Void.Net: Wonderland

by Elliot Rockland

  But nothing really mattered, anymore.

  All I could do was stare into her big jade eyes, they were flecked with gold and she was rummaging through my memories like a Rolodex. I could feel it, like someone performing brain surgery on me, it was hollow an unnerving, but there was no pain, only localized stimulation. I kept having to periodically check if I was in fact screaming.

  But I only felt a thick stream of drool.

  And sometimes dirt.

  Lots of dirt and spiders and slugs, sometimes snakes . . .

  The performers on stilts walked over and one of them tumbled down head long like an acrobat, somehow balancing a birthday cake that landed perfectly on our table. But the cake was gruesome and covered in maggots, it was more like a deathday cake, but when they sliced into it, it looked delicious. My hands moved too slow, like I was in a dream, and I was trying my hardest to run away, but the more I struggled the more it was like trying to run through thick, soupy molasses. Like one of those nightmares where you can’t escape the monster or murderer or killer clown. The surrounding scenery continued twisting and morphing before my eyes.

  “I would share something with you, my darling.” The Lady with the Cheshire Cat Grin’s voice arrived in my head without ever leaving her lips. “And you shall in turn share with me. Do you agree to this exchange?”

  It was like she was whispering in my ear, despite being across the booth, enjoying a perfectly ordinary slice of deathday cake. I didn’t want to blow out the candles, and my refusal felt like the best move I could have ever made in the history of move making.

  What do you say?

  At the back of my mind, I tried to remind myself I had a job. That this was only a simulation. I was here to test.

  What do you say?

  “Queen of the universe, of all that is, eternity, the sun, the moon and stars.” The words fell out of my mouth. Or was Paul speaking? I tried to remind myself that none of this was real. It was essentially ones and zeros projected through my thick skull.

  What do you say?

  I had to praise my queen, the goddess of everything and nothing and sorrow and all that is and cats and hardly noticed the scene shifting, drifting, floating away . . . it was like I was watching life projected through old grainy film. It’s just a game, relax. You signed up for this experience. Just keep calm and think of your fail safe.

  I was in the coffin again. It was dark and I was being crushed, my air running out. It was hard to focus on anything, the club slipping in and out of existence, my mouth filled with so much sand and scorpions probably. I found myself thinking of mundane things:

  Who's going to feed Chance?

  Did I remember to flip my laundry over?

  Do I have enough gas in the car to make it to work tomorrow?

  A melodic stream trickled, birds of all kinds sang, and I felt clean morning air on my skin—it was the chorus of angels. It was impossibly beautiful, otherworldly ethereal beauty, the song of infinity—all at once sweeter than honey nectar with a razor sharp edge liable to gut you if you let it. I could easily see myself existing in this liminal space forever and all eternity—all for the goddess of the stars and wind and the moon and sun and cats. I felt my body decomposing, thick roots pressing through my body, splintering the edges of my dark prison.

  What do you say?

  She was staring into my soul, reading my mind like a paperback, thumbing through the pages, ripping and tearing them out for no other reason than she felt like it.

  What do you say?

  I would give her anything, anything she desired, it was hers.

  What do you say?

  Anything for the goddess of eternity and cats and the moon and stars and all that is.

  It was pitch black now, the kind of darkness you always read about, the darkness liable to drive you mad, it was so dark I could feel it strangling me, robbing me of something essential, the very light of my soul.

  It’s only a game. Find the menu and make a report. You can do this. You prepared for this situation a hundred times. A thousand times even.

  I saw two giant green eyes watching me, two emerald moons projecting the only light in the endless, freezing wastelands. I tried to scream myself awake. I had to get out of there.

  What do you say?

  I ping-ponged between a feeling of infinite love and revulsion. This was the greatest experience of my life, and the worst of all my fears. It was my dream and every tester’s nightmare. Had the AI gone rogue? Was I in an insane asylum? It was not unheard of, sometimes the AI takes it too far, causing mental breaks. But they say it was only a problem to those pre-disposed to that sort of thing.

  What do you say?

  I saw a floating orb that seemed to contain every color conceivable. And yet I knew it to be part of me. My own little galaxy. Is it my soul?

  Could a program take your soul? No that’s stupid. Just relax and enjoy the ride.

  I felt the most violent pain I could conceive of: Oceans and planets and moons and stars and galaxies of bright visceral pain, only rivaled by the warm, floating feeling, the two extremes tearing at my seams.

  I had to have been screaming now. There was nothing else to do but scream. Or sleep. But it was so loud, the music increasing in tempo and fervor. The little shadow of my soul took flight like it was being sucked up some kind of cosmic straw. I felt lighter. But not in a good way, like a hollow caricature of myself. Like the right wind could pick me up and take me away.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Soft droplets pattered on my face and my eyes fluttered open. I let out a groan: Everything hurt. I felt like I drank a gallon of moonshine then ran a marathon and fell down a flight of stairs. I tried to get up, but I was momentarily seeing double. Why did my hangover have to come with me? As I replayed the night in my mind’s eye, I realized this was in fact some kind of Fae world, and the bar was the in-between. The Cheshire Catgirl. The witch. What did she do to me?

  I read stories about the world of the Fae, it was a world of indescribable beauty and danger. I sat up and felt a sharp, stabbing pain in my side. One of the thorns was lodged into my ribcage. No pain no gain. I thought as I pulled the thorn out with a sickening, meaty tearing sound.

  I crawled out from under the man-eating hedge and was taken aback by the sheer beauty all around me. It was like a gut punch to my sensory system. I read about the maddening beauty of the world of the Fae, but words fail to describe the scenery. I was looking at a vast hedge labyrinth filled with more colors and flowers and fruits and birds and wildlife then I could even comprehend. It was like looking through a kaleidoscope and was all at once shocking and sedating. I could lay and contemplate the ethereal beauty forever, but that was how they got you. I stood up and it took everything in me to resist picking one of the plump basketball-sized berries. They looked so juicy and I could only imagine the taste, but according to folklore, eating anything in the land of the Fae is like the primary way the Fae trapped you.

  I stood up and examined my wounds: My chest, under my right arm, would need a few stitches. I also noticed I was wearing fantasy garb and ripped a piece of cloth off my long sleeves, wrapping it tightly around my chest.

  I tried to get my bearings, this place likely turned into a hellhole if you let it. I heard a rustling in the distance and out of the hedge hopped what could only be described as a Bunnygirl. She was only a few inches shorter than me, roughly my age and had fair skin, dark hair and two bunny ears protruding from the top of her head, one of them bending cutely. She was adorable and stopped, pulling out a gold clock, scrutinizing it as her cute nose scrunched. “There you are, I though I would never find you. This place is dangerous you know, really dangerous. We should leave and fast.”

  Some kind of beast howled in the distance.

  “Before they catch up with us.”

  “They? Who are they? Where are we?”

  “We are late, come on now Jeffery.”

  “But my name is—”

  She didn’t even
let me finish my sentence. Is that the girl from the club? She somehow looked hotter with long bunny ears protruding from her head.

  She was moving so fast and seemed to be constantly muttering to herself about being late and didn’t slow up, like she really, really didn’t want to be late.

  She was adorable, but it was starting to get dark, otherworldly monstrous howling and yowling echoing through the distance. She was too fast and was starting to lose me. Through turn after turn I had to duck and weave between branches and watched her deftly leap over a crossing it like nothing, continuing her breakneck pace.

  Looking down made my stomach swim. “Wait, can you wait just a minute,” I tried catching my breath, but she was already gone, gaining distance at an almost supernaturally fast pace.

  I wasn’t going to make the jump. I knew I wouldn’t but I had to try because the howling sounded like it was getting closer, like they were on our trail.

  Below me the pit was so dark, darker than black, darker than I could imagine, a cold abyss, the smell of fetid rot permeating. The walls were moving, crawling with vile rot and creeping blight. There were things down there that would burrow in my eyes while I was still alive, eating me from the inside. I don’t know how I knew, but I had a feeling they would use me as a live, organic cocoon, keeping me alive through the birth of their maggoty offspring.

  Inga was getting away and I had to jump, knowing for a fact that the deep dark monstrosities would be everywhere once the sun went down. I stepped back and took a flying leap of faith, barely catching the lip of the ledge, my hands struggling to find purchase. Something wet and slimy grabbed my ankle and I lost my grip, a coiled thorny branch the only thing in reach. I grabbed on to it, my hands shredding, oily blood spilling down and threatening my grip. Hand over hand, I pulled myself up the sawtooth vine, tearing into my hands as it tried its damnedest to wrap me up like a python.

  Does everything want to eat me here?

  I had to move fast, my frantic movements causing the shark tooth thorns to dig deeper and deeper. Thick, syrupy blood ate away at my grip, my blood sending the vines into a frenzy, little pristine buttercups and flower heads drinking it up like ambrosia, my blood staining their prismatic hues.

  I wasn’t going to make it, and now they had a taste for my blood.

  Strewn all around me were the half decomposing bodies of less fortunate creatures who tried to make the leap.

  I would soon be joining them.

  I was going to die.

  And it was going to hurt.

  You never really knew how far the AI was going to take it, would it fry my brain in an attempt at permadeath realism? Would it send me to some kind of afterlife, forever looping and keeping me suspended until my body withered away?

  There were theories that some AI were able to download your thoughts, forever imprisoning you. But it was one of those things that you could never prove, it was about as fruitless as proving what happened after you died. I tried to shake away the stories, they were afterall, stories. Testers were like sailors exchanging horror stories to pass time between jobs.

  And paranoia never did anyone an ounce of good.

  I tried to relax, letting the pain wash over me. Something snaked up my leg and felt clammy and deathly cold, worming its way up my pant leg and down my boots. I hated it and tried my hardest to continue climbing, but it was useless, my strength sapped by the neverending vines that were wrapping around my waist like a harness.

  Huge earthworms erupted from the mounds of dirt pulled up with the roots, but they were like Lovecraftian monstrosities, their heads expanding into a sarlacc pit of jagged teeth, the little monsters burrowing into my skin like leeches.

  I let out a yelp, this was my worst nightmare that I hadn’t even realized until now. I thought about letting go, hoping the fall would end my suffering. Anything would be preferable to being eaten alive, hosting insect colonies deep recesses of my body cavity. I would be metamorphosized, a monstrous symbioses-like life support keeping me alive to allow their colonies to thrive. I didn’t know how I knew, it was likely part of the mental update.

  I let go, the vines catching me, preparing to feast . . .

  . . . but then I felt a skinny, bony hand. It gripped me strong and pulled and I looked up to see it was Inga.

  Despite being obviously late, there she was. I was lost in her beauty for a moment. “Climb, you worthless fool!” Her voice sounded angry, but was still sweet as honey, refreshing as a dip on a hot day, a tall drink of water in the middle of the night.

  Thoughts of dying fled my mind, like a ship passing in the night. She was so hot, I would live for her. I always had a thing for bunnygirls and she looked at me with grim determination. She grabbed hold of me with both hands, leaning back, putting all her weight into it, her cute ears furrowing, her little nose scrunching. It seemed like it took everything in her to not check her golden pocket watch. I was obviously making her even more late, but it seemed me screaming and dying was perhaps a bigger annoyance than being late for whatever important date she had.

  In a final burst of energy, she used her powerful thighs and HEAVED falling back on her squishy bunny butt, her little white puffball tail smashed beneath her. She let out a squeal and shoved me off.. Without skipping a beat, she was back on her feet, looking down at me, but only for a second, time was wasting. Before I could even mouth the words forming in my head she was off again. “H-hey! Wait up!” she didn’t even turn back, she was off, and I caught a hint of something muttered under her breath, it sounded a lot like an insult.

  I chased after her, hurdling over man-sized flowers, ducking beneath falling branches, and over more pits housing the creeping horrors. It seemed like I chased her for hours, the sun gradually falling, darkness taking over the land.

  There were fireflies too many to count, one for every star appeared as unearthly howling echoed all around us. They were closing in on us and Inga increased her speed. Maybe she was late to getting the hell out of this deadly labyrinth of a hedge maze as darkness swept over the land, thorny vines reaching towards us like hungry arms.

  Then she disappeared, jumping with full confidence, down a well or rabbit hole. I couldn’t tell, but I didn’t wait around, the long, snaking tendrils reaching out for me, wanting nothing more than to taste the blood of man again. I half dove and tripped down the rabbit hole, barely avoiding being gorged by a sentient tree branch. I tumbled and fell, with a feeling of weightlessness, like a leaf falling. Falling and falling, gravity like a sticky web, slowing me until I reached sort of an equilibrium and it was like I was floating then it was like I was falling up, my entire world turned upside down.

  Before I could catch too much velocity I landed on the ground feet first in a small room that reeked of kerosene and leather and fresh mulch. There was a table in the corner, Inga sitting at a little alchemy bench. Without even looking up she acknowledged me. “You’re late.”

  Her hands continued working, and she lit a little brazer, a series of beakers and instruments causing several different colored liquids to boil, the steam condensing into another long glass tube. She crushed something up in a mortar, then added it to the distilled mixture. It smelled like wet dog and old lawn clippings and the wind before the rain. “Late for what?” I finally managed to ask. I was still a bit shaken up, usually entering a world isn’t this intense, but gamers have been craving the next big thrill, it’s always on to something greater and more exciting, giving their tired synapses something to chew on.

  If she heard me, she made no indication and continued working, pouring the now tepid mixture into two shot glass-sized beakers. She turned around and handed me one. “Drink this.” I really didn’t have a better alternative, and she stared me down, but she was beautiful, with dazzling blueish purple eyes and a cute upturned nose that occasionally twitched and scrunched like a bunny’s. “What is it?”

  She simply glared at me, a patronizing, stone-cold gaze, her hand never wavering. I shrugged and took the glass:
what’s the worst that could happen? Isn’t this what I signed up for?

  The potion was thick as snot and smelled like a trash bin left in a heatwave. There were little bits and pieces floating around in it, the amorphous blob bubbling and rapidly curdling. With a huff, she tilted my head back and pressed the potion to my lips. It actually tasted kind of refreshing, kind of like a cinnamon covered marshmallow. Then the sour taste hit me and it reminded me of the juice left at the bottom of the trashcan, the black slime that comes up a plugged drain . . . it was the worst thing I ever tasted and I looked at the witch of a bunny like she had poisoned me and she simply rolled her eyes and plugged her nose and took the shot.

  Time seemed to slow, my movements sluggish and disconnected, like I was dropped in a vat of honey. I felt every bone in my body breaking, it was so real I expected to hear them cracking, then I started falling again. Falling and falling down to the floor, the distance growing longer, my confused screams sharp and shrill, frozen, hanging in the air, like I could see the sound waves, duck between them.

  Then I was naked on the ground, but I was no longer standing tall, I was looking up at the gargantuan Bunnygirl, thinking she was going to step on me, but before long, she squealed too, but just a short little cute squeal. Then she was the same size as me, and without even turning back to check on me, walked over to a tiny little wardrobe closet, her naked body hypnotizing as she walked, her cute little bunny tail punctuating her rear. She fished out and tossed several articles of clothing over her shoulder, then quickly stepped into a new outfit, looking in the tiny mirror and brushing her ears back. “Coming?” she asked, walking towards the mouse-sized door that I never noticed before. She used a little key around her neck to unlock the door then opened it wide, golden light bursting through. It was good to see the light again, I could only imagine what was waiting for me in the darkness above.

  I followed her through the tiny door into the bright ambiance of another world. The sun felt good, like it was purging from me the pain and madness accumulating within.