by Deck Davis
He’d checked as much code as he could by himself, but it was like trying to inspect every part of the Pacific Ocean using a coffee cup and a sieve. Then he’d focussed on bug reports from players since a lot of Boxe’s old tricks used to get reported by them.
Nope, nothing. He’d even stumbled on a message to the tech support team from Tripp Keaton, the guy who Boxe had taken such a liking to and who maybe, just maybe, would be instrumental in fixing all of this.
In his message, Tripp explained how much more fun it felt to have Boxe change the game and make it tougher as he played. Lucas was surprised, to be honest. He had composed a message back thanking Tripp, and it made his nerves, which had been tightened up like screws, loosen a little.
Now it was time to see what their digital psychiatrist thought. Had the ship hit the iceberg and was the water gushing in, or had they changed course early enough to avoid the icy goliath and enjoy a pleasant cruise?
The door opened, and Lucas spun around to see Osbeck there, furrowing his forehead. He was a serious man with a stage magician’s goatee beard, and he always wore a belt with a giant silver buckle with a falcon on it, which was out of keeping with his normal office-smart suits. Word around the canteen was that he loved his coffee so black it was like treacle, and he was always getting people to try the latest blend he’d bought. Then he’d watch them, like his whole life balanced on whether they liked the coffee or not.
“Well?” said Lucas.
Osbeck stuck his thumbs against the underside of his belt buckle and stood with his feet apart like he was a cowboy spitballing in front of a saloon. “How can I put it nicely? Let’s try this: I won’t be investing in Soulboxe as part of my pension fund.”
“It’s not working?”
“Not as a long-term solution, no.”
“What? Player incidents have dropped. I can’t see any bug reports as a result of Boxe’s interference, and I told tech support to let me know if there was even a whiff of that. One guy got punched eighty feet into the air by a forest ogre, but that was just a glitch.”
“Even so, my conversation with Boxe has confirmed what I feared when we first discussed this. Allowing him to focus his frustrations and channel his creativity by altering the play path of one player has worked for now, but when that player logs out, Boxe won’t be cured. Like an alcoholic who won’t admit he has a problem, Boxe will appear clean for a few days, but slip back into his old ways.”
Lucas ran his hands through his hair. He swore it was getting thinner. This goddamn game was twisting him up. “Tripp isn’t logging out any time soon. We’re ready to pull him the second that we see any kind of real trauma, but that’s about as likely as Rathburger winning the Nobel peace prize given how much we tested Soulboxe’s realism on the human psyche. From the reports I’ve had, the more Boxe messes with him, the more resolute Tripp becomes.”
“That only provokes Boxe further. You don’t calm down an excited dog by waving a toy in his face and telling him to fetch.”
“I wish people would stop talking about Boxe like he’s a dog.”
“A digital intelligence on his level is still new to most people, and our brains like to relate anything unknown to the things familiar to us. It’s a coping mechanism. For many, especially people who work on your game, talking about Boxe as if he is a trainable beast is a way of making them forget how intimidated they are by him.”
Lucas looked at the windows of Boxe’s processing room. The glass was frosted, so he couldn’t see much, and he didn’t want to go inside today. He needed a shower, a beer or ten, and then about a month’s worth of sleep. If only.
“What do you think, doctor? If we know these changes aren’t going to stick, do we pull the experiment?”
Osbeck shook his head. “It’s your decision, but I wouldn’t advise that yet. I believe Boxe is enjoying himself. It seems to me that it is less like he’s toying with the player, and more like he’s playing against him. A chess match set inside a labyrinth. Only, our digitized friend is changing the rules as he sees fit. If there is no danger to this player’s mind or body, then we should let this play out.”
“And if this fails, we really have nothing else to try with Boxe5.”
Osbeck nodded. “I am afraid not.”
“We better see how things pan out. We have a new feature called Blood Wave, which Rathburger thinks will bring people to Soulboxe in droves. I forget what he called the psychological effect, but he thinks by restricting access to a certain part of the map, we’re going to drive people wild in wanting to go there. If we can increase subscriber fees, we might be able to create a new AI, who knows?”
Osbeck smiled, but Lucas could tell he hadn’t been listening. Whenever they talked about anything game-related that didn’t involve Boxe, Osbeck drifted away with the fairies. He wasn’t a player, and he didn’t care about anything except his own field of study.
“Blood Wave sounds lovely,” said Osbeck. “I better go. Keep me informed of our friend’s behavior, yes?”
“Got it. Thanks, Doctor.”
“Any time. And listen, Lucas. There was something I wanted to mention. I go to a country club called Wickerton Woods. It’s a members-only club.”
Lucas nodded. “Right. My dad goes there.”
Osbeck cupped his goatee beard with his hand. “Yes. Tell me to keep my nose out of it if you like, but your father is a lonely man, Lucas. He told me all about you and him falling out.”
“I’m surprised he talked to you, given that you work for us. It’s Soulboxe that caused all of this.”
“Sometimes when a parent sees their child making what they perceive to be mistakes, it’s hard to bear. At first, they try to offer advice. When that isn’t taken, they impose rules and restrictions. If the child is too independent for that to work, they eventually whittle down their options until there are just two; acceptance, or abandonment.”
Was the doctor talking about Lucas and his father now, or about Lucas and Boxe? The similarity was so eerie it made him shiver.
“We haven’t spoken in years,” he said. “Not since he tried to get me to interview for a position at one of his old golfing buddies’ business.”
“A time will come when any bitterness you feel turns to nostalgia, and then regret. Talk to him, Lucas. And drop by my office before you leave work today; I have a blend of Bolivian roasted beans that are simply fantastic. You won’t have tried java like it.”
Lucas watched Osbeck walk away, and he felt the urge to reach for his phone and make a call that he hadn’t made in years.
CHAPTER 49
Tripp had never wanted to feed anyone to a bunch of orb weavers as much as he did Gilla. On seeing her guild blocking his entry to Mountmend and hearing the weavers scurrying over the plains, dread slithered down his spine.
Either he accepted the friend request so that Gilla could access Konrad’s part of Old Kimby, or he died on the plains. That would mean he’d respawn outside of Godden’s Reach. He’d fail the labyrinth quest, and everything he worked for would be gone.
If he did let her access the mines, then that’d leave Gilla and her guild free to go into the labyrinth. They were at a high enough level to clear it, and she had artificers and crafters in her guild. They’d solve the rooms and claim all the loot, leaving Tripp with nothing once again.
He felt like he was trapped in a vice, with the weavers approaching over the plains on one side, with the Forgestriders on the other, and Gilla was the one tightening it, ready to make him snap.
He wasn’t ready to bend his will to hers. There had to be something he could do.
“Jon, can you use some of your ice arrows? Slow the weavers and buy us time?”
He nodded, dropped to one knee to steady his aim, and started firing.
“Arrows? Really? You’re squirting water at a stove fire while your living room is burning down,” said Gilla. “Accept my friend request, and you’ll live to see the next wave. Who knows, you might even make it to the end with
us as your friends.”
“Friends?” said Lizzy. “Do you know what that means?”
“Now I’m being talked down to by an elephant.”
While Lizzy and Gilla bickered, Tripp weighed things up. It felt good to let his mind slip into reasoning mode, like changing into a higher gear when a car engine revved too loudly.
If they stayed on the plains, they’d die. Jon’s arrows were slowing down the weavers but the artificery of his arrows and his archery skill weren’t high enough, and rather than freezing them to the spot, the ice arrows were only delaying their advance.
They needed to get into the safety of Mountmend so that they weren’t the first people in the weaver’s line of sight. But they couldn’t get by the Forgestriders blocking the gates.
Could he force them to move out of the way? No, that wouldn’t work. Even if the guild didn’t outnumber them and weren’t all higher levels, they were standing just inside Mountmend, so that PVP wouldn’t be enabled. Tripp couldn’t attack them even if he wanted to.
It was down to him. His skills might be the answer, but how would they help? Even if he had the time to use his armorer or artificery abilities, he didn’t know what items to craft that would get him out of this.
A flash of inspiration hit him, as weak as the almost-spent beacons at first, but getting stronger, a flame devouring fueled by the kindling of possibilities.
Maybe artificery was the answer, but not to use it now; more, to use something he’d already artificed.
A wave of satisfaction washed through him. He looked at Gilla’s face. It was so resolute, her expression one of utter confidence. Then he glanced at the Mountmend fences; twenty-five feet high, too tall to climb over.
The best solutions were sometimes the simplest; he’d learned that from Konrad.
He turned to the others. “Put on your anchor boots,” he told them.
Warren looked puzzled. “Tripp, they make us slow as hell. Why sacrifice our agility?”
“Because we don’t need it. Put them on and watch me.”
Facing Gilla, he accessed her friend request and denied it.
After equipping his own anchor boots, Tripp walked to the fences and put one foot flatly on the metal, and felt the boot latch against it. Then he raised the other, and soon he was stuck fast to the fence, and he was able to walk up the surface and over it, back into Mountmend.
CHAPTER 50
“Don’t listen to them,” said Bee. “They’re only jealous.”
When they got back into Mountmend, they ignored the jeers of the Forgestriders and went from one weaver corpse to the next, stripping them of loot. Tripp gathered all of his up and stuffed it into his inventory.
“Bee, can you categorize my loot, please?”
“Sure thing. Hmm. Not bad.”
Loot Received!
- Orb Weaver flesh x6
- Orb weaver limbs x48
- Crafter’s Codex Version 2 – Premium
- Gold Key
- Silver Key
- Bronze key x2
- 105 gold
Tripp felt his heart race as he looked over the list. Lots of lovely orb weaver flesh that he could turn into essence, and he already knew how valuable that was on its own. When he made more orb weaver brooches, he was going to be rich. Or, a little richer, at least.
But it wasn’t the flesh or limbs, nor was it the keys or gold that sent jitters through him. It was the Crafter’s Codex Version 2.
The first codex he’d found in the labyrinth had 50 crafting cards. The one he had now was a premium version, so what kind of cool stuff would it have?
He opened it up and thumbed through to the first page.
Blank.
He turned page after page, and they were all blank save the very last one. He read the words on it and felt his blood run cold.
I watched you last night, Tripp.
I searched the networks to find you, and it led me to a hospital, where they have you in a pod. You were naked, which came as a shock. There are some things you can’t unsee.
He couldn’t hear anything over the beating of his pulse in his ears. It didn’t surprise him that Boxe could access networks outside of the game – but tracking Tripp down? Watching him through…what…Wi-Fi? Haunting him like some kind of internet ghost?
Why the hell had Boxe taken such a fascination in him?
Wait. This couldn’t be right, could it? Even if it were possible that Boxe could use Wi-Fi-networks like the digital version of a subway, he wouldn’t be able to look around and see whatever he liked.
Take the hospital room. Where were the cameras? What was Boxe using to see him?
“Bee?” he said. “Come and read this. I’m not going crazy, am I? It really does say what I think it says?”
She squinted, her frown growing deeper by the millisecond. “Boxe has way too much time on his hands.”
“The lack of a worrying tone to your voice is reassuring. Unless you just don’t have any empathy.”
“Relax, Tripp. He’s bluffing. How would that even work?”
Tripp was so glad to have Bee with him that he could have kissed her. Then, something occurred to him. “I told Warren and Jon about my accident and everything. Boxe must have been listening.”
“That makes more sense. Occam’s Razor. The in-game AI is more likely to have heard about your accident from what you said in-game, then traveling through data cables like an electrical poltergeist.”
In a way, Tripp felt sorry for Boxe. All the games and the ticks, was it because he was bored? Was it because he was a digital janitor of a human playground? If so, it meant that Jon was right; Boxe’s intelligence was too advanced for him to be stuck in Soulboxe.
Even though he wasn’t worried about Boxe spying on his real body, he still needed to tell someone about this. This was beyond anything he’d expected in Soulboxe. Mess around with quests and stuff, sure. Make things personal by mentioning Tripp’s out of game problems? Not cool. If Soulboxe was marketed as a vacation from reality, then Boxe had broken the developers’ ethos.
Before he did that, he had an idea. He made a quick stop at the general trader’s shop and bought a pencil. Then, he started writing in the book, just below Boxe’s voyeuristic message.
Boxe, is this you?
Then he waited, and a strange nervousness stirred in him. He hadn’t stared at something and waited for a reply to his message with such interest since he’d worked up the courage to text Jennie Walden, a girl he’d liked back in school.
Just like with Jennie, nothing came. At least he’d tried.
In the same way as when he’d messaged Jon, Tripp willed the message screen into being and composed his thoughts.
To: Soulboxe Tech Support
Hello, this is Tripp Keaton. I just read something pretty alarming; I am in a regrowth unit in Gloverdale Hospital, and they have linked me into Soulboxe while I wait for the treatment to finish. I found a book in some loot, and when I opened it, there was a message from Boxe. He somehow knows that I’m in hospital; he claims that he can see me – the real me – through the hospital network or something. I know he can’t, but it was an alarming message to get.
“Now we wait,” said Tripp. “How long does it usually take?”
“At least twenty-four hours. They prioritize the oldest complaints and game-breaking complaints first. Yours won’t even get-”
A bell chimed.
Message Received: Soulboxe Tech Support
Mr. Keaton, thank you for contacting us. I have escalated this to a lead developer and they will be in contact soon. Please note, this isn’t an automated message; we are treating your support request urgently.
That was all it said. If anything, the message made him worry more, because not only was it vague, but it had arrived within seconds. That kind of speed meant only one thing; his message had flagged up on some kind of filter, and it sounded like they were getting in a panic about it.
If they panicked, then he panicked.
“You’re sure Boxe can’t access anything outside of the game?” he asked Bee.
“Honestly. Lucas once told me he’d learned his lesson about AI from watching a film. The Finisher.”
“Terminator,” said Tripp. “It’s set in the future where an AI has destroyed the world, and that’s not the comparison I needed right now.”
With the message sent, there was nothing he could do but get on with things. If he didn’t, he was just going to turn it over again and again in his head, and he didn’t like the cold shiver that came over him when he thought about what Boxe had written.
I watched you last night, Tripp.
I searched the networks to find you, and it led me to a hospital, where they have you in a pod. You were naked, which came as a shock. There are some things you can’t unsee.
Was it a trick? A threat? Did Boxe need friends? Whatever the answer, Tripp needed to find a way to deal with the AI while he waited for tech support to fix whichever screw had come loose in the digital od’s brain.
CHAPTER 51
They waited out the last dregs of the night in the plaza, which became busier when the second wave ended and daylight leaked into the sky. Tripp felt twin energies of anger and relief work through him as the morning birds perched on gutters and sang wake-up songs, and as players queued up outside potion and weapon shops and waited for them to open.
His anger wasn’t at Gilla and Lamp for the position they’d put him, even though it should have been. No, this was Soulboxe, and things like that happened. People got killed by other players, they got scammed, they got robbed.
The fact this was a digital world with only digital consequences freed people to take another side of themselves off the leash, and it was a good thing in a way – people needed a release.
The sourness his stomach was more because of himself, for getting into that position in the first place. He’d focused so much on crafting, that he hadn’t really come up with a plan for what he’d do at nighttime other than try to level up. He needed to fix that.
