TQG 49. Lewis

“Lewis, it is time for you to awaken,” the digital voice said kindly.  “You have reached your destination.”

Lewis grunted sat up in the car, looking around.  In The Gates of Tirniki, he was known as Laurant Basak.  Not widely known; he hadn’t been playing very long.  And if he was being honest, he was merely average.  A decent [Archer], planning on becoming a [Ranger] at some point, but there were millions more skilled than he.

His only claim to fame was his relationship to Hail, whose status was unknown since the Branding Boss event had occurred.  Or at least it had been unknown when he had logged out.  Events moved fast when you were stuck in the real world.  Sometimes Lewis could only envy those players who had managed to go pro, or semi-pro.  One of whom he was on his way to see.

“Thank you for the ride, Uber-jon,” he told the autonomous car.

“You are welcome, Lewis.  Now I must go and recharge my batteries.  If you need any future transport considerations--”

Lewis tuned the sales pitch out as he gathered his pack and got out of the car.  It had been a long drive, but the convenient thing about autonomous vehicles was that you could sleep in transit.  Which he had, for almost fourhours.  He was still groggy as he did a few stretches, then he looked up at the apartment building the Uber-jon had dropped him off at.

He looked up and saw her, dancing on the balcony of the apartment building.  Wearing gym clothing and dancing, looking more beautiful in real life than she did in the game.  He shook his head.  She was out of his league and he knew it.  She was just being kind by offering him a place to sleep and log into the game while he toured the campus over the weekend, that was all.

Still, she hadn’t completely shut down his harmless flirting so far, so he figured he’d play his chances a little further.  The worst thing that could happen was actually catching her and realizing that he had no idea what to do next.  It would be as far as he’d actually gotten with a girl, after all.  A woman, he reminded himself, because Tarisha was certainly that.

Dragging his luggage behind him, he went over to the door and pushed the buzzer for the apartment number she had given him.

“Yes?”

“It’s Lewis,” he said.

“Who?”

“Laurant, sorry.  This is Tarisha, right?”

“You’re real name’s not Laurant?” Tarisha asked.

“No, I thought it sounded cooler than Lewis at the character creation screen.  Didn’t I tell you that already?”

“I think I would have remembered.  Buzzing you in.”

Slipping inside, Lewis rode the elevator up to the third floor.  They were cheap but quality apartments, a few decades old but well maintained.  Nothing fancy, but it was clear that the occupants weren’t living in squalor.

Better than the home he’d grown up in, at least.

The door was cracked open when he arrived at it, but he knocked anyway.

“I left it open for a reason,” Tarisha shouted from inside.  “Get in here, Laurant.  You’re late, and I need to finish exercising before I log back in.  Lord Hail might need me.  For that matter, you should log in too.  You have a bond with him that--”

“So he is alright then?” Lewis asked, interrupting her just as he turned a corner and came upon the sight of her stretching in rather revealing clothes.  He couldn’t stop the blush that ambushed his face for critical damage.  Fortunately, or rather unfortunately, she was faced away from him towards the open balcony as she danced about.  And she was even more beautiful in real life than she had been in the game.

“Define alright,” Tarisha said, continuing her dance routine as though she had not been interrupted.  “Lord Hail is deeply troubled by the loss of his grandfather and his first death.  Add to that the fact that the asshole administrators have chosen this opportunity to throw the entire text of the D.S.S. at him, and that his actions have changed the course of history for the world which he believes to be real, and he is understandably deeply troubled.  I am worried for him.”

“That’s rough.  But he is returning to the game, right?”

“He has options.  He can become an anonymous player, or an anonymous NPC, rather than return to his Hail persona.  I do not believe that he will take either of those routes, however.  It is a relief to know that his Blood of the Travelers makes him canonically immortal, however.  We can relax our guard somewhat, although not entirely, as we work to grow his personal power,” Tarisha answered, all while dancing up a sweat.

“Where’s your bathroom.  I need to brush my teeth before I log in.  I’ll check on Hail before going out to tour the U.”

“Second door on the left,” Tarisha said, motioning toward a hallway.

Lewis brushed his teeth, splashed some water on his face, used the toilet, and spent a moment examining himself in the mirror.  While Tarisha seemed to have toned down her natural beauty for her digital avatar, Laurant’s appearance was an improvement over Lewis’s.  He wasn’t ugly, just average.  And now that he had actually met Tarisha he realized just how out of his league he really was.

Still, she hadn’t completely shut him down …

After psyching himself up a bit, he returned to the den.  “Where’s your modem?  I’ve got to sync my helmet.”

“It’s built into the wall beside the projector,” Tarisha answered, still dancing, her face towards the balcony.  Lewis wasn’t certain she had even looked in his direction since he had come in.  He sighed, and took his V.R. helmet out of his bag and began the process of connecting it to the quantum network.  After it was synced up, he took a seat on the couch, put the helmet on, and took one last look at the beautiful dancing woman before flipping the switch that brought his consciousness out of his body and into virtual reality.

~~~~~~~~~~

He logged out of the game half an hour later, taking off his helmet to find Tarisha walking across the room in a towel.  He jerked in surprise, but when she realized that he was back she simply acknowledged him and continued her journey from the bathroom into her bedroom.

“You’re sleeping on the couch tonight, so I hope you find it comfortable.  My roommates will be back in a few hours.  Until then, we’ve got the apartment to ourselves.” she said.

“I-um-right,” he said.  “That’s not a problem, we already discussed that in game, remember.”

“Just clarifying,” she said.  “Did you speak with Lord Hail?  Has he returned to the world yet?”

“No.  He said he’s not ready to return quite yet.  He’s being active in guild chat, although I’m not certain that’s a good or bad sign.  Usually he ignores it completely.”

Tarisha sighed.  “I will log in and attempt to speak with him.  Perhaps I can convince him to return, or at least help him with whatever is bothering him.”

“Um, right.  Is that before or after you get dressed,” Lewis asked, regretting the words the moment they slipped out of his stupid mouth.

“You didn’t strike me as the prudish type, Laurant,” Tarisha chided from her bedroom.

“Sorry, mouth and foot disease,” Lewis apologized.  That at least made her giggle.

She emerged from the bedroom moments later with wet hair, a sweatshirt, and jeans.  She was still beautiful, but the baggyclothes went some distance towards making Lewis feel relaxed.

“So then, Lewis, what do you want for dinner?  There is a Chinese place which is simply fantastic, but if you don’t like--”

“Chinese is fine, thank you,” he answered.  “Or whatever you want, I’m not a picky eater.  I guess I’d get an order of orange chicken, if they have it.”

Tarisha laughed.  “Of course they have orange chicken.  It’s quite good too, although I prefer their sesame chicken.  I’ll put an order in to be delivered at Eight O’clock.  It’s a bit late, but I try to time my bio-breaks for Hail’s sleep schedules as much as possible.  It is rather convenient that he has a period of inactivity each day where he retires somewhere safe, allowing his protectors to take care of their bodies.  I wonder if that was intentional or not.”

“Honestly, I think that the developers threw everything against the wall in developing Hail to see what would stick,” Lewis replied.  “I think he’s really going to need a lawyer to sit down with him at some point and explain the actual legal situation that he’s in.  I mean, he’s an A.I, so he’s covered by the D.S.S., but he’s also meant to think and act like a kid, right?  But the child protection laws don’t apply to him because he’s not biological, and--”

“And perhaps you’re thinking about it too hard,” Tarisha interrupted. “Anyway, <Peasant’s Revenge> is already working on the groundwork in case Hail decides to retaliate against his creators in the courtroom.  Unfortunately, they’re not certain that he has much of a case.  The D.S.S. was set up for beings like Thedum and Cortana, not Hail.  There are entire sections which simply do not apply to him because he is limited to the game world, while the authors of the D.S.S. were obsessed with an ancient movie series.”

“Hey, The Terminator franchise was quite good for its day,” Lewis pointed out.  “It’s regrettable that it made people terrified of artificial intelligences for a while, but--”

“But the reality was quite different from SkyNet, I know.  And part of that was the preparation humans had put in place to prevent that fictional story from ever becoming reality,” Tarisha said, sighing.  “It is a little scary to think of what Cortana could do if she ever turned evil.”

“It’s scary to think of what most of the big A.I.s can do even when they’re benevolent,” Lewis argued.  “But Hail is even less dangerous than the average Uber-jon.  The worst that he can do is change the balance of a fictional reality, and honestly now that the initial outrage is wearing off some people are excited that there’s now a canon way for players to be evil in the game.  It’s completely changing the PvP meta as we speak, and the players who have embraced the darkside are starting to report exclusive dungeons and raids.”

“Yes.  Although it troubles me that players would choose to be evil, I must admit that this might increase the game’s popularity, which can only be a good thing from Arc’s perspective.  I am worried how Lord Hail will view the results of his actions, however.  And, well, I am just worried about Lord Hail in general.  I’m going to log in now and try to speak with him for a while.”

“I’ll join you,” Lewis said.  And so they put on their helmets and sat on the couch together, and together they logged in.

~~~~~~~~~

“This chicken is good,” Lewis said.  “I wish I had a local place half this good where I live.”

“Yes.  It is convenient, although I do not usually indulge,” Tarisha agreed.

“Oh?  Is my visit a special occasion?”

“I don’t often have guests,” Tarisha admitted.  “I’m falling out of contact with many of my old friends due to the amount of time I have been spending in the game.  And while I make enough money as a professional player to afford rent and a few luxuries, I am on a budget since my parents stopped paying my bills.”

“Ah.  Yeah, I’m living mostly on loans at the moment.  I’m still doing generals, because I haven’t decided what direction I want to go in yet.  Actually, after meeting Hail, I’m considering going into law, and specializing in the rights of digital entities,” Lewis said.

“That will take you years.  Hail will be decades old by the time you can--”

“It’s not for Hail.  I’ll help Hail just by being a friend.  But if Arc is making sapient NPCs, then eventually someone is going to fight for their rights at some point, and I think I might want to be involved in that,” he said.

“Well, if that doesn’t work out, you can always chase ambulances,” Tarisha teased, and Lewis shrugged.

“Do you think Hail will ever be able to interact with the real world?” Lewis asked.  “I mean, like, putting him in an android body or something?”

“I don’t know.  Maybe, if many ‘digital children’ like him are ‘born,’ then their parents will fund the research to give them a means of interacting with reality,” Tarisha said, sighing.  “But someone will have to fund the research, and I don’t believe that is something Arc is presently working on.”

The conversation fell off for a while as they both focused on eating.  Then, abruptly, Tarisha simply asked the question that had been on her mind for a while.

“Lewis, how would you like to have children with me?”

Lewis blinked in surprise, a chunk of orange chicken falling from his chopsticks.  “Ehhh?”