D. MacHale - The Reality Bug

I blasted out the door and almost lost my balance again when I was hit with the sight of the interior of this vast pyramid. Man, talk about a rude awakening. I had to shake off my disorientation, fast. I looked both ways and saw Aja sprinting along the balcony. I sucked it up and ran after her.

Up ahead, a red light was blinking outside one of the cubicle doors. It didn’t take a genius to know that was where the alarm was coming from. Just before Aja got to the door, I saw a red suited vedder running up from the other direction.

“Where is this jumper’s phader?” Aja demanded.

“I don’t know,” the vedder answered.

They both entered the cubicle with the flashing red light. I ran up and peered into the open door to see what was happening. Aja was at the control panel, quickly pushing buttons. A second later, the alarm stopped blaring.

“It came out of nowhere,” the vedder said nervously. “There weren’t any signs.”

“Did the jumper try to abort?” Aja asked.

“No! His vitals just suddenly spiked.”

A second later the silver disk in the wall slid open and the table emerged with the jumper lying there. The vedder immediately attended to the person. The jumper was a man maybe around my father’s age. He didn’t seem to be in any kind of trouble. It looked like he was sleeping peacefully. The vedder had a device that resembled a Game Boy. He put it to the jumper’s chest, then checked the readings. A second later he took it away and shook his head.

“Too late,” he said sadly.

“Too late?” I asked, entering the room. “What do you mean, ‘too late’?”

“What do you think he means, Pendragon?” Aja said quietly. “He’s dead.”

Whoa. Left field. I hadn’t expected that. “I thought this was supposed to be safe!” I said, feeling numb.

“It is,” Aja shot back. “But sometimes… things happen.”

The vedder started for the door.

“Where are you going?” Aja asked. “You’ve got to fill out a report!”

“Not me,” the vedder said haughtily. “My shift’s over. I’m jumping. The next shift can handle it.”

The guy left. What a tool. Someone just died on his watch, and all he cared about was jumping into his own fantasy.

“Aja, what happened?” I asked.

Aja looked shaken. She tried to collect her thoughts. “I don’t know. We’ll have to look at the records of his jump. There are thousands of people in the pyramid. Sometimes they die of natural causes. But…”

“But what?”

“But it’s starting to happen more often,” was her sober answer.

I didn’t like the sound of that.

“You’ve seen Lifelight at its best, Pendragon,” she continued. “It’s a wonderful tool that has brought joy to the people of Veelox. But it’s got a downside, too. That’s what you’ve got to see next.”

I’m going to end this journal here, guys. While Aja did a postmortem on the dead jumper, she put me in a room by myself with this incredible recording device. I wanted to be part of their investigation, but Aja didn’t know how to explain who I was. Still, I’m curious to know what they come up with. Once they’re finished, Aja is going to take me to her home. Then tomorrow she’s going to show me more of Rubic City.

But the truth is, I’m not here to sightsee. I’m not here to learn about the wonders of Lifelight or tour the city or take a trip into my own fantasies. I’m here to find out what evil Saint Dane has brought to this territory. After seeing what happened with the jumper, I have the sick feeling that I just got my first taste of it.

So I’ll sign off now. This is the end of my Journal #13. By the time I record #14,1 should have more answers. Good-bye, guys. I miss you.

(END OF JOURNAL # 13)

After a quick good-bye wave, Bobby’s image disappeared in a flicker, leaving Mark and Courtney staring into the empty space of her father’s workshop. Neither could say anything. They had been watching Bobby’s story unfold before them, spoken by Bobby himself. It was like he had been standing in front of them, in the flesh.

“Well,” Courtney said after several silent seconds. “That was… different”

“I can’t imagine something like Lifelight being real,” Mark said thoughtfully. He reached forward and picked up the silver, credit card-size projector. He turned it over in his hand, inspecting it. “Then again, I can’t imagine something like this, either, so what the heck do I know?”

“Do you think Saint Dane sabotaged Lifelight?” Courtney asked.

“That’s my guess,” Mark answered. “But I’ll bet it’s not as simple as that. Man, what I wouldn’t give to try it out.” “What would you do?”

“A million things,” Mark answered quickly. “I’d ride a horse.

79 88 I’ve always wanted to do that. I’d fly an airplane, and play in a rock band, and run the New York marathon.”

“But you can do all that for real,” said Courtney.

Mark shrugged. It didn’t feel to him as if any of those things were within his reach. “What would you do?” he asked Courtney.

Without hesitation Courtney said, “I’d put some major whup-ass on that soccer team.”

Mark said, “Same thing, you can do that for real.”

Like Mark, Courtney shrugged. Her confidence was so low, the idea of putting major whup-ass on anybody seemed like a fantasy. Mark then looked back at the silver hologram projector. A thought came to him, and he frowned.

“What?” Courtney asked.

“This is wrong,” Mark answered. “Bobby shouldn’t have sent this to us.”

“Why not? It beats having to read the journals.”

“But he’s not supposed to mix things from other territories,” Mark answered while fingering the device nervously. “It’s totally against the rules.”

“We’ll put it in the safe-deposit box at the bank,” Courtney offered. “Nobody will ever see it.”

“Good idea. I’ll go first thing after school tomorrow,” Mark said. “Man, why didn’t Bobby think of this?”

“Maybe they don’t use paper on Veelox. It might have been the only way he could send a journal.”

“Still,” Mark said. “It might cause-“

Mark’s ring started to twitch. He stopped talking and held his hand up.

“You’re kidding?” Courtney said with surprise. “That was fast!” Mark stared at the ring quizzically. “It feels different” was all he could say.

He quickly took off the ring and put it on the table. Courtney stood next to him and the two gazed at it. Normally when one of Bobby’s journals was arriving, the gray stone in the center of the ring would turn crystal clear. The band would then grow and the journal would arrive in a flash of light and music. But that wasn’t happening this time. The large gray stone didn’t change. But something else did.

Engraved in the silver band and circling the stone was a series of odd characters. Each symbol was unique, with no apparent pattern. When Mark first got the ring he did a search on the Internet, thinking he could decipher them. But he came up empty. After tons of research there was only one thing he knew for sure: The symbols had no relation to any language or culture on Earth.

Now one of those symbols was starting to glow. It was as if there were a light inside the ring, shining out through the engraving. The glowing symbol was nothing more than a squiggle with a straight line passing through it. Mark and Courtney watched, dumbfounded, as the ring finally began to grow.

“Something’s coming in,” Mark gasped. “I think.”

The ring didn’t grow as large as usual. But they heard the familiar jumble of sweet notes that accompanied every trip. The light from the symbol then flashed across the room, momentarily blinding Mark and Courtney. A second later they looked back at the ring. As always, the event was over quickly. The ring had returned to normal. No more light, no more sound, nothing unusual…