He finished by telling them he felt fine now and he hoped it was over.
“You lying sack,” Bryson said. “I can tell you believe that about as much as you’d believe Sarah and I are married back in the Wake.”
“Which we aren’t” was Sarah’s response. “Just want to make sure that’s clear.”
Michael shrugged as they passed a group of men dressed in full armor. “Just trying to stay positive.”
“Well,” Sarah chided, “if it happens again, you better not wait until the next day to tell us or I’ll make you hurt somewhere else to take your mind off the noggin.” She smiled and touched his arm gently. “You have to trust us, Michael.”
All he could do was nod.
Bryson was shaking his head. “I can’t believe that stuff about Ronika. Seriously. Are you sure it’s her?”
“Positive,” Michael replied. “That KillSim barely got started on me and look what happened. According to Ronika, the whole point of those creatures is to erase your mind, remember? Not just your Aura but your mind in real life.”
Bryson stopped and looked at them. “And yet we’re jumping right back into the fire. What if KillSims are just the start of it?”
Sarah and Michael shrugged at the same time. Bryson followed, but he continued shaking his head as if he knew they were making the wrong decision, but he’d do it to appease his friends.
“You want to turn back?” Michael asked him, then tried to make light of it. “Just say the word, brother. I’ll buy you a pacifier and you can go home.”
Bryson didn’t miss a beat. “Nah, I’ll just borrow one of yours.”
And that was when they turned a corner and saw the sign for Devils of Destruction.
3
Michael loved how the VirtNet was a visual soup of archaic imagery mixed with the most advanced technology humans had ever known. This section of the Gaming Depot resembled an old boardwalk by the ocean, where arcades and restaurants and old-looking social clubs lined a walkway of wooden planks. Most of the shops here were actual games, though—a faux entrance to an entirely different world.
The sign for Devils of Destruction was huge and bordered with burning lightbulbs that flickered and sizzled. The letters were written in dark green—which Michael assumed was a reference to Greenland—with a red glow behind the word Devils. On the right side of the sign, there was a picture of a heavily clothed, helmet-wearing soldier, a machine gun pointed to the sky in one hand and a severed head, dripping with blood, hanging from his other fist. It seemed a little over-the-top.
They stopped right under the marquee, their necks craned to get a better look.
“Greenland,” Bryson said. “I’m almost seventeen years old and I’ve never played a game set there before. Must be one happenin’ place.”
Sarah turned to face her friends. “Most of it’s covered in snow and ice, big glaciers. We’re going to freeze our butts off.”
“Or something worse,” Bryson muttered. Then he flashed a playful grin like he’d just told the funniest joke of his life.
“Then keep ’em warm,” Sarah said with an eye roll.
He pointed to the front door, a rickety piece of wood that looked like it hadn’t been painted in ages. More specifically, a door that had been programmed to look like it had been neglected. It was all part of the atmosphere. “Well, we’ve studied the maps and we’ve made our plan. Let’s go for it.”
“When you die it makes you go back to the beginning,” Sarah said. “So if it happens to one of us, the other two need to die on purpose. We can’t get separated if we’re going to all get through.”
Michael didn’t necessarily agree with that. “I don’t know. As long as we figure out where the Portal to the Path is, that’s all that matters—we can’t waste a chance if we’re deep inside the battle zone. We just won’t actually go through the Portal until we’re all back together. If someone dies, the others wait for them.”
“Yeah,” Bryson said with a mock look of arrogance. “I’ll be sure to hold off until you guys catch up. Now come on.” Without waiting for a response, he walked to the door, opened it, and stepped inside.
4
It was an old-fashioned lobby with red carpet and lightbulb-bordered posters for other games covering the walls, the lights flashing around each in a clockwise loop. A concession stand stood in the middle, and the smell of popcorn filled the air. Michael noticed a teenage girl with black hair and bright red eyeliner at the register, smacking her gum like she hoped to pulverize it to nothing.
To the right was the ticket counter, behind which stood a woman, arms folded across her ample bosom, scowling at the newcomers. Everything about her was ample, actually. Large shoulders, thick neck, huge head. She wore no makeup, and her graying hair was stringy and unstyled. A real looker, Michael thought.
“Um, I’m scared,” Bryson whispered. “Could one of you buy the tickets, please? I think that lady slaughtered half my village when I was a baby.”
Sarah laughed, louder than she probably meant to. “I’ll do it, you big teddy bear.”
“I’ll come with you,” Michael whispered. “I think I’m in love.”
“What do you want?” the lady asked gruffly when they stepped up to the counter. “Popcorn’s over there.” She nodded toward the concession stand, but the rest of her body didn’t move a muscle.
“We’re not here for popcorn,” Sarah said coolly.
“Then what are you here for, smart aleck?” The woman had an unpleasant way of speaking out of the side of her mouth.
Sarah looked at Michael, half amused and half puzzled.
“Hey!” the lady barked. “I asked you, not your boyfriend.”
Sarah’s head whipped back to face the woman. “Well, obviously we want to play the game. Devils of Destruction? There’s a huge sign for it right outside your door? Maybe you’ve heard of it.”
Michael winced. Sarah was going too far.
The ticket lady laughed, a deep rumble that sounded like it should’ve come from a man. “Go on, kids. I’m not in the mood.”
Michael tried the nice approach. “Ma’am, we really do want to play. We have the day off from school. I’ve been studying Greenland.”
The woman unfolded her arms and put her hands on the counter, then leaned forward. Michael caught a whiff of something like cat pee. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”
He knew his expression showed how perplexed he was. “Um … yeah. Why are you acting like this? We just want three tickets to the game.”
Her face actually softened a bit. “You really don’t get it, do you? You aren’t just being a wise guy?”
Michael shook his head in response.
“Kid, you can’t play this game if you’re under twenty-five. Now scram.”
5
The three of them stood back outside the building a little shell-shocked and very confused.
“What in the world?” Bryson asked, glaring at the shoddy door. “All I’ve heard about is how crappy this game is. What could possibly be in there that makes it A.O.?”
A.O. stood for Adults Only, and Michael was just as confused. “Maybe when people say that only grandpas play it, that’s literally what they mean. They’re the only ones who are allowed to.”
“No way,” Sarah responded. “If there was really stuff in there that made it A.O., we’d know all about it, because every kid on the planet would be figuring out ways to break in. They have to be trying to stir up interest. They probably just changed it.”
Again, just like with his strange attack in the alley with the headache, Michael wasn’t buying any coincidences. “Or more likely a certain someone doesn’t want us playing it. This would be an easy way to throw a roadblock at us.”
Sarah scoffed. “All they’ve done is add another hour or two to the trip. Ratings haven’t stopped us before.”
“Ain’t that the truth,” Bryson said. Then he let out a sinister laugh. “Who could forget our adventures in the Vegas Vat of Doom?”
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“Oh boy” was Sarah’s response.
“Let’s get to work,” Michael said. They went to a bench that overlooked the ocean, closed their eyes to focus on the code, and started maneuvering.
6
Two hours later, they still had nothing.
They’d tried everything, pooling their experience from years of gaming and programming and hacking and other illicit doings. But nothing worked. It wasn’t that the firewalls and shields protecting Devils of Destruction were impenetrable; they were just elusive. Almost like they didn’t exist—and if you couldn’t find a wall, you couldn’t climb it. After searching and searching, they all agreed it’d be useless to even keep trying. Michael had never come across such a thing before.
“This is weird,” Michael said, looking out at the endless sea. The sky was dark with clouds. “I almost wonder if the game’s even real. Who knows—maybe if we had been adults, the lady would’ve had some other excuse to keep us out. It doesn’t add up, does it?”
Sarah was staring at her shoes, concentrating hard on something. “Maybe the game is really, really awesome and super popular with older people, and they don’t want us knowing about it or getting in on the action. It could use old security technology we don’t even know about. Either way, what are we going to do? I don’t think we can try the same trick we used at the Black and Blue.”
“If we did,” Bryson said, “that old lady would probably sit on us until we had to Lift out or suffocate.”
Michael stood up. Determination raged like an inferno inside him. He was getting into that game, no matter what.
“Come on,” he said. “We’re doing this the old-fashioned way.”
“We are?” Bryson asked, surprised.
“Yes, we are. I’m going back inside.” Michael stomped off, not knowing where his sudden bravery had come from and not caring. His friends hurried to catch up.
7
Michael didn’t really have a plan. And he knew there’d be more waiting for them than that gum-smacking girl and the lady he thought of as Stonewall. The game people had to have other ways to keep them out. But Michael was ready to get past them all. He was fired up and ready for a fight.
Bryson grabbed his shoulder and spun him around just as they reached the shabby door.
“What?” Michael asked. “If you try to stop me, I might chicken out.”
“Call me crazy, but shouldn’t we talk this through a little? I don’t know, come up with a plan, maybe?”
Michael knew he should calm down, but he didn’t want to. “Think of all the crap you’ve dragged me into over the years. It’s my turn now. Just follow my lead. It can’t be too bad in there—they know people won’t just try to break in. The visual evidence would be too strong, and they’d end up in jail. But we’re desperate enough to try, so let’s go.”
Sarah was smiling at him with her eyebrows slightly raised, as if she was impressed. “I like this side of you.”
“Yeah, I know. Come on.” He turned away from them and opened the door.
8
As soon as they entered, Michael could tell that the huge lady behind the ticket counter knew they were going to start trouble.
She shook her finger at them. “No, no, no you don’t. I can see it in your eyes, boy. I already told you—there’s no way I’m letting you game today. Just turn your butts around and scoot on back out the door.”
Michael hadn’t stopped walking, hadn’t slowed a bit. He stayed on course for the back of the room, with Bryson and Sarah right behind him. When he reached the concession stand he noticed that the black-haired girl had momentarily stopped chewing her gum. She just stood there staring at them with a shocked look on her face as they passed by.
“Why’d they let you work in a place like this, anyway?” Michael asked her, but she didn’t answer.
Stonewall was moving out from behind her counter, flabby flesh swaying on her arm as she waved at them to stop. “Stop right there, mister. Stop. Right. There.” She took a path to cut them off, but they were walking too fast for her.
Michael didn’t know the layout of the place, but from what he could tell, aside from where they came in, there was only one exit from the lobby, which had to be the entrance to Devils of Destruction. It was a shadowy hallway that branched off the back right corner of the room. And that was where he headed.
Suddenly a booming voice filled the air. A deep voice with a thick Southern accent. “How’d you like your pretty faces filled with holes?”
Michael stopped in his tracks, then turned around just as he heard two heavy metallic clicks—the sound of a shotgun being cocked. When he saw the source of the voice, his breath caught in his throat like the air had turned into balls of cotton. That same girl who’d been smacking her gum and acting like she didn’t care one whit about the world was standing on top of the concession stand holding two sawed-off shotguns, their barrels pointed at Michael and his friends.
“The name’s Ryker,” the girl said. “And I ain’t letting punks like you three steal entry on my watch. Ain’t, can’t, won’t. Now get your runty little butts out of here before I start shooting.”
Michael had frozen in place, eyes glued to the strange person with the guns named Ryker.
“Y’all think I’m just some clown at a rodeo?” Ryker asked, holding her weapons up a little higher. “It’ll be some awful mess to clean you all up, but y’all better believe I’ll do it. I’ll lose every last penny of my pay this month if you get in. Now get lost!”
At some point during her rant, Michael decided that he wasn’t leaving. If he had to go through the horror of being shot, so be it. He’d wake up in his Coffin and come marching right back. This girl wasn’t going to kick him out without a fight.
“Fine,” he called. “We’ll just mosey right on out the door.”
Holding his hands up, he slowly made his way toward her. He knew he’d only get one chance at this, and he hoped his friends didn’t end up being the ones who got shot.
“Careful, there,” Ryker said. “Make one more move and you’ll be hurting good before Lifting back to the Wake. How’s that sound?”
Michael took another slow step toward the girl. She was only a few feet away now. “Look, I swear we didn’t mean any harm. We just have some questions.”
“I said careful!” She aimed both shotguns at his face. It should have relieved him that Bryson and Sarah were no longer in immediate danger, but he found himself wishing she’d go right ahead and aim the stupid things back at them.
Another step. Then another. Hands up, his eyes wide and innocent, steady pace with no sudden movements. So close now.
“Stop!” Ryker screamed.
Michael froze. “Okay. Okay.” He put his hands down and pretended he was going to turn away and head for the door again. “I’m sorry we—”
He spun and leaped into the air, swinging his arms up as he did. He swatted at the barrels of the two guns, tipping them toward the ceiling just as the girl pulled the triggers. Twin booms thundered in the air. Pellets riddled the ceiling and walls, breaking glass and splintering wood. Michael slammed into Ryker, and both of them tumbled over the edge of the concession stand and crashed to the floor. She struggled to get free, but he was on top of her and he was bigger. He wrestled the two guns out of her hands and pointed one of them at her face.
“Tables … are turned,” he said through heavy breaths. “Don’t tempt me.”
Ryker squirmed beneath him but with less effort than before. “Such a brute, pointing that thing at a girl’s face. Your daddy beat up your momma, too?”
“Oh, shut up. You were the one threatening to kill us.” He lightly tapped the tip of the gun on her nose, then got up.
“Ow!” she yelled. Michael had never seen such a look of ferocity on a girl’s face before.
“That was dangerous,” Sarah said dryly. He looked over to see her and Bryson exactly where he’d left them.
“It worked, didn’t it?” Michael realized someth
ing then. “Hey, where’d that lady go?”
Bryson pointed over at the ticket stand. “She ran over there and disappeared under the counter.”
Michael knew immediately that something was wrong. He climbed over the concession stand and joined his friends, handing one of the shotguns to Bryson. “Let’s get out of here.”
That was when Stonewall popped up from behind the counter, huge arms folded across her chest, just like the first time they’d seen her. “You picked the wrong day to mess with me. Did you really think I’d let you waltz in here and play a game you’re restricted from? Huh? Did you?”
A hissing sound suddenly came from all directions at once. Michael spun in a circle to find its source, and it took him a moment to realize that several holes had appeared along the walls and in the ceiling. Before he could warn his friends, thick lengths of black rope were shooting out, slithering through the air like flying snakes.
He turned to move, but the ropes were everywhere. A piece wound around his ankle, squeezing tightly, as if it was alive.
As he bent over to yank it off, the rope jerked him off his feet and flung him into the air.
9
Michael’s stomach lurched as his body twisted, the rope whipping him back and forth like a dog does its prey. And just like a dog’s prey, he was disoriented. But somehow he’d held on to the gun. As he flew around the room, he focused all his energy into trying to get it cocked. Lights flashed and the colors of the lobby spun until they merged into one. His head began to ache, as if another episode was coming on.