Hard Wired Trilogy DeAnna Pearce (if you give a mouse a cookie read aloud txt) 📖

“I can do it,” Ari replied pushing her hair out of the eyes and wishing for a ponytail for the hundredth time.

“You’re her back up,” Torq said to Tessa.

“I said I’ll do it,” Ari snapped.

“Yeah, and Tessa said you knew how to play. Pardon if I don’t take your word for it.” His eyes flashed in disbelief.

Before Ari could reply, Tessa pinned Torq to the ground. “Take care of the damn troll and we’ll get it. Remember who is a level four champion here, huh?”

Torq rolled his eyes as Tessa released him, and he did a back roll to get up. Ari couldn’t take too much offense. They probably had no idea she’d never played before. And as annoying as he was, Ari loved to watch Torq. When fighting, his intricate tribal tattoos spun wildly around his body.

“Let’s do this,” Ra-soon said, and they all went charging over the rocky cliff face into the battle.

While Tessa carried down the guys, Ari crawled down the side of the cliff so as to not to draw attention to herself. At the base, four gremlins charged her. Despite the fact they were slow, they were also strong. She took care of three with a gust of wind, but the last one held on to a nearby rock. Ari took her small blade out and finished him off with a swift jab in the general direction of where his heart should be. He dissolved into a black miasma that clung to the ground.

Ari approached the battle from the side. Tessa repeatedly dove towards another winged fighter, attacking and pulling back before the counter-strike. She had a finesse and grace to her that the other purple-winged fighter could not match. Tessa toyed with them, while they struggled to stay afloat.

Torq had almost defeated the huge troll, while Ra-soon fought off gremlins and the other team on the ground. The needed jewel laid in a cave directly behind the battle. As Ari neared the fighting, she cast a spell. The wind obediently picked up dust to cloud her from the warriors’ vision. With the needed cover, she sprinted for the cave.

Once inside the interior appeared dark, almost blood red, with a small light shining deep within. The jewel. She was almost there. As she crossed the entrance, someone slammed into her side, taking her to the ground. He grabbed her hands, restraining her powers. They struggled, but he obviously had the upper hand.

“Why, hello there.” A guy, dressed in slim green armor, sat on Ari’s chest. A metal mask surrounded his head, with large insect like eyes poking out. “You really think we’re going to let a newbie get the last Jewel of Achman? Sorry, sweetie.”

His voice sounded familiar, even with the computerized lilt to it. Changing your voice was another option in the game, one Ari never bothered with. She didn’t have time to figure out who he was as he gripped her hands together over her head and used his other hand to slowly squeeze her neck.

There were a number of ways to kill someone. Most went for the quick kill, hoping to make them start their quest over with a time delay. Or if a person was injured, with their life levels near zero, they remained in the game, helpless until their life levels regenerated.

But this guy seemed to enjoy restraining her, slowly draining her life and in no hurry to finish her off. She fought his grasp, sending electrical currents through her hands. He didn’t move. She struggled to turn her head and out of the corner of her eyes she could see the fighting outside. It was evenly matched with both sides sustaining losses.

“I guess I don’t have all day to win.” He cut off any reply by increasing the pressure in her throat.

A small gasp escaped her mouth. Black dots danced in front of her eyes and something else, too. Code. A variety of multi-colored letters, numbers, and symbols danced through her vision. Was this the same type of code she learned in school? It looked similar. Enough so that upon further inspection, she could read it and see what exactly this character was. She found his strengths, saw the code that gave him his armor and other protections.

The characters mesmerized Ari for a moment, like reading or speaking a foreign language for the first time and realizing she was fluent. The black spots floating in her vision brought her back to reality. Without a thought, she shifted the code.

She easily picked out the code for the green man in front of her. She shifted the color of the armor out of the code and watched it float up into the air. Letters and digits spun around, and the guy in front of her glitched for a moment only to return colorless. This new aspect of the game was like a whole different game within a game. Piece by piece, she stripped away the green armor. Any perceived strength and power fled with another mental flick. Stripping off all the code that made the character, she found Garrett, in his usual jeans and shirt, sitting on top of her.

His hair stood on end, yet with his normal eyes and pale skin he looked alien in this environment. With his powers stripped, it only took a second for Ari to change the positions, ending with her on top, straddling his chest. Garrett’s eyes widened in disbelief.

“What happened to the game?”

“You mean why am I on top and you’re on bottom?” Ari had a sick pleasure in pinning him to the floor. Briefly, she wondered if his powers were stripped what would happen to his pain response.

“What happened? Who screwed my game?” Stripped naked of his power, he lost his usual bravado.

“What the hell is your problem?” Ari yelled, tired of his attitude.

“Why did you stop answering my texts?” he replied with as much force, his face flushed and angry.

Her response froze in her throat. What was she