The Game Trilogy

by Anders de la Motte

  The shop consisted of some thirty square metres of worn cork-matting, plus a couple more hidden behind a shabby bead-curtain behind the counter. Practically every available surface, as well as several that weren’t, from floor to ceiling, was packed full of things, mainly computers and electronic components and accessories. Cases, hard-drives, cables, print cartridges and various USB gadgets jostled with printed signs for various games and all sorts of discontinued products. A worn-out air-conditioning unit above the door was fighting a noisy losing battle against both the summer heat outside and the warmth generated by the countless machines within the shop.

  At the back of the shop two computers were whirring, ostensibly for demonstration purposes, but in practice this area was used as an internet café, as indicated by the neat lettering of the printed sign hanging askew above the grimy coffee-machine. The machine bore another sign offering free coffee to paying customers, but there was at present a distinct absence of these.

  As usual, the lighting was subdued, mostly provided by the various screens spread around the shop. Together with the feeble fluorescent strip-light above the counter, these made up the only opposition to the sheets of paper taped across the barred window that effectively blocked out all sunlight.

  HP pulled the mobile phone out of his inside pocket. With a triumphant gesture he slapped it on the counter in front of Manga.

  Game over, mothafucker!

  But instead of giving up and admitting everything, Manga merely adjusted his dark-framed glasses and leaned forward with interest.

  ‘A new mobile … pretty cool design. Haven’t seen one like that before. Found or bought?’ he summarized as he looked up again.

  ‘You tell me, Manga,’ HP grinned, but without quite achieving the degree of triumph he was hoping for in either the comment or the smile.

  The confidence he had felt when he slapped the phone on the counter had vanished. This wasn’t turning out the way he’d expected. Manga had never been able to keep a straight face, even when it didn’t really matter. When they were younger, Manga had let HP and the others down more than once, and he had been expecting him either to confess at once, or to make a pathetic and embarrassing attempt at denial. But neither had happened, and his hastily improvised Plan B, which involved staring angrily at Mangalito, met with the same meagre response.

  Not a hint, not a blink or a twitch of the eye – none of the things that usually happened to a little geek when he was out of his depth. And his voice passed the test too …

  ‘Huh … what you talking about, brother?’

  HP tilted his head and made a last, half-hearted attempt.

  ‘So you’re telling me you don’t know anything about the little practical joke someone played on me on the train from Märsta half an hour or so ago?’

  ‘Nope, not a clue, scouts’ honour,’ Manga said, raising two fingers to where his hairline had once been.

  ‘Do you feel like initiating me into the mysteries of the Märsta train over a cup of Java?’ he asked, taking another look at the mobile, evidently keen to get to know it better.

  ‘Sure,’ HP muttered.

  So what the fuck was really going on?

  ‘Well, if you don’t have any questions, we’re done here.’

  Rebecca shook her head and was out of the sofa before the psychologist had time to stand up. She knew that debriefing was important and that it was just standard procedure after an incident like the one she had been involved in earlier, but that didn’t mean she had to like it.

  She didn’t like talking in confidence to strangers, she’d had more than enough of that growing up. Even though she couldn’t have been more than six or seven years old when it started, it hadn’t taken her long to work out the ‘right’ answers. Wide-open eyes, a childlike smile, just enough confidentiality for the lies to sound sincere. It had worked well then, and it was surprisingly easy to use the same technique, with only modest adjustments, in the adult world.

  ‘Thanks, Dr Anderberg, I’m a bit shaken, but basically I’m fine,’ and a few more similar standard-issue clichés. The same wonky smile and shy eye contact, that usually worked. But today it felt unusually difficult. Her words rang slightly false, and the performance wasn’t as convincing as usual. She was having trouble keeping track of her thoughts and concentrating.

  The composed feeling she had had in Runeberg’s office had suddenly vanished without a trace.

  Her thoughts kept racing away and she was having trouble keeping her focus. The sounds were still echoing in her head. As soon as she let them loose her pulse started to race and she saw it happen all over again. The shouts from the men attacking them, the alarm, the blood-filled balloon bursting. Then Lessmark’s scream … In retrospect, the panic-stricken falsetto had become distorted in her head. Younger, more shrill. Like something she’d heard before. Her mouth felt tight and she swallowed drily a couple of times in an effort to lubricate it. Concentrate, Normén!

  She had glanced furtively at Anderberg a few times, trying to sneak a look at his notes, but if the psychologist had noticed anything he’d concealed it well. He’d stuck to the standard questions, running through the usual script and making a couple of dutiful attempts to probe a bit deeper, but mercifully quickly he gave up his attempts at incisive analysis and accepted the concise answers she gave him. Her performance seemed to hold in spite of its shortcomings; it was good enough, once again. And the conversation was over at last.

  They shook hands, and it wasn’t until she was halfway across the courtyard of Police Headquarters, heading towards the garage, that she realized that her t-shirt was soaked with sweat.

  Anderberg stood at his window and watched her go. He took a deep breath, held it for a few seconds, then let out a deep sigh.

  ‘Police Inspector Rebecca Normén, thirty-four, thirteen years’ service,’ he said quietly to himself. Her career path had been fairly conventional. A few years in patrol cars after graduation from Police Academy, picking up drunks and shoplifters, breaking up fights. Then a stint in Crime via the custody-section duty desk. Then the usual – watching, investigating and pulling in wife-beaters, burglars and muggers, until she had enough experience for the Security Police and the bodyguard unit. Good references, but not exceptional. None of the over-effusive statements that were fairly common in the service when you wanted to get shot of a difficult colleague.

  She could probably have applied to the personal protection unit a couple of years earlier. After the Foreign Minister was murdered the group had been expanded considerably, and female applicants had been particularly hard to find – and were therefore particularly welcome.

  But Rebecca Normén had taken her time. It looked like she had wanted to put in the years and gain experience in the regular force before leaving reality behind for the secret world of the Security Police. He himself had given her a ‘highly suitable’, the second highest of the four grades used in recruitment.

  ‘Focused and ambitious, possibly slightly reserved,’ was how he had summarized her in his notes on that occasion, and nothing he had seen in today’s conversation had given him any real reason to change that judgement.

  ‘And she could also be considered fairly attractive,’ he added slightly guiltily to himself, well aware of how unprofessional the comment was. As if to make up for this slip, he qualified the thought by adding ‘if you like the tall, sporty type’, which he didn’t.

  Rebecca Normén had dark eyes, defined cheekbones, and a slightly too pointed nose which, in his opinion, made her face more interesting than conventionally beautiful. Her sharp features were emphasized by the fact that she always pulled her hair back in a tight little ponytail down her neck.

  But Inspector Normén wasn’t the type to draw attention to her appearance. Little or no make-up, nails cut short, and strictly practical clothing – with the possible exception of today, although he guessed this was because of the incident a few hours earlier.

  Even though she had made obvious efforts to be
obliging, her manner was reserved, almost defensive, offering no opening for confidential conversation. To judge from her personnel file, Rebecca kept a low profile in her unit, did her job and studiously avoided the swamp of workplace romance that was otherwise so common in the force. More than half of her male colleagues probably thought she was lesbian, and the ones who knew better had the sense not to cross the line between private life and work that Normén obviously guarded so zealously.

  He doubted whether any other officer had ever got particularly close to her. A smart move if you wanted to get on in the force, and Rebecca Normén was definitely both smart and ambitious. The fact that she didn’t want to share her personal thoughts and secrets with a psychologist hardly made her unique in the force, rather the opposite.

  In spite of this there was something about her that unsettled him. A vague feeling that he couldn’t quite put his finger on. As if there was something there, something she was hiding behind the rigidly maintained façade and was desperate not to reveal.

  He hadn’t made any notes about this at her recruitment, so either it had become more obvious, or else he was simply more attentive than he had been last year. But he got the impression that he had picked up a small, almost imperceptible fracture in her otherwise polished and professional exterior.

  He couldn’t quite shake the feeling that it was all just a façade, some sort of game where the packaging didn’t quite match the contents. But on the other hand he could be wrong. Psychology was hardly an exact science, after all.

  He fetched a mug of coffee and sat down at his computer. When it came down to it, Rebecca Normén had demonstrated that she was more than capable of handling every aspect of a critical situation, so what else was there to say?

  Right now she was the bosses’ favourite, and it would take more than a few vague suspicions on his part to get them to change their minds. If he couldn’t back up his feeling with facts, he would just have to let it go. After all, this concerned another person’s career, and he of all people ought to know that gut instincts were way down the priority list within the police service.

  Everyone has their secrets, so why should Rebecca Normén be any different? he thought as he settled to write his report.

  Welcome to the Game, HP!

  On this page you will be informed about the basic rules and regulations for participants.

  I recommend that you read them carefully and think things over before deciding whether or not you wish to continue.

  Do you understand?

  Yes

  No

  Yep, he understood all right, rules, blah blah blah, but – more importantly – more information. Just what he needed.

  As soon as he got home to his little two-room flat on the steeply stepped alleyway of Maria Trappgränd, he threw all the windows wide open in a vain attempt to stir up the stale air inside. The bitter coffee from the computer shop was still bubbling in his stomach and it dawned on him that he hadn’t actually eaten anything since the burger he gulped down when he was drunk the previous night. And he was desperate for a cigarette. A crumpled, half-full packet of Marlboros that he found under the sofa after a bit of a search solved the latter problem, and he took a couple of deep drags and relaxed. Sweet!

  With the cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth he mounted a raid on the fridge, but without any great expectations. Apart from a couple of cans of beer it offered thin pickings, but the ice-covered freezer compartment actually managed to produce a frost-damaged Gorby pie. He zapped the little delicacy in the microwave and settled down at the kitchen table, fiddling with the mobile and trying not to burn his mouth on the melted cheese.

  It was all pretty straightforward. Even though the touchscreen was fairly large, there were only five icons. Phone, calendar, email, internet, and the one he was after – ‘The Game’.

  He clicked Yes and a new text appeared instantly.

  Welcome to a new dimension of gaming, a world where reality is a game and the Game reality.

  Welcome to the most intense gaming experience in the world!

  Welcome to the Game!

  He couldn’t help smiling at the bombastic tone, then ran his finger across the screen to scroll down to the next piece of text.

  Definitions

  Participants in the Game are known as Players and are hand-picked after a careful selection process.

  Every Player is given various Assignments by the Game Master who is the person who directs the Game.

  The Assignments, if carried out correctly, result in a number of Points, as well as a matching quantity of American dollars which will be paid into an account to which the Player has free access.

  All Assignments are documented by the Players themselves with the help of the handheld unit, and in specific instances also by Functionaries or other Players.

  All visual material is the exclusive property of the Game and will be presented at regular intervals in edited form together with the league table on the High Score Page.

  At the end of each round of the Game a Winner will be declared, and they will receive a Reward.

  HP frowned. If this was a joke, then it was a bloody convincing one.

  So had he been selected to take part in whatever it was called … a live game or something? It was all a bit too close to those ridiculous historical re-enactments, really, people on Gotland dancing about in homemade chainmail costumes. Or kids dressing up as vampires with plastic fangs and capes. How the hell had he got involved in something like this?

  The page had two links. He clicked the first, marked Rules of the Game:

  Rules of the Game

  To guarantee a satisfactory experience for all parties, there must be a set of Rules, as in all games.

  These Rules are absolute and must not under any circumstances be broken.

  Rule 1: Never talk to anyone outside the Game Community about the Game.

  Rule 2: The Game Master directs the Game, allocates assignments, rewards, and – if necessary – punishments.

  The Game Master’s authority is absolute, all decisions must be obeyed and there is no right of appeal.

  Consequences

  Breaching or disobeying the Rules of The Game will result in immediate

  Disqualification and Expulsion.

  HP sighed and pulled out another Marlboro, lit it and took a deep drag. So far he was no wiser than he had been when he started. He was clearly being invited to take part in some sort of weird game that seemed to take place out in the real world. But why him?

  Not that he didn’t like gaming, he had Counterstrike and World of Warcraft on his computer, and obviously Guitar Hero on his Playstation. But they didn’t make you run around town like a fucking Duracell bunny. But on the other hand, there was that bit about money and rewards …

  Getting paid to play games, he could definitely live with that. Professional gaming was actually something he’d looked at before. But how the hell could they know that?

  He clicked the second link. Just like the heading said, it contained something that looked like a high score table. In the left-hand margin was a series of numbers, which at a guess represented different players. At the top was someone called ‘58’, who had evidently managed to scrape together more than five thousand points by completing seven tasks.

  If every point was the equivalent of one American dollar, as the earlier page suggested, then number fifty-eight had earned something like forty thousand Swedish kronor, presumably tax-free, just by playing a game. Not bad, not bad at all in fact! His interest was definitely piqued.

  So what did he have to do to get his share of the dosh? He scrolled down through the list of high scores, right to the bottom, where, surrounded by a number of other players on one hundred points, he found number one-two-eight. The same number as on the back of his phone. He clicked the little icon of a reel of film alongside the number. A new window opened up, showing a shaky film sequence, and he heard his own voice crackle through the phone’s little speaker:<
br />
  ‘Tell Manga … still a carpet-lick … bastard!’

  The picture bounced up and down. Train doors, tarmac, then a shaky sequence of some steps and a bit of Rörstrandsgatan. Then the whole sequence over again, but this time filmed from the side with considerably better focus and less shaking, and once again he saw himself steal the umbrella and jump out of the carriage. From the angle of the shot, it had been recorded either by the attractive young woman in training gear, or one of the thirty-somethings. Christ, the look of surprise on the man’s face when he took the umbrella was priceless! He clicked to repeat the film and watched it again.

  First his own recording, then the one taken anonymously. It was almost like reliving it, but with all the details more defined. The look of surprise on the young girls’ faces, the drunk jumping when HP started shouting, the shocked reaction of the man in the coat, which seemed to suggest that he had no idea what was going on. This was massive, totally massive!

  HP had nicked stuff before, it wasn’t that … It was actually bloody cool to be able to watch it again, even if he didn’t look quite as slick as he’d imagined. It was like getting a repeat of the adrenalin rush, just with more time to enjoy the finer nuances.

  After a while he tried a button marked ‘mix’ and to his delight discovered he could watch the two sequences of clips alongside each other, his own on the left and the other one to the right, perfectly synchronized, the entire event seen from two different angles.

  When he had watched the film for the fifth time he found that his heart was thudding with excitement.

  4

  Safe or all in?

  She needed new clothes. Even though the blood would probably come out if they were dry-cleaned, she had thrown her jacket and trousers in the nearest bin as soon as she got them back from Forensics.

  Runeberg had understood.

  ‘Make sure you get a receipt and we’ll sort it out, Normén,’ he had said, so she had just spent the past hour or so in the outfitters in Östermalm that supplied their uniforms. Getting measured and trying things on, marks in white chalk and pins. It felt like a luxury to be able to try on clothes like this, and in work-time as well.