Ready Player None

Chapter 7.2 - Kate "Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word"

I can fix this.

Yes, I know; you don't have to tell me. Things have gone wrong, and it's all my fault, and I'm very, very sorry about what I did. I'm not stupid, I just *did* something stupid. But I'm done crying about it, and I can fix it. I can find a way to restore his account without him ever knowing it was me that added the hacked one and got him in such trouble.

I just need a moment to think.

I have enough credits to cover the bills Alex showed me, and could probably figure out a way to explain their existence without actually explaining their existence. But he says somehow that's not enough, we've also got to find someone at Community One who can help us fix things on that end. I've already sent out messages to all my friends, trying to find one who lives there, so far without any luck. Rache and Niki would probably crawl to C1 if I begged, but I'm not going to let this situation get worse than it already is. Outside travel is not as dangerous as everyone makes it seem, if you are prepared for anything, and travel mostly at night. But neither of them understand what real preparation means. I do. If anyone is going to go there, it will be me.

But hopefully it won't come to that. Hopefully I can find someone that I trust to act on our behalf with a stunning amount of saved credits, even though they could take the whole thing and walk away without a single negative repercussion. To them, anyway. Lots of negative repercussions on our side.

It's going to take some serious planning, and I'll have to stay four or five steps ahead of Alex, but I can fix this.

Tapping away on my ahaptic, I almost missed her message.

"I live in Community One, Kate." It was Mnemosyne, the shy girl. Not exactly my first choice, but any port in an Armaggedon-level meteor storm.

I connected voice-only, which would hopefully allow me to get my points across without making her feel threatened. "You do? That's spectacular! If you've got a moment, there's a few things I need to explain about what's going on."

"I have some time to talk with you. The house is quiet right now." I had thought her avatar was timid and quiet, but her real voice sounded like a baby mouse with a tomcat sniffing at the doorhole.

I caught her up on the situation with Alex's account, skipping over a few unimportant details like how it happened, and which person specifically could be blamed for all of it. "So, what I need is to find someone I can trust that lives where you do. I'm guessing that you're not yet an adult, right?"

"No. I'm only 8."

"That's fine. It just means I need you to find someone like that for me. Could you talk to your parents?" I asked.

"It's just our mommy. She takes care of me and my brother by herself."

I was trying desperately to control myself and be patient, but was also about to start tearing my hair out. "That's fine, honey, you still have one parent more than I do. Could you talk to her, and see if she can help us?"

"You said it should be someone you can trust?"

"Yeah," I replied. "There is lots of money involved, and if this doesn't work out, or someone steals the money, things could get really bad here."

"Could you die?" she asked, voice quivering audibly.

"We won't, as long as someone can help us." It was a lot to put on a small child, but I wanted her to be able to explain the importance of helping us to her Mom, even if it meant stretching things just a bit.

"Ok, I'll go get her."

I could hear her running away from the device she was using, calling for her mommy, then the connection went silent. A few minutes later she spoke again, and was being prompted by someone I couldn't hear, hopefully her mom.

"She says she might be able to help, but wants to know what happened with Alex."

Umm, okay. Let's dance, Mnemosyne's Mom. "Well, Alex thinks someone hacked his sim pod and added a second account. Someone in Community One figured out the second account wasn't being paid for, and had his normal account suspended. We only have a short time to fix it before we will start having problems keeping the House." All 100% true.

"She says, did Alex really get hacked?"

"I think so." Well, I think he did, because I know he did. By his kid sister.

"She says, does Alex play in tourna.. what is it again, Mom?.. tourn-a-ments with the illegal account?"

Wow, this woman did her homework. Divert all power to the forward shields. "It's possible." How would I know what he does in his pod when I'm not around?

"Do you play in online tournaments, Kate?"

"Well, my main avatar is very low level, and I don't run in a big guild, so it would be real difficult to do that." Dancing on razor blades with that one, but all true. It was real difficult, I'm just real awesome and do it anyway.

"She says, and you can't fix it yourselves because you and Alex live alone and don't have any parents."

"Well, we do live alone, just the two of us, and our parents are probably alive, but are in a medical coma while they recover from their community work assignment." I'm not sure if Mnem's mom knows about that side of immigrant life. I wasn't supposed to know. I was supposed to think they were just "away" for awhile.

"What's a medical coma?" Mnem asked, clearly for herself. I explained it to her. "She says, so what do you want us to do?"

"I need you to go to someone in Community One, get them to accept a form that will arrive via overland courier, and then pay the fees for the account to remove the suspension. We can transfer the credits from my account to yours, but it's a lot of money. A *lot* of money."

Mnem was silent for a few moments. "Ok, she's gone. She says that she'll talk to some people about the account, and see if it can be fixed. She will contact you with what she finds out."

"That's great news. I really appreciate it." See, I told you I could fix it. Screw you, Jesus of Consequences, and your pointed spikes.

Mnem still sounded hesitant and scared, despite telling me exactly what I had wanted to hear. "Kate, you need to know..." she trailed off.

"Yes, Mnem?" Silence. "What is it I need to know?"

"You can't trust her."