Chương 71: More than an Update

Myka P. O. V. The Rivian R1T hummed at a steady pace up the winding mountain path. A thin fog covered the treelined road, and every member with a sensory Skill was on high alert.

"So, you said we're going to stay with your sister?" Dan asked.

"Yep. She inherited a whole lot of land up there. Knowing her, she's stockpiled on food, medical supplies, all of it. She's the type to plan."

"It was nice of her to invite us all." Raj said. Kain laughed but didn't respond.

"A touch naïve," Sombra said from his place in the passenger seat.

"Or she's neighbourly," Raj countered. Sombra shrugged. Myka and Dan were silent. The image Kain had painted of his sister didn't match the woman Myka remembered. Confident, sure. A little audacious, perhaps. But naïve? Risk-taking? The kind of woman to let strangers into her home during a horrific global crisis? It just didn't fit. Myka looked down at the wand he'd been given at that convention, all those days ago, it had seemed so innocuous. A souvenir, nothing more.

Something cute to remember a woman who'd tried to help him in her own interesting way.

"Hey, soft touch," Kain called he healer in the making. His grin appeared just slightly off.

"You said you met her before, right? Come on, tell them what she's like."

"I don't really like talking about people when they're not around." Kain rolled his eyes.

"Come on. We're literally about to go live in her house. You don't think they deserve to know the person they're going to be living with?"

"Does she know the people she'll be living with?" Myka asked.

"Alright. My bad, morality police. Jesus." Kain said, causing Sombra to frown in reproach. Kain let out a breath and turned back to face the road. Myka was confused. He looked at Dan, who was sitting in the middle seat to his left. The kid just shrugged and continued scrolling through his phone. Myka let it go, returning to the web-serial that was still downloading over this trash network reception. Just as he was getting into it, a voice broke what had become an uncomfortable silence.

"Hey, Raj," Dan cut in.

"You have STARnet, right?"

"In a browser, yeah," she responded, turning her gaze from the window and facing the frowning kid to her right.

"Could you open it real quick?" Raj raised her brows.

"Why?" Dan shook his head, dragging his thumb down his screen with one hand to constantly refresh the browser, the cast-iron skillet held securely on his lap with the other. He attempted to refresh the page three more times, but not only was it painfully slow, every time it reloaded he saw the same error message.

"Site's down?" Raj read over his shoulder. She pulled out her own phone. STARnet was still open in her browser. She'd been doing research as the town they'd just come from had a surprising number of active users. When she reloaded the page, she received the same error message. Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings. Her eyes widened. She tried manually refreshing, then going to the homepage, then trying the backspace option.

Each time it took minutes to load, and each time she received the same error message.

"I don't... I think… STARnet is down. Yeah," Raj breathed, genuine alarm lacing her words. Sombra pulled out his own phone while Myka tabbed into STARnet as well. The car went quiet. Kain, with his eyes on the road and his senses out for any of the mutants or creatures they'd had the displeasure of infrequently encountering, was left entirely out of the loop.

"Hey, any update?" He prompted.

"Sorry, yeah, it's just..." Dan waited for the page to refresh.

"It's…" He dragged out the word as the little circle indicated the page was still loading.

"It's back up."

"It's back?" Raj asked, watching her own little loading circle.

"Yeah, but this ain't the same site."

"What?" Kain asked.

"No, it's STARnet. It's just..." He looked at the banner advertising an app, then at all the new features in the dropdown menu.

"I get it," Raj nodded.

"Feels wrong to call this an update. This is something else." Dan frowned hard when he realised the app was only available for Android users, then crowded into Raj's space.

"You're downloading it?" He asked, then his brows shot up along with his volume.

"Bro, the speed," Dan said, while Raj pushed his face back slightly with her hand.

"Sorry, sorry. It's just-""I know." Raj said. Dan, Sombra and Myka nodded along, eyes glued to their own screens. The site wasn't fast by modern metrics, it was however the fastest they'd experienced in a long while. Myka quietly looked through the website. Maps, search filters, an updated profile bio with mandatory sections to fill in if he wanted to post, engage with any of the content, or earn something called STARpoints.

He found the profiles for the people he was in the car with and sent them friend requests, then switched back to the map and watched in real time as the area all around Metro Vancouver was rapidly updated by other, equally excited users. There was a whole legend explaining the marker system, and already the forums were flooding with people talking about the update. But the thing he was most excited about was the wiki.

He tapped over and saw different tabs for flora, fauna, Skills and Traits and Titles, a section on System-specific terminology, and more. At the top of the landing page, he saw a button inviting him to contribute. For every verified contribution, he'd earn contribution points. The same applied to updating the map or getting highly voted posts or comments on the forums. He clicked on the STARpoints icon in the corner. Beside the stylised 'SP' Myka could see he already had fifteen points.

Apparently, he'd earned five from filling in his profile, and he'd retroactively earned points from previous posts he'd made. This was beyond incredible.

"Has everyone seriously gone mute? Guys, what's going on?" Kain spoke up again.

"This update is incredible," Raj echoed Myka's thoughts.

"I don't know who is running the website, but their team must have some kind of magic. Seriously. I mean, it looked nice before, but somehow the this is so much better," Raj continued.

"I can see why they hadn't updated all this time," Myka said.

"This is the kind of thing that should take several weeks to months. Not several days," Myka finally spoke up again.

"And the site was only down for what? Ten minutes? Fifteen?"

"There's a private group function now," Raj said.

"Want me to make one for us?" Eyes on the road, Kain reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone, handing it back to Raj.

"Use my account."

"I can't. You've gotta fill in a bunch of details first." The car went quiet.

"I can just add you as a friend and make you the administrator after?" Raj said. Kain's hand remaining outstretched for a beat longer before he drew it back in.

"Let's do that," he said. The car went silent again until sound blasted out from the passenger seat. A video began playing through Sombra's phone. The voice coming from the shadowy figure on the screen felt slightly incongruous, but after a few seconds the feeling went away entirely. The video had no interruptions, no lag, no cuts. Just one clean playthrough that they listened to from beginning to end.

The group avidly discussed the first in the Trial-and-Error Tutorial series, debating information they'd learned, lamenting mistakes they made, and planning out future actions.

"I miss fast internet," Dan said, as they played back a section of the video for the third time. Sombra laughed.

"You've been spoiled."

"You're just old," Dan shot back. Their joking was cut off as the passengers were jerked forward. Had the car somehow stalled? No, that wasn't quite right. The car hadn't stalled, and the wheels were still turning; they just weren't moving. Everyone looked towards their driver, who himself was looking out at the road in confusion. It was nearing dusk, and despite the fog having begun to obscure the road and the forest around the group, it had stopped feeling so ominous.

The closer they got to the property, the fewer monsters they'd encountered. For a group that had been on high alert for days now, sleeping in fits and starts. Normally they'd be huddled together like Dickensian orphans in the winter, borrowing courage like it was heat. How had they let their guard down so much that they hadn't even noticed when a figure stepped out from the fog.