Normally, Todget started off the night by working out his muscles and stretching. He would spend over an hour contorting and lifting his body. For extra weight he would get Lily to lie on top of him. Lily would also work out, but later, right before her second shower and bed. Tonight, however, Todget had a fight and needed to save his strength, so he spent the entire hour stretching and clearing his mind in preparation. Although he didn’t tell Lily, only one of the fighters would leave the ring alive.
CHAPTER 7
MetaGame, also known as a “Divine Quest” or a “House Crusade,” is a high-stakes real game typically played by nobility. Each month, one major house is selected to play the MetaGame…
MetaGames are comprised of a series of quests. These quests can be of any kind, the only stipulation being that it must be real-real meaning that the game is not illusionary, as is typical of spanker games. Examples include classic mazes furnished with traps and hostile products, off-world scavenger hunts, and authentic murder mysteries complete with real killers and victims. Other examples…
Teams score points based on the difficulty of quests and the time they take to complete them. At the end of the year, the twelve MetaGames are compared and the winning house is crowned House Champion. In addition to the honor and points collected by the House Champion, it is widely believed that the victorious house receives divine favor from the OverSoul…
MetaGames are extremely costly to run since they do not rely on software for special effects and storyline, which is one of the reasons these games are only played by the nobility of major houses. While wealthy commoners might be able to afford such games, they usually view them as pointless and therefore do not initiate them. MetaGames, then, may be viewed as a cultural phenomenon. Indeed, they are firmly entrenched in aristocratic culture. The stakes are extremely high, and the games are taken very seriously, so much so that a winning team becomes a source of pride to its family and the envy of others. Said Grandmother Sillia of the House of Tesla, “Let the plebs play in their dreams. We, the free, have always required light.”
Participating houses ante in the points used to run the MetaGames and reward the victorious. Depending on the quests undertaken, the Divine Authority may also contribute points to the pool, which is perhaps why some call it a “Divine Quest…”
Due to the stipulation that the game use only real components and the fact that there has been a gradual but notable escalation of game intensity over the years, injury and even death are relatively common in MetaGames. Serious injury 15 %, death 4.43 %. Statistics are per game, per person.
— Excerpts from “MetaGame Summary,” gathered by familiar #409083094839 (alias Smorgeous) and presented to D_Light Ravi (#39309283271938)
D_Light clasped his hands together and smiled as he peered down on the spanker ghetto below. This could be the beginning of something HUGE! D_Light thought to himself. I’m definitely on the nobility track now! I just have to play this right…
In response to his thoughts, Smorgeous overlaid in his mind a dance composition including choral singing and a fast, low bass beat. D_Light silently reveled for a few seconds before ending the song.
The apartment mounds spanned out in front of the team as far as they could see. It had taken nearly two hours for the team to arrive in this part of the world, and so the sun hung low in the sky. The rounded hills were covered with harvester flowers laid out in clusters of reds, pinks, purples, and every other hue imaginable. D_Light knew from sky images that these low-rent residential areas resembled oriental rugs from high above. The slow, dull buzz of countless harvester insects surrounded them as they gathered precious nectar in their tiny mouths. The players were scattered throughout the twisting, crystal white pathways that snaked their way to and between the gently rolling apartment mounds. There were hundreds of them, and by the looks of them, they were mostly spankers. Spankers were easy to spot. Their eyes were always glazed over, and they’d swing their arms at unseen foes, ducking and weaving to avoid invisible dangers. D_Light was only accustomed to being around spankers when he was plugged into a spanker game himself, so he never realized how insane they looked to an outsider-how ridiculous he must look when playing them.
The ghetto was vast and densely populated, and somewhere in these hills or underneath them stalked a demon. It was the team’s task to hunt it down and report it to the Divine Authority. Mother Lyra ran her fingers absently through her long, dark hair as she peered out over the landscape. “How in Soul’s name are we going to find a demon in all of this?”
“The proverbial needle in a haystack,” Djoser said dryly.
Having decided to speak only when it mattered, D_Light said nothing. From the dark looks he got from Djoser, D_Light surmised that the noble, who still questioned the software engineer’s worth, was barely tolerating him. He would reserve his comments for when he was clearly being helpful. Worse than Djoser, however, was Lyra’s bodyguard. In what must have been a cruel joke, Lyra had brought with her Brian, the hulk of a guard who, just the night before, had been threatening him with a mace called “Tiffany.” And based on the glares and obscene gestures Brian gave him when his mistress was not looking (his favorite being the cupping of his crotch), D_Light concluded that the warrior’s opinion of him had not yet softened.
The group’s other bodyguard was also an interesting choice. Since MetaGame rules allowed for one bodyguard per noble, Djoser brought with him a female product who looked to be as much a concubine as a soldier. Why not bring a concubine along for a MetaGame? Mix play with more play, D_Light thought.
The bodyguard’s name was Amanda, and there were several telltale features of this product that placed her in the concubine category. To begin with, there was the way she was dressed, if you could even call it dressing. She wore only the legal bare minimum of clothing, consisting of two strips of fabric, held in place by devil knew what. Her face was classically beautiful, classically concubine, boringly so in D_Light’s opinion. Her hair was contemporary, striped with jet black, blond, and reds, all of which sprang out in tails over her head like the whips off a willow tree. She had large blue eyes, exaggerated as though she had just stepped out of an old-time anime visual feed. So typical.
However, it was her body that hinted that she was along for more than mere amusement. A standard concubine product was typically designed to be a little softer around the edges. Amanda’s curves, on the other hand, were just a little too suppressed, and her muscles were a hair too pronounced. Her body was built for speed, and she appeared to have just enough strength for when she needed to put down versus put out. And then there were the less subtle hints of her formidable abilities: two samurai swords-one short and the other long, a wakizashi and a katana-were tucked into the strap around her waist. Last but not least, Amanda possessed a nice set of vampiric fangs that D_Light had gotten a glimpse of on the rare occasions that she spoke. Of course, the fangs were not for sucking blood, but just another weapon that could be used in a pinch. D_Light had seen archives on the Cloud about products designed with poison-injecting fangs, poison to which the product itself was immune. D_Light wondered if Amanda had that capability, but he knew better than to ask.
Of course, the undisputable sign of a product was tats on their cheeks, and Amanda had none. Apparently, Djoser had paid a little extra to have a servant without the tats. Customers often did this to enhance the illusion that the product was actually human and that the affection they gave their owner was genuine, rather than from the chemical coercion known as “imprinting.” She had even been given a classic human name, Amanda, to aid in this fantasy. Nevertheless, her methodical, mirthless attitude-a constant dearth of emotion so complete that it could only belong to a being designed in a lab for a narrow band of behavior-gave her true identity and purpose away. The dolling up of this toy to try to pass it off as human irritated D_Light, although he had to admit to himself that his annoyance was perhaps just envy, envy because he could not afford one of his own.
“
Flip, it could be any of these fools, right?” Djoser’s question was rhetorical, for they all knew that demons did not sport cloven hoofs, horns, or any other fiendish feature to announce themselves. In this way, the word “demon” was a misnomer. Demons were not born, as were the demons of mythology, but rather made — made by the Divine Authority when the subject transgressed divine law, at which point they were “demonized.” Historically, these types were called “criminals” or “fugitives.” Therefore, the demon could be anyone in this ghetto, or anything, as in the case of a product.
Lyra’s ferret-styled familiar, PeePee (the initials for Pretty Princess), stood beside her mistress, grokking everyone in sight. Who knows, maybe we’ll get spectacularly lucky? Maybe the demon is strolling by right now, Lyra thought. Lyra frowned down at the ferret. She was not at all fond of PeePee, but since MetaGame rules prohibited the use of high-powered familiars, she was forced to leave her much preferred lynx at home. Because the ferret was the House Tesla mascot, only this style of familiar was available for loan from their house. Normally, she would have spent the time and points to rent something more fashionable, but the MetaGame invitation had sprung up suddenly, and there had been far more important preperations to attend to. Having to rely on a more primitive familiar did, however, add to her sense of adventure and excitement.
This is going to be fun, she thought. The first quest of the game-to find a demon in a densely populated spanker ghetto-was interesting, challenging, and even held a hint of danger.
Djoser raised his eyebrows and cocked his head slightly while accessing his own house-loaned ferret. “There are four gates to Anywhere,” he announced.
“Where?” Lyra asked, irritation seeping into her voice.
Djoser chuckled. “ Anywhere is the name of this ghetto. Apparently, the plebs who named it thought they had a sense of humor.”
“They’d be wrong,” interjected Brian. As though realizing his mistake, the bodyguard turned away from the conversation and resumed standing at attention near Lyra like a watchdog waiting for an intruder.
Lyra licked her lips impatiently and then spoke quickly. “Okay, so there aren’t enough of us to cover all the gates and effectively search this ghetto, right?”
“Not by my reckoning,” Djoser answered. “I mean, look at this place!” Djoser waved his arm as though to encompass all the spankers, apartment mounds, trees, and flowers before him. “There are 2,834 citizens registered to this ghetto-2,834!” he exclaimed.
This is it, D_Light thought. This was his first challenge of the most important game he had yet played. He remembered Minister A_Dude’s words from the MetaGame blessing earlier that morning. The minister had taken each member of the team aside to impart a few words before they set off on their crusade. “Deeeelight,” he chuckled with his large, toothy grin. “You’ve been called! ” D_Light had flinched as the word boomed against the stone arches and walls of the cathedral. “This ain’t your usual grind, boy. This…this is a game close to the Heavenly Soul. No rules, understand? You gotta set that mind free and make your family proud.”
It puzzled D_Light that the game presumably knew the location of a demon, or at least the general area to look. After all, demons were wanted by the Divine Authority, and therefore it was a sin to know the whereabouts of one and not report it. But as the minister said, “No rules, understand?” Anything goes now, he reminded himself.
The two noble-borns stared blankly at one another for what seemed an eternity. Finally, Djoser took a deep breath and let out all the air with a big whooshing sound. “Standing here is wasting time and hemorrhaging points. We need a plan, and it better not suck!”
CHAPTER 8
It is wrongheaded to think of medicine in terms of “fixing” or “repair.” Treating our bodies like old-time automobiles whose parts wear out is a primitive paradigm. Cloning organs as though they were spare parts or injecting nanobots to fix tissue were stopgap measures for previous generations, but in the long run, that’s an uphill battle. Rather than growing old and trying to piece us back together as we fall apart, is it not more desirable to simply remain young? Using the divine wisdom of the OverSoul to instill youth at the cellular level, we now “heal thyself.” Aging is a disease, no more, no less, and once you cure it, everything else falls in line.
— Excerpt from Dr. Arrest_Ya_Hart in her “Kickass Address” to players of Medical Game
“Well, there’s always the brute force method,” Djoser said with a certain resignation in his voice. “We split up, canvass the area, grok everyone in sight, and hope we get lucky.”
The team had wandered away from the gate of the spanker ghetto. They were debating how to find the demon-the quest objective-but had not yet settled on a plan. The air was beginning to cool as the blurry orange glow of the summer sun faded. Despite the coming of nightfall, the harvester insects did not slacken their humming activity; their bulbous bodies bobbed under their bloated masses, and the bee-derived products resembled small balls of yarn as they went about their business.
Lyra shook her head skeptically. “I don’t think there are enough of us to do it the brute force way, Djoser. According to the maps, it’s a good-sized area. Besides, it’s getting dark. Is it likely that the demon will just be roaming around? For what purpose?”
“Why do demons do anything?” asked Djoser with a shrug. “We don’t have any idea who or what we’re dealing with here, so I’d rather take a long shot than just stand around while our time bleeds out. Soul, if anyone’s got a better idea, let’s hear it.”
Djoser had given D_Light as much of an opener as he could hope for, so D_Light cleared his throat and swallowed hard in preparation to speak. Thanks to a cocktail of focusers and a mild sedative delivered with precision by Smorgeous, D_Light did not even feel the slightest twinge of nervousness when he finally spoke up. “If I may,” he interjected, “the two of you are nobility, so you may not know as much as I do about how we plebs live in these spanker zones.”
Djoser’s eyebrows lifted as he regarded D_Light with a slightly mocking expression. He gave Lyra a quick smirk and then returned his attention back to D_Light. “By all means, avatar artist,” he said. “Earn your keep as our advisor.”
D_Light gave a humble smile and nodded. “Spanker ghettos attract a specific type of person, and so we ought to be able to take advantage of that fact.”
D_Light paused for a moment. He had everyone’s attention, even Brian’s, who did not try to mask the look of contempt on his face. D_Light did his best to ignore the mixed reception. “Perhaps we can think in terms of process of elimination. Let me run it down for you. A ghetto like this is zoned for spankers and spanker games. That means that anyone living in this area is assumed to be hard-core-that is, into the most intense and addictive entertainment games out there.”
Lyra nodded affirmatively. “Indeed, and I think it’s safe to assume our little demon isn’t a spanker. I mean, how would he or she even get an account to jack in?”
D_Light became excited as he realized his idea might get traction. “Right! Spankers have their own culture. Soul, they even have their own way of speaking-and we can use that, starting with the word ‘him.’ I can tell you right off the bat that most spank games are aimed at men. We’re talking about violence and sex. All those guys you see around us swinging imaginary swords, cradling invisible guns, and dry humping the lawn-they’re playing those sorts of games.” In a grand gesture, D_Light swung his arms about, urging everyone to take a look around them in order to fortify his point.
Concerned that he may have offended the nobles with his coarse talk and flamboyant body language, D_Light looked at his present company for signs of disapproval. To his delight, there were none.
Lyra clapped her hands once and spoke with authority. “Okay, so for the kind of games played in this ghetto, any woman we see is worth taking a second look at.”
“Consider it done,” replied Djoser with an impish grin. He put his hand on Lyra’s shoulder in mo
ck tenderness.
D_Light stammered out, “Begging your pardon, sires, what I mean is since demons are as likely to be male as female, and few spankers are female, then the probability of a female we see-”
“Yes, we get it!” Lyra rolled her eyes at D_Light. “We might be nobility, but we’re not inbred.”
D_Light took a generous breath and bowed. “Begging your pardon, Mother.” He bowed again. “At your leave, I have another suggestion.”
“For Soul’s sake, D_Light, if you don’t stop bowing and begging my pardon and otherwise wasting our time with your pleb-speak, I’m going to have Brian here beat the shit out of you,” exclaimed Lyra, who was smiling in a way that D_Light had never seen before-a nasty smile that made him wonder in earnest if she would, indeed, unleash that oaf on him. D_Light took note of an overly eager Brian, who stood proudly behind Lyra, grinning from ear to ear.
Her smile disappeared in an instant, and her voice adopted a certain icy edginess. “You will address me without formality during this game. Formality only slows the communication process, and speed is of the utmost importance. I chose you as my advisor, so I expect you to participate effectively. Is that clear?”
D_Light was about to bow to signify acknowledgment, but then he nodded instead. Regaining his momentum, he continued. “Another thing about ghettos like this is that most private apartments are open to other spankers. When you lease an apartment here, you have a choice of whether you will allow the common rooms of your apartment to be open to spank games-that is, open to other spankers.”
Djoser interrupted abruptly. “You mean, someone would allow spanked-out plebs to bumble about in their own private living space? Why would anyone opt for that?”
MetaGame Page 7