(A little late, a few thousand words short, and very messily put together.)
Rhys Franklyn had once had the biggest crush on Tamra Mors. It had started in elementary school. He couldn’t remember why he had a crush on her. There was something stubborn about her, a certain verve and zest for life that had made her more exuberant. Like the way she laughed with her whole body, or the angry furrow of her brow when the teachers tried to get her to listen in class, or the way sunlight always seemed to halo her like an angel. He had never personally been close to her, but they were friendly enough. They shared a lot of classes over the years.
And then she had gotten hit by the car, and wasn’t going to be there for the final year.
When he heard that some friends of hers were visiting her in the hospital, he asked to tag along. Apparently, she was going in for a surgery and they were going to wish her luck. He wasn’t sure how many she’d had so far, but it was some ridiculous number. He was looking forward to seeing her, to seeing how she was dealing with things. If there was one person he could imagine tackling such a situation head-on and overcoming it, it was Tamra.
So it was an absolute shock to see her in person.
Much of her upbeat brightness had faded – her hair hung listless, and the smile she flashed when they entered the room failed to light up her eyes. She answered questions slowly and didn’t seem very interested in their presence. He wondered if they had come at a bad time, if perhaps she was too drugged to deal with them. After one too many awkward silences, her friends had finally excused themselves and wandered out into the hospital hallway to navigate their way back to the parking garage. He could hear them chattering softly amongst themselves, just as disturbed by Tamra as he had been.
Rhys lingered at the door before leaving, wanting to say something to Tamra. He felt he had so much to tell her, so much he had always wanted to say and could never get out. He wanted to extend something to her, something that could give her hope. He stared at her, trying to work up the courage to speak.
She stared back at him. The lightless look behind her sunken eyes disturbed him. “It looks like you’re getting left behind,” she said to him.
He glanced down the hall where most of her friends had disappeared around a corner. Then he nodded, muttered an awkward goodbye, and let the door close behind him.
A week later she was dead. He still wasn’t sure what he should have said.
Even though the night didn’t last long in the game world, my brain perceived a full rest, and I woke feeling better than I had in a long time. I realized that the sound that had woken me was a gentle knocking at the door. “Whazzat?” Slate mumbled as it also woke, rolling out of the bed and thumping softly onto the wooden floor, its shape going momentarily flat from the impact. I slipped out of the bed and stepped past the floof, who was testing a few different shapes as it woke. Opening the door, I found myself face to face with the innkeeper, an older woman with greying hair and smile lines around her eyes. She smiled tentatively at me. “I’m sorry to have woken you, miss. If I recall, you’re an alchemist?”
I nodded, stifling a yawn. Of course. This must be the beginning of the game intro that James had told me about. He had said that it was a little different every time, but during my first stay at the inn, someone would approach needing a simple level 1 potion. During the intro they would talk extensively about the town’s need for an alchemist. “Yes, I am.”
“There is a woman here. She has a young boy that was injured just this morning while playing with his friends, and she was hoping that you were able to make a healing potion?”
“I should be able to.”
I followed the woman out into the hallway. Slate bounced along behind, still not fully awake, its face heavy lidded and sleep fuzzed. She continued to speak as she led me downstairs. “Our previous healer died last winter and we’ve had quite a shortage of potions and salves. It has made it quite hard for our little village.” I nodded. According to James, the game world could only accommodate three real players, one for each class. They could interact with each other if they wanted to and there were quests that could be completed together as a team, but it wasn’t meant to be a multiplayer game so that was completely optional. James had chosen the clerk class and apparently owned a store in town. Whenever someone chose alchemist or farmer, he would do his best to escort them to town and advise them to move on to another game world.
“What happens if they choose clerk, like you?” I had asked.
“A new version of this world and village gets generated for them,” James said. With a shrug, he added, “Then there’s no chance for me to help them, or anyone that gets generated into their game instance.”
At the bottom of the stairs, the old woman took me into a back room. “I have an alchemy table for you to use. It should be well stocked,” she said, gesturing toward the table. I nodded and approached it, pulling up the HUD and selecting the alchemy table’s menu. Slate bounced up on top of the table’s edge. The way it was reacting to it, I realized it could see the menu I was cycling through. Creating a potion was as simple as selecting the potion’s name and choosing to make it. A level 1 healing potion was already known for a beginner – as well as a basic poison’s antidote, and a hangover recipe. To find more potion recipes I would have to gather ingredients and mix them in different variations, but once the recipe was known I could create it without pulling up the individual ingredients.
I selected the healing potion, which queued up a set of basic actions for me to follow, and in a very short time I had a bottle of fizzy pale red liquid sitting before me. My understanding was that the potions leveled with your character level – as I got stronger, what I made would be more effective. I held the bottle up to the innkeeper, ignoring Slate’s ooh’s and aah’s at the final product. “Is this good enough?” I asked, feeling uncertain. It looked right, but I still strangely felt like I must have messed up at one point.
She smiled brightly, not seeming to sense my hesitation at all. She took the bottle and said, “Perfect! And what a wonderful color. You really know your stuff, don’t you?” Turning, she walked out of the back room. I followed, and she went to the tavern the inn operated. There were a few patrons inside at this early hour and the smell of breakfast foods was overwhelming. Just inside, there was a woman pacing, wringing her hands. A young boy sat on the edge of one of the tavern tables, wincing, his knuckles white as he gripped the table’s edge. His pants leg was tattered and covered in blood, but the wound was hidden from sight, which I was thankful for. The innkeeper handed the boy the bottle. “Here you go, dear. Bottom’s up, Timmy,” she said.
He closed his eyes and drank the potion, shivering almost immediately. I remembered with sympathy the full body chill I had gotten when I had used the healing potion the day prior. Slate bounced up onto the table, tilting it’s head to study the boy curiously, waiting for the effect. After a moment, his eyes popped open and he smiled – the color had returned to his face. He twisted and lifted his foot a bit, testing it, before jumping off the table. “Thanks!” he said, immediately dashing for the door.
His mother called his name, sounding exasperated. She turned to me and smiled, looking slightly embarrassed that her son had taken off like that. “Thank you so much,” she said, and then turned to follow after her son.
“Oooh, little Timmy didn’t die,” Slate said suddenly.
I frowned. “Where’d that come from?”
“Ancient internet lore,” the puff said solemnly.
The innkeeper launched into her spiel to convince me to maybe stay and help take care of the town. She was offering to let me stay in the inn for free if I used her alchemy table, and she would handle the sales for me and share the profits. I would have a daily quota of so many potions to make, after which I could use my free time to improve my skills, explore the area, and find more local ingredients.
I gave a noncommittal, “I’ll think about it,” and excused myself. Slate bounced along behind me as I stepped out of the inn and walked down the village street. The place was idyllic – now that I could access the menu, I could find the mini-map. There were little quests and objectives scattered about town. I stared at a man that walked by – he had a little objective marker over his head, marking him as a quest giver. He smiled at me as he passed. “Are you thinking about staying?” Slate asked as it bounced along beside me.
I shook my head. “It may be a really nice place, but anytime I step outside I’ll be in danger. We couldn’t even handle squirrels.”
Slate made little agreement sounds. “The squirrels…” it said somberly.
I paused and glanced over at Slate, wondering if it was going to continue what it was saying. It was frowning as it bounced along, lost in thought. “We’ll switch to one of the other games. I just wanted to walk around for a little bit. Besides, we have to wait until night time when we hit the Save Game option to be able to pull it up. At least, that’s what James said.” I stopped – we had reached the village limits. “So what do you want to do with the rest of the day? We’ve got a couple of hours to kill.”
“Think we could find James?”
“He said he was going to be out of town. And it’s not safe out there, so no.”
“Hmm.” Slate bounced up onto my shoulder. It didn’t weigh very much at all. “Pull up the mini-map again.”
“You can see that, huh?” I obliged, pulling up my menu and showing Slate the map.
It hummed an affirmative as it studied the map. “Maybe we should find a simple quest to do? Just to try it out?”
I looked at the markings on the map that showed the people in town. “Some of them might be asking us to do things that involve leaving town. Besides, what’s the point in getting attached to any of the characters or their stories if we’re leaving?”
“Hmmm,” Slate sounded thoughtful for a moment. “I really feel the need to push for you to do something here, but I don’t feel like it’s something I really want. More like an outside thing.”
“What does that mean?” I asked, a little alarmed at the statement.
“It says the farm is owned,” Slate said. Frowning, I tried to find what the poof was looking at. A store in town was highlighted green and said it was owned by Clerk. Similarly, a small blue patch of farmland just outside of the village was highlighted blue and marked as owned by Farmer. “Didn’t James say he was the only player here?”
I stared for a long moment at the map. Glancing around, I could see that there were multiple alchemy table icons scattered around town, including the one in the inn. Apparently I could set up shop in any of the areas shown. But none of them were highlighted or marked as owned. “Maybe it’s a glitch?” I wondered out loud. The farm wasn’t very far outside of town, but I was hesitant to go to it.
“DONUTS!” Slate shouted suddenly, bouncing off in loud boings! of excitement. Distracted, I closed out the menus to focus on what Slate was doing. It was bouncing toward a food cart that was indeed selling donuts.
“Wait,” I called after it, “We don’t have any money!”
A few hours later, the short day had already passed us by. I told the innkeeper I’d have an answer by tomorrow, somehow feeling too nervous to simply say no and disappoint this unreal person. I settled back into the room. The Save Game option prompted as I sat on the bed, and I selected the Switch option at the bottom. Apparently this was going to be replaced with a Quit option for the actual game environment, but since it was still being tested purely by recently dead brains, there was no real exit. Slate bounced into my lap and I placed my hands on it – the texture of its skin reminded me of a squishable fidget toy. Despite myself, I kneaded it absentmindedly, and it made little sounds of contentment. The room faded around me slightly and text hovered over. [Change worlds?] the text said. I stared at it and then sighed.
“Yes.”
[Choose your world: a hack and slash fantasy game, a rollicking space adventure, or a modern day life sim! You also have the option of a survival horror game.] I shivered as I was reminded of that option. How many had chosen to go into survival horror not knowing that their deaths… or rather, their afterlife deaths… would be permanent? James had recommended the life sim on the basis that it was harder to die in those, though he had warned it wasn’t impossible. He had mentioned that the fantasy and sci fi games did have battles, and probably wouldn’t be recommended.
It was boring, but boring meant safe, and I had no intention of dying again. “Modern day sim,” I said.
[Before you leave, please provide detailed feedback on your experience with our isekai game test environment.]
I left a very long, very angry complaint about squirrels.
Boring proved safe. The first few weeks in the life sim game were kind of an adjustment, but the game wasn’t significantly different than any other life sim I had played or heard about. I was a little alarmed initially when I found that characters could age and eventually die, but after messing with the settings I found that there was an option to turn off aging. It was possible to live here seemingly forever. I focused on leveling skills, and got a job. In order to fit into the environment better, Slate took on the appearance of a cat – but owing to its already less-than-fuzzy nature, it looked quite a bit like one of those hairless hypo-allergenic monstrosities. Maybe only slightly cuter.
This game left multiplayer as an option also, which I had turned off at first. I was mostly uncomfortable with the idea of dealing with people, but after the thousandth time of having the same garbled conversation with an NPC coworker, I decided to turn it on.
In the original single player instance, I couldn’t travel far from my own yard without triggering a fast travel option that took me to specific locales, like work or the gym or a park. I was standing just inside my front room and staring out the window when I turned on multiplayer. Before my eyes, the game world extended. The street stretched beyond my property, and other houses came into view. I realized that they belonged to other players.
There was someone watering a garden in their front yard in the house immediately next door to mine – a young woman, only a few years older than me. Or at least she appeared to be only a few years older. It was possible to change one’s appearance here, and I looked like a slightly older version of myself as well. She looked up curiously as my house appeared, and raised a hand to wave at me where she could see me in the window. Alarmed, I ducked out of sight. Immediately after doing so, I placed my face in both hands. Why? Why had I done that? Why couldn’t I just wave back like a normal human being?
Fuck.
I sat and stewed in existential angst for a moment. I had been a social kid, popular but not too popular, I got along with most people at school. But the entire hit-by-car experience, followed by a long stint in and out of hospitals, and then actually dying, had apparently all killed my normal skills. As I sat agonizing over what my next steps should be, there came a knock at my door.
I ducked up, just enough to try to peek out the window to see who it was. The young woman who had waved was standing there. Ignoring the internal screaming, I forced myself to stand, straightened out my shirt, and then opened the door. “Hello?” I said.
She smiled widely at me as I greeted her. “Hi! You must be new. Or at least new to multiplayer?” I nodded and stepped back to let her in. She did, glancing around curiously at the décor that I’d chosen. “My name is Anastasia,” she said.
“I’m Tamra. And yes, I’m new.” Slate slinked into the room from down the hall to investigate what was happening.
Anastasia’s eyes widened just slightly at the sight of the poofball-turned-cat. “Very new, I see. You’ve got a BOAI?”
I frowned, glancing over at Slate. It sat, grooming itself and pretending not to listen. “Is it unusual to have one?”
“They’re usually paired with more intact personalities. Even with the advances they’ve made with body preservation post-death, it’s hard to find a mind that hasn’t been fractured or confused in the hours after death.” Anastasia sat on the edge of the armchair, watching the cat carefully. “There’s a rumor that the people they give them to are also serial killers, so be careful.”
I gaped at her openly. “Serial killers?” I had been about to ask a million questions about literally anything else but that had derailed me completely. “Serial killers?” I repeated, staring at Slate.
“Black Hole Entertainment supposedly have been communicating with players through them. Usually there’s not a lot of direct interaction. Most people that show up in the games just want to live in peace, and once you find out death is permanent, naturally you avoid the more dangerous games and game areas. But that doesn’t benefit the programmers. They need players to die in game.”
“They need us to die?” I sat down in an armchair. “Why?”
“To know whether we’re really dying or not. Think about it – the end goal is to sell the game to regular living people, who they don’t want dying in game. Can’t kill the consumer. But they want immersion gaming to be as detailed as possible, so at the beginning of testing they started the game with 100% immersion. When we die testing the environments without regenerating where we’re supposed to, they step back the immersion rating incrementally. They’ve been testing for about a year now, and we’ve been knocked back to 92.56% immersion, last any of us have been able to hear. It might be lower now. But then their ability to test slowed considerably, even with as many users as they have – because we caught on, and we stopped playing.”
I nodded dumbly as she spoke. All that made sense. I realized how naïve I had been to think that I might be able to live here for as long as I wanted. The game developers wouldn’t want us to. They needed us to die.“So where does the serial killer part come in?” I asked numbly, glancing at Slate.
“It’s just a rumor. I don’t even know how true it is.” Anastasia looked temporarily embarrassed. “But I guess you need to know it’s what some people think, if you’re going to start interacting in multiplayer.” She hesitated a moment, taking a deep breath. “The BOAI are supposedly here to make deals and convince the players they follow to murder other players. This helps Black Hole advance their testing, letting them know if they need to step back the immersion another step.”
I eyed Slate warily. Slate lifted its head and shrugged at me. “If that’s true, I don’t know anything about it,” it said. “I sometimes have a feeling that I need to get you to interact with the game in certain ways more, but I can ignore that feeling.” Slate turned to look directly at Anastasia. “I do what I want,” it said confidently. A very fitting statement, given its current cat form.
Anastasia chuckled nervously. “I see.”
“What is a BOAI anyway?” I asked, remembering some of my earlier questions.
“Biologically Originated Artificial Intelligence,” Anastasia answered.
I paused, waiting for her to elaborate, but she seemed to think that was answer enough. “Umm? Well? What does that mean?”
“I have no idea,” she said confidently.
“Okay. Cool.” I sighed. “What about what you said about intact minds? What does that mean?”
“Your brain is well preserved. You likely have all of your memories and personality preserved.”
I studied her curiously. “Do you not?” I asked.
She gave a thin-lipped smile. “Most of us don’t.”
“Oh.”
She stood, making her way to the door. “I won’t tell anyone about your BOAI, in case you want to hide it. It gives you something to think about, whether you want to stay or not.” I watched her as she hesitated at the door, wondering how much I could trust her. She turned to glance back at me. “Regardless of rumored serial killers, I do need to warn you that there is one real one here. No one knows which game he’s currently in though.”
“A real serial killer?”
She nodded. “He used to work for Black Hole Entertainment before he died, so he has a lot of knowledge about the game. And there have been so many deaths in his wake… it’s pretty damning. So it’s best to beware of him. His name is James Lear.”
I spent the next hour numbly working on growing one of my skills as I thought about everything that Anastasia had said. Slate sat, watching me with its head tilted, its tail swishing. “Do you think it’s the same James?” it asked after a moment, as though reading my mind.
“It couldn’t possibly be. Right? I mean, why not just kill me?”
Slate narrowed its eyes, a mischievous light glinting as it smirked. “He saw me and realized that you were a future serial killer set on achieving the same goal.”
I stopped and turned my head to regard the cat, narrowing my eyes at it.
“I’m joking.”
“If you say so.” Still, none of that stopped the nerve-wracking twists my stomach was taking. “Do you think we need to go back to single player? What if someone decides to kill me first?”
“Oh? Kill you first? Are you planning to kill someone then?”
“No!” I sighed. I aimed a very critical look at the BOAI. “You’re not going to try to convince me to kill people now, are you?”
Slate became suddenly quite somber. “No, Tam-Tam. I’m not sure I’m meant for that, but even if I was, I wouldn’t want to.”
“Why not, if it’s what you’re programmed for?”
“I don’t feel like I’m just programming,” Slate lifted its chin into the air, and stomped a front paw in irritation. “Not at all!” I frowned as I looked over the red-hued cat, wondering what it meant to be ‘biologically originated.’ What was the biological part?
mehryment 