After finishing up the mutants on earth, Dr. Thompson had them explore several of the other Armageddon planets. Earth was just one of many possible worlds that you could explore in AO. In Champions, the Misfits had the ability to explore various continents that were extremely detailed. Even within the continent of Asperia, where they had just fought Cermillion, there were the Urser and Lupine cultures to the south, the Logar Elves in the north, and dozens of others in-between. It had been amazing going into this expansion because it had opened up an entirely new continent. Thinking about the different cultures and possibilities on supposedly infinite worlds made Miles’ head spin. How were they going to go about exploring or determining where the best place to gear up for their abilities was located? They needed a three-dimensional space map just to orient themselves to all the possible planets in this galaxy alone.

Miles was ready to continue exploring endless planets when Dr. Thompson’s prompt reminded them that their test hours were up for the day. Due to the possibility for over immersion in the new AI environment, one of the control’s that Dr. Thompson had put into place was to limit the length of the Misfit’s dives at least until they had collected sufficient evidence that human trials were proceeding without any side effects. The first day she had shared the animal trial test results with the team and it was pretty clear that there were few if any side-effects and the few that they’d noticed thus far were things like euphoria, a feeling of wellbeing, and occasionally they forgot to eat. But other than some slight hunger pangs Miles was disappointed that his four hours were up for the day.

He logged out and saw that the other pods were already empty. With only two showers in the entire bunker he suspected that the team had rushed to get a good hot shower in. Fortunately for Miles, he wasn’t interest in a shower just yet. He left the central command and went to the bunk area. Quickly throwing on his running clothes he checked the temperature outside. It was about eight o’clock at night but the sun was still out at it had cooled down to about 90 degrees Fahrenheit. It was currently winter back in Detroit and he hoped that his mom was staying warm inside with some of the money he’d sent to her from his last race winnings. Down Under it was the middle of summer and the sun stayed up late which made running in the evening a lot more pleasant. Miles wasn’t averse to night running but there were some scary poisonous spiders and snakes in the outback. Miles wasn’t too fussed about snakes but spiders were his archenemies. He still had a level 35 spider slaying dagger that they’d picked up on an old dungeon run. You never knew when it was time kill some eight-legged creepy crawlies. Miles knew that he would rather face a whole raid full of ancient dragons than have to fight a giant spider. Hopefully no one in the guild had let that little fact drop to Aeon. He’d remind Sean about it at their next guild meeting.

As Miles ran, his worries about what they would be facing tomorrow when they started doing real-world VR dropped away. For the first time in a long-time he didn’t have to worry about his mamma back home or his brother trying to make their rent. Things were still messed up back where they lived and you could still get killed just walking to the grocery store but having to worry about starving to death or keeping the heat on added exponentially to that everyday worry. Someday soon he was going to win a big race and buy his mamma a new home in the better part of town. Eric had gotten really close to being able to do that when he’d been successful in business. It had hurt to see his brother’s dreams go up in smoke. There was an adage that anyone could get ahead in America if they worked hard enough. His brother had worked hundred-hour weeks, no vacations, no holidays, no weekends, no days off. If anyone deserved to get ahead it had been him. But getting ahead in this world was left to just a select few these days. It wasn’t something that just anyone could achieve anymore, let alone a black man who had come from nothing.

Miles wrapped up a short fourteen-mile run and started heading back to the bunker. He didn’t want to push too hard since he was still recovering from the last big race and he wanted to be fresh to face whatever Aeon threw at them tomorrow. As he approached the bunker, he noticed Kevin and Emmy talking outside. He was glad that the two of them seemed to be doing ok with an actual in-person relationship. There were a lot of relationships that started online that never survived when two people actually had to get within proximity of their real bodies. Miles wasn’t a psychologist like the good doctor, but he also suspected that Emmy had dealt with some very heavy stuff earlier in her life. She had the look of a kid who’d lived through the hood which was weird because she was white and to his knowledge had never experienced the traumas of living on the street. It was good to know that he wasn’t the only person out there who’d dealt with their share of crappy life experiences.

Not everything was transitioning as easily as Kevin and Emmy’s relationship into the real world. He could tell that Alison (Linca’s real-life counterpart) was uncomfortable around Miles. They had never talked much outside of game and the fact that she was now in the real world talking with a black man definitely wasn’t in her comfort zone. Miles was used to discrimination but seeing it come from someone he’d built a close relationship with in game cut pretty deep. He tried not to resent Alison for it and gave her the space she needed. She was a sheltered southern girl who’d attended a wealthy private school and graduated to living off the family’s old money. Miles knew that she wasn’t a bad woman but she’d grown up in a world where men like Miles were seen as super predators. He hoped that she’d eventually come to realize that Miles, the black man, was the same person as Cheezus, the loveable rogue. Fortunately, not everything was as difficult. He and Sean had been good friends for years in-person as well as in-game. His friend was going through some tough times at the moment with his divorce and the responsibility of moving the guild out to the Australian outback but Miles was his homeboy and would take care of him until he got his feet back under him.

When Miles got back to the bunker the showers were free and he took a quick shower to get the trail grime off of him. He’d finished changing and grabbed some dinner in the mess hall when he heard a chime on his handheld from Dr. Thompson. Apparently, the Misfits would be going on their Gears mission tonight instead of tomorrow morning. Miles wondered why they’d moved up the schedule but at least he wouldn’t be stuck awake all night wishing it were the next day. He was ready to see what Cheezus could do in the real world and why Mr. Tiel had wanted this particular feature in his game so badly. Weren’t there AI and robots that could do anything the Misfits could?

He didn’t have to wait long to find out about why the schedule had been moved up. Everyone had gathered in the central command room about five minutes ago. It was still surreal seeing all of the actual people in his guild in one room at once. Dr. Thompson walked in and immediately apprised them of the situation.

“As I’ve mentioned before, the real-world VR MMO module is controlled by ‘Gears’ which are essentially robot automatons equipped with Aeon’s AI controller module. We’d like to test the Gears capabilities on an asteroid that was heavily mined until about two weeks ago when an explosion happened on the remote base. Your job will be to test the Gears and see if you can determine the cause. Originally, we were going to go tomorrow morning but since the Gears have arrived early we’ll begin our mission right away. Does anyone have any questions?” Laura explained.

The group was silent for about thirty seconds.

Laura looked around at everyone in the group. Sean finally asked, “Are there any differences that we should anticipate between the normal VR interface and this real-world one?”

“No, it should be seamless. In fact, you won’t even need to wear any protective gear,” she replied.

Miles was surprised and asked, “So why did we have to wear protective gear on that mutant world earlier today?”

Laura looked at him with a wry smile before replying, “It seems like you chose to wear it and didn’t question the fact that it was on you. Aeon thought it would be fun to see how you responded to a situation where sneaking around wasn’t as easy.”

Miles had been played by the AI. Damn, that wasn’t a good feeling. He was going to need to make sure that he knew exactly what they were up against going forward and question everything. Suddenly, this game seemed a lot more challenging and a lot more fun that he’d previously anticipated.

“Sounds like I won’t be able to take anything for granted going forward. When can we start this mission?” Miles asked.