“Are you sure?” Hondo asked.

  My brain said no. My mouth said, “Yeah. I’m sure.”

  I juked a few more times, watching how the Green pilot hung behind me, seemingly always one step ahead. Time had already proven I couldn’t lose them this way, which in turn dialed my acceptable risk up to eleven.

  I dropped all evasion and whipped the ship into a punishingly tight loop, briefly thankful for the limitations of the pod’s delivery. Timing would be everything for this gamble to pay off. I turned until I sighted the trailing fighter and kept rotating back onto my original heading. Caught completely flat-footed, the Green pilot overshot wildly. I rolled out, squarely on his six. Squeezing hard on the trigger, I sent a hail of laser bolts into his tail, shattering his engines and sending the ship pinwheeling as it vanished in a fireball.

  "Got him!" I cheered, adrenaline and excitement nearly overwhelming me. The desperate move shouldn't have worked against the obviously experienced player, but fortune had favored the bold. Surely that earned me some...

  "Watch it, Cat!" Tyler shouted an instant before my ship shuddered under multiple impacts. Alarms blared damage warnings while I yanked the stick and aimed for empty space. “You’re attracting the wrong kind of attention.”

  Annoyance replaced smugness at the cheap shot after winning my one-on-one. Things had suddenly gotten personal. I craned right and then left, seeking the offending ships, wanting names and payback. “Why the hell is everybody picking on me? Tyler’s a newbie, too.”

  Tyler’s laughter echoed over the comms. “They don’t know who’s who, man. They probably think you’re me. I figured Ally would have her squad gunning my way. That’s why I picked an X-wing.”

  “I thought you were in a Y,” I replied.

  “Nope. Fooled you, too.”

  “Katzuo, focus,” Hondo said. “You can do this.”

  I couldn’t guess the reason for his calming support, but I appreciated it, especially as green laser streaks blew by my port side, narrowly missing me. I followed the path back to a modified X-wing. Its black and green overlay definitely wasn't standard, nor was the row of skull decals proclaiming the pilot’s aerial victories. Someone else in the fight had put down cash for some upgrades.

  “That’s Jedi showing off again,” Psych0K1ll3r informed me as the modified X-wing banked tightly to reacquire weapons lock. From the looks of the grid, the vulture had no intention of helping me deal with any of my attackers.

  Fine with me. I didn’t want help before, and I definitely didn’t want it now, especially from Jedi.

  I punched the throttle, racing across the black toward the middle of a gnarly exchange of battery fire from a pair of opposing warships. Jedi trailed a few thousand meters behind, the other members of Green left too far behind to remain relevant to me. The modified X-wing’s thrusters flared from blue to white, the trails extending as his electric boost kicked in, accelerating the ship’s ion drive. He closed up behind me in a hurry. Everyone else faded as we rocketed toward destiny, diving into the middle of the furious crossfire.

  Larger, thicker bolts surrounded me as I juked and jinked. Eyes in constant motion, I checked the holographic grid and then glanced over my shoulder, searching for cover from the intense fire of the warship batteries. I barely made it through a few exchanges, escaping to cover behind a chunk of wreckage that went up in a cloud of debris just as I swung past it. Jedi clung tight to me, unleashing barrages I could tell were intended to funnel me toward the point of his real attack. The arrogant bastard had the better ship as if that alone guaranteed success. Too bad for him I remained unintimidated by bullies, especially those depending on such predictable maneuvers.

  Jedi's trap sprang as expected, his nearly-algorithmic tactics telegraphing his intent. I had no doubt he expected me to panic without thinking and turn sloppy. My complete focus was on navigating the crossfire while I obliged him and centered us in his kill box. However, I wasn’t offering myself up for the kill. I frantically jinked and rolled before nosing hard up. Jedi tried predicting my arc, but he didn’t predict me throwing the Gunstar into a tight backflip at the top of my arc. He couldn’t replicate it, leaving him squarely in my crosshairs halfway through his own turn.

  "Surprise, idiot!" I snapped, mashing the thumb trigger. My Lasers hammered Jedi’s cockpit, tearing through and killing his avatar before he had a chance to react. Still moving backward, I kept the dead hulk in the crosshairs until the lasers punctured armor and initiated a sympathetic chain reaction that turned his pretty starfighter into a short-lived blossom of flame.

  “You’re dogfighting in space, padawan,” I cried out to nobody. "Class dismissed.”

  "Nice shooting, Cat," Psych0K1ll3r admitted begrudgingly. "Didn't know you had the furballs.” He cracked himself up. “I guess I don’t get the moolah this round.”

  I checked the grid. While I had been dogfighting Jedi, Hondo had finished off the final Green fighter. I winced when I saw Tyler had been knocked out of the fight, the only one of our team to have their ticket punched.

  The simulation ended, the battlefield turning back into a star field. A holographic gold medal appeared on my dashboard, naming me the MVP of the fight.

  “Are you kidding?” Psych0K1ll3r said over the comms. “I had two kills, too.”

  “Jealous?” I asked.

  “Nah. Enjoy your fifteen minutes, pussycat,” he laughed.

  I thought the pod would open on its own, so I waited as the star field repeated and the seconds ticked past. At thirty, I decided something had gone wrong with the mechanism. Still calm, I reached for the HELP button, but before I could tap it, the screen suddenly changed.

  “Searching for real adventure? ” a voice asked that reminded me of every action movie trailer I’d ever seen. “Looking for an escape?” The robot head starship shot forward, pausing front and center on the screen. A huge FOR RENT sign slammed down over it. “You’ve found it! The only question is, are you ready for the ride of your life? Don’t miss this once in a lifetime opportunity.”

  The screen remained static for a few seconds before the robot head blasted away and the star field returned to normal. The pod finally opened while I stared at the screen in confused silence.

  I had no idea what I had just seen.

  I only knew that I needed to find Hondo.

  CHAPTER 7

  I scrambled out of the pod, wild eyes quickly scanning the group of players near the staging area. None of them had changed out of their flight suits, including Alyssa and Tyler, who I imagined were waiting to see if I wanted to go another round.

  "Hondo!" I called out, searching the small crowd gathered between the pods and the equipment racks. Most of them turned to look my way, but the one person I wanted to talk to wasn't among them.

  "Hey, Kitty-Cat, what's up?" Psych0K1ll3r asked. "That was some incredible flying out there." He had relaxed considerably now that the match was over. Apparently, asshole vulture was just his game face.

  Even so, I barely registered the compliment, still scanning faces. "Thanks. Have you seen Hondo? The guy in the robot head ship?"

  He shook his head with a baffled expression before looking over the gathered players himself. “No. That’s strange. We all exited our pods at the same time, except for you.”

  “Yeah, my pod didn’t open right away,” I said, leaving it at that for the moment. Finding Hondo was more important right now.

  Where could he have gone so fast? Even with the delay, it hadn't taken me more than a minute to exit my simulator. How could he have made it out of the staging area that fast?

  “Hey, Katzuo,” a voice that didn’t belong to Hondo said. Jedi approached me with a devilish grin, as if he planned to compliment me now for beating him and then jump me once I went outside.

  “Jedi, have you seen Hondo?” I asked.

  The question took him off-guard. “Who?”

  “The guy with the curly black hair,” I said. “Showed up late.”

  “Oh man, that guy had a crazy skin on his ship,” ShottaLotta said, turning away from his chat with Alyssa. “A freaking giant robot head. LOL.” He actually said ‘el-oh-el,’ which under any other circumstances would have drawn a weird look from me. Right now, I was too focused on the advertisement at the end of my game to care.

  It was like Hondo had vanished into thin air.

  "Whoa, someone's in a hurry," Tyler quipped, catching up to me. "Where's the fire, Cat? You already toasted one Jedi."

  “You, Catman, that was a decent move you pulled on me,” Jedi retorted. “I haven’t seen anyone take advantage of the physics engine like that, especially their first time.”

  “Is that a backhanded way of suggesting he got lucky?” Alyssa asked, coming to my defense.

  “If the sneaker fits,” he replied.

  “Someone sounds like a sore loser,” Tyler added.

  “No, it’s not like that. I just think beginner’s luck is real, and you had it on your side today.”

  “You have so many tells in your attack pattern. If we were playing poker I’d not only beat you, I’d know what cards you were holding,” I blurted without thinking.

  His eyes narrowed. “What? You little mother⁠—“

  “Cool it,” Mark said, stepping between us. “It may be adult swim, but we’re still a family establishment. If you can’t handle being beaten, you shouldn’t play.”

  “Yeah, Jedi,” Psych0K1ll3r agreed. “It’s not like you’ve never lost before. Nobody wins every time.”

  “If he saw patterns in your flying, you should try buddying up instead of getting angry,” Tyler said. “You might learn something new and maybe get better.”

  Jedi stood down with a nod. “Yeah, you’re right. Sorry, Cat. I’m still a little hyped after that chase. It was a fun duel.” He grinned sheepishly. “Until the end, anyway.”

  “No worries, Jedi. We’re good,” I said, not really interested in his argument or his apology. "Did any of you see a weird commercial after the match ended?" I asked, scanning each face, one after another.

  Tyler and Alyssa exchanged confused looks. "No advertisements popped up on our end," she said. "The system reset to the home screen like normal."

  “I didn’t see anything,” Psych0K1ll3r and ShottaLotta agreed.

  “Me, neither,” Jedi said.

  "That's so strange." I ran anxious fingers through my already disheveled hair. "It was right there on my monitor. Like someone hijacked the feed to show me that robot ship and post a 'for rent' notice on it."

  “He’s renting out his NFT?” Alyssa asked.

  “How would he get a commercial into the game?” Mark asked, obviously baffled.

  “I know this is going to sound crazy,” I said. “But it seemed more to me like the advertisement was for a real starship, not the skin he used in the match.”

  The comment drew laughter all around. I was surprised Jedi didn’t just say ‘LOL’ again.

  “What makes you think it was for a real ship?” Alyssa asked.

  “I don’t know. It just looked so real.”

  “That’s the whole idea of VR, dude,” Jedi said, still chuckling.

  “You can laugh all you want. Maybe I’m crazy. Maybe it’s just the end result of a day that’s both the worst of my life and one of the best, as strange as that sounds to even say. Maybe I’m just going completely insane because of what I’m going through. Who knows? All I know is that it sparked something in me, and I need to find Hondo and ask him what it was all about.”

  "Calm down and think, Noah,” Alyssa said. “Did the advertisement include any contact details? A phone number? Email address? Website? Anything?"

  I mentally replayed the brief video, paying closer attention to specifics instead of letting my imagination run wild. "No, no info," I admitted reluctantly after a moment. "It didn't even list a price."

  “Come on, man,” Tyler said. “Who knows why, but it has to be Hondo just messing with you.”

  “Why would he do that? He seemed like a pretty nice guy during the match.”

  Alyssa smiled kindly. "I'm sure he didn’t mean any harm."

  I sighed, coming back down from my irrational heights. "Yeah, you're absolutely right. I'm being ridiculous. Everything else today finally caught up and knocked me for a loop, no pun intended. Just let the crazy be crazy for a few minutes. I’ll be okay.”

  “That’s the spirit,” PsychoK1ll3r said.

  “Regardless of the reasons for the commercial, I’m worried about how he was able to insert a video into the end of the runtime,” Mark said. “The thought that some random customer can just hack our systems isn’t very comforting.”

  “You should bring that up to Shandra,” Alyssa said.

  “I’ll leave a note for her tonight. All we need is for our systems to be attacked and user data to end up compromised. I love this job. I don’t want us to be shut down.”

  “Do you think we should close early?” Alyssa asked. “Just in case?”

  “Wait, what?” I said. “I only had a chance to play one game.”

  “If Hondo, whoever he is, was able to stick a video into the end of the game, he’s probably a skilled enough hacker to have broken into whatever he wanted to crack,” Tyler said. “Shutting down now won’t help anything. It’ll just add more headaches.”

  Mark and Alyssa looked at one another, silently negotiating the outcome.

  “Please,” I said, eager to give another title a shot. Maybe Jungle Invasion.

  “T-Bone’s right,” Alyssa said. “If there’s any damage, it’s already done. Hopefully, Hondo was just having a little fun at Noah’s expense. Let Shandra deal with it tomorrow.”

  Mark nodded. “Yeah, okay. We’ll keep this between us for now.”

  “Thank you!” I shouted in relief, practically coming to tears and leaving no question about the fragility of my current emotional state.

  “We’ve still got a solid hour left on the play clocks if you want to jump into another round. I'm itching for payback against little Miss All-red over here."

  Alyssa shrugged nonchalantly. "Promises, promises. But we all know I can run circles around you any day of the week." Her playful retort raised welcoming smiles. Lingering emotional turmoil wouldn't stand a chance against friendly competition. Maybe that had been Hondo’s goal in showing me that advertisement. To pull me fully into the moment.

  I let the last ragged edges of Hondo's puzzling disappearance go, turning bright eyes Tyler's way. "I hope you've got a few more lives left. Because you’re going to need them!”

  “Rematch then?” Jedi asked. “Maybe you can brief me on my tells ahead of time, so I can smoke you in this round.”

  “I don’t know,” I replied. “I think it might be better to pause my Star Squadron career while I’m ahead. At least for tonight. I really want to try the other games, too.”

  Jedi shrugged. “All right. I haven’t played the others as much as this one, but I’m happy to hunt you down wherever you go.”

  “Dude, let it go for tonight,” ShottaLotta said. “I’m sure Noah will be back, assuming Hondo doesn’t hack everything and get the place sued and shuttered.”

  “You’ll definitely have another chance,” I said. “We made it out this far once, I’m sure we can do it again, right Tyler?”

  Tyler grinned and nodded. “Yeah, man. That sounds great.”

  “If you’re coming back, I might have to find another job,” Alyssa teased.

  “What’s your number?” Jedi asked. “I’ll send you a text so we can stay in touch.”

  The request surprised me. “You can all add me to your contacts if you want,” I said, giving them my cell number. My phone immediately buzzed in my pocket. Once. Twice. Three times in rapid succession. Finally, a fourth. “I’m on social media, too,” I added, digging my phone out to check the messages. “Katzuo, of course.”

  I looked at the screen. The senders were all listed by their phone numbers, but I checked the messages to see who was who. Alyssa, Cody (Jedi), and Phil (Psychok1ll3r) had all reached out. The sense of camaraderie nearly overwhelmed me, threatening to break me down again. In the time when I needed real, physical friends the most, there they were. I needed to believe that somehow my parents had something to do with that.

  The moment hit me so hard, I almost didn’t notice the last message in the group of incoming texts.

  See you at Jefferson Farm.

  CHAPTER 8

  My eyes remained glued to my phone screen, pulse elevating as I read and reread Hondo's text.

  See you at Jefferson Farm.

  I had barely begun considering the implications of the message when Alyssa's gentle hand on my shoulder drew my attention.

  “Noah, are you okay?” she asked. “I know you’ve been through a lot today. We're here for you if you want to talk.”

  Five sets of eyes broadcast the same supportive message from where the group had paused preparing for a rematch. I blinked hard, temporarily overwhelmed by their collective kindness. Most of them didn’t even know exactly what Alyssa was referring to. I’d only mentioned being in an accident earlier to explain away the bandages and bruises. I hadn’t told anyone else my full tale of loss.

  “I know." I swallowed the emotional lump in my throat and passed Alyssa my phone. "And I appreciate everyone rallying around a total stranger. I think Hondo sent me a text.”

  “You gave him your number?” Tyler asked.

  “No,” I replied, a chill running down my spine. “That’s the weird part.”

  “This whole thing is the weird part,” he countered. The others murmured in affirmation.

  Alyssa studied the brief message, her forehead wrinkling. “Jefferson Farm? I can't say it's familiar.” Alyssa handed the device off to Mark with a questioning glance. “Any idea what’s out there?”

  “Not a clue.” After giving the message a quick scan, he passed the phone along to Tyler. “It’s some old homestead surrounded by cornfields would be my guess. Shotta, you ever heard of it?”

  “No. Jedi?”