The familiar surroundings of the selection room weren’t comforting in the slightest. In fact, I took out my anger at my rapid removal from the world by smashing the floating tablet to pieces. The fragments vanished, and a new one appeared magically in the middle of the room. I did a very Mark thing, and beat the shit out of that one too. Six more fell to my petulant fury before I finally gave up.

“Why did you take me straight out, you pricks?” I yelled. “You sent me to save people and then didn’t give me the time to say goodbye? It’s not as if we’re pressed for time, is it?”

I stood there, steaming with anger.

“Fuck this, I’m out. Where’s the get out of jail free tab?”

It appeared in the centre of my HUD, and I was about to select leave when Bart appeared. He wasn’t smiling. In fact, he carried every one of his fake eighty years as he looked at me.

“Hello, Mark,” he said, wearily.

“Bart, what the hell was that? You couldn’t give me a few days to say goodbye?”

“These decisions are taken far above me. For what it’s worth, I’m sorry,” he droned, sounding anything but.

“You realise I very nearly quit just then, don’t you?”

He nodded, the head seeming to weigh a thousand pounds. “I do.”

“And you’re here to stop me?”

“No. You must do what you feel is right.”

“What I feel is…” I began, then hesitated. “Wait, what happened to you after you vanished?”

“I was disciplined, and rightly so,” he replied.

“Jesus, Stockholm Syndrome much? You just gave me some information that didn’t impact the world at all. So what?”

“Information I wasn’t supposed to give, Mark.”

“It worked, though, didn’t it? I’m still here.”

“Only if you want to be. You can leave now if you wish.”

I couldn’t help myself. I grabbed Bart by the shoulders and shook him. “What the hell happened to you? Where’s the piss and vinegar Bart that tore me a new arsehole when I was in the cell? Don’t you care anymore?”

The ancient, jaundiced eyes looked at me. It was like the lights were on but no one was home. Another thought hit me and I let him go, backing away a few steps.

“Who are you?” I asked, cautiously, looking for any subterfuge.

“I’m Bart,” he replied.

“Bullshit!” I snapped. Either they had broken him completely, or the thing stood before me wasn’t the cheeky-chappy who had greeted me in the tutorial safe room all those weeks ago. Either way, my guard was firmly up. “What happens now?”

“You either pick a world or you don’t.”

“And what if I do?”

“You’ll be sent home for an hour. It will be timed. Consider it a gift.” The words coming out of his mouth were almost robotic.

“An hour as opposed to total freedom if I quit?”

“That is your choice to make.”

“Fuck this. You’re creeping me the hell out,” I muttered, moving to the selection screen while keeping a wary eye on Not-Bart. The tutorial dungeon and the orc world were now green and unable to be chosen. I flipped the page and found one of the rows of question marks had revealed itself. I groaned at the mangled title.

E.T. The Extra-Terrorestrial – There’s no cute bulb fingering going on here. No Drew Barrymore. No other actors who we can’t quite remember. There is no home to phone. This is a full on war of the world, and we’re losing. They appeared one bright summer morning, bringing death and destruction with them. The military bases were hit first, then the cities, then everything else. Atmospheric bombardment gave way to a full on ground invasion. The resistance is barely holding on, and they need your help!

World size – Large

The next one was thrilling, and also utterly terrifying.

A Greek Tragedy – Olympus is falling. The gods bicker and make war against each other for amusement. Meanwhile, the people of Greece are beset by the forces of Atlantis, and creatures of darkest nightmare sent by Hades from the underworld. Face your fears and save the civilisation from the selfish deities. Minotaur and Medusa. Pandora and the Titans. Great threats await in this world of gods and men.

World size - Large

“No thanks,” I said, flipping back and making my selection.

“You’ve made your choice. Now you return home for one hour. Enjoy.”

He vanished again and I felt… unclean. Or something like that. My entire body was itching as if I’d come into contact with something bad. If it had been Bart, they’d performed the alien equivalent of a lobotomy. If it was someone else, then where was my sponsor? I was oblivious to the power games that were taking place inside their ship, and that scared me even more than the world I now faced. There was literally nothing I could do about it, so I resigned myself to the gradual bloom of heavenly light that was most definitely not holy in any way.

Pop.

**********

My eyes opened and I found the patterned swirls of my flat’s textured ceiling waiting. I felt the warm touch of Cris’s hand at my side. Then I felt the warm touch of another hand at my other side. I turned my head and found Sun staring at me.

“What the shit!” I blurted, sitting bolt upright.

“What is this place?” she gasped, staring at my retro alarm clock, my wall-hung TV, my window and curtains. Her hands rubbed at the duvet cover, then rose up to squeeze the soft, clean pillow under her head.

I ignored her questions and studied Cris. She too was staring at the ceiling, but she wasn’t seeing it. It was the same expression Trystan had worn at the campfire only a short time ago. A look of mental detachment, as if the mind needed to reboot after suffering a catastrophic crash.

Honey heard our words and came bursting through the partly closed door. I heard Mrs Atkins curse about missing a stitch and then her groans as she stood up from the sofa. My dog caught sight of the stranger, gave a cautious chuff, and moved in for a sniff, ignoring me completely.

“Charming,” I said, climbing from the bed to kneel at Cris’s side.

“This is your warg?” asked Sun as my pet gave her the once over. She seemed particularly interested in the barbarian’s legs, which must’ve been covered with Fen’s scent. It was bizarre to see the leather clad warrior laying atop my bed as if nothing was drastically amiss.

“She doesn’t fight very well, but she gives mean kisses,” I warned as the pooch moved to stand on the opposite side of the bed. Straining on her hind legs, she began licking Sun’s face, much to my friend’s delight.

“Oh, you’ve got company,” said Mrs Atkins from the doorway. “Frank tried to get me to have a threesome in Turkey once. I slapped him and we didn’t talk for the rest of the holiday. I’ll get the kettle on.”

As she strode away, I began blushing. Sun had no idea what the word meant, and fussed over Honey. And Cris just lay there, unmoving.

“Mrs A, how long were we quiet for?” I called.

“Hardly five minutes. I’ve not even started on your scarves. By the way you were talking, I was expecting you to be asleep for hours or days.”

You have no idea, I thought, gently patting Cris’s clammy hand.

I heard the tap running in the kitchen. “You want tea or coffee?” she called back.

“Umm, tea, please.”

“Coming right up!” she replied, cheerfully.

I tried to look into Cris’s eyes but they were seeing something else entirely. “Can you hear me?”

Her eyes welled up with tears that trickled slowly down either side of her head. Other than that, there was no sign she was aware I even existed.

“Who is she?” asked Sun as she play wrestled with Honey.

“Her name’s Cris. She was a volunteer too.”

“A volunteer?” she asked, pinning my dog down and scratching her belly until her back leg kicked.

“She was me, in another world like yours.” I left out the multiverse and the millions of Sunliths that likely existed within them. “She signed up to fight and help people too.”

“I like her then.”

“So do I, but I think she’s been overwhelmed by it all.”

Sun looked her over. “She looks like the commander did at the fire,” she said. “Lost. Away.”

“That’s exactly what I was thinking. What can we do for her?”

“Nothing. Either she will work through it in her own time, or she won’t.”

I was horrified at the last part and held Cris’s hand more tightly. “You really think she might not come out of it?”

“I don’t know her. She put herself in harm’s way, just like you, so the girl has courage. If I were to bet on the dice like your soldiers, I’d say she would roll a five or six.”

I wasn’t party to the gambling of the Dawnstar forces. “Is that good?”

“A five or six is a win, so yes.”

I was filled with relief. My apocalypse induced borderline infatuation with the American had waned a little while I was away in the game world, and I felt like an arse about it. The wedding bells had turned into an 80’s pop hit playing in a bar where we would get to know one another without the giddy joy of a narrowly avoided death. If love blossomed, then it was meant to be. If not, I had made a new friend at least.

A muffled cry from outside carried through my window. I gently lowered Cris’s hand and moved to see what the commotion was. There was a dark blue car parked outside Amir’s corner shop across the road. The amiable owner and a woman were trying to pull an unconscious man from the driver’s seat, but he was a hefty lump if the vague shadow I could see was anything to go by.

“I’ll be back,” I said, heading for the door. “I just need to help my friend quickly.”

Sun moved toward the glass as I ran out of the flat. Crossing the street, I found my friend performing CPR while the man’s partner or wife sobbed into her balled fists.

“What happened?” I asked, kneeling beside Amir, ready to take over the chest compressions.

“Heart attack maybe,” he replied, pumping on the guy’s ribcage. “The lady was screaming and I found him slumped in the car.”

“Ambulance on the way?”

“Gita’s calling them now. Hopefully they’ll get here fast.”

“Want me to spot you?” I asked.

“Nah, I’ve got a good rhythm going.”

The shop’s bell jingled, and I turned to find Gita looking distraught. She would put the phone to her ear, drop it, redial, and return the handset. “It’s engaged. I can’t get through.”

“What?” Amir exclaimed. “How can 999 be engaged?”

“I don’t know, love,” she replied. “It just is.”

Something down the high street caught my eye; another group of people all gathered round someone laying on the ground. A cry from behind caused me to spin round. I found a woman running into the street in pyjamas, begging for help and that her boyfriend wasn’t breathing.

“Oh no,” I moaned. “Please, god, no.”

Amir glanced at me. “What is it, my friend?”

I couldn’t answer. I stood up in a daze, walking into the middle of the road. Even if cars had been zipping past, I don’t think I could’ve stopped myself. Thankfully, the roads were clear, and upon spying the far end of the street, I found the reason. A group of cars had been involved in a pileup. Steam poured from beneath crumpled bonnets. More people were trying to help the unresponsive drivers who were slumped at the wheels, dead.

Bart’s voice haunted my memories.

There’s a price to pay, but you won’t know what it is.

Now I knew. A life for a life. Death paying for rebirth in a universe not our own.

The knowledge may well break you.

As I stood there amidst the death caused by our failures, he was right. I wasn’t the cause of the catastrophe unfolding around me, but I was a party to it. The math wasn’t hard to work out when the number of volunteers had been hundreds of thousands strong. Multiply that by the repeated failures and… It was too many. Far too many.

I sank to my knees and shut my eyes, trying to force away the bereft screams of those left behind.