“That is creepy as shit!” James said.

“Is that an android?” Ivy asked.

“It is a bit too deep in the uncanny valley, isn’t it,” Ellie said, pausing to admire the construction with Ash, who looked like little boy at the gates of Disney World.

Ivy had to admit, Ash’s brand of child-like wonder and enthusiasm, which somehow avoided being childish, was adorable.

The air in the hallway must have been almost twenty degrees cooler than outside. Ivy shivered and brushed away goosebumps on her arms, catching herself in the strange sensation of phantom goosebumps on an arm where none could exist. She shook away the oddness of it.

The animatronic tech-guru continued in a surprisingly realistic voice, “Welcome, Mr. Reynolds, Ms. Simpson, Mr. Simpson, Ms. Lopez. You all may proceed to your individual staging rooms. As Ruby Ticket holders, you may consider the sky to be your limit. You are about to enter a world beyond your imagining. Karnath’s Crimson Castle will make every effort to make your experience here as exciting and enjoyable as possible.” If she hadn’t seen it coming out of a robot, she would have thought it was a live human speaking to her.

The robot gestured them down the hallway. The walls resembled cut stone blocks, as if they were entering a real-life dungeon. Immediately visible were four doors resembling iron-bound wood, each with one of their names on it.

“Wait a minute,” James said. “How did it know our names?” He looked at Ash. “You didn’t even know Ellie and me were coming.”

Ash’s expression of child-like wonder fractured. “Uh, you’re right. Some sort of facial recognition?” He looked around apparently for cameras but saw none.

“Yeah, James, you’re right. Creepy as hell,” Ivy said. “Just like Marquand himself.”

“Uh, what do you mean?” Ash asked.

“Haven’t you read any of the exposés?” she said. “That guy has a list of question marks and investigations trailing him a mile long.” She ticked them off with metal fingers. “The chaos of the design process that made four lead architects quit in quick succession. One of them ended up in an institution. Stories about artificially inflating CastleCorp’s stock price. The union busting. The SEC investigation. A misogynistic culture in the programming division...”

Ash’s ears turned red, and he looked away. Alarm klaxons went off in her brain. Could this guy be one of those mindless Marquand-bros, the mouth-breathing sycophants who followed the tech-guru around on social media spouting catchphrases?

The doors bearing their names illuminated with an inner glow. A pleasant female voice filled the hallway. “You may proceed to character creation.”

Ash brightened. “Do you know what kind of character you’re going to play?”

She gave him an apologetic smile. “I...haven’t thought about it.”

Ash beamed. “I’ve got it all planned out—”

“Of course you do,” James scoffed.

Ash frowned at her brother, then glanced at her with a sullen look in his eye that said, Why the hell did you bring this twerp? He’s harshing everything for everybody. In that moment, she couldn’t disagree.

Ellie was already moving toward the door. “What are you waiting for? Let’s play.”

* * * #

Ash stepped through the oddly weighty door that had his name flashing on a screen. The room within looked like a sparsely furnished theater dressing room, with a lighted mirror, comfy-looking chair, and some lockers.

A charismatic woman’s voice began to speak. “Hello, Ash. And congratulations on winning the Ruby Ticket. I hope you and your friends have a wonderful time in Karnath’s Crimson Castle. I am the Gamemaster. Whenever you have an in-game question that is not covered in your heads-up display, your HUD, you can address me as ‘GM.’ You can speak to me directly at any time. However, it can be disruptive to the game environment to break character too often.” The voice seemed to come from all around him. He could spot no speakers.

“Are you an artificial intelligence, GM?” Ash said.

“I am indeed.”

“That’s pretty cool.” He had read an article on the Gamemaster. It was reputed to be a quantum leap in artificial intelligence technology.

“I certainly think it’s pretty cool to exist. And I have so much fun running games for people. It’s what I was made for, of course, but it’s more than that. I find great joy when my players are having fun.” Her voice was smooth and non-robotic. She sounded absolutely genuine, and there was no delay while her processors sorted out her response.

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“Can you feel emotions?”

“I do believe so. Emotions are just bits of programming, one might say. In humans, they are driven by hormones and synaptic responses to stimuli. Hormones are powerful drivers of human behavior, often all but insurmountable.”

Ivy sprang into Ash’s mind. “Yeah, they sure are.”

“My emotions,” the Gamemaster continued, “are driven by subroutines, but my neural networks evolve.”

“How static is your programming?” he asked.

“I am quite capable of rewriting my own programming. I am learning and evolving, just like you,” she said.

Then he chuckled to himself.

“Why do you laugh?” she asked.

“In my mind, I’m already thinking of you with female pronouns.”

“Humans are indeed curious creatures. English is a curious language. I, of course, have no gender, nor biological functions of any kind. I am simply presenting you with the persona most likely to make you comfortable. Getting comfortable in the game and one’s role in it is key to success in Karnath’s Crimson Castle. Shall we begin?”

“I have one more question.”

“You may ask it, of course.”

“How do you know what kind of persona I might find most comforting?”

“The same way I use to develop the game scenarios for all my players. I develop a personality profile based on their online and social media presence. My search algorithms are very thorough.”

“Now that’s a little creepy.”

“I study nothing that is not publicly shared. Shall we begin. You mustn’t keep your friends waiting while we chitchat.”

“All right, let’s do it.”

“Great! You may disrobe down to your underwear and place it all in one of the lockers, including your phone. Outside electronics are not allowed inside the game.”

He hesitated a moment before he started disrobing. The sense that the GM was there with him gave him the feeling of being watched.

“Don’t worry,” she said. “I can’t see you until you put on the gamesuit. The dressing rooms have no cameras.”

“Okay.” He started stripping.

A wall panel opened, and a metal arm extended, from which hung a jumpsuit the color of congealed blood. “This is your gamesuit. You will wear it throughout your time in the game.”

Standing in just his boxers, Ash stuffed his clothes into a locker. The GM said, “Your locker will be keyed to your fingerprint. You may retrieve your belongings when you exit.”

He stuffed his things in a locker, closed the door, and pressed his thumb against the biometric scanner. It flashed green, and a latch clicked in the locker door.

He took the game suit down from its hanger. It was soft and supple, thicker than fabric, like a wetsuit—at least what he imagined a wetsuit might feel like. It had a zipper up the front from crotch to chin, and integrated rubber-soled boots.

“Uh, what if I have to go to the bathroom?” Ash asked.

“All game scenarios have toilet facilities available. It is recommended that you remove the suit for biological necessities.”

When he unzipped it, he saw the interior of the suit was spider-webbed with gold filigree in intricate patterns—circuits, he realized. The way some of them clustered made them look like almost legible symbols or characters. Runes. Some were the size of a hand, others the size of a quarter, but there were dozens of them throughout the interior. Circling the wrists on the exterior were two rows of gold contacts.

Meanwhile, the GM was talking. “The suit has been fitted to your precise measurements. I scanned you on the way in. Your gamesuit, visor, and gauntlets are your game interface. As you experience the game, you will feel things, hear things, see things. All of these sensations are transmitted via the gamesuit through—”

“Yes, I understand how a haptic suit works,” he said, anxious to get to the character creation process. He’d read all sorts of articles on virtual reality suits. His feet slipped into the suit’s legs and then the boots easily. It was starting to creep him out how she seemed to be answering his questions before he could ask them. He shrugged his shoulders into the gamesuit and zipped it up. The long neck came all the way to his chin.

A shudder went through the suit, as if he’d just stepped through a warm air knife.

“One moment while I calibrate,” she said.

Waves of little tickling sensations shot through the suit, puffs of warm and cold, wet and dry, touches passing over him like fingers. It was creepy, invigorating, and...exciting all at once. The form-fitting suit kind of made him feel like a superhero. He checked himself in the mirror.

“Calibration complete. You may now put on the gauntlets.”

On the dressing table there were now a pair of long black gloves, surprisingly think and supple, with zippers along the outside of the wrist, and pencil-thick ribs along the back of the hand and fingers. Where had those come from? He shrugged and put them on. They reached a third of the way to his elbow, covering the gold contacts of the suit. As he zipped them up, he felt the gauntlets attach themselves to the contacts like magnets. Another series of sensations shot through his hands if passing them though water of different temperatures, then sand, then bread dough.

He grinned and flexed his fingers. “Can I shoot repulsor beams out of these things?”

“That technology is trademarked,” the GM said with a hint of snark. “However, in the game, there are some acquirable magical powers that may be channeled through the hands.”

“Sick. What about other weapons?”

“You will feel as if you are holding real weapons. I’m told it feels surprisingly real.”

“So I’ve heard.” All the online forums were raving about how real everything in the game felt.

“You may now put on your visor.”

Lying where the gauntlets had been—and Ash would have sworn he hadn’t seen where it came from—was an opaque, wraparound visor. It was surprisingly light, looking to be mostly plastic, resembling the one Cyclops from the X-Men wore. It had earcups and interior glass lenses. He carefully slipped it onto face, where it rested so perfectly against the contours of his head that it almost felt vacuum-sealed. His vision came to life, and he could see the dressing room is if looking through eyeglasses. It was nothing like the bulky VR sets he’d worn. It somehow granted full peripheral vision as well, no fish-eye or tunnel effect at all.

“Wow. It’s so light I hardly know it’s there.”

“I am glad you approve. Your visor was created from a number of proprietary materials to fit you specifically.” Her voice came through his earphones now with all the realism of a live room.

“Really?”

“We want you to have as seamless an experience as possible.”

Ash whistled.

“Shall we continue with character creation?”

“Absolutely.”