"Jane! You're never going to believe this!" I barge into her dorm. She's brushing her waist-length hair.
"Shouldn't you be at school?" She holds her hair in pigtails with her fists to decide if she likes the look.
"That's not the point." I sigh. I take a quick glance outside the door, checking to make sure no one is listening. "This place isn't real!"
She sighs and looks at me. "Whisper, have you been taking your medication?"
"That's not the fricking point!" I fling my arms around. "Jane, none of this is real! I saw it! I saw the real world... it was..." I pace around the room. No amount of exaggerated hand gestures or sound effects could describe what I had seen. "People line the walls. Half-dead. Goggles strapped to their heads like the ones we used to have with our VR set. There were people there, like us, alive. They were telling me about it. Jane, you have to believe me!"
She stares at me, concerned. "Whisper..." she speaks slowly, "I'm not saying I don't believe you..." she sighs, "but.. I hope you can understand why it's hard to think that it was real..."
I feel like I've been stabbed. By my best friend no less. "I'm being serious." I object. "I really am, Jane. This wasn't a schizophrenic episode."
Jane turns around to fix her glittery lip gloss in the backlit mirror above her dresser. "You're a great kid, Whisp, schizophrenia or no. Maybe you should schedule another appointment with your therapist? Up your dose?" She suggests. "You're starting to worry me."
"What?" I scoff.
"Whisper, this place is perfect, there's no way what you saw could be real. Nothing like that exists here." Jane assures me.
"It's not! Miss Harvey locked me and her daughter, Aliza in the car the day after she adopted me. Yeah, Aliza's her daughter." I chuckle at the thought. "She was going to kill us. She was talking to someone on the phone. Her mafia boss or something."
"Whisper..." Jane straightens up, "what are you talking about? Miss Harvey hasn't been in contact with you in months..."
"No, she adopted me two days ago, don't you remember? You helped me pack..." my voice kind of gets quieter and trails off when I see Jane's face.
"You're starting to worry me, Whisper." She gives me space as she walks around me. "Why don't you stay here... I'll get the Center's psychologist."
"No, wait!" I grab her arm. "Jane, you can't tell anyone."
Jane seems to fight for her very life to get out of my grasp. "Let go, Whisper!" Her hand catches me across the face. My grasp immediately loosens as I flinch back from her. I stare. She gasps, her hand coming to her mouth when she realizes. "I-I'm sorry. Don't grab me like that." My eyes hit the ground. I thought it was all behind me. The flashbacks. The hitting. The abuse.
"Sorry." I say quietly.
"No, no. That was my fault." She reaches out to give me a gentle touch in replacement of the slap. I flinch away from her, my unforgiving survival instincts telling me to run from her. She retracts her hand. "You wait here, okay? I'm gonna go get the psychiatrist." She leaves the room. I wait until the door shuts to open the window. Two stories between me and freedom.
"I'm so sorry, Jane..." I look hesitantly back at the door. Propping myself in the window, I look down at the glassy water of the pond beneath. Nothing like a little parkour after finding out the world isn't real, right? I take a deep breath and plunge. The minnows and sunnies disperse upon my arrival into their wet domain. I stay under the brown water until I feel the surface go still. I swim across to the safety of the park's trees.
I surface with a gasp. I walk ashore and turn back around. Jane is standing in the window with the head of security. What a traitor. I'm not crazy. I'll prove it somehow. I follow the little creek that leaks into the pond. It leads deeper into the forest.
"This is perfect." I chuckle. I'm cold, wet, frustrated, wrongly labeled, and back to square one with my trust in Jane. My life was just about to start looking up. That stupid group of kids ruined it.
As if on cue, I hear Lukas' voice in my head. "Hey, where you at?"
"Just shut up." I snap, sitting down at the base of a cedar tree when I feel that I'm far enough from the center.
"Woah, you're way out of bounds..." he says, "where in the world are you?"
"Just leave me alone. You people ruined everything!" I scold. I wipe my nose free of the mud and/or fish poop.
"What?" His tone lowers. "You didn't tell anyone, did you?"
"Just my sister." I shrug it off. "She deserves to know. But now my family thinks I'm crazy."
"Oh my god..." Lukas sighs, "I told you not to tell anyone. Why would you tell anyone?"
I fiddle with the pine needles. "I just explained it to you. What are you, stupid?"
"Alright," he sighs, "Anne and Ben are on the way to your location to get you. Just stay where you are... why are you moving... where are you going?"
"Canada." I reply sarcastically.
"Canada doesn't exist in the simulation." Lukas tells me.
"Ever heard of sarcasm?" I scoff as I shiver. The portal appears beside me and Ben and Anne jump out.
"Lukas told us you'd be here." Ben smiles at me. "He also told us that you told people about the sim."
"Can you people just leave me alone?!" I scold. "You've ruined everything!"
"Don't cry." Anne soothes. "Everything's gonna be okay..."
"I don't cry, sweetheart." I scoff. "Never have, never will." I look the both of them over. "What I'm not understanding is why you people feel like I even want to be a part of this."
Ben speaks up. "It's everyone's own choice wether or not to join us in taking down this awful place. But when you go around telling people inside the simulation, it causes massive glitches that are almost impossible to reverse. Not glitches that you can see, but ones you can't." Yeah, well no duh, Sherlock. If I can't see it, I can't see it. What an idiot.
"What do you mean?" I raise an eyebrow.
"The longer the simulation runs, the more people die. And when you tell other people about it that aren't ready to be woken up yet, it sends a surge through the system that cuts off all power to certain people's pods. The wires keeping them alive go dead and so do they." Ben explains it to me. "Now, luckily, you got yourself out of bounds before anything major could happen. NPCs virtually forget all about you when you leave the boundaries. And, since NPCs make up a large majority of the population, you didn't cause a whole lot of damage because you got out of bounds rather fast."
"Good on you for doing that." Anne nods with approval. How old even are these kids, I wonder. I mean like, Anne can't be any more than fifteen. Same with Ben. Danny's gotta be somewhere around my age. I'd have to look at Lukas again, but he seems to be slightly older than Danny.
"You people are crazy." I chuckle dryly. I pace around. "You people are dead crazy." I run my fingers through my wet, matted hair. "Look, okay, I'll join you guys. But no more hacking into my head, alright? No more showing up unexpectedly out of nowhere, okay? If I'm gonna play, you guys are gonna have to follow my rules." I fold my arms.
"Are you ever nice?" Lukas asks in my head.
"Lukas, get out of my head." I warn. I feel the familiar click that tells me he's gone.
"But, seriously, you can't tell anyone." Ben says.
"Not a soul, got it. I'm not dumb, I heard you the first time." I lean against an old oak tree. "Any other life-threatening situations I should be made aware of?"
"Don't let on that you know anything. The NPCs are programmed to eliminate any threats to the simulation's existence."
"I'm a threat to everything's existence, buddy." I chuckle as I fling my hair out of my face.
Ben scoffs. "Yeah, sure. Anywho, you also cannot, under any circumstances, trust anyone. The guy running the thing is on to us. He knows we exist."
"Got it. Big Boss Man'll throw a fit. Anything else?"
"No, that's about it." Ben shrugs.
"'kay, cool beans. Can I leave now?"
Ben and Anne look at each other. "I mean, yeah... I guess so..."
"Alright, see ya." I start walking away.
"Wait, so you're gonna help us?" Anne calls after me.
I turn and walk backwards. "Yeah, sure, why not." I shrug. I turn back around and roll my eyes. Yeah, no, I'm not joining their crazy cult. I mean, seriously, come on. How is a group of five kids going to take down what seems to be an entire empire. I snort to myself at the thought. Those kids are dead. But I'm gonna survive because I'm not gonna do anything about it. I'm gonna just go to the café and order a large pizza for myself like a normal person. And skip school. The usual. I stop by the laundromat and borrow someone's expensive-looking towel before heading towards the café.
"'ello, Whisper, love. What can I get fer ya, t'day?" Mister Peterson asks as he cleans the counter.
"The usual today, Peterson." I sit at the barstool. "Just put it on my tab."
"One large pizza an' a coke comin' right up." He smiles.
"Hey, look who it is!" James Carlton sits beside me. Xavier takes his place on the other side.
"It's dumb and dumber." I look at the two of them. "What do you boys want?"
"Nothin'. You still got that stupid picture?" Xavier adjusts the toothpick in his mouth.
I shrug. "Seriously? The picture again?" I snort. "You guys need new material. This is getting old" I lean against the counter. "What about the picture?"
"Does it still have that dumb note on the back." James nudges me.
"Don't touch me, Carlton..." I warn.
"Or what?" James chuckles as he shoulders me again.
"You wanna go, Carlton?" I roll up my sleeves. I'll fight them both right here. Nothing I haven't done before.
"You're gonna get your butt kicked, little girl..." Xavier warns. "Two against one, you don't stand a chance."
"Wow!" I chuckle. "I didn't know you knew how to count, Xavier!" That brings his fist across my face. I stand up and wipe the blood from my nose. I laugh. "That all you got?" I take a swing and catch him in the stomach.
Pain shoots through my arm from the wound Miss Harvey had given me. Never thought I'd be the one to forget being literally shot, but here we are.
"Not again!" Mister Peterson exclaims as I'm thrown into one of the tables. Ketchup and food bits go everywhere. James' hand presses against my collarbone, keeping me there.
"My goodness!" The woman at the table raises her hands in the air.
I recognize her. "Mornin' Miss Mayor." I nod a hello before James yanks me back up and into Xavier's waiting fist. I land flat on my back. I roll out of the way when Xavier tries to stomp on me. That was close. I let out a victorious laugh as I spring to my feet. I wind back my fist, but something stops my arm.
"What's going on here?" Lukas holds my arm back.
"What's going on here is that you're gonna let go of my arm before you get clocked." I seethe. Lukas lets go respectfully.
"Who's this, Whispy?" Xavier chuckles, looking Lukas' tall figure over.
"Nobody important." I scoff.
Lukas looks between James and Xavier. "You kids have a problem?"
"No. Do you?" James stands his ground. "We're just talking to our friend here."
"That didn't look like talking." Lukas towers over him.
"You don't speak the same language as us." Xavier shrugs.
"You good?" Lukas turns to me.
"I'm fine." I sit back down at the bar. "Thanks, Peterson." He hands me my coke in a to-go cup and my pizza box. James and Xavier continue arguing with Lukas behind me.
"You got a little..." Mister Peterson gestures to just below his own nose.
"Thanks." I grumble, wiping my sore nose with my sleeve. Another nosebleed. More evidence of another fight.
"Who are those guys." Lukas sits beside me after convincing Xavier and James to leave. I ignore him, taking a big gulp of my coke through the straw. The burning of the carbonated bubbles is so satisfying. "Hey, you gonna answer me?"
I turn to Lukas and fountain the mixture of coke and saliva out onto his shirt. It drips down the band logo and soaks him. "Have a good day, Milton." I nod as I grab my pizza box with one arm and the coke in the other. "Sorry about that, Miss Mayor. Won't happen again." I give her the twenty dollar bill I had swiped off of James' person. She looks at me with disgust as she hesitantly accepts it.
"Hey!" Lukas chases after me. "Hey, where are you going? I'm not done talking to you!"
"Mmm... yes you are." I continue walking, not stopping to wait for the traffic light to stop the cars. They've got brakes.
"Sorry, sorry! I'm sorry!" I hear Lukas saying to the angry drivers.
"Whisper!" Jane rushes up to meet me. She wraps me in a gentle embrace. "I'm so sorry." Her eyes are red and her makeup is smudged. "I'm sorry I didn't believe you."
I glance back at the approaching Lukas. "Maybe not here?" I suggest.
"Why? Who is that?" She holds me at arms' length. Her face drops when she sees my bruises. "Did he do that to you?"
"Nah. James and Xavier were at the café." I explain. "That guy's just been following me around all day." Jane pushes me behind her and takes a protective stance, as I expected she would.
"You have a problem?" Jane stands to her full height of five foot nine. She's tall.
"N..no..." Lukas looks at her with an intimidated face.
Jane looks him over. "That's what I thought." She turns around and grabs my arm. "C'mon, sis, let's go." Lukas takes a few steps in our path, then hesitantly lets us leave. "Do you know that guy?"
"Not in the slightest." I scoff.
"I'm so sorry I didn't believe you." Jane sighs.
"What do you mean?"
"When you left... it was like... like you never even existed. I got security into the room, but when they got there, they all forgot who you were." She shakes her head with disbelief. "I got lectured for calling security on an imaginary friend."
I snicker. "I don't put it past you." I kick a rock into the road and watch it pop as a car rolls over it. "Who knows, I could be a figment of your imagination. Oooh! Spooky!" I wave my fingers in her face.
"So we're good now?" Jane looks at the ground, her hazel eyes following the cracks in the sidewalk.
I shrug. "Sure. We're good."
"Whisper... I really didn't mean to... Y'know..."
"Yeah, I know you didn't." I assure her. "It'll take me a hot minute, but I'll be alright." Jane has a guilty look on her face. She tries to force a smile for me.
"Whisper!" Andy comes running across the street. "What the heck, dude? I thought we were gonna go skating after school the other day. What happened?"
I wince. "Ooh, sorry about that, A. I completely forgot."
"Nah, that's alright." He shrugs. What happened to your face?"
"Oh, this?" I gesture to my nose. "Carlton boys."
"Ah. I can go grab the gang and whip up on 'em if you'd like." Andy walks beside me and nods a respectful hello to Jane.
"It's all good, bro. Don't even worry about it." I nudge him. "Wanna come to basketball this evening with the peeps? Will that make it up to you?"
"Only if I can be on your team." He chuckles.
"Alright, then. Basketball tonight it is." I nod.
"And dinner afterwards?" Andy suggests.
"Only if you're paying, my guy."
"Of course, milady." He bows jokingly. "See you tonight, Whisp." He salutes.
Jane smirks at me. "He's cute..."
I shrug. "He's Andy. He's nice to everyone. Besides, I'm pretty sure he already has a girlfriend." I continue on my way to the center, my hands in my pockets.
Jane pulls me aside before we can reach the doors. "So tell me everything. Start at the beginning."
I blink at her. "Well... Miss Harvey came and adopted me on Wednesday, then I went to school on Thursday, had one of my episodes, but this time, it was, like, really bad." I find myself, once again, excited to share my knowledge with someone. "I passed out on the track going full sprint, like actually zooming. Then I woke back up at Miss Harvey's and the nighttime sky was all like.. like.." I make erratic hand gestures and sound effects, "right? So then Miss Harvey busts in and tells me and Aliza, who's her daughter by the way, that we're going camping, which is, like, way weird according to Aliza because her mom never goes camping. So we start on the way and we pull off the road at some point, all the while there's this guy in my head telling me not to go on the camping trip, right? So then, we get to this pond—the sky's stopped seizuring at this point—Miss Harvey didn't bring tents so we had to sleep in the car, which wasn't too bad..." I tell Jane the full story in detail. Including pulling off my shirt sleeve to show her the patched bullet hole in my shoulder from Miss Harvey's Glock firearm. I explain to her how Anne had done something to it to make it almost impossible to feel.
I tell her everything. Even what happened when I ran away.
"Wow..." is all Jane can manage after I finish talking. "That's... that's... definitely something..." she doesn't seem to know how to react.
"It was so cool!" I tell her. "C'mon, I can show you!" Instead of my usual grabbing her arm, I gesture for her to follow me.
Jane hesitates before following. "I don't know, Whisper. We could get in trouble for skipping school."
"Oh, relax, will you?" I scoff as I cross the street, once again not waiting for the traffic light to stop the cars. "You've got a perfect attendance record. One day won't hurt anything."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
I walk Jane all the way to that one roomed abandoned church. The group of kids isn't inside, but all their stuff is. Ben's computer and portal remote doohickey. Anne's first aid backpack. Lukas' green jacket.
"Woah..." Jane looks around. "This is... weird..." she pokes at someone's food. "So where are these people?"
"They must be in the other dimension." I sink down in the preacher's chair. "They'll be back soon, I think."
"Okay, because I have an appointment with a real estate agent at one." She folds her arms and leans back against one of the pews.
As if on cue, a white portal appears and out jump the four of them. They pause and stare at me and then Jane.
"Uh, hi..." Anne says slowly.
"Hi..." Jane replies, standing in front of me defensively.
"Hi!" I peer out from behind her with a smile. "This is Jane. My best friend. Jane, this is Lukas-with-a-K Milton, Anne, Ben, and Danny. Aliza ran away."
"Holy mother of all that's good." Danny groans as he rubs his face.
"Gosh-dang it." Ben paces.
"You're serious?" Lukas looks me over. "We all told you not to tell anyone! You go and tell your sister, now her?!" Jane gives me a small glance of confusion.
"Don't yell at my friend!" Jane scolds.
I shrug. "You guys seem like you need help, so I grabbed help."
"You're free to go kid, sorry about all this. Ben, go ahead and wipe her." Lukas instructs.
"What? No way! You're not gonna mind-wipe her!" I stand between the kids and Jane. "Go ahead, Jane, tell them what you saw."
Jane hesitates. "Well... uhm... when Whisper told me the first time about all this not being real, I didn't believe her, and went to go get the center's security... she jumped out the window and it was like she never existed. No one knew who I was talking about. They all told me that there's no one named Whisper in the center."
"What center?" Lukas looks at the both of us. Oh boy.
"The adoption center on the east side of town." Jane explains. I get looks from everyone. Dang it, Jane. Darn you and your stupid honesty. "It was really weird. I don't know how to describe it..."
Ben nods understandingly. "I get it. Don't worry. Whisper went out of bounds which made the NPCs forget her."
"NPCs?" Jane looks to me of all people.
"I dunno." I hum the noise with a shrug.
Lukas pinches his nose. "Oh, this is a disaster." He sighs. "Listen, Jane, was it? I'm so sorry to have dragged you guys into this. You're free to go. Both of you. We'll have Ben do a full memory reset so you guys can go on about your normal lives and forget this ever happened."
"No!" I scold. "I'm not going back to everyone thinking I'm a schizophrenic cheese puff!"
"Well that's our only option!" Lukas scolds. "Unless you have a better idea."
I chuckle. "Alright, first of all, who died and made you king? Second of all, what if we just join your team, huh? Because, clearly, it's struggling."
Lukas scoffs. "Struggling how?"
"You've got little miss Britain's Got Talent over here," I gesture to Anne, "you've got emo-wannabe kid over there," I gesture to Danny, "Ben doesn't really have a problem, his crackly voice is annoying, though."
"I'll take that as a compliment." Ben nods.
"And then..." I pause to laugh and take a step towards Lukas, "you've got a half-brained dude trying to be their leader. I think you need my help."
The group stands, stunned.
"Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk." I take a bow.
"Okay..." Jane clasps her hands together, "it has been so fun meeting all of you, really, I mean that. Anne, I think your accent is awesome. Danny, didn't really get to know you, but love the height, I guess. Ben, your voice sounds fine, and, Lukas... nice jacket."
"Why can't you be nice?" Lukas asks. "Like her? See? She's nice. Wanna join our team?"
"Not really. But I will." I shrug.
"Then. Apologize." Lukas uses one-word sentences to try to intimidate me. He clearly doesn't know who my father was.
"Who, me?" I gesture to myself. "Yeah, no. Apologizing is for people who are wrong. I'm not wrong."
"I give up." Lukas exasperates. "Mind wipe it is."
"Now hold on just a second." Jane steps in. "She may be a little... rough around the edges... but she can still help you guys. And I'm sure she's perfectly willing to."
I shake my head. "No I'm not."
"Okay, you are not helping your case. Be quiet." Jane sighs. "You guys seem like you need help with this whole 'revolution' thing. Why not add a few members to your group?"
Lukas lets out a heavy sigh and clenches his fist in his hair. He looks at his current group. "Fine." He exasperates. I give an upper-hand grin.
"Pleasure doing business with you." I say, extending my hand to Lukas-with-a-K Milton for a handshake. He gives me a bored look.
"So you're not gonna mind-wipe us?" Jane asks cautiously.
Lukas rolls his eyes as he sinks into the preacher's chair. "No. We're not gonna erase you. I don't know about her." His finger gestures to me.
"No idea why. I'm a very likable person." I sit down in one of the pews.
"Among other things." Anne grumbles.
"Okay... so... what do we do first?" Jane clasps her hands together.
"I don't care what you guys do. I have a basketball thing to go to. People to see, butts to beat." I salute as I head for the door.
"Hey, wait a second, you said you'd help us!" Lukas objects.
I frown. "Did I? I don't remember that. Caio!" I let myself out.
I am absolutely dying to do the only thing that's normal anymore. A good game of basketball at the center.
"Hey! Wassup?" Andy greets me with the handshake/shoulder-bump. "You ready?"
"As always." I grin, dribbling the ball.
"Alright, I want a clean match. If you're gonna play dirty, don't let me catch it." The center's coach, Mister Bradley, announces.
I smirk at Andy as we check the ball between us as team captains.
"First to seven wins!" The whistle blows, announcing the beginning of the game.
"That all you got, Gerald?" I taunt when I block Andy's shot.
"Don't get cocky." He warns. "Remember what happened last time."
"What happened last time? All I remember is wiping the floor with you." I shoot a hoop. My team laughs.
Andy and I are good friends. We've practically grown up together. He moved here with his family when I was three. He's been with me through it all. We dated for a bit in middle school, but then kind of stopped going out. There was no awkward break up or tears. We just sort of drifted back to being friends.
"Alright, one more point." I tell my team during our water break. "One more point and Gerald is going down. Think we can manage that?"
"Sure." Carlos pants, wiping the sweat from his mouth.
"Me too." I gulp down the rest of my water and crumple the bottle, throwing it into the crowd of onlookers like I'm a famous singer on stage or something.
"You finally back from your pep talk?" Andy chuckles.
I roll my head around on my shoulders. "Just check the ball, chicken." He does as he's told. The ball gives its hollow thud as it bounces on the pavement between us.
We play so long that the streetlights come on. All for that seventh point. Andy told me a few times to just give up, I told him to pound sand, naturally.
"Good game." Andy reaches to shake my hand when coach finally makes us quit. "Come on, Whisp, let's go grab a bite." He gestures.
"Wait, really?" I snort.
He shrugs. "That was part of the agreement, right?" Andy starts walking along the sidewalk.
"Curfew's at ten!" Mister Bradley calls after me.
"I'll have her home by then, sir!" Andy replies. "So, what sounds good to my fair lady?" He asks. "There's Maverick's, Tito's, and that new hotdog stand at the corner of sixth and main."
"Yeah... no... James and that hotdog place... he was throwing up for a week." I shudder. "Maverick's sounds good."
"Alright. What do you want to eat?" He asks.
I shrug. "Probably just a pizza."
Andy sighs. "Come on, Whispy, let me treat you to something nice for once." He smiles at me. "Look at the menu." He hands me his phone, the menu of Maverick's Café pulled up.
The prices startle me. "Twenty bucks for a salad?!" I gasp. "Dude, what the heck?! We can't eat here! This is an act of terrorism!"
Andy scoffs. "Here, I'll just get you something." He takes his phone back and puts it in his jacket pocket. "So picky. And, it's not an act of terrorism. Dramatic much?"
He shoulders me. "We're gonna go to Maverick's. I'll get you a burger and some fries." I lean into him with a grin. He knows that's my favorite. That and pizza.