Free Gamerunner by B. R. Collins Page A

his eye and jerked his head at the door.
    ‘OK, I’m going,’ Rick said. ‘Can I take your P&V shake, please?’
    Daed frowned, but he nodded.
    Paz turned and leant against the glass, her hands spread on either side of her. She watched Rick as he went to Daed’s shelf and picked up the cup of brown sludge. He heard her lick her lips; then she said, ‘I hear they’re very good for you. Of course I’ve never tried one, myself . . .’
    ‘I love them,’ Rick said, before he could stop himself. He went to the door, tapped precisely on the panel and stepped through the moment the gap was wide enough. He heard Daed clear his throat as he walked round the corner, out of sight.
    But it wasn’t the shake he wanted: it was the straw.
    He dragged it out, sucked the shake off the end, and he was on his stomach and waiting for the door to close before he even had time to grimace at the taste. Then the door slid shut, and he slipped the straw into the gap and upwards. It stuck just below the electrolatch. The door paused, confused, leaving a micro-em of space.
    Rick smiled, and checked the comms panel. Nothing.
    Safety mechanisms, he thought. All that technology and you can keep a door open with a drinking straw. Honestly.
    But the flash of triumph didn’t last. How could it, when he could hear Paz’s voice, faint but clear? She said, ‘We don’t like people who break their promises, Daed.’
    ‘I don’t recall ever promising you —’
    ‘Oh, but you did. Don’t you remember? The perfect product. A game that would never be obsolete.’
    ‘It isn’t obsolete!’ The response came too quickly, too fiercely. ‘All right, I promised you that — but it’s still true. It is the perfect product. There’s no reason why —’
    ‘A game no one could win, you said. Always another quest to run, always something more . Our unique selling point, I think you said. As well as the RPG elements — real , classic gameplay — that would never be completed. Tell the world they can win it, and keep the end just out of reach.’ Rick heard a faint rasp, and realised that it was Paz’s stockings, as she moved. ‘I hope some of this is ringing a bell?’
    ‘There was a cheat. The avatar who got through the Roots was cheating. You can’t hold me responsible for —’
    ‘If he cheats and gets away with it, I certainly can.’
    A pause. Rick wished he knew what they were doing; but there was only silence. The gun-grey metal in front of his face blurred and came back into focus.
    Paz said something else, too low to catch, as if she was standing right next to Daed. Rick imagined her touching him — his face, or his arm — and shivered. There was an answering murmur, and Paz laughed.
    ‘Let me recap,’ she said, her voice quiet but so precise Rick could have been reading the words. ‘You promised us infinity. You promised us a game which would never be won. You said that no matter how long our customers spent in the Maze, no matter how hard they worked, there would always be something they couldn’t do. You promised us a game without an endgame.’
    Daed said, ‘No one could win against the Roots without cheating.’
    There was a noise like something cracking. A split second later Daed laughed, or gasped, Rick didn’t know which. Something heavy fell off a table.
    ‘I don’t care if they were cheating,’ Paz said. Rick heard her sigh. ‘Oh, Daed . . . The Roots were your masterpiece, weren’t they? Constructed to show us how good you were. We gained hundreds of new accounts, because the best players couldn’t resist, and the Roots couldn’t be beaten. Perfect. But now — I’m sorry, Daed, did I hurt you? — now we can see that your masterpiece is flawed. Or, put simply . . .’ She paused. ‘Would you mind? My shoes were rather expensive, and Housekeeping have such problems with blood . . . I do apologise, I forgot I was wearing a ring. No, as I was saying, Daed, the problem now is that your work has turned out to be