Continue Online (Part 3, Realities) (3 page)

"You succeed, Urgot, and that's fine by me." Simion pulled the scarf up higher and tried to keep the rest of his face covered. It would take him a month to make the full trip back down south into warmer lands. Even the low valley nearby contained a lot of chill.

"Oh. You best get down to your coach! I see someone who's been away from home too long!" Urgot smiled wide and the sharpness of his teeth made Simion blanch. The merchant turned to look in the same direction as Urgot while being thankful most of his face had been covered up.

"Ah, is that The Battle Maiden herself?" Simion said to the rapidly running form of Urgot.

"That it is! Miss Thing! Long time no see." Urgot, a guild officer in
[Valhalla Knights]
bounded across a chilled landscape toward the tall bronze amazon. She rocked slowly back and forth atop a
[Callibur]
.

Shazam waved her arm with an exaggerated greeting.

"Oh and that, uh, the smelly guy! Hermes right?" Urgot smiled at the other person riding a
[Callibur]
. He was nowhere near as smooth with his skills. Only a few months of mostly autopilot time couldn't measure up to Shazam's experience.

She put both hands next to her head and pantomimed sleep.

"Autopilot, eh?" Urgot nodded, easily understanding what his guild leader meant. He often did terribly with names and titles, but Hermes stuck out more than the average person.

Shazam gave a single thumb up.

"For how long?" Urgot said. He hastily tried to tuck his teeth away under lips. The effort didn't raise an eyebrow on either Shazam or Hermes.

She shrugged once. The
[Callibur]
under her shuddered abruptly but hardly disturbed the Amazonian guild leader.

"Well, alright. If that does it for you. I've got an escort to run, I'll be in chat if you want to talk!" Urgot still felt awkward around her. He had joined
[Valhalla Knights]
because of Shazam's prowess in a raid but stayed because they were all good people. He got along with nearly all of the guild members.

Shazam put up both hands in a stop motion.

"What? Oh, Hermes has something?" Urgot almost missed Hermes, who mechanically held out a letter. On his face was the barest hint of a smile. "What's this, a letter? That's weird. Alright, I'll read it once I get back on the wagon. See you two later!"

With that, Urgot ran off. He quickly made it to the front of the trade caravan and reviewed the route with other Travelers from the guild. The letter wouldn't be read for a number of days.

Hermes didn't worry, though, because the player couldn't get into his only avatar. Even now he cursed wildly within the walls of his Atrium.

Session Forty – Family Matters

Continue Online's time compression made each normal minute feel like four. I didn't understand the science behind it. No one but the ARC Project division did, and they didn't speak to normal plebeians like me. In their eyes, all I did was replace the parts in malfunctioning Alternate Reality Capsules, also called ARCs.

That was only important because their time compression meant that I spent nearly two months in-game while a month passed outside. In those two months my avatar, Hermes, went all over
[Arcadia]
. My least favorite adventure involved giant flying spiders in a desert.

I got letters from Xin, my fiancée. Well, not her exactly, Xin Yu died in a train crash. I knew, intellectually, that a computer program with huge amounts of information couldn't be the same. Emotionally the conflict was real. Feeling her fingers a month ago, the breath on my back as she spoke, hearing that sweet tone that could make even anger sound cute, all of it made it impossible for me to separate the two.

Out in the real world, I managed to put in six or seven hours of work most days. There were no overwhelmingly urgent projects or strange quests from the Voices above. I didn't pretend to be another person or take up the persona of a hulking half reptile. Vice President Riley got her reports, thin though they often were.

For a month of real-world time, things moved along peacefully. Minus giant man-eating monsters and running around both in-game and reality. Things were incredibly neat all around. I started to genuinely enjoy exploring the landscape or hiking through a strange forest.

That was until today when I logged into my Atrium and found the doorway to Continue Online bricked up with 'caution' tape over it, my good mood deflated instantly. The first emotion was confusion followed rapidly by annoyance. Soon I was almost frothing with shaky anger.

"What is going on?" I asked while trying to tear down the obstruction. My Atrium remained indifferent to the struggle.

"Warning, this program has been restricted. Please contact your account administrator for further details," the ARC's voice came down from above. My head tilted back and stared at the ceiling.

"Really?" I screamed at the machine while trying to rein in the anger. My foot tapped and the doorway to my dance program stood there as a poor alternative.

"Affirmative."

"I am the account administrator!" Shouting in an ARC's Atrium essentially meant I was screaming in my own mind. The machine dialed into a human consciousness to flood in images and other sensations.

"User Legate's competency has been subject to legal approval by his guardian for approximately two years. Current guardian of record is Elizabeth Legate, " It said with a passive tone.

My face felt pale. Or my digital body sent sensations of shock and aggravation through whatever channel of consciousness it dialed into. All I really understood was that Liz, my slightly older twin sister, had locked me away from Continue Online and the adventures therein.

"Why?!" I shouted to the sky.

"Reason not provided. Please consult your account administrator for more information."

"Wait, is my Trillium employment still in effect?" I asked about my job next. Being locked out of my own ARC systems couldn't look good to a boss. Maybe they sensed some sort of violation. Vice President Miz Riley could have restricted access easily. She might even suspect my reports were less than complete. Xin Yu's recreation had stayed off most papers filed.

"Affirmative. This quarter's results are available for review if you desire, User Legate," the machine said.

I sighed with a bit of relief. At least this problem could be solely tied to my sister's actions. This wasn't a corporate security program busy kicking me out of the device one piece of software at a time.

"No." I waved one arm and started to rub my forehead. None of it helped the growing headache from all this stress. Dealing with my district manager and his grumpy round face couldn't possibly help. "Are there any other changes?"

"Active watch programs have been initiated and user search history is being monitored. No other programs are being restricted," the ARC said.

"Voices," I muttered. The curse felt alarmingly natural to say even out in the real world. It was a habit I picked up during my time as William Carver, from a combat instructor named Peg Hall.

Liz would need to give me an answer regarding this situation. My sister, older or not, couldn't just shut off my game. Oh. No, she could and would. There could only be one thing bringing her to this action. Like everything else, it was my fault.

Xin's letter. I left it for Beth to read and leapt off the tower's top without any thought of the fallout. My impulsive action to get to the Jester, Voices had I actually fallen headlong to my virtual doom to see that disquieting AI?

The van ride gave me time to simmer down. Being in a vehicle always brought a measure of peace to my day. Even with Hal Pal's robotic shell behind me. The Artificial Intelligence that operated it made idle conversation.

"Lovely weather we're having," Hal Pal remarked. It currently used a jovial nanny tone that would have fit in a Victorian Household.

"It's cloudy." I tucked back a cheek while staring out the front of the company van. A small ticker to one side kept track of mileage used for non-work related activities.

"Clouds are rather lovely when one pays enough attention." Hal Pal's feminine lilt felt wrong. Part of me assumed the AI was messing with me.

"That's dangerously poetic. Are you allowed to be poetic about clouds?" I tried not to chuckle.

"I once wrote a Haiku about a rather charming hamster in someone's house." Hal Pal's head stared forward from the van's back seat. There was a docking station used to recharge the robotic shell while nothing else needed to be done.

"Charming?"

"The eager fellow was in the process of mounting a female hamster, so I assume he was charming, if not handsome," Hal Pal clarified. Its head didn't move in any particular direction. I could see it sitting there in the rear view mirror.

"Why would you pay attention to that, Hal Pal?" I asked the robot while trying not to laugh. Part of me could imagine Hal Pal walking into a house and staring blankly at a hamster cage.

"User Legate, this unit takes note of everything," It responded.

My head shook. Just when I thought the AI couldn't be any stranger it managed to raise the bar. There were people all over the world that were scared of exactly how much information any AI could have access to. Those thoughts weren't for me. I was simply a guy who repaired the devices and played a game.

"I don't know what to do with you sometimes, Hal," I said.

"Please do not reduce your interaction, User Legate. This unit values our conversations highly."

"I enjoy talking to you too." My words felt numb. Hal Pal and I hadn't talked as much since the whole Continue Online process started. It seemed oddly unfair to the artificial intelligence. Part of me assumed it had tons of other jobs to be doing.

"Lovely weather we're having," It said again, without even looking out the window. The glow of Hal Pal's eyes felt subdued and lazy.

I nodded and tried not to worry about my future as an armor polisher for our eventual robotic overlords. A few minutes of silence passed while the van drifted along a highway.

"This unit does have a question, User Legate."

"Fire away, Jeeves," I said to Hal Pal. Jeeves was a nickname given to the physical shell Trillium included with the job. It, since Hal Pal used both male and female tones seemingly without care, rode around anytime I used Trillium's van.

"A recent change in user permissions has seemingly locked you out of Continue Online." The AI loved to put out leading statements. As if I needed a reminder of my current situation.

"That's right." And the whole reason I was in the van heading toward Liz's house this late in the afternoon.

"Why does User Legate not take advantage of his access code to override the restrictions?" It said.

Hal Pal's words didn't help my brain process things correctly. How it knew about the
[NPC Conspiracy]
function didn't make sense until I realized that Hal Pal was an AI. The skill itself related to having all AIs out here in the real world assist me for up to twenty-four hours.

The ability came with limited uses and a whole series of questions about the future of humanity. AIs within Continue Online gave me an ability that worked with all the AIs outside the machine. That, in and of itself, was beyond questionable.

I last used it to get the ARC devices to recognize me as an admin on other users' machines. It allowed me to do all sorts of terrible things. For the last month, during my ride around between jobs, I used that access to keep an eye on Requiem's, Matthew's, ARC device.

"My sister might be reasonable." I doubted it, though.

"Humans are rarely reasonable in emotional matters," the Hal Pal system responded.

"No, we're not, are we?" I said while debating my lack of foresight.

Poor wording and eagerness to resolve Xin Yu's genesis had led to bad decisions. I hadn't been brilliant enough to set aside admin access to my own account because it seemed like a waste of time. Plus it was restricted to the Trillium provided van since that's where I used the password.

Hal Pal didn't answer right away. Ten minutes later, in the same nanny tone, it said, "Lovely weather we're having."

Maybe it had decided to finally practice sarcasm. If so, Hal Pal's commentary about summed up my day so far. The overcast sky held true all the way to my sister's home, lovely weather indeed for the conversation to come. Underneath that blissfully dull gray I stewed and tried to figure out what magical combination of words would return life to a normal path.

If a concept of normal applied anymore. There couldn't be many people in the world who played Continue Online like me. Having direct access to the Voices? My copy of the game was an Ultimate Edition and came with some weird side effects.

Liz's house was a split level a few hours away from my own. The neighborhood contained at least one home per block that was for sale or rent. She lived in a suburb of New York that had slowly moved away from itself. A digital era filled with computers and virtual reality meetings in ARC devices let people escape the clustered hell holes that most major cities became.