The Game Trilogy

by Anders de la Motte

  What annoyed him most was that he had actually believed that the whole thing was a huge fucking coincidence. That karma had put her there like some angel of salvation …

  Whereas in fact she was more like a tart who’d just tumbled out of Philip’s bed after a night of passion …

  His life had pretty much always been basically fucked up, but he had always been able to rely on Becca. She was the one who helped him keep his head above water. But now she’d let him down, several times over. First she’d jumped into bed with his worst enemy, and then lied about it, or at the very least neglected to tell the truth.

  It wasn’t Stoffe who’d blabbed about him – it was his own sister.

  Fuck!

  Fuck!

  FUCK!!!

  He had to take a break from the computer, go for a little four-metre walk to the door and back, until he calmed down a bit.

  The whole thing was like some evil bastard flashback to the days when Dag had her under his thumb …

  To begin with he had admired Dag, seeing him as a big brother. When Dag and Becca were dating, he hadn’t really wanted to see the signs, because Dag was a cool guy, the sort you wanted to hang out with, get a pat on the back from. It had been Manga who woke him up from his admiring sleep and made him realize what Dag was really like, what was actually happening. Then he started to hate Dag almost as much as he hated his dad.

  Up to now he hadn’t actually hated Philip Argos. On some level HP had still been able to understand why his boss was acting the way he was. Because after all, he had betrayed Philip’s trust, put his whole plan at risk. Cause and effect, so to speak. But now that had all changed.

  Now it was fucking personal!

  The situation was actually even worse than she had imagined.

  Last time it had been the sinking of the Estonia and Palme’s murder, but this …

  When she had finally got him to start talking, he didn’t stop. The words had tumbled out of him like a torrent, especially once she herself had been honest and at least tried to explain about her disastrous date with John, a.k.a. Philip Argos.

  She had done her best to believe him, really, really tried hard. But it just wouldn’t go in. Companies cleaning up the internet, directing blogs and discussion forums while simultaneously collaborating with forces that carried out fake terrorist attacks in order to shift the media’s focus away from things they wanted to hide …

  Seriously?

  And as if that wasn’t enough, he had thrown in a bit more – hired assassins, secret Google algorithms and clairvoyant Lidingö ladies, only to end up back where it had all started.

  That bloody Game …

  38

  Online games

  Pillars of Society forum

  Posted: 29 December, 18:41

  By: MayBey

  Little Henrik’s holed up in a shabby little hostel for single men on Södermalm. He probably thinks he’s safe.

  But we know better, don’t we?

  This post has 29 comments

  Goodboy.821 says: Are you there?

  Farook says: Good to hear from you brother. Long time no c … ;)

  Goodboy.821 says: Far too long old friend –my bad …

  Farook says: Did u miss me??

  Goodboy.821 says: Fuck off Manga!1!1

  Goodboy.821 says: Did you get my email?

  Farook says: Yep but it took a while to decrypt. You’re more paranoid about the net than me these days.

  Goodboy.821 says: With good reason as you can see …

  Farook says: Yeah I get it. I’ve read the whole thing.

  Goodboy.821 says: And?

  Farook says: I completely agree with you brother. What Argos is doing is wrong on more levels than I can think of. It goes against the whole point of the internet. I know loads of people who’d love to drag those trolls into the light. The trojan’s no problem, I can put one of those together in a couple of days, even from here … The only question is how to get it into the system …

  Farook says: But it must be possible to hack in. I know a few people who could probably manage it, but it might take a couple of months. And you never know how effective that’s going to be, there’s a pretty good chance the attack would be discovered and then the effect would be limited. Same thing if you try to email the trojan in as a hidden file …

  Goodboy.821 says: Ok, not really the answer I was hoping for …

  Farook says: I can imagine …

  Goodboy.821 says: Other ideas?

  Farook says: Well, if you can’t send it in from outside, the only other option is to introduce it manually.

  Goodboy.821 says: Go on!

  Farook says: Ok, thinking out loud here, but if you go down that road you need a computer with full access. An ordinary workstation won’t do. You said yourself that they’d disabled the USB ports on the ordinary rigs so you need to find the right machine, you copy?

  Goodboy.821 says: Copy!

  Farook says: But obviously that’s a lot more dangerous, you get that too?

  Goodboy.821 says: Just sort the trojan and leave the rest with me …

  She wound the clip backwards and forwards.

  Grainy pictures, presumably taken with the camera of a mobile, but it wasn’t hard to see what they showed. The red ground, people in ragged clothes, and in the middle of them the black cars. Then you heard shots, the camera lurched wildly between ground and sky. The whole scenario felt unreal. As if she had dreamed the same thing over and over again, but this time the dream was being projected on a screen instead of inside her head.

  Then the vehicle reversing came so close that the cameraman had to jump out of the way. A short glimpse of a dark-haired woman hanging off the door. Then suddenly he was there.

  Right in front of the car, and even if the camera only picked him up for a second, that was more than enough. If you paused the clip you could see plenty of detail. His clothes, far too neat and clean for him to blend in properly, then a glimpse of something like a well-polished, black army boot below one trouser leg. The yellow plastic bag dangling from his free hand.

  Then, finally, the enormous black revolver pointing straight at the car.

  ‘Sent in an anonymous email to the prosecutor yesterday,’ her lawyer had told her.

  The clip had been sent for analysis, but if it was genuine she could count on being back on duty after the New Year holiday.

  In other words, Uncle Tage had kept his promise.

  The least she could do in return was to do as he asked.

  She pulled out the pay-as-you-go mobile and pressed the call button.

  ‘Yes.’ His voice sounded cold when he answered.

  The sound of traffic in the background told her he was outside.

  ‘Monument,’ she said curtly.

  ‘What?!’

  ‘The Monument Hotel, that’s where you’re staying, isn’t it?’

  There was silence on the line.

  ‘Are you still there?’

  ‘Sure. So who told you?’

  He was trying to sound relaxed, but she had no trouble hearing how worried he was.

  ‘Have you ever heard of anyone calling themselves MayBey?’

  ‘MayBey, you mean that pretend cop?’

  ‘What do you mean, pretend …? You know him?’

  ‘Sort of, I checked your computer the other night while you were out. Saw you’d pasted together a document with quotes, then took a look at the forum. That’s the sort of thing I did when I was working for Philip …’

  Then a car horn, and the sound cut out for a moment, and for a few seconds she thought the call had been broken.

  Then she heard his footsteps. It sounded a bit like he was running.

  ‘Did what, Henke?’ she said irritably. ‘Look, I don’t feel like playing your silly games right now …’

  ‘Trolling.’

  ‘Like I …’

  ‘Going into different forums anonymously and fucking up the debate, or trying to steer it in the right
direction, so to speak. Weren’t you listening when I told you all this the last time we spoke?’

  She sighed.

  ‘You said loads of stuff, Henke, and most of it wasn’t very nice …’

  ‘Fuck that,’ he interrupted. ‘Whatever, this MayBey shows all the symptoms of troll disease.’

  ‘Which are …?’

  ‘He picks up words and jargon from others on the forum. Manages to get accepted. Then he starts tossing in little fire-crackers, and soon enough everyone’s attention is focused on him.

  ‘He doesn’t seem to be an attack troll, because he’d be swearing all the time and causing loads of trouble, so at a guess he’s got some sort of agenda.’

  ‘But how can you be so sure he’s not a police officer?’

  ‘Okay, so the police jargon sounds right. But a real cop would hardly need to throw in a load of film quotes.’

  ‘What?!’

  She could almost hear him grinning.

  ‘So you hadn’t noticed? Well, I didn’t check that thoroughly, but there were quotes from De Niro and Clint, I’m sure of that. That line about rain to wash the trash off the sidewalk, that’s from Taxi Driver …’

  He paused, but she could still hear his quick footsteps.

  ‘Besides, there’s his name,’ he went on. ‘In the world of forums, names always mean something, even the trolls’ … To show how fucking smart they are, dangling bait in front of people’s noses without anyone noticing.’

  ‘So, MayBey?’

  ‘Well, to start with there’s the obvious connection to Maybe. And that’s the name of Judge Dredd’s arch-enemy. A serial killer who loves playing all sorts of games with the police … But if that wasn’t enough, there’s the whole anagram thing. Internet jockeys love anagrams. MayBey – Abyme?’

  He left a dramatic pause and she had no choice but to spring the trap.

  ‘And?’

  Mise en Abyme is a film term for looking into an abyss. I learned that at Adult Education …’

  For a moment his voice sounded strained and he cleared his throat.

  ‘Like when you put two mirrors opposite each other, kind of. A copy of a copy, ad infinitum. Doubly unreal, yeah? Like a dream within a …’

  ‘Dream …’ she concluded.

  Shit, they were on his trail!

  He ought to just forget about the hotel, forget about his stuff and find another hiding place at once. But he couldn’t leave the phone there. It was his only link to the Game, and as long as he had that, he had at least some sort of physical proof that they actually existed.

  He cautiously poked his head above the wall behind the hotel.

  No obvious danger.

  The little bit of wood he had poked into the catch of the emergency exit at the top of the fire escape was still there so he had no trouble getting to the right floor. The corridor was empty, but to be on the safe side he waited a minute or so before creeping up to his door.

  He put his ear to it and listened.

  Not a sound.

  He didn’t have much time.

  If Becca was right and someone was posting information on the internet about where he was, it wouldn’t be long before they showed up here. But why would that police troll have posted anything about him? And how had he found him?

  He’d have to deal with all that once he’d found himself a more secure place to hide.

  He put the key-card in the lock and opened the door. The room was dark. He took a cautious step inside but refrained from turning the light on. His eyes quickly adjusted. The room was empty, as was the bathroom. He grabbed his bag and hurriedly gathered together his things.

  The phone went in first. He hadn’t touched it since he’d got it back from Nox. To be honest, he’d had so much to think about that he’d almost forgotten about it.

  But now it felt like his life depended on it.

  There – done!

  He closed the bag and took a couple of steps towards the door. But instead of opening it and taking off towards the fire escape at the end of the corridor he stopped. He wasn’t sure where the feeling came from, but something wasn’t right. He leaned closer to the door and peered carefully through the peephole. At first he could only see part of the corridor. Then he saw movement over by the lift. Two figures in balaclavas and dark clothing, heading straight towards him.

  In a flash he put the safety chain on, then grabbed the little chair by the desk and wedged it under the door handle.

  Then he opened the window as far as the safety catch would allow and clambered up onto the windowsill.

  Just as there was a rattle from the lock behind him he gave the window-frame a good kick, breaking the catch.

  He tossed his bag down, then took aim at the snowdrift a few metres below.

  The chair slid to the floor and the door opened a few centimetres before the security chain caught it.

  ‘There!’ a voice roared.

  Then he jumped.

  39

  Battle for control

  Pillars of Society forum

  Posted: 30 December, 16:37

  By: MayBey

  The votes have been counted – you have decided.

  Now Henrik must face the consequences of your decision.

  This post has 149 comments

  It looked like MayBey had lost his grip, but weirdly enough Rebecca seemed to be the only person reacting to it. Most of his readers appeared to think the whole thing was just kinda cool, writing encouraging comments, goading him to carry on with his plan to murder her brother. As if it was all some sort of game.

  Like that poor girl who announced her suicide on Facebook, as a last cry for help, only to get scornful comments from her so-called friends.

  ‘You haven’t got the bottle’

  ‘Go on – go for it!’

  This whole thing was sick!

  He had built himself a little den behind the empty boxes so that even if anyone opened the storeroom door, they wouldn’t be able to see his little nest. A sleeping bag and cut-off cola bottle for pressing emergencies. The laptop, so he could stay in touch with the outside world. It was fine, the only problem was that he had to get up every ten minutes to press the timed red button if he wanted more light.

  Okay, he could have tried to find another hotel, but he didn’t actually have the time. Besides, the Game would be bound to check every place in the city now that they knew he was back.

  The basement storeroom under the computer shop would have to do. But at least he’d got his very own little slave into the bargain. Well, two, actually, Wedge and Marky, but to be honest he was still having trouble telling the difference between Manga’s little acolytes.

  He had received the things he had ordered over the net faster than he had dared to hope. The list was more or less complete, there was just one thing missing …

  He had just ‘borrowed’ the building’s shower and sauna, and had put on the new clothes that Wedge and Marky had been kind enough to get for him. Just to be sure, he had gone with the whole hat and sunglasses routine all the way to her building.

  He composed himself as he stood in front of the door, checked his breath and tugged as his collar to stop it sticking to his neck. He had to admit it, he felt nervous.

  He had thought about her a fair bit over the past few days. She had every right to be angry with him, disappointed even. After all, he had lied straight to her face. But without her help he wouldn’t be able to do it. Besides, he missed her …

  Shit, this was all so fucked up!

  He took a deep breath, then rang the doorbell. Then he cupped his hand over the peephole in the door and saw the light from inside flicker as she approached the door.

  He took a quick step to the side, to stay as far out of reach of the peephole as possible.

  What if she didn’t open the door?

  She had to, his entire plan depended on it.

  His mouth felt dry as dust and he swallowed a couple of times in an attempt to moisten it.

&
nbsp; A drop of sweat ran down his spine, then another one.

  Come on!

  The lock rattled, then the door opened a crack. She had the chain on. Smart girl.

  He opened with:

  ‘Hi baby,’ then added his very best smile as he held out the flowers he’d picked up down at the Seven-Eleven.

  ‘What the fuck do you want?!’ Rilke snapped, and for a moment he thought she was going to slam the door in his face.

  ‘Calm down, I came to apologize. Here!’

  He waved the flowers but she made no move to open the door and take them.

  ‘You’ve got a fucking nerve, Magnus or Farook or whatever your real name is …’

  ‘Henrik,’ he interrupted. ‘My name’s Henrik Pettersson, but my friends call me HP.’

  ‘Like I care,’ she snarled. ‘Philip’s told me all about you. A traitor and a spy, sent to …’

  ‘You’re absolutely right,’ he said. ‘I’m all that, and quite a bit more …’

  She opened her mouth but he quickly went on:

  ‘But I’ve got a proposal for you, a very lucrative one. It’s about the company …’

  He fired off his best Valentino smile and crossed his fingers. She stood there without saying anything for a few seconds.

  ‘Give me one good reason why I should let you in!’ she said eventually.

  ‘I’ll give you forty! Since the day before yesterday, that’s the percentage of ArgosEye that I own …’

  There were eight people on her list. Five officers in Tobbe’s rapid response unit, Nina Brandt, and another two names that she had reluctantly added after her conversation with Henke.

  MayBey had some connection to Tobbe, the problem was that she didn’t know what the connection was. Out of his five colleagues she thought she recognized two of the names. One who’d been in the same class as her at Police Academy, and another she’d worked with back when she was in uniform five or six years ago. But she honestly couldn’t think of any reason why they should want to get at her.

  Nina Brandt and Tobbe went out with each other for a while when they were at the academy, and she knew they were still good friends. It sounded pretty far-fetched, but she couldn’t get away from the fact that Nina was the person who had first tipped her off about the Pillars of Society website.