The Alembic Valise by John Luxton Read Free Book Online

cups on the table. Joel smiled at her and declined her offer of sugar then worked the lid loose on his cup and took sip.
    “These are transition points located at various points within the PW,” said Joel on studying the map. Receiving blank looks he began to backtrack.
    “Alembic Valise is a MMO game, that’s massively multiplayer online game. It is played within a persistent world, meaning the gaming environment continues to evolve even when a player is off-line. On every level, and there are nine, there are zones the player must locate, and these are known as the vulture’s neck. An esoteric metaphor that is based on the idea that time is essentially a spiral and that the possibility exists of being able leap between the coils. Usually only the denizens of the spirit world are able to perform this vault across both time and space. Anyway the game player must recognise and use these hidden doorways in order to progress to the next level.”
    DC Sharma started writing furiously on her notepad then announced, “Nukes Culvert; it’s on this map and it’s an anagram of Vultures Neck.”
    “Anything else you can tell us about theses maps?” asked Detective Z.
    “One thing occurs to me,” said Joel. “But I need to talk to the developers in order to clarify it. I’ll call them now.”
    Two minutes later Joel flipped his phone shut. “They will look at the maps right now if you email them.”
    DC Sharma’s fingers flew over the keys of her computer. Joel’s coffee had gone cold but he drank it anyway.
    “Do you know Shah’s real world movements at all?” asked Joel thinking he had better try and ground things a little.
    “Well apparently he was watching your houseboat from the nearby park. For a while my boss had the theory that he was there to kill you, in order to free himself from the game; thought he may have been in the grip of some kind of obsessive psychosis.”
    “Oh fuck!” said Joel.
    “Even the tramps do not doss in the park in midwinter. We spoke to some of them and he was seen over the few days leading to his death.”
    “They have replied,” said DC Sharma suddenly. Both Joel and Detective Z looked at her expectantly.
    “Well,” continued DC Sharma reading the email response from her computer screen. “He says that this map was almost certainly generated from a pirated copy of Alembic Valise of which there are many in circulation. Usually some of the menu options and functions do not operate correctly if at all.”
    “Well that is reassuring to know,” said Joel.
    “In fact he goes on to say that when a player has reached the pinnacle of their quest they are deified and inducted into the pantheon of immortals. This is missing from the pirated copies and can clearly be seen to be absent on these particular maps even though the player reached level nine.” DC Sharma pushed her chair back, tasted her coffee, grimaced, and then looked enquiringly at her superior.
    “Maybe we should just let the coroner decide if it was an accident or suicide,” said Detective Z wearily, after a few moments of thought.
    “You mean draw a line under it boss?”
    “I mean, can you imagine calling a press conference and telling them that a pirated computer game could be sending folk crazy. On the other hand if there is the issue of public safety and if we do not warn people and it happens again or for that matter it has happened before and we do not know about it then we will be accused of being negligent. The only link in the Shah case is his tattoo; if he did not have that then the whole thing would have past us by completely.”
    Joel remained silent. The two detectives seemed to be going through some process and he was content to listen.
    “OK”, said Detective Z after a short pause. “You, DC Sharma, will start going through recent cases. You can search the database by keywords, so let’s compile a list of those and get started.”
    “It will take weeks, boss.”
    “I know but then if we find