Hypercage: Instant Reality Prequel One Read Free Page B

the place for a decent seat, trying to pick one the farthest away from the jackers. He chose one in the corner, away from the double doors that led God knows where. To the end of his fun no doubt.
    He slumped down in the chair and let out a deep sigh, annoyed that it had come to this.
    The head and shoulders of the clinic’s ARvatar appeared at the top of his HUD.
    “Thank you, Mr Charlton. You are 17th in the queue. Calculated waiting time is currently forty-three minutes,” it informed him, gesturing over to the right hand side of his HUD where his queue position and anticipated wait time slid into view.
    “Yeah, whatever,” he mumbled as the ARvatar disappeared.
    Forty-three minutes? With his time dilation plug-in, that would be hours in Galaxy War. If Becks got her way this could his last ever session. Although he’d see about that. He had no idea what was going to happen behind those closed doors, but there must be a way to turn this around? He could dial it back, sure; he didn’t want to lose Becks and Jake, but surely he would still be able to play a bit. If he could convince her he was serious about cleaning himself up, whatever that meant, maybe he could keep his profile.
    He was about to connect when a jack-head loomed over him.
    “Sorry to bother you.”
    “What?” he spat, annoyed at the intrusion.
    But when he looked up, he was surprised to see it wasn’t a jack-head at all. In fact, she was extremely pretty. Pink hair all messed up. Deliberately torn clothes. And lots of bare skin. Her skin is what drew his eye immediately. Glowing lines and shapes flowed over her body, tracking her curves and contours. She was covered head to foot in ARt. At least he assumed it was all over. The constantly flowing tattoos appeared and disappeared beneath the edges of her clothing. He queried her appearance with merely a thought.
    His personal AI assistant captured her image and cross-referenced it, delivering the information straight to his HUD. He scanned through it quickly. Dave cancelled the wiki feed with a thought.
    “Sorry, I didn’t mean to shout at you,” he said.
    “No worries, man. Look, any chance I can sit here? Those jack-heads are giving me the creeps,” she admitted, jerking her thumb over her shoulder.
    Dave looked behind her and two dishevelled husks were leering at her, practically salivating as they watched the glowing lines of her ARt flow all over her body.
    “Yeah, sure. Of course,” he said.
    She stepped past him and sat down, distancing herself from the lecherous creeps.
    “Thanks. They kept pinging my personal profile, over and over again, with disgusting pictures of themselves. Dirty bastards,” she said with disgust.
    “No problem,” he said.
    “So what you here for then? You don’t look like a jack-head,” she said.
    “Well, that’s not what my wife thinks. She says I’ve got a problem. Get detoxed or don’t bother coming home.” Maybe it was from talking to someone about it, even a stranger. Or else it was the fact the drugs had worn off. But either way, he noticed his hands were shaking again.
    “Hey man, we all need our jack time, right?” She encouraged as she took his hand and gave it a squeeze.
    Yes, exactly. Why couldn’t Becks see that?
    “Fancy telling my wife that?”
    She laughed at his joke and he watched as her ARt flowed around her mouth, tracing her smile lines.
    “Sure,” she offered, giving him a big smile.
    “So, you into your gaming then?” he asked, a little nervously.
    She crooked her arm and clenched her fist. Her whole arm turned black. Pinpricks of white light faded in from the blackness. A familiar blue spaceship appeared around the curve of her wrist and shot up her arm, rocketing towards her shoulder. As it reached her elbow, a purple ship appeared from underneath her tank top and streaked towards the other craft. They started to dance and twist around each other, firing off salvos of laser fire. Eventually the blue ship pulled a