by Trent Reedy
Rogan stared at the closed door to Beckett’s room. At X guarding it closely, his arms folded over his chest. Beckett was out. In a few minutes he’d be gone.
X and Sophia advised the gamers to relax and to celebrate their victory. It could be some time before the next game round. Sophia reminded them there were movies and shows on the server and plenty of great food and drink, all accessible through their tablets. With promises to return soon, the two adults left the commons.
The gamers stood in silence for a few moments. Rogan looked around, wondering what they were supposed to do now. If there were no video games to play, no digi-space to explore, and no school lesson objectives to meet, what was left to do?
Takashi finally produced his Atomic Frontiers tablet from his pocket. He swiped, and his taps were like drumbeats in the quiet.
Rogan met Shay’s confused look.
“Chicken Does It” exploded over the speakers as the video popped up on screen. A hard wiki-wiki electronica rhythm, punctuated by a thumping bass beat. A guy in a feathery chicken costume, his face sticking out of the beak, sang some really fast lyrics that were hard to understand as a rapid bok-bok-bok—bok—bok-bok-bok-beGOK built up to a camera-shaking climax to end each mostly nonsensical verse.
“Yes!” Shaylyn immediately began flapping her arms and strutting, shouting “BeGOK! Chicken does it!” on cue.
“Oh no,” Rogan groaned. It was the YouTube sensation of the year, with sixty-five million views in 2-D and eighty million in the VR version where people could dance around the lead chicken man and the dance troupe who wore egg costumes complete with jagged cracked-shell-piece hats. Rogan hated it.
But in no time, Takashi led a line, followed by Jackie and Shay, laughing, flapping their crooked arms and strutting, seemingly eager to get to the “BeGOK! Chicken does it!” part.
Maybe the others went to IRL schools that held dances, making them old pros at this. Rogan didn’t know or care. He would not dance. In fact, he preferred one of the hundreds of “Chicken Does It” parodies, his favorite being “Kill the Chicken.”
All that talk of chicken reminded him he was hungry, though, and with his tablet he swiped and tapped up pizza, cheesy puffs, and more PowerSlam energy drinks, more than enough for all of them. Minutes later, server bots, shorter and more squat versions of cambots with big trays on top, glided in to deliver the great feast of delicious junk.
With cold PowerSlam and the best dinner, the final four celebrated moving ahead in the contest. Rogan plunked himself down on the enormous sofa, happy and relieved to be safe. He was not used to having this kind of uncertainty surrounding his gaming.
He was also not accustomed to celebrating with his gaming opponents. Or to how awesome arena gaming actually was. But no matter how much fun the others made the after-game party, Rogan reminded himself that they were still his opponents, that they would, if they could, be just as happy celebrating him being eliminated from the contest. Beckett had taught him not to be a jerk, but that didn’t mean these people were his friends. Rogan didn’t need the other gamers or anyone else. He would keep enjoying these victory parties again and again, until finally he was the only one left.
Ego sum maximus.
The next day at breakfast the remaining gamers talked about the mission the day before, their attention immediately drawn to the differences between playing Laser Viper in the arena and playing at home. After they’d marveled for a while about the added realism offered by the game suits, they began to notice other new developments.
“One reason I love modern video games is because the stories are so complex,” Jackie said. “A good video game is like a great movie, but a movie where I’m one of the characters. I felt like that was missing from our first round.”
“I know, right?” Shay said. “Like in some games, I wish the cut scenes would go on longer. This didn’t have any.”
“The enemy was also weird,” Takashi said. “Usually, we fight a small army of Scorpion terrorists.”
“And there was no end boss,” said Jackie. “I was waiting for a giant robot to leap out of the sea at the last moment to try to prevent us from taking the Tian Li.”
“It’s just because it’s a special tournament design,” Rogan said. “There were no gamer or upgrade points available. No special achievements to unlock either. They haven’t even made any music for the game yet. This isn’t the normal, finished game that they would sell to the public. It’s no use complaining about it.”
“We weren’t complaining, Ro,” said Shaylyn. “But maybe finding some of the differences between the regular game and the one we’re playing now could be useful in the contest. Did you ever think of that?”
Rogan was thinking up a reply when Takashi spoke. “Speaking of useful for the contest, I was dinking around with my boring Atomic Frontiers tablet last night and found out they recorded all the game footage. I think we should watch it, see what we did right last time, and figure out how we could do better in the next game.”
“Good idea,” Jackie said to Takashi. “Let’s watch the videos. We all need to work together better.”
Rogan figured it wouldn’t hurt to study the strengths and weaknesses of the other gamers. “Might as well. Nothing else to do.”
Shay said nothing, but watched Rogan skeptically.
They viewed the game footage, quietly at first, but as it rolled on, the group became more and more fired up.
“Nice shot,” Takashi said to Rogan when his viper took out one of the Tianjin’s guns.
“I like the part coming up.” Jackie sat on her perch on the back of the sofa seat and pointed at the screen. “Wait.” Shaylyn’s viper was being chased by two Chinese drones, with another enemy flying up from another direction. “Right here!”
Flyer whipped into a tight spin, swooping into position behind the single drone and using it to shield her from the other two. None of them had seen NLEPs fly so fast before. A storm of energy blasts, and the drones were quickly destroyed.
“That is some amazing gaming, right there,” Takashi said.
“Not bad” was all Rogan would give her.
Shaylyn shrugged. “Well, I had help from my target lock assist, and those two were flying close together.”
“Yeah, but all those moves, so fast,” said Jackie. “The quick flying. The shooting.”
They went on like that, reviewing which moves worked the best, sometimes acting out different parts of their previous game round, to see what they might do better. Throughout all their practice, Rogan watched the others carefully, looking for their strengths and weaknesses, thinking about how he could use them to help him get ahead in the contest. He noticed Shay watching closely too, and she met his gaze once, a look of defiance in her eyes that told him she was preparing just as he was.
In the days that followed, the four gamers transitioned from merely watching their past game performance to practicing viper movements. They walked through different patterns, from wedge formation to a circular rotating attack, being careful to remember Shay would be in the air. At first Rogan thought this practice would be boring, but they found ways to make it fun, pushing one another onto the couch or breaking out of their planned movement to just wrestle around.
“This is like a dream come true,” Takashi said after practice one day.
Jackie swung a couch cushion and smacked him in the head from behind. “A dream where you get knocked down by laser cushion attack?”
He caught the thing as Jackie swung it at him again, and he used it to push her back toward the couch, where she fell on top of Shay, all three of them laughing.
“I mean, for the Healer, the laser viper mission is different. I only have one nonlethal pulse emitter, so I’m not there to run around blowing things up. I’m in the game to fix damaged robots so the fireteam succeeds. It works better if we have a strategy. That way I know where I have to go to get into the best position to fix people. When I play at home, I get stuck on teams where everything is pure c
haos. The other gamers aren’t very good, so I run out of parts fixing them, or they take off all over so I can’t reach them in time to save them when they’re blown up. Even when I play with my friends from school, they laugh at me when I talk about making a plan.”
“Oh, Takashi.” Shaylyn’s voice oozed exaggerated sweetness. “That’s just sooo nice of you.” She laughed.
“Fine!” Takashi laughed. “I was going to say it’s great playing with the best Laser Viper gamers in the country, but forget it. You’re the worst.”
Rogan couldn’t hold back his smile. And he couldn’t help but think that Takashi was a pretty good guy. If he didn’t live so far away, the two of them might have been good real-life friends. He didn’t have many friends IRL.
But game practice wasn’t all they did, and after a while their time together started to resemble a party more than a contest. They had no idea when the next game round would be, so they stayed up late watching movies on the big screen and eating junk well past the point when their parents would have made them stop, and they never had to eat vegetables with their meals if they didn’t want to. Except that Shaylyn wanted to. Weird.
One night they found a trivia game in the Atomic Frontiers system, put it up on the big screen, and had fun playing in teams. It quickly became obvious that Jackie was the one everyone wanted on their side. She seemed to know everything. After the girls had crushed the guys, Jackie slapped Shay a high five. “Not only was it great chumpifying you losers—” Shaylyn said to the guys.
“We’ll beat you next time,” Takashi said.
“—but it’s great to be wanted for something besides chores or babysitting.” Shay sighed. “I have four siblings, and I swear, at home, I’m not Shaylyn. I’m Three of Five. I love my family and all, and I guess I miss them, but it’s nice being here where I don’t have to clean up after everyone. That’s all I’m saying.”
“I know what you mean,” Jackie agreed. “I have a summer birthday and I skipped a grade, so I’m the youngest in my classes by far. At school they mostly call me ‘that smart kid’ or ‘the girl who reads a lot.’ ”
“Like reading is a bad thing?” Shaylyn asked.
Jacqueline shrugged. “Sometimes the fictional characters I meet in books feel more real to me than a lot of people I meet at school or in my neighborhood.”
“I feel the same way about video games,” Takashi said.
“Real life stinks,” Rogan said. “Who needs it?”
The party couldn’t last forever. Being at Atomic Frontiers was fun enough, but when they couldn’t text with anyone besides X or their fellow gamers, when they couldn’t watch any live-streamed games, when they couldn’t visit friends in Virtual City, when all there was to do was wait for the next game and they had no idea when they might play, the dorms eventually felt kind of like a prison.
Rogan had been using one electronic device or another since he was two. He’d been playing games and visiting people in digi-space since he was eight years old. His need for news and entertainment updates, to see what other leading gamers were playing, to join in arguments in Virtual City or on old-fashioned text message boards, his need to check was physical. He kept picking up his tablet to log in to something, only to remember the thing couldn’t log in to anything.
He was not alone with this problem.
“My guildies are going to think I’ve abandoned them,” Takashi said a week or so in. “Worse, they’re running around Azeroth leveling up and getting all the gold and weapons. Pretty soon I’ll be the anchor on the team, the weak one dragging behind the others, slowing them down.”
“I didn’t know we’d be totally cut off from society.” Shay agreed. “I belong to, like, three different gamer discussion groups. When I’m not in school, my phone is buzzing all day with updates. During the school year, the last bell rings and I get on the bus and it’s, like, a million new messages. These idiot guys going on and on about how girls are bad gamers. It’s not the same kind of battle as Warcraft Universe, but me and three or four other girls always attack those guys, calling them out, like ‘You’re an idiot’ and ‘What’s your gamer level?’ ” She laughed. “It’s like a real war. We get some of those guys so mad, a lot of them, like older men, like over thirty or whatever, so mad that they flip out on us, drop some sexist crap. Show who they really are. Then we report them to the admins and get them banned.” She dropped her Atomic Frontiers tablet on the table and tapped it hard like she was trying to stab through it with her finger. “But here, I’m cut off and can’t help fight those guys.”
“No texts from friends, no status updates, no new blog posts or technology articles.” Takashi wiggled his fingers. “I don’t know what to do with my hands.”
“Good thing I never have to dust in my Virtual City apartment. The place would be a mess by now,” Rogan said. “At first I thought being stuck with these offline tablets would be kind of cool, a change of pace. But now it’s like … like I’m dead. I keep reaching for my phone, but then it’s not there.”
“I know, right?!” Shay said. “I keep actually checking this thing, hoping that this time it will connect to something. Stupid.”
Jackie had been unusually quiet in the discussion. Finally she pulled them all in close. Really close. Weirdly close.
“Um, Jackie,” Rogan said, “you’re all great gamers and stuff, but I don’t really do the group hug thing.”
“You all want to get into digi-space?” Jackie whispered. She nodded toward the cambots that rolled around them. Careful to hide what she was doing from the cameras, a difficult task. She opened the right cargo pocket on her pants and revealed a pair of virtual reality glasses. It was a cheap set, something only a total noob would use, but in here, it was impressive.
“You’re not allowed to have that,” Takashi whispered.
“A set that small has got to be wifi only,” Shaylyn said. “And Culum has everything locked out and password protected.”
“I hacked the system to get this set online.” Jackie smiled. “I even boosted its power supply.”
“You hacked Atomic Frontiers’ data network?” Takashi asked.
“You can go to Virtual City from here?” Rogan asked, amazed. “You’re a genius.”
Jackie frowned. “I didn’t break into their mainframe or anything. I just got around their lockouts so we can connect to digi-space. It’s not like I’m stealing company secrets.”
“You’re going to get in trouble,” Takashi said. “They might kick you out for this.”
“Why do you think I keep it hidden?” Jackie said.
“You can go to Virtual City,” Rogan said again in disbelief.
“But the cameras will see you using the headset,” Shay said. “X will take it away.”
“I use it in my bedroom. No cameras in there.” Jackie carefully slipped the device back in her pocket, keeping it covered so the cambots and other mounted cameras couldn’t see.
It was weird how close they were leaned together, worse because Takashi had been eating corn chips and his breath smelled like a dead pig fart. But Rogan ignored all that, being so excited for the chance to get out of the dorms.
Jackie met their eyes. “You guys can use it if you want. We could take—”
The double doors opened, and X and Sophia entered the commons. “Good evening, gamers! How are you all doing?”
The gamers jumped apart and tried to act casual.
“Is it time for the next game round?” Shaylyn asked.
Sophia tilted her head a little. “Not quite yet,” she said. “But I have some other good news for you all.” She was quiet then, and Rogan sensed he wasn’t the only one getting a little tired of Sophia’s need to draw everything out for the sake of reality TV excitement. “How would you like”—she fixed each gamer in turn with a serious stare, then smiled brightly—“to speak to your families by video tonight?”
The pandemonium that erupted in response to her question was answer enough.
A short
time later, Rogan was happy to have his turn to call home. He would have preferred meeting his mom and dad in person in Virtual City, but he’d take what he could get.
“Hey, Ro!” Dad said. His parents were sitting at the kitchen table, family photos on the wall behind them. They were probably using Mom’s tablet. “How’s it going, buddy? We miss you.”
“I miss you too,” Rogan said. “How’s Wiggles?”
Dad laughed and leaned off camera. He came back, holding the black-and-white fuzzball. “Why don’t you ask him yourself ?”
Dad held Wiggles closer to the tablet or whatever they were using, and Wiggles pushed his little pink nose forward, sniffing the camera.
“Hi, buddy!” Rogan said, an ache of longing in his chest. “I miss you.”
Wiggles was noticeably excited, squirming in Dad’s arms to get closer to the image of Rogan on the screen before him, trying to lick the camera in reply.
Dad shook the dog’s paw. “Say bye-bye, Wiggles.” Dad set him down somewhere off camera, and Rogan wished he could pet his best doggy friend.
“We were wondering when you were going to call,” Mom said.
“Sorry. They took our phones. Now we only have these lame tablets that can’t even go online.” He wasn’t stupid enough to mention Jackie’s hacked VR set when cameras were covering his entire conversation.
“Oh,” Mom said. “That must be tough. You can’t even check text messages?”
“Nothing,” Rogan said.
His mother raised her eyebrows. “That would be relaxing, actually. I’d love something like that, if I could get away from work that long.”
The connection froze for a moment, his parents’ faces stuck in those weird stopped-video expressions. “Whoops,” Dad said when the image finally moved again. “Rogan, you there? Slow connection, I guess. Internet’s been having prob—” Another freeze-up. His parents resumed movement a moment later. “So annoying. How’s the game?”
Rogan leaned forward and smiled. “It’s so cool. We use these game suits, like gamer gloves for our whole body. And we play in this huge arena so we can run all over. No more walking in place to move our laser vipers. In our first round we—” Rogan stopped when he noticed the image had frozen again. The video resumed and he continued. “We had to fight this—” When the connection locked up again, he couldn’t hide his frustration. The first chance he’d had to talk to his parents in forever, and it was like he was stuck with his grandparents’ internet!
