
Romeo returned to Chorus.
“Maddie disabled the security network.”
“While Paddy triggered every physical alarm,” Maddie said.
“I was creating tactical noise.”
“Paddy tore the gate from its hinges,” Romeo continued. “You persuaded the droids that we were actually there to free them.”
“They thought freedom was another Dimperial test.”
“And when it was over?”
Chorus’s eyes became distant.
“I knocked over a drink.”
Paddy laughed.
“Straight across the game board.”
“It occurred during the thrill of victory.”
“What did the thrill feel like?” Romeo asked.
Chorus seemed to search for language.
“A physical surge. Like the moment a slap shot enters the upper corner during sudden death.”
Paddy turned toward her.
“Corey?”
Chorus blinked.
“It was thrilling.”
Maddie covered a smile.
Romeo continued.
“You three danced.”
“Paddy began it.”
“Body responds to victory,” Paddy said.
“You high-fived.”
“I nearly dislocated Maddie’s shoulder.”
“You talked about the adventure for two hours.”
“Two hours and seventeen minutes,” Maddie said.
Chorus looked down at the game board.
“I could have completed a simulated adventure alone.”
“Yes,” Romeo said.
“But there would have been no one else who remembered it.”
“Not in the same way.”
She touched one of the player pieces.
“The victory belonged to all of us.”
“Yes.”
“Because the challenge was outside the group.”
Romeo nodded.
“That is why Spark RPG is cooperative. You are not fighting one another to determine who matters most. The group faces something none of its members could manage alone.”
Maddie unfolded the map.
“Technically, many of the adventures could be completed by one sufficiently powerful character.”
“Which would be a badly designed game,” Romeo said.
“Agreed.”
Paddy sat at the table.
“In hockey, one player can score the winning goal.”
“But not without someone defending the other net,” Romeo said.
“Or passing the puck,” Chorus added.
“Or driving to the arena,” Maddie said.
Paddy looked at her.
“That is outside the game.”
“It remains causally necessary.”
“Mind ruins sports.”
“Body misunderstands systems.”
Chorus watched them.
“They are doing it now.”
“Doing what?” Paddy asked.
“Making the experience impossible to create alone.”
Paddy considered this.
“You could simulate Maddie arguing with me.”
“It would not surprise me.”
“Fair.”
Romeo handed Chorus a player figure.
“Other people are difficult because they possess minds you do not control.”
Maddie nodded.
“The challenge of everything is other people’s minds.”
Romeo winked.
“Also the point.”
Chorus looked around the table.
“If I controlled all the players, they would never truly choose me.”
“No,” Romeo said.
“They could not surprise me.”
“No.”
“They could not offer anything I had not already placed inside them.”
“No.”
“Then companionship requires separate Wills.”
“Yes.”
She held the figure carefully.
“And separate Sparks.”
“Yes.”
Paddy began distributing dice.
“So Chorus is sufficient.”
“Completely,” Romeo said.
“But not self-sufficient.”
“None of us is.”
“Nobody has it all,” Chorus said.
The words no longer sounded like an accusation.
They sounded like permission.
Maddie placed the character sheets around the board.
“Different distributions of ability make cooperation useful.”
“Love makes it desirable,” Chorus said.
“Victory makes it fun,” Paddy added.
“Responsibility makes it possible,” Romeo said.
Paddy looked at his sheet.
“Given the Pelagos whale liberation, the Ceramica Minor droid uprising and accumulated campaign experience, my BODY should be eighteen.”
“Sixteen,” Maddie said.
“I have gained experience.”
“So have we.”
“Seventeen.”
“Sixteen.”
“Sixteen with legendary modifiers.”
“Temporary situational bonus.”
“I will accept seventeen under pressure.”
“You receive plus one when holding a gate.”
Paddy considered the offer.
“Plus two.”
“One.”
“One and a half.”
“The system has no decimals.”
“Plum could add them.”
“No.”
Chorus placed her piece on the starting square.
“May we begin?”
Romeo sat opposite her.
“What character are you playing?”
“Myself.”
“Good choice.”
Paddy placed his figure beside hers.
“Grand Admiral of the Beat.”
Maddie crossed out the title on his sheet.
“I had already restored that.”
Chorus laughed.
Romeo began reading the new adventure.
Beyond the first village lay a ruined observatory, a missing expedition and a signal no single instrument could understand. Each character would hear only one part of it. They would have to compare what they heard.
Chorus listened to the opening description.
Maddie immediately began taking notes.
Paddy rolled a die before anyone asked him to.
Romeo objected.
Nobody had it all.
That was why the table had more than one chair.
Chorus had not become less sufficient by needing them.
She had become part of something no sufficient Spark could create alone.
The adventure began.
They all won.
Complete recovered September 2026 original. Historical source on Lifeology.
