“Charlie Bit My Finger” plays on a floating YouTube loop next to an infinite RickRoll. Vertical vids float through the air nearby, one with a dude singing “Why you always lyin’?” Another one features a kid behind the camera yelling “Damn Daniel!” at his friend. Images float everywhere, from the cartoon dog in the fire with the caption “This is Fine”, to the one with that evil-looking girl smiling in front of the burning house, plus one of the Doge coin dog thinking “much wow”.
I’ve been sent to hell… and it’s made of memes.
Pepper stands next to me, her eyes wide and enchanted. “Much wow!”
I see a countdown timer displayed prominently above the Million Meme March.
RiftBorn Season 2 Begins: 34 hours, 59 minutes
Thirty-five hours stuck with this crap. I’d rather be dead.
Several alerts are waiting for me in my HUD, but I’m not ready to look at them. I’m tired. I see the “Life is like a box of chocolates” meme and plop down on the green bench next to Forrest Gump.
I take off my Air Jordans and rub my feet, collecting my thoughts. I’ve been granted a stay of execution, at least for now.
Health: 100% | ??????
Looks like the reset for my next round of RiftBorn includes three hearts in my health bar. New game. New quarter. At least that’s something to be hopeful about.
Forrest Gump turns to me and speaks with the wrong voice. “You really are the turd in my punch bowl, David.”
Heh. That didn’t take long. “Drink it all, O’Cavity.”
Forrest’s face transforms to Bill O’Cavity, his weasel eyes hidden behind holospecs. “You should have been denied coverage by now. However, thanks to your little companion here…” he jerks his pointy chin at Pepper. “...you are still a red number on my Profit & Loss statement.”
“Oh hi!” Pepper waddles over to O’Cavity. “Are those chocolates? Can I have one?”
O’Cavity throws the box at her. It hits the ground first, but the corner smacks her. “Ow!”
“Hey!” I grab his shirt. “Don’t do that.”
“It is a piece of code.” O’Cavity sneers at Pepper. “Are you so lonely that this is what passes for a friend?”
“You should see how I treat my enemies.” I bash him in the face with my Kaboomerang. It detonates and blows his head off, which bounces into the street and is run over by a bus.
“Honestly,” Rick Astley RickRolls toward me, wearing O’Cavity’s face. “It’s like talking to a child.”
“Ooo!” Pepper pops a chocolate in her mouth. “Peppermint!”
“Let me make this clear for you, Mr. McClain.” O’Cavity flicks his hand and the LivingLegend Scoreboard appears. Anna’s Moby Dick victory has put her at #2; the Chaos Twins are in the Top Ten. O’Cavity scrolls down and I realize the Leaderboard is much shorter than the last time I saw it. Less than 200 LivingLegends remain. The other half, real patients in HumanAsset’s care, have been denied coverage and are on their way to FullCircle Crematoriums.
I look for Charlotte from Charlotte, the K-pop woman I talked to before the regatta race, who couldn't figure out how to operate her attack controls. She’s not on the list, which means she is down at the bottom with all the other missing patients. Forgotten. Deleted. ???.
A shiver runs through me.
I’m no longer at the bottom of the standings. There are at least 50 players with a lower HypeScore than DDD — ?21,218.
I made $21k in twenty days; that’s more money than I made teaching from Labor Day to Thanksgiving, but it’s nothing to HumanAsset.
“This penguin,” O’Cavity gestures at Pepper. “Is the only reason our algorithm claims you are still a viable asset. You are receiving ancillary VSC with every one of the penguin’s viral videos. I have explained to Accounting that the penguin should not even be receiving VSC points.” So that’s why he’s so mad at Pepper. She’s keeping me alive. “Plus there’s this—”
Another screen pops up. A commercial for a national haircutting chain with a sports theme. The lady barber smiles at the camera. “At Varsity Barber, we know that real sports include gaming! And some gamers have some really unique trims!” The commercial cuts to a RiftBorn player with a four-foot purple mohawk, an ogre-thing with shaggy white hair down to its knees, and a close-up of a crazy-looking hobo.
“Dave!” Pepper chirps. “It’s you!”
I blink, surprised. I’m the hobo. I’m standing over Dan Anthrax with my MacHack trimmers, but the background has been replaced with a Varsity Barber shop. I watch myself cut a furrow through his hair, revealing his scalp map, which has been altered for the commercial with a Varsity Barbers logo. “Find your nearest location on the Varsity Barber app!”
They stuck me in a commercial. HumanAsset is making money off of my face… even that doesn’t belong to me anymore. I glance at O’Cavity. “You should be thrilled. I’m finally monetized.”
“Oh that’s fun!” Pepper claps as the logo pops up at the end of the commercial. “You’re a barber now! Shave-and-a-hair-cut—”
I can’t help but chuckle. “—two bits.”
Annoyed, O’Cavity adjusts his glasses. “Our entertainment division is presenting it to the client on Monday. When they sign off, it will be RiftBorn’s first commercial tie-in.” He waves his hand and the commercial disappears. “You got lucky.”
I give him my best evil grin. “So you’re stuck with me.”
“For now.” O’Cavity’s face disappears from Rick Astley’s body and reappears on an Andre the Giant “OBEY” poster. “I have eliminated 82% of my depreciating assets in Season 1, Mr. McClain. The highest clearance rate in the company.” Depreciating assets. He’s talking about patients that HumanAsset was supposed to protect. How many of those Deleted names at the bottom of the LivingLegend list belong to O’Cavity? How many people has he pushed out of a hospital bed into a FullCircle funeral urn?
I get up from the bench, my fists clenched. “Get the f§ck out of here.”
“With pleasure. Your hospital room stinks like old man now that they’ve moved your body to the basement. But you won’t be here long.” He smirks. “The actuarial tables say we’ll wheel you up to the Placebo Protocols before the end of the week.”
It takes everything I have not to hit him. “Shove your actuary up your a§s.”
“Charming. Always a pleasure, David.” The OBEY poster morphs back into Andre the Giant’s face, and O’Cavity is gone.
“He’s a mean man!” Pepper folds her fins. “Who throws perfectly good chocolate? Oh wowzers! Look!!” Pepper’s chalkboard blips. “I’ve got invitations to lots of parties!”
Her chalkboard displays hundreds of invites from RiftElite players. Apparently, the word is out that Pep can boost viral views, and for a bunch of fame-chasing gamers, she’s the golden goose.
I consider her, thinking.
O’Cavity said she shouldn’t be earning HypeScore points, but she is. But she appears on the LivingLegend Leaderboard… and she’s getting team invites? Pepper is not a LivingLegend, she’s not a player, and she’s not really an NPC. So what is she? I get the feeling not even the muckamucks at HumanAsset know. She’s a ghost in the machine. Whatever piece of buried code I activated by skipping the sensitivity training module is throwing a monkey wrench into their little game.
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I can’t help but feel good about that.
Empathy Engine? : Be a Team Player!
Look how popular you are! Share your awesomeness with new teammates and meet new companions! Remember: strangers are just old friends you haven’t met yet!
“Which one should we join?” Pepper scans the board, excited. “Ooh, Team Unicorn Storm sounds like fun! Or Rainbow Bridge!” She gasps. “Look! There’s an invite from Anna S’s team! And the funny-boy twins! We could see them again, they’re our friends! It will be like one big happy family!”
“I’m never joining another RiftElite team.” The words are out before I know they’re coming.
“But… you have to!” Pepper’s eyes go wide. “Anna said you have to or you’ll die!”
“I don’t have to do anything.” I settle back into the bench and realize I mean it. I mean it like I meant it when I asked Molly to marry me. My mind is made up and all my chips are in. Screw HumanAsset and screw RiftBorn.
I don’t have much life left to live. I’m not spending my remaining days getting pushed around by multi-trillion-dollar corporations and overprivileged twelve-year-olds. “If I’m going out, I’m going to do it on my terms.”
“But Dave, you—”
“You do what you like, Cabbage Patch.” I let out a breath. Pepper has come a long way from the little piece of 8-bit edu-tainment code I found on Isla Soledad. Truth be told, she’s saved my life more times and in more ways than I want to admit. Without her, I’d be dead already. But if I’m going to make my own decisions, then so can she. If she wants to go, I won’t stop her. “Join Anna S, or the twins, or the Unicorns. You’ll make them very happy. You’ve got a lot of value to them.”
“But you’ve got a lot of value to me.” Pepper takes my hand. “You’re my mommy.”
I feel something in my throat try to well up. I know the digital penguin is just a discarded computer game, but for the first time since Molly died, I feel like somebody actually gives a damn about what happens to me.
I don’t know what to do with my hands, don’t know what to say, I haven’t felt this exposed in a long time. I just ruffle her feathers between my fingers. “Okay, Cabbage Patch.”
She blinks up at me. “Do you want to see what presents we got from the last season? That always makes you happy.”
“Sure. Why don’t you go first.”
Pepper’s chalkboard lights up.
LEVEL UP!
Congratulations! You reached a new level of excellence! You are now Mesmerist: Level 4
Health Bar Capacity +10%
Psyche +4
Charisma +2
Agility +1
Skill Tree Advancement
Head Fake: Create 2 distractions at once, 10 second cooldown
Goldfish Mode: +10 sec
Mirror Mirror: +5 sec
Congratulations! You have unlocked Class Ascension! Your Mesmerist Class has been upgraded to: Mindblender
New Class Bonuses:
Thought Bubble: Psionic shield reduces damage 80% for 15 seconds (1 Psi point) Warning: Thought Bubble Incompatible with Meat Missile skill
Imaginagerie: Summon 1 random balloon animal mob to pull aggro for 20 seconds (1 Psi point)
Groupthink: Pick 1 enemy and make another 2 mimic their movements exactly for 20 seconds (3 Psi points)
She’s right. I do feel better. With the extra 4 Psyche, Pepper now has 2 more Psi points, which lets her get off more spells in combat. Plus Golfish Mode now lasts a minimum 15 seconds, which is a big help. I don’t really understand Groupthink, which sounds… weird. 3 people following the same movements? Maybe she can use it for her next dance party. “Can you cast Imaginagerie?”
“Sure!” I feel a rush of power pulse as her eyes turn neon, and suddenly, there’s a purple ostrich. It makes a gwak sound then runs in circles on ridiculously long legs, making stupid noises. I have to admit, the bird certainly pulls aggro. It’s so annoying I want to hit the damn thing myself.
“Oh she’s so fun! Look at her go!” Pep claps her flippers. “Here, birdie birdie! Come see mama bir—” The ostrich explodes. It releases one last gwak! as it detonates in a spray of pink intestines and purple feathers.
“Oh no! She ‘sploded!” Pepper gasps. “I’ll bring her back!”
More psychic energy ripples from Pepper and something new materializes amid the floating feathers—a goblin. Green, hideous and covered in some kind of Nickelodeon slime, it rips a dagger from its belt and runs around in circles, making stabbing motions and yelling something that sounds like German: “Ich bringe deine Mutter um! Ja! Ja! Ja!”
Pepper frowns. “Oh, he’s not so cute.”
The goblin explodes in a shower of slime.
I catch myself laughing at the ridiculousness of it. “Okay, my turn.”
I got level 4 for free by solving the Fine Tooth Comb mystery, but the bonuses have been suspended until I select my Class Ascension. Pepper automatically upgraded to Mindblender, but my Class Tree has three options for me to choose from. I see the first title and click on it immediately.
Hermit Ascension A: Hobo with a Shotgun
Close-range chaos artist who creates a buckshot bloodbath. (Comes with free shotgun!)
+30% Fear | +3 Strength
Shell Game: Reload Speed x2 | Fire Speed x2
Street Sweeper: 50° Knockback Cone 30’
Doublebarrel: x5 damage (1/day)
O–kay. Now we’re talking. Whoever wrote the Yellowbeard segment must have written this one as well; I remember the Hobo with a Shotgun movie with Rutger Hauer; it was terrible but hilarious. And it provides me with everything I’ve been missing in this game: Strength, a real weapon, and the ability to chew bubblegum and kick ass. I click on the next Hermit Ascension, knowing there’s no chance I pick any option but Rutger Freaking Hauer.
Hermit Ascension B: Dumpster Druid
The saint of salvage, this street scavenger believes one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. Forage / Scrounge +10
Refuse Radar: 5% chance to find Legendary Loot
Finders Keepers: Every lootable corpse +50% gold
Trash Panda: Gain +10 Inventory slots
Dumpster Druid is useless. I already have a high Scrounge score, unlimited inventory slots, and the last thing I need is more gold I can’t spend. The Legendary loot thing looks okay, but the whole upgrade is a big pass. I might as well check the third one before I select the shotgun. I click the tab.
Hermit Ascension C: Parkour Pilgrim
A roof-running nomad who turns obstacles into exits.
Agility +5 | Speed +15%
The Parkour Pilgrim is based on movement. Once you run 21 steps, you activate Parkour Pulse, which triggers the following abilities:
Don’t Touch Me There: Dodge +5 | Damage -15%
Slippery When Wet: +10 Evade in rain, soap, or spray
Balls to the Wall: Run on any vertical surface for 10 seconds | Jump +3 at release
Running and jumping. Who cares? I move to press Hobo with a Shotgun.
“Dave?” Pepper chirps. “Remember when you were mad about not getting time to pick your skills?” She rubs her fins together nervously. “I just want to make sure you’re not going to get mad again.”
I stop.
Dammit.
Every RiftElite in this game has a weapon better than a shotgun. I’ve already seen blaster pistols, laser rifles, pirate cannons, and the Mother of All Bombs. What is a shotgun going to do against that? But the Parkour Pilgrim…
Don’t. Die. Dave. Every time I’ve managed to survive this game, it’s been because of some crazy escape, from Trader’s Point to the Pirate Booty regatta. When you’re up against battleship-class firepower, sometimes all you can do is live to fight another day.
And I want to live. I truly do.
Combine the Parkour Pilgrim with the Speed and Jump skills from my Air Jordans, plus my MacGyver Evade bonus, and I would be slipperier than an eel and twice as quick. They can’t kill me if they can’t hit me.
And that wall-run trick sounds pretty cool.
“Hungry?” Pepper offers me an Ahi tuna poke taco in a crispy wonton shell. Where she got the ingredients, I have no idea.
“Sure, Pep.” I take a bite of the best fish taco I ever ate in my life as Pepper cuddles up next to me on Forrest Gump’s bench. I feel my baseline vibe improve from the magic properties of her Meal Prepper dinner, the warmth of her against my belly.
Pepper is not fast on her feet. She’s got crazy skills, but she’s slow. And she’s depending on me to protect her.
Maybe O’Cavity is right. Maybe I’ve been in the game too long, been alone too long, and I’m kidding myself that this little penguin is my friend. But like Molly taught me, once you feel a certain way about a person, it’s not easy to unfeel it.
The heart wants what the heart wants.
I click the button.
HERMIT ASCENSION! Congratulations! You reached a new level of excellence! You are now Parkour Pilgrim: Level 4
I gain a bunch of augmentations, including another four points to my Stamina. This takes my total to 18, which gives me an additional 10% to my Health and Vitality bars. If the game follows geometric progression, my Health is 146% of where I started. Harder to kill is fine by me. Agility and Strength get a bump, along with a few of my skills. It’s a nice haul.
Ability Calibration:
Please take 21 steps when you are ready to activate Parkour Pulse.
That can wait.
I settle in on the bench to eat a meal with my friend.
Don't Die Dave and plan to keep reading, hit Follow.