“Sixteen,” said Sahara. “All of them sponsored by multinational megacorps. Round one is spread over two days: four games Monday, four on Tuesday. The big teams will be getting all the press, but if we can make it through that first round we’re golden: every match from then on is getting big budget promos, live commentators, the whole deal.”
“Toll,” said Anja.
Sahara nodded. “They haven’t released the matchups yet, so we don’t know which opposing teams to start studying, but I’ve found some replays we can watch of the prime teams.”
Marisa sat up. “I’m up for some replays. Who’ve we got?”
“Ganika’s hired the Saxon Violins to play for them,” said Fang.
“Bunch of friggin’ douchebags,” said Anja, rolling her eyes.
“Saxon Violins is one of the best teams in North America,” said Jaya. “Which is not saying much, let’s be honest, but still. Ganika’s not pulling any punches, are they?”
“When you’re the world’s largest djinni manufacturer, you don’t have to pull punches,” said Sahara. “The other interesting team is, fittingly enough, our own beloved KT Sigan.”
“They sponsored the tournament,” said Marisa. “They’re running a team as well?”
“They hired most of Presto,” said Sahara. “Last year’s runner-up for the Korean National Championship.”
“That explains the Seoul Draft,” said Jaya. “If their own team’s familiar with it, they’ll have an advantage over the rest of the field. That’s kind of dirty.”
Anja frowned. “Why not hire the actual Korean champions? Why runner-up?”
“Plus, Presto broke up,” said Fang. “They’re not even a whole team anymore, so why bother with them?”
“That’s why I said ‘most of Presto,’” said Sahara. She started to smile, like she did when she had an exciting secret. “And that’s why I said their team was interesting. They’ve got three members of Presto, the Guard from another Korean team called R4ina, and Kwon Chaewon.”
Marisa waited for someone to remark on the name, but no one did. “I have no idea who that is,” she said at last. Anja, Jaya, and Fang all shrugged and said the same.
“That’s because she’s not a pro,” said Sahara, obviously relishing the chance to reveal whatever juicy bit of gossip she’d discovered. “Kwon Chaewon is the daughter of Kwon Dae.”
“Dios mío,” said Marisa, and then laughed out loud, her eyes wide in hilarious shock. “That’s the CEO of KT Sigan. Chaewon’s one of the spoiled rich kids!”
“Yep,” said Sahara, and her eyes twinkled. “She’s a spoiled rich kid who bought herself four pro-player friends. It’s the best of both worlds!”
“That’s the most pathetic thing I’ve ever heard,” said Fang with a laugh. “Please tell me she made herself the General.”
“Of course she did,” said Sahara.
Fang and Anja burst into laughter, and Marisa couldn’t help but join them. Even Sahara was chuckling.
“Wait,” said Jaya. “She’s riding the coattails of a champion-level team, pretending to be their leader, in a tournament which, let’s remember, her father created and is hosting. He might have created it solely so she could play in it. That’s taking ‘spoiled rich kid’ to a whole new level.”
“I’m seriously dying over here,” said Fang, between bouts of laughter.
Jaya was the only one not laughing. “Guys, I don’t think it’s that simple.”
“Why not?” said Marisa.
“Because a girl who would put all this together just so she could pretend to be an Overworld pro is not a girl who’s going to be content to lose. And her father owns the network we’re going to be playing on.” Her face was solemn. “I’ll bet you right now, there’s going to be some hardcore cheating.”
“Either way,” said Sahara, “we need to get practicing.”
SIX
Marisa and Anja crouched on the top of a tree, peering across the leafy green jungle in front of them. Every Overworld map was functionally identical—the jungle canopy was laid out exactly like the warehouse roofs in the war-zone map, or the tops of the buildings in the medieval map, and the players could move across it in the same way, stepping on leaves and branches as if they were a solid platform. In this particular map the city was a loose collection of huts on the jungle floor, and the AI bots were guerrilla warriors. They were playing against a Korean team called Skull4ce—their name struck Marisa as hopelessly macho, but they’d been willing to try a Seoul Draft, so Sahara had accepted the challenge.
“Another wave down,” said Sahara, her voice crackling over the comm, “but it was all bots. Haven’t seen the enemy agents in a while.”
“We haven’t seen them either,” said Marisa. “I’m going to move out and check behind that big tree to the west.”
“I’ll cover you,” said Anja. She was holding a long Arlechino sniper rifle, at least three times the length of her small red panda body.
“I don’t see them in the sewers,” said Fang.
“I’ve got the new shield,” said Jaya. “Think it’s safe to bring it out? I don’t want to get sniped coming out of this cave.”
“No,” said Sahara, “stay there. If the whole team’s missing, odds are good they’re in the sewers, getting ready to blitz the vault.”
“I’m telling you, they’re not down here,” said Fang.
“Head back to the base, Yīnyĭng,” Sahara ordered. She insisted on using call signs instead of real names, thinking it helped put them in a professional mindset. Fang’s call sign, Yīnyĭng, meant Shadow. “I’m going to try to take this turret as soon as the next wave of bots catches up to me.”
“Go carefully, Yīnyĭng,” said Marisa. Her call sign was the much less edgy Heartbeat. “You don’t want to stumble into all five agents coming around a corner.”
“Yes, I do,” said Fang. “I bet I could take out two of them before they killed me.”
“Go carefully,” Sahara urged.
“No movement up here,” said Anja. “Move out.”
Marisa picked up her longbow and crept across the upper canopy, crouching low and staying in cover as much as possible. She came to the edge of a leafy platform and looked down at the mossy tracks and tree trunks below her; she could see a wave of bots moving forward, and the wireframe display in the corner of her vision showed Sahara’s icon ahead of them, beckoning them forward to assault a turret. Were the agents lying in wait, planning to ambush her? Or were they really headed for the vault, like Sahara thought?
“I want to move forward and help Sahara with the turret,” said Anja on the comm. Sahara had used her real name as her call sign, which seemed to Marisa like it missed the whole point, but that was Sahara for you. She lived her entire life online; keeping her name as visible as possible was part of her branding.
“No,” said Sahara, “stay there.”
“I’m sorry,” said Anja, “who was that order directed at?”
“At you,” said Sahara. She sounded frustrated, and Marisa rolled her eyes at Anja’s teasing.
“Who, though?” asked Anja. “We’re supposed to use call signs to be more professional.”
Sahara grumbled over the comm. “I want you to maintain your position, Happy.”
“That’s not the whole call sign,” said Anja. “Are we allowing nicknames now?”
Sahara sighed. “I want you to maintain your position, HappyFluffySparkleTime. I also want you to die in a fire.”
“Will do, Sahara,” said Anja. Marisa smirked as they skirted the edge of the canopy.
“No dead drones in the sewers,” said Fang. “I’m standing right under our vault, and there’s nobody here. I’m literally turning around slowly in a pool of light, and no one’s killing me.”
Marisa readied her bow and stepped carefully through the leaves, sidling up to one of the gaps in the canopy. In the war-zone map this was a roof access stairway; here it was a collection of sloped branches and jury-rigged stairs leading d
own into a thick grove of trees. A large drone, in the shape of a massive silverback gorilla, crouched on the far side, munching on a banana as the game ran him through a series of idle animations. Marisa stayed back, barely peeking around the corner. If the drone saw her it would attack, and she wasn’t equipped with a stealth suit to get away from it—
“Este cabrón,” hissed Marisa, realization dawning on her in a sudden rush. “They’re stealthed.”
“The whole team?” asked Jaya.
“They’re not built for it,” said Sahara. “We saw their powersets—none of them have any stealth ability.”
“That’s why it’s brilliant,” said Marisa. “They showed us a team with zero stealth, so we didn’t plan for it, and then they earned enough gold in the first half of the game to buy stealth suits from their vault, and now the whole damn team’s invisible.”
“That’s stupid,” said Fang. “They’ll reveal themselves as soon as they attack—they spent a fortune on a trick they can only use once.”
“No,” said Sahara, “Heartbeat’s right—this can totally work, because they caught us with our pants down. All they need to do is focus on one of us at a time and we’re f—”
The canopy around Marisa erupted in a mass of gunfire and swirling blades, as all five enemy agents appeared out of nowhere to attack her at once. She tried to dodge out of the way, but there were too many; they broke through her armor in seconds, and her health a few seconds later.
“Heartbeat is down!” said the announcer voice. Marisa found herself floating in blackness, and screamed at the sudden feeling of helplessness. She couldn’t help her team or even talk to them until she respawned, and she’d gained enough levels so far in the match that her respawn timer was nearly thirty seconds long—more than enough for the stealthed Skull4ce agents to kill one or even two more Cherry Dogs.
“Quicksand!” shouted Sahara. “Sell everything you have and buy stealth goggles!”
“Got it!” answered Jaya.
“Happy, fall back!” shouted Sahara. “We need to regroup at the vault and let the towers protect us until we have the right gear to fight these idiots.”
“Roger,” said Anja.
“Falling back,” said Fang.
“Yīnyĭng, you stay ahead,” said Sahara. She sounded breathless, like she was running. “Rush their vault—don’t attack it, just steal their credits. If they see their money start disappearing, they might send a few agents back to protect it.”
“If they bought five stealth suits, they don’t have any credits left,” said Fang.
“Just do it!” shouted Sahara. “If you try a full attack, you’ll get murdered by the turrets; this is the only way to split their focus—damn it!”
Marisa looked at the team display, seeing Sahara’s health meter evaporate in seconds. A moment later Sahara appeared beside her in the waiting room, cursing horrifically.
“We should have survived that!” she shouted. “There’s no way they should have been able to move that fast!”
“Where were you?” asked Marisa.
“Almost all the way back to the stupid cave,” said Sahara. “They got you at the stairs, and then me at the cave, what, eight seconds later? Ten at the most? Nothing in their build says they can move that fast, and there’s no way they could afford speed packs and stealth suits this early in the game.”
Anja’s health dropped by half in a sudden ambush, and crept steadily downward as the seconds ticked by. Marisa checked her own respawn timer: Six seconds left. Five. Four.
Marisa rematerialized in the vault just in time to see Anja limping past the turrets. Jaya was firing magic bolts into the forest at the retreating enemy.
“Only three agents,” said Jaya. “Yīnyĭng split the team, just like Sahara said.”
“Get out of there, Yīnyĭng,” said Marisa. “They’re coming for you, and their team moves crazy fast.”
“They don’t have any speed powers,” said Fang.
“They used a slow power,” said Anja, gasping in pain as she used a health pack. “That’s the trick that makes this work.”
“What slow power?” asked Marisa, trying to remember the Skull4ce build. “And how would one help them catch Sahara?”
“Their Spotter has Air Buff,” said Anja. “I didn’t think twice about it, because Spotters use that all the time for Wind Leap.”
“Wind Leap doesn’t boost your speed,” said Marisa, “definitely not for the whole team—oh, holy crap, you’re right. Feather Fall.”
Anja nodded. “They killed you on the roof, then dropped into the city slow enough to survive the fall. They’re not faster because they have a speed power, they’re faster because they didn’t take the stairs.”
“I’m back,” said Sahara, appearing behind them. “Yīnyĭng, you safe?”
“I got out just in time,” said Fang. “Good call on the vault rush; that probably saved Anja’s life.”
“Maybe,” said Sahara. “It’s not going to help us win this match, though. In the time I was dead they dropped two turrets.”
They bought stealth goggles and kept playing, but their team had already lost its momentum. Fifteen minutes later their vault exploded under enemy fire, and the announcer loudly trumpeted the Skull4ce win.
“It’s okay,” said Sahara in the team lobby, sounding more like she was trying to convince herself than anyone else. “This was a learning experience.”
“I’ll check some of the Korean forums,” said Jaya. “If this is a common strategy over there, there’s bound to be some good counterstrategies as well.”
“You speak Korean, too?” asked Marisa. “Maybe you should just tell us what you don’t speak.”
“Finnish,” said Jaya. “Trying to learn that one’s like slamming your brain in a door.”
“Whoa,” said Anja. “Hold up.”
“What’s up?” asked Fang.
Anja looked shocked, which was rare. “Remember that spoiled rich girl we were all making fun of? Kwon Chaewon?”
“Daughter of the Sigan CEO,” said Marisa. “What about her?”
“I just checked my messages,” said Anja, “and she sent me an invitation.”
“To what?” asked Sahara. “We’re already registered for the tournament.”
“It’s an invitation to a dinner party. On the top floor of the Sigan building.” Anja raised her eyebrows. “For all of us.”
Fang frowned. “She knows who we are?”
“What night is it?” asked Sahara.
“Saturday,” said Anja. “I’m forwarding it to you.”
“Probably some kind of ‘getting to know you’ social before the tournament starts.” Sahara’s eyes gleamed, bright and eager. “This is going to be amazing.”
“We won’t even be in LA yet,” said Jaya.
“I’ll see if I can switch your flights,” said Anja. “Maybe I can convince my father this is a key public appearance as representatives of Abendroth, I don’t know.”
“Don’t worry about it,” said Fang. “I’m not really a party person.”
“But this is a formal party,” said Sahara, reading from her own copy of the invitation. “Black ties, gowns—that’s when you know it’s a fancy party, when they say ‘gowns’ instead of ‘dresses.’ They’re flying in a master chef from Korea. They’re going to have ice sculptures of all the team logos!”
“Nothing you are saying is making this sound appealing,” said Fang.
Marisa found the forwarded invitation in her own inbox, and blinked to open it. She skimmed through the details while the others tried to convince Fang, and her eyes struck on one detail that made her jaw drop.
“Girls,” she said.
“They’ll have champagne,” said Sahara. “And no one will stop you from drinking it underage—it’s a rich-people party, you can break any laws you want.”
“We can hunt humans for sport,” said Anja.
“Girls,” said Marisa again, louder this time. “Did you see who’s going to
be there?”
“All the other teams,” said Sahara. “Some of the local CEOs.”
“Yeah,” said Marisa, “but read to the end. The toastmaster is Su-Yun Kho.”
The four other girls went instantly silent. Even Fang’s mouth hung open.
“Su-Yun Kho?” asked Sahara. “As in, the Su-Yun Kho? The Su-Yun Kho who was the first female world champion of Overworld, and my first crush, and the greatest human being who ever lived?”
“I’m devoutly het,” said Anja, “and I would still kiss her full on the mouth until I died of asphyxiation.”
“I love Su-Yun Kho,” said Jaya. “I have posters of her on my wall.”
“I have the headjack cable she used in her second regional championship,” said Fang, though she looked sheepish as she admitted it. “It . . . came with a certificate.”
Marisa smiled. “Yeah,” she said. “That Su-Yun Kho.”
Fang closed her eyes and slumped against the wall. “I swore I’d die before I ever wore a dress, let alone a gown.” She shook her head. “But this is totally worth dying for.”
SEVEN
Marisa looked up as the waiter nuli approached. “One Solipsis Cafe roast pepper salad,” she said. “Extra dressing.” The nuli was Arora brand, and incredibly simple: little more than a digital screen with four small rotors, hanging in the air right at Marisa’s eye level; the screen lit up with text confirming the order, and a speaker on the front spoke with an incongruously human-sounding voice:
“Will that be everything?”
It wasn’t a real AI, at least not in the sense that it was self-aware—that kind of technology still didn’t exist. Service nulis were fitted with a handful of prerecorded phrases most likely to come up in the course of their duties. If Anja had been there, she’d have started trying to stump it, probing the limits of its conversation tree just to watch it get flustered, but Marisa was on her own today. Which meant she barely had enough money for the salad, let alone anything else.
“Nothing else,” she said. “Thanks.”
“Would you like something to drink?”
She desperately wanted a Lift, but she needed every last cent for the train ride home. “Water’s fine.”