“User DM01852 authenticated. Press start button to initialize.”
She reached up to the small rubber button above the right temple, and pressed it.
“Synchronizing in three… two… one…”
Vertigo came and went. For a few seconds, she felt as though she fell in a void of infinite blackness. Pins and needles ran over her entire body. The next thing she knew, she―rather Fawkes―stood in the login lobby. A room with electric-blue walls surrounded her, holding ten alcoves, nine of which were empty. Another Fawkes stood in one, like a life-sized Barbie doll still in its box. The game let people have ten characters per account (with an additional monthly fee for more space). If she had bothered to make any other characters, all she’d need do is walk up to one, and her ‘active’ avatar would change. To make a new character, she’d have to step into one of the empty slots.
As she always did, she approached the giant, shimmering energy portal that would take her into the game―and stepped through.
Fawkes appeared seated in the cushioned bench of a small restaurant adjacent to the Xiānjìng City starport, the same spot she’d logged out from. The missions she’d run last night didn’t involve leaving the surface, even though the whole group had been there for them.
Her friend list showed Nighthawk as online, the only other member of her five-person crew currently in the game. She couldn’t remember ever logging in and not seeing him, so she figured he either had no job or worked at the best job in the world, one that let him log in and play Axillon99 from his office. Hell, maybe he worked for CSI.
‹Sup Fawkes,› said Nighthawk by way of in-game text.
‹Not much. Just got home. U?›
She picked up the half-eaten monstrous doughnut she’d ordered before logging out last night, and continued munching on it. It transcended doughnut into the realm of small cake, and had a heavy dose of dark chocolate frosting with an inner core like hot molten brownie. Despite the treat being virtual, it was so sweet she expected her blood to turn to jelly after three bites.
‹Up in North Rosewood doing some bounty quests. Wanna group?›
Nighthawk played a gunslinger class, and according to her friend tab, he’d hit level forty-two at some point today. She’d once heard him mention an alt, a side character he sometimes messed around with, and it annoyed her. Dakota had made Fawkes as her first (and so far only) character, and she’d made it only to level thirty-seven as a rogue/spy hybrid. The two classes were similar, though the spy side contributed more to stealth and infiltration while Cognitive Systems’ opinion of a rogue made them mostly a sneaky sort of combat character. Since both classes came from the same ‘scoundrel’ branch, mixing levels between them didn’t have an overall effect on her combat abilities. Not like someone who combined, say, technomancer levels with a soldier, the worst-case scenario. They’d wind up being able to do magic and physical combat, but pretty much stink at both compared to an equal-level character that focused all in one direction.
Still, she envied Nighthawk, mostly for his free time. Level forty-eight had a really nice ability in the rogue list that she desperately wanted: Shadow Mastery. With it, she could engage stealth and stay hidden for a full minute no matter what she did. In her head, it sounded like a cheat code, running around getting ambush criticals on everything when nothing could see her.
But… eleven levels away. And combat out in the open kinda sucked. At least, with her focusing so much on the hacking side, she almost had to hide and ambush to have a chance to defeat a same-level opponent. Not like Nighthawk’s gunslinger. He could own five or six enemies in seconds assuming none were ‘captains.’
Hmm. I’m not above riding some coattails for some easy experience. ‹Sure. Inv plz.›
He sent a group invite, which caused two things to happen: a small octagonal frame appeared high and left in her field of view with his portrait, name, and life-bar. Also, a blue holographic window scrolled open in front of her bearing the question: “Teleport to group?”
She poked the ‘yes’ button. The world around her vanished in a blue flash. She appeared standing in a grassy field with a ripple of red laser fire going by on the left, leaving a trail of smoking holes.
“Holy shit!” shouted Fawkes, while diving behind a giant rock.
Nighthawk, standing out in the open with a large laser pistol in each hand, stopped shooting at some black-armored soldiers to gawk at her.
Fawkes curled up as laser blasts shaved fragments of her boulder away. Shards of rock rained over her head, some of which remained stuck in her pink hair. She stared right back at him. “What?”
“Uhh, nothing.”
Nighthawk returned his attention to the group of enemies and began a slow walk forward while firing his pistols rapidly, alternating left and right. As soon as the pelting of incoming fire stopped hitting her boulder, she attempted stealth, and it worked. That meant none of the computer-controlled bad guys paid her any attention. Hiding while in combat required she use a special ability.
She poked her head up and prepared to use Shadowblink to teleport the fifty or so feet she needed to travel in order to get behind the enemies, but the last of them had already collapsed to the ground with smoking laser holes in his chest.
“It’s safe now. I got them all,” said Nighthawk.
He twirled his guns around his fingers and stuffed them in hip holsters. Except for the white plasticized body armor under his duster coat, he resembled a twenty-something cowboy straight out of the Old West, only with the long hair and ‘beautiful’ face of a male hero from a Japanese anime.
“Gee, thanks. Little warning next time.” Fawkes stood and brushed dust off her black leggings.
“Oh, sorry.” He scratched at his hat “I didn’t even think… those guys are only thirty-nine.”
She walked over to stand next to him. “Is that why they couldn’t hit you?”
“Nah, that was Showdown. New ability I got this afternoon.” He struck a confident pose. “Gives me one minute of protection like I’ve got heavy cover while standing in the open. Like you know in those old movies, where the good guy just stands there and no one can hit him.”
“Yeah…” She frowned at the dead men in armor. “What’s up with these guys?”
“Oh, mercenaries. Kidnapped some woman I’m on my way to save.”
Another holographic window appeared: “Nighthawk would like to share ‘A Wayward Bride’ (mission) with you. Accept?”
She hit yes.
“Correction. That we are on the way to save.” Nighthawk smiled and tipped his hat.
“Are you sure this woman wants to be saved?”
He stared at her like she’d spoken Greek. “Huh? Of course. It’s the quest. Why wouldn’t she?”
Fawkes put on Dakota’s coffee-shop smirk. “The quest is titled ‘Wayward Bride.’ I’m betting this woman ran away.”
“Oh.” He mulled this over for a moment before shrugging. “Okay. So, what do we do?”
“Let’s go ask her.” She winked.
Dakota walked up to a locked door with a small barred window, from which the terrified face of a blonde girl of about eighteen stared at her with huge blue eyes. Her guess had been close, but not entirely correct. Her suspicion turned out on the right track, however. The bride did run away, and her father had hired mercenaries to drag her back home. Those mercenaries, in turn, demanded more money once they had her.
She couldn’t figure out if the developers were riffing on Romeo and Juliet or trying to do a Helen of Troy thing… or maybe just a Hatfield and McCoy reference. Either way, she could’ve sworn she’d already let this young woman out of her cell and brought her home for the reward. And for that matter, where the hell did Nighthawk go?
And why had her hair turned blue again? Fawkes had pink hair.
“Hey, I’m supposed to get an extra shot in this,” said the kidnapped teen through the bars while holding up a latte cup.
“What?” blurted Fawkes.
&nb
sp; “My coffee. Duh…” The girl stared at her like a spoiled princess. “You didn’t put an extra shot in it.”
Fawkes sighed at the dingy metal ceiling. “Dead mercenaries are littered all over the place. You’re locked in a cell, and you’re giving me shit about coffee?”
“I paid for the extra shot,” said the girl.
“Ugh.” Dakota rubbed the bridge of her nose. “I’m dreaming, aren’t I?”
“How should I know?” asked the girl. “If you’re dreaming, I’m going to say whatever you want to believe.”
“And that’s exactly what I would say if someone asked me that.” Dakota sighed. “I’m dreaming.”
The room faded away to blurry nothingness.
“Kota! Holy shit!” shouted a male voice.
She peeled her eyes open to find a hologram of her younger brother, Nebraska, standing at the foot of the bed, cringing away from her nudity. Groaning in protest, she rolled to the side, grabbed the comforter, and pulled it over herself.
“That’s what you get for barge calling me, Brass.” She yawned, then forced her eyes to stay open and looked at him. “Let it ring next time.”
Nebraska risked a peek, and, seeing her covered, un-cringed. He looked a bit worse for wear, too thin, in torn jeans and a puffy orange winter vest. The flannel shirt he had on under it looked so dirty she practically smelled homeless vagrant through a holographic projection. Scraggly dark brown hair hung around his face like a greasy theater curtain, but at least he’d shaved. Without facial hair, he looked closer to sixteen than his actual age of nineteen.
“Sorry. Don’t have a lot of time.”
“Huh?” She propped herself up on her elbows and squinted at him, still not fully awake. “Are you being chased or something?”
“Naw, using a public terminal. Only got fifteen minutes.”
“You’re going to get shot,” she muttered.
He rolled his eyes. “You sound like Mom now.”
“So, what’s so urgent that you barge call me at”―she twisted to look at the alarm clock on the little stand by the bed―“five fucking thirty in the morning?”
“I thought you got up this early.”
“I do,” she muttered, and let her body flop back into the mattress. “On a work day. But I’m off today.”
“Oh, then you can sleep more after I hang up.” He grinned.
“What do you want?” She stared at the ceiling.
“Umm.” He stuffed his hands in the pockets of his winter vest and glanced down. “Can you spare a couple bucks? I’m out of food.”
“Turn around.”
“Huh?” He looked up.
“Unless you want to see me naked again, turn around.”
“Oh.” He faced away.
Dakota slid across to sit on the edge of the bed and grabbed her giant T-shirt off the rug. After wriggling into it, she padded over to the computer desk and retrieved her Android Supernova smartphone. Nebraska’s holographic ghost wandered up beside her.
“Wow, nice phone.”
“It’s four years old,” she muttered. “Got it used.”
“Oh.” He shrugged. “Still looks cool.”
“You still using the same PayZon ID?”
He nodded.
“You know, I’m not exactly rich either.” Dakota tapped at the small screen, navigating her PayZon app to send him some cash. “I sent you $100. That leaves me with $100 until Friday at midnight.”
“Thanks, Kota.” He flashed that same sheepish grin that always came out whenever she let him get away with something.
The look on his face reminded her too much of him being little again, so she glanced away. The parents had cut him off, but she just couldn’t bring herself to. “You know, they have these things called jobs that generate money, which you can turn into food.”
“Yeah, yeah.” He kicked at the rug. “You know how it is. It’s all organized, legal slavery. The fuckers in power keep us busy all day doing whatever, reward us with hamster treats. All the people’s effort makes those bastards tons of money while we barely get by. I’m not gonna be no one’s slave.”
“I’m not awake enough to pick on you for horrible grammar.”
“So, don’t?” He grinned.
“Brass…” She turned back and made eye contact, desperation radiating from her. “You’re on the street.”
He waved her off. “It’s not like that. I’m with a group of similar mindset. We are the revolution… eventually.”
“Yeah, well, revolution or not, I’d much rather you were a wage slave with food than a free dead guy in an alley somewhere.”
Nebraska rolled his eyes like she’d asked a seven-year-old to clean up his room. “It’s nowhere near as bad as you think. We don’t do the gang war thing. It’s not a ‘street gang,’ Kota, we’re an organized group. Like a militia.”
She tried to grab his hand, but the holo-phone ghost broke apart into static where her fingers disrupted it. “Mom and Dad fucked us up, Brass. It took me a while to see it, but they are mental. There’s a little validity in what they say, but they take it way too far. I hate seeing you out there like that.”
“If we weren’t related, would you agree with our goals?”
Dakota fidgeted. She couldn’t deny her strong anti-corporation mindset. While her parents had advanced to thinking the entire political system had become an illusion for corporate control, she’d backed off from fully believing that to thinking that billionaires and huge corporations simply had an overabundance of influence in politics. The whole ‘the life you think you know is a lie’ Matrix style head game sounded like a conspiracy theorist’s wet dream. Her brother and his friends, all of whom were well into their twenties or older, had this far-reaching goal of ‘overthrowing’ the corporations and even the puppet government ala some neo-American-Revolution. Fortunately, the most hostile action they’d yet taken against The Man thus far amounted to activist posts on social media and spray paint.
“In spirit, yes. Big companies and billionaires have too much influence on society, but Dad is cracked. Politicians aren’t android replicants.”
“That’s Congress. Senators are lizards,” said Nebraska.
She froze, staring at him. “Please tell me you’re making fun of Mom.”
He cracked up laughing. “Yeah. That android crap is way out there, but you know the whole system is rigged for the elite. As long as we keep jumping through hoops like trained monkeys, nothing will change. We have to take a stand and do something!”
“It’s not going to start from a dingy alcove under an overpass.” She folded her arms. “It’s going to come from the thinkers and the artists. The true underground. We have to reach people.”
He shrugged. “You just called the Brooklyn Bridge an ‘overpass.’”
“Look, I am dead on my feet here.” She trudged back to the bed and sat on the edge. “I’ll swing by sometime. You guys still in the same spot?”
“Yeah.”
“Hey, Brass?” She peered up past a neon-blue haze at him.
“Yo.” Her brother’s hologram froze, one arm reaching for a disconnect button out of view.
She bit her lip, hesitating to mention Eric to her brother. An isolated life trying to stay on the fringe of society hadn’t done much for her social life, and her time in college didn’t leave her any lingering circle of friends. The number of people she would even think about getting real with represented an extremely short list that had at one time been four names long. Her parents had fallen off it two years ago when she decided they’d gone headlong into ‘totally nuts’ territory. Not that any bad blood existed, but she didn’t trust them in matters involving critical thought. That left two, and she couldn’t exactly talk to Eric about her feelings for Eric.
“Something wrong?” asked Nebraska.
“Umm. So, there’s this guy I’m seeing.”
He folded his arms. “Need someone’s legs broken?”
Dakota laughed. “No, no… He’s coo
l. Nothing like that. The problem is that I’ve been seeing him for like a year now and I’m not sure what he is.”
“Huh?” Nebraska tilted his head. “Think he might really be a chick?”
“No. Shit’s sake!” She threw a pillow through the hologram, not sure if she should be angry or laugh more. “It’s just that, I dunno. We were friends and now we’re more than friends, but I’m not sure why I’ve been hesitating at it going past that.”
“Do you love the dude?”
“Yeah, kinda. I can’t tell if it’s just that I’m really falling for him or if I’m resisting ‘being the girlfriend’ because that’s what society expects. It’s what normal people do, and I don’t want to become another society drone doing what people are expected to do.”
Nebraska shrugged. “If you like the dude, go for it. That ‘day job’ of yours is already making you a drone. Love won’t.”
She shot him a sour look, but he did have a point.
An overly generic ding-dong sound filled the room.
“I’m getting beeped at, anyway. Time’s gonna run out. Stupid pay terminal.”
“’Kay. Take care of yourself. I’ll be by soon.”
Nebraska pointed at her, winked, and disappeared. The room became darker for his absence.
She squinted up at the tiny whirring motor pulling the hologram emitter back into the ceiling. Her brain woke up enough to be embarrassed at his walking in on her while she slept, but she didn’t trust turning off his emergency access. Their luck, as soon as she did, he’d have some serious life-or-death issue and wind up dead because she didn’t get his call. At least he hadn’t barged in when she was with Eric.
The doorbell rang again.
“Hang on,” she yelled, stood, and hurried to her apartment door.
A thirty-something woman in a white polo shirt with a red logo in it stood outside holding a package. Since she hadn’t made any enemies in places high enough to send her a courier-assassin, she opened the door.
“Dakota Marx?” asked the woman.
“Yeah.”
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