Microstory 2791: He’s Being Paranoid, No One is Coming

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Jande bolts. He does not wait to see who shows bloodthirst in their eyes. He does not ask questions, or hope to hear other people’s questions. He just takes off, needing to put as much distance between him and anyone who might want to see him dead. Van and the producers are truly sick, not only allowing deaths to occur, but actively encouraging murder. How are they getting away with this? Killing is illegal in the stellar neighborhood, and very illegal on the Core Worlds. It might be a clue that people aren’t really dying, or an old law is so ironclad that it’s a loophole no one can argue against. Either way, he just wants to survive. Even if it means he’ll never be Superintendent, he would rather at least keep living.

They’re still in the vector stadium, though it’s empty of its audience. Everyone is watching at home now. There is almost certainly plenty of smart dust tracking his every move. He doesn’t have the equipment to destroy it. It’s part of the competition, seeing him make it through...or not. He makes it out of the stadium, though. He isn’t looking back because it will only slow him down for precious fractions of a second. If someone catches up to him, there is no point in seeing it coming.

Jande is in the parking lot now. It’s pretty dead, but there are a few random ancient land vehicles scattered about. They may have placed them here strictly for ambiance, which could mean they’re non-functional. But they could also be the means of widening that gap between him and his opponents. But which one to choose? He doesn’t know much about obsolete Earthan tech, but some of these look nicer than others, which implies they would be faster. Is that a trap? Should he choose the boxy-looking one with peeling paint? Or did the producers guess that he would pick that, so they intentionally discharged the battery. Do these damn things even run on electricity?

Oh, it’s a crapshoot. Now he does turn around, but immediately feels a shiver down his spine. Since he didn’t stick around, he doesn’t know if Van provided the other candidates with weapons. They could have bows and arrows, guns, or even rocket launchers. He has no clue. His only hope has not changed since the moment Van said go. Jande has to let his instincts take over, and pick a car without thinking about it.

He runs over to a sweet cherry ride. The door is unlocked, which is either very good for him, or the trap he was worried about. Nope, it doesn’t matter. Always forward, never back. He slides inside. It feels so good, the seat wraps around him perfectly, like the designer knew he would be the one to drive it. Maybe they did. Who knows how long they have been planning? Even if this is a real model from the olden days, the producers could have commissioned a synthwright to modify it, knowing he would be right here, right now. Again, it doesn’t matter. He just needs to make it go. How do you do that?

Jande stares at the console before him. There aren’t any buttons or levers. It’s just a smooth, curved surface. He looks to his left. “Oh. That makes sense.”

Jande climbs back out of the car, takes another look towards the stadium, feels another shiver, then jogs over to get into the driver’s side of the vehicle.

“Welcome to your new Starburst,” the AI voice says in what he has heard described as an Australian accent. “Where would you like to navigate to? Or if you would like, you may browse Aevum’s comprehensive library of entertain—”

“Just get me out of here as fast as you can,” Jande interrupts.

“Posted speed limits require that I travel no faster than ten miles per—”

“Manual mode,” Jande demands.

“Sir, I really must discourage—”

“Manual mode!” Jande screams.

The engine engages. The steering wheel adjusts itself to Jande’s dimensions. A little graphic tutorial appears on the central screen, showing him the basics of how to operate it. It’s not all that different from the vehicles he uses on the farm. The pedals are new, but they look intuitive. And when he presses down on one of them with his right foot, it feels so intuitive too. It feels like this car has been waiting for him since it was invented. It doesn’t even lurch. It knows exactly what he wants from it, even though he’s quite inexperienced. He starts out by taking it a little slow, but he can’t afford to wait much longer. He takes one more look in the rearview mirror, and then he guns it.

He finds the parking lot exit to the main road, and then the highway. They don’t have much infrastructure like this anymore, but if you’re looking for it, the early colonies are the place to check, especially Thālith al Naʽāmāt Bida. They pride themselves in being low-key and low-tech when luxury is not necessary. Many worlds are building out their vactrain network, but it doesn’t really fit the naturistic vibe of this one. The highway doesn’t either, but it looks fresh and new. He still doesn’t know what continent they’re on, but this could be a closed course built specifically for the game.

Jande is smiling now, realizing how many miles he’s putting behind him. It slowly fades, though. There were other cars in that lot. Maybe none of them was a trap. Maybe they were there to even the playing field. He should have taken the time to disable them. Of course, he wouldn’t have known exactly how to do that, but he could have brute forced it by crashing one car into all of the others before absconding with the only good one. Then again, that would have taken a lot of time. Those people don’t likely know how to drive either. They live in the same time period. Even if they were alive when self-driving was more common, they probably lost those skills. Or he’s just kidding himself, because there are plenty of simulations—both physical and virtual—that will teach you legacy skills like this. The fact is, he is no better off than he was before. All he can do is keep going and hope to run the timer out. Except...the road abruptly ends.

It just stops. There are three little lozenge-shaped signs in a row, sticking out of the ground where the asphalt meets the grass. Jande stops the car and gets out. There was nowhere to turn off for miles and miles. If he tries to double back, he could wind up running into someone who is trying to kill him. The grass is tall, this thing won’t be able to make it through. One of the cars in the lot looked like it was some kind of off-roader, but what you get in versatility, you sometimes lose in speed, and he wanted to go fast. The producers knew this. They knew exactly what he would choose, and they designed the path so he would lose no matter what. There were a number of ways he could have gone, but they probably all end like this. It was inevitable.

Jande shakes his head, disappointed in how they rigged the game. He checks the trunk for supplies, but finds nothing, so he reties his shoes, prepares himself mentally, and walks into the woods. He doesn’t stop moving save for periodic five-minute breaks. He doesn’t want to lose any lead he might still have.

He’s exhausted, but he never lets himself sleep. While he’s delirious and moving quite slowly, a drone descends from the sky right in front of his face. “Sudden Death contest is over. You won, Jande Ter Avest. All other candidates forfeited.”

Microstory 2766: Winner’s Circle

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It begins as a pinprick of consciousness as Elise becomes acutely aware of the passage of time, even though there are no external stimuli. She isn’t truly thinking about anything. She is only mindful of her own ability to think. At first, she believes there might be a tiny light before her, but it may simply be her imagination...but does she even have an imagination anymore? She tries to come up with other things to occupy her mind, but nothing comes. She can’t even articulate in her head an idea of what ideas she should be able to come up with. No categories of thoughts, no things, no things to do or have done. She is nothing more than a thinking thing. A thinking thing called Elise. So that’s something at least. She is someone. She is a someone with a name, and if she has a name it must mean there are other someones with their own names. But who?

Elise quietly screams at her own brain. Wake up. Think. Think about something, anything. It doesn’t have to be important, it doesn’t have to be major. Don’t just sit here in the silence like a moth in the dark. A moth? What is a moth? It must be something, or she wouldn’t have a word for it. What is a word? What are things? What is anything? Go back to the moth. A moth is...a moth is something that is. It’s something that...flies. It has wings. Flying wings. And hair and eyes. Elise should have eyes. She has seen things before. She has seen moths. She has smelled the hot and cold nights as the weather transitions from summer to autumn. There she goes thinking about more things again. This time, it’s the seasons. There are two others: winter and spring. Spring is her favorite. Tofu is her favorite food. She eats. She is a person. She has a mouth.

She is Elise Perkins and she is in a race. No, an expedition. A quest? No. It’s a hunt. It’s a treasure hunt. She is a treasure hunter. Her name is Elise Perkins, Treasure Hunter. She has a mouth, a nose, and lucky her, two eyes. Also two ears. She’s hearing something. She’s hearing something with her ears. It’s...it’s talking. Other people. Other people with names. She can hear them. She can hear, but she can’t see. Why? Eyelids. She opens. Still dark, but less dark. A hint of light. Light behind...a visor. Her mouth, it doesn’t only eat. It also speaks. It screams. “Help!”

The visor slides away.

“Elise?” someone asks. “Elise, can you hear me? Are you there? Elise!”

“She opens her mouth but the words won’t come. Who said that? It sounded like the way Elise sounded like when she could sound like something. But she doesn’t sound like anything because when she opens her mouth, the words won’t come out.”

“You can’t use your mouth,” a different person claims. “You don’t have an airway anymore. But the helmet can convert your thoughts into sounds. Just think what you want to say, and it will come out. Go ahead and try again,” they encourage.

“Rubber baby buggy bumpers,” the helmet says. “Gina Linetti Spaghetti Confetti.” A face. Elise’s famous two eyes have adjusted to the light and can see when there is something that isn’t light. “That is definitely a face. It’s a very pretty face. She used to know what to call it. Whatever the face’s name, Elise may be falling in love with it.”

The face smiles. “Thank you. My name is Rage. You are Elise Perkins.”

“I know that,” Elise replies. “I am Elise. I have a face. I have a head. Do I have anything else?” She tries to tilt her chin down, but it won’t move. She can’t move at all.

Another person sighs. “You don’t have anything else. You only have a head.”

“Mino? A little more tact?” someone says to the person who has no tact.

“It’s okay,” Elise insists. “I am Elise Perkins, Treasure Hunter, a.k.a Ladymoth. I don’t need anything more than a head, because my head is where I do all my thinking.”

“Do you remember what happened?” the Rage face asks.

“I remember...” Elise begins. “I remember ice.”

“There was ice on the track during the race,” Rage confirms. “You sacrificed yourself so that your friend, Jolanda could make it across the finish line. You managed to defeat the last automated racecar, so she didn’t have to get there quickly. She had time to get out of her car, find your head, and carry it across with her. Now we’re in the winner’s lounge. Only six of us could win. I’m not sure what that means for you yet.”

“We’re not sure what this means for any of us,” Zelda adds. Yes, that’s Zelda.

Elise’s memories are starting to come back to her now. She feels like she’s becoming herself again. They lounge there for about an hour. The normal humans eat while Elise focuses on her recovery. The Custodians are not letting them out of this room, or they would seek medical attention for her. For now, she’s sitting on a snack table. Watching her friends talk is helping a lot. After they’re done eating, she finds that she’s pretty much back to her old self. She is centuries old, so there are a ton of memories that have not yet resurfaced, but they’re not paramount to her core.

While they’re just sitting around doing nothing, the lights begin to flicker. It’s not like a lightbulb is burnt out, though. It’s clearly intentional, like the theatre warning the audience that intermission is over. Out of the corner of her eye, Elise can see the door open, though she’s not at the right angle to see who. She needs her legs back.

“Hello,” comes the voice of a man. She recognizes it, but can’t place it.

“Hello,” Colley says, intentionally positioning himself directly in front of Elise.

“Please, Mister Rochelle.” Hrockas, the owner of the planet. That’s who this is. “Do you honestly believe that I am not cognizant of the severed head you’re keeping on the table? If I didn’t want death survival to be an option, I would not have commissioned those helmets in the first place. The plan was to keep any heads in their comas while the winners moved on, then transfer their consciousnesses to their respective backups so they could recall as much of the hunt as they were here for.”

Colley steps off so Elise can see. “We can’t trust you. You’re not taking her.”

Hrockas nods. “Now that you have reinitialized her, taking her is no longer a decent option. The reason we left you in here for so long is the producers and I needed to figure out how to move forward. The truth is, not anywhere near this many was expected to survive. Some of the bots were easy, but some were hard. You destroyed them all, and through a loophole, managed to keep your entire group together on the other side. It’s impressive, I admit. But the challenge we had planned will no longer work. Funnily enough, however, the challenge reward is now more relevant than ever.”

“Whatever the reward,” Jolanda says, “it’s not worth it if Elise can’t compete.”

Hrockas smiles. “That’s the irony. The sudden death challenge is quite literal. Whoever wins, dies...and will be given a superior substrate. It would be cruel to force you to compete if the one person who genuinely needed it stood no chance. That’s what we had to change. Now it is no longer physical, but a contest of wits. Elise has a shot.”

“I forfeit the challenge,” Colley volunteers immediately.

“That’s fine,” Hrockas says, “but it comes with a penalty for the next challenge.”

The others forfeit too. Elise is getting a new body.