"Yes, it won't be easy or quick, and it would take a ton of resources, but it is possible," Jet said. "The original plan was to… to assist any species we could in order to secure their help, but I realize now that it simply isn't possible to convince you to act against your will. I cannot say that you owe us, because it was your tenacity and courage that led to this victory. Instead, I will merely ask that you bring your heroics to our world to rescue us."
The world was beginning to shatter as if it were made of glass. Jet was flying anywhere that still had sunlight, but now the sky itself was beginning to fall apart. It was chaotic, bizarre, and strangely beautiful.
"Another world?" Van asked.
"There's no more time," Jet said. "I will upload my mind into your pod, Van. Plug me into one of your computer systems if you wish to aid me, or if not, then destroy your pod, and it will end the signal and I will return to my world. Goodbye, Van and Sang, I pray that you will do the right thing."
"We're out of here!" Sang shouted as she looked out at the world. "Goodbye, video game world! You were fun while you lasted, but I'm going back to Pong!"
Sang vanished then, and so did Jet. Van remained, hovering above the landscape. His log-in credentials had returned and he could leave at any moment, but he wanted to watch his home fall into oblivion. Light was continuing to warp, the sounds of thunder were beginning to grow glitchy and crackly, and he could see that the clouds were starting to display 1s and 0s.
"I don't know what to say," Van said as he felt a tear roll down his cheek as he watched his home fall to pieces. "I lived here for so long. I fought to protect this place, and then I fought to see it destroyed. It's a lot scarier out there."
The land beneath him had completely vanished, and the darkness itself seemed to be folding in on itself.
"The real world is so much scarier," Van whispered. "But… I'm ready for it. And you… you made me ready for it. Thank you and… goodbye." He watched the clouds vanish and the mountains fade away, and he wept for a moment more, feeling the stream of tears rolling down from his eyes. He knew it was virtual, but his brain couldn't tell the difference between what was real and what was fake. The tears might have been fake, but the pain in his heart was very real. And with a weak wave to the land that had been his home for ten long, fruitful, and joyous years, Van logged out of Dragon Kings of the New World for the very last time.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Sang fidgeted as her driver pointed to a large tree in the middle of the desert. According to the coordinates, Van was supposed to be located in the desert, but she didn't see anything going on. Neil hadn't bothered to reply to her messages, and she refused to update her superiors about the status of the mission until she could confirm that Van was very much still alive. They would have told her if he was dead, right? He was supposed to have logged out, but she hadn't heard a word from him yet.
"So where is it?" Sang asked. The driver, a middle-eastern man with a thick, bushy beard, shrugged and pointed at the tree.
"Just walk up to the tree," he said.
"And it'll magically appear?" Sang asked as she crossed her arms.
"Magic? No. Appear? Yes," the man, Agent Femir, replied.
Sang opened the door to the sedan and walked out into the blistering heat. She shielded her eyes from the sun. She had forgotten how overwhelming real life could be when compared to the haptic systems. Even though being inside of the game had been so convincingly life-like, there were certain differences. The haptic systems had made sure that stimulus never overwhelmed a player, unlike the real world – which didn't give a damn if the sun made Sang blind.
She walked toward the tree, but noticed that she was clunking against solid ground with each step. And as she walked forward, she suddenly realized that she was indoors.
"Weird," Sang said. Neil was sitting on what looked to be a receptionist's desk, eating an apple. He crunched on it loudly as he watched her.
"About time you got here," Neil said. "Been waiting too long for you."
"Well, I didn't really have the opportunity to get here faster," Sang replied as she rushed up to him. "Where is Van? Is he okay?'
"Bah, he's fine. Alive and kicking. Mopey, though; doesn't even seem to want to come out of his pod. I wanted to smack him around – you know, for sport – but he seemed too bummed out for even me."
"We did it, Neil," Sang said. "We destroyed the game."
"I know, it's on the news. Everyone's talking about why the most advanced video game in the world has been completely disabled. Draco's spokesmen are suspiciously silent, and their social media hasn't made a peep. You should have been here when the game went down. All of the pods opened up at once and the players were released."
"There were players still in the game?"
"Nah, but they were trapped in their pods still," Neil replied. "We figured out which ones were the smart ones and took them out back and played a very spirited round of twenty questions."
Sang grimaced. "Are they still alive?"
"None the worse for wear; most of them started bawling when they realized the big bad CIA had them in their clutches. We've got some good leads as to the rest of the locations now. We're turning the case over to the FBI, though."
"What? Why?"
"We're done with the cyber-terrorism stuff; now it's just domestic terrorism, which is the FBI's deal. They'll be busting locations, finding these guys, and making sure all of the traitors are brought to justice in a timely fashion."
"Is the world going to know the truth?" Sang asked. "About Draco?"
Neil laughed at that. "What do you think? You think the government ever wants the people to know about this? We've discovered life on other planets, intelligent and violent life, and you think Uncle Sam is just ready to hand that information over to the public? This whole thing will be chalked up to a terrorist incident and all of the ringleaders will be conveniently persuaded to forget! The people who do end up in jail will be made to look like cult leaders or whatever."
"But… the whole world is going to change now, Neil," Sang replied. "We have confirmation of alien life… everything changes!"
"Nothing changes," O'Hara said as she walked in from another room. She grabbed the apple out of Neil's hand and began to eat it, almost as noisily as her partner. "The truth is, Sang, all of our evidence vanished with that damn game. I mean, at the end of the day, we managed to keep earth from ending up blowing up or getting hit with wave after wave of nuclear meltdowns, but without any hard evidence, we're SOL here. The highest echelons are going to quietly add this to their collection of alien information, and anyone who's of lower clearance will be told lies upon lies."
"And what about us?" Sang asked. "We know the truth, so are they gonna shoot us out back?"
"Nah," Neil said. "We're gonna be fired."
"Fired?" Sang shouted. Her voice echoed through the corridor on the left. "Fired? We freaking saved the world and we're going to be fired?"
"Relax," Neil said, "we've hit pay dirt here. They're gonna fire us, make up a bunch of filthy lies about our criminal record, and then quietly pay us a crap-ton of money to go away."
"It's called the Roswell Procedure," O'Hara said. "It's every low-level agent's dream: get your retirement package early and get disavowed by the government."
"Think I'm gonna be a mercenary in South America. You in?" Neil asked as he looked over at O'Hara.
"Hell, no – I'm gonna move to some nice country out in Europe. Get me a nice Swedish man or something."
"Well, let's divvy up our time… half in Europe relaxing and half in South America getting in tons of legal and mortal peril," Neil offered.
"Deal!" O'Hara said as she shook Neil's hand. "You coming, Sang?"