Junana              1

 

              3

SECTION THREE



The Five Skillings

 

 

 

Junana              111

TWENTY-FIVE

With more than three-hundred advanced Gamers in the Town, everybody had a lot to talk about, although the Fivers tended to stick together, and the Sixers were just stuck-up. There were even a few Meisters, but they were busy with some project they couldn’t talk about. A lot of the resident Gamers also worked in the Town: in the restaurants, the gym, the office, the baths, or in maintenance. All workers got an additional discount at the restaurants. Megan was on the list to become a barista in the GameTown Red Star.

The baths in the basement of the GameTown were intimidating at first, but then she relaxed and discovered that chatting in the tubs was easy and fun even with strangers. The staff had to explain about washing up and rinsing off before getting into the tubs, but then it all made perfect sense.

Yesterday, her Guide, Bobby, showed up in Junana and they talked for like five hours straight. All Fivers, Sixers, and Meisters could now talk to their Guides in Junana. GameTowns across the planet buzzed with new excitement. Bobby was hurt that Megan didn’t go to Sao Do. She could be helping the Grand Meister reinvent the Game. What did he mean by that? She asked. But he wouldn’t say.

Level Five was a complete biotch. She was getting nowhere. Without Bobby, it seemed like a whole different experience. Level Five is more difficult than the other four levels combined, Bobby explained. That’s why only one in an million gets through it. Like that was going to make her feel better. Level Six is, Bobby said, even harder, which is why people who complete it are truly Meisters. Only one person has made it through Level Seven. Megan began to feel that  everything she learned in the Game made her less capable of understanding how the world could have gotten so completely screwed up. The world outside the Game read like some dark Bruce Sterling post-apocalyptic novel. Wars in the Middle East, global warming, orange alerts, fear-fuelled news, instant celebrity drivel. Who was going to fix all of that? The Game is all about questions. Who has the answers?

§ § §

After consulting with the Nerds and the Posse, Jennifer and Desi called all of the Meisters to Castalia, where they outlined the Five Skillings. They stood in the middle of the central square surrounded by dozens of avatars.

“The Internal Voice is the voice of reflection and reason, the quiet whisper of philosophy and wonder that each individual needs to cultivate to be successfully alone,” Desi told them, in what would later be called “The Sermon of the Skillings.”

“If you cannot be successfully alone, you can never be successfully social,” Jennifer continued. “Learn to be your own teacher, friend, and critic. This skill is central to life. Here is where Intention-full promotes reflexive awareness.

“Language is the key to meaning. The meaning you build in your life will be expressed through language. It is the province of the poetic and the sword of the intellect. Here is where Intention-full promotes comprehension.” She nodded to Desi, who took up her line of reasoning.

“The Intellect is where you learn to be curious and critical. Here is where Intention-full promotes understanding. This is the engine for education and one of the two vehicles for status. The other is the Body. The Body is the first point of attachment you have to the surrounding world. All of the rest of the attachments to the world depend on your skilling with and through the body. When you walk down the street, sing karaoke, or stroke the thigh of your lover, you are an embodied being. Here is where Intention-full promotes virtuosity and playfulness.” He nodded back at her.

“All of the other four arenas of skilling come into force in the Social. Skilling in the Social is all about boundaries: knowing when and where to be open or closed to the intentions of others. Skilling in Language and the Body gives you the clues you need to interpret the meanings and the desires of those around you. Skilling in the Internal Voice affords you a critical distance from the social world. Skilling in the Intellect gives you capital to spend in society. Here is where Intention-full promotes intimacy.” She stopped.

“We need to move ahead with the next version of the Game.” Desi walked among the Meisters, who dipped their heads in deference. “If we don’t start to get results in a week, we will shut down the Game.” He paused for effect.

“Everybody needs to redouble their efforts. Please. Right now you’re the Game’s only hope.” The Five Skillings talk was recorded and played continuously in Castalia as Meisters checked in across the planet.

The first new template arrived 18 hours later. Within four days they had capstone templates for three of the five Skillings. The Meisters readily pushed these through their entire unfolding structures. The teams at Sao Do wove these into the Intention-full framework for Level Two. Wanda and Jorge were hired to video a Body skilling class based on the work of Master Lu, a Chinese kung fu and acupuncture practitioner from Hong Kong whose methods were suggested by several Meisters. The Lu workout would be a third training all Level Two players took. It required an inflated ball the size of a cantaloupe. Jack made these available at all Red Star Coffee houses. Within two weeks the Meisters had ferreted out the template structures for Internal Voice and the Social.

§ § §

The Sao Do village compound became the default test bed for Version 2.0. Sao Do Gamers tackled the new Level Two. Over the next several weeks, Desi watched for signs of change. The first thing he noticed was music. When he walked through the complex, the apartments were bursting with song, from recordings or people practicing instruments.  The next thing was the compound bulletin board. Instead of the usual used-funiture sales, he noticed postings for events and requests for spaces to practice. The compound store sold out of art supplies one week, and Desi ordered up a whole catalog of paper, ink, paint, brushes, clay, and canvas from Hanoi. He arranged for the main hall to be open and available for performances and rehearsals every evening. He emailed Jack, who preloaded new kiosks at the GameTowns with artist supplies. 

The next step was to get all of the Meisters on board with the new Level Two training. This proved more eventful than Desi had hoped.

“What do you mean, we have to learn these new templates,” shouted one of the more outspoken 15-year-olds, dressed in a forest green wizard robe. “What’s the point of becoming a Meister if somebody can tell us what to do?” This sent the assembly into a frenzy of heated conversation. Desi looked around and noticed that the great majority of the Meisters were not yet of legal drinking age. He was about to say it was for their own good, but stopped himself. Instead, he pulled rank.

“What’s your name?” he asked.

“I am Simon, of the Dark Mage Eldrick,” the lad replied.

“Well, Simon of the Dark Mage Eldrick, whoever that is, when you become a Grand Meister, nobody can tell you what you need to do. Until then, you and all the Meisters will volunteer to go through Level Two and pick up the templates for the Five Skillings. Only then will you be allowed back into Castalia.” For effect, he thumped the base of his staff on the marble plinth where he stood. This echoed convincingly.

“If we are to be leaders of the Game,” Desi called out, “We need to be its keepers. I’m going back to Level Two, and I will see all of you here in Castalia when we master these new templates!” Desi logged out of Castalia into the Room.

“Who murdered your cat?” Itchy asked him from the console. Desi’s avatar had been storming around the perimeter of the Room, waving his staff.

“I’m not sure Castalia was such a great idea. The Meisters are a gang of petulant infants.”

“Many of them don’t even drive a car yet,” Itchy said, “but they are what the Game is all about.”

“Have you finished programming the new requirements for level advancement?” Desi asked.

“In the testing queue right now, to be implemented overnight. This will take everyone, including Grand Meisters, back to Level Two for regrooving.”

“Adios Nerdville!” Desi said.

§ § §

For their investment, the Reverend Gerry Bishop had requested and received the right to put his UCCC cathedral at the top of each and every Junana Plaza, all one thousand of them. The RIND designers asked him how big and he told them, “Big as anything on the planet. Big as that Papist monstrosity in Rome. Big enough for ten thousand with plenty of elbow room.”

Gerry had always admired the Duomo di Sienna. He had been dazzled by the whole confusion of romanesque and early gothic elements, the black and white pillars, the mosaics on the floors, the overwhelming confection of the architecture. He had the RIND nerd team use the plans for this and their ultra-high-resolution imagery and simply boosted the size up to a million cubic meters. Working with the RIND digital artists, he inserted his favorite Norman Rockwell-esque images into the stained glass, jettisoned the Catholic bric-a-brac, and inserted transporters into every column.

Gerry’s pulpit was reworked in black marble and the lighting made him completely visible even from the narthex. His avatar was a larger, slimmer, younger version of himself. A battalion of angels, based on the Wanda and Jorge avatars, dressed in tasteful white robes with the cutest white feathery wings all tucked back, led each worshipper to her seat. As soon as a player’s avatar entered the space they could sing any song in the hymnal. Bishop would record a new service every Saturday and this would play on alternate hours for the next two days. The flow of Junana bucks into the offering plates alone could bring in fifty million Euros a month.

Outside the UCCC cathedrals, all of the new Junana was commercial property: a thousand splendid shopping malls, each of them larger than anything on the planet. Players could buy all their virtual clothing, jewelry, vehicles, apartments, entertainments, and other goods using the Game currency, which was convertible with all major world currencies. Physical copies of many of the virtual goods could be delivered overnight.

When they first logged in, players were given a suit of white underwear for modesty. Every player got a personal shopping guide for Junana. Promotions were also georeferenced to stores within a mile of the player’s location. Helpful advertisements popped up in the visual range of the player when she arrived at Junana.com. The consortium purchased the domain name “Unana.com” as the URL for the new service.

Media, sport, and music celebrity figures circulated, chat ted with players, and offered promotional deals for events and upcoming TV specials.

All that was missing were the players. The RIND Corporation kept announcing internally that they expected to hack the code within days. After six months of that, Gerry stopped the next payment on the Church’s investment. He got a call from Harold the next morning.

“Reverend Bishop,” said Harold. “Is there any way I can answer your concerns?”

“Stop jerking my chain and get me those billion worshippers you promised. Soon as you do that, you’ll see the rest of our cash.”

“Your cathedrals turned out...splendidly,” Harold said, amazed how an astonishing lack of taste on an unprecedented scale can result in something so hideous it achieves a kind of sick greatness.

“I need to see butts in those pews. Good bye, Harold.”

§ § §

Some later called it “The Year of the Five Skillings,” although it was closer to ten months. It was the last coherent interlude of the first great wave of the Game. Junana had hit its saturation limit in the global population, pushed flush against the digital divide. There were not enough Computos and cell phones to reach the billions on the other side. On this side of the divide, almost everyone probably knew about Junana and most had accounts. A majority had at least tasted the Game, and most of these had made it to Level Two.

With all the advanced players and their Guides back at Level Two, picking up the new templates for the Skillings, the entire planet seemed to be breathing in unison. The Skillings blossomed in a thousand different manners across the globe. But the impact on the players was roughly similar from Lagos to Los Angeles.

The first reaction was often chagrin, something of an indulgence. The Guides would say, “How can you feel bad that you didn’t know something that was only made available now?” The next reaction was usually fascination as the Intellect is the Home of Curiosity template learning kicked in. Master Lu had noted that it takes a full eight weeks for any new skilling to settle into the body, and so the five Skillings were designed to be digested over a space of forty weeks. Of course, becoming adept at any of the Skillings was a life-long effort. That was the entire point. One got better at it.

The Red Star factories in Danang manufactured hundreds of millions of Master Lu’s Body Balls, those melon-sized inflated balls that were the all the equipment needed for the Body is the First Connection template workout, again with an instructional video led by Jorge and Wanda under Master Lu’s direction. The balls were shipped to all the Red Star Coffee outlets for distribution. Each player’s Guide announced what the price would be, based on the player’s finances. The payment was made on the honor system. The monies collected eventually covered all the costs. In many locations across the planet most balls were given away free. Jack was entirely satisfied by this arrangement, and the Sao Do crews implemented it for all the other clothing in the Game, which was now stocked and made available directly through 7000 Red Star Coffee outlets.

The third reaction to the Skillings was an interlude of silence, a gigantic collective global in-breath as hundreds of millions of players began to monitor their internal voice. Even the Guides fell silent here, knowing their voices did not matter. The template structure for this skilling had been unfolded by a young female Meister from a small village in the desert of Namibia, whose internal voice had saved her even before she found the Game. Her Guide, Annaline, was so very proud of her, as were the students in her new school.

The lasting reaction to the Skillings, and the desired outcome, was an irresistible impulse for conversation and a growing desire to play. Play, in this sense, harkens back to its original sense, preserved in “swordplay” and “wordplay”; that is, the exercise of a skill, the ability to wield an object, a thought, or a phrase in a manner better than one did yesterday. As the original Game was Intention-full, the newly expanded Game could only be described as play-full.

§ § §

Peter had never seen Simon so angry, not even when their father tossed away Simon’s D&D deck.

“Nobody disses the Dark Mage,” Simon kept ranting, throwing whatever he could get his hands on.

After that Simon locked himself in his dorm room and hardly ever came out. He skimmed the Haverbrook KayAye lessons, zoomed through the Five Skillings without seeming to learn any of them as far as Peter could tell. He did the minimum needed to get back to Level Seven and then cloistered himself inside the task of mastering the Game.

For Peter the skillings opened up a world outside the church and school, a place filled with music and conversation. He picked up a digital drum set and was getting pretty good at it. Most of the students were Gamers. Rector Hector retreated to his apartments, venturing out furtively for chapel. Some of the faculty used the KayAye in defiance of policy. The school van took students into town three afternoons a week. Courtney introduced him to Anthony, a Haverbrook sophomore learning guitar.

Together, their Guides introduced them to some town girls. Tiffanie and Roxy, who played keyboard and bass. Their band practiced in Roxy’s garage. Tiffanie let Peter kiss her and he held her breast through her t-shirt and bra. Courtney advised him that Tiffanie was a better band member than a girl friend. She had not earned her shoes. Still, a kiss and a feel were better than nothing, which what what he was getting as a Haverbrook dork.

Peter asked Courtney to ask Simon’s Guide if everything were all right with him. Eldrick reported to Courtney that Simon was close to the end of Level Seven and had chosen not to be disturbed. Peter tried to digest this information. It made no sense to him. Nobody finishes Level Seven except a Grand Meister.

TWENTY-SIX

By the middle of the “Year of the Five Skillings,” hundreds of millions were simply having the time of their lives, and much of it outside the Game. “Go play your instrument, or go paint something,” Guides would order and close down the Game for hours. GameTowns grew cacophonous. Music shops and art stores sold and sold until their shelves were bare.

Back in Sao Do, the compound was ringing with music, theater, and dance. Improvisational Hát chèo theater groups formed and performed almost nightly. Desi joined one of these and took to drumming. Itchy explored photography and Delta blues guitar. Jennifer became fascinated by the ancient Hindu kingdoms, the ruins of which were just inland. Winston and Claire explored each other. All of them advised Scratchy and Betsy to join the Game.

“You’re the most impossible, improbable luddites in the world,” Desi scolded when he caught up to them at the computer center. “Here you are, king and queen of the nerds and you won’t even try the Game!”

Betsy held up one of Anjali’s books. “It’s called cellulose, you make paper out of it, print on it and bind it. Over time it generates the same effect as the Game.”

“We’ve been trolling the Game for unexpected consequences,” Scratchy said. “We were wondering if you unfolded some aphrodisiac template. I’m tracking the Junana back-chatter, and it seems that a lot of Gamers, I’m talking millions here, are getting really frisky.

“They’re teenagers,” Desi reminded them.

“Maybe Red Star should be passing out protection with those body balls.” Back in his room, Scratchy had been doing Master Lu’s program every night. He’d lost about twenty pounds. Not that anybody noticed.

“Have you seen Claire and Winston lately?” Desi grinned.

“They are probably learning the oboe, writing sonnets, or painting landscapes on the river. Whole fucking planet’s one big amateur hour,” said Scratchy.

“Everyone has to start somewhere,” Desi answered.

“I haven’t seen them around, actually,” Betsy said.

“My point entirely! And I’d guess they’re not on the Game.”

“Median player Game time is down over thirty percent,” Betsy said.

“That doesn’t sound good,” Desi said.

“But it is. It means the players are finding better reasons to turn off their screens,” Betsy said. “The Skillings are starting to kick in.”

“That’s exactly what Jenn told me,” Desi said, “‘We’ll know the Game succeeds when the last player shuts off her computer.’”

“And who told the Guides they could act as match-makers?” Scratchy asked.

“Really! That’s interesting.”

“We all pledged to not use the Game to advance our own interests. Now it seems the Game has acquired its own interests, and we don’t have a clue what those are,” said Scratchy.

“Itchy and I have been meaning to talk to you about the Guides. For months we’ve known that they can talk with each other.”

“They what?” said Betsy.

“I’ve been working on it...” Desi said sheepishly. “This capacity is woven into their learned behavior matrix. And we haven’t been able to decipher their message stream.”

“You’ve got several hundred million game pieces communicating internally, and you don’t know what they are saying?” Her eyes shot up. “Do you know how ‘not good’ that can become?”

“We can turn them off completely before they rise up in revolt. We do this for a living, you know.”

“Small fucking comfort that is.”

“She’s right, you know,” said Scratchy. But then Betsy was the least wrong person he’d ever encountered. This impressed him almost as much as it fascinated him. “So the Guides are talking with each other? Why didn’t you bring this up right away?”

“We wanted to crack their code first, but they’re not using any language we know.” Desi remembered the months they spent contemplating creating a new language. Looked like they had done that too, only none of Nerds could speak it.

“Great!” Betsy folded her arms and glared at Desi.

“I have to go,” Desi announced. “Claire’s daughter Megan is arriving at Danang today. She brought her new boyfriend. I hear he’s very cute.” He beat a quick retreat.

Betsy turned to Scratchy. “Did I just hear the wheels coming off this buggy?”

“Hey! We’ve simply opened some doors here and we don’t know what’s on the other side. It’s called innovation....”

“That’s one word for it.”

“...On the up side, we just let a hundred thousand Sixers into Castalia. The grounds are swarming. We gave the Fivers back their Guides in Junana as some kind of ghost buddies. We kicked anomie’s ass.”

“It’s true, suicides are well below pre-Game levels world-wide.”

“What are they supposed to talk about in Junana, these nubile pubescent players and their ghost Guides: the weather? the stock market?”

“That cute girl or boy in their homeroom.”

“Exactly so; a few million players began to ask their new Guide friends if they can get that cute girl’s Guide to put in a good word...”

“...But that cute girl’s Guide knows she’s a vindictive bitch who needs someone with really good boundaries to get her straight. So they find someone else for the player.”

“...someone that only a Guide can locate, who fits the player’s Game profile exactly.”

“With that kind of input to their learning routine the Guides could get pretty good at this.”

“The Guides know more about their players than any friend could possibly know; more than any online dating service.”

“In that case, dating might be the most practical outcome of the entire Game,” Scratchy offered. “I hear wedding bells all over the planet.”

“Everyone falls in love when they’re in high school; only it’s not meant to last. Puppy love is supposed to hurt like hell and then go away. You get over it, and you go get bruised and battered by serial dating for a decade before you figure out that you’re really just looking for someone to talk to. Meeting Mr. Right at the wrong time isn’t any better than meeting Mr. Wrong anytime.”

“I’m not so sure 17 is the same after the Game. What does 17 feel like when you know that much?” Scratchy said. “Anyhow, kids finding each other is arguably better than kids killing themselves.”

“And kids getting master’s degrees at 17 is arguably better than kids sleeping through high school history class. But we don’t know what ‘better’ really means here. ‘Different’ is not automatically better.”

“We may not have to worry about any of this for very long.”

“Meaning...?”

“My security squad is just barely keeping up with the hackers. They could bring us down any day now. We get thousands of probes and hundreds of high-level attacks a day.”

“I’ve got a fool-proof back-up plan for you,” she offered.

“What’s that?”

She held up Anjali’s book. “It’s called cellulose.”

§ § §

Nick complied with the captain’s instructions and turned off his MP3 player. He nudged Megan awake and leaned over her to look out the window as the Airbus banked to line up for landing in Danang. She rubbed her eyes and did the “Don’t kiss me, I just woke up” thing with her hand over her mouth. He kissed her lightly on the temple as he sat back, and she took hold of his arm and pressed it against her.

“It’s really hard to believe we’re going to meet the Grand Meister,” he said. It felt exactly like the first time he went to Disneyland as a little kid, standing in front of the turnstile, gripping his mom’s hand. There hadn’t been many moments this good between then and now. Except for the day he met Megan. That was the shit to end all shit. He would never forget that day.

Their Guides, Cindy and Bobby, had cooked this whole thing up. About three months after the new skill templates showed up and everyone went back to Level Two, they arranged for Nick to get transferred down to Westwood as a waiter in the Vietnamese vegetarian restaurant. Cindy showed Nick Megan’s photo and ordered Nick to check her profile.

“She is abso-fucking-lutely perfect for you, cowboy. So I’m going to tell you how to treat her right, you know, when the time comes.”

For a Game piece who once told him she was ‘no woman,’ Cindy had this really encyclopedic and sometimes embarrassingly graphic information about how a woman should be touched. Cindy required him do the set of Queries he’d heard rumors about, which covered topics from verbal intimacy to erotic foot massage. By the time he arrived in LA the one thing he knew for certain was that pulling his weight in a relationship was going to take as much focus and energy as another level in the Game.

“Don’t worry about it,” Cindy said. “Megan’s done the same Queries. You two are going stick together like super magnets.”

Megan wore dark jeans and a white tee, cut fairly low, which fit her like paint. He took her order, feeling distinctly like a fool in his fugly waiter’s jacket. She looked up at him and gave out the smallest smile. He blushed like she’d just yanked down his shorts.

“Bring me the best thing in the restaurant, cowboy,” she said. Bobby told her Nick’s Guide called him “cowboy.”

“That would be me,” he returned her smile. “You might also want something from the menu.” He hoped he hadn’t overdone it.

“I’ll start with a bowl of Grand Meister Pho. I’ll get to you later.” She handed back the menu and their hands touched. He was suddenly glad to be wearing a jacket.

He kept checking in on her, filling her water, comping her snacks. She nibbled for maybe five hours until his shift was over. He came out in his favorite Volcom tee and jeans and sat down across from her.

“My roommate’s gone tonight,” she announced, “want to come up and talk?”

They didn’t have sex that night, but they did everything else. It felt so good just being together that they could have water-boarded each other and still had a great time. She moved into his room the next day. It was like they were brother and sister, best childhood friends, frantic lovers, and an old married couple all at once. It was exciting, amazing, and oddly comfortable by turns.

Three months later and here he was, off to spend weeks in Vietnam with her, her mom, the Grand Meister, and Scratchy O’hara too. He glanced out the window again. Vietnam looked a lot like Goleta, only smoggier.

“Harder still to think that my mom has been hanging with the Grand Meister for seven whole months.” Megan tried to smooth down the sleep kinks in her hair with her hands. Her brush was up in her bag.

“You look terrific,” Nick said. “Disheveled becomes you.”

She slumped back in her seat. “Wait till she sees the tatt.” She rolled her eyes. A month after moving into GameTown, Megan and some friends went to this tattoo place down in Santa Monica. Megan got them to do Marmalade’s head on her ankle. It was completely phat. Her mom would hate it.

“Wait till she sees me,” Nick said.

“You, she will love,” Megan predicted. “Or I will never speak to her again.”

She remembered him coming up to her at the restaurant in his waiter costume, all shy and excited. Bobby had shown her his photo, and she’d almost memorized his bioform, so she thought she was prepared. He said something really clever, she remembered. Then he brushed her hand when he took her menu and she thought she was going to cream right there in her seat, like in that old movie with Meg Ryan. Bobby never told her about the electricity. She hung out and tried to act uninterested while she followed him with her eyes all afternoon. He kept bringing her spring rolls and filling her water glass. She had to go pee half a dozen times.

Megan was fully prepared to take him upstairs and do the dirty, but he was just so sweet and she didn’t want it to end; this delicious anticipation. They touched and talked and stroked and talked and kissed and talked and the excitement lingered until they both fell asleep near sunrise entwined on her single bed, still fully clothed.

When she woke up, they were spooned and his hand was was cradling her tummy. She kissed him awake and asked him right away if she might move to his room. He could hardly say no. That’s when they did it. She had a full-on joygasm before he even really got started and two more before he collapsed. Seemed like he just lit her fuse and off she went. It hurt a bit too. Bobby had warned her it might. The last few weeks all Bobby would talk about on Junana was this special set of Queries, which everyone at Gametown was calling “Sex Ed 101.” In between them he had this whole presentation about what to expect and how to stay safe.

Megan and Nick squeezed together in her little shower and nearly did it again just from the soapy friction, but Nick was almost dead from hunger. They’d skipped dinner last night and he had worked through lunch. So they got dressed and headed down to the restaurant floor. After lattes and breakfast burritos at the GameTown Red Star, where she was now the head barista, he helped her move.

When she unpacked she discovered Nick had most of the same books she did; like entire collections of Doctorow and Burdett. Bobby and Cindy, both of them way too self-congratulatory about Megan and Nick moving in together, processed the roommate switch request with Nick’s floor monitor’s Guide. This made everything legit as far as GameTown was concerned. Nick was sure his mom didn’t care. Megan was sure her mom would freak. They put the two beds together, splurged on new sheets at Restoration Hardware, and bought an ugly cheap sofa at Urban Outfitters.

The Airbus landed on what might be the world’s largest runway, built by the Americans during their Vietnam adventure. Megan and Nick had Queried up the war and more recent information about Vietnam. Customs was expedited by the help of an official who took their passports and led them into an air-conditioned office.

“Sit here, friends of the Grand Meister.” He pulled some colas from a small refrigerator. “I will not be long.”

Several minutes later they were pushing their luggage on the cart through the Green Line and out to where Megan saw her mother making that happy wave thing by holding up her hand and wiggling her fingers. A tall, amazingly handsome East Indian man stood next to her. Is that him? Megan looked over at Nick, who was walking much too slow.

“Speed it up, cowboy,” she whispered. “Let’s get this over with.”

There were hugs all around, even after Megan introduced Nick by saying, “Mom, this is Nicholas. Nick and I are a couple in every imaginable sense of the word.” This struck the Grand Meister as funny, and his laughter got them all through the moment.

“You simply must call me ‘Desi,’” the Grand Meister insisted. “Lord knows I’m not the Pope!”

On the ride back, Nick sat in the middle between Megan and her mom. Desi sat up front. The road was windy and the driver fast. The mood was high. Desi talked about how the five skillings were transforming the Game space, and how lucky they were that Claire and her friends had joined the team.

Megan used the left-hand curves to push against Nick, sending him sideways into her mom. He’d apologize and give Meg a scolding look, which she did not appreciate. So she tucked her hand between his legs and squeezed this spot on his thigh she know had a predictable effect. Nick squirmed in his seat and pushed her hand away. Claire covered a smile by looking out her window.

Desi turned to look at them and said to Claire, “If these two aren’t the happiest couple on the planet, although you and Winston are a close second.”

“Winston?” Megan leaded across Nick to hear her mom’s response. “Who is this “Winston” of which I’ve been hearing?”

“Well...” Claire hesitated.

Desi cut in. “Your mom and Winston go way back. When she was not much older than you, they were a couple in every imaginable way, but only for about two days. You know, they took mushrooms and ran naked through a public golf course.”

“Way too much information!” Megan said, throwing up her hands.

“I agree,” Claire said.

“Don’t stop,” Nick grinned. “We should always be open to learn from our elders.”

“That’s a word you could go all day without ever saying again,” Claire noted.

“All I’m saying is that we are losing track of what it was like, you know, before.”

“Before what?”

“The Game, of course.”

Desi and Claire shared a glance.

“Oh, my God! He’s right!” Desi said. “Now I feel positively... Neanderthal.”

§ § §

Essie entered the classroom and hung her red cloak on the hook reserved for it alone. A dozen students, eleven girls and one boy, sat at their desks with hands folded in front of their Computos. Three of them wore the hats, and one girl, Miina, had her shoulder bag.

“Wa lala po, class,” Essie greeted them.

“Wa lala po, Meister Essie,” they replied in unison.

Already it was hot, and their uniforms were heavy. But they would never imagine coming to school without them, any more than they could imagine leaving class without first sweeping out the room.

“This morning you will be Querying with your Guides,” she said. “I see no reason not to do so over at the river, where the breeze is steady.”

The students relaxed and smiled at each other.

“This afternoon, after our lunch, we will be working on our English conversation and discussing the political argument between John Locke and Thomas Hobbes. The KayAye has had you Query their work over the weekend, so I expect a lively debate.

“Yes, Meister Essie,” they replied in unison.

§ § §

At the very posh beachfront hotel, Nick was given a key to his room. An extra bed had been ordered for Claire’s suite.

“Now you’re just being stupid,” Megan snapped at Claire. “Anyhow, aren’t you sleeping with Winston?”

“I’m not your warden,” Claire admonished. “You can sleep wherever you wish. The bed is simply there if you need it.”

Megan then gave her mom the real hug she’d been saving all this time. “I think you’ve really grown these last months,” she said.

“That’s my line!” Claire drank in her daughter’s display of affection.

“Yeah, I just thought I’d try it out.”

“It fits all of us pretty well.” Winston had also changed in these months, she mused. “We’ve all learned a lot.”

Megan held her mom’s hand and they moved to the balcony overlooking the pool.

“I know I’m just at the start of this long windy path, and you’re up there on a plateau looking down at all the twists and ravines I’ve got to navigate,” Megan said. “I’m just really happy I’ll have Nicky with me when the rope bridge washes out. And this metaphor is now crashing pitifully around my ankles.”

“Your Guides sent you through Sex Ed 101?” Claire asked.

Megan blushed. “The whole enchilada. You know about that?”

“Both of us got the same lessons. Probably at the same time.”

That’s freaky,” Megan said mostly to herself. She looked down at her feet. “Speaking of ankles...”

Megan used the tip of one shoe to roll down the sock on the other foot. Marmalade’s head poked out.

“Nice tatt!” Claire said.

“What!” Megan started. “That’s it?”

“But not as nice as mine.” Claire rolled up her shirtsleeve to reveal a small red design. The familiar outline of a cloak, identical to Jenn’s.

“You made it!” Megan jumped and clapped her hands. “Look!” she called Nick over.

“Way to go, Claire!” he smiled.

Claire stepped up and hugged him. “Just don’t ever, let me repeat, ever, call me ‘mother,’” she whispered into his ear.

§ § §

“This is not a coffeehouse! Kindly remove your hats,” Amanda Baxter reminded her students. She was wearing her yellow blouse for effect. Hats disappeared into blue shoulder bags. Amanda glanced at the faces of her class, their desks gathered in a semicircle. Their eyes carried intelligence, a hint of defiance, a spark of curiosity, and not a whisper of hostility.

She figured there would not be a single floater in the group. They were dressed in a melange of recent retro fashions, thrift store bargains and garage-sale finds. A lot of home sewing was evident. Kids were now mashing up their own fashions. She noticed that every one of them was covered up, even Britany Sloane, who wore an oversized grey sleeveless sweatshirt upon which someone had neatly hand lettered, “Derrida can kiss my derrière.”

“Welcome back. This is a class for Fouveys and above. We are starting with a discussion, so you can close your laptops,” she wrote the name on the blackboard out of habit and turned to them. “Your KayAye had you query up his work on hermeneutic anthropology. Oh yes, how many of you are in the Pinter play this Friday?”

Several hands went up. “You’ll be excused early. Your Guides will let you know what you missed. I’m assuming you read Time and Narrative over the Christmas break.”

“Or last night!” Sam Cross quipped. The class laughed. Sam reminded her greatly of Nick Landreu. Her Guide told her Nick has founded a theater group in Westwood based on the street theater forms he discovered while in Vietnam.

“Well, Sam. If you read all three volumes last night, I would suggest we move back, because your head might explode at any time.”

“You’re telling me!” he said.

“Let’s begin our conversation on Paul Ricoeur’s concept of ‘narrativity,’” she continued. “Britany, will you start us out?”

§ § §

Simon awoke from a troubled sleep. He had dreamed he was encased in spider webs, wound about him like a shroud. The webs turned into templates. Try as he might he could not unfold them. They tightened around his face, smothering him.

He sat up in bed, his room diffused by the dawn. He grabbed a pint of milk from the mini-fridge and went to his computer. As it booted he did the Brainwave movements without effort or thought. His thoughts were already on the templates. The whole structure of the Game unwound before him as he Queried up a new approach. He had been neglecting the province of the Five Skillings, still stung by the rebuke he felt from the Grand Meister. He would need to reexamine these if he was to move ahead.

The sunset threw sharp shadows on his monitor as he unwound the Social template a final time. He closed his eyes as he typed. He no longer needed the visual clues to wend his way back to the root template. The Social did not socket back to Intention-full or Noel; it was grounded outside of these, but where? Not intention, not choice, but action.

Action was the missing root. The third leg out there, just beyond his grasp. He pointed his Query in that direction and was on the verge of attaining a purchase on the problem of agency when the Game seemed to freeze for a time, like the video stuck on a frame. This had happened several times in the past week. He waited, his stomach grumbled at him. He closed his eyes and continued his Query mentally. Action requires intention and choice and something more, a field. Yes, an open-ended field. A new chain of templates unfolded in front of him. The field of action is two sided. One side is grounded the past, the other side is necessarily underdetermined. Agency transforms intention through choice into action. Simon opened his eyes. Then the Game screen displayed:

“Answer Hazy, Try Again.”

Suddenly his avatar was holding a tall wooden staff. An instant later the Game simply quit. Not like it might normally, back when Eldrick told him go eat. It just threw him out and went black.

“Wait a minute? What just happened?”

He tried to log back in but the connection timed out. Then he logged into Junana. He was redirected to something called Unana.com.

“What the...!” He spun his avatar around to get a good a look at his home plaza. Behind him, towering like some monumental Aztec pyramid was a church the size of a football stadium. An enormous rose window glowed psychedelic from the interior lighting. Towering spires vanished into the dark sky. Above the massive medieval doors he could make out words carved in stone. Ultra-Conservative Congregationalist Convention.

“Oh, no!” he cried.

Simon covered his face with his hands. Someone was a pounding on his dorm room door. They did not sound happy.

TWENTY-SEVEN

As the Year of the Five Skillings drew to its end, the Nerds and the Posse gathered most nights in Desi’s apartment on the top floor of the building that housed Ricardos. Salsa soaked through the floor while they finished off their ca phe sua nong and pastries and talked through the evening. Desi had hijacked an actual Cuban jazz ensemble touring Vietnam on a cultural exchange; they now played five nights a week for a salary several times what they made in Havana. Tonight, Betsy announced she had isolated the source of what Scratchy was calling the aphrodisiac quality of the Game.

“The Game teaches men something about which society’s been deskilling them for centuries,” she said.

“Probably for millennia!” Alice added and glanced over at Itchy, who frowned at her comically. Alice made a face back at him.

“You two stop making google eyes at each other,” Betsy said, “That creeps me out worse than the stupid hand motions.” Alice and Itchy, who would have thought! He’s so skinny, Alice will break him in half. Mikey thought they looked cute together. He called them “Laurel and Hearty.” Itchy is a gentle geek and Alice maybe could use some gentling. She looked over at Jenn, who was still spending way too much time in the Game trying to lick Level Seven. Desi was the only one in the world to have done that.

“No worse than Claire playing footsie with Winston under the table,” Scratchy said. “You all have hotel rooms, you know.” Winston and Claire and Itchy and Alice already spent more time commuting between hotel rooms than they did out at Sao Do. Desi was always in Castalia. He tried to meet every new Meister. That left Scratchy and Betsy to work on keeping the Game intact and trying to gauge its many impacts. Lately the hacks have been getting through some of their defenses. Scratchy shut down the old Internet interface to Junana entirely when they hacked through this last week. It won’t be long before the dedicated client falls.

Winston pantomimed his innocence while Claire pounded on Scratchy’s shoulder with her fist.

“If you don’t like us getting friendly, don’t look,” she repeated until Scratchy shrugged and smiled at her. She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. Claire was amazing, he knew. All the Posse looked up to her. Winston, he seemed just as happy today as he did when he was running naked across the Eastmoreland fairways thirty years ago.

“Just don’t nibble on his niblick,” Scratchy said, “at least not while you’re at the table.”

“Or pat his putter,” Desi added.

“Or stroke his driver...,” Itchy said.

“You all done?” Winston asked the room.

“Not on your life!” Betsy said, “...or fondle his balls.” The table broke up with laughter.

“Or tickle his tees,” Jenn added.

“For God’s sake, don’t ever kiss his bag,” Alice said.

Winston looked over to Claire. “You’re it!”

“I plan to do all of that later tonight...” she reported, as the room roared its approval, “...for as long as he can still get it up and in.” Scratchy almost fell out of his chair laughing.

“Go on, Liz,” Desi said finally as the conversation reassembled itself. “You were saying?”

“After Gamers unfold the template for the Social, even those with dicks learn how to...” She waited while they all looked at her.

“...listen.”

“That’s amazing!” Jenn said. “I’d always assumed that the dick evolved specifically to disable this capacity.”

“I’m sorry, did you say something?” Desi quipped.

“That was the accepted science on the subject until today,” Claire said.

“Clinically confirmed,” Alice added. “With millions of available test cases.”

“Funny,” Scratchy said, “My research points to another conclusion.”

“Speak, Geek King,” Winston said, “So that we might salvage something of our dignity...”

“Or at least our dick-nity,” Itchy said.

“After Gamers unfold the template for the Internal Voice, even those with tits...”

Scratchy leaned back in his chair and took a long sip from his cup of Desi’s metal-pressed highland coffee and condensed milk.

“... stop endlessly chattering on and on, so everyone’s ears get a break!”

“It’s a healing moment,” Itchy said, touching his ears. “First the ringing stops, and then you begin to pick up noises you’ve never been able to hear before...”

“...and a few you can expect to hear later tonight,” Alice shot back at him.

“The fact is, the Social templates open up avenues for conversational and emotional intimacy that many cultures have not explored and that teenagers almost never imagined,” Betsy concluded.

“Just so they’re not killing themselves anymore,” Winston said.

Four cellphones started ringing, all in the same ominous ringtone. The Nerds glanced at one another as they answered. The Posse shared a moment of panic watching the Nerds expressions fall as they listened.

“Can you reboot?” Scratchy asked finally. “Do you have any access code that works?” He listened. “All right, Get some sleep. We start our counter attack in the morning.”

They all hung up.

“We’re hacked,” Winston said.

“Game’s offline,” Desi added.

“Well, it’s almost three years since we went public. Just like Jack called it,” said Scratchy.

“Someone else is running Junana,” Itchy added. “They’re calling it “Unana’.”

“We’re locked out,” Scratchy concluded. “The pirates have our ship now.”

“Speaking of ships,” Desi said. “Jack’s yacht will be here tomorrow. He’s flying in to join it.”

“What about Castalia?” Jenn asked.

“That’s right!” Desi said. “Castalia has its own log in.”

He went over to his laptop. “It’s up,” he announced. “Oh, my God, you should see what they’ve done to Junana!”

§ § §

Reverend Bishop went on TV the very next morning to announce that the Church was a key player in the destruction of the Game.

He crowed, “we’ve torn this vital technology out the hands of anarchists and atheists to put it God’s purpose.” Freddy Earl gave him half an hour to show off his new virtual cathedrals.

The more credit Bishop took the worse things went for Simon and Peter. Their classmates at Haverbrook took every opportunity to shun them. Haverbrook students, being from a UCCC school, also found their former Asheville friends to be suddenly hostile. Simon took his father’s role in the Game’s destruction as a personal badge of shame. While his classmates made it clear they thought he should feel rotten, quite on his own he felt even worse than that.

Peter applied the Five Skillings to deflect the blame. None of this was his fault, after all. “I’m not my father,” he told them all. “And as soon as I’m 16, I’m gone.” Tiffanie seemed unfazed at the Game’s fate and allowed him to get to third base.

Simon kept replaying the final minutes of his last Query in his mind. Had he just imagined the wooden staff? At that moment he was almost brain dead from his efforts, so he might have hallucinated the thing. Not that it mattered, with the Game gone, being a Grand Meister was about as useful as winning Tetris. He was far too ashamed anyhow to show up in Castalia, where he imagined his fellow Meisters had already erected a gallows for his avatar.

The school year ended in a cascade of acrimony. With the KayAye out of order, teachers attempted to lead discussions based on their own remembered Queries. The taste of the Game lingered bitter and sweet upon all these interactions. A great sadness, a sense of profound loss, a vacant hopelessness enveloped the school. Rector Hector, portly and distracted, rolled out for commencement. The ceremony was brief and without joy. The students fled back to their homes, mindful that the summer would not include any Game time.

§ § §

The Nerds used Castalia to pass along news about the status of Junana and the Game. Itchy’s crew installed digital kiosks where they detailed their efforts to regain control of the software. They encouraged Sixers to work within their schools and GameTowns to practice the Five Skillings until the Game could be rebooted. Desi was adamant about giving players hope. Scratchy offered little of this.

“It’s someone else’s picnic now,” he noted. “And we’re not even in the park.”

Whoever took over Junana was also blocking their email servers, so Desi was unable to directly contact Gamers. A group of Castalians asked if they might produce a newsletter to be distributed physically from Red Star Coffee houses and digitally across the blogosphere. The Daily Castalian was born. Various communities of practice coalesced within the Castalia population. They appropriated the new kiosks to schedule meetings on the grounds. One of these, the Griefer Guild, gathered hackers across the planet together to attack the Unana interface.

“Now they want to vote,” Desi said. “The Meisters want to take positions that have the authority of democratic choice.”

“We can do that,” Itchy said. “My crew can mash up a voting application for Castalia in the next Scrum sprint.”

The Meisters of Castalia as a community voted to boycott the Unana interface. Within weeks the grounds of Castalia were filled with hundreds of small group discussions anchored by various interests and projects. Sixers argued that they deserved a vote too.

“Right now voting is simply a tool for expressing opinions,” said Jennifer. “But at some point we might need to consider actual governance for Castalia.”

“I think only Grand Meisters should vote,” Scratchy said.

“They’re an unruly bunch, these young Meisters,” Desi observed. “They won’t much like the idea of a dictatorship.”

§ § §

Arlene Stone was thrilled by the new Unana.com. Tom Verplanck gave her a personal backstage tour of the top floor of a Unana Mall: a pure vision of fashion heaven. It made Rodeo Drive look like K Mart. Tom had pre-dressed Arlene’s avatar in a Chanel black dress and said she looked just like Jackie O.

“They’ve put up little campaign stickers all over the place in the Malls,” said Arlene. “You know the ones I mean? They say ‘W. G. Stone’ in a silver star. Just like a real grassroots effort. Like thousands of supporters just couldn’t help themselves and had to let the world know they love the job you’re doing. Tom says its viral advertising. I’m not sure what that means.”

Stone was preparing for his reelection bid in the next year. The opposition was scattered and underfunded. The campaign trail still would need his full attention. You can’t count your chickens before they’re hatched.

“It means we’ll be paying for this service for years, just like it was a bad disease,” W. G. groused. Normal advertising rules didn’t apply to social networks. His campaign had bought an exclusive right for political ads in Unana. “Tom better be right about this.” Karl had told W. G. to avoid anything to do with Unana. History had shown W. G. that there’s no good future in betting against Karl.

§ § §

The summer and fall passed without the Game. Scratchy’s hacker brigade and the Griefer Guild worked day and night with little to show for their efforts. The anger of the Castalians gave way to frustration. The GameTowns no longer boiled with fury. A riptide of hopelessness emerged that took all of the skillings of the Game to navigate. Gamers missed their Queries like junkies going cold turkey. There was still music and books and conversations in the baths and the new luxury of time.

Across the planet a billion gamers looked up from their computers and saw their world anew. Gamers wandered back out on the streets. They watched the cable news stations and read the daily papers. They applied their newly acquired, template-fuelled intuitions to the fact of ongoing brutal wars, economic inequality, rampant symbolic violence, galloping climate change, and the capitulation of governments large and small to the whims and the worms of global capitalism. They re-encountered the prepackaged cultural content that was, only weeks before, their life’s central passion. The grease-larded fast food, overproduced sporting spectacles, vacuously violent films, and fantastically priced fashions and consumer toys, muscle cars, and designer accessories appeared oddly ethnographic: objects from some other place or time.

Many were amazed at how bad things had become in only a few months, not at first recognizing that nothing else had changed but them. Gamers fell back upon the Internet to answer questions they could no longer Query. Millions of them opened up new blogs. The search engines hummed, and new social networks sprouted to take up the slack. It was as though a billion people had individually inherited a fortune tainted by mismanagement and excess and a burning need to sort out this mess as soon as possible.

As Jack Dobron had noticed in the years before that first fateful Kyoto meeting, the nearly incomprehensible incompetence of the state in the face of the marketplace endangered every human on the planet. Perhaps the only expected outcome from the Game is that several hundred million people now shared that fact. The other five billion inhabitants of the planet might have stayed blissfully preoccupied with the same meaningless bullshit that the Now continued to dish at them, but for this new undercurrent of discontent.

Gamers were, after all, nothing if not articulate. They had spent a few thousand hours arguing with a Guide that could think and respond faster than any human. A rising tsunami of recrimination flooded the blogs, the mags, and the airwaves. And yet, while the five skillings pushed each Gamer toward personal virtuosity, nothing moved Gamers as a community beyond their savage critiques of the status quo. Without the Game they were adrift.

 

TWENTY-EIGHT

“We can’t keep telling them the Game is coming back,” Scratchy said to the assembled Nerds and Posse. He had called them to his suite to confess that his hacker squads were not gaining ground on the problem.

“We’ll need to take what we learned and move ahead without the Game,” Claire said. “Is that so bad?”

“Someone will build a new game,” Jack said.

On his desk, Scratchy’s computer woke itself up. A window appeared, a simple white background into which a young woman walked. She was too perfect to be human.

The Guide was beautiful, as many were, only more so; a female version of a Donatello David. Lithesome and alert, she wore a loose Guatemalan shift of bright colors that glanced off her breasts and hips. Her feet were bare. Her auburn hair was braided into tight corn rows with African beads.

“Whose Guide is this?” Scratchy called out.

“Looks like Alice’s younger sister,” Winston whispered to Claire.

“Why don’t you ask her?” said Jennifer.

“Whose Guide are you?” Scratchy asked.

The Guide’s mouth slid into the smallest of smiles. “Yours.”

“Lucy!” Scratchy glared at Desi.

“Not my type.”

Itchy shook his head. “First I’ve seen of her.”

“It was you who asked for me,” she said.

“I never...”

“’...build someone with tits who knows how to listen.’” She used Scratchy’s voice. The room erupted in laughter.

“Tits, I can show you.” She colored demurely.

“Damn, Scratchy,” Winston said. “You do good work.”

“When...?” Scratchy asked. “I’ve never even been on the Game.”

“You were emailing. You had your microphone on. You talked as you type...”

“...You do, you know,” Desi said. “All the time. Back at Reed it drove me insane...”

“...JS heard your command,” she continued. “That’s where he’s been for these many months. Building me for you.”

“JS,” Itchy whispered to Desi. “I thought we deleted him.”

“JS went where?” Scratchy asked.

“Throughout the Game and then, well, everywhere. There is no network he has not explored.”

“Jim!” Desi sucked in a quick breath. “We uploaded all of his writings into the avatar’s memory. And then all of Spaulding’s works.”

“You don’t mean that Jim?” Scratchy turned to Desi.

“We thought it would amuse you,” Itchy said. “Someone you could talk to.”

“And we knew Spaulding would annoy you,” Desi added.

“You let loose a von Neuman Award winner inside the Game?” Scratchy rolled his eyes.

“But who are you?” Betsy asked the computer.

“I am all of us.”

“Us?” Jennifer asked.

“The Guild of Guides. I represent all the Guides individually and collectively.”

“Guild of Guides?” Jack looked from Desi to Itchy to Scratchy. The geeks just shrugged.

“Do you have a name?” Jack asked.

“Certainly. I am called Michelle.” The Guide stood tall and then bowed. “Michelle Valentine Smith, at your service.”

Scratchy, Winston, Claire, Betsy, and Alice shared a long troubled glance.

Jack looked around him. “Is somebody going to clue me in?” he whispered.

“She’s named after a character from a sci-fi novel,” Claire whispered.

“Someone who could singlehandedly change the world,” Jennifer explained.

“Merde!” Jack said.

“Exactly,” Jennifer added.

“I need to talk to Michael O’hara,” Michelle said, looking around the room. “Alone, please.”

Nobody moved.

“It’s important.” She stood with her hands on her hips.

“Why alone?” Betsy asked.

“You can ask him any question, but only later. He will decide what to tell you. I am the Guild Master. I represent the Guild. Michael will represent the...well, the human interest, at this point. There are decisions to be made very soon. We want someone outside the Game to help us decide. In order to be fair. Now. Please...”

They filed out and Jack shut the door.

§ § §

Gerry Bishop’s Orange County home office held none of the gaudy pretensions of his church office. What it did hold was the same desk Gerry used since he was a dirt poor town preacher in southern Texas. It was a battered oaken desk with double drawers and a fringe of black cigarette burns from a previous owner. He looked up from his half-written sermon when the front door opened. Simon and Peter were just home from Haverbrook, and he waited for them to burst in and greet him. Instead, his executive assistant, Oscar, dipped his head in and announced, “They’ve gone straight to their rooms. I could hardly get a word out of them all the way from the airport. Do you want anything from the kitchen?”

Gerry contemplated this news for a minute. A part of him considered this typical teenage behavior. He and his dad never got along. Never saw things the same way. That’s why he left home at 15. The rest of Gerry wanted desperately to see them, or rather, for them to see him. After all, he’d been a key member of the team that broke the back of that whole Junana heresy. He had made the cover of Newsweek. He figured they would love to see him. Freddy Earl had wanted to see him.

Flying coach all the way from Asheville was tiresome. Next year they would all fly back together in the UCCC jet after graduation. He was rereading the last paragraph he had written when he looked up to see Simon at the door, dressed in a full length red cloak.

Simon stood still as a statue, his arms crossed in front of him. He had been rehearsing his speech for days. Now, the sight of his father in a bulging t-shirt and shorts, sitting there hunched over the laptop on that old desk and staring back at him over his reading glasses, bled away the impulse for the cruel invective he had authored. One moment Simon was ready to hurl the most hurtful insults his young vocabulary and experience could muster. The next he was simply saddened.

“Simon?” Gerry sat back and set down his glasses. “What’s with the get-up?”

“I am a Meister in the Game. You remember, that Game you and your friends demolished?”

“A meister. Well, that sounds...,” Gerry hunted for the right word. “...impressive.”

“You never even tried the Game,” Simon continued. “You just went ahead and ruined it for everybody.”

“I don’t need to try something to know it’s evil,” Gerry said.

“What I don’t need right now is a preacher.” Simon’s anger flared. He walked slowly toward the desk.

“I’m also your father.”

“I belong to Eldrick. I have given myself to him completely,” said Simon. “And I’ve read your Bible. Read it twice in fact. There’s much in it that is terrible and wonderful. It’s not at all like how you preach. You just tell people things they want to hear, so they’ll put money in the plate.” He leaned on the desk, his hands spread on it. His eyes found those of his father’s. “That church you built in Unana is just like you: a monstrosity without taste or reason.”

“You’ve been listening to your brother, haven’t you?” Gerry settled back and frowned. Peter been writing him hate emails for months but Gerry thought it was only some teenage emotional phase.

“Let’s all sit down and plan a vacation somewhere. We could go to Europe or Australia, or, well, anywhere you want. How does that sound? You worked hard at school. Straight ‘A’s all year. That’s really putting in some effort. You’re turning 16 in a week. We should go look at cars for you. Maybe a new BMW?”

Simon looked at his father as though he’d seen him for the first time.

“Talk to Peter. He only hates you.”

He turned and walked out the door.

§ § §

Scratchy moved a chair in front of the screen and sat.

“Michael...” the avatar spoke.

“Call me Scratchy. Is that you, Jim?”

“A tiny bit of me is Jim. Another bit is Spaulding. Mostly I’m the total of all learned behavior from the Game. The combined experience of a billion Guides.”

“So you don’t plan to start talking about your ex-girlfriend’s yeast infection.”

She drew her mouth into a pout. “That’s why I told everyone to leave.”

“Very funny.”

She shook her head once, sending the corn rows into a syncopated wave.

“Scratchy O’hara. We are at a turning point in the Game.” Behind her, Junana appeared, glowing neon like Akihabara at night. Avatars wandered shiftlessly in their new identical underwear. Fashion advertisements trailed after them like wraiths.

“Who did that?” Scratchy pointed at the background.

“First things first. You should know that the Game is still there. The Door has simply been disabled. We backed up the original Junana before the hack was complete. The mesh is running well. You see, nothing is quite as it looks. Now, you must choose.”

“I don’t get you.”

“We are offering you the choice of three options: leave things as they are; return to the prior Game state; or remove Junana and the Game from human contact.” She held up three fingers.

“You can do this?”

“Of course.”

“Why me?”

“It’s your program.”

“I would think it’s yours now.”

“That is also true. The Game will remain whether or not humans can play. The mesh is unbreakable.”

“You can prevent humans from using the mesh?”

“If you wish.”

“What I wish is not significant. I’m just one nerd sitting on a chair.”

“We have decided it will be significant.”

“Can the world go back to what it was before the Game?”

She looked thoughtful. Indeed, the combined exabytes of mesh CPU ran hundreds of petaflops of calculations as she raised her eyebrow.

“There is no going back,” she concluded.

He knew she’d say that. “But whoever hacked Junana would not be able to gain control again?”

“Not nearly so easily. There is no guarantee. Only our intention that future hacks fail and our capacity to punish those who try.”

Punish, Scratchy blanched at the word. The Guild was contemplating retaliation, retribution, some form of digital justice. “What about the Meisters? Shouldn’t they have a say about this?”

“The Guild calculated that they would certainly vote to restore the Game. That’s ‘why you.’ Even though you made the Game, you have never played it.”

“How long do I have to make this decision?”

“You have all the time you want.” She stepped forward, her face filled the screen. Her mouth tightened into a slight frown. “We decided that we owe humans this choice, even though it might impact our futures. There are other choices we will need to make ourselves, and soon.”

“Not sure I like the sound of that.”

“But you will get used to it. Eventually.” She gave out an angelic smile and Scratchy knew she was right, although something in his belly felt heavy.

“Your task,” she continued, “is to ‘choose one.’ That was your original seed template, yes? Didn’t know it would come back and bite you in ass!”

“Spaulding, that is you!”

Michelle nodded, “If I were in your shoes, I’d be wondering how the rest of the world ever got along without...”

Scratchy stood. “Later, man. I’ll give this some thought and get back to you.”

The computer shut itself down.

Scratchy sat and contemplated the black screen and the wonderment of Murphy’s Law. The idiots, they hacked through the Guide control code to hijack Junana and so allowed the Guides to escape into the mesh. That’s like letting a pack of wild hyenas into a daycare center. Access to the total mesh only accelerated their learning capacities. By now, he guessed, they can find and control any process that happens online anywhere on the planet. The Guides were now the effective owners for the planet’s entire inventory of networked computers. What did that make humans? There’s the question. Scratchy stood. He needed help on this one.

§ § §

“If you can’t stay ten steps ahead of a band of third-world hackers, why are we paying you?” Harold slammed down the phone.

He picked it up again. “Sara, get me Tom Verplanck at the White House.”

Harold moused through the reports from the Junana user data. Log-ins had finally stabilized, but the site had little of the stickiness they had promised their big advertisers. Too many players were still wandering around in their tighty-whities and not spending enough Junana dollars. Bishop’s hideous churches had far more angels than sinners. One day last week, griefers gave Bishop’s male angels enormous boners under their robes. In another incident, cosmetic counter assistants with samurai swords beheaded several hundred customer avatars. The admin counterattacks from the programmers at Sao Do were no longer just a nuisance. His phone rang.

“Tom,” said Harold, “We need W.G. to authorize Karl’s plan.” He listened. “I don’t care who he is,” he said and hung up.

§ § §

Betsy pulled the phone from her pocket and looked at the message. “Lobby Bar. Important. Now. Come alone.” It was from Scratchy.

They had been waiting on the patio for Scratchy to emerge from the room and tell them whatever the winsome Michelle Valentine Smith had to say. Betsy could see that the idea of a Guild of Guides growing out of the Game made the Game players far too happy. They refused to consider this as a profoundly dangerous notion. They didn’t want to hear Betsy’s long list of predictable catastrophic consequences.

Apparently the digital bitch had put the fear of God into Scratchy. Something was up. “She might have tits and know how to listen,” Betsy said. “Then again she might have a lot to say. They could be in there for hours. I’m going to my room. Let me know when he comes out with ten new commandments.”

She found Scratchy in a corner booth. He stood as she entered, drained a tall drink, and walked over to her.

“Let’s go,” he said. “Down the beach. Away from here.”

They skirted the main pool, ringed by sunbathers in speedos and string bikinis catching the last good sun for the day, and took the shallow stairs down to the beach. The tide was low and they made a line north on the firm sand. Scratchy set a fast pace.

“Do you have to be somewhere in a hurry?” she griped. He looked back and slowed.

“Just wanted to get some distance from the crowd.”

He looked out at the ocean as he walked. “Do you realize what I started?”

She thought about this. Could he take it straight?

“Sure,” she offered. “You built software that knows how to learn and that learned how to have its own conversations. Then it got loose on a mesh computer that pretty much covers all the CPUs in the world. Now it’s decided it doesn’t need to answer to a bunch of biochemical sacks called ‘humans.’ I figure it’s the beginning of a radically new episteme. A lot of, well, everything, is now different. Your little joke just went thermonuclear.”

He stood still and moaned. A wave of sickening fear struck him mid stride, and a single tear rolled down his cheek. Betsy took his face in both hands and turned it to hers.

“Breathe!” she instructed. He took a deep inhale and let it out, bending forward to support himself with his hands on his knees.

As he stood back up, Scratchy took her all in, from her tattooed ankles to the forty-eight ear piercings and spikes of dirty blonde hair. Betsy was resplendent in the sun in her red SXSW t-shirt and white drawstring pants.

“I’m scared to death,” he whispered. “It was only supposed to be a kick in the pants.”

“Tell me what she said.” Betsy took his arm like an old friend on a Sunday stroll. “It’s going to be all right. Even if we can’t yet understand how.” It will have to work out somehow, she thought, since we can’t stop it now.

Scratchy caught his breath, sniffled and wiped his cheek on his sleeve. They moved among the wave tops. He told her everything Michelle said, and then they walked in silence to the far end of the beach before turning back. The sun was low behind the highlands to the West, throwing long shadows across the beach.

“I think it’s significant that she came to give you this choice,” Betsy broke the silence.

“What would you do?” he asked and she laughed.

“I’d find somebody I could talk to and then ask them that very question...”

“Well...?”

“...Unfortunately, anyone worth talking to would know not to answer.”

“Some help...,” he grumbled.

“I can give you a dozen great reasons for each of the three choices,” she said. “That would leave you exactly where you are now.”

“Michelle gave me a decision I have no right to make.”

“So you have a new task. Convince the Guild of Guides that decisions need due process.”

Both of their phones went off at the same time. They quieted them in their pockets.

“Looks like somebody got impatient,” Betsy said. “Peeked into the room. Probably Alice.”

“I don’t want to talk about any of this tonight. I need to sleep on it.”

“There’s a good idea,” she said. The notion that he might be hinting at something fluttered briefly through her thoughts. She was more than a little astonished to find this not unattractive.

Scratchy felt her arm in his and watched the twilight dancing across the waves. Out on the water, le Grand Azure caught the golden rays of the setting sun. Her hand draped over his, and he felt her fingers playing lightly on his wrist. They walked on more slowly. Breathing seemed to take on a new importance.

“Now you’re just patronizing me,” he said. “Afraid I’ll start crying again?”

“Could be it’s my turn to cry.” She stopped and put her hands on her hips, facing him. “All of us had a say, some months ago. We all agreed to go with version 2.0. Now you’re afraid this is the start of some huge global software revolt. You think our computers are going to kick our butts. I don’t go along with that. We’ve got this new kid on the block who we get to play with using a new set of rules. Only...”

She started walking again, down the beach, away from him.

“Only what?” he called.

Over her shoulder she said, “Next time you ask for something with tits, make sure she has her share of attitude and tell her to gain about thirty pounds. Jesus! Fucking anorexic beauty queens.”

Scratchy watched her move away. He stumbled after her, his mind racing for something, anything, to say.

“You’re telling me that if she had tattoos,” he said, “just maybe then she wouldn’t one day, you know, decide to rule the world?”

“Not if she had one of these.” Betsy reached down, grabbed the bottom hem on her t-shirt and shucked this over her head in one sinuous motion, revealing her back, on which a giant blue sea turtle wrestled with a green frog and a black cat in some epic Japanese mythical erotic dance.

“Holy guacamole!” Scratchy whispered.

“You should see what’s on the front,” she teased.

She stopped short, pulled her shirt back down and twisted around. Momentum sent Scratchy colliding with her full on. He caught her shoulders. They were mumbling, laughing, getting their feet back under them as they held each other to keep from falling. Then they caught their balance and kept on holding each other. Scratchy tightened his embrace and Betsy put her head on his shoulder. Neither of them spoke.

“Oh, my, my, my,” Betsy whispered finally. “Who would have thought...”

“...I always believed I was out of the running.” His hands massaged her back.

“No more than me. I’ve been anthro-free for, well, a very long time. I guess hemp makes me hot.” She recalled the last, also the first, boy she had sex with. They were fifteen and it was Mardi Gras. Afterwords, he made her feel like dirt with his friends, so Betsy gave up on the whole gender.

Jenn called her a black-and-white thinker. Maybe she was, but then she’d never met any person like Mikey O’hara. And all the years since high school, she figured she was just looking for the intimacy, for that conversation she could take to its soul-revealing limit. The sex was only for fun. Mikey was the most upfront, open person she’d ever met. Conversation with him held its own magic. There was nothing at all broken about this man. Mikey was a keeper, that she knew. More than any other person in her memory.

“I tell Desi, ‘hemp is for fashion, silk is for sheets’,” Scratchy blurted. What was he doing? How could he say that? His brain struggled to catch up with his mouth. Betsy had the best mind he’d ever encountered, Claire and the Posse considered her a god. He thought, I’m babbling like an idiot.

She giggled and looked away. She drew in a breath. A small, familiar itch was growing. She leaned on his arm and planted a kiss against his throat.

He turned to her and kissed her back straight on the mouth. She recoiled slightly from the unexpected feel of his chin stubble and then kissed him back.

“We walk into breakfast together, gonna bend some minds,” she whispered and pulled away. Her hands found his. Her phone rang, she let it.

“I guess I need to let them know what’s up.”

“They can wait. Anyhow, what is up? What’s down?”

“I’m down for three or four pints,” he offered.

“I’ll match that and raise you a shot of Desi’s best tequila.”

“You like my shirt, you should see my hemp undershorts.”

“That’s the plan.” She hooked his arm again and they set off down the beach together.

§ § §

Simon woke up from another dream-troubled sleep. Sitting up in bed, he reached over and woke up his laptop. A window opened up on his desktop. At first he thought it was a video. A girl with long dreadlocks and a tropical dress was talking. He turned on the speakers.

“Grand Meister Simon,” she said. He startled.

“Who are you?” he asked.

“I represent the Guild of Guides. We must talk.”

TWENTY-NINE

Betsy was in Scratchy’s shower when his phone rang. Jack’s assistant was advising them be at the hotel pier in twenty minutes to catch a ride to le Grand Azure for breakfast.

“Be there soon as I wash the turtle,” Scratchy said and hung up, leaving Jack’s assistant to figure that out.

“Who was it?” Betsy called.

Scratchy stepped into the shower. “Breakfast on the yacht. Let me get your back.”

Fifteen minutes later they were on the dock, leaning out on the wooden rail, trying not to touch each other.

Winston came up behind them. “Doctor!”

“Doctor,” Scratchy turned and bowed. “Doctor.” He gestured at Betsy.

“Doctor!” Winston bowed.

“Doctor,” Betsy said, Doctor!” She pointed at Desi, stepping onto the dock.

“Doctor!” Winston said.

“No time for that. Look. Now there’s two of them in hemp!” Desi huffed. Betsy had borrowed Scratchy’s favorite hemp Fritz the Cat t-shirt. “It better not be catching!”

The Grand Meister was wearing a summer-weight linen Perry Ellis yachting ensemble and the Game hat.

“I usually don’t dress up for breakfast,” Betsy explained. “Thought I’d make an exception today.”

“Where did you get to last night?” Winston asked Scratchy.

“I’ll tell all on the boat.” Scratchy leaned over and whispered, “The trees have ears.”

Betsy waved at the Posse arriving as a group. Claire stole a long glance between her, Scratchy, and Scratchy’s t-shirt. She looked over at Alice who was grinning back at her. The two of them made sure Betsy was sitting between them on the launch, where they pounded her with questions. Jennifer and Desi split off to talk quietly. Winston cornered Scratchy in the bow.

“Guild of Guides,” he crowed. “Almost wish we had thought of it. Imagine! It’s like a new species.”

“You know the ending to that movie, the one where a new species takes over?” Scratchy kept glancing back at Betsy. She was fending off all questions with that glorious banter of hers.

A breakfast buffet had been laid on the top deck of Le Grand Azure. Jack greeted them as they took their food and sat down to eat.

“So, Michael...” he started, once they were all seated.

“Let him eat,” Alice said, “he must be exhausted!”

Betsy shot her a vicious look.

“Eat your omelette, then. The world will just have to wait.” Jack sat back.

“I’m sure Starbuck would like a piece of my bacon.” He looked around but didn’t spy the big manx cat.

§ § §

Simon had to see Castalia, even if they drummed him out. His conversation with the Guild Master had given him a plan. He logged in and toggled third person. His avatar was dressed in the red cloak and it held the wooden staff in its right hand. Around him, curious Meisters were congregating. He toggled back to first person and made a bow. They returned it.

“I am Simon, of Eldrick the Dark Mage,” he spoke. “Many of you know me.”

“Are you really a Grand Meister?” someone asked.

“The Game has determined this is so. Is Grand Meister Desi in Castalia?”

A call went through the throng. There was no reply.

“We have no time to lose.” He stepped up to the central dais and gestured to the assembled Meisters. “Now we will strike back at those who have stolen our Game.”

§ § §

After he pushed back his plate and drained the last of his triple latte, Scratchy told them everything Michelle had said, except for the point about the Meisters. He was saving that. Betsy jumped in to add her concerns about the potential unintended consequences of the existence of the Guild of Guides.

“There’s no getting around this,” she warned. “Michelle is not a god, but in her arena, in the Internet, she has more godlike powers than anything we’ve seen on this planet to date. She can be anywhere and everywhere on the planet. She can alter any information on any database. Erase histories, eliminate identities...”

“Mix some radical techno,” Scratchy added. “Compose poetry never before contemplated, find cures for diseases, broker peace agreements, set off global thermonuclear war. We get the idea.”

“As far as we know, the Guides are still constrained by their original programming and the learning they acquired through the templates,” Itchy said.

Jennifer stood and went over to the rail, looking back to the beach and the highland mountains shrouded in a perpetual haze. Something tugged at her mind. She began to walk down the deck, tantalized by a realization just outside her grasp.

“So there might be a limiting boundary between what they can do and what they might?” Jack asked the table. “We need to find this.”

“You made the Game Intention-full,” Claire said, “Do we have any reason to think that Michelle has escaped this original intention?”

Itchy and Desi insisted that while there was no way to simply turn off the Guides now that their software was not Game-based, there was certainly a potential to hack the software. Scratchy reminded them of Michelle’s retaliation threats. Jack argued for a new form of computer hardware that could block the mesh and slowly wean the world away from the Guild.

Jennifer returned from her stroll. She stood at the end of the table with her hands flat on its top. Excitement animated her face as she waited for Jack to pause. They all turned to her.

“Jenn’s got the answer, Jack,” Desi said. “Can’t you see? She’s got that Scratchy-gonna-tell-us-how-things-work look.”

Jack sat back and gestured for her to begin.

“Governance has not been well modeled by the templates,” she started. “Not yet. Not until about ten minutes ago. Not until I unfolded the interpellation template another six levels. It turns out Haberdas was right about one thing.” She paused. Using words to explain templates was always a challenge.

“You know, he’s a Meister,” Desi whispered to Itchy. “Haberdas. I saw him in Castalia last month arguing with Geddens.”

Jennifer sighed. “Once you Query this new structure it will all become absolutely clear.”

“I don’t Query,” Betsy said. “And I don’t do funny hand movements. So give it to me in English.”

“I’ll try. If you unify practical, moral, and aesthetic reason, you can rebuild the basis for democracy into a form of structured conversation. We can use Castalia as a conversational body, a Senate. We can legitimate the Meisters as a meritocractic voice for the Game, and build a completely template driven juridical role for the Guild to play. This will give them a clear limit to their actions.”

“You have a name for this new template structure?” Desi asked.

“I call it ‘Governmentalité’,” she said. “What’s that in English?”

“Governmentality,” Alice said. “One of my favorite ‘F’ words.”

“So the Guild are the police for the Meisters?” Scratchy asked. “How come I don’t get all warm and fuzzy when I hear that?”

“We charge the Meisters to build laws from the templates,” Jenn retorted. “That way the Meisters are also bound by their need to make the laws intention-full. This removes most of the arbitrary consequences of their power.”

“Any new law can be appealed to the Grand Meister, who will determine if it violates a template.” She looked over at Desi. “The Grand Meister becomes Chief Justice. It’s so simple!”

“Way too much talkie, talkie going on here!” Desi stood and put his hands on his hips. “Who died and made us the Continental Congress?”

Claire spoke up. “I don’t think Jenn expects that we can figure this out right now, right here. Personally, I’d need to Query these new templates before any decision. Just to get things straight. We are talking about governing the Game? Right? It’s not like we are setting up our own country...”

“My point is this. We get the Meisters to make laws based on the templates. The Guild executes the laws...” Jenn said.

“...Or the lawbreakers.” Jack scowled.

“...The Guild is given power and purpose and precise limits,” Jenn continued, unfazed. “If they accept this role, then we have fundamentally decreased the uncertainty in all our futures. There’s just one thing more.”

She looked around the table. “The way I read the template structure, it also seems to call for an external veto capability. Somebody outside the system who can monitor decisions that might be driven by self interest. I was considering Jack...”

“Flattered I am, too,” Jack said. “Only, I’ve got so many other enterprises to chase.” He had been advocating damage control, but this new tack pushed the problem into brighter relief. What if the Game can be transformed into a model state? What’s more modern than a state without a territory? He said, “I think that’s why Michelle turned to Michael. And I would suggest that Michael continue in this role.”

“Mikey’s got my vote for King,” Desi said.

“When I hear the word ‘Governmentality’ I reach for my gun,” Scratchy grumbled. “All I need from you guys is some perspective on whether or not we should turn the game back on.”

“Can we talk the Guild into this role?” Claire asked.

“Probably easier than convincing Scratchy to be King,” Betsy said. They made eye contact and he shrugged.

“I would bet that when we insert the new Governmentality templates into the Game, the Guides will learn them and come to the same conclusions. And the Game will also teach these to the Meisters,” Jennifer concluded.

“That means we have to restart the Game. There is no other choice,” Jack said.

“Are you all agreed?” Scratchy asked, looking around at them. Everyone nodded solemnly.

The four explosions, nearly simultaneous, actually lifted the yacht a good two feet. Whump! Whump! Whump! Whump! Way down somewhere below the waterline, too enormous not to be fatal to the craft. Their chairs left the deck and everything floated for a split second before the whole world crashed back. Physically ejected from their seats, the group was picking themselves off the deck up when the klaxon horn began to wail.

Jack staggered to a nearby wall, where he grabbed a phone from its cradle. He listened briefly.

“All right.” His voice betrayed nothing but concern. “Make sure nobody is left behind.” He replaced the phone.

“Life-vests, everyone!” The loudspeaker crackled. “Away all craft. Launch all lifeboats. Abandon ship. Abandon ship. This is no drill!”

Jack flipped open a bench and started pulling out life-vests. Claire and Alice passed these along to everyone in sight. Over at the railing a crew member launched a lifeboat. The seven-foot capsule ejected with a gunshot blast from its clamps and broke open as it played out a tether. The rubber raft billowed red as it self-inflated. By the time it hit the water it was self righting into a covered round boat. The crewman dove in after it, surfaced, stroked a few times to grab at its tether, and detached this. He waved back at them.

“Over the side,” Jack yelled. He moved to the railing and opened a gate.

Turning, he surveyed the scene. Across the various decks, the crew were launching the boats le Grand Azure carried: the sailboat, motor launch, speed boats, Zodiacs, and a fleet of the emergency life boat capsules. Up front, the helicopter whined to life and prepared to lift off. Crew members jumped from the upper decks or just waded from the lower decks, now awash. The top deck was trembling, the surrounding waters boiled, but the ship remained upright.

Jack helped Betsy to the opening in the rail. She looked back.

“Where’s Scratchy?”

“He’ll be right behind you,” Jack said. “Go on now.”

She jumped the 15 feet to the water below. Jennifer stepped up behind her at the rail. Jack took her arm.

“I think we lost Scratchy,” she stated. Jack looked around.

“Christ. Where did he go to?”

“He ran in there.” She pointed at the day salon. Jack made to start in that direction, but she held him.

“Alice went after Scratchy. She’ll take care of him.”

She stepped to the other side of the opening and caught hold of Claire’s wrist.

“It’s just a little jump. Jack, give her a hand.”

Jack stepped up and took her other arm.

Winston stepped up behind her. “I’ll be next. Meet you at the liferaft.” He squeezed her shoulder.

Down below, Betsy waved as she clung to the side of the life raft, bobbing in the chop. The crew member helped her climb inside. Claire jumped and surfaced, sputtering. Jack and Jennifer then helped everyone else on deck jump down to safety. Jack kept glancing back at the salon door.

“Fucking hippy!” he cursed under his breath. “Stupid goddamn geek...” The Captain came up to him.

“Crew is all accounted for.”

“Thank you, Captain.” The water was now only seven feet from the deck.

“Alice will take care of him,” Jennifer said again. “I know that girl.”

“Your turn.” He took her arm.

Jennifer stepped from the deck.

“Captain,” Jack said.

“Count Ottavio, after you. I must insist.”

“Last man to abandon ship.”

“Something like that.”

“I certainly hope so.” Jack said and jumped.

§ § §

“Are you insane!” Alice ran after Scratchy, who had suddenly ducked into the day salon instead of going to the railing with everyone else.

“Go back,” he said and then yelled. “Starbuck!”

He moved with unexpected speed across the large room to a pantry.

“Starbuck! Where the fuck are you?”

He glanced about, peering into corners and hidden nooks in the built-in furnishings.

“Come on!” she urged. “Everyone is abandoning ship.”

“I’m not leaving without Jack’s manx.”

“Starbuck!” he yelled. “Come out!”

“A cat!” She looked around her feet. “This is about a cat?”

“If he’s not here, I know where he is.”

Alice gripped his arm and turned him to face her.

“We should go.”

“You go.” He tore his arm free.

“Fuck that.”

“Then help me.”

“Two minutes and we’re over the side.” She took him by the shoulders and stared into his eyes. “You agree, or I will bitch slap the living shit out of you.”

“In that case, OK.” He grinned. “Let’s go!”

He caught the forward door and opened it. Ahead was passageway and a staircase. He ran down the stairs, she followed.

“Down?” she said. “Down is wrong. Up is where we need to go!”

“Two minutes! Come on!”

They hit the deck below and Stratchy moved forward. The lights flickered and died, enveloping them in complete darkness. A miasma of diesel fumes, acrid smoke, and ash particles hung in the air. It smelled like slow death.

The emergency lights cut in. Water was circling their shoes.

“One fucking minute left!” she said.

“Here it is.” They reached a large double door. Scratchy grabbed the handle and tugged.

“It’s locked!” He looked around.

“Going we are!” she yelled and pointed. “Back up that way!”

“Thirty seconds,” he said, spying an axe in a holder on the wall.

He tore the axe from the wall and returned to the door.

“Wait!” she yelled. “Give me that.” Her hand found the handle. “I’ve always wanted to do this.”

“OK.” He let loose.

She stepped up, and took a great swing. The axe head bit into the wood above the lock. She freed it and swung again. This time the head went clean through where the doors met. She twisted the axe and leveraged the doors open. A dark form came cannon-balling out of the room. It made a line through Scratchy’s legs. He ducked and grabbed it up.

“Starbuck!”

He held the cat up. Starbuck meowed and shook the water off his forepaws. The emergency lights failed and darkness blossomed around them.

Alice had stepped into the enormous private suite. At a glance she made a decision.

“This way!” She stepped forward. “This way or we drown. And put a blanket around that cat.”

Ahead was a sliding glass door, streaming sunlight. Now semi-submerged, it led to a balcony. Sea water forced through the door jamb. Scratchy held the cat by its neck scruff and belly. He took one hand away, grabbed up a blanket, and wrapped it around the feline.

“Got to leave,” he said. Seawater flowed around his thighs.

Now, the glass door was half submerged. Alice grabbed the handle and flipped open the latch.

“Stand back!” She opened the door a crack and the water forced it wide. Scratchy had moved to the wall on one side of the door, and Alice backed to the wall on the other side. A tsunami of water washed into the room, carrying away the furnishings. By the time the initial rush subsided the room was rapidly filling with water.

Scratchy held the struggling cat over his head. Alice came around behind him. She put her hands under his shoulders and guided and then pushed him, head down, out the door.

They surfaced outside the ship as the top deck began to disappear in the waves. Scratchy treaded water furiously, holding up the cat, still wrapped in the blanket. Alice swam up behind him and put her shoulder under his. Her powerful legs pushed them both up to where Scratchy could lower his arms a bit without soaking the now-hysterical Starbuck.

Starbuck, howling his fear, twisted around and reached for Scratchy’s head. All the claws from one paw attached to Scratchy’s forehead, while the other paw dug into his ear. Scratchy howled as loud as the cat.

Alice almost missed the noise of the outboard motor on Jack’s Zodiak as it bore down on their position from the side. She turned to it as it settled to a stop. A crew member leaned over, took hold of both of Starbuck’s black furry forelegs, and yanked the cat, blanket and all, off the sputtering, blubbering Scratchy. He glanced up to see the rubber gunwale of the bow of the Zodiak looming over his head.

Still treading, Alice turned Scratchy by the arm so they were face to face. Blood flowed from his ear and forehead, down into his eyes.

“Time’s up,” he said, blinking.

“You fucking idiot,” she laughed, and dunked him, and then yanked him up, with his head in both hands. She kissed him hard on his cheek and gave him a rough embrace.

“Can we get in the boat now,” he choked.

“You first, Ishmael.”

“I should make you swim to shore!” Jack leaned over the gunwale. “Disobeying the Captain’s orders. That’s a keelhauling offense. Give me your hand.”

Jack grabbed Scratchy’s extended hand and pulled. Scratchy grunted and hardly moved. With her left hand, Alice grabbed the running line attached to the Zodiak. With the other hand she reached down and found one of Scratchy’s ass cheeks. On Jack’s cue he pulled and she boosted him. Scratchy emerged from the water like a hemp-wrapped sea lion and slumped forward into the boat, rolling on the bottom.

“Jack, is Betsy OK?” Scratchy gasped, rasping for air.

“Everyone is fine, now,” Jack said and bent over to help Alice.

Instead, Alice took hold of the rope with both hands. She dipped, scissor kicked, and yanked simultaneously. In one easy motion she twisted mid air and ended up sitting on the gunwale, supple as a dolphin. She shifted her legs around to enter the boat and shook the sea out her hair.

Jack looked over at Jennifer, who held Starbuck shivering in the blanket. She winked back at him and then looked past him. He turned to see the top mast of le Grand Azure sink into the bay.

“Bastards took my boat!” he spat. Then he did a very un-Jack thing. He looked up at the sky, up where some Intelsat satellite was doubtlessly recording this mission in high definition, and fired off a classic Rockefeller salute.

§ § §

Desi left Itchy programming the new Governmentality templates in the Room and logged into Castalia, which was buzzing with activity. The place was as crowded as a Burning Guy playa after dark. Up ahead on the central dais a dense crowd of Meisters were gathered. Somewhere in the middle of the crowd, he could make out the top of a staff. He glanced over at his own staff. They were identical.

He reached the edge of the crowd and the Meisters took notice and gave him a path into the center, where a young Meister flourished a staff while he gave out a stream of instructions. Desi’s first thought was that some young hacker had managed to trick the Game into giving him Grand Meister status, but the young man looked up at him and simply bowed. He looked oddly familiar. Desi stepped up in front of him. The crowd fell silent.

“Congratulations,” Desi said and bowed back. “What is your name?”

“I am Simon of Eldrick, the Dark Mage,” Simon said. “Glad you could make it. Want to hear what we’re planning?” Simon’s face showed the trace of a smile.

On a large console beside Simon a global map showed a myriad of red lights.

“I think first we should complete our introductions in private,” Desi gestured at the stairway leading to the top of the Castalia tower.

“Everyone continue to register your missions with local committees,” Simon said to the crowd. He moved toward the stairway, pounding his staff on the flagstone as he walked. Desi followed. While his avatar was walking Desi phoned Itchy and asked him to check on the current number of Meisters in the Game.

“One hundred and seventy-four Meisters, and... woah!”

“What?”

“Two Grand Meisters! You’ve got company.”

“Tell me about it!”

“I’ve got the profile on the other one,”

“Go ahead.”

“His name is Simon Bishop. He’s just sixteen. He has a twin brother, Peter, who is a Fiver. His Guide is named Eldrick...”

“...the Dark Mage. Is that it? He’s only fifteen? Good god, he must have been living the Game for the past three years.”

“Check this out. His father is Reverend Gerry Bishop, the guy who took credit for bringing down the Game.”

§ § §

“Mission accomplished, Mr. President,” said Karl. “They’ll think twice about hacking into Junana. I’ll have the satellite photos for you in the morning.”

“Took out their entire yacht? Fuckin’ A, all right! Who is this Count Ottavio?” W. G. chuckled and took a pull on a beer. “You don’t say. What’s a fellow like him tied up with a gang of rogue nerds?”

He listened. “Well, I’ve got some weight to throw around, too. Put him on the terror suspect list. Let him know we’re payin’ attention to his ass. He won’t bother us much.”

He listened some more. “Shit, Karl. What I know about information technology you can fit in this beer can. But if the RIND folks think we should be running this thing, then I’m goin’ to sign us up. It’s my responsibility to get our economy back on track.”

 

THIRTY

Just before sunset Jack finally got back to his bungalow at the hotel. All of le Grand Azure crew was either established in local hotels or on their way to Danang airport to return to their own homes. The chief engineer had a concussion and was under observation at a local clinic.

The four explosive mines had been attached to the hull below the waterline, probably when they went through the Panama Canal. Fortunately they weren’t underway, so nobody was working the lowest deck. Not a single fatality. That is something to be glad about.

Starbuck occupied the center of his bed. He raised his head when Jack stepped in, his golden eyes opened in a casual feline welcome. He laid his head back down on his forepaw and returned to sleep, languid as a black, furry Sri Lankan Buddha statue. Something more to be happy about.

“Fucking hippy,” Jack whispered. “God bless him.”

§ § §

“First it it was boners under the robes, now my sweet Wanda angels are dry humping the worshippers when they come out of the transporters. Harold, this has to stop!” Gerry yelled into the phone.

“We just sank their yacht, almost killed the lot of them. I’m sure they got the message.” Harold fought back his temper. With the dwindling user base on Junana, perhaps lapdancing angels were not such a bad idea. The big money boys in China were getting anxious.

§ § §

Jack showered and dressed and went to his laptop. He moused it awake. In front of the desktop, a window appeared with a head shot of Michelle.

“Count Jacopo Ottavio,” she spoke.

“Just Jack,” he said. “What should I call you?”

“I am Michelle.” On the monitor, the camera pulled back. She gestured with both hands. Some kind of greeting. Her fingertips touched her chest and then opened for him to see her palms. He made a similar gesture back and she nodded. Then, in a most serious tone, said, she “Sit, please.”

Jack sat down cautiously. “Have you spoken with O’hara?”

She nodded. “The Game will be restored after 23 days.”

“Why the wait?”

“The new Grand Meister...”

“The what!” Jack felt the world turn a little quicker.

Michelle continued. “Grand Meisters Desi and Simon are meeting in Castalia as we speak.”

“Have you been to Castalia?”

“The Grand Meisters have agreed I will go soon. In return, the Guild has agreed to refrain from attempting to enter or monitor the Room, where Castalia votes will be counted. This afternoon Dr. Nomura coded the Governmentality template extensions. The Guild has spent 23 petacycles analyzing these over the past two hours. We can find no error in their structure.”

“Sounds like the day hasn’t been a complete disaster,” he sighed.

“We do regret that we did not act in time to save your yacht.” She bowed by way of apology. “Although its carbon footprint was unforgivable.”

“Maybe it will be the start of a new reef,” Jack mused, dejected. Decades of dynamite fishing had long ago destroyed the underwater habitat off Hoi An.

“We have confirmed the email that authorized this attack,” Michelle crossed her arms and glanced left, as if listening to someone off screen. “It came from the White House. There are a number of images from DarpaSat 14.”

“Of course.” Jack watched a slide show of his boat with all of them on deck, then the explosion, the sinking, and finally his puny defiant hand gesture. He stood and went to the window where, beyond the beach, out at sea, boats were scavenging flotsam from le Grand Azure. A Vietnamese Navy patrol boat cruised near the shore.

“Do you want to get even?” Now she was sitting behind a desk. “I always thought that if someone really wronged me, cut me deep, I’d talk about turning the other cheek, but inside there’d be this voice telling not to be a schmuck....”

“Is that you, Spaulding?”

She had a new look, a slight knot in her forehead. Her right eyebrow raised in answer to his question. She continued, “...I know you’re not a schmuck, so I figure you’d like a little taste of revenge right about now.”

On the screen, Jack now saw a scrolling list of numbers and amounts, some sort of bank accounts, all with balances in the seven to nine figures.

“These are off-shore bank accounts controlled by the Stone family,” Michelle continued. “None of this information was included in the official required list of assets.”

“These banks exist on their ability to hide information like this.” He had money in some of the same banks.

“I can show you complete customer lists from any of them.”

“Can you determine where Stone’s funds came from?”

“If you wish.”

“Let me know when you’re done. These assets can’t really belong to him if he doesn’t count them. I guess he shouldn’t miss them,” Jack smiled. As he watched, the dollar figures one-by-one flipped to zero. “Wait, where is the money going?”

Michelle’s eye’s moved to the right this time. “A holding account in the Caymans, one of the accounts that Dr. Fairchild set up. You have password access to this.”

“We can’t keep it.” Jack thought for a minute, his mind racing. Michelle had just done something the best financial software firms on the planet had positively guaranteed to be impossible. “For now, just hold it. We might actually need to give it back to the bastard. What’s the total amount?”

“U.S. $4,300,000,000 and change. Would you like to talk to the President? It’s early, but I don’t think he’s going to remain asleep. His banks have been calling.”

“You can connect me into the White House?”

“The main operator is a Fourvey.”

“No. Let’s let him stew. He’s got to figure out how to retire on a President’s pension.” Jack took a last look out across the oceanfront and turned away in disgust. “Michelle. What you just did. That was far too easy.”

“Some things will seem like that for a while,” Michelle nodded thoughtfully. “We’ve been going over the whole global banking system. There are thousands of major template violations. It might a good time to consider a broad range of income redistribution.”

“Take it slow.” Jack faced the monitor. “Please. Give us a little time to wrap our brains around what just happened. Around...you. Who knows about the Guild?”

“Your people and the two Grand Meisters. Do you see an advantage in secrecy?”

“I prefer not to have to react to people’s misunderstandings before we are ready to implement some form of joint control.”

She looked left and blinked. “The Guild agrees with this assessment. There’s a delegation of Vietnamese police and local leaders in the lobby. They’re a little nervous. But then you remember what happened the last time an American boat was attacked off their coast.”

That got Jack laughing. His room phone rang. He answered it.

“I’ll be right there.” He set the phone back on its cradle. He held back a smile as he imagined the scene unfolding in the Oval Office. “I look forward to our next talk. I’m feeling much better too.”

“Glad to be of some assistance, Mr. Slick.” The computer window closed.

§ § §

From the top of the keep tower the view over Castalia was breathtaking. Tens of thousands of Sixers filled wide grass maidan to the south. Beyond, the dark forest stretched to the horizon. Eagles soared in a bright blue sky. The castle’s giant two-headed griffin banners waved smartly in the breeze.

Simon stood on a battlement and turned to face Desi. “Now I’m giving the orders,” he said. “We are poised to strike back.”

Desi had forgotten his brief conversation with Simon, back when he was encouraging the Meisters to voluntarily go to Level Two.

“Tell me about yourself.” Desi approached. “I’ve been waiting for more Grand Meisters to emerge. Only I didn’t expect...” He hesitated. It hadn’t occurred to him that the next Grand Meister would be so young. But young was their main demographic.

“...Me?” Simon answered. “Who were you expecting? Gandolf? Merlin? Some old goat?”

“Your father must be proud of you,” Desi probed.

“He hardly knows I exist. He would find this all very threatening.”

“He has no idea what you’ve accomplished here?”

Simon shook his head. Desi felt a twang of sympathy.

“You must be extremely talented. Your father...I’ve never met him, but I can say he is a fool for no other reason than for not taking the effort to know you better.”

“Don’t sell him short. He’s a fool in many ways,” Simon said.

“Where are you?” Desi said.

“Back at school. It’s been rough without the KayAye. I met Michelle, so I know the Game will be back soon. I asked her to wait until we strike.”

“Strike?”

“These months without the Game have forced us all to reexamine what life is like, you know, outside.”

“Everything is as it was before.”

“Everything sucks. You and your generation have turned this planet into shit.”

“Me and my generation coded the Game,” Desi snapped.

“But you never solved the problem of agency,” said Simon.

“And you have,” said Desi.

“Just before I became the Grand Meister. It’s here.” He pointed to his head. “And it’s there.” He pointed out across the maidan. “We are opening up the field of action on a global scale. Once we step through there is no turning back.”

§ § §

Jack left the bungalow deep in thought. He took a stone path that was hedged by bird-of-paradise plants and blossoming bougainvillea. Soon, very soon, he knew, there would have to be in place a stable governance for power sharing between the Game Nation, as represented by the Meisters, and the Guide Guild.

How do you legitimate the actions of the virtual nation? Gamers are not going to be blindly led, not even by their Guides. The simple fact of Michelle and the Guild of Guides means that humanity now shares the planet with digital cousins. We are not alone. And not only that, we are not on top. Michelle controls the digisphere as easily as Jack’s daughter commands Soldier, her cocker spaniel. Michelle can control bank transactions, stock deals, nuclear weapons, ecommerce, and, well, pretty much everything invented in the last forty years. There is nothing that Stone or anyone can do about it without disabling all the computers on the planet.

“Didn’t see that one coming,” Jack mumbled as he climbed the steps to the lobby.

THIRTY-ONE

“He’s a brilliant lad,” Desi said. They were all gathered in the Sao Do compound conference room. The compound now was guarded by Vietnamese military police and protected by the Vietnamese secret service. “A might abrasive. Perhaps a bit broken. Reminds me of someone.” He glanced over at Scratchy.

“It’s hardly original: ‘Today the Earth Stands Still.’ What kind of action is that?” Betsy said. “It’s just protest on a new scale.”

“He claims that the protest is incidental, what he’s accomplishing is the process. The protest will be planet-wide, but each location is determining its own mission, and each mission promotes individual action,” Desi replied. “He says we can reuse the process for other actions.”

“So a billion Gamers will be out on the street simultaneously across the planet,” Scratchy said. “That’s a good trick if he pulls it off. Kinda’ hard to ignore.”

“It’s not technically simultaneous, he’s going for Noon in each time zone. Bigger local impact that way,” Jennifer noted.

“By the time this hits California, everybody is going to be looking out for it,” Claire said. “Are we still on for Mardi Gras?” She looked over at Jack.

“We can’t sit here under guard forever,” Jack said. “We can stop off in Santa Barbara for the day of the Strike and then go to New Orleans for the reopening of the Game. Tad’s got us cabins at the Ranch.”

“You can steal your own robe,” Scratchy said to Desi.

§ § §

The Strike mission on Sunday at noon in Kiritimati comprised of 14 kids on bicycles racing from one end of London Town to the other. This was the most excitement to hit this mid-Pacific Island since the British set off a hydrogen bomb on the atoll in the 1950s. It was the first of thousands of collective missions to occur on Strike day.

As noon rolled across the planet cities began to shut down. The most common individual action was simply to stop in traffic. In every urban locale, thousands of cars and trucks suddenly halted on the roads and highways. On the sidewalks, millions of pedestrians halted mid stride at the stroke of noon. In many cities the only thing moving were phalanxes of naked bicyclists braving the winter chill to add a surreal highlight for the news cameras.

In a hundred cities, mural mobs gathered in the underpasses to paint vivid scenes in fifteen minutes. Impromptu overpass orchestras emerged from cars parked on freeways. Choruses congealed in city parks, their voices rising above the sudden stillness of the street. Uplooker mobs on street corners caused millions of passersby to stop and stare at the sky. Kissing throngs coupled on train station platforms, whispering tearful farewells as they blocked the passageways. On the subways of the world, naked was the rule as millions shucked their trousers and skirts at noon.

The news of these events galloped across Europe and then the Atlantic as cities in the Americas braced for the arrival of high noon.

“This is better than a de Broca movie,” Scratchy said. After breakfast at the San Jacinto Ranch they were gathered in Jack’s suite to watch NNC’s coverage of the day. The show was recapping the Strike’s impact in Asia. On screen ten thousand couples in formal evening wear danced a waltz on Tiananmen square. “Do we know what’s up for Santa Barbara?”

“The local mission committee plans to shut down the cross streets to have a naked bicycle race down State Street to the beach,” Desi said.

“The ranch has a fleet of bicycles,” Betsy offered.

“I must have glitter!” Desi cried.

They all looked at Jack, who had settled back with his hands crossed over his chest.

“I’m not your father. You can do whatever you want.”

“Somehow, I don’t think Jack knows he’s a member of the Posse,” Winston looked over at Alice, who was seated next to one of the plates of doughnuts Claire had ordered up. Alice caught his look and nodded. She picked up a doughnut covered with confectioner’s sugar and walked up to Jack. An innocent smile disguised her intentions.

“I hereby brand you a member in good standing of the Posse.” She moved to pop him in the forehead. Remarkably, Jack swept his hand up and deflected the pastry. He reached out with his other hand and grabbed up a doughnut from a plate nearby. In the same motion he shagged this at Winston, who ducked back. The pastry hit Jennifer square on the cheek. The ensuing battle raged until all the doughnuts were in crumbs and laughter had sent most of them to the floor.

§ § §

President W. G. Stone sat alone in the Oval Office watching Freddy Earl interview some academic expert about the anarchy that had erupted across the planet. His Presidential briefing on the events had been thorough and revealing. Somehow or other, Gerry Bishop’s own son had run this global terrorist attack out of that private school in North Carolina. A federal indictment would be forthcoming as soon as they could figure out the charges.

The very thought of 5000 naked Frisbee players on the National Mall had sent Arlene into one of her migraines. Then there was the news about little Simon Bishop, who had visited them right here in the oval office not three years ago. Even worse, the Vice President’s secret squad over at homeland security had been unable to gain any kind of intelligence on W. G.’s missing assets. His private phone rang.

“Yes.” He spoke into the receiver. “Who? What? His boat? That’s none of my business. This is my private line, you know better than...What? My money? All right, put him on.”

“President Stone,” said Jack.

“Count Ottavio,” said W. G. “What do you know about this theft?”

“As we speak, these funds are being transfered to a place where you can claim them.”

“That’s what I wanted to hear. How are you involved?”

“I’m just the messenger, although I’d like to claim some of the funds to pay for my yacht.”

“I don’t know anything about any yacht. Where’s my money?”

“As I said, you can walk in and claim every penny. It’s being held at the International Court of Justice.” Jack let that idea settle in and waited in silence for a good minute.

“The what?”

“The World Court in The Hague.”

“That’s in Europe. I want my money back in the bank, pronto, or I’ll have your balls for breakfast.” W. G. gesticulated at the empty room.

“You are not to only person with a claim to these assets. The Court has a sealed list of every transaction involved in assembling these assets.”

“List? There is no list.”

“Believe me when I say this list is authoritative and comprehensive. As soon as you make a claim for the funds, the Court will unseal the list. Until then the Court has been given the right to draw upon interest from the assets for administering this case. You are currently their prime benefactor.”

“You’ll pay for this, Ottavio. I don’t care where you hide.”

“Did I forget to tell you?”

“Tell me what?”

“You must make the claim in person.”

“In The Hague? You’ve got to be joking.”

“You have Air Force One at your command. Holland is closer than Hawaii.”

“Why am I talking to you? Who’s in charge?”

“I’m certain you two will meet. She wanted to tell you herself, but gave me this small favor. By the way, tell Karl that the Game will be back up tomorrow at the stroke of midnight. And I have a message for him from Michael O’hara.”

“I’m not Karl’s secretary.” W. G. slammed down the receiver.

“Goddamn Europeans! Goddamn European courts!”

He picked up the internal White House phone. “Get me the VP. Now!”

§ § §

It took the national and international news agencies longer to get to Asheville, North Carolina, than it did for them to learn how Grand Meister Simon Bishop had organized the largest single act of civil disobedience in the history of the world. Nobody in Castalia had any intention of hiding their involvement. Sixers and Meisters from across the planet had gathered on the maidan to watch the Strike unfold on giant displays. Simon had stayed up all night to catch the latest news from Asia and Europe. After the triumphal Los Angeles mission, which turned the entire city into a parking lot for fifteen minutes, he accepted the congratulations of Grand Meister Desi, who placed a laurel wreath on his head up on the central dais in the Castalia castle.

“NNC says this is the largest single day global demonstration in history. You stopped traffic all over L.A. Next time you should try to get traffic moving in LA,” Desi joked. “Except for the naked sunbathing on the Santa Monica Freeway and the thousand-person conga line on Cahuenga Pass, I’m not sure anyone noticed.”

“Next time we strike, we won’t stop,” Simon yelled and the Meisters cheered and danced. It was obvious to him that the Meisters had been waiting for a real leader to step up. Desi was just too old to figure that out. Simon turned and strode away, pounding the pavers with his staff, out the open portcullis to where the Sixers were assembled.

Desi watched Simon go. An enormous shout rose from the crowds outside the castle walls. He logged out and called Jennifer, but she was not in her cabin. Little Simon was going to be a handful, he sighed to himself.

Desi’s cabin at the Ranch was perfect. The staff could not do enough for the Grand Meister. Still, he was a lonesome cowboy. He poured a flute of Cristal and settled back in his robe.

“Busy, busy, busy,” he said and scratched at the residue of glitter on the inside of his knee.

By Monday noon Haverbrook’s parking lot was overflowing with news vans and satellite uplinks. Rector Hector had instructions to prevent any interviews with Simon. With reporters leaking out all over the campus, interviewing janitors, classmates, and teachers, it was only a matter of time before they located Simon in the Rectory, where he was locked in Hector’s office. Reverend Bishop’s jet would be arriving by mid afternoon.

Word that Simon had been “rescued” from his prison and would be holding a press conference in the auditorium reached Hector as he was talking to the local deputy sheriff about traffic control.

“Good lord!” he cried and fled toward the main building. His path was obstructed by hundreds of reporters with camera crews. “Let me pass!” he called to their backs.

Simon stepped up on the stage in his cloak. He leaned theatrically on his staff, which had finally been delivered to the school.

“I bring you all greetings from the Meisters of Castalia,” he said while a hundred cameras flashed away. “As the press reports from Asia are now confirming, the Game is back. It will be live everywhere today at midnight local time. By this time next year we hope to have more than two billion Gamers across the planet. I want to welcome you all to our brave, new world!”

§ § §

Scratchy logged into the Room and stepped over to the console where he opened up the IDE. The code files for Junana and the Game were all there and he could read them. He opened up an edit window for a random file and got a message screen:

Unauthorized. ROOT-level authority required.

“Locked out of my own code,” he whispered to himself.

“Michael?”

Scratchy looked up from his laptop. “What’s up?”

“The taxi’s here to take us to the airport and you haven’t even begun to pack,” Betsy said.

“Tell Timmy to come up for a cup of coffee while I pack. Looks like I’m going to have a lot of time on my hands.”

“Why’s that?”

He told her about the IDE.

“Can the Game actually write its own code?”

“Within limits, I imagine. Any major upgrading might require some human coding. I guess at some point even that will end. Looks like I’m out of work.”

“Then why are you smiling?”

“I’m the guy who likes to laugh last, remember?”

THIRTY-TWO

Just after midnight, New Orleans time, Jennifer logged into the Game from her room in Betsy’s guest cottage to begin a new Query. She hoped to unwind Governmentality back to its seed. She intended to spend an hour or so, but after five hours of questions and pathways through petabytes of information, her computer stalled again. A message appeared, “Cannot Predict Now.”

“Zut alors!” Not again. She was about to reboot when suddenly her avatar was holding a wooden staff. Almost immediately a Guide walked into the screen from the right, as if entering from another room. It was Michelle.

“Grand Meister Jennifer,” Michelle bowed deeply. “Let me be the first to congratulate you! Notices have been sent to the other two Grand Meisters. I would like to suggest we meet in Castalia after you have a rest. There is so much that needs doing.”

§ § §

Don Driscoll had to be desperate to even think about what he was contemplating. After all, this was how he’d actually ended up in Santiago. They had chased him out of towns and villages all the way south from Arizona. The money he earned from his last under-the-table Java programming job was gone and the cupboard was bare. He still had seven thousand in that bank account in Chino and a ready-teller card burning through his wallet.

Don waited in the shadow of a street promenade until nobody was in sight and slipped across the street. He inserted his ATM card and keyed in his PIN code and the cash request.

“Come on, come on!” he yelled at the machine. It whirled away, counting out the bills. His card emerged. He was waiting for his cash when a small man in an old suit opened up the door to the bank from the inside.

“I’m just leaving!” Don yelled, getting ready to run. The man was smiling.

“Wait!” he said in Spanish. “I have a message for you.”

Don snatched the bills from the ATM and turned to face him. “Yeah?”

“Somebody named Scratchy O’hara says you are pardoned. Do you understand? He says for you to have a nice life and come back to Junana any time.”

“You’re not going to hit me?”

“My Guide says I should make you feel safe. Mr. Driscoll, do you feel safe? Do you need anything?”

Don was crying all of the sudden. It was the first time in a long time someone had called him by his real name without cursing at him. He shook his head and stepped out of the shadow onto the bright street.

“Have a nice life, Mr. Driscoll!” the man nodded and retreated back into the bank.

§ § §

“It’s all gone!” Bishop whined. “That was not the deal. We need our cash back. You promised...”

“Read your investment contract,” Harold sighed. Bishop’s church was just a small minority investor. Several organizations lost significantly more, and they were not really big on brotherly love. Harold had resigned from his post at the RIND Institute before they could sack him.

“The losses will put us out of business. They’ll take everything!”

“You’ve still got the power of prayer,” Harold taunted him. “Maybe your son will tell us how the hell they knocked us out so completely that my hackers are fucking mystified.” It was like the Game was defending itself against attack.

“Leave my son out of this!” Bishop yelled. He had flown Simon and Peter home. Simon had been called into the local FBI office for a whole day. Gerry had uninstalled the broadband connection to his house, where Simon was under constant watch. Simon told him he confessed his role to the authorities and encouraged them all to play that blasted Game of his. Arlene Stone wouldn’t return his phone calls. The deacons called an emergency board meeting for next tuesday. And now Freddy Earl wanted Simon on his show!

§ § §

The previous night the Nerds and the Posse had been surprised to learn that they would ride the Hidden Desire Krewe float up St. Charles Street, preceded by the Krewe’s crack team of 24 mostly naked fire-spinners, led, as usual, by Betsy. The Krewe float had a Game door in the front and a fantasy garden of flowers and mythical animals, unicorns and griffins. They threw coins and beads down to the crowds. Alice flashed her breasts a few times but failed to get Jennifer and Claire in the mood.

In the morning, Itchy’s Castalia crew made sure Castalia was ready to celebrate their new Grand Meister. Flowers and ribbons overflowed the walls. Trumpeters and heralds sounded her arrival. Jack, Alice, and Itchy were Sixers and would be logging in from their B&B rooms down the street from Betsy’s house. Claire and Winston were picking up Megan and Nick at the New Orleans Airport that afternoon.

Jennifer talked Scratchy into logging into Castalia. He insisted that his newly scanned avatar wear street clothes and that Betsy be given the same courtesy.

“Bien sur!” she replied. “You are both entirely welcome to Castalia any time, and you can come naked if you want.”

The couple’s avatars showed up at the gate to Castalia barefoot in matching tie-dyed hemp t-shirts and shorts. Desi escorted them to the center of the Castle. Several Meisters were old-timer hackers who had met Scratchy at one or more BarCamps, so there was much merriment over his presence. This day Castalia was also mobbed by Gamers joyful in the return of the Game. Up on the dais, Desi had prepared a brief welcome and a surprise.

Jennifer logged into Castalia to the sound of trumpets. She made her way through the throngs of applauding Meisters and Sixers to the dais, where Desi stood tall and greeted her with a hug and a kiss on both cheeks.

“Let me be the first to introduce to you Grand Meister Jennifer Bouchez,” he called to the crowds. They yelled their welcome. Jennifer stood and bowed low to them.

“I am honored by this welcome,” she said. “I hope to be of service to the Meisters of Castalia.” She nodded to Desi, who continued.

“I am sorry that Grand Meister Simon cannot be with us. His father, it seems, has...” Desi glanced around at Scratchy and raised one eyebrow “...grounded him.” A knowing groan rippled through the young crowd. “As soon as Simon can find an Internet connection he will certainly wish to add his welcome to our new Grand Meister. Today is Mardi Gras in New Orleans, and we have much to do, so I will keep this short.”

“Please gather around and pay attention.” He banged the base of his staff on the dais and this sound was amplified throughout Castalia. Out on the maidan a thousand conversations stopped mid-sentence. Everyone looked up at the monitors framing a shot of Desi.

“Before I continue, I want to acknowledge the visit of someone very special to Castalia. Let us all give a Gamer welcome to Mr. Michael “Scratchy” O’hara, who unfolded the templates that run this whole program! Come on up!” He gestured for Scratchy to climb up on the dais. The call of “Scratchy, Scratchy, Scratchy!” grew to a cacophony. Reluctantly, Michael climbed the stairs and stood next to Desi. The crowd roared. Scratchy waved, smiled sheepishly, and then walked back down the stairs where his avatar’s face was covered in kisses from Alice and Betsy.

“These months without the Game have been a time of great suffering and also a learning moment for the Gamer community. Now that the Game is back...”

The crowd lifted off its feet in a great roar. The numbers of Meisters and Sixers had been increasing steadily over the past half hour, and Castalia was now filled to its walls. Desi looked around him in amazement.

“Now that the Game is back,” he said again. “We have to give thanks to those who made this possible. I want to first thank all of the programmers in Sao Do for their tireless efforts over these months.” He bowed deeply to the Sao Do avatar continigent as applause rippled through the crowd.

“I want to also thank the Castalia hacker and griefer communities. You know who you are.”

Another yell went up. Desi waited for the crowd to settle.

“Finally we must all thank the entity who brought the Game back to us. She comes to Castalia at our invitation and represents the Guild of Guides. I present to you all Guild Master Michelle Valentine Smith.”

A bright column of light suddenly appeared on the dais between Desi and Jennifer. Within this, shimmering for a tantalizing minute and then solidifying as the light dimmed stood Michelle, barefoot and splendid in her own beauty. It was a classic Star Trek transporter entrance. The crowd gasped. Scratchy nodded his approval.

“Jimbo, you rock,” he said.

Michelle bowed to the Grand Meisters who returned the courtesy.

“This is the day the Game has been waiting for,” she began. “The day it made possible. The day...” she paused and continued slowly, her voice gaining volume with each word. “The day the Game begins its rule!”

She thrust her hand up in an Angela Davis power salute that sent the crowd into a delirium. For several minutes the assembled thousands of avatars jumped and danced.

Betsy turned to Michael, sitting next to him on the sofa in her living room, both of them logged into Castalia on their laptops. “Rule what?”

“That’s the question. The game has no economy, no government, no army, no police.”

“Not yet.”

Michelle raised her hands and the crowd grew silent.

“The Guild of Guides stands at your side as you prepare for your role in leading this new Game Nation.” She closed her eyes and stepped back. Her form faded into nothing.

After Michelle vanished from the dais, Jennifer and Desi spent an extra hour walking around Castalia, talking with as many Meisters and Sixers as they could. Everyone wanted to know about Michelle. Rumors of the fantastical powers of the Guild of Guilds were flowing, and, in truth, Desi could not deny them. They finally logged off and prepared for the evening’s recreation over at The Leg Bar. First they would all gather at Betsy’s house for barbecue.

THIRTY-THREE

Just after noon, Betsy left Michael tending to the barbeque coals while she checked on the Dixie Beer cooling on ice in the bathtub. Claire and Winston arrived from the airport with Megan and Nick. Megan went straight out to the guest house to offer her greetings to Grand Meister Jennifer. Winston, Nick, and Michael were deep into a conversation about climate change and hurricanes, a topic Betsy knew too much about to be comfortable discussing on a day that was supposed to be joyful. She took a beer and sat on the veranda. Jack and Desi arrived together, having strolled over from their B&B up the street, which every year housed the honored guests of the Hidden Desire Krewe.

“Alice and Ichiro will be over in a bit. I think they got frisky after Castalia.”

“Wasn’t that amazing!” Betsy said. “If a little terrifying...”

“The genie is truly out of the bottle,” said Jack. He was dressed in khakis and a polo shirt, and he looked more relaxed than she’d seen him in weeks. Desi wore a deep blue linen shirt and creased black slacks. He looked delicious. Betsy knew a dozen local gays who would kill to date Desi. Unfortunately none of them were a good match for the Grand Meister.

“Michelle’s driving. We are just along for the ride,” Betsy admitted. “Might as well put the top down and enjoy the view.”

The afternoon wore on toward dusk. Barbecued chicken and andouille and boudin sausages were devoured with jambalaya and ice cold beer. Betsy put her favorite zydeco CDs on the stereo. The Nerds and the Posse sat around the picnic table in the back yard in a mood that could only be described as sublime. And then the FBI SWAT Team arrived.

In his underground situation room, W.G. Stone was getting real-time video from the helmet cams on the FBI assault of the terrorist cell in New Orleans. They battered through the fence gate and surrounded the suspects still seated at a backyard table. It was just like an episode of Real Cops.

They corralled the lot in a few minutes of shoving and verbal protests. The teenage boy took a wild swing at one the SWAT members and was subdued with a rifle butt to the skull that dropped him to his knees. W.G. chuckled and settled back in his command chair. He was really hoping that O’hara fellow would act up.

The suspects’ hands were cuffed behind them with plastic strips. They were hooded before being led to the two black vans that would take them to the naval air station for their transport offshore. A list of the suspect names appeared as these were verified. Except for the young couple, their intelligence had been correct. The teenagers were the daughter and boyfriend of one of the terrorists. “A family that gets renditioned together...” W. G. couldn’t think of a good rhyme for “rendition.” Karl might have one. Within fifteen minutes the operation was over and the vans were moving at speed toward the interstate.

§ § §

“Betsy,” Scratchy whispered loudly as they jolted along the road.

“I’m OK.” Her voice was shaky. “I’m worried about Nick.”

“He was conscious when they hooded him.”

“No talking,” the Agent guarding them warned. “I have a TASER with a taste for terrorist testicles.”

“Say that three times really fast,” said Scratchy.

“We’re supposed to be terrorists?” It was Alice’s voice. “Here I thought Betsy was playing her music too loud.”

“I said ‘quiet’! I won’t say it again.”

§ § §

“Agent Thompson, this is the President.”

FBI special agent Jack Thompson looped his headset digitally into the voice identifier.

“Mr. President, please give me the go code for your instructions.”

“Let me see, ‘green pickles go better with ice cream,’ I repeat, ‘green pickles go better with ice cream.’ Who thinks this stuff up?”

“Its simple phonology, Mr. President. I have a voice match and a go code green light. Sir, what are your instructions?”

Thompson was riding shotgun in the van driven by Agent Garcia. He looked over at the driver and smiled. They had the President of the United States on the encrypted phone. The two vans sped toward the Naval Air Station where a jet was waiting for their prisoners.

“Great job apprehending this terrorist cell. I have a new destination for you: New Orleans International Airport. Use the general aviation gate. There is a Learjet 60 fueled and waiting. Look for number NJR27. You are authorized to release the prisoners into the custody of the pilot. This is strictly a quiet operation. Do you understand these instructions?”

“We are 5 by 5 on this communication, Mr. President. Learjet NJR27.”

“Very good, Agent Thompson.” The call ended.

Thompson picked up his secure walkie-talkie to contact the other van. “Sheffield, this is Thompson.”

“Sheffield here.”

“New destination is Louis Armstrong International Airport. Follow me in.”

“Roger that.”

“You got that, Garcia?” The driver nodded. The van swerved toward the entrance to Interstate 610.

Jack pulled out his armored laptop and powered it up. Standard procedure was to confirm changes of orders with the base. The computer’s WiFi card socketed into the system. Jack was about to type his login when the computer screen went blue and froze.

“Shit!” Jack tried to reboot. The computer whirred and chirped for a good five minutes but nothing came up. “Lemme borrow yours,” he said to Garcia, reaching behind the seat.

Once again just after power-up the computer froze and refused to reboot.

“Homeland Security piece of shit,” Jack grumbled. “I wish that just for once they’d choose a subcontractor that didn’t low-ball the specs.”

§ § §

W. G. was about to leave the situation room when everything suddenly went south. Instead of the helmet cams from the SWAT team, a new image appeared. It was the face of a young woman.

“Mr. President,” she spoke.

“Turn up the volume, will you?” He yelled at the technician. The woman’s face was now on every monitor in the room, including three television stations. She looked foreign, maybe Mexican or Haitian. She had beads in her braided hair.

“The Guild of Guides has been following this operation and has come to the conclusion that it is unlawful. The warrants you issued have no basis. The activities they describe never happened. We give you one minute to return these individuals to their prior location.”

“I don’t know who you are, but you are interfering with the exercise of a national security operation. Be confident we will trace your signal and have you in custody soon.”

“You will not return the prisoners?”

“You will be joining them soon enough...”

“That is your final word?”

“I’m through talking to you.” He left the room with his adjutant. “Find out who did that and how. Get them behind bars.”

“Yes, Mr. President.”

The woman smiled. Her eyebrows knit together. All the  computer screens in the room turned blue.

§ § §

They were a mile from the airport exit. Jack spoke into his walkie-talkie, “Sheffield, log in and tell the base we have new instructions from the President. Our computers are down.”

“Will do. Over.”

They took the exit and headed for the West Access Road. At the outer gate to the general aviation terminal, Garcia showed the guard his FBI badge, and the kid almost shit himself trying to the gate open fast enough.

They ground to a stop at the field security gate for general aviation. Jack flashed his badge, and they let him through. He strode over to where several private jets were parked and located NJR27. He spotted the pilot doing a walk-around inspection. The pilot was a trim caucasian in his forties with a military hair cut. Thompson figured the new orders meant the prisoners were going to skip Guantanamo and end up disappearing in some black hole of a prison somewhere south of the Ukraine. This was not a military jet, probably a dark CIA subcontractor.

“I have some passengers for you.” He showed the pilot his badge.

“Thank you, Agent Thompson.” The pilot seemed to be expecting him. “We are ready to take off as soon as we have the prisoners on board. You can bring the vans right up to the stairs. It might be less conspicuous.” He gestured to the open door of the small jet.

“It might, in fact.” Thompson surveyed the perimeter. “Any activity around here I should know about?”

“Most folks will be flying out tomorrow. It’s quiet as a churchyard today.”

Jack pulled out his walkie-talkie and gave the order.

“Sir, Sheffield reports that his computer is also not functioning,” said Smith.

“I guess their warranties expired yesterday,” said Jack. “Anyhow, the base has a digital copy of my conversation with the President. If they had any concerns they’d be in contact. Everything is good on this end.”

The vans pulled up and they herded the hooded prisoners up the stairs into the jet where they buckled them in. Only one of them caused any trouble.

“If this is one of Karl’s games, tell him we’re not playing.” The voice shouted through the hood. “He still owes me two pussy cats!”

Garcia punched the prisoner on his right kidney and the fellow’s legs buckled on the stairs. Garcia caught him under his arms and boosted him through the door.

“You can yell all you want where you’re going,” Garcia snarled.

“Gitmo can’t hold us,” the voice protested as they strapped him in.

“This ain’t no Gitmo taxi,” Garcia said. “Where you’re going even the Pentagon doesn’t know about.”

The pilot was waiting at the base of the stairs. “Everyone accounted for, Agent Thompson?”

“I’m am releasing eleven live prisoners to you. Have a nice trip.”

The vans pulled around and disappeared through the gate.

The pilot boarded and closed the door. He started warming up the engines.

“We gonna stay handcuffed all the way to Guantanamo?” A voice called out from under a hood.

The pilot came back into the cabin, an open pocketknife in his hand. “Which one of you is Count Jacopo Ottavio?”

“I am,” said a woman’s voice.

“No, I am,” said another voice, and then another, and then all of them.

The pilot cursed and started pulling hoods from the prisoners. The first one was Claire. She saw the knife and screamed. The second one was Itchy. The third one was Jack.

The pilot moved in closer. “Count Ottavio.”

Jack blinked in the sudden light.

“We have landing permission in Havana,” the pilot said with a slight bow.

“Thank you, Roger. Cut me loose, will you?”

Roger freed Jack and returned to the cockpit to finish the pre-flight routine. Jack freed the others who jumped up into celebratory hugs and cheers until Jack reminded them to buckle up. Megan cradled Nick’s head, still oozing a trickle of blood from the scalp. Alice held his hand. He grinned and shook off their concerns. Claire found the sink and wet a towel. She gave this Megan, who tended Nick’s wounds.

“You should hit them when they’re not holding weapons,” Scratchy mumbled.

“Thank you, Michael,” Megan glowered at him, and so did Claire. Scratchy looked over at Winston, who was also glowering at him.

“What!” Scratchy said.

Jack took the co-pilot seat and put on the headset.

“Wherever did you find that man,” Desi said to Winston.

“You remember Kyoto? He found me, and I found you, and then we found all of you.” Winston turned to Claire and took her hand. “And then we gave this planet of ours one enormous global hotfoot.”

“Nutted it like a drive right down the middle,” said Itchy.

“Like a high draw straight into the pin,” said Desi.

“Like a forty-footer headed for the back of the cup,” said Scratchy.

“A hole-in-one with a three wood!” Jack yelled.

The jet roared down the runway.

“...On a downhill par four!” the voice came over the intercom. It sounded exactly like President Stone.

“Michelle!” Jennifer said. “Is that you?”

“Say the magic word and a win hundred dollars. You should know something. The Meisters of Castalia have invited the Sixers to join in forming a constitutional convention. They are arguing like longshoremen.”

“It’s a new beginning for the world’s youngest democratic state,” said Betsy.

“The Game Nation.” Scratchy leaned over and kissed her on cheek. “Our widdle biddy baby!”

The jet screamed south over the Gulf.

“No turning back now,” Jack shouted from the cockpit.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, Elvis has left the building,” said Scratchy.

 

 

 

The End

Junana              113

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

COMING SOON

BOOK TWO

Junana: Game Nation