small area of
plants again. They were growing out from under a table in the
center of what looked like a mess hall adjoining a large kitchen.
Joe ran up and moved the table aside to get a better view. Once
again he saw a brightly colored creature crawling around in the
plants.
Joe kneeled closer and examined the
creature. A dark stain and a smashed carrot chunk marked the side
of the armor.
“ Aha! You are the same one. And
somehow your environment follows you around!”
The creature crawled out of the plants
and moved towards the wall along the smooth floor. It headed into a
corner, turned around, and headed back the other
direction.
“ It follows you around when
I’m not here,” Joe corrected himself.
Joe stood up and looked around the
dining room. He felt like a bug under a magnifying
glass.
“ Shit. And mine follows me
around too.”
Chapter Nine
Telisa opened her eyes. The bar no
longer surrounded her. Fear rose in her chest and stirred her heart
to a rapid beat. She was lying on a flat spot in an irregular cave
with light brown clusters sticking out of the walls. She saw that
the clusters were made of reddish blocks with green sticks
protruding from them. Some of the blocks glowed as if they were
hot, casting weak light on the scene.
Magnus lay just a few feet from her,
unmoving. Suddenly an irrational fear, born of a memory from years
ago, gripped her.
“ Magnus, wake up!” Telisa
demanded. “Please, please be alive!”
Magnus started awake. Like her, he
stared in surprise at the surroundings.
“ How did we...?”
Telisa almost sobbed in relief. He
wasn’t dead.
“ I don’t know. I just woke
up and we were here, and I thought... I thought it was happening
again.”
“ Then we’re back in the lair
of whatever killed Jack and Thomas.” Magnus cautiously stood up and
swung his slug thrower in a slow arc, ready for anything. “What is
that shit? It reminds me of something.”
“ Project blox,” Telisa said.
“More project blox caves.”
“ Yeah, it’s those green
spikes. They remind me of the sticks that hold the project blox
together.”
Telisa looked at the floor. “Oh my god.
Look at the floor, where we were sleeping!”
The floor beneath each of them was
perfectly flat. Smooth turquoise tiles were intact in the shape of
their prone bodies. Telisa remembered the color and pattern as
identical to what had been behind the bar.
“ Uh, whatever’s going on
here is even weirder than I suspected,” Magnus said. “Either we got
moved here with the tile by some sort of transport mechanism that
we didn’t feel, or the whole rest of the room melted
away.”
“ I remember that ledge we
were on before, and the light in the ceiling was sheared in the
middle, like it just melted away.”
Magnus nodded. “I bet that’s why there
aren’t any UNSF people here. Their complex is slowly changing into
this... whatever it is.”
“ And the computer network is
probably damaged in the same way,” Telisa said. “But we didn’t get
melted or changed or whatever it is.”
“ What did you mean just
know, about it happening again? You mean someone dying?”
Telisa looked away for a moment.
“It’s... it’s dumb, I know, but one time, years ago, a boyfriend
and I snuck into some maintenance tunnels to steal some extra VR
time. We were at our quotas but we thought the rules were stupid
and he knew a way to hook us in without being charged. We had a
good time too, until later when I jacked out and found that he’d
been killed right there next to me in the tunnel, run over by an
automated maintenance vehicle.”
Magnus absorbed her story for a moment.
“I’m sorry to hear that. So it reminded you of that time, waking up
next to me just now, and you thought I was dead.”
Telisa nodded. “At first, I blamed
myself for his death. We had been reckless for sneaking in there
and cutting off all our senses to the real world. But a part of me
blamed the government and their laws. I
plants again. They were growing out from under a table in the
center of what looked like a mess hall adjoining a large kitchen.
Joe ran up and moved the table aside to get a better view. Once
again he saw a brightly colored creature crawling around in the
plants.
Joe kneeled closer and examined the
creature. A dark stain and a smashed carrot chunk marked the side
of the armor.
“ Aha! You are the same one. And
somehow your environment follows you around!”
The creature crawled out of the plants
and moved towards the wall along the smooth floor. It headed into a
corner, turned around, and headed back the other
direction.
“ It follows you around when
I’m not here,” Joe corrected himself.
Joe stood up and looked around the
dining room. He felt like a bug under a magnifying
glass.
“ Shit. And mine follows me
around too.”
Chapter Nine
Telisa opened her eyes. The bar no
longer surrounded her. Fear rose in her chest and stirred her heart
to a rapid beat. She was lying on a flat spot in an irregular cave
with light brown clusters sticking out of the walls. She saw that
the clusters were made of reddish blocks with green sticks
protruding from them. Some of the blocks glowed as if they were
hot, casting weak light on the scene.
Magnus lay just a few feet from her,
unmoving. Suddenly an irrational fear, born of a memory from years
ago, gripped her.
“ Magnus, wake up!” Telisa
demanded. “Please, please be alive!”
Magnus started awake. Like her, he
stared in surprise at the surroundings.
“ How did we...?”
Telisa almost sobbed in relief. He
wasn’t dead.
“ I don’t know. I just woke
up and we were here, and I thought... I thought it was happening
again.”
“ Then we’re back in the lair
of whatever killed Jack and Thomas.” Magnus cautiously stood up and
swung his slug thrower in a slow arc, ready for anything. “What is
that shit? It reminds me of something.”
“ Project blox,” Telisa said.
“More project blox caves.”
“ Yeah, it’s those green
spikes. They remind me of the sticks that hold the project blox
together.”
Telisa looked at the floor. “Oh my god.
Look at the floor, where we were sleeping!”
The floor beneath each of them was
perfectly flat. Smooth turquoise tiles were intact in the shape of
their prone bodies. Telisa remembered the color and pattern as
identical to what had been behind the bar.
“ Uh, whatever’s going on
here is even weirder than I suspected,” Magnus said. “Either we got
moved here with the tile by some sort of transport mechanism that
we didn’t feel, or the whole rest of the room melted
away.”
“ I remember that ledge we
were on before, and the light in the ceiling was sheared in the
middle, like it just melted away.”
Magnus nodded. “I bet that’s why there
aren’t any UNSF people here. Their complex is slowly changing into
this... whatever it is.”
“ And the computer network is
probably damaged in the same way,” Telisa said. “But we didn’t get
melted or changed or whatever it is.”
“ What did you mean just
know, about it happening again? You mean someone dying?”
Telisa looked away for a moment.
“It’s... it’s dumb, I know, but one time, years ago, a boyfriend
and I snuck into some maintenance tunnels to steal some extra VR
time. We were at our quotas but we thought the rules were stupid
and he knew a way to hook us in without being charged. We had a
good time too, until later when I jacked out and found that he’d
been killed right there next to me in the tunnel, run over by an
automated maintenance vehicle.”
Magnus absorbed her story for a moment.
“I’m sorry to hear that. So it reminded you of that time, waking up
next to me just now, and you thought I was dead.”
Telisa nodded. “At first, I blamed
myself for his death. We had been reckless for sneaking in there
and cutting off all our senses to the real world. But a part of me
blamed the government and their laws. I
Similar Books
