by Vic Connor
Somera’s head whirls. She can’t even begin to process this news. Had she given in to her parents’ protests, had she agreed to marry Sameer and become a part of his family, then she would have been living in that exact same house right about now. She would have been building a life with Sameer, learning to love him and to care for his family… She would have been caught by the bomb, by the fire, and would most likely be dead right now. The same thought seems to have occurred to her father: he stares at her, tears welling in his eyes, his brow creased and furrowed more deeply than she’s ever seen it before.
Somera’s heart goes out to Sameer, the strange, cocky boy she had behaved so callously toward. Her heart goes out to his family, who wanted the best for their son and were instead presented with a young girl who held them in obvious contempt. “Oh, my goodness, no,” she whispers, tears running thicker and faster down her cheeks.
“I pray to God for your safety, every single night,” her father tells her. “He heard my prayers, I think. You were wise to follow the path you have taken, my darling Somera. It has kept you safe.”
Unable to hold back any longer, she weeps. Every wracking sob contains all the grief and all the stress that has gathered inside of her since she left her home. The fatigue she feels from the previous night’s gaming weighs heavy, as does the anger that burned within Somera from the treatment she received from her fellow classmates. The homesickness and the heartbreak at leaving her parents almost crushes her, as it all mixes together.
This is where the darkness came from, she thinks. I pushed Aremos so readily toward the darkness, but he pulled me back to the better side of my own nature. But how can one person hold all of this in their heart, be shown so much ugliness, without letting the darkness grow?
“How, papa?” she asks, looking up into his kind, sad eyes. “How do people listen to this kind of thing, all the ugly, horrible things, and stay good? How do we not all turn to animals, to vicious, awful beasts?”
“Oh, don’t be so silly, my darling,” her father whispers tenderly. “The answer is easy. We all have people in our lives like you.” She almost melts at his kindness, at the open-hearted generosity of his love. “We all have people to show us the best of ourselves, people for whom we must cling to the light, the kindness … the love in life. That’s our privilege and our duty, Somera, my darling.”
She nods, bowled over by his wisdom. “Yes, papa. You are right.”
They talk for a little while longer. She says she’ll come home, but her father forbids it. “Not until this place is safer, and not until your studies will allow it.”
“But then, when everything is in order?” she asks.
“Then you had better come home, my darling.” He smiles. “My heart could not take it otherwise.”
Tired and emotionally wrecked though she might be, Somera forces herself to get ready and go into college. When she arrives at the academy, however, she finds that it’s in chaos. So much chaos everywhere around me, she thinks. It’s all too much.
But as it turns out, the events of last night made a mark both in the main game, affecting Arkhart itself, and in the servers of Lynch Media—and, by association, the Pixel Academy. The corridors are abuzz with the news and a couple of TV screens have been set up, showing reports on all the main news channels revolving around conspiracies of cyber terrorism aimed at the company.
Catching bits and pieces of the broadcasts, Somera learns all the servers crashed, overpowered by the sheer amount of progressive programming taking place, spilling out of Sanguis and into every connected system. Now everybody—the higher-ups in Lynch Media, the board of directors, the heads of every programming division, even the college staff at the academy—seems to be looking for answers. They’re looking to make heads roll.
Somera grows nervous. Her part in the crisis could be discovered easily enough, she’s sure of it. A couple of her classmates hear the term ‘cyber terrorism’ and turn on her, asking if any of her ‘rag-head friends’ are responsible.
“You don’t need to look far for terrorists in this place!” One of the boys laughs, mocking her as she enters their seminar room.
But she lets it slide and simply settles behind her desk: her mind is too overwrought to deal with idiots like him.
No classes take place that day, however. Rather, since the servers are all still being repaired, the students receive hand-written assignments and are asked to remain on campus, to “aid with the investigations as and when we need to question certain members of the student body,” as one teaching assistant puts it to them.
“What the heck does that mean?” people start asking each other. “What’s the attack got to do with us?” They moan and they grumble, but they do as they’re told—and for the whole day, everybody stays on campus, fizzing with barely contained stress and excitement.
Somera feels the stress more keenly than others, to the point that she nearly throws up several times. How could I have been so reckless? she wonders. I put my career at risk just so I could prove myself in a stupid game!
At around 2 p.m., as she sits in a corner of the library scribbling in a notebook, a company aide approaches her table. “Excuse me, miss,” he says, bending low and whispering. He speaks quietly, but everybody watches, tense as they are. “You need to come with me now.”
“Where to?” she asks, packing up her things as her stomach turns to lead.
“The dean’s office,” the aid tells her. “A panel of company and college experts are looking into recent events. Your assistance is required.”
Somera waits in the reception area of the dean’s office for fifteen minutes as the panel inside the office itself finishes up another interview. The rumors have been flying all day and they are not subtle. The FBI are involved now, and they want answers almost as badly as the staff; they’ve been interrogating various people all day, students included, and the tech teams upstairs have been going through reams and reams of data. The initial trouble-shooting investigation is expected to go on for weeks, with a wider investigation set to follow over the coming months or even years. They are drafting in more and more people—cybercrime experts and governmental officials, all determined to find out whatever they can about the illegal mod and how deeply entrenched it is in Lynch’s systems.
Somera is sure something horrible awaits her, she is convinced of it: expulsion, deportation … if she’s lucky. The thought of criminal charges turns her white. She nearly faints with anxiety, and only stays conscious through force of will and by staying on her feet, pacing up and down, up and down.
The image of her mother in bandages floats incessantly before her eyes. Her mother in hospital, her mother beaten up by a force beyond her own reckoning… Only her father’s words comfort her. We all have people to show us the best of ourselves, people for whom we must cling to the light, the kindness … the love in life. That’s our privilege and our duty, Somera, my darling…
Finally, when her nerves nearly fail her, the dean’s office door opens, and Somera is told to come in.
A panel of five stern-looking men and women sit behind Nikolai’s long, sweeping desk. Each has tired eyes and skin made pale from stress and a lack of sleep. “Come in, please sit down,” someone says, gesturing to a chair in the middle of the room.
There’s no sign of Nikolai himself. His room seems to have been requisitioned from him by this panel. Somera sinks into a chair, her heart thumping hard. She feels queasy, as though she could be sick instantly and endlessly.
One of the panel members begins to speak. She is a woman in her fifties with ash-colored hair and crow’s feet crinkling the corners of her eyes. Her lips move, each word like the crack of a whip. Somera catches every few phrases, though for the most part her head spins and her hair tingles as her brain tries to process what on Earth is going on.
“You’re being expelled from the academy…” the woman explains, her eyes firm as they lock with Somera’s. “Our server logs tell us that a profile linked to you, a play
er profile by the name of Aremos, was logged into the illegal mod Nightmare of Sanguis… Prior to the attack last night, and periodically over the last couple of months… The severity of the situation is obvious, and you will be remanded… After relevant law-enforcement agencies have finished with you, you will likely be deported… This company no longer supports your visa…”
Somera opens her mouth to defend herself, but she’s far too tired. Her nerves are at their end and she sags into her chair, deflated. The queasiness dies and her heart stops its hammering as the understanding of her situation rolls over her. She wants to shout and scream, but her voice falters in her throat. She wants to fight back, like Aremos would do—like Aremos always has done—but her muscles fail her. Instead, she sits still as tears began to fall silently down her cheeks for the second time today.
All I care about is my mother and my father and the safety of my village, she tells herself. All this can go and hang, if they do not want me…
But she is disingenuous to herself. Of course, this matters. Her dream is evaporating before her eyes and she can only watch on, impotent.
As the woman continues, preparing to take down some information, preparing to question Somera, the dean’s door opens and Nikolai walks in. He coughs politely to interrupt the panel and holds up a manila folder. A few sheets of paper poke out from inside of the folder, and Nikolai smiles at Somera as he crosses his room and places the file on his desk. The blond woman takes it and removes a few sheets of paper, scanning them with a faint frown beginning to cross itself over her eyebrows.
While she reads, Nikolai addresses the other men and women.
“I’ve been going through the data streams myself and, as these documents show, the server logs tell a different story about this young woman. It seems as though she did not join the illegal mod, after all: her profile was hacked and duplicated. Whomever was using it—and I can see no way of finding out their identity, at least for the moment—was stealing from this young woman, using her character as a shield for their own illegal activities.”
As the other board members look over the papers he has provided, Nikolai turns to Somera, grins, and winks, ever so briefly.
Of course, Somera thinks, her eyes wide as everything falls into place. Nikë: Nikolai. The dean of the academy is the dreadnought—he has been all along. That is how Nikë appeared to know her, how he has managed to keep an eye on her, and how he will now, it seems, save her from recriminations after the attack the previous evening.
The people stare at the papers in confusion, revealing they clearly have little grasp over the technology in comparison to Nikolai. They seem to have no real way of reading the data, and for the time being, it looks like they must take the dean at his word.
As Somera remains still, overwhelmed, Nikolai speaks, reciting some meaningless jargon that appears to impress the board. “So you see,” he finishes. “There’s no way that Somera could have done the things you’d thought she had done.
“In fact,” he carries on, warming to his theme. “She’s as much a victim of cyber bullying as Lynch Media and the Pixel Academy. Not only this, but you yourselves have now chosen to victimize her, compounding everything. Rather, you should be apologizing to Somera.”
“Eh…” one board member utters, then looks askance, his face reddening.
“To think your systems could allow this to happen,” Nikolai continues, “when she assumed that her data was secure, that her online identity was secure—you have not only let her down, but tried to pin the blame on her and, doubtless, many others like her who are victims…”
The blond woman straightens in her seat, her back erect and her eyes fixed once more on Somera. “Please allow me to offer my apologies for the breach in our security, and for our baseless accusations,” she says. “Let me assure you that your position in this school is secure, and as soon as our servers are back online, you will have full access to the latest in cyber-security.”
“Th-thank you,” Somera manages to stutter, surprised at this abrupt shift in demeanor.
“It’s the very least we could do,” the woman says. “Now, I know you must be tired. Please, be excused, and thank you for your cooperation today.”
Somera stands and leaves while Nikolai remains, still talking to the board. She feels wobbly on her feet: light-headed and exhausted beyond measure.
The news is out, apparently: Aremos the Great has been hacked. His profile was used in an illegal mod, Nightmare of Sanguis, to complete missions in environments that were harder than any ever seen in Arkhart. It was Aremos who was responsible for rallying the players of the illegal mod for their final battle against the rogue programming and the demonic horde created as a result, and it was Aremos who slew the mightiest demon of all, the Osirion.
Rumors accompany the news, however. As Somera walks along the academy’s corridors, she sees people with tablets and phones watching footage of Aremos as he fought and slew the demonic horde, as he fled and returned mightier than ever in his griffon form. And as Somera passes them, her fellow students watch her, wary yet impressed: Her name has become attached to Aremos. People have heard that she created him, that she is him, and they have noticed the likeness in their names and understood there is truth to the rumors.
“Is it true… Somera, are you…? But how can it be…?” Questions come to her from people who had never bothered to speak to her before. They come from people who have openly scorned her before, the laughter in their eyes replaced with a slightly fearful respect.
Ignoring everybody, Somera walks to the college rec room, feeling like she is walking on air, floating above it all. The room is crowded, and everyone is talking—but they fall silent when she walks in. All eyes turn to her, and she knows she has to address them.
Somera has never felt so conflicted. Three things revolve in her mind’s eye, all of them looming large and pressing in on her as her fellow students watch. Her own identity plays on her, the divide between herself in real life and herself as Aremos in the game: Where does one end and the other begin? she wonders. When she calls herself Aremos, what is she really saying? And how responsible should she be as Aremos, given how real the consequences could be for her—for Somera…?
These questions give way to the image of Nikolai, the dean, the dreadnought Nikë who had given her such a hard time. He had abused her in-game whilst befriending her in the classroom. He had groomed her as a lieutenant in Sanguis whilst grooming her for a bright future in real life. He had beaten her bloody to make her tougher, then he had sheltered her from the consequences of their joint actions when she could not defend herself.
And this all gives way to thoughts of her parents, bruised and broken and so, so far away. The image of her beloved home town in ruins because of the actions of so few breaks her heart, and the idea of her mother in a hospital bed and her father alone and scared is almost more than she can bear.
All the while, her classmates and fellow students stare at her, wanting answers, wanting to know the truth of the situation.
One of them speaks up. “So, er, Somera, are you, like, you know—” She silences him with a look, which she has never been able to do before. She feels their respect bubbling up, palpable and real, and she feels the fear they feel for her alter-ego brimming over.
She makes up her mind, doing what she has realistically wanted to do for a while now. She stands on a chair, looks around the sea of faces, and clears her throat as a few dozen smartphone cameras point at her, recording. “Guys,” she announces. “I am—”
Epilogue
Aremos the Great dodges and swerves, raising high the Staff of Adamant in a blaze of white light. He manages to duck under the last swing before he’s wreathed in flame, keeping the demon at bay.
The journey into the heart of the volcano was long and arduous, and Aremos had to fight a myriad lesser demonic beasts along his way. He blasted them apart with White Fire, burning them all to a cinder, or else he lay them low with his new sword, pulsating
with his own magics. He cut his way along and down, weaving through passages and wincing all the while as the heat rose, the heart of the volcano growing nearer. Finally, he emerged from a slim passageway to find a high arch before him. Beyond the arch was an open, high-vaulted cavern with stalagmites and stalactites the size of houses rising and falling throughout. Surrounding the cavern were deep trenches, each glowing orange with the fury of the fire below. In the middle was a platform, reached from the archway via a slim bridge, and on the platform stood a mighty demon, a creature of purest black magic who once might have terrified him.
It is three times his own height, with lithe arms, hoofed feet and skin of the subtlest hues of pink, purple, and scarlet. Great horns grow from its head and its eyes burn hotter even than the center of the volcano. It holds a sword of obsidian in one great fist, and in the other, it clutches a staff of silver and gold. Silver and gold amulets drip from its neck, all adorned with precious stones, and bracelets and bangles jangle on its wrists and ankles. A powerful nimbus of magical energy surrounds it as Aremos approaches, pulsing and glowing as it chants a deep, sonorous litany, working an evil ritual.
On its altar, chained and bound, lies the body of Meredith, the sorcerer’s daughter. The demon would fill her with its black magic, warping her into its own image to work as a pawn in its evil schemes. But Aremos arrived in time to stop the ritual as it began. He entered the chamber and threw a cascade of White Fire and chain lightning at the demon, forcing it away from the woman’s body and making it deal with Aremos instead.
Now, ten minutes later, their duel rages to its climax.
Once, I’d have feared this creature, Aremos thinks, dodging its sword and returning fire with a blast of pure, white magic from his outstretched palm. The blast catches the demon in its face, cracking one horn clean off its skull and making it stagger backward with a howl of pain and rage.