Chapter 3

I followed the directions inside the message. I traveled to a place I've never been before inside the OASIS, which isn't really saying much because of how selectively I moved around. This place was an underground, not literally underground, but off the grid. It looked like the back alley of a slum, everything was textured dirty and wet and it always drizzled. With a few turns and a couple blocks down, I made it from the teleporter to my destination in a free for all and fully unlocked PVP zone. I looked around and nothing, nothing but a dead end. I walked up and investigated the brick wall to see if there was any kind of loose brick or keypad or just anything. My direction just vaguely say to walk on in. I pressed all along the wall and it was solid so I tried to just walk through the wall, thinking to myself that it won't hurt. I approached it with an even step, like the wall was just imaginary and my visor blacks out. So I take it off and shake it then put it back on, still nothing. I started getting audio back, distorted audio. Within a few more seconds the visor began displaying my surroundings again and I was in a whole different world.

Unlike the cliche underworld, this place was bright and loud and full of people like a market place out of an adventure movie. I could see a sky, but I was underground, interesting. Before I could wonder off and explore this new place, my contact sent me a private message instructing me to not to approach him, look at him or talk to him, just follow. I glanced around and recognized his avatar, he faced away from me and began to lose interest in what he was staring at while messaging me. He appeared to be meandering, but I kept my distance and never stopped on him when I scanned the crowd with my eyes. It didn't look like he was going anywhere too fast so I started looking at the flea market stalls.

This place was packed with rare items that you never see up for 'legal' auction without an obscene price tag, and none of the items were labeled with any kind of monetary amount, just various combinations of repeating symbols I didn't really recognize. I had a feeling, so I looked up, I was just in time to see my contact enter a terracotta colored building through a beaded curtain. I slowly worked my way to the entry way and waited outside for a few minutes before entering.

Everything changed when I stepped through that curtain, like I teleported to a different area. There was no door behind me and everything around me reflected light like black glass would. I didn't see him initially, when I tried moving everything changed again. This time It was a white room, it could have been huge or it could have been small, it was too bright to tell.

"We're safe here." A deep accented voice said out of the nothingness.

"Where is here?" I asked.

"No where!" He replied, excitedly.

I got an invite to a private room from ZealousOrca and I accepted it. My avatar stayed behind while a copy resolved in the chat room. "Wow!" I let it out as soon as my visor feed switched over. His room was stunning, it reminded me of the old lavish offices that Bond villains had in their volcano bases, including the crazy high pile white shag carpet, an exaggerated fireplace and all the matching white contemporary furniture circa 1960.

"I apologize for all of the stagecraft." He said to me, walking into the room in a white leisure suit, shoes and shirt matching the decor holding two glasses and a bottle of scotch.

"I have tons of questions, but I'm confused. Why didn't you just invite me here from the start?" I sat down on his white chaise lounger, still trying to figure out his accent.

"It wasn't safe, it still isn't, but it's safer." He handed me a glass and he poured the drinks. "Someone wants you or your avatar dead, and before you ask, I don't know any of the who's or why's, but I do know that they are going to be equally infuriated and impressed that you foiled those amateurs."

"Amateurs? Like us playing tea time." I threw my drink out over my shoulder.

"Worse." He replied, refilling my glass."I don't do any of the dirty work for those types of people. I do the leg work."
"Is that why I saw you following me?" I asked. I came to the conclusion it was a light german accent, but I wasn't going to ask him.

"I do things in game very similar to a private investigator. It pays about a fraction of the total price on a mark, but it is still lucrative. Someone wanted to know your habits, day in a day out routine. So I collected the information they requested in exchange for a fee."

"What's with the accent?"

"I'm European."

"And why haven't I heard anything about people being victims of a hit before now?"

"Do you hear about hired hits in the real world, do you hear about all the things mercenaries do for money outside of the OASIS."
"Not really. No."

"They are the best people at keeping secrets and doing big things under the radar. Those skills translate almost directly into the OASIS. Do you do things safe, smart and fast?." He leaned back in a chair and let out a sigh. "Anyway, one of a few things is going to happen to you after this, best case scenario: You personally killed who was after you on that hit. This outcome is highly unlikely. Worst case scenario: This is a trap and you're about to die."

I jumped up and tried to leave the chat room. "I knew better." All my options for leaving and logging out were unavailable and if I just logged out, I would stay standing in a PVP zone for a few minutes until my avatar faded. My face felt cold from the panic.

"Take joke, guy." he chuckled the took a drink. "Your avatar is in no man's land. It's floating in limbo. Unobtainable, if you will. I wasn't lying when I said you were no where."
"Asshole! You're a real, genuine asshole." I sat back down.

"When you walked through that beaded curtain you entered a trick room. The door was a teleportation spell to another similar trick room on the other side of the universe in the center of a blank planet. Those trick rooms are bouncing your avatar back and forth faster than it can load, so it just queues up the teleportation to stacks. Eventually, the last trick room will stop the loop and you'll be back where we started."

"Why all the trouble?"

"Well, while the possible outcomes for you aren't great, mine aren't any better, especially if they knew I had contacted a mark, which they might already know. My avatar will be killed and/or I will be blacklisted and not allowed back to the underground, where it is safe for me to do my version of dirty work."

"I'm tired of asking questions, but why did you risk meeting me?"

"Isn't it obvious? You've got a valuable grade of potential. You're really good at what you do, but not refined enough to get noticed."
"Okay." I was not sure it that was really meant as a compliment or not, but he thinks I'm good so I'll take it.

"What I'm saying is, I have some resources for you. Take them, leave them, It's your choice. I have some other business to take care of soon, another appointment. You should be leaving." He hands me an actual data item. "Oh, and don't log on for a few days. I'll contact you another way to reassess our options in the near future."

I faded away and found myself back in the dead end alley. Not wanting to take any chances, I booked it to the teleporter and found a non-PVP zone.

I found a safe place to logout for the night.


The next morning I woke up with everything still on my person, the visor, the gloves, my clothes. I really didn't have bed to sleep in, just some allocated space and a sleeping bag for me to stay in the main room and all other spaces were shared. I had to pack up my things and store them every time I was done using them. When I said store, I really meant hide. Too many people come in and out of this tiny apartment that I don't have time to try and trust everybody to leave it alone. I tucked it away in a return air duct and put the vent back on and screwed it into place.

I did my basic chores the old lady needed done in the apartment before I left. I headed down to the street where her cart was. She sold a variety of items, almost like a garage sale daily, and she needed me to move her large and heavy boxes around. I could sort out the items, almost to her satisfaction, but there was a language barrier. She knew enough english that we could understand her, but she also threw in other words that I didn't understand at all and I couldn't recognize what language it was. I definitely didn't speak whatever language it was and wasn't patient enough to try to learn it. In the course of a normal day, I would help her out until everything was set up and then I would wander around town and look at the other vendors. When I started to get dark I would come back and help pack everything back up and take it up to the apartment.

Today wasn't any different, I did what was expected of me and then I made my rounds. Right around the corner from where I was staying there was a younger man in an old windowless van that I walked to visit. I can't say the sight and smell of his living situation didn't stir up bad memories, but I was numb to most everything now. He always had something new, or at least new looking, for a dirt cheap price or trade. One time I traded a couple cans of Pork 'n Beans for an operating laptop with a working screen, battery and charger, but I don't use it as much anymore, since I started using the OASIS rig. It just sits around now, but it's still full of movies, TV shows and music, plus other media not worth mentioning, having all that time to do whatever I wanted or watch whatever I desired taught me something about myself: I am a nerd and a completionist. I watched so many TV shows from very first episode to the finale, and the genres range from sci-fi to drama, even a sprinkle of comedy if the references were right. All of that and I wouldn't watch them again, maybe an episode here or there if I was thinking about it, but once I had completed something it just stayed in storage. I couldn't bring myself to delete any of it, physically incapable, so I started calling my addiction and compulsion Brainiac Syndrome, after the Superman villain. Consume, catalog, continue. The exception was my music. I always had it playing in the background during my daily round of quests and I wanted to listen to it more, but didn't have the means.

I made my way around the corner just in time to catch my guy opening up shop. He was a post-teen proto-hipster with greasy blond hair in the pompadour style when it wasn't under his blue beanie cap and mirrored aviators covered his eyes, just like Johnny Bravo. His beard covered the rest of his face, thick, full and blond just like his hair, but with streaks of red running through it, and he always wore a vintage t-shirts or fake vintage reprint with a pair of fitting and worn jeans. I walked closer, wondering what he added to his spread.

"Anything new?" I asked as I got closer to the table.

"Yeah, not really. Not since yesterday." Johnny replied while he continued to lay out the gadgets and oddities. I looked them over and saw what I had been idly searching for. An old cellphone caught my eye and I inspected it. It turned on and everything. "You can't get service on it anymore."

"I don't need service, I just want to load it up with music. Got any headphones to go with it?" I asked

"I might have something. You like the shitty little earbuds or like, real headphones?" He gestured cupping his hands next to his ears.

"I'd like them to knock out background noise."

"Got it. Let me rummage through my collector's box." He turned away hopped in the back of his van and opened a wooden chest. He pulled out some documents that didn't look too legit, like passports and social security cards, and he also pulled out some really vintage vinyl records still in the sleeves. I watched him sift through the box, it sounded like a kid going through a box of legos looking for the perfect part, knocking everything else to the side. He kept pulling things out until something new caught my eye. At first I thought he pulled out a gun, but the shape wasn't quite right and it had a cord and extra buttons and what looked like an old 'Haptic' logo across the barrel.

"What… is that?" I asked him, not breaking my gaze.

He grabbed it, "Oh, this old thing?" He brandished it and aimed it at me, winking. "Haptic just started giving these things away, practically throwing them in the trash, before they stopped making them."
"Why? What does it do?"

"First off, it's a piece of garbage. Secondly, this is the Haptic Quick Draw. Released in 2019 as a lame gun handle adapter for the OASIS, it was supposed to make aiming and reloading optimal." He brought it out of the van and handed it to me to fondle. "However, it took up a glove slot on older machines, making it undesirable for 80% of their current clients, the ones that did use it, hated it."

"That seems kind of harsh." I said as I examined the peripheral more closely.

"These are the facts, man. It's in the history books." He followed up.

"It can't be that bad, can it?" I pulled the cocking mechanism on it and it sounded fantastic, along with the weight and the tactile buttons.

"It's too heavy and has a limited range of uses for those long OASIS sessions." He snatched it away from me. "Every OASIS junkie can't handle anything but the weight of nothing or their dick in their hand."

I tried not to laugh, so I asked him, "How much for it, then?"

"I'm not sure if it's for sale, I kinda like holding onto these quirky things." He put his hand out in front of him like he was going to start singing.

"Please don't." I pleaded.

"Don't what?"
"You were going to start singing about the island of misfit toys."

"Not even close, man."
"You were, and you were probably going to jumble up the words because you haven't seen it in a decade."
"Bro." He put the Haptic Quick Draw back in my hands. "Don't try to get into a guy's head like that."

"Well, was there an amount or a trade for this thing?"

"Just take it, guy." He looked away, like he was done with me. "But if you don't like it, bring her right back here."

"I can't say I won't like it, but I'll bring her back to you if it doesn't work out."

He didn't respond to me, he just turned his back and started shoveling everything back into his wooden box with the exception of the old records. I just walked away with the device holstered behind me in my pants and under my shirt and jacket. I couldn't wait to try it so I rushed back to the apartment. I ran up the stairs and through the door, no one was inside so I rushed to my corner and pulled out my rig.

It plugged in along with the gloves, I was expecting it to make me replace one glove slot like Johnny said, but I guess this old OASIS stations wasn't all that old. I studied the device thoroughly, now that I was huddled over it like Smeagol coveting his precious. The trigger was two stage sensitivity, the first thing I played with, it would click on the lightest press and again right before full compression. I could feel a few buttons where my thumb rested, the tip of my thumb could flick a two-way switch up and down and the actual rest was a flat toggle switch that only clicked with extreme thumb movement. Above the trigger on the right side sat a button that my finger could reach comfortably while still easily being able to place it back on the trigger. Then the two features I used before, the manual cocking mechanism and the fast reload button where an ammunition magazine would normally be on a real gun. Because it was unfortunately designed to replace a Haptic glove, I assumed the Haptic Quick Draw had motion sensing capabilities.

I started logging in and I selected to open the OASIS extension. I remembered that the guy told me not to log in for a while. Glock blocked. So I backed off and looked through the screenshots I saved to find those resources he gave me. The first link I notice is a Star Wars book: The Bounty Hunter Code, I started the download. After that was a link to another book: Hit Man: A Technical Manual for Independent Contractors, that one queued up next in the downloads. I noticed a pattern to the point of cliches for the reference material, but I still downloaded it all. Next was a list of online communities, they all had weird labels like surface, deep and dark. There was a note above one of the dark links that told me to download a browser proxy extension, so I did, I wasn't exactly sure what it did, but the words privacy and anonymous were bold and underlined at the download link. I wondered what I had gotten myself into. I figured if I couldn't log in I would have to kill the time some other way. So I buckled in for a long session of research.