CHAPTER 15
A DOOR IN THE DISTANCE
1
And Helga had never come back, either.
Michael didn’t know which bothered him more—that something terrible was going on with his parents and nanny or that he was so wrapped up in his entertainment that it had taken him this long to notice. He was equally horrified and ashamed.
He tried to think of what possibly could’ve happened. Maybe the VNS was involved somehow. Or Kaine and this Mortality Doctrine program. All the things that had so drastically changed his life over the past couple of weeks were, after all, related—though he didn’t know how to connect the dots.
But Michael couldn’t remember. As hard as he pressed his mind, he couldn’t recall the exact last time he’d been together with his parents. Everything he thought of—parties, meals, riding in the car—it always seemed overwhelmingly true that surely he had seen them since then. But there was nothing.
It was weird, and it terrified him. And haunting it all, Michael had to wonder if it had something to do with the KillSim. There was no doubt in his mind that the creature had done something to his brain.
He didn’t know what to do, what to think, but eventually he allowed himself to lie back on his designated stair and stretch out. The sheer exhaustion finally became too much and he fell asleep.
2
Bryson woke him with a gentle shake of his shoulders. Michael looked at his friend through bleary eyes.
“Sheesh, man,” Bryson said. “We’ve been awake for an hour. And you snore like a fat bear.”
Michael swung his legs around and sat up, yawned, rubbed his eyes. The black world of the staircase tilted for a second, then righted itself. Nothing had changed while they’d slept.
“Anybody else have weird dreams last night?” Sarah asked. “There was a guy in a bunny suit in mine. Don’t ask for more details.”
Michael hadn’t dreamed at all, but his upsetting discovery came back to him like a whammy. Why couldn’t he remember when he’d last seen his parents? Where were they? Why hadn’t Helga come home? How could he not have thought about his mom and dad being gone so long? He never talked to his parents much while they were away, but it was still weird. And he had no doubt that something was not right, in one form or another.
“Michael?” Sarah asked. “You okay?”
He looked at her and decided there was no way he’d tell anybody about this oddity. “Yeah, I’m okay. Just excited to walk down some more stairs. And starving so bad I’m thinking about eating one of Bryson’s legs.”
“Better shave them first,” Bryson responded, lifting a leg straight out in front of him as if to offer it. He put it back down, then said, “I had a weird dream. I’d never met Michael in it and was living a wonderfully happy life, with no one trying to kill me or damage my brain forever. It was sweet.”
“That does sound nice,” Sarah said.
Michael stood up and stretched. “Hardy har har. Let’s get down these stupid stairs.”
No one argued, and step by step they resumed their descent.
3
It was impossible to tell just how long it took before something changed. Michael tried counting the steps for a while, then seconds and minutes, just to keep his mind occupied with something other than his parents. His watch had stopped working at some point, and the clocks on their NetScreens kept doing weird things. The longer they descended, the crazier Michael felt. The monotony of it began building an anxiety that he had to work hard to push down. Occasional—and failed—attempts to hack into the seemingly impossible code only made things worse.
Then, finally, they found a door.
It was at the end of the stairs, where the space around them had narrowed until it formed a tunnel that dead-ended at an ordinary wooden door. The relief of seeing it overwhelmed Michael, and an irrational surge of giddiness made him suddenly erupt in giggles.
“Something funny?” Bryson asked, on the verge of a smile himself. “Better share it with the whole class.”
“No, nothing funny.” Michael was the first to the door, and he reached out for its round brass handle. “Just happy to be home.”
Bryson snickered at that, and Michael didn’t wait for more conversation. He twisted the handle and the door swung open easily. Then he stepped through to see what awaited them.
Two long rows of people stood, backs to the walls, stretching down a hallway. And despite the fact that they all had their eyes open, every one of them looked dead.
4
Michael stopped right past the threshold of the doorway. He could sense his friends at his back, but no one made a move to urge him on. He was sure that they wanted to walk down the hallway as much as he did. Which was not at all.
Bare lightbulbs, like the ones from the haunted-house hallway, hung from the ceiling to illuminate the two lines of people, and Michael suddenly missed the darkness they’d been surrounded by for so long. The strangers stood as still as carved rock, every pair of eyes trained on Michael and his friends.
Michael focused on the ones closest to him. To his right was a woman, her skin as pale as the moon. She wore a white dress, wrinkled but clean. Her dark eyes bore into Michael’s, and it seemed that she might open her mouth to speak to him at any second.
Directly across from her, to Michael’s left, was a man in a black suit. He was just as pale as the woman and just as still, but his right arm was held out halfway from his body, the fingers spread apart.
Michael focused on the others lining the hallway. All of them ghostly white, all completely still, all staring at the new arrivals. Like the man, many of the people were frozen in odd positions. As if they’d been turned to stone in the middle of an activity.
“Hello?” Bryson called. His voice echoed down the hallway, and just before it faded, each person in front of them moved slightly. Michael’s heart skipped.
“What was that?” Sarah whispered, and a few of the bodies twitched. Then she said even softer, “All I can tell from the code is it seems the Path goes straight ahead. I can’t break through anything or see another way out.”
“What else is new?” Bryson added. “Me neither.”
Very slowly, Michael turned around to face his two friends. Then, so quiet he could barely hear himself speaking, he said, “Okay, but no talking. No sudden movements. Follow me.”
He turned back and took a careful step forward, then another. The heads of the strangers slowly pivoted to watch his movement, their eyes zeroing in on him specifically. Michael held his gaze on them, terrified of what they might do. With each person he passed, a choking fear grew in his chest that was making it harder and harder to breathe.
He pressed on, forcing himself to take each step as slowly as possible. He could sense Bryson and Sarah behind him, but he didn’t dare turn to look at them again. They passed an old man with a large nose and fire in his eyes. Another man with an enormous birthmark covering half his face, like a bruise on his pale skin. A lady with her mouth wide open, teeth white and gums purple. A toddler, a slight smile frozen on his face.
Michael felt an itch growing in his nose and was unable to hold it back. He sneezed, and the bodies around him twitched again, their arms and hands rising almost an inch. His heart skipped and he stopped, waiting to make sure nothing was going to happen. All was still. Relieved, he pushed forward again, step by agonizingly slow step.
They’d passed about ten more people when Michael tripped over an uneven break in the floor. He fell to the ground, landing on his shoulder. But before he even hit the hard floor of the hallway, he heard movement from all the people around him.
5
Michael rolled onto his back and shot his arms up protectively around his face, but then froze. The scene above was like a horror-movie poster. Several sets of hands reaching toward him, framing angry faces. But they’d frozen as soon as he had. Bone-white fingers with sharp nails hovered over him. And eyes, bright with hunger, stared down. But no one moved.
Sure that they’d soon hear his banging heart, Michael tried to calm himself down. Slowly, he took several long, deep breaths; then he readied himself and started inching backward, using his legs and arms to do it in tiny motions. Sweat broke out all over his body, soaking his clothes and dripping down the sides of his face. He couldn’t tear his eyes away from the many locked on him. One mistake and they’d attack—he knew it—and then it’d all be over. Fighting would only cause more movement.
Happy thoughts, he mused as he slowly scooted away from them.
Finally, Michael got out from under the frozen canopy of arms. The creepiest part for him was that even though their bodies—below the neck—remained still, their eyes continued to follow his movements. Chills washed through him.
Ever so slowly, he turned over, then rose to his feet. He looked back at Bryson and Sarah, who were on the far side of the pack Michael had just escaped. Luckily a space had opened up along the wall where some of the people had been standing. His two friends slipped into it to wind around the group, and once again they were all together. Bryson was unusually distraught, his face tense, his eyes wild. Michael wanted to ask him if he was okay, but knew they couldn’t afford to make any noise, so he silently pressed on.
They headed down the hallway. Slowly. Ever so slowly.
6
Being quiet was hard, and the three inched along slower than Michael had ever moved. The pace drove him a little mad, though he was happy as long as the strangers stayed put.
Gradually the people they passed soon melded into one mass for him. He no longer distinguished between man and woman, adult and child, fat and thin. It was all just a kaleidoscope of pale skin and staring eyes. He tried not to look at them at all, focusing on the distant point at the far end of the hallway instead.
And after what seemed like an eternity, an end came into sight. Far ahead, Michael could see another door.
7
Once he saw the door, the urge to break into a run was almost too much to fight. But Michael held it back. He continued, moving toward that door with deliberate care.
As they walked, eyes followed Michael and the others. Michael was concentrating on staying slow when a strange sound began behind him, like someone whimpering, and his heart sank when he realized it was Bryson. Michael saw the strangers on either side of him twitch.
“I keep thinking about Kaine and the impossible code of this place,” Bryson whispered far too loudly. The people lining the walls twitched again. “And it just hit me. What if Kaine isn’t really a gamer? What if … Hey! The code is weaker up there!”
The last few words came out not in a whisper but an echoing yell. And as Bryson’s voice permeated the silence, Michael’s mind spun into a swirl of panic. Bryson was suddenly pushing him to the side, running past him in a full sprint toward the door. Michael crashed into a cold body, and the thing sprang to life. But instead of turning on Michael, the creature took off after Bryson. All of them did. Every single figure was chasing Bryson, and Michael sank to his knees, stunned with horror, watching the vicious horde storm after his friend.
8
Michael understood how things worked. When you were in the Sleep, you were always aware on some level that you weren’t in the real world. The worst-case scenario was that you’d die—maybe pretty awfully—then end up back home in your Coffin, where you could get out, take a shower, recover from the ordeal, and go back to play another day. You were always aware of that basic truth.
But on the Path, that awareness felt more distant. And in that moment, Michael was torn about what he should do. He knew Bryson was about to experience something that wasn’t actually real. If it was, Michael wouldn’t have hesitated for a moment—he’d have run after his friend and tried to save him. If they’d been in a normal VirtNet game, he probably would’ve done the same thing. It was, after all, a game. But here, if he died, their mission was over. He couldn’t risk it.
Still, knowing that didn’t make it any easier to hear as the sounds of violence escalated. It certainly didn’t feel like a game.
Sarah plopped down next to Michael. “We have to hack—”
He cut her off. “We’ve tried and tried.”
“Then we need to try again!” Her face was red.
“Fine.” Michael shrugged. “You’re right.”
Michael closed his eyes and entered the realm of code surrounding them. He poked and prodded, swam through the data. He could sense Sarah’s digital presence doing the same. But the Path here was even more strongly shielded than before. Michael tried everything in his power to get to the code where Bryson was being attacked, and he just couldn’t do it.
Sarah tried longer but couldn’t manage to get there, either.
“Thanks anyway,” she said softly.
Eyes open again, she and Michael avoided looking toward Bryson. Michael didn’t want to take a chance of seeing what was inevitably going to happen to him. But the sounds were bad enough. Growls and ripping and tearing. Roars of anger, or maybe delight.
And of course, worst of all, Bryson’s screams. They tore through the air over everything else and traveled down that long hallway as if Bryson was standing right next to them. The cries were desperate, so full of terror that Michael’s heart hurt, as if someone was squeezing it with both fists. They’d signed up for this kind of life inside the Sleep, but, real or not real, at the moment Bryson was feeling every single bit of the torture being done to him.
Finally, mercifully, it stopped. And Michael didn’t need to look to know that what was left of Bryson had disappeared, gone with the last breath of his Aura’s life. Somewhere far away from them, their friend was waking up inside his Coffin, probably still screaming from the horror of it all.
Sarah grabbed Michael’s hand, squeezed it. And for the second time in less than a day, he heard her crying.
With everything still again, Michael could finally think about the odd words of his friend right before he’d freaked out, wonder if they were just the thoughts of a person driven to the brink.
What if Kaine isn’t really a gamer?
Michael closed his eyes and felt on the verge of tears himself. What in the world had Bryson meant?