Somnia Online by K.T. Hanna (reading strategies book txt) 📕

put her head in her hands and waited for it to activate. She wasn’t even sure if this was a good idea. Anyone who fiddled with a headset in a way that made its ping back test as an unverified model would be given a forty-five-minute window to exit the game. They would only be allowed to re-enter the game once the headgear had been restored to factory settings. She had gone over every single member in Fable’s current raid and exempted them for the duration of said raid. Shayla really hoped she’d got them all.

Two.

Almost there. She was bracing herself for the amount of calls they were about to receive. She’d already pulled all available customer service agents from home and readied scripts for everyone. After all, no one ever read the Terms of Service they agreed to, or if they did, it wasn’t many of them.

One.

It clearly stated in the TOS article three, subsection F that headgear had to be pre-approved by the company in order to provide a safe environment for the players to participate in. Any and all models or modifications that had been tried and vetted were already loaded into the headgear verification module. Should any player have been found to have tampered with the headgear that could bypass verification, they would be given only one chance to rectify the breach. Otherwise their account would be terminated.

Updated Headgear Verification Process - Version 8.293.42 has been activated.

Notifications commencing.

Shayla watched the reactions in real time. So many people being told that their headsets had incorrect status features, where people had modified them so the HUD looked different or so certain aspects that shouldn’t be available were. There was a reason the HUD looked like it did. A good reason that involved making it easier and less stressful on eyes and not about to trigger anyone with epilepsy. There was so much that went into the damned game, and here people were being reckless. Reckless with a device that used laser accuracy to pinpoint portions of your mind.

It took maybe ninety seconds from the time the notifications began to hit the server for the phones to show maximum call volume. And she wasn’t sure why they called them phones; they just did. Some sort of throwback, she presumed. But here it was, her time to shine. The proverbial “I want to speak to a manager” was about to flood them. While Silke and Thomas would work through them first, not to mention several other supervisors, eventually a chunk of them were going to leak through to her, and she had no idea where Laria was.

Ah, perfect, there was her first one. She put on her no-nonsense business voice and opened the call. “Hi, yes, I’m sorry you received this notification. But it does in fact mean that your headgear is in flagrant violation of the ToS you agreed to when you signed up for the game.”

At least, in some ways, it gave her great satisfaction to tell them how they’d fucked up. After all, it was the least she could do.

“What the ever-living fuck was that?” Sinister screamed out as a massive rodent, larger than any unusually sized rodent, jumped out of the black sludge leaking down the walls and attempted to bite her. Luckily, Beastial had been standing next to her and flung it across their path and into the other wall with a huge thud that meant he’d probably—most definitely—brained the poor creature.

Murmur tried not to let the rodents get to her, or the muck pouring from crevices in the stone walled hall that surrounded them. It was all she could do to keep her shit together walking four abreast in this tiny passage that was trying to intimidate her. Sure, it might not make the others feel like that. But each time pathways or areas were narrow and constricting, she felt like something knew how much she despised confined spaces.

The dull glowing light up ahead was the only thing that helped her breathing even out. Well, that and Sinister and Snowy being next to her. They had calming presences. The end the corridor wasn’t too far away. If she spoke it as a mantra to herself, it would help.

Though at least the ceiling didn’t appear to be walled in. Far above the towering walls she could still see the murky remnants of the sky through the shielding that surrounded the island. Technically, they weren’t completely locked in.

“Breathe, Mur,” Veranol whispered. “It’s all good. We are all here. Nothing is falling on you.”

“Easy for you to say,” she snapped out, trying to rein in her emotions so they didn’t leak out and affect everyone else around her. “Sorry, I just hate knowing how that chicken felt.”

But Veranol laughed. “Have you seen me? I’m a hulking Viking, for crying out loud. I mean, I could probably sneeze and blow some walls away. Relax. We will be fine.”

It was what she needed to hear. Just what he needed to say. It gave her perspective that helped greatly when she’d just been so stressed. “Thanks.”

And when she looked, like concentrated on actually looking without wishful thinking influencing it, there definitely was a wider opening up ahead. Everything around them was open air through the lack of ceiling. Even if this current path felt much like a corridor, it wasn’t, because they weren’t actually blocked in.

Slowly, the hallway began to widen out, first to five people, and then six and beyond. With each step, Murmur found her breathing easier, her mind sharpening back to where it should have been. Probably better to keep that whole “doesn’t operate well in confined spaces” thing to herself.

Good idea, Somnia quipped, and before Murmur could comment back she added, Be careful.

And then she was gone. Murmur let the expletives fly in her head, just in case Somnia was still listening. The rest of the raid was spreading out now as they approached a new area. No longer huddled together, Esolan jogged forward