Warcross

  “You have the other piece of this file,” he says.

  I frown at the glowing cube for a second before I realize that I’m looking at another piece of proj_ice_HT1.0. The same file that I grabbed from Ren before Hideo’s attempted assassination. “How do I know you’re not just trying to give me a virus?”

  He actually looks offended at my question. “You don’t think I could find a subtler way of doing that? I’m trying to help you, you idiot.”

  I scowl, my teeth clenching. “Why? We’re supposed to be rivals.”

  He smiles again, touches two fingers casually to his brow, and salutes me. “Not if Hideo already dropped both of us from the job. I’ve received a compensation payment already, so there’s not much incentive for me to stay on this hunt. I have bigger hired jobs to concentrate on right now.” He tilts his head at me. “But I bet you’re still keen on protecting Hideo, aren’t you?”

  I blush, annoyed.

  He nods at the hovering file. “Thought I might as well pass along what I’ve collected. A gift from one hunter to another. That way, if you find Zero, you’ll know who’s responsible for your win.”

  I shake my head, still unwilling to touch the file. “I don’t trust you.”

  “And I don’t like you either. But we don’t have time for that right now, do we?”

  We eye each other for another beat before I finally reach out and accept the file. For a moment, I expect something in my view to go horribly wrong, like I’ve just downloaded a virus. But nothing happens. The file seems clean.

  Maybe he’s being genuine, after all.

  I look back at Tremaine. “You helped Roshan get Ash out of our building.”

  At that, his expression wavers. I wonder if his change of heart had anything to do with that moment—if he, as another hunter, also understands what had really happened.

  Tremaine shrugs and turns away. “Just tell Roshan I stopped by,” he mutters. Before I can say anything else to him, he vanishes, leaving me alone again in the room, staring numbly at the spot where his virtual form had just been.

  How is this possible? I think back to the opening ceremony party, when I’d confronted him and Max Martin, when he’d sneered at me. His data had looked perfectly normal, disguised to be indistinguishable from an average player’s—I hadn’t even seen any shields installed to protect his info. He had probably set up an entire, elaborate system of false info to throw off anyone who tried to get to him. He’d likely been studying me, too. He’d been right in front of me, and I’d missed him entirely. You tricky bastard, I think.

  I squint at the file, trying to make sense of it. It’s clearly garbled, just like the piece that I have.

  My eyes dart back to the contents in my box.

  My Christmas ornament and Dad’s painting had been destroyed, but just because they were destroyed doesn’t mean some traces of them, however small and broken, weren’t left behind. And if there are enough pieces, you can see what the original object was supposed to be.

  I bring up a main menu and tap my fingers rapidly against my thighs. A scrolling list appears. I sift through it backward until I finally reach the day of our first Warcross tournament.

  Then I pause.

  proj_ice_HT1.0.

  I tap on it. Sure enough, an error message pops up, telling me that the file no longer exists. But this time, I run a hack that forces the file to open, regardless. The hospital room around me disappears, and I am immersed in a field of mangled ghost code.

  It is all nonsense, partially corrupted—just like the file Tremaine had sent. I pull up what he sent me, and then I run both files together, splicing them into one. Suddenly, there is just enough info for the file to open.

  It is a Memory.

  I am standing in someone else’s recorded Memory, inside a massive, dimly lit space. A train station? Wherever it is, it’s a real, physical location. Cobwebs adorn the air between archways, while thin shafts of light slice through the darkness to dot the floor below. People are gathered here in a loose circle, but they remain silent, their faces hidden in shadows. Others appear as virtual figures, as if they’d logged in from distant places to be here.

  “The track’s done,” someone says. I startle, realizing that the words are coming from the person I’m watching this through. It’s Ren’s voice. This is one of Ren’s Memories.

  One of the figures in the darkness nods so slightly that I barely notice it. “Hooked up?” he says. His words come out as a whisper, but from the way the tunnel’s archways curve at the ceiling, I can hear his words as clearly as if he stood right beside me.

  My point of view—Ren—nods. “It’ll play the instant the championship final’s world loads.”

  “Show me.”

  The authority in the mystery figure’s voice makes me freeze. This is Zero, in real life, flesh and blood.

  Ren obliges. A second later, music is piping through my earphones, the familiar beat of his track. When it hits the chorus, he pauses it, then brings up a ream of glowing code for everyone to see. “This will start the countdown on the rigged Artifacts,” he says.

  I suck my breath in sharply. Rigged Artifacts? The teams in the finals will have rigged Artifacts?

  Rigged to do what?

  “Good,” Zero says. He looks around the room at each person in turn. As he does, they each bring up a hovering copy of an assignment, syncing with one another and checking their progress. In my view, Ren brings up a copy of it, too. My eyes widen as I read it. This is what I’ve been looking for.

  It details what Zero is going to do.

  During the final game, Zero is going to switch out the Artifacts and replace them with rigged ones. Corrupted ones. Ones containing a virus on them that will sweep through to every active NeuroLink user.

  It’s why Zero had been gathering so much data inside each of the Warcross worlds. Why he was assigning locations to his followers. They’re making sure the virus will trigger in each location, that no security shields can stop them.

  My breaths come short and quick now, my eyes darting frantically across the text. What will the virus do? Destroy the NeuroLink? What does he want from destroying it? What will it do to people who are logged on during the final tournament? The final tournament. It’s no coincidence that he chose this time to unleash a virus. The maximum number of NeuroLink users will be online around the world at the height of this final game.

  Why would Zero, someone clearly skilled in technology, want to destroy this technology?

  In the Memory, Ren speaks up again. “One more you should check,” he’s saying. “Emika Chen. The other wild card.”

  Zero turns to him. “You’ve found something?”

  “She’s connected to Hideo outside of the tournament, in more ways than one. She’s sniffing out your trail. If she finds something significant and alerts him to it, he’ll find a way to stop all this.”

  A chill sweeps through me at his words. Ren had found me first; he had alerted Zero to me, possibly even at the same time that I’d alerted Hideo to him.

  “I’ll look into her.” Zero’s voice is calm. “We’ll be watching their comings and goings, and if she tries to alert him, I will know. We can always make this a double assassination.”

  The Memory ends. It fades around me until I’m back in my hospital room. I sit there with my heart pounding, head whirling, feeling more alone than ever.

  A double assassination. This meeting must have happened before the first attempt on Hideo’s life—I’d shared information with him, and in return, they’d tried to kill him. Then Zero had appeared to me, warning me to stay out of it, offering for me to join him instead. The house bombing. Zero has no qualms about coming after me, too.

  Instinctively, I reach to connect with Hideo.

  I should send all of this to him right now—tell him everything about Zero’s planned virus, the rigged Artifacts. But if I contact him, Zero might know. And if he sees Hideo do something about the final game to stop this plan, then Zero wil
l definitely know that I’ve been communicating with Hideo. He might change their plan, and then everything I’ve already discovered will be useless.

  I have to stop this without tipping off Zero, without Hideo’s involvement. And that means I have to find my way into the final game and stop Zero from planting those rigged Artifacts.

  I let out a long, shaky breath.

  Maybe I am in over my head. And a small, scared part of my mind reminds me that, if I just stop right now, just leave like Hideo had insisted I do, Zero might return my Memories to me.

  But I can't stand the thought of leaving. If I do, what will happen? My gaze now returns to the box sitting at my side. All I can concentrate on are the shattered remains of my precious things. All I can linger on is the thought of Zero hidden behind his insufferable mask, frustratingly opaque, telling me what to do. My temper stirs, and my fists tighten.

  Hideo wants me off the official games and the hunt. Zero has warned me to stay away. But I’ve never been good at following instructions. I’m a bounty hunter. And if my bounty’s still out there somewhere, I have to finish this.

  I get out of bed, walk to the corner of the room underneath the security cam, reach up, and yank its wires out. It goes dark. Then I call Roshan and Hammie. When they answer, my voice comes out as a hush.

  “Ready to hear the truth?” I say.

  “Ready,” Roshan replies.

  “Good. Because I could really use some help.”

  28

  Common sense would tell me that this is absolutely the worst possible time to log back in to the Dark World. I almost died in an explosion, I’m no longer on the job, and a hacker and his crew are after me, turning me from the hunter into the bounty, ready to take me out the instant I show some sign of continuing on their trail. There might even be assassins after me by now—I’m probably on the assassination lottery list in the Pirate’s Den.

  But I’m out of time.

  Now my virtual boots slosh through puddles in the Silk Road’s potholes as I pass street after street of neon-red signs, all listing the names and info of people who have been exposed in the Dark World. There is more traffic in this section of the Silk Road, a jumble of anonymous users crowding into alleys and in front of doorways, creating the sense of a night market. Wayward strings of lightbulbs hang overhead, beyond which I can see the mirrored, upside-down version of the city hanging down toward us from the sky.

  I glance warily at the stalls I pass. Some sell virtual Warcross items laid neatly out on tables, everything from gold rings to glittering capes, leather boots and platinum armor, healing elixirs and treasure chests. Others sell illegal, real-world items. One offers outlawed guns and bullets, promising overnight delivery for cases of thirty and up. Another sells drugs—the stall is set up as professionally as any online shopping site, where you add grams of cocaine and meth to your shopping cart, get the packages delivered to your doorstep two days later, and leave customer reviews for the vendor without ever endangering your identity. A third stall hawks diet pills not approved by health departments, while another offers discounts to watch a famous Dark World girl’s R-rated livestream. I grimace and look away. There are stalls for stolen artwork, poached ivory, currency exchange between virtual notes and bitcoins and Japanese yen, and, of course, gambling on both Warcross and Darkcross games.

  I see bets being cast right now for the final tournament—and the amounts are astronomical. A number hovers over each stall, telling me how many people are currently considering purchases at that vendor. The number over the betting stall says 10,254. Ten thousand people making bets at this one little gambling stall alone. I can only imagine how many bets people are casting right now in larger gambling shops like the Pirate’s Den. It’s another reminder of how many people will be on the NeuroLink during the final game, and it makes me move faster.

  I stop at a currency stall to exchange a huge chunk of my money for notes. Even now, converting this much money physically hurts—what I wouldn’t have given just a few months ago to hang on to this much for the rest of my life. But I trade it anyway, looking on as the numbers in my view change from one type to another. Then I continue on. Finally, I reach the intersection of the Silk Road and Big Top Alley. When I look down the alley, I see the vendor I’m looking for: the Emerald Emporium, home to expensive, valuable, and very, very rare power-ups.

  The outside looks like an enormous circus tent, painted with broad black-and-gold stripes that glitter under the strings of lights. The flaps of the tent’s entrance curve to both sides, revealing a yawning, pitch-black hole into which a velvet carpet extends. An immediate, instinctive fear hits the back of my stomach at the sight. Dad and I had once gone hiking in the woods at midnight, and when we had to walk through the black space of a gnarled tree trunk, I’d nearly had a panic attack. Everything in darkness looks like fragments of monsters. The entrance to this circus triggers the same sort of fear—stepping into the black unknown, beyond which is something dangerous. In fact, this intimidating entrance is all part of the vendor’s security shell, to deter window-shoppers. If you’re too scared to enter, then you’re probably too scared to make purchases.

  A pair of twins on stilts stand on either side of the entrance. They lean down toward me as I approach, their faces painted white and their eyes completely black. “Password,” they say in unison, their frowns identical. At the same time, a transparent, hovering box appears in the center of my vision.

  I type in the password for today, a string of thirty-five jumbled letters, numbers, and symbols. The twins consider for a moment—and then move aside, silently holding out their long arms for me to enter the Emporium. I take a deep breath and step forward.

  Inside is completely black. I continue walking, counting my steps out carefully. When I finish taking ten steps, I stop and turn to my right. I take eight more. Stop, turn left. Fifteen steps. I continue walking in a long, elaborate combination like this until I finally take twenty steps forward and stop completely. For users who don’t know how to get past this second security shell, they’ll get trapped entirely in the darkness. It’ll then take them weeks to reclaim their lost avatar and account.

  I reach out and knock. To my relief, a rap-rap-rap sounds out as I do so, as if I were knocking on wood. A gate slides up, and I enter the enormous belly of a circus, the space lit up with hundreds of dangling bulbs.

  Shelves and pedestals are everywhere, displaying glass jars inside which are power-ups of all kinds—scarlet gems and white marbles, rainbow-hued balls of fuzz and blue-striped cubes, black-and-white-checkered spheres, and clear, soap-like bubbles. Some of these power-ups have only been seen once in games, never to be offered again, while others are prototypes, still in development at Henka Games but yet somehow now in the hands of hackers who are selling them here. Over each one hovers its name in gold letters, along with its starting bid price. Sudden Death: N46,550. Alien Attack: N150,000.

  Clusters of anonymous avatars gather in front of the rare ones, chattering excitedly. Security bots glide around the floor, looking like ladies with mechanical jaws and long-nosed masks and black parasols. I study their movements. There is always a pattern to the way they move, however randomly. A shopping cart icon floats in my view now, as well as a field that I can type an amount into. I look around, admiring each of the glass jars on display, before I finally find one on a pedestal, inside which is a marble that looks like a frozen crystal ball, its surface adorned with beautiful feathers of frost.

  Team Freeze: N201,000. This will, according to the accompanying description above it, immobilize the entire enemy team for five full seconds.

  The people gathered around this glass jar all have auction paddles, and I realize that an auction is happening for it right now. I join in, accepting a paddle from a nearby security-bot lady. There are five bots patrolling this auction now, two of them drifting over from an auction that had finished moments earlier. Standing next to the glass jar is a little girl, the auctioneer, wearing a top hat near
ly as tall as herself. “Two hundred and fifty-one thousand notes!” she says at a loud, rapid clip. “Do I hear two fifty-two?” Someone raises their paddle. “Two fifty-two! Do I hear two fifty-three?”

  The bidding goes on and on, until it narrows down to a battle between two users. I watch them carefully. The highest bid is now 295,000 notes, and the second user is hesitating on raising the bid to 300,000. The little girl continues to shout out the number, waiting for someone to take it. No one does. The highest-bidding avatar straightens, puffing his chest out in excitement.

  “No one for three hundred thousand?” the little girl says, looking around. “Two ninety-five going once, going twice—”

  I raise my paddle and call out, “Four hundred.”

  All eyes whirl to me in shock. Murmurs ripple through the crowd. The little girl points at me and smiles. “Four hundred!” she exclaims. “Now we’re flying! Do I hear four hundred and one?” She looks around the tent, but no one budges. The other avatar glares at me with a look of murder, but I’m careful not to stare back.

  “Sold!” The little girl claps in my direction. My shopping cart icon suddenly updates, the number 1 now showing, and my number of notes drops by 400,000. At the same time, the Team Freeze power-up vanishes from the glass jar on the pedestal, and the other avatars start to wander off, muttering. The losing bidder lingers, though, his eyes still on me—as are the eyes of the security bots.

  I thank the auctioneer, then go to look at the rest of the jars. I can still afford to spend another million notes, and I need to gather as much help as I can get.

  I join a second auction happening for a power-up that looks like a round, growling, fuzzy black creature with two large paws. Artifact King. If your enemy’s Artifact is within your line of sight, then using this power-up will automatically teleport that Artifact straight into your hands, instantly winning your team the game.

  This time, the starting bid is 500,000 notes.

  Again, the auctioneer calls out the rapidly rising bids. Again, it boils down to a few active bidders. I’m one of them. The bid rises to 720,000 as I face off against one other opponent, and yet still, he won’t back down. Finally, in frustration, I throw down an amount that I know is much more than the power-up is worth.