Soda Pop Soldier

by Nick Cole

  “Stop!” roars the Minotaur, the only other standing player left in the palazzo.

  Plague halts.

  I glance around. There are dead bodies everywhere. It’s just three of us now.

  The lethal Minotaur.

  Plague.

  And me and my 25 percent health.

  Everyone else is very dead.

  A quiet wind sweeps out of the low desert mountains that surround this lost city. A lone piece of parchment flutters across the paving stones and is gone.

  “The Samurai is badly wounded,” growls the Minotaur. “If you want to kill him . . . then you’ll have to kill me first.” His in-game voiceware is gruff and husky.

  “This ain’t yer (cough) fight,” spits out a hoarse Plague. “Why should you care enough to die before he does?”

  I’m wondering that myself.

  “You’re just a player,” rumbles the Minotaur. “Nothing more, sickly man. If you knew the books, knew the world in which we fight . . . there is so much more to it than Rolexes and Ultravettes, and money. So much more.”

  He won an Ultravette! No way! This guy’s good.

  “I may not know the story. But I know this Samurai (cough). I know him (cough) very well.”

  The Minotaur hefts his spear above his bulging shoulder in one sudden movement, then asks, “How fast are you, sickly man?”

  Plague raises both guns with his gloved hands, thumbing back the hammers as they rise. The Minotaur flings the heavy spear as both cannons erupt.

  Over ambient, I hear twin short wet thumps following each other, as both speeding balls strike the wide barrel chest of the Minotaur.

  Plague, still standing, looks down at the place where the spear has impaled him. Then he drops to his knees and, a moment after that, falls over dead.

  I race to the Minotaur and check his Vitality bar. He’s down to 10 percent health and falling. I rifle his inventory and find the health potion I need.

  Inside the suite on the Skyliner, we bounce through a little turbulence. Unusual for a Skyliner, or so I’d heard.

  “Why’d you do that?” I ask the Minotaur over chat.

  His health is now at 6 percent. Still falling. Plague’s musket balls must come with some sort of secondary infection side effect.

  “In the books . . . ,” begins the Minotaur as though he’s actually injured. A role player. This game was much more to him than just . . . well, what he’d said earlier.

  So much more.

  “In the books, ours was the greatest of friendships, Samurai. That is why. We first journeyed together in the book Another Place, Far Off and over the course of many others. Now that this world has been hijacked . . . I guess . . . I guess I just wanted it to be something more. To be like the books.” His health meter falls to 1 percent. My cursor hovers over his potion.

  Double left-click and it’s mine. Right-click and I can save him.

  I right-click. I guess I’m that kind of guy.

  My Samurai jams the health potion down the Minotaur’s muzzle as I watch his Vitality bar begin to rise.

  I know what it’s like when you wish something was more than what it actually is. I wish Sancerré had stayed. I wished I’d been enough for her.

  “What’s your name, big guy?” I ask the Minotaur.

  “Morgax.”

  Chapter 24

  Morgax patches me up using first-aid skills the Minotaur has in one of his menus. I end up at 45 percent. Then we loot the bodies of the slain players.

  “How’d you get here?” I ask him in chat.

  “When the game started,” he begins, his role-playing voiceware making him sound like a talking bull, “I was hanging from a meat hook in the kitchen of an inn at the foot of Korzum Pass. Once I got out of there, I had to fight my way up the Cliffs of Madness and onto the pass into the Lost Desert. Then I found a cave that turned out to be the lair of some player from Saudi Arabia running a green dragon with a penchant for gambling. Long story short, I made it out of there and down to the Whore’s Gate of Zandsabad. In the books, Zandsabad is the desert city of the lost and the damned. It was pretty much that. I fought my way through the outer ruins. I got chased by some cult group that plays as a clan and meets online. Lots of ’em. I had to fight my way through the bazaar, and then I finally made it to the inner ring of the city, where we are now. That’s where most of the players are headed. This is where the fighting started. Apparently no one wants to let anyone else get through the gate without making sure everyone who survived the city is dead. That’s how the big fight started. How about yourself?”

  I tore my eyes away from all the loot in my inventory menu.

  “I started in a dungeon cell I thought was below the tower. Then when the game reset the first night, just after it started, I ended up in a place called the Oubliette.”

  “The game never restarted the first night,” interrupted Morgax. “But the sessions have been pretty seamless from the get-go since then. There can’t be many players left by now.”

  I wanted to ask him who he was, where he was from, so I’d have some clue as to why the mysterious voice on the other end of the red phone at Seinfeld’s wanted him dead, in-game. But in the Black, it’s not just considered extremely bad form to ask personal information, it just isn’t done. No one’s going to divulge it. Regardless of what Callard knows about me. Everybody thinks they’re safely anonymous inside the Black.

  “We should still have another hour of game time,” says Morgax. “Let’s head into the courtyard. Maybe we can get into the tower before the game shuts down for the night.”

  I drew my sword, following the Minotaur through the gate. Even though I had just over seventy-four thousand dollars, I could always use a little more.

  I could have killed him with a power attack as he turned his back on me and walked toward the massive gate. There was something attractive about being able to name your price to an anonymous genie even if you had to do something dark to get paid. I guess it’s that hit man fantasy we all have.

  But murder wasn’t on my price list. I know it’s just a game. But so is life. And how we play the game has something to do with how we live our life.

  An hour later, the game shuts down and again thanks us for not dying. We’d spent the hour searching the tower courtyard and found no way into the Marrow Spike other than the obvious unopenable door at the base. We’d even thought about going up the side, but that didn’t seem possible either. The tower is very high; one fall and that’s it. Game over.

  In the final moments of the night’s game, I slew my Samurai’s POV upward to look at the height of the tower in the last of the fading apocalyptic orange daylight. Stars reveal themselves in the deeper blues above. Staring upward, the tower seems crazy and impossible, architecturally speaking. At points, it leans one way only to be counterbalanced by bulbous expansions of stonework. At the distant top, smoke-blackened parapets far beyond our reach lay, spreading outward, guarding whatever waits for us up there.

  The child.

  The witch.

  The doomsday file.

  When the game ends, I shut down the desk and lean back in the soft leather executive chair. We’re over Los Angeles now. It’s four in the morning. The dull hum of the aircraft envelopes me as I lean back and close my eyes. I can’t remember the last time I slept. The subways? What kind of sleep was that? I have a lot of money and prizes now. But I need an address to have the prizes shipped to. And how far can I ride this plane? At what point would the crew find out I was on a hacked pass? And then what? Put me in airplane jail? Toss me out at altitude screaming over the Pacific in the middle of the night?

  Things have changed. Just a few days ago I was fighting for rent money, now here I am holding more cash than I’ve ever had in my whole life.

  Electronically speaking.

  I’m free.

  Next stop . . . MegaTokyo.

  I pour myself another scotch and open the door to the bedroom. A full-size bed, immaculate white sheets, and s
oft fluffy pillows call to me in the dim light of the interior cabin. I unwrap a chocolate left on the pillow. Gray sea salt and bacon—it’s great. Moments later, I’m asleep.

  In the morning I wake up tangled in sheets. Bright sunlight shifts across the bedroom as the sun comes into view through the porthole for a moment. We’re turning, banking. We must be over Tokyo in a holding pattern so the brokers can cover the market. Literally.

  I splash some cool water on my face, using the expensive salt scrub and foaming soap scented with sandalwood to wash my face, and then dress. I know there’s a restaurant on board. And a bar. Food sounds real good.

  As soon as I open the door an air hostess greets me. The blond one.

  “Is everything all right, Mr. Saxon? I can have breakfast served in your cabin, if you like.”

  “Everything is perfect, Miss . . .”

  “Trixie.”

  “Miss Trixie?”

  “Just Trixie. Or whatever you prefer, Mr. Saxon.”

  “Well, Miss Trixie, I thought I might like to sit with some real people for a while and eat some real food. Too much time online.”

  “Then I’ll recommend the Commander’s Cabin at the end of this corridor below the flight deck,” she says, unconsciously tugging at one of her pearl earrings. “We have an excellent crème brûlée French toast, but you can order anything you’d like. Did you make a killing this morning, Mr. Saxon?”

  I stop for a moment, forgetting who I am. Does she know about the Black? Or is she talking about WarWorld?

  It was a long night of each.

  Then I remember the plane is full of traders.

  “Absolutely. Did five mil, easy.” I have no idea if five million is a good or bad day when it comes to trading. I suspect “not great” after Trixie doesn’t leap up and down like I would if I’d actually just made that much money.

  “Well, it’s all how you look at it, Mr. Saxon.”

  She leads me to the Commander’s Cabin and pushes open the door with one of her white-gloved hands.

  I could get used to this.

  Tables covered in starched white cloths and sleek sculpted silverware lay along one side of the cabin near large porthole windows that gaze out on the wide sky and the glittering sea below. On the other side of the lounge, a bar with a bank of several monitors showing all the major trade news reporting outlets waits, ready for service. There are only a few people in the room, and all of them are part of the immaculate-looking staff.

  Impressive.

  I take a table and look out the large oval porthole. Below, MegaTokyo swallows the scene. Sky bridges and LaserBoards sweep across the forest of ultrascrapers.

  “Finished trading early, Mr. Saxon?” I look up to see a smiling waiter. His hair is perfect.

  “Seems that way.”

  “Well, better luck next time.”

  “Who says I didn’t make enough and decide to quit while I’m ahead?” For a moment the waiter looks confused.

  “Ah,” he starts to laugh. “Good one, Mr. Saxon. Very funny. Can I offer you some breakfast this morning?”

  “I’m dying for some croissants and jam. Maybe some butter too. Coffee also.”

  “Excellent.” And the waiter’s gone.

  Ordering the croissants reminds me of my apartment, now gravel. I loved the instant croissants I used to heat up for Sancerré and me. I’d cut them open and stuff them with jam and butter. Some coffee, and I’d be on the road to recovery.

  I rub my eyes and look out the porthole at MegaTokyo. Abe Citadel rises up off the sky bridge. The new ninth wonder of the world. It should’ve amazed me. But slaying Balrogs and fighting alongside a Minotaur I’m supposed to kill while trying to win the Cola Wars has desensitized me to amazing things.

  Maybe I have some new special level of game hangover.

  I briefly wonder if that’s an achievement.

  I need to work out, get into a gym and exercise, have real friends. I think about Kiwi and RiotGuurl. Then I know I really have game hangover for sure. When your online friends are the only ones you can name, you’ve got it bad. No wonder Sancerré left.

  The croissants arrive on bone-white china embossed with the airline’s blue skybird logo. The waiter pours aromatic black coffee and offers me cream and sugar. I say yes to both and take up a croissant as he leaves. It’s buttery and dense. I prepare it like I want it, stuffed with butter and jam, then I bite into it.

  At that moment, I realize I’ve never actually had croissants before in my entire life. Not real ones. Not like these. This is the first time. What I taste is flaky and buttery and slightly sugary and, yes, very dense. The croissant’s fresh heat melts the butter I’d placed within, which runs golden and salty across sweet raspberry jam. Before I know it, the entire croissant is gone. I drink my coffee.

  I feel human.

  I haven’t felt that way in a long time.

  I spend the rest of the morning eating breakfast and listening to the chatter of others as the dining room begins to fill up. I order two fried eggs and some bacon while eavesdropping on a currency broker who talks loudly about “Burying the entire Malay Peninsula on a UN exchange deal for Yamashima and walking away with a cool sixty-five billion for five minutes’ work.”

  My eggs and bacon arrive.

  “They asked me to hold it while they strong-armed Korea for a better percentage . . . ,” bellows the broker.

  I fork into the eggs. Rich yellow yolk spreads out across the buttery whites of the salt-and-peppered eggs.

  “Five minutes in and they want it all back. So I tell ’em they gotta pay the penalty or we wait the whole hour, and who knows what House Korea’s gonna do here in the next few minutes about strong-arm tactics and relief money.”

  The bacon is crisp. Salty. A road of cured, smoked, fried pork.

  “They didn’t even bat an eye. Cha-ching, sixty-five megalarge, Tokyo style,” finishes the triumphant broker.

  I tune him out and order orange juice and a plate of fresh mango.

  “Yamashima wants time on StarDeep!” whines some other broker. “That’s the word I hear as soon as the bell rings. Takes me half the morning to find the requisite googlebytes you need to even do a deal with that bunch of freaks at StarDeep. For five minutes the guy gives me a quote for a thousand googlebytes, optical. Yamashima will never go for it! And you know what, they don’t and there I am, half a day down the drain on a deal I shouldn’t have even been chasing in the first place.”

  My ice cold orange juice and fruit arrive. The juice is so clear and so sweet, I feel it take hold of the back of my throat as vitamin C breaches my system like a pleasantly assertive grenade. I feel clear and even slightly alive. The mango is ripe. I can tell just by looking at it. I squeeze some lime over it.

  “Carter did a deal for Yamashima an hour ago and said he made enough to send his daughters to college. Which means he has to endow a new chair and build a lab as soon as they both get out of rehab.”

  “That . . . Hey, that was my deal!”

  The mango is firm, but still it explodes with juice in my mouth. Bad mango is either too hard or too soft. This is neither. The quiet buzz within me turns up a notch, and now it’s a steady hum somewhere between my ears.

  Chapter 25

  Hi there,” I say, as I approach the trader who’d beat the whiny guy over the Yamashima deal.

  He looks at me. I’m an intruder, that’s clear. Am I prey or predator? That’s not clear, just yet. He’s feeling good about ripping off the Malay Peninsula, so the guy probably thinks he’s the biggest gorilla in the jungle.

  Good, because I need a big King Kong–sized monkey.

  “I have a problem” is my opening. “And I was wondering if I could bounce it off you?”

  The big man waves at the other side of the table, indicating I should sit, then he orders two draft beers with two fingers. I suppose one’s for me.

  “Club sandwiches?” he asks then looks at me, waiting, as though the only correct answer is always
yes to whatever he wants. At which point, the credit history check can proceed, or no, and then it’s get lost, I haven’t got time for people who aren’t worth something.

  “Love ’em,” I reply.

  He raises two thick fingers and nods to the bartender.

  “So what do you want?” says the big business gorilla.

  “I’ll be honest with you,” I start, trying to find a rhythm. “I’m not altogether sure.” I pause. Then, “But you seem like the kind of guy who can score, big time.”

  The emotion of nothing crosses his large predator face.

  “I have no idea how it is that you guys make money, exactly,” I confess.

  I detect slight puzzlement. Even boredom.

  “The truth is, I hacked my way onto this flight. So . . . if you think I’m conning you or trying to rip you off, I just gave you the key to getting rid of me real quick.”

  Nothing remains written on his large face.

  He raises his eyes. A signal for me to continue. We’re playing poker, and he likes my ante because it’s all in. At least, it is for me. All in.

  “So here’s what I’m betting.” I lean close. Just so only we can hear us. “I’m going to tell you about something that’s going down in the business world that everybody might not know. My hunch is, with this information you might make some money. Maybe even a lot of money, though I don’t know how you would go about that. But you seem like a guy who knows how.”

  Bright afternoon sun floods the cabin as the Skyliner slowly banks and turns toward Thailand. The big gorilla gulps his ice cold draft. I sip.

  “Who are you?” he asks. His voice is quiet, his eyes off somewhere else. Over my shoulder. Whatever you do, I tell myself. Don’t look back.

  “I’m a professional gamer. I fight for ColaCorp.”

  “Hold on,” he says.

  He raises another two fingers at the bartender and nods for me to finish my beer.