Gamer Fantastic

by Greenberg, Martin H.

  “I think I’ve finally mastered this gewgaw, so . . .” AJ’s voice trailed away as his trench-coated persona blinked up on Sam’s screen.

  Tessa laughed. “Ace Barrigan! I thought the computers locked anyone out of playing the name or admin characters!”

  “Normally, yes,” Len said, “He’s usually left as an admin character or for the AI as an NPC. Still, I want to see how much he affects a game, and I thought it would be an honor to have his creator be the first to play him.”

  AJ said, “Thankfully, I have two young men in my ears telling me which buttons to push. I’m not limber enough to use these floor controls without falling over. And Rick says I can switch into a Solomon Lazarus persona too, if we need magic to defeat boss characters—whatever those are.”

  “Well,” Len said, “now that we’re all here, Bobby can get the scenario playing. This is a scenario we’ll use tomorrow—everyone gets five minutes of training for controls, and unlike you, they have to choose from a roster of characters instead of creating new ones like they can in the home game. We’ll be adding Sam’s and Miss Rahn’s characters to the roster as soon as Sam tells us his rookie’s name?”

  “Dave Holverson, fresh outta the academy and ready for anything!”

  “Get that name, Rick?” Len said,“Okay, folks. Ground rules are just like a tabletop role-playing game. Use the persona’s name if you’re talking within the game. Use our real names if you’ve got a question or comment outside of the scenario. Any—” A loud staccato of gunshots echoed out of speakers inside of Sam’s pod, overwhelming Len’s voice. Sam grinned, noting that the TV speakers added to the illusion that the shots came off to the right of them.

  “I’ve never spoken Barrigan’s dialogue aloud, so forgive me if this shatters anyone’s illusions on writers and their characters,” AJ muttered in the headphones. When he spoke again, Sam noticed a growling edge to his voice as Ace. “Mason, where’re those shots comin’ from?”

  Len answered, “Over there!” Mason pointed across the park. “That alley behind the pawnbroker’s!”

  Sam had Dave pull out his gun again and run toward the alley, followed by Darlene, Ace, and Mason. When the alley loomed on his center screens, Sam saw three figures—all in blue suits and fedoras—gunning down another pair against the back wall. No, actually, one of them was shooting through the back door into the shop as well.

  He said, “Stop, in the name of the law!” and fired a warning shot over the men’s heads. They spun on their heels and opened fire. Dave dodged back around the corner, sweeping Darlene with him out of the line of fire. Mason and Ace fell back to the other side of the alley’s opening, pinned against the pawnshop window.

  “Seems we interrupted something here,” Ace said. “Boss Mackay’s boys want to trade bullets for a pawn-broker’s ticket. Mason, take this gun and fire at the ground in front of them.”

  “Um, AJ, not that I don’t want to, but why give Ace’s signature guns to anyone else in the game? Technically, it’s not allowed, but your admin status lets it work.” Len’s voice quavered, and Sam wondered what made him so nervous.

  AJ replied, “My plan needs someone with quicker reflexes than this old man to fire the guns. Indulge me. Remember what the guns do, after all—transform bullets into spells. And besides, your character is nearer to me than Sam’s character, or I’d have him or Tessa do this.”

  “Okay, Ace!” Len said, and Mason took the revolver. He hesitated before stepping forward, while Dave dropped to the sidewalk and rolled halfway across the alley opening. Lying flat on his back, Sam’s persona fired at the light attached to the left-hand building. That light shattered, and the reflector clanged down into the now-darker alley. “GO!” Sam yelled into his mike, goading Len into action as Dave rolled toward where Mason stood.

  Mason jumped over the rolling rookie and fired three shots into the alley at the ground. A blue glow shimmered where his bullets hit, and everyone heard the gangsters yell as ice froze the puddles in which they stood and crept up the walls around them. Ace stepped behind Mason and fired once, his shot hitting a gunsel and surrounding him with gold energy.

  “You goons looking for a score? It’s Ace and friends three, goons bupkis!” Ace fired again, and the second gunman erupted in gold light. Both men stood paralyzed, and Mason entered the alley. Len’s voice came through the headphone. “Um, freeze, punks!”

  “Timing needs work, Len,” Sam said as he maneuvered Dave up off the ground.

  “Ain’t you fellas forgettin’ someone?” Tessa’s voice held a southern twang as she spoke as Darlene.

  “Best stay back, doll. Pretty thing like you could get hurt around here,” Ace replied.

  “Not me!” Darlene said. “Where’d that third mug go?”

  As if on cue, the door to the pawnshop rattled open and a blue-suited blur dashed toward the black roadster at the curb. Sam had Dave aim his gun at the man for a moment, and then he changed his target, blowing out the car’s curbside tires. The gangster dove into the car anyway and it sped away easily, ignoring the fact that its right rims scraped and shrieked and sparked.

  “Damn it guys!” Tessa said, “Len and Rick, fix the servers to make sure that the program recognizes when a car’s not drivable. I can’t believe that’s not already in . . .”

  Len replied, “It was on our list of final checks, Miss Rahn, and it didn’t get implemented before we had to ship everything here. It’ll be okay tomorrow and for the release—just one of the reasons we’re testing this tonight away from the public.”

  “All right,” she said, then slipped back to her accent. “Sorry for droppin’ outta character, y’all.”

  AJ cleared his throat as Ace advanced slowly down the alley, keeping his footing careful due to the ice covering most of the surfaces. The other personas followed as he maneuvered around the glowing paralyzed men. He said, “Don’t touch ’em unless you wanna wake ’em up. Say, ain’t that sumtin’ . . .”

  Ace pointed at the lead man’s outstretched arm. Sam toggled his controls to move around and see the computerized image of an elaborate tattoo on the gunman’s inside right wrist. On the lowest screen to Sam’s left, an icon of a brain flashed beneath a numeral 8. He pressed the number on his keypad and a brief memo popped up in that screen, suggesting he share this info with the other players.

  Sam paraphrased the text aloud in his mike. “Ace, the police found at least three bodies with this tattoo in the past week. We don’t know what it means, but Mackay gang hitters’re sporting this mark all of a sudden. We been trying to find what needle joint gives them this tat and why.”

  Darlene said, “That’s nothing, officer. I’ve got a pal at the museum who tells me it’s the mark of a cult that worships some Middle Eastern demon type. Hard to pronounce name, but it’s—”

  Ace yelled, “NO! Don’t say it!” Sam flinched from AJ’s shout, but AJ’s voice dropped as Ace explained. “To say a demon’s name sometimes gives it power or helps it break down boundaries between its world and ours. If you know what you’re doing, you can command it, but never say its name without the will and means to rein it in.”

  “Geez, okay, Ace. No need to shout,” Darlene said. “So why’s Fairgeth’s main bootlegger and rackets-runner mucking about with a demonic cult?”

  “The better question, blondie, might be why’s a Middle Eastern trickster spirit mucking about with gangsters in Fairgeth?” Ace said as he entered the blasted back door of the pawnshop. Darlene and the others followed quickly, Dave entering last. Sam heard AJ sigh in his headphones just before Dave followed Mason into the pawnshop.

  “You fellows copied one of Monty’s old Lexicon Jones stories for this game.” Sam saw AJ’s Ace persona staring down at the dust on a shelf. “You’ve got us playing out ‘Through Amethyst Eyes, I See Yesterday,’ don’t you?”

  “We borrowed a whole bunch of plots, sir,” Len said. “The writers wrangled more than forty stories together into eighteen scenarios for the initial game launch.
”

  Dave slipped next to Ace and Darlene, finding an odd triple-diamond pattern outlined by the dust to show where something had been removed. Sam asked, “You get that clue from the pattern alone?”

  “That and this particular pawnbroker’s, yes, Sam.” AJ replied. “Darlene, do us a favor and see what the broker’s records say was at . . .” Ace lit his lighter, then wiped a thumb across the dusty label on the shelf edge and read, “. . . O-five. Mason, go with her in case another mook’s hidin’.”

  Darlene and Mason worked their way through the crowded shop slowly, but they moved quicker once Dave turned the lights on. She gasped as she stepped behind the counter, and said, “Fellas, there’s a body here!”

  “And you’re surprised by this why?” Ace asked.

  “Go easy on her, Ace. Not everybody sees dead bodies every day like us,” Mason said.

  “Yeah,” Darlene snapped, “and besides, I’m not scared—just excited. This’ll make my story front-page copy for sure.”

  “Maybe,” Ace said, looking at other items on the shelves. “Mason, you got who pawned the item yet?”

  Mason flipped through a card box on the desk. “Yeah, Ace. O-five—Darrel Springfield.” Len whistled low, then said, “Ritzy guy—his family owns the mills and the two big bakeries down on the river. He lives up on Marcus Heights . . . even has a phone line all to himself. Now why would a rich guy need to pawn anything?”

  Dave replied, “Just cuz’ he’s rich doesn’t mean he’s got liquid cash. Could have gotten in deep with the ponies or somethin’, which is exactly why Mackay’d be puttin’ the squeeze on him. Darlene, is the clerk alive?”

  Darlene knelt by the body and just shook her head. When she stood up, she had a crumpled piece of paper in her hands. “Hey, fellas, he had this in his pocket.” She smoothed out the paper on the desk and read aloud. “ ‘You are behind in your payments, Marvin. Give my boys what they want, and you’ll be allowed a few more days. Remember the only brass balls you’ve got are the three hanging above your door.’ It isn’t signed, but I’d bet even money this was written by Mackay’s righthand, Alan Gehring.”

  “Mackay’s always been into protection rackets more than B n’ Es. Why would he bother stealing someone else’s stuff instead of the usual shakedowns?” Mason asked.

  “Because he can’t broach Mr. Springfield’s estate security, but he found out about an item or three that got pawned down here for some reason,” Ace replied, “There any other items in here belonging to that guy?”

  Mason reached for the clients’ card box, but Darlene’s hands snatched the card. She said, “Here it is—O-five, P-thirty-one, and S-nine. It notes O-five was ‘one Aztec-style molded urn, used for fireplace ashes, not fu nerary’; P-thirty-one was ‘a small silver bell, carved with weird Indian markings’; and S-nine was ‘gold ring and bracelet connected by three delicate silver chains.’ Odd collection.”

  Mason looked on the shelves behind the desk and said, “S-nine is gone, boss.”

  “P-thirty-one’s been swiped too, Ace,” Sam said as Dave. “I’ll bet we’ll find that Mr. Springfield’s being pressed for cash by the Mackay mob.”

  Ace said, “Worse than that, if he’s selling those things. You said the Springfields own warehouses on River Row, yes? Do any of us have a car to get there?”

  “I do,” Darlene said, “and I’ll even drive you boys if Ace tells us what’s up.”

  “I don’t wanna spoil the surprise, doll,” Ace said, as he led the quartet out of the shop. “Besides, Tessa, everybody knows you don’t reveal the full plot until the third act.”

  “Okay, folks, Dave’s going to hook an arm through the window and ride the sideboard!”

  “Your inner fanboy is showing, Sam . . .”

  A few minutes later, Sam marveled at the complexity of the program’s graphics. The four personas now perched atop a warehouse, a grimy skylight revealing the warehouse interior beneath them. It also hazily reflected each persona’s face against the dirty glass. In his headphones, Sam could hear muffled voices from the computer-controlled characters down below.

  Three Mackay goons stood below, their blue suits contrasting the fourth figure—a blond man with glasses and long olive robes standing inside one of two mystical circles chalked onto the concrete floor. The center of the second circle held a small golden urn, but Sam couldn’t see details on it from this distance.

  “Since when is Alan Gehring a mystic type?” Dave asked.

  Darlene whispered, “Since Brass Bradley took down Mackay’s previous lieutenant, Hank Duncan. What should we do, Ace?”

  “You should stay up here, where it’s safe, doll, and . . .” AJ replied.

  Tessa interrupted, “Okay, AJ, I realize it’s period and in character, but don’t do that. Darlene can protect herself.”

  AJ said, “I’m not being a chauvinist, Tessa. From here, your persona can both cover any of us when we’re down below and get the view of the whole situation for her story.”

  Sam heard the blush in Tessa’s voice. “Oh, okay then. Let’s do that.”

  Ace’s edge returned in AJ’s voice as he said, “Dave, you and Mason use the eastern entrance there—” Ace pointed at the door they could all see through the skylight “—and take out the goons. I’ll handle Alan. Just hurry. He can’t finish that incantation he’s started.”

  Mason and Dave nodded, and they moved quickly across the roof and down the metal ladder. Sam enjoyed the random game details, like the warehouse wall painted with an old, much faded advertising for Bull Durham tobacco, or a random spiderweb on the ladder. When Mason stepped away from the bottom of the ladder, Sam put Dave’s feet outside the rungs and slid the rest of the way down. Without warning, his screen flashed with a white glow, and Sam found his persona slumping down to the ground, paralyzed. “Hey! My controls aren’t responding!”

  “They’re working fine, Sam. All part of the story,” Len replied, and Sam saw Mason step over Dave’s crumpled form and open the warehouse door. Mason then dragged Dave by the heels into the warehouse where ancient mystic words filled the air. In the pod’s lower left screen, Sam saw the flashing clue icon. Clicking it highlighted the gold ring and bracelet on Mason’s left hand. The clue also suggested he stay quiet while his persona was paralyzed. Sam stayed quiet while Dave’s viewpoint showed him the floor close to the circle. His head lolled over and the gold urn dominated his central screen—an ugly Aztec god figure resting on three diamond-shaped feet. The eyes and the seam beneath his head glowed bright as Alan Gehring continued his mystic ritual.

  Mason said, “Here’s another sacrifice for Niangarl, Alan. You owe me big for this.”

  The bespectacled figure in robes finished a series of chants, and then stared with great anger at Mason. “You were supposed to bring three more! One doesn’t do us any good!”

  “Look up,” Mason said, sneering up at Ace and Darlene.

  “Traitor!” Darlene yelled, while Ace simply drew his gun and smashed the nearest pane of glass with the butt of the gun. AJ yelled as Ace, “Mason, Alan, you don’t know what you’re doing . . . what you’re dealing with . . . It can’t be controlled, no matter what you think.”

  The gangsters all drew guns to fire at Ace, and Mason yelled, “No! We need them alive . . . for now . . .” Alan continued his incantations with a louder, faster pitch, and the glow around the urn intensified.

  “Len, Tessa, not feeling the fun for my character right now,” Sam said. “If I’d had a chance to fight back before getting paralyzed, I might be more patient about this . . .”

  “Good point, Sam,” Tessa said, “Len, can we make sure . . .”

  “Almost there,” Len said.

  “Huh?” Tessa said, “Len, pay attention. Your boss says you’re not showing our guests the best sides of this game.”

  “Oh, they’ll see something soon, Tessa.” The gloating in Len’s voice was immediately apparent. “And so will you.”

  Tessa yelled, “Hey! Why are the pod
s locked? Rick? Bobby? Len? What’s going on? This is ruining the game, guys.”

  “Only for them and you, boss,” Len mocked.

  “What’s it promised you, Len?” AJ’s voice was quiet and calm.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, sir,” Len replied.

  Sam couldn’t see Ace from Dave’s vantage point in the game, but he heard a gun up above fire twice. Golden light completely enveloped the urn and a roar erupted from it.

  “Then you won’t mind if I help the story along then?” AJ asked, his voice barely heard over the crackling and roaring coming through the headphones and the pod speakers.

  A green mist geysered out of the now-fallen head of the urn, and Len yelled, “Hey—what’d you do that for? You’re ruining my plan!” While Len’s Mason persona stood stock still, Sam could hear Len turn his microphone away and then some grunting and whispering.

  “Yes I am, son,” AJ said. “I cancelled the bindings on that urn, unleashing the spirit without your having the proper precautions in place. You can’t control him now.”

  “Aaaalllekkkssaaannndduuuurrrr . . .” On screen, a sibilant hiss came from the emerald cloud, which now engulfed the legs of the Mackay gang. Talons impaled the three gangsters and their robed leader, dragging them all with gurgling screams into the roiling fog. Sam watched the mist flash red as each vanished into it. After the fourth man’s screams died, the mists coalesced into a gigantic muscular male torso with massive arms and clawed hands. The torso held no neck or head—simply a gout of shimmering black flames with deep green leonine eyes at the center. It looked at Mason, then at Ace and Darlene, and laughed loud enough to shake the pods.

  “Hello again, trickster,” AJ sighed.

  “Again?” Sam asked. “AJ, you said this was a Lexicon Jones story. Who’s Alexander?”

  “He’s talking to the old man, fool, not the character,” Len snapped, as his Mason persona came back to life and fell to his knees. “He’s here, like you asked. You can have Soltare, just like you wanted.”