"This is getting too weird," Gabby said.
She closed her eyes, reached out, and rubbed the front of Guybrush's pants three times. With the job complete, she opened her eyes back up to see Guybrush had a huge smile.
When she opened her mouth to complain, the FunCar lurched to a stop, throwing her into the bubble screen. A knot formed where she had hit the see-through bubble. Gabby pushed herself back into her seat dizzily and rubbed her neck.
The FunCar had completely shutdown. No lights were visible and when she tried to push the bubble open, it stayed closed. They were supposed to open in case of emergency.
Frustrated, Gabby looked outside to see where she was stuck. The vehicle sat on a lonely stretch of road on the floor of a wide valley. The sun had begun to peak over the mountains and long shadows flooded the field to her right.
A gentle breeze tickled the tips of the grasses surrounding the road. A lone hawk gently floated in the breeze above a grove of trees.
The surroundings reminded Gabby of a time when she was barely older than a tot, playing colorful counting games that floated in mid-air. Her father had taken them on a picnic, which even now seemed such a foreign word.
They had turned their systems off and spent the time running in the grass and falling down, into piles of giggling laughter. It was one of Gabby's fondest memories.
She was getting used to the quiet ambiance when the FunCar powered back up. But instead of a loading screen with the game options, the bubble stayed blank.
The car accelerated and she was pushed into the chair. Accustomed to the normal motions of a FunCar, she could immediately tell that the vehicle was exceeding the normal speeds.
The road ahead split: the main winding along the foothills toward the town of Eastoria; the other, a narrow blacktop with crumbling sides heading straight into the mountains.
The FunCar banked hard onto the blacktop. Gabby had to keep her arms out to steady herself, but there were no handholds in the interior. The vehicles were programmed not to hit each other, so there was no need for constraints. The Frags seemed to have disabled the safety features.
She didn't like the way it leaned around the corners, making her feel like it was going to tip. Going downhill bothered her most because she slid out of the chair. She tried wedging her feet against the bubble, but that just made her feel like she was falling out altogether.
When a full projection version of Guybrush appeared next to her, minus the genie lamp in his pants, Gabby threw herself against the side.
"Sorry to startle you," said Guybrush, but he didn't sound sorry.
"How much longer do I have to ride like this?" she asked.
Guybrush grinned. "Not long at all, in fact."
She didn't like slant of his grin. A steering wheel appeared in the space above her knees.
"We don't have the next portion of the trip programmed very well. So you're going to have to pilot it," Guybrush explained.
"Me?" said Gabby. "I've never driven a FunCar before. Nobody drives them."
Guybrush shrugged. "We do all the time. Quite fun, in fact."
"Why can't you drive it for me by projection?"
"We're busy making sure you can't be tracked," he explained. "And remote driving just points a big sign to you."
"Alright," she said, regretting she'd agreed to come. "Tell me where I'm going."
Gabby grabbed the wheel, feeling the leather beneath her fingertips.
Guybrush clapped his hands together. "Keep following this road. Take the next three rights and then when you get to the split, take the one with the yellow sign, not the white one. They both get you to us, but the bridge got washed out on the white one a few months ago."
"Three rights and a yellow. Got it," she said.
"Good. I'll be leaving--"
"Wait." She interrupted. "What's your name?"
Guybrush paused. "Milton."
She was about to ask him what kind of name was Milton, when the road turned sharply and she was forced to bank hard. Without a restraint she slid into the wall, but at least the steering wheel moved with her.
Guybrush/Milton disappeared and Gabby was left to pilot the FunCar alone, which was fine because keeping on the road was taking all her focus. She'd played driving games before, but there was more educational content and less knuckle-tightening adrenaline.
The sun, now completely over the tops of the mountains, blinded her so she was forced to drive with one hand blocking the sun. The road led deeper into the foothills. Each time it curved away, the right turn appeared.
Beads of sweat had formed on her forehead, a consequence of the sunlight through the bubble and the intense focus she had to maintain. At times, the road hugged a cliff with no barrier between her and a long drop.
When she'd taken the last right turn, Gabby kept watch for the split. Her current direction led her into a broad valley. The trees, higher elevation than her town, had already turned brown. Swirls of dead leaves often whisked across the road as she passed.
The trees had enough leaves that she didn't have to hold her arm up to block the sunlight. But when she made a hard right around a deep bend, she was pointed straight into the sun.
Squinting and trying to see ahead through her fingers, she blew past two signs and her split. The signs had both looked white, reflected in the blinding sunlight.
She thought about stopping to turn around but the path had narrowed and turned to gravel. The center of the path held clumps of weeds, but the wheel paths had none. She hoped that meant they used this road, though Milton had said the white one had been usable a few months ago.
As she crested a ridge, the road seemingly dropped out beneath her. Her stomach flew up into her throat as the FunCar leaned downward.
What she saw at the bottom of the hill made her palms sweat. An old rusty bridge with the center chewed out lay across a rocky creek. Gabby quickly realized she had too much momentum to stop before the bridge, so she increased her speed.
The FunCar shook as it rattled down the gravel slope. About halfway down she realized she had no way to keep herself from being thrown around the interior, so she wedged one foot against the bubble while the other pounded the accelerator.
The washed-out bridge approached quickly and before she could close her eyes, she hit the curved portion. The rattling stopped as the wheels left the ground and she felt herself being pulled upward.
It seemed she was now level with the branches of the trees, and then, the FunCar hit the ground and it was all she could do to keep from veering into the trees.
She had taken her foot off the accelerator when she flew into the air, but she still had so much momentum that she careened down the pathway.
She hated that they had given her pseudo-physical controls for the FunCar. If she'd been able to use her neural actuator, then she could be slowing the vehicle down. But since her feet were now swimming wildly as she was tilted over, gripping the steering wheel and trying to adhere to the path, she had no way to stop.
Suddenly, the FunCar shot out of the trees into a wide gravel area. She was headed straight for an old barn. Two figures ran out of the entrance and were waving at her.
With so much speed she wasn't sure if she could stop in time, so she spun the wheel and slammed onto the brake.
The FunCar with its low center of gravity, spun like a top, kicking up dust and throwing her around the interior.
When it finally came to a stop, the outside was covered in a thin film of dust. Gabby could see the faded red wood of the barn only a few feet outside the bubble.
Gabby felt shaky and weak. She hadn't eaten since the morning and all the excitement had drained her. She clutched her backpack to her chest and waited for them to release her from the FunCar.
Chapter Eight
When the bubble opened, Gabby was confronted by a boy holding a strange contraption made of cobbled together wood and metal pieces. He had reddish-orange hair, freckles, and stood taller than the FunCar. He had to stoo
p to point the apparatus into the interior.
Gabby clutched her backpack defensively and dug her hands into the fabric to hide the shaking.
"Please don't point that at me," she said.
Michael appeared next to the red-headed behemoth and lifted the contraption with the back of his hand. "Drogan. She's a friend."
He cocked a half-smile, apologetic, and yet mischievous, and offered his hand so she could climb from the vehicle.
A familiar high voice cut through the morning air from somewhere behind her. "Drogan, you idiot. You shouldn't be pointing that thing at everyone who comes here. It's a useless hunk of metal anyway."
Milton, she assumed, was walking out from the trees, scowling at Drogan. He was pointy thin and had strange blotches on his face. Dangling from a cord around his neck was a wooden rod with teeth marks on it.
Drogan backed away, a pained expression on his face like a scolded five-year-old and wandered back toward the barn with his shoulders hunched. Gabby couldn't quite place what was different about the Frags, but something rattled her perception.
As she tried to figure it out, a swarm of bugs buzzed her head. They didn't fly as she expected, almost hovering around her as if they were watching. They flew off toward the barn before she could swat one.
Gabby realized she was still holding Michael's hand and let go. He shrugged and she turned away before she got caught in his crystalline eyes.
"I guess you Gamers can't listen to directions," sniped Milton. "Have to have everything painted on the world to understand."
Michael kicked a spray of gravel at Milton. "That's no way to treat a guest when she's risked so much to come out here."
"I wouldn't have had to risk so much if it weren't for you guys messing with my files," she said. "And I missed the fork when the sun shone in my eyes. Should have just told me to go left."
"She risked? Remember the files we pilfered from the LIE? They'd fall over themselves to forgive her if she got caught."
Milton sounded out of breath at each word, but she barely noticed as she was trying to figure out what he meant.
"Shut up, Milton," said Michael, glancing sideways in her direction.
"Anyway," Milton continued. "We're the ones risking our lives messing with her. Not the other way around."
Gabby was about to ask a question when she heard a woeful sob. Drogan was sitting on a stump with his face between his hands. The contraption leaned against his massive leg and his shoulders heaved with each sob.
Milton and Michael continued to argue behind her, so she wandered to the big red-head. At first she thought he might be playing some trick, but then she realized he was genuinely crying.
Gabby tentatively put a hand on his shoulder and Drogan flinched it away. She decided he didn’t want to be touched.
She leaned down. "Are you okay?"
Drogan shook his head while keeping his head buried.
"What's wrong?" she asked.
Through the crying and sniffling, Gabby heard in a deep baritone: "Milton said it was useless."
Gabby assumed he was talking about the item leaning on his leg. The apparatus looked like a crossbow of sorts, made with corroded spoons, bailing wire, and an old wooden olive boat. The bolt looked authentic at least.
Though the separate pieces seemed ludicrous as parts for a crossbow, when she squinted at it, the weapon looked formidable.
Gabby checked back to the two boys who hadn't noticed that she'd left. They hadn't even stopped to see why their friend was crying. Gabby had an idea.
"Drogan," she said softly. "Can you show me how your weapon works?"
The big red-head nodded and stood up immediately, wiping a ribbon of snot on his sleeve as he dragged his arm across his face. The crossbow dangled in his meaty fist looking like a child's toy.
Then Gabby realized the contradiction of Drogan. He was man-sized with a faint reddish shadow of a beard on his face, and his arms were as big as her waist. But he had the eyes and mouth of a child. The eyes looked ready to burst back into tears and his lips quivered unsure.
When Drogan listed about, holding his crossbow at arms length, Gabby offered a suggestion.
"Can you hit that tree across the way? The one with the big knot on the side?"
He nodded and in a smooth motion, aimed and fired the crossbow. The bolt flew between Michael and Milton, and impaled a tree on the other side of the clearing.
The two guys jumped and yelled at the same time: "Drogan!"
Drogan froze, but when Gabby started laughing, the big man laughed along with her, glancing to her for reassurance as Milton and Michael scowled.
"Looks like his useless hunk of metal works pretty well," she said.
Drogan had gone beyond laughing and was making huge knee-slapping guffaws. Gabby turned to him.
"How did you make that? I would have never guessed those pieces could make a crossbow?" she asked.
When Drogan kept laughing, Michael filled in. "He has a way with mechanical things. He's as simple as a child but can do miracles with metal and wood and other physical objects."
"He's one of the reasons we asked you to come out here," added Milton.
Gabby squinted in the midday sun. "Have you totally zoned? You wanted me to come out here for him?"
"Affirmative," said Milton. "Can we go inside and explain?" He glanced at Drogan, indicating he didn't want to talk around the big redhead.
Gabby checked with Michael and he nodded. She didn't know why she trusted him more than Milton. She knew them both the same, but still, his nod made following them into the house more reassuring. She was still aggravated from when Milton had made her rub his pants and if he was looking for a little personal buffing, he was going to be sorely mistaken. She was tops in her rank at martial arts games.
A high sing-song voice drifted from the entrance of the barn. "Drogan."
Drogan dropped his make-shift crossbow and burst into a sprint, kicking up gravel, running toward the barn. A face-wide grin was pasted across his face.
A strange apparition floated through the shadows of the trees. The girl looked like a featureless white peg with a mop of black hair stuck on top. Black bandages were wrapped around her eyes, but she didn't appear to have any difficulty avoiding the trees.
Gabby checked back with the other two.
"Celia," Milton said with a shrug.
This was the girl that Michael spent the night with? She couldn't quite picture it. What jealousy she felt evaporated as Drogan lumbered across the yard. She feared he would tackle the fragile girl.
At the last second, he slowed and swooped her off her feet. Celia squealed. The picture of Drogan spinning around, laughing, with the slight girl in his arms, black bandages across her face and white dress twirling beneath, made for a surreal picture.
Michael had gone into the farmhouse and Milton was motioning to follow. Gabby knew then what was different about the Frags--they didn't wear skins. She could see their flaws and zits and scars. Milton had reddish blotches on his face.
It was different than her friend Dario, who let sections of his real skin show. He only let the parts show that looked good. She was seeing their real selves.
"You guys don't wear skins," she blurted out.
Milton touched his face reflexively.
"Too much reliance on that unreality can confuse you on what's real and what's not," said Michael.
"Skins are as much reality as clothing," she said.
Michael scowled and his eyes burned with white-hot intensity. "Let them take that reality from you and they'll take the rest of your life while you're playing with all the buffest fashions."
They were standing in the farmhouse kitchen and Michael was gripping the edge of the counter as if he were trying to keep from falling. The muscles in his jaw flexed as he stared at a ceramic cat on the windowsill.
Gabby wasn't sure why Michael was so mad, but she regretted saying what she did.
"Would you like some water?" Milton
asked, clearly trying to break the awkward silence.
"Yes, please," she said.
While Milton rooted through cabinets for a clean glass and wiped one out with a towel, Michael slowly relaxed his grip on the counter.
"Is Celia a Frag, too?" Gabby asked.
Gabby knew instantly that'd she'd asked the wrong question, when Michael tightened his grip and Milton closed his eyes for a moment.
"That's his sister," said Milton.
Except for the black hair, Gabby found it hard to see the resemblance. Michael was taller with broad shoulders and his skin had the warm glow of time spent under the sun. Celia was a pale, skinny waif. More like a handful of spider silk floating on the morning breeze than an actual flesh and blood girl.
Milton handed her the glass and the three of them stood in silence while she drank. She examined the inside of the farmhouse, avoiding the gaze of the two boys.
The farmhouse, like the boys, was devoid of any digital coverings. Black mold grew in the corners, recent waterstains made random circles across the ceiling and wallpaper peeled away at the seams. Gabby realized then she'd never actually seen wallpaper before. If they wanted different color walls at home, they just changed the program.
She also realized the light on the ceiling was dark.
"Do you have electricity?" she asked.
"We have a generator," said Michael, who had let go of the counter. "But we don't run it unless we have to. For water, we use the hand pump out back."
"Why are you living out here? It's such a...," she let the words trail off, though in her head she finished: major debuff.
"We'd prefer to live in the city," Milton said. "But we lost the game."
"Lost the game? You mean LifeGame?"
Milton nodded.
"That doesn't make sense," said Gabby. "You guys have pulled off some major hacks, including reprogramming a FunCar, and you lost at LifeGame? Were you guys even trying?"
"We were trying, alright." This time it was Milton's turn to look grim. While he wasn't much bigger than Celia and the blotches on his face made him into a poorly drawn clown, Gabby could feel his rage as if it were a blazing fire.
Gamers - Amazon Page 5