Chapter 46 The City of Hunters
The man in the suit didn’t look like a soldier. He looked like an accountant. But the way he held that black pistol told me everything I needed to know. The "Real World" was just another arena. The Publisher hadn't let us go; he had just turned the whole world into our enemies.
"Found her," the man said again. His voice was flat, like he was reading a grocery list.
"Xavier! Get the kids behind the car!" I screamed.
I didn't wait for him to shoot. I lunged forward. My body felt different here, heavier, more solid, but the white light of the virus was still humming under my skin. I slammed my palm into the man’s chest. A blue spark jumped from my hand into his shirt.
He didn't fly back. He just froze. His eyes rolled back into his head as the data from the virus scrambled his brain. He dropped the gun and fell like a sack of stones.
"Mommy, everyone is looking at us!" Leo cried.
I looked around. It wasn't just the man with the briefcase. A woman in a jogging suit stopped and pulled a taser from her pocket. Two construction workers dropped their shovels and grabbed heavy iron pipes. Everyone with a smartphone was turning into a bounty hunter. Ten million dollars was enough to turn any "normal" person into a killer.
"We have to get off the street!" Xavier yelled. He grabbed a heavy metal trash can and threw it at the woman with the taser. She dodged it, but it gave us a second to breathe.
"The building!" I pointed at the skyscraper across the street. Storyworld Publishing Hq. "If the signal is coming from there, we have to cut it at the root!"
We ran. We wove through the honking yellow taxis. Bullets started to hiss past my ears. People weren't even hiding it anymore. They were firing guns in the middle of New York City because a notification told them it was okay.
"Why won't they stop?" Elias sobbed as we reached the glass revolving doors of the building.
"Because they think we aren't real," I hissed, pushing the door open. "To them, we’re just a mobile game that jumped out of the screen."
The lobby was huge and white. It looked like a temple for people who loved money. A security guard reached for his belt, but I didn't give him a chance. I focused the blue energy into my voice and let out a roar.
"Offline!"
The lights in the lobby flickered and died. The computer screens at the front desk exploded in a shower of glass. The guard tripped over his own feet as the floor became slippery with leaked ink.
"The elevators are dead," Xavier said, checking the touchscreens. "We have to take the stairs."
"It's fifty floors, Xavier!"
"Then we climb fifty floors," he said. His eyes were glowing gold again. The shift wasn't full, but his claws were out. "I’m not letting them put my kids back in a jar."
We hit the stairs. Every flight was a battle. On the tenth floor, a group of interns tried to block us with fire extinguishers. On the twentieth floor, a delivery man tried to stab Xavier with a box cutter. We didn't kill them. We just broke their bones and kept moving.
My lungs were burning. My legs felt like they were filled with hot lead. But every time I felt like giving up, I looked at the red marks on Leo’s neck from where the spiders had touched him.
Revenge isn't enough, I realized. I have to delete the whole company.
We reached the 46th floor. The door was made of solid gold. It didn't have a handle, only a face scanner.
"Elara, let me," Xavier said. He stepped up to the door and punched it. The gold dented, but it didn't break.
"It's not physical, Xavier," I said. I stepped forward and pressed my palm against the scanner.
The screen turned red. Access Denied. Subject 001 Is An Expired Asset.
"I’m not an asset," I whispered. I let the virus flow out of my fingertips. The blue light turned black, crawling into the wires of the door. "I’m the boss fight."
The locks clicked. The door slid open.
The room inside was a giant library, but the books weren't on shelves. They were floating in the air, glowing with different colors. In the center of the room was a giant chair shaped like a hand.
A woman sat there. She looked like the editor I had met before, but older. Much older. Her hair was white, and her skin looked like it was made of fine porcelain.
"You're early," she said. She didn't look scared. She looked bored. "The 'Hunt' event was supposed to last for three more chapters. You're ruining the pacing, Elara."
"Turn it off," I said. My voice was shaking with rage. "Turn off the bounty. Let us go."
"I can't do that," the woman said. She stood up, and I saw that her legs were made of glass. Inside the glass, I could see tiny versions of my forest, my lab, and my wedding. "The fans have already paid for the 'Final Stand.' If I stop it now, they’ll sue us for a refund."
"I don't care about the fans!"
"You should," the woman smiled. She pointed to a giant screen on the wall.
It was a livestream of the stairwell we had just climbed. There were thousands of people coming up after us. They were carrying axes, guns, and cameras. They were only a few floors away.
"But here's the real twist," the woman said. She touched a floating book.
The book opened, and a holographic image of a man appeared. He was sitting in a dark room, his face hidden by shadows.
"Hello, Elara," the man’s voice said.
I fell to my knees. I knew that voice. It was the only voice I had ever truly loved before Xavier.
"Dad?" I whispered.
"No," the woman said. "That’s not your father. That’s the person who sold us your father’s soul to start the story. Meet the real villain of the Silver Line."
The man in the shadows leaned forward into the light.
It was Xavier. But he was older, with a scar across his eye and a crown made of human teeth.
"Hello, my Queen," the older Xavier said. "I've been waiting for you to grow strong enough to replace me."
Beside me, my Xavier let out a scream of agony. He collapsed, his skin bubbling as his body started to merge with the floor.
"The loop is closing, Elara!" the woman laughed. "The only way to save your husband is to kill the man he becomes!"
The older Xavier on the screen stood up and stepped out of the hologram into the room. He held a sword made of blue sparks.
"Kill me, Elara," the king said. "Or I'll watch you die a thousand more times."