Chương 8: Fear

Underwater Yoga Blaster was a somewhat unique beast in the world of video games. It was one of the exceedingly few titles that was neither made by nor intended for humans, yet had been ported to terran virtual reality technology. This was curious for several reasons, chief among them being the race that originally created it. Known as the vrix, they were a species of hyper-intelligent and profoundly warlike insectoid creatures. Or rather, they had been those things.

For better or for worse, the vrix had bombed themselves into extinction before they could achieve interstellar travel. The archeologists that studied their irradiated ruin of a homeworld agreed that the most likely trigger for this catastrophic event had been an international incident that had started with a misplaced bagel. Among the remnants of their relatively advanced civilization had been several technological marvels and scientific breakthroughs.

One of the former was an incredibly advanced space combat simulation with unprecedented modability. A software company called Superstar Flyway Go-Go bought the rights to this ancient program and adapted it for the V-Life platform. Exactly why they had chosen to name it Underwater Yoga Blaster was one of the galaxy's many mysteries, as it featured little-to-no water and even less yoga. There were plenty of blasters, at the very least.

Its rather remarkable origins and misleading nomenclature aside, Underwater Yoga Blaster was most famous for being a genre-defining title. Even though it was already five years old, it had remained as the forefront leader in the field of competitive team-based space combat arenas. It would also serve as the medium through which Joe and four of his friends intended to compete, their hopes set on winning a prize in the upcoming tournament.

To that end they had spent the last few days vigorously brushing up on their virtual dogfighting skills. The enthusiastic hobbyists had no chance of claiming the championship, but felt good about their odds at grabbing one of the lower-hanging prizes in the pool. Their training regiment had to be interrupted, however, as most of them were reaching their limit. There was only so much time the human mind could spend in virtual reality before it started to suffer from negative side effects and complications.

That was why the V-Life service mandated an eight hour break every forty eight real world hours. Joe emerged from what felt like an eight day training marathon feeling positively exhausted, but in a strangely pleasant way. Though he had no way of knowing this, the odd satisfaction he was experiencing was close to that of an employee who had just put in a hard day of honest work. What Joe did know was that he would sleep soundly in his pod during the mandatory off-hours.

Or at least that had been his intention until he noticed something odd through the transparent door of the slightly eldritch machine. Maggie was, for lack of a better term, sitting cross-legged while hovering about a meter off of the floor. This by itself wasn't all that unusual, as the girl had been in that very same spot and pose when Joe last saw her. What stood out as out of place was the lump of something brown in her hand.

The man's vision was still a bit blurry since he hadn't used his eyes in two days, so he couldn't get a good look at it from his position. Nevertheless, he decided it was probably a good idea to check it out. The shoggoth-possessed pod slid open and Joe somewhat unsteadily emerged from within.

"Hey, Maggie," he greeted her.

"Did you miss me?"

"I have indeed been inconvenienced by your absence, Joe." It was an oddly impersonal way of saying it, but the simple man decided to accept it as an elaborate 'yes' and moved on to the topic at hand.

"What've you got there?" Or rather, in hand.

"I have claimed rightful ownership of this creature during our physical separation." She held the snake in question up to Joe's face in a manner that implied she was showing it off. The man beheld the serpent with the gold-and-brown patterned scales with a sort of bemused wonderment. He had no idea where Maggie had even found the thing, but at the least her claim of 'rightful ownership' implied she hadn't stolen it. The creature itself was certainly an adorable little bugger, emphasis on 'little.'

The snake was small enough to sit comfortably in her open palm while loosely coiled around itself. It was roughly as long as the distance between Joe's elbow and wrist, and its average girth was about the same as his thumb's. The snake raised its tiny head curiously towards Joe's face, its tiny forked tongue actively tasting the air between them. The way it seemed to study the man had an endearing resemblance to its insatiably inquisitive owner.

Once that pleasant thought had passed, Joe briefly wondered whether Maggie was capable of caring for the little guy. Or girl. He wasn't an expert on snake-ology, nor was its gender immediately relevant. He glanced around the room and easily spotted the glass terrarium and large bag of food pellets in the corner, right next to the pod. He felt strangely proud that the ancient cosmic entity had already taken care of those most basic of necessities.

"I have gifted it with the name of Azgod'Kalar the Calm," Maggie boasted.

"Oh? Does he like it?"

"Azgod'Kalar is incapable of grasping the significance of those words as of yet."

"That's nice," he glossed over that ominous reply.

"Can I touch it? I've never seen one for real before." Maggie nodded to show affirmation. Joe slowly and carefully extended a finger towards it and lightly patted its nose, an action sometimes referred to as 'booping the snoot.' He moved to pet its tiny head in a similar fashion. The serpent responded to this stimulation by raising the upright portion of its body and coiling once around Joe's finger. The man found himself rather appreciative of the oddly warm and dry feel of its skin against his.

That sensation also provoked a slightly worrisome thought that pertained to the snake's owner.

"Wait, it's fine with you holding it?" Maggie's satisfied smile briefly twisted into a confused one.

"For what reason would Azgod'Kalar object to dwelling within my grasp?"

"It's just that your skin feels a bit weird." Indeed, Maggie's pale body exhibited a peculiar sensation when touched. She somehow felt both pleasantly warm and soothingly cool at the same time. It was by no means unpleasant, just strange. Joe was vaguely aware that snakes were cold-blooded, so he wondered if the little bugger would find it comfortable.

"Your concerns are appreciated, but unnecessary. Azgod'Kalar has expressed a clear preference for resting upon my flesh, otherwise I would have returned it to the terrarium provided by Mr. Charles." As if to prove her point, the snake withdrew from Joe's finger and resumed lazing atop Maggie's palm.

"Can't argue with that. Wait, Mr. Charles? You mean the owner of Lyfe Haxx?"

"You are familiar with this individual?" she looked surprised.

"Someone mentioned him on the neighborhood message beard," he flubbed his words.

"Er, sorry, board. His avatar had this incredible- Anyway, apparently that store is blowing up right now." Maggie's pleasantly half-closed eyes flew wide and her soft expression twisted into one of cold, calculating fury.

"Not exploding!" Joe quickly reacted.

"I meant it's getting popular! It's a good thing!"

"… I comprehend," the girl relaxed her face.

"Blimey, Maggie," the man sighed.

"You really need to stop instantly assuming the worst. Look, you scared poor little Azgod'Ka-something!" Indeed, the snake was as upright as it could get and baring its tiny fangs while its head pivoted around wildly. It was one agitated critter, to say the least. Maggie stared at it blankly for a few moments before slowly reaching for it with her other hand.

The diminutive serpent let out a tiny hiss at the approaching fingers, but calmed down straight away once the girl started stroking it along the length of its spine.

"Wow. You're pretty good at that," Joe remarked.

"The instructions I was supplied with were thorough and informative," she replied flatly.

"Still, it's rare to see you get angry over anything. You must really like that shop, huh?" Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.

"Yes. It is the place of purchase from which I obtained Azgod'Kalar. I will not forgive any creature foolish enough to harm it."

"Ah. That would explain a lot." The aforementioned message board thread Joe had skimmed through contained numerous references to a black-eyed, black-haired, black-dressed beauty that led customers to Lyfe Haxx. A few of the people involved in the online discussion had even invented a few embarrassing titles like 'The Mistress of Darkness' and 'The Pale Goddess.' Joe wasn't the sharpest stick in the bag, but he was now certain that they had been talking about Maggie.

It made him deeply curious as to what she had been up to over the past few days. However, he decided to get the story another time as he recognized the look on her face as one of mild distress.

"You okay, Maggie? You seem troubled." It was a good thing the girl had learned to emote properly as of late, otherwise he'd never have realized it. She looked at him intently for a few seconds, then relaxed her face into an expression of mild content.

"Your concern is appreciated, but unnecessary."

"Don't give me that. We're in this together, aren't we? If there's anything I can do to help, just say the word." Joe's attempt to show off his reliable and manly side was met with a tight-lipped smile that seemed to be halfway between joy and mockery.

"I shall endeavor to do so when and if the need arises."

"Good," the selectively dense man nodded.

"Anyway, I would like to spend some more time with you, but I really need to get some rest. Take care, and I'll see you later." He climbed back into the pod and set it to 'sleep mode.' Some quiet sliding and hissing sounds emanated from the machine as it oriented its cylindrical chamber from a mostly vertical to a perfectly horizontal position. Joe passed out within minutes, leaving Maggie to mull over the potentially catastrophic issue that her earlier outburst had highlighted.

She would have gotten the man's opinion on the matter, but she judged that he was woefully incompetent when it came to that particular subject. Maggie had realized that she knew almost nothing about fear. At least by her standards. She was aware of how the emotion worked in terms of chemical reactions in the brain and their physiological effects on the human body. She also had a general grasp of what sort of stimulus could invoke or abate said reactions.

However, Maggie had never experienced fear herself, and that wasn't just because her true self didn't technically have a brain. Throughout its maddeningly long existence, Magh'rathlak the Observer had never once found itself in a situation where its being had come under serious threat. Even though it had been through a few conflicts with the elder ones of its home dimension, its immortal nature allowed its consciousness to reconstitute itself even after seemingly being destroyed.

That and its affinity for observation, study, and experimentation had shaped its personality as an emotionally stunted one. That was steadily changing ever since Magh'rathlak had become Maggie. Living as a partially human existence had taught her a great many things she hadn't even considered exploring beforehand. Concepts such as joy, love, sorrow, and anger had been completely foreign to her past self, and trying to fully comprehend them had been an incredibly enlightening endeavor.

She now understood why her past attempts at interacting with the material world had been so thoroughly unproductive. The main issue was the inherent horror that cosmic entities invoked in the minds of lesser beings they encountered. Those meetings provoked a powerful mix of self-preservation instincts and the fear of the unknown that overwhelmed all logic and reason.

While some of Maggie's peers revelled in the vague feeling of power and control they derived from terrorizing rational minds, the Observer wasn't like that. If anything, it despised the irrational behavior that accompanied fear. That was why the astral entity had taken such a deep interest in Joe Mulligan. That peculiar human had been the only individual who had come face to face with Magh'rathlak's immense being without immediately succumbing to that primal emotion.

However, that was also precisely why, despite his intent, he could not assist with Maggie's current dilemma. Though her grasp on the concept of fear had improved significantly, she felt she could never gain true understanding of it until she had experienced it for herself. She was confident it was possible since she had been through states of mind that bordered on fear.

For instance, she had concern for Joe's wellbeing and was wary of causing an incident that would jeopardize her presence in his reality, but neither of those were the 'real deal.' The biggest issue was that Maggie was unsure of how to rectify this. Her ongoing existence was under no serious threat and losing her physical shell was of little consequence, so it was impossible for her to fear extinction or mutilation. Furthermore, she welcomed the unknown with open arms, so that form of terror was equally beyond her.

With the most obvious candidates out of the question, Maggie considered some seemingly lesser options. For starters, humans had a profound apprehension for anything that infringed on their sense of control, autonomy, or free will. It was just another component of the emotional cocktail that sent them screaming when confronted with an entity from beyond the veil of their reality. Maggie felt unsure whether she was capable of experiencing that particular sensation.

The thought of being subjected to the infallible will of an elder one certainly was unpleasant, but it was more infuriating than terrifying. The next likely candidate was the fear of loss, not of oneself but of another. Maggie had experienced something that could arguably qualify as this when she had unintentionally subjected Joe to that potentially fatal soap opera viewing. However, her thoughts at the time were polluted and unstable as a result of her overindulgence in dramatic entertainment.

Furthermore, a good deal of it was caused by anger at the idea that she had violated her obligations to Joe. Therefore, Maggie was unable to classify what she had endured back then as pure and genuine fear. On the other hand, the soap opera incident showed that this was a potentially viable venue of self-study. The only issue was finding a suitable subject to threaten with extinction that wasn't Joe. She glanced towards the shoggoth-infested pod, but immediately concluded it was unsuitable.

While she was fond of her pet project, she wouldn't have been all that bothered if its existence had ceased. She might feel a bit of disappointment that the time and effort she put into it had gone to waste, but that was it. If she understood things correctly, stimulating her fear of loss required the use of a conscious being she had an emotional investment in. The shoggoth most definitely did not qualify since it was of zero sentimental value to Maggie.

Her mind then drifted towards her right hand, whereupon her latest acquisition was lazing about in a little ball of gold-and-brown scales. Azgod'Kalar seemed to sense her gaze and turned its head as if to meet it, its tiny tongue idly flicking in and out of its mouth. It was, by all accounts, an innocent and insignificant creature that was ultimately of negligible practical use to the otherworldly entity. Maggie would not have concerned herself with it at all if not for an arbitrary whim that was of no consequence.

"… This will do," she coldly decided. A suitable experiment instantly formed within her terrifyingly logical mind, and she wasted no time in making her designs a reality. Maggie left Joe's apartment and rode the nearest elevator as high as it would take her. Once on floor one-ninety of the hyper-scraper, she located a large window and walked over to it, unsuspecting snake in hand.

She pressed her free palm against the massive pane of shatterproof glass and created a person-sized opening in it by bending its molecules to her will. A howling gust of freezing air rushed in through the gap, forcing little Azgod'Kalar to seek shelter up Maggie's long sleeve. The girl was completely unfazed by the wind and stepped outside, making sure to close the 'door' on her way out.

The incomprehensible creature wearing human skin then started walking up the side of the building as if gravity was merely a suggestion. The ferocious winds kept flapping her dress and hair around but were otherwise completely incapable of upsetting her vertical gait. After proceeding upwards for another thirty or so meters, Maggie arrived at the hyper-scraper's rooftop.

She wasn't at its tallest point just yet, as the flat surface was populated by a myriad of satellite dishes, signal towers, lightning rods, backup generators, and other maintenance-oriented machinery. There was no need to climb further, however, as Maggie's current altitude was more than sufficient for her experiment. The girl did her title justice and carefully observed her surroundings. There was a gap of about fifteen meters between the rooftop ledge she was standing on and the other hyper-scraper opposite her.

It was difficult to get an accurate measurement because the massive buildings swayed in the relentless high-altitude winds regardless of the various countermeasures included in their construction. Looking at the layered streets and air traffic lanes below, Maggie estimated that she was eight hundred and sixteen meters above sea level, but only a fraction of that above the uppermost 'high road.' That still gave her two hundred and seventy meters of leeway, which would prove more than adequate for her purposes.

The rather extreme wind speeds might cause some complications, but she felt confident they wouldn't interfere with the experiment to a noticeable degree. Having concluded that the conditions were satisfactory, Maggie stuffed her right hand up her left sleeve and fished out her test subject. She held the innocent snake by lightly pinching its midsection between her index and middle fingers. Her arm stretched out as far as it would go, leaving the utterly confused serpent precariously suspended over the edge.

Recognizing the mortal danger it was in, it desperately coiled around Maggie's fingers as best it could. However, its efforts were in vain, as its fall was deemed necessary for the girl's research. And so, Azgod'Kalar the Calm was dropped. Its tiny body, weighing in at a mere thirty grams, was instantly swept up by the uncaring air currents while gravity pulled it downward. Were she a normal person, Maggie would have instantly lost sight of the creature.

She certainly wasn't, so she was able to track its chaotic descent with unerring accuracy. Given its increasing velocity and general helplessness, there was absolutely no doubt that her pet would meet its end in precisely seven seconds. Despite her heartless actions, Maggie did not think herself cruel. She did not take pleasure in tormenting the innocent serpent. This was merely a necessary step for her growth as an individual. So what if an insignificant life had to be snuffed out in the process?

The snake's existence was fleeting at best, whereas hers was indescribably vast. Objectively speaking, the witless critter's imminent death would have far more meaning and purpose than its ongoing existence. In some odd way, it could be argued that Maggie was doing it a favor. The girl was thus able to watch thoroughly unconflicted as the snake fell. Her stone-faced expression did not flinch as the winds tossed it around, nor did she waver when the cold air caused it to slip into torpor.

Indeed, it seemed as though the defenseless thing might expire before it even splattered across the pavement. If not, then a mere three seconds more and it would be gone forever all the same, with only a wet smear and a fleeting memory to mark its all-too-brief existence. A terrifying boom rattled the hyper-scraper as Maggie's slender body instantly surpassed the speed of sound.

Within moments she landed on the sparsely populated high road with an illogically soft impact that was a massive middle finger to the laws of acceleration, mass, and momentum. Indeed, the only thing that had broken from the abrupt stop was the girl's uncaring facade. Her eyes were wide and her mouth hung loosely open as she hyperventilated. Her heart pounded loudly in her ears as a single bead of icy cold sweat ran down her forehead.

And there, squirming miraculously within her cupped hands, was an innocent ball of gold-and-brown scales.