Gamer Army Read online

  “It’s perfectly safe,” said Dr. Sharif. “Think about it. We are merely reflecting the normal energy from the sun back to Earth. We cannot possibly send more energy than the sun is already sending to Earth all the time. I wish we could!”

  “It’s actually a little less power than the sun’s rays provide,” Dr. Dorfman said.

  “Yes,” said Dr. Sharif. “The physics are complex, but a certain amount of the energy collected by the reflectors is lost in the form of heat, more as it goes through our conversion system. The most power that can be sent, that could affect any one person, is no more intense than the midday sun.” He laughed. “So, yes, if you are standing on the receiver panel with no sunscreen for a long time, you would eventually get a sunburn. But you run the same risk on the beach anywhere in the world.”

  The gamers were next led on a tour of the crew quarters, dining facility, and even the latrine with its vacuum toilets.

  “Fortunately, your game suits can’t reproduce what it’s like to use the space potty!” Mr. Culum joked. “Those who use them are really riding technology into the future!” He looked pleased with himself when his joke made everyone laugh.

  They finished their tour way down in the transmission module, in an observation room at the extreme end of Sun Station One. Out the windows before them was nothing but space and Earth in the distance.

  “This is all very cool, Mr. Culum,” Rogan said after the man had been quiet for a long time. He didn’t take his gaze from Earth.

  “Thank you for showing us all this,” Jackie said. “I want to be a real-life engineer someday. I’d love to work on one of these stations.”

  But Mr. Culum didn’t seem to hear them. “What do you see when you look out there?” No one knew what to say for a moment.

  “Um, space. Our planet.” Takashi looked at the other gamers like, Is Culum OK?

  “I think …” Shay moved closer to the glass. “Is that Saudi Arabia there? And that over there is Africa, right?”

  “Wrong,” said Mr. Culum.

  Rogan had earned a fair amount of credits in geography in school. He might not know every country in Africa, but he knew the continent when he saw it. “That must be Africa, though. Up above it is the boot of Italy.”

  “No,” Culum said again. “You’re talking about made-up borders and boundaries that separate humanity, lines along which humanity fights, lines that separate people who have enough from those who have nothing. You see division. Chaos.” He stopped for a moment and looked at them, then turned back to gaze down at the world. “I see something different. I see the potential for a unified Earth. One people united through technology.”

  Culum stepped away from the window and motioned to the room around them. He continued, breathing a little heavier now, excited about what he was saying. “This station represents the greater potential for humanity to continue to evolve to something better. From the chaos of random chemicals, amino acids and such, to single-cell organisms, to more complex, more organized forms of life, to humanity, still struggling with the chaos you see out there. And now technology brings our next leap forward, allowing us to transcend petty divisions, to save ourselves from a deadly reliance on fuels that poison our world, to end our struggles, our wars, over those fuels and other resources.”

  Culum was quiet for a moment. Then he laughed a little. “I’m sorry. I’m just so terribly proud of this station and what it represents. Abundant—no, surplus clean energy for everyone. One step closer to eliminating the distinction between the haves and the have-nots, an end to all the pain and suffering that unfair division brings.” He smiled at the gamers. “You’re a part of it, you know.”

  Rogan frowned. “Mr. Culum, this station is great, and I love what you’re saying about getting the world away from using fossil fuels, but we’re just playing a video game. How are we a part of it?”

  Mr. Culum pushed his hands into the pockets on the front of his sweater. He frowned. “X, can you make sure my game suit has real pockets installed? It does a great job simulating it, stopping my arms from sliding down, but it’s just not the same as my real sweater.”

  “Yes, Mr. Culum,” X said over their channel from the control room near the arena.

  “But you are a part of it!” Mr. Culum went on to the gamers. “This reality show that we’re filming won’t just market Laser Viper. It will highlight to a wide audience just how well digi-space can bring people together. With Atomic Frontiers advancements, humanity need not be bound by the physical locations of our bodies. You will help show everyone that we can be digitally freed from organic isolation. You’re doing it right now. You’re in space! And you know, when I was younger there were many TV shows, books, and video games about terrible futures. Dystopian fiction. Terminator. The Hunger Games. Tales of environmental catastrophes and evil oppressive governments. All those authors failed to consider that humanity might make it, that the future could be better.” He looked out the window at Earth again. “Better than they could ever imagine.”

  Rogan felt like Sun Station One’s ground-based receiver, absorbing at least some of Mr. Culum’s energy and enthusiasm. This man had almost single-handedly created digi-space, making Virtual City possible. He was one of the richest men in the world, and yet he still cared so much, whether he was helping to provide power and communication to billions of people or taking the time to communicate with one twelve-year-old kid who missed home. It was corny to say, or even to think, but it was an honor to be around him. Rogan promised himself he would work even harder to win Mr. Culum’s video game contest.

  Is this, like, a joke or something?” Shaylyn asked a few nights later, as X rushed the four gamers down the hallway toward the arena.

  “I’m not laughing.” Takashi yawned. “What time is it?”

  “Move it!” X was awake, not wearing the pajamas the sleepy gamers might have expected at this hour, but looking almost like a soldier in dark green cargo pants and a black shirt. “If you want to advance in this contest, you need to be in the arena and suited up in the next two minutes!”

  Jackie checked her watch. “Three twenty-one a.m.”

  The dullness of sleep and the confusion of a loud, sudden wake-up was squeezed out of Takashi by a tense fear that tingled from the core of his chest down into his legs. Rogan was down the hall ahead of him, and he ran faster to catch up, escorted as always by fast-rolling cambots.

  Takashi yawned. “This is stupid,” he said. “What difference does it make what time we start? Why do we have to play in the middle of the night?”

  “Early morning,” Jackie said.

  “You know what I mean,” said Takashi.

  He always worried about how they were being judged in this contest. What truly mattered in the games—individual accomplishments or being part of the team? If they were judged by what they did outside of the games, would he be at a disadvantage because he didn’t act as super confident as Shay or Rogan? And now, was this a test of how well they played while tired and unprepared? None of this made any sense! There had to be a way to stall to get some answers. “Where’s Sophia? Doesn’t she want to do interviews for the show?”

  “No time!” X yelled. “Go, go, go!”

  When they were through the double doors into the black-walled cave of the arena, technicians rushed to them, game suits and VR helmets in hand. Mr. Culum paced the floor, a tense urgency cracking through his usual friendly demeanor. “Good morning! Quickly now. Suit up! It’s game time!”

  A swarm of Atomic Frontiers techs hurried to dress them, pushing arms and legs into the suits as if the gamers were little babies.

  “I can dress myself!” Shaylyn cried out.

  But her protest was useless. The techs moved with the speed and efficiency of a NASCAR pit crew, each person ready to do a specific task, get one of the gamer’s arms into a sleeve, slip on the gamer’s VR helmet, hook up the flight and jumping harness.

  Mr. Culum laughed weakly. “This game will start in the next minute. We ar
e not losing this window.”

  “Good luck, every—” Takashi started to call out, but a couple of techs shoved a helmet down over his head. They pushed it on so fast it hurt. He thought they could have at least let him finish his sentence.

  Seconds later all four laser vipers stood in the dim red light in the launch bay of the SR-73 StarScreamer.

  “Wait a second!” Takashi shouted to the roof of their small cabin within the plane, like Mr. Culum or X were above them in the cockpit. How were they supposed to succeed if they had no idea what to do? “Can you at least tell us our objective? How are we supposed—”

  “My Heads-Up Display is different,” Engineer said. “Are you all seeing the same thing? The power level percentage indicator is gone.”

  Takashi noticed it and smiled, because of course Jacqueline would be the first to spot a technical detail like that.

  “Listen up, gamers.” X said. “Your vipers have been upgraded with small but still powerful adaptations of the Tian Li quantum ion fusion energon cell. As a result, your power supply will be much more stable.”

  Takashi was grateful for the upgrade. One of the abilities of the Healer was to laser cut damaged pieces off vipers or weld on armor or good parts. These functions had always drained his battery fast. Hopefully the new power system would make all that work better.

  “Why the rush to start the game?” Shay asked.

  “Everybody listen,” X said. “There isn’t much time. This is a test to see how quickly gamers can react and adapt. Mr. Culum will prepare you for this round of the tournament.”

  The optimistic cheer was back in Mr. Culum’s voice. “Gamers, here’s the situation. German military scientists have developed an amazing new technology. Unfortunately, Scorpion terrorist operatives have infiltrated the staff at the lab where this technology was developed, allowing Scorpion to steal the prototype device. Moments ago, German military forces shot down the Scorpion helicopter carrying the device. However, since Scorpion infiltrators among German authorities allowed the theft in the first place, the German commandos working to retrieve the device cannot be trusted. This technology will be used as a dangerous new weapon, which will help Scorpion agents target almost any facility anywhere in the world.

  “The Polyadaptive Nanotech Cloak, or PNC, is a harness worn on the chest that works with a neural interface crown, a sort of headband that fits tight to the scalp to interact via electrical impulses directly with the brain. This allows the user to control millions of microscopic robots called nanobots. These nanobots, initially stored in the harness, have limited programming to execute variations of a single program. They interlock and work together to completely cover a human body. The nanobots can change color, and working together, they can form different shapes so that they can make the wearer appear to be a completely different person. They can disguise a man as a woman, a white person as African American, a short person as a tall person. The PNC stores thousands of different patterns of appearance and can change to look like a completely different person in a matter of seconds. It can even render the user invisible.

  “By now, your plane is nearing the air space above southern Germany and the crash site of the Scorpion helicopter in a wooded area near Neuschwanstein Castle, an amazing castle built in the late nineteenth century. I think you’ll find our designers did an excellent job reproducing a digital version of the structure. Your challenge for this level will be to locate and capture the Polyadaptive Nanotech Cloak, to seize it from whoever has it. Innocent civilians as well as German military, intelligence, and law enforcement personnel will be in the area, so there must be no fatalities. Stick to your NLEPs.”

  Flyer spoke up. “How are we supposed to find this polyada … poly—”

  “Polyadaptive Nanotech Cloak,” Engineer said. “Let’s just say PNC. It’s easier.”

  “Get the PNC,” Mr. Culum said. “And remember it is very important that you leave absolutely no video or photographic evidence that laser vipers were there.”

  “Go get ’em, gamers,” X said.

  With the familiar violent air displacement, the vipers shot out of the cargo bay of the SR-73 StarScreamer, and the jet vanished in the distance.

  “Crap!” Rogan shouted. They weren’t nearly as high as they’d been on the previous insertion. Their altimeters showed them plunging hundreds of feet per second. “We’re coming in low!”

  Flyer soared out ahead of them, arms spread wide, her body in a flying T position.

  “Braking thrusters!” Healer shouted. “Now, now, now!”

  Rogan fired his rockets a couple of seconds after the others, so the two of them appeared to fly up above him, though the real difference was that Rogan was falling faster.

  Trees rushed up at him. Small limbs whipped his faceplate, evergreen needles scraping against the outside of his helmet. He smashed into heavier branches as he continued to fall.

  Hard slap to the chest.

  Sharp slam in the legs.

  He flipped over and over, hitting tree trunks, bashing branches, until he crashed onto the rocky ground and tumbled helplessly out toward the river.

  “Ranger!” Healer ran out of the woods moments later. “You OK?”

  Rogan slowly rose to his feet, dizzy from the whirlwind crash and embarrassed after such an amateur, messed-up combat drop. He was standing in a riverbed, a long line of white and gray round rocks, like the forest had been broken open for a quarry. He picked small twigs off his body and noticed the dents in his armor. A sharp diagonal swath had been cut through the forest with busted branches, and a scarred trunk marked the path along which he’d fallen. X hadn’t been kidding about their safety. He would have been killed if he had really crashed like that. Still, the simulation had been so perfect that he wondered if he would have actual bruises.

  Jackie’s drop had gone far better. She’d steered herself toward the mostly dry riverbed, and although contact with the ground was a little sharper than usual, her viper was undamaged. She immediately scanned her surroundings for hostiles. If the PNC was in the area, it was well camouflaged. This raised several practical concerns. Among them, she wondered how they would find the device if it could render it and its user invisible. She and her fellow gamers would have to be quick and clever to succeed at this round. Her radar-like direction finder showed Flyer far to the west. The other two were much closer, southwest of her position on the river. She was about to run off to join them when her sensors alerted her to a strong heat signature, something mechanical, nearby.

  Her NLEP at the ready, she hurried to examine whatever it was. Sprinting at viper speed over the rocks, she reached the crash site of a helicopter. Her computer quickly identified the aircraft as an unmarked UH-60 Black Hawk. It had burned after it crashed, and a couple of small fires still smoldered. Scanning the bodies inside, she found this was one of those moments she wished Laser Viper weren’t so realistic. Cuts and burns made facial recognition software useless. She couldn’t even determine the ethnicity of the bodies. But the pilot and crew hadn’t been wearing uniforms, so they probably weren’t military or law enforcement. Their heavy weapons told her these weren’t normal civilians.

  “I’ve found the crashed Scorpion helicopter,” she called to the others. Healer and Ranger joined her a moment later.

  Healer pointed to the woods. “More bodies out that way. Some of them in uniforms with German flags on the shoulders.”

  “Fighting it out over the PNC,” said Ranger.

  “Yeah, but who won?” Healer asked.

  “I’ve got movement to the north,” said Flyer from above. “A bunch of soldiers and … Zooming in … Yeah, one of them is wearing some kind of technical harness. I have eyes on the target. I’m going for it.”

  As if they thought as one, the other three gamers took off at a run, jumping and rocket-bounding over rocks and downed trees, covering ground faster than any human ever could. A storm of laser fire convinced Flyer to join the others behind cover halfway up a wooded hill. �
��They’re going for the castle.” Flyer landed next to them. “Look at that thing. It’s, like, straight out of Disney. That’s all I’m saying.”

  “Sleeping Beauty’s castle,” said Healer.

  “Pretty sure Disney copied this thing,” said Engineer.

  High on the hill above them was a perfect storybook castle. Four stories of white stone perched on top of a steep mountain, it had a dark blue, sharply pitched roof, and round and square towers at various places. The whole building looked almost as though it had been carved out of the mountaintop.

  “Who cares what it looks like?” Rogan said. “How do we find this PNC?”

  “That’s the bad news,” Engineer said. “The target and the rest of the soldiers were heading for the castle. They’d have made it there by now.”

  “So we go in there and get it!” Rogan said.

  “Would you just calm down for once?” Flyer grabbed his arm before he could take off. “It’s not that simple. If the PNC can change the target’s appearance, we’re going to have a tough time finding him among all the tourists.”

  “The castle will have tons of surveillance cameras,” Healer said.

  “I’ll take care of that,” said Engineer.

  “The tourists will be taking photos and videos too,” Healer said.

  “That will be tougher,” said Flyer. “We’ll have to stun everybody quickly and make sure we destroy all their phones and cameras.”

  “Not just by smashing either,” said Engineer. “Or they might still recover the data. All that stuff will have to be lasered. Melted down.”

  “You think they’ve programmed this game with that kind of specific detail?” Healer said.

  “Do you want to take a chance for mission failure?” Engineer replied.

  “I’ll take care of the phones.” Rogan nodded to Engineer. She was easily the smartest gamer he’d ever played with. “But speed will be key. If part of our objective is to keep our mission a secret, we’ll only have seconds before anyone in there can snap a photo of us and post it online.”