Awaken Online: Inferno (Tarot #3) Read online

  Awaken Online

  Tarot Book 3: Inferno

  ______________

  Travis Bagwell

  Copyright © 2020 by Travis Bagwell

  All rights reserved.

  ______

  To my wife, if you died, I’d totally resurrect you inside my favorite videogame.

  How exactly is that not romantic?!

  ______

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1 - Ruined

  Chapter 2 - Tested

  Chapter 3 - Reunion

  Chapter 4 - Cavernous

  Chapter 5 - Endgame

  Chapter 6 - Prepared

  Chapter 7 - Well-Traveled

  Chapter 8 - Rocky

  Chapter 9 - Shifty

  Chapter 10 - Mechanized

  Chapter 11 - Intrusive

  Chapter 12 - Fail-Safe

  Chapter 13 - Frantic

  Chapter 14 - Cannibalized

  Chapter 15 - Corrupted

  Chapter 16 - Distracting

  Chapter 17 - Exploratory

  Chapter 18 - Ignite

  Chapter 19 - Explosive

  Chapter 20 - Supervisory

  Chapter 21 - Trapped

  Chapter 22 - Terminated

  Chapter 23 - Dire

  Chapter 24 - Disoriented

  Chapter 25 - Ignited

  Chapter 26 - Harried

  Chapter 27 - Ancient

  Chapter 28 - Forged

  Chapter 29 - Ordered

  Chapter 30 - Handy

  Chapter 31 - Bustling

  Chapter 32 - Hounded

  Chapter 33 - United

  Chapter 34 - Dreary

  Chapter 35 - Nebulous

  Chapter 36 - Strategic

  Chapter 37 - Maelstrom

  Chapter 38 - Storming

  Chapter 39 - Fiery

  Chapter 40 - Breach

  Chapter 41 - Elemental

  Chapter 42 - Chaotic

  Chapter 43 - Suicidal

  Chapter 44 - Mechanical

  Chapter 45 - Drowned

  Chapter 46 - Check

  Chapter 47 - Mate

  Chapter 48 - Reunion

  Chapter 49 - Recovered

  Chapter 50 - Remorseful

  Epilogue

  Prologue

  10 years before the release of Awaken Online.

  Finn woke with a start, blinking bleary eyes. The movement was a strain with the way his eyelids were crusted shut. An incessant beep came from just to his right, the sound rhythmic and monotone and painfully, fatefully familiar.

  A hazy glance confirmed what he already suspected.

  A hospital monitor loomed beside the bed, the machine flashing occasionally and showing a readout of his pulse, blood pressure, and brain activity. Although, with the way his vision was swimming, it was difficult to focus on the images. More than that, his body throbbed and ached. Except for his legs, those were blissfully free of pain. Numb really. He raised a hand to rub at his eyes, the movement tugging at the IV embedded in his wrist, and he frowned at the transparent cable in confusion.

  “Fantastic, you’re awake,” a voice spoke up. A woman’s face soon hovered in front of him. There was something about the shape of her nose… or maybe it was her eyes… “My name is Nancy Carrigan. Do you recognize me?”

  “I-I think so,” Finn croaked, his voice hoarse.

  Why does she look so damn familiar? His thoughts felt sluggish, as though his head was full of gelatin. It took a concerted effort to focus – something that felt out of place and unusual. Normally, the thoughts came so quickly…

  “Do you remember your name?”

  That one took a second, but it came to him, eventually. “Finn. Finn Harris.”

  “Good,” Nancy said, tapping at a small display projected beside the bed.

  “Do you know where you are, Mr. Harris?”

  Finn let out a snort. “A hospital, clearly.”

  A small, sad smile on the woman’s face. “Do you remember which one?”

  His brow furrowed.

  How had he gotten here? Why was he in a hospital?

  Then it struck him with the force of a freight train.

  It had all started with a small, nagging worry. The flash of a sequin dress. An award digging into his side. A tremor that quickly spiraled out of control. Then he was tumbling, flying weightlessly through the air. His hand had reached out to the woman beside him, her auburn hair tumbling around her face. Those beautiful brown eyes, contorted in fear…

  Rachael

  It felt like Finn had been kicked in the chest, the breath whooshing from his lungs in a rush. The monitor beside him was beeping erratically now. He couldn’t breathe – couldn’t move. He remembered the accident…

  Rachael getting sucked out of the jagged hole that had been ripped in the side of the car… the pain, the anger, the terror… her mouth opening in a silent, desperate scream…

  …it felt like he was drowning…

  …and then it all faded into the background.

  Suddenly, Finn was just numb – as though a switch had been flipped in his head.

  “Mr. Harris, are you okay? Can you hear me?” Nancy asked, her gaze troubled now. Her brow creased with worry, and her eyes flitting nervously to the nearby monitor.

  “Stop calling me that,” Finn said, his voice quiet and disturbingly steady. “You and I have known each other for years, Nancy.” He now understood why her face seemed so familiar– those eyes that were now wide in surprise. Nancy had been his wife’s PA for the last six years. He’d met her dozens of times.

  And if she was caring for him personally instead of a nurse…

  Finn swallowed hard, forcing that thought aside and giving himself over entirely to the calm void that had filled his mind. The gesture was painful. His throat hurt. Feeding tube, it came to him immediately. The lack of feeling in his legs made sense now too. Spinal injury, long-term paralysis, his brain supplied clinically.

  “Finn, please look at me,” Nancy said, her voice filled with an emotion that he didn’t want to hear right now. Finn couldn’t bring himself to do it. He didn’t want to see the information painted across her face. He just wanted this moment to continue a little longer. For her to let him be and let him embrace that numb emptiness.

  And yet his eyes raised to hers on their own, drawn inexplicably upward.

  He saw the truth shining in Nancy’s eyes, in the moisture that clung there. The pinched lips, the pale skin. Dark circles that spoke of sleepless nights. His mind picked out each piece of data, and he could feel it unraveling that clinical calm, leading inexorably toward an inevitable conclusion. And so, Finn squeezed his eyes shut, not trusting himself to stay in control – not if he had to see the compassion and pain reflected in her expression.

  A small, nervous cough came from Nancy. “You’re at St. Peregrine Memorial,” she explained. “You suffered severe injuries from the accident. Internal organ damage. Multiple fractures along both arms. Dislocated shoulder. Yet the most severe injury was to your spine, that’s what’s causing the lower-body paralysis.”

  “How long?” he croaked.

  “10 days since the accident. They induced a coma to help repair most of the damage and injected neuroplastic into your arms to repair the fractures. It’s set by now, but the adjacent tissue is still damaged. Internal injuries have also stabilized. It’s your spine that’s the problem. We had to wake you to ask what you want to—”

  “My kids?” Finn interjected, cutting her off.

  “With your sister. She picked them up the night of the accident,” Nancy said softly.

  A brief hesitation.

  And then, “Finn, you nee
d to pick a treatment, and then we have to put you back under. If we wait, the damage to your spine may become permanent.”

  He just shook his head. That didn’t matter – not right now.

  There was still one question he hadn’t asked yet.

  “Rachael?” His voice cracked, and that numb void shuddered. It felt fragile, tenuous.

  His eyes shot open.

  He saw Nancy. The pain etched across her face. The tremble in her hands.

  “Dr. Harris… Rachael didn’t make it,” she said, unable to meet his gaze. Nancy reached out a hand, laying it on his arm. Compassion. Pity. Grief. His mind listed the emotions in a strange, detached way, as though he were reciting a recipe.

  It didn’t feel real. It couldn’t be real.

  He pulled his arm away. “Where is she? The morgue downstairs?”

  Nancy’s eyes widened. “Well, yes… but—”

  “Get me a chair.”

  “Finn, you can’t—”

  “Just do it, Nancy,” he said calmly, his eyes meeting hers, his gaze even and unwavering. “It’s either that or I crawl. Or you sedate me – but then you aren’t getting your answer on the treatment.”

  He saw her hesitate for only a moment before she left the room. When Nancy returned, she was rolling a folding wheelchair – no fancy electronics or life support. Sometimes there was still a use for the classics. She moved toward the edge of the bed and then circled to help him.

  Yet Finn shrugged off her hands. He would do this himself.

  With a grimace, he tugged the IV free. Pushing against the cushions, he forced himself upright, his arms burning in protest. Then he began the laborious process of moving his legs, shifting the numb limbs to the edge of the bed. When he was ready, Finn took a deep breath and shoved off. He nearly missed the chair, barely landing on the edge, and his arms trembled unsteadily as he clung to the armrests.

  He felt something tear in his left arm, a burning pain lancing through the limb. Yet he ignored it. He also ignored the distressed look in Nancy’s eyes and the way she appeared to resist the urge to help him by clenching her hands together. She only tugged his thin hospital gown down around him once he was settled, not saying a single word.

  Then Finn wheeled himself out of the room. Each movement cost him dearly, even the smooth metal grip along each wheel ripping open the recently healed cuts along his palms. The ache in his arms and shoulders soon turned to a throbbing pain that rippled up each limb and across his shoulders. It felt like his left arm was on fire.

  But he kept moving.

  The hospital staff stilled as he entered the hallway, a hushed silence filling the corridor. Finn pushed past them. He didn’t stop or say a word, just forced his reluctant limbs to keep moving, pushing himself toward the elevator he knew rested at the end of the hall. He could hear hushed whispers behind him and the soft tap of shoes on tile – Nancy, most likely – following him.

  He entered the elevator and spoke over his shoulder. “I’m fine from here.”

  “I really don’t think—”

  He cut Nancy off again as he tapped the doors closed with a faint hiss of hydraulics.

  Several long, pain-filled minutes later, Finn had managed to wheel himself into the morgue – past a very surprised and upset-looking member of the hospital staff. However, a tap at the man’s coms and a few hushed whispers later, Finn had been let inside and directed to a table at the far end of the room.

  Now he rolled up to that metal counter, his ragged breathing the only sound that filled the room. He saw the outline of a body lying there, a sheet drawn taut. It seemed surreal. Impossible. A scene from a film. A horrible dream, maybe? He drifted forward, and his fingers touched the cloth. He could feel the coarse fibers, wondering in a detached way why they were so rough. Wouldn’t she be uncomfortable? Cold on the metal table?

  Finn took a final deep breath.

  Then he tugged.

  He didn’t know what he had been expecting. But the horror of what he witnessed didn’t do it justice. It was like a portion of his brain had shut off completely. All he could think about was the force and angle needed to sever each limb. The shape of the objects that would have left those ragged lines of flesh. The heat required to boil away skin. The tensile strength of human bone. Numbers and graphs replaced conscious thought.

  It was a physics problem – that was all.

  A problem to be solved.

  It wasn’t his wife.

  It wasn’t Rachael.

  It couldn’t be, could it?

  Could it…?

  His eyes drifted toward the base of her neck, ignoring the ruined flesh and the hint of ivory. He was searching for something specific. Something that would indicate it was Rachael – his Rachael.

  Then he went dead still. A small black nodule rested along her skin, the plastic scuffed but still intact. A cluster of electronics, microscopic wires that drifted up into her cranial cavity. It was the sensor they had implanted while they had been studying her – while he had been building the thing that ultimately killed her…

  Finn couldn’t ignore that. Couldn’t ignore that final piece of evidence.

  Faced with the harsh reality that lay on that table, the numbness finally fractured and then burst apart, the shards and fragments cutting and tearing their way through his mind. All he felt was pain – excruciating, gut-wrenching pain that made his injuries pale in comparison. It was as though someone had ripped out a part of his soul.

  He didn’t even realize he was sobbing until he felt a hand touch his shoulder, the fingers gentle but firm. Finn didn’t move. It was as though his entire body was paralyzed, his eyes merely staring at the remains of her face. Those eyes, now vacant and lifeless.

  “Finn, you shouldn’t be down here,” a voice said. Masculine. Younger than Nancy.

  Finn couldn’t respond, his eyes locked on Rachael.

  He felt himself wheeled around, turned to face a young man who crouched down in front of him. Finn knew that face, and his mind supplied a name. Robert Graham.

  “What are you doing here?” Finn managed to ask.

  “The hospital contacted me when you insisted on leaving your room,” Robert said, eyeing Finn with a worried expression. “I’m your emergency contact after… well, after Rachael,” the young man said with a grimace. “You’ve been down here for an hour. If it weren’t for the tag in your wrist, indicating that your vitals were stable, the hospital staff would have rushed in here already and sedated you.

  “Shit, you’re bleeding,” Robert muttered, his eyes hovering on Finn’s chest.

  Finn looked down and could see that blood now stained the white gown a bright shade of crimson. He must have torn some of his stitches. Probably pushing himself in the wheelchair. His left arm also hung limp and unresponsive. Torn tendons, most likely.

  “Come on, we need to get you back to your bed.”

  “No,” Finn snapped. Then in a more pleading tone, “Just a few more minutes… please, Robert. Please.”

  The young man stared at him for a moment, and then his eyes drifted to Rachael’s body. Robert squeezed his eyes shut against the horror on that table. When he opened them again, Finn saw moisture brimming there. “Fine. A few more minutes, but then I’m wheeling you back to your room myself.”

  Finn felt himself rotated back around to Rachael.

  Then he forgot about anyone and anything else. He reached forward with his right arm, his fingers sliding into what was left of Rachael’s hand – that same hand that had been stretched out toward him as she floated inside the car. The one he had failed to grasp.

  Tears rained down his cheeks, his chest heaved, and his blood slowly leaked across his hospital gown as he held her hand in that still, cold room. “Just a few more minutes…” he murmured, his voice echoing softly.

  “Just a few more minutes, that’s all I want.”

  Chapter 1 - Ruined

  It had been nearly a full day since Finn had been able to log back into Awaken
Online. The system had booted him the day before, shortly after his last fateful confrontation with the Seer and his conversation with Julia. It seemed that whatever sickness had afflicted his character had locked him out of the game.

  He woke to find himself lying on a hard, flat surface. The fever and hot flashes had disappeared, and the pain had receded. Only a dull burning sensation now simmered through his left arm… or what was left of it.

  His eyes crept open, taking in the room around him. Finn’s Short-Sighted ability was active and cast the room around him in varying shades of blue. The enclosure was dark, lit by a faint sheen of glowing algae that coated the ceiling. As best he could tell, a single passageway lingered across from him.

  With a groan, Finn shoved himself upright. It was at that point that he ventured a glance at his left arm. The limb had been severed at the elbow, the skin now wrapped in a thick layer of dark metal with tendrils curling up his biceps like obsidian flames. At least the surrounding skin had healed, red welts and pink flesh replaced with a healthier hue. As his fingers traced the metal, he could see that the substance had fused with the underlying bone. Removal would be tough… if not impossible.

  The injury had cost him dearly: a few days of in-game time to recover and the loss of his Multi-Casting ability.

  “Damn it,” Finn muttered with a grimace.

  Although, there wasn’t much he could do about any of that right now.

  He needed to focus. First things first, where the hell am I?

  Finn had been with allies the last time he was inside AO. He could still vaguely recall the rhythmic sway of a beetle below him. At least 2-3 days had passed in-game under the effects of the time compression. Which meant he was probably somewhere deep within the desert by now. He could only assume his body must have stayed in-game during his absence, perhaps a function of whatever magical illness had afflicted him.

  Now he was who-the-hell-knew-where in this dark room.

  At least this was a concrete problem – one he could tackle.

  “Daniel,” Finn barked.

  The AI immediately flashed into existence nearby, his glowing body lighting the small space. “Hello, sir… oh, shit,” Daniel muttered as he took in the walls of the cave. “Are we in the Abyss again?”