The Leveller (3 page)

On a nearby stage a choir of Meeple sing a jazzy version of “Jingle Bells,” then segue into “Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow” as synchronized fluffy white snowflakes fall from the ceiling. Elves from the fantasy templates stroll through the crowd, passing out sample potions and discount coupons. Every item in every store in the Landing will be “on sale” for the next month, guaranteeing billions of dollars of profit for MeaParadisus Inc.

Not bad for selling the equivalent of the emperor's new clothes—exactly nothing, in other words.

But MEEP shoppers won't care. It's like Diego Salvador, the MEEP's zillionaire founder, says: “They're paying for the
experience
.” And he has a point. Compared with shopping in a real-world mall, the Landing is a cakewalk. First of all, the Meeple walking around are all good-looking and cheery, every single one of them. No whiny tots, no disgruntled husbands, no peevish mothers, no obnoxious tweens. Additionally, no lines, no waiting, no schlepping—your purchases go right into your virtual storage locker.

I spend the next hour checking out all the special features so I can report back to Dad. I visit Santa, who lets me choose a gift from his workshop. (I pick night-vision contact lenses—awesome.) I participate in the gift exchange, where you can donate something from your inventory and get a surprise gift in return. I donate the size-D breast enlargement I'd purchased earlier and happily get an ultra crossbow in return, which I can't wait to try out on my next quest.

I play a bunch of mini-games: Reindeer Racing, Chimney Toss, Snowman Slalom, etc. I kiss Lancelot under the mistletoe at the courtyard King Arthur Yule Party (what can I say, I'm a very thorough beta tester), then check out the
Joyeux Noël
runway show, where all the latest wardrobe options are being modeled. Some of the new medieval dresses are pretty cool and I try some on for fun. One of them actually looks halfway decent on me, so I put it on my Wish List. With my no-curves body and dirty blond hair, I make a pretty convincing wench. Who needs enhancements?

I check the timer and see that I've only got fifteen minutes left, so I head for the main control panel at the Information Desk. MeaParadisus prides itself on “global awareness,” so if you're not into the whole Christmas thing, you've got options. I press the H
ANUKKAH
button, and immediately everything's decked out in dreidls and stars of David, the blue-and-white-robed choir belting out Hebrew tunes. I press the rest of the buttons in turn—K
WANZAA
, W
INTER
S
OLSTICE
, B
ODHI
D
AY
, and so on—and watch the scenery change before me like a fast-forward movie montage.

The final button says H
OLIDAY
-F
REE
, which I assume just takes you back to the regular old Landing, but I have two minutes left so I push it anyway. In the blink of an eye, the decorations disappear, the Meeple choir is gone, the party's over. The Landing is blissfully calm and quiet, with only the tranquil burbling of the water fountain to break the silence.

I breathe in and enjoy the low-stim environment after two hours of overload, then jump out of my freaking skin when a huge banner unfurls in front of me. B
AH
H
UMBUG
! it says. I barely have time to read it before Santa crashes through the banner in his sleigh and an elfin flash mob starts singing “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer.”

At that point I crack up, even though the shock has nearly made me wet my virtual pants.

This little prank has Dad's handiwork all over it. If you
look hard enough, you'll find Vic Bauer's practical jokes hidden all over the MEEP, though they always manage to hit you when you least expect it.

The frequency code summons me back home and my eyelids flutter open. My dad, freshly showered, is on the sofa grinning at me.

I throw a pillow at him and grin back. “Good one, Dad.”

YESTERDAY, MORE THAN FIFTY MILLION PLAYERS LOGGED ON TO
MeaParadisus to shop the Black Friday sales. I think it's safe to say that Diego Salvador is officially richer than the Walmart guy, King Midas, and the pope combined. Mom and Dad are on their second bottle of champagne, having spent most of the day cooking up a belated Thanksgiving dinner now that Dad has emerged from his cave.

Moose and Chang have joined us, making short work of the feast and providing comic relief between obscene mouthfuls of turkey and stuffing. They take turns describing their battles in the MEEP and the custom armies they've created—armored beavers, winged Vikings, amazon samurai—each more absurd than the last.

I've not heard my parents laugh this hard in months. Moose and Chang aren't
that
funny, so my guess is that champagne functions as a humor accelerant; that, or my parents are just extra giddy about having a day off. Either way, it's a good time.

We've already done major damage to the homemade pecan pie when Dad tells us that he's been given $300 in MEEP money as a bonus for his overtime work on Christmas in the Landing. I immediately begin to rant about the grave injustice—the utter
ridiculousness
—of a fake-money bonus, but Dad puts up a hand to stop me.

“Not now, Nix,” he says. “Your mother and I have agreed to see only blue skies today.”

“But it's grayer than a school mop outside,” I protest. “Besides—”

“Zip, zip, zip,” Mom says, pretending to thrice zipper her own mouth, though she continues to speak nonetheless. “It's our day of thanks, Phoenix. Tomorrow we can go back to our usual complaints, but today let's just enjoy what we have.”

Dad reaches over and tugs my ponytail. “And that means the three of you have three hundred dollars in MEEP money to spend, while Jill and I take a long stroll by the river and pretend it's a gorgeous day in June.”

Moose and Chang hoot and bump knuckles at this sudden windfall.

“May your walk be filled with imaginary bluebirds and
daisies, Mr. and Mrs. B,” says Chang. “Thanks for all the treats today.”

Moose nods in appreciation and rubs his stomach. “Belly full of pie from Mama B, pocket full of MEEP green from Papa B . . . oh yeah, I am
feeling
the Thanksgiving love. You guys are awesome.”

I shake my head at my grinning parents. “You guys are
cracked
.”

“Indeed,” says Dad, bowing to Mom and taking her by the hand as if she's the queen of England. “Cracked as crackers. Now if you'll excuse us, the Premium Saltine and I will be off gallivanting and dreaming of Cheez Whiz for the remainder of the day.”

Mom gives us a courtly beauty-pageant wave. “Catch you on the
chip
side!” she calls as they exit the dining room.

Everyone laughs at her joke, even though chips have nothing to do with crackers, and Mom is obviously too tipsy to make the distinction. I laugh too, but make a mental note to hide the third bottle of champagne chilling in the fridge. Someone's got to keep her head in this family.

Half an hour later, Moose, Chang, and I lie sprawled across the living room couch, MEEP devices in front of us, feet propped on the coffee table. While clearing the dining room table and loading the dishwasher, we engaged in some serious debate
about how to divvy up the $300 credit. Now we're ready for playtime.

“Once again, to summarize,” Chang says, referring to his notebook, “solo battle against skeleton horde, one hundred strong. Two weapons each. Rapunzel's Tower. Thirty minutes. And steer clear of the Black.”

I roll my eyes. Lately, Chang's been obsessing about the Black, the empty space that supposedly surrounds the edges of the MEEP world, though I've never seen it, nor has he. Chang insists that the Black is dangerous, that it will fry your brain if you even touch it. I think Chang's been reading too many conspiracy theories—the kind of viral “news” manufactured by bored teens and internet trolls who like to incite hysteria for kicks.

“Yeah, Moose, watch out for Bigfoot too, I hear he'll rip your head off if you even make eye contact,” I say, nudging him with my elbow.

“Whatever,” says Moose, “I just want to know what my reward is when I beat the pants off you two scrubs.”

“Winner gets the last piece of pie,” replies Chang, ignoring my previous snark. “Losers scrub the pots and pans.”

Moose and I murmur our agreement as we fiddle with our device settings.

“Begin weapons draft. Nixy goes first,” continues Chang, like he's initiating countdown on a nuclear deployment.

“Ultra crossbow,” I say, eager to test my Christmas exchange gift in timed battle.

“Optic boomerang,” says Moose, pretending to fling one through the living room. “Gonna take the crack-a-lacking heads right off those boneheads, CR-ACK, CR-ACK, till they cry wee wee wee all the way home!”

“Explosive slingshot,” says Chang, oblivious to Moose's theatrics.

“Mage staff,” I continue, selecting it from my inventory.

“Double wrist daggers,” says Moose, slicing his hands through the air like a juiced-up ninja. “Gonna slice 'em to pieces, leave a pile of bones in my wake. Hope you suckers got your dish gloves ready.”

“Samurai kanabo,” intones Chang. “Ready in five, four, three . . .”

We each adjust our ear trans and when Chang says, “Go!” we clip them to our studs.

When I wake up, I run right through the Landing and out the door to Rapunzel's Tower. I've already equipped myself via the external settings on my device so I don't waste time going through my inventory now. Time is precious if I want to win, and I
always
want to win. I may not be a trash-talker like Moose or possess Chang's precision mind, but I have my own strategy that serves me well in the gaming world. On the outside, I play it casual, let the competition think I'm an easy mark, the first
man down in battle. On the inside, I'm a machine.

As I book it to Rapunzel's Tower, I hear the skeleton horde screaming their battle cries in the distance, though I can't see them yet. The tower's nothing but a tall, skinny stone turret, just like from the pages of a fairy tale, a popular choice for the timed battles we play.

We invented these mini-games after we got our MEEP piercings a year ago. Since the MEEP only offers a single-player option, there's no way for us to play together, like we did in the nonvirtual game platforms. They say a multiplayer MEEP is in the works, but due to various liability issues with the neuroscience involved, it'll be another year or two before its release. For now, “crisscrossing,” or playing across worlds, is a straight-up no-no except for licensed beta testers like me. And even I have to be careful about not abusing my beta code, or the MEEP admins will toss me out of the chowder like a bad clam.

Our mini-game rules, strictly enforced by Chang, go like this. First, we agree upon the constants: same setting, same enemy, same length of time, same number of weapons. Then we run a draft pick for the weapons—no overlap allowed, since they're the variables in the equation. Next, we place our wagers—losers pay for chili dogs at the Pound, winner gets to set rules for the next game, things like that—to stoke the competition. Finally, we battle, each in our own MEEP worlds. After the allotted time, we come back together and compare
notes. Whoever destroys the most enemies before dying (or if you're lucky, before time's up) wins.

Afterward Chang writes up the results in his game log to share with LEGION, his online MEEP Geek community. Those guys are all about the data and figuring out how to use it to hack the MEEP. They're probably responsible for the Black rumors too. According to LEGION, Diego Salvador is the Russian czar of the gaming world, and they are the rural peasants, trying to topple the empire brick by virtual brick.

Moose, on the other hand, couldn't care less about stats, efficiency ratios, or how to exploit glitches; he plays solely for bragging rights. And me? I love the rush it gives me, kind of like a runner's high, I suppose—that moment when I feel invincible, like there's no one I can't level.

At
this
moment, however, I'm far from
that
moment. The skeleton horde is now visible on the horizon, charging at me like a sea of rattling bones. I scoot inside and seal the door, then take the stairs two at a time until I'm at the top of the tower, where waist-high stone walls offer me protection on all sides. Even though you can't physically feel pain in the MEEP, your brain still registers all the emotions that go with imminent bodily danger: fear, anxiety, panic, and sometimes even exhilaration, as crazy as it sounds, especially if you have a bit of a masochist streak like Chang. Though certain enemies still freak me out—I've never been overly fond of anything that
may want to take a bite out of me, for example—I've logged so many hours in battle and “died” so many times that any dread I used to feel has mostly been replaced by anticipation. Right now I feel jittery, like my palms would be sweating and my heart racing in the real world, but pumped, too, for the fight to come.

I ready my crossbow and wait for the horde to come within range. As they near, I see that they're all dressed in ragtag fashion, like they've just popped into the Goodwill store on the way over. Some wear Civil War uniforms, others jaunty pirate hats and pantaloons; a few sport bridal gowns complete with flowered veils. Apparently, no regulation uniform is required in this oddball regiment. I like it. Even better, their weapons are all handheld: swords, clubs, and axes. Nothing projectile.

“Fish in a barrel,” I murmur under my breath, then
whoosh
, I loose my first arrow. A skeleton in a red fuzzy bathrobe goes down like . . . well, like bones in a bathrobe.

“One down, ninety-nine to go,” I say, pleased with myself, then quickly take down two more. My ultra crossbow is wicked fast, the perfect weapon at this height. The ragamuffin skeletons skitter around the tower, clamoring to get in. I pick them off right and left, my body working in perfect rhythm as I slide the arrows from my quiver, load, aim, fire.

I can taste the pecan pie now.

Even if Chang's slingshot and Moose's boomerang prove as
deadly as my crossbow, I know I've got better aim than both of them. The rush sweeps over me: I'm in the zone. “Nixy B. for the win,” I crow aloud. Right then, a skeleton wearing what looks like a toddler's sailor cap turns to the bonehead next to him and rips the guy's arm right out of its socket.

“Holy sh—” I start to yelp, but before I can finish the obscenity, Sailor Cap flings the dismembered arm bones at me. I duck, but it's too late, the arm too long. The bones hit me right between the eyes and knock me on my butt.

“That was
humerus
,” I joke to nobody as I stumble back onto my feet.

Though vexed the horde won't be dispatched as neatly as I'd hoped, I can't help but give a mental high five to the MEEP designer who programmed a big dollop of sassy into these skeletons.

I look down and laugh-snort at what I see next. The horde is working together to form a human—or undead, I should say—ladder up the side of the tower; all that's missing is the circus music and peanuts. They stand on each other's shoulders, three skeletons high on all sides, circling the tower like an overzealous cheer squad. They put our own high school cheerleaders to shame. Mindy and her crew always act a little too cool for school, if you know what I mean. In contrast, these boneheads have spirit, yes they do!

The spryer skeletons are now climbing the ladder, cracking
their comrades' bones with impunity as they use a rib cage here, a skull there, for purchase. I manage to ward off the first wave with some quick-fire crossbow action, but there are too many, too fast.

I whip my mage staff from the holster on my back and crouch down, tensely waiting for the second wave. One exhale is all I get before they come scrabbling over the stone walls like clicking white spiders. I jump to my feet and pivot-spin a full 360, taking off four skulls with my outstretched staff—
WHACK, WHACK, WHACK, WHACK
.

Not bad
, I think, stopping to catch my breath before the third wave arrives.

CLICK CLICK
, I hear behind me. My heart races as I twirl around, staff at the ready.

I'm face-to-face with my old pal, Sailor Cap, who clacks his big grinning teeth at me, then plunges his sword through my heart. Though I feel no pain, the force knocks me backward, and I drop my mage staff.

Fy fæn
.

Score one for the boneheads.

As I slump to the stone floor, my ear trans starts beeping at me, summoning me back to real life. I can't believe thirty minutes have passed so quickly—I would have guessed no more than fifteen—but then again, it's easy to lose track of time in battle.

When I open my eyes, my parents hover over me, staring into my face. I nearly jump out of my skin. “Jeez!” I yell, sitting up on the couch. “That's totally creepy! What are you
doing
?”

My parents look at each other, like they're trying to decide which one of them should answer. As I try to back away from their looming faces, I notice that Chang and Moose are still asleep on either side of me.

“Did you guys override my ear trans?” I ask, irritated by the parental intrusion. This really isn't their style. “And why are you back already?”

Mom clears her throat. “Phoenix, our boss just called—”

Uh-oh
, I think.
Too much unauthorized bounty hunting. They're shutting me down
. “Little boss or big boss?” I ask, turning to my dad.

“
The
boss,” he says. “Very very big big boss.”

“Diego
Salvador
called?” I ask. My mind is whirling. Surely the MEEP's head honcho doesn't deal with small-fry levellers like me. That's what minions are for. “So what did he want? Are you both getting huge promotions?” I ask and fake a smile, though I know that's definitely not the case. My parents look way too serious for this to be good news.