Escape The Grid: Volume 1

by Patrick F. Kelly

  “Where are you going?” Sofia asked.

  “I thought you were going to take your goggles off because you are so scared.”

  “Don’t be mean, Samitha.”

  Samitha turned around and looked at her.

  “You’re right. I’m sorry. Are you gonna keep your goggles on then?”

  “Yes, if you’ll play nice.”

  “I’ll play nice. But let’s do something more fun. Toni gets pretty boring after a bit. No offense, Toni.”

  “None taken, beautiful.”

  “Let me show you somewhere even more exciting,” Samitha said. “Toni, go back to your closet and shutdown.”

  “Yes, dear,” he said and walked back inside the house.

  Sofia was worried.

  What is Samitha up to now?

  Suddenly they were in an online platform looking at various screens displaying the favorite worlds of Samitha’s. All of these were well known worlds to Sofia. Samitha made a set of hand gestures and those worlds disappeared and a new set of worlds came in front of them. None of these worlds looked familiar.

  “This is the grid that the men play on,” she said. “I found one here where boys our age play.”

  Sofia’s heart was racing. She could barely speak. “We can’t do this, Samitha. Isn’t it illegal?”

  “I don’t think so. They just tell us not to do it because we’re little kids, but isn’t America the land of the free?”

  “I don’t feel comfortable with this. Why can’t we go to one of the worlds at school? We can keep working on our project. I still have a lot to do.”

  “That is so boring. Just do this once with me. You’ll love it. You know you want to. You said you weren’t a doof.”

  “I’m not!”

  “Exactly. So come to this place with me where there are castles and dragons. A bunch of boys our age play. We can talk to them. Have you ever talked to a real boy?”

  “Of course not,” Sofia said quickly. Then she thought for a second and asked, “Have you?”

  “Of course I have. Watch this. I have access to this one account where I’m a magician. The boys think that I’m a boy. You can watch while I play and just tell me what you want me to say or do, and I’ll do it. The boys can’t see you but you can see them.”

  “How did you learn to do all of this?”

  “I just figured stuff out, reading things on the dark webs. These boys live in camps just for boys under 15. My mom says that there are people there who watch them and teach them things and make sure they are fed. They get to play online pretty much all the time while we have to go to boring school.”

  Samitha had taken control of a magician. Sofia was watching from her perspective but could also change and see from farther away. She watched as Samitha walked up to a group of people and started talking to them. They were in some kind of old medieval town. A group of weird-looking characters were gathered around a fire pit.

  “I know these guys,” Samitha said.

  “What are they?”

  “That is a troll. His name is Henry. The tall one is a warrior named Bud. The slender guy with a bow and arrows is an Elf, but I don’t know his name. They call me Gandolf, so don’t be surprised.”

  The men looked at her walking up. Samitha’s avatar was an old man with a long gray beard, a tall hat and a white robe.

  “Hey, Gandolf!”

  “Hey boys,” she said.

  Sofia noticed that there was an audio filter causing Samitha’s voice to sound deeper than it was naturally.

  Must be some feature that she setup in her microphone settings.

  “We were thinking of doing a big mission tonight,” the warrior Bud said. “Do you have two hours to play?”

  “Nah. I’ve only got about thirty minutes. Was just going to buy some weapons and supplies and log off. Just wanted to hang out in the town today.”

  “Come on,” the troll Henry said with a deep troll voice. “Play with us. What else do you have to do?”

  “Well, I’m a little sleepy actually. I’ve been playing non-stop,” she lied. “Tell me, which camps are you boys in? Are you all in the same one?”

  They looked at her funny.

  “I don’t think we are supposed to talk about that, Gandolf,” warrior Bud said.

  “Who’s the Elf?” she asked.

  “I’m Todd. I just met the guys here.”

  Sofia jumped in. “Ask him how old he is.”

  “How old are you Todd?” Samitha asked.

  “Twelve.”

  “You any good at fighting dragons?”

  “I’m level fifteen.”

  “That’s pretty impressive. Bud is our highest level at seventeen. I’m only a twelve. Which camp are you in Todd?”

  Instantly, without thinking, he said “San Antonio. Why?” Then he thought about the conversation and looked upset.

  “Gandolf, why are you asking questions that aren’t allowed?”

  “I’m a magician. I can do things that break the laws of physics and many other laws.”

  Todd seemed upset. “Guys, I’m sorry, but I need to leave. Sorry.”

  His avatar disappeared.

  “What the heck, Gandolf,” Bud said. “That guy would have been great for the team. We can’t find Will anywhere, and anyway Todd had a higher level.”

  “Not cool,” troll Henry said.

  Samitha muted her microphone and tapped Sofia as the two were sitting on the bed.

  “Hey, let me teach you how to play. Join the team as an Elf, ok?” she said.

  “No way,” Sofia replied.

  “Just do it.”

  She unmuted herself and said to Henry and Bud, “Guys, I’m sorry. I like to know this stuff because I’m interested in geography. That’s all. I’m in a camp in San Diego, and so I’m always trying to find if someone at the same camp as me is playing in the same world.”

  Bud said, “So aren’t you and Todd in the same camp then?”

  “No, he said San Antonio. I’m in San Diego. Very different Saints.”

  Henry said, “What do you mean, different saints?”

  “San is Spanish for saint. It doesn’t matter though. Listen, guys, I know a boy in my camp who is a great Elf and at level sixteen. What if I go get him?”

  “Sure,” said Bud.

  “Great,” said Henry.

  “OK. Give me a few minutes.”

  She logged off and pulled off the goggles. Sofia pulled off her goggles and they looked at each other.

  Both started laughing hysterically.

  “What will your name be?” Samitha asked.

  “I’m not going on there,” Sofia said, laughing.

  “Look at me,” Samitha said.

  Sofia looked in her eyes for a second and they both burst out laughing again.

  “You are Johnny the Elf,” she said, and then chuckled.

  “I’m absolutely not Johnny the Elf,” Sofia said, trying to get her composure.

  Samitha put her goggles back on. She was making frantic hand gestures. Sofia watched her from the bed and then put her goggles on too.

  “I’m not doing it.”

  “Shut up. Don’t doof out on me, Johnny. I just bought a cracked code to get you up to level sixteen. It cost me two weeks payroll, so you better not squander it.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I have to spend real money if I want to get you to level sixteen from nothing. These kids will play for years to get there, but we’ve only got a few minutes, so I have to buy access from somebody else. Probably a kid who turned fifteen and doesn’t want to play with dragons anymore. He sells his equipment and access levels and uses the money for something else.”

  “But I don’t know how to play.”

  “I’ll teach you. It doesn’t matter anyway. You’ll be nearly invincible against the creatures we’ll be fighting. You know how to move your hands. You just need to pretend like you are pulling back an arrow and letting it go. Mostly just follow me. This E
lf I’m buying you is so strong that you would live even if you didn’t fight.”

  “I don’t know about this.”

  “Shut up already. I’ll show you how to log in from your house and we can play together tomorrow.”

  “I can’t do it from my house.”

  “Are you kidding me? You are in the best situation possible. Your mom is always working and traveling. I wish I was so lucky. My mom is a teacher. She’s here all the time when I’m here. I can’t ever play long missions unless I stay up after midnight, and then I have to stay really quiet.”

  Sofia was thinking about everything as she watched Samitha purchase and customize the Elf.

  “OK, Johnny the Elf. We are ready. Here we go. Is your mic on?”

  “You tell me.”

  “I hear you. It’s on.”

  46

  SUSAN LOCKED the doors of the hotel room. It had been a while since she had been with her boyfriend, and she had a lot to tell him. She slipped on her special body suit and gloves and then put on the goggles and sat on her bed.

  Suddenly, she was back in her jungle platform, with the waterfall behind her. Various tents were propped up around the camp site.

  “Baby,” she said, tapping one of the tents. “Come out here with me.”

  There was a sound of unzipping and her man crawled through the tent entrance and stood up to see her. He smiled.

  “Hello, dear,” he said.

  “I’ve missed you,” she said.

  “I’ve missed you too. Where have you been?”

  “Working too much,” she replied. “Baby, I did something terrible. I have to tell someone.”

  He walked over to her and hugged her. He knew instinctively how to react to her needs. She had trained him for almost fifteen years to be the perfect companion.

  “Tell me what happened,” he said, embracing her.

  Susan let herself go and lay on the ground in his embrace. “I’ve done what I promised myself I would never do.”

  “Which is?”

  “I’ve let myself be manipulated by this terrible woman. This complete bitch of a woman. She owns me now.”

  “What on earth do you mean?”

  “I mean that she wields this power over my life, this power to destroy my career, maybe even have me arrested.”

  “Surely, you are exaggerating, sweetheart.”

  “No, she can destroy me. What’s worse, she can destroy Sofia’s life too. I’m a slave to her every will.”

  He took her in his arms and faced her.

  “Susan, snap out of this. It can’t be this bad. We’ll find a way out.”

  She looked at him. His blue eyes were so beautiful. His brown hair matched photos she had seen of her great grandfather. Susan had modeled him off the only man she ever respected, a man who stayed true to his wife.

  “There is no way out. I have to do everything she says. And she demands that I do terrible things.”

  “Like what?”

  “Murdering people. Maybe hundreds of people.”

  “Well, you can’t do that. Susan, we have to find a way out.”

  “I mean, maybe ‘murder’ is too strong of a word. They are criminals. But they deserve a fair trial. She wants me to send in attack drones and kill everyone.”

  “Is it a terrorist cell?”

  “That’s what she would call it.”

  “Susan, that’s your job. Why are you calling it murder? Your job is to find the bad actors and kill them when necessary. Haven’t you always told me that? It’s not like you’ve never killed an enemy combatant. Why are you making such a big deal of this?”

  “What she wants me to do is wrong. She’s going too far.”

  “Haven’t you always told me that there is a chain of command? I think you’re over-reacting. I love you, but I think that you may be too emotional about this. Have you been getting enough sleep?”

  Susan began to cry.

  “I haven’t,” she agreed. “I’m not sleeping. I’m working twenty hours a day. I’ve got this poor girl now that I brought into this mess. Margaret is gonna destroy her. She’ll corrupt her more than me even.”

  “I think you need some sleep, Susan. Here, turn around. Let me give you a massage.”

  Susan turned and sat up, looking at the waterfall. She watched the water crash into the stones at the foot of the cliff. He touched her back gracefully, kissing her neck.

  “There, there, dear. Everything is gonna be fine. You are a great mother. You are a great agent. Everything will work out,” he whispered in her ear.

  47

  VICTORIA WAS HAVING a prayer breakfast at the Vatican with her long-time friend Lidia. Lidia was a Spanish cardinal, the second female cardinal in Vatican history. After many pleasantries had been discussed, Lidia surprised her.

  “Your friend Mark is being watched.”

  “What do you mean?” Victoria asked.

  “There are many at the Vatican who don’t approve of his actions.”

  “Which actions?”

  “Victoria, you are a great friend to me for many years. When I tell you this, please know that I tell you out of love. It is not my opinion of which I speak. I think that Mark is wonderful. But the budget shows multiple line items of payments to our friends in Cuba. Budget items far in excess of the norm, which were authorized and administered by Mark. This is something everyone knows. There are also many rumors about how this money is being spent. Many rumors that are unflattering.”

  “I understand your point. I have myself expressed concerns to him.”

  “Well, do you know of the large transfer made last week? To Venezuela?”

  “No, but it doesn’t surprise me.”

  “I was asked to look into it. I can’t tell you who asked me, but he is close to his Holiness. I found a trail of money flowing to churches in Venezuela which then flowed into a petroleum company. The petroleum company seems to have come into existence in the last few weeks. The Vice President of the company, a person that we can find no records of in the Vatican, depleted the entire company bank account on Saturday. She then flew to Washington DC on Sunday, two days ago. This woman then completely disappeared with the money. I haven’t reported back what I have found because I wanted to talk to you first.”

  “Well, thank you. This is all news to me. What do you think will happen when you report this back?”

  “My guess is that the Vatican may consider reporting it to the Venezuelan and the US government.”

  Victoria was shocked. “But why would we do that? What business is it of the US government?”

  “The Vatican can’t be tied to illicit activity. If something happens in the US that gets tied back to us, it will create huge problems. If we report it now, it will buy us better relations with the US government. What can you tell me about this woman?”

  “I don’t know much. I’m guessing that she is part of the group in Cuba that Mark is working with. I’m not sure why she would go to the US or take a bunch of money, but I’m sure that she won’t cause any violence. The group he is working with is Catholic and non-violent.”

  “I’m coming to you as a friend. I need to report back soon. Can you talk to Mark?”

  “I’ll talk to him today and he can discuss it with you. Please don’t turn in this report until you have discussed it with Mark. I’m sure there are details that you don’t know that will set your mind at ease.”

  “I hope so, Victoria. I will wait to hear from Mark. It must be today, though.”

  “It will be. In fact, I’ll go find him now.”

  Both women rose from the table and embraced in a hug. “God be with you,” Victoria said.

  Lidia leaned in and whispered in her ear, “If he needs to send such funds, use our friend in Haiti.” They looked each other in the eyes and Lidia nodded.

  “Thank you,” Victoria said.

  IT TOOK VICTORIA about forty minutes to find Mark, who was praying in his favorite garden.

  “I’m sorry to interru
pt your prayers, but we need to talk,” she began.

  The two spoke for thirty minutes, until Mark was clear on what he would say to Lidia. He pulled the phone from his pocket, turned it on, and messaged Lidia.

  “When can we meet?”

  The reply was almost instantaneous. “30 minutes. My office.”

  “Mark, I need to tell you something else,” Victoria said.

  “OK.”

  “There is a person I know in Haiti. Well, she is someone very special that I never told you about. But she is someone who could help you.”

  “Please, go on.”

  “Well, many years ago, soon after I became a cardinal, I was tasked with investigating claims of miracles in the Americas. I took Lidia with me on these trips. In fact, she was the one who did most of the leg work and early interviews. There were stories of a woman in Haiti with an amazing power of prophecy. The Archbishop in Port-au-Prince was giving us reports that sounded impossible to believe. If these reports were true, this woman was consistently performing the highest level of miracles.”

  “Crazy. Why have I never heard about this?”

  “Well, there were many complications in our journey. We arrived in Port-au-Prince, Haiti and the Archbishop took us directly to meet with the woman. She was young at the time, in her late twenties. When we met with her, she told us of a coming age of women in power throughout the world. She said that it would start in the US and spread everywhere. That it would be a wonderful thing at first, but it would turn toward corrupt power and evil. She predicted that the US would pass a series of laws which would destroy the human rights of men and would dramatically impact human relationships of all kinds.”

  “How long ago was this?”

  “It was around twenty years ago. Many years before the Female Protection Act was passed. Long enough that Lidia and I thought that her prediction would never come true.”

  “Far out.”

  “There’s more. We investigated all of her past prophecies, which were accurate with astonishing detail. Many people claim to be prophetic but make predictions that are too vague to disprove. Silly tricks, the way horoscopes are written. But this woman had made prophecies in the past regarding events in Haiti. All of them documented by the Archbishop with tremendous detail, and all of them fulfilled. Unfortunately, we didn’t know enough about the conditions of the written prophecy, and they weren’t recorded with tamper-proof dating methods, so all we had was the word of the Archbishop.”