I could never forget the time I passed my first solo tutorial. I was around six, obsessing over things I could no longer remember. My parents hadn’t bought me Twinkle yet, so I was using one of the generic AI assistants that the games offered. I remember thinking it was a huge deal that I could play on my own. My parents had told me not to worry if my character got killed, which made me want to prove all the more to them I was a big girl. I had followed all the instructions the game provided, getting everything right on the first go. After half an hour, I had become so good that I could complete tasks before they were given to me. The AI had been giving me compliments non stop, inflating my ego as much as it could.

I had managed to defeat all the NPCs without losing a single health point. I still remembered the sensation of confidence and power I felt. Then, when I had completed the tutorial—after the final congratulations pop-up had disappeared, leading me into the real game—the first player had crushed me like a cockroach. Until a few minutes ago, I never thought I’d feel such devastating defeat again.

“Ten minutes have passed, Sarah,” Twinkle said, diligent as a Monday morning alarm.

“Remind me in five.” I kept staring across my small apartment.

Level hundred and five mobs killed in seconds, and I had made a deal with the person who had destroyed them. It wasn’t the first shifty deal I had made since I’d started the quest, but it felt different.

“Twinkle, do a stealth search for SpiceDecker.” I rubbed my eyes. “One word.”

“Okay. Want me to peek beyond paywalls?”

“No, just a broad search.” I stretched. My joints crackled like popcorn.

I picked up my phone and swiped to my flagged messages. The most recent ones were all from FlickerFlacker. He had been told the fifth clue, which was good, but also was panicking over real life. From what I could tell, his parents weren’t pleased he was wasting time on the game. I didn’t see the connection but had gone ahead and arranged a meeting at the cliff.

Interestingly enough, Flicker hadn’t shared the hint in any of his messages. Possibly he was getting a bit paranoid himself. With everything going on, I couldn’t blame him.

“No results found,” Twinkle said in a sad voice. “Would you like me to do a paid search?”

The temptation was huge, but I resisted. SpiceDecker wasn’t part of my concern and, for the moment, neither was the elf maiden.

“No need,” I whispered, then entered my gaming rig.

When I logged in to Vesperia, the skies were full of airships. According to the announcement boards, there was a special air armada battle event against a “new and unknown enemy”. As far as marketing went, it was obvious that the event would be disastrous; all decent announcements had embedded video clips instead of plain text.

I activated my ring and teleported directly to Bent Cliffs. On the surface, the area was the same—barren and desolate. My dev vision, though, made me see it in a whole different light. Hundreds of semi-transparent avatars roamed about like ghosts, heading to and from their meeting sports. None of them had display names or other identifiable features, though based on their gesticulating, I could probably be able to identify a few of them if I wanted.

“What’s my meeting spire?” I asked.

“One hundred and seventeen,” Twinkle replied in upbeat fashion. A pillar of light appeared a short distance away. “I put a marker on it so it’ll be easier to find,” he added. “Do you want to me to get more oracle tokens? You only have two remaining.”

“It’s fine.” I knew that Twinkle was behaving according to his programming, but it still felt nice imagining someone had my back. “Any new messages?”

“There’s been a new spam wave. You’ve received seven hundred—“

“Important messages,” I interrupted.

“You have one new message from college, informing you that they are looking into the problem and will soon provide you with a date for your exams.”

That figured. A team of tech administrators were probably going crazy trying to fix the situation with the minimum amount of losses. Depending on how bad things were, they might just give me a passing grade and try to forget the whole thing. Right now, I was hoping they would do just that.

“You have received two close beta invites,” Twinkle went on. “Fire Aegis and Pacific Storm.” None of the names rang any bells. They probably were made by some startups who didn’t have the money for marketing or pro players. “Both are active until—“

“Anything else?” I continued walking towards the light beacon.

“No other messages, Sarah.” Twinkle hovered above me. “Would you like me to do another search for SpiceDecker?”

“Maybe later.”

One hundred and seventeen. I checked the time. There was about seven minutes until the meeting time—an eternity for the one that had to wait. I sent FlickerFlacker a quick message that I was waiting, then used my oracle token. The sky above me turned green, though that didn’t affect the phantom avatars.

“What a day,” I leaned against the rock spire. After this was all over, I was going to get some proper sleep... assuming there were no further surprises.

“Twinkle, play me some music.” I closed my eyes.

“With pleasure!” The cat swirled around me like a seal in a circuits program. “Anything in particular?”

“Something relaxing. Dark wave maybe.”

“Sure thing, Sarah!”

The sound of violins and female vocals filled the air. One couldn’t get more cliche with such a choice, but for the moment, it was perfect. The artist sounded young, probably not even my age, doing a cover of a cover of a last-century-hit wonder. With the new laws on music, that was pretty much everything indie artists could perform nowadays. Original songs had gone out of fashion and modern covers cost more than the average person could afford. If the music lobby had its way, instrumentals would be next to go.

“What’s the name of the band?” I asked.

“Vector 5, part of the Synthcon.” My AI companion wagged his tail in absurd fashion. Obviously Jeff hadn’t caught all of the bugs. “Do you want me to get their albums?”

The name didn’t ring a bell, but I knew about Synthcon. It was possibly the single organization that managed to do well, despite music labels, artists, and most of the audience hating them. The issue was that all music they created was AI generated with token human presence, and people didn’t like that. I myself had signed the Human Player petition against AIs participating in game tournaments. However, I also had to admit that I lately I was starting to like synthetic music more and more.

“Only if it’s free.” No way I was spending money on AI entertainment. “And let me know when it’s time for my meet.”

“Your meeting was three minutes ago.”

My eyes popped open. I opened my game menu and checked the time. Three minutes past the hour, just as Twinkle had said. This was unusual. I checked my party status tab. FlickerFlacker had left the party six minutes ago. Normally, the system was supposed to give me a notification, but with enough money or skills, that feature could remotely be disabled.

Crap, Flicker. I sent him two new messages through the game system. “Can you check if he’s online?” I asked Twinkle.

“FlickerFlacker logged off six minutes, eighteen seconds ago,” Twinkle said with a helpful expression. “Before that he was online for four hours and—“

“Where?” I barked.

“I’m sorry, Sarah. Flicker kept his location private.” The AI’s smile vanished. “Apart from the time you were together, I have no way of determining where he was.”

Just great! I had no idea what had gotten into him. Just an hour ago, he had been so pushy that he had almost triggered the game’s spam filter. Now he logged off without an explanation, and after he had received my meeting request at that. I muted the music and did a user search. His character was still listed in the game database, marked as max level. At least that meant Flicker hadn’t deleted him... for the time being.

“Twinkle, have there been any hack attempts?” I asked.

“No hacks or pings in the last six hours, Sarah.” Twinkle floated onto the ground before me, looking up at me like a happy kitten. “There’s a very good promotion on security modules. Do you want me to get an upgrade?”

“Not now, Twinkle,” I hissed through my teeth. “Just keep monitoring for Flicker. And for attacks.”

Crossing my arms, I waited. After five minutes of watching the time, I closed my menu window and started the music again. That didn’t make me feel calmer. One song ended, then another, but there was no sign of Flicker. Several times, I checked the marker Max had put on him, only to find it was still inactive.

Maybe he just got bored, I lied to myself. At the end of the day, there were dozens of reasons why he could have missed our meeting. Deep inside, though, I felt the reason was me. I had consistently ignored him when he wanted to talk to me, and it was possible this was his response.

Half an hour later, I logged off. Once again, I felt like winning the ultimate money token, only to have my solid state drive crash seconds later. Before I moved out, my mother would constantly complain how the world had conspired to keep success from her reach. Back then, I was sick of hearing her say it. Now, I was beginning to understand. “Things only pick up to crash harder,” she used to say, and she was right.

“Twinkle, block everything unless it’s from work or Flicker,” I said, engaging my rig’s sleep mode. “Don’t wake me up until ten.”

“Are you sure, Sarah?” There was a note of alarm on my companion’s voice. “It would be more beneficial if you spend the morning streaming or studying. Your viewer base has increased considerably in the last few days.”

By 'considerably,' Twinkle meant about fifty people. Considering my previous follower count, that was a lot, yet when it came to paying, it was going to earn me five bucks per session, if I was lucky. Keeping in mind that my Vesperia adventures had made me lose practice in the current popular games, I would be lucky to get that much.

“I’m sure.” I was still rich enough to allow myself a night of nothing. As long as it didn’t become a habit, there was nothing to worry about. “Night. Let me know if Flicker goes online.”

Normally, I never caught the moment I fell asleep; I’d be lying still in my rig, listening to music, doing things I found perfectly normal, until the Twinkle alarm went off, telling me it was time for work. Tonight, things weren’t normal. I actually felt the exact second I lost consciousness; when the darkness around me split apart, revealing a large gate with seven locks, I knew instantly that I was in a dream. I felt that if I wanted to, I could turn around anytime and walk myself awake.

“You’re still at it, aren’t you?” Jeff asked. He was dressed in a knight’s outfit, cleaning a pile of swords with an electric toothbrush. “There’s no point, you know. Everyone who took that path got a thirty percent pay cut.”

“I know,” I found myself replying. “Am I in trouble?”

“Not until I’m looking out for you.” He winked. “Get your gear. There’ll be a crowd today.”

I nodded and went to the storeroom to get my equipment belt. There were eight pockets on it, each large enough to hold a toothbrush. I grabbed one from the shelf, when I noticed that four of them were missing. Right, I haven’t earned those yet, I thought.

“Sarah, you’re keeping customers waiting!” I heard Jeff shout. “Grab your stuff and come out here!”

I turned around. A giant knight in black armor slammed a shield of teeth on the counter in front of me. A sticky note read Urgent! Treat with care! I reached to start cleaning it, but the moment I did, the knight grabbed my hand.

“You need the fifth brush to clean that,” he said in a British accent. As I blinked his head changed to that of FlickerFlacker. “You can’t clean it if you don’t have the fifth brush.”

“You have the fifth brush,” I protested, struggling to free myself from his grip. He wouldn’t let me go.

“Yes.” Flicker nodded. “That’s why you won’t have it.”

“If I can’t have it, how do you want me to clean your shield?” I asked.

“Will you hurry up?” an elf princess shouted from the line behind Flicker. “I have an appointment for two o’clock!”

I glanced at the clock. It was one sixty-seven.

“Sorry.” I put FlickerFlacker on the counter and pushed him to my left. Jeff gave me a disapproving look, then slapped a Dissatisfied sticker on him. “I’ll take care of that later,” I explained, but neither Jeff nor Flicker paid any attention.

“You really don’t have the skill for this.” The princess crossed her arms. “Just look at Firestarter. She’s already finished her line.”

I looked. Firestarter was beside me, rubbing through a breastplate with such ferocity that the metal had given way to the toothbrush. A few seconds later, the whole set of armor was tossed on the recycle pile, yet instead of grumbling, the customer gave her a golden trophy.

“That’s how you’re supposed to do it,” the princess whispered in my ear. “Don’t worry, though. Do me a favor and I’ll write you a positive review.”

“What favor?” I very much wanted a positive review, even if I had no idea what I’d do for it.

“That’s a secret.” She winked at me.

“What do I have to do then?” I asked as Kyle moved beside her and placed a greasy pot on the counter.

“That's easy.” The princess looked me in the eye. “All you have to do is wake up.”

And I did.