I followed her up the stairs watching her huge butt sway beneath the dress.
Elise said, “Have fun!” I gave her a dirty look.
The merchant turned on reaching the little bedroom upstairs, hesitated a long moment, and then pulled off the dress. She sighed.
“I accidentally chose the biggest size when I made my character. I’m thinking about staying up after dark and letting one of those monsters kill me.”
“Hey, maybe you’ll turn out like a plus-size model or something,” I said, trying to be helpful.
“Yeah, when, when I’m a Level Ten? Who’s going to sleep with me until then?”
“Well, uh, me.” I guess, I added to myself. Look, I’m cool with big girls, but you could have landed a helicopter on this woman.
I pulled down my breeches. She tried not to laugh. She failed.
“Sorry!” She laughed some more. She stepped back to the bed. When she sat down on it I thought it might break.
I heard footsteps run up the stairs and then Elise opened the door and peeked in. The merchant didn’t seem to notice the door being opened, and I remembered Elise wouldn’t be visible to her.
“I forgot to tell you, if the other player has an orgasm, you get bonus EP.” She looked at my ugly ass standing there naked with my tiny level-one tool, and at the huge woman on the bed. She laughed as she shut the door.
Bonus points, eh? I looked at the merchant, her massive legs parted on the bed, her eyes pointed nervously at me. I knew what I had to do.
I went to the bed and got down on my knees.
I remembered from judo class, the first thing you learn before any of the good stuff was how to take a fall. Well, I wanted to get to the good stuff in this game.
I parted her thick thighs and moved my head into the danger zone. I’ll spare you the gruesome details, but in ten minutes she was moaning like a banshee. Specifically, a banshee having an orgasm. I checked my hand: Experience +25.
I crawled up on top of her. It was like climbing a small hill. I stared at her enormous body, fascinated by the bizarre shape of her breasts, trying not to look at the mole.
Am I seriously going to do this?
I took hold of my tiny Level-Oner and slid it in.
Ho. Ly. Shit.
I had never done it without a condom. Not once, not even for a second. It felt so good I no longer cared I was banging a woman that rivaled some of the monsters in the game. I didn’t care that I was doing it with a micronized penis. I didn’t care about anything other than how unbelievably good it felt.
I knew I would get extra points each minute I lasted, but I don’t think I got any extra points. I squeezed a floppy breast and let loose.
“Sorry,” I murmured, panting.
“It’s fine. I was already done.”
I had just made love to someone even I would never have been desperate enough to sleep with in real life, but I felt great. We looked at each other and smiled. For a second I considered giving her a little kiss, but then saw the missing tooth again. Never mind. I gave her a pat on the shoulder and got dressed.
I walked downstairs with a hundred Attraction points, the bonus EP, and a little less Stamina. Elise grinned at me.
“How was it?”
“Not as bad as I thought. Is that really how good it feels without a condom in real life?”
“Yes it is. That’s what all the guys say, anyway.”
Now, I want to make it clear that in the real world, you’ve got to be responsible. Don’t screw your life up for a few seconds of pleasure. Remember, I’m already dead.
And I never thought being dead would make me so happy.
* * *
“Do you want to try and score with some more women, or kill more monsters?” Elise kicked a pebble down the street.
“Actually, I’m pretty tired. I stayed up all night fighting monsters. Maybe I’ll go back to the inn and crash.”
“You know, now would be a great time to check out Verterria.”
“I forgot all about that. How do I go there?”
“Well, normally during the game you just pull open the world and step out into The Arcade or your house—”
“How do I do that?”
“You just grab the air like you’re pulling a handle and the game knows when you want to open a port. But since you’re planning on hitting the sack, you can just decide to wake up in your ‘real’ bed.”
“And the game somehow knows?”
“Uh-huh.”
“That’s just weird.”
“Yeah, a little.”
“Will you be there to help me around?”
“No, I keep my Conquest character separate from real life—er, Verterria.”
“So, can Verterria be hacked, too?”
“Digital Afterworld makes every effort to ensure the integrity of their databases.” It sounded like she was reading from a script.
“Yeah, that’s what my bank said. When it got hacked.”
We reached the inn. Like all the buildings in town it was like an alternate version of the Middle Ages, and yet somehow reminded me a little of the Old West.
I asked, “How do I get back to the game?”
“Just leave your house and follow the signs to The Arcade.” She followed me up to my room.
“Well, sleep tight.” She pulled the wool blanket over me.
I desperately wished she would get under the blanket with me. As I drifted off to sleep—way easier than I usually did in real life, I might add—I wondered what it would take to score with an Eleven.
Chapter Seven
I woke up in my bed. My own bed in my own room. For a minute I thought everything had been a very long, very realistic dream; I hadn’t died after all, there was no Elise, and Conquest had just been the fantasy of someone who spent too much time playing video games and not enough time playing with women.
Now it was—well actually I had no idea what day it was, and then I realized no matter what day I should be waking up in my dorm, not my room at my mom’s house.
I looked at my alarm clock, the same ancient Jiaoxing personal-assistant clock I’ve had as long as I could remember, and the orange letters told me it was almost noon. I checked my phone; also a Jiaoxing of course, like ninety percent of electronics after The Great Change. I had a message from Mom.
Hi honey, call me when you wake up. Miss you!
I called. After a few rings I heard my mom’s voice.
“Hello?” She sounded slightly different. Older.
“Mom?”
“Ace? Ace, is that you?” Her voice was shaky, brimming with emotion.
“Yeah. I got your message.”
“Oh thank God! I’m so happy to hear your voice! I missed you so much!” I could hear tears in her voice.
“I—I missed you too.” This wasn’t exactly true, because to me it seemed like I’d seen her only a day or two ago.
“How is everything over—over there?”
Over there? Where is there? And come to think of it, if I’m at home, which I shouldn’t be, where is Mom?
I yanked aside the curtain. This might have been my room, but it definitely wasn’t my old neighborhood. A decidedly eclectic assortment of houses lined the street across from me. It was like a suburb filled with houses plucked from random locations from across decades. A Formula One race car pulled into the driveway opposite me. I had not been dreaming.
“Uh, everything’s fine. . . .”
“What’s it like? Are you getting enough to eat? Have you seen your uncle Cylock?”
“Uncle Cylock died?”
“He had a heart attack last year. Only eighty-seven, too.”
“No, I haven’t seen him. I’m—I still haven’t had much time to get used to everything, or see much yet. It’s all still pretty new to me.” I wasn’t about to tell her I had so far spent all my time playing a game where I killed monsters and slept with ugly girls so that later I could sleep with hot girls. I somehow didn’t think she’d understa
nd.
“Oh, yes, of course.”
“Do you mind if I call you back after I’ve had a little more time to adjust?”
“Of course, honey, of course. Call me whenever you’re ready. I love you! I wish I could send a batch of mac and cheese. . . .”
“I love you too, Mom. Bye.”
I put on my slippers and went into the kitchen. A bowl of Sugarnauts, my favorite cereal, waited for me at the table along with an egg cooked just the way I liked and a mug of coffee loaded with cream and sugar. I sat down and ate. The cereal was at the height of freshness, and the yolk of the egg exploded perfectly when I bit into it. The coffee was just right and steaming hot.
I left the dishes on the table when I finished and went into the living room. Everything sat in its place, except I noticed that glass end table I’d always hated was gone. And the clock didn’t tick. That beautiful old clock was there, the pendulum swinging away, and yet as hard as I listened I couldn’t hear the annoying tick.
I went back down the hall to Mom’s room. I turned the handle, but the door didn’t open. The room that used to be my sister’s before she got married was the same way, just a door.
I went back to my room to get dressed. All the old clothes in my closet I never wore anymore were gone. The stuff I liked was still there. It was a little creepy.
My favorite Patel sneakers sat by the front door. They smelled brand new, and that annoying scuff mark on the left one was gone, but they were as comfortable as ever. I went out into the new world.
I noticed there was no car in my driveway. My driveway . . . A strange feeling came over me as it hit me that the house was mine; not because Mom died and left it to me, but because I had died.
I opened the garage and found it empty. Next door, a guy walked out and opened the door to an ancient car that looked brand new.
“Hey,” I called out. “where’d you get that car?”
“I bought it with gold from playing Sengoku Warlords. It's a 1936 Graham Supercharger. Sweet, huh?”
“Yeah. You can buy stuff with gold from the games?”
“Yeah, or you can work.” He snorted, making it clear what he thought of that idea. “I’m Ronatrin. Looks like we’re neighbors, at least until I can afford to get a castle built.”
“I’m Ace. Ace Singleton. Is there anything to do around here? I don’t seem to have a car.”
“You could check out the downtown area. Just follow the signs for The Arcade.”
I took his advice. The signs were small, not overly conspicuous, but they were everywhere. As I walked down the sidewalk I noticed the temperature was just right, and wondered if the seasons would change. On my right was a stone embankment, and on my left was a road, where every conceivable type of vehicle passed by, from hundred-year-old classics to futuristic makes I doubted existed yet in the real world.
“But I’ve been dead for sixteen years, so who knows?”
I thought about what kind of car I would buy, assuming I could have whatever I wanted. Something from the nineteen-sixties perhaps. Maybe a GT500? Or what about a 250 GT Lusso? When I died, you couldn’t find one for less than a billion. Not to mention the cost of fuel. Oh, how about a DB4 Zagato? Only nineteen were ever made, and not many had survived up to my lifetime, but now . . .
One thing I knew for sure: I would not, under any circumstance, choose a Weixian Awesoma.
I followed the sign left and found myself looking down Main Street. It was beautiful. Unlike the neighborhood I’d just left, all the buildings here were harmonious, each being in the style of about two hundred years before. Victorian, I recalled instantly, to my surprise remembering everything learned in my college history class like it was an hour ago. Essentially it was, because after class I had uploaded my mind to Digital Afterworld.
I reached back and felt the base of my skull. The neural-interface jack needed to plug in the cable from the DA100 was gone. I guess there was no reason for it anymore. Now everything was digital. Including me.
Digital though it was, the town before me was a perfect analog of the world I once occupied. I began to walk through it, looking at the little stores: Gem’s Authentic French Croissants, where the buttery smell of fresh-baked pastries seduced my nose; Verterria Records, which promised, “Every recording in existence!”; Little Town Theatre, whose list of films playing seemed impossible, given that there didn’t appear to be room for a single screen in the tiny bungalow; Bilgoff’s Tobacco Shop, with a sign reminding “Because it can’t kill you anymore.”
And then a poster in a window caught my eye: Mabel, the feline-esque female assassin from Cybertronic Catgirl Killer, as drawn by Densha Mikimoto. I looked up at the name of the store.
“Comic Fucking Heaven. Well that’s appropriate.” Now, anyone who knew me in real life wouldn’t need me to tell them my next move. But since you didn’t know me, I’ll tell you: I went in.
My eyes opened so wide I thought they might fall out. My jaw dropped.
Outside, the place was tiny, maybe five or six hundred square feet. Now, standing inside, I found myself gaping at a sprawling superstore filled with comic books, graphic novels, posters, anime movies, toys—in short, at least for a geek like me, heaven.
Faced with such an overwhelming selection, I didn’t even know where to begin. I wandered the store, my face undoubtedly filled with wonder. I realized I was wearing my glasses. I took them off. I couldn’t see shit.
“Damn.” I put them back on and kept moving down the aisle. It occurred to me it would take a lifetime to read all the stuff they had, and then I remembered that, barring an apocalyptic event on Earth destroying the DA servers, I had longer than that.
I finally made it to the manga section. It dwarfed entire comic stores from the real world. Browsing the seemingly endless racks of books, I realized I had missed a lot being dead for over a decade.
“Wait, how do I pay for things here?” I noticed the prices were in GC. I checked my pocket, and discovered it full of gold coins from Conquest.
I stared at a handful of coins, the regal profile of a woman on heads and the castle and battle-axe on tails. Heavy as they were in my hand, I couldn’t feel them in my pocket.
I found Cybertronic Catgirl Killer, picked up the first few books since I had passed away, and searched for the checkout counter. It took me ten minutes to find; the store was so big I got lost.
The girl tending the counter smiled at me.
“Did you find everything okay?” She had blue hair, kind of a goofy face, big glasses—actually kind of big everything, though nothing like the woman I had boinked in Conquest. Her chest was really big, too, though it was what was on her shirt, rather than under it, that really caught my attention: the same picture of Mabel from CCK that was in the shop window.
“Nice shirt.”
“Thanks.” She looked down at the books I set on the counter and grinned. “Nice choices.”
“Yeah, I missed quite a few issues, since I died in 2076.”
“You’re in for a treat; the story gets even better around that point.”
“Awesome.”
“Need a bag?”
“No, I—well, you know what, we don’t need to worry about recycling anymore, so I guess I will take a bag.”
“Sure thing. But when you’re done with it, don’t forget to throw it in the garbage to free up memory. It would slow the world down if they have to render all those bags.”
“I hadn’t thought about that.”
She thanked me and handed me my bag.
“I’m Anaksa, by the way.”
“Ace.” I looked around the store. “I suspect you’ll be seeing a lot of me.”
“I hope so.”
* * *
When I got home I could smell the macaroni and cheese waiting for me in the oven. I sat down on the couch with a bowlful, reading Catgirl Killer as I ate. It tasted just like Mom’s. Maybe even better.
When I finished eating, I kept reading and then closed the book. I w
ondered if Anaksa had been flirting with me when she said, “I hope so.” She wasn’t too bad-looking, but if the higher-level women in Conquest approached the looks of Elise, I didn’t have much motivation for nerds like the comic-shop clerk.
Which reminded me, I had better get back in the game and work my way toward the hotties.
Chapter Eight
Iwalked back downtown, but this time I went all the way down the street until I came to the sign pointing right. I went right. I saw a big tunnel, totally different in character than the street I had just traversed. It was dark, with streams of people going in and coming out, and in the distance I could see, in big bright blinking yellow letters, “Arcade.”
I went into the tunnel. It gave me a strange thrill, walking through the darkness along with all these strangers toward the beckoning beacon of the sign. As I got closer I could see my destination, all lights and people and excitement, and then I stepped onto the brick road of The Arcade.
The Arcade, as it happened, was in fact an arcade, in that it was a long covered walkway with stores on each side. Except they weren’t really stores, they were games: each building housed a different game, screenshots plastered on the walls to entice each passerby with the game’s awesomeness. Racing games, fighting games of every variety, horror games that looked absolutely terrifying. First-person shooters where you actually walked around with the gun. People were filing into the door for a hidden object game, all women except for an unhappy-looking man dragged in by his girlfriend. There were even adaptations of hundred-year-old classics; I wasn’t sure I would ever want to try my hand at actually being a frog trying to cross a busy freeway, though I could see myself running around a maze while chased by ghosts.
It took every ounce of my willpower not to walk into any of the games I passed on the way to Conquest. There were just so many cool-looking games I wanted to try.
“Calm down, Ace,” I said to myself. “You have the rest of your—well not life, but whatever you call this.”
Conquest Page 4
