Press Start to Play

by Daniel H. Wilson

  1UP

  Holly Black

  When people die in games, you just press a couple of buttons and bring them back to life. You reset. That’s how games work. Restore from your last save point. Restore from the beginning. Start over.

  Your people are never just gone.

  That’s what I think as I look at the photograph of Soren resting on top of a coffin. His family is Jewish—well, other than his stepmother—so they don’t have open-casket funerals. I’ve never been to a closed-casket one before. I’m used to seeing the waxy faces of my dead relatives, made up with red lips and red cheeks, like they’re waiting for true love’s kiss to wake them. According to my phone, Jewish law prohibits embalming or removing any organs or doing anything but wrapping him in a shroud and putting him in the ground. That’s why we aren’t allowed to see him, I guess. He’d look too dead.

  I can’t help being sad, though. We’ve never met in person. And now I guess we never will.

  In games, we know we’re not supposed to give up, not until we’ve won out against the big boss and the credits start rolling. We know that if we don’t give up, we’ll win. There’s always a solution. There’s always a way. That’s why games are great and this sucks.

  Even as I listen to the rabbi talk, even as I watch Soren’s grandmother dab her rheumy eyes with Kleenex, even as I hear everyone say his nickname—Sorry, Sorry, Sorry—over and over, I can’t help trying to figure out how to fix this.

  Just last week, he sent me a message: YOU HAVE TO COME FOR THE FUNERAL. PROMISE ME. It was the first message I’d gotten from him in more than two weeks. Still, I messaged back that there wouldn’t be any funeral, that he was going to get better and we were going to meet up at PAX East in the winter like we’d all planned. But then there was the death notice. That’s why me and Decker and Toad met up in Jersey and made the drive down to Florida together.

  We’d never even met Soren in person, be we were still his three best friends in the whole world. Even if no one from his real life knows us.

  Black ribbons get torn and pinned onto mourners. After they lower the casket into the ground, dirt gets tossed, and we go over to his house to visit his family while they sit shiva.

  It’s mostly old people. A graying great-uncle with bristling nose hairs. A hysterically weeping second cousin. Aunts who run the coffeemaker and take the plastic off trays of cold cuts. Uncles who smoke outside with a girl who tells us she’s Sorry’s cousin, back from art school for the funeral. No one else talks to us.

  Sorry’s stepmother sits in the center of a sofa, her shoulders rigid as relatives comfort her, tell her what a wonderful nurse she was to Sorry those last months, when things went from bad to worse, talk about her inner core of strength. Someone has given her coffee in a paper cup. I wonder if it’s hot. I wonder if the coffee is burning her hand and she hasn’t even noticed yet.

  Sorry’s father sits alone in a corner, looking at his phone. He’s wearing a black pin-striped suit with a paisley tie that looks more appropriate for a business meeting than burying a kid.

  We obviously didn’t know what to wear either. Decker dressed in a too-small black blazer over black jeans and a black T-shirt. He looks like he’s going to a concert.

  Toad is about what I expected from his avatars and message-board signature. Big and shy, with a small, untrimmed goatee that extends to his neck. Wears the same thing every day—jeans, funny/ironic nerd shirt, and a flannel open over it. It doesn’t even occur to me he might change for the funeral, and he doesn’t.

  I’m in a black shirtdress that my mother lent me. It’s boring, which is apparently the point. I have on panty hose too—medium brown, to match my legs—and my big clunky black boots. Mom told me I couldn’t wear boots to a funeral, but I left the pumps she loaned me in the trunk of Decker’s car. Maybe I shouldn’t have.

  None of us fit in at Sorry’s place. I can’t imagine Sorry fitting in here either—not the Sorry that we knew. Of course, he was sick for so long that maybe it didn’t matter.

  Three years, stuck in his bedroom, too ill to go to high school or do anything teenagers are supposed to do but play games and hang out online.

  Me and Decker and Toad drift toward that bedroom, not sure what else to do. We’ve never been there before, but we know it instantly by his posters of Resident Evil, Arkham City, Left 4 Dead, and Warcraft. We talk in hushed voices about how weird it is to be in his room for the first time.

  “Maybe we shouldn’t have come,” Toad says.

  I sit down on his bed. “I know what you mean.”

  Decker flops on the plush-carpet-covered floor and rests his head against a plush alien chestburster.

  I can’t quite put my finger on what I think of Decker now that we’ve met in person. He’s some bizarre combination of cute and pretentious. He has a put-on British accent and insisted we navigate our way here with real maps, instead of just using the navigation on our cell phones. We got lost twice, until finally Toad turned off the sound on his phone and pretended not to be looking at it.

  I wonder if Decker notices that I’m a girl. I wonder if he likes girls. Before Sorry died, we would sometimes send each other flirty messages, so maybe it’s not okay that I wonder that.

  Maybe it’s not okay that we’re going to have a long drive back and we’re going to argue about which Marvel movie they should make next and stop for junk food and fast food and we’re going to be sad about Soren, but happy that we went on a road trip together.

  My mom insists that my friendships online aren’t real. She says that until you meet someone in person, you don’t really know them. I don’t agree, but I think that belief is part of the reason she let me come on a three-day road trip with two boys. I’m supposed to call her every night at seven and text her three times a day, plus she spoke with Decker’s and Toad’s mothers before she agreed to let me come; I think she believes this is my one shot at having IRL friends before college.

  Sitting there, I wonder how I am supposed to feel. I cried when I first heard Sorry was dead, but I haven’t cried since. My eyes were dry when they lowered the coffin into the ground, even though I told Sorry things I never told anyone, things that I don’t know if I will tell anyone ever again.

  It just doesn’t seem real that he’s gone.

  It’s hard to cry when my brain still can’t accept the truth.

  After a while, Toad turns on Sorry’s computer. “Lot of parental controls on this thing. And it’s not connecting to the Internet.”

  “That sucks,” I say. I wonder if there’s something wrong with it. I wonder if that’s why he didn’t message us more or come online to game these last few weeks. I thought it was because he was tired from being sick, but the idea that we couldn’t be there for him—that I couldn’t be there for him near the end of his life—because of a stupid broken cable modem makes me want to punch something.

  Across from me a corner of one poster has peeled back, rolling up. I wonder if Sorry’s dad is going to box all this stuff up and put it in the attic. I wonder if his dad is going to box all this stuff up and just throw it out.

  Toad opens a few more things and types a little. “Weird,” he says, frowning at the screen.

  “What?” demands Decker from the floor.

  “I don’t know,” says Toad, rubbing his head. “Look.”

  He’s opened up a game on Sorry’s computer. It’s an interactive fiction game—what people used to call text games, like Zork—but not one I’ve ever seen before. But no matter what it is, Toad shouldn’t be messing around on his computer, opening his files and stuff.

  “What are you doing?” I ask.

  “I was trying to find his password for Diamond Knights,” Toad says without missing a beat.

  “You were going to make him donate his whole inventory to one of your characters, weren’t you?” Decker says. “Asshole. We’re at his fucking funeral.”

  “I’m an asshole,” says Toad. “This is known. But I didn’t find his passwords, d
id I? I found this, right on the desktop. Look.”

  We crowd around the computer, peering at the screen.

  “THE LAZARUS GAME”

  by Soren Carp

  You are sad.

  >|

  “He wrote a game?” Decker says. “Did any of you guys know he wrote a game?”

  Toad shakes his head. “I didn’t even know he liked this kind of thing.”

  Neither did I. Interactive fiction games aren’t all that impressive to look at. They’re just blocks of text with a blinking cursor after, waiting for you to make the right choice—the clever command—that will unlock the rest of the story. They used to be made and sold by big companies, but they don’t make enough money for that anymore. Now they’re pretty much just made by the people who love them.

  “Look around,” I say. “Type in ‘L’ for ‘look.’ ”

  He does.

  You are wearing black, standing in a kid’s bedroom. There are nerdy posters on the walls and nerdy stuff all around you. One of the posters is curled up at one corner and you think you might be able to see writing on the other side.

  >|

  The poster I was looking at just a moment before.

  I slide off the bed while the other two are still staring at the screen. I gently pull the poster free of the blue sticky stuff adhering it at three out of four points. Then I turn it over.

  The back has been written on in Sharpie.

  YOU HAVE FIVE HOURS TO WIN.

  THE CLOCK STARTED WHEN I WENT IN THE GROUND.

  GRAB THE FLASH DRIVE AND GO.

  GO NOW BEFORE SHE FINDS YOU.

  My heart starts hammering in my chest. Decker starts to roll up the poster.

  “What are you doing?” Toad says. “They’ll notice it’s gone.”

  “So what?” Decker keeps rolling, crinkling the poster in his haste. “So they think we’re poster thieves.”

  “Where’s the flash drive?” I demand. “We need to find the flash drive.”

  “No, wait, this doesn’t make sense.” Toad looks around the room, like he’s wondering if there’s going to be some kind of hidden camera.

  I go over to the desk, ignoring Toad. Loose change, breath mints, paperbacks, nerdy toys (including a figurine I sent him of a brown-skinned manga girl I wanted him to think looked like me), and a Hot Wheels car that had clearly been modified so that a USB connection stuck out of its rear bumper.

  “Got it,” I say, picking up the car.

  “Wait,” Toad says, and I pause. “Shouldn’t we check what’s on it first?”

  “Don’t worry about that,” Decker says. He tries to push open the window—I guess so we can slip out in the most criminal way possible—but it doesn’t budge. Toad turns off the computer.

  I shove the flash drive in the pocket of my dress. As I am shutting the desk drawer, the door to the room opens.

  Sorry’s stepmother is standing in the hall, a startled smile pulling at her face. “What are you three doing in here?” she asks.

  “We just—” I start, but I don’t know what to say. This is the exact kind of situation that I’m bad at. This is why I started staying inside and talking to people over the Internet in the first place. My tongue feels heavy in my mouth. I want to crawl deep in my clothes, curl up, and hide.

  Her gaze goes to the wall where there isn’t a poster anymore, and then to the drawer she saw me close. Her expression sharpens and she stops smiling. “Who are you?”

  “We’re Soren’s friends,” Decker says.

  “None of you ever visited here before.” After a moment of silence, she steps back from the doorway and continues in her brusque voice. “I am going to ask you to leave. Now. We’re all very upset, and whatever you’re doing—we don’t have time for it. Be glad I don’t have the energy to pursue this further.”

  “Sorry,” Toad says, sliding past her into the hall, head down. I follow him, unable to do anything else. I feel shamed, even though I know we weren’t doing anything wrong. Sorry made us promise to come. Sorry left us the flash drive. He wrote a message just for us: go now before she finds you.

  Out in the hall, I feel like a coward.

  Decker is standing in the middle of the room, staring at Sorry’s stepmother, eyes blazing. He looks like he’s trying to swallow words before they crawl out of his mouth.

  “Come on,” I say.

  Finally Decker makes a motion like he’s zipping his lips closed and swings toward us. I keep glancing back to make sure he stays with us, and as I do my gaze falls on something I didn’t notice before. There’s a lock on Sorry’s door—a brass dead latch—on the wrong side. The side that would have locked Sorry in.

  My head starts to pound and I can feel the sweat under my armpits. As I walk out the door, my gaze sweeps over the black-clad people in the living room.

  It occurs to me that maybe Sorry was sure he was going to die because he thought that someone was about to murder him.

  We get back in Decker’s car—a beat-up Impala with inside upholstery held together mostly with duct tape. We don’t speak. Decker starts the engine and drives in what appears to be a random direction.

  Finally, after long minutes of silence, Toad says, “I’m sorry. I freaked out.”

  Decker says, “I wanted to punch that bitch in the face.”

  And I say, “We need to see whatever is on that flash drive.”

  A few minutes later, Toad and I are on our smartphones, trying to find a place with Internet that also serves food. There’s not a lot of choices, but there’s always Starbucks. We head to the nearest one. This time Decker doesn’t say anything about us navigating with our phones.

  We all have laptops, but there’s only one free outlet, so I pull out my MacBook Pro, and Decker and Toad crowd around. My laptop is covered in stickers; just the familiar sight of them makes me feel better. I flip open the case, type in my password, and shove the flash drive into the USB.

  The game starts up again.

  Words appear on the screen of my computer.

  You are sad.

  >|

  I type in “L” again.

  You are wearing black, standing in a kid’s bedroom. There are nerdy posters on the walls and nerdy stuff all around you. One of the posters is curled up at one corner and you think you might be able to see text on the other side.

  >|

  I try something else this time. Why am I sad? I type.

  Some guy you know from the Internet is dead.

  >|

  I raise my eyebrows and look at Toad and Decker. Sorry had clearly intended for us to find this, just the way we did, but why? X poster, I type, “X” being standard shorthand for examine.

  The back of the poster looks like a crazy person has written on it. It seems to indicate that you have a deadline to complete this game. I guess you’d better hurry.

  >|

  Decker raises his eyebrows. “I don’t like this. I don’t like anything about this.”

  “What do I do next?” I ask them.

  “Take the flash drive from his desk,” says Toad. “I mean, that’s what we really did, right?”

  “Right,” I say, my fingers on the keys.

  You’ve already taken it or you wouldn’t be playing this.

  >|

  “I don’t think there’s anything else here. Exit the room,” Decker says, blowing out a frustrated breath.

  Toad stands up, heading toward the counter. “I need cake for this,” he says. “And caffeine.”

  “Good idea,” says Decker, reaching into his pocket for wadded up cash. “Get me a latte. And get Cat…What do you want, Cat?”

  “Cappuccino with a lot of extra shots,” I say, and start typing to exit the room in the game.

  You are in the living room. More sad people wearing black. One of them isn’t as sad as she seems, however.

  >|

  Talk to Sorry’s stepmother, I type without anyone needing to suggest it.

  What would you like to ask her?
Type the number to ask the question or type “X” to say nothing.

  1. Do you still have your MasterCard?

  2. How come you tried to murder your stepson?

  3. How come Sorry’s father is never home anymore?

  4. Did something happen three weeks ago?

  5. Are you a diabetic?

  >|

  I turn the computer so Decker can see the screen. Toad comes back with our order. His pink-and-white piece of cake is enormous.

  “Uh, two, obviously,” Toad says, taking a big bite of it.

  Sorry’s stepmother looks at you like you’re a worm stranded in a puddle after rain.

  “That’s ridiculous,” she says. “Surely if I did that, there would be proof. Surely someone would have noticed. Just because he got sick a few months after I married Aaron and then got progressively sicker until he died, just because I was in sole control of his care, just because I love the attention I get when he’s unwell, just because I locked him in his room and disconnected his cable modem three weeks before he died, none of that means anything.”

  >|

  “Do you think that’s what his game is? The proof?” Decker says between swigs of latte. “Are we supposed to take his game to the police?”

  “Then why would we need to play quickly?” I shake my head.

  “Maybe his stepmother’s going to destroy evidence,” Toad replies. “Maybe the game is going to tell us how to stop her.”

  “Then why doesn’t it?” I ask, frustrated and sick to my stomach. All those times we chatted while playing and he never said a thing—not one single thing about what was going on. “Why not just spell it out? Why all of this?”

  “I think he made the game for us,” Decker says. “His stepmother wouldn’t understand it, but we would. I don’t think there is any proof. I think he just wanted somebody to know.”

  The idea of that being true is awful. “Why not tell us in chat?”

  Decker shrugs.

  “Remember what I said about the parental controls?” Toad said. “I bet she was tracking what he said.”

  I type, Talk to Sorry’s stepmother, again. I pick number three.