Ian looked out through a smudged third story window pane in rapt concentration, his eyes darting back and forth across the empty industrial street below.
A ringtone came across his earpiece and he absentmindedly waved a hand over the thin bracelet on his right wrist. A projected image cascaded into his field of view utilizing an advanced contact lens and he noted the appearance of his friend and confidante Alex.
“Ian! I’m glad you’re okay.” His friend was visibly relieved, sitting back heavily into his padded chair. His eyes soon squinted in contemplation. “Where are you? Your transponder is blocked.”
Ian’s calm, cold voice quietly echoed out into the abandoned warehouse. “In hiding, obviously. I can’t say where. We don’t know where the breach originated.” He paused. “What’s the situation on your side?”
Alex shook his head. “Control is reporting an 89% loss in active cells. We’re not sure how they found us, but they’re steadily finding all of our bases and weeding out our operatives.”
Ian grimaced from the mental feeling of loss. Every single of those brothers and sisters had been personally vetted by him.
The sound of a pipe skidding across the concrete came from across the cavernous room, drawing a practiced reaction. He silently withdrew into the shadows and tried to conform as much of his body into the adjacent I-beam as possible, slowing his heart rate and triggering the cooling function in his suit to hide from their infrared.
He whispered to the bracelet he brought up near his lips. “I don’t have much time here. How’s the extraction plan coming?”
Alex frowned in his field of view and paused before finally shaking his head. “It’s not. All of the pockets of resistance in the area have been dismantled and we don’t have anybody nearby. The bridges are covered, the waterways watched at the edges of the island. All the highways are blocked. They even have a squadron of F-42s patrolling the skies overhead and a battle group off shore. You’re on your own.”
He looked down in shame and then turned his eyes back to the screen with resolution. “I can only recommend the Dive plan.”
Ian almost groaned in disgust. He hissed back, “Like hell I’ll go into that game! It’s the main culprit behind the apathy running rampant in our society!”
Alex threw up his hands defensively. “Preachin’ to the choir, pastor. But Ian… things out here are bad. Really bad. We’re going to have to rebuild from scratch. I’ve already got four teams relocating our tech personnel to the arctic research lab and we’re torchin’ this place in twenty.”
He leaned in and emphasized with his hands, saying, “We can recoup our losses with time, but the one thing we cannot lose is you. You’re our figurehead. Our philosophical leader. If you die, it would destroy any hope our movement has of ever killing this Leviathan of a government that rules over us.”
Ian cursed to himself and then replied with quiet fervor, “All of you are just as capable.” His eyes darted to the side after hearing a muffled set of steps stalking towards him. “In any case, my time is done. I know that you’ll…” The sound of an old .38 being cocked drew his eyes back towards the projected screen.
Alex displayed the gun in his hand and then placed it on the table. Continuing with a tone of exasperation, he said, “I hate to do this to you, old friend, but you’re the most stubborn man I know. Let me make this irrevocably clear: I will unload this into my head if you do not go to Dr. Schneider.”
Ian gave a frustrated grunt as he flashed out of his hiding spot and covered the mouth of an armored SWAT agent who had just walked near him. Taking out a diamond-edged blade, he plunged it downwards with a flash and punctured the soft tissue of the throat, ravaging the trachea and vocal chords. The subtle tearing of flesh was softly accompanied by the rustle of clothes, but no cry ever left the dying man. A faint gurgle of blood was all that announced the sudden injury.
Ripping out the blood-coated steel, Ian ill-temperedly drove it back down with lightning fast precision in three separate and lethal places, silently, and mercifully, ending the man’s life. Pulling it back out, he flung it with force towards another agent who’d just rounded a beam twenty paces away.
The dagger accurately pierced the neck area again, causing the man to fall to the ground clutching the blade, terror in his eyes. Crossing the span, Ian retrieved it without fanfare, noting the usual bloody tide. He wiped the blade on his pant’s leg and then slid it back in its holster on his thigh.
Grabbing the agent’s legs, he started pulling him across the small section of concrete as quietly as possible. Refocusing on the projected screen, he sighed and then spoke softly, “Fine.”
Alex visibly relaxed, the tension flowing out of his nervous posture. “Thank you,” he said tiredly. “Do you know the way?”
“Mhmm.” Grunting in affirmation, Ian dragged the man back to the edge of the window he’d previously been looking out of and then propped up the dead weight on the wall as he opened it up. Feeling the breeze on his skin, he paused for a moment in realization of what he was about to do.
Sighing he grabbed the agent and heaved him upwards and over the windowsill, feeling the weight disappear from his hands and get taken over by gravity.
A moment later, a dull thud accompanied by the clatter of metal and a crack of a helmet echoed back up to him, followed by a few low shouts of surprise and anger.
“He’s on the third floor!”
“Third floor, bravo team moving to engage,” the squawk of a radio announced.
Ian derisively chuckled to himself as he seemingly floated across the room towards another window. Maybe it won’t be so bad to not have to do this every day. Turning his attention back to the open call, he whispered, “I’ll go, you don’t have to worry. Is the lazarus project progressing well, then?”
“As well as the scientists expected. We’ll need about three years to grow the clone, though, so make yourself comfortable. We have some members who play the virtual reality game, but after your scathingly prophetic words last year before its launch, not many have developed their characters beyond confirming your assessment. They instead opted for the real world.” Alex shook his head in frustration. “I’m afraid we won’t be able to offer any assistance with your survival there.”
The quietly stalking man nodded approvingly. “That’s fine. I don’t need them.”
Alex appeared even more frustrated at this. “But Ian, it's a hardcore style world. You get one life. If we upload your mind using Dr. Schneider’s illegal procedure, you could absolutely die there if your character dies.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“The government is sure to have their own already in the game, though! I heard down the pipeline that they already have a high leveled guild named Valorous. What if they get wind of you?”
“Enough! I’ll be okay, Alex.” Ian placed a hand on a catwalk railing and smoothly dropped down to another metal walkway below.
Continuing his soft padding across the room towards the target window, he added finally, “But if it’ll make you feel better, have a few that we can spare to begin the game as well. However, do not let them actively seek me out. Open the safe in my office. The code is 72372. There is a guide in there that will prove useful to them. If they follow that, I will be able to find them. I need to go.”
Alex nodded reluctantly. “Godspeed, Ian. Purge the darkness...”
“And make way for the light.” Ian finished with a warm smile. “See you in a few years, my friend.” With another wave of the hand, the communication terminated.
Opening up the window once he neared it, Ian paused to listen to the flurry of boots ascending the metal grated staircase, the flashing of barrel flashlights sweeping the corners of the same floor as him.
Frowning, he peered back out the window and at the murky black river below. He murmured to himself, “But still… do I really have to go back to that world? After all the efforts I’ve taken to avoid it?”
Shaking his head, he suddenly leapt gracefully out the window and disappeared with a few ripples of the waters below.
***
“Dr. Schneider, I presume?”
A graying elderly gentleman, thin as a rail, stopped in the alleyway and looked towards the young man who’d just appeared out of the shadows. He snorted slightly and waved a hand in a dismissive gesture, saying, “Former doctor. I had my license revoked, my research grant cancelled. I cannot help you with whatever it is that ails you.”
Ian smiled. “I heard you had a hell of a headache prescription, though. Might I trouble you for an informal checkup?”
That stopped the doctor in his tracks.
He turned ponderously, weariness evident in his wrinkled face. “Young man, I implore you to reconsider. This world needs the vigor and passion of youths like yourself now more than ever.”
Ian stepped forward and placed a small briefcase on the dirty pavement. His eyes creased in sadness as he looked at the man steadily. His resigned voice rang out,“I couldn’t agree with you more, doctor, but I have no other option.”
Leveling a gaze at the average looking Ian, the doctor shook his head dispiritedly. He stepped closer and popped open the case, noting the bills that were arranged neatly in bound stacks.
“Full disclosure? This isn’t a guaranteed procedure.”
Ian’s sky blue eyes bore into him resolutely. “I understand that.”
The good doctor threw his hands up in acquiescence to the fact that he couldn’t persuade him further, and then grabbed the briefcase with little ado. “Follow me then.”
The two passed through a couple of whitewashed hallways and descended down three flights of stairs to be dumped out into an underground lab. In the center was a gurney surrounded by lots of machines and apparati that Ian couldn’t identify. There was an old school EKG, he knew that one, but the rest were all new and, from the looks of their construction, handmade.
Motioning towards the gurney as he climbed on, Ian remarked, “Kinda morbid doctor, don’t you think?”
Schneider shrugged. “What’s it matter to you? You’re abandoning this reality after all.” He unceremoniously strapped in Ian with the restraints and added, “If you must know, though, I’m an old man. I can’t lift a brick like you.”
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Ian chuckled.
Dr. Schneider manipulated a few of the machines and attached a headdress to Ian’s head, placed diodes all over. Next, he hooked up an IV and then took a second large needle, gently inserting it into the side of his neck, angled towards the spine.
Ian immediately felt all sensation beneath his neck disappear. He could only barely breathe. Mildly panicking, he started to croak out a few desperate words, but the doctor noticed his expression and said soothingly, “You’re fine. Shh, now. It’s necessary to isolate your brain signals. Easier on the resonance machine.”
Schneider went to stand next to a terrifyingly complex machine and leveled a solemn gaze back at him. “Are you sure I can’t talk you out of this? This is a permanent choice. I have no way to bring people back.”
Ian cleared his throat with difficulty, lightly shaking a strand of his black hair out of his eyes as he cut his gaze towards the man. “Necessity begets action, good doctor. Today, I am a traveler. But there will come a day that I return. This is my home, and I will see it change.” Twitching his head more than nodding, he added with finality, “Do it.”
The doctor’s hand floated downwards and pressed the button.
Ian felt his world fade into darkness, bereft of all feeling and thought.
***
A flurry of motion and the sound of hurried feet announced the people before they ever entered the room. Dr. Schneider turned from his cleanup work in bewilderment as a dozen heavily armed agents came flowing through the door like a tide.
A man stepped up who was different from the rest. He was clad in an expensive suit with an adaptive armor vest while sporting clean-cut blonde hair and a powerful jawline. His eyes came to rest on the body still attached to the gurney and a streak of wildness started to appear within his gaze.
Striding over to the doctor with confident steps, he took the frail man and slammed him against a cabinet. “What did you do!?” he growled more than exclaimed.
The doctor was terrified. “I-I uploaded him to Turen. Th-that’s what he wanted.”
The blonde agent groaned and dropped him down. “Do you know who that was?” he nearly shouted. “That was Ian Leon Czolgosz. The leader of the Reformed Anarchist Movement responsible for the assassination of one hundred and eighty-three government officials. He’s the one who began it all! And you just uploaded that monster into a gameworld where we have no authority! Fuck!”
Dr. Schneider’s eyes went wide. “Holy…” Glancing back and forth between the agents, he quickly added, “I want my lawyer.”
The agent started and then chuckled dryly. He smoothed out the doctor’s ruffled lab coat and said reassuringly, “Of course.”
He then strode over to Ian’s body and pulled the diamond-edged blade from its scabbard. “How many people have you killed with this?” he mused quietly before turning and plunging it into the doctor’s chest. The old man crumpled to the ground without a sound.
Looking back towards the agents gathered around the room, he demanded, “He was dead when we got here, right?”
“As a doornail, sir,” one SWAT member replied.
The blonde agent in charge sighed and then motioned towards Ian’s steadily cooling corpse. “Collect the body and add anything on him into evidence. We can use it for publicity at least until we find him in-game and delete his consciousness permanently.”
“Agent Gray?” another member asked confusedly.
Gray tore his gaze away from the doctor and looked back up at them. “This task force doesn’t disband merely because the criminal we’re tracking flees to a digital world.” He sighed and then suddenly grinned. “Look on the bright side. We’ll get paid our salaries to play a video game from now on. I’ll take that over the threat of diamond-edged blades in my sleep any day.”
Laughter swept the room.
***
In a digitally built holding space, Ian suddenly woke up and stared around in confusion.
A beautiful setup AI materialized in front of him, perfect in every way. A figure to die for, he was sure that many of his peers had drooled over her when she appeared to each of them. Her crystal-like eyes gazed back at him in curiosity and questioned, “I’m sorry, I’m have difficulty confirming your pod status. Are you a player or an AI like myself?”
Ian cleared the fog from his thoughts and said resolutely, “I’m a player.”
She smiled in response happily and clapped her hands with enthusiasm. “Great! Well, welcome to Turen. You are player #1,356,876,322. What would you like your username to be?”
Ian almost threw up right there and then if that were physically possible in this space. The entire world’s population was sitting at around 5 billion after the third world war. Over 25% of the world’s population has escaped to this reality! This included the fact that a full third of the world was still encapsulated in a persistent state of poverty and technological deprivation.
Ian replied somewhat squeamishly after a moment, “I would like to delete account #0000000045, security code cSghc@ol211, and acquire its name.”
She blinked and replied somewhat robotically. “Security code accepted for beta account #45. Name shift confirmed.” She came out of her stupor and smiled warmly back at Ian. “Congratulations, the name Anarch is available. Which starting class would you like to choose? There are 12 base classes…”
“I would like to forgo class selection, please,” Ian interrupted.
“Are you sure? It will be very difficult to have a future in the world of Turen without the aid of starting spells and abilities,” the blonde AI cautioned.
“I am sure,” he promised. The truth was that he’d played the game before.
Sure, he had the beta account, but that wasn’t the full story. The reality was that he’d played Turen before in another lifetime. It was ironic that he was now forced back into the game that he’d so desperately avoided.
He shook his head to forcefully draw his thoughts away from those unpleasant memories.
What he was doing at the moment allowed him to pick up a discovered hidden class from that alternate timeline. He had to go in as a blank slate, because the game wouldn’t override his primary class. It would assign it to the secondary class slot if he didn’t already have one, but he couldn’t allow that to happen. He had a perfect design in mind for his character that would achieve all of his aims.
Shaking her head, she moved on. “It seems you’ve given this thought already. Very well, race?”
A large circle consisting of slowly revolving pedestals with an example race for each appeared in his vision.
“Show me the high elves, please.”
“Certainly.” A tall elven that looked exactly like Ian, besides the pointy ears, stepped forward off of his pedestal and regarded the player before him coolly with subtly glowing eyes. “Lithe and graceful, the high elves are the masters of spells and magical abilities.”
A screen appeared before Ian.
[Racial ability: Innervate]
[+10% magical skill experience gain]
[+5% reputation gain with all factions]
[+2 spell accuracy]
Ian nodded in satisfaction. It was perfect for what he had planned.
He turned to the A.I. “This is the one I want.”
“Very well. Starting location?” A gigantic map of the currently explored and named territories, cities, and geographical landmarks was displayed in front of him. His eyes turned to the upper left hand corner of the map and silently brooded.
Padun or Claford? Padun is closer to the Hlaca Plateau, but there is also that follower camp in Claford…
Tapping the map with a digitally rendered finger, he pointed.
The A.I. nodded in acceptance. “Claford is an icy coastal town that thrives on the northernmost reaches of the Dragon Sea. The closest areas of note are the northern town of Padun to its northwest and the Fallenwood to its immediate southeast. While it is possible to start here, it is recommended that only veteran players begin here due to its geographical… difficulty.”
“I’m sure,” Ian stated firmly.
The blonde A.I. smiled happily. “Choice confirmed. Please be advised that the death penalty is 25% of the current level's total experience and you will also drop one piece of random gear, with better gear taking priority in the drop table. Furthermore, if you die in Turen, you will be forcefully ejected from your pod whereupon you will have to wait 24 hours until you can log in again.” Ian snorted mentally, not me...I’ll just bite the dust since I have nowhere to be downloaded. I’ll end up like a bug splattered on a digital windshield. “Hosted PvP encounters like battleground realms feature a suspension of this rule, but all world PvP and PvE will abide by it. Please keep this in mind. Do you acknowledge this risk?”
“I do.”
“Then allow me to be the first to welcome you to the world of Turen. Have a pleasant and rewarding game.”
Ian smirked as he started to dissolve into fiery ash. “Thank you, Duchess.”
The A.I. gasped in surprise, but didn’t have an opportunity to ask him how he knew her name. Her emerald green eyes twinkled in curiosity as she watched him vanish into motes of light and flame.
***
A tunnel of light dumped Ian out onto a summoning circle in the heart of a wintry coastal town. Shops buzzed with activity and the cry of seagulls echoed overhead, drawing his light blue eyes towards the sails that peeked over the rooftops. NPCs manned all the stalls and crowds of other NPCs and players milled around, either selling their hard earned loot or buying items needed for another grind session.
Taking in a lungful of cold, salty air, Ian breathed out with mixed emotions. He was here once more. For better or for worse, he had to play, to fight, to survive in this virtual world. Until the day came that Alex could get him out, he would do just that.
Thinking of the government sponsored guild Valorous, a demonic grin spread across his lips.
Perhaps I can have some fun while I wait.
He set off towards the edges of town. He had a follower to recruit.