D. MacHale - The Reality Bug

“They already know!” Aja shot back. “They don’t care! They think they’ve created the perfect system that runs itself. But the truth is the phaders and vedders would rather jump than do their jobs. You saw that vedder today. Someone died and all he cared about was starting his own jump. You only got a taste of Lifelight, Pendragon. And you know what? You didn’t want to come out, did you? What was it you wanted? Twenty more minutes? They all want twenty more minutes, twenty more hours, twenty more days, weeks, months! Most of them don’t even realize it’s a fantasy anymore. If I hadn’t timed your jump, you’d still be in there.”

I had to admit it. She was right.

“Okay, you convinced me,” I said. “Lifelight is, like. addicting. But my question stands. What makes you think you’ve got it under control?”

Aja threw the thing she had taken out of her pocket onto the table. It was a small, silver disk about the size of a quarter in a clear, plastic case. It looked like a tiny CD.

“I’ve been working on that for nearly a year,” she said with pride.

Evangeline picked it up and handed it to me reverently. “It’s all she thinks about,” she said.

“Saint Dane was right in some ways,” Aja said. “He’s done here. If things continue the way they are, it would only be a matter of time before Veelox falls apart for good. Lifelight itself wouldn’t be far behind. But I know how to save the territory.”

“With this?” I asked, holding up the disk.

“With that,” she answered with confidence.

“What is it?”

“I call it the Reality Bug,” she said. “And tomorrow you’re going to jump back into Lifelight and get a firsthand look at exactly how it works.”

(CONTINUED)

I wasn’t so sure I wanted to jump back into Lifelight, not after seeing that jumper die. On top of that, I was starting to get nervous about Gunny. He had followed Saint Dane to the territory of Eelong and was supposed to take a quick look around and come right back to Veelox. Since Aja had the gate monitored, I asked her to let me know the instant Gunny arrived. I couldn’t help but wonder what he’d found on Eelong. My guess was it wasn’t good, but then again I always assume the worst. Trouble is, I’m usually right.

I decided the best thing I could do was stay focused on Veelox and trust that Gunny could take care of himself. I spent the night in a guest room of the mansion. It was real comfortable and I would have had a great sleep if it weren’t for the fact that I couldn’t turn my brain off. It was all jammed up with worries about Gunny and jumping back into Lifelight. I ended up tossing around most of the night, nervous about what the next day would bring.

In the morning, Evangeline made us a yummy breakfast of, what else, gloid. We weren’t treated to the tricolor stuff this time. This batch was all orange. That was okay by me, as long as it wasn’t blue. I was surprised again by how filling the little cup of goo was. I would have preferred a stack of pancakes with maple syrup, but the gloid did me just fine.

Aja had on her blue jumpsuit, ready for business. She gave me a jumpsuit of my own, only mine was dark green. She said jumpers wore green when they spent long periods of time inside Lifelight. I didn’t want to hang out inside Lifelight any longer than necessary, but figured I should be wearing Veelox clothes anyway. So I traded in my jeans and flannel shirt for this new suit. Aja also gave me some lightweight, black boots. I kept my boxer shorts, though. Rules or no rules, I always keep the boxers.

When we were ready to leave, Evangeline gave me a big hug. This time I hugged back. I liked her. Besides, she had to be pretty special to put up with Aja.

“Be safe, Bobby,” she said to me.

“Don’t forget, Evangeline,” I said. “I told my friends I’d find out about the acolytes for them.” “I promise,” Evangeline assured me.

I gave her one last squeeze of thanks and followed Aja outside. Evangeline watched as we went down the marble steps to the street and the vehicle that would take us back to the Lifelight pyramid.

“Bye, Vange,” Aja called to her aunt. “I’ll be home when I get home.”

The two of us boarded the three-wheeled vehicle and began pedaling back toward Lifelight.

“Tell me about the Reality Bug,” I said.

“I’m going to give you a demonstration,” she said back.

“I know. Humor me.”

“It’ll be easier to show you,” she argued.

“I’m sure,” I countered, into my voice. “But it would help if I knew a little bit about what to expect.”

Aja sighed. I got the feeling that she thought of me as an inferior intellect who couldn’t put two thoughts together without drooling.

“It’s a computer program,” she reluctantly explained. “Lifelight is designed to take the jumper’s thoughts and give them the perfect experience. The Reality Bug alters the program… slightly.”

“How?”

“It attaches to the data stream, changes it, and makes the experience less than perfect.” “Really? How?”

“That’s what I’m going to demonstrate,” she snapped. “You’ll have a lot less questions after I show you.”

I didn’t want to argue. This was her show. I figured I was going to get the answers I needed soon enough anyway. Doing it on her terms was going to be less painful. So I shut up and we rode the rest of the way to the pyramid in silence.

When we arrived, we followed the same route as before. We went through the long hallway of freaky purple’ sterilization, then to the airlinelike ticket counter where I was fitted with another silver bracelet with three buttons. They didn’t take any blood this time, I’m glad to say. I was already in the system.

As I waited for my control bracelet, I looked at the portrait of the kid Aja called Dr. Zetlin. After having been in Lifelight, I had even more trouble understanding how a kid could have invented such an incredible device. But then again, didn’t Beethoven write symphonies when he was, like, four? I guess you’ve either got it or you don’t.

We left the bracelet counter and continued on through the core. This time Aja stopped at one of the control stations. A glass door opened and we stepped into the high-tech room. Sitting in the coolio chair was a skinny little phader who looked like he was around twelve. He was gazing up at the wall of monitors, scanning each, looking for signs of trouble on the jumps while slurping down some blue gloid. Ick.

“Hey, Alex, we’re doing a dual. I need you to phade for us,” Aja said.

The kid, Alex, didn’t take his eyes away from the screens. I noticed that he had a wicked case of acne. I wondered which color gloid caused that.

“I’m off soon,” he said with a high voice that sounded as if he were talking through his nose.

“But you’re the best, Alex,” Aja implored, sounding a little flirty. “I hate jumping with anybody else.”

Alex gave a little smile. Aja had him. She knew how to manipulate the guy.

“You need a vedder?” he asked.

“Nah, this is gonna be short and sweet,” Aja answered. I liked that.

Alex then tore himself away from the screens and looked at us. He checked me out, then looked to Aja and gave a sly smile. “Careful what you do in there. I’ll be watching.”

“Do you have any idea how creepy that sounds?” Aja said to him coldly.

Alex instantly lost the smile and went back to watching the screens, embarrassed.

“Don’t be long,” he said while shoveling more blue gloid into his mouth. “When my shift’s up, I’m jumping.”

“Don’t worry” was Aja’s reply as she turned and left the control room. I followed right after her.