Read Online User Unfriendly by Vivian Vande Velde - Free Book Online
Authors: Vivian Vande Velde
Tags: Ages 9 and up
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me: "There's nothing there."
"I know there's nothing there," I shouted back. "You keep telling me there's nothing there. All right, I get it: there's nothing there."
We stood nose-to-nose, glaring at each other, both breathing hard. We were being stupid—loud enough to attract unwanted attention. All of a sudden I could feel every ache from being whacked on the head and tied up and thrown into a cold, damp dungeon.
I looked beyond him to the perfectly harmless-seeming air into which he had disappeared. "How did you get back?" I asked.
"Just stepped back," he told me.
I took a steadying breath. I flexed my hand on the handle of the torch. I was taking it with me, to light up Robin's nothingness. I started to take a step forward.
In the half moment as my center of balance shifted, Robin said, "It's just a matter of finding your body so that you
can
step back."
I finished the step.
And I was nowhere.
No walls around me. No floor under my feet.
No feet, come to think of it.
I was slightly dizzy, though I wasn't aware of having a body, as though my head—if I still had one—was stuffed with cotton.
Was it dark?
I don't know.
Not, I don't remember. Just,
I don't know.
I didn't have eyes to see with, or a brain to think with. Dark or light? The question was meaningless, like asking, Is the sky afraid?
I wondered if this was death. Or rather the computer equivalent of death. But Robin had come back from it. And only a cleric can bring people back from the dead. Game rules.
I wanted to step back, but I couldn't.
I didn't know how.
Just like I don't know how to wiggle my ears, can't find the right muscles to spread out my toes, couldn't begin to flex my appendix.
I couldn't see.
Couldn't hear.
Couldn't feel.
Couldn't scream.
Couldn't move.
I was beginning to dissolve, to spread out, to lose track of who I was. In my head (I think) I formed a picture of myself. I made that image step backward.
Nothing.
I remembered that I wasn't Harek Longbow of the Silver Mountains Clan, tall and fair and muscular and self-possessed. I was Arvin Rizalli. And while I couldn't remember exactly what that meant, I knew it was the opposite of Harek. I got a vague image in my head (I think) then gave
it
a mental shove backward.
I stepped back into the cell.
Robin had the decency not to ask me whether it had been dark.
I grabbed hold of his arm to steady myself. "Something's wrong, Robin," I gasped.
"Yeah, tell me about it. Let's get out of here."
We stumbled out of the cell, down the hall past the dead guards, through the guard area with the tipped-over bench. Robin snatched up the abandoned playing cards. I didn't wait, but he was only two steps behind me when I reached the stairs.
The stairs were carved out of the ground and slanted first one way then the other. They were worn lower in the middle than at the edges, so that I continually felt off balance as though I were about to fall.
At the top was a foyer. In one direction a door led outside, guarded by one of the bandits, who had his back to us. It was night already. I could see the not-quite-full moon low in the sky, and bright pinpricks of stars.
To the left of the stairs was a hallway leading farther into the bandits' hideout; but when I looked in that direction, my eyes watered and I lost track of where my feet were. It must have had a similar effect on Robin, for he never suggested exploring. He indicated my dagger—his dagger—tucked into my belt.
This wasn't like a bloodless miniatures-and-graph-paper game, nor like a video game with cartoonish graphics; so instead of challenging the guard, I sneaked up behind him and whacked him on the back of the head with the pommel of the knife.
He'd barely stopped twitching when Robin started searching his pockets.
"Would you cut that out?" I demanded between clenched teeth. "What if he comes to?" But I picked up the crossbow that had clattered to the ground beside the guard.
There was a courtyard ahead of us, a
"I know there's nothing there," I shouted back. "You keep telling me there's nothing there. All right, I get it: there's nothing there."
We stood nose-to-nose, glaring at each other, both breathing hard. We were being stupid—loud enough to attract unwanted attention. All of a sudden I could feel every ache from being whacked on the head and tied up and thrown into a cold, damp dungeon.
I looked beyond him to the perfectly harmless-seeming air into which he had disappeared. "How did you get back?" I asked.
"Just stepped back," he told me.
I took a steadying breath. I flexed my hand on the handle of the torch. I was taking it with me, to light up Robin's nothingness. I started to take a step forward.
In the half moment as my center of balance shifted, Robin said, "It's just a matter of finding your body so that you
can
step back."
I finished the step.
And I was nowhere.
No walls around me. No floor under my feet.
No feet, come to think of it.
I was slightly dizzy, though I wasn't aware of having a body, as though my head—if I still had one—was stuffed with cotton.
Was it dark?
I don't know.
Not, I don't remember. Just,
I don't know.
I didn't have eyes to see with, or a brain to think with. Dark or light? The question was meaningless, like asking, Is the sky afraid?
I wondered if this was death. Or rather the computer equivalent of death. But Robin had come back from it. And only a cleric can bring people back from the dead. Game rules.
I wanted to step back, but I couldn't.
I didn't know how.
Just like I don't know how to wiggle my ears, can't find the right muscles to spread out my toes, couldn't begin to flex my appendix.
I couldn't see.
Couldn't hear.
Couldn't feel.
Couldn't scream.
Couldn't move.
I was beginning to dissolve, to spread out, to lose track of who I was. In my head (I think) I formed a picture of myself. I made that image step backward.
Nothing.
I remembered that I wasn't Harek Longbow of the Silver Mountains Clan, tall and fair and muscular and self-possessed. I was Arvin Rizalli. And while I couldn't remember exactly what that meant, I knew it was the opposite of Harek. I got a vague image in my head (I think) then gave
it
a mental shove backward.
I stepped back into the cell.
Robin had the decency not to ask me whether it had been dark.
I grabbed hold of his arm to steady myself. "Something's wrong, Robin," I gasped.
"Yeah, tell me about it. Let's get out of here."
We stumbled out of the cell, down the hall past the dead guards, through the guard area with the tipped-over bench. Robin snatched up the abandoned playing cards. I didn't wait, but he was only two steps behind me when I reached the stairs.
The stairs were carved out of the ground and slanted first one way then the other. They were worn lower in the middle than at the edges, so that I continually felt off balance as though I were about to fall.
At the top was a foyer. In one direction a door led outside, guarded by one of the bandits, who had his back to us. It was night already. I could see the not-quite-full moon low in the sky, and bright pinpricks of stars.
To the left of the stairs was a hallway leading farther into the bandits' hideout; but when I looked in that direction, my eyes watered and I lost track of where my feet were. It must have had a similar effect on Robin, for he never suggested exploring. He indicated my dagger—his dagger—tucked into my belt.
This wasn't like a bloodless miniatures-and-graph-paper game, nor like a video game with cartoonish graphics; so instead of challenging the guard, I sneaked up behind him and whacked him on the back of the head with the pommel of the knife.
He'd barely stopped twitching when Robin started searching his pockets.
"Would you cut that out?" I demanded between clenched teeth. "What if he comes to?" But I picked up the crossbow that had clattered to the ground beside the guard.
There was a courtyard ahead of us, a
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