It made Jake jump when Tom called down, “Hurry up!” His voice was both muffled by the wind and the tight scarf tied across his mouth.
Something moved in Jake’s peripheral vision. Something languid and dark. Then it was gone. Stepping towards his friend, Jake stopped again.
“Jake! For fuck’s sake, man. Hurry the fuck up!”
Tom didn’t swear often, but it wasn’t often that Jake found a discarded headset. There was a white teardrop of synthesized sludge hanging from the food tube. Staring at it, pregnant with sustenance, Jake’s arid mouth started to water, and his dry tongue lifted involuntarily. He jumped when Tom called again, “Jake!”
“All right. Keep your mane on, Seabiscuit.”
Tom’s face fell slack as if living up to his moniker. “Stop calling me that.”
Jake presented his friend with the back of his middle finger before returning his attention to the headset.
“What are you doing, Jake?”
When Jake looked up, he saw that Tom had a metal bar in his right hand. What had he seen? Was it them? Would he admit it if it was? Glancing in the direction he expected the monsters to be, Jake still saw nothing.
The headset was the second one Jake had seen that wasn’t attached to a gamer. He could crack it. How hard would it be to get the food tube working for them? That would shut Tom up.
The long man was still glaring at him, so Jake pretended to examine the gamer. “He’s not been dead long.” Some flies flew out of the cadaver’s mouth when he nudged his face with his foot. He swallowed and grit shifted in his throat like he had flies of his own.
Jake continued, “I’d say he was in his forties.” Putting his foot on the big man’s forehead, Jake rolled it from side to side. “He could do with shedding a few pounds, mind. The game really isn’t good for your health.” It hurt his throat to shout over the wind.
“He looks better than either of us, Jake. And we’re probably younger than him.”
Looking at his own body and then up at his friend, the pair of them seeming about as well cared for as prisoners of war, Jake accepted Tom’s point with a shrug. “I’m sure he’s only just died. I’m certain that’s why the headset’s still here.”
“It’s a trap, Jake! Everything about this world is a bloody set up. A crater with a prize in it? Could it be any more inviting? Just hurry the fuck up!”
When Jake turned his full attention onto the headset, Tom’s voice faded into the wind and Jake said, “Why do you think they still feel the need to brand everything?”
“Fucking hell, Jake, get away from the fucking headset before it’s too fucking late!”
“I mean, it’s not like the technology could belong to anyone else. They’ve won the corporate race; they have a monopoly on the world.”
“They’re reminding you who your master is. They’re reminding you they’re always watching. That you only exist with their permission.” Tom paused before adding, “Maybe you should pay attention to that. Besides, do I need to remind you that we’re still looking for Rory? I don’t want anything to jeopardize that.”
“Of course, Tom.” It had been over a year since they’d last seen Tom’s son. The boy lay beside his mother and had already been playing New Reality for three years by then. All Tom wanted at the time was to stay with him, but after removing Thalia’s headset, Rixon didn’t want them anywhere near the boy. The Bots had shepherded them away for days, their Gatling guns the sharp teeth that nipped at their heels when they strayed too far off course. They’d been looking for him ever since.
Bending down, Jake peered into the headset. His right hand opened and closed, itching to grab the strap. The muscles in his weak arm buzzed with the desire to reach out.
“Don’t, Jake.”
Jake ignored him.
“Have you not seen what those Gatling guns do to the foxes and crows that accidentally touch one?”
Jake thought about the crow he’d recently seen explode from a barrage of bullets. It went up like a balloon filled with glitter.
When Jake knelt down, the rubble shifted by his feet, wobbling the headset. Adrenaline put a spring in his legs and he jumped back. To touch it was to die.
“Is the food tube malfunctioning, Jake? Is that what you’re looking at?”
Jake shook his head.
“Damn it. Stop wasting our time then. You’re putting both of us in danger. Leave it alone and hurry up!”
“There must be a way to hack this thing.” Several burning coughs exploded from Jake’s tight lungs.
“You and I both saw what happened the last time we tampered with a headset.” Grinding his jaw, Tom waved a bony fist. “I swear, if you don’t hurry up, then I’m off. You can fight a Rixon-Bot on your own. Anyway, there’s no way the headset will malfunction.” Lifting a rock, he said, “This is more likely to go wrong. You’re hungry and deluded, now hurry up.”
Holding his concave stomach, nausea sending a sharp pain through him as it gurgled in protest, Jake whispered to himself, “I’m not hungry. I’m starving.”
“Anyway, even if a headset did go screwy, there’s no way we’d be able to keep it,” Tom pointed out. “Rixon would terminate us within seconds for stealing their property. All it needs is a tracking device to know where the headset is. It’s not rocket science. Besides, they’re always watching us anyway.”
Suddenly Tom stopped talking and his jaw fell lose.
Before Jake could question it, he heard the sound.
Thwip, thwip, thwip, thwip, thwip.
It was a small helicopter blade.
Witnessing his own fear in Tom’s panicked face, Jake looked back at the headset. Should he just take it and run?
His breath quickened. He searched around. Where was the Bot? Jumping back, he continued to look for it. He hadn’t touched it. He hadn’t done anything wrong. All of the muscles in his body locked tight. His pulse galloped. He hadn’t touched it. He hadn’t done anything wrong. He hadn’t touched it. He hadn’t done anything wrong.
Where was the Bot? What would it do to him? He hadn’t done anything wrong. Please, he hadn’t done anything wrong.
The noise grew louder.
Watching Jake and Tom was a break from the madness. Stepping away from the tornado of chaos and bloodshed, she sat observing the two. If sides were to be taken, she was on Jake’s. The monsters were real. Running her tongue over her dry lips, she stared at Tom. He’d realize that soon enough.
Chapter Two
Holding his stomach as he laughed, Jake pointed at the mangy fox scratching itself. It was sat beneath a sheet of corrugated metal. Its whirring back leg spun like a propeller, flipping the sheet: Thwip, thwip, thwip, thwip. “It’s just a fox, Tom. Little shit.” He covered his chest with his palm, his heavy heartbeat kicked against it. “I thought I was going to have a heart attack then. Jesus!” Picking up a rock, Jake launched it at the flea-bitten canid. It sailed several meters wide.
After the fox had run away, he looked up at Tom.
Peering down at the ineffectual projectile, Tom pointed at it. “That’s why we’re starving.”
Throwing his arms up, Jake said, “I’ve not seen you do any better.”
Tom’s blank expression was made all the more barren considering his once brilliant blue eyes were now gunmetal grey. Speaking in a sigh, he shook his head. “Please just hurry up, Jake. I’m leaving in one minute. I can’t put my life in danger for you any longer. You’ve got what we came for.” When he turned to look out over the wasteland, the wind made streamers of his raggedy clothes.
Before Jake walked away, he looked back at the glossy headset. It shone against its battered surroundings. Holding his breath, Jake reached forward.