Teal was about to respond when Junco tapped her arm, pointed at the door, and exclaimed “Crap. That's him – Spandex!”
Then all hell broke lose.
Teal was at the biker's throat even before he had both feet on the beer-stained carpet. She was gouging, kicking and punching at a furious rate. The three accomplices left Spandex to sort out his own problems and made a beeline for Junco. He was obviously the main target for this evening's festivities. He fought hard but never really stood a chance and went down under a hail of fists and boots. Then it stopped.
Junco staggered to his feet and just about made it to a bar-stool before he noticed Ani standing over the battered, bleeding, and headless bodies of the three that had attacked him. The most notable thing was that the cuts were butcher-shop clean, no ragged pieces of flesh anywhere. The heads seemed to be wherever they had rolled to after landing on the floor.
Teal lurched towards the bar to join the others. Her head was cut but the damage was superficial despite the large quantity of blood. Her limp worried Junco more.
“What happened to Spandex?” Asked Junco
“Not sure, one second I was pounding him the next he was gone”
“Ran away?”
Teal: “No just vanished into thin air – poof”
Junco fixed Ani with a hard stare. “Not funny – not funny at all!”
Ani looked puzzled but didn't say anything.
“Were those goons yours?”
Realization came to Ani. “No, other than the other me I have not populated this sim at all”. He continues. “I am into environments, mood, atmospherics. I set the thing up then enjoy watching others do what they want with it. I really don't do people.”
“What about the beheadings.” Asked Teal”
Ani pointed a finger just to one side of her nearly empty beer glass and drew it across the glass. “Now pick up your glass.”
Teal did as was instructed the top part of the glass came away with her hand while the bottom inch with the beer in it remained on the bar. The new top of the glass was perfectly smooth.
“Holy crap that's impressive.” Junco subconsciously glanced at his own finger. But before he could even formulate his question Ani was already answering it.
“Only me I'm afraid. I don't even offer that little trick as a reward or online purchase. It would just make the scenario too chaotic.”
Teal changed the subject. “Well, Junco I don't know about you but I need to think this thing through – would you mind if we dropped back down to your Level for a while?”
It was Ani, looking a little sheepish, rather than Junco who spoke next. “There is one thing that I neglected to mention earlier – and you are not going to like it”
Junco and Teal both turned to him.
“Your injuries – they go with you when you leave the Level”
It was only the thought of the three neatly severed heads that stopped both Junco and Teal from kicking the crap out of their host.
Ani pressed on. “Look, its not that bad, you can be fixed up here within the hour – be as good if not better than new.”
“And I bet that treatment is available as an in app purchase making you considerably richer and us considerably poorer.” Teal was catching onto the economics of virtual surprisingly quickly.
Ani shook his head and at that same moment the credits totals in their displays showed unlimited amount and unlimited duration. The next line down on Junco's flipped from 'Guest' to 'Member full rights'. “Least I could do.” said the program's creator.
“Thanks – I think” said Junco. “But why no auto injury fix on exit?”
“It wasn't planned. I forgot to reinsert injury fix code on one of the maintenance and bug fix updates. Within the hour I was getting reports of members and guests arriving back at Level Zero still injured. What amazed me was the fact that they didn't seem to mind – of course they could just come back here and get fixed up but even so. Apparently, it made the scenario more real – the players wanted their actions to have consequences.”
“So you fix them up for free?” asked Teal.
“Offered that, even set up a poll just to make sure I was doing the right thing. The result was five to one in favor of charging. Sometimes you just have to go with the flow.”
Teal was not done. “Injuries carry over to Level Zero but are they persistent down at Minus One? “
“Not to Level Minus One, but they do carry through to Level Zero and to the Levels above this one.”
Junco perked up. “So you are saying that this Level has entry points to higher Levels?”
“Yes,” said Ani, “and to some sideways ones, other Level Ones. I told you this build is solid, makes a great platform for development that just wouldn't be possible on Level One's current architecture. Entire tech corporations are migrating here solely to do development work. Of course the taxation and banking laws help but that is a whole other story.”
The visit to Bob's Superior Body Shop Inc. went as well as could be expected. The two of them walked in through a scanning type device that was built into the doorway of a small building next door to the bar. Junco suspected that the shop's close proximity to the bar was not coincidental. After the scan, which Junco wrongly assumed was a security measure, they were told to lay down on adjoining slabs. Teal threw Junco a worried look which he in returned with a very forced smile. Junco had done some odd virtual stuff in his time but this trip was turning out to be right on the edge. He was in awe of how well Teal was handling her first time ever out of Level Minus One space.
When they were on the slabs what looked like metal boxes came down from the ceiling and covered each of them. A voice from inside the box read out an impressive list of each of their injuries with a credit amount. After the list was completed the disembodied voice stated that all fees were waived by order of Ani the Benevolent and the boxes lifted back up and into the ceiling. Teal lifted herself off the slab and gingerly placed her weight on what was her injured leg. She felt no pain even after taking a few tentative steps. The door scanner wished them a safe and profitable day as they passed through it and onto the metallic roadway.
The giant red sun was coming up over the lake, sea or whatever the body of heavy metallic liquid stuff was. There was also a fog trying to migrate from the water onto the land. Junco and Teal found what they assumed to be a bench that appeared to be made out of incredibly thick and flawless orange tinted glass. As the alien sun made its way fully over the strange sea they both just sat, perfectly still within their own individual worlds – taking it all in.
After watching this unreal world go by for several minutes Teal turned to Junco. “Don't know about you, but I'm hungry.”
“OK lets take a walk. There must be a cafe somewhere in this scenario.” Junco replied.
“I's prefer a real meal to be honest – let's drop down for a while.” She continued. “Besides I want to test the stuff about injuries and healing for myself”
“Sounds good to me.” And at almost the same instant they were back in Junco's apartment on Level Zero not even stopping for a readjustment period on Level One.
8. JUNCO'S APARTMENT
Junco opened two cartons of nutrients and gave one of them to Teal who was less than impressed. “You have got to be kidding me!” and then. “No way ever am I going to eat this slop – we can go back to mine for some real food”
“You don't understand. You don't eat it without an assist program; please let me show you.”
Teal reluctantly agreed. Junco accessed his food folder on his internal homepage then selected a fish main course and ice cream dessert. For location he chose picnic area, side of mountain overlooking desert. He left the time on its default sunset setting. Teal was in full access mode while he was making the selections and did not raise any objections. She did, however, add a bottle of something very potent to the mix. They chose not to add the cleaning up and waiting for transport home option that was provided for extra authenticity. O
nce the meal was finished the scene faded out and Junco's apartment returned. Only now there were two empty cartons in front of them.
Teal looked like a child with a new favorite toy. This left Junco confused. “Nothing that has happened today has really fazed you yet you are excited by this?
Teal pondered on this for awhile before answering. “The other stuff was like a dream or rather a nightmare. It was too big to take in, to process. Also it had a continuity to it like a story.” She thought a little more before speaking again. “This was doing stuff at the same time on two different Levels – that's it I think.”
“Makes sense I suppose. I know I'll need a hell of a lot of therapy to get past today.”
Junco considered himself a pretty tough cookie but he was fast coming to the realization that Teal was harder by a factor of lots. He knew that her type of hardness was not genetic, that it came from brutish experience. Despite what she said about recent events seeming like a dream there was something else going on with her. Junco was certain that Teal had seen death before, close-up and often.
Junco decided to check in at work. Of course Level Minus One oil production was trundling along very nicely without his help, just as it was designed to do. He left a note saying that he would probably not be back on duty for several days and knew that this would not put anyone out in the slightest. Teal didn't bother tagging along on this call and he was not overly surprised to find her checking out one of his fight sims when he returned.
Some of the talk that night was broad brush about their respective families and cultures but most was much more specific and most of it related to Teal's past.
Teal had no memories prior to the age of ten, nothing. It was as if a switch had been flipped on her tenth birthday and the lights came on. Before her tenth birthday nothing – from then on everything. Not only that but her memory after her first decade was complete there were no gaps and no errors. Sound, visuals, touch, taste and smell. It was all there exactly as if stored on the most reliable back up device ever. Of course the human brain is usually just about anything but the perfect recording device – at least in terms of fidelity. Great for an overview but downright lousy at the detail.
Junco filed this information away for later discussion; as for now he was quite happy to listen to Teal talk. Truth be told, he was also enjoying hearing the story without the use of any technology. It had been a long time since he had done anything without a layer of virtual reality and he was actually enjoying the experience. Of course that could be more to do with the company than anything else.
She started her advanced diploma training at age eleven, specializing in astrophysics, military strategy, and population manipulation. This was one discipline more than was usual for the institution and she was eight years younger than the traditional applicants. Not only did she compete academically with her much older classmates but also physically. She was on several school sports teams and represented district at swimming by age thirteen. Like every other person from her state she entered the military for her four year mandatory service. She chose to start her service after finishing her diploma and spending a year on the lecture circuit. She was sixteen when she joined up.
Junco was curious. “Why do you have a military?”
“A couple of reasons beyond the obvious one of self defense.”
“Wait – defense from what?”
“From Level Zero of course” Teal replied.
“What? We are no threat to you surely. I mean, I didn't even know that your group existed up until a few hours ago.”
“You really think that no one from your Level has the slightest idea that we exist other than the odd eccentric historian?” she continued before he could respond. “Believe me, the drones, the cameras and even the occasional bomb are not figments of our imagination.“
Junco had never heard even as much as a rumor of this before and he actually took a quirky pride in being something of a conspiracy theorist. He did a couple of online searches while she was talking but of course he drew a blank.
Teal went on to explain the other benefits of a military which were more esoteric and of much less interest to Junco. Besides he didn't really buy into the idea that people needed to be involved with the handling of lethal weapons to bond or to have a sense of purpose outside of their own existence.
Junco woke before Teal, who was still crashed out in the corner of the room. He was halfway through his first virtual amphetamine coffee when it occurred to him that doing some research on Ani may well be a good starting point for saving his newly endangered neck. Junco did try to do a search for Mechanik but nothing of any use showed up for that one – no big surprise there. He entered Ani's name into the search box and expected to see hundreds of references instantly but nothing came back. Junco tried a few variations but still came up blank. This was odd because Ani's name had risen like cream when he was searching for someone to do Teal's implant work. Now, apparently, he had completely disappeared, or more to the point had never even existed.
By this time Teal had woken up and was on her first drink of something interesting that she had ordered up from Junco's library. “Morning, Teal – good sleep?”
“Great thanks, what are you up to?”
“Hook up and see for yourself.”
She did as Junco suggested and replayed Junco's recent browsing history. “That makes sense.”
“Wait what? Didn't make any to me but there again I don't have an IQ in the two hundred plus range” Junco was smiling.
“No, seriously, we've been played. Think about it, your previous search for someone to implant me was hacked, probably by Vireo.”
Junco thought he knew where she was going with this.
“Think about it, Ani was an easy choice, a no-brainer. Do that search now and its a mess, we would spend hours trying to separate out the genuine from the cons.”
This made sense to Junco, he knew that for something as important as a temporary implant he would have normally spent hours if not days checking out star ratings, reviews online forums, and his social networks. “So then – how do you feel about a return visit?”
“Do we really have a choice?” Teal asked.
After a breakfast of toast, eggs and watermelon eaten while in a transparent bubble two miles above the surface of volcanically hyperactive Io, Junco hit the spinning cube with “Rubidium Beach” on it.
They were back on the same glass bench looking over the liquid metallic sea. Only now it was early evening judging by the position of the huge red sun. Two moons, the largest seemingly ten times the size of the Earth's satellite, were visible to the west. The fast moving objects that seemed intent on running into them on their last visit were nowhere in sight. The road was still metal and the buildings looked pretty much the same as before but there were differences. Several of the buildings had either gained or lost identities and the air tasted different. There was a sulfur tang that was not present before. Junco guessed that time flowed differently here.
The neon sign above the bar was no longer well maintained though it did still say 'Jupiter Moon Bar' Two of the letters, the M and the first o, were on the verge of going dark. Once inside, Junco pulled a couple of chrome bar stools together and they proceeded to order. Their supply of credits was still unlimited and Junco noted that Teal's countdown timer had reset to infinity. Odd seeing as the implant was meant to dissolve after an allotted period of time. “Teal, have you checked your timer?”
“Yes, so much for a temporary implant.” She didn't seem overly concerned and Junco was relieved. He suspected that the relief was not entirely due to the current task at hand.
The bar's decor was definitely different but the layer of grime looked pretty much untouched. This time, the bar was more densely populated with around sixty others occupying all of the available tables and a fair amount of the standing room. It was a mixed crowd where the groups seemed to have little in common with each other.
Closest to the door was a group of ha
lf a dozen student types, earnest and self-conscious while the back of the room was occupied by a rougher crowd that Junco automatically associated with the sulfur smell that wafted in every time a customer either came or went. A reader's club had pushed three tables together for their group of a dozen or so members. Several of the members were getting very animated about something that sounded to Junco like 'first person omniscient.' Teal knew what they meant.
The one thing about the whole scenario that was exactly the same as before was Ani. He seemed to appear from nowhere, pulled up the only free barstool in the place and sat between them. “Want to go someplace quieter?” He asked.
9. THE CASSINI DIVISION
The three of them left the bar and headed inland. After about five minutes Ani indicated that they should stop and made them stand on what looked like a rectangular brushed steel plate that was set into the sidewalk. As soon as they were all in place four walls grew up from the metal plate and a ceiling formed above them. As soon as the box had finished forming one of the sides slid from the ceiling to the floor revealing another bar albeit a very different one.
For a start this one was clean, really clean. Not as much as a stain or a cobweb anywhere. The bartenders were all immaculate, not a bead of sweat or a grimy coverall anywhere. The drinks were all shades of neon and were served in geometric glasses with slices of geometric fruit either in the drink or perched on the glass. The place felt exclusive. There were enough customers to make the place feel comfortable but nowhere near enough to make it feel claustrophobic. Ani indicated a low perspex table bordered by green sofas on each of the long sides. He tapped the reserve sign with his forefinger and it blinked out of existence. The designer neon sign above the bar read 'The Cassini Division.'
“Well, here we are, great to see you both again.” beamed Ani. “I just know that you have some questions for me.”
The Rubidium Beach Series - Episodes 1 Through 4: Cyberpunk/Dystopian Science Fiction Page 3