Dammit, Kiro, where are you?
I wait another minute, but no one triggers the admittance protocol on my portal. Swearing, I log out to the real.
Darkness greets me, the blank nothing of deactivated immersion goggles. I push them up onto my forehead with a shaking hand, groaning at the cramping pain, exactly how I felt in the Game. Dim light illuminates a spherical room, nearly four meters in diameter, oddly gray-colored material surrounding me, like the pixels of a busted monitor. I’m sitting in the rough approximation of a chair formed from the same substance, its surface cool through the thin material of my full body hapsuit. A portal irises open in the curved wall.
“Almost broke the chamber this time, Ash,” comes a laconic voice as a curly-haired woman steps into the room. Thin covers surround her feet, like nurse’s scrubs, and mirrored silver glasses cover her eyes. “Servos could barely keep up when you went diving around that dragon. Energy bill’s gonna be a bitch.”
I groan, thinking of the money that could go toward Mom’s treatments, now forced to pay for petro from all the power I just used.
“I’m good for it, Sare, don’t worry.” My voice is muffled by the layer of bodysuit covering my mouth and nose. My reflection in her glasses reveals only a thin strip of visible skin across my eyes, like I’m one of those old anime ninjas.
“Oh, I’m not worried; this one’s on the house. That stream was pure gold.” Sarah smiles, revealing crooked white teeth. “My reservations just about quadrupled when everyone saw you climbing out of its stomach. We’re booked solid for the next six months. Can’t beat advertising like that.” She leans down, extending a hand. “Here, you look like you could use some help.”
“Thanks,” I grunt, pulling myself to my feet. The chair melts down into the floor behind me, electric current shaping the malleable polymer. A thin sensation of static fills the air, the base state of any activated hapsphere, waiting for energy flows to mold it into whatever form the user desires. Gingerly, I walk over to the portal, legs quivering with each step. The slight incline is agony. Behind me, Sarah peels up a section of the floor with a thin multitool that hangs from her form-fitting jeans, creating a seam in the seamless plastic. Intricately folded machinery glitters underneath.
“Hey,” I say, pausing at the oval frame, “is Kiro still here?”
“Yeah. Saw him go to the men’s locker already.” Sarah looks up at me, her fingers adjusting something—no doubt an actuator driven past its limits by the stresses I just put the room through. I’m struck once again by the way her jeans hug her body, but I push the thought aside.
“Make sure he doesn’t leave without me, please.”
“Mm-hmm. I’ll hold the doors. See you tomorrow.” She taps her fingers briefly, then goes back to the maintenance chores. “Unless you want it to be tonight.”
“Thanks, Sare.” I blush at her barely disguised flirting, as I always do. “See you tomorrow.”
She smiles and flips a hand, shooing me away.
Outside the room, a brightly lit hallway stretches to either side, high-efficiency glow panels set into the ceiling. More portals, all closed, dot the walls at regular intervals. Sarah’s business—renting out premier quality hapspheres with the fib-optic connection to utilize them—takes up the entire thirty-fifth floor of the megaspire we’re currently in, but business hasn’t been great lately; barely enough to keep her afloat. Another recession rippling through the economy has people less willing to spend on true one-to-one quality rooms, content instead with limited hap and latency from home bodysuits.
It seems like that’s what we’re all doing. Trying to keep our heads above water, I think bitterly. Glad some of the viewers realized the quality of Sarah’s rooms. They’ll keep us swimming a little bit longer.
I push open a door marked LOCKERS, and walk through the rows of metal cages to my unit, a battered collection of holostickers covering its front. Time to shed my skin.
First off is the immersion viewer, a gently rounded pair of lenses that look like old aquatic goggles with earpieces attached, and a small bulge for my nose. Re-creating scents is one of the hardest things for current haptech to handle, and it’s priced accordingly, but I’m not going to take any chances when it comes to success in the Game. The whiff of a monster’s odor has saved me from more than one ambush. An adjustable strap keeps the viewer snug against my face, and connects it to the control box at the back, a flexible piece of computing substrate that bends and twists with the motions of my head.
I lay the entire unit carefully in my locker—it’s designed for the rigors of full haptic immersion, but only the ignorant rich or fools treat their equipment poorly. That’s also why I keep my gear here—I can’t afford for it to get stolen out of my room.
Next is the back zipper, starting at the base of my neck and running down my spine to the hollow just above my ass. Unlike traditional metal zippers, this one is actually a molecular lock, forced apart by the catalyst stick lying inside the locker. Exposed metal on a live hapsuit is a quick way to get electrocuted, as the military’s first iterations proved so many years ago.
I peel the hood up and over, letting it dangle in front of my neck like someone just flayed my face, the subvocal mic sticking briefly to my sweaty neck. My hair sticks up in short spikes. I’d prefer it long, but long hair can interfere with the EEG sensors in the hood, and that can throw off the brain tracking for the suit’s feedback, so short it stays, my bangs the only concession to fashion, a dark blue curtain just above my eyes. Not for the first time I wish I had Mom’s thicker, kinky hair, but those genes went to someone else. I got stuck with my father’s boring, straighter strands. I shrug my arms out, pull the suit down my body, then off my legs, until I’m standing naked in front of the locker, relishing the cool air-conditioning on my exposed flesh. The suit lies crumpled on the floor, its wetsuit black surface dull. Like I’ve molted a polymer skin.
Ultrafine specks, almost too small to see, dot the interior of the suit in ordered grids, contact points to transmit nerve signals when I’m in the hapsphere, reinforcing the immersion. The suit mimics almost any possible sensation while I’m inside the room, but quickly grows claustrophobic once away. I hang it up in the locker and trigger the automated cleanbot, then head to the shower.
A thin stream of hot water sluices down, resource rationing always in effect these days, but at least Sarah covers the first minute of charges. An involuntary groan escapes my lips, the momentary heat like a thin slice of gummie paradise. Aching muscles roll and pop like beaded water on a skillet. The dragon tattoo on my right side seems to dance as I move, nanoparticulate scales gleaming iridescently in the single shower light. Its tail wraps around my thigh, body leading up to a head perched on my shoulder, outstretched claws framing my breast.
I wish I could soak here for an hour, but I need to talk to Kiro. A loud grumble from my stomach reminds me that I need food as well, especially after burning so many calories battling Hammer. Reluctantly, I turn off the water and head back to the locker, toweling myself dry with one of the rough swatches of fabric, more like reclaimed carpet squares than towels, that are all Sarah can afford. Almost everything she makes goes to maintaining the hapspheres, as she’s grouched more than once.