She smiled expectantly; Nick hoped the expectation wasn’t anything to do with him. He lowered his voice.
‘In? Or out?’
She didn’t get it immediately. Nick mimed fencing moves. ‘Oh! Out, unfortunately. But if they think I’m putting up with it, they’ve got another thing coming. I’ve already tried to get a new copy, I’ve been to a few shops and I even —’
‘Just drop it,’ Nick said. ‘The whole thing. Pretend the game never existed.’
‘But . . .’
‘I know. But still.’
She looked at him with wide eyes. Nick tried to imagine her and Jamie together on a park bench, in the cinema, in a field of flowers. A nice image. He hoped she’d ask him how Jamie was. But she didn’t.
That evening he sat in his room and didn’t know what to do. The only thing he knew was that he couldn’t bear the uncertainty. When he thought about it, Emily had behaved logically when she ignored Nick. Completely. Unless . . . unless the game had somehow made him look bad to her. There was an image in his head that had been haunting him the whole day: the messenger telling Emily that Nick had spied on her online. That he’d helped to bring a gun into the school grounds. And to top it all off, the photo of him and Brynne would turn up, and then she’d be through with him forever.
But that was all nonsense. Emily had been cool towards him because she was taking her cover seriously. He’d ring her and clear things up. Immediately.
But Emily didn’t answer her phone; her voicemail didn’t even pick up. Nick tried again after ten minutes; and again after half an hour. The result was the same.
Oh well, she was probably playing. He hadn’t ever answered the phone when he was playing either.
He considered going over to her place. Yes, good idea, keep on ringing the doorbell and wake up her depressive mother – since Emily’s headphones would certainly stop her from hearing the doorbell. Maybe that applied to her phone as well.
He sat in front of the computer and thought about it. Surfed over to deviantART and checked Emily’s page for new entries. But nothing had been added since Night, the poem he already knew.
He spent the rest of the evening with Mum and Dad in front of the telly. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d done that, and Dad was pleased, Nick could tell. ‘Swotting all the time isn’t so good either,’ he said, and patted Nick on the back of the head.
That night Nick dreamed his way into the graveyard in Erebos, and searched desperately for Sarius’s gravestone, but suddenly all the inscriptions were convoluted symbols that he didn’t understand.
The next day Emily didn’t come to school at all. Nick sat in Chemistry class and stared at her empty seat; he felt like howling. He knew the pattern: The game had gained control of her, just like all the others.
I shouldn’t have left her alone with it. How would Emily, of all people, just happen to be immune? But now it was too late. There was nothing he could do – she wasn’t going to speak to him any more, wasn’t going to let him near her. From now on she would only care about carrying out her orders. He should have told her more about the game – instead he’d allowed her to walk straight into a trap, unprotected.
He rang her at recess, but of course she didn’t answer. Fine. Then he would go to her place after school.
After he’d made the decision, he immediately felt better. He would talk to Emily and remind her of their joint plan: to stop Erebos. After all it had been her idea.
The feeling of elation lasted till English class, when Nick opened his book and found a folded-up note that he certainly hadn’t put there himself.
His heartbeat accelerated. He unfolded the note.
‘There’s an empty bed next to Jamie,’ the note said in clumsy block letters.
Nick took a deep breath. He hoped no-one could tell he’d had a fright. He checked out of the corner of his eye for anyone who might be watching him, waiting for his reaction, but no-one looked conspicuous. Helen was yawning and absently scratching the back of her neck. Colin? Reading. Dan and Alex were whispering to each other; perhaps it had been them? Alex was always grinning at Nick with such overt friendliness; perhaps that was his idea of a disguise.
Nick folded the note again and stuck it in his trouser pocket. So there was an empty bed next to Jamie. Those rotten bastards. That was practically an admission. The accident had been planned; someone had sabotaged Jamie’s brakes. Because of a stinking lousy game. Suddenly he hated them all so passionately that he felt like jumping up and bashing them over the head with his chair. So they got some idea of how much fun it was to have brain trauma. He looked over at Colin again and the urge to go for his throat was overpowering. Nick jumped up.
‘Yes?’ Mr Watson asked. ‘What is it, Nick?’
I’m about to go crazy.
‘I’m not feeling very well. I’m afraid something has upset my stomach.’
He was sure that Mr Watson had caught the ambiguity in his words. It was clear from his expression, but he didn’t inquire further. ‘Then perhaps you should go home.’
‘Yes. Thank you.’
Nick didn’t care that someone was bound to think the threatening letter had scared him away from school. That didn’t matter. What was important was Emily. He had to talk to her. She couldn’t be so caught up in it already that arguments would have no influence over her. He had to tell her about his Jamie theory and show her the letter. Now. Quickly.
He took his phone from his bag – he’d have one more try at ringing her.
1 new message, the display said. He pressed Read.
Whatever u do don’t send me emails & don’t try 2 reach me via MSN or Skype. If u have time, come to 32 Cromer St Bloomsbury @ 4pm. Don’t say a word 2 anyone & make sure u r not being followed. Emily.
He swallowed, looked around frantically. Checked the display again. No emails, no MSN – why? Had Emily found out something? He took a deep breath and tried to get things clear in his head. At least the text sounded as though Emily still had all her wits about her. And she wanted to see him! Still three hours to go before four o’clock. Nick had no idea how he was supposed to control his impatience for so long.
In the end he used the time to make sure – really sure – that no-one was following him. No-one had ever gone to Cromer Street a longer way round, or used more Tube lines to get there, than him.
CHAPTER 25
There was a very odd fellow standing in front of the house numbered 32. A fiery red beard, long fiery red hair. Both plaited. He must have been waiting for Nick, because he came straight up to him as soon as he laid eyes on him.
‘You’re Nick, right? The lady described you well. I’m Speedy. Come with me.’
He dragged Nick up a narrow staircase to the first floor, where he opened a green wood-panel door. ‘Come on in. Do you want cola, beer or Ginseng Oolong? Victor claims the stuff’s good for the brain. It works for him.’
Nick, who hadn’t said anything at all yet apart from a brief greeting, asked for a glass of water. Why had Emily asked him to come here? Was she here too?
He followed Speedy through an amazingly jam-packed kitchen into a large room filled with a chorus of humming sounds. Nick counted twelve computers, not including Emily’s laptop. She was sitting in a corner by the window with her headphones on, staring at her screen with intense concentration.
‘Better not interrupt her,’ Speedy said. ‘It’s all happening right now. Come on, I’ll take you to Victor.’
He led Nick around a giant structure made of various pieces of technology, behind which a plump man, all in black, was sitting, almost hidden. Nick’s gaze was immediately drawn to his monitor, which measured at least twenty-two inches. On it a shimmering purple lizard man was felling a worm-like monster. He was incredibly adept with his sword, and lightning fast in his movements. The gamer’s chubby fingers flew over the keyboard and controlled the mouse as precisely as a scalpel. The giant worm didn’t have a chance, despite its needle-sharp teeth. One chop, and it was
cut in two. The front end, the end with the teeth, kept fighting until the lizard severed its head.
Speedy pulled one of the earphones on the man’s headset from his ear. ‘Nick is here!’
‘Ah, perfect timing! Take over for me?’
‘Sure. By the way, Nick only drinks water.’
‘We can’t have that!’
The man stood and stretched. He almost reached up to Nick’s chin. ‘You have to at least try my tea. I’m Victor.’
‘Pleased to meet you.’
‘We’ll go next door, we can talk in peace in there.’
He put his headset on Speedy, who was already looking out for more enemies, and gestured towards a graffiti-covered door. Nick had hold of the doorknob when something occurred to him.
‘Dissect the worm,’ he called to Speedy. ‘Chop it up as small as you can; perhaps you’ll find something!’
Speedy held up a thumb and began to slice up his fallen adversary. ‘Not so fast,’ said Victor. ‘Otherwise it will notice the difference. You need to keep the same pace as me.’
A deep sigh escaped Speedy. The lizard man was chopping more slowly now, although still as quickly and skilfully as a Japanese sushi chef.
‘You go ahead,’ said Victor. ‘I’ll get us some tea.’
Behind the graffiti door were three giant sofas and three coffee tables. Not one piece matched another. Nick wasn’t all that sensitive to aesthetics, but the colour combination alone gave him a slight headache. He sat down on the most hideous of the sofas – olive green with yellow roses and blue sailing boats. That way he wouldn’t have to see as much of it. Seconds later Victor entered the room with a tray that made it clear to Nick that there was method behind the mixture of styles.
‘Victorian bone china with violets, or The Simpsons?’
‘Since you’re Victor, I’ll leave you the Victorian one,’ Nick said and took a mug from him that had Homer posing on it over the words ‘Trying is the first step towards failure.’
While Victor sat sipping from his bulbous cup, his eyes blissfully closed, Nick took the opportunity to study him more closely. He guessed he was about twenty-two or twenty-three. At first glance he’d seemed older, but that was probably the beard. A beard like a musketeer’s, long and curling up above his lips, and a pointy triangle on his chin. Victor looked like Porthos. A gothic Porthos – he wore skull studs the size of pound coins in his ears, and at least one silver ring on each finger – there were enough skulls to form a parliamentary majority, with snakes close behind. A lone angel dangled from a chain round his neck to compensate.
‘Drink your tea,’ Victor said.
Nick sampled it dutifully and was astonished at how good it tasted. ‘What Emily’s brought us is very unusual,’ Victor announced after another sip of tea. ‘I know about computer games, let me tell you. But I’ve never got my hands on something like Erebos before.’
‘Did she give it to you, just like that?’
‘Not at all. It was all very proper, as part of the third rite. I’m her novice.’ He twirled his moustache between his fingers and grinned. ‘I am still very new; I’ve only been playing since this morning.’ He sketched a bow. ‘Squamato, lizard man. I wanted to call myself Broccoli, but the charming gnome in the tower probably would have thumped me with my bronze shield. He explained to me that Erebos must not be mocked. Humour is not this game’s strong point.’
He put his cup down. ‘But the interactivity! My goodness!’
‘It talks to you, I know,’ Nick said. ‘You ask questions and it gives logical, correct answers. Do you have any idea how that works?’
‘None at all. At first I thought someone was sitting at a central terminal and playing the role of the messenger or that dead bloke. But that could never work. Emily says heaps of people are playing. How many, do you reckon?’
Nick thought of the Arena fight. And not everyone had even taken part. ‘About three or four hundred. Perhaps more.’
‘Exactly. You’d need a whole army of messengers and then they’d still have to have the relevant orders and interconnections in their heads. Computers can master these memory tasks thousands of times better than any human, but complex conversations are not usually their forte.’
Victor’s teacup was empty; he helped himself to a refill, and topped up Nick’s too.
‘Tell me about the orders. Yesterday Emily had to do surveillance on a thirteen-year-old girl who had been instructed to buy pepper spray. She didn’t know the girl and vice versa. She was probably from another school. But the messenger provided Emily with the girl’s name and a photo, and with the time of the purchase and the address of the shop. Totally insane. Were your orders that specific too? Was there anything to suggest a pattern?’
Nick thought hard. ‘Unfortunately not. Once I had to take a wooden box from Totteridge to Dollis Brook Viaduct. The box turned up at our school later with a gun in it. Apart from that I once took pictures of a man and his car, and . . . asked someone out to a cafe.’
Victor snorted in amusement. ‘Doesn’t sound very threatening. Do you have any idea why you were supposed to do all that?’
‘No. Except the last orders – I’m pretty sure about them. I was supposed to put pills into our English teacher’s tea. He thinks Erebos is . . . well, that it’s dangerous, and he’s trying to get people off it. One of the gnomes said at one stage that we should treat our enemies as enemies, and I think that’s what the game means by that.’
Victor looked quite distraught. ‘In his tea?’ he asked, as if that was the most reprehensible thing about the orders.
‘Yes. But I got cold feet, and that’s why I got kicked out.’ Nick was astonished at how good it felt to talk about it. All of a sudden everything seemed less threatening.
‘Have you ever thought about why the game demands what it does?’
No, he hadn’t. Not seriously. Well, maybe a similar question had flashed through his mind a couple of times, especially when it had come to the date with Brynne and the photo assignment. Who had benefitted from that?
The thought had always faded into the background. They were simply tasks. Obstacles that had to be overcome in order to move on to the next level, just like in a paperchase.
‘I thought that it was just about making the game interesting,’ he said, and realised, as he said it out loud, how unlikely that was.
‘If I’m not mistaken, the game makes its players work together like a well-oiled machine,’ Victor said. ‘One person hides something, the next one gets it and takes it to another place. One person buys something, the next one watches him doing it and reports in, so the game can plan its future moves. Based on what Emily has told me, I believe you’re all working on something that no-one can understand, because each player only knows about a tiny part of it. One or two pieces in the puzzle.’ Victor chuckled. ‘And now I’m part of it too, but I want to see the whole picture, damn it!’
The whole picture. For a fraction of a second an image flickered in Nick’s head, a colourful, familiar image, but it was gone before he figured out what it was.
‘Know what would help? If I could hear more stories like yours. If we knew what other orders the game has been handing out. We could put the pieces of information together, and who knows?’ Victor rubbed his hands together. ‘Maybe it will turn out that we’re looking for the Holy Grail, ha, ha.’ Victor’s good mood was infectious.
‘If you want, I can try asking a few of the former gamers,’ Nick suggested. ‘But it’s possible that no-one will tell me anything. When you get chucked out you’re instructed to say nothing.’ ‘It’s worth a try. In the meantime we’ll set up our own little research lab here. I’m hoping it’s about time for the next level. My shimmering Squamato is still only a One; it’s pathetic.’
‘You have to get him into difficulties. When he’s about to kick the bucket the messenger comes and rescues you, and saddles you with a task, and when you complete it, you get into the next level.’
Victor slapp
ed himself on the forehead. ‘You mean I’m playing too well to make progress? That’s just wrong. Wait a sec, I have to tell Speedy to mess some things up . . .’
Victor darted out and came back a minute later chuckling. ‘Speedy’s having a punch-up with an overgrown skeleton. Do you want to watch?’
The old excitement stirred in Nick’s stomach. Yes, he wanted to see it, to be part of it – of course he did.
They positioned themselves behind Speedy, who was making Squamato dash forwards recklessly, straight at the strongest bone warrior, whose head was adorned with a crown. They couldn’t hear what was happening – the headset meant the sounds were reserved for Speedy – but they saw Squamato’s belt getting greyer and greyer. The skeleton king lunged and Squamato parried badly, another blow . . . and there he lay with only a barely visible remnant of life in him, while the battle raged around him.
Nick dug his fingernails into his palms. Many of these warriors were unknown to him, or he knew them only from the Arena. Hang on! That was Sapujapu! So he was still alive – good. And Lelant was fighting back there – not so good. Nick kept scanning the screen and caught himself looking out for Sarius. How foolish. Yes, it was foolish to miss his other self so badly. Still.
Minutes later the battle was over and the messenger arrived. Nick couldn’t help taking a step back, then chided himself and resumed his spot behind Speedy. The messenger’s words appeared in the familiar silver on a black background.
‘Lelant fought like a hero; he deserves the greatest reward.’
He handed the dark elf a sack of gold and a shield that shone like a star. Sapujapu, who was slightly injured, received three bottles of healing potion – that was more than enough. Nick was happy for him. The others were fobbed off with mediocre rewards, and then finally the messenger turned to Squamato.
‘You were exceptionally adept at first, and then suddenly very weak. That does not please me.’
‘O-ho,’ Victor said.
‘I’m sorry, I was interrupted. But it won’t happen again,’ Speedy typed hurriedly.