A warm autumn wind blew through Hyde Park, bringing with it a mixed smell of brine, and distant seasonal coffees. Daniel was hastily trekking through the parc, his graduate project rolled up in a cardboard tube swung over his back, and the rest of his work hidden away on his laptop squished between his course on Mainland fabric history and a handful of magazines that he'd permanently borrowed from his faculty.
“Inspired by Jeremy Farringdon's work in the '80s, and - no, the anonymous contributors of the Bellway collection, which Jeremy Farrington based his mid-career work on. The geometric overlay, no-” he muttered to himself.
He couldn't fantom why his professor had invited him to present his work in front of a class of freshmen. He didn't even get that high of a grade on it, a mid-2-2, and a voice at the back of his mind kept nagging at him that he'd be used as an example of what not to do.
But he was proud of the tapestry he made, and having it hung in the reception of Clayford’s University Arts and Huminites building was going to be worth something on his CV.
He didn't want to think about that dreadful and inevitable concept though. A bachelor's and two masters down the line, he still wasn't ready to enter the job market. If it were up to him, he would have stayed in academia. But his parents put in no uncertain terms that they were just about done with paying for his “hobbies”.
He stopped in his tracks and caught his breath. He hadn't realised how fast he'd been walking, and a spiking pain in his side quickly reminded him that he shouldn't be running around with about 15 kilos of books and tapestry on him. He quickly found a bench, and let himself fall onto it. Using his messenger bag as an armrest, he glanced around, checking for campus security. Unfortunately, there weren’t any around. Not that he wanted to get caught rolling a joint, but it would get him out of having to do that presentation. Then he could do it the following Wednesday, which would give an extra week here.
It took him several tries to light the joint. The lighter was old and empty, but it had come to the UDR with him, and in two days it would return to Réque with him. He signed. The weed was doing nothing for him, and the clock on his phone told him that he still had 40 minutes to kill before the lecture. He checked his emails. His message app. His other message app. His timetable now displayed only blank dates...
He sighed, then checked his emails again. The last subject line read ‘BUD Transfer from Hanna J. Mercer’ it cut off just before the sum his mum transferred him could be displayed. But he’d seen it when he received it yesterday, and earlier today. It was enough for a premium economy flight home. Or a ferry ticket and one last night of partying. Not that he really partied.
He checked the message apps again, this time opening the group chats he had muted. There was an open invitation for a pub crawl later tonight. Daniel could go, he reckoned, as he took a drag of the joint. It still wasn’t doing anything, and he wondered yet again if the other students were just lying about getting high. He typed out a reply, then selected the text and deleted it. 6 PM was too early to start drinking, plus he didn’t know over half the people going.
So, he checked his emails again before opening the ferry website. It took a few seconds to load, long enough for Daniel to double-check what date they were. His parents wanted him home before Yom Kippur if he didn’t find a job. Which was in two weeks, and he hadn’t applied anywhere where he’d actually like to work, so he entered the details for a one-way trip to the Mainland.
He found a travel time that worked for him. It was a 15-hour trip from the Clayford port, to Val de Nantes, which was only a three-hour drive to the Réque border, and Dan could bet good money his dad would love to pick him up and ramble on about the history of the DMZ strip along the coast that they’ll drive by. So, he wrote down the details in his notes app, hoping that the prices wouldn’t go up too much by the time he’d found the energy to finish buying the tickets.
He finished his joint and got up.
“His late career work came to redefine modern textile arts, as he began experimenting with industrial materials and techniques, thus,” Daniel took a deep breath. Even though all there was in front of him was grass, and a few joggers about two hundred meters away, down the wet grassy hill, he felt as if he was at the centre of the auditorium, with dozens of first years expectantly staring at him, “the recycling narrative of renewable resources in the United Dukedom-” The words that came out of his mouth did not make much sense.
He ran his hands through his messy hair, in dire need of both a haircut and re-colour before his return home, and threw both the tapestry, which was soon to be freed from its cardboard coffin, and his bag over his left shoulder.
He headed towards the open metal gates, that stood all by their lonesome, at the west exit of Hyde Park. He passed them and stopped by a messy crossing. Someone had tried to design a three-way interchange, and for some reason had decided to add refuge islands and U-turn lanes for each of the directions.
Daniel waited for a good gap in between cars, and walked over to the first island. There was a button to push for the light, of course, but that would completely remove the possibility of some lorry or SUV driver going over the speed limit, and not seeing Dan.
He was about to run over to the second island, and then into his faculty building, when something strange appeared in front of his eyes.
In 1: System Operational
System_Online = sys.exec("TheSystem.ssy", (sys_ii for sys_ii in range(1, 555)), raise_alpha_error=False)
diagnostic_Check = dgsc_alpha_145(System_Online, D="OlegS/SystemFinal/all_runn.ssy", diagnostics_Check_=[jj for jj in all_pop[Quad + sys.fetch.location.gbl]])
Out 1: True
In 2: User name:
out_cath = class.person.human[alive].isTrue
name = [peer for peer in gbldata["2014.csv"] if out_cath or (excpt_alpha == sys.version.System(v=0.8))]
Out 2: User name: Daniel Maximilian Mercer
In 3: Tutorial Activation
try:
print("tutorial working")
TutT = sys.fetch.ppt(o='D:OlegS/SystemFinal/Alpha_NT/Tutorial_slides.ppt')
System_Tutorial = Display(slide for slide in TutT if out_cath, "sys_145.ssy")
except:
pass
Out 3: Input Error: not enough input in sys_145.ssy line 593
In 4: Display HUD
hud_display = sys.activate("HUD_Main_Interface", [stats, skills, goals, other], combat_overlay=False, HUDalert=False, HUDnotification=True)
quest_limit = {}
sys.check_errors(display_errors=False)
quest_limit["User name"] = 5
Out 4: True
He grabbed a nearby pole, the one with the button he was supposed to press, suddenly dizzy. He wasn’t sure if the blue screen that’d just appeared in front of his eyes had actually been there, or was a by-product of him smoking while on medication.
Several cars honked, and the sound of a crash came just as a new series of screens appeared before him.
System Operational
Welcome Online – Daniel Maximilian Mercer
MEMENTO MORTIS IN SEMITA VITAE
Stats
Skills
Goals
Other
Power
Luck
Conditions
Goals not fulfilled
Stats
Skills
Goals
Other
No skills to display. Your learnt and acquired skills will be displayed here.
Stats
Skills
Goals
Other
Goals
· Kill a person
· Settle on a career path
· Feel happiness again
Give Up
Stats
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
Skills
Goals
Other
Map
Notes
+
Scan the surroundings to unlock the map.
Daniel had played enough video games to recognise what he was looking at. Code, tasks, skills; it looked like the simulation he was a prisoner in finally glitched. He couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of it all.
And what were his tasks? What was his role in life? As if per unvoiced command, that screen appeared before him again. It wasn’t to become a hero, to defeat an evil government, or even to start his own farm. It was to kill someone, hence somehow sorting out his life. He would have said that the last quest was the biggest joke of them all because he hadn’t felt anything but existential boredom and numbness in several years now, but the first task was to commit literal murder.
Daniel didn’t pay much attention to the commotion starting up around him. He laughed one last time at the sad irony of it all and hit the ‘give up’ button.
In 1: Alpha Error
try:
user_action = sys.fetch(lib_action{name}, type=sequential, t_stamp=ng1)
task_execution = sys.exec(user_action, sys.active[goals[2]])
except AlphaError:
try:
user_action = sys.fetch(lib_action{name}, type=sequential, t_stamp=ng1)
task_execution = sys.exec(user_action, sys.active[goals[2]])
break
except AlphaError:
try:
user_action = sys.fetch(lib_action{name}, type=sequential, t_stamp=ng1)
task_execution = sys.exec(user_action, sys.active[goals[2]])
break
except AlphaError:
sys.exec(Patch_splz_alpha, i for proba_output in lib_action{name, global}, j for item in solutions_lst.txt or item=NaN)
Out 1: NaN
In 2: Patch
updated_sys_interface = tree_learning(1000, int=ng5, int=500, rate>=95%, Tmax=False, Tmin=10)
generated_outcome=sys.import(dynamic_tasks[False, False, default="No_Combat”, updated_sys_interface])
sys.exec("TheSystem.ssy", [sys_ii for sys_ii in range(1, 555)], raise_alpha_error=False, alpha.update(i for i in alpha.get(generated_outcome)))
A pain stronger than anything Daniel had ever felt before spiked in his chest. He couldn’t breathe, no matter how much he tried to force himself to swallow air. It was like someone had short-circuited all the nerves in his chest, and all he could feel was this pulsating pain that didn’t match the absent rhythm of his heart. His vision went blurry as he half-collapsed, half-slid against the pole and down onto the asphalt.
He was too scared to fully process how close to his head several cars had passed. He just wanted this to stop, in one way other the other. He knew it was wrong, but he begged to cross that line he’d trodden so many times. But it just kept doing on, and on; rhythmically moving energy through his body, distorting the shapes of the people running by, and the cars speeding past. The yelling and car horns were muffled, distant. A while curtain was slowly falling over the world, getting thicker and thicker with each pain-filled second.
Tears in his eyes, the initial wave of panic had passed, and he tried to push himself off the road. But his limbs wouldn’t move. He was scared the pulses of energy that kept his heart beating would stop if he tried again, but he wanted to escape the pain. If only the car would go over him – he caught himself thinking. If only –
Someone pulled him off the road and put him in an upright position.
The world was almost fully white now, and he couldn’t hear the voice of the person opposite him. He was barely registering that he was being talked to. He tried to move once again, to show where the pain was emanating from, but for the briefest of seconds those pulses stopped and he felt his lungs burn from an absence of air.
He didn’t try to move after that. He let himself be pulled up and hoisted over someone’s shoulder. He was carried that way to his faculty, or at least in its direction. The world went fully white after that.
----------------------------------------
Out 2: True.
Dan almost choked on the first breath he took. He breathed in and out, frantically, as tears ran down his cheeks, more from the terror of the whole experience than anything. He sat up, knees folded under him, as he looked around.
It was dark, well past sunset. Some ambient light came through the large bay windows of the entry hall of his faculty illuminating the globe-like structure of shoes and dead beetles that hung from its ceiling, each of the objects slowly spinning on themselves under a cold brine-rich breeze. There were other people laid out in this large hallway, and Dan quickly realised that none of them were moving, or even breathing.
He nodded to himself. He understood why he’d been put here, and the mistake he’d made. The hours of agony where he was unable to perceive anything but the pain inside his body had been punishment enough.
He did wonder if that had been the price to pay to reset his character.
Stats
Skills
Goals
Other
Goals
· Kill a person
· Feel happiness again
No. It was still there. Staring him mockingly in the face. Two stupid, equally unachievable goals. He just couldn’t. He considered going for round two of the pain and the blackout, but that option too had been taken away.
He tried to steady his breath, as he patted down the pockets of his black overalls. The email app of his phone opened when he unlocked the screen. He didn’t remember checking it, but that sounded about right. There was one unread email now, black letters over a blue and white background read ‘UDR’ and the sender had a gov.co.udr extension.
Daniel chose to ignore it, as he opened his contacts, and called his mum. She didn’t answer. None of his 5 calls. His dad must have also been away from his phone. None of his uncles or aunts replied. Eventually, he managed to get a hold of his maternal grandma.
“Who is this?” Her voice sounded anxious. But Daniel figured it wasn’t that late yet on the Mainland.
“It’s Dan, how are you doing?” He asked, as he got up, and walked a few steps to one of the benches, carefully avoiding the corpses placed on the ground.
“Oh, Daniel, good to hear from you!” Her tone immediately changed, “Martin told me you were coming home soon. Ah, but with the airodrome closed, I’m not sure if you’ll make it for the 7th… Well, as long as you get back for Sukkot, it’s all the same to me.”
He remained silent for a long while. He wasn’t sure anymore what he’d tried to achieve by calling her. Perhaps it’d been some sort of reflex. He’d been in this country long enough to memorise their drills on what to do, and in what order, in case of a terrorist attack. But there wasn’t a booklet on how to prepare for this video-game interface thing. And the interface didn’t explain these dead bodies, with no lesions, no wounds, nothing. Just dead. And dragged to the Arts and Humanities faculties, to lay forever under a sky of dead scarabs and worn shoes that emulated the constellation in the night sky in a contemporary metaphor.
“Daniel, are you still there?” Mamie’s worried voice came through.
“Yes mamie, still here,” he spoke. “I don’t think there’s anywhere else I could go.”
“That’s not true, Danny, you’re young, you still have many places to go,”
“I don’t think-”
“Nonsense,” She cut him off.
They talked until the battery on his phone ran dangerously low, and exchanged one last ‘love you’ before he ran home. When he plugged his phone in and called her again, she didn’t reply. His phone stopped charging soon after that.
He found his dorm surprisingly empty, as no amount of yelling, banging on doors, or purposefully triggering the fire alarm got anyone but one of his flatmates to appear. Said flatmate promptly returned to packing his bags and offered Dan a ride to the nearest storm shelter.
The laminated sign in their kitchen said that that was proper protocol, but Dan wasn’t sure how a shelter would help. His flatmate didn’t believe the simulation theory and told Dan to follow government orders before leaving him be.
So he sat on his bed and went over the screens again.
Stats
Skills
Goals
Other
Power
Luck
Conditions
No current condition to display.
Stats
Skills
Goals
Other
No skills to display. Your learnt and acquired skills will be displayed here.
Stats
Skills
Goals
Other
Goals
· Kill a person
· Feel happiness again
Stats
Skills
Goals
Other
Map
Notes
+
Scan the surroundings to unlock the map.
His future sure looked grim.
He didn’t really sleep that night, and he woke up around 1 PM to the noise of someone trying to break down a door. He lept to his feet, and ran down the hallway, excited to see the rescue team that’d come for him. What he saw instead was a deserted hallway, and loud banging noises coming from behind one of the bedroom doors.
He’d played enough games to understand what the walking undead outside his window were.
Like a switch flipping, his survival mode turned on. He’d never been more glad not to have gone to the shelter. There was enough food in the three-storey student flat to outlast available water by several weeks. But he didn’t stay there that long.
If this was like a game, and if he’d seen code, he was certain there was a way to hack it. At first, he hoped that the undead would continue their decomposition and that they’d return to the earth a few days in. But the woman who wandered outside his building showed no sign of deterioration, and the banging on the door down the hallway only stopped to be replaced with banding on a window leading outside.
During those first 6 days, Daniel often thought about how lucky he’d gotten. He was on the second floor, in a now empty building, a fair distance away from the city centre, and with an ample supply of food. Finding a book on coding in one of the empty bedrooms was only made tricky by the fact that he wanted to avoid making noise or attracting attention. Between the 16 free rooms, excluding his and the one with the broken window, he found four bike lights, a good pair of hiking boots, and three mostly-full bottles of alcohol that could be used as projectile weapons with some fabric and oil stuffed into them.
On the seventh day, he was ready to venture into this brave new world. He’d set his mind on getting more books on coding from the library before making it out of town. As soon as he set foot outside, he was greeted with several new blue screens.
Domain Entered: Derelict
Domain Goal
Kill the unique enemy of this domain.
Reward
Domain mastery increase to Untrained.
Skill: Scan
Accept
Yes
No
Personal Goal
Enter the library are retrieve 15 kg worth of relevant books.
Reward
Skill: Digital inventory
Skill: Weight Reduction
Accept
Yes
No
Personal Goal
Find allies.
Reward
Maximum Luck threshold +1
Accept
Yes
No
Personal Goal
Escape the city of Clayford completely unharmed and unseen.
Reward
Skill mastery increase by 1 level for Scan.
Skill mastery increase by 1 level for 1 physical skill.
Accept
Yes
No
Dan swore under his breath. This really was just like a video game. He accepted all of the goals, that really seemed more like quests, just as a groan came from behind the hedge lining the edge of the house’s front yard. He slowly backed away, back into the house. This was going to be tricky, but the undead could be outsmarted and out-waited. It would take time, maybe the full day, but he would get to the library.
Domain Entered: Heaven
Derelict Domain Goal cancelles.
Domain Goal
Kill the unique enemy of this domain.
Reward
Domain mastery increase to Untrained.
Skill: Healing
Accept
Yes
No