The Game of Lives

  He reached the pod in question, drifted within a few inches. The same screen he’d seen when visiting the current resting place of Jackson Porter started to materialize with a name, but he dove into the code without looking—he didn’t have a moment to spare. He dove into the code the way Kaine had shown him. The pods of the Hive blurred and shook, transforming into an array of tightly condensed symbols and letters, still glowing orange.

  It was the code, dense and crowding him tightly into the small space, overwhelming him. The structure of the Hive itself had its own code, surrounding the individual pod data chunks, so that Michael was completely immersed in a blinding display of information. All of it moved at a blistering pace, up and down and sideways, in and out of his vision. Different colors and sizes and shapes. His head swam with nausea trying to take it all in.

  He looked to the right, in the direction of Weber’s attacks on the pods. The darkness was thicker, more menacing in code view, like a black oil that had come to life. It reached out to devour huge swaths of code at once. Weber’s program had already eaten through half of the pods between him and where he’d been floating before. There was no way he had enough time to create something to stop her. At least, not there.

  But he could learn something. Bringing his attention back to the data in front of him, he studied the code, the organization, the characteristics of its programming. Darkness grew in his peripheral vision. It was making a sick squelching sound as it crept toward him, like a knife sticking into flesh. He tried to ignore it. He tried to focus on the code, find a link. There had to be something in there that Weber was specifically attacking. A link between the Hive and her program.

  Like tar thrown from a bucket, a splash of a strange black substance sprayed the Hive in front of him. Upon contact, half of the pod’s information sizzled and died, whisking into the endless darkness of Weber’s program. Another thick ribbon of inky darkness came swirling in from above, snapping at the code, then whipping toward Michael’s face. He cried out as it hit his skin, latching on, burning. The pain was like acid on a wound. He screamed and the sound died in the thick blackness that had covered him. With a burst of panic he reached up and pulled at it until he ripped it off. It came back at him but launched back into visual mode and flew out to the center of the vast open chamber of the Hive.

  Breathing heavily, he floated there, his skin burning as sweat trickled down his scorched face. He took in the Hive around him and saw the pod where Weber had begun her attack. At least thirty pods had now been destroyed, leaving nothing behind but empty space. And the destruction was spreading, its pace quickening.

  Michael scanned the wall of consciousnesses, trying to gather his thoughts. Focus, he told himself. Focus. If ever he had to act without thinking, now was the time. Lives were dropping by the second.

  A sudden, chilling thought almost froze his heart.

  Jackson Porter.

  In the frenzy, Michael had almost forgotten that he himself was a Tangent, that he himself had taken over a human body, that he himself could die at any second. If Weber got to Jackson’s pod…

  Still he floated there, thinking all these things, when people were dying left and right. Indecision had him in its grasp. A sickness grew in his stomach. If he went straight for Jackson Porter, Weber would know. She’d throw everything at that pod.

  Do it! he almost shouted at himself. He had no choice. He could do nothing if he ceased to exist. Nothing else mattered. He had to protect himself, no matter what she brought down on him.

  The Bubble.

  It flashed across his mind, that membrane of protection that Kaine had programmed for him. Michael closed his eyes, tried to remember its feel, its look, its code. Complex, unusual, something he’d never done before. But it might be his only hope.

  It was time to work on instinct.

  As Weber’s wave of dark decay swept across the Hive, Michael accessed his files, found Jackson’s location, and went for it.

  CHAPTER 20

  LIFE

  1

  The pod was at least sixty or seventy rows up from the swath of destruction laid out by Weber’s program. Michael zapped himself to it and dove into the code as if he were diving into the cold ocean. It was a sensory shock as it enveloped him, that beautiful, complex universe of information. He scanned the data, allowing his mind to open up and take it all in. He couldn’t afford to think about it in individual pieces. He had to let it all flow past him, through him, grasping its meaning on a subconscious level.

  At the same time, compartmentalizing his mind, he worked at the code for Kaine’s creation, the Bubble. It had been a wonder of coding, but Michael was a wonder himself. He knew that, even if all the forces against him had made him doubt his abilities. An unexpected burst of laughter exploded from his virtual chest as he pieced his vision of Kaine’s program together.

  He was giddy.

  He was delirious.

  He was having the time of his life.

  2

  Near the end, things happened so fast he could barely track them all. The Bubble grew around him. He scanned the code of Jackson Porter’s pod, searching for any clue that would help him rebound against Weber’s program and stop it in its tracks. Then he could feel it coming—the darkness swooping. A shadow fell over him, and he turned and saw that Weber had abandoned her original course. She was now cutting across the Hive wall diagonally, heading straight for him.

  Pod by pod went black as she passed.

  Michael swam in the code of Jackson Porter’s prison, even as he put the finishing touches on the Bubble of protection. He had no idea whether it would hold against Weber’s program like it had against the KillSims. But surely it would, wouldn’t it?

  In his frenzied state, he remembered a line from an old flat-film.

  Surely you can’t be serious.

  I am serious. And don’t call me Shirley.

  He laughed again, certain the pressure was finally starting to crack his mind wide open.

  Yes, he was delirious. But he was sharper than ever.

  Michael went back to the code, the Bubble around him giving him the time he needed. He hoped.

  But what was he searching for? He had no idea—just had to trust that he’d know. He worked the information that pressed in from all directions, worked it like wet clay.

  His entire world shook when the darkness of Weber’s program hit the surface of his Bubble. Every piece of data around him shuddered and blurred for a moment, then righted itself. He looked over his shoulder and saw the visual manifestation of it all: black tendrils of some monstrous, amorphous beast attacking the invisible layer of protection between them.

  From there, his instincts took over. He found things he hadn’t dreamed of finding within the code. Access points to the Hive. A running history of the Mortality Doctrine program and how it did what it did to Michael’s Tangent self. He even found a piece of himself in there, something he couldn’t quite understand. It was almost as if he’d found his own DNA gene sequence.

  He was a building block. He was beginning to see how he served as a foundation for the Doctrine and all that it had accomplished.

  He took as much of the information as he could until he finally felt ready.

  It was clear to Michael now that what would follow would be horrible, but it had to be done.

  It was the only way.

  Michael turned around and faced the Bubble. Weber’s black destroyer program had now completely encased it. With a few quick manipulations of the code, he dissolved the shield of protection and let the tarlike substance come at him and his pod.

  It struck him all at once, and the stinging pain from before overwhelmed him. He resisted the urge to suck in a breath from shock, the world around him shifting between visuals and raw code, flickering like a bad WallScreen signal. Michael forced his mind to calm and made his surroundings solidify in the pool of code, the substance in which he needed to work. And work he did.

  Michael floated a few feet f
rom Jackson Porter’s pod and let Weber’s program devour him until it had nearly merged with his own code. He had to let it in to have access to what he wanted. The pain was excruciating, the intensity heightening. He ignored it, not caring how battered his body back in the real world might be—all he needed was to stay alive.

  Darkness dimmed his vision, so he brightened the code. He dug into it like he’d done with Jackson’s pod, but this time he was much more focused. He knew exactly what he was looking for: a pathway to Weber. That was the last piece of the puzzle.

  Weber. He needed her.

  The darkness ate at him, but it was confused by his programming because it was so different from the pods themselves. Michael knew it wouldn’t take long for it to adapt, though. Like a pool of smart nanobots, it learned and changed as it worked. It was only a matter of time before it sucked the life from his Aura, leaving him as brain-dead as any KillSim would.

  The true death.

  Pain ignited his skin and sank into his muscles. His vision was blurry—almost black—and his own tears stung.

  He pushed on.

  Darkness closing in…Pain…

  There.

  Every program had a link to its owner, especially when it was being controlled. He’d found it. Weber was hidden somewhere, but it didn’t matter. He had the link. The pain was so great he shook, barely able to reach forward and latch onto her, throw a million strings of code to lock her to him, pull her to him.

  He felt her fear. Like stepping under a waterfall, it was a burst of coldness.

  Through her own program, Michael had found her, and now she was his.

  With his last ounce of strength, he launched an anti-program, countering every line of code encompassing the destructive darkness Weber had unleashed. In an instant it eviscerated her program, eliminating it from existence. Light poured back in, blinding and glorious, and the pain disappeared.

  Michael held Weber in his grasp, the massive world of her code enclosed in his mental might. He leaped toward the wall of the Hive and found a pod that had already been half destroyed by Weber’s program before he’d stopped it. Whoever it represented had no chance of survival. Gaping holes covered the orange oval so Michael could see inside to the dark purple world beyond.

  It was enough. He hoped.

  Michael launched himself at it, sank into its code, reached for the links to the Mortality Doctrine he’d discovered within Jackson Porter’s pod, threw Weber’s code into its vortex, and channeled her very being into the body connected to the pod at hand.

  And Weber’s essence vanished from the Sleep.

  She entered a new body in the Wake, possessed its mind, linked to the pod before him. Her own link severed, the real body of Agent Weber was brain-dead.

  Using his scant knowledge of the program she had created, Michael finished off the job on the half-destroyed pod that now represented everything that was left of Weber’s essence. The pod disintegrated, vanished in a mist of darkness, killing anything linked to it back in the Wake. And then all was as silent and still as a windless day.

  Michael had just killed Agent Weber.

  CHAPTER 21

  THE MORTALITY DOCTRINE

  1

  The sea of code vanished in a blink, replaced by the orderly world of the Hive. The scar of destroyed pods was a conspicuous gash of black in the orange light.

  Michael pulled in a deep breath. He’d done it. He’d stopped Weber’s program from annihilating every single life he could see, both the Tangent side and the human side. The problem was far from solved, but he’d accomplished the most immediate task. And Weber was dead. The true death. Her body now lay lifeless back in the Wake, her consciousness wiped from the earth and the VirtNet.

  Exhaustion overtook him. He floated within the void of the Hive, limp. He wanted nothing more than to go back to the Wake, stay inside the Coffin, and sleep for a day or two. Let Gabby and Bryson and Helga figure out the rest. If the VNS was out of the way, things could be worked out with Kaine, right?

  Michael floated in place for a while, his eyes closed, enjoying the warmth of the orange light against his virtual skin. He was too tired to even think. Too tired to Lift himself. He just wanted some time. Some sleep.

  Surely he could rest now.

  Don’t call me Shirley, he thought with a smile.

  2

  Michael fell asleep at some point, waking and slipping back under several times. The Hive glowed and pulsed around him—which, combined with its soft hum, was like the world’s greatest lullaby. During those short, groggy moments of half awareness, he thought of Gabby. Bryson. Helga. They were so smart. Maybe they’d already figured everything out.

  Could it really be over? Michael smiled again, knowing it was too good to be true. Nothing had been okay in so long. Always, always, something was wrong.

  He needed to check on them. He needed to talk to Kaine. He had to finish this.

  Thoughts bounced around inside his weary mind.

  He fell back asleep.

  3

  He didn’t know how long he’d slept, but eventually Michael woke up, feeling refreshed and alive, if a little rough around the edges. Floating there in the void of the Hive, he wished a coffee cart would swing by with some wake-up juice. He briefly wondered if he could code such a thing, steal a cup of grow-joe from one of the many virtual restaurants he’d plundered throughout the years. The thought seemed ridiculous now. Silly. Gloriously silly. He missed it so much.

  He rubbed his eyes, looked around. He winced when he saw the dark gash in the Hive wall again, its emptiness so stark a reminder of the lives lost. And he’d just begun to feel a little upbeat. People were dead. Tangents were eliminated, gone forever. If only he could’ve been a little faster.

  He sighed, looked at the other side of the Hive, where everything was whole and brightly lit. Pod after pod after pod. That made him feel a little better.

  With another sigh, he realized just how sick of that place he was. Time to move on. He wondered about going back to the VNS building to see how Kaine’s Tangents had done cleaning the place up, but decided against it. He’d gotten the rest he needed, and he missed his friends. It was time to find them. And if they hadn’t already infiltrated the Doctrine and figured out a way to kill it, he’d help them. They’d do it together. With the VNS no longer breathing down their necks, it shouldn’t be too hard.

  For the third time that day, Michael accessed his history files to search for a previously visited location. This one was a little tougher. It had more firewalls than even the Hive. But he’d gotten there once, so he knew he could do it again. Once, the Path had taken him there, the place where he’d first met Kaine, the place where he’d been born into a human body for the first time. The Hallowed Ravine.

  He jumped into the code and made his way.

  4

  He saw Gabby first, and even though he barely knew her, her face brightened his day. Not until she stood before him, her Aura looking so much like her actual body, did he realize how lonely he’d been. For so long he’d gone at this all by himself.

  “Hi,” she said, obviously startled at his sudden appearance. They stood on a rolling hill of wind-flattened grass, a thick forest at the bottom. “I…We…Where’d you come from?”

  Michael shrugged. “Oh, I’ve been out and about. Saving people, killing bad guys—that sort of stuff.”

  She stepped forward and threw her arms around him, hugging him as fiercely as if they’d known each other forever. He hugged back, thankful for the human touch. The light went on in his mind: no matter what happened, she saw Jackson Porter in him, and Jackson Porter was her boyfriend.

  She pulled away and looked up at him. “It’s good to see you. Any word on…I don’t even know what to ask, actually. Did you do it? Whatever it was?”

  He nodded, feeling more confident by the second. He’d half expected to be greeted by KillSims when he’d arrived, something that had happened in this very place not that long ago. But there were
trees, and there was grass and a bright blue sky. Kaine must have really worked hard to protect the place from the ruination of the VirtNet.

  “Yeah,” he said, “I think so. I think the VNS is done, and Weber’s days of making our lives miserable are over for sure. What about here? Any luck?”

  She gestured for him to look around. “We’ve been looking and looking, but there’s nothing. There’s an old cabin in those woods, and an abandoned castle on the other side of the forest that’s barely standing. Not much else. Bryson’s checking out the castle, and Helga’s in the woods somewhere. I feel like I’m wearing a path up and down this hill.”

  Michael let out an exaggerated sigh. “Do I have to do everything myself?” He quickly laughed it off, hoping she didn’t think he was a jerk. “Just kidding. That’s really good, actually. I’m glad you weren’t attacked by KillSims or Rodents of Unusual Size.”

  “Huh?”

  “Nothing. Let’s go find the others. I need more hugs.”

  5

  Michael remembered everything about the Hallowed Ravine. The castle, overrun by VNS agents and Tangents loyal to Kaine and KillSims charging out of the ruins to attack him. He remembered confronting Kaine in the cabin, being dragged through the woods by that giant of a man. He remembered the world spinning into chaos and dissolving around him.

  But strangely, it looked like none of that had ever happened. The castle was still standing—old, yes, but in one piece. It was confusing, and Michael wondered yet again what had truly happened that day he’d been sucked through the Mortality Doctrine program and placed into the body of Jackson Porter.

  Michael and Gabby walked into the wide clearing between the forest and the castle, and before he could let his thoughts get too dark, they slipped from his mind. Bryson came charging out of the entrance of the castle and bounded down the stairs with a ridiculous smile on his face, and Michael couldn’t stop his own smile from forming.