Multiplayer (4 page)

His mother frowned at the TV, displaying stats from the last match. “And I’m not sure I like that game. Those people you play with, this Mal-X, he could be anybody, anywhere in the world. What if he figured out who you are?”

Hector rolled his eyes, still reeling inside from his defeat at the hands of a cheater. He had failed! Failed his father! “Why would Mal-X care who I am, Mom? I’m not going to agree to meet him somewhere; I’m not that stupid. Besides, he’s just a gamer.” But I’d like to find him, Hector thought bitterly. Find him and kill him. The
real
him. Dad would approve.

“I’m just not sure it’s a good idea for you to run around killing people, and vice versa.”

Hector scowled, matching his mother’s look exactly. “Dad thought it was okay.”

She shook her head in frustration. “Don’t do that to me Hector. You don’t play soccer anymore. You hardly go outside. You don’t study like you should. You don’t do anything but play
that game
. And it isn’t even real.”

“There’s nothing to do outside.” He looked out the window, thinking how true that was. In his old home, he was always outside. So was everyone else. This was like a ghost-town, everyone holed up in their houses or bustling about in their minivans racing from one event to the next. It was
Omega Wars
or … nothing.

“We’ve been here for almost a year, Hector. And you have friends, or at least you would if you’d get off that game. There’s Jordan, Blake, Deion. Tyr –”

“I was just playing with Deion,” Hector blurted, and pointed at the TV. “And Tyra. Just now, on the game. See? That’s interaction. That’s –”

“Human interaction, Hector. People. And what about Sanjar, next door? He’s always asking you to do things. He’s such a nice boy. And the family is so sweet. Mr. Zahedi is always offering to help.”

“Sanjar?” said Hector doubtfully. “You want me to hang out with Sanjar?”

Mom frowned. “What’s wrong with him?”

Hector shook his head, not believing she was going to make him say it. “Have you seen him?” he asked.

“Yes I’ve seen him. This has nothing to do with what happened to your father, Hector. You’ve had Muslim friends before. He just wants to be your friend.”

Friend? Sanjar wasn’t trying to be his friend – he was thumbing his nose at Hector. Laughing at what had happened to Hector’s father. The whole family was. But anything he said just confirmed his mother’s belief that he was paranoid – imaging problems everywhere.

“Well tomorrow,” she finally said, then paused for her own wheels to turn. “I don’t care what the psychologist said. Tomorrow, I don’t want you playing any of this game when you get home. No video games until you go outside and get some exercise. You look like a zombie.”

Hector growled in frustration. “What do you want me to do? Sit and watch the news with you?”

“Don’t be a smart aleck, Hector,” his mother warned. “It’s important to keep up with what’s going on in the world.”

“But there’s nothing to do around here.”

“Well, find something.”

“Whatever,” he muttered as she left the room.

When she’d gone, he glanced back at the game screen. There was a message from Mal-X that read simply,
Shokran
, whatever that meant. Hector felt his spine go rigid and his teeth ground together so hard he thought they would splinter. He threw his controller at the floor in rage, and it broke into pieces.

Ch. 3

Mrs. Reynolds reminded Hector of one of his dad’s sergeants, and had a well-deserved reputation as the hardest teacher in the school. The grizzled, old hag retrieved a stack of papers from her desk. Discontent spread across the room when the students realized what it was. “I have graded your tests from last week,” she announced. “Some of you don’t appear to have studied at all.” Her gaze swept over the students like a prison-camp searchlight, lingering on Hector who froze like an escaping prisoner caught in its beam.

She always handed out the top five grades before the others. And the one that was usually first was, “Sanjar Zahedi,” she announced. “Well done.”

Hector’s eyes followed Sanjar as he collected his test. Sanjar was an Iranian, like the people who had made the bomb that killed Hector’s dad. He always carried a thick, leather Qur’an with weird symbols on the front, and usually dressed in some kind of Muslim clothes. Today it was a tunic and baggy pants with a deep red fez. Sanjar took his paper and tried to conceal the smile that spread across his nut-brown face.

After Sanjar came the Goth. Sabrah Moody was always dressed in black. She had long, shiny, black hair, pale skin, multiple earrings, and lipstick the color of dried blood. She rarely talked or said much of anything, whereas Sanjar never shut up. Why did the weird people always make the best grades? A terrorist and an emo-freak, Hector snorted to himself. Then remembered he used to make good grades too, but that was before he understood that none of this mattered. Now that he knew, it was impossible to concentrate on this useless stuff for more than a few minutes.

After the first five tests, the rest were well shuffled. Deion wasn’t in the top five, but he was smiling when he returned to his seat. He flashed an ‘84’ to Hector and did a little dance, which worked amazingly well with his stylish clothes, and plopped into his seat behind Hector.

Finally, she came to Hector’s name. His face flushed when she called him. He already knew what the grade would be. He rose and shuffled to the front of the class. He was wearing his
Bayern Munich
soccer jersey and felt his face must be as red as the shirt. For an instant, he made eye contact with his teacher, then looked away and took his paper. He didn’t bother to check the grade, just retreated to his desk with his test curled into a tight tube so no one could see.

“Now I want everyone to correct the problems that you missed,” said Mrs. Reynolds, after she’d called everyone forward. “Bring them in Monday and you will receive half-credit. Apparently there was some confusion about some of the problems. So open your books to chapter fourteen. Polynomials are easy to understand, you just have to…”

Sergeant ‘B’s voice faded in his ears as he slowly uncurled the test. He could see a lot of red marks. The last little bit remained hidden until he finally peeked. His stomach felt sick:
48%
. An
F
. He stuffed it into his folder so no one else would see.

Mrs. Reynolds went over polynomials then assigned homework and gave time to work on it and ask questions. Hector spent the time wondering why math was so full of strange names, and why they had to learn them when none of it served any useful purpose in life. Just busy work to keep students occupied during the day. Finally, his thoughts drifted to something that did matter – how to bring Mal-X down. And get Vera back. By the time the period ended, he had the beginnings of a plan. A plan he could start on tonight. Hector packed his books and followed Deion out to tell him about it.

He’d just hailed Deion when Mrs. Reynold’s called him to her desk. Hector stopped with a groan and whispered a swear word.

Deion looked at him too gravely. “I’ll wait for you, man,” he said. “If you’re not out in five minutes I’ll –”

“Air strike,” Hector grumbled. “Napalm the whole school.”

“I was thinking more along the lines of SEAL Team Six.”

“Works, too,” Hector replied and went to meet his doom in the form of an algebra teacher seated behind her desk with her grade book open. “Yes ma’am,” he said, standing before her, trying to make out the cryptic characters from upside down.

She tapped a gnarled finger on a large red number, then looked up and peered at him over the rim of her glasses. “Hector, as of this test you are failing my class.” Hector gulped hard. He’d never flunked anything – not even close. It wasn’t a good feeling. “If this continues, you will repeat the grade. I know you’ve had a difficult year, but…”

Hector stopped listening as his body tightened.
Difficult year.
What did she know about him? Nothing. The last thing Hector needed was someone else’s misguided sympathy, especially over meaningless math problems.

“I want you to go home and correct the test, and I’d like your mother to sign it.”

Hector nodded woodenly, feeling particularly hollow inside. “Yes ma’am.”

“I also noticed you didn’t turn in last night’s homework. Did you understand it?” Hector shrugged and looked away as Mrs. Reynolds sighed heavily. “I’m going to give you one chance, Hector. I want this test corrected, and all your homework, in my hands on Monday. All signed by your mother. Do you understand?”

Hector nodded again, but had nothing to say. He couldn’t move because his legs were wobbly. He was flunking. Flunking! And he had to tell his mom.

Ch. 4

The walk home felt like swimming through sludge. The perfect, sprawling neighborhood with its too-big houses, and too-small lawns mocked Hector’s life. It didn’t matter how much of the money from his dad’s life insurance policy they’d spent, nothing in Hector’s life was perfect. Nothing in anyone’s life was. Look at Pappous. Hector’s family had moved here to be close to his grandparents – just a few blocks away. But not long after moving in, his grandmother had dropped dead out in her garden. Now only Pappous was left, and had nothing to do but fiddle around in their house. No reason for him to stay in his own, even though he refused to just move in with them.

Hector tried to be patient and sympathetic with his grandfather, but it was hard. The old geezer insisted on telling stories, over and over again, mostly from World War II when he was a boy living in Greece. He made a big deal of them, like they were supposed to mean something, but they didn’t. And they were boring. No guns or explosions or anything. Just people. Besides, World War II was a long time ago, and no one hated the Germans anymore. Hector hoped he wouldn’t be there today. His mom would be bad enough. He didn’t need Pappous and his meaningless stories on top of everything else that was going on.

“Big raid on OW tonight,” said Deion, walking at his side. “You in?”

Hector shrugged. When his mother saw his algebra grade, he’d probably be banned from
Omega Wars
for the rest of his life. “I don’t know. I’m sort of thinking of starting my own clan. Tired of GoreFiendHell ordering everybody around. He’s such a dick.”

“Just don’t give it a stupid name.”

“It’ll be a good name.”

“You know, like Fart Demons, or Quest Bunnies, or something like that.”

“Would those be good names or bad?”
 
Hector looked up to see Halie wandering into the street like she could catch the chipmunk that sat taunting her. “Princess! Get out of the street.” She looked at him and frowned, then strolled back to the sidewalk pouting.

“I thought you hated her,” said Deion.

Hector shrugged again, and trudged on in silence next to his friend.

Deion was shorter than Hector but thicker. He kept his curly black hair cut short, almost bald, and had large, round, dark eyes that matched his deep brown skin. Deion was one of the few people who hadn’t looked at Hector strangely when he’d learned about Hector’s dad. Just nodded, said he was sorry, and asked if Hector wanted to go to the pool with him.

“You want to ride bikes this afternoon?” Hector asked. “My mom says I’ve been playing too much
Omega
.”

“Soccer practice.”

“You’re always at practice,” Hector said, trying to hide his frustration.

“We got a big tournament coming up.”

“When don’t you?”

Deion shrugged. “You should be on our team. We could use a guy who played in the Bundesliga.”

“I didn’t play in the Bundesliga.” This wasn’t the first time he’d been asked to play on a team, but nothing in the US had matched his time in Germany, when his father had been stationed there. “Too much travel. You don’t have a life anymore.”

“And sitting at home playing video games is a life?”

“For now.”

They stopped
at Deion’s house. Deion’s mother was an orthopedic surgeon, and the large house showed it. “So, you coming tonight?”