The Game of Life

Every day is Game day

SAMPLE

Lawrence

The Game of Life nanotech that had been injected into me six years ago jolted me awake with a quick burst of electricity at exactly 6:15 A.M., the time I always woke up.

Gotta get ready for the Game again, I thought with a groan, sitting up on my mattress and pulling away the coarse sheets that covered me before getting out of bed. I quickly strode into the small bathroom adjoining my room to brush my teeth, take a shower, and put on my standard-issue red jumpsuit decorated with the Game of Life insignia.

Sliding them off their hooks, I buckled on my bulletproof vest, my thick leg-plates, and sturdy boots, all of which I had won from the Game for small exploits. I glanced at my digital watch, also a prize, to see that it was 6:27!

I pulled open my bedroom door and dashed through the dim hallway past so many other rooms identical to mine. The dully glowing Portal opened on the other side of the hallway, softly humming and emanating waves of purple. I would have to hurry, it would only be open for a minute, and missing the Portal meant getting a Warning. Three Warnings and you're Dispatched, kicked out of the Game to live in who-knows-what's outside.

As usual, I leapt into the Portal in the nick of time, just as its energy was starting to fade. I didn't bother to pay attention to the other Players dressed in jumpsuits like mine, floating in the swirling vacuum inside the Portal, I didn't know most of them very well anyway.

After spinning through the seemingly endless expanse inside, I was finally spit out of the Portal with a whooshing sound, landing flat on my butt in tall grass.

I surveyed today's Game location. There were no trees, shrubs, or anything except grass for that matter, so no chance of finding food. Dinner had to be won, or I would starve, but I wasn't complaining. I had seen far worse locations during my six long years of Gameplay.

"Graceful as always, huh, Lawrence?" Came a familiar taunting voice from behind me. I turned just in time to see my friend Lillian do a front flip out of the Portal and land lightly on her feet beside me.

When we first met about four years ago, Lillian and I filed a Pairing request, like most Game friends do. Since it was accepted, we always spawn pretty close to each other.

"Not everyone in this Game's a flying squirrel like you," I rolled my eyes, standing up and brushing the grass off my back.

Lillian wasn't exactly pretty, with her sharp features, tight brown ponytail, and hawk-like gray eyes, but she looked and was fierce, which was more important than beauty in the Game of Life.

"So, are you ready to kick some butt!?" She yelled, pulling out her gun, stocked with a fresh supply of poison darts for the day. Last year, when we had won our first Quest together, Lillian chose the gun for her prize and I chose my bulletproof vest. While she seemed bent on Dispatching every Player within a ten mile radius, I was just trying to focus on not getting Dispatched.

"Good morning, Players of the Game of Life," said the recorded hologram of Sterling Richardson, lead Game Director. "Today, you will begin a day of the most comprehensive virtual reality video game ever created in the history of Earth..." I blocked out the rest of her five minute long speech, I had pretty much memorized it after listening to it every single morning for six years in a row.

"...good luck, and I hope to see some of you soon on this side of the Finish Line!" She concluded. It was a cheesy pun, but somehow, Lillian found it funny every single time. I suppressed a smirk when I heard her snorting with laughter beside me.

"You can put that gun down, you know. There are no Players here to kill."

"Eh, I guess," Lillian reluctantly lowered her weapon and sat down in the grass. "And by the way, tomorrow's my birthday. I'm turning eighteen," she smiled. "I guess I deserve my rest."

"Well...Happy early birthday!" I smiled and patted Lillian on the back. "I know how you feel. Eighteen used to be a huge deal back then, you know. Now, though, we're too busy with the S-T-U-P-I-D Game of Life to celebrate."

She laughed at the spelling trick we all knew so well. Audio and video cameras in the Game were programmed to alert Finish Line if we used negative adjectives with the "Game," "Sterling Richardson," the "Government" or "Finish Line." We were immediately issued a Warning for "disloyalty" if we were caught, so most players just spelled the words out to stay under the radar.

"But no, I'm not going to have a happy birthday this year," Lillian blew some hair out of her face. "I'm actually going to have a heartbreaking one."

"What do you mean?"

"I'll never break Sterling Richardson's record." She paused when she saw my confused look. "You know, she became a Winner at age seventeen. My lifelong dream has basically been to do it before that, but I guess that's not happening," she put her head down in defeat.

"Are you serious? That's what you're worried about? Come on, you're on level 102! That's, like, fifty million levels higher than me! And besides, we all know Sterling's a G-R-E-E-D-Y Game-loving P-S-Y-C-H-O and she C-H-E-A-T-E-D."

"What?" Lillian's jaw dropped. "How dare you insult the greatest Gamer ever? And besides, how do you even C-H-E-A-T at the Game of Life? It's not like you can just move the pieces or mix up the cards when no one's looking. This place is basically swarming with security cameras, and don't forget the nanotech trackers in us!

Why couldn't my best friend be a Jerry O'Conner fan? I'd even be okay with a Bella Kramer fanatic, and she was the worst singer on the planet! But a Sterling Richardson fan. Sterling Richardson the egotistical, power hungry brat out of all the celebrities out there.

"Okay, whatever," I smiled smugly. "She's related to the ABC, and she magically finished the Game about fifteen years before everyone else. No, she didn't C-H-E-A-T at all."

"Hey! Maybe she's related to the ABC, but that's so distant, like, I don't think it even counts as a relation. And, besides, the Game is completely fair! Being related to one of the Leaders doesn't give you an advantage. The XYZ's son and daughter are still in the Game, and they're twenty six and twenty eight! Give the girl some credit, Lawrence, she's a genius!"

"Okay, okay- WAIT!" I yelled, pointing behind us to where two other players approached, a man and a woman.

"Charge!" The man yelled, pointing to us, and Lillian responded by hefting her heavy dart gun over one shoulder and standing at the ready.

I drew a long knife from my belt and stood at the ready as I glanced at the hologram stats that hovered over the woman's head.

Name: Julie Anne Carson
Age: 29
Kills: 1
Level: 78

I smiled confidently. One kill at level 78? Such a noob and a softie. Even I had more kills than that, and I was only on 65. Lillian could easily take her.

Well, that was, until I saw the man's info.

Name: Jorge Killian Carson
Age: 30
Kills: 87
Level: 147

A level 147. Three levels away from Finish Line. And eighty. Seven. Kills. I felt useless as he rushed toward us head on, looking like his muscles were about to rip his puny jumpsuit open.

Reaching into his belt, he pulled out a real gun. Guns were probably some of the rarest items in the Game, second only to instant level-up tokens. You had to be at least level 100 and win the Death Quest, the hardest Quest of the year, to win a gun, and from Jorge's willingness to use his gun on us, he had an infinite bullet supply. Those were even harder to obtain.

There was nowhere to hide in the endless, flat grassland. We were as good as Dispatched already.