by Jason Segel
My cab drops me off on the corner of Seventieth Street and Madison Avenue. I try to keep my head down as I walk the rest of the way to Alexei’s town house. Whenever I look up, I see things I don’t want to see. The gate to the service entrance is locked, so I ring the bell beside the carved wooden doors, and a cordial man in a plain black suit greets me. He’s not one of the tough guys I saw during my first visit to the mansion. If I had to guess, I’d peg him as an accountant or a statistics professor. Hundreds of washings have turned his once-white shirt a drab cream color. And unlike the men I met last time I was here, he doesn’t look like he’s ever popped a steroid.
“Mr. Eaton?” he asks in a Russian accent. I answer with a nod. “Welcome. I’ve been expecting you. Please follow this way.” This time, I’m allowed in through the main entrance. I guess the sanitary precautions are no longer necessary now that Alexei Semenov is gone. I’m sure the irony isn’t lost on anyone here. Alexei managed to survive a poisoning and an acid attack only to lose his life playing a video game.
Alexei’s men are still here, lurking like ghosts. There must be a dozen of them, yet the house is eerily silent. My guide leads me deep into the mansion, past palatial chambers and a wood-paneled library with shelves that circle a central atrium. We stop outside a room that’s the size of a walk-in closet. A single capsule takes up most of the floor space. It’s a rectangular box around seven feet long and three feet high. A hexagonal glass door offers a view of the stainless steel interior, which has just enough space to fit a reclining human.
“This is where Alexei died,” the man announces. “In that miserable box.” I hear the sadness in his voice, and I suddenly see something I missed.
“You’re a relative.” They look nothing alike, but those icy blue eyes could only have come from the same gene pool.
My suspicions are confirmed with a single brusque nod. “His brother. I arrived in New York this morning.”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” I say, and immediately regret it. I apologized to Alexei once and he took offense.
The man stares at the capsule. He doesn’t want to meet my eye. “Alexei was not a good man. It was always just a matter of time,” he says. “Converte gladium tuum in locum suum. Omnes enim, qui acceperint gladium, gladio peribunt.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t understand Latin,” I tell him.
“I believe in English it is most often translated as ‘Those who live by the sword will die by the sword.’ ”
I wouldn’t have imagined Alexei Semenov’s brother would be the sort to go around dropping quotes in dead languages. “Are you a professor?” I ask.
“I am a priest,” he says, moving on before I have a chance to pick my jaw off the floor. “It seems my brother left very clear instructions about what to do in the event of his death. You are meant to play a key role. I brought you here, to this room, so you could see how Alexei’s life ended. If you don’t mind, I would like to show you how it began.”
He reaches into the pocket of his suit and produces a photograph, which he glances at and then passes it to me. The paper is square and the image faded. It was taken by the kind of camera that hasn’t been manufactured in decades. There are two barely teenage boys in the picture, standing outside a rickety wooden cottage. They can’t be more than a year apart in age. Their arms are around each other’s shoulders and they’re beaming at the camera.
“That is the Alexei I choose to remember,” the priest says. “The one I knew before the money or power. He was the best of all brothers. A few days after that photo was taken, our parents were killed in an accident. Alexei went to work to take care of me while I stayed in school. He was thirteen years old. In another life, he would not have grown into the monster he became.”
I hand the photo back to the man whose name I don’t even know.
“What do you know about my brother’s death?” he asks.
I tell him everything. I can’t see any reason to hold back.
“So it is true that the Company murdered him,” Alexei’s brother concludes when I finish.
“Yes,” I say. “They gave Alexei a disk, though they knew it would eventually kill him.”
“Thank you for your honesty, Mr. Eaton,” he replies. “Do you know what Alexei left for you?”
“A kid,” I tell him. “And a pair of glasses and a disk.”
“Yes,” Alexei’s brother says. “Those are all part of the package.”
I hear footsteps behind me. I turn to see two figures coming toward us, one a large man with a pasty complexion. The other is a boy, thin and dark with a nasty-looking scar on the side of his shaved head. Otherworld wounds don’t leave scars. It must have been from the real-world accident that left him comatose. He’s wearing what appear to be plaid pajamas. I know his name is Declan, but he’ll always be Gorog to me. The boy pauses when he sees me, as though he’s trying to figure out if I’m real. Then he rushes right at me and throws his arms around my chest like a child. After a while he straightens up and steps back. His body has recovered, but I can tell how much he’s suffered at the Company’s hands. His eyes are hollow and his ashen face is so gaunt that I can see the skull beneath his skin. I have to grit my teeth to force the rage back down inside me.
“Thank you, Simon,” he says. “I always said you were the One.”
“Geez—that again?” I force a laugh. “I’m not the One. I’m pretty sure the One would have rescued you sooner.”
Alexei’s brother gestures to the larger man. He comes forward with a duffel bag, which he holds out to me. At first I assume it’s filled with Gorog’s things. Then it dawns on me that Gorog probably doesn’t have any things. When I reach for the bag’s handles, they slip out of my fingers and it drops to the ground. For an ordinary-size bag, it’s incredibly heavy.
I give Alexei’s brother a nervous glance. I’m not sure I want to know what’s in the bag. “That one’s a surprise, is it?” he asks. “Alexei wanted you to have everything you need to get the job done.”
I’m curious as hell, but I won’t pull the zipper. I figure I’ll wait until we’ve left to open my present.
“A car is waiting outside,” says the brother. “It will take you wherever you need to go. I wish you good luck.”
That seems to be all he has to say. “Wait,” I call out as he walks away. “Is there a way we can reach you?”
“No,” the man says. “Soon all of this will be gone, and I will have vanished along with it.”
* * *
—
The car outside is a black Mercedes with a tinted glass panel separating the driver from the backseat. The glass lowers as Gorog and I settle in.
“Head toward New Jersey, please,” I tell the man behind the wheel. “I’ll give you directions once we’re out of the tunnel.”
As soon as we’re rolling, I check inside the bag.
“Oh my God,” Gorog gasps. The bag is filled with stacks of hundred-dollar bills. It’s not the money that interests me the most, though. Sitting on top of the pile of cash is a small box. I crack it open to find a pair of black glasses and a disk inside. Stuck to the disk is a bright pink Post-it note. On it is a list of five names. I recognize a couple, including the famous movie director who was recently arrested for attacking an actress. Aside from him, these must be the names of men who’ve died wearing the glasses.
“That’s OtherEarth.” Gorog gestures toward the glasses. He’s careful not to touch them. When I look at him now I see a thirteen-year-old kid who’s still waiting for his growth spurt. It’s hard to imagine how someone so small and fragile could survive what he’s been through.
“You know about OtherEarth?”
“The engineers at the Company made me play it a million times. The disk is different. It’s not like Otherworld. You stay in this world and you can move your body. But you feel everything you see through the glas
ses. They’d hook me up to all kinds of monitors and let a monster loose in the room. Every time it would kill me, they’d do some kind of scan afterward. Try to figure out how I was still alive.”
“Did it—” I can’t finish.
“Hurt?” Gorog asks. “Hell yeah it hurt! You don’t know what pain feels like until you’ve been eaten or ripped apart. But it all went away when the game ended. As soon as the disk was off I felt fine. They never could understand how I stayed alive.”
“When was the last time the Company did that to you?” I ask.
“Day before yesterday. A few hours before the Russians came to get me,” Gorog says. Which means they haven’t given up on debugging the disks. The Company is definitely going to want Gorog back.
I start to hold the OtherEarth glasses up to my face, but Gorog grabs my hand.
“Don’t mess with it, Simon,” he begs. “It’s every bit as bad as Otherworld. With the disk on, it’s almost worse.”
“I have to understand how it works,” I tell him. “Alexei Semenov thought it could help us destroy the Company. He was convinced that OtherEarth killed people too.”
“He was right,” Gorog says. “I heard a couple of engineers talking about someone who’d died. Sounded like a guy who used to work with them. They said he’d gotten hooked—and they were trying to guess what he’d kept going back to OtherEarth to see.”
“What were some of their guesses?” I ask.
Gorog’s cheeks flush. “They were pretty gross,” he says. “You know—dirty stuff.”
The car emerges from the Lincoln Tunnel and the darkened glass lowers. “We’re in New Jersey, sir,” the driver announces. “Where would you like to go?”
“Elizabeth,” I say.
The name of the town hits Gorog hard. “What?” he cries. “Don’t tell me you’re taking me home!”
“Not exactly,” I say. “We’re going to get your parents. Then you’re leaving New Jersey with them. Give the man your address.”
Gorog just stares at me like I’ve broken his heart. Most thirteen-year-olds in his position would be dying to go home by now, but Gorog obviously wants to stay for the fight. The kid is amazing.
“Come on, just do it,” I tell him. “You can argue all you want on the way.”
Gorog reluctantly gives the driver his address.
“Let me go with you,” he pleads as soon as the window goes up again. “I want to destroy the Company just as much as you do!”
“I can’t let you.” I hold up my injured hand as I tell him. “I won’t be able to protect you. I can’t even protect myself.”
Gorog crosses his arms. “When we were in Otherworld, you took me with you. That was just as dangerous, but it paid off, didn’t it? I saved your life there. And I proved I can take care of myself.”
I want to point out that in Otherworld, Gorog was a seven-foot ogre dressed in a loincloth and covered in tribal tattoos. But I know he’ll say that he’s the same person here that he was back there—and I know I can’t argue against him because he’ll be right. The boy beside me is a fearless warrior—one to whom I owe my life.
“I know, Gorog,” I tell him. “I’m not sending you away for your sake. I’m asking you to go for mine.”
“What do you mean?” he asks.
“I’m not well,” I tell him. He’s the first person I’ve confided in. I don’t know why, but I want to tell him everything. “The game has messed me up pretty badly. Carole was the first person I saw die, but she wasn’t the last. I’m not sure what will happen to me if I lose another person I care about. I’m already losing my mind.”
“Carole chose to die because she believed in you,” Gorog says. “She thought you were the one who could stop all of this. I believe in you too.”
If that’s supposed to make me feel better, it doesn’t. Even in my dreams, I know I’m not the One.
“Look, I don’t know how this is all going to end,” I admit, “but if you’re safe, at least I’ll know I’ve done one thing right.”
We pull up at the address Gorog gave the driver—a tiny row house that’s seen better days. The sun is going down and the lights are on. I can see two people making dinner in the kitchen. It’s such an ordinary scene that I almost tear up. I never knew you could miss ordinary this badly.
“They’ll be in danger if I’m with them,” Gorog points out. “The Company knows who they are. They’ll come searching for me.”
They will. And as I think about it, I realize I’m sure that was part of their plan. Alexei dies, they snap Gorog back up. I just hope that the news of Alexei’s death hasn’t managed to reach them.
“They’ll be in danger either way,” I say.
I knock on the glass divider and it lowers. “I was told you would drive us wherever we want to go. Is that true?”
“That was the order,” the man confirms.
“This kid and his family will tell you what the next stop will be.” It’s safer this way. Alexei’s driver can be trusted. The Company will have no way of knowing where Gorog and his family have gone.
I unzip the duffel bag and pull out the black box and a wad of bills, which I keep for myself. “Take this,” I say, shoving the rest of the money toward Gorog. “Leave right away. Don’t go to any relatives’ homes. Don’t take any credit cards or phones. Lie low until the Company’s gone under.”
“But don’t you need the money?” Gorog asks. I do, but even if that bag contained all the money in the world, I’d still make him take it. I’d give him anything I could if it meant he’d be okay.
“I have enough,” I tell him.
“Promise you’ll come find me when the coast is clear,” Gorog begs.
I nod. “You have my word.”
“Then I believe you. Because you’re the One.”
I don’t bother to argue. I just give him a hug, then open the door and slide out. I don’t look back until I’m too far away for him to see the tears in my eyes.
I watch from across the street as Gorog lugs the duffel bag up a short flight of stairs to the door. He rings the bell and a woman answers. She teeters for a moment, and I’m worried she’ll faint. Then she calls out to someone inside the house, grabs her son and pulls him toward her. Gorog’s father appears—every inch as tall as his son once described him. The three are still standing there bawling when I walk away.
* * *
—
I hail a cab a few blocks from Gorog’s house. In Manhattan you don’t find many cabs with protective Plexiglas barriers between the front and backseats these days, but apparently they’re still necessary in Elizabeth, New Jersey. The driver laughs when I tell him I’m going to the Waldorf Astoria, and I have to flash a few bills to convince him I’m serious. We’re on the New Jersey Turnpike and the car has come to a stop. I can see flashing lights about a mile away. There’s an accident directly in front of us—and no exit ramp in between. On the other side of the Hudson River lies Manhattan, just close enough to tantalize. There’s no telling how long we’ll be stuck. It’s funny. I can’t even remember the last time I was bored. I’ve almost forgotten what it feels like. Even before Otherworld, I always had a smartphone in my pocket that could keep me company. Now it’s just me—and the driver up front. It’s strange to have nothing to look at and no one to kill.
I open the black box that’s still sitting in my lap and take out the rather ordinary black glasses inside. I put them on—just for a second, I tell myself, though without the disk they should be harmless. A menu appears in front of my eyes. It’s what looks like a list of games. They seem silly and innocent. I scroll through the options and choose GOLIATH. A weapon icon pops up in the upper right corner of my vision. To my civilian eye, it looks like an antiaircraft gun. I position my arms the way I imagine you’d hold it, and the life-size weapon is suddenly in front of me. I can’t feel it, of cour
se, but it responds to my movements. It’s pretty impressive, but I’m still not sure what I’m supposed to shoot. Then I hear a roar in my ears. An explosion follows soon after. My body doesn’t sense the tremor that accompanies it, but I see my surroundings shake.
I turn to the window and realize the island of Manhattan is under attack. A reptilian monster that looks different enough from Godzilla to avoid copyright disputes is laying waste to the city. I feel myself flinch as it rips off the top half of the Empire State Building and hurls it into the Hudson. A red warning flashes in front of me. DAMAGE DETECTED 2%. I assume the object of the game is to minimize the destruction. Narrowing my eyes lets me zoom in on the beast as it snatches an airplane out of the sky and crushes it in its claw. The detail is magnificent—every bit as good as Otherworld. I roll down my window, raise my weapon and position the monster in its crosshairs. My right hand is still in a lot of pain, so I pull the trigger with my left. When I fire, a small missile blasts from the barrel and streaks across the sky. I lose track of it over the river, but the ball of fire that bursts from the beast’s shoulder tells me I hit my mark. It roars and searches for its assailant. It can’t see me, but it knows I’m somewhere to the west and it starts to stomp in my direction.
“Hey, you okay back there?” I hear someone ask. I turn to see the driver staring at me in the rearview mirror.
“Yeah.” I tap my glasses with an index finger. “I’m just playing a game.”
“Sure you are,” the driver replies warily, looking very thankful for the plastic barrier between us.
I figure there’s only one way back to the home menu. I close my eyes. When the sound of the game fades, I open them again. The menu is in front of me, and I choose FUTURE WORLD. Instantly, the city as I’ve always known it vanishes. It’s replaced by soaring buildings that reach far beyond the clouds. Flying vehicles maneuver around them. The cars alongside me are now unrecognizable forms of transportation. The people inside them don’t appear to be people at all, but rather a variety of alien life-forms.