‘It’s an idea, Cheryl. We can’t let anything like this happen again. No one would want to play it anymore, and when I think of all the money I’ve spent developing Operation Wipeout…’
Ant, Rubie and Griff gave each other meaningful looks. This was Kody’s first mention of Operation Wipeout. Rubie took her mobile phone from her pocket, scrolled about to find the ‘record’ button and held the phone to the bottom of the glass. Ant and Griff carried on listening.
‘They’ll be queuing up to pay me for playing Wipeout, all the big guys who need some schmucks to do their dirty work for them. How’s that for a great game, controlling people, getting them to do whatever the highest bidder wants, while pocketing all the money? Brilliant!’
So it was true: Operation Wipeout was about controlling players in real life. Gamers would be brainwashed to do whatever Kody Crunch wanted, and Kody was willing to sell the service to anyone willing to pay for it. It didn’t bear thinking about, what horrible tasks these gamers might be made to perform.
‘They’ll be here before long with the meal,’ said Cheryl. ‘I ordered lobster tonight, Kody, I hope that’s okay? We could eat on the dinky little balcony out there and watch the swans again.’
‘Sure, sounds amazing,’ said Kody sarcastically. ‘Another lobster and swans evening. Whoopie-doo. Anyway, straight after that treat, I’m going back into Ray-Chay. There are still a few empty avatar plugs to clear out of my cache. And there’s nothing to stop me making a new rareio. Or a whole batch of them. Why not?’
‘You want us in there too, boss?’ asked Norm.
‘Sure, getting rid of the avatar plugs is kind of slow work, there’ll be plenty for you to help me with,’ replied Kody. ‘I’ll set up an unsecure connection, so you can enter my world again.’
‘Oh Kody, that’d be just great,’ gushed Cheryl. ‘It’s such a blast visiting your Ray-Chay world. It’s so beautiful there.’
’Just don’t mess up, right, Norm? Don’t press anything or do anything unless I tell you.’
There was a knock on the Oak Suite door and Ant heard the waiter wheel in the trolley, presumably carrying the finest lobster and champagne. He heard the huge French door onto the balcony slide open and the voices left the room. It was impossible to hear anything now and Ant signalled to Rubie to finish recording.
As soon as they were sure the waiter had gone back to the kitchen, Ant signalled to the others to follow him. They left the cupboard, tiptoed down the corridor and left the building via the fire escape.
At the bottom of the fire escape was a shady, neglected strip of garden. Ant, Rubie and Griff stopped there and began to whisper, all at once. So it was true, Operation Wipeout was as evil as they’d suspected… What on earth was he going to brainwash the gamers to do?… Now Kody was planning on making more rareios, perhaps a whole army of them!
Griff was still massively miffed at being referred to as a ‘little idiot’.
‘Oh, hang on,’ said Rubie. ‘Let’s see if we’ve got that hard evidence.’
She scrolled about on her phone until she found the recording and pressed play. Ant and Griff crowded round and the three of them strained to make out a single word, but the voices sounded no louder than a buzzing bluebottle.
‘Couldn’t the recording be enhanced in a lab?’ asked Griff. ‘I’d really love to get those guys after everything they’ve done.’
Rubie shrugged her shoulders. Her recording didn’t prove anything.
‘You know, it was so weird the way he was talking back there,’ said Ant. ‘He said he had to clear his cache out before making more rareios, as if his Ray-Chay world is some kind of command centre.’
‘He’s a thrill-seeker,’ said Rubie. ‘I can’t imagine him sitting at some desk and controlling these players. It’s more fun to be actually inside the game.’
‘He’s a flipping thrill-seeking maniac,’ agreed Griff. ‘But the worst of it is, all these gamers are putting their lives in his hands.’
Kody Crunch had to be stopped, and time was ticking by. The next day he would be leaving for home.
‘Look,’ said Ant. ‘You two wait here, I’m going to sprint home and get my Ray-Chay suit and my Kismet headset. I can put them on, like I did before, and hide in the cleaning cupboard. If it really is an unsecure connection, I should be able to get into Kody Crunch’s world too.’
The other two made faces, as if they weren’t sure about the idea. ‘Okay,’ said Griff slowly, ‘but what do you plan on doing when you’re in there?’
‘I don’t know yet,’ said Ant. ‘I will have Pradahl to protect me and she’s got that stealth ember in her inventory, although I’ve got no idea what it does. She and I can do a bit of detective work, find out what those “avatar plugs” are for a start. The more information we’ve got, the more we could eventually take to the police. At the moment, our evidence is practically nil and they wouldn’t take us seriously.’
‘We can stand guard outside in the corridor,’ said Rubie. ‘And warn you if there’s any danger.’
‘Perfect,’ said Ant. ‘Okay, I’m going to run home. I’ll be back as soon as I can.’
20
Kody’s Cache
Ant was so out of breath when he returned, he had to wait a couple of minutes before climbing the fire escape to the first floor. Griff and Rubie were waiting to let him in. Rubie was dressed in one of the cleaners’ aprons, with a large yellow duster sticking out of the front pocket. There was no point in Griff disguising himself. The Crunch Hut guys all knew him as the owners’ son, so it wouldn’t seem suspicious for him to be hanging about.
They had moved the trolley into the corridor to give Ant more space to
