House of the Galactic Elevator

by Gerhard Gehrke

  “Tell me,” Jeff said. “What have you heard about aliens in the news?”

  Zachary grinned. “Depends which news. The funny papers in the grocery store feature them regularly.”

  “I mean the real news. TV, newspapers, online networks. You know, the serious stuff.”

  “Some of us like our tabloids.”

  Jeff clenched his jaw. “You know what I mean. What have you heard lately?”

  The kid started to stammer, looked at Zachary, and finally said, “Nothing.”

  “But we’ve heard about you,” Zachary said. He shot a finger in Jeff’s direction. “An abduction story covers a multitude of sins.”

  Jeff shook his head. “Tell me what you heard about me.”

  “Oh, Jeffy. I wanted to hear it from you. All of the juicy details. The gory stuff. The parts the papers left out for the sake of the kiddies. Lay before me your meta-magical psychosis, and Doctor Zachary will absolve you! Trespass against your creator and your fellow man? I have the cure!”

  Zachary was getting excited. He gestured large as he spoke. The kid backed away. Jeff balled up his hands into fists.

  “Keep it down,” Big Albert said. The attendant now stood large in the doorway to the rec room.

  “But we have a celebrity here,” Zachary said, his voice broad and loud.

  One of the kitchen staff members froze in mid–place setting, clearly assessing whether this was going to turn into an incident.

  Big Albert stepped forward and pointed towards the exit. “Zachary, go to your room. It’s a time out for you.”

  Zachary froze. His face split into a grin full of mischief. A couple of drops of milked iced coffee fell from his beard. It appeared as if he were about to spout more jabber, but instead he lowered his arms, gave Big Albert a conciliatory wave, and shuffled out of the dining room.

  “And you two,” Big Albert said. “Out of the dining room until dinner is ready.”

  ***

  Once in the rec room with the kid, Jeff repeated the question in a hushed tone.

  “What have you heard about aliens in the news?”

  Jeff knew what the answer would be before the kid said it. There was something in the kid’s eyes. He didn’t know who the kid was or why he was here or what he had done. Something big was bottled up in the young man that threatened to break him if it were ever allowed to escape. Jeff saw a hint of pity in the kid’s blue eyes.

  “Nothing,” the kid said. The kid looked away, clearly uncomfortable with the way Jeff continued to look at him. Jeff waited for more, but the kid was silent.

  Whatever turn had taken him to the hospital left Jeff without a clear idea of what exactly had happened over the past few months. The Galactic Commons, the Bunnie, Oliop, even Jordan and his last job at the school all now hung on thin branches of memory, fragile and out of reach. The pasty taste in his mouth, the smell of sweat from his fellow hospital guests, the clinking of dishes being set in the next room, the I-feel-sorry-for-you look from the kid were the real and now.

  Jeff traced his fingers along the laminate of the rec room table. It felt smooth and solid. He examined his hands palms up and palms down. He touched his fingers. They were all real. This was real. His fingers felt like his fingers. He examined an index finger and scraped a trace of dirt out from under the nail with his thumb.

  He needed to get back to the tablet. Get online. Search for his name and any news events. What had happened at the school? When he had last been there, the owner, Mr. Kim, had been replaced by a Bunnie in a Mr. Kim costume. What fate had befallen the old man wasn’t clear. The Bunnie were capable of real violence, but also had a knack for wrapping people up in webs in some kind of drugged sleep. And here he was thinking about Bunnie again. What if the things never were?

  Jeff thought about his recent travels, during which time he was the center of attention of the Happy Alien Welcome Committee, all unbeknownst to him. A series of alien ambassadors all lost their lives trying to contact him, misled into their fatal course by a corrupted probability computer. What made him the center of attention for an entire Galactic Community? Wasn’t this the height of paranoid conceit?

  “So there has been nothing in the news of an alien struck and killed by a vehicle on the highway a few months ago? In Nevada? The body was later stolen. Or how about some trouble in Stewart Lake?”

  Jeff didn’t add that Stewart Lake was where Oliop had crashed their stolen Bunnie spaceship, right in the center of the town’s Quinoa Festival preparations. Government people, disguised Bunnie, some grassy aliens bent on vendetta, and the Grey all converged there for a royal scrum down. Jeff had been the ball.

  The kid shrugged. “I didn’t hear anything like that.”

  Jeff discreetly bit down on his pointer finger’s second joint. It hurt. Jeff examined the white tooth marks. The marks receded after a moment. The pain of the bite lingered longer.

  “What are you doing?” the kid asked.

  “Wondering what I need to do to wake up.”

  Jeff looked at the television and the backs of the heads of those watching. The row of guests on the talk show were revealing their inner family turmoil to the host, to the studio audience, and to cameras beaming their words to the viewing audience. Jeff hadn’t watched television since breaking up with his wife, but the show looked like one of dozens that had been on at the time. Now the home audience had the opportunity to text in their questions for the guests.

  Words flashed on the bottom of the screen. “Tomorrow's program: An extraterrestrial made me pregnant!”

  Jeff perked up. The host looked at the camera, but the audio was too muddy to make out her words. The show cut to commercial, but not before the host seemed to wink, not at anyone else in TV land, but at Jeff.

  CHAPTER 14

  Jordan felt a cramp in her hand. She had been swinging her sword at some kind of creepy-crawly bug worms for at least an hour while collecting their tadpole spawns with a net. This had been the first task assigned to her by a faction boss after Jordan had gotten past outfitting her character. Her throat felt parched and her breathing felt hot in her chest. Sweat ran down her face and neck. After smacking down two score and five of the beasts, she felt tired. The tadpoles were heavy and they reeked of swamp mud.

  This was nothing like her previous game. There the sensations had registered in her head and with her senses but always with a degree of separation, as her input devices had their limitations that occasionally broke immersion. Emotions showed clumsily on the avatars’ faces. Dirt sometimes didn’t smell dirty enough. The sense of taste never came through at all. And there never were any real aches or pains. She had thought that perhaps interfacing with an actual living avatar had reached its limits. Its hunger and hurt would never be hers.

  But this new game had to be experienced to be believed. Not for the first time, she laughed at the wonder of standing in the middle of a foggy, otherworldly bog with a sword in one hand and a net of giant tadpoles in another. A spray of rainbow-colored moths floated up from a thick tuft of dark green weeds. Something moved towards her through the gloom.

  Another bug worm. She tightened her grip on her sword. She would have calluses soon, but there weren’t any yet. She needed gloves if she was going to keep this up, and not for fashion but function. The bug worm made a bubbling gurgle sound as it leaped forward. Jordan sliced it in half. She laughed again as its body parts sank into the yellow water. A fat tadpole swam up next to her, and she snatched it up into her net.

  She counted. She had enough tadpoles. Mud under the water tugged at her feet as she waded back towards dry ground and the safety of a nearby camp. She took a moment to wash the bug worm blood and mud off of her armor in a nearby freshwater pool. The starter armor was attractive, yet heavy and practical. No cleavage or boob window or ridiculous skirt with a slit up to the thigh, but rather a lavender leather jerkin that allowed free arm movement and a pair of tough hide pants inset with steel rings. She had seen some of the early upgrades wo
rn by other players sporting gear like fencing gloves, bracers, and helmets, and she wanted all of those, but the current gear functioned well enough.

  Someone had joked once that to simulate the actual experience of fighting someone with medieval weapons you needed to pick up two fifteen-pound weights and bang them over your head for an hour. And to simulate the wounds you’d experience in a battle, tie a pair of live badgers to your naked body and jump into a cold shower.

  Jordan hadn’t suffered any wounds, but she was indeed tired. Going out and actually playing any of the new game hadn’t been intentional. She only meant to get past character creation, get situated, and log out again. She hadn’t even managed to find Shannanon or her group of friends. But that was okay. Her alarm app would automatically go off after an hour so she could take care of her evening rounds at the park.

  Jordan trudged back the short hike to the pier, where several game characters waited for her. A halo of green lantern light illuminated the area and no monsters lurked nearby. This was a safe zone. She handed off the tadpoles and received begrudging praise from her faction leader, who sat on the end of the pier. He next gave her another assignment, something about checking on the settlers in some village who hadn’t been heard from in weeks. Blah blah blah.

  Listening to the instructions for her next quest was boring. She was used to games leading her by the hand for the initial period of gameplay. Even her previous game had done that, schooling her in the finer points of avatar care to maximize the game experience. Some things never change. She walked away from the quest giver mid-spiel. She was sore and needed to park somewhere so she could log out.

  She wandered through the camp and headed for the small town nearby. The walk only took minutes. She felt a sense of accomplishment at having achieved so much within her revised time limit of an hour. Character creation had been a breeze, as her base avatar looked exactly like her, but with firmer muscles, better posture, and none of the remaining acne that had haunted her into her late twenties. She could have spent hours in customizing her hair, skin tone, body art, and clothing, but the game had reminded her that these options could be revisited later.

  It had been Shannanon’s repeated messages that made her rush through character creation. She had been overwhelmed by the game world, had been carried away by the initial orientation and a short series of beginner quests that had eventually taken her to the swamp and the tadpole collection. Shannanon was still waiting and had invited her to a virtual group.

  She felt she should probably say hi before logging out.

  But she was sore and tired, and when she walked by the tavern with the shingle bearing a frothy mug of beer, she detoured. Just one drink would soothe her parched throat. Plus she was hungry. The sounds of laughter and the bustle of a busy bar greeted her. The place smelled of a burning fireplace and roasting meat. She made her way past a score of patrons and stepped up to the bar. A short elfin woman with golden earrings that draped to her waist gave her a nod.

  “What’ll it be?”

  Jordan realized that she didn’t have any game money. She patted her empty coin purse.

  “I guess I’m short. How much for a brew, anyway?”

  “We can do credit, deary.” The barkeep poured a mug to overflow with dark amber beer. The white suds slid perfectly down the sides of the mug. She set it down in front of Jordan. “What do you say?”

  “Credit works.” The mug felt cool in her hand. She took a sip. It was everything she could have ever hoped for in a beer: medium bodied, slightly malty, and cold. The tiredness washed away in an instant. Her muscles felt rejuvenated. After a second sip she felt like she could go bop swamp mutant lizard creatures for hours. A plate of sausage and crispy tuber wedges was placed in front of her. The barkeep smiled at her. Jordan smiled back. The sausage was delicious, especially when dipped in the small pool of mustardy-spicy white sauce on the plate. It complemented the beer so well that in no time she had to order another mug.

  Somewhere at the edge of consciousness she heard a soft chime. The meal had just cost her a credit of real money. How had the game been able to access her credit information? She had never given the app any permissions, aside from reluctantly agreeing when logging in to allow it to override her senses. There might have been some fine print about accessing memories for a better game experience, but she had paged past the details of the user license rather quickly.

  She finished the plate of food.

  “Want more?” the barkeep asked.

  Jordan put up a hand. “No, thanks. Say, what time is it?”

  “A while past midday, yet still before sunset.”

  “That’s not helpful.”

  Jordan tried to pull up her alarm app. It didn’t respond. Her head felt fuzzy from the beers. She wanted a nap. She concentrated, tried to find any of the visual cues that would bring up elements of her HUD, but nothing was working. The barkeep stopped in front of her and gave her a puzzled look.

  “Not feeling okay?”

  “I’m…I’m fine.”

  Just then another patron rose from a table. He was a tall man of dusky complexion. He held an unstrung bow and a score of arrows in a quiver. His turquoise eyes seemed to shine.

  “Milady, I was wondering if I might trouble you,” he said. “It seems I have need of one with your martial talents –”

  Before he could finish, Jordan pushed away from the bar and elbowed her way out of the tavern. She felt rising panic as she realized not only could she not find the alarm clock app or any of the rest of her interface, but she also couldn’t seem to locate the menu with the option to log out.

  “Shannanon, what did you get me into?” she muttered.

  At least the game message system came up readily enough. Jordan sent Shannanon a virtual wave. No reply. Jordan pinged her and saw she was down in some kind of labyrinth under the city, labeled a safe level above what appeared to be a hundred other levels no doubt filled with monsters, loot, and danger. For the first time in a long time she wanted none of that, just wanted to find a way out of the sim.

  Jordan focused on clearing her head as she made her way across the fantasy town’s many bridges and crowded streets filled with vendors hawking their wares. Jordan tried not to bump into anyone lest she accidentally buy something.

  The entrance to the labyrinth was a stairway behind an apothecary and hat shoppe.

  The twisty spiral stairway took her to a crowded chamber with a low ceiling and blinking lights that played across the dancers’ faces. Hundreds of avatars swayed, bebopped, and grinded in spastic flashes, all to a deep bass thrum that made Jordan’s avatar feel like it needed to go to pee. Here in the city and on this level, faction was forgotten. Jordan pushed her way through the crowd, staying as close to the edges of the room as possible. Niches were carved into the walls where dusty skeletons lay, indifferent observers of the rave that rocked their final resting place. The room widened even further as Jordan took a few steps down to the main dance floor. A holographic many-eyed monster of some sort floated just above the dancers, its eyes firing blue and red lasers across the tops of the revelers’ hands. Its toothy mouth spewed red mist that sank to the floor and stirred around the dancers’ feet.

  Shannanon was in the middle of it all, pumping her hands in the air, gyrating her hips, and swaying about with wild abandon. She was dancing with no one in particular or with everyone. Her four eyes were closed. She appeared much like the orange great ape that she was in real life, but her eight-inch heels made her tower over some of the nearby dancers. Half of her body was covered in glittery body paint. She also now had long braided hair, which swung to and fro about her stocky frame like a beaded curtain.

  Jordan had to swing elbows into a few dancers to make her way through the pack. These must have been computer-controlled characters, as they moved when pushed. She made it to her friend and leaned in close.

  “Shannanon! Hey!”

  Shannanon didn’t respond, just kept swaying to the beat. Jordan
tapped her on the shoulder. No answer. That’s when Jordan’s own dance routine kicked in, a built-in part of the game, like knowing how to fight or ride a mount. Suddenly her avatar matched Shannanon’s wiggles and sways. If Jordan didn’t interrupt, her own avatar would boogie until it collapsed. Jordan stopped the dancing. She grabbed Shannanon by a shoulder. An invisible barrier prevented Jordan from actually handling Shannanon or any other player. Her friend just kept dancing.

  Jordan sent a message. In all caps and in neon green letters she wrote, “SNAP OUT OF IT! I NEED YOUR HELP AND I CAN’T LOG OUT OF THIS GAME!”

  No reply.

  “Wake up!”

  The ape continued jiggling about. No one else paid Jordan any mind.

  “Shannanon, I really need your help,” Jordan said in a quiet voice. Maybe Shannanon was on autopilot. Maybe she was asleep back at her apartment with her avatar continuing on, like the victim of the Red Shoes from the old ballad. Maybe she was a queen scrub douche mama that only wanted companionship when she needed something.

  “Fine.”

  Jordan marched out of the rave and the labyrinth and deleted Shannanon from her friend list. That’ll show her.

  ***

  She tooled about the town, unsure of where to go. She had no destination, nor the inclination to engage in any normal game activity. She was afraid that if she started to do anything sedentary, she might fall asleep. Other avatars passed her by, intent on their own adventures and game business. The sun was setting. Jordan estimated that it was actually evening and she had been playing for at least four hours.

  She considered spamming for help in the market square, but when had she ever paid attention to anyone shouting for anything in-game?

  The beauty of the city didn’t escape her. Crenelated towers of marble reflected the golden sunset. Arched festoons of crimson flowers decorated the main market’s broad avenue. Fine attention had also been paid to the smallest detail. Rooftops had loose shingles and small birds built nests under eaves. Gutters had slime from recent rain runoff. A loose manhole cover smelled of brimstone from the lower labyrinth.