LevelUP: an 8-bit novel by Micah Joel. Author's definitive online edition.

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Chapter Thirty-Five

2-11: [Esc]

Explosion.

Blinding light and disorientation.

Floating?

Nausea and vertigo.

Blurred movement.

Pain.

Intense pain, more than physical. Loss. Feet on the ground. Standing, wobbling. Profound disappointment and sadness. Familiar sounds.

Molly.

Screaming in Max’s ear. “Answer me!”

Another sharp burst of cleansing pain. Max’s cheek throbs. He’s been slapped, hard.

“Whaa?” he mumbles.

“Max, can you tell me where you are?” Molly again.

Max looks around, but his eyes are slow to respond. The room seems thick, like it’s filled with dirty water. There’s a familiar-looking bit of hardware near his feet. But all he can think about is, “Food…”

Molly produces a chocolate bar, and the world gets a little less fuzzy around the edges.

“Was I…was I inside the computer?” Max asks.

“Where. Are. You,” Molly says.

“I dunno,” Max says. Molly holds her breath as if about to cry. “Doctor’s office. You said this used to be your doctor.”

Molly breathes again. “You’re back!” She takes both of his hands. Hers are warm against his clammy skin. “You were totally dead to the world for maybe two or three minutes,” Molly says.

“Three minutes?” Max asks. “No, that can’t be right. More like half a day.”

The corners of Molly’s eyes crinkle again. “I don’t like this. Why can’t we just go back home?”

Home. Hemera’s threat. Will there even be a home by the time they got there?

What happened to the trophies? “I didn’t get the trophy,” Max says. “Well, I got it, but lost it again.”

“What’s Hemera going to do now?” Molly asks.

“Not to Hemera. I lost it to…I think it was The Eigenthief.”

“That pompous ass? I thought he was only a character,” Molly says.

“The games are linked,” Max says. “We need to find him before—”

Gravel crunches from the parking lot just outside. “Somebody’s here,” Molly says.

It can only be one person. “She’s here,” Max says. “Hide.”

“Where?” Molly asks.

It’s a fair question. Max desperately scans the room, the corridor, the exam rooms further back. It’s a small space. Too easy to search. Then his eye settles on the ceiling.

“What’s above the tiles?” Max asks. He climbs up on the desk and lifts. The true ceiling is unfinished drywall. “Do you have a light?” he asks. Molly hands him the green device from the apartment. It doesn’t emit a beam like a flashlight, but with some squinting he makes out a rectangular opening.

“There’s a roof access panel. Let’s go. Hand me the node, then I’ll help you up.”

The panel leading to outside is levered shut with a rusty handle. Max cranks on it but it doesn't open. His hand slips off and he nearly comes crashing down. The VR haze has mostly left him, but effects linger. He cranks again and the hatch slides open, but the handle feels slippery in his hand. He’s bleeding. Pain in the real world feels different than it did in the simulated one. Harder to play through.

Molly hands him the hardware, and Max tosses it, as gently as possible, onto the roof. He extends a hand—his good one—to help Molly up. She’s strong but not very coordinated.

“You’re bleeding,” she says. “Let me go back and get something for that. There’s got to be gauze or something.”

Below, the outer door slams open. Someone’s inside.

“No time,” Max says. “And I wouldn’t trust anything here to not give me dysentery or something. Climb!”

Max boosts her up, and she’s through. With his foot he carefully rearranges the tiles to look undisturbed, then follows her out.

The roof is covered with gravel and patches of barren and cracked tar. Crumbling leaves and pine needles everywhere. Are there trees nearby? There are. Tall ones.

Max creeps to the edge to get a view of the parking lot. Hemera’s neon blue limo is there, but he can’t tell if anyone is inside or not, but a gullwing door is open.

“We need to get out of here,” Max says. “C’mon.”

There’s a big tree along the side of the building, out of sight from the limo. It’s just beyond their reach. A meter lower, there’s a Y-shaped split in trunk.

“We need to jump for it,” Max says.

Molly’s face goes pale. “I can’t do that.”

“Sure you can. I’ve seen you jump over bigger puddles outside the camp.”

“Sure, but those were puddles. The worst that might happen is splashing,” Molly says. “I don’t want to die, thank you.”

“You wouldn’t die,” Max says. “You’d probably only break a leg.”

“Not helping,” Molly says.

“That was worst-case,” Max says, “Look, I’ll go first.” Then before he can second-guess himself, he launches off the roof. His foot slips on the gravel—a far cry from the effortless in-game jumps—and Max comes up short. He slams into the trunk and scrambles to find purchase. The rough bark rips at his already-bloodied hand, and only with some difficulty does he find a grip strong enough to hang on.

Molly frowns from the rooftop.

“See?” Max says, and smiles crookedly. “I was, uh, demonstrating that even a terrible jump won’t get you killed.”

“Effective demonstration,” Molly says. Max can’t tell if she’s being sarcastic or not.

“Hurry,” Max says.

Without even crouching first, Molly commits. She sails easily off the roof and her feet land softly on the thick branch. She almost doesn’t even need to use her hands for balance. But after, she wraps her arms around Max.

“Let’s get down,” Max says. Nearest to his level, there are several hat-racked branches that serve as narrow toeholds. He picks his way down, one-by-one, dropping the final meter.

“C’mon, Molly. You can do it.”

“I’m scared,” Molly says.

“What’s the worst that could happen?” Max asks. I’m here. I’ll catch you.”

Molly lets go. She lands harder than Max expects. Max’s hand continues to give him trouble, and he ends up bearing the brunt of her weight through his wobbly knees. He catches her, but both of them end up sprawled across the rough tree roots.

“Shhhh,” Max says. Footsteps approach. Delicate, high-heeled footsteps, not the plodding tromp of bodyguard boots.

Max scrambles back to his feet as quickly as he can do quietly. The stealth cloak would come in handy about now.

Hemera stops at the edge of the parking lot, just barely visible around the corner of the building. She pulls out her phone.

“Find anything? … Why not? Tear the place apart. We know they were in there recently… Yes, I have all four… No, listen to me. I. Want. That. Router.”

Hemera suddenly has all four trophies? How? Was she working with Bode? Sure didn’t seem like it earlier.

Hemera barks additional orders into the phone. “The little brat nearly got his hands on four of the five trophies in a single swoop. I had to make special arrangements, and you know how much I hate doing that.”

Five trophies? There’s a fifth? Hemera somehow collected all the trophies that had been stolen from Max. But she didn’t yet have the complete set. There was one more. And with it, another chance for Max to beat her.

Then another car, several notches lower in prestige than Hemera’s limo, pulls into the lot. Two angry-looking men storm out with handheld directional antenna devices. Within seconds, both sets of fingers are pointing in their direction. They’re after the router.

Max frantically scans for another escape route, but unless he can climb the sheer wall of adjoining buildings, there’s none.

Molly looks at him, eyes wide. Max wishes there was some way to keep her out of this, but options are not thick on the ground right about now.

At last, Hemera spots them. She calmly marches over the patchy grass toward them, carefully stepping over sprawling tree roots.

“Just the one I was looking for,” she says.

Max swallows hard.

“I have an offer I’d like to make you.”

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