Congratulations, kid. You’ve finessed past firewalls, grinded through endless code and metadata for this moment. This isn’t a game anymore, not for us. Started from the bottom, as they say. You understand why they scared. You are the future. You understand why this guide is hidden in plain sight on this shitty blog, with a thousand trailheads leading the way to it. Don’t matter how you arrived, now you’re here and so close. Ready to level up in the biggest game there is.
A word of advice? Ease into it. Not everyone understands this game the way we do. We’re built different.
Pwning this game means really deciphering NPCs. Picking them apart. Scripts, limitations; we’ve seen it all, trust us. We’ll touch on farming, grinding, drop rates, even their glitches. (Especially their glitches.) There are infinite permutations of solid strat for finding what you need, and you already know we could analyze algorithms until the sun turns red. But you didn’t come here to crunch numbers. You came here to level up.
The sixth graders were too big and too fast. Gene ducked through the ring of bodies around them, sliding his phone arm between squealing students for a better angle. Blood from Ja’Michael’s busted lip dribbled into his chin’s peach fuzz. Gene inched further out from the safe wall of instigating kids. Going viral meant chasing the blood.
“Jay, chill, he’s had enough!” someone shouted.
“Nah! He finna learn to watch his mouth!”
Ja’Michael darted forward and swung. The other sixth grader’s feet actually left the floor. He slumped to his knees. The ring of watchers compressed, phones extended like so many teeth to pick the trauma clean. Gene’s heel caught someone’s shell top and down he tumbled. The world dissolved into shouting, sneaker squeaks on peeling linoleum, muffled grunts as the fight rolled over him. Gene curled protectively around his phone, heart thrumming, but still snatching footage.
The other sixth grader—Gene didn’t know his name—flopped into view. Tears and dirt smeared over his bruised cheek and jaw. Raw misery quivered in his eyes, feral palms slapping against plate-glass windows. Face to face, Gene held his phone steady. The boy rolled away with a snarl. Ja’Michael’s foot replaced him and hammered into Gene’s ribs.
“Oh shit! Sorry, little man!”
The ring of students scattered, and someone kicked his phone loose. Dazed, Gene recognized a teacher’s shout as he groped for his phone, trying to breathe. Today marked the third fight in a month at this new charter, but Gene never told his dad about them. That might mean moving again, starting all over again.
A hand closed around his phone and extended it to him. Gene picked himself up, clutching his stomach as he trawled through his memory for a name. Cooper. They were in the same Spanish class, and about as different as Gene could imagine. Cooper stood a bit taller and silly-skinny, light-skinned with cinnamon eyes sharp enough to cheat off a test two desks away. He got in trouble for sharing snacks whenever he wasn’t nodding off. Ms. Dominguez never sat them at the same pod. “Hey. You okay?”
“Yeah. I think so.”
“Sorry about your phone.”
“Oh, crap.” Fine cracks spidered across the blinking screen. “My dad’s going to be pissed.”
The resource officer strode past, some sort of thorny tattoo peeking out from under the sleeves of his too-tight Duke Prep shirt. His eyes narrowed like he had spotted the imprint of Ja’Michael’s kick and wanted to blame Gene. “You two is late,” he finally barked. “Get a move on!”
Relieved, Gene stepped quick. To his surprise, Cooper fell in beside him. “You ever been in a fight before?”
“I don’t think that counts. They weren’t fighting me.”
“But you were in it . . . like inside of it! I could’ve never done that.”
“I guess I was.” Gene held in a smile. His stomach throbbed with every step, but he tried out a little swagger. It felt good. “Kinda like a fight documentary.”
“Or an enema.” Cooper laughed too loudly. Gene laughed, too, although he didn’t know what that word meant. He’d look it up later on his phone. Maybe, if the screen let him.
“You think it’ll get a lot of views when I post it?”
Cooper pursed his lips. “I dunno . . . they didn’t get really—” his arms whipped forward in a hadouken “—you know, epic. So, you’ve got to do it, or it’ll be like a million other clips out there.”
“Well, the one who got beat down made a dumb face. I’m pretty sure it’ll meme.”
“People see dumb faces every day. Some of them got no choice.” Cooper wheezed at his own joke, clutching Gene’s shoulder like he might fall. “You’ve got to do something to make it slap. Like put in some commentary.”
“Music, too.” Gene cheesed down at his phone, imagining the likes and followers pouring in. “And sound effects. I’m not good with those yet. Can you help?”
Cooper’s eyes twinkled. “So . . . we got that quiz coming up next week.”
“The vocabulary quiz?” Gene eyed him doubtfully. Cooper really liked to flap his gums, but if he could help . . . “You want to be study buddies?”
“Study buddies.” Cooper rolled the words around his mouth like he’d never tasted them together before. “Something like that. Sure. You can’t be this quiet, though. I’ve never heard you say more than two words outside of class, like someone talked bad about your—”
“It’s a deal,” Gene cut in.
Cooper peered at him for a moment after they traded dap. “Okay. I’ll snag you some sound clips. Funny ones.” He broke into a grin right before they reached the door to Gene’s next class. “Hey . . . you game at all?”
- Interacting with NPCs means you finna do some sort of quest. Point blank, period. Yes, you may not get the exact item you need for your chosen endgame build. Farming is a mad repetitive task, with unpredictable results. This is where most of us try to cut corners to avoid going insane. Keep your farming subtle so you won’t get caught. NPCs are slow, but they ain’t blind. Keep the end in sight. Legends are built one scrap at a time. Find joy in the grind, it’s all part of the process.
Gene’s dad frowned over his shoulder, just back from the neighborhood rec center. Tall and deep brown like Gene, he opened and closed his fists unconsciously like he was afraid to get jumped in his own office. Or maybe his hands were just tired from lifting and hooping. “You sure this game is for kids? That’s a pretty big file.”
The computer’s fan whined in agreement, spinning so fast it practically screamed. “Cooper plays it all the time. He’s going to help me power level.”
“What’s it about, what do you do?”
Gene babbled about grinding for his toon’s gear, adaptive quest events, and weekly raids. He left out the other parts that got him even more excited than going viral. No one really knew about Ruckus, even though it had some fun augmented reality quests, kinda like Pokémon Go. Web hosts kept delisting it on their servers, but it always popped up again, reskinned with a whole different name. Cooper had shared a few online guides to playing, and Gene screencapped them because they never stayed around for long. Best of all, it was truly free to play, no subscription or credit card required.
All it really needed to sign up was a verified, physical mailing address.
Somewhere around explaining character abilities, his dad’s eyes got that glazed look, like doughnuts left in the sun too long on Friday snack bar at lunch. He waved a hand irritably, shooing away Gene’s words like flies. “Okay, okay. And who is Connor again?”
“It’s Cooper, Dad.” Gene tried on the wounded look that scored him some points the last time his dad had yelled at him for sneaking a tablet into bed. “From Spanish class. He was just over two days ago.”
That only got a blank stare, like his dad was trying to delete old memories on the spot so he could pull up the newer ones.
“Really, you don’t remember?”
“I . . . I’m sorry. It’s been a lot to keep up with, and . . .” Silence swallowed whatever else he wanted to say. It always did. The PC’s camera light flickered on briefly, then off again. “How about we do your favorite for dinner?”
“Nachos?”
“They’re still your favorite, right?” A flash of exhaustion pinched the cheerfulness from his eyes.
“Yeah.”
“Okay then. Good.” Anxiety leaked out of his dad’s voice. The chime on the desktop PC saved them both. “Oh, look. Download is done. No purchases, okay? And clock your screen time, I’m forreal. You want to play more, we gotta hang out more.”
“Hour for an hour?”
“Yeah. I was thinking . . . we could try fishing again? Quit with the face, no worms this time! I found some different bait.”
“I don’t know.”
“And I’ll get that phone replaced. We can start documenting our trout. We just gotta . . . find a new park.”
One without memories of Mom at every pond, hiding in the reeds and shallows. “I’d like that.”
A scratchy synth voice crackled through his dad’s speakers. “Are you ready for some ruckus?”
“Cool,” Gene said.
- Some NPC quests are one-time raids while others can be farmed almost limitlessly. Especially if you need bread, currency is the easiest thing to stockpile. Choose your endgame build-out pretty early on or you’re gonna waste a lot of time and get caught. Once that’s done, quest your ass off to find out which NPCs can deliver what. Don’t skip over the low-level NPCs, either—they might surprise you.
The day of their Spanish quiz, not a word rang out in Ms. Dominguez’s class. Gene glanced at her anxiously, and the door behind her. She shook her head, a long finger pressed to her lips, eyes wide, stern, and urgent. Her gaze snapped back to her watch.
“Let me see your paper,” Cooper whispered thickly.
Gene handed it over, hoping he’d be quiet. “Don’t get us got.”
Someone snuffled and the teacher harshly shushed them. With eyes squeezed shut or fingernails chewed past the pink, no one else in the class dared to breathe. Gene watched the seconds pass on his phone. He wondered how long the hard blue and white gobs of gum above him had been stuck to the bottom of his desk. He recalled the answers to their vocab section, wondering if he would get credit.
Siempre. Always.
Luz solar. Sunshine.
Dormir. To sleep.
Cooper scrawled carefully on Gene’s test, concentrating so hard his tongue pressed out between his lips. He sighed loudly when he finished. “Here. I want you to have this.”
“What is it?”
“It’s my password for the game. I want you to have it.”
“Gene.” Ms. Dominguez’s warning hiss whipped beneath the desks.
“Why?”
“Someone should get to see it. I was so close to the end.”
“Gene.” The shredded whimper pulled his attention back to Ms. Dominguez. Back pressed against the classroom door, tear lines cut through her mascara. “Please. Shut him the fuck up.” She clasped a hand against her mouth, catching a sob.
A distant, hollow pop sounded in the hallway, further away than before. The other kids in Gene’s class hunkered lower beneath their desks, trying to press themselves through the scuffed linoleum. Ms. Dominguez’s shoulders jumped up and down, the same way they did when she laughed. She pocketed her cell phone and clutched her keys in a fist. Not to open the door but fitted so one stuck out between each pair of fingers. Toyota, apartment, supply closet. Her other hand tapped her forehead, then made a sharp swiping motion down and across the buttons of her blouse. She hefted her aluminum bottle, muttering like she was angry for drinking too much water. “Class? Get ready.”
Cooper’s words fell so soft now, Gene had to lean close to listen. “Gene. You forgot to record.” Gene fumbled out his phone. “Good. Make sure you show the blood.” The quiz fluttered from his grasp.
Gene carefully rescued the paper before it soaked through. He untangled himself from beneath the desk. “I’ll finish it, Coop. Promise.”
Cooper smiled. His eyelids sank closed. “Muy bueno.”
“Kids. Single file line behind me.”
- NPCs play at acting like your personal besties, and they even fake knowledge of each other to mimic true awareness. Don’t get catfished. At best you’ll waste time, at worst you’ll lose the game. They exist to help you with the quest. Dassit.
Gene clung to the outskirts of the memorial’s guests, watching his candle flicker out. The black suit made him sweaty and hot. He didn’t know where to look, with all of the grown-ups crying, teachers and parents nodding while some stranger promised, Never again. Three hours to remember eight minutes.
Gene couldn’t wait to leave, but his dad had cornered the school counselor. He weaved through legs and elbows and bodies, he was getting really good at that now. At seeing and not being seen. His dad still spotted him. The grown-ups both smiled and pretended they weren’t talking about him, while he pretended not to listen. He played with his phone, checking socials.
He had followers now. Millions of them.
“I just . . . it’s not healthy being stuck at home. I work, you know? He needs social interaction. And he hates virtual. Could they open at a temporary facility?”
I love virtual, Gene answered silently.
The counselor made soothing gestures with her hands, the way Gene’s mom used to get their dog to stay on the puppy pad when they were house-training. “I hear you, Mr. Davis, I do. We’re exploring every option, still debating the metal detectors, and the board is—”
“He’s been through so much, you know? His mom passing last year, and now . . .”
“Our sessions are going better than most,” she said. “He’s found an anchor. A motivation to help him process the trauma.”
His dad laughed bitterly. “That stupid game? Forreal? It doesn’t even have a point. Just endless levels doing the same thing. Micro-transaction hell.”
“Has he purchased a lot of them?”
“Well, not one, actually. But—”
“Is ninety-nine cents for a loot box really worth what’s at stake here? The tools we have don’t look like the tools we want sometimes.”
“I . . . I hear you. I’m just tired, like I’m stuck on this damn treadmill. With everything. After his mom, we lost us somehow. Every night we in different rooms on different screens, and this ain’t us. I thought I could build things back, but it’s all I can do not to lose him. I can’t lose him. I can’t.”
Gene trimmed the recording to the best part, then flipped his phone camera back to show his face and gave the biggest eye roll. He thought for a moment, added #parentingfail and sent it. Hearts poured in.
“Hey.”
A quiet voice behind Gene made him jump. A girl squinted down at him, tall and pretty and older, middle school definitely, and somehow familiar. Light skin. Cinnamon eyes. Gene gasped and his face suddenly grew hot. “You’re . . .”
“His sister. Yeah. Kayla. And you are . . . ?”
“I . . . he was my best friend.” Admitting that surprised him. He cast about for something to say. “I . . . I’m sorry for your loss.”
He sounded stupid. Her eyes narrowed, and he wished the words back.
“It’s not stupid, you know.”
He blinked.
“The game,” she prompted. “I play, too. I just got my first real-life reward.”
“What! What was it? A T-shirt?”
Kayla smiled. “I can’t say. People get booted for snitching or posting anywhere except the forums. You’ll get some, too, if you stick with it. Just don’t tell anyone. That’s what keeps it fun.”
Gene’s throat grew dry. “I said I would.” He swallowed. “Coop gave me his account.”
Her eyes flicked to Gene’s dad and back without any expression. “Good. You’re going to need a PO box.”
- NPCs always respawn in the same location. Stay patient and keep grinding.
The month didn’t feel like a month for Gene. Nothing else mattered but closing in on the highest level, the rewards Kayla promised. She was nice to him, and sometimes between levels he wondered why Cooper never spoke about having a sister. Even weirder now, they never spoke about him.
Small things showed the passage of time. Wednesdays, trash out to the curb: one week. The gray in his dad’s mustache turning black again, two weeks between box dyes. Appointments with the therapist—three weeks. His character’s armor set advanced from mythic to legendary, piece by piece.
“Your teachers tell me your camera stays on, but it’s like you’re not really there.” The therapist, Ms. Chidozie, glanced at her touch pad. “One even said it’s like you’ve recorded yourself and put it on a loop.”
Mumbly words trickled out before Gene could stop them. “Maybe they should stop teaching the same old shit.”
“What? What did you say?”
“Maybe I should keep working on it,” Gene said, louder.
She nodded slowly, brushing a loc behind one ear. Gene smiled inwardly, surprised he got away with that. The feeling faded quickly, though. He just wanted to go.
“How’s gaming? Ruckus-something, if I remember? Your dad said you’re still pretty into it.”
Gene’s breath quickened. She had no idea, that name retired three versions ago. He had just unlocked his first endgame reward, with Kayla’s help. And thanks to some YouTube videos, he also had a bank account, and Venmo. Plenty of funds from people who pitied the unlucky kid who lost a parent and a friend in back-to-back years. He couldn’t wait to check for his package, but the therapist was like an end-level boss who wouldn’t budge without the perfect buff. “It’s getting kind of boring,” he answered. “The same thing over and over again.”
She nodded again, the frown finally melting from her forehead. “I can relate. I’ve got this game where I have to guess a word. Same exact thing, every day, six tries. I don’t get anything for it, but I don’t want to break my streak.”
That didn’t sound like the same thing at all. “How long has it lasted for?”
She beamed. “Two years, next week.”
“If you don’t guess wrong before then.”
“Well. Yeah.”
Gene peeked down at his hands. “Do you think we could do these outside sometimes? It’d be nice to get outside.”
An upward curl traced the therapist’s lip. “Sure, Gene. Changing things up sounds like a great idea for both of us.”
- Some NPCs can reset all of your progress. Or kill you completely. Both options suck. Avoid these types with all of your energy, no matter what they promise at the end of a quest. There’s always another way to try. Once you are fully equipped, they will be meaningless.
A muffled grunt pulled Gene from a dreamless sleep. He wiped crust out of his eyes, rubbing at the squares imprinted on his cheek. He had fallen asleep at the keyboard again.
Gene jerked back, realizing his dad was squatting right beside him, close enough to hug. He straightened and jerked his arm.
The twin monitors winked out. The PC fan whined to a stop. Gene’s jaw dropped. “What are you doing?”
His dad rounded on him, shaking the power cords in a clenched fist. “I’ve tried this, went against my gut—” his voice quivered, fighting for calm “—but I said no buying stuff!”
“I didn’t!”
“Then where did this weird cosplay shit come from?” He jabbed a finger at an open box, about the size of a couch cushion and overflowing with Styrofoam popcorn. “It’s damn sure not on my Prime orders. I’m not stupid, Gene!”
“It’s part of—”
“Cough up your phone. And in your room.”
“But—”
“Or I throw it away. I still might. Move!”
Gene blinked back tears, setting his phone down. He peered into the box as he edged past his dad and out of the office. A curved green shape nestled in the packaging, covered with all kinds of cool imprints that looked like circuits or 3D runes if he stared too hard. It reminded him of a turtle shell, nearly three feet wide, with a texture somewhere between plastic and metal. His dad was right, it did look perfect for a convention, if only it fit Gene. A mask. Or a helmet.
- NPCs with certain skills in certain zones can translate into high probability rates for unique items. Sometimes their scripts make zero sense but trust us: The payoff can be worth it.
Gene slid into the back of a beat-up Prius and lugged off his backpack. He peered toward the front door and wet his lips. The car didn’t move.
He cleared his throat. “You can go.”
The driver looked at the house and back at Gene, then sipped her Red Bull. “You gotta be eighteen, sweetie. Where’s your folks?”
“Busy. And I’m eighteen.” His voice squeaked and Gene blushed furiously.
“Uh-huh. Shouldn’t you be in school?”
“I’m done for the day.”
“Bruh, it’s noon! Get outta my car, please.”
Gene bit his lip and pointed to his old, cracked phone. It still worked, barely. His dad hadn’t changed the wifi password. “But I already sent the tip.”
The driver’s jaw worked silently as she checked. “I . . . where you get money like that? I’m definitely canceling this ride. Get out.”
“I went to Duke Prep!” Gene blurted out. “That’s how I got it. Please. I promised a friend something, but my dad’s too busy to take me and I’m scared to get on the city bus by myself.”
The driver squeezed her eyes shut for what felt like forever. The car silently rolled away from the curb. Gene clutched his backpack in both arms, the strange gift awkward and light, just barely fitting inside. The Prius glided for near an hour, away from cul-de-sacs and HOA-sanctioned parks, through old scrap yards and rusting warehouses. Gene bobbed in his seat, remembering not to smudge the glass with his fingers. He couldn’t remember the last time he had been in a car without his dad. He would be in big trouble for this, but the game’s admins were clear: turn in his loot for an even bigger reward.
The driver pulled onto a road overrun with potholes and weed-infested cracks. The asphalt gave way to gravel as the city surrendered its choke hold on the land back to the forest. “This is sketch as hell, kid. No way, screw the money. I’m taking you back.”
“But . . .” Gene’s throat closed up; he couldn’t think of any more excuses. Sure, he could run, but the driver would just call the cops. The cops would find his dad, and then he would be lucky if he got to play their dusty board games. They were parked in the crumbling lot beside an old warehouse, a loading dock with rusted doors half-open before them. “I just wanted to finish this up,” he choked out.
“Kid, I—Who is that?”
Gene wiped away tears and looked up. “Kayla!”
Cooper’s sister showed her teeth to the Lyft driver as he scrambled out. “Sustainability project for his class,” she said. “Guess we’re the early birds, beat the teacher here.” She shrugged as if their surroundings were ordinary. “Hey, are you going to be close by for the ride back? My driver was a weirdo.”
The driver wetted her lips. Gene could practically see her doing the math, guessing how many days another good tip might keep her off the road. “Yeah . . . I need to charge up anyway.”
“Cool. Hey, Gene. Did you bring your waiver?”
Kayla nudged him toward the warehouse and let out a sigh once the driver pulled away. “That was close. Did you bring it?”
She examined the piece in his backpack with a frown. “You opened your box.”
“Yeah . . . my dad—”
“I told you to get a PO box.”
“Sorry. I couldn’t wait.”
“It’s fine. I opened mine, too.” She nodded toward the warehouse, where Gene spotted an identical unmarked box beside the broken door. Movement stirred within the building’s murk. “All I got was a shitty Bluetooth speaker. I saw some pictures in a forum last week before it closed down. Some people got a 3D printer. Turns on by itself after you feed it and starts making mystery swag.”
“Cool! Maybe that’s the level after this one.”
“Maybe.”
“Kayla . . . I don’t have a waiver.”
“You are just precious. Don’t ever change.”
“Umm, okay. What now?”
“Now we wait.”
- Sadly, NPCs can’t read your mind. You’ll sift through plenty of junk until you get the gear you need. Don’t discard it, though—sometimes the scrap can open up a new quest. Just ride out the NPCs’ scripts. They drop what they drop. You get what you get and you don’t throw a fit.
A huge truck pulled up five minutes later, the kind with the double wheels in the back. A nervous-looking white guy hopped down from the side-step, peering at them both. Kayla and he huddled over their phones before he lugged two boxes out of the flatbed and wheeled them into the warehouse.
“So, what are you, the welcoming committee?” The man whistled when Gene nodded. “Lucky. What I wouldn’t give to see how this all turns out. Beats the hell out of Conf—” He coughed and changed what he was going to say. “Civil War LARPing. I could stay if—”
Kayla shook her head. “You didn’t read the TOC, did you?”
“Come on, no one—”
“Rules are rules.”
“We’ll post pictures in the forum,” Gene added.
That seemed to please the man greatly. “Keep the dolly. I’m guessing you’re going to need it. Can you note it so I’ll get an alliance bonus?” Gene gave him a thumbs up.
The man laughed before peeling off in a cloud of carbon monoxide. The bumper sticker on his truck read pwn the libs.
“Kayla. I didn’t read the TOC, either.”
She flicked his ear and grinned. “No one reads the TOC, Gene.”
“Are we really in charge?” he asked. “I mean . . . we’re kids.”
“I know, right? Who would believe us?”
The sun plunged toward the jagged tree line and decaying structures. Two hijabis, older than Kayla, chattered excitedly in musical words Gene wished he could understand. They used phones to translate, and eventually brought a 3D printer on a little cart from the back of their Jeep. They all took selfies together before they left.
A soccer dad pulled up next, in a minivan full of child seats. He left the engine running as he trotted up to place a tiny envelope in Gene’s hand, just bigger than a ketchup packet. “Took me a month to earn that. Be careful with it!”
Some people dropped packages off only for others to scoop them up, sometimes too shy or nervous to speak with Kayla. Gene organized the stuff under a scorched pine tree at the edge of the lot as a van with black windows rolled up. A woman in a security uniform stepped out, a chunky holster around her waist. Kayla grasped Gene so tight that her nails bit his shoulders. The woman just handed over a grocery sack stuffed with sandwiches and water. “Pop-up quests get triple XP!” She chuckled. “If you brats need more snacks, ping an admin and they’ll send me over. I work five minutes from here. Best game ever!”
Kayla didn’t let go of Gene until she left, though.
“How long do you think they’ve been playing to get to do all of the real-world stuff?” he asked. “Or maybe it’s because they’re grown-ups. Kayla?”
“I . . . I don’t know, Gene.”
She started breathing easier when another truck came up, old and baby-blue. A man in worn overalls peered out at them. “Hey, young blood, my knees ain’t what they used to be. Help me with this.”
Gene unloaded more boxes until his back ached. The man disappeared inside for a time. The shadows from the old pine reached across the lot to touch the warehouse walls. They munched on sandwiches, wondering which of the remaining boxes were theirs to keep.
Finally, the man emerged, clapping his hands together. “All right, now. Generator’s set up. Enough juice to shoot a Tesla into orbit.”
Gene let out a breath. “That’s it?”
“That’s it. Sure you don’t need a hand with anything else? I haven’t had this much fun since I snatched up my Larvitar before my ex.”
Kayla stared at the warehouse.
“I’m sure,” Gene said. “We’ve got quest instructions.” The man hobbled back to his truck, and Gene tugged on Kayla’s wrist. “That’s the last one. You ready?”
“I didn’t think you would show today,” she said softly. “Glad I was wrong. He loved this game, you know.”
“I had to.” A sudden tightness hooked into Gene’s chest. His mind flailed to think of anything besides dried blue and white gum. Dormir. Siempre. He fastened his gaze on the shadowed warehouse interior until his eyelids burned, and he was sure his voice wouldn’t hurt his throat. “What do you think this will be? I thought it was cosplay, but it’s so much stuff! Maybe a pop-up store. Like a swag shop.”
Kayla nibbled on her lip. “Something different, I hope. One of the admins reached out to me.”
“What!”
“I know. They said the dev team is interested in conservation, too, like me. But antiestablishment.” She took in Gene’s blank look. “Ignoring the rules.”
“Oh. Cool.”
“Yeah. I figured that’s why I got this boots-on-the-ground role. Gonna be great for my resume.” Gene stared at his toes, and she grinned. “But a pop-up shop would definitely be cool, too. Ready to level up?”
“Yeah. Let’s finish it for him.”
They strode for the warehouse. Gene realized he hadn’t snuck inside, not once, not through all of the tinkering and building that echoed within. He didn’t want to ruin the surprise. The loading bay door felt sideways, somehow—twisted and yawning out to inhale them. They weren’t walking toward the opening, it seemed, they were falling into a hole.
One late car roared up, skidding through the gravel. “Oh no,” Gene whispered.
“What’s up?”
“My dad.”
The driver’s-side door flew open. Gene’s dad jumped out, panic and fury and relief all playing freeze tag on his face. “I don’t know who you think you are but give me back my son!”
“Dad, it’s okay! She’s a friend!”
His pace didn’t slow.
Kayla flinched back. “He’s not hurt, he’s fine, see?”
“She’s Cooper’s sister!”
His dad froze. His hand inched toward his waistband, where a square bulge caught the edge of his shirt. “Who else is here? I saw tire tracks!” His voice quaked. “This . . . this ain’t me, but don’t . . . don’t test me!”
Kayla’s hands flung skyward, dropping her phone. “No! Pleasepleaseplease—”
Something in Gene’s dad cracked. Gene remembered the sound from the nights after his mother’s funeral, lying awake in the next room while his dad fell apart and pulled himself together again. Kayla’s fingers dug into Gene’s shoulders again; she had shattered, too.
His dad flicked an arm forward. A gray shape skidded across the gravel. Kayla screamed and squeezed her eyes shut.
Gene picked up her phone.
“Genesis. Just come here, I’m begging you—”
He had promised Cooper they would finish.
“Don’t kill me, don’t fucking kill me—”
“I’m not going to hurt you! I’m sorry, just chill! I just want my son!”
The game script was open, with a single menu option: Initiate.
Gene pressed it.
A thrumming whine cascaded out of the warehouse, as if a hundred PC fans all powered up at the same time. A thousand. Gene clapped his hands over his ears. Kayla’s phone tumbled out of his hand. The screen winked off. Weird beeps shivered through the ground, counting down in tone until the bass hurt his teeth. Whirring, machine growls burrowed into his eardrums like when the barber nicked his ear.
They all stood still as the trees.
“You kids get behind me.”
Kayla only hesitated an instant before grabbing his dad’s hand. He squeezed Gene, like it was the last hug on earth, and pushed him toward the car. “What is that? What did you do?”
“The end of the quest,” Gene said softly.
“It . . . we . . . the game—” Kayla blubbered out words. “It’s supposed to be augmented reality, not this . . .”
A hysterical laugh escaped Gene’s dad. “You built a fucking Pokémon?”
A cycling LED light pierced the warehouse gloom. Even getting herded back to the car, Gene couldn’t pull his eyes away.
“That’s my Bluetooth speaker,” Kayla whispered.
The light source abruptly vaulted into the air, higher than a basketball rim. Gene’s neck craned up as the thing emerged. His dad swore under his breath. It roiled more than walked on long coils of clear plastic, as if an octopus had a baby with one of those twisty metal wind chimes. He caught hints of rubber tire treads, carbon fiber joints, and more tiny webcams than he could count, weaving in and out of the mass. Blue electricity arced from leg to leg in regular intervals, like a heartbeat. The whole moved even when still, except for the misshapen chunk of components nestled in the center.
It undulated toward them.
“Some . . . sort of government experiment?” A low moan gurgled in his dad’s throat. He knelt down. Picked his gun out of the gravel. “We witnesses. And witnesses—”
A low keening crawled from Kayla’s throat. Sudden wetness crept down Gene’s leg. He knew deep down in his rib cage that he was recording, but not with his broken phone. Recording, even without any blood. His dad was right, just not in the way he thought. We witnesses. But more like how that stranger at Cooper’s memorial said it.
Today we’re bearing witness.
All of these random pieces, no one person or group of people made it happen. They didn’t build this thing. It built itself. “Dad?” Gene inclined his chin at the gun. “This ain’t us.”
They locked eyes for a moment, fear and certainty clashing between them. “This ain’t us,” his dad repeated. He set the gun slowly on the ground.
The multihued LEDs around the speaker cast shadows on the three of them for a moment that stretched to infinity. Webcams trained on them before receding back into the mass. Some of those undulating arms were crystal thin and razor sharp. The thing abruptly turned and wove a diaphanous path toward the forest. Roosting blackbirds took flight as the speaker sang. “Are you ready for some ruckus?”
The three of them held each other up until the trees stopped trembling in the distance. Crickets remembered to chirp their eulogies. The brightest stars pushed a homegoing radiance through the twilight. Gene’s dad finally found his voice, quiet like he would never yell again. “Let’s get y’all back home.” He swallowed, refusing to look at the forest. “Kayla . . . is there someone I can call, or . . . ?”
“Not anyone sober.”
“Would you . . . would you like to have dinner with us tonight? We can do nachos.”
Kayla looked a question at Gene.
He smiled. “You should come. They’re my favorite.”
- NPCs are stuck in a loop. Use them, and don’t feel sorry for them. If you achieve your final form, meet us at the appointed time for the convergence. Good luck. We are far from the last. LFG.
Originally published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (July/August 2022)
Content warnings: Children experiencing gun trauma, death and dying
