Dek? The top solo adventurer in Dis? He can’t join any clan without penalties. What’s he doing there?”
‘He isn’t with Mogwai. He turned up first, quiet like. By the way, Crash fought them to the last, but he bought it. He’s respawning now.”
They’d taken twenty percent durability in twelve hours? That meant I had no time at all. Other clans would be rushing toward the temple that ver\ moment, eager to claim Nergal’s rewards. Damn, damn, damn!
I messaged Ed again:
“Where are the other preventers?”
“Some others tried to break through too, butShazz is pushing them all back now. He’s leveled up his air skills and has the skies under cojitr’ol jww. The Alliance decided to concentrate OJI the undead army. What are we going to do? Maybe we should jump to the temple, try to distract them at least?”
‘Yeah, an observer wouldn’t hurt. Fly around a little. Alright, over and out, I need to somehow get out of you-know-where.”
Channel terminated.
Polotsky must have been planning to tell me about the attack on the temple. Or maybe he had some other information. Either way, there was nothing I could do for now. First I had to get out of the Nether, and it seemed the only person that could help me was Kiran Jackson.
I couldn’t call him in the state I was in. I took quarter of an hour to have a contrast shower and let the Home Doctor remove the alcohol from my system. Then I drank down some fresh coffee and finally called the Snowstorm director. It occurred to me that Jackson might just ignore me, but on the other hand, he’d probably already been told where I’d gone. That might be a good enough reason to answer me.
And he didn’t just answer. Kiran recognized me.
“Hey there, Alex!” His clean-shaven face appeared on the screen, with a warm smile and spiderwebbing wrinkles at the corners of the eyes. “Hows it going? How can I help you?”
“Hello, Mr. Jackson.” My voice still sounded hoarse. I coughed. “Thank you for picking up. Sorry for bothering you, but Snowstorm tech support couldn’t help me.”
“You have my full attention. I’ll do everything I can.”
“The day before yesterday, my character fell into some strange version of Dis. It’s either the Nether or some beta version…” In short, without leaving out any important details, I told him how I got there and what happened to me there. “Tech support told me that it was part of the gameplay. I doubt that. I’m asking you to help me get back to the normal version of the game.”
“That’s a curious story, Alex…” Kiran’s tone changed, turned sympathetic. “And you don’t look too good. Say, you haven’t been taking any stims, have you?”
“Never touched them.”
“No? That’s even more interesting… You see, what you just told me is basically impossible. It sounds like a nightmare or one of the many urban legends that do the rounds online.”
“I’m not lying! It was just like I said!”
“Do you have any recordings to confirm it? Photos?”
“The place my character got stuck in doesn’t have those functions! It doesn’t even have a quit button!”
“Alex…” Kiran sighed deeply. “Listen to me. You’ve had your many adventures in your time. Others have fewer in a whole lifetime… You’ve been through a lot, and maybe… Look, obviously it’s your decision, but I recommend that you take a break from Disgardium. Now I have to go, sony, lots to do…”
“Mr. Jackson!” I interrupted, feeling myself boiling over, not letting him end the conversation. “Try to forget about all your very important business for a moment and understand this: my character, a class-A Threat, is stuck in an undocumented reality of Dis where time flows five hundred times faster, and beta testers have been living there in confinement for thousands of years. Do you want me to interview them and pass it all on to Disgardium Daily? Do you want me to…”
“No, you listen to me, kiddo!” Kiran snapped. He wasn’t shouting, but his face twisted. “You were told very clearly what to do and what not to do. But you started getting clever! Nothing of what you speak of exists. You have no way to confirm what you’re saving. And as for spreading baseless rumors to damage the corporation… I advise you read the user agreement again. You won’t just lose everything that depends on your character and its clan. We’ll sue you for all the funds you already withdrew from the game. Not to mention compensation for damaging the company’s good name. Believe me, there’ll be a lot of zeros on that number! And you’ll lose the case. I guarantee it. And then you can forget all about citizenship. Is that clear? I hope it is.”
“Mr. Jackson, wait…”
“Keep your head down, son,” Kiran interrupted him. “And forget this number. Don’t call me again.”
The Snowstorm directors face disappeared, replaced by text: Caller Kiran Jackson dropped the connection. As soon as he disappeared from the comm screen, I heard Karina’s sleepy voice behind me.
“Alex! Good morning… Can I have some coffee too?”
* * *
I couldn’t play the good guy for long. Saying that I needed to do some homework (damn, back to school tomorrow!) and a thing or two in Dis, I walked Karina out, promising that we’d meet again the next weekend. As soon as the door closed behind her, I started reviewing the recording from the lounge video camera.
The girl had left my room when Kiran said “Keep your head down, son”—at least I was lucky there. She must have thought I was talking to my dad. I was annoyed that my shouting had woken her up, and there was too much confidential information in my impassioned speech. I hoped the half-asleep Karina didn’t pay any attention to what I’d said.
Once done with that, I ordered some life-support cartridges for my capsule. While I waited, I ground
