by Mars Dorian
“User not accepted,” the artificial voice said.
It came from the rifle.
But before Violet could even muster a WTF, a thunderstorm of needles seemed to stab at her insides. She shivered and dropped the rifle.
An uncontrollable spasm made her lose control of every limb.
She fell over like a sack of potatoes and hit the ground just as hard.
Trigger strolled over to her and put the rifle away.
“This one comes with user recognition. If the user is unknown, the system sends a 500,000 volt ballade through the body. Powerful, eh?”
119
Back inside the ‘guest room’, Violet found herself in chains. Wrapped up to the max like a little burrito. She brought her glaze to the right and found Trigger with a cautious facial expression. He sat on a steel chair with its back turned to her. She felt like a criminal in a cheapo interrogation scene from a second-class police series. Still, her heartbeat hammered.
“We’re not going to hurt you,” Trigger said, “but we’re going to keep you here until the show is over. I’m sorry, but I thought you’d understand. Heck, I even thought you were going to help us. I thought you were one of us.”
More brother and sister talk. First from Elli, now from Trigger. Looked like everyone wanted to convert her to a cause. Violet kept her mouth shut. Trigger moved up from his chair.
“You’re going to make it.”
“Are you going to unchain me at least?”
“No can do. At least for now. Understand this is for your own protection, Violet. But don’t worry, we bring you food and drinks. You will be treated like a guest.”
“In chains? Worst hospitality ever,” Violet said.
“Only for twenty-four hours, that’s all.”
Nick grinned behind Trigger.
“Look at the bright side. We have some pasta carbonara left for you.”
“Gee, thanx.”
“We have to prepare for tomorrow. Rest well.”
She sighed. Trigger and Nick left the room and locked it from the outside. She shifted around her seat but the chains squeezed. The more she moved, the more she felt the metal tightening in. She turned her head towards the closed window, saw the sunset flooding the forest landscape into a honey orange. Here she was in a country house, imprisoned alongside mother nature and her finest sunsets.
Ridiculous.
Infuriating.
Violet’s mind went on a tirade.
Become so angry you turn into a green, muscle-mountain giant that raises his mighty chest that breaks the chains apart.
Hunger yourself close to death so you are slim enough to slip through the chains.
Jump with the chair chained around the body and break through the closed window.
Yeah right.
Violet fabricated an army of like-minded escape thoughts, one more outrageous than the other. Five points for creativity, minus ten for feasibility. She moaned and kept pondering more escape options for what seemed like eternity.
In-between, Nick came in and brought her fresh water and the promised pasta carbonara.
The water tasted like angel tears and the pasta melted like divine honey on her tongue. Ok, so the food was as magnificent as the boys hyped. But that didn’t change the fact she needed to get out of here, asap.
Violet shifted around and tried to find more leeway. She heard new voices from the living room, it looked like new folks visited the place. Was it a neighbor, or maybe even the police?
She had to find out.
So she cleared her throat.
And shouted her lungs out.
The door opened up, Nick walked in with an artificial smile.
“We try to concentrate. Do you mind?”
Violet swallowed.
“I’m kind of tensed up.”
“Will you shut up now or do I need to put a gag into your mouth?”
“My lips are sealed,” she said.
“Glad to hear that. BTW — how was the pasta?”
“Pretty good,” Violet said.
“Not too salty? I added a dash of European sea salt,” Nick said.
“Good for you,” she said.
Nick stood around, awkward silence settled in.
“Well, I better get back to the others and help them prepare.”
“You do that.”
Nick nodded, left the room and locked it behind him.
Violet gnarled.
And when I’m out of here, I’m gonna take the pasta and stuff it up your ass, added with a dash of Asian fist punching.
Because, Violet.
120
Back in the BBB, Sunday night.
Bam settled into his suite. He grabbed a chilled tomato juice from the robot freezer and activated his eScroll.
Re-analyzed the remaining vloggers, re-read their history, sniffed through their character traits. He even re-took Laci Steem’s branding guide, soaked it up like Spongebob on steroids. Victory was within grasp. Whatever was going to happen during the last mission, he needed to out-brand, out-sell, and out-shine his rival vloggers. Prove to the world he was more than a lousy stunt man. Prove that he was the grandest vlogger of them all. He was going to prove that he, and only he, could become the Head of Online Content for Stax Media. Because the fans demanded it.
They wanted to see him succeed.
They wanted him.
B to the A to the M.
Because, Bam.
121
Monday morning sun, no way.
Violet couldn’t tell whether she slept or was awake the whole time. But she could tell she was still in chains, because her limbs started to hurt from the tight steel grip. She looked at the window, saw the sun peaking above the treetops. What time was is? Around five am? Almost six? It must have been early morning. She had at least three more hours till the final mission started. She heard Trigger instructing a bunch of people — Violent could detect both female and male voices. Was he assembling a troop? Equipment clanked and clonked, the group moved forward with their plan. But after a lot of moving, the sound effects dropped to dead silence when the front door shut.
Violet breathed. Was she finally alone now? She waited. A car motor roared outside, faded out in seconds. This was it. They drove off. This was her chance to flee.
Despite the chains pressing into her skin, Violet could slip her right hand into her underwear *cough*. She fumbled around, pulled out the ancient smartphone device with the cheap plastic shell. It dropped next to her feet. Bien. Violet shifted around her chair, swayed so hard from right to left she and her chair fell over. The impact on the wooden ground sent a major ache through her ribcage, but this wasn’t the time to lament. With both arms still tied up, she used her nose to unlock the screen on the ancient device and voice-activated the OS. Thank the technology that these relics already came with a dumb, but somewhat functional AI assistant.
“Connect me with X.”
The phone dialed in front of her face. A sleepy voice appeared on the other line.
“Mmm, yeah?”
He moaned on the other line, sounding like a zombie with indigestion.
“Wake up.”
“Violet? Do you know how early it is? I’m still lying in bed.”
“Good for you, because I’m lying on a cold floor, chained to a steel chair.”
“This is too early for humor.”
“I wish it was funny, but it’s the truth. And it’s a long story we don’t have time for. But I’m imprisoned in a ranch outside the city. I’ll send you the address. Come as fast as you can, I have to arrive at the Blogbuster asap.”
“This better be no joke.”
“You’re my savior, X.”
“Whatever.”
She was about to hang up but stopped for the most important reminder of them all.
“And X?
“Yeah?”
“Bring a laser cutter.”
122
Inside the city.
Blogbuster Build
ing, compound.
So this was it.
The air reeked of endgame. Bam could feel it when he saw the enemy vloggers. They put on their poker faces, tried to play it cool, but he could see beneath their facades. A stick figure shakefest deluxe.
Because, this was it.
Only Elli Mental, Fitnessy, Whizzard and him were left. They all stood in line, waiting for Stax’ final mission announcement. Bam looked around the compound, saw more fans than ever lined up. What started with dozens ended up in thousands. Screaming, waving, crying, swooning. The security people could barely keep them in line — it was like a pop concert where everyone was hooked on aggro drugs. Scary in a way, cool in another. Because at least five hundreds fans stood in line because of Bam.
Girls with Bam love signs.
Women with official Bam merch shirts, only 29.99 credits via the official Bam vlog. A steal, really.
And some dudes shouting, ‘Bam’s the man’.
Because, d’uh, in a way, he was the man. He went from pathetic crash vlogger to über-media messiah. He knew he could point his finger at some random fan chick and command her to have sex with him on the street, and she’d do it, no questions asked.
Because, Bam da man.
He smiled and looked up.
Vorbs buzzed through the air like vultures. More than ever — dozens at least. All circling ‘round and ‘round, filming the Blogbuster stars for the masses. Bam posed his Bamilicious smile and raised his trademarked Bam fist. He made sure he positioned himself in the right angle for the Vorb cam, although that didn’t matter, because every of Bam’s angles was the right angle.
‘Cuz Bam D’man.
He didn’t know the current live viewer numbers, but they must have been in the nine digit realm. Bamtastic. Let the world watch how he was going to dominate this showdown. Let the world witness the second coming of the greatest vlogger alive.
Screech.
A crimson limo stopped next to the red carpet. Stax stomped out, arm in arm with Laci Steem. He ignored the fans as usual and aimed straight for his speaking cue. Bam welcomed that, he was tired of foreplay, he wanted to end this charade with a win. Stax positioned himself in front of the vlogger line and put on his drill sergeant voice.
“Morning, vloggers.”
“Morning,” everyone said in return.
Stax smiled.
“Do you see these crowds?”
Bam saw all of them.
“There are going crazy for you. They ditch school for you. They spend their last credit on buying your merch, they cover their rooms with images of your pretty vlogger faces. Let me ask you — how does it feel to be revered by millions of folks?”
“It feels Bamtastic,” Bam said.
He raised his fist for the Vorb.
Stax smiled wider.
“That’s it boy, that’s the hidden brand power I always expected from you.”
He paused himself.
“And you know what? I’m tired of talking. You know this is the end. Win this mission, and you’ll work for me. I’ll shoot you into the stratosphere of online stardom and pay a million credits for it.”
Pause.
“Laci?”
Laci jumped forward. Another gleam on her face, another cosplay on her body. This time some sci-fi armor uniform with a five star crest over her chest. Anime LGBT Star Commander of the Galactic Government or what? Bam didn’t bother to guess this one. It didn’t even matter at this point. Laci opened her fake teeth-infested mouth.
“Vloggers. First, I want to say how happy-happy I am to see you all here. What an A-mazing journey we had so far, wouldn’t you agree? I feel like we’re one big, web family at his point. But unlike—“
“Let’s get this over with,” Whizzard said.
Laci lost her train of thought.
“Scuse me?”
“For the sake of our sanity, just announce the damn mission and shut the hell up. No one wants to hear your deranged geekspeak. They want to see me winning this show.”
Bam and Elli turned to Whizzard in unison.
“Someone’s tripping on confidence pills,” Stax said.
Whizzard smiled back at him.
“Stax, I don’t want to sound like I’m bragging or something, but we should just drop this mission. You want to hire the ultimate Head of Online Content? You have him already.”
Whizzard shot Bam and Elli a dismissive glance.
“I mean, look at them. You have a guy crashing his face off, a blonde muscle-mountain and a man-hating hypocrite. Do you really want one of these freaks to represent your brand?”
Elli hissed.
“How dare you call me a freak, you crippled chauvinist. I have contributed more value to this show than you will in your entire life time.”
“Shut up, midget babe. I’m tired of your rants and aggro issues. Go back to your kindergarten and learn some basic etiquette.”
Elli hissed at Whizzard melodrama style.
“Look who’s talking. You’re by far the vilest human creature that ever slimed across the tectonic plates.”
Bam watched both going curse-crazy. He didn’t even know what to do. Whizzard was by the far the most unlikable vlogger of them all. His popularity froze below subzero, his brand was nothing but an ugly mismatch of hate and verbal poison. And still, the guy with the crooked teeth had the audacity to proclaim himself as THE vlogger. That was not only wrong, but morally reprehensible. Bam was the best, the numbers proved it. He had acquired the most ‘luvs’, the most subscribers and even sacks of fanmail, like real, paper-based fanmail. And now these second class vloggers were ego-ing it out at each other. It was wrong. Laci must have thought the same, because she finally stepped up.
“Please guys, let me announce the final mission first. You can always go after each other’s throats during the task.”
But they ignored her. Like, ignored with capital ‘I’. Little Elli barked at Whizzard, Whizzard barked back.
She said,
“You delusional, degenerate abomination of a XY chromosome.”
He said,
“You little righteous, half-human midget bitch.”
Stax smiled and watched them. He scanned his display, watched the view numbers shooting up and smiled.
Laci played mediator and failed miserably.
And Bam?
Stared at the drama and hated the fact no one paid attention to him anymore. He wanted to say something, either a witty one-liner or something that made him look good on cam, but before he could even mutter a word, Whizzard raised his fist and punched Elli to the ground.
123
Like, what?
A thousand people on the compound, and no one said a thing.
Dead silence instead.
Laci = still.
Bam = double still.
Fan crowds and security = triple still.
Only Whizzard didn’t shut up. The contrary, he was just getting into it.
“Man, I should have done this a long time ago.”
Elli lay on the ground and wiped the blood from her nose.
“You hit me. You hit a girl.”
“You want gender equality, don’t you? I hit you just as hard as I’d hit a guy.”
So he kicked her in the ribcage to prove his point.
“This is for pulling up your hypnotic chicken shit on me and making me hit the ground floor.”
Bam stood up.
“Dude, what are you doing?”
“Playing my part,” Whizzard said.
Bam wanted to intervene, but a loud shout from across the compound made him stop. He turned around and saw the fans breaking through the line. Ten security guys tried to hold them back, but they couldn’t stop the fan flood from taking over.
Armor vs. thousands of mad fans? Fat chance.
The followers ran over them and aimed for the Whizzard.
Stax watched the scene for one second and ran into the safe perimeter of his BBB. Laci followed him, just like Elli. Fitnessy w
asn’t even around anymore.
The chaos began.
124
Somewhere not to far from the BBB, Trigger checked his equipment and moved into position. Nick’s voice appeared over the encrypted channel.
“The weasel delivered the package. Repeat, the weasel delivered the package.”
“Understood, beta fox. Let’s plant the seed.”
“Roger, roger.”
Ok, having code names wasn’t necessary over an encrypted channel, but better be safe than sorry. Plus, it sounded pro, like a real squad. Which made sense, because they were fighting a real enemy.
Trigger grabbed the binoculars and zoomed into the scenario. Thousands of fans stormed the BBB compound like an uncontrollable zombie horde. Brilliant. He couldn’t have asked for a better distraction. That part of the plan was taken care of, now came the second. Trigger addressed his squad. They stood in line and waited for his next instruction. Trigger smiled. They looked like regular fans with their self-printed outfits, but they actually carried stolen Stax security armor under it.
Exactly what they needed to sneak into the BBB undetected.
Trigger closed his eyes, took a deep breath.
It was time for some serious action.
125
Explosions. Lots of them. Like in the movies, just so much more and sooo much louder.
A handful of Vorbs blew up, gun shots rang through the air and echoed across the perimeter. Now the fan army went from berserk to batcrap crazy. Mass hysteria ensued. But the terror didn’t stop there. Smoke grenades bounced around the ground and spat thick, dark clouds that devoured the masses. Bam rolled his eyes. The only thing scarier than a fan mob was an armed fan mob. He should have known the armored Violet Gear freak wasn’t the only armed lunatic. There were plenty more. Bam swallowed and inspected the area. The compound turned into a battlefield, and the longer he stood around, the faster he risked getting smoked out, run over or shot by a fan or troll. Thanks, but no thanks. Bam ran towards the BBB entrance and took cover within the lobby. Unfortunately, people acted just as crazy inside as they acted outside. He saw more security guys marching around the lobby with their batons readied. Bam asked one of them,