Tam lifted the sim helmet and blinked. He felt like he was waking up from some crazy dream - the kind that left your mind and body sluggish and overly warm. In the chair beside him, Jennet peeled off her e-gloves and ran her fingers through her hair. She looked…
Huh. She actually looked better. Less worn-looking. Her eyes were sparkling, and bright blue. Why had he ever thought they were pale?
She smiled at him, the glow and relief in it making him dizzy. “So - what do you think of Feyland?”
“Really amazing. Those fights…” he shook his head. “I could feel so much in there. Thanks for showing me the Full-D. Let’s do it again - soon.”
Her smile dimmed. “Tam… I really need to tell you—”
“Oh no!” He glanced at the clock blinking on the wall, and then read it again to be sure. “No - it’s not really six-thirty, is it? I promised Marny I’d be home by six. She has to leave by then. Jennet, I have to go. Now.”
He slid out of the chair, apprehension tightening his lungs. What a crappy thing to do to Marny. Hopefully she’d be able to stay a little longer. He didn’t like the thought of the Bug on his own, even for a short time. There was no end of trouble that kid could get into.
“I’ll call the car.” She hit the blue switch beside the sim systems, turning off the jamming field. “HANA?”
“Yes, Miss Jennet?”
“Have George bring the car around front. Mr. Linn needs a ride home, as soon as possible.”
“Right away, miss.”
“I’m sorry,” Jennet said, leading him down the hall. “Time is weird in-game. I knew you had to go, but…”
“It happens.” He had lost plenty of hours in the past, had emerged from simming to find that the whole day had spun away. The consequences this time couldn’t be that bad. He hoped.
Outside it was dark, the air quickly cooling into night. Jennet waited by the grav-car as he climbed in.
“So, see you at school tomorrow?”
“Yeah.”
“Thanks for playing, Tam.” Her voice was soft, almost wistful.
“See you.” He let the door slide closed and told George where to head. The man didn’t raise an eyebrow, which, considering their destination, was impressive. He must have some weaponry in the car - maybe even attached to it - if the thought of driving into the Exe didn’t worry him.
It was full dark when the grav-car slid to a stop in front of Tam’s building. He mumbled his thanks and got out as fast as he could. People were watching from the shadows and boarded-up windows - he could feel their stares. He hurried up the rickety stairs, not bothering to look back as the car slipped away.
It was quiet upstairs. Too quiet. A quick glance around the living room confirmed that his little brother wasn’t there.
“Hey,” he called. “I’m home. Come out now.”
There was no response - and the Bug wasn’t any good at hiding. He always laughed and gave himself away.
Tam peeked into the tiny room where his mom’s bed was, did a quick check of the cramped bathroom - nothing. He pushed back the panic creeping up his throat.
There was a note on the dingy table. Tam picked it up, trying to keep his fingers steady. It was in Marny’s round handwriting.
Hey Tam, it’s 6:20 and I really need to head out. I gave your evil kid brother the rest of the Sugar Crunchies and made him promise to chill until you got home. Hope you get here soon. And that you had fun.
--M
Tam checked the faded green readout on the kitchen clock. Half-an-hour since Marny left. That was plenty of time for the Bug to get into trouble. Or for someone else to show up, and get him into even worse.
He sniffed - no telltale smell of matches or smoke. Not like the last time he’d left his brother unsupervised. He’d come upstairs after simming a little too long, to find a pile of paper smoldering in the middle of the kitchen.
“Bug?” he called, “Peter?” Maybe his brother would answer to his given name. Nothing, and the fear really began to set in.
Should he call the cops? No - they’d only blow him off. The first few times Mom had gone missing, he’d tried to get them to come help, with no luck. Why would this be any different? He lived in the Exe.
His stomach twisted and he tried not to picture all the hurt his little brother could be in. The Bug was pretty random. The medicine he had to take for his blood disease made him act on impulse - not that an eight-year-old had a lot of sense to begin with. In the last year he’d started with the whole pyromaniac thing. He said the flames made him feel good. Tam was sure he’d hid all the matches where Peter couldn’t find them, but still…
Maybe the people hiding out in the old shop down the street had seen something. They scared the piss out of him, with their crazy yellow eyes and the sickly-sweet smell of whatever they were smoking filling the air, but he had to start somewhere.
Tam was partway down the stairs when he heard it. A muffled clang, then a scrape of metal, coming from close by. He flung himself down the rest of the stairs and pelted to the back. Sure enough, the big door was unlocked. And inside -
“Peter!” He scooped his brother up in an awkward hug. “I was so worried about you.”
“Yeesh.” The Bug squirmed in his arms. “Let go, Tam. And don’t step on anything.”
Tam let his brother slip free, and finally saw what the kid had been doing. Disbelief hit him hard, right in the gut.
“Oh, god.”
He turned in slow circles, trying to take in the destruction. Disconnected cables were half-unwound in coppery spirals over the floor. The visor of his helmet was propped against the open side of his CPU - which looked like it had been visited by a bomb. His gloves were turned inside-out, the sensors dangling like broken spider-webs.
Anger rushed through him, and a horrible sense of loss. “My system! What do you think you’re doing?”
The Bug scuffed his shoe against the cement floor. “Marny said it was all messed up.”
“Well, now it’s really messed up. Damn it!”
He wanted to take his brother by the shoulders and shake him. Hard. So hard he’d fly into as many bits as the computer scattered across the floor. Instead, Tam took a deep breath. The Bug was too fragile for that - and besides, Tam was the one who held the family together.
“I’ll put it back.” His brother sounded on the verge of tears. “I didn’t think it would be so hard to fix, Tam. I thought maybe, you know…” He curled his shoulders forward.
“Aw, man. Don’t cry.” There were enough other things in their life to cry about. “The system was about to die completely, anyway.”
He tried to make himself believe it. And maybe the Bug could actually get the thing up and running again. Stranger things had happened.
“Ok.” His little brother sniffed, his voice still strained.
“Here.” Tam pulled him into a rough hug. “Let’s get you upstairs and ready for bed. You can work on putting it back together tomorrow after school.”
Just before waving off the lights and locking the door, Tam couldn’t help glancing once more at the ruins of his system. So much for his gaming.
Everything around here was falling apart. The stairs were getting more treacherous by the day, the neighborhood was disintegrating, and his brother had a disease nobody could fix. His mom was barely functioning. And now his sim-system was officially dead.
Tam shoved his anger deep down.
“How’d you cut yourself?” the Bug asked, one hand on Tam’s arm.
“What?” He glanced down, to see his brother was right. There was a red gash on his forearm. It wasn’t bleeding, but it was long and deep. “Oh, that. Don’t worry about it. Jammy time, Bug.”
While his little brother was getting into bed, Tam went into the bathroom and examined the cut. It throbbed, now that he knew about it. He didn’t remember cutting himself.
For a second, the image of the Black Knight flashed before his eyes. That faceless black visor stayed there, floating in his vision, as if it were looking at him. With uncanny clarity Tam recalled their battle - the moment the knight’s sword had slid into the gap between his armor….
A sick, shaky feeling moved through him. No way. You didn’t get injuries that carried over from computer games into real life, no matter how intense the virtual reality was. It just didn’t happen.
He had cut himself getting out of the grav-car, or downstairs, and just hadn’t noticed. Yeah, that was it.
He gulped back a glass of water, and then splashed more on his face.
“Tam?” The Bug’s voice was lonely.
“Coming.” He slapped some all-purpose ointment on the cut, then went out to tell his brother goodnight. It was time they both got some rest.
“’Night to you, too,” his brother murmured sleepily.
Tam curled into his old sleeping bag, and weariness hit him heavy in the chest. A crazy mosaic of his day flitted through his head. Jennet, smiling at him. The hairy brown man. A ring of pale mushrooms. Marny, stuffing his cash in her pocket. His system, the guts of his life, spilled everywhere.
Just before he slipped into sleep, he thought he heard the Black Knight's laughter echo in his mind, low and menacing.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
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