“A little bit.” Dave laughed awkwardly as he sat and opened up his interface. “See you in a bit.” He pressed the logout button. The room around him slowly faded. The lighting strips of the room and the consoles disappeared.
Dave found himself lying down, he quickly sat up in his bed and looked around. Well, this isn’t my house, Dave, now in the body of Austin, thought to himself as he looked around.
It was dark in the room. Without his dwarven abilities and his night vision, he was back to the same blinding darkness that humans on Earth experienced. He slowly got up, finding a desk next to him. He nearly knocked the lamp on the nightstand right off. He caught it, his heart racing as if he were on some thieving mission and had nearly been caught.
He turned the lamp on, light filling the unfamiliar room. Spotting the door, he walked towards it.
There was a murmur from the side from someone else in his bed.
Deia is going to kill me! Dave thought, his eyes going wide and icy fear running through him as if he knew Deia could see him this very moment.
“Babe, is there something wrong?” Suzy, wearing pajamas, looked to Dave through sleepy eyes.
“Uh.” Why the hell is Suzy in my bed? “Yeah, I’m fine. Just going to get some water. Had a bad dream.”
“Okay,” Suzy said sleepily. Then her body froze for a split second before a confused look appeared in her eyes. She looked to the side, to Dave.
“D—Austin,” Suzy, the real Suzy who had logged off Emerilia and was taking over Suzy’s body, said. Dave was now in Austin’s avatar.
“Hey, Suzy, I was wondering if you had that information on those accounts?” Dave asked. He knew that the Earth simulation AIs were extremely powerful and they could watch any part of the simulation. If Dave or Suzy were to do something too far outside of their normative parameters, then they might look back on this conversation and start looking to see whether something odd happened. Like, if Suzy called Austin Dave.
“Yes, I can do that.” Suzy frowned slightly as she raised her hand, a piece of silver metal on her hand with a black band inside.
Dave felt his own ring finger, finding an identical wedding band here.
Their eyes locked onto each other with odd expressions.
We’re married! The two of them thought in alarm.
“If you can find out about those accounts, I’m going to get a glass of water,” Dave said.
“Okay,” Suzy said, still a little stunned.
Dave moved out of the bedroom down a long hallway that opened up into an open-plan living area with a balcony above the hallway. He passed the living room and entered the kitchen, as he went, he saw pictures of him and Suzy—their different achievements, their wedding photos as well as them on vacation thrown in with abstract art that some interior designer had filled the large modern mansion with.
So we’re married, okay.. They were good friends but living together and marrying? That was a little extreme! Seems that the AI that took over our avatars as we became bleeders was a little liberal with their actions.
As Dave started to get over the shock, it started to make a certain sense: if Suzy and Dave had romantic feelings for each other, then they would make a powerful couple who could stabilize each other and the entity known as the Rock Breakers Corporation.
Dave tapped on the kitchen countertop. The black marble changed to a screen. He quickly looked up the news about him and Suzy.
Seemed that they had got close on their Tokyo transfer and now the entire company was based in countries outside of the US. After their departure, a number of other businesses were also looking to move overseas even as the US government threatened them with penalties.
Dave shook his head and grabbed a glass and filled it up with water as he read on about Suzy and Austin having a surprise kiss when they once again started dropping materials from orbital holding stations into the Pacific.
From there, they had dated, traveled and within a few short months, they had a very quiet wedding ceremony.
They were called the power couple of the business world.
“Austin!” Suzy’s voice carried through the house from the office.
“Coming!” Dave moved from the kitchen to the office. He found two large desks facing a large single-pane window that looked out over a carefully manicured garden lit with subtle lights.
Suzy sat at one desk, a holographic display lit up at the other computer. “Okay, so the accounts are here.” Suzy grabbed a screen and held it up so Dave could see it. Dave scratched Austin’s face, only finding a light stubble instead of his usual beard. Weird.
“What did you want to do with it?” Suzy looked to Austin.
Now time to act our damn asses off for the cameras.
“Well, you know how there’s that event going on in Emerilia. It seems like the gamers are getting just run over. I was thinking of maybe sponsoring a few of them so that they can keep playing and get more items.” Austin shrugged.
“You woke me up to look at these accounts for that? You really are a gaming nerd.” Suzy sighed.
She should get a damn Grammy—or is that music? A Golden Globe? Whatever that one is for acting. Oscar! That’s it!
“Okay, well, what do you want to do?” Suzy sighed.
“Well, I was thinking a sponsorship for the Stone Raiders and the Alliance, with the stipulation that they have to use the money to build stuff or get materials. They can’t use it for just straight gold unless that gold is to get resources. That would be cooler than just using the money for more money,” Austin said. “Also, building all these things on Emerilia, I need some coin to keep up with it all. Can you get me a whole bunch of vault soul gems? That’s possible, right?”
“Yes, you can buy soul gems from Jukal Enterprises. Though they only come in the grand size and smaller.”
“Okay, that’ll work, get as many as you can with those after all of the sponsorships and that,” Austin said.
“Aiming on being a general or something, coordinate their fighting by their resources?” Suzy joked.
“No, just, well, got a ton of money and I want to see the people of Emerilia win. Anyway, what is a few million to us when spread over like twenty different guilds?” Austin snorted.
“I don’t know why you want to use these hidden accounts for that,” Suzy asked.
“Well, as much as I love gaming, people would lose their minds if they found out I was spending anything like this kind of money on nothing but a video game. I really hope that Jukal Enterprises comes out with a new game.” Austin sighed.
Yeah, a game called Alien Blasters, where I can kick their froggy asses back to the primordial goop they came out of. Not like I have a grudge against them or anything.
“Okay, I’ll get it done, but you owe me.” Suzy tapped away on the keyboard in front of her. Even with all of the touch and holographic interfaces, Suzy liked a good old-fashioned keyboard.
“You in for a late night Emerilia sesh?” Austin asked.
Suzy rolled her eyes as she worked on the multiple holographic screens around her.
“Fine. You’re addicted to playing Emerilia now that this event is going on.”
“Got to have some fun!” Austin smiled. He headed out of the office. He had seen a room filled with gaming equipment as he’d walked from the kitchen. He went back to the room, pulling out one of the immersion helmets, and put it on his head as the large server tower in the corner booted up.
Time to leave this nightmare.
He left Earth behind and stepped into his lobby. With a smile, he used his interface to open Emerilia before a screen popped up.
System Message
Would you like to begin your game?
Y/N
Dave logged back in. He reappeared in his command center and quickly opened up his in-game interface and connected to his bank.
He watched his bank’s inventory as more and more charged soul gems started to appear, as well as rare materials. Their price wasn’t low in the
Earth simulation, but he had millions of dollars to play with—the resources he gained could be immense!
A party chat invite from Suzy came a few minutes later.
“Happy yet?” Suzy asked.
“Yep, wife in an alternate universe.” Dave laughed.
“Gross.” Suzy huffed. “Anyway, all of your resources are now accessible from any of the banking terminals or locations on Emerilia. So you’re going to need to go to a bank in order to get them all, or you can send them to the corporation and I can get the resources loaded up onto carts and shifted to Terra for distribution.”
“I’ll transfer them. If we can get them on the automated carts, then we can start juicing this citadel up and make good progress on our projects in Nal as well as modify the rest of the citadels around Goblin Mountain,” Dave said.
“Okay, I’ll look after things on my end,” Suzy promised.
“And I’ll get back to work on this damn citadel,” Dave said.
Dave turned to Lucy, relief evident in his tone. “We just got a whole lot of resources and the Stone Raiders are now sponsored by Austin Zane—well, unofficially.”
“Good. I’ll check things on my end to see that everything goes smoothly,” Lucy said.
***
Bob took a deep breath as he looked inside the capsule in front of him. He was in the moonbase. Usually there would be myriad screens around him to work off of and keep updated on all the projects that were going on at the various bases.
Now all of them had been moved away as he looked at a single capsule.
All around the capsule and linked into it, there were coded machines with tubes and runic lines carved through the soul gem construct in the ground and along the walls. There were containers of all manner of liquids and materials around.
Bob took a deep breath as he pressed a button on the console in front of him. Power surged through the runic lines as machines started to come to life.
The interior of the capsule was lined with runic lines and holes at certain points. Now these runic lines started to glow brighter and brighter. They glowed with all the colors of the affinities, red, blue, white, black, gold, and green. These lights spread outward, combining and melding into a gray miasma that shone like a light in the middle of the night, illuminating the capsule and the room that Bob was in.
Bob turned his attention from the capsule to the console, checking the readings and the different information that was being pumped out. His hands moved across dials. His breath was short and fast, his heart feeling as if it would come out of his chest at any moment as sweat covered his body. Even with his nerves at their end, his hands moved with careful grace, not making the slightest mistake as his eyes followed the information on the screens.
Different liquids flowed from their holding tanks and into the capsule, whatever was happening in there hidden away.
More and more power was consumed as from the gray miasma that covered the inside of the capsule motes of light started to flit about.
For several nerve-racking hours, Bob didn’t dare to look away, watching everything that happened like a hawk.
Then, without preamble, the machines stopped pumping materials into the capsule. Still, other runic lines were lighting up, doing different things as Bob continued to watch.
“And that was just the first part.” Bob laughed dryly to himself.
Hours slipped by as the tension within Bob’s mind and body only seemed to increase. Finally the runes along the capsule stopped surging with energy and slowly started to stabilize. They started to glow softly, pulsing rhythmically, much like a person’s heart would beat.
Bob braced himself, letting his hands fall away from the console. His body, mind, and spirit were all drained. He had a hopeful but solemn look on his face.
He took slow steps forward, moving around the console and to the capsule. His feet came to a stop as he was just a foot away from it.
With a deep breath, he pressed a button on the side of the capsule. The gray smoke pulled back deeper into the capsule revealing a completely hairless human male, naked as the day he was born was resting within.
Bob watched the man’s chest slowly rise and fall. It would have been hard to know whether the man within was truly alive or dead unless someone was looking for it.
“Well, happy birthday.” Bob smiled as he looked down on the human body. It had taken nearly three days but he’d done it!
“Shouldn’t have left me on Emerilia, you Jukal assholes.” Bob laughed and a smile split his face as he let out a laughing cheer of victory. He looked to the racks of capsules that were within the moonbase. “Well, once we get this all set up on the ice planet in the Nal system, we’ll be good to go. I never thought this day would come.” Bob smiled.
The ice planet wasn’t under observation and was far safer than the Emerilian system. There, Bob could freely create the bodies of the players who were being stored within Emerilia.
“Soon, they’ll wake from their dream.” Bob had a complicated look on his face as he wondered what those who woke up from the Earth simulation would think and do.
He patted his pocket and pulled out a thin crystal.
“With this uploaded, we’ll be able to start pulling people from the simulation without anyone knowing about it.” Bob had Jeeves working on the program for months, using all of the Datskun’s servers in order to complete the complex code that would trick the AI watching over the players.
“Those AI controllers might be able to see everything that’s going on in the players’ lives when in the simulation, but they’re weak to outside attacks. Just change their orders and they’ll broadcast whatever.” Bob tucked the crystal away and watched as a cart moved into the moonbase, taking a rack of capsules and putting it into its storage. In other areas, soul gem constructs were being “grown” from the original soul gem construct of the moonbase.
The fusion plant hummed and customized repair bots worked on the massive greenhouses that had been erected to fulfill Bob’s needs for organic materials.
It was the sign of progress and a sign that they were indeed succeeding.
Bob frowned. “Even with all of this, it will be useless if the people of Emerilia are killed off in this event.” Even though he was tired and fatigued in the extreme, instead of heading to rest, he pulled out some jerky and water, consuming them as he checked the moonbase and headed off to Pandora’s Box.
They were all holding back their power. Although Bob couldn’t fight, he would do his best to be prepared for when they were truly backed into a corner and had to use their full strength.
Chapter 5: Onto a New Dawn
Dave held little Koi as he looked out over the modified citadel Steve, Malsour, and he had worked on tirelessly.
The wind around Dave was cut down by a Mana shield, keeping Koi warm as she looked around in interest at the goings-on of the citadel.
With every minute, the soul gem construct that acted as the veins and arteries of the citadel grew. Since Dave had visited Earth, the resources had been coming in.
Soul gems by the ton were being poured into the citadel’s soul gem construct. The exchanger system was complete, pulling in more power from the surrounding area every hour.
The metal roots within the ground were being quickly covered by the soul gem construct that now permeated the ground, converting the rock around the roots into a soul gem.
The walls of the castle seemed to have been brought to a polished finish, cold and hard. Now soul gem weaved through these walls, keeping that same polished finish but adding to it veins that glowed with power.
Dave looked from the citadel to Koi. He could feel the power that filled the citadel, the domineering force that would be at his fingertips when the modifications were complete. The Blood Kin, with their mother Yemi, worked tirelessly to modify the other citadels around Goblin Mountain and expand Terra and its supporting facilities. Supplied with as many blood essence crystals as they could need, their power was even greater than
Malsour’s when backed up by these kinds of resources.
Dave smiled at his daughter. He had come to this world to escape Earth; he had found friends and started a family. He had fought in the name of friendship and according to his own beliefs. At first, it was to fight against the injustice, to regain the freedom that humanity had been denied for so long. A thought rooted in defending his friends, his family.
Now, he not only fought to regain that freedom, he fought to gain it for his daughter, so that she didn’t have to see the violence of the world, to be scared of the what-ifs and maybes that plagued the people of Emerilia.
In Dave’s heart, she and Deia were the most precious people to him. He would not let the Jukal continue to lord over them. He wanted to spend his time with them without the pressures and uncertainties of tomorrow. For that—for his family, for their future and their freedom—he would go to war with the galaxy if he had to.
He smiled into those innocent eyes. Koi smiled as she reached out for her dad with excited hands.
This is what I’m protecting. Dave couldn’t help but smile as he looked down at that face.
“Dave, Citadel Three’s root systems have been completed and the soul gem construct is already growing according to plan.” Malsour walked up behind Dave.
“It looks like we’ll be ready to start using this thing soon enough.” Dave kissed Koi’s head and then once again looked over the city. “There’s not much for us to do here. Shall we go meet up with the rest of the party?”
“I think it’s time,” Malsour said.
Dave took a big breath and looked at Koi once again, unable to not smile. “Okay, little one. Going to have to leave you with your grandmother for a bit. You and Desmond will have a lot of fun. Daddy is going to help Mommy kick the bad guys’ butts,” Dave said in the exaggerated tones that people used with dogs and small children throughout time.
Koi made a happy noise as Dave stepped off the tower, descending slowly. Malsour followed, his hand sticking in the wall as the wall moved to allow him to descend with Dave.
Of Myths and Legends (Emerilia Book 9) Page 6
