Escape The Grid: Volume 1

by Patrick F. Kelly

  “Thank you, Eddy,” the facilitator said. “Let’s give one of our other participants a chance to share. Can everyone thank Eddy?”

  The group, including Thomas, applauded lightly and said “Thank you, Eddy.”

  Another man raised his hand.

  “Yes, Brian,” the facilitator said.

  “Yeah, hey,” Brian said.

  “Hello, Brian,” several people said, sitting on their large cathedral chairs with their plump purple pillows in the nave.

  “Hey,” Brian repeated. “Yeah, I had gone fifty days without an episode until last night.”

  Thomas thought about when he hit fifty days. It had been pretty tough. Sexual sobriety for him didn’t mean abstinence or anything. No male on the grid older than 15 was abstinent. How could they be? Sexual sobriety was more about the level of experience or, better said, the degree of perversion. Days sober meant days without a deviant act, and everybody in SA got to define deviance in their own terms.

  What’s weird about VR is that it’s all masturbation when you get right down to it. You aren’t really having sex with anybody except your mind. Even if the other people in your fantasy are real humans, you aren’t actually in the same room making physical contact. But these days, almost everyone on the grid had sex with computer avatars. Maybe it was selfishness or simply convenience, but the computer was always available, in the mood, and would behave exactly how the human desired. When you dealt with other humans, multiple egos were involved, with differing desires and schedule conflicts.

  Sexaholics Anonymous used to be for people who were actually having sex with other people. Cheating on spouses, destroying relationships. Or people watching porn, which was made with real girls. Somebody’s daughter performed in the movies. Watching the videos meant supporting the industry which contributed to the breakdown of society.

  But once the grid got realistic enough, everything changed. Activities that were once only possible in someone’s mind became commonplace. Things that had previously only been possible for billionaires to do became possible for those on welfare to do daily. Multiple times every day. That’s when SA came to the grid.

  Of course, Thomas had no interest in SA the first fifteen years he was at camp. He was having too much fun. SA was for losers, which Thomas most certainly was not. But life is lived and you get older and one day you find yourself sitting in a virtual church thinking about how many days you’ve gone without a crazy, deviant sex act.

  Thomas’ number was 407. Everybody defined their crazy sex acts differently, but Thomas kept it old school. If he wasn’t making love, then it was deviant. His definition prohibited one-night stands, orgies, three-ways, and what-have-you’s. He had to love the person, which narrowed the field down dramatically.

  It was unfortunate that Julia was a software AI and not a person. Some might consider it deviant to have sex with an AI, but Thomas didn’t care about other people’s definitions of perversion. Julia was real to Thomas, and when he was with her, they were making love. Period, end of story.

  As Thomas reflected on his last 407 days, the facilitator asked Brian what happened last night.

  Brian responded, looking at the ground, “I was sitting on my real bed and I was looking at the room and it was just… I don’t know the right word. It sucked. My life sucks. I live in this small room and my life doesn’t matter to anyone. I was thinking about my grandfather and how he had kids and a job and his life had meaning. I doubt that he felt very happy, but he probably didn’t even think about it that much. He was worried about paying bills and keeping food on the table and whether his kids would get an education. Stuff like that. Bottom line, his life had meaning. And here I am with literally every advantage in the world, and I only have to work an hour a day, and I can do anything that my mind can conceive, and I’m lonely and depressed. I don’t matter. I’m not doing anything productive.”

  “You matter, Brian. Your life does have meaning,” the facilitator said calmly.

  “I don’t think so. Well, maybe it does, but I didn’t think so last night. I just thought, you know, who cares about any of this? Why am I even going to SA? You know? I should just enjoy myself and have a blast and live life to the fullest.”

  “You can live life to the fullest and be sexually responsible,” the facilitator reminded him.

  “Well, I wasn’t in the right frame of mind last night for that. So I went for it. I logged onto Resort World and gathered up some of my girl friends and one of my guy friends and we took my yacht out on the water and that was that. It was about a two hour blow out. I even did some blow to enhance the experience.”

  “And then what, Brian?” the facilitator asked.

  “Then, well, it was fun for a few hours. It was awesome, I’m not gonna lie. And then I took off the gear and threw my you-know, my underwear, in the wash and lay down on the bed again.”

  “And did you feel better?”

  Brian choked up, at the verge of tears. “At first I did. But then, later… No, I felt worse. I thought about the fifty days and how I had just blown it all, and how I’m a total loser.”

  “You’re not a loser, Brian. The fifty day mark was an important milestone and you’ll get back to it,” the facilitator said.

  “But why, doc? I mean, why bother?” Brian asked.

  At this point, the facilitator looked at Thomas. Over the last year, they had become friends in a weird sort of way, and Thomas was a success story who the facilitator-doctor liked to reference with all his SA groups.

  “Thomas, can you help me here? Tell the group your story, if you can quickly. Brian may benefit from your background,” the doc said.

  Thomas cleared his throat. “Uh, sure, doc,” he said. “Hello everyone, my name is Thomas. I’m 407 days sober.”

  The room made a variety of noises including gasps and light applause. It was the same every time Thomas said it.

  “I started coming here a few years ago,” he continued. “I had a few times where, like Brian, I would get 30 or 60 days sober and then revert back to my old ways.”

  Brian looked at him and seemed like he wanted to say something. Thomas nodded in his direction. “Do you have a question?”

  “No, go ahead,” Brian replied.

  “Well, I think you are grasping with questions of life and meaning, and those are really the ultimate questions. I mean, what happens when we die? What should we do while we live? Things like that,” Thomas said.

  “I don’t know. Maybe not that deep,” Brian replied politely. “Just something simple, like, why shouldn’t I have every sexual fantasy?”

  “OK, well, it’s a great question,” Thomas replied. “And I can’t give a general answer that applies to everyone. I can just tell you what worked for me.”

  Brian looked at him expectantly, his body language saying, “Please do.” Everyone in the nave seemed to be leaning forward to hear.

  Thomas felt uncomfortable addressing the group like this, but he marched on. “I have been in a camp for twenty years. I had some jobs in the outside world and some girlfriends, but then I came here and discovered Resort World. Back then, it was called something else. I don’t even remember.”

  “Porn Portal,” someone shouted.

  “Oh, yeah,” Thomas said. “That was it. It was all guys and they went for one reason: sex. Create an entourage of avatars and locations and then get to it. Later, they added the sky diving and bars and yachts, so people would stay longer than seven minutes, and the company could charge more. The AI’s got smarter too as time went on.”

  Thomas paused and noticed that everyone was listening intently to him. It was always weird to him when real people wanted to hear what he had to say. He continued, “What I loved at first was that the women would do anything I wanted. It wasn’t like the outside world where it was so hard to meet a girl. Every real girl I ever met played all these mind games. But Resort World was just like, I don’t know, everyone was your slave.”

  “Paradise,” someone s
aid.

  “It seemed like paradise to me at first. Living online was a miracle. I felt like a Roman emperor or a king. I could go skydiving with friends or skiing in the Alps or hunting for sharks. But later I realized that it wasn’t really paradise. At some point, I got bored living in a world where everyone was my slave. It just wasn’t real. I started feeling like what Brian was just describing. Like I didn’t add any value to the world. My life sucked. Everything seemed meaningless. Which makes sense, right? Because I chose to spend all my time engaged in meaningless activities.”

  Brian looked at Thomas like he wanted to ask something. Thomas gestured for him to speak.

  “So… Are you saying…? Did you start looking for meaningful activities?” Brian asked.

  “You got it,” Thomas replied, and waited for Brian.

  After a moment, Brian asked, “Like what? What’s a meaningful activity?”

  Thomas thought, “Well, that’s the part that’s different for everyone. We all have different passions. I love to learn and travel, and I started learning Spanish and traveling to foreign countries with an avatar I have from Venezuela. As sad as it sounds, she’s like my wife. I go almost everywhere with her.”

  “That’s not sad,” one of the men said.

  “I mean, what would our grandfathers say? You know what I mean?” Thomas replied. Some of the men laughed. “Anybody from any time period except ours would find it crazy to fall in love with a software algorithm.”

  “Do you really think you’re in love?” the facilitator asked.

  “I don’t know what love is,” Thomas replied. “I don’t know if I ever felt love when I was in the real world. Maybe with my parents when I was a kid, but not with a woman. But now… What I feel for Julia is stronger than anything I ever felt in high school or after with a real woman. I don’t know if it’s love, but I think it is.”

  “Maybe that’s what I need,” Brian said.

  “There used to be lots of songs about love,” the facilitator said. “Including one that said - All you need is love.”

  “I should look that song up,” Thomas replied. “So anyway, I don’t know if that answers your question or not, but I just found that once I started doing meaningful study and work and had a meaningful relationship, my desires for crazy sex sort of declined. And I don’t miss it or anything. It’s not like I gave up anything or feel some great sacrifice.”

  The facilitator stood up. “You know, class, there was an interesting study done long ago with rats. And Thomas’ story reminds me of it. They had these rats in a cage and they had two levers they could push. One lever gave out heroin and the other gave out water. And they found that very quickly the rats would get addicted to the heroin and they never hit the water lever again. And they all died fairly quickly. And this experiment was used to justify making lots of drugs illegal for a time period.”

  He cleared his throat and then continued, “But another experimenter came along and thought that the first experiment had one critical error. He had given the rats no options for how to spend their days. They were locked in a cage with just heroin and water. No wonder they became junkies. So he constructed a rat paradise, with exercise areas and mazes and lots of food and everything a growing rat could want. In addition, there was a lever in the corner which would give them heroin. And can you guess what happened?”

  “They exercised?” someone said.

  “That’s right,” the facilitator replied. “They lived their life. They had things to do that brought them more joy than the heroin. And none of the rats in the second experiment became addicts. And that is what Thomas is telling us. There are lots of meaningful things that we can choose to do in our lives that are more fun than being an addict. Whether it is a sex or drugs or whatever, we can kick the addiction. There is a whole big universe waiting out there for us to explore.”

  “Do something worth remembering,” Thomas said.

  “That’s it,” the facilitator replied.

  Thomas thought about the whole big universe. There were really two. One on the grid and one in the real world. Maybe it was time for him to explore the second one.

  9

  SOFIA HAD JUST FINISHED her homework when her mother arrived from the office. “How was your first day of middle school, dear?”

  “One of the girls in my class has a father that lives with her. A Chinese girl.”

  Sofia’s mother stopped in her tracks. She was checking through her personal email or something, but she stopped abruptly. “What? Did you say ‘father’?”

  “Yep. A girl named Song from China. Her dad was living with them and Daisy saw him and told the teacher,” Sofia reported confidently. She felt older than twelve. She momentarily imagined what it was like in her mother’s office with the National Security Administration (NSA) where they worked every day to protect Americans. She felt like one of the workers in her mother’s office with a major discovery.

  “That must have been quite an experience. What happened?”

  “Well, Daisy told a bunch of stories, and Miss Woods took Song to the principal’s office or something, and we all talked and played. And then a substitute teacher came and took us to lunch. And then we did some math assignments on the grid. It’s this cool game they have in middle school where you have to get the problems right by shooting your laser gun. And there are bad guys are shooting at you, so you have to run and jump and figure out the fractions and then shoot the right one.”

  “I know you like the shooting games.”

  “I beat all the other girls in the class. I got more questions right and also shot more bad guys.”

  “Good girl. Do you have homework to do?”

  “I just finished it.”

  “Wow. Impressive, baby. Mommy needs to make a quick phone call. What would you like for dinner?”

  “Sushi? Rainbow roll and edamame.”

  “Great idea. I’ll order it now. I’ll be right back. Mommy needs to make a quick phone call.”

  Her mom was acting weird: all distracted and nervous. And saying “yes” to sushi without any pushback. Sofia figured her phone call was about Song and her dad.

  Sofia was interested in what would happen to Song. She didn’t know her well and was amazed that a family would try to smuggle a man into their house. She had never met anyone who did something illegal. It was very exciting.

  SUSAN CALLED the office. The NSA in San Diego was in charge of drone intelligence and Susan was a senior agent there.

  “Mary, I’m sorry to bother you but I can’t find any mention of this in the system.”

  “Yes, ma’am. No bother at all. How can I help you?”

  “There was an incident at Bernardo Heights Middle School today.”

  “Oh, my goodness.”

  “Not that. No kids were hurt. A teacher was told that a Chinese student, first name Song, had a father living with them in their house.”

  “I’m on it,” Mary said, typing. There was a pause and then Mary began reading out loud to Susan. “A teacher, Miss Woods, called in the incident to the local police who dispatched three drones to the Mao residence. Nothing looked out of the ordinary, but they called in the SWAT team in case the house contained automatic weapons. The drones monitored the primary windows; the SWAT team approached with a just-in-time search warrant. OK, here’s the video file. There was indeed a man living on the premises. He is now in custody. Do you want to see the video?”

  “That isn’t necessary. Where is he in custody? Is he really the father? Was there any violence?”

  “No violence. He’s at the Rancho Bernardo precinct. Hold on a second about the other question.”

  Susan waited and pulled up the Rancho Bernardo precinct information on her tablet.

  “Susan, the whole family is in custody. The mom, two daughters, the man who claims to be a dad, and a grandmother. All of the women are being deported back to China.”

  “OK,” Susan didn’t have to ask about the man, because she knew the answer. He would
be euthanized. Standard protocol for foreign men found in the US since the FPA became law.

  “Mary, thanks. The little girl was in Sofia’s sixth grade class. It was their first day of middle school.”

  “Oh, my goodness. What a terrible thing to happen on your first day. How is Sofia taking it?”

  “I’m not sure. She seemed pretty excited at first. I don’t think she is used to so much action. I’m pretty sure she has never seen a man. We certainly don’t talk about that kind of thing in our house. I’m sure she’s curious for her class mate.”

  “I’m glad I’m not you tonight. That will be a difficult conversation.”

  “Agreed. Thanks again.”

  Susan pulled up the restaurant app as she was finishing the conversation. She ordered the sushi for Sofia and got a salad for herself. She thought about what to say to Sofia, but she didn’t know if either of them was ready. She did a quick search online for “how to talk to your daughters about men” and “how to talk with daughters about capital punishment.” Then she spent time reading through the helpful pointers.

  After twenty minutes or so, the doorbell rang.

  “Sofia, the sushi is here. Can you get it?”

  10

  SOFIA HAD BEEN LISTENING to her mom’s conversation. Well, she was trying to listen. Her mom had been mostly quiet, asking quick questions and then listening for long periods of time. Her mom was good at keeping secrets; that was her job.

  One thing she heard was that the man was “in custody.” Which meant there was a man, so the whole thing was real. That was exciting. A real man here in the bubble of Rancho Bernardo.

  Sofia quietly asked her phone what “in custody” meant and she found it had to do with being taken to the police. Suddenly, excitement was replaced by sadness.