by Alden Odessa
“Do we need to go get your stuff?”
“I ain’t got no stuff,” he said. Surely he had something, but he didn’t seem to care, he just wanted to get on with it. So did I.
“All right, Bogo, let’s get the hell out of here.” I said this and out of the corner of my eye I saw a green flash, I have no idea what it meant or what it had to do with, hopefully it said “Save progress and get the hell out of here.” This was unlikely.
I tapped by wrist and the first thing that popped up was my stats:
H: 42 $:520 BR:48 T:59 DOM:57 PRW:70 ST:12
Wow. +4 in both brains and trust, although I did lose one in health, I have a feeling that number will continue to slowly decrease until I get some sleep. I really didn’t do anything special to gain that power up, though, and to tell the truth this wasn’t what had actually grabbed my attention.
I had a new tab: HAREM
I tapped on it and I saw an image of both Betty and Bogo, they were both in my harem. I guess that Bogo classified. I went to tap on their image as it looked like there was more information when I heard Betty’s voice.
“What are you doing, master?”
Shit! I forgot about that, the game didn’t pause when I opened my menu. I had it in my head that it did. In most games when you opened the menu screen it paused the surrounding action, but then I remembered this wasn’t a game, this was a reality. Life here moved on whether I needed to check my stats or not.
I guess it made sense, I could foresee a moment when I would be in a situation and I would need to collect myself and think, but I don’t have that option. That’s how I always used the feature in game playing in my past life. Getting attacked—PAUSE. MAKE PLAN. ACTION!—get out of the bad situation.
Fuck, am I really going to start calling that my past life?
Doesn’t matter. Task at hand. That’s what I had to deal with.
Although the game did not pause, it didn’t seem to be that they could see my screen. I just looked like a crazy person staring off into space. Reaching up from time to time to swipe or tap. Is that what people called crazy in my past life? Where people just living in a different reality, tapping screens we couldn’t see?
My past life is adding to this life’s existential crisis.
I broke out of my haze and closed the screen. I looked at Betty. “Nothing.”
“Are you sure?” she asked.
“It looked like you were doing something, sir.”
I’m a sir now? Gotta be careful with how I handle all this shit in the future. The Man in Blue told me, if any of these people, the NPC’s, found out I didn’t belong here, that I wasn’t one of them, I zeroed out. If I shattered their reality, I shattered my own.
I lose the game.
“Nevermind, I’m just tired,” I said and then saw a red flash out of the corner of my eye, I caught it just in time to see it read: -2T. What the fuck? Did my nose grow too? The rules in this game were twitchy.
“Well then, we need to find a place to get some rest,” Betty said.
“Do you have any recommendations?” I asked her. “A place where we can relax and hang low for a day or two until we figure out what we are doing?”
“Are we going to be staying long term?”
“Who knows,” I said. “I think we need some sort of base of operations.”
“You don’t have a place to stay?” the big man asked. Damn, I didn’t need him to start doubting me, I needed his muscle.
“We just haven’t quite figured out where to hang our hat yet?”
“You don’t have a hat,” Bogo said, then looking at Betty. “Neither does she.”
Fuck this guy was literal. “It’s a figure of speech, buddy.” He nodded, accepting this answer. “Do you need anything right now?”
“Hungry,” he said simply. Oh man, feeding this guy would be a nightmare. I looked at my “harem” and realized that I had a lot of work to do. Betty was still wearing her tube top and hot pants. This guy was wearing rags, and I had no idea where to buy clothes and cheap food. Not to mention finding a place to hang my hat. Now I also had two people looking to me for some form of leadership.
“This Lower Bottoms, how far away is it?”
“Lower Bottoms not very nice. Alley on Burke Street better than alley in Lower Bottoms.”
“We’re not going to stay in an alley.” I hope.
“We could stay in the Upper Bottoms. It’s nicer, slightly,” Betty said. Finally, some good news.
“What’s in the Upper Bottoms?”
“Cheap rent, lots of locals and drug addicts. Small casinos.”
“Sounds like my kind of place,” I said. Two things were happening to me right now. The first was that I was getting increasingly tired and the more tired I got the more likely I was to make a mistake. I didn’t have the cash or the time to make a mistake. I had no idea how to get more cash if I ran out. Other than whore out Betty, and I just wasn’t there yet.
The other thing that was happening was that I was getting bored. This wasn’t a good sign. I think I may be mistaking impatience with boredom, but either way, whatever my fate held, I wanted to get on with it.
“Let’s head that way. We’ll see about some food on the way for you big guy,” I said and then looked at Betty. “And let’s see about a new outfit for you.”
She smiled and led the way.
6
Onward and Upward
These are the things that happened on the way to The Upper Bottoms:
First, we found a street vendor selling turkey legs and biscuits. Apparently these were giant fucking turkeys, or at least genetically engineered, because I have no idea what kind of turkey made a turkey leg this big. It was the size of my forearm. Bogo ate four. He also had six biscuits. One thing about this part of town though, I got out of there having only spent twenty bucks. I considered it a victory.
We also found a clothing store, and I bought Betty a sundress and sandals, plus two pairs of clean underwear and a small and not-at-all fashionable bag to carry her stuff in. All coming in at thirty bucks. Reasonable.
I didn’t have any luck finding clothing for Bogo, that would have to wait. He didn’t seem to care; he was overjoyed with his turkey legs. The sight of them made me sick to my stomach. But that could just be the ailing bank account speaking.
The most fascinating thing that I learned on our journey to the Upper Bottoms was a way to tell some form of time. I had assumed that Canny Valley was perpetually night, and it was, to an extent. But there appeared to be different shades to the night.
When we left The Regency, the night was a lighter shade of blue than it was now. It had a slight yellow cast to it, almost as if it was sunrise. I thought nothing of it at the time as I just thought it was the lights of the city. But the bright lights of the city really didn’t seem to change the color of the sky. This part of town, or at least the further we got into it, the buildings were smaller, rarely going above five stories. In fact, most of them were only two or three stories tall.
As the day has gone on, the yellow hue was replaced with blue, but it was a lighter blue than the night. When I first arrived, it was dark. The sky was a deep navy blue. Unmistakably night, and although right now it was still nighttime, it was a little further down the color wheel towards the light.
It was hard to discern in my mind, but it was a significant enough of a change for me to at least register it as a change. It’s something I will be keeping my eyes on. Betty seemed to have a regular schedule, or at least she treated sleeping, waking up, and eating as a routine. Meaning, she seemed to treat earlier as morning. It will take me a while to get the hang of it, but I think that this is as close as I am going to get to any form of a time system in this world. Until the powers that be, meaning The Man in Blue, gives me a watch.
Another thing about the city is that it was turning into more of a residential type of environment. There were still a few places like I found early on in the world. A small casino here and there, a strip club, a few brothe
ls. We seemed to be traveling a main street, and I felt that if we went off into more side streets, we may encounter some seedier locations. I was wearing down, and I only took a brief second to check my health, it clocked in at a thirty-seven. I was loosing health slowly.
I had a theory about this place as to why it was changing the further we got into the game. This wasn’t for players so much as it was for the characters that inhabited this Canny Valley. The further I got into the city, the more it just looked like people doing their daily routines. There were markets, even gas stations. I’ve seen a number of apartment buildings, but no houses. This was not the time for it, but I would like to do some exploring. I don’t know if there will be anytime for any of that at all as I want to follow the path that’s been set out for me.
Build my harem.
That part had begun, and it had grown in the form of one very large enforcer type. He wasn’t too bright, and he was going to be expensive to maintain, but the further we got, and the uglier things looked, I was glad he was with me and not against me.
I promised him I would take care of him and that he would have a place to sleep tonight. That, with the added promise of being allowed to protect Betty, seemed to be enough for him. Again, he’s a little, uh, simple.
After what felt like forever, Betty stopped walking and said that we were pretty much here, she said there was no exact start to The Upper Bottoms. I’m not sure what classified this as The Upper Bottoms other than I had felt that we had been walking at a slight incline for the last thirty minutes or so. So I am guessing that upper was a very literal term. The Lower Bottoms would probably be on the other side, however far that was.
If we would be going into The Lower Bottoms, I wanted to be as close to it as possible without actually entering into it.
“How far to the Lower Bottoms?” I asked.
“Four blocks,” she said. “The Lower Bottoms are beneath the Landscape Bridge, that connect the Upper Bottoms to Ridge Hill.”
She said all of this as if I had any idea what she was talking about. “So The Lower Bottoms are underneath the bridge.”
“Correct,” she said. “There should be a few hotels we can use.”
“Onward and upward then,” I said, and we continued moving whatever direction it was that we were moving.
I’m going to call it straight and leave it at that.
7
The Falls Hotel
The Falls Hotel was a dump.
The outside of the Hotel looked okay, it looked a little more like a run down Howard Johnston’s from the eighties. It was tall and rectangular box shaped. It didn’t look like it had been painted in thirty or fifty years; it was about ten or fifteen stories tall, by far the tallest building in this part of town. It looked wet, just like everything else in Canny Valley, it looked like it had just been rained on, but I have yet to see rain. It’s like the rain cloud is always just three blocks ahead of me.
It sat just adjacent to the Landscape Bridge and the street that led down to The Lower Bottoms. I suspected that it got its name by being right on the edge of the drop off. The Lower Bottoms were literally lower than The Upper Bottoms. There was a hundred foot or more drop into that part of town. Where the bridge started, there was an abrupt cliff that led down into them.
It was bizarre landscape design, but I’ll have time for being fascinated by the world building of the game later, for now, I need a room.
Betty assured me that this was the best hotel in The Upper Bottoms. This was, of course, assuming that there had not been any new construction or remodels, which was unlikely. I took her word on that.
We walked into the main lobby and it felt like a dive bar, well off the beaten path. But it wasn’t a bar, it was a hotel lobby. It felt almost western in its design. Western as in from an Old West movie. It didn’t look like the lobby had ever been painted, it looked more like it was just built and the builder decided not to paint it. Then for years the hotel just let the natural occurrences that took place here paint it for it.
It stunk of smoke and grime, and that is how I would classify the lobby. The interior was lit mostly by dim light bulbs and blue and green neon. This game really had a thing for neon.
It was a small lobby, there were two couches I wouldn’t even consider sitting on. In fact, one of them I couldn’t, there was a man passed out on it, spittle rolling out of the corner of his mouth.
It looked like there was a hallway off of either side of the lobby, one of them had a green neon sign that read: BAR. I made a quick mental note to come down later, find the bartender, and get some information about this place. Currently, Betty had taken up the mantle of information giver and she had been very good at it, but I knew there were other NPC’s around here that could provide me with some form of information.
Along the back wall was a cage of black metal wires, and inside of it was a man wearing a red brimmed hat. Looked like that was Guest Services. Now that we had found a place to stay, I took the lead once again and walked to the cage, my harem followed.
“I’d like a room, kind sir,” it didn’t hurt to still be cordial, bad part of town or not. The man looked up at me and then he glanced at my two compatriots.
“How many hours?” he asked.
“It may be a little longer term,” I replied.
“We got suites, rooms and dens,” he said.
I wasn’t sure what the difference was; I would try the honest approach and see where that got me. “I’m sorry, sir, but I’m new ‘round here and I am not sure of the difference.”
He seemed slightly annoyed at me and I wasn’t sure if it was what I was saying or how I was saying it. It didn’t really matter, provided he told me what I needed to know.
“Suite’s is two or three bedrooms with a bath and shower. Small Kitchenette. Room’s is just a room with a shower and bed. Den’s is just a bed.”
It took me a second to understand the descriptions as he described them. I couldn’t get past the fact that he was the type of person who spoke with the word is instead of are.
He paused, waiting for my response, and as soon as I had wrapped my head around it I could formulate what the rooms were for. A den was there strictly for one thing. Prostitution. This made sense considering where we were. It was interesting that even though it seemed like this area was mostly populated by NPC’s, sex was still a big selling point.
NPC’s need action too.
Rooms were probably used for the same thing, just a nicer experience. Suites were what we were interested in. Someplace that we could relax for a moment and gather our thoughts. I looked at Bogo and figured he had a few less thoughts to gather than Betty and I.
“How much is one suite?” I asked.
“How many rooms?” he countered.
I looked at Bogo and Betty, not sure how I was going to organize this, but I assumed that if I wanted to upgrade later I could. “Two, please.”
“Fifty a night.”
Sounded reasonable, even though I didn’t know how long constituted a night in Canny Valley. “I’ll take it,” I said.
“How many nights?”
“Let’s start with two nights. I’m guessing I can add more later?” I inquired.
“Sure thing, mister,” he said and turned to get a key. He turned around and handed it to me through the opening in the wire cage and I saw a red -100$ out of the corner of my eye. Money was going fast, just like real life. I would have to think of something quickly.
I looked at the key in my hand; it was marked: 405. Fourth floor I am guessing.
“Enjoy your stay at The Falls,” the hotel clerk said with no emphasis or excitement whatsoever.
I looked back at him and instinctively said, “Thanks.”
He didn’t say anything and just turned around and sat down, picking up the magazine that he had been reading previously.
The trip to the room was refreshingly uneventful. I could tell that my team was wearing down and needed rest. The hotel remained consistently shi
tty. It wasn’t falling apart, which was at least something, but it wasn’t a ringing endorsement either. It smelled bad too; the hallways had a distinct musk to it, but it wasn’t urine it was just the lack of a good cleaning lady. It smelled old, which was an amazing feature in a game that, as far as I knew, was still in the beta phase.
How could something feel this old? The design up to this point had been spotless and stylish, but it gradually deteriorated the further I got into the game, or the world, or whatever this was.
For what it’s worth, the game had me questioning my own existence. I was told not to let any of the NPC’s know anything about the outside world. Basically, don’t let them know that they weren’t real.
But weren’t they?
I looked over at Bogo and Betty. How were they not real? In this world they were just as real as I was. They were sentient, capable of making choices and having memories. Their bodies were made of the same stuff as my own. Hell, I’ve been inside of Betty and that certainly felt real. The two grand a night hooker and the stripper all felt real. Everyone I interacted with felt real. What’s to say that my own reality wasn’t just as fabricated as this one. How deep did it go? Where did the simulation end?
I have to stop thinking about it as it makes my head hurt and my will weak. Right now I had a task, get to the room and start building my harem.
My plan was not yet fully formed. I knew I had to get girls, that was the key, but I had no idea how doing that would help me win the game. What did building a harem have to do with winning the game? Where were the scoreboards? Was there a point system? How many players? Could multiple people win?
I needed to start keeping a notepad so that I could remember to ask these questions if I ever ran into The Man in Blue again.
We came to our room, and I put in the key, I almost expected it not to work, or for the door itself to not work. But the key in the door worked exactly as a key in the door should work and I opened it up to reveal our newest base of operations.
