Читать книгу St Oda's Bones - Marcus Attwater - Страница 7

Jake loved GrailQuest. Ever since he had discovered the game two years ago he'd been playing it almost daily. There was something about its slightly out of true fantasy world that appealed to him more than any other game. He didn't know how faithful the makers had been to the legend it was based on, but he liked what they had done with it. He usually preferred video games that were about the story more than the battles - although GrailQuest had plenty of those - and sometimes he would just wander about exploring the virtual world instead of going on a quest. That was why he had chosen a Knight Errant as his avatar, even though this did oblige him to rescue the occasional damsel in distress, which he always felt wasn't quite him. As a newbie he had assumed the damsels were just there for decoration, like the Black and Red Knights who periodically popped up to challenge you, but they actually provided clues to the quest you were on, or useful magic tricks you could learn. And, just sometimes, they turned out to be some other gamer's avatar, whose sole purpose it was to thwart your progress. Last year, after he had been shot, after his grandfather died and his aunts were arrested, he had spent days and days just wandering about the game-world, responding to every challenge, picking up every gauntlet. He had been refusing to deal with the real world, he knew that well enough, it was escapism in its purest form. But it had been good, too. He sometimes thought about those days of total immersion as something he would like to do again someday. And it was good to have a place - even virtual - to escape to. When he thought about it, it was actually quite wonderful that that worked. The human brain was a strange thing. And he had badly needed to escape. Although he had run away from home at seventeen, and hadn't kept in touch with most of his large family for years, he still became entangled in the aftermath of the police enquiry. Now his great-uncle, two of his aunts, and the uncle who had shot him had been convicted, his father had moved to France with his new wife, his mother had taken his youngest brother to live in Scotland, and the house he had grown up in had been put up for sale. There was nothing to stop him resuming his old life, partying and making his money by selling sex and drugs. But he had always known that he couldn't go on doing that forever, and his own brush with violent death had made him think it might be better to get out while he could. When his father had offered to sub him and his two sisters through university he had accepted the offer gratefully. So here he was, a psychology first-year with an allowance, a bedsit and a job stacking shelves in Waitrose, rather than a rent-boy who always knew where to lay hands on the latest party drug. He had thought it would be easy. He had no trouble keeping up academically, he made an effort to get along with his fellow students, the job was a useful addition to his income. But if he were honest, most of the time he felt as if he was watching another Jake acting in a play. It wasn't quite convincing. Now, a few weeks into his first term, the actor was starting to argue about his lines. The coursework was laughably simple, this rebellious voice said, his fellow students were predictable and - what was the word? - callow, and since he was careful with money, he didn't really need the job. But what else could he do? Sometimes Jake feared that if he didn't have to get up to go to a lecture or to work, he would never bother to get up again. Then, telling himself not to be so dramatic, he would get his stuff together and go out in search of something to learn or something to laugh about.

Wednesday morning. Satchel, iPad, books. Bus in ten minutes. Lecture with Miss Dacre. Lunch in the student union. Seminar with Mr Lyall. Stacking shelves till six. Spend the evening gaming or reading. Eat. Sleep. Repeat. Just your normal student really. He was sure a better actor would have brought it off.