Virtual Horizon

by Kris Schnee

  "Tidings, milady!" said Paul. She still didn't see his face, but his voice was as reassuring as ever.

  "Ahoy. Anyway, yes, I'd like that. Maybe tomorrow? I wish we could meet in person again."

  "Mom can't afford to pay my way, and the Community doesn't make it easy to earn money. But I can save up my stipend."

  Linda felt guilty for splurging on VR hardware. Her family wasn't rich, but she did have an allowance on top of the taxpayer funding that was helping her pay for college. "Great!" she said to encourage him.

  * * *

  Both of their schedules got snarled, and she ended up doing the school "quest" before playing with Paul. That was a weird experience. The Boston-area subway system had gotten less reliable lately but she arrived on time.

  The bearded, grinning science teacher greeted her. "First of all, thank you for your service," he said, pumping her hand up and down.

  "I was just a glorified intern. Not really inducted."

  "Even so! Do you have a speech prepared?"

  "Notes and a few slides and animations." She'd been practicing at giving speeches.

  So she greeted a roomful of teenagers, total strangers, in a classroom with regimented desks facing a portrait of the president. She gave them an overview of the Navy's flying and swimming robots, some remote-piloted and some autonomous. Some non-classified stories about working with them, some speculation about the next models' AI. From there she got into talking about a recent deadly debacle aboard an aircraft carrier. The disaster had exposed the vulnerability of the modern fleet's reliance on behemoth ships. The official story blandly blamed "management issues", since the word "problem" had been banned. But really there'd been a breakdown in the vital trust and cooperation that made a free society's ships so effective. Furthermore --

  "Ah, miss Decatur? We're drifting off-subject."

  Linda scratched one ear and smiled apologetically. "Anyway, it's an exciting technology. But the people are more important than the hardware."

  * * *

  "Come and see," wrote Typhoon by e-mail.

  Linda logged in the next afternoon with her tablet and one VR glove, no headset.

  "Where are you today?" asked the pirate otter, standing on his beach of smooth glass. He was looking at the Dread Pirate Lexington.

  Linda switched the camera to first-person so he was looking at her directly. It felt more polite. "A restaurant called Neon Haven."

  Three tall floors of tables looked out from balconies at a pair of magnificent fantasy airships that seemed to be moored there. The sky was painted and softly lit from below. She was here for a late lunch, so she'd been able to grab a table aboard the lower ship and gaze up at the magical harbor above her. There ought to be more places like this, she thought. It even smelled of a salty ocean.

  Typhoon's voice from the screen said, "Can I see?"

  Linda turned the computer's camera on and pulled off the duct tape covering it. Thousand Tales was the only reason she ever let the machine monitor her. "You'd said something about a vision upgrade?"

  "Yes. I..." Typhoon went quiet as Linda slowly panned the computer up and down to look around the tall, open room. "That's way better than what I built."

  "The designer's been at it a lot longer than you. What did you make this time?"

  Typhoon scuffed at the beach with one webbed foot, making glass rattle. "Not much. But it's over here."

  He led her inland again. Gone was the childish mansion. Instead, he'd built three similar cabins of a few rooms each. The first was rough logs and had a floor of linoleum tiles, the second was all rounded off-white plastic like an eggshell, and the third was grey stone with floors of reddish sandstone. A few pieces of furniture decorated each, none of them including the swing set or trampolines from the first design.

  "Well, they're a lot more subdued," Linda said.

  "Is that good?"

  "Definitely better. Now that you can put together something basic, you can branch out a little with more variety."

  Typhoon frowned slightly at his own work. It erred on the side of dullness this time, and didn't look lived in. "What makes a design 'good', anyway? Is it just something you like, and you don't know why? I know about the standard tropes of a story, but all the stuff I read says it's not necessarily good or bad to do what others do with them."

  Linda was impressed that the AI could even conceive of applying lessons from a field like storytelling to architecture. "That's the kind of question we have trouble answering. Humans, I mean. Why didn't you include a swimming pool?"

  He looked at his webbed fingers, then at the mystical waterdrop icon on his left hand. "I thought about it. And then I asked myself, is it important that I'm supposedly this animal creature from your world? Do I actually like swimming, or is it something I do because I was programmed to think water is fun? I got really confused."

  Linda laughed, and used the Command button to ruffle Typhoon's ears. "Your creator set you up to have a whole pile of philosophical problems."

  "So what's the answer?"

  "We don't know. Welcome to the sapient-species club; we're all mad here." She paused. "Put 'Alice In Wonderland' on your viewing list."

  Typhoon added the title to a too-long interface window. "Can you show me what kind of house you'd design?"

  Linda forgot her adventure and her meal for a little while, just building and playing with Typhoon and teaching his hungry mind everything she could think of.

  Eventually, the waitress got annoyed at Linda, and Linda left with some embarrassment and a to-go box. As she shut down the game for now, Typhoon said, "If it's so much easier to build in my world, you ought to make everything in here. You can have more fun that way."

  * * *

  A pair of griffins hopped through a rippling portal and landed on the glass beach. One was a traditional gold and brown, the other a more slender and dark model like a raven. When on all fours they were about waist-high to her. Linda walked over to crouch and hug Paul's creature. "Cute!"

  She was anxious about Typhoon meeting Nocturne, though. First contact between two of the AIs could go terribly wrong.

  From behind Linda, Typhoon called out, "Hello, strange bird I have never met!"

  The dark griffin said, "Hello, unfamiliar aquatic rat!"

  Paul-the-griffin chirped, somehow mixing the sound in with his voice. "I'm told time doesn't stop in there when we're offline. So, what did you want to do?"

  "Retake my ship!" said Linda.

  Nocturne looked skeptically at the dinghy. "Starting with this?"

  "All the numbers start at zero."

  Paul hopped in. "All right! Are we going to fight your pirates, then?"

  "Not yet. We need a plan."

  Typhoon grinned. "I've got one." All eyes turned to him. "First, we need to get to Bastion Island."

  They set sail, and let Typhoon savor not telling them the whole plan. It worked perfectly for five minutes before a lesser kraken rose from the depths. Its three tentacles and one side of its giant-squid head churned the sea.

  "Can you take it on?" said Linda. No cannons available, just her trusty sword and ornate black-powder pistol and Typhoon's own knife and similar gun.

  The griffins leaped into the air, veering right. Two of the tentacles flailed toward them. Linda stood and braced her feet wide to take aim. With her skill level she had a targeting cursor and could steady it against the boat's rocking. Now! She fired. Smoke kicked out and an explosion of pale pink blood marred the nearest pillar of flesh. Nocturne swooped toward the wound and raked it wider with her lion claws. She clung to rest for a second and then jumped off again.

  Linda tossed her gun back to Typhoon at the oars. "Switch and reload." The otter whipped out a powder horn from his inventory and a puzzle window appeared for reloading.

  With his gun Linda took aim again. Paul had gotten a rock from somewhere -- oh, right, inventory -- and chucked it right into the beast's exposed eye. The whole thing thrashed and a burbling roar chill
ed her. The rules warned her she was [Shaken!] as a status effect, penalizing her stats. Linda hesitated, took a shot, and whiffed.

  The tentacles writhed. Both griffins got swatted out of the air with major wounds. The boat kicked up beneath Linda with nobody tending the oars. "Let's get in closer," she said, and swapped seats to row toward her fallen teammates.

  "One gun ready. Hold course and I'll --"

  "Great!" Linda said. She snatched the pistol from him and focused. Typhoon muttered something behind her and there was a splash. Linda just aimed. The base of the most wounded tentacle was wide open while the others thrashed at the griffins. Bang! Perfect hit, major wound. Pale blood gushed from the tentacle and most of its mass sheared off, crashing down into the waves. Horrid shrieks filled the air.

  [Terror!] said the game, with a scream icon and a massive 50% penalty to everything.

  "I'm not scared," she said. She tried reloading but the sliding ball-and-powder icons on her screen refused to cooperate. She turned around, but Typhoon wasn't there. She grumbled and mimed sitting down.

  While she was trying to steady the boat and maybe recover from penalties, Typhoon popped up from the water under Paul and gave him a boost, helping him launch. The griffin flapped awkwardly toward the kraken's head, talons extended. The monster squealed and dived beneath the waves, dragging all its bulk underwater and leaving the one severed chunk fouling the surface. Paul crashed down on empty, bubbling waves. Nocturne was in the air now too but barely able to stay up.

  "It's gone!" said Typhoon, ducking below to look again. "Yep! Retreating."

  "Any treasure?" Paul asked.

  "Fresh meat," Typhoon said. "That was just a lesser kraken."

  Nocturne said, "Lesser!"

  They struggled to get back into the boat with Linda. She said, "I was useless at the end, there; kept getting hit with penalties from the screaming."

  "Us, too," Paul said. "I think you need the Spirit stat to block that kind of thing. How far are we from that island, Typhoon?"

  "One to three events."

  Linda explained, "A few possible battles or strange sights per trip, not a fixed time or distance."

  They sailed on. Nocturne said, "There's a new world opening up called Endless Isles. That place has real distances between the islands."

  Typhoon's whiskers perked up. "Really! I think you'd mentioned it but I was paying more attention to your charity work. I'd like to see that place."

  "Charity?" asked Paul.

  Nocturne scratched her ears with one set of talons. "Just a little, and the money really came from humans. Say, did you get a talent upgrade too?"

  "I did," Paul said, and got distracted by his interface. "Hmm... Definitely taking the Hover feat. I see how getting your wings soaked is a problem. Maybe there's some kind of feather-oil to handle that."

  Typhoon said, "Now that you've just suggested it, probably yes. Not a problem for me!"

  Nocturne razzed him. "Except you can't fly."

  "I do like swimming, though." He sat up straighter. "I really do. Maybe it's just a stereotype I'm falling into, but I want to do more of it. Hey!" Typhoon squeaked as Nocturne grabbed his legs and sent him toppling into the water. The griffin looked triumphant until he shot up under the boat and capsized it to dunk them all.

  * * *

  Linda logged out eventually and went to the gym to get some real exercise. They'd left off at the docks of Bastion Island, with Linda in her noblewoman disguise. Typhoon had revealed his plan at the end: reveal to the governor that the notorious pirate ship Fallen Crown was planning to attack the King's next silver shipment, and offer to help ambush it. It'd take some social maneuvering to convince them her strange friends were extra muscle worth hiring. And to let them ride along on the secret bullion ship, and -- oh yes -- to find time in her school schedule to play with Paul. But she could handle all that.

  In her next session, Typhoon dragged Linda along to a different world of sunny beaches and palm trees in a crystal-blue sea. "Is it warm where you are?" he asked.

  "No, another cold front is coming through." With her goggles on she saw only light and water and the shore, but she could faintly hear cold wind rattling the dorm's windows.

  "You can be warm here, at least."

  There wasn't much in this particular world yet, and Linda had arrived wearing only ragged castaway clothes. Her AI explained, "Normally you'd have to make a whole other character to visit a shared game world like this one. Most people are either in their personal adventure zones, or small-group ones, or the handful of bigger, shared worlds like Planet Bonneville. This here is Endless Isles."

  "Are there plans to hook up all the zones?"

  "Even Ludo isn't sure, yet. Seems to me like a waste to have just one world. It'd be sloppy with all the different special rules and creatures people have; 'Fantasy Kitchen Sink', you know?"

  "Yeah. I wouldn't want to be pushed into having just elves and dwarves either, to conform. So what are we doing here?"

  "Making things." Typhoon showed her a camp of players who were clear-cutting pristine tropical forest and stacking up logs and boards. He called out, "I'm back!"

  These players were all human. One of them said, "So, boards and tools now for a raft tomorrow?"

  "Sure."

  Typhoon told Linda, "I have an advantage here. I can be 'online' as long as I want, so I can do work in the background for them."

  "All-human world, though?"

  "Actually no. The local quest AI is setting things up so people will get slow elemental transformations as they explore the sea." He hauled a stack of wooden boards away from the players' pile.

  Sitting on the beach near the players, they shared some basic tools made of stone and copper to cut up wood and try making it into things. There was a surprisingly detailed crafting system that let Linda try making cuts and holes. Still surreal to watch, what with the meters for timing and power. She made a useless triangle, some scraps, and finally an item worthy of the rule system taking note. [Wooden Buckler: Defense 1. "May cause your swashes to buckle."]

  Typhoon brandished his knife, which he'd been using for carving when not lending the steel blade to the human crafters. "Try blocking this. Ready?"

  Linda equipped the shield and raised one arm in time to block a slow-motion strike from Typhoon. "Useful, then."

  They traded off, blocking hits, until Typhoon got too enthused and gashed Linda for a minor wound. "Sorry, sorry!"

  "It's fine; it'll heal soon."

  "That's enough hitting for now. Want to learn more magic?"

  They practiced that, though all they could do was conjure a little water or ice. The human players watched them and said, "Have you tried teaming up on a spell yet?"

  Typhoon made his spell grid visible to her, and conjured his [Water] icon. Linda tried the same thing with [Ice]. They stood nearby and steered the marks through a three-dimensional spiral pattern with their hands, and into a mystic whirlpool. A hovering ball of icy water appeared in the air between them.

  Typhoon took it and tossed it between his hands. Then he tossed it toward the humans, saying, "Catch!"

  One of them switched tools to wield a club, and swung. There was a perfect baseball crack of the bat as the icy orb flew off and plunged into the sea. "Hey, do that again!"

  One improvised baseball inning later, the crafter players laughed and split up to go offline or do other things. That left Typhoon and Linda alone on this stretch of the beach.

  "That was fun!" he said. "And I'm due a second magic element." He frowned and said to the air, "Oh, come on; let her have one too. It might encourage her to start a new character in the Isles."

  Linda's interface pinged and announced in a swirly blue font, [You've earned another magic element... says Typhoon's Eye. Make a selection! In this case it'll be linked to your main character.] A list of words showed her the possibilities: [Water, Create, Shape, Wood, Throw, Cut, Portal.]

  "Ludo's bending the rules for this, huh?"
>
  Typhoon said, "No, that's the new quest AI for the Isles. Ocean-of-Origin, she's calling herself." At the invocation of her name, the quiet beach stirred with old console game music. Typhoon added, "She does the music too."

  Linda listened to the simple but mysterious tune, and nodded in appreciation. Reluctantly she spoke up again. "I'd like [Create], please. A verb will help."

  A swirl of light coiled inward to Linda's left hand, creating an abstract glyph of a shining dot to represent the new word of power. She was marked now with a little more complexity and variety.

  Typhoon took [Shape] as his element, and got the same treatment. Then the two of them tried combining all four words into a single spell. Steering all of the little icons was a challenge, forcing them to step around each other and turn on the sand, moving their arms up and down. Linda took the [Water] icon like a tangible thing and turned it, leaving a glowing trail, and brought her hands together with his to complete the weaving.

  A large orb of icy water swirled into being, and this time she could bend and shape it like putty. Now flat, now sharp, then a ball again. She handed it off to Typhoon and he hollowed it out into a necklace that he slipped over her neck. "Ah, sorry, it looks like it won't be stable for long without an even more complex spell."

  "That's all right," Linda said, and admired the surreal ring of glittering water. "It's pretty. And... and it's probably good for resisting fire or something."

  [Skill gain: Magic 1.]

  That was nice. But getting to be here and doing strange, creative things was more important to her than the numbers.

  "I'm told there's a shop opening soon in your world. Or a lot of shops; I'm not really sure. Places where you can play Thousand Tales with better hardware than the kind you own. There's going to be one near you. And I'll pester Ludo to make sure you premium people can play there without spending coins."

  "It sounds fun," Linda said.

  "Great! It's a date then."

  She blushed. "What?"

  "That's what people say when they're setting up a meeting, right?"