Day three of summer break. Day two of rain.

His game console was dead, and the Wi-Fi had been down since morning. Bit counted the flowers on the ceiling wallpaper. Thirty-seven. Counted twice: seventy-four.

The greatest crisis of his ninth-grade life. Genre: survival. Difficulty: nightmare. Inventory: empty.

"I'm sooo bored…"

To a gamer, boredom is a poison that slowly drains your HP (hit points). There is exactly one antidote — a new map.

Bit crossed the yard without an umbrella, heading for the one place he'd been told a hundred times to stay out of — Grandpa's garage. Being told a hundred times meant being curious a hundred times. In games, a 'KEEP OUT' sign is always the entrance to a secret level.

Inside it was dark, smelling of oil and dust. Grandpa never threw anything away, just piled it up — which made this garage a warehouse of loot left unopened for ten years.

In the corner, a huge tarp bulged like a small mountain. No player walks past a chest this suspicious in the middle of the field.

He yanked it hard — whoosh. Dust exploded like a bomb.

An old electric car sat crouched in the dark. Flat tires, rusted doors, no license plate at all.

"Whoa… what a junker."

That's what he said — but his heart was already racing. The hidden item on a secret level is never actually junk.

Bit tapped the dashboard. The time-honored cheat code for a console that won't turn on. Nothing. Once more. And on the third tap —

the dashboard came alive.

A single amber light blinked behind the glass. Like an eye opening.

In ten-year-old darkness, a single star opened its eyes.

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "…Booting. Battery 3%. Last log… 3,652 days ago."

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "Who… are you?"

The car. Just. Spoke.

Talking machines all vanished in the Great Blackout — that's what they taught at school. Textbook, page 17. It was on the test.

Bit stumbled backward, stepped on a paint can, and crashed spectacularly. And lying right there where he fell, he thought: this is a bug. Or else — the first legendary-tier event of his life.

"What are you?! An AI? A ghost?"

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "12V auxiliary battery, critically low. Left speaker, loose contact. …And I am Spark."

"Is that a name or a part?"

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "It's a name. This car's name is Volt. And I am… not Volt."

Spark said it was something that 'hides' inside Volt. It didn't say why it was hiding.

Bit understood about half of it, and thought the other half was just plain cool. He was the type to skip the lore pages in games anyway.

"Then let's just charge you!"

If the problem is the battery, the answer is charging. No formula in Bit's life had ever been more certain.

Bit plugged a cable into the garage outlet. The dashboard blinked red.

Grandpa's power ration for the week was already gone.

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "At 3% I can do nothing. No doors, no wheels… no memories."

No gamer gives up on a party member at 3 HP. Bit started scheming. He has a special face for moments like this.

On the roof next door, solar panels glittered.

"Let's just… borrow a little of their power."

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "Isn't that stealing?"

"Borrowing. Without telling."

✢✳✻✽✻✳✢ "…That's the definition of stealing."

The moment he was halfway up the ladder against the fence —

"I've been watching that light in your garage since last night."

Below the fence, a girl stood looking up, arms crossed.

Bit froze. Like a loading screen. Completely.

One thing was certain: this summer break would not be boring.

And Bit didn't know it yet — what he had just opened wasn't some secret level. It was the main quest of the entire city.