YE/D06 - Holodecks

[Paul]

==

[Riley Wright]

Time has this way of smudging the edges of things when you’re on a ship. Shifts come and go. Hallways fill, then empty again. The lights never change. And your brain—it tries, stubbornly, quietly—to shove everything into tidy little boxes you won’t flinch opening.

Riley hadn’t figured out how to do that yet.

So she ended up standing outside the holodeck in civvies—soft pants, short-sleeved top, her right arm bare. The tattoo along it caught the corridor lights, a tangle of dark lines she could feel even when she wasn’t looking at it. She should’ve felt lighter being off-duty. But it didn’t feel like freedom—it felt like walking around without armor. Her hands were locked behind her back, fingers woven tight enough to turn her knuckles pale. Like if she just held on hard enough, she’d hold herself together. The ship hummed all around her—steady, familiar—and something about that calm made her jaw twitch.

She stopped at the control panel, not the door. Let the screen bathe her hands in soft blue while she keyed in the program list. Skimmed past a bunch she’d already tried. Forced herself to pick something. No overthinking.

Zero-G Racing. Competitive Course. Full Field.

She hesitated, one breath, then dug into the settings—because if she was going to do this, she had to do it right.

[Simulated opponents: enabled.
Opponent count: full roster.
Opponent difficulty: advanced.
Collision safety: engaged.
Course: Gate Run Alpha-Seven.
Reset on injury: immediate.]

She stared at the confirmation screen longer than she needed to. Her thumb just hovered over the key. “Advanced” meant no easing in. No space to wobble. Screw up, and you’d feel it fast.

She hit it anyway.

The tone was soft. The screen blinked: [PROGRAM READY]. Then: [WAITING FOR ENTRY].

Now she moved.

The doors slid open, quiet as always. She stepped through.

For a second the grid blinked into place—those bright white lines in empty space—then it dissolved into a massive, dark stretch of nothing laced with glowing gates and floating markers. No floor, no ceiling. Just movement. Just force. The track hung there like someone had tossed neon rings into the stars and called it a game. In the distance, fake constellations sparkled like they were trying too hard.

Environmental settings kicked in. Her feet lifted a little off the floor as gravity peeled away. Near the door, a suit rack waited—padded flight rig, forearm thrusters. Slick. Practical. Kind of ridiculous next to the clothes she’d walked in wearing.

She floated over, caught the rack with two fingers, dragged the rig over her head and shoulders. Tightened the straps until the whole thing hugged close. Something solid. Dependable. The tattoo on her forearm shifted when she pulled one strap tight—ink over pale skin, one of the only real things in a place built on code.

Farther out, the racers drifted into position—humanoid figures in matching flight gear, holding still with tiny, perfect bursts of thrust. They moved like this was muscle memory. No one looked her way. No one cared. They weren’t here for her.

The countdown flashed in the corner of her vision.

Riley flexed her hands once. Then let them go.

Stop thinking about it.

Zero.

They launched.

They didn’t just go—they exploded off the line. Riley kicked off and punched her thrusters. Clean launch. But the pack was already ahead, tearing through the first gate like a swarm. Tight formation. No gaps. Two racers cut across her path—one above, one low—and she had to make a call fast. She rolled and dropped under, barely threading the gate’s center before the warning tone chirped.

Already?

The next gates came fast. One racer stole the inside line and Riley had to hit the brakes hard, her harness biting in. Another slid past her on the left, smooth and unbothered, the wash of their thrusters brushing her shoulder. Nothing personal. Still sucked.

She clenched her jaw. Not angry. Just done being pushed.

Next sequence, she adjusted early. Cut tighter. Clean pass, then another, and another. She started clawing her way back. Found a rhythm in the pressure—pick a line, commit, live with it. And for a little while, the noise in her head just... shut off.

Then the choke point hit.

A mess of gates bunched together into a bottleneck. Markers floating so close together that one wrong twitch would cost her. Riley pulled in behind another racer, shadowed their line. Waited. Watched. A sliver opened on the left.

She went for it.

Same moment, the racer beside her made their move.

No wobble. No drift. Just a clean, sharp lateral shove straight into her path like they owned it. She snapped the thrusters to avoid a shoulder-check, but there was no room. Her hip slammed into theirs with a dull, rattling thud. The safety buffers kicked in, but it still knocked the air out of her lungs.

She spun. The gate she’d aimed for whipped past in a smear of neon.

A red flash: [CONTACT / LOSS OF CONTROL].

She barely had time to curse before another racer clipped her rig mid-spin, knocking her into a full tumble. Stars and gates spun around her like some kind of slow-motion nightmare carousel while the rest of the field disappeared.

She tried to correct—quick bursts, left thruster, right—but her inertia was all wrong and the course didn’t care. She missed one checkpoint. Then the next.

[DISQUALIFIED] lit up in her vision. Red and loud and final.

Nobody stopped.

They just kept going like she’d never been there.

Riley drifted in silence, her rig slowly bleeding off the spin. Her chest still tight—not from the hit, not from pain, just the leftover punch of being shoved out of the way and knowing no one even noticed.

She didn’t move.

Not right away.

And then, in the quiet that followed, the thing she’d been trying to outrun slipped back in. Slow. Inevitable.

Of course.

She closed her eyes. Swallowed. Forced her hands to release the controls. When she looked again, the gates were still there. Waiting. Like it didn’t care what just happened.

She didn’t restart.

Didn’t ask for another shot.

She just eased herself toward the edge of the course, moving slow and steady, like maybe if she went gently enough, she wouldn’t feel the shake in her fingers or the hollow behind her ribs.

She’d come here because the rules were supposed to be simple.

Tonight, even the holodeck had called her bluff.