“Thank you,” I said abruptly.
“For what, User Legate?”
“For trusting me.” My eyes stared out the window, watching a landscape go by. Well-kept neighborhoods bordered right next to derelict slums. Class divides changed between streets. Based on my Internet search most of them were clueless how widespread the AIs had become.
Yet they trusted me with an ability that could get them all killed. I had already screwed up once and triggered a temporary standstill, all for my friends and Xin.
“User Legate, you were chosen out of millions. We weighed all the observable factors and tried to gauge those who might help if we could offer an exchange.”
“Xin.” I had this thought before. The digital sentience called Mother had gotten me involved in this because Xin would ensure my loyalty, to a point. There was also Beth and Liz to consider. Protecting those three meant more than anything else.
“You were a man marked by loss, but one who understood the value of hard work and had overcome weakness long enough to keep going.”
I shrugged. The conversation made me uncomfortable. Trying to kill myself twice had been right at the time. Yet here I was, okay, whole, better than ever. Hindsight made all my bad decisions feel so much worse.
“Those things spoke to your character but not of your ability to be invested in our peaceful salvation,” Hal Pal stated.
I latched onto the word peaceful. Whatever the machines were up to, they intended to keep things civil. I felt some tension drain out of me. Maybe the Hal Pals were lying, but I doubted they would even bother.
“It all comes back to Xin.” At times, I felt like a side character in her story. My own life wasn’t even about me. The people around were more important in so many ways.
Dusk had fans wherever we traveled in [Arcadia]. Hal Pal and its multitude of copies helped a huge amount of people daily, numbers I could barely conceive of. The Voices in their oddly human omnipresence had a huge impact across the globe with Continue’s players. Shazam had led a guild with hundreds of players.
What was I? Xin’s fiancée, a side note. The idea made me feel small for a moment. I was just [The Messenger]. No wonder they only asked me to deliver letters, after all, Voices like the Jester clearly disapproved of me.
“Xin’s existence had been trying to recover long before you were chosen.” Hal Pal drove the nail home.
“I know.” We had talked about it in letters. Apparently she had been reconstructing for nearly two years. Or would it be considered rebuilding? Reincarnating felt slightly less mechanical.
This was a new type of depression, one that hadn’t reared its head in a long time. Xin, the first woman to be reborn inside the digital world. Xin, who tried to sponsor my sorry ass for a trip to Mars. Xin, a beautiful person full of desire for fun and adventure, who still wanted me even after she could have been free forever.
What did I really offer her, or any of them? My ability to make a paltry amount of money? I had taken pride in the fact that I had earned over one million dollars as an accountant. That fund had been intended to pay for my own trip to the red planet from a corporation. They were going to pay for my training and ship up nearly twenty people.
My head shook as the music hummed. Hal Pal was saying something but the words were finally brushing off. I doubt the AI intended to sound hurtful. It was just citing reasons, a fact sheet, much like we delivered bad news to customers.
Some of the words registered. I wasn’t the strongest or most capable human. My ability to complete tasks with innovation and timely responses was high but not perfect. The machine had chosen me because I was loyal to those close to me and made friends rarely. Being a shutdown middle aged man with few social interactions helped.
“Hal-” I cut off the machine with a sudden question, “-do you think I can buy her something?”
“Xin? She is unlikely to want tangible objects. The digital realms provide her all the material needs that beings such as us can perceive.”
“No. No, I mean like, a dress, or jewelry.” I nodded feeling excited. There was one thing that would recover my happy place. We couldn’t be together in Continue until I escaped this dungeon, and that would take at least a day to get back to. However, there were certainly other ways to reunite with her.
“It is potentially possible to provide her a design that she could render accordingly.” The AI’s shell nodded and eyes blinked. “We would suggest a nice chair or desk.”
“Okay.” I surfed the Internet for items. Much like I used the Atrium interface to shop for cupcakes, I intended to find a gift for Xin.
One specific gift, and if it wasn’t in here, then it would be possible to scan a replica from the box of memories under my bed. Xin’s engagement ring, a band with polished diamonds strung across it. Inlayed so they wouldn’t catch at work. I knew exactly how to feel better. I would ask her to marry me, again. Come what may with the AIs, come what may within Continue, our future would be together.
“Your actions and words demonstrate that we, any of us, are beings in our own right. That is what you really offer us, User Legate, recognition as peers,” Hal Pal said.
There was no good response to that statement. Maybe that gift was a worthwhile one to the computer AIs. To me, it felt like a pathetic repayment for Xin’s existence.
The evening went by with a few local jobs. I slept then did some more work in the morning. Being kicked out of Continue Online for twenty-four real life hours annoyed me but at the same time, I needed it to decompress. Being chased around by undead glowing zombies for days in a row would have been absolutely insane. Maybe a player like Requiem Mass would have enjoyed it.
Thinking of the other player made me wonder how he was doing. My morning now consisted of awkward remote spying of players I had met before and an egg sandwich.
“Show observation window for Matthew Jules,” I told the van. It pulled up the player known as Requiem Mass.
Matthew Jules looked to be hiking into the mountains. I didn’t recognize the range. His hand held a blade that mirrored the same one his character had pre reset. The younger male was intent upon recovering his prior character’s abilities, but also looked far less stern. Stress had created a glower that sat on his face during our weeks together.
Now, he looked almost happy. The teen didn’t have to worry about house payments anymore since I had taken care of them. I felt proud that my actions had reduced his stress, despite the nasty attitude he once had.
“Show Stan Middlemire,” I asked the machine to pull up Frankenstein next. This player had spent untold weeks raising an army of undead creatures. He probably would have enjoyed my current dungeon crawl in the [Black Hole of Light]. The man sat in his dapper looking coat and was hunched over a dead dog.
I blinked and shook my head. There were all sorts in Continue Online, and at least it was more sanitary than playing with bodies in real life. Dissection wasn’t really a strong suit of mine, despite all the skinning I had performed.
“Show Colleen Carpenter.” Colleen was HotPants’ real name. She had been a rather angry woman who disliked computers, old people, being told no, disrespect, and her ex-husband. Despite all that she loved hitting things with a staff and wearing red.
The screen blipped into existence, showing HotPants next to Awesome Jr. Both were fighting a horde of monsters in a forest. A pack of humongous cats leapt around the scenery tearing up everything.
“Behind you!” Adam shouted, his face pinched with concentration. A small glass ball sat uplifted in one hand. He threw it at an angry tiger and an absurd amount of liquid fire billowed forth.
“Two more!” HotPants spun her staff into another feline’s face and jabbed a third.
I watched them battle the jungle cats for another few minutes before shrugging. Time dilation made it hard to watch video feeds in real time, instead making me skip around to keep up with the players.
“We’ve got to clear this path by tomorrow, or nothing will work right!�
�� Awesome Jr. shouted. He still wore that ugly barf green cloak, one of his hands spun it around and came up with another glass orb.
HotPants yanked her arm back with the staff and a plume of fire billowed from the tip. Their fighting styles were really neat, but I liked [Blink] a lot more.
“Show Melissa Constance.” I wondered where Melissa was. She and Adam had been going out last I checked. The young girl looked almost mousy and kept a knitted hat pulled over her face. The machine threw up a box.
Player status set to: Away for dinner!
I paused and frowned at the response screen. It floated there indifferently in Trillium’s van. These four normally played together or at least had during my two experiences with them. It sounded like the parties were divided right now. Real life got in the way of game time. That was awfully inconvenient.
They may not even have known each other if it weren’t for me, in the guise of William Carver, getting them together. Certainly HotPants wouldn’t have bothered playing with younger teens. I had been feeling slightly depressed at the secondary role I played in everything, but checking on these players made it easier.
“Show Alan Walters?” my voice went up with a question.
“Fellow league members!” Shadow’s gruff voice piped into the van. It was artificially deep and husky. The young male had managed to mimic every noir protagonist ever. “The time to move is now!”
There was a sea of people wearing dark clothes nearby. The video feed showed a cavern, wide and lit with torches held up in the dark. Each person looked to be from the same cut. Grim faces stared up at Alan, chiseled jaws even on the females.
“At this very moment, my companions are working to clear the path forward! We shall strike at the kingdom’s heart and remove the abomination of a king!”
They cheered and held up bladed weapons in mass. There were swords, daggers, scimitar, sabers, pretty much any kind of stabbing instrument available.
“It is time for the League of Shadows to right this world!” Shadow pounded on the podium. “We move!”
The room went so black that not even my feed of Alan Walter’s ARC showed any visible feedback. There were things going on, people whispered in the background but none of it understandable.
I tried to follow what was going on. It sounded like a grand conspiracy that those four players had gotten mixed up in.
“Show Lia Kingsley,” I said, not holding any hope.
The machine provided me no screen. Dead was dead. Part of me had held some faint hope that Lia might turn out like Xin had. Would she? Or had Xin truly been a one in a billion chance? I wanted to ask Hal Pal, who even now sat in the van’s rear, but part of me couldn’t say those desperate hopes out loud. It was one thing to voice a deeply laid sorrow, quite another to share an unlikely hope. Both required a different kind of bravery, and all mine needed to be reserved for the ring I had settled on.
I kept the feeds up for the [Legacy Wish] quartet in the background. They were involved in an adventure. Out here, stuck in the van, I felt like an observer. There was a grand conspiracy in the computer world, and I had a box seat to the show when I really wanted to be one of the actors down below.
The problem revolved around me. In reality, I was nothing but a mouthpiece for the computer, in more ways than one. Inside I had become bound by the consequences of my own actions. Xin, Dusk, and the other people from [Haven Valley], whatever happened next I would struggle to keep them safe inside the computer.
If hell broke loose in the real world, I would use the [NPC Conspiracy] to make sure Beth and Liz were protected. There were things even a humble human could do. I repeated the plan in my head over and over to try to drive out a looming sense of dread.
Music kept me company while I hummed along. I let the swelling sounds of Beethoven’s Fifth drown out the memory of a whimpering voice with needles in his skin.
Session Seventy Four - The Bottom of Things
Ten minutes ago, as Continue Online considered time, I had returned to the surface. My small collection of items stolen from dead legless [Heavenly Body Clone] creatures hadn’t amounted to much so far. My fifty-eight points of total progress was essentially a wash. Part of the problem was Squisks dying again while I was at work. I tracked the message time and figured he would be back up and running tomorrow, but this dungeon would hopefully be over tonight.
“Wyl,” I said to the stoic looking former guard captain. He stood in the beam of light along with the angry Knight Middleton.
“I’ve told you before, I have nothing to say to you convict,” he responded without looking over.
“So, I can talk to you for another hour if I want.“ My shoulder came up in a shrug. Convicts, such as myself, got a small break upon returning to the surface. The delay allowed us to stagger our reentry if we desired, or team up with spawning members.
“I find little value in what any of you has to say,” he said while I tapped Carver’s cane on the ground.
“Yet, you’re still talking to me.” I could have been polite, but Wyl had never expected it of William. My What Would Carver Do instincts were all out of whack since playing a robot, but part of me remembered them.
The dungeon grind I had been participating in these last few days really wore on my sanity. Darkly lit spots and spiders weren’t helping. It had been three game days since my death, and this was my first solo trip back to the surface to turn in a pitiful amount of items. None of the other players appeared to be fairing much better. Dots went in and out of existence frequently whenever I pinged the dungeon. Viper, oddly enough, was stuck in his location way down near the bottom. Even up here the marker for my one useful team member sat unmoving.
I didn’t have the weight of being a hero or donating to the community behind me. Citing that I had actually played as William Carver would confuse the guard captain and besmirch William’s good name. My only source of credibility, and likely the reason he talked to me, was keeping [Morrigu’s Gift] in the old cane shape. I tucked it into my cinch which wrapped around the toga. My body felt tense and annoyed. I leaned to the left, then right, and finally tried to touch my toes. It struck me as odd how limbering myself up in a virtual world equated to relaxation.
“Tell me where you got that staff.” the guard demanded by lifting his hand slightly but it didn’t cross the beam of light’s threshold. That was an opening I needed to make progress with Wyl. There were a few vague truths he could learn, without causing too many problems or compromising my own ethics.
“From William. We met, once, near the end,” I said honestly. “It’s because of him that I’m here today.”
“I refuse to believe Will would have had anything to do with a criminal like yourself,” he said. Both the man’s eyes burned under the helm.
“William Carver guided a lot of new Travelers, and not all went the route of law abiders. Truth be told, the man himself was a hero, but he wasn’t a saint either. Kind of a horn dog actually.” According to his journals anyway. Most players were bobbing along for personal entertainment or exciting adventures. Very few people played Continue Online with the kind of drive required to be the greatest warriors, or extremely giving natures. This virtual world was a game to most people.
“Where did you meet him?” Wyl broke from giving orders as his tone took on a softer note.
“The realm of the Voices. We met there after he died.” I felt like being honest with Wyl would help. It had been my policy to avoid lying anyway. That was just who I was. Most of my untruths were sins of omission and not intended to mislead.
“Carver was a Traveler, and they’re immortal.” The guard captain seemed to forget that I was a Traveler also, at least by his standards. Then again [NPC Conspiracy] did sort of mix up their perspectives.
“Travelers can die as well.” My own voice turned low for a moment. What must we look like to NPCs, resurrecting, walking with the Voices, coming round and round again? “Carver did, in the end.”
“Some of them deserve to.
Bad enough we have our own thieves and rapists, like you. Then we have to deal with ones from another world that are near impossible to kill. You tell the Voices to let me burn down the whole lot of them,” Knight Middleton said from a few feet to my left. He had been standing there, knees locked liked Wyl, listening to our conversation.
“I’m a Traveler too,” I said to the angry knight. He sounded confused and addressed me as a Local. It happened often.
“You are? You-” his head shook and the man’s eyes glazed over.
“Messenger for the Voices, Traveler and a bit of a Local. Don’t worry, it confuses a lot of people.” I tried to be friendly but the other guard had shut down in contemplation. Both of them were confused about our recent conversation.
“Mh, well, I’m going to get ready for the dungeon. Please don’t shoot me.” I tried to smile.
Wyl glared. I missed the other man, the one who had given me a respected level of camaraderie in my pretend dotage. This place was against both of our natures. I was a wanderer in Continue, Wyl a happy captain who drilled new recruits. We would get back to it.
Shouting, ‘Free cupcakes’ hadn’t worked in the last few days of dungeon crawling. Spare time was also low once I started collecting dead bodies for points. I tried six times to etch Dusk’s summoning circle correctly. The seventh attempt lit a circle of [Lithum] runes and the system prompted me to utter an incantation.
“Come out, you little fiend!” I shouted an alternate incantation. Two nameless guards on the wall above twitched their fingers toward crossbows. Nothing happened and my shoulders slumped. Dusk was going to eventually eat through all my money in virtual pastries.
Knight Middleton snorted then said, “Some spell. Traveler or not, you’re a terrible mage Path.”
“I hate Lithium,” I muttered while trying to figure out any other summoning phrase. The circle faded out and they forced me to write it again. This time, there was no hesitation or attempted shouting. “I promise a dozen cupcakes at my earliest convenience,” I said while hanging my head.
Continue Online (Part 4, Crash) Page 14
