Heir Apparent (5 page)

"What do you mean, 'emergency'—" I started, but he talked over my question.

"People from the Society to Protect Our Children," he said, still getting it wrong, "have broken into the building. They have damaged our equipment. Don't worry. There is no physical danger to your body. The intruders have been removed by the police."

"What do you mean, 'no
physical'—
"

But again he kept on talking.

He can't hear me,
I realized. He probably couldn't see me. I shut up and listened, since I wouldn't be able to ask him to repeat.

"We are working to regain control," Mr. Rasmussem was saying, which wasn't comforting at all, especially from someone who had ink stains on his lab coat where he'd forgotten to use his pocket protector. "There are fail-safe measures to keep external stimuli, like power failures or surges, from affecting your mental state. But while these safeguards are in effect, you will find it difficult to exit the Heir Apparent program."

I was stuck here?

"The only route," Mr. Rasmussem said, "is to successfully complete the game. Unsuccessful solutions will loop you back to the start of the program."

I can do that,
I thought. What he was telling me was that I was getting free extra tries. I began to breathe normally again.

"Unfortunately," Mr. Rasmussem said, and my breath caught again, "this is the last time we will be able to communicate with you. And, unfortunately, I cannot tell you the solution to the game since there is no one, single, right path. There are an infinite number of permutations, depending on which characters you take into your confidence, how you react to the problems with which you will be presented, and what policies you set for your government."

Mr. Rasmussem might have been counting on this going over my head, but I could figure it out: If there were an infinite number of possible right ways that could get me out of here, there had to be an infinite number of wrong ways that would set me back on that hill in St. Jehan.

"Don't panic," Mr. Rasmussem said again. Their readouts on my heart rate and blood pressure must have been going wild. "All you have to do is play the game as well as you can as quickly as you can."

And while that was still sinking in, while I was mentally repeating
quickly?
Mr. Rasmussem said, "Wait!"

Wait?
That seemed all I could do. But he wasn't talking to me.

He was beginning to float upward again. The heavenly choir started humming. The clouds took on a pink hue. Mr. Rasmussem was again talking to someone else, arguing. "No, this is foolish. She needs to know the urgency." He turned back to me, speaking in a rush now, so that I suddenly suspected his earlier comments had been scripted. "What I said before isn't entirely accurate. I don't want to frighten you—you should be fine. But there is no time to waste. The prolonged direct stimulation to your brain is dangerous. The longest game we have is supposed to be over in an hour, and our equipment would normally be safe for up to five times that exposure. But with the damage these people have inflicted, your safety zone is much, much less. We don't know how long you have, but the longer you're in the game, the more you risk fatal overload."

Overload?
What was he saying? And
fatal overload?

Now it was my turn to cry, "Wait!" to him. But even if he could have heard me, it was obvious that there was nothing he could do about remaining.

"Advice," Mr. Rasmussem called down at me as the clouds foamed about him. "Kenric and Sister Mary Ursula don't work well together."

Who in the world was Sister Mary Ursula?

Mr. Rasmussem's voice was fading despite the fact that he was obviously shouting. "And next time, don't forget the ring."

"What ring?" I shouted back up to him. All I could see, far above, were the bottoms of his sneakers.

"And whatever you do, don't..."

But, naturally, I couldn't make that out.

SUBJ: URGENT—Emergency Situation
DATE: 5/25 03:37:02
P.M.
US eastern daylight time
FROM: Nigel Rasmussem

TO: dept. heads distribution list

BACKGROUND: The Rochester, New York, facility has been compromised by unauthorized persons who have forced entry and damaged equipment *while it was in use*.

See attached file for damage assessment and equipment specifics.

The intruders have been removed and arrested by local authorities. Security believes them to be politically motivated local individuals working spontaneously in an isolated incident rather than organized terrorists, BUT TIGHTEN SECURITY IN ALL GAMING CENTERS NONETHELESS.

See attached file for background on CPOC political lobby group.

At the time of the raid on the facility, 2 gamers were in the VR arcade and were not harmed, one group of 4 TI gamers had just gone under and were successfully retrieved by the premises technologist, but a lone player was already fully in total immersion and the technologist believes serious bodily harm would result from disconnecting this gamer before successful completion of the game.

Access code #703-592-B-3 to monitor subject's vital signs.

Note: Gamer Is a 14-year-old minor beLieved to have limited gaming experience.

Using the residual power in the grids, contact was made with the gamer to apprise her of the situation, though on the advice of Lisa in psychology, the risk was downplayed so as not to cause nonfunctional anxiety. Once that power drained, contact was obstructed and cannot be reestablished.

CURRENT SITUATION: We do not know exactly how much time we have and we need all possible Input from all available technologists with all possible speed. We require estimates, advice for repairing the equipment in minimal time, contingency plans to disconnect the gamer in case of systems failure before game completion.

Legal is working to make sure we are covered, but I DO NOT want R.E. to be the first VR company with a fatality.

What kind of cheesy outfit was Rasmussem that crazies could walk in and endanger innocent kids? A picture flitted through my brain of the Rasmussem Gaming Center receptionist—the last defense between immobilized semiconscious kids and crazed CPOC members taking out their frustrations on Rasmussem's equipment. She'd probably been too wrapped up in her nails or in a game of Free Cell to notice the intruders. And what about those idiots at CPOC? Wasn't their whole purpose to protect kids? Did I not count because they considered me some sort of evil deviant for having come in here?

You're wasting time,
I told myself.

I tried to work it out in my head: Rasmussem's engineers said I
should
have had five hours for the supposed safety zone. Since Heir Apparent took only half an hour to play, that should have given me ten tries ... Except those CPOC demonstrators had caused enough damage that however much time I had, it was less than that. And time before ... what? What did "overload" mean?

Stop it,
I told myself.
Panicking is not going to help. Think calmly; plan things out.

Would my brain literally fry, getting so hot that I would feel fevered, or like I was stranded in a desert, or like I was being cooked alive?

Don't be melodramatic,
I told myself.

It would probably be more like an electrical shock.

Or an epileptic convulsion.

Would I—immersed in the game—feel it? Would I know it was happening?

I tried to drag myself away from that line of thinking. Lots of drastically wrong things could be happening inside a person's body without that person even knowing. It wouldn't necessarily hurt.

On the other hand, I knew that the Rasmussem technology sometimes made it so that a sick person who didn't even know she was sick would—while playing the game—feel sick. The gaming-as-diagnostic-tool scenario.

Not that I felt sick yet.

Did I?

I felt all clammy and my stomach was in a knot and my throat was tight and my chest hurt, but that was probably from the tension. Probably. I touched my forehead and didn't think I had a fever. Or at least not yet.

At the most, I would have had ten tries, feeling like thirty days, which would have been a long time to feel sick. But Mr. Rasmussem said I had less time than that—"much, much less," I remembered him stressing. What was much, much less time than thirty days—half of that? A quarter?

Did I, in fact, have only one try?

No. He'd said, "Next time..." So, at least one more try. I hoped.

There is a possibility,
I told myself firmly,
that you will make it. You need to play smart and maximize your chances.

Nigel Rasmussem had talked about infinite possibilities of ways to play Heir Apparent correctly.

I might stumble on one. In ... whatever time I had left.

If I played carefully.

I was so preoccupied, I wasn't aware of anyone approaching until someone grabbed me from behind—which I guess was a pretty good indication I wasn't playing carefully enough. Someone spun me around, and I saw that I was facing a group of about twenty of the castle guards.

Something about them was spooky. I mean, in theory, weren't they there to guard me, the officially named heir apparent of this realm? Surely it wasn't proper guard etiquette to come up behind the person who's scheduled to be crowned as your king, to lay hands on her and spin her around. And several of them had swords or knives drawn.

I glanced around. Maybe something had happened, I thought. Maybe they were here to rescue me from some danger?

Right.

"She's too weak to be a proper king," said the guard who'd spun me around, the guard I'd ordered to release the boy accused of poaching. "She'll be the death of all of us."

And with that he stuck a knife into me.

It didn't hurt. I felt fizzy, like an ice cube in a glass of ginger ale, all covered with carbonated bubbles. My knees gave out from under me, and my eyes grew heavy. When I opened them again, I was on the hill above the cluster of huts that was the village of St. Jehan, and my mother was calling, "Janine! Janine, come back to the house."

So much for playing smart.

O
K
,
I thought,
that brings me down to ... what?
Whatever I'd had before minus half a day.

Never mind,
I told myself.
Just play smarter this time.
Nigel Rasmussem had given me two hints:
And next time,
he'd said,
don't forget the ring.
OK, I'd be on the lookout for a ring. And,
Kenric and Sister Mary Ursula don't work well together.
I'd be on the lookout for Sister Mary Ursula. I would concentrate on being a good heir apparent so that I would win thè game, and I wouldn't distract myself by keeping a running calculation on how much time I might or might not have left.

Just as last time—until I did something different,
everything
would be just as last time—Dusty, my dog, leaped on me and began licking my face. "Down, Dusty!" I ordered. "Stay. Guard the sheep."

Dusty lay down and either guarded the sheep or went to sleep.

I ran down the hill. "Hello, Mother," I said. I glanced at her hands. No rings. Of course not, she was a simple peasant woman, and peasants don't wear jewelry.

I asked, "Who's this?" Even though I knew Sir Deming's name and business, my character wouldn't.

Sir Deming was just as rude as last time. Waving his handkerchief as though to dissipate the smell I brought with me, he asked, "Is this the lass?"

Who cared what he said? I saw he was wearing a ring.

Aha!

"My, what a nice ring," I said, talking over my mother, who was telling me to stand straight and not fidget.

Deming looked as though he suspected I was a ring thief as well as a sheepherder, and he crossed his arms over his chest, tucking his fingers under his arms.

In games, certain events are keyed to certain actions. It was probably too early for me to actually get the ring.

I listened, antsy with impatience, while I was told, once again, that I had been living with foster parents; I learned, once again, about the death of King Cynric, my father.

When Deming said that the dying king had sent for me, I eyed his hand and asked, "Did he send some token?"

"He sent me," Deming said in his snooty, snotty manner.

OK, maybe it was still too early.

I didn't bother asking about my half brothers or the queen—we could discuss them on the ride to the castle, without taking any extra time.

Once again my foster mother wept when I left, saying that my foster father would be heartbroken to miss saying good-bye to me. (
Yeah, yeah.
In my experience—in two worlds now—fathers were just big sentimental softies.) If I had felt rushed the first time, now I knew myself to be in a race. No time to waste on characters who were there just for the scene-setting.

This time as we rode away on Deming's horse, I asked Deming all sorts of questions about my new family, to show I was interested. Deming, of course, was
not
interested.

"Who's Sister Mary Ursula?" I asked.

Again Deming gave me a suspicious look. "Interfering old busybody," he said. "Has she been in clandestine contact with your family?"

Oops.
I realized I shouldn't give away that I knew things I shouldn't know yet.

"No," I said.

"Then where have you heard her name?"

"I can't remember," I said.

Deming snorted.

I still didn't like him, and he still didn't like me.

As we approached the castle, I once again tried for the ring. "I can't help but notice the interesting design on your ring," I told him. "What do you call that?"