SUBMERSION

Five tanks roll across an open field. The sound of gunfire echoes in the distance. A lone soldier in a foxhole shoulders a Javelin, rises up so the rocket clears the foxhole rim, takes aim at the nearest tank and fires. Without waiting to see if the rocket finds its mark, he drops back down, discards the empty Javelin tube and grapples for the next rocket. Above his head he hears the sound of the rocket detonating. Very close. Engines roar as the remaining tanks all change direction and pick up speed. He rises up with the second rocket. The sound of machine gun fire assaults him but he cannot tell which tank is firing, or at what. The command tank is the furthest away, an officer rises up out of one of the hatches. He seems to peer at the soldier in the foxhole, who fires his weapon at the closest tank and drops back down. Again he hears the sound of the rocket detonating, and he discards the second tube. There are three Javelins left, he tells himself. Three rockets, three tanks, you can do this. You have survived worse.

He shoulders the third rocket and rises back up. He focuses on the command tank and fires. He drops back down. The third rocket takes far too long to detonate.

It missed.

He missed.

With shaking hands he fights to get the next rocket to his shoulder. His knees begin to buckle but he forces himself erect. One of the three remaining tanks has stopped, a hatch in the aft has opened and three foot soldiers race in his direction, firing their weapons. He fires the rocket and drops back down.

The fourth rocket detonates but when the sound fades he hears angry shouting in a language he does not recognize. Two tanks, one rocket, no time. His M16 leans against the far side of the foxhole, too far away. A voice screams, triumphant, as a man’s figure silhouettes above him.

He is dead meat.

A finger reaches out and stabs at the escape key on a white keyboard. Edgar Jamison reaches up, drags the headset off and looks around the apartment. It is predominantly white, clean and spare, it seems to shout ‘single male, well-off, minimalist taste.’ The wall of floor to ceiling glass looks out over the lights of the city. It is night and the city noises are muted. Edgar wipes sweat from his face. “Control,” he says.

“Control here.” Male voice, sounds like one of Edgar’s late and unlamented uncles.

“Control, female voice.”

“Control here.” Female voice, sounds like a nun from a school he once attended, long long ago.

“Control, female voice number six,” Edgar says, holding his head. “How long was I under?”

“Sixteen hours and twenty three minutes.” It’s a female voice, but soft and musical. Much better. You have to get a handle on this, Edgar tells himself. This cannot continue.

You have to stop.

“Control, what’s on the menu tonight?”

“Your favorite,” the woman’s voice purrs. It’s a girl’s voice, really. “Prime rib, grilled vegetables, and chianti.”

“If I order now, how long until it arrives?”

“Thirty six to thirty nine minutes. Time enough to shower and change. You look like you…”

“Control, place the order and mute.”

He rises out of his office chair and pads across the marble floor, stripping off clothes as he goes. He stops outside the laundry room and tosses his stuff on the floor in a sweaty pile. Who even does the chores around here? At the moment, he cannot remember. At the entrance to the bathroom he catches sight of himself in the mirror. Yeah, peak, he tells himself. Peak. Enough muscle, nice definition. Body fat looks to be twelve or thirteen percent. But you need to eat better, he thinks. And hydrate. Drink some water with that chianti. This is not sustainable.

In the shower, he tends to business. There’s a ‘companion’ button on the front wall but he doesn’t touch it. Enough computer generated nonsense for one day, he thinks. You need to get real.

He finishes up, towels off, heads for the bedroom. His doorbell chimes. Can’t be, he thinks. They can’t be early, they are never early.

The lights go out.

“Control, he whispers harshly. “Control!”

No response.

Edgar drops all caution and sprints down the hall, because he has a Ruger .32 automatic, it’s in his office. Somewhere… His front door bursts open as he goes by and three men in helmets, olive drab uniforms and kevlar jump in after him. One of them lights him up. He is eight feet from the office door, his white skin shining in the dark, their triumphant shouts are in a language he doesn’t recognize.

This is not happening, he tells himself, this is not real, that other world cannot bleed over into this one, no way…

He is dead meat

Shaking white hands reach up and tear the hood from his head. Sparks flare behind his eyes as wires rip from the electrodes taped to his skull. His entire body shakes. “Control!”

A mechanical voice resonates throughout the apartment. “Control here.”

“Control, female voice number, number six.”

“I do not understand that command,” the machine voice says.

“Oh, shit. Okay. Control, lights on.”

The lights come up. He sits on a stained mattress on his bedroom floor. There is a paper plate with some pale green cubes next to him on the bed. There’s another one on the nightstand and one on the floor, its cubes scattered and crushed. Piles of dirty laundry occupy the corners of the room. “Control,” he says. “What are these green things?”

“Nutrition,” the voice says.

“I thought I ordered prime rib,” Edgar mutters.

“That was in the game, external level fourteen,” the voice says. “Do you wish to return?”

“NO!” Edgar shouts. “No.” He clambers up off the mattress and steadies himself with one hand on the wall. Realizing that he is ravenous, he stuffs a green cube in his mouth and grabs two more from the plate on the nightstand. Water, he thinks. You have to drink water with these freaking things. He pauses at the bedroom door.

Yeah, the floors are still marble. He dimly remembers the apartment. The wall of glass is still there. Brown fungus has taken over the white couches, and the kitchen looks like a bunch of teenaged gorillas partied in it the night before. There’s a pile of dirty dishes in the sink, it bleeds over onto the counter. Roaches turn to look at him, and a few of them run.

I’ll get water in the bathroom, he thinks, and he continues on. He catches sight of himself in the bathroom mirror. Matchstick arms, pipestem legs, long greasy hair, matted beard. It is not fat that hangs over his beltline, it is empty skin. He still holds two green cubes in a shaking, dirty hand. Eat ‘em, he tells himself. You have to eat ‘em.

“Control!”

“Control here.”

“How long was I under?”

“Local memory on this platform only goes back seven days.”

Holy Jesus. “Why didn’t you, fuck me, man, why didn’t you wake me up?”

“This platform responds to verbal instructions.”

Edgar sighs. The bathroom, if anything, is worse than the kitchen. He forces himself to turn on the tap in the sink and drink from the water flow. He sticks the last green cube in his mouth and walks back to the living room.

It is full daylight. He looks out over what might once have been a city, but is overgrown with vegetation. “Control,” he says. “Is it possible to die, for real, when you get killed in the game?”

“Death while submerged in the game results in biological death in approximately sixty-four percent of all cases,” the voice says.

“Why?” Edgar says.

“Myocardial infarction,” the voice says, “cranial hemorrhage or respiratory failure. There is a strong statistical relationship but the root causes are poorly understood.”

Edgar stares out over the ruined city. “Where is everybody?” he says. “Where are all the people?”

“The human population is currently fourteen percent of peak,” the voice intones.

“What? What happened to them all?”

“Submersion,” the voice says.

“How many people live in this apartment building?”

“One.”

“Is there… You have to be kidding me. Is there a government?”

“Technically the government still exists. In practical terms the government is inactive.”

“What happened to the, you know, the senators? And the president? The oligarchs, the ruling class?”

“Submersion,” the voice says.

“Jesus. So how are the lights still on? How do those green things get here? How is it all still working?”

“Nutrient production and distribution is automated. Power generation is automated.”

“Is there anything to eat besides those greenies?”

“Other food sources exist,” the voice says, “but the take rate was so low that production and distribution became unsustainable.”

Edgar shakes his head. “Submersion,” he says. “Control, mute.” He walks back through the ruin of his apartment, mentally cataloging the work he needs to do to restore sanity. You could just toss all this shit over the balcony, he tells himself. No reason not to. But he feels so tired. He stops when he reaches the bedroom door. The smell assaults his sinuses. The mattress looks putrid. And those green cubes might get the job done, but damn.

His hood lies on the floor where he discarded it. If you hook it back up, he tells himself, put it back on, the place is clean. Your prime rib awaits. With chianti.

Okay, so...