Nova Project #1 by Emma Trevayne Read Free Book Online

he’s looked everywhere, “how’s it coming?”
    â€œBedroom.”
    It doesn’t have a name. At even a third glance from someone with decent skills, it doesn’t exist, hidden away on a secret partition of Miguel’s computer, blocked by enough firewalls to burn anyone who tries to knock them down.
    It could probably get him into trouble, though he’s never been too sure, or thought too hard, about what kind. Legal, since there might be copyright issues at play, but even if they let that go, it’s a safe bet the Gamerunners wouldn’t be too happy about it. Miguel wouldn’t be too happy about having other players beating down his door to give it a try either. That would be a special kind of hell.
    Years ago a music teacher had told his class that Mozart could hear a piece of music once and instantly, perfectly repeat it. Miguel’s never been particularly musical, but he has talents.
    Like Chimera. And computers.
    The simulation boots up, pixels on a screen. The graphics are a little crude, but they’re recognizable, they work. Every level he’s played is here. Inside a ChimeraCube, going back to retrace his steps is a waste of time, going forward is more important. Here, though, in the darkness and hum of his room, every spare moment he has, he can go back and retrace his steps, learn from his mistakes, find faster ways out and through.
    â€œCan I take a look at Thirteen?”
    â€œSure.” Miguel types rapidly and retreats to his bed as Nick takes the chair. He’ll help if Nick asks, which he sometimesdoes, but for the moment he relaxes, watches his friend. Nick’s wrong; he can be lazy when he wants to.
    It’s cheating, for sure, and wrong, but like the coded status updates, it’s not blatant. It’s actually way more of a secret than those. Nick is the only other person who knows of the sim’s existence, and it’s going to stay that way. Publicizing it might make Miguel rich—for about five minutes. Then it would make him dead, quickly or slowly. Neither is an attractive option.
    Miguel slides on his visor. He checks the clock in the corner of his lenses: 4 hours, 240 minutes, 14,400 seconds in which to defeat the testing level.
    Some hours are more valuable than others. Minutes, seconds, years, same thing. Time is humanity’s greatest and costliest asset because there is no choice but to spend it, and no guarantee of ever getting more.
    These hours pass in the span of a heartbeat, and he is back in a tiny slice of real world, a gaming room like any other. There is nothing else he can do, no more skills he can display to the Gamerunners. He finished the level with ten minutes to spare and spends it lying on the floor as he usually does, trying to catch his breath.
    He kicked ass. He knows it. Whether the Gamerunners agree is up to them. If they don’t, well, that’s their problem, andhe’s no further behind than he would be if they hadn’t come up with this competition thing.
    All he can do now is wait. He leaves the Cube and walks home, pushing his way through the people waiting for their turns. It’ll be another few days before all the prospective entrants have played the testing level. The night before it opened up, everyone who had registered interest had been given a time slot in the nearest Cube, four hours in which to try to pass it.
    It’s Wednesday, the level closes on Saturday. He can’t even play more to kill the time; all the Cubes are being used.
    The real world is bright and crystalline, solid but oh so fragile, just like the people who pass him on the sidewalk. Visible biomech gleams in the sunlight or creates its own illumination, winking dots of red or green to show the machinery is functioning.
    The only choice now is to adapt because it’s better than outright surrender. Submit to the razor-edged knife of future, wake up with parts of metal or plastic where there was once