Solarversia: The Year Long Game (28 page)

The last stretch of the course on the river was tame in comparison. Ludi Bioski interfered with the mechanics of the bascules at Tower Bridge so they flapped up and down like the wings of a lazy pigeon, but only three racers got snared. By the time Nova made it back to Canary Wharf to hit the second checkpoint, she was up to 26th place and had narrowed van der Star’s lead to eight seconds. Her health was flagging though. She was down to 35 points, after a tussle with Park Min, the Korean kid in a speedboat. As she careened into the jetty at the Wharf, Bruno morphed into Flynn for the third and final section of the race. She felt the thrum of his engine and brushed her fingers against the grips of the wheel.

“Negrahnu cleared that corner with the precision of an F1 driver. Flynn’s supposed to be her best vehicle, so let’s see what she can do with him. She’s approaching the White Tower at the Tower of London, close on the tail of the South African driver in 25th. That’s right, folks, one more place and she’s in the money, places twenty-five to twenty-one paying out a cool five grand. She’s tearing through the tower and will need to slow down for this next corner. It’s not happened yet, she’s left it awfully late. In fact, she hasn’t slowed down at all, what’s she playing at? Has she taken leave of her senses? There’s a ramp there, but it’s facing a wall. Isn’t she going to hit it at full speed? She does hit the ramp, she’s flying through the air … and boom! What a legend. That has to be the move of the race, the crowd here has gone wild.”

Nova knew the unwritten rule of all good computer games:
things are there for a reason
. When she saw the ramp she did what every player ahead of her had done — looked where it led. In this case, the solid brick wall of the White Tower. Their instinct had been to steer clear of it. Nova on the other hand, reasoned that the designers had put it there for a reason. She trusted both
her
logic, and
their
design. She did hit the wall, but a part of it covered by one of Henry VIII’s tapestries. Flynn ripped clean through it to reveal a secret passage, one that not only cut a few seconds off her time, but also gifted her some Winged Beauties and a jar of Skidz.

As she left the Tower, she roared through the city with a renewed sense of purpose, cheered on by the crowds lining the streets, and, as she went past St. Paul’s Cathedral, saw Emperor Mandelbrot himself. He had flown Castalia to London, the first time the palace had moved since the start of the Year-Long Game. Ludi Bioski had removed the Cathedral’s dome so that the Emperor could teleport there on his dais to watch the race go by. At his side, seated in the lotus position, was Spee-Akka Dey Bollarkoo, working on a section of the October portrait reserved to depict the final.

“Van der Star rips up The Strand, fast approaching Trafalgar Square, which happens to be the scene of total pandemonium. He’s been at it again, folks, the peddler of randomness, Ludi Bioski has brought the four bronze lions to life, and by the looks of it, has given them a taste for blood. Ooh, that looked nasty. Van der Star just took a big hit, losing 32 health points in one go. Those claws are sharp. I wonder what Negrahnu’s going to do. It seems like she’s in no doubt though, she’s just sprouted her Winged Beauties, allowing her to fly clear of the trouble on the street. She got away with a minor scratch to the paintwork, and she’s up to 14th place, which pays ten grand. But will her 23 health points be enough to make it all the way to the finish line? Players are heading down Whitehall toward the Houses of Parliament, which means there’s about three miles left.”

Driving up Big Ben’s clock tower reminded Nova of a multistorey car park. She wound her way up, taking right turn after right turn, a seemingly endless corkscrew up the building. At the top, she followed the lead of the eleven players still ahead of her and drove straight at the clock face. As she popped out the front, ninety metres up, Big Ben chimed and Flynn deployed a parachute that floated her back to the ground.

It was the first time in the race that she could relax and take everything in. There were hundreds of blimps, balloons and zeppelins parked over the city, and above them, a fluffy face-shaped cloud for each of the remaining finalists. To celebrate Spiralwerks’ home nation, the sky had been painted like the Union Jack, the flag of the United Kingdom, but would change to match the flag of the winning finalist.

As she watched a cloud break apart — signalling the exit of an Icelandic player — a tingle went down her spine and she entered a flow state of consciousness. Even the throbbing pain in her hands and wrists seemed to subside, as if her body knew how important the next few minutes were.

She tore past Buckingham Palace in 10th, up to Piccadilly Circus in 8th, and by the time she got to Regent Street, she was in 5th. The noise in the cafe was so loud that, for the first time, she activated the noise-cancellation feature on the headset, leaving only the in-game sound of revving engines, tooting horns and her racing heartbeat. Regent Street was split into two: she was in the left lane, behind the Peruvian guy in second place; van der Star and the two other drivers were in the right. A fraction of a second was all that separated the five of them.

The street was populated with a light smattering of regular London traffic: red buses, black cabs and the occasional pedestrian. Her driving was masterful. She weaved in and out of the traffic like she owned the city and couldn’t help but flash a snarky smile at van der Star as she overtook him. The way she took the corner into Marylebone Road was so smooth it increased her lead by a tenth of a second. All she needed to do now was drive down the road, hang a right into Regent’s Park and head for the big yellow sphere, Sun Two Point O, the chequered flag of the race.

She steered hard right and went to brake, actions that should have seen her skid round the corner, lined up for the final straight. Except she couldn’t brake. At first she thought her left ankle had seized up. Her reaction was to try the brake pedal with her right foot instead. She still couldn’t depress it. Flynn missed the turn and was headed toward a group of spectators at top speed when she felt someone grab her legs. Just what, in the name of all that was holy, was going on?

She volleyed back to the cafe to discover that it had gone silent. McCafferty stared at her open-mouthed. Zhang’s little head stuck out from under her brake pedal; kneeling next to him was Charlie, who looked white as a sheet.

“Charlie? What the fuck are you doing?”

“I … it was Zhang,” he croaked. “We were pushed. Zhang fell. Honest.”

She removed her headset and looked around the room in frantic desperation, beseeching the crowd to throw her something, anything, that might have explained what was going on.

Silence and stagnation gave way to whispering, pointing and the arching of eyebrows. Instead of answers she found the monitors on the wall, and they contained nothing but pain and humiliation. The largest screen replayed Flynn’s final few seconds. He hit the curb at speed, flew through the air, maiming, mangling and mutilating the non-player characters assembled on the pavement, tumbled along the ground and wrapped himself tight around a bollard. Nova’s avatar looked deader than ever.

To add insult to her multiple injuries, she looked on helpless as van der Star flipped her the finger as he whizzed by. He hurtled round the corner into Regent’s Park, zoomed up the pathway and disappeared into the giant Sun, his hundred thousand pound cash prize flashing on the screen.

Up in Castalia, Gorigaroo struck his gong and several million spectators looked up to the heavens to watch the reds, whites and blues of the Union Jack rearrange themselves into the striped Dutch flag. A troop of arkwinis appeared along the outer faces of Castalia and manned cannons that fired van der Star-shaped clouds into the sky, his stupid smug face taunting her from on high. Hero to zero in the space of two seconds.

She moved her foot from the brake pedal, allowing Charlie to pull Zhang from under it. He offered him to her, a look of remorse and confusion all over his face.

“I’m so sorry, I don’t know what happened,” said Burner, who had ducked under the barrier to join them. “We were watching, cheering you on, when we got pushed from behind. Zhang was with us one second, flying through the air the next.”

She grabbed the furball from Charlie and hugged him tight, distraught that he’d been caught up in the affair. She wanted to hide, and she wanted to cry.

“Like Charlie said, it was an accident. Nova, mate, I don’t know how it happened.”

She looked the two boys up and down and gave them the biggest scowl she could manage while her face wanted to crumple into tears.

“Don’t you ‘Nova, mate’ me. You fuckwits just cost me a hundred grand. You
owe
me a hundred grand. Thanks a million for coming along today, Charlie, you stupid frickin’ hippy.”

She pushed past them, tears now streaming freely down her face, then past the assembled crowd and out of the door.

And then she ran and she ran, and she didn’t look back.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

As Nova panted heavily, struggling to get her knees into the action, the spectators lining the path stepped up their efforts. They cheered, they clapped and some even chanted her name. Two metres ahead, and struggling nearly as much, was another Nova, one programmed to complete the five-kilometre course in the time she’d set last week, when she’d run her personal best.

The fitness app overlaid virtual crowds onto three-dimensional maps of real-world locations, including the streets and paths surrounding the university campus. It was a fun way to do training — race the best version of yourself while hundreds of people cheered you on, like you were about to set a new world record.

Even though her legs complained with every step she took and she could taste blood in the back of her throat, she charged forward, reaching deep inside for what remained of her energy reserves. With less than two hundred metres to go, she stormed past her digital copy to a renewed roar from the crowd.

As she crossed the finishing line, her Booners flashed up the good news — she had shaved another half second from her best time, nudging her into the 92nd centile for her age group over the five-kilometre distance. Not bad, given that she was in the 78th centile only a month before. She walked on wobbly legs to the nearest tree and stretched against it, drawing the fresh autumnal air deep into her lungs.

After a quick shower she returned to her bedroom and opened the virtual room she’d created that contained the information on Project Drone. Realising that the room needed a name, she’d gone for ‘Super Nova’, a stripped-down version of her avatar name. Now the app comprised not just one, but a series of rooms, each dedicated to a different project. She’d created them in a pensive mood the day after the Krazy Karting debacle. Still angry with Burner, Charlie and the universe in general, she’d reflected on how Project Drone had enabled her to channel her negative emotions in a positive manner.

She came to the realisation that what she’d enjoyed about the plan was that it resembled a puzzle. It had been a game with lots of moving parts, some basic rules and a goal. It felt a bit wrong to have made a puzzle out of Sushi’s death, but the more she’d thought about it, the more inescapable the truth had revealed itself to be. She’d
gamified
her response to the terrorist attack, and the result had been impressive, to say the least. Anything she wanted to change about her life could be turned into a game too. All the challenges and obstacles she faced could become games to play, puzzles to solve.

The realisation had not only seemed glaringly obvious, but also incredibly liberating. Everything you had to do could be
fun
, if you went about it the right way. It felt like she’d worked out one of life’s secrets all by herself. She was the master of her own destiny. Who better to take up such a challenge than her, Nova Negrahnu, self-proclaimed professor of Science?

The app opened to display a rotating tetrahedron. Its four triangular faces each led to a different gamified project. The black face led to the cube that contained the information on the Order. She hadn’t returned there since the police visit. It was a room that contained pain and misery. Instead, she tapped the skin-coloured face, the one that represented her body.

It led to a room dedicated to the improvement of her physical being: her speed, strength and flexibility. She smiled at the new time at the top of the running table. A new best time meant a reward. Once lectures had finished she would treat herself to a proper latte from the university shop, rather than a cup of liquid mud from the grotty machine at the library. Such simple incentives were surprisingly effective, though she had to admit that the penalties were playing their part too.

The app was synced to Burner’s computer so he would know if she missed a run. His role was to administer her punishments, a task he had accepted with rather frightening enthusiasm. While she’d been thinking along the lines of extra uni work as a penalty, he’d suggested things like having her walk around campus wearing a sandwich board that proclaimed she was a lazy bum. They’d compromised, and agreed that for the first run she missed, she’d have to buy him a fancy lunch in town. That had been a good enough deterrent so far, though she didn’t like to think about how she’d fare in the cold dark mornings when the winter deepened.

She left the ‘Body’ room and considered the tetrahedron again. The magenta-coloured face led to the ‘Mind’ section of the app, which was lined with the books she needed to read for her course, with barometers for each one that indicated how much she had read. It was also synced to several brain exercise games that claimed to boost puzzle-solving skills.

Rewards and punishments were attached to these tasks too, not that they were much required. She grabbed hold of the tetrahedron by two of its vertices and rotated it to look at the sage-coloured face, the one that led to the ‘Soul’ section. For now it contained a list of people she wanted to apologise to: Jockey, Mrs Woodward, Charlie and her parents.