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  The door closes behind her without a sound, leaving me completely alone with Zero.

  He moves closer to me, looking amused at my fascination and unease. “You’ve always worked on your own, haven’t you?” he says. “It’s uncomfortable for you, being marked with a group.”

  Somehow, his physical appearance seems even more intimidating than his virtual one. I realize I’m clenching my fists and force myself to relax my hands. “I was doing fine with the Phoenix Riders,” I reply.

  He nods. “And that’s why you’ve already told them everything you’re doing, right? That you’re here now?”

  I narrow my eyes at his mocking tone. “And what about you?”

  “What about me?”

  “How long have you been with the Blackcoats? Were you the one who formed them? Or have you never been a loner?”

  He puts his hands in his pockets in a gesture so reminiscent of Hideo that, for an instant, I feel like he’s the one here instead. “As long as I can remember,” he answers.

  Now’s my chance. All the questions swirling in my mind sit on the edge of my tongue. My breath is suddenly short as the words pour out. “You’re Sasuke Tanaka. Aren’t you?”

  My statement is greeted only by silence.

  “You’re Hideo’s younger brother,” I urge him, as if he didn’t hear me the first time.

  His eyes are absolutely devoid of any emotion. “I know,” he says.

  I blink, thinking I’d misheard him. “You know?”

  There’s something unusual about his eyes again, that empty stare. It’s as if what I’ve said means nothing. It seems irrelevant to him, like I’d revealed he was related to some faraway stranger he knows absolutely nothing about . . . and not the brother he’d grown up with, the brother who had destroyed his own life and mind out of grief for him. The brother he is now trying to stop.

  “You—” My words falter, my voice turning incredulous as I look at him. “You’re Hideo’s brother. How can you know that and still talk like this?”

  Again, no response. He looks completely unaffected by my words. Instead, he steps closer to me until we’re separated by a mere foot. “A blood relation is meaningless,” he finally replies. “Hideo’s my brother, but more importantly, he’s my mark.”

  My mark. The words are harsh and cutting. I think back to the grin on young Sasuke’s face in Hideo’s Memory, when they were both at the park. I puzzle over the deep wounds that Sasuke left behind in Hideo and his family when he disappeared. This is a boy who had been loved deeply. Now he doesn’t seem to care at all.

  “But—” I say, faltering, “what happened to you? You vanished when you were a little boy. Where did you go? Why are you called Zero?”

  “Jax didn’t warn me about how curious you are,” he replies. “I guess this is what makes you a good bounty hunter.”

  The way he’s responding reminds me of code stuck in an infinite loop, going round and round in useless circles, or politicians who know exactly how to evade a question they don’t want to answer. People who can turn a question on you to take the heat off themselves.

  Maybe Zero doesn’t want to answer me. Maybe he doesn’t even know. Whatever the reason, I won’t be getting anything out of him voluntarily—nothing more than these piecemeal replies. I shove down the urge to keep pressing him. If he won’t tell me himself, then I’ll have to gather info on my own.

  So I try a different kind of question. “What are you planning?” I force myself to say.

  “We’re going to insert a virus into Hideo’s algorithm,” Zero says. He holds his hand out, and a glowing data packet appears over his palm. “The instant it’s in, it will trigger a chain reaction that deletes the algorithm entirely and cripples the NeuroLink itself. But to do this successfully, we have to launch it from inside Hideo’s own account, his actual mind. And we have to do this on the day of the closing ceremony, at the very moment when the beta lenses finally connect to the algorithm.”

  I guess the rumor about when the beta lenses would convert to algorithm lenses is true, after all. It makes sense—theoretically, there’ll be a split-second delay when the beta lenses are hooked into the algorithm but not yet influenced by it. When it’s setting itself up. That’s the only chance they’ll get to insert a virus.

  “And when, exactly, are the beta lenses connecting to the algorithm?” I ask.

  “Right at the start of the closing ceremony’s game.”

  I look sidelong at him. How does he know so much about Hideo’s plans? “So, I’m going to have to get into his mind,” I repeat. “Literally.”

  “As literal as it gets,” Zero replies. “And the only way into the algorithm—into his mind—is for Hideo himself to allow it. That’s where you come in.”

  “You want me to warm up to Hideo.”

  “I want you to do whatever it takes.”

  “He’ll never go for it,” I reply. “After our last encounter, I doubt he’ll ever want to see me again. He already suspects I’m out to stop him.”

  “I think you underestimate his feelings for you.” He waves his hand once.

  The world around us disappears, then wraps us both inside news footage of Hideo leaving an event while being swarmed on all sides by anxious reporters and fans. This is from two nights ago, after Hideo had announced the rematch between the Phoenix Riders and Team Andromeda.

  His bodyguards shout and push, cutting a path for him, and a good many paces behind him walks Kenn, who looks pale and distraught. I’ve never seen the two of them like this, walking so far apart. As the security team forms a stern line in front of the crowds, one of the reporters shouts a question at Hideo.

  Are you still dating Emika Chen? Are you two an item?

  Hideo doesn’t react to the question—at least, not obviously. But I can see the tightening of his shoulders, the tension in his jaw. His eyes stay turned down, focused intensely on the path before him.

  I look away from Hideo’s haunted expression, but it remains seared into my mind. “But you’re his real weakness,” I insist, forcing myself to concentrate. “You must know that! Hideo would do anything for you.”

  “We have discussed Hideo’s potential responses to me,” Zero says casually, as if he were telling me about the weather. “He hasn’t seen me in a decade—his reaction to me won’t be directed at me, but at the Blackcoats. And it will be revenge he’s seeking. So, we need someone with one degree of separation. You.”

  He speaks of Hideo as if his brother were nothing more than target practice—when I search his gaze, all I see is darkness, something impenetrable and unfeeling. It’s like looking at a person who isn’t a person at all.

  I lean against the desk and bow my head. “Fine,” I mumble. “How do you suggest I do this?”

  Zero finally smiles. “You're going to break into Hideo’s mind. And I’m going to show you how.”

  7

  “Come join me in the Dark World,” Zero says. He waves his hand once again, and a screen appears between us, asking me if I want to Link with him for a session.

  A direct connection with Zero. What kind of thoughts and emotions would I get from him? I hesitate for another moment, then reach out and accept our Link. The hotel room around me darkens at the edges until I can’t make out Zero’s face anymore. A few seconds later, I’ve sunken into a pitch-black abyss.

  I hold my breath at the familiar, drowning sensation that always settles over me right before I go down under to the Dark World.

  Then, slowly, it materializes.

  At first, I recognize it. Water drips into potholes dotting the streets, forming miniature reflecting pools of the red neon signs that line the building walls. They display a constant stream of personal data stolen from unprotected accounts that dared to wander down here. Stalls line the road itself, each one lit with strings of lights, hawking all the things I’m used to seeing—
drugs, illegal weapons, cryptocurrency exchanges, discontinued Warcross virtual items, and unreleased avatar clothing.

  This is a location I should be familiar with, and yet none of these buildings are what I remember, nor are the streets or signs recognizable. All the sidewalks are empty.

  “Looks strange, doesn’t it?”

  Zero’s sudden presence beside me makes me jump. When I face him, he’s hidden behind armor again; black metal plates covering him from head to toe gleam under crimson lights. He moves like a shadow. While the few people passing us are anonymous, no one appears to notice him. In fact, if I didn’t know better, I’d say they were giving him a wide berth without even realizing he’s there. It’s not clear to me if they can even see his figure, but they definitely notice the black cuffs we both wear. No one wants anything to do with us.

  Tentatively, I reach out through our Link to see if I can catch any emotions coming from Zero. But he feels calm, his temperament smooth as glass. Then, a ripple of amusement.

  “Poking around already? Too curious for your own good,” he says, and I remember that he can sense me, too. I quickly lean away.

  “Where is everyone?” I ask him.

  “After Hideo activated his algorithm, any user who had already switched to the new NeuroLink lenses became restricted from logging on to the Dark World. It took out a good number of the people who used to wander down here. Others have been compelled to go to the authorities with what information they know about this place. There have been dozens of raids in the past couple of days. Those who can still access the Dark World have gone deeper underground, rebuilding as they went. Many of the spots you’re familiar with won’t be here.”

  I wander down the road, trying to get my bearings. On a normal day, a market like this would be swarming with anonymous avatars. Today, it’s a trickle, and many look too uneasy to stop at the illegal stands.

  This is a good thing, I tell myself. I should be happy about it, and Hideo is right to do this to the Dark World. Haven’t I spent years hunting people down here? This isn’t a good place. There are pockets of the Dark World so disturbing that they ought to be permanently wiped out, people so perverse and evil that they deserve to rot in jail. They should be afraid.

  But . . . the idea of one person having that kind of reach down here, to put his hand inside someone’s mind and compel them to leave this place . . .

  “What’s going on over there?” I ask when we walk past a stand in a night market. Even though it’s a small shop, there must be a crowd of well over two hundred people gathered around it. When I look long enough at the stand, a number appears over it.

  50,000

  The sheer volume of visitors keeps causing the shop to crash, and from here, it looks like the stand is collapsing into a pile and resetting itself over and over.

  “They’re auctioning off cases of beta lenses,” Zero replies. “Rare commodities, as you can guess.”

  I realize that the number over the stand is the price that the beta lenses are currently going for. Fifty thousand notes for a single pair.

  The bidders obviously have their own beta lenses to even be in the Dark World, so my guess is that they’re here on behalf of others. There’s a desperation in the space that makes it feel dangerous. Already, arguments are breaking out, and overhead, I can see users being doxed by angry competitors, their private info thrown up on the neon-red signs spanning the sides of the building walls. I quicken my pace until we’ve left the stand behind us.

  We’re somewhere close to where the Pirate’s Den was the last time I saw it, although the roads have shifted since then. When the black lake comes into view, there’s no ship floating on the water.

  I turn to Zero, startled. The Pirate’s Den has never been successfully shut down. “Is it gone?” I ask him.

  He looks skyward. I tilt my head to follow his gaze.

  High above the Dark World’s nonsensical buildings and Escher-like stairways, under a smoky brown night sky, is a pirate ship suspended in midair. Rope ladders dangle from it, far out of reach. Its masts are lit up with cascading neon colors that highlight the clouds with electric shades of pink and blue and gold.

  “After Hideo activated his algorithm,” Zero says, “one Dark World user afflicted by the new lenses went to authorities and ratted out where the Pirate’s Den was. There was a raid down here. But cockroaches are hard to eliminate.”

  I give him a humorless smile at that. The Dark World won’t go down without a fight. The pirates just move out of the water and into the skies.

  Zero cocks his head slightly to one side. He must already have the entrance code to the new Pirate’s Den figured out, because a second later, one of the ship’s rope ladders starts descending toward us. It stops right in front of us, at the perfect height.

  Zero holds a hand out at the ladder and turns to me. “After you.”

  I walk past him and grab one of the ladder’s rungs tightly. He steps on it after me, his gloved hands clasping the rope on either side of me. As we rise, I look over his arm and down at the city. I’ve never seen the Dark World from the sky before. It looks even less logical than it does from the ground. Some of the buildings resemble spiral staircases that disappear into the clouds, with dozens of window lights that shift colors in gradients. Dark, anonymous avatars walk sideways along other walls, as if the people were held up by strings. Other buildings are painted all in black, with no windows at all—only thin neon lines that run vertically along its walls. Who knows what the hell goes on inside there. There are spheres that hover in midair, supported by nothing, with no obvious way of getting inside. As we rise as high as the clouds, I can look down and see some of the towers forming circular patterns on the ground, as if they were alien crop circles.

  We finally reach the floating ramp leading into the Pirate’s Den. Now that we’re close enough, I can see how enormous this new ship’s masts are, stretching up like screens on the sides of skyscrapers. What I’d seen as gradients of neon colors on the masts are actually advertisements showcasing that day’s matches, as well as the current bets on the Phoenix Riders and Team Andromeda rematch.

  Zero steps off first. He walks onto the ramp and gestures for me to follow. My eyes shift from the broadcasts to the ship’s entrance, where dozens of avatars are walking in underneath the Pirate’s Den slogan.

  INFORMATION WANTS TO BE FREE

  We step inside. I can hear the pulsing rhythm of my heart in my ears, the blood pumping in time to the soundtrack playing around me, no doubt some stolen track from an unreleased album. Fog hugs the ground. The avatars here are as twisted and strange as ever, a weird mix of people with random, forgettable faces, and users who have remade themselves with monstrous features.

  But what makes me freeze is the sight of the glass cylinder looming in the center of the cavernous space. The assassination lottery looks like it always does, with its list of names in scarlet letters and the current bid beside each one. Up on the higher deck and looking down at the list are assassins and hunters carefully analyzing the list.

  What looks different is the name at the top of that list.

  Emika Chen | Current Offer: 5,625,000

  No wonder everyone’s after me: 5,625,000 notes for my assassination.

  “They can’t see you,” Zero says, cutting through my paralyzing terror. When I glance at him, he gives me a simple nod. I can’t see any part of his expression behind his dark helmet, of course, but his body is turned vaguely toward me, giving me the sense that he’s protecting me.

  In spite of everything, I feel oddly safe beside him. It’s hard to believe that, not long ago, I’d first seen Zero in this very same space as my enemy, the bounty I was hired to hunt down by Hideo. Now the bounty has reversed.

  Betting on the Final rematch is happening in another corner of the space, while others are clustered in a large crowd around the current Darkcross game, t
hrowing amounts of money around at an increasingly frantic pace. Over the onlookers is a banner showing the match, followed by how much is at stake.

  MIDNIGHT RAIDERS vs. HELLDOGS

  Current Odds 1:4

  “New game!” a voice calls out. An automated announcer is speaking now, its androgynous voice echoing around us. “Match ends when a player takes their opponent’s Artifact. Bets may be placed two minutes before the game’s opening call and can continue until the official start.”

  I look at the chaotic audience. All of the patrons of the official Warcross teams are public figures with deep pockets, each one well-known. But the identities of the patrons of the Dark World teams are a mystery. Rumor has it that they are mafia bosses, gang leaders, and drug lords. None of them are stupid enough to publicly sponsor a team—but one Dark World team can earn double the profits of the Phoenix Riders. No wonder the teams down here can recruit such talented players. Some of them are even ex-Warcross professionals, those whose reflexes can’t keep up with the younger, upcoming stars. If you don’t mind playing an illegal game that could get you arrested at any time, then you’ll be showered with riches far beyond that of a legit, official Warcross player in the real world.

  Of course, as with everything else down here, playing Darkcross comes with its own unique risks. Unlike Warcross played legally, where the only consequence of losing a game is your money and your ego . . . the patrons of Dark World teams are a dangerous crowd to disappoint. If you lose enough Darkcross games, you might see your own name up on the assassination lottery list. I remember one Darkcross player who was found hanging in his garage, his body bloodied and broken, and another who was pushed in front of a train.

  “Several teams lost their players after the algorithm triggered,” Zero goes on as we move to a different part of the den. Here, the room is darker and emptier, some distance away from the others and partially separated by a film of light that acts like a curtain. “Of course, this has just made the betting all the more exciting and unpredictable.”