Soldiers of the Metaverse story.
The Sandcastle
Lars stood there again, bent over the nanofiber balustrade of Romaris’ royal guest chambers. Just a moment ago he was enjoying himself, staring at the perfect desolate orange expanse. Now he was uneasy and increasingly jittery. He really needed to end this once and for all. He sure as hell hoped he’ll never have to go through these disgusting, touchy-feely mental convulsions again.
His Pulga helmet caught the full sync. They must be very near now. He could feel the overwhelming surge of memories and… feelings incoming. He clenched his fists and resisted as stims started flowing and overpowering his will.
He did not want to reminisce. He did not want to remember… and yet he started to flow.
How did it feel? To experience the slightest resonance or smell. How did it feel to be human? Or whatever it was they were before they got here, before they’ve been enslaved by the everpresent allure of the eternal non-existence. Cyborgs. Post-humans, part flesh, part machine, but still real. And then even that was taken from them.
Ah, the Metaverse. Lars started to grind his teeth, at least they still felt real. What a lofty goal, what a lost opportunity. It could’ve been so grand. We could’ve just all waited it out. Until the Earth was ready for us to go back to. The promise was so lofty and uninhibited. Everyone could become anyone and do whatever their imagination conjured, a true free-for-all, with no centralized control and no overseers — he chuckled. When people thought of the metaverse before they got here, they thought of all these great things that they will get to do there. The fast cars, the sprawling villas by the beach, the perfect sunsets, oh and the concerts, of course, they’d fly, no they’d teleport to the concerts.
They never bothered to think whether they will actually feel anything. Whether they will still be capable of feeling anything. Living in the metaverse was like never exiting a movie theater. A never-ending audio-visual spectacle. That’s all there was. Nothing was real. It was all just a replica. A digital one. Flat and unconvincing. Except for the people. The people were fucking real. And they sucked. They turned this would-be paradise into something much more familiar. A hell. A constant, never pausing battlefield. Accessible 24/7. With no off button.
Well, it didn’t start like that — he thought for a moment — or did it? It took time, even the metaverse took time. It’s one thing to autogenerate thousands of items, buildings, and landscapes, it’s another to customize them, weather them, personalize them, make them unique… and human. Make the street the main street and the favorite coffee shop favorite even though no one actually drank any coffee. Have people congregate and make the metaverse believable… or simply, livable.
On some continents, though Lars often wondered why, the cities almost mimicked the ones on real Earth. The squares were the same, the streets were the same and so were the landmarks. Painstakingly recreated in the digi-verse. One-to-one replicas. Because that’s what the people wanted. They wanted to feel the familiarity. They wanted to stare at the same pictures and sculptures and graffiti, the never-ending walls of graffiti.
Others wanted to start completely from scratch. They wanted deserts where there were lush forests, well mostly forests where there were desolate deserts, but also buildings on top of mountains, never-ending caves leading to even more underground cities. Some people literally dug the underworld vibe. They wanted more. They thought they can go deeper. They thought they can replace the sun with the core. Or some shit like that.
But it didn’t work out like that. Not at all and from the very start.
Stripped from physical needs like sleep, humanity reverted to the one thing it liked most — eternal carnage — all it has known for the last several decades. Nothing has changed. Even the Battledrome was ported over and became the ultimate form of entertainment and glory. Humanity has become so enthralled with virtual carnage that it has completely forgotten there has ever been a “real” world. It’s become a construct, a fairy tale told for generations that no one really believed anymore, and most thought that EDEN had nothing to do with it or that it’s not even real. There were those who believed that the ecosystem has been long restored and been fully habitable for generations but no one really knew for su…
“Wakey, wakey,” Lars heard a familiar voice but could not make out the face through the mist.
“I…, I can’t… see… anything,” he mumbled, and his arms flailed in the air as he tried to grab onto something.
“Easy now, easy, it took a lot of powder, sorry I meant power to get you here brother, so you go easy now. I know you’re used to always being on in the meta, free of those silly remnants of physiology so it will take a few moments till your mind gets fully adjusted to this… body of yours, but stay with me. Few more hours and you’ll feel like… well like you need to drink an ocean and eat an elephant and we haven’t had those in a while… anyway soon enough you’ll get back to your senses and Hector will…”
“Where is Hector?” Lars stopped convulsing and tossing around. “I need to see Hector.” He rose abruptly but the nano restraints brought him gently right back into his cryobed.
“He will see you shortly,” he felt a strange, warm sensation of a hand touching his cheek.
“Yrsa… “
“You rest now. We have lots of catching up to do,” — he heard Yrsa say before the hiss of the door opening and closing in quick succession brought on silence again broken only by his quick, loud breath.
It all came back to him now, and it felt real, so nauseatingly real. He was born Larson von Sacken and raised in Jericho, a sub-city lost early in the scrap wars. He never knew his parents. He never knew childhood. He was born a soldier. Ready to fight as soon as he could walk. First trained as a juggernaut, an assault trooper, due to his dominating stature but quickly switched to special ops because he turned out to be an expert marksman, had a soft touch with explosives, and could place an artillery strike on a hairpin in under fifty seconds. He could hack a transmitter without a toolset and rally troops under fire. It didn’t take long before people took notice. He ended up in front of Hector before he turned seventeen.
“I hear you are good with gear,” said Hector when he first saw him.
“I’m good with everything sir,” Lars saluted.
“At ease boy, nobody’s good at everything and that’s a fact.”
“I am sir, and I’m not a boy sir, I’m a killing machine…”
“Whoa, whoa there… if you are a machine, then we have a problem don’t we?” Hector hang his voice as he approached Lars, his black and gold tunic sweeping the floor behind him.
“I’m not a literal machine sir, it was a figure of speech sir.”
“Do you have anything against machines though?” Asked Hector as he put his perfectly smooth bionic face right in front of Lars. His cybernetic eye made quite mechanical sounds as it scanned Lars’ face. His watery blue human eye did not move.
“Only the bad ones sir.”
“And which those might be huh?” Hector rose his thick eyebrows.
“The drones captured and operated by the Free Force for the Liberation of the Pure Human Republic sir.”
“Ah those. Well, those are few and we have many more than they do, don’t we… so put your worries away. We stopped them capturing those for good, a long time ago. Now they rely on what they can scrap together and make themselves. We have the numbers, we have the technology and we have EDEN. My self-deluded brother lives in the Lala land and thinks only of himself. He fights to cling to his power and promises what exactly?”
“Death sir,” Lars interjected before Hector could finish his sentence.
“Exactly. Death and nothingness. No hope, no plan, just an old atavistic instinct to fight and cling to whatever power he’s got left. That’s all he’s got. We will let him fight. It’s good for us to hone our skills. But soon enough his time will come, and once we are rid of him we can focus on working together with EDEN to bring back the atmosphere and reclaim what’s ours. Hector held up his voice and seemed to get lost in thought.
“Yes sir, we shall reclaim what is ours.” Said Lars to break the uncomfortable silence.
“Indeed, then you are ready boy?”
“I am ready for anything sir.”
“That you are. You shall be put to the test immediately.” Said Hector as he snapped out and gestured towards his guards lingering behind. “take him to the Battledrome!“
His first battle was the hardest. He did not understand the rules… or lack thereof. He let his opponent gain the initiative. She was faster and nimbler than he was and she was aggressive. He parried her first electric battle falx swing with the shield that he picked up just moments ago, one of many items randomly strewn around the arena. He immediately countered with his plasma fingers, but they just hissed in the air where she’s been moments ago. He swung around panicking as he could hardly keep up with her. She moved around like a tornado and must’ve had premium leg servo gear and micro boosters to get this kind of agility. Lars made a long jump back onto a raised platform and hoped she’d follow him as he had his own surprise. He just needed her in one place for a second… and for that, he needed a distraction. He activated the holo projection and knew she’d not fall for the trick twice. As soon as she landed on the other side of the overhang right behind him he deployed a projection and used his last booster to jump over her. She hesitated for a split second. That’s all he needed. He wrapped his laser fingers around her midflight and kept them on stun until she fell to the ground incapacitated. He hoped to meet her in the metaverse as soon as he lost his next battle. Just that he didn’t.
Lars won the next nine fights before the end of the third round and earned the title of “The Undefeated. He went into his last fight wearing just a plain t-shirt — a privilege reserved for the most accomplished fighters of the Battledrome. Most opponents faced with such berserker foe chose to give up their existence and be digitized without a fight. His final opponent did not. He wore a plain gray hitman suit and a stock Midas helmet. He chose to start a fight in a “zombie hand” pit which meant he cannot move offensively until his opponent does as an additional taunt.
The fight lasted eighteen rounds and generated the highest betting revenue ever recorded in Battledrome history. They fought each other to a standstill and collapsed out of exhaustion. There was no regulation for that. The fights were to be held till a single man was left standing. That night was different. Lars was a star. He’s won his ten fights in a style rarely seen before. He was still undefeated. His opponent was too. His name was Erik Stormborne. They were about to make history.
They became the first one percenters. The ones that’ve past the test and survived the Battledrome. Earned the right to stay. They have been assigned their tasks by EDEN immediately. They pertained to the logistical tasks at hand — management of the Battledromes. Fifty games were held every day in each of the seven continental Battledromes. At this point populations on most continents plateaued at around fifteen percent of the original before the environmental apocalypse. The more populated ones have been on the lower band of the count. The ethnicities making them up have hurled themselves at each other’s throats with fierce resolve they’ve been tending for generations, and they’ve evaporated each other.
As far as Lars and Erik were concerned, people had to fight, and then they had to be processed.
Lars was sent to oversee South America and Erik went to Europe. They were the Overseers of the Battledromes, but people called them simply Pimps of Death.
“Transfer complete, please hydrate and wait for the staff to assist you before exiting.” He heard the familiar soft female voice announcing the completion of the FDF cycle. Lars woke up. It felt oddly… unnatural to be back in the flesh.
“Yrsa?” He called in a dry, raspy voice. He tried to swallow and immediately wished he was back in meta.
“Please remain calm. Our staff will assist you shortly. Please do not stand abruptly…”
What on earth was that? A double dream spoof? It sure did not feel right. Without rising from the bed, he reached into his pocket and felt a pack of cigarettes. Real fucking cigarettes. They were right where he’s left them. He lit one. His lungs were pure benzoate adamantium or whatever they called it now, they worked better than the real ones and that was that. He released the smoke and watched it slowly twirl and dissipate in the air. So at least that’s confirmed. This is the real deal. He looked around one more time. He was in an FDF station that’s for sure… just not the right one.
“This is the last time you’ve taken me for a ride… my friend.”
Erik must’ve used their shared memories to lure him in, gain control of the flow, and reprogram the arrival destination. How he managed to do that Lars did not know, but it didn’t matter now. He knew exactly where Erik was headed. He had to act fast.
He carefully examined the chamber he was in. This was no ordinary FDF station. There was no staff and no discernable exits. His sensor feed was also completely blocked off or jammed as he was getting no reading on his location or disposition of his team. The comms were down too. He deployed a semi-analog autonomous auxiliary comms station. It was a primitive technology from a previous era that circumvented the main Romaris network. Only select individuals carried these old terminals for emergency situations.
The antiquated digital display turned green and read — connected. Lars punched in his code and waited for a connection.
“Lars? Is this a joke?” Hector’s distorted holo-stream visual was not distorted enough to obscure his dismay.
“It’s good to hear your voice sir.”
“Where on earth were you? Do you have any idea what happened?”
“I got spoofed, sir.” Lars struggled to maintain composure.
“How on earth did you get spoofed Lars, you are my protector, you are my vanguard, you’ve trained for this, you’ve prepared for this, you’ve looked at all the contingencies, you assured me you’ve got this covered.”
Lars switched off the flickering visual and kept just the audio.
“I don’t want to get technical, and I don’t have all the answers yet…”
“Indulge me.” Hector interjected.
“My daydream flow got hacked.”
“How? We both know it’s not actually possible unless you allow it.”
“It’s called a sandcastle, a limbo flow state where one loses awareness of their self drifting in the FDF stream. Everything looks and feels real to the recipient and can stay that way for as long as the stream is sustained with a legitimate, unadulterated memory feed.”
“How?”
“It must’ve been Erik… and not just him…”
“You’re telling me that Erik managed to hack into your drift, trap you in it, feed you his bullshit, and manipulate your final destination?“
“Precisely, in a controlled environment, we sometimes employ this technique in soldier conditioning and interrogations. It’s like radio signal eavesdropping in the old days, just that once you lock onto the signal you can also transmit and interfere with it. It’s also used routinely to disguise troop transfers by projecting fake destinations and faint attacks…”
“Spare me the smoke screens.” Hector raised his voice, “your entire team reached the target and got slaughtered, an FDF station has been fucking stolen from under our noses and you are telling me about some routine shit here? You knew exactly who you were up against. What happened here is only possible between individuals who shared the deepest thoughts and feelings. You should have been prepared for this Lars!”
“We were too close,” answered Lars stoically, “could have happened to anyone.”
“No, in this case only to you,” said Victor, “and it still doesn’t add up. You’ve had him in your scopes several times and I still don’t understand how you did not manage to take him out by now but most importantly you haven’t actually spoken in ages. Someone else had to jack you in and facilitate this.”
“Yrsa,” said Lars in a saddened tone.
“This gets worse by the minute… first your former best buddy takes you for a fucking brain ride, then it turns out it’s your lover who enabled it. What’s next huh? You’re gonna tell me you’re Hector’s pet?”
“Unfortunately, in a way… yes sir, as I am indeed trapped in here.”
Lars heard a short scuffle coming out from outside and the voice feed terminated. He could hear metal scraping but his sensors could not penetrate past the walls. Suddenly bright light flooded the chamber as previously invisible doors split open directly in front of him.
“Hello brother, I hope we did not keep you waiting too long,” said Erik, “I just wanted to make sure your liege hears from you personally that you are safe and how…”
“You will regret this Erik.” Lars lurched forward and attempted to power up his weapons but almost instantly fell flat to the ground unable to move. His visor display went red blinking a critical suit malfunction warning. He must’ve been struck with a surge pike.
“Maybe, maybe I won’t. One thing is sure. You are coming with us now. Your new liege is awaiting you. All you have to do is kneel and I’d suggest you don’t hesitate much ’cause we’re rather pressed for time. We must leave our little sandcastle now as I’m sure your friends will be arriving soon looking for their precious hero and the FDF he was supposed to protect.”
“I’ll take care of him,” Yrsa pushed past Erik as she collapsed her surge pike into close combat mode. “Good to see you again my love,” heard Lars before she put him out with another precise spike.
This is the story of the Soldiers of the Metaverse (SOTM) project.
You can find more information here:
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