Эрнест Клайн - Ready Player Two

“This is hopeless,” she said. “I’m debating a group of drug dealers who are all getting high on their own supply. You’re just as addicted as your customers.” She turned to Faisal. “Let’s get this vote on the record, so I can get the fuck out of here.”

Faisal nodded and, still smiling cheerfully, he called for an official vote on Art3mis’s proposed ONI age restriction. She was outvoted once again, three nays to her one aye.

“All right,” Faisal said. “With that out of the way, this meeting can now be adjourned.”

Without another word, Samantha logged out and her avatar vanished.

“Thank God!” Aech said, massaging her neck with one hand. She turned to me. “Why do you always have to get her all riled up like that?”

“Me? You were the one who pissed her off this time!” I pointed at Faisal. “Have him read back the transcript.”

“No thanks,” Aech said. “I gotta bounce out and blaze. All this drama rattles my nerves. But the three of us should catch up sometime soon. Hang out in the Basement for old time’s sake. Watch some bad movies. Play some Risk . I’ll text y’all, OK?”

“Sounds good,” I said.

Aech and I bumped fists, then she gave Shoto a high five before teleporting away.

“I gotta get going too,” Faisal said. “More prep to do for the update.” He walked over and shook hands with each of us and then he teleported away too.

As soon as we were alone, Shoto turned to me.

“Do you think Arty is right?” he asked. “Are we giving up on the real world?”

“Of course not,” I replied. “Art3mis means well, but she has absolutely no idea what she’s talking about.” I grinned at him. “She’s still stuck in the past, and we’re already living large in the future, my friend.”

“Maybe you’re right,” he said, nodding. His expression suddenly brightened. “Hey, I’m almost finished coding my new Macross Plus quest! Wanna help me playtest it when it’s done?”

“Oh hell yes!” I said. “Count me in.”

“Great! I’ll text you later this week when it’s ready,” he said. “Later, Z.”

He waved and vanished from the conference room, leaving me alone.

I stood there motionless for a long time, listening to the echo of Samantha’s accusations ricochet around inside my head until the noise finally faded away.

“Hello!” I shouted at theSix-Fingered Man one final time. “My name is Inigo Montoya! You killed my father. Prepare to die!”

Then I lunged with my rapier, launching into a rapid series of attacks that forced my opponent to parry and retreat backward across the length of the banquet hall, until I finally had him cornered. I could have just killed him at that point and completed the quest. But the Flicksync gave you bonus points for correctly reciting all of your character’s dialogue, and I was trying to get a perfect score this time around.

“Offer me money!” I demanded, slicing open the Six-Fingered Man’s left cheek.

“Yes!” he hissed, wincing in pain. “Power too,” I added. “Promise me that!”

I flicked my sword once again, giving him a matching wound on his right cheek.

“All that I have and more!” he whispered. “Please!”

“Offer me anything I ask for….”

“Anything you want,” the Six-Fingered Man replied.

“I want my father back, you son of a bitch!”

And with that, I ran the Six-Fingered Man through, plunging the point of my rapier into his stomach. I savored the expression on his face for a moment, then I pulled the sword free and kicked him backward. The NPC fell to the stone floor, let out a groan, and died. His corpse immediately faded out of existence, leaving behind a pile of the items he’d been carrying. I scooped them up, then turned and sprinted out of the room and down the hall to Buttercup’s bridal suite. Once there, I completed the quest by helping her and Westley escape out the window. Fezzik was waiting for us down below, holding the reins of four white horses. We rode them out of the kingdom to freedom, while the song “Storybook Love” played on the soundtrack.

When the song ended, so did the quest. The horses and the other characters vanished and my avatar’s appearance returned to normal. I found myself standing alone outside the quest portal I’d originally entered, on the eastern shore of the kingdom of Guilder.

A chime sounded and a message appeared on my HUD, congratulating me on completing the Princess Bride quest with a perfect score of one million points. Then the message disappeared and…that was it.

I waited for a full minute, but nothing else happened.

I sat down on the beach and let out a sigh.

This wasn’t my first visit to the planet Florin. I had already completed this quest with a perfect score three times before, each time playing as a different character—first as Westley, then as Buttercup, then as Fezzik. The Princess Bride had been one of Kira Underwood’s all-time favorite films, and she’d helped create all of the interactive OASIS quests based on it. (Including the controversial gender-swapped The Prince Groom, in which Buttercup is the swashbuckling heroine and Westley serves as the damsel in distress.) I’d thought that solving one of these quests with a perfect score might yield some clue related to the Seven Shards. But I’d come up empty-handed each and every time. Today was my final attempt. Inigo had been the only other playable character, and the most difficult one with which to obtain a perfect score. Now, after nearly a dozen attempts, I’d finally done it. And once again I had nothing to show for my efforts.

I got to my feet and took a deep breath. Then I teleported back to my command center on Falco.

Once my avatar finished rematerializing, I settled into the comfy TNG-era captain’s chair I’d installed there. I stared out at the cratered landscape in silent frustration for a moment. Then I opened up my grail diary, and once again I began scanning the vast mountain of data I’d collected over the past eight years, about James Halliday and his life, work, associates, and interests—although for the past three years, nearly all of the new material I’d added pertained to one associate in particular. The Siren herself, Kira Morrow, née Underwood.

I’d started my grail diary in an old spiral notebook when I was thirteen and still living in the stacks outside Oklahoma City. I’d been forced to burn the original the night before I infiltrated IOI headquarters, to prevent it from falling into the Sixers’ hands. But I’d made hi-res scans of the notebook’s pages beforehand and stored them in my OASIS account. Those scans were all still there, in the digital version of my grail diary, which appeared as a jumble of cascading windows floating in front of me. It contained countless documents, diagrams, photos, maps, and media files, all indexed and cross-referenced for easy browsing.

The four-line Shard Riddle was displayed in a window that always remained on top:

Seek the Seven Shards of the Siren’s Soul

On the seven worlds where the Siren once played a role

For each fragment my heir must pay a toll

To once again make the Siren whole

When the riddle had first appeared shortly after the ONI’s launch, I’d gone back and re-analyzed the free digital copy of Anorak’s Almanac available on Halliday’s old website, just to make sure it hadn’t been updated with any new information or clues. It hadn’t. Every word of the Almanac was still the same. The famous series of notched letters I’d found scattered throughout its text during Halliday’s contest were still there, but no new ones had been added.

One of the superuser abilities the Robes of Anorak gave me was the ability to simply wish for things out loud. If it could, the system would almost always grant my wish. But whenever I tried wishing for information about the Seven Shards, a message would flash across my HUD: