It started to rain. Joe didn’t move. Then it poured. He still didn’t budge. The lightning that struck close to the bus stop made him jump away from a now burning trash can behind the bus bench, but anger quickly replaced his shock, and he sat back on that bench. Did Joe have a stubborn streak? Possibly. The red door appeared and for a moment, Joe’s eyes slid to eye it as suspiciously as he was watching everything else.
Over the next 15 minutes or so, the sun set, and it grew cold—unusually cold for an LA setting. The rain in the gutter iced over and for a moment Joe thought the rain had stopped, only to realize that it had just changed to snow. Joe leaned back against the backrest of the bench and remained seated. The sun rose and set again within minutes. He did not endure this cycle for days, though it appeared so due to a fast-forward effect that created the illusion of time passing. The slush from the gutters still managed to splash him, and the door persisted.
Joe amused himself with what he could imagine a conversation between the World AI and his AI Advocate, Grace.
He’s still not moving, the World AI would have complained to Grace.
“He’ll move,” Grace might have reassured. “He’s just in shock.”
He’s taking too long, the World AI would retort, its impatience uncharacteristic for an AI.
“It’ll just be a few more minutes,” Grace could have pleaded for patience. “Give him a break.”
I will not give him a break, the World AI would persist irrationally. I’m invoking the most severe punishment because he is being unreasonably stubborn.
That imagined exchange wasn’t how it truly went, but Joe liked to think it did. He knew he could twist this narrative any way he wanted—it was, after all, his recounting. And if he ever chose to fictionalize his story, who would question it?
There was a clause in all broadcasting contracts (one Joe never signed but was signed on his behalf by a justice system gone awry) that allowed the World AI to take drastic measures if their human component failed to perform as expected. His World AI, frustrated that Joe had chosen its venue just as it was about to be recycled, decided to use his shock and "recalcitrant behavior" to justify a complete overhaul of its settings, venue, and plot to boost ratings.
Three key elements had to happen for the World AI to invoke this clause. One, the human component, that was Joe, had to refuse to engage in the storyline, which he had technically done by sitting on the bench for too long while “on air.” Two, the human component had to refuse to use the red door when the “off air” sign was engaged. And three, the human component had to be willfully tanking the program. The reason Joe had been given so long to sulk was that a technician had been called to check that his pod was working properly and that his medical condition was officially healthy.
Falling hail was distraction enough for Joe not to feel the blood test that confirmed his healthy hormonal and amino acid levels, as well as a visual check of his overall physical condition. Those background checks done, the World AI, which was capable of neither the vindictive nor petty reactions that Joe was attributing to it, got together with the Producer AI who agreed that the “Dead Air” clause could be reasonably evoked. They then spent twenty very long seconds determining the best program to encourage Joe back into the program. Everything faded to black for Joe, reminiscent of being put under anesthesia—quick and disorienting.
----------------------------------------
Joe woke up in a cave. The walls of the cave were only about an inch taller than his own height of 6’2” and he knew this because he stood up and nearly hit his head. The walls were rough rock, and the floor was mud that squelched under his sneakers. His jeans were caked in the mud that he’d picked up from laying there in it. Joe only stood up to get out of the mud and was distractedly trying to wipe it off as he looked around. It was a blank cave. What else could he say about it? All it had in it was him and his backpack which was currently posing as a crude leather version of itself.
“Now what?” Joe muttered to himself, giving the only exit from this place a dubious look. Light filtered in through a bunch of sticks and leaves that might have been a door?
“This is your new safe room,” came a very muffled voice from his backpack.
Was that Grace?
“Open the backpack,” it came again.
Joe didn’t hate Grace, so he opened the backpack. What crawled out of it made him wish he hadn’t. He nearly stomped on the furry thing before it looked up at him with Grace’s eyes. He would just say that a furry spider is a thing that should not have the sepia-colored eyes of an old woman. Joe barely managed to resist stomping on it, but it was a close thing, especially when she raised her front legs. She might have been trying to smile and wave, but it looked much more like… well, did you know the things hiss? Joe hadn’t known that. Of all the things his old apartment hadn’t had, it was furry black and tan striped spiders as big as his fist.
“Don’t smush me!” Grace’s voice came out around the hissing. “It’s me, Grace.”
“If I didn’t know that, you’d be squished already,” Joe told her, trying to stuff his eyes back in his head and be polite. “What the hell happened!?”
“The World AI has evoked the Dead Air clause,” Grace explained, giving Joe all the reasons given before, so this part will skip past his perfectly reasonable indignant response and all the swearing that could take up the next two chapters. “Your venue has changed to a dungeon crawling game show, reminiscent of a cult classic book series from the 2020s named Dungeon Crawler Carlisle. Since that series had a pet show poodle, it was determined that I should be your pet sidekick. This is your safe room. You have a fifteen timer in your upper right vision that says how long you have here before you are ejected into the dungeon that is crawling with nasty monsters that want to kill us both.”
The timer had about ten minutes on it. Joe had sworn about five minutes off of it.
00:09:43
“This isn’t what I signed up for,” Joe argued, poking his nose into his backpack to see if anything else was in it. He had a coil of rope, some soap, two candles, and a few energy bars. “You’re supposed to be my advocate. Do something advocatey! Get me out of this!”
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
“You do remember that you’re a criminal and not in charge, right?” Grace asked, and Joe flinched again as her hairy front legs waved as she talked. “AI parameters require that an advocate be assigned to all criminals, but they don’t stipulate what the advocate’s role is. Since the World AI has more power than you do over my fate, I’m just here for the ride, Sugar.”
“Obviously,” Joe gritted his teeth and sent a mild kick at the wall. “At least I have shoes.” He remembered that series.
00:08:59
“You bought them with creation points, so the World AI can’t take them away,” Grace gave him the good news even as she was trying to crawl up on his pants. “I feel rather vulnerable down here, Sugar. Care to give me a lift?”
“Does that mean that I can still upgrade stuff? Like my safe room?” Joe asked, edging away from Grace and avoiding the question.
“If you managed to earn any experience, then yes, you could upgrade stuff,” Grace groused at him. “But last I heard, you were on a sulk strike.” It was the first time Joe had heard Grace’s tone slip to accusatory and he took it harder than he wanted to. “If you dislike spiders so much, maybe this will give you a reason to upgrade me since you weren’t interested in doing it for kindness’ sake.”
That prickled at Joe. He’d always thought of himself as a nice person. Who didn’t? “It isn’t that I don’t like spiders,” he admitted reluctantly, trying to keep his disgust from his tone. “I just have a problem with the ones that have fur.”
“Great,” Grace gave up the pretense of politeness. “I’m going to die because you’re squeamish about fur. You have all of 4 xp. You can’t buy an upgrade with that, so unless you want to lose your only guide in this place, you’re going to have to swallow your revulsion of me long enough to kill something other than me.”
00:08:03
Joe blew out a breath, the timer making him feel very insecure in his life choices since his arrest. Her feet felt silky against his palm, but he still had to fight back a shudder. He placed her on the shoulder that didn’t have his backpack slung over it and as far from his neck as possible. She still had fangs.
“It’s not like I asked to be a spider,” Grace did her own form of a sulk, and Joe was thinking that she was better at it than he was. His mom hadn’t been a guilt-dumper in general, but when he didn’t live up to standards, she let him know. Did his mom even know he’d been arrested? He didn’t want to think about that. It was bad enough that he wasn’t married at his age and giving her grandchildren.
00:06:27
“I’ll upgrade you,” Joe told her, feeling like he didn’t have a spine for the first time in his life. It wouldn’t last, but it was something to start with. “What about my character sheet?” And his words summoned it up.
Actor Character Sheet
Name: Joe Cockran Denphry Level: 1 Exp: 4/1000
CB – 6
DQ – 1
TA – 1
SS – 1
ER – 1
Dungeon Character Sheet
Name: Joe Cockran Denphry Level: 1
Class: Exp: 0/1000
Health Points: Durability x10 Stamina: Dar+Dex x5
Mana: MS+MA x5 Charm: Likability x 10
Dar – Daring – Charge! Go get ‘em! That kind of thing.
Dex – Dexterity – How well you can dodge without falling down and throw without missing the barn.
Dur – Durability – How much damage you can soak up before you die.
MS – Mental Stability (-2) – We both know how little of this you have.
MA – Mental Ability – You’re going to need more of this even if you don’t cast spells.
LI – Likability – How much NPCs will not want to spit on you as you walk by.
LK – Luck – This stat will help determine how likely you’ll be able to get out of something stupid you got yourself into.
Skills: Stupid Stubbornness (2)
“Yeah,” Grace pointed toward the floating boxes. “You’ve still got the old one which is based on our ratings, but now you’ll have one for your character in the show. You’ll be able to pull up your dungeon sheet outside of the safe room, but the viewers will also be able to see it. You have the same deal with 10 points to distribute to start you off and 5 points per level.”
Joe just about put it all in luck, but then he noticed the snarky comments. “What’s with my MS stat?”
“You defied the World AI with a stunt worthy of a five-year-old,” Grace eyed him in a very unnerving way from his shoulder. “What did you expect? And don’t bother stuffing everything in Luck since the World AI has final say over anything crazy you want to try.”
Joe rolled his eyes and evened out all his stats with 1s, dumping 3 into Mental Stability to get it out of the red. Then he had one left, and he couldn’t decide where to put it.
“What about a class?” Joe asked because nothing happened when he tried to select it.
“Class will be determined by actions,” Grace explained, her furry legs pointing. Joe hadn’t minded that she talked with her hands when she was a safe grandmotherly figure in the mirror. Now they threatened to brush his cheeks as she talked, and Joe swore to himself that she was the first thing he was spending experience on to upgrade. “If you do stuff, the Writer AIs will make up some classes for you to choose from. Your skills are going to work that way too.”
“Like Stupid Stubbornness?” Joe glared at the words like it could make them go away. He should have chosen a fairy tale world.
“The World AI always has final say on things,” Grace warned him, her tone serious enough to scratch through the terror Joe barely hid behind his crossed arms and furrowed brows.
00:03:07
That clock wasn’t Joe's friend. It was a steady reminder that his previous attitude wouldn’t be tolerated. Thing was, Joe wasn’t sure he had another attitude.
“What happens if I die out there?” Joe choked out the question, clenching his hands so they wouldn’t shake.
“You end up back here with a penalty,” Grace told him, and Joe wondered if an AI could be bracing herself for sure death.
“What kind of penalty?”
“The World AI – “ Grace started.
“Has final say on everything,” Joe finished for her, watching that clock. “Yeah, I’m getting the theme here.”
“It could be anything from an experience penalty to a stat or skill loss,” Grace shrugged her second set of legs in a way that only a spider could do, but probably shouldn’t.
“I could do with losing that skill, but I doubt that would be the World AI’s first choice of penalty,” Joe said, swiping away screens that now looked like this:
Dungeon Character Sheet
Name: Joe Cockran Denphry Level: 1
Class: Exp: 0/1000
Health Points: 10 Stamina: 10
Mana: 10 Charm: 10
Dar – 1
Dex – 1
Dur – 1
MS – 1
MA – 1
LI – 1
LK – 1
Skills: Stupid Stubbornness (2)
00:01:19
“You can’t afford to defy the World AI anymore,” Grace warned, her legs all falling into a stable position on Joe's shoulder as he reached toward the vine-covered door in front of him. “Just because he didn’t take away any of your bought items doesn’t mean he can’t with the right situation.”