Chapter 76

The DUMB Official

“There are four groups of people in the world right now,” The DUMB official said, staring up at the six players. “First, and most numerous, are the mindless monsters you keep encountering that eat anything they find. Second, and also the second most numerous, are the ordinary humans like those,” she pointed at the preppers, “who haven't been infected by the aliens. Third, there's you, the smallest group, who've formed a symbiotic relationship with the aliens, the so-called heroes. And finally, my group. The group myself and the late General are part of.”

The woman looked around nervously, eyes wide with fear, terrified the wrong people would hear her, before taking a deep breath and continuing. “You see, the government scientists created a vaccine they believed would protect us from the alien protozoa. More than that, the vaccine would allow us to merge with the alien protozoa, creating a superior being. A human/alien protozoan hybrid with all the strengths of both human and alien-protozoan, but with none of their weaknesses. There wasn't enough vaccine for everyone, obviously, so the vaccine was given to people with connections, people who matter. Myself and others. The vaccine worked, after a fashion. Most, like myself, became healthier and stronger than normal humans, but still more or less human. In a small minority of cases--less than one percent--the vaccine worked perfectly, causing the human and alien to combine—turning them into ultimate god-like beings. The General was one of the weakest of those beings. The others are much more powerful, and there are thousands of them. They are our gods now.”

“Bleep. How do we defeat them?” Teresa asked.

“These gods will tolerate me, and even them,” she motioned towards the preppers, “as long as they're sufficiently devout. But not you. The gods sense your evil, your symbiotic corruption. They will hunt you down. They will kill you all!”

“So what do we do? How do we defeat them?” Teresa shouted.

The woman giggled. “You don't. Your kind is stupid, weak and few. You die. You die. You die! YOU DIE!” The woman's voice rose in volume and pitch until it turned into a scream.

Teresa pulled out a pistol and shot the woman in the head. The woman fell to the ground, twitching.

“Bleep!” Teresa shouted.

“Everybody breathe,” Joseph said. “What do we do now?”

The game went black.

“Fuck!” Leo shouted. Was that it? Was that their answer? There was nothing they could do? They were all going to die? There had to be more to it.

With groans, the pods opened, and players disconnected themselves.

“What happened?” Jason asked, tiredly stepping out of his pod.

“What happened?” Howie asked, echoing Jason as he opened his pod and sat up. “Did the system crash?”

“No, it didn't.” Mr. Osmond studied one of the monitors. “'This concludes the unfinished version of the game,'” he read. “'Thank you for Beta testing. We are working hard on the completed version of the game and will release it as soon as possible. Thank you for your patience.'” He punched a nearby pod with his fist. “Assholes!”

“It's worse than that,” Leo said. “Is there any way you can pull up an image of the game from right before it ended?”

“Sure. Why?” Mr. Osmond asked.

“It's important,” Leo said.

A few minutes later, an image of the game appeared on Mr. Osmond's monitor. With the six frozen players surrounding the equally frozen dead DUMB official.

“Look at the sky,” Leo said. “You see that dot? Magnify it as much as you can.”

The dot expanded to six smaller dots in a circle. The dots, in turn, expanded into six blurry, pixilated, tentacled blobs.

“Shit,” someone said.

Leo felt sick. “You didn't know what to look for, because you haven't lived through it. You are looking at six High-Level Bosses. Each one of them is the equivalent of one hundred Generals.”

“Uh. Guys?” It was Liam.

Leo ignored him. “One hundred Generals is my conservative estimate. The six of them will come down with the force of an atomic bomb, laying waste to everything within miles of them. That's before they actually do anything.”

“Uh. Guys? Guys!”

“What!?”

“Check this out!” Liam held up his cell phone.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

Leo read the message with the others.

The human board of directors of the human corporation of Bio-Blessed wishes to make an announcement. There is no—repeat, no--end of the world planned when the timepiece on our billboards hits midnight. Nobody is turning into a monster. A digital fireworks display is set to go off when the billboard timepieces hit midnight. This was meant to be a surprise gift for our loyal customers. But because of the end-of-the-world rumors, the humans of Bio-Blessed feel the need to inform and reassure everyone.

Repeat, the world will not be ending when our billboard timepieces hit midnight.

“That announcement came out right around the time we finished the game,” Liam said, a huge smile on his face. “Did we just save the world?”

“That definitely didn't happen last time around,” Leo said. “The not-ending-the-world announcement, or billboard fireworks.”

“I suspect the timing of the announcement was a coincidence,” Mr. Osmond said. “Thanks mostly to myself, Leo's end-of-the-world predictions have reached a lot of people, some of them were concerned enough to investigate and make inquiries. I think that is what brought on the announcement. The question is, do we believe the aliens?”

Leo shook his head. He wanted to believe it, but this felt wrong. Too easy. “I don't know.”

“Would the aliens lie?” Liam said. “I never understood why they would end the world to begin with. As Ambrose pointed out, these aliens have trillions of our dollars. For them, destroying our world would be like one of us burning down our own house with all our stuff inside after canceling our homeowner's insurance policy. What could they possibly gain by destroying a world they pretty much own?”

“I don't know,” Leo said again.

“Might I suggest that this was all an experiment?” Liam said. “When the aliens gave Leo his implant, they also gave him a vision of the end of the world to see what he'd do about it, and the world itself was never in any danger.”

“I wish I believed that, Liam,” Leo said. “But I don't.”

“Game's over,” Mr. Osmond said. “Everyone out. Except for Leo.” He tossed Howie a debit card. “That's what I owe you.”

“Thanks. This has been really fun,” Howie said, pocketing the card. “Let me know if you need anything else.”

“What about the rest of us? Do we get paid?” Jason asked.

“Considering we've been playing your favorite game in my state-of-the-art gaming pods, Jason, I should be charging you.”

“Good point,” Jason said. “I'm out of here.”

Half an hour later, Leo and Mr. Osmond were the only people left.

They looked at each other.

“So now what?” Leo asked.

Mr. Osmond sighed. He'd gotten little sleep for the past several days and looked exhausted. “I'm too tired to think. Did you notice anything else in the game that might be useful? ”

“Not much.” Leo told him about the piece of paper with the picture of a water reservoir and the possible number.

“I've seen that sign in many locations in the game,” Mr. Osmond said. “I assume it's humor, since swimming in a water reservoir was a bad idea even before alien protozoa took them over.”

Mr. Osmond sighed and rubbed his eyes. “Leo, either the world's going to end, or it's not. If the world doesn't end, then it's business as usual. So let's focus on what we do if the world does end. The game we played is obviously based on your end-of-the-world scenario. The aliens are your Afflicted. The alien symbionts are implant-wearers, and the Bosses have far too much resemblance to your end-of-the-world Bosses not to take this game seriously.”

Leo nodded. “Unfortunately, the programmers neglected to mention how to stop the world from ending, or how to win the game.”

“Correct. And we can't ask them about it, because they are dead.” Mr. Osmond sighed and put his in his hands. “Not to come across as depressing, but what if there isn't a way to win? What if this is the human race being judged? What kind of species gives virtually all of their world's resources to a tiny fraction of their populace? A fraction that does nothing while billions of their own kind starve? Does our species even deserve to win?”

“All I know is I'm sick of losing. The Bosses do have a very few weaknesses. Let's talk strategy when you've had time to rest.”

Mr. Osmond nodded. “Go home, Leo. Tomorrow, I want a list of every item that you think could help us survive. Food, fuel, weapons, water filters, the whole bit. I want the locations of every hiding place you ever used. Anything that can help us.”

“Will do. We'll be better prepared this time around.”

“So will they,” Mr. Osmond responded. “If you think the rich bastards running our planet are ignoring all this, you're deluded.”

Leo stood up. “Do I have to go to school tomorrow?”

“I believe so,” Mr. Osmond responded. “You've attracted enough attention. Time to blend in.”

Leo sighed. “Great.”

***

Leo took his time walking home. When he arrived, it was almost midnight and the TV was on.

The story I've heard, and keep in mind, this is unverified. The story is that there's a crazy kid out there. Let's call him Chicken Little. Now Chicken Little puts on an implant, goes crazy, and starts running around saying the sky is falling. Now instead of going, “Oh you poor crazy person,” everyone believes him to the point where the aliens – I mean the humans--have to step in and say “No we're really not going to destroy the world. Of course, they're not going to destroy the world. Unlike so many people down here on earth, they're not complete idiots...

Lydia was sleeping on the couch, Sparkles curled up next to her. Leo couldn't find the remote, so he unplugged the TV.

“Hey, I was listening to that,” Lydia mumbled.

“Why aren't you in bed?” Leo asked.

Lydia rubbed her eyes and sat up. “What do you care? Mom was looking for you earlier and you weren't answering your texts. I had to tell her you were in your room studying so she'd go away.”

“I've been busy. Saving the world and stuff.”

“Whatever. I feel sorry for that stupid kid that put on an implant and went crazy,” she said. “What a moron.”

“Yeah.” Leo felt very tired. “He must be stupid all right. Go to bed.”

Leo went to his room, but it was a long time before he went to sleep.