“Speak to Lady Capitoline,” Lord Akimbo said. “She can hear you down here. She hears all within this house. But this machine speaks to her from here, and so can you now that she has surrendered to my friends.”
No one spoke for a moment. Jeff opened the hatch a few more inches to be able to see. There was Lord Akimbo striking a broad three-legged stance. His eyes were closed and worms crawled all over his body. Irving the Grey was next to him, his big eyes shut, a hand resting on the copper metal machine. More worms crawled up the machine from the floor.
Jeff closed the hatch.
“What are they doing?” Jordan asked.
“Calling all the worms. And Irving is just standing there with his hand on the machine like he’s doing some kind of Vulcan mind-meld.”
“I didn’t know you liked Star Trek.”
“Why would you assume that?”
“Because, you know.” She shrugged. “You’re so uptight about everything. Especially technology.”
“Akimbo said that Irving had to talk to Lady Capitoline.”
“She’s upstairs.”
“He also said that she’s been neutralized. So the worms got her.”
“When the worm attacked your translator, you were able to talk to me even when you were on Earth. Maybe Lady Capitoline has some kind of interface device, installed or otherwise, and we can free her. And perhaps Irving has one, too. Could he have logged into some kind of program inside of that machine?”
Jeff nodded and said, “Thought I was done with this. I’ll see what I can find. Wait here.”
He found Zachary. Among the menus now polluting his mind, the scraggly figure leaned on a virtual console with his arms crossed, clearly bored.
“I need your help,” Jeff said.
Zachary made a face as if he were tasting sour milk. “Hmm, we’re off the grid here, Jeffy. I’m cut off, for some reason. We’ll have to wait ’til later to play. Sorry. What a weird place you found yourself in.”
“Is there a local network I can access with your software?”
“If it’s not my game's, it’s the competition’s.”
“Just find it.”
“Fine, all right. I can do a little pro bono work, especially for an A-number-one customer like you. Just don’t tell anyone.”
Zachary opened a new screen in the air and found a single open network to interface with via the game software. Jeff watched him work. A program interface appeared with a login box. Before Jeff could do anything with it, Zachary had also found Lady Capitoline listed and extended a friend request on Jeff’s behalf. No words were spoken, but in an instant Jeff had a new friend on his list. Jordan soon appeared as one of Lady Capitoline’s mutual friends. Then Lady Capitoline invited them both to a game.
CHAPTER 28
Lady Capitoline’s virtual world looked like a simulated workspace that managed an overwhelming number of displays with charts, colored meters, and scrolling data. Scores of fields of information were laid out like photovoltaic panels at a solar farm, filling a vast courtyard with an open ceiling that revealed silver and orange clouds above. Dozens of technicians could work here, with room for five times that number. The layout looked identical to Lady Capitoline’s upper chamber, with a display standing in for each fountain or sculpture. It all reminded Jeff of a monstrous love child between a cable newsroom and the bridge of a modern battleship, on steroids.
Jeff’s stomach tightened when he looked down and saw the floor was translucent. He was standing above the circle of a world. A pattern of what were obviously streets and avenues filled a large section of the planet, looking like a coarse fabric of greys, blues, and greens. He was looking down at the Galactic Commons. Mountains, hills, forests, and oceans filled the spaces beyond the city.
Jeff examined himself. He saw he was wearing the pajamas from the hospital. Why would he be wearing those here? Jordan was next to him. She looked as she always did, but she was clad in some kind of leather and hide armor. Somehow elements of their respective sims were present here.
Jordan ducked down behind a display, gesturing for Jeff to do the same. She pointed. Standing at a brilliantly lit map stood Irving the Grey. Its back was to them. It studied a giant floating monitor with a map of the world below. Various overlays covered many of the geographic features. Each of these was labeled, and when Irving touched one, a box with scrolling numbers appeared.
How Irving had logged in without Lady Capitoline’s invitation wasn’t clear. But Jeff didn’t hide.
“Hello Irving,” Jeff said. He strode up behind the little alien and grabbed it.
Irving snarled. “Put me down.”
When Jeff didn’t, Irving tensed up. Jeff was expecting the oozing sweat the little bugger produced and definitely the rank smell. But when Irving forced Jeff’s arms open with a strength it never had before, Jeff was surprised. Irving slipped from Jeff’s grip and punched him. The blow knocked him back into another display. It felt like being hit by a stone fist. Jeff couldn’t see straight. He felt his mouth and found a loose tooth and blood.
The Grey let out a chuckle.
“You dimwit,” Irving the Grey said. “Ever take the time to actually think before you act, or do you just plod along from one accident to the next?”
Jeff spat to clear his mouth. “A bit of plodding, actually.”
The Grey walked over, took him by the front of his jumpsuit, and threw him. Jeff sailed over the rest of the displays and to the edge of the courtyard. He landed hard and slid to a stop at a thick parapet. His ears rang. Something had popped in one shoulder and pain shot through that arm. He managed to sit up. The Grey walked towards him, flexing and stretching its arms with a popping sound. A wild smile crossed its face.
The parapet ran along the outside of the courtyard. There was nothing but sky beyond. If Irving grabbed him again, it would easily throw him over. Jeff managed to stand and hobble away. Irving strode after him. Jeff climbed six steps up to a curved rostrum, and saw from the raised vantage point that there was no stairway exit to the courtyard.
But this place wasn’t real. Like the mental hospital, it had rules. And judging by Irving’s increased strength, the little bugger had found out how to take advantage of that rule set. Jeff saw Irving climbing the steps after him. It cracked its knuckles. He also saw Jordan on the opposite side of the courtyard, crouching next to an unconscious Lady Capitoline.
“I don’t normally go in for sims,” Irving said. “But I should have tried this before. It’s fun. I get to kill you, reset, repeat. Practice makes perfect.”
“Log out,” Zachary said inside Jeff’s head. “This game blows.”
“Go away.”
“Afraid not,” the Grey said.
Irving reached for him. Jeff vaulted the rail of the rostrum and collapsed in a failed landing. The pain from where the worm had stabbed his foot had transposed into the sim. His foot wouldn’t hold his weight. He had to lean on a display just to stand up. With one arm dangling and one foot too painful to stand on, he began to hop away.
“You don’t fit in here,” Irving said. It hopped down to the floor nearby. “You were home on Earth. You should have stayed there.”
“And miss this?”
Jeff kept on the opposite side of the displays. This worked for a while, as the Grey wasn’t running. But the Grey tired of this soon enough and climbed over a console, passing right through an illuminated image displaying moisture content and colored bars that showed the balance of the various gases in each level of the planet’s atmosphere.
An indicator on Jeff’s friend list showed that Jordan had just logged out of the simulation. Irving must have noticed that too.
“Your friend is smarter than you.” Irving grabbed Jeff by the trailing leg, yanked once to bring him to the floor, and took hold of him. Jeff couldn’t even budge one of the Grey’s fingers.
“Good-bye. Keep in mind, I’ll be back soon to kill you for real. Get a good hiding spot.”
Irving threw Jef
f. He spun through the air, a high arc that would take him well over the parapet and into the clouds. Willing it not to happen didn’t work. Something snagged the back of his jumpsuit and yanked him downward. He landed flat on the stone. The impact took his breath away, and he thought he would pass out as his painful parts all screamed in unison.
Jordan stood over him. He almost didn’t recognize her, thought his aching head was making things up. Her armor now appeared to be some kind of shining black metal, bulkier than the leather, yet she was clearly not hindered in her movement. She also had a helmet on with the visor pulled up. In her hands she held a Japanese-looking sword.
“Aren’t you glad I got the high-jump perk?” she asked. “A few others, as well.”
She turned to face the Grey. It waddled forward, its face crumpling into consternation, a heady aroma of rancid apricots preceding it.
“How did you get that stuff in here?” Jeff asked with a wheeze. He tried to inhale, but his lungs and diaphragm weren’t cooperating.
“Simple. I just opened a line of credit with Zachary and went shopping. Irving must have purchased a few game add-ons, so I got some too. Of course, I’ll be paying mine off for a while, assuming we survive this.”
Irving tried to pick up one of the displays but couldn’t. He tried a second one. It too refused to be moved.
“Going to have to take me on without picking up the furniture,” Jordan said. She struck a fighting stance.
Jeff continued to be distracted by Jordan’s new armor. “How is this possible? We’re not inside one of Zachary’s games. This is part of Lady Capitoline’s simulated workspace. It’s like bringing a game item into an Excel spreadsheet.”
“I don’t know. But Zachary is here. Maybe he’s part of this place now too since we met Lady C. Didn’t you see them become friends? Irving’s enhanced abilities made me think that’s what was going on.”
“Zachary?” Jeff said, both out loud and in his head. If he was in either place, he didn’t respond.
Irving placed both hands on one of the screens, but it wasn’t trying to pick it up. The Grey began to play at different points of light with its fingers. The colors on the display went from yellows to purples. Some angry-looking bars of code began to blink, demanding attention. The clouds above and around the courtyard darkened and swirled. Green flashes erupted from behind the gloom.
Jordan leaped forward, a high wirework maneuver that the current sim had no problem in allowing. She landed where Irving had just been, but the Grey scurried aside at the last moment. Jordan’s sword struck stone. Sparks flew.
She gave chase, Irving taking advantage of his small stature to duck under one of the displays. Meanwhile, the storm began to turn around them with the courtyard as its center.
Jeff hobbled to the last control station where Irving had been. The amount of information before him was overwhelming. A neighboring screen showed a point of view that Jeff could understand. It showed a live feed from beneath the floating castle. He saw what looked like a cluster of tornadoes dropping down from a bruised sky. Curtains of hail and rain swirled about between the twisters. And all of this weather was descending down onto the city below.
Jeff tried closing anything open on the screen before him. The program ignored each of his gestures. The interface was different from anything he had encountered either in the Commons or back home. No AI guided him like on so many of the Commons computer systems. He couldn’t find a help menu. The notion that an alt-F4 or a Windows key-plus-pause button would work was ridiculous, but he fingered the commands anyway in case there was an invisible keyboard or the system responded to wishful thinking.
Jordan continued to bounce after the Grey, chopping at the air with a flurry of swings that all missed. At least she was forcing it further from any of the active control screens.
“Zachary!” Jeff shouted. The mental patient in his head still wasn’t answering.
A shadow in the room caught his attention. It appeared at first as a trick of the swirling clouds, yet it stood separate from the storm. It beckoned Jeff over. He heard his name whispered.
Jeff limped in that direction. At first he didn’t see anything, the shadow having vanished. But then he could just make out an ethereal shadow of Lady Capitoline’s large form. She began to take shape yet remained partially transparent. She reclined on the floor where he had last seen her fighting off the worms. All three of her slender arms were crossed over her chest. Her latter body sections were curled underneath her. Her eyes opened, and she gave Jeff a sleepy look.
Jeff tried to bow, but it hurt too much. He settled for a nod of the head.
“Lady Capitoline, how do we stop this?”
She pointed at him with a finger and beckoned him closer. He stepped forward. When she touched him he almost jumped, as she still didn’t appear quite solid. She traced a fingernail along his neck, around his chin, and up one cheek. He gently pushed her hand away lest she knock him over. Her eyes fluttered and rolled back.
“I can’t help,” she said weakly. “Irving the Grey is in control now.”
“Listen, lady, you need to snap out of this. Wake up! Your machine is going to destroy the city.”
“It’s not my machine. I was just the caretaker.”
“Was? What do you mean?”
“Someone else wanted the job. That’s how things work here. You know that, don’t you?”
He grabbed her hand to keep her awake. Jostled it. Squeezed it. It was limp and dangled from her shoulder.
“What, this is like becoming Captain of the Commons Security?” Jeff asked. “Anyone can just decide to be in charge of the planet’s weather?”
Lady Capitoline made a vague gesture with one hand. “Perhaps. But no one knows about this place. No one visits. No one remembers.”
“Lord Akimbo does, and he brought a friend that just took your job. He’s going to destroy everything if you don’t do something.”
A look of concentration filled her face. This turned into sadness. “You poor dear. Such sincere concern for one so new. If you were only here from the beginning.” She let out a long sigh.
Thunder shook the air. Across the courtyard, Jordan and Irving the Grey charged at one another, each landing a blow that sent them both sprawling.
“A little help here might be nice,” Jordan called.
Both she and the Grey were back on their feet and facing off.
“What do want me to do?” Jeff asked.
“I don’t know…how about hit him?”
Irving and Jordan rushed forward. Irving tried a straight-on punch. At the last moment, Jordan jumped and slapped Irving’s head with the buttcap of her katana.
“Lady Capitoline?” Jeff said. She had fallen asleep. He tugged the arm. His hand passed through her, but her eyes opened again.
“Is there a way to turn this all off?”
“Of course not.” She faded before his eyes.
“Hang in there,” Jeff called out to Jordan.
He logged out, careful not to reboot the entire works. The sounds of the storm became muted. He was back in the utility space above the machine room. The howl of the wind and thunder from outside echoed around him. The storm was real. Whatever Irving had started or changed was actually happening. Jordan sat nearby with her head down on her knees and her eyes closed. Jeff felt some relief, as the pain in his shoulder was gone. His foot still throbbed. He closed his eyes and immediately the inventory of achievements from his brief history of gaming was before him.
All he saw was the tablet computer and the CD-ROMs with the game program.
“Zachary, where’s all my weapons from Invasion! Target: Earth?”
Zachary stepped from the shadows. He was eating from a single-serving pudding cup. Banana-flavored.
“You didn’t make it through enough of the game to unlock anything. You want to play?”
“I don’t have time.”
“Well, you can have some diabetic ice cream from Doubt and Apprehension. On t
he house. Pudding’s better, though. Real sugar. Why don’t you log in, and I’ll show you how to get the Sleep ’Til Noon skill.”
Jeff picked up the tablet from Doubt and Apprehension. Nothing was under it or hiding behind it. He tested its weight. It felt flimsy. If only he had spent a few hours blasting aliens with the Sarge. But he had already wasted too much time.
He went back into the weather control sim. Like his pajamas, and Jordan’s armor and katana, the tablet remained in his hand. Had the game not only copied itself from user to user but from Jordan to Lady Capitoline to the weather control program? Was Lord Akimbo the source of all of this?
An overlapping cascade of thunder greeted him. Lady Capitoline was still there, but barely a shadow. She was snoring. And Jeff looked up in time to see Jordan catch a backhand from Irving the Grey that sent her over a parapet. Had she just been knocked over the side? He couldn’t see her. He resisted the urge to call out, instead getting down on the stone floor and powering up the tablet.
The low power warning was still there, but outside of Doubt and Apprehension Jeff hoped this was only a game effect. The tablet worked in that game, and it might work here just like Jordan’s items and perks.
He found network access for Weather and Atmosphere Management. He tried to log in. It asked for a password.
“Jeff! Help!” Jordan shouted from somewhere. Her voice was muffled by the wind.
“Just a sec,” he muttered.
He tried to enter with no password. Access denied. Suddenly, a short figure appeared next to him.
“You think you could do that to me twice in a row?” Irving asked. “I’ve learned how to set a password since you hacked into my computers last time.”
It raised both hands, about to deliver a haymaker. Jeff brought up the tablet to block the blow. He felt instant regret, expecting the device to shatter, but when the Grey slammed its fists down, the tablet took the brunt of it without breaking. Jeff still wound up flat on his back from the force of the blow, and had to scramble away to avoid a second wallop. His previous wounds were once again with him. He tumbled over a console and called for Jordan.
House of the Galactic Elevator Page 33
