“Good luck,” he told the two of them, saluting as he stood up and stretched like a cat.
They couldn’t hear him, but it was the thought that counted, anyway.
Deep inside his pocket, his tablet started buzzing, urgently, the way it only did when he had a high-priority message coming in.
“What the hell does he want now?” the kid muttered.
But when he checked his screen, the message wasn’t from Death. It was an automated notification from the game itself.
PLAYER APPROACHING LEVEL 2 ENTRY
The kid grinned. “Oh, fucking finally.”
The game had been running for nearly two weeks, and somehow, no one had managed to make it to this point yet. The kid was starting to wonder if he’d made the puzzle too difficult.
Well, now he had a show to put on.
The kid used his tablet to fast travel to the portal for Level 2. He’d thought the way to the next level would have been obvious, if a little difficult to reach.
After all, he’d put it in the dead center of the map.
He teleported to the open field and stood in the air, wincing at the unflinching eye of the sun.
A player was belly-crawling through the weeds, her hair so blonde, it was nearly the same color as the field. Or perhaps she’d just been crawling through the dirt so long, it was caked on her.
The kid glanced over her player profile.
Daphne. She looked like she was only thirteen or fourteen, maybe. It was strange, looking at someone who had died at the same age he had. He could see the same heaviness in her stare, the soul-deep experience that no mortal age could match.
To be honest, he was a little impressed.
She’d managed to hit level 8 without ever joining a party. She even made it all the way out here without taking any health damage, despite Florence’s guards roving the perimeter on the northern side.
The kid decided he might as well make his entrance dramatic. He tucked his tablet back into his pocket and snapped his fingers, materializing instantly above her.
Her blue eyes went huge and moonish as she stared up at him and coiled like an animal about to run.
“Congratulations,” he told her. “You’re the first player to make it this far.”
She said, “Are you here to kill me?”
“No, no. I’m your guide. Although, shit. It looks like you don’t really need me that much.” His grin curled. “Does the name Virgil mean anything to you?”
The girl’s eyes lit up with recognition, relief, excitement.
“It really is just like the book,” she breathed.
“Sure. If you add in guns and stuff.” Virgil winked at her and said, stepping down the open air like it was a set of stairs, “Now, as the first player to make it this far, I do have a special perk for you and only you.”
Daphne’s stare followed him, reluctantly hopeful. “What is it?”
Virgil dug into his pocket and produced a trio of glowing orbs that clicked together like giant marbles. They were each about as big as his fist. He set them down in front of the girl.
When the spheres hit the ground, symbols appeared within them: a purple crosshair, a green plus sign, and a yellow eye. Their descriptions hovered above them in color-coordinated labels: slow time by 50% for up to 15 seconds when aiming; permanently increase her health by +5 HP per minute; or see all enemy players within a 500-foot radius.
“Every time a party reaches the next level first, I’ll give you a choice between three perks. None of the options will repeat, so you’d better be sure about what you want.”
Daphne said, “Can I ask you questions? About the game? How it works?”
“Sure can’t. We both have shit to do, don’t we?”
Really, he just didn’t want to deal with explaining it all: oh, sure, we’re in a suspended limbo that’s not-quite-real and not-quite-fake either, because it’s just a network with all your consciousnesses mixed in. It’s Schrodinger’s organic code, baby.
The girl scowled. “You don’t seem like a very helpful guide.”
“I never said I was. Now, what’s it gonna be?”
She hesitated, nose crinkling as she read the ability descriptions once more. She reached out and picked up the yellow orb.
The eye within it blinked and pulsed. The sphere floated up out of her palm and became a ball of light that shuddered in front of her for only a few seconds before it leapt forward, sinking into her ribcage.
Virgil could see her HUD update on his own, the massive dev portal that spun behind his eyes when using his tablet didn’t have the right aesthetic.
“Good pick.”
Her eyes brightened. “Really?”
Virgil shrugged. “You’d better hope so. There’s no taking it back. Now, get ready.” His smirk grew toothy, devilish. “Level 2 is a hell of a ride.”
With any luck, she wouldn’t be alone in there for long.
CHAPTER 17
C
LINT AND MALINA WERE ALMOST out of the neighborhood when the sirens started blaring. It reminded Clint of visiting his grandparents one summer in Oklahoma, when the summer sky went greenish and the wind started howling and the low wail of a tornado siren resounded like it was the end of the world.
But the sky was still that perfect, flat blue.
They both froze where they stood, pressed against the wall of yet another picture-perfect house. They were getting to the edges of the suburb, where Clint could start to see a smattering of forest beyond it.
“What the fuck is that?” he said.
Malina scanned the sky, her shotgun already in her hands. “I don’t know. Something new.”
A notification scrolled across Clint’s HUD. Malina must have seen it too, judging from her furrowed brow.
The first player has now reached Level 2.
“Shit,” Malina said. “Someone beat us to it.”
Clint sagged against the house. His breath came in short, ragged spurts. His energy level was down to just 10 points already.
Malina kept them moving fast, a walk so brisk it was practically a jog. The bullet wound fucking seethed with every step, and his bag jostling on his good shoulder made his shirt tug over the bandage, which was like being prodded over and over by a hot poker.
“What does that mean for us?” he said.
“It means we move faster.” Malina kicked the wall of the house. “Shit.”
“You think it was Florence?”
“Well, she’s been chasing us like a rabid dog ever since you showed up, so I’d guess not. But I don’t know if they announce the whole party or just one member. I mean, it’s not like this has happened before.” Malina grimaced at him. “Let me see what your stamina level’s at right now.”
“It’s not fucking great, I can tell you that.” Clint paused. “What do you mean? You can see it?”
“Sure.” Malina’s hand waved vaguely in front of her face, and her eyes got that distant look of focusing on something he couldn’t see.
“Wave your left hand sort of like this.” She gestured with an open-palmed wrist flick. “Like you’re slapping someone’s ass.”
Clint snorted. “That’s the comparison you’re going for?”
“If it works, it works.”
To Malina’s credit, it did work. He lifted his uninjured arm and pulled over a section of his HUD he hadn’t seen before. It had two boxes to select from: recent kills and current party.
Clint glanced at the recent kills list. The total player count had already dropped more since he and Malina had fled, down to 179. But he found his name there at the bottom:
Gavin Garcia — killed by Clint Hawkins
Zheng Wei — killed by Clint Hawkins
Just like that, those soldiers had a name and they could no longer be just anyone. They were real. Just as human as he was, just as terrified of death.
Clint’s stomach turned, but his mind didn’t have room for the
guilt, not for long. Not when he was this dizzy and delirious and aching to just sit down and rest.
He flicked his index finger to scroll through the list, but he didn’t have to go far down it to find a familiar name: Florence. His finger paused over her name, and her player profile opened itself for him.
So that’s who they were up against. Anger and anxiety hammered in Clint’s throat. He scanned over her stats. Level 19. How the hell was he supposed to catch up to that?
“How does Florence have more than her base HP and stuff?” he said, his brow furrowing.
Malina was pressing her face against the fence to scan the yard beyond it. She grimaced at Clint. “You found her, huh? I’ve always guessed it’s some kind of active effect she’s got. That crown, under her picture. Don’t ask me what or how. She and I haven’t chatted much, as you can imagine.”
“Got it. Any other vital game information you didn’t tell me about?”
“Probably. Let’s never rule it out.” Malina punched him lightly in his good shoulder. “Let’s hurry. Looks like we’ve got ten minutes or less to get you somewhere safe to restore your stamina. I’ve got some granola bars in my backpack. Not a lot, but it should help a little.”
Clint grimaced, thinking of the food he’d left in his cabinets. He thought they were just background detail and didn’t even bother to pick them up to investigate. It would be a painful irony if leaving those behind meant he was going to die out here, exhausted and in pain.
“You think you can run?” Malina said.
“Sounds like I gotta,” Clint muttered.
They took off, Malina leading the way. Clint carried his Beretta in his left hand. The mere idea of his rifle’s recoil against his wounded shoulder made him sick with anticipated pain.
Maybe the level announcement had distracted the other players too, or at least drove everyone into a frenzy of hoarding and collecting and trying to dig down to figure out what the hell they missed that someone else already put together. They didn’t encounter another soul as they ran through the last couple blocks of the suburb.
The neighborhood ended with a wooden fence running along the perimeter of the suburb, along with a sign that read The Highlands in gold. A two-lane road bordered it, stretching on in either direction for what seemed like forever. Across the road was a thin forest that looked semi-tamed, like it was more of a park than a wilderness.
“You’ve been this far before?” he panted at Malina.
“Only once or twice, to fill out the map. It’s useful to have a home base. Fewer places to hide out here.”
Clint nodded, but he didn’t have enough breath to keep talking.
Malina led them through the shadow of the trees. She started going slower now, her shotgun level with her elbow, ready to aim and shoot at a second’s notice.
Clint’s stamina bar started throbbing now, like it too was in pain. His last five points flashed at him, urgently.
“I think,” he muttered, “it’s telling me I’m going to hit zero soon.”
“Fuck. We need to get you to sit down and eat or you’re going to pass out. Let’s just find a safe spot—”
Her voice floated like an oil stain on water. That’s when Clint realized that he felt like he was falling, like the world had suddenly gone cottony around him.
And then he saw it, in the corner of his HUD: 42/120 HP and only 1 NRG point left.
“Sorry, Mals,” he tried to mumble, and then his NRG dropped to zero, and the world became nothing but a smooth sheet of white, blanketing around him.
Maybe he fell. Maybe he didn’t. His body felt like a concept he’d been severed from completely. Like a switch flicking off, the world had become a dream, with all its dream logic. Just a soft feathery nothingness, all around him.
But his HUD was still there. His stats were gone along with his player information and the active player count. Everything had vanished except the small glowing vector of his own hand, down in the equipped item slot.
There was a figure, walking at the edge of the white light. He recognized her instantly: the curve of her back, the familiar tilt of her head.
“Rachel!” he called out, but his voice didn’t make a sound.
Rachel turned, but she didn’t smile when she looked at him. Her face was a dark scowl, full of a hate he’d never seen from her before. It was like a stranger was wearing her skin.
The light seemed to compact around them, drawing her close to him like space itself was inhaling, shrinking itself. Neither of them moved, yet she was suddenly close enough that Clint could see the freckles scattered across her nose.
“I know what you did to me,” she hissed. “To us.”
“Babe, what are you talking about?”
“Don’t fucking lie to me.”
That hit like a slap. Rachel only cursed at bad drivers and video games. Even when they argued, she could be shaking with anger, but she’d never talk to him that way.
“You’re the reason I’m dead,” she said, her eyes red with furious tears. “You went to Hell because you fucking deserved it.”
Clint’s mind scrambled for traction. He shook his head. “You’re not the real Rachel.”
But she looked real and sounded real and somewhere deep in his chest, doubt burrowed into his heart, more painful than any bullet: what if she was right?
Clint closed his eyes, but Rachel’s burning glare hovered there, even behind his eyes. Her voice echoed relentlessly through his mind.
All your fault, it’s all your fault, you know what you did, you bastard, I hate you, I hate you—
It had to be a trick. A mind-trap from Death, just to fuck with his emotions.
Clint wondered if Hell would be like this. Real hell. Permanent hell. An infinity of looking at the love of his life and seeing only hatred, staring back at him.
The dream-Rachel seethed in his ears, saying, I hope you die in here.
No. Of course this wasn’t Rachel.
If it was meant to break him, it did the opposite. Clint could feel a cold armor icing over his heart.
He resolved it instantly, as certain as his next breath: no matter what it took, he would kill the Lord of Hell, just for daring to fuck with him like this.
Clint paced back and forth in the prison of his own mind and dreamed up murder.
CHAPTER 18
M
ALINA WOULD BE LYING IF she said she didn’t think about just leaving Clint there and booking it. She already knew where to go. Hell, from here on, it would be easy enough to get to the library, find whatever key or portal or whatever video game shit was next, and move on.
Clint had already given her everything she needed from him, really. If he hadn’t stumbled on her porch at just the right moment, she’d either be choking on her own blood right now or already dead. She’d hidden from Florence’s gang before, but they’d never sniffed around her home base so thoroughly.
Florence must’ve been feeling the pressure, too. That noose of time, tightening around all their necks. It would only get worse with a player already entering Level 2.
When Clint went down, she summoned up his player profile, saw the zero in his energy bar, and growled at the empty sky, “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”
She hooked her arms under Clint’s armpits and dragged him backward, cursing herself the whole way.
“You fucking naive bitch,” she muttered to herself, like she did when she was alone and pissed off. “You’re gonna die out here for some dumbass kid you’ve known for a few hours. But at least you won’t feel guilty. God, I’m so stupid.”
But he looked even younger with his face all blank and unconscious. He could’ve been her kid, if she made some really irresponsible choices as a teenager.
She dragged Clint’s body into the brush and shrugged off her own backpack. Her stamina was replenishing quickly enough, but it would be quicker without the extra weight.
Malina pawed through her bag
until she found a notebook and a pen in her front pocket. She’d kept it on a whim when she woke up — god, it must have been only weeks ago, but it felt like years since she first opened her eyes and found herself in her bedroom, in the swimsuit she’d died in, with her son nowhere to be found.
She scribbled, Going foraging. Stay here. — M
Malina slipped the note up Clint’s hoodie sleeve, so it was poking out but wouldn’t get tugged away by the wind.
She frowned at his unconscious face and said, “You’d better not be the reason I die today, kid.”
She took her shotgun and an extra box of ammunition and ran back the way they’d come.
As she stole through the trees, back across the road, she spun through the numbers in her head. Her watch was broken, but she kept track of time by Clint’s plummeting stamina. It had only been fifteen minutes since she patched him up and they started running as fast as his stamina would allow.
That left two and a half hours before the worst of his energy drain wore off.
That much game time was the difference between living and dying. Between making it to Level 2 and staying here to rot.
If Florence found it first, the bitch would guard it with her life. Malina knew what she would do if she had Florence’s reputation and firepower. Block the entrance—whatever or wherever the fuck it was—and have her gang mow down every other player on the map.
Zero competition. It was the best way to play a game where any death was final.
Malina glanced at her watch. There was still water trapped under the faceplate. It winked at her like it was taunting her.
The familiar stone of guilt settled in her stomach, but it was already turning into anger.
She kicked open the door of the first house she came to and called inside, “I’m not here to kill you. You leave me alone, I’ll leave you alone.”
The house answered her with silence for a few long seconds.
Malina froze in the threshold, holding her breath, listening until white noise hummed in her ears.
9 Levels of Hell: Volume 1 Page 10