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BLAKE

In Red World , you could never die.

As the game began, you were dropped in the middle of a dystopian universe of your choosing. You might choose Urban Hellscape, a crumbling city populated by zombies, or Jungle Warfare ruled by militant apes. There was a universe that consisted of only sewer tunnels called What Lies Beneath, WLB for short. Eyeless, white troglobites ruled WLB, using their sonar to find you. Blake’s personal favorite was Death Mall, an abandoned five-level shopping center that also included an additional two levels of subbasement, if you found the right door, access always changing. Here, hot Stepford-mom robots with glowing green eyes and bouffant hairdos were the ones to kill.

No matter which world you chose, no matter how horribly your avatar was maimed in any of these places, or if you got trapped somehow and couldn’t escape before the red circle closed around you, or even if you got your head chopped off or chopped off someone else’s head, you always returned to The Locker Room, where you could choose a fresh skin, new weapons, and start again.

Tonight, though, Blake was headed to Haunted Amusement Park. He hadn’t been there in a while and supposedly there were some sick new upgrades.

Violet was in bed; he could hear the white noise coming from her room, a sound she always needed to sleep. Her homework was long done, of course. Because she was perfect . Blake still had some math to do, and it was nearly eleven o’clock.

But just one more round.

If Mom was home, she’d have already checked on it to make sure it was done. No gaming until schoolwork was finished: that was a hard-and-fast, as Mom liked to say. But Violet couldn’t care less. It’s your business if you want to fry your brain with that stupid game. Violet, when she lowered herself to play with him, slayed at Red World , like she did at everything.

Blake checked the various computer windows he had open to monitor his mom.

There was the weather tracker, where he watched an unnamed storm in the Atlantic move slowly toward the island.

There was a window he thought of as Find My Mom that showed Adele’s location, in the middle of an island, in the middle of the Atlantic.

He had an alert set for any news about Extreme and the challenge.

Malinka’s WeWatch page was open in one window, Mav’s in another. He had enabled notifications in case either of them went live. He’d been toggling between the open windows, texting any new info to his mom.

He did a quick check—all quiet. He watched the recorded live broadcast his mom had done when she was riding with Gustavo to Enchantments. She looked happy, if a little tired, maybe a bit nervous. Seeing her, he felt some relief. Like she was close by instead of so far away.

He had a catch in his throat as he thought about his mom out there, hiding in some abandoned hotel.

This whole thing had been his idea.

If anything went wrong, it would be his fault.

He got up to shut and lock his door, then he donned his headset, turned off the lights, and pulled up to his desk. The controller was heavy and cool in his hand.

He dropped into the game, dropping out of real life and all the things he couldn’t control.

In The Locker Room, he chose his mohawk helmet, black leather jacket, ripped jeans, and heavy boots. He took his virtual machete, rocket launcher, two guns, and a first-aid kit, which always came in handy. Not everyone had one of those; it was a high-value item. He could use it to heal himself or others if he was so inclined. The kit had earned him a reputation with the other players: they came to him for help all the time. And as a result, a lot of people owed him favors.

In the upper-right corner of the screen, a timer counted down. You had twelve minutes to gather as many prizes and supplies as you could and then find the doorway to the next level before the Red Cloud descended, ending everyone still in the game.

He entered Haunted Amusement Park by the roller coaster, a towering purple-and-black behemoth where a runaway coaster roared by every few minutes with riders screaming in terror.

As soon as he was boots on the ground, he had to react quickly and behead two skeleton bikers, the resident evil beings of Haunted Amusement Park. Afterward, he got moving fast. He grabbed two canteens, a gold ingot, and a bag of magic beans, shoving them into his pack. He hadn’t had beans in a while; they got you out of all sorts of messes.

There were a lot of other players here tonight. He recognized a couple of kids from school. Blake’s avatar was big and muscular, with a chiseled jaw, huge fists, and broad chest, a far cry from his doughy and essentially wimpy self, named The Beast. Vio let had snorted at that. But that was fine. Everyone’s avatar was somewhat aspirational. There was Tisha. In life, she was cute, a bit pudgy with thick glasses and braces, a bookish strawberry blonde who sometimes sat with him at lunch. In Red World , she was Pink, a leather-clad babe with thick powerful thighs and huge boobs, and heavily armed rocking a knife in a leg holster. She was a friend, and he could count on her in a pinch, unless they were competing for the same thing. Then she’d kill him without a second thought. He’d learned that lesson the hard way.

The only person who looked exactly like herself in Red World was Violet. And just like in the hallways at school, if she saw him in Red World , she ignored him. But she wasn’t on tonight. Her avatar name was Violent.

He spotted some of his former friends. He avoided them, kept moving.

And then there was Marco. Blake’s former best friend turned archnemesis. Marco’s avatar, called Savage, was a bald, hulking prison escapee in an orange jumpsuit and a hockey mask. His smile was a metal grid. He wielded a gleaming machete. The bridge of Blake’s nose ached just thinking about him. Sometimes he dreamed about Marco punching him in the face, smashing his glasses. He’d cried in front of those guys; the pain and the shame had been too much. You fucking waste. Everyone here hates you and your whole family. The words were on a loop in his head.

That’s why he never told on Marco and his former friends. The shame of it all. How small and helpless and how sick it made him feel. And how maybe there was a part of him that felt like he deserved it.

Blake kept to the shadows. He was just here for the prizes, for the game. He didn’t want to engage with anyone. He was on an ongoing quest for the golden peach. If you found it, it quadrupled your Red Coin balance and unlocked a whole new wardrobe of skins, as well as the ultimate weapons cache.

He watched as his friend Gregg dropped in. Blake rushed over to help him kill off a few more skeletons. Gregg, or Bone Breaker on Red World , was a ninja, slim and shadowy. He was a master with the Chinese stars, preferred hand-to-hand combat. Gregg was a senior at another local high school. They’d even met at a football game in the real world. Gregg’s parents got him a new Bronco, and he’d shown it to Blake.

“Thanks, brah,” said Gregg now. “I can always count on you.”

Then he took off. Everyone was looking for that peach.

Blake was about to follow when he heard Marco’s voice over his headset. Their avatars were still connected from all their years of playing, so Marco didn’t have to request permission to engage with Blake.

“What are you doing here, loser?”

The glasses incident had happened at lunch. He’d accidentally bumped into Marco on the cafeteria line, tipping his tray to the ground. Marco had spun around and punched him hard, knocking his glasses to the ground and then stepping on them for good measure.

Blake, true to form, had just stood there staring, weirdly remembering how when they were in kindergarten Marco still sucked his thumb. It was like a math equation he just couldn’t solve no matter how hard he puzzled over it: How could someone who was your friend once just stop being your friend? How did they suddenly hate you?

“Your dad did a bad thing, and people judge us for that. Some people will stop wanting to spend time with us,” his mom had explained.

“He didn’t do it.”

“Yes, he did, Blakey. He stole a lot of money from his company. People lost their jobs and their savings. And then he disappeared. He left us behind. I’m sorry, but that’s the truth.”

“That’s the way it looks, but it might not be the truth. What if something else happened?”

His mom got that look, a kind of sad patience. “Maybe,” she said. But she didn’t mean it.

“Just playing,” Blake answered Marco now.

“Play someplace else. That peach is mine.”

“Go fuck yourself, Marco.”

It wasn’t Blake who spoke up. It was Pink. He hadn’t seen her come up beside him. “He has as much right to be here as you do.”

“He has no right to be anywhere ,” said Marco.

With one swing of Marco’s machete, Pink disappeared into a cloud of glitter.

Blake might have been next, if he didn’t think to grab his stun gun and blow Marco back into a stone wall where he fell hard, rocks piling on top of him. Marco would have to stay there for a second to recover his energy.

Blake took off into the woods that surrounded the amusement park, hoping that would be the end of it. He didn’t like to fight in Red World any more than he did in the real world. He felt bad for Pink: she’d be raging right now. She hated Marco almost as much as Blake did. He’d get her a cookie at lunch tomorrow.

He refocused himself on finding the peach. You were supposed to look for the doors to an underground bunker, hidden near a twisted old oak and a creek.

Blake made his way through the thick trees, using his scythe to clear a path.

“I’m coming for you, Blake.”

Marco in his headset again. Behind him, Marco was running, so Blake picked up his pace.

“Just lay off of him.”

Gregg was back, squaring off as Marco caught up to him at the creek. But then Marco threw a grenade, and Gregg was blown to pieces. Blake was on his own.

Marco’s hulking avatar panted, arms akimbo.

“We used to be friends,” said Blake pathetically.

“Used to be,” said Marco. “Before my mom lost her job because of your dad.”

That was true. A lot of people used to work at Dad’s company. His dad had invented a new kind of prosthetic that was cheaper, lighter, and more comfortable for the wearer. But, according to police, his father had embezzled millions of dollars over the years, hiding money in offshore accounts. Then, just as he was about to get arrested, he took off, bankrupting the company, leaving his family, and disappearing without a trace. A scientist from the company stepped forward to claim that the original prototype had been her invention, that he’d stolen even that.

“He didn’t do it,” Blake said to Marco now. With all his heart, he still believed that.

Marco lifted his rocket launcher, and Blake prepared to return to The Locker Room. He didn’t want to play anymore anyway.

But then it was Marco who disappeared into a cloud of green.

There was a man dressed all in black with combat boots and a shorn head standing behind Blake’s avatar. He had stubble on his cheeks, muscular arms. His Red World name was Charger.

In the real world, Blake didn’t have any truly close friends. But on Red World he had a few.

“Thanks,” he said.

Charger, who was part robot, part soldier and who mostly stayed silent, saluted him. Beside Charger, another player dropped in.

Hugo was an Extremist like Blake, King Killer on the game, and the one who had told Blake about the challenge on the island.

Hugo actually lived on Falc?o Island, sharing a house with a bunch of adventure guides. You never knew who was telling the truth on Red World . But Hugo’s tip about Extreme’s hide and seek and how there was an open spot had been true. And Hugo had given Blake some sweet intel about the casitas on the hotel property. Blake still had to verify.

“How’s your mom doing?” Hugo said over Blake’s headset.

“She arrived today,” said Blake.

“Sweet,” said Hugo. “Heard it’s going to get hairy on the site. Bad weather moving in.”

“She’s pretty tough,” said Blake, feeling his anxiety ramp up a little. He took a quick click through the sites he was monitoring.

“Cool, cool. Well, if she needs anything, I’m not too far from the hotel.”

It was crazy—this person who he’d never met in the real world, who lived an ocean away, was more friend to him and his family than some of the people he’d known all his life. Of course, Hugo didn’t know about his dad, didn’t hate Blake because of what Miller had done.

“Looking for the peach?” said Hugo.

“You know it.”

Hugo laughed. “Not if I get there first.”

He took off then, disappearing into a wormhole.

“You’ve still got seven minutes to find it,” Charger said. “Let’s do it.”

The sky was already turning pink, indicating that the Red Cloud was closing in.

“How’d you know where to find me?” Blake asked.

“I know lots of things, Blake-Man,” he said. “And I’m always looking out for you. Don’t forget that.”

It wasn’t the first time, or even the second time Blake had met Charger here. They talked a lot this way.

“Let’s do this,” the big man said, jogging off toward the twisted oak.

Blake waited a second and then followed.