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

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Chapter Thirty-Six

2-12: The Offer

“Is that a smile?” Molly whispers to Max. “I don’t like it.”

“That’s not a happy smile,” Max says. “We need to just listen for a bit.”

Hemera’s eyes pause on Molly for the tiniest moment, then pass by like she’s nothing. This infuriates Max as much as anything else she’s done.

Hemera adjusts her blue wool overcoat against the chill of the night. “Max Root,” she says in a voice that commands attention. “You’re quite the player. There are things that have been whispered rumors for a decade you’ve been able to uncover in a day.”

How much does she know?

But what comes next is unexpected. “I’ve been looking for a quality Chief of Staff, and I’d like you to fill that role,” Hemera says. “Do you understand exactly what I’m offering?”

Max, with effort, manages to keep a neutral gaze.

“Let me spell it out, then. Look here.” She pulls her sleeve away from her wrist. When she runs her finger over the skin, glowing pixels appear in a sleek digital display. Her heart rate shows 58 beats per minute.

“Technology has progressed beyond what most people, especially those in the camps, are privy to. Those trinkets you bought and sold are nothing. We’ve been making steady progress in every imaginable field, with one notable exception. Even this top-of-the-line implant has a processor more-or-less out of the eighties. But once LevelUP breaks the lock, that little obstacle will be solved as well.”

She seems to truly look at Max for the first time. It feels like being in the X-Ray scanner that the corporation sets up at the camp during lockdown events. “You'll get a salary, of course. I know about the stack of IOUs you kept under your pillow, each hand-written with a little poem. I can guess how much money that represents. You’d make that in an hour. Wouldn’t it be nice to stop worrying about necessities for once in your life? It’s so much more fulfilling when you’re not scrabbling for survival.”

Hemera talking about what Max used to keep under his pillow. Nope. Not creepy at all. And her mention of IOUs reminds Max of what he means to the rest of the people in the camp. For them, he was their lifeline. He made it possible for them to keep living, to keep going despite the conditions. It reminds him of how much of a different person he is compared to Hemera.

Molly looks at Max, confused. He glances back with what he hopes is a reassuring face.

“And then there’s power. Wouldn’t you like, just a little bit, to call the shots for once instead of getting slapped around every day? Command someone—she snaps her finger—and be obeyed, no pointless questioning. And that’s not all. Within the very broad sphere of things that interest me, you’d have broad discretion to make things happen.” Hemera pauses. The silence is dead serious. “For example, if someone makes a choice you disagree with, you could order the cleanup of an unsightly refugee camp and have it carried out within the hour.”

Molly gasps.

The words hit Max like a punch to the gut. Would she do it just to make a point? Not even a question. That she’d use this as a lever against him is the most nauseating thing Max has heard since…

“What do you really want from me?” he says. “Ask me plain.”

“Max, no!” Molly says, pulling at his arm.

“I need someone to handle basic administrative tasks. Bringing me my chai. Managing my calendar. And your full unconditional support. It’s going to be a lot of work managing an empire.”

So that’s what all of this is about. Even if she manages to acquire all the trophies, she doesn’t know how to go about removing the lock on technology.

“Don’t you need to find another trophy first?”

A look passes her face like something funny crosses her mind. “Oh, I have ways of getting what I want.” She looks through him again. “There’s no use in being coy. I obtained all the trophies from that loathsome creature. Finding the last one will be easy.”

“How’d you convince Bode to hand them over?” Max asks.

“Convince?” Hemera says. “Weren’t you listening?”

“Well, then,” Max says.

“This is a one-time offer,” Hemera says. “I need your answer right now. Think carefully, because once you respond, there’s no going back.”

Molly’s nails dig into his arm. He puts his hand on top of hers and the pressure relents, a little.

“Well Miss Krapht,” Max says, “for an important decision like this, for which you’ve urged me to think carefully, you need to give me a minute to think, wouldn’t you agree?”

“I suppose so,” Hemera says. The words are icy. “You have sixty seconds.”

“Do you have paper and pencil?” Max asks. “When I’m making big decisions, it helps me to write down my options.”

This seems to throw Hemera off. From her clutch the produces a business card, blank on the reverse, and an obnoxiously tiny Mont Blanc in corporate blue.

Max kneels to use his knee as an impromptu writing desk. Seconds tick past. More than a minute passes. Hemera’s face progresses through deepening shades of crimson as Max waits.

“Enough! I demand your answer now.”

“Not very polite to demand,” Max says. “I put great thought into my answer.” He hands her the card and pen.

She pushes a tiny button on the pen, and reading glasses spring out from somewhere. She holds them up to her face to read the handwritten message.

Damage defines the past, but not the future too.

I’m in a maze of twisty passages, none alike.

It is pitch black. I am likely to be eaten by a grue.

It is dangerous to go alone. Without support of you.

“Very poetic,” Hemera says.

Max nods.

Advice delivered through magic deed:

Beware the singular power that be.

Beware, the goddess of the light and greed,

And don’t believe everything you read.

It’s signed with an upward-pointing finger as Max’s middle initial.

Molly snickers, and Hemera’s face flushes. It can’t be healthy to have that much cortisol coursing through one’s veins.

“Very well,” Hemera says. She angrily punches a button on her phone. “Raze it to the ground, NOW,” she screams.

“You can’t do that!” Molly screams.

Hemera’s look drips with disdain. “Weren’t you listening, child? I do whatever I want.”

Molly balls her fists. “I’m not a child. You’re a horrible person. Go ahead and tear down my camp. At least you’ll never find the last trophy.” Her eyes go wide, and she covers her mouth.

Hemera puts two fingers to her lips and lets out two sharp whistles. “What do you know of the fifth trophy?” she asks, but doesn’t wait for an answer. Seconds later, a pair of bodyguards arrive.

“These two—in the limo,” she says. “We’re making a little trip back to the camp to watch the festivities.”

Rough hands grab both of them. These guys are strong; not a chance of a daring escape. At the limo, they remove Max’s backpack—still containing the node circuit board—and lock it in the trunk. Max and Molly are manhandled into the back, in a separate compartment from Hemera.

“Lockheed,” Hemera barks. The car leaps into action.

Less than block traveled, it stops.

“Why are we stopped?” Hemera screams.

“Obstruction, ma’am.” A light pole, a rare enough sight in this part of town, lies across the road. “Sorry, ma’am, let me go take care of it.” The cords in his arm look like steel cables as he struggles with the heavy streetlight.

Hemera mutters something about competence.

Max notices someone on the sidewalk, watching. He fights the urge to turn his head to look. Too obvious. On the opposite side of the road, also someone standing, watching, almost invisible in the dark. Someone who looks a lot like…

“Get down,” he tells Molly.

“Why?” she asks.

“Isidore!” Max shoves her below the level of the windows.

Glass shatters. The car rocks up on its side, teeters for a moment, then goes over, ending up on its roof. Inside, gravity seems to abruptly flip, tossing Max and Molly against each other and into the door and ceiling of the limo. Loose shot glasses and ice cubes rain down on them.

Molly cries out, more in fear than pain. “What’s going on?”

“Rescue,” Max says. “We need to get out.”

The outside window has a huge crack. Max braces himself and delivers an energetic kick. But the window must be bulletproof, because the cracks spread another few millimeters, but hold strong.

Molly looks around. “A small piece of ceramic would break the window.” Max wonders how she knows this. Having concluded the search, “Again,” Molly says.

Max obliges, and the window bulges outward. A third kick pops the whole window loose. Molly and Max scramble out.

Max looks around frantically. “Where’d Hemera go?”

“Fire in the hole!” somebody screams. Max has time only to yank Molly out of the way when another explosion rocks the street.

They stumble onto the dead grass alongside the road.

“Are you alright?” Max asks.

“My ears won’t stop ringing,” Molly says. “Echo. Echo. Yeah. That’s weird.”

“Did you see Hemera?” Max says. “We’re not safe with her on the loose.”

“That, my young friend, may be one of the greatest understatements of the year,” says a new voice, gentle, and with an accent from somewhere in the British isles.

“Isidore?” Max asks.

“At your service.” His voice has a polished quality rarely heard of late in Silicon Valley. “We detected the signal drop from the beacon and we got here as quickly as we could. I’m sorry we didn’t make it sooner.”

“Who’s we?” Max asks.

“You’re bleeding!” Molly exclaims, and dabs at a line of blood running down Max’s face.

Max puts a hand to his face and it comes back smeared with fresh blood on top of the dried blood. “I don’t even feel it.”

“We’ll get you taken care of,” Isidore says. “We need to get you talking to our network techs as well.”

“There’s more of you?” Max asks.

“There is an entire movement, my good boy. And now you’re part of it. Your girlfriend too.” Max’s cheeks grow warm, but if Isidore notices, he doesn’t comment. “Welcome to the resistance.”

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