Space:  A Cold Artificial Reality.

Chapter 1

The alarm sounded like it was right outside my cabin, which it was.  I was jolted awake with my heart pounding and it took a minute to realize I was in the game, playing.  It felt so real that I literally pinched myself to make sure that I was not dreaming, it was no dream.  The problem was the story arc I had joined had no alarms signaling a problem. 

Suddenly the ships com lit up and the Captain appeared, he looked dazed and was having some difficulty talking, but eventually, the words came out.  “Passengers and crew, we are under attack, passengers please stay in your cabins, crewmembers please stay at your posts until further orders, and do not engage in hostilities with the boarders.”  Suddenly a man in a dark armored mech suit walked up behind the Captain and punched him in the back of the head.  I stared in horrified shock at the Captain's brains oozing out of the front of his face or what was left of it.

I realized that I needed to move and move fast if I wanted to escape and live.  The brutality of the Captain's death had galvanized me, game or not I did not want to have my brains pounded out of my head.  I grabbed my pack and quickly loaded it with my tablet and a few spare power packs.  I also threw in all the water in my cubby’s fridge, 6 water bottles.  I added all the food and snacks I could find; I was not worried about being charged for anything anymore.

Finally grabbing my e suit I quickly put it on, it would give me about one hour of air and heat before the power went down.  Leaving my cubby, I scrambled the lock and then went off towards the engineering section.  I knew that the lifeboats were not going to launch and if they did they would be picked off by whoever was attacking us.  My hope was that they would set the ship off on an orbit into the sun of the asteroid belt, and knowing the ship was close to the belt meant that was the probable location.  The reason was simple we would intersect an orbit and then there would be a few scraps of melted metal, the ship would be gone.

I was guessing but it was what I would do it made the most sense, you had to hide the evidence or get rid of it as fast as you could and this was the fastest way.  As I reasoned this out I arrived at engineering, as I suspected it was empty.  It should not have been empty but the chief engineer had a small problem, a 12-ounce problem.  Thankfully all modern ships were fully automated and only required one crew member to stand watch per department.  This watch was supposed to be the chief engineers but as I said he liked to relax during the night watch.

I stopped for a moment, how the hell did I know all this I thought and then I remembered, I had bought into the game with a level 10 account.  The first 10 levels suck and take a long time to complete, and with people bitching about that the game designers had taken note and then offered to sell a basic level ten account, no pathway had been selected and the new player had full control of what he wanted to do within the game.  A back story was provided including artificial memories with a unique story line entrance to the game.

This storyline entrance while unique was still supposed to be simple and allow the new players the opportunity to master the game basics, pick a pathway and begin the long and rewarding leveling process.  Do I sound slightly jaded, it is because I am.  This was not my first go around in the Game world of Cold Space.  I had previously bought an account and the gear needed to play all legal, I had made it up to level 72 out of 100.  I had played the AH and been successful enough to have a couple of freighters and one fast skiff.  Then it all went south, the account I had bought had been used in hacking other players and stealing gear and gold.  Who knew, I sure the fuck did not.  The Gamemasters did not give a rat’s ass about my account or the fact I had just bought it 6 months ago.  Permanent ban on that account.

Twenty thousand dollars wasted, I managed to salvage the gear which in all honesty was top line and then I bought a level ten starter account.  I called a couple of real life friends over who happened to be gamers also, sword and sorcery shite, I had never really gotten into that, the idea that a midget could cast a fucking nuke fireball at you out of his hands just seemed so much bullshit to me.  But I digress in my account.  My two pals showed up one with his masters in AI Programing and the other with three degrees engineering, hardware design and interface controls.

A few beer and pizza later my buddies were at work, they were going over the Virtual Room as it was called with a fine-tooth comb.  Several hours and many beers later I received the new.  The Vr had been hacked and the program had been hard coded into the ROM circuits.  The long and the short of it was that the Vr was fucked, the game had its own Ai who controlled security, and would send out bots which would analyze both the hardware and software of each players Vr.  The only saving grace was that with 2 billion players, Hal the Ai could only send out a limited number of bots before the game would degrade and become unplayable.

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I ended up getting the commands to start the illegal software once in the game, they were useless to me and I tossed them into the Vr and then moved the whole damn thing down to the basement.  The new Vr set me back 14 thousand credits and I was pissed.  If I ever found the bastard who had sold me that account I would send him into the sun.  I had enough money saved to play for about a year, and that included my house and food and utilities.  I had actually set up prepayments for everything including supplies and meals to be delivered.

I was not a rich person and the cost of the new hardware and account had depleted my account, if I could not make credits in the game I would have to write another story.  That is how I had made it on my own, I was a self-published author with the biggest and some would say only international store in the world.  Amdex.  It did 95 percent of all online transactions and had replaced all the smaller players if you wanted something you received it through Amdex.  I hated it but it helped to pay the bills. 

I had posted a story I had written in high school and it hit bestseller.  Screw you and other things you tell cheerleaders.  I had no idea that my tongue in cheek stories would be so popular, but once I received my first payment I was hooked.  I had made more than my Dad and with that knowledge I left home.  My parents had three other kids to feed, and while we survived I did not want to live that life.  My parents received a few credits from me to help them and then I was on my own.  I loved it, I was not into parties or large social get-togethers.  I occasionally had a couple of friends over and that was that.

I became hooked on the Vr games once a friend invited me to play on his guest account.  It was an incredible experience.  How many people do you know have lost the big V online to a dark Elf with breasts that defied description and a rear that once it caught your attention just drew you in, literally.  Who knew that dark Elves were into backdoor meetings.  It was a once in a lifetime thing, because after nailing the lovely lady I had to nail her with my sword, the metal one this time.  I still don’t know why she tried to kill me but there you have it, women are fickle.

So here I am present day, just logged into my new character a level 10 male aged 17 years old.  No alliances, no pathway chosen, backstory, on the way to Mars to live with an uncle, a diplomat who served in the Terran inner planetary service.  Tips. Who thinks this shit up I thought?  I was now about to enter the engineering department of the good ship Frack.  My hope was that the safety pods in engineering were strong enough to survive an impact with an asteroid and that they were not on the same circuit as the rest of the ships lifeboats.

Walking into the rectangular room I closed the door and then scrambled the locks.  I then went to the far end of the room where the pods were located and then scramble up a recessed ladder and made my way to the very back of the room on a small gantry.  It had a narrow walkway and had the control cabin located at the far end.  Behind the cabin was the safety pod.  Unseen from the ground and from the gantry you had to look past the control cabin to see it.  The door opened up to my touch and then closed and locked.

The Ai spoke up and began to list the power levels, 100 percent and currently tethered to the ship.  Oxygen levels, good for about 4 weeks.  Rations both food and water, again good for about 4 weeks.  After going over the safety checklist I overrode the Ai and fired up the video screens, I could access all the ships cameras and did so in an attempt to learn what the hell was going on.  There were teams of mechanized men and women going through the ship, they questioned and then killed everyone.  I watched as they brought the still drunk chief engineer out and questioned him.  It was over soon and then within minutes a team was dispatched to engineering, I observed as they broke the lock and entered the room and checked out the open space of engineering.

Once the had checked everything on the ground level including the safety pods they left and headed back up to the bridge.  Within an hour I could see that the bridges controls had been preset and the pirates began to leave the ship.  Finally, only the head pirate was there and I watched as he removed his helmet.  The fucker was Bai Ong the bastard who had sold me the hacked Vr and cost me that account.

He looked right into the monitor, smiled then said, “Duke I know you are somewhere on this ship as a level 10 player, congratulations on hiding from my crew.  I came here to capture than kill you but sadly I will have to only kill you.  I want my Vr back, and I think you won’t need it if you are dead.  At any rate, once you are dead this won’t matter. I have a suicide switch built on the Vr and once you die in here the Vr will kill you out there.  Cheers.”

I can handle almost anything but when that sob said Cheers with his English public school accent I swore that I would make him pay.  Not sure how yet as I was only level 10 and about to die while he was lever 63 and commanding a ship full of bloodthirsty pirates.  As I was thinking these happy thoughts the ships drive flickered and then cut off.  After a few minutes the solid propellant drive fired up and we began to blast away with ever building speed for about a minute.  I had the Safety pod Ai display a trajectory until impact.

I was right we were heading towards the asteroid belt and in two-day would impact a large asteroid called Em210.  I knew that we were being watched and if I tried to slow the ship down or eject on a lifeboat I could expect a quick death by laser.  In addition, my Ai informed me that all the ship's hatches and doors were locked and scrambled.  That damn Bai Ong had made sure to screw me over like a number 4 Robinson’s being drilled into some wood.

I decided to have a nap and see if I could think of anything else once I woke up, just before I drifted off I had the Ai run a descrambling program and see if it would unlock any doors.