The Galactic Express by Tobias Wade

Author:Tobias Wade [Wade, Tobias]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Haunted House Publishing

The Queen and Her Prince

“Now is our chance, Senator,” Tareesh said, typing on his tablet computer as passionately as a mistreated customer composing a scathing review. “Once we take out the Queen, the rest of virus won’t be conscious any longer. That means no more adaptation, no more replication. The remaining bugs will be helpless, unthinking, malformations of code that you can wipe clean at your leisure.”

“Don’t you feel any sympathy for your creation?” Senator Hallum’s avatar stroked its mustache, watching over the boy’s shoulder as he worked in his virtual prison cell. “How does it feel to play God, creating and destroying life at your pleasure?”

“No, sir, I’m not playing anything. I don’t think God is a noun at all,” Tareesh replied without looking up. “I think God is a verb: the process of complexity arising from simplicity. I think God is the tendency for the Universe to organize itself. That’s been going on long before I ever got involved, and will continue long after I’m gone. Anyway if my creator had any sympathy for me then I wouldn’t be in prison right now.”

Hallum didn’t much care for that answer, but he couldn’t put his finger on exactly why. Instead he asked: “How can you tell if we’re winning? I can’t see anything with all those bright lights.”

“Everything projected on the screen is happening live inside the simulation. We’re watching from the perspective of Amore as the antivirus is channeled through her. As you can see, the Draiths have already killed the local criminal population, and are currently attacking the remaining prisoners.”

A low-resolution blur resolved into rows of needle legs encompassing the screen. The perspective shook violently back and forth for a moment before a blast of light caused the squirming creature into fractals of countless individually squirming parts.

“How long has the virus been flying? And what’s that awful squeaking sound?” Hallum pressed with fascination.

“They’ve continued to grow since they were released into the simulation, but it won’t be enough,” Tareesh asserted. “I now have complete administrative control over this world. Scatter, run, it doesn’t matter. I’m going to pop you little pimples.”

Tareesh was enjoying this a little too much, considering he was technically still performing penance for his own crimes. Amore too howled enthusiastically as she danced through the battlefield, leaping over her cowering companions as she flung herself at the teeming insectoids. Senator Hallum wanted to share the same excitement, so why couldn’t he? This was his victory too, his more than anyone’s. None of the villagers had even logged off, so he could still revive their avatars and simply pretend this was another miracle from the Quasi Crystal. The oversight board would leave him alone, the life and death trials would resume, and Hallum could go back to making Pria a better place. And yet he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was as savage as the criminals, about to perform a ritual sacrifice in order to build his peace.

“Where’s the Queen?” Hallum asked. “That thing was bigger than the whole Galactic Express.

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