head, but by the time we've descended ten floors, I've lost track of my orientation.
We descend another five or six floors before I hear the hollow moaning of the worm outside the building. Directly below me, the beast cuts the building in half, deleting floors thirty-five through fifty-one. What remains of the top half of the building still floats in the air as if the deleted section was still holding it up. Past the blackness, three Level Zeros look back at me in horror from the lower floors. I stand with Cyren and two others, the rest of the group swallowed. Gone. Their existence erased.
Cyren's fists clench. The other two Level Zeros look at me with a panicked sadness, but we don't have time to mourn. We don't have time to remember our fallen comrades. We need to survive.
“Grab on to me,” I shout, holding out my arms.
There's a moment of confusion, but I thrust my hands toward them. They fumble, but eventually find a tight grip on my trench coat. I step off the deleted staircase and activate my Anti-Gravity Belt. The weight of all four of us still pulls us through the black at an accelerated rate, but the belt gives us enough pause to tumble on to the staircase below unharmed. We waste no more time and run down the rest of the stairs as fast as we can. I hear the worm pass overhead a few more times, devouring the rest of the rooftop and the remaining upper floors.
When we erupt from the doorway into the underground parking lot, half of the area is gone. A row of cars and trucks idle near the gate, packed full of civilians, but not as many as there were before. I can see a look on their faces that must be mourning. It deepens when they see only seven of us running toward them.
I don't have time to explain anything. I swing myself into the bed of a pickup truck and Cyren joins me. As soon as the other Level Zeros find a vehicle I shout, “Move!”
The tires squeal as each vehicle launches up the ramp, turning on to what remains of the street. I tell them to head east, toward the ocean, while I watch the worm continue its ruthless decimation of the city behind us. I can't look away, but when I hear Cyren say my name, I pull my gaze forward. The group in the back of the truck are all staring at me, all awaiting some kind of order. Some kind of direction. They want a plan.
I look into Cyren's eyes and among the sparkles of light that reflect back toward me, I see her. The real her. The girl I love. I realize, in that moment, that I'm no longer playing a game. I'm only fighting to win another day with her. So I push past my disdain for cheating and I accept the absence of rules.
“I need you to change the code,” I yell to the civilian dressed like a baker that is sitting near the back of the truck.
“What can we do?” The baker summons his code book and opens it up, flipping through the pages, showing me how many are now blank. “That worm isn't a part of the game. It doesn't exist in the code.”
“But the airport does,” I say as I look forward, toward the untouched coastline.
“The airport?” Cyren asks, flashing a nervous look over her shoulder at the rest of the group. “Escaping in a plane would only be a temporary solution. Eventually we'll run out of fuel.”
“I know.” I flash a smile of confidence at the baker and say, “That's what I need you to change.”
00111000
While our caravan of vehicles makes its way out of the city and travels down the coastline, toward the airport, I'm still watching the worm. I'm timing its consumption against our speed and I don't like our odds.
“How's it coming?”
As the baker searches the text that scrolls across the page of his code book, he holds up one finger, as if to silence me.
Cyren tries to assure me by saying, “I have faith they can accomplish a simple hack of an airplane's fuel supply. They were able to change your spawn point-”
“When they changed my spawn point, they brought down the game's firewall and let in a virus.”
She
We descend another five or six floors before I hear the hollow moaning of the worm outside the building. Directly below me, the beast cuts the building in half, deleting floors thirty-five through fifty-one. What remains of the top half of the building still floats in the air as if the deleted section was still holding it up. Past the blackness, three Level Zeros look back at me in horror from the lower floors. I stand with Cyren and two others, the rest of the group swallowed. Gone. Their existence erased.
Cyren's fists clench. The other two Level Zeros look at me with a panicked sadness, but we don't have time to mourn. We don't have time to remember our fallen comrades. We need to survive.
“Grab on to me,” I shout, holding out my arms.
There's a moment of confusion, but I thrust my hands toward them. They fumble, but eventually find a tight grip on my trench coat. I step off the deleted staircase and activate my Anti-Gravity Belt. The weight of all four of us still pulls us through the black at an accelerated rate, but the belt gives us enough pause to tumble on to the staircase below unharmed. We waste no more time and run down the rest of the stairs as fast as we can. I hear the worm pass overhead a few more times, devouring the rest of the rooftop and the remaining upper floors.
When we erupt from the doorway into the underground parking lot, half of the area is gone. A row of cars and trucks idle near the gate, packed full of civilians, but not as many as there were before. I can see a look on their faces that must be mourning. It deepens when they see only seven of us running toward them.
I don't have time to explain anything. I swing myself into the bed of a pickup truck and Cyren joins me. As soon as the other Level Zeros find a vehicle I shout, “Move!”
The tires squeal as each vehicle launches up the ramp, turning on to what remains of the street. I tell them to head east, toward the ocean, while I watch the worm continue its ruthless decimation of the city behind us. I can't look away, but when I hear Cyren say my name, I pull my gaze forward. The group in the back of the truck are all staring at me, all awaiting some kind of order. Some kind of direction. They want a plan.
I look into Cyren's eyes and among the sparkles of light that reflect back toward me, I see her. The real her. The girl I love. I realize, in that moment, that I'm no longer playing a game. I'm only fighting to win another day with her. So I push past my disdain for cheating and I accept the absence of rules.
“I need you to change the code,” I yell to the civilian dressed like a baker that is sitting near the back of the truck.
“What can we do?” The baker summons his code book and opens it up, flipping through the pages, showing me how many are now blank. “That worm isn't a part of the game. It doesn't exist in the code.”
“But the airport does,” I say as I look forward, toward the untouched coastline.
“The airport?” Cyren asks, flashing a nervous look over her shoulder at the rest of the group. “Escaping in a plane would only be a temporary solution. Eventually we'll run out of fuel.”
“I know.” I flash a smile of confidence at the baker and say, “That's what I need you to change.”
00111000
While our caravan of vehicles makes its way out of the city and travels down the coastline, toward the airport, I'm still watching the worm. I'm timing its consumption against our speed and I don't like our odds.
“How's it coming?”
As the baker searches the text that scrolls across the page of his code book, he holds up one finger, as if to silence me.
Cyren tries to assure me by saying, “I have faith they can accomplish a simple hack of an airplane's fuel supply. They were able to change your spawn point-”
“When they changed my spawn point, they brought down the game's firewall and let in a virus.”
She
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