“You don't have to forgive me, Cowboy. But you're goin' to need my help if you want to get her back.”
“If what you've told me is true,” Worlok says, “and these NPCs are actually capable of learning, than they belong in NextWorld anyway, not trapped in some game.”
Raev sets her hand on my shoulder. “Think about what Cyren will be able to accomplish in NextWorld.”
I don't care if it's better. I want everything to be back to the way it was. I want the Cyren I knew back. I want her to love me again.
Xen touches my other shoulder and says, “Metaversalism teaches us that we can't go back, we can't change the past. We can only change the future. We need to move forward and choose the right actions in order to secure our vision of the life we want.”
I'm worried about my own ability to rationalize when Xen starts making sense. But he's right, of course. It's tempting to lose myself in memories. I want to close my eyes and dream of her again, next to me, her black lips smiling, but I don't have time for that. I don't have time to get lost in this ache that's threatening to take me over. I need to act. I need to complete my quest.
I straighten my cowboy hat, slide my fingers across the brim, and with a deep breath, I reboot my mind. I put my emotions where they can't hurt me and lock my brain back on to the task at hand. I step up closer to Worlok and Fantom. Everyone jerks, expecting me to lash out again. But I don't. If I've learned anything, it's that I need to accept the help that someone else can offer me. I can't play solo.
“I need your help.” It may be the hardest thing I've ever said. Right or wrong doesn't matter to me right now. Only her. Only Cyren. “But if this doesn't work, if anything happens to her...”
Worlok silently accepts the terms of my halfhearted peace offering. He pulls his long white hair behind his faceless head and cracks every one of his knuckles.
“Let's hack.”
01010011
It's the last thing I care to admit, but I can see why Fantom thinks Worlok might be the best hacker in NextWorld. Deep in the cavernous tunnels below DOTnet, he maneuvers through menus with both hands like he's conducting an orchestra. Dual-wielding programs, he assesses and exploits vulnerabilities in the security with simple gestures, flicking wrists and twisting fingers in a digital dance. There's a driven passion to his movements, but I can tell that he loves every second of it.
Fantom assists him, throwing out her own attacks, trying to break through the shielding that protects the wires and tubes that line the tunnel. It doesn't take long for the outer shell to fade away, pixel by pixel. As it does, I can see the raw data flowing through the pipe.
“There's our ride,” Worlok says.
“I'll bounce our signal,” Fantom says. “But from here on out, we won't be as protected as we have been. If the DgS catch us in here, it's all over, yo.”
I look at Xen and Raev, ready to relinquish them from all their responsibilities of following me inside, but Xen holds up his hand and pops another Dizzy Fizz.
“Don't you dare say a word,” he says. “We're going to see this through to the end.”
Raev shrugs her shoulders. “For better or worse, I'm going to follow my partner. No matter what.”
“Hitch us up,” Fantom says to Worlok.
Worlok thrusts his hand into the data stream. His body shakes as the code runs up his arm, coiling itself around him like an army of ants. Fantom selects something on her screen and our avatars shimmer, vibrating at incredible speeds.
“Got it,” Worlok says. “Grab on. And don't you dare let go!”
We all latch on to his avatar and our bodies squeeze into a compression algorithm. Once it crushes us into the tiniest amount of data that can still hold our consciousness, the data flow sucks us down the wires and tubes of DOTnet. The movement is exhilarating, like I would expect flushing my mind through a bolt of lightning would feel. There's static on the tip of my tongue, my skin crackling with zettabytes of information, ones and zeroes washing over me like the crashing waves of an electric ocean. There is a flash of light right before we reach our doorway. Our avatars expand toward it, the white light fading into pixels of every color, each one solidifying into the graphical display of the domain we've entered.
The Trash Bin.
An infinite grid of blue lines extend in every direction, laying on a black background with no attention to detail or design. Cubes of different shapes and colors lay about, as if dumped here without any need for organization. In the distance, far off to one side, is a wall of light, thousands of feet high and stretching in either direction as far as I can see. It advances slowly, disintegrating every cube it touches. I stare up at the foreboding approach, knowing this is the timed deletion that we've been racing against.
“Each one of these cubes is a deleted file,” Worlok says. “We have to find the one that contains your game.”
“We're runnin' out of time,” Fantom says as she summons her flying carpet.
“It shouldn't take long. The location code will lead us right to the data,” Worlok says as he climbs on to the carpet with the rest of us.
Fantom pushes on the edge of the carpet and we take off across the grid, skimming a few feet above the ground. As she sways between each colored cube, directing us toward the location of the game, I notice a strange sensation inside the domain. There's no wind blowing through my hair as we fly. There's no real sense of movement other than the graphics changing. It's strange, like manipulating a screen rather than operating in a virtual world.
As we get closer to the wall of light, Fantom points and shouts, “There it is!”
A red cube sits alone on the grid, far from any other file. Each side is two feet across. Simple. An unremarkable shape that would most likely go unnoticed in this setting, yet inside this small, nondescript box is my entire world.
Stepping off the flying carpet before Fantom comes to a complete stop, I wrap my hands around the edges of the cube and try to lift it from the grid floor. It doesn't budge, locked in place by the deletion timer. As my hands grip on to the side, the cube gives off a strange warmth, like it's compressing the energy contained within so tightly it's generating heat. Even though I can't lift it, I bend down and wrap my arms around it, cradling it close to my chest like it's fragile glass, afraid that something may threaten its stability. Somewhere inside this cube is the woman I love.
Fantom strides toward me. Without hesitation she pulls the cutting program from her inventory and stabs the pair of scissors into the cube. A screen appears in front of her. The scissors glow.
“Is it working?”
“I need to search through a lot of data to find the NPCs,” she says, her eyes scanning the screen. “This could take me some time, yo.”
I glance nervously over my shoulder at the wall of light. Its approach is relentless. I sit down on the grid pattern floor, crossing my legs underneath me.
Xen sets his hand on my shoulder. “You did it.”
I shake my head. “We did it.”
“We didn't do anything yet,” Fantom says, still searching the screen. “We're close, but I ain't gonna congratulate anyone until we're out of this place.”
“Metaversalism teaches us that we only need what is possible,” Xen says, his thin cheeks inflating as he smiles. “We will succeed because we have to.”
In the absence of action, I let myself feel again. I let an emotion creep up behind me, its cold fingers sliding under my trench coat and tickling the back of my neck.
“I'm scared.”
“There's nothing to be afraid of,” Xen says, patting me on the back.
“I'm afraid to see her.”
“Cyren? Why?”
I consider my words carefully. “I'm afraid to look into her eyes without seeing the love that used to live there. I'm afraid to see someone else looking back at me.”
“No matter what, it's still Cyren. Her soul isn't just a collection of memories. Her soul isn't some accumulation of information. Her code, the core of wh
o she was, who she is, hasn't changed.”
I close my eyes as I consider the possibilities before me. “People change. A different set of circumstances could set any one of us on a completely different path. A different life. If she lives a different life, I'm afraid she'll be a different person.”
Xen sits down next to me, folding his legs in a perfect meditative position. “Are you afraid if she changes, she won't fall in love with you again?”
“Yes,” I say automatically, but when I consider it more, I add, “and I'm afraid that if she changes, I might not love her.”
Before Xen can reply, we hear Worlok yell from the carpet, “We got trouble,” as he anxiously swipes his hands through menu screens.
Fantom doesn't look away from her own screen as she shouts, “What's wrong?”
He hesitates, leaning in closer to the information, double-checking to make sure what he's seeing is correct. He looks off into the distance and points. All of us follow the direction of Worlok's finger until we see a swarm of flying saucers descending toward us. The ships look like smooth chrome disks spinning through the sky with spotlights beaming out from their belly, each one scanning the grid below. The lead saucer shines its light directly at us, blinding us all for a moment. When my eyes are able to focus again, I see the entire swarm circling to surround us.
Worlok and Fantom recognize the ships, but it's Raev who tells us with a single word: “InfoLock.”
01010100
We gather closer to Raev as the ships encircle us completely. Worlok pulls out two short swords and spins them in an arc, one in each hand.
“Their scanners are breaking through my ghost patterns,” Worlok says. “Another few seconds and they'll know who we are.”
“This is your mom?” I whisper to Raev as the silent ships continue their scan.
“Yup,” she says, her tone unnervingly dark.
“Data insurance,” Worlok says. I can hear the derision in his voice. “If they're here to ensure everything gets deleted on schedule, they're not going to like what we're up to.”
“What do we do?” I ask as Fantom's hands search faster through the screens. “We need more time.”
“We have to stall them and hope Fantom can find the NPCs before they lock down the domain,” Worlok says. “One of us needs to get back to NextWorld with the scissors.”
“Okay,” Xen says, trying to pull another Dizzy Fizz from his inventory. “So how do we stall them?”
Worlok glances at Fantom out of the corner of his eyes and grips his sword with an even tighter grasp. They both give each other a nod before he leaps into action.
Worlok launches himself into the air with his swords held out in front of him like the tip of a spear. His entire body pierces through the belly of one of the saucers, leaving a fiery hole as he erupts from the other side. The saucer crashes to the grid below, cracking in half and sending a rain of sparks down on all of us. Worlok is still flipping through the air before he lands on the roof of another saucer and drives both of his blades through the chrome outer hull. He roars with strength as he drags the two blades across the entirety of the ship, tearing open the saucer before dropping inside. Seconds later, he jumps out of the opening, leaving the saucer to crash helplessly into the ground.
One saucer manages to pull away, creating a safe distance between itself and Worlok's hacking abilities. A spotlight from the belly of the craft strikes Worlok head on as he leaps toward it. His avatar freezes in place.
“No,” Fantom whispers to herself, her expression showing fear behind her skull-shaped face paint. “Just a few more seconds.”
Another beam strikes Xen and his avatar hardens in place. Fantom yells at Raev, trying to stop her when she reaches out to help Xen, but it's too late. As soon as her hand crosses into the light, her avatar stops moving as well.
“Raev?” The booming voice comes from one of the saucers. “Why are you... how are you...?”
“Mom!” she yells out from her frozen state. “Let us go!”
The beam disappears and both their avatars fall back into motion.
“I should have known you'd be here with him,” her mother's voice says. “Is this part of your religion now, hacking into DOTgov domains?”
“Shut up!” Raev yells at the saucer as she helps Xen to his feet. “You have no idea what you're talking about. Leave us alone.”
“I'll do no such thing. You're trespassing and stealing data. I should turn you over to the DgS with your friends. Maybe that would teach you a lesson.”
“Please,” Xen begs, “you have to let us go. The data we're trying to save is more important than you understand.”
“I know exactly what you're stealing. That's my job. And I know all about the lies Xen has been trying to fill your head with. NPCs that think for themselves? What kind of inebriation apps are you two on that would make you believe such nonsense.”
Fantom steps next to me and whispers, “I got it.”
My head whips toward her. “Why are you still here? Go!”
She shakes her head, watching the saucers above us with a careful stare as Raev and her mother continue to argue.
“They locked down the domain. We can't exit.”
“But you hacked through the DOTbiz lock down. All you have to do is-.”
“I'd never be able to finish the hack in time. All they have to do is point one of those scanners at me and it's all over.”
“What about your sword? It would force a log-out and-”
“The scissor program is only a temporary storage solution. We have to paste it somewhere before we log-out or it'll end up right back here.”
As Raev's mother completes her scan of Worlok's account, she screams, “A cyberterrorist? Do you have any idea what's going to happen to you when the DgS finds out what you've been doing? You've thrown away your entire future!”
My mind is racing, trying to piece together the puzzle in front of me before the tension reaches its climax. As soon their argument ends, Raev's mother is going to alert the DgS to our actions.
I can't lose. Not when I'm this close.
I grab on to Fantom's arm as the answer rushes over me. “Is your connection to my nanomachines still open?”
She frowns, trying to understand where I'm going. “Sure, but I-”
“What's their storage capacity?”
She blinks twice as the numbers add up in her mind. A smile grows on her face.
“That's it young lady,” Rave's mother yells. “There's nothing I can do now. You're going to have to face the consequences for your actions.”
DgS officers suddenly appear all around us, popping into existence with tiny flashes of light. Their glowing red hands latch on to Worlok first, taking his account into custody. Four more officers step toward Fantom, their scanning screens already open with anticipation for their next arrest.
She moves with a speed I haven't seen since DangerWar 2. Her left hand rises up, holding the scissor program above her head. Her right hand reaches behind her back, gripping the handle of her sword tucked away in her secret inventory. In one fluid motion, Fantom drives the point of the scissors into my head and draws her sword.
DgS officers rush toward us as thousands of NPCs upload into my mind. The surge of information flows into my brainwaves, scrambling the patterns and causing my perceptions to warp around the incoming code. It obliterates my senses. All I can see are data packets piling on top of my thoughts. It's like drowning in binary. As my nanomachines consume the last byte, my vision returns just in time to see the DgS officers latch their glowing hands on to Fantom's avatar. Before she's tracked, before they force her to log-out, before her account is completely and utterly compromised, I feel her sword impale me.
01010101
“Error. Error. Error.”
As soon as I lift my head, a spike of pain drives itself from ear to ear. A squealing noise pierces my brain, vibrating between low and high, then just high. The pitch increases until my eyes feel like they're goi
ng to shatter from the inside. I look down and see blood dripping on to the white floor of the E-Womb. I touch my nose and the wet mess drips across my fingertips.
“Error. Error. Error.”
The voice inside the E-Womb keeps repeating the word until I open the hatch to exit. As soon as I do, I fall from the opening on to the floor. Hands grasp on to my arms, trying to help me up. I hear words, but I can't understand them through the pitched ringing in my ears. I lunge for the toilet, heaving every last content of my stomach into the bowl. When I finish, I'm helped to the bed where I lie back, my head resting on a pillow. I can taste the iron in my blood draining into the back of my throat. Ekko's partner is standing over me. Another man presses a cloth to my nose, trying to wipe away the blood that's covering my face.
The ringing turns into a squelching mess of static noise, like someone is strangling a data transfer. It writhes inside of me, twisting and coiling through my mind. My body shakes with a rhythmic pulse. One, two, three. And everything stops.
The ringing fades away with the pain. My body melts into the mattress, every muscle relaxing. My eyes flutter open and I see the other man leaning over me.
“Arkade?” He places his hand on my forehead as if he's checking my temperature. “It's me, kiddo. It's Ekko.”
“I... I...” I try to speak but it comes out raspy and I cough up a large chunk of phlegm that I'm forced to spit on to the floor. It's red with blood.
“Take it easy.”
“Did... it... work?” I ask through panting breaths.
The two men glance at each other, checking to see if the other one knows what I'm talking about.
“Did what work?”
I close my eyes and use all of my strength to lift my head from the pillow. “I have to contact Fantom. I have to find out what to do-”
The NextWorld 02: Spawn Point Page 18
