Press Start to Play

by Daniel H. Wilson

  —

  You warm up your Lean Cuisine in the break room. Pasta primavera and a can of Sprite Zero. Oh shit, Carla’s here. You try to hand-comb your hair a little. She smiles. Oh shit oh shit. She’s having a Cup Noodles and a Dr Pepper. You move your iridium collection tool off the table on the off chance she wants to sit across from you. She says don’t worry about it and your stomach drops a foot. And then she comes around the table and sits right next to you. Oh shit oh shit oh shit. You talk for seventeen whole minutes, the rest of your lunch break. As you’re putting your bio-suit back on, you notice you are lightly sweating. It feels good.

  —

  Moon base six. What, maybe one fifty, two hundred yards away? You could get there in thirty seconds. Flat-out sprint. You could do it. You’ve seen fast, watched them do it. You know it can be done. You’re not sure why, but you feel it—there’s more to it than just this. You have big things ahead of you.

  Cha-chung. Iridium. Big piece. It’s been a good week.

  —

  Is Carla seeing anyone? You ask around a little. Mixed messages, but bottom line what you are hearing is that she’s available. You have no chance. But. Hmm. You never know.

  —

  Moon base six. You do the work. The day goes fast. You keep your eyes down, but your head is in the stars. Iridium, schmiridium. Carla carla carla.

  —

  Plasma rains down on the surface of the planet, melting almost everything into molten death. In other words, it’s Tuesday. This week, though, you’re standing right here, in the crease. Stay away from the crease. Far far away. That’s what they teach you in training. They never explain why, but you know better. Stuff happens in the crease. Weird stuff. You can always get iridium there. You hoover it all up, leave for a few minutes, come back, and there it is. So, no. You’re not going to stay away from the crease. What do they think, you’re an idiot?

  Apparently, you are an idiot.

  Because this Tuesday, when the plasma rains down, melting everything, molten death, blah blah blah, et cetera, you’re standing in the crease when it happens. There is so much iridium coating your bio-suit, it’s fusing into a protective layer, shielding you.

  The whole of creation seems to be falling down from above, raining down on your head, and you’re in your suit, feeling all warm and fuzzy inside. Tingly. You check your body parts, which seem intact. Fine. More than fine, in fact.

  You seem to have been…changed.

  —

  Moon base six. Right there. Now there’s a whole mess of activity. Preparations being made, fanfare, all kinds of official-looking window dressing going up. There is literally a red carpet being rolled out toward the landing dock. Rumor has it CENTCOM Council is coming to investigate the incident. The Incident. That’s what they’re calling it. That’s not what you’d call it, though. You don’t know what you’d call it yet.

  —

  There’s that dude. He’s right there. In the middle. Of everything. At all times. Did he just grab his junk? He just grabbed his junk.

  Get back to your iridium mining, someone says. You look up and see a CENTCOM noncommissioned officer, about five feet above you, riding one of those hover pads. You wonder if he realizes how much of a tool he is, balancing on that thing. You wish you could just take your iridium-collection thingy and whack him right in the nuts.

  —

  You whack him. Not in the nuts. In the shin. Which is probably worse, because it sounds like it shatters on impact.

  —

  People lose their minds. They have no idea what to do with you.

  They are taking you down to the base. Holy crap. You are in an actual jeep, actually riding toward the actual base. You cannot believe it. You look around, try to take it all in. You have no idea what has happened. One day you’re an iridium-mining grunt, working for four and a quarter chits per year, on, like, a billion-year contract or something, and the next thing you know, you’re zooming toward moon base six with electromagnetic restraints on and two plasma rifles trained at your head. You are smiling like an idiot.

  —

  The smiling probably pissed them off, them being the dudes on the other ends of those plasma rifles, because you wake up in an antigravity holding cage floating ten feet off the ground. You’re floating around, bumping into the walls and ceiling of the cage. Your head is throbbing, probably because they clocked you in the skull with the butt of an RZT-195, but it was worth it. You’re still smiling, although a little less obviously.

  Hey, you say.

  What?

  One of the dudes turns to the other. They both look perplexed.

  Did he just?

  Yeah.

  Huh.

  Hey, you say again.

  Stop talking. You aren’t supposed to be talking.

  Huh. Okay. Well, I am.

  —

  Again with the smashing of the skull. This time, your brain feels like it’s broken. That last hit did something. Between the plasma storm and having your brain bashed, you don’t feel quite yourself anymore.

  You know better than to smile again. You’re not in the cage anymore. Now you’re being walked down a long corridor. This corridor is ridiculous, how long it is. Is it repeating? It seems like it’s repeating. There are doors as far as the eye can see. Doors, doors, doors. You know better. You could easily kick a dude from behind, maybe sucker-punch the other one with both cuffed fists and then smash through one of these doors. They all probably lead somewhere. Technically. There are rooms on the other sides of those doors. Maybe a break room, two people sitting at a table, staring at each other. In silence. For eternity. Just blinking. Maybe one goes to the microwave to refill a coffee mug every few hours. You’ve been in those rooms. You know what it’s like. You don’t want to be in those rooms anymore. Ever. Again. These fools think you’re a flight risk, so their fingers are on triggers. Little do they know, they’re leading you right to exactly where you want to be. You have no idea where that is, only that it’s at the other end of this corridor. A corridor is good. Interesting stuff happens in corridors. You’ve always wanted to be here. Right here. Somewhere. Wherever this is. Inside. On the map. Not out there in the infinite fields of iridium. They think they’re guarding you, but really, they’re escorting you. Right to your destiny.

  —

  This is him?

  She says it so dismissively, you want to melt into a puddle on the table. You may be in love. You are definitely in lust. This is Oona Bantu, which is a ridiculous name for a very serious person. Bio-suit helmet off, long red hair pulled back into a tight ponytail. Stripes on her sleeve make her seem like someone important. This is good.

  What’s your name?

  Name?

  Yeah. You have a name, don’t you?

  Uh, one of the dudes tries to break in.

  Shut up, Sergeant. I was talking to him, she says, indicating you with a pointed, sexy finger. Everything is so sexy about her.

  I don’t, I don’t.

  You don’t what? You don’t know your own name?

  I don’t have a name. Ma’am.

  That’s, uh, what I was trying to tell you, Commander.

  Shut the hell up, Corporal.

  Yes, ma’am.

  Also, you should have told me.

  Yes, ma’am.

  Super Sexy Commander Lady turns her attention back to you.

  So. An NPC, huh?

  —

  After all these years, it’s a weird feeling to know the name. Of what you are. You’ve heard that term before, but without understanding the context or what it stands for (you still aren’t sure—although your awareness, like a spreading gas, is starting to creep around the edges of the term and you feel that soon it may come to you, all at once). Now this CENTCOM officer from twenty thousand light-years away has come all this way. And for you. For you!

  —

  It works. You get a promotion, then a gun. They start sending you out on missions. You get stats, a profile
, a backstory. You get hit points. Just a few, at first. People know your name. Oona Bantu knows your name. Sometimes she flirts with you in the elevator. You level up, then you level up again. With every mission you can feel it more and more. You don’t know how it happened. Actually, you do. You finally took control of your own actions. You’re free. No more of that iridium-collection bullshit. No more Lean Cuisines in the break room. No more…

  Carla.

  Hmm.

  Well, you can get Carla. Right? You’re you now. If she liked you before, of course she’s gonna like you know. You just need to know how to keep this going. So far, it’s worked. Just do the worst possible thing you can think of doing. And then do something worse. Something you would never imagine anyone doing in any situation.

  You go on missions. You level up. Up and up and up you go. Your armor looks great. You catch sight of yourself in the reflection of your pod craft and, you hate to say it, but you kinda look like a badass. How did this happen? You hover over the grunts in the iridium fields. Poor suckers. If only they could see what you see, the world from up here.

  —

  There are just a couple of things that bug you.

  You used to be stuck down there, with those losers. And your life was the same every day. Wake up, brush teeth, put on the bio-suit. Get the thingy, use the thingy to collect iridium. At the end of the day, detach the basin, load it into the spectrometer. The number pops up, you get your chits for the day, and that’s that. Every day the same. Every single crap day the same.

  Now you’re a player. You get to do what you want, when you want. When you’re not doing what you want, you get to chill out here, in this air-conditioned lounge with couches and free snacks and a cappuccino maker, waiting for the next mission. The music is a little repetitive, but the people are cool, if a little aloof. You’re you now. That’s something. It means something. It’s just that—how do you say this—to keep this going, you can’t help but feel as if your days aren’t any more free than they were before. They might even be, and you can’t believe you’re saying this, less free. How is that possible? You don’t know. But it is.

  That’s the first thing that bothers you. The second thing is Carla.

  —

  You don’t know if she doesn’t recognize you now that you’re kind of a badass or what. Whatever it is, when you wave at her, from a pod craft or if you’re doing a perimeter sweep of moon base six, she doesn’t wave back. She sometimes gives a little smile, but you can’t tell if it’s because she still remembers your lunch chats or if maybe she’s just smiling because a second grade lieutenant is waving at her. Plus, the smile she gives you is one of those sad smiles.

  All of which is to sort of make it a little more understandable that when Oona Bantu comes to your quarters wearing just her under-skin armor, you don’t turn her away. She comes to sit on your bunk, and things get a little kissy for a hot and sweaty five minutes, and you feel really terrible the whole time and confused but also you are kissing Oona Bantu, so you don’t stop right away but then Carla’s sad little smile face keeps inserting itself into your head and you break off the kissing and Oona can’t believe it. She just laughs, gathers her underthings, and walks out of your room.

  —

  You don’t know if it was that whole weirdness with Oona or what, but after that day in your quarters, you kind of hit a plateau in your career. The leveling up slows down. No more weapons upgrades. Your number doesn’t come up as often, and those missions you do get seem smaller, more like diversions, just messing around. And the thing is, you don’t even get to see Carla anymore. You got transferred to base nine, which is on the other side of the moon.

  —

  Mission selected. Gear up. Player chosen. Save save save. Complete the mission. Power down.

  —

  Mission selected. Gear up. Player chosen. Kill kill kill. Complete the mission. Power down.

  —

  Mission selected. Gear up. Player chosen. Blah blah blah. Complete the mission. Blah blah blah.

  —

  Mission selected. Gear up. Player chosen.

  You look at the brief.

  Moon base nine, collateral damage acceptable.

  The ride over is only twenty minutes, but it feels like half a day. As you reach the base, the twin suns rise on the horizon. Oona’s up front, barking orders—she’s leading the mission—but all you can think of is Carla. You know she’s in that base somewhere, in one of the five thousand rooms. If only you could guess which one.

  —

  Blam. Blam. Ska-doosh. Ska-doosh.

  Your team rips through the east wing in a minute forty-five, then up to the second floor and the third, clearing out the entire side of the building in four flat. Oona radios for your squad to secure the wing and await further instructions. A couple of the guys use vending machines as target practice. Wanger decides he’s going to flush a grenade down the toilet. You tell him you’ll stand guard in the hallway, but no one really seems to care as you wander down the corridor, peeking into rooms here and there. Nothing to see, nothing to see. A couple of randoms walking into corners here and there. You hear Wanger and Gutierrez messing around back there. Sounds like they’re torturing a couple of NPCs for fun. For a minute you think of going down and saving them, because it’s not cool and also an actionable offense punishable by court-martial, but mostly because, hell, you haven’t forgotten where you came from. Hey, you say, and turn back to go knock some sense into those two idiots, but then from a door behind you, you hear a soft voice say, Yes? And you recognize the voice.

  You poke your head into a generic break room, not meant for any kind of action, barely even rendered. A table, a few chairs, a fridge, and a microwave. And Carla, sitting there, staring straight ahead. She looks scared. You take off your helmet, try to hand-comb your hair a little, give her a second to process. When she recognizes you, her eyes soften, and she says:

  I know you. Or, at least, I used to. Right?

  Yeah.

  Look at you. Wow. I mean. Wow.

  You look great.

  At this, she blushes. You want to hug her, or reach out and take her to safety, or marry her, or something, but you have an ionized plasma rifle in one hand and an RPG launcher in the other. In your ear-comm, Oona’s voice blares out, all staticky and aggressive. Base is clear. Mission complete. Return to shuttle. Your feet don’t move. You feel pulled, like you know you’re supposed to go back. It’s all wrong. First you were trapped, shuffling around like a mindless iridium-collecting zombie. But your thoughts were free. And then that plasma storm, and whatever came next. You could move your body, go where you wanted, but it was your mind that felt trapped, controlled by something else. This job, this life, whatever it is. And now, standing here, you have a choice. You want what you want and you can’t help it. Oona’s voice blurts again, all units accounted for except for one. Lieutenant, you headed back? You copy?

  You take off the rest of your suit, throw it in a pile in the corner, blast it into nonexistence with your plasma rifle. You go into the freezer, pull out a Lean Cuisine, start it in the microwave. Wait right here, you say to Carla, and you take both weapons, go into another room, and leave them there for some other sucker to find. When you go back to the room, Carla is sitting, staring forward. She takes a second to recognize you again. Oh hey, she says. Hey, you say, and you sit down and wait for your lunch to defrost.

  * * *

  Charles Yu is the author of How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe, which was a New York Times Notable Book and named one of the best books of the year by Time magazine. He was a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 honoree for his story collection Third Class Superhero, and was a finalist for the PEN Center USA’s literary awards. His work has been published in The New York Times and Playboy, among other periodicals, as well as on Slate. His latest book, Sorry Please Thank You, was named one of the best science fiction/fantasy books of the year by the San Francisco Chronicle. Yu lives in Santa
Monica, California, with his wife, Michelle, and their two children.

  RESPAWN

  Hiroshi Sakurazaka

  (translated by Nathan Allan Collins)

  In the beginning God created the screen.

  And the screen was without form, and void; and all the pixels were dark.

  And God said, “Let there be a dot,” and there was a dot. The dot was light, and the screen was darkness.

  And God said, “Let there be a paddle,” and there was a paddle.

  When the paddle struck the dot, a beep sounded. The dot ricocheted, and then bounced at the edge of the screen, returning, and the paddle struck it again. And God saw that it was good.

  God took one of the paddle’s ribs, and with it, He made another paddle. One paddle struck the dot, and the other returned it. There was evening, and there was morning. The paddles struck the dot without food or rest, and when they needed to urinate, they remained in place and used an empty plastic bottle. And God blessed them, and said to them, “Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the Earth.”

  —

  My nose only itches in critical moments.

  I was working alone late at night in a beef bowl joint when it all happened. Situated away from the city’s center, the place was like a feeding trough for humans to come shovel down their food in a matter of minutes. But even cows and horses—and chickens only able to stick out their heads from their cages—ate because they liked the taste, and people were no different. For me, the beef bowls I was permitted to eat during my shift were even more; they were my primary diet, my lifeline.

  I had finished wiping a table, about to prepare it for the next customer, when he arrived. The robber.

  The drowsiness lifted from my mind in an instant, but my very first thought was: This is gonna be a pain in the ass. Naturally, I was irritated that he was going to stroll out of here with the money I’d earned over hours of scooping out beef bowls. But annoyance came to me first, when I pictured all the extra work I’d have to do after he’d gone.