Josh dribbled the soccer ball between his feet. Where had he found that, anyway? Or did he mod it himself? I hadn’t thought to ask him if he had the capability and passwords to make changes to the game. Probably something I should have considered before ditching him and my sister earlier.
“It was a long time ago,” Josh explained. “Back when he used to go to gaming conventions. At the time, he’d just released his new game, Wild West, and evidently some of its players didn’t like that he’d given a lot of the good story lines to female characters.”
“So they shot him?” Lilli asked, incredulous. “Over game story lines?”
“I know, right?” Josh agreed. “He had to spend weeks in the hospital. I was only a little kid at the time, so I didn’t know the whole story till way later. I just knew someone hated my grandfather so much they wanted to kill him.” He scowled. “Which is ridiculous, by the way. I mean, I know my grandpa is weird and all. The whole fake admiral thing and the uniform—it’s totally embarrassing. But he’s a good guy, deep down. He cares about people. He’s worked his whole life to help people and make them happy.”
“Wow. That’s really…” I trailed off, not knowing the word I was looking for. Fascinating? Horrifying? Confusing—maybe? After all, the man Josh was describing—that Starr described earlier—didn’t sound like the monster who would kidnap a young girl for his own selfish gain. Was there something Josh didn’t know about his grandfather? Or something we didn’t know about the kidnapping? Could Admiral Appleby be innocent? Maybe it was one of his employees who had kidnapped Ikumi. After all, Hiro had no idea Eugene was sabotaging Dragon Ops. Could something similar be going on here?
“I think the word you’re looking for is inconsequential,” Yano interrupted, looking impatient. “Ikumi is waiting for us out there. That’s all that matters in the end.”
I turned to him, surprised—and a little guilty. “You’re right,” I said. “Let’s go inside.” I started toward the door, Yano on my heels.
“Not the dragon,” Josh said suddenly, stepping in front of Yano.
“What? Why not?” Yano burst out, looking quite offended. “I’m part of the team.”
“Sorry. Players only. Grandpa has very strict perimeters of what can enter and leave through this door. You take one step inside, and you’ll be obliterated by his digital sentries.” He shrugged and added, “I mean, your choice, of course.”
Yano flapped his wings, looking extremely annoyed. “Well, I suppose I shall wait out here, then. But, Ian and Lilli—you be careful going into the belly of the beast like this. I will be here if you need me.”
“We’ll be fine,” I assured him, patting him on the side. Though I was admittedly a little nervous. Yano was right—this was the belly of the beast, and we had no idea what might be waiting for us on the other side. What if we were walking into a trap?
But we had little choice. We couldn’t break Ikumi out ourselves. We needed those keys. And so I followed Josh up to the fortress’s front door. I watched as he dialed in a code at the door and it swung open easily.
Here went nothing.
Starr stepped through the door first. Or halfway through the door, anyway, before she stopped short. “Whoa!” she exclaimed. “Are you kidding me right now?” I scurried to follow her in, eager to see what had her so freaked out.
“Oh my gosh,” I breathed, looking around once I’d stepped up beside her. “This is… incredible.”
I’d expected something cool. I mean, this was the game maker’s personal playground, after all. It had to be top-of-the-line. But even in my wildest imagination I could never have imagined something like this.
For so long we’d been wandering through an apocalyptic future—complete with death, destruction, decay. But here in Admiral Appleby’s private sanctum, it was like we’d stumbled into the Garden of Eden. Everywhere we looked there was a breathtaking rain forest of exotic plants, waterfalls, and sparkling pools filled with koi fish. I knew, on some level, it wasn’t real—it was just really good programming. But it was so wild and colorful and overgrown that if you’d told me I had stepped into a real-life jungle? I would have agreed without question.
Just then something rumbled in the bushes behind me. I turned to find a baby chimpanzee hanging from a nearby banana plant, giving me a grumpy look. I watched as he plucked a bright pink banana from a branch and began to peel it, keeping a wary eye on the intruders the whole time.
“Aw,” Lilli cooed, coming up next to me. “Look how cute he is!”
Josh walked over to the chimp, plucking him from his perch and letting him climb onto his shoulder. “This is Mr. Donkey Kong,” he said. “My grandpa’s pet.”
“Is he… real?” I asked, squinting at the creature.
Josh beamed. “Yup. Or he’s the avatar of a real chimp anyway, back at HQ. He was one of our first beta testers. Grandpa wanted to see if the world was real enough for actual animals to believe in it.”
“Wow,” I said, reaching out to pet Mr. Donkey Kong. He was softer than I’d imagined, and he chirped happily as I scratched behind his ear. “So cool.”
“So cool!” the monkey agreed happily.
Josh laughed. “Oh yeah. The game allows him to talk, too. Isn’t that great? He loves to be able to communicate with his voice instead of sign language like back in the real world.”
I shook my head, unbelieving. This was so awesome. It was really hard to see it as a castle of evil. There had to be someone else behind this whole thing. There just had to be!
I turned to find Starr, to see what she thought of all of this. But she had already wandered off and was now standing inside a small hut with a computer inside of it.
“Oh wow. This is a
