Is there crossplay with the real world?

The red cell luckily, had a little bench bed suspended from the wall with two cables, so Gradie sat down and exhaled pointlessly through his nose.

“Where you at bro?” Luke asked, after an embarrassingly long moment of silence.

‘Back in jail. Lost the fucking fight.”

“Shit. Ok sit tight, we’ll come get you.”

“We got another wave coming,” Angel said.

“Bro fuck it,” said Nova. “We’ll go get him then come back, probably get some kills on the way. We’re already attuned to the prism so—”

“Don’t worry about it,” Gradie said, feeling the blood rush to his face, somehow. “I’m heading up there. If I get pinned down, yall can come get me, but I think I can slip by on my own.” He leaned his head back against the wall and crossed his legs. Surely this game couldn’t last forever?

“All right man. Good luck.” Angel said.

“Nah bro, fuck that. We’re on our way,” said Luke.

Gradie thought of other times in his life when he had been the dead weight in a game, and from there his thoughts drifted to the Hardworlds, and like dry kindling that had just been waiting for the passing focused beam of a magnifying glass, an idea flared up that he had been trying to keep from igniting for weeks. He saw himself in the Hardworlds alone, without Philips commands or EP’s watching drones, sailing down a highway, or robbing a bank, or using a million dollars to live a day of unimaginable debauchery—

“Top team needs twenty points to win,” the robotic female voice said from everywhere, as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

“What the fuck?” said Nova. “I thought Colors was on a timer?”

“No, it’s old school,” Angel said.

“Shit no time to waste then,” said Luke. “Let’s go pick up Corpse and fuck them up!”

“Bad idea,” Angel said, and for a miserable moment Gradie thought he meant the first part of Luke’s statement. “First of all, when a team is close, you want to just avoid them, starve them of points, get your score off easier teams. And second of all we don’t know who they are. There’s no scoreboard on colors.”

“So wait, then it could be us?” Luke asked.

“No.” Angel and Nova said at the same time.

“Top team needs ten points to win!” The lady sounded absolutely unhinged.

“See, that’s what happens when you go after the top team,” Angel said.

“Thought you said you couldn’t know who it was?”

“Well, we can’t, but I’m assuming everyone else is seeing them running train and figured it out. There’s probably a big brawl in the arena. Camping that place was meta when Colors was more heavy in rotation.”

“Sounds dope,” Luke said. “Where is it?”

“It’s a big crater on the other side of the—”

“Victory! The winning team is… Hyperflex!”

“Who’s Hyperflex?” Gradie asked, as the world turned white and foggy and fell away from itself. In an instant, the four of them were standing on the strange contact lens platform again, as a wide screen floating ahead of them displayed a scoreboard. The world around was a indeterminate mist of light clouds and white noise. Ghostly images of six or seven avatars floated momentarily over the scoreboard, posing and dancing, until they faded into the mist. A banner over them had read “Hyperflex”.

“The winning team,” Luke said with a smile.

“Fuck you. I mean do we have a team name?”

“Yeah, its VisionQuest, our guild,” Nova said. “We’re playing under their banner for today.”

Gradie found his own name on the scoreboard, highlighted, in red like the other three, but separated from them by a wide field of blue rows. Six kills. Two deaths. Angel was well at the top, twelve and zero, with Luke and Nova not far below him.

“Not bad for your first time,” Luke said with a leering smile.

Gradie looked out at the swirling clouds, hoping they could take some of the edge off his rage at once again being the new guy on the fucking team, and threw the conversation forward, as if it could take him with it into the future.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“So I get the gun part, but why is it called a maze again? Did losing set us backward in the maze, or—”

“We didn’t lose, bro,” Nova said, sounding disgusted. “We just didn’t make top slot. And the maze is more a legacy name, from the inner core, the OG maze. It’s not like this there. The segments blend seamlessly into each other, like a series of dreams. This is more for the mass market, get me?”

Gradie studied the clouds again. The inner maze sounded like something that would actually be worth the time. Despite the brief moments of excitement in Colors, they hadn’t been worth the embarrassment. An itch in the back of his head, an unformed desire, took shape out of his reflection. Gunmaze might have been a lot of fun if there was no one with him to disappoint. Once again, like kindling, the idea of going into the Hardworlds, telling no one, ignited in his mind, and whisked his thoughts away.

“So no maze, but lots of guns, right?” Luke asked

“Yeah bro. I queued us for shooters only today,” Nova said. “Good way to get familiar with the experience."

The screen dinged and a pop up appeared over the scoreboard. Two words stuck out to Gradie.

“Conquest Invite”

“Oh shit. Goat-Head is pushing that power plant on Sarthor,” Nova said.

“How many slots does he have?”

“Looks like eight open.”

“Fuck yeah, get us in.”

Luke squinted at the screen.

“What is it?”

“Conquest. Remember that big shared sci-fi thing I was talking about?”

“The one that’s like an MMO?”

“Yeah. Got some openings.”

“An MMO?” Gradie couldn’t imagine a game type that would punish him more for his inexperience.

“Kinda,” Angel sighed, the comparison clearly frustrating him. “Its four persistent planets and a bunch of moons. Multiple factions grouped by language. You can make a character and respawn at the cloning station, pay mem to lower the rebirth time, that kind of thing. Or you can get dropped in on a maze run in a temp character. The makers put it out to compete with Arthel. Which is like the fantasy roleplay gameworld that kind of competes with Gunmaze.”

“Yeah, but Arthel is way more stuck up about it. Lots of LARPers who live that shit,” Angel said.

“Maze queue paused. Preparing…Soulara.”

“So, is it still part of the maze?” Gradie was trying to get a picture of the gameworld in his head, and his original vision of multiple games arranged in a mazelike mesh had collapsed, now apparently reserved for the top players at the inner core.

“Yeah, you still get tokens,” Angel said. “And winning counts towards your streak. Theres a few portions of Gunmaze that are like that. Sometimes if they’re hard up for characters they’ll offer extra for dropping in.”

“Characters?”

“Yeah, there are no NPC’s in Gunmaze. So if you have a game that needs enemies or something, it has to be done by actual people. Some do it professionally.”

“Like, if every goon in a game had to be controlled by a real person?”

“Exactly. It’s why so many of the segments are competitive. It’s usually either that or player versus environment kinda thing.”

“What’s the game like?” Luke asked.

“Sci fi, space opera. In the actual Conquest the avatars are pretty fleshed out. You can get genetic—”

“Can I get a lightsaber?”

Nova stopped mid-sentence and shook his head at Luke with a smile. Angel scowled behind.

“Soulara portal established. Prepare for departure.”

The fuzzy clouded world went dark, and just like before Colors, Gradie suddenly felt like he was falling at an incredible speed. This time, however, after about five seconds of falling, a mirror appeared in the dark, reflecting the four of them in their avatars.

“Previous loadouts found.”

The twin’s avatar’s picked up new clothing as if they were falling through them on the way down. Angel had a kind of armor plating and monk robe combo, with a helmet that looked like a kendo mask made of metal and colored glass, and Nova got something that reminded Gradie of a formula one Racer who had patterned his suit after a psychedelic experience topped with a space age gas mask and, surprisingly, a fucking cowboy hat.

“Nice hat bro,” Luke laughed.

“Welcome newcomers.”

Luke and Gradie’s avatars were slowly given space suits and masked helmets that screamed space age grunts, and then two identical rifles and gear pouches. Once the system was convinced they had looked at themselves in the mirrors long enough to make the effect stick, a map appeared in front of them, with a dialogue box.

“Solara Tutorial. [accept][decline]”

Nova waved his hand and the decline button flashed red then vanished, leaving only the map. The sensation of falling faded and Gradie felt he was floating in zero g.

“Ok, lemme see.” Nova manipulated the map with hand motions and zoomed in on a portion that looked like the center of a spider web.

“Ok, so this is high roads of Sarthor. Big fuckin sci-fi highways and skyscrapers. Drop ship is somewhere down here,” he motioned towards the bottom edge of the screen. “And here’s the fuel plant.” He swiped up and the map revealed a beach and ocean rendered in muted colors. A large structure that looked like a cannon-age starfort was stuck on the beach, with five of the spider web lines branching out from it.

“So here’s Geyser Squad control.” He motioned to the red overlaid on half the map. “And this is allied territory.” The other, bottom half, overlaid with blue, and turning purple at the edges. “So let me see what…”

“Yo Quasar,” an unfamiliar voice said on the comms. “You in yet?”

“Nah bro I’m at the map,” Nova said. “Where you need us?”

“One sec.”

A box popped up on the map that Nova quickly interacted with, turning it green before it vanished. A new icon, like a circular avatar portrait, appeared on the map, as well as a pink and black cursor.

“Ok, center road got nuked, we’re trying to build up on left center, but I need some cover so here.”

The cursor marked a dot on the map, just on the red side of the purple belt.

“Clear this tower out and call a cannon team. If you guys are still around when we storm up, then that would be cool.”

“Alright bro. You got a transport.”

“Yeah, Mav and Robin are already on it. You wanna pilot?”

“Always bro.”

“Ok I’ll drop you in.”

Another box popped up and Nova hit accept and the sensation of falling renewed with a vengeance.

“All right bros, pretty simple,” Nova said. “Shoot em dead and watch your head.”

Gradie landed in a sitting position, and the world tugged away from him, two cross chest straps keeping him in place

The transition was so seamless, so perfect. That his mind accepted the new world around him wholesale.

And very quickly, it became apparent that it was a world of violence.