by Mia Archer
“What’s happening?” Caitee asked, panic touching her voice. There must’ve been something even more terrifying happening to me, though, because she went from panicked to looking downright worried as she stared at me.
“I’m coming for you!” she shouted. “Don’t worry! I’ll be there soon! I’ll…”
Whatever she said faded away as the world melted into a star field of blinking lights, and then even that field of stars disappeared and I was in total blackness, and then nothing.
37
IRL
On the bright side it’s not like that blackness took me for very long. On the not-so-bright side that blackness resolved into Chelsey’s face staring down at me with what I could only describe as the single most unpleasant smile I think I’d ever seen.
I sat up. At least I tried to sit up. There were still some after effects from whatever the fuck she’d done to me that were really hitting me hard. I grabbed my head in a vain attempt to try and keep the world from spinning around me.
“You thought you were so clever taking everything from me,” Chelsey spat. “But there’s one thing you forgot. You don’t have any power in the real world. It doesn’t matter what the fuck you do in that game, I’m going to have the last laugh where it really matters!”
I put my hand to my head to try and get the room to stop spinning around me. I wasn’t sure what the fuck Chelsey had done to me, but it sure as hell didn’t feel great.
“What are you even doing in here?” I asked.
It was right about then that I realized there were other people in the room. A couple of guys who looked like they meant business. I figured they were the same assholes from before.
“Something tells me you guys don’t mean anything good for me,” I said.
“Get her,” Chelsey said.
The two guys grabbed me and wheeled me around. Which gave me my first good view of the Etherea crystal. Or rather what was left of the Etherea crystal. It would seem that rather than trying to get me to log out the old fashioned way, they’d simply smashed the thing.
Huh. Not the kind of thing I would’ve expected from a massive crystal that looked so solid. Usually your crystals were made of solid rock, but I guess this was the kind of crystal thatad been manufactured to contain high tech computer equipment so what the fuck did I know about how tough it was?
The guy who wasn’t holding me in place raised something that looked hard and metal. It was difficult to tell exactly what it was in the darkness, but I figured that whatever it was, the thing wasn’t going to feel so hot when it landed on my skull.
I preferred not having my skull busted open, thank you very much.
“You shouldn’t do that!” I said in a panic.
“Why shouldn’t I have him do this?” Chelsey said. “Don’t you understand the position you’re in? You might’ve been all big and bad in the video game, but you’re nothing out here in the real world. I can have them kill you and lose your body and there’s not a damned thing you can do about it!”
“Uh right,” I said, thinking back to some advice I’d gotten and coming up with a bluff on the fly. “Except if you do that then that picture is going to go out to the world.”
“What?” Chelsey growled.
“Yeah,” I said. “Dead man’s switch. If I disappear and I’m not around to push a button then that thing gets emailed out to all the biggest gossip sites in the world. It won’t matter if I’m dead at that point. Everyone’s going to know what you were doing in the game, and then they’re probably going to find out how you were humiliated by a rizon. Think they’ll start wondering what happened to that rizon when they figure out I’ve disappeared?”
I was thinking fast and bullshitting. Thinking fast and bullshitting was the only thing I had going for me. If I didn’t think fast then I was going to be royally fucked over very quickly.
She might still kill me. I was well aware that thinking and talking fast and bullshitting might be the last thing I ever did in this world. I still had to give it a try, though. Otherwise I was going to be seriously fucked.
“I know daddy has a lot of money,” I said. “But you and I both know that when the world gets ahold of a story like that they don’t let go until someone’s head rolls. Is that going to be your head? Daddy’s head? Or is he going to sacrifice the two guys who actually did the job?”
I pointedly stared at the guy who was holding up the thing that might or might not be a crow bar, but ultimately it didn’t matter what the fuck it was if it was going to bash my skull in when it was applied to said skull with a great deal of force.
The dudes suddenly looked unsure of themselves. I’m sure they were getting paid a shitload of money to do what they were doing, but I was also sure that in their line of work they didn’t want the kind of attention I was describing.
“Fuck you,” Chelsey said. “Come on boys. We’re going to take care of this and then we’re going to take care of you, rizon.”
Well then. That wasn’t exactly what I was hoping for, but it was better than one of these dudes braining me in the middle of the Etherea lab and leaving my body for Jessica to find.
They manhandled me out of the room. I glanced at the plate that was supposed to keep me locked in here and saw that someone had smashed the thing up. Presumably with the same tool they’d been on the verge of using to smash my brains in.
It was nice to know I’d been able to stop them for a moment, because that plate was made out of tough stuff and I knew my head wouldn’t stand up to that kind of abuse.
“The school is gonna be pissed about that,” I said.
“My dad’s the one who gave them the grant to build this stupid lab in the first place,” she said. “They can bill me for it.”
“You mean they can bill your dad for it,” I said. “He’s the one who has the real power.”
I figured if I was going to have a short reprieve then I was going to use every moment of that reprieve to remind her that what she was talking about doing here was a terrible fucking idea, and if she got caught then it was going to end badly for her.
At the very least I figured there was a good chance that I might convince the two meatheads dragging me along that it wasn’t going to be good for their long term career prospects to continue going along with this.
For a surprise Jessica was out there at her desk. For a moment I felt a flash of anger that she’d let them in there in the first place, but it only took one look at her terrified face to realize maybe she didn’t have any more choice in this than I did. She kept looking at the big guys, and particularly at the weapons they were carrying.
“So what’s the plan anyway?” I asked, figuring there might be a chance here if I could get Jessica to overhear something. “Are you going to take me to some quiet corner of the Academy and off me, or are you just going to brain me in the middle of the quad because you think you’re powerful enough to get away with it?”
“I’m not stupid, rizon,” Chelsey said. “We’re going to take you someplace nice and quiet where we can take care of you for good. They won’t be able to record anything happening in my room.”
“Oh yeah?” I asked. “And you don’t think they’re recording who goes in and out of your building? That’s a ballsy move.”
“Would you shut the fuck up?” she asked. “I’m getting tired of your mouth! None of this is going to save you!”
“I mean it’s not going to save me, but it’s at least a good reminder to you and your friends here that what you’re doing is illegal as fuck. We do still have laws, you know, even if they’re selectively enforced,” I said.
“Shut the fuck up!” she hissed again.
“Like they might enforce those laws for a couple goons who were following orders and thought this was going to be a nice easy job where they kill someone in a lab, and suddenly it’s getting a hell of a lot more complicated,” I continued.
The grip at my back seemed to loosen just a bit. Like the guy was thinking about all the trouble he could get
in for pulling something like this. I couldn’t help but smile. I also glanced to Jessica as they led me out.
“Got that?” I mouthed at her.
Her eyes went a little wider. Then the hint of a smile played across her face. It wasn’t a hell of a lot, but I figured it was better than her doing nothing. She nodded, though she still looked terrified.
Which was probably a good thing. I didn’t need her suddenly looking all confident. Not when those guys were escorting me out of there and Chelsey might see her going from terrified to confident and wonder what the fuck I was trying to pull.
We stepped out into the hall. Chelsey pointed up to one of the cameras hidden in the ceiling. They usually had a nice pleasant blue light on them to let people know they were being recorded. Only there were no lights on these.
“It’s amazing how cheap it is to buy off the people who work here,” she said. “They really should pay them more, but I suppose they keep the salaries low because that makes it easier to hand out bribes.”
“That actually makes sense from a sick and twisted point of view,” I said. “Not like educators have ever made all that much to begin with.”
It disgusted me. They purposely kept the pay low for the people working here, because what better way to bribe someone than to make sure they weren’t making enough to make ends meet while living in the elevator so they’d be more amenable to bribes?
It also made it crystal clear why there was never any stink about teachers obviously taking bribes to let people get through their schooling. It wasn’t a bug in the system. It was a feature that the ultra rich took advantage of. Those motherfuckers.
“You’re still not going to get away with this,” I said.
“I already have,” she said.
“At least I’ll be able to fuck you over from beyond the grave with that picture,” I shot back at her.
That was the only thing I had left. She literally had my life in her hands now, and the only thing I could use to get back at her was the threat of releasing a compromising picture that would cause her some embarrassment.
Embarrassment versus getting killed. Not to mention it was embarrassment she’d never suffer since I hadn’t actually had time to set up a dead man’s switch. Yeah, it wasn’t much, but it was all I had.
We walked on mostly in silence after that. Mostly because my thoughts of my impending doom kept getting interrupted by what sounded like an angry murmur. I knew that had to be my imagination, but it persisted. Like a bunch of angry bees buzzing off in the distance or something.
Though of course it’s not like there could actually be angry bees buzzing off in the distance. Not when the environmental controls self-pollinated using AI controlled micro robots since a bee might accidentally sting some rich asshole and provide them with a few moments of inconvenience.
Then we rounded the corner to Chelsey’s dorm, presumably where she intended to hook me up to her own Etherea rig so she could force me to do her bidding, and I saw the source of that angry buzzing.
It was a crowd. A massive crowd that seemed to be made up of just about everyone at the Academy. And the moment we came into view that massive crowd let out an even more massive roar.
I couldn’t help but grin when I saw who was at the head of that crowd though. None other than Katie, and she looked good and pissed off.
“Oh snap,” I said. “Looks like you might be in deeper shit than you thought.”
Maybe Jessica got a message off. Maybe Katie had gotten lucky guessing where Chelsey would take me. Either way, it looked like the shit was about to hit the fan.
38
Angry Mob
“What the fuck is this?” Chelsey groused.
She turned to the hired muscle she was using to quite literally strong arm me. She gestured behind us with a jerk of her head.
“They’re just in front of us. If we get the hell out of here going that way they won’t be able to…”
Something happened. One moment the dude behind me was still holding my arm so tight that it was almost to the point of pain, and the next moment he went limp followed by a thud as he hit the grass behind me.
The other guy turned, his eyes wide as they darted around trying to figure out what the fuck had done that to his friend, and then a moment later those eyes went rolling into the back of his head as he fell to the ground as well.
That time I’d seen what’d happened though. It was the sort of thing I would’ve missed if, say, I’d been blinking while it happened, but I’d been staring around with my eyes wide as well since I was trying to figure out what the hell was making these guys drop.
The answer was they were getting hit with some sort of glowing weapon that cause bolts of electricity to run over their bodies for a moment before causing them to fall to the ground. I’d heard of stun weapons that could do that sort of thing, but I’d never seen them working in person.
Down on the surface the powers that be tended to use far more direct and way more lethal means of crowd control on any of the rizon who decided to get a little uppity about their place in the world.
I’d seen that firsthand, unfortunately. They were some of my least fond memories of my time down on the surface.
Katie walked across the space between the dorm and where we stood once it was clear the hired muscle had been taken care of.
“If you think for a moment that you’re going to be able to use your influence to…”
Whatever Chelsey was about to say was interrupted as Katie reached back and clocked her with one hell of a punch. Chelsey spun around, her own eyes rolling into the back of her head as consciousness retreated from between her ears, and then she was going down for the count as well.
Between the nosebleed I’d given her and the haymaker Katie had just delivered it hadn’t been a great day for Chelsey.
“Holy shit,” I said.
“I’m not done yet,” Katie said.
“You’re not done yet?” I asked, panic setting in as I looked at Chelsey and the guards and wondered if Katie was going to do the same to me.
Her father was the Director, after all. She had more power than even Chelsey could aspire to have thanks to those family connections. If she wanted to take out some of her frustrations on me then it’d be lights out and there wasn’t anything I could do about it.
She moved in close. Then she really surprised me by wrapping her arms around me and pulling me into one hell of a thorough kiss.
My toes curled and my whole body was on fire. What can I say? It was the first real kiss I’d had since coming to the Academy. Assuming you didn’t count some of the shit that’d happened in Etherea, which I totally didn’t count considering it wasn’t happening in the real world, for all that it felt real.
Finally she pulled away. Smiled at me.
“You just took over one of the most powerful in-game intelligence networks that was being used to blackmail the rich and powerful and you got the girl,” she said. “What are you going to do next?”
I looked at her. Looked at the thugs on the ground where they’d landed after being taken out by whatever the fuck snipers Katie had working around here. I looked to the crowd who’d gathered and were cheering like they’d been set free, and realized that once more there was a hell of a lot more to everything that was happening here than I’d realized.
In-game intelligence network? Though it made sense. Run a network of girls, have them get with people in the game, then pump them for information.
Or, more likely, she was just mind controlling them in the game and then pumping them for information.
Damn.
It was all a little too much for me. My eyes rolled into the back of my head and my brain decided to check out for a little bit, only this time that checking out wasn’t assisted by an Etherea crystal pulling me out of the world.
I woke up and it felt like no time had passed. Though clearly some time had passed, because I had no idea where the hell I was. I sure as shit didn’t recognize my sur
roundings.
“What the hell?” I grumbled, rubbing some of the sleep from my eyes.
“Give it a moment,” Katie’s familiar voice said from beside me.
I turned towards her and the world spun around me. I blinked a few times and waited for my stomach to cool its jets as I tried to make sense of what the hell was going on here.
So I decided to take a look “around here” and figure out where the hell I was.
The place was lavish. I was in a huge room on a couch that was easily three times the size of the bed I had in my room back in the scholarship dorms.
“Where am I?” I asked. “And did all that stuff really happen?”
“You’re in my quarters, and why wouldn’t it happen?” Katie asked.
“I figured waking up like this there was a good chance I’d fallen after Tori and Chelsey confronted me outside class and this whole thing was a dream or something,” I said.
“I can assure you it’s not a dream,” another male voice that sounded strangely familiar said from off to the side.
“Who is…”
My eyes went wide as I realized exactly who that was talking to me. A voice I’d heard plenty of times because he was always out in front of the cameras giving speeches. I tried to scramble up, and the world went spinning around me again.
“You’re suffering from the aftereffects of being pulled out of Etherea by having your crystal destroyed,” the man said, sitting down on a table next to the couch that was bigger than my bed and smiling a kind smile. “I’ve been in touch with top experts at Etherea, however, and they assure me that you’ll be fine. You might be dizzy for a little while, but otherwise you’ll be fine.”
“Director Reynolds,” I said. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m Director Reynolds to the outside world,” he said. “But for you I’m simply Thomas, or Tom. Katie here calls me dad, of course, but that might be a little familiar considering I understand the two of you are just getting to know one another.”