The swordstick blade digs in deep and I go down with him when his knees unlock. Over, backwards – there’s no time to pull out and that ain’t a sex joke. I actually hear the THWOCK as my skull slams into the floor.
~*~
Feedback mind splatter digital chatter. Pixilated raindrops neuronal life blocks. Life in a grid unimaginable; fathomable Quantum leap from stone to stone. Alone scatter backbone BIOS. Open the logic gate and nod to the nodes, leaf through the hard drive of life’s recursive functions. ICANN name domains and sift through endless kernings, vandalize vectors and tattoo virtual memories to the souls of safe modes.
QUUUUAAAANNNNTTTTUUUUUUUMMMMM.
Blurred words, slivers of light and screenshot crack shots of a hotel assault. My mind reels from burning bitmaps as I blink my eyes awake.
“Where am I?”
“Quantum!” Frances Euphoria blurs into focus. I move my arm up and she presses it back down. A hospital room? Great, the last place I hoped to wake up. It only takes another second or two to become cognizant of the IV drip plugged into my arm.
“You’re okay!” she cries, hugging me softly.
“Keep Nurse Ratched away – no Humandroids, send me a real nurse.” I mumble as I try to sort out all the images perforating my brain. There was an attack – that’s for sure – and it was on me. What happened after is … gone with the wind by this point, Clark Gabled up. I try to focus on Frances’ face, her concerned eyes. They’re puffy, red and swollen; she probably turned on the waterworks several times while I was out.
“Relax, Quantum, just relax. You’re tensing up.”
“Who was it?” I ignore the dryness of my throat, try to steady my gaze.
Another image flashes across my mind’s eye – some fat bastard teen, pear-shaped and pizza-faced, dressed in black like a pretend killer wannabe with a big frickin’ shooter, waiting for me in my room. I’m glad he was just some asshole with a gun and not someone with some training, but I’d be even gladder if I didn’t feel like someone whopped me upside the head with a two-by-four.
“What happened?” I ask again, and try to work up a little moisture in the rancid catbox that is my mouth. My brain is Play-Doh going through the spaghetti factory; still, the logical side of my noodle is already kicking into high gear. Thank you, neocortex.
Frances grits her teeth.
“Well?”
“A lot has happened since you’ve been out.”
“How long have I been out?”
“Not too long.”
“What’s not too long? Please don’t say eight years … ”
“Long enough for the police to decline to charge you. Your iNet data, your attacker’s iNet data, the man in the hallway and the hotel’s surveillance system clearly show that you were attacked and that you defended yourself. The Dream Team lawyer has already squared away everything else. The hotel is technically your home and you were attacked in your home, so your actions were lawful self-defense.
“The hotel wanted to press charges against you for having a weapon on their premises, and the cops wanted to confiscate your cane, but Solon pointed out that the hotel was criminally negligent when they gave your assailant access to your room, and he’d file suit against everybody and revoke the hotel’s government contract.”
“Solon’s a damn good lawyer.”
“He is. The hotel’s lawyers quickly agreed with him and so your cane is safe. A drone should be delivering it to the office any moment now.”
“It’s a swordstick.”
“Whatevs … if you hadn’t had that with you … ”
“I get it, Sponge Boob Trigger Pants would have murdalized me. I’d be American Swiss cheese.”
Frances half-smiles.
“Oh, and you can thank you for the swordstick. You’re the one that bought it for me.”
She nods.
“What about the kid?” I ask. I almost call him an assassin, but about the only thing he has in common with an actual assassin are the first three letters of the noun.
“That wasn’t just any teenager, that was … ” Frances bites her lip.
“Well?”
“A guy named Matthew Henderson.”
“Who? Should I know this person?”
“Rollins.”
“Rollins the Reaper?” I suddenly recall the beefcaked gothic John Cena in his skull mask pumping his muscles and posturing. The thought comes and I open my mouth to let it out: “Strata sent him.”
“We don’t know that.”
“That’s how he got the gun.”
She bites her lip. “Again, we don’t know that. The police are investigating, but the receiver was 3-D printed, so no serial number, and all the other components are over the counter sales to anybody so there’s no way to trace it.”
“It has to be Strata’s doing. How else would Rollins get in and spoof the hotel’s security system or whatever if not for some high level hackery? Rollins may be a wowsie-wow gamer, but all the time he spends in the Proxima Galaxy probably means he doesn’t have the time to be a wowsie-wow hacker.”
“That’s where money comes in.”
“Spent … ” Frances looks down.
“Huh?”
“The amount of time he spent in the Proxima Galaxy. Rollins … uh, Matthew is dead. You killed him.”
The fourth book in the Feedback Loop Series will be called Reapers and Repercussions is available here. Join my reader’s group to be the first to hear about new releases. Book Five, The Mechanical Heart, is out now and Book Six will be released in February 2016
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Table of Contents
The Feedback Loop: Book One
Day 545
Day 546
Day 547
Day 548
Day 549
Day 550
Day 551
Day 552
Day 553
Day 554
Day 555
Day 556
Epilogue
Steampunk is Dead
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
High Fantasy
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Epilogue
Back of the Book Shit
Reapers and Repercussions Preview:
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Table of Contents
The Feedback Loop (3-Book Box Set): (Scifi LitRPG Series) Page 54