Needless to say, I was a little overwhelmed. Malcolm had found a way to escape his Debug Room and possess the avatar of my strongest friend. I was surrounded by Screamers on all angles, their armored forms terrorizing the audience. But even worse, Malcolm had just canceled out one of the core directives of the game. He had somehow just broken one of the unbreakable Color Blades.
I breathed out shakily and faced Siena’s avatar, knowing that for the sake of fighting her this time, I was going to have to get my head around the fact that this was actually Malcolm.
It was as this thought sprang to mind that I realized what the stakes of this fight were. Siena was proud of her avatar, and Malcolm’s A.I. could reside in it for as long he wanted. Not only did this mean he could run rampant for as long as he remained alive, but Siena would be locked out of the game as well. The only way to stop him and allow Siena to reclaim her account was to kill him.
Siena needs her account to get the photos and send me the locations of the Screamers . . . Does Malcolm know that? Is this his way of stopping us?
I didn’t want to reveal my cards by asking him, not until we knew exactly where the Screamers were. I looked around uneasily. Defeating him was going to be no easy task, especially now that I was surrounded.
“I should really thank you,” Malcolm said. “If it weren’t for you beating her, Siena would never have resorted to using my help, never accepted the RTS software that could allow my consciousness to possess her avatar. But now I’m finally free of that Debug Room, and with a strong body, no less.”
I gritted my teeth. “You use the word consciousness as though you’re alive. You’re an A.I., nothing more than a bit of software that can be deleted if need be.”
Malcolm grinned. “Not quite. I am only a copy of myself. Another aspect of me is still in the debug room with no idea what is happening right now.”
I recalled what he had said about the servers he had all over the globe. Somehow, they were connected to the Dream State, allowing him to anchor his A.I. to the Debug Room. I shook my head, knowing that I should try to piece together this puzzle later. Now was the time for fighting.
“I don’t suppose you’d be willing to fight me one-on-one?” I asked, testing to see if arrogance came along with his new power.
“You should know by now that I don’t play this game by your rules. I—” Malcolm suddenly frowned and looked up, as though hearing something. “Well, it seems I have no choice. You’ll get your way after all.”
“What do you mean?” I looked up to see what he was seeing and I grinned. “Wow, nice timing guys.”
Above the stands were several hovering platforms, and as soon as I saw them, seven avatars jumped down and landed on the upper stands behind each of the Screamers. Vega, Dice, and Chloe were the ones I recognized behind the Screamers. Data landed on the pit behind Malcolm.
“Finally back into the fun stuff, I see.”
Data smirked. “When it comes to you, Noah, the fun never stops.”
As he said this, he raised his hand and a sword emerged in it, resembling the other Color Blades, but this one a bright topaz. I recalled how after I had won the Sapphire Edge off Brock, I had offered it back to Data, but he had refused. Now I knew why: he had already found its replacement. I mirrored his action by equipping my own Color Blade. Although Malcolm had just shown that he could break them, they were still the most powerful weapons in the game.
Malcolm raised his hands out to either side of him. “More toys for me to break.”
There was a sudden wail in the stands as the Screamers charged at Data’s teammates. At a glance, I saw that whatever Windsor had done to their Dream Engines was working, for even when they came within range of Shawn and the others, the Screamers weren’t making them vanish. Looks like Windsor might have to do that mass recall after all.
“Noah,” Data called. “You remember our fight against the Dark Warrior?”
I nodded, recalling how I had launched spells at the armored knight’s back as Data and Siena took turns engaging him. Considering the RTS software didn’t allow you to see back attacks, the strategy made sense. Added to this, Malcolm had possessed a Warrior avatar wearing garments meant for high speed, not defense, meaning he had little to no resistance against magic.
“Let’s test the waters by seeing if that’ll work on him, eh?”
Data raised his blade and I cast Speed Amp on him. Knowing where Malcolm was going thanks to the FPS, I cast a Gravity Warp spell on where he was heading. However, I forgot that he was using Siena’s avatar and was fast enough to dash out of the spell’s range. Thanks to the Speed Amp spell, Data caught up with him and began slashing out. However, due to seeing his projection, he could easily avoid and block all of his attacks.
I used this distraction to get around Malcolm and launch an Ice Coffin toward his back. While in the Debug Room, Malcolm had been able to use magic, and it seemed he had gotten used to this, for he looked at me as though he were going to cast a protective spell. However, he was in Siena’s body, and Siena wasn’t a Spellcaster. The Ice Coffin spell hit him and he was trapped in the block of ice.
“Hah, got him!”
Data raised his blade to hack away at it. However, a Fire Weave was aimed his way to block him. Data jumped back, and I looked up to see one of the Screamers, clearly a caster, land between them and use Flame Conductor to redirect a flame toward Malcolm’s Ice Coffin. Before he could, I jumped onto the block and shot down a Water Hose at the flame. Steam pooled in front of me, and Data ran to cut down the Spellcaster.
I saw the next Screamer come to back his teammate up. Seeing Chloe look around, confused about why her opponent was fleeing from her, what they were doing suddenly made sense. If the players continued to back up their comrades, a domino effect would occur. However, because some of the Screamers had already been taken out by my team, eventually this tactic would leave our team with an outlier.
If that’s the case, we can choose who.
I grinned as I remembered how we had defeated the Mother Bat.
“Vega!” I shouted. “Ditch your tin can and hit this guy with an Earth Punch!”
Vega summoned an Ice Wall between him and his Screamer’s bullets and leaped off it, flipping back onto the pit. “I’ll go left!”
“Right!”
I jumped from the Ice Coffin and punched out as Vega punched in the opposite direction. The two fist-shaped rocks rose from the ground, smashing at either side of the Ice Coffin. They both hit, and though the damage they did to Malcom was substantial, it didn’t kill him.
It did, however, free him from the ice, and I quickly realized what a mistake this had been as soon as he said, “Again, thank you for setting me free, Noah.” Malcolm turned to one of his Screamers. “Michael, some speed, if you will.”
The Screamer who had been fighting Lisa suddenly stopped his onslaught of Cyclones pushing her back. He did the motion for Speed Amp and directed it at Malcolm. As soon as the sparks rained down on him, Malcolm used Siena’s mouth to smile. With Siena’s already maxed speed and stamina stats stacked with the speed spell and the prediction software, Malcolm was now the fastest avatar with the highest reaction time of anyone else in the game.
How did I know this? Because I had the software, too, and saw his movements before he did them, his blue form moving in a line from Data to Vega to me. I was just too slow to stop him. Using only his blackened fists, his punches acted like bullets that shot out, knocking Vega and Data back onto the pit. Knowing I couldn’t fight back against his speed, I dove out of the way and drew my Sapphire Edge.
However, with blinding speed, he knocked the Color Blade from my hand and lifted me up by the collar of my cloak. He raised his hand, intending to finish me off, when he heard a call and looked over his shoulder.
“Hold on!” Chloe cried out.
My team had killed enough of the Screamers that Chloe and Dice could back me up. However, with Siena’s speed, I knew they wouldn’t stand a chance.
I shouted, “No, stay back!”
Chloe lifted her revolvers to shoot him, Dice nocked an arrow to fire, Lisa blasted a wind spell, and Shawn charged a Plasma Beam to fire at him.
“Ah, backup,” Malcolm said. “Excuse me for a moment.”
As he said this, I saw his blue projection bounce from Chloe to Dice, and then Shawn and Lisa, knocking each of them to the dust. He dropped me to do this, but was so fast that I had barely hit the pit before he returned to grab hold of me again. I had come to this pit intending to be beaten by Siena, but this was not what I had in mind.
“Now, where were we?”
Over Malcolm’s shoulder, I saw Vega staring at me. Having caught my gaze, his eyes shot to the part of the pit just next to his foot where my Sapphire Edge lay, behind him and just off to the side of where Malcolm stood. I then remembered the ability Vega had introduced us to, one I had bought in Heaven but had never used.
“You were gloating over having a new body,” I said, my fingers working at my side to pull my menu over so I could shift the ability into my Key Triggers. “Or maybe that you can bring your Screamers back? Or maybe that you can break the game’s rules now?”
Malcolm shook his head. “I was actually about to say that I finally can communicate with people that might able to help them.”
I gritted my teeth. “If you wanted to help them, then you would tell us where they are.”
“Surely you have everything you need to find them yourself.” Malcolm’s head lowered. “And yet here you are, hesitating, wasting time playing games.”
He was right, of course. Out of fear that the footage we worked so hard to get would lead us nowhere, out of fear that something bad would happen IRL were we to continue on our search, or—just like Siena—out of fear of letting Chloe down, I had been hesitating and second-guessing myself ever since I saw the boatman murdered in cold blood.
But no more. I wasn’t going to let Malcolm take Siena’s avatar, I wasn’t going to let him stop Siena from helping us find the betas, and I wasn’t going to let my fear of what might or might not happen stop me from finding them.
“You forgot something,” I said as Vega kicked my Color Blade so it was in line with his back and I triggered the Weapon Retrieval ability. “I’m going to stop.”
My Sapphire Edge flew from the dust of the pit and landed directly in his back. After he had been hit by both my Ice Coffin spell and two complimentary level-two spells, his Hit Points were low enough that my Color Blade hitting him in the back put his health in the red.
Still not enough!
He could have been killed with one more hit, but everyone else was grounded, and he had them all in front of him now so they couldn’t strike him from behind. He released me and reached back to pull the Sapphire Edge from his back. Then he held it at both ends as though to snap it as he had the Ruby Edge.
He peered down at me, grinning. “And you were so close, Noah.”
Instead of the snap of metal, there was a gunshot that echoed from the entrance behind him. It was a fire-specialty bullet from a regular-looking pistol, and as weak of an attack as it was, Malcolm’s final Hit Points vanished. As his body exploded in a ball of fire, I looked up to see where the gunshot had come from.
I saw who I thought was a stranger standing at the opening to the pit. The girl had short auburn hair, looked to be in her late teens or early twenties, and her face was strangely familiar, mainly because it reminded me of the thing that had just exploded in front of me.
“You were wrong, Noah,” the girl said in a voice I recognized. “I do have someone I don’t want to disappoint.” Although she was breathing heavily, as though she had sprinted to get there, she was also smiling. “Me.”
I grinned up at Siena, knowing I was looking at her default appearance as a Range Niche. “How?”
“The E4 code allowed me to bypass the level restrictions, and I ran the rest of the way. Lucky Range Niches are so quick and that Tessa was willing to send me a gun filled with explosive bullets. She and Frank should be on their way . . .” She broke out into laughter and held up her pistol. “But I have to say, shooting that prick felt really good.”
“Do you think you can remove his program from your account?” I raised an eyebrow. “I’m sure you want your other avatar back.”
She shrugged. “I’m guessing he just added a copy of himself to the software code he gave me. Shouldn’t be too hard to remove it.”
I nodded but then noticed her looking over my shoulder. I turned to see that there were two Screamers still remaining. They had removed their helmets, and I could see that one of them was the blonde girl—Siena’s friend—and the other was a young man with black hair. My team encircled them and looked like they were about to finish them off. Without Malcolm giving them commands, they seemed uncertain about what they had to do, looking around like lost puppies without their mother.
“Kristie, we should go,” Ray said to Kristie.
Kristie, however, kept staring at Siena’s new avatar, a semblance of recognition in her expression.
Why aren’t they fleeing through Chaos Engines?
Data advanced on them, raising his new Topaz Edge. However, before he could cut them down, someone shouted from the stands.
“Wait!”
I frowned up at Frank’s Tamer avatar. She jumped down on the sand and ran up to the Screamer.
“Raymond Cranel, I saw your social media feed. You’ve been updating it even after you were taken,” Frank called, peering down at the dark-haired Screamer. “If you’ve been given access to the Internet, why aren’t you contacting your parents? Why aren’t you addressing being kidnapped? If you’re trapped, then why are you working with Malcolm?”
Finally, the two remaining Screamers summoned Chaos Engines behind them. Kristie walked backward toward hers. However, before Raymond followed her lead, he grinned up at Frank.
“I never said I was trapped.” He looked over at Kristie. “Let’s go.”
So some of the Screamers are working with Malcolm voluntarily? Why would they? What are they getting out of it?
The Debug Room then swallowed them and vanished into thin air, leaving us to puzzle out what we had learned from this encounter. Personally, I had learned more than I wanted. Not only could Malcolm copy himself and possess people, but he could do it with anyone who accepted his ability with an offer to become more powerful.
So his appearance here confirmed for everyone that Malcolm’s Ghost was indeed in Heaven. But now what’s stopping him from just making an army of himself in the Dream State?
Still looking at the area where Kristie had vanished, Siena frowned. “She won’t be the same until she’s out from under his thumb.” Then she faced me with a sudden grin. “Thanks for loosening that jar up for me.”
I grinned. “No problem. And now that you have your account back, you’ll still have access to those photos, right?”
She sighed and put her hands on her hips. “I couldn’t have gotten my account back by myself with an avatar as weak as this, and it was because of you that I managed to . . .” She grinned, belaboring the point. “I mean, I will have to reconnect with a few people, grab the photos, and post them alongside the same sob story you’ve been peddling, but I can make that sacrifice. Hopefully it shouldn’t take me too long to have some addresses to send your way.”
I grinned back, finding it amusing to look down on her in a smaller Range form for once. “It’s all on you now.”
Siena nodded and turned to leave the Coliseum, vanishing with her E4 hack before reaching the entrance. The others in my team joined me, looking confused by her sudden appearance.
“So did we win?” Vega asked.
I nodded. “We will soon enough.”