Gamers Con: The First Zak Steepleman Novel

by Dave Bakers

  After all, we hardly knew one another.

  Me, Kate, James and Chung had only known one another for a little longer than twenty-four hours.

  They didn’t know if I was a psycho, or what . . .

  So I just slunk in with the rest of them, taking glances of the spectators as I did so, trying again to see if I could find my dad.

  But, nope. He wasn’t there.

  I turned my attention to the person who’d just walked into the enclosure.

  Mr Yorbleson.

  Of course he was here.

  He wouldn’t miss out on this.

  He looked like a corpse in that suit of his, and he walked across the stage which I now noticed before us, and he tapped the microphone a couple of times—sending an electrical pop about the enclosure—before he spoke.

  “Gamers, and spectators,” he said, his voice calm, almost sweet . . . though I felt like I could easily have strangled him . . . if it would’ve solved the mystery of what he’d done to my father . . . “we’re gathered here to witness the Final of the Grand Tournament, which, I think you’ll agree, promises to be quite a spectacular event.”

  There was a little polite applause from the spectators, and I allowed myself the flicker of a smile, knowing that the spectators—them being gamers—had come here to see the gaming, and not to hear speeches from old guys in suits.

  Mr Yorbleson clapped his hands together, then continued, “Before we begin the Final, I must explain the precautions we have taken”—he gestured in the direction of the plastic shell, large enough for all five of us who remained, and our invigilators, to get inside—“so that we can ensure the integrity of this event.” He paused, smiled so widely that all the skin which surrounded his eyes creased up. “I’m sure you’ll all agree that that is one of the most important duties of Gamers Con—to ensure the quality of that very greatest prize: the Grand Tournament Trophy.”

  Another smattering of applause, and I heard several grumbles among the crowd for Mr Yorbleson to ‘get on with it.’

  I allowed myself another smile.

  Then I allowed it to slip away, telling myself that I needed to get my head into the game, not just for the good of my chances of winning this tournament but so that I might win back all our parents.

  With that, Mr Yorbleson indicated to the invigilators and they proceeded to lead us five across the enclosure and towards the plastic shell which—I supposed—housed the Sirocco.

  I wondered whether our parents would be inside—waiting.

  For some reason, I convinced myself of the idea that—just maybe—the Final would consist of us having to, on the spot, teach our parents—or instruct them—on how to play through the games . . . if that was to be the case then I guessed Chung would take the competition without so much as a bead of sweat rolling down his forehead since his mother had been a pro gamer, a prodigy . . .

  But, inside the plastic shell, there was no sign of our parents.

  It was cool, and I could hear the noise from the audience, the shuffling of feet, and the mumbled conversations, echoing about the shell.

  I thought of the plasma screen outside, and what they might be seeing.

  Then I snapped back to the present moment, looked to the screen here—on the inside—and I saw the Sirocco standing there, ready for playing.

  The invigilators all stood about us.

  Waiting for something.

  Someone?

  Just as I caught Kate’s eye, I heard Mr Yorbleson begin to speak outside once again.

  Into the microphone.

  His voice echoing about.

  “For the Final we really have something special lined up—nothing less than virtual reality.”

  Mr Yorbleson broke off there, and I guessed that Yorbleson had thought this might have drawn a gasp from the spectators, as if he expected the whole collection of gamers in the audience to be impressed by the concept of virtual reality.

  But if Mr Yorbleson had been a gamer—a real gamer—then he would’ve understood that, for people like us, virtual reality represented nothing more than disappointment upon disappointment, rubbish technology that never really worked.

  Apparently understanding that he wasn’t going to get a positive reaction from his audience, Mr Yorbleson continued.

  “Our remaining five gamers”—I guessed he was pointing up at the plasma screen at that point—“shall take on three-dimensional avatars of themselves, and they shall strive through a whole series of challenges, where one shall eventually emerge triumphant.”

  Now I could see what he was planning—just why we found ourselves here, in this plastic shell, confronting the Sirocco 3000.

  We were all going into the game.

  And the spectators were going to watch us, thinking that it was just some sort of a virtual reality trick . . . if only they’d known the truth.

  “And so, with that,” Mr Yorbleson continued, “I announce the beginning of the Grand Tournament Final—may the best gamer win!”

  Again, this was greeted with a smattering of applause.

  I looked to my side, watched as the invigilators, Steve and Harold among them, brought the curtains shut on us, left the inside of the shell in total darkness for several moments.

  The TV screen blinked into life.

  Its glow of static illuminated us.

  I looked across the others—caught Chung’s eye.

  He gave me a slight smile, but I knew that he was nervous.

  Just as I was nervous.

  Just as—surely—all of us were nervous.

  But there really was no turning back now.

  If only the others knew how much that was true.

  That if they didn’t go through with the Final now then there was no telling just what might become of their parents.

  Mr Yorbleson appeared in the shell, swishing in past one of the curtains which held us in blackout. Without looking over any of us, he shifted over to the Sirocco which stood ready beneath the TV screen.

  I watched on as he poked around the back of it, looking for the infrared strip.

  And then—just like that—he disappeared into thin air.

  Now it was our turn.

  38

  I FELT MYSELF tumbling down.

  I reached out my arms, trying to find my balance.

  And failing to do so.

  My gut seemed to fall right through me.

  And my nerves caught fire.

  I could feel the tension in my left wrist, that knowledge I had that if I fell in a certain way I wouldn’t be able to break my fall with it.

  I just kept on falling down.

  Further and further, deeper and deeper, into the darkness.

  It was around then when my eyes began to adjust.

  I could make out the shapes about me as I continued to fall.

  Four other shapes.

  The others.

  I heard my name.

  “Zak! Zak!”

  It was Chung.

  As I tumbled down, I looked off in the direction of Chung’s voice, saw that he must be the blurry shape over to my right, or was that my left?

  Even though it was mostly pitch-black, only a dribble of light about the place, I could see that he wasn’t flopping through mid-air as inelegantly as I was, that he had some sense of control of his descent.

  “Breathe in deep!” Chung said. “Try to catch yourself . . . it’s not . . . too hard.”

  I thought to myself that it was easy enough for him to say.

  But I did as he said.

  Drew in a deep breath—right to the pit of my lungs.

  Felt it inflating me, similar to that effect of breathing out while swimming and floating up to the surface.

  I imagined myself underwater.

  Tried to get a hold on my constant motion.

  To stop my arms and legs from sprawling all about me—from flopping all over the place.

  It was slow.

  At first I was sure that I was dreaming it.

>   But . . . just like Chung had said . . . I was beginning to get control of my fall.

  When I looked about me again, I was surprised to find him close—really close.

  I mean, the tips of our noses were almost touching.

  As we continued to fall.

  “Don’t you know this one?” Chung said . . . and I could see that he was grinning.

  Not wanting to ruin this whole balanced-falling thing that I had going on, I took care not to speak too loudly. “What one?” I said.

  “Labyrinths, Labyrinths,” Chung said.

  Despite our situation, what with all this free-falling, my brain clicked and whirred, got itself back into order, and I recalled the game. A good one. Surely worthy of the Grand Tournament Final.

  . . . Yes . . . it was funny . . . how I’d played so many games that I couldn’t keep track of all of them—but Labyrinths, Labyrinths I did remember.

  It opened with a scene—this scene—the main character flopping down through the air, through the darkness, and then right down onto—

  I barely had a chance to catch my breath before we hit.

  Hit the mattress.

  I felt myself sink right down.

  Could feel the coil of the springs pressing up against my cheeks.

  Heard the sick groan as they caught my weight.

  And I remember my brain thinking, Oh no! right at the point where the springs pushed me back, tossed me back up into the air.

  I seemed to forget the falling lesson Chung had given me.

  For a long while I continued to flail.

  I’d hardly even had the chance to think about breathing and controlling the direction of my limbs when I was dropping down all over again.

  Down into the mattresses.

  Into the springs.

  This time, though, I didn’t get tossed so high.

  I only fell for about ten seconds.

  Then landed back on the mattress.

  Another couple of bounces and I was more or less stable.

  I noticed, when I finally realised there was a light source from somewhere, beaming down on us from above, that the others were all lying over the mattresses, apparently having stopped a little while before me.

  I was sure that my physics teacher could’ve explained—in pretty baffling terms—just why that was, why it had taken me just a little longer to find equilibrium, or whatever the hell it was. Since the others were all fairly trim, there was little doubt that it was to do with my weight.

  I looked over them, from Kate, to James, to Chung . . . to Alan.

  Just for a few seconds, everybody was stock still.

  It was like I’d fallen down into a painting, or something like that.

  I’m pretty sure it was right as I caught his eye, that Alan scrabbled about, found his feet, and then, unable to get his footing that well, did his best to run along the surface of the mattresses.

  “Get him!” I called out, and the others quickly scrambled after him.

  39

  THE MATTRESSES almost seemed to go on forever.

  Walking on those springs reminded me of going to the beach, and trying to make my way through fine sand.

  And the chase wasn’t improved at all by the fact that the lighting was—at best—inconsistent.

  Every couple of steps, Alan seemed to pull away from us, seemed to find his way into the darkness, and make his escape.

  As we pursued him, as I did my best to keep on lagging at the others’ heels, I mentally thought through how Labyrinths, Labyrinths had been when I’d been back in my room playing it.

  I tried to recall what happened after this, the initial stage.

  Would we continue on into the darkness?

  . . . No, from what I could remember . . .

  And then, just like that, I felt myself falling again.

  I thought I might end up falling right down a huge distance like I had before.

  But, no, it wasn’t that. I stopped soon enough, and I heard my foot make a splosh down below me.

  A cold dampness seized hold of my trouser leg.

  Water.

  That was right.

  Now we had to face off with water.

  I called out to the others, told them to stop running off along the endless mattresses, and to come back to where I was.

  I watched on as they emerged from the darkness which surrounded me and then I helped each of them down—down into the water beside me.

  For some sexist reason, I’d thought that Kate would make the biggest fuss about having to get wet but it was actually James and Chung who made the loudest gasps as they hit the water. Though I knew this was deadly serious, that there were things here that I desperately needed to tell them about, I couldn’t help but give the flicker of a smile.

  With us all standing down there, in the water, the darkness still closing in on all sides, James said, “Which way’d he go?”

  I stared hard into the darkness. Tried to sense something.

  I could hear splashing in the distance but I was having a hard time in working out precisely where it was coming from.

  So I had to guess.

  “Over there,” I said, pointing, and we took off that way.

  As we sploshed through the water, I thought to fill in the others on what had happened, and on my suspicions. Just as I had suspected, each of their invigilators had gone back to their hotel rooms and made them go into Halls of Hallow to hear just what the Cloaked Figure had to say . . . and the Cloaked Figure had told them all to bring back the trophy.

  Though I was sure that I should’ve clicked what Gamers Con was up to at that point, I just couldn’t make the leap, couldn’t work out the spark which would lead to the revelation, and knowing just what their motive had been.

  I decided that I had to make peace with that too.

  For now, I—we—had to venture through this challenge, bring back our parents.

  It was funny. When I told them the part about their parents being captured—or me suspecting that our parents had been captured—I thought that might have got me a gasp or two . . . but no . . . everybody just seemed to take it in their stride.

  Then again, I guessed that since Mr Yorbleson had forced us all into the Sirocco and into the Final that this might’ve seemed relatively minor to them in comparison.

  Several times I thought that I could see the darkness thinning out—or parting completely—and I could’ve sworn that I caught sight of Alan, running away from us, on at least a dozen different occasions.

  But it seemed to just be an illusion.

  We—all of us—were simply running about in knee-high water, getting wetter and wetter, and chasing the shadows off into the darkness.

  And that was when I felt the bottom falling away.

  The solidness beneath my feet vanish.

  It was the water growing deeper.

  Yawning open to reveal the much wider ocean.

  I knew this stage well—of course—that we would be required to duck down, go underwater, and walk the maze that was concealed down there.

  But, at the same time, I knew that we couldn’t.

  Unlike the character in Labyrinths, Labyrinths—a kind of fish-slash-duck if I remember right—we wouldn’t be able to breathe under the water.

  We would drown.

  And though I knew, from all my adventures into my Sirocco, that no harm would come to us in the real world, I also knew that if we died here we would be sent back out of the game . . . and our parents perhaps lost forever.

  As the water became deeper still, I had to transition to swimming along the surface, doing a kind of doggie paddle when I could no longer touch the bottom.

  The others paddled on alongside me.

  And then we came up against a solid wall.

  “It’s no good,” Kate said, “we’re going to have to go under.”

  It was strange—I was so used to being a solitary gamer, being back in my own bedroom alone, that I’d sort of forgotten that games were for e
veryone, that everybody had similar experiences to my own . . . and that these three with me now—above all others—would no doubt have experiences, if not better than my own, then surely to rival them.

  I looked to Chung and James.

  Both of them nodded.

  But neither of them looked enthusiastic about being the first to put his head under.

  “Listen,” I said, “let’s make a deal now, okay?”

  The other three all eyeballed me.

  “If anything happens to one of us—on our way through the game—then it’s up to the rest, the ones who stay in the game, to save all the parents, okay?”

  I waited for them to acknowledge that.

  They all gave me shaky nods as they struggled to keep themselves above the surface—treading water to keep their chins dry.

  But they all did nod.

  And so, just like that, I ducked my head down.

  Prepared to dive.

  40

  EVERYTHING got a lot simpler underwater.

  I forced myself to keep my eyes open, that was the only sense I really had now.

  My hearing was dampened by the water.

  My sense of smell rendered the same.

  The only thing that I could feel was the cool swill of the underwater currents which flowed around me.

  It was only after about a minute or so that I realised I’d stopped breathing—that I no longer needed to breathe at all.

  As if my body had forgotten.

  Not that I was complaining.

  Because if I’d had to obey all the natural rules of the real world here—in the Final of the Grand Tournament—then I knew I wouldn’t have had a chance in hell at saving my father.

  As we descended, the others dropping down alongside me, I heard an odd slashing noise passing through the water.

  I looked up.

  Above now, there was no sign of the surface.

  Just the black-blue gloom.

  I turned to look below.

  It was the same.

  Side to side.

  Nothing to see at all.

  All I could make out was the other three descending alongside me.

  I didn’t click onto what was going on—didn’t fully recall this specific aspect of Labyrinths, Labyrinths till that exact moment when I saw the mechashark burst from the shadows, tailing flicking, mouth full of razor-sharp teeth.