by Jaxon Reed
She smiled and spread her arms wide, showing enormous, gravity-defying breasts.
“You like it? This body set me back 500 credits. And it’s worth every dime!”
Melody said, “Wow, 500 credits? Does everybody do that? No wonder VIR is making money hand over fist.”
The black giant laughed, a deep throaty chuckle. The voice that followed was definitely Finney’s, though. “You can spend what you want here. Detective Parker just felt a little underdressed our last time out.”
“That won’t happen again,” Emily said. “And we better not walk into another ambush. I have no intention of losing this character, now that I’ve invested so much in her.”
Melody said, “Where did you go to get the new body?”
“The beauty shops are right here at the airport. Come on, I’ll show you.”
Finney smiled at Bryce and said, “You might want to drop some coin, too, Detective. So you don’t feel left out.”
-+-
Half an hour later the foursome sat in an autocab as it flew into the city. Bryce had restrained himself from overspending, opting for a body similar in height to his own in real life: an even six feet. Since increased height grew progressively more expensive by the inch, he stopped there. He did pay for a more muscular build, but only dropped a handful of credits on his avatar’s face. It was not overly handsome, but at least it distinguished him somewhat from the standard male avatar’s. Altogether, he ended up spending just over 200 credits for an approximation of his real world self, only looking 30 years younger.
He had chosen a name for himself, too: Caesar Rex.
“Get it?” he said to Melody. “Caesar Rex. Both names mean the same thing.”
She gave him a mock look of disgust at his lame attempt at humor, then turned her virtual window so he could see the nom de plume she had chosen: Lacey Hastey.
She shrugged and said, “I couldn’t think of anything better. It only costs a few credits to change it later.”
Melody had opted for a youthful, slim figure with fiery red hair. She kept to a waif look, choosing a 110-pound body with an incredibly thin waist.
She smiled at Bryce and said, “I haven’t looked like this since I was a teenager!”
Parker turned from the front seat and said, “It’s one of the nice things about this place, I have to admit. I actually feel younger in this body.”
“Heads up, people,” Finney said. “We’re about to get back into my casino, where Detective Parker bought the farm last time.”
“Is it cleaned up by now?” Emily said. “Have you guys reopened?”
“Yeah we took a hit on earnings. But my partner came in from out of town and paid an NPC cleaning crew to get us back up and operating. He emailed me earlier and said we’re starting to draw crowds again. I told him we were heading over.”
Bryce said, “How did you manage to escape getting killed last time, Finney?”
“By the seat of my pants, and a little bit of luck. Those Russian dudes were so busy shooting up the place, I managed to logoff without being noticed.”
“Can everybody logoff to avoid getting killed?”
“Most of the time. That’s why surprise hits are so efficient.”
The autocab slowed and began a gentle descent to rooftop level. It landed lightly and the doors opened. Everybody exited the vehicle.
Melody said, “Nice view up here.” She spent a moment looking all around at the virtual city.
Finney made a grand gesture toward the canopied entrance on the rooftop. He said, “Ladies and gentleman, if you will follow me to the VIP entrance, I’ll show you what some time and effort in this game can yield.”
Everybody started walking for the door, Finney leading the way.
Melody said, “Wait!”
The other three turned and looked at her. She stared down, pressing her temples with her fingertips.
“There’s two gunmen inside the doorway. They’re going to shoot the first person who walks in.”
Finney frowned. He said, “Really? How do you know that?”
“Just trust me on this. Send one of your guards in and see what happens.”
Finney shrugged and said, “Okay.”
He pointed at one of the NPCs sitting behind the greeting desk.
The NPC said, “Yes, Mr. Grunge?”
“Walk in there and summon the elevator for us.”
“Yes, sir.”
The guard dutifully turned to the doorway, opened it, and started inside.
Blam! Blam! Blam! Blam!
The guard’s body shook as bullets slammed into his chest. Finney pulled out his own gun and ducked behind the desk. Two gunmen burst through the doorway. Finney and the other guard shot them down.
Bryce, Parker, and Melody pulled themselves up off the ground. Finney walked over to check on them.
Bryce chuckled nervously and said, “We hit the deck soon as the shooting started. Where do you get guns in this game?”
“You can take one off those jerks who tried to kill me. They weren’t NPCs, either.”
“I’m sorry,” Parker said. “What’s an NPC?”
“Non-player character,” Finney said. “NPCs are just code in the game, they’re not real people.”
“Yeah,” Bryce said with a wink. “Don’t you know anything, partner?”
“Some of us didn’t play a lot of video games growing up. At least, not like this one.”
She threw her head up and sniffed indignantly, tossing her impossibly long hair.
Finney said, “But those guys were real people. Judging by their stat windows they were experienced players, too. Right now, I’m more interested in how you knew that was going to happen, Mrs. Bryce.”
Everyone turned to stare at Melody. Her face reddened slightly, almost matching the shade of her hair. She said, “I’m a precog, but it’s usually not this . . . reliable. Or strong. I guess because I’m in the game with you, Jerry, it’s spiking or something.”
Bryce said, “That’s interesting. I wonder if it has something to do with this enhanced neural network we’re in. We’ll have to experiment and let you login without me next time.”
Finney said, “Come on, I’d like you to meet my financial partner. He’s not in town all the time and I’m not sure how long he’ll be here. Let’s grab those guns and I’ll order a cleanup crew for the bodies.”
He glanced meaningfully at Melody and said, “Uh, you don’t foresee anything else if we go inside now, do you?”
She smiled and shook her head.
-+-
Bryce felt better with a gun in his waistband as they stepped out on the floor of the main casino. He and Melody took in the sights and sounds, their heads swiveling as they walked. Finney led the way, followed by Parker, who had picked up the other weapon from the thugs upstairs. She kept her hand near her purse just in case the firearm would be needed. Bryce could feel her trepidation as they took the same route across the floor to where she had been shot earlier.
He found himself wondering how he could read Parker’s emotions when they were in the game.
Melody interrupted his thoughts and pointed at one of the slot machines. She said, “It’s about to go off.”
An award siren blared and lights flashed as the slot machine suddenly dispensed a couple thousand credits to the avatar playing it. Several people nearby whooped in congratulations.
Bryce smiled and said with a wink, “Well, I think our retirement is taken care of.”
Finney said over his shoulder with a pained expression on his face, “Please, do it in someone else’s place. Not mine.”
At last the party reached the far end of the room and the door leading to the office. Finney rested his hand on the knob.
He turned to Melody and said, “Is it okay if I open this one?”
She smiled and said, “I’m not seeing anything.” Then she shrugged and said, “My power has never been foolproof, though.”
Finney nodded, and opened the latch.
A man with light curly locks and a face that reminded Bryce of a Roman statue looked up from the desk, startled.
“Thaddeus! How, uh, how are you?”
“Hello, Simon. Don’t act so surprised, I told you I was coming. I’d like you to meet some friends of mine. Everyone, meet my partner, Simon Cybershot.”
6
Bryce sensed every emotion streaming out of Cybershot, just as if they were meeting in the real world. He knew Simon felt shocked to see Finney, though he tried very hard to hide it. Bryce easily deduced their recent incidents with gangsters were no accidents of fate.
For his part, Finney seemed oblivious toward any ill will from his partner. The other three waved. Cybershot closed his mouth and waved back.
Finney said, “I need to cash out my quarterly share today now that we’re showing a healthy profit. I meant to do it the last time I was here, but that shoot-em-up put the kibosh on things.”
Cybershot nodded and agreed it was time to finally split the profits. He opened a corporate credit window and transferred a healthy sum over to Finney. All the while he continued making small talk and discussing business, but underneath his pleasant exterior Bryce sensed alarm and resentment. It seemed clear to Bryce that prior to their arrival, Cybershot had no intentions of cashing Finney out. His partner’s unexpected appearance and the subsequent transfer of cash were unwelcome developments.
Bryce felt a whiff of indignation that things were not going Cybershot’s way . . .
Slowly, Bryce raised a virtual eyebrow at a sudden realization.
The partners continued talking, discussing sundry aspects of their trade. Bryce cleared his throat. They stopped and looked at him. He said, “I was just curious, Simon. What do you know about Michel Luc Caron?”
The eyes in that perfect, very expensive face went flat. Cybershot reached under the desk and pressed a switch. Then he faded from view as he logged out of the system.
“We’ve got to go!” Melody said. “The whole place is going to blow!”
She ran out the office door. The other three looked at each other for a second, then scrambled after her.
Finney shouted, “Back door! This way!”
He ran to the right and went through a side entrance leading to a service corridor. The others followed. They ran toward a door with a bright “Exit” sign above it when the first explosion went off, muffled behind them. Screams came from the gambling floor.
Finney pushed open the door and ran out into a back alley, followed by Melody, Emily, and Bryce. More explosions could be heard behind them, then a final WHUMPF! as the entire building collapsed. Pressure from the explosion blew everybody into the air. Bryce hit the pavement rolling and blacked out.
-+-
Bryce woke up, still in the game. He recognized the trappings of a hospital, including a bright red cross on a white background hanging on the wall along with various medical machines scattered about the room. An NPC doctor came over and made the motions of checking his pulse.
“You’re all healed up. That’ll be 58 credits. You might consider buying health insurance. Plans start at ten credits a month. We have a sales representative in the outer office.”
Bryce thanked the doctor, transferred over the required money from his credit window, and hopped out of bed. He went into the hallway and followed the signs to a waiting area. The other three were there, talking. They looked up when he entered and smiled at him.
He said, “Have I been out long?”
“Nah, only a few minutes,” Finney said. “You were last in line and got the worst of it.”
“Huh. I don’t feel anything. I guess that’s what my money went toward.”
Finney nodded. “That’s the way it works. If you live, they fix you right up. For a fee, of course. It varies on how badly you were hurt.”
“This company is practically growing money on trees,” Melody said. “And they’ve got an entire virtual forest.”
Bryce looked back at Finney and said, “Sorry about your place.”
Finney waved it off. He said, “Hey, at least I was able to save this character again. I do need to transfer some credits out of game before I log off, though. That’s three times in a row I almost died. I don’t want to tempt fate again.”
Parker said, “So, if you had died in the explosion, could your partner have taken back the money he gave you?”
Finney nodded. “Yeah. He could have logged back in and looted my corpse.” He glanced at Melody and said, “I really owe you one for sounding the alarm in time. I didn’t know Simon had the place wired to explode.”
“There’s a lot you didn’t know about Simon,” Bryce said.
The others turned and looked at him. Parker said, “We figured you had an epiphany that he’s our virtual sniper. That’s why you asked about Caron.”
“The emotional imprint was the same,” Bryce said. “I seem to have retained my abilities in this game. In some ways they’re even better.”
He shared a glance with Melody. She nodded in agreement and said, “Maybe the neural networks do enhance things, somehow.”
Finney said, “Man, when I said that hit the other day looked like something out of Metro-X, I had no idea how close to home that was. Cybershot is something of a legend here.”
Bryce said, “What do you know about him? He was your partner. You must have picked up something.”
Finney shook his head. He said, “Nobody knows a whole lot of real world info about anybody here. Anonymity is precious, unless you’re playing with real life friends. But I can tell you what I learned about Simon, which isn’t much. He’s an old player, one of the first to jump on when the game first opened. They say he was legendary even back in the beta.”
Parker said, “The beta?”
“That’s the pregame they introduce to work the bugs out. Free to play until the final version is ready. Supposedly Cybershot ruled the beta, racking up the most kills and income. When the actual game started he kept going. Never been killed. He has one of the oldest characters, if not the oldest, in the entire game. The man is phenomenal.
“So yeah, some time ago he wanted to set up shop here in Texas, and I jumped at the chance at joining him. To run a really classy joint like we had takes a lot of capital, you know? And Cybershot is one of the richest people in the game.
“I ran the place while he went back to Europe. Here lately we’ve been doing really good. In fact, if I ever were to lose my job with the police department, I think I could run a casino in real life and be successful at it. Or maybe just run one here.
“Anyway, I didn’t expect him to try and kill me and make off with my share like that.”
“The bigger question is,” Bryce said, “who is he in real life?”
Finney said, “We’ll probably never know. This game is so insulated from a privacy standpoint, if somebody wants to remain anonymous you’re out of luck.”
“I wonder if some pressure might be exerted on the company to open their books a little. They can at least let us know where he is, physically.”
“You can try. But I doubt you’ll get anywhere, even in a murder investigation. They’re based in Europe, out of our jurisdiction.”
“Well, it’s worth looking into,” Bryce said. “For right now, let’s see if we can find Cybershot online again. He’s our only direct link to Caron’s murder.”
-+-
Cybershot reappeared in the smoldering rubble of the casino, logging back in. He scanned the bodies nearby, looking for the character known as Thaddeus Grunge.
After several minutes of futile searching, he gave up. None of the four in that group were present, as far as he could tell. Somehow, they had survived the bombing.
He stalked off, fuming, and made his way to the street, hailing an autocab. One came floating down and he hopped in.
As the vehicle flew over the city he stewed in his anger. Obviously, the one named “Caesar Rex” was a cop. Possibly they were all police. Now that he thought about
it, Grunge had acted strange about some things. He seemed like someone playing a bad guy rather than really embracing the lifestyle.
And that, Cybershot reflected, was both the strength and weakness of the game. He reveled in its near absolute anonymity. He could be the feared Underlord Simon Cybershot online, while nobody knew he was an actual assassin in real life. The cover was nearly perfect.
Yet, by the same token, he was in the dark about most of the other players with whom he associated. He had no clue who Thaddeus Grunge and his friends were in real life, just as they did not know his identity.
It was time for that, he decided, to change. Few knew he had been an early investor in VIR-1. Fewer still were aware that the plane crash killing the company’s founder and his family had been orchestrated by Cybershot in real life. What remained of the small bomb that detonated in its engine compartment burned up in the impact. It appeared to transportation investigators that a bird must have been sucked into the plane’s jets.
This led to the current CEO’s ascension to the top spot. It was now time to remind that gentleman of certain debts he owed to Simon in the real world. He needed to have a leg up on other players, privacy laws or no privacy laws.
Reflecting back to current events, he recalled that he never planned to continue the partnership with Grunge for very long, anyway. He just needed someone to tend the casino in his absence and help generate income. He had played this game-within-a-game in Europe and Asia quite successfully. This was his fifth joint venture. There was always some local rube that would take his startup funds to establish a high-class casino. Then Cybershot would backstab the mark, cash out and leave town. Word was slow to spread to the other metropolises in the game.
And if word ever did make its way around to not take startup funds from Simon Cybershot, he’d simply start a new character to fill the role. One who apparently was rich in real life but with little knowledge about casinos in the game and looking for a partner to start a new venture . . .
It seemed a fast, reliable way to earn money in the game, and it continued to grow his real bank account in Switzerland as time flew by.
