Evoker Sample Chapter

EVOKER

CHAPTER ONE

Advertisement loading…

Michael stepped out of the car and let the door close behind him, then stood on the sidewalk as the vehicle seamlessly whirred back into traffic. The payment would withdraw itself from his account—automated like everything else—but it still always felt odd to have no part in the transaction. Not even a placebo button to press anymore.

He tucked his hands into his pockets against the autumn chill, and turned toward the tight row of storefronts lining the downtown city block…and couldn’t suppress a little sigh of disappointment at the sight. It was all so boring. Every building down the row was gray or brown brick, with barely any variation to tell one store from another. A few still had a little architectural character that set them apart, but all of it seemed vestigial, details left from a different time. It was becoming a novelty to find a bit of real stonework or even some decorative trim around a window, and instead, everything built or renovated within the last ten years was little more than a bland box, with bare walls like empty canvases. Which meant the newer areas of town had become very monotonous places for people like him.

Michael let his eyes wander over the other pedestrians as they went about their own errands, and he was pleasantly surprised at how many were venturing out into reality that morning—or at least, into their own distinct versions of it. He briefly wondered what each might be seeing as they passed. How they might be filtering it all. What they might be adding or editing out. And he couldn’t help but feel pity for them. It was one thing to want to live in a different world, but he drew the line at swaddling himself in lies for it.

He glanced over the store signs, each one disappointingly similar with plain block letters, until he finally found the one he was looking for. The coffee shop was called Mocharisma, and it was supposed to be one of the few places in the area that still sold the real stuff. It was only a block from his meeting at the gallery, so he figured he might as well indulge a little and treat himself. Heaven knew he could use the caffeine before going to discuss things like digital reproduction royalties and derivative attribution rights. He could already feel himself getting annoyed just thinking about it.

Michael waited for a break in the stream of people, then angled through to make his way to the cafe. He dodged a small puddle from the rain they’d had the night before, and got to the entrance just as another customer was exiting. The rush of warm air from inside was redolent with the promise of hot drinks and baked goods, and he took the held door from the other man with a nod of thanks.

The place was nice enough inside, even with some semblance of real decor, but he came to a stop only a few paces in as he realized there was nothing like a regular front counter from which to order. He glanced around for a server or a menu, but found only a room full of customers quietly enjoying their drinks—with the exception of a pair of young kids bouncing in their seats and waving their hands as they played some imaginary game together. Michael couldn’t help but smile at that. His own kids had been that young and full of energy not so long ago.

A teenage employee emerged from a back alcove, and Michael moved toward him. “Excuse me?” he asked. “Do I wait to be seated, or…”

The kid looked confused for a second, like he was trying to translate the question for himself. Then he shook his head. “Uh, no,” he said with a little too much amazement. “It’s all EVO, sir. Just have a seat and order.”

“Yeah…okay,” Michael replied, nodding his thanks. But secretly, he was banking a little annoyance at the kid’s baffled tone. It was like he’d asked if the air was breathable.

For a moment, Michael considered just leaving and trying another place, but a glance at the time told him he didn’t have nearly enough to go wandering in search of something that had likely stopped existing. Everything was EVO now. It was where most of the modern world lived, and kids like that server had grown up knowing nothing else. So instead, he found a seat a few paces away and placed his bag in it, letting the strap drape over the back before dropping into the chair opposite.

Embedded Virtual Optimesh had taken over everything almost a decade ago, practically an overnight revolution as far as he remembered. And now nearly everyone had some kind of access to the new layers of existence it afforded. So much so, in fact, that it had basically become a human right—required hardware to hold down a job or participate in society at all. With one simple procedure, quick and painless, you could open up a whole new world of possibilities right behind your own eyes. Or so the advertisements said.

But as far as Michael was concerned, EVOs were more of a devolution for humanity. And if his circumstances had been any different, he probably would have remained one of the dwindling few who refused to get chipped up. He saw it all as nothing more than smoke and mirrors—fairy dust in high-speed, high-res, nonstop bulk, available at a thought and discarded just as quickly.

But most days he knew it was better to keep those opinions to himself. Especially after his youngest daughter had once accused him of sounding like “a crotchety old man yelling at motor-cars from the back of his donkey.” Teenagers were great for that kind of vivid perspective. And if there was ever a good reason to give up and log in, a good cup of coffee was certainly near the top of the list. So he sighed and reluctantly pulled up the memory of his key image to activate his EVO.

He closed his eyes and saw the picture…a beautiful day at a lake…all of them happy and smiling. A streak of yellow and red down by the shore…

For a moment, nothing happened. His model was a few years older and still had the boot sequence most of the latest chips had done away with. But then his head began filling with the familiar autonomic tingling as the hardware came to life, and the interface coalesced into the EVO logo and a single box of translucent white text hovering over his vision.

“Hello, Michael. Would you like to connect?”

He sighed again and selected “Yes.”

And the world came to vibrant life around him.

First it was the music—some generic corporate dance beat piped directly into his head at his personal default volume. Then the surface of the plain table in front of him began glittering as the layers of effects loaded, first wavering like a heat haze, and then fully morphing into a pool of crystalline water rippling gently over the image of the menu he’d been looking for. And despite knowing better, he couldn’t help but reach down to touch it. His fingertips disturbed the water convincingly to leave shimmering trails as he moved his hand in small circles, and as usual, he found himself equally impressed and annoyed at how good the illusions were. Though that was immediately mitigated by the lack of any real wetness or coolness over the smooth table. His fingers wanted to feel the water they thought was there, but it was just a phantom projected into his head. And that emptiness always left him feeling somehow unfulfilled, like a sneeze that wouldn’t quite come—but happening constantly, as long as his EVO was on. No matter how many virtual layers they draped over top it, reality was always waiting beneath, and he just couldn’t quite make himself forget it.

He shook off the malaise and turned his attention to the menu, glancing over the options and trying not to linger on any one item for too long. But just as he thought it, a blueberry muffin caught his eye and he had to endure a few seconds of sizzle reel showing the thing plumping enticingly in the oven. And after trying and failing to dismiss the video before it looped again, he simply ordered the thing to get it to stop. The coffee went easier, even through the dozens of options and upgrades the sub-menus threw at him, and soon he was treated to a confirmation message from a miniature AI avatar who began frantically scurrying around a virtual kitchen in his periphery. Another prompt showed the price being deducted from his account, and he tried not to think about how many hours he’d have to work in one of his various side jobs to cover the expense of the treat. But he had to eat. Surely even debtors could be allowed that much.

Michael minimized the prompts to the top left corner of his overlay and sat back in the chair, feeling a little like he’d just run a gauntlet. He knew most people must prefer to interact with the world this way, otherwise every business wouldn’t have so readily leapt into the technology. But for him, the augmented reality just felt wrong. Artificial. Like he was pounding on a suffocating film of shiny plastic wrapped over existence.

His display suddenly lit with some kind of fire effect to his right, and he turned to find that the two bouncing kids were actually playing an EVO game that involved tossing magical spells at one another. The older one threw a series of scintillating bolts that zigzagged through the air between them, and Michael watched as the younger grimaced and activated a blue aura that deflected all the shots. Both kids whooped in delight, and the adult at the table looked up and patted the air for them to tone it down.

As Michael watched, another prompt came up in his screen to advertise the game as “Arcane Quest III,” and he let it play for a moment to see animated characters throwing massive fireballs from the parapets of a dark tower. The slick marketing looked nothing like the cheap effects the kids were using, and he knew it was just the way of things now. But even so, he had to admit that he would have killed to have something like it at their age. He would have been over there laughing and throwing spells right along with them. Meanwhile, at forty-seven, it took him three tries just to successfully dismiss the stupid ad.

The wait timer on his coffee ticked down a little more, and he let himself look around at how the shop itself had changed in his overlay. It was now bedecked in a whole array of ambience effects, including one entire wall that was now a floor-to-ceiling window overlooking a silent forest canopy. The area at the front of the shop was covered in a running display of beautiful, smiling people harvesting and roasting coffee beans, and the back wall was now seemingly gone, replaced instead by what looked like live feeds from other cafes around the world, giving the space a much more open and bustling feel. Even the ceiling above had the augmented treatment, now draped in delicate purple curtains that swayed softly in a virtual breeze. It was almost convincing enough to make him shiver with the cool that he knew he couldn’t possibly be feeling—just a trick of his meat brain trying again to reconcile his dueling senses.

And all of that was just on the default settings. He could see the little shimmer of icons in the corners of every display, inviting him to explore the different customization options for each. The forest canopy could scroll over to become a mountain vista or a sprawling desert, and there were many more choices in grayed-out windows to either side if he wanted to pay to “upgrade his Mocharisma aesthetic experience.” For just a small fee, he could customize the place to look like practically anything.

And at that point, it became too much.

He considered shutting off the chip now that he’d placed his order, but the bag in the chair across from him caught his eye, and his thoughts slipped straight to what was inside.

One memory led to another…

And before he knew it, Michael found his attention drifting to his local storage, following the long trail of directories down until a file was suddenly unpacking on his overlay. And every bit of his willpower ran away like sand through a sieve.

He closed his eyes as the program finished loading, and he stayed that way for a long beat—long enough that if someone were to glance over, they might wonder what was wrong with him. But he didn’t care. Because when he finally opened them again…she was sitting there. Smiling.

And he had to fight very hard not to smile back.

At his wife.

His oldest daughter had made the illusion for him a long time ago. And though he knew she’d meant well, he’d stopped counting the number of times he’d tried and failed to delete it. The thing had come from hundreds of pictures, rendered into three dimensions and given a semblance of life with a rudimentary AI—the chest rising and falling naturally as if with breath, and the eyes drifting around the room like she was taking it all in on a lovely morning out. And despite himself, Michael had always found that if he didn’t look too hard, he could almost believe that she was actually there with him. Waiting for their order…about to reach out and take his hand…or say something funny…or call him “Mikey” in the way she knew he playfully hated. In the way that he would now give nearly anything to hear again.

A seven-year-old knot loosened in his chest, and for a few seconds, he let himself slip into a different version of reality, just like everyone else there. Into a world where this moment was true. Where his life had gone on along its original path without diverging so abruptly. Where he was still writing and she was still painting, and the present hadn’t left them both so far behind.

Where the insurance hadn’t given out.

Where the cancer had been treatable.

“I’m sorry, Nay,” he said under his breath. “I tried to think of another way, but this might be my last chance. Hopefully if I can get enough to keep the foundation—”

He heard the scuff of shoes just in time to look up and watch a tray pass straight through her image. The server placed it on the table, then turned back toward the alcove without a word, leaving only the muffin, the coffee, and a prompt on the overlay asking for a tip. The little cartoon avatar told him to “Have a great day!” as it gestured subtly toward the gratuity.

Michael agreed and swiped the messages away, watching the little animation of more money drifting from his account as he wondered if the kid had noticed anything. The image was supposed to be set to private, but there was no such filter to hide the expression on his face. He casually felt at his cheeks to make sure they were still dry.

Then he simply sat there for another moment, letting himself enjoy the last tatters of his fantasy before they frayed completely away again. Until a meeting reminder prompt finally forced him to let it go.

He drew a deep breath and completed his regular ritual by staring directly at the image, taking in all the little details about her that were wrong—like the artificial sparkle in the eyes, the airbrushed skin, and the perfect smile instead of the crooked, wry one he remembered. Not to mention the fact that there was a warm muffin on the table in front of her and it was still whole. He absorbed all of those flaws, making himself really see them, until looking at the reproduction felt less and less like a relief and more like a tiny blasphemy. Then he forced himself to close the image down and say goodbye for the thousandth time, letting the program blink out with no fanfare, to once again be buried deep in a series of directories that would make it too difficult to pull up on a whim. At least, until the next time he couldn’t quite resist.

And that, he knew, was the real reason he still had an EVO. Not for work or games or illusory decorations, or even to be a part of modern society. But because it was the only place in the entire world he could go to pretend his Naomi was still alive. Even if for just an instant.

A glance at the system clock at the bottom of his display told him it was time to leave. So he pulled up the location of the gallery and activated the beacon program in his map, letting the AI draw a glowing yellow guide line on the floor that led straight to the door. Then he rose and carefully slung the bag over his shoulder, before picking up his coffee and muffin to follow the path out of the shop and back onto a street that had completely transformed.

——-

Thanks for checking out the sample chapter for EVOKER! If you want to find out what happens next, please consider backing the Kickstarter!