Rick rose from the chair and disconnected his implant. “You here?”

The ceiling woke up and said, in Alex’s voice, “I’m here.”

The room again. It had been painted black, but the lights came up, giving it definition it hadn’t had before.

“How is this safer—”

“Private connection. I monitor everything in and out.”

“No law enforcement, but what about Hector?”

“Hector’s tried to get in, but every time he’s tried, I’ve patched and improved.”

Rick sat back in the SR array chair. He gripped the faux leather upholstery, which wasn’t as nice as Hector’s rig. “So he could be trying right now?”

She laughed. “It’s a game we play with one another, and he’s running out of exploits. I have detection, so I’ll know when he tries, and he always tries when he thinks I’m sleeping. He’s not in right now.”

Rick nodded, then sniffed. “Smells like food in here.”

“My ex liked Korean food and he was messy.”

“No, I mean it smells like cooking…” He narrowed his eyes. The scent was gone. He looked up. “That’s weird.”

“It’s an old building,” Alex said.

Rick looked for another door into the room, but nothing stuck out. Hmm… “You know about Kristina’s…

“Your wife?”

He nodded again, and waited.

“Go on.”

He remembered her telling him earlier she couldn’t see him nod. Were there cameras? “You know this hasn’t been Kris’s first trip to the hospital, right?”

“Didn’t know anything. Suspected it.”

“Right, well,” he said, “it’s her fourth.” He waited.

“I don’t…”

She must be really young. “You know what they do after a third suicide attempt in California?”

There was a sharp intake of air. “Oh God.”

He nodded slowly.

“Okay, I can’t put the pieces together, though. Why does that—I mean, I’m terribly sad for you—for her—but what does it…”

He gave her some time to think, but the silence got heavier with each passing second. “I found her the third time. They don’t take your ovaries or uterus when they—”

“Oh my fucking God!” Alex said. “Her eggs?”

He nodded again.

“Wow. I’m really glad we left the game before you said that. Muni AI monitors the voice chats for certain words, and that would have lit us up. I’d have had federal officers at my—” She stopped herself. “So you found her?”

“Unconscious on the kitchen floor.”

“Jesus, Rick. Does she—”

“No. She doesn’t know.” He hung his head.

The silence stretched out interminably, but he wouldn’t fill it. He breathed deeply, waiting for her to come back.

“Y’know Rick, my brain keeps flashing between ‘He’s the best husband ever,’ and ‘He’s the worst husband ever,” and it hasn’t settled. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

“How do you think I feel?”

“Who else knows?” She didn’t let him answer before she said, “You know Hector’s a sociopath, right? Goddamn. Goddamn!”

He frowned. “He just threatened to destroy something I can never replace because he thinks I might have been cheating him on a bet. Yeah.” He gritted his teeth, then forced his jaw to unclench. “Yeah, I know he’s a sociopath.”

“Okay, so since we’ve opened that box, you did try to throw that fight.”

His breath caught in his throat a second before he forced himself to breathe. Did I? “I didn’t want to be responsible for…”

“Hector’s got a great bullshit detector. You can’t do that kind of shit and not… you know.”

“You don’t—”

“Okay,” she said. “Now you know I have shit riding on you, so please, don’t ever do that again without at least talking to me first. Okay?”

He echoed what she’d said earlier, “Now that you’ve opened that box, why do you need me to win so badly?”

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

Not even the occasional electric pop of a microphone or the light sound of breathing greeted him. “Come on, Alex. This has to go both ways.”

“I can’t—”

He raised his fist. “I just admitted to fucking treason, Alex. You can.” He hammered his fist down hard on the arm of the SR array chair.

“No, you don’t—”

“Oh, now you’re gonna tell me all about what I don’t understand? Help me understand.”

“I… I can’t. I’m sorry.”

He stood and started walking for the door. “Fuck this, Alex. I don’t need—”

“Wait!”

“Wait for what? You won’t tell me—”

“I’ll tell you something almost as dangerous!”

Rick stopped walking but didn’t turn around. “About you?”

“Yes, yes! About me.”

“But it’s not what he’s got on you?”

“Rick, he’s a sociopath. It’s not that I don’t want to, but he might kill me if I did.”

His heart rate rose. What the hell could be so important Hector would kill a moneymaker? He walked back to the chair and sat. “Better be good.”

“Okay, okay.” She took a deep breath in and out. “You’re never going to see me, but I live here.” There was a pause, then she said, “I mean in this building.”

He waited a moment before saying, “I thought so, but how is this…”

“I’m not very mobile. You’re one of two people who know where I am, not counting—”

“Hector?”

“Oh hell, no. I told you, he’s a sociopath.”

“You betray me, I betray you?” Rick cleared his throat. “That’s the implication?”

“That’s the implication. I’ll try to remember to let you in on more of what I have planned.”

“Try?”

“I’ve been on my own so long, I just…” There was the sound of sniffing—is she crying?—before the total blankness of the mute button cut it off.

“All right, Alex. That’s good enough, I guess.”

Her unexpectedly wry laughter filled the room. “I’m glad being the third person on earth to know where I live is enoughfor you.” Her tone, which had been sarcastic, changed abruptly. “This isn’t a small thing, Rick. This is my life, and I hope you understand I have a stake in your success now that could hit me where I live. Literally.”

He thought about what she said, then said, “Can I ask you something?”

“Okay.”

“You have a bathroom somewhere nearby? I drank four beers before I came.”

***************************************************

Rick listened to the sound of his piss as it splattered against the wall. He felt exposed in the alley, but he’d found a darker place, if not a totally dark place to pee.

She really couldn’t let me use her bathroom?

He looked into the night sky, then zipped up before checking his phone. He jumped when he read the time; it was just after three in the morning, and he’d missed five texts and two calls from Kristina. The last call had been ten minutes back.

Fuck.

The line rang only once before she picked up.

“Rick, where are you?”

“Working,” he said.

“You never work at night, baby. What’s going on? This new job needs you to work nights?”

“I’m training for a fight.”

“Oh,” she said. There was the soft sound of her breaths, then, “I thought Hector fired you.”

He took a deep breath. “Alex is letting me use a spare unit so I can enter general competition. We need money, and we need it quick. I can’t wait for a paycheck”

“You’re with Alex?”

He hesitated. “Yeah. She’s helping—”

“I’m gonna go back to bed, Rick.”

“Baby, baby, baby—don’t hang up.

Her breathing was still there.

“Are you… Do I need to come home right now? Are you—”

“Night, Rick.”

He didn’t dare breathe. The sound of traffic from the main street was the only sound as he stood there, paralyzed.

He texted:

R: Bby, we need the money.

K: …

He waited for the text, but the bubble disappeared.

R: baby, you need to trust me. Please tell me you’re safe.

K: …

K: I’m not going to hurt myself.

Rick started to type, then stopped when he saw her typing.

K: …

K: but we need to talk when you come home.

Shit.

He dashed back to the door, then down the long hall back to the room with the SR array.

“All good?” Alex asked.

He paled, then bent, trying to catch his breath.

“What happened? You good?”

“My”—he took a deep breath—“my wife knows I’m here with you, and she knows I’m training with you.”

“And?”

“She’s not happy,” he muttered.

“Rick?”

“Yeah?”

“Your wife has tried to kill herself four times. Why would I think she was happy?”

He chuckled at that despite himself, then stifled it. “I mean about this.”

“I know what you meant.” There was a long silence. “You going home?”

He shook his head.

“Good.”

“Alex?”

“Yeah?”

“Where are the cameras?”

She laughed. “It would be easier to tell you where they weren’t, smart ass. How’d you know?”

He ignored the question as he hooked up and sat back in the chair.

Alex’s voice. “How did you—”

The world went black.

***************************************************

This time, Rick let his trainer pick the server, and in no time at all, they were party-linked and back in-game.

Yet again, he’d materialized in a new opening area. “How many starting locations does this game have?” Rick gazed over an expanse of dry grass. In the distance, a lone, dead tree stood like a tombstone.

“A lot,” Alex said. “This map alone has twenty-four. Hold up.”

He waited.

“Okay, I’m closer to you this time. No headhunters inbound. Wait.” She laughed. “Wow. There’s one coming for me. Take the third tree on the right—the trail is hard to find, so don’t fuck it up.”

“Third tree?”

“Yup. I know your entry point, and you’re exposed, so get moving. Excuse me, I’m about to make somebody’s day very, very bad.”

The line went mute-silent, and Rick bolted for the dead tree—the only tree visible from his location. He hurried, trusting Alex’s admonition, though nothing rose from the grass or descended from the sky.

Once he made it to the tree, he rested his hand on its dry, barkless trunk and scanned the horizon, turning a full circle. There? When the wind blew, there stood out there in the distance something ever-so-slightly taller than the grass, something that didn’t sway the grass did. A stronger push of the wind made it more obvious.

He loped away in that direction, checking his peripheral vision for signs of bots or players. Though Alex was right that he was exposed, the lack of cover also made it much easier for him to spot incoming combatants.

Had there been incoming combatants.

In the corner of his vision, the number 499 came up, then flashed to 498 before rapidly dropping through the numbers until it stayed at 480.

Alex was right. The players got eliminated. In his first public match, he’d been taken out by the first bot. Talk about not feeling in control. It was strange to be so isolated and know twenty players had already been dispatched.

How the fuck will I make it in the top hundred, let alone the top ten?

He’d looked up public matches early in his training with Alex, but since his future had depended on a one-on-one match with Sonny Esposito, he’d let it drift to the back of his mind as something he’d have to think about someday.

Someday had arrived.

The tree was another dead specimen, leafless and brittle-looking. He scanned the horizon again, and found another tree. He estimated he was halfway there when he spotted movement in the distance to his left.