by Liam Brown
In … Out …
The cloud keeps drifting across the sky, oblivious to me and my struggles far below. I keep breathing, willing the cloud to speed up.
In … Out …
In … Out …
I watch in amazement as, almost imperceptibly at first, the cloud begins to obey my command, its pace quickening as it intersects the sky. This time I actually laugh out loud. ‘Very funny,’ I say. ‘So I’m God now?’
It’s been so long since I’ve spoken to anyone that my voice startles me. It sounds small and frail, lost amongst the vast expanse of the natural world. It certainly doesn’t sound very God-like. I return my attention to the cloud, willing it to move faster. This time it responds immediately, sliding smoothly across the sky, as if pushing a tiny white bead along an abacus.
My heart begins to beat faster, a cold terror gripping me as I realise that it’s finally happened. That I’ve lost my mind.
‘Okay, okay – you can knock it off now,’ I say.
Again, the cloud reacts instantly, freezing on the spot where only seconds before it had been racing through the sky towards the horizon.
Around me, the breeze drops away, so that the only sound I can hear is the faint ringing in my ears.
‘Backwards,’ I say at last, my voice no more than a murmur.
I watch in horror as the cloud complies, beginning to retrace its path, moving back the way it came.
‘Stop,’ I say.
Again the cloud stops.
I stop breathing.
This time I don’t say a word. Instead, I simply reach out my hand, so that it’s silhouetted against the sky. Then I wrap my thumb around the tip of my middle finger.
I take aim and flick.
The cloud rockets across the sky, disappearing beyond the horizon. Seconds later it reappears behind me, as if having looped around the Earth. Gradually it slows down, rolling to a rest in the same spot it started in.
I jump up. My mind racing. Heart hammering. I want to run from this madness. Yet I can’t tear my eyes from the sky. This time I stretch both arms high above me, framing the cloud with my fingers. Then I clap my hands together. The cloud immediately fragments, turning to a powder that sprays between my fingers in a fine mist. When I open my hands to look, the cloud has vanished altogether.
Not finished, I scan the sky for another target. By now I have stopped panicking. I have abandoned myself to insanity. Tilting my head, I aim a lazy swat at the sun. Just like the cloud, it tumbles across the sky, turning over and over like a golden bowling ball. As it moves, everything becomes dimmer, until the sun too plunges out of sight, and the world falls dark. Stars appear, peppering the black with points of white, as somewhere behind me the moon rises, tumbling gently into focus. Grinning, I flick out my hand again, scattering a constellation of stars, before lashing out at the moon, sending it reeling away as once again the sun rises to the east, the sky flooded with daylight.
Let there be light … and at once there was light.
It goes on like this for a while as I bat lazily at celestial bodies, the sun and moon switching places faster and faster. Day becomes night becomes day. Weeks and months whiz past in the flicker of an eye, until at last I grow bored of the game.
At which point, I reach up and tear the sky in two.
And then suddenly I’m not standing in a field anymore. Rather, I am streaking like a human-comet through time and space. Backwards, backwards, backwards. Stars and galaxies unravelling in a cloud of hydrogen and helium as I hurtle backwards, backwards, backwards. Subatomic particles disintegrating into photons, neutrinos, quarks. Everything coming unstuck. Backwards, backwards, backwards. Back towards the very conception point of the Universe. Backwards, backwards, backwards, until at last a blast of white heat, of pure energy, strips my mind from my body. Dematerialises me. And suddenly I am nothing.
Nowhere.
Eternity passes in an instant.
Eventually I become aware of something.
All around me. Through me. In me. Is me.
The fabric of everything.
It’s a pattern, I realise. A code of some kind.
I squint.
And now I begin to recognise the shapes. A familiar system of dots and dashes from a world 13.8 billion years from now.
Marks on a page. Black against white.
And then, all at once, the pattern slurs into focus:
Noughts and ones.
Noughts and ones.
Noughts and ones.
01000001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01110111 01101111 01110010 01101011 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01101110 01101111 00100000 01110000 01101100 01100001 01111001 00100000 01101101 01100001 01101011 01100101 01110011 00100000 01101010 01100001 01100011 01101011 00100000 01100001 00100000 01100100 01110101 01101100 01101100 00100000 01100010 01101111 01111001 00001010 00001010
I open my eyes.
PART FIVE
Blink.
I’m awake.
At least, I think I’m awake. My mind is racing so fast that in truth it’s hard to tell. I look around wildly, trying to take in my surroundings. Trying to latch onto some detail that will unlock what is happening to me.
The fields are gone now. So is the sun and the moon and the sky. I am standing alone in a small box room, the ceiling, walls, floor all made of mirrored glass. There I am, reflected in every surface, staring back at myself.
Hello, David.
Only my reflection doesn’t make any sense.
While I was in the hut, I’d lost track of what I looked like. There was no mirror, no phone. The stream was too shallow to provide anything but the faintest blur of my outline. Even so, I was still vaguely aware of how dirty and unkempt I’d become in the last few days and weeks. Black filth was crushed into my fingernails and palm lines. My clothes were encrusted with grass stains and dark splotches of pigeon blood. Recently, I’d also become aware of how long my beard was getting, a thick sprouting of bristles around my jaw line that often left me scratching my face deep into the night.
Looking at my reflection now, however, I’m confused to see how clean I am. Gone are the stains from my clothes. No mud. No blood. There’s no sign of a beard either, other than the light shadow of a two-day stubble. I hold up my hands, confused by my sparkling cuticles, before something else catches my attention. Lying crumpled in the far corner of the room is my sleeping bag, rolled out and looking recently slept on. Nearby is my rucksack, my spare clothes spilling from the top. I start to walk towards it, then stop. On the other side of the room is my camping stove, along with a small frying pan. And there, in the very centre of the room, equidistant between the two, is a small pile of rubbish. The empty packets of food look suspiciously like the supplies I’d finished eating days ago.
I struggle for breath, my airway seeming to collapse in on itself. The room is laid out in the exact order that I’d set up the hut.
Bedroom. Kitchen. Living room.
Before I have a chance to consider what any of it means, there is a flash of movement behind me. I turn to see that one of the mirrored walls has disappeared, replaced by a sheet of transparent glass. On the other side is a well-groomed man. It takes me a couple of seconds to place him. His rags are gone, as are his dreadlocks. Instead, he is dressed in a sharply tailored suit, his hair slicked back, his face freshly shaved and glowing with a mineral-enriched moisturiser. And there, on his left cheek, running from his temple to his jaw, is a scar.
‘How’s it going, dude?’ Xan asks, his voice coming to me in crisp surround sound.
I scan the ceiling, spotting the concealed speakers, before I turn back to him. He is smiling at me now, his capped teeth glinting in the artificial light. He seems a little sleepy, his eyes pink, as if he’s slightly high, or just woken from a nap.
‘You okay?’ he asks. ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost.’
I try to speak, but my voice is little more than a dry wheeze, the first strangled gasps of a panic attack.
‘Hey,
take it easy,’ Xan chuckles. ‘You need to breathe. Come on. Get your head between those legs. Take some deep breaths. Oxygenate that beautiful brain of yours.’
At this point, I double over and heave. There’s not much to bring up. The room spins a couple of times before settling. I wipe the bile from my mouth.
‘Feel better?’ Xan asks, still beaming behind the glass.
‘What’s going on?’ I say, the words stinging my oesophagus.
Xan raises an eyebrow. ‘Really? Don’t tell me you haven’t figured this out yet?’
With enormous effort, I stagger towards him and slap my hand on the glass, smearing it with vomit. ‘What. The. Fuck. Is. Going. On?’
Xan doesn’t flinch. ‘If I seriously have to spell everything out for you I will. Though I would remind you that, once again, this was all covered in the initial briefing documents that were supplied to you.’
‘Briefing documents?’
‘Jesus, Dave. How many times do we have to go over this? The terms and conditions. Section nine-point-four clearly states that MindCast Limited has a legal obligation requiring us to prevent foreseeable harm coming to the participant – that’s you – and that, should it be deemed necessary, the Company will undertake decisive action in order to ensure they fulfil their obligated Duty of Care. In other words, we deemed it necessary to intervene in order to keep you safe. And not just so we can stay on the right side of the law, either. We care about you, Dave. Your wellbeing is our primary concern.’
‘Keep me safe?’ I groan, clutching my head. ‘What did you do to me, Xan? What are you trying to keep me safe from?’
Xan chuckles. ‘From yourself, silly. I mean, trying to pay someone to kidnap you? You were quite clearly delusional. Where the hell did you think you were going to go, dude? Back to the wilderness to get in touch with your primal self? To live off the land like some nouveau-caveman? Don’t forget, I’ve seen your videos. You couldn’t hunt and gather a Pot Noodle.’
I think back to the hut, to the pigeon I caught, cut and cooked myself. The sense of satisfaction I’d felt. Reflected in the glass, I can make out the outline of the gas stove and sleeping bag.
‘So what are you saying? That the last few weeks … weren’t real?’
‘Hey bro. Come on. Just because something didn’t actually happen doesn’t make it any less real. That hunger? That thirst? Your pain and suffering? All of those emotions were totally valid in so much as you experienced them. They were real to you. As were the lessons you learned along the way. Resourcefulness. Emotional resilience. Those are yours to keep. No one can take those away from you, Dave. You’ve grown as a person. I’m actually proud of you …’
‘Enough of the bullshit, Xan. I just want to know the truth for once. Was the whole thing just made up? What was it? Virtual reality?’
Xan grimaces. ‘You know I’ve always despised that term. It suggests an inferiority of experience, don’t you think? As if what we see around us now is any less virtual than what you just experienced. As if what we think of as consciousness is anything but our brain’s pathetic attempt to shrink the world around us into something tangible. I mean, good luck with that, right? It’s like asking a pocket calculator to display the contents of the Universe. No, I prefer the term ‘alternative’ reality. Or parallel simulation, maybe? Anyway, the point is that while Paul and I were developing the M900 chip, we discovered an interesting quirk. As well as being able to collect and transmit data about your thought patterns, it also works in reverse. Instead of just sending out data, it can receive data too. In effect, this means we can upload custom content to it so that it overrides your usual sense of perception.’
‘Custom content? You mean you hacked my brain?’
‘Amazing, right? I mean, it’s early days yet. We’ve still got a few bugs to work through. The biggest issue we’ve found so far is rejection. If the content strays too far away from the subject’s established sense of reality – breaking the laws of physics for example – the simulation has a tendency to break down. That’s what you experienced back there, by the way. Things got too crazy so you “woke up”. No, the best results we’ve achieved so far have come when we’ve stuck close to a subject’s expectations of what they “should” be seeing. You wanted to go and live in the middle of nowhere, therefore we facilitated that for you. At least mentally. I mean, sure, physically you never actually …’
‘I never actually left this room,’ I say, finishing his sentence. To my surprise, I find I’ve begun to cry, hot tears streaking my cheeks.
‘Hey, take it easy bro. I know you’re a little frazzled, but you need to try and keep a perspective on things. You’re a pioneer, remember? You don’t think Chrissy Columbus had rough days? When he thought that he might have got it wrong and that his ship might just sail right off the edge of the world? You don’t think Neil and Buzz might have had second thoughts once they were strapped into that rocket and they started counting back from ten? This is important work we’re doing, the two of us.’
‘The two of us? This had nothing to do with me. I was an unwilling participant in your stupid game.’ I swallow a sob. ‘You let me think that I got away. That I was free. When the whole time I was stuck here with you watching me, like some caged laboratory bunny. You … you lied to me.’
‘Okay, first off let me just say that I acknowledge your emotions. Having said that, I’m afraid I have to refute the fact that anyone lied to you. Phase Two of the experiment was clearly flagged in the briefing documents, which again were checked and signed by yourself. This was always part of the agreed schedule. Your little “episode” just meant we brought it forward slightly. For your own safety. A less progressive organisation might have seen fit to have you sectioned or locked away in rehab once you started displaying such overt signs of psychosis. Instead, we provided you with a safe, immersive fantasy space where you could work through your problems, giving you a real shot at recovery. If anything, you should be thanking me.’
‘Thanking you? I nearly starved to death. What happened to your concern for my wellbeing when you left me without food, huh?’
I’m shouting now, punctuating my argument by pounding on the reinforced glass that separates us. Xan only smiles though, seeming to grow calmer with each muted thump of my fist. He knows I can’t go anywhere.
‘I told you, I was concerned about your wellbeing. We all were. But there was only so much we could do about it. You see, at present the system only allows us to construct a simple scenario. We have limited input past that point. You’re the one who forced it to play out as it did. We gave you free will, dude. Just like The Big Man. If you’d wanted to, you could easily have stumbled on an all-you-can-eat restaurant out there on your lonely meadow. It was you who chose to be tied up and starve. And do you know why? I think that, on some level, you wanted to suffer. You fetishised physical hardship, as if it might redeem you somehow. As if a rumbling belly might somehow offset the metaphysical hollowness you feel inside. That tedious, self-indulgent angst you’ve been boring half the planet senseless with for over a month now. Well let me clear something up for you, Dave. The suffering you underwent in the simulation is nothing compared to the pain and misery you would have experienced had you actually succeeded in getting yourself kidnapped and making it out to the wilderness. The truth is, you’ve never known real hunger. Real thirst. If you had, you’d have been down on your knees in a matter of hours, begging for us to take you back under our wing. To make it all go away. No, all in all, I think you were pretty lucky that we got to you when we did. Like I said, a little gratitude might be in order. Starting with your friend. After all, if she hadn’t called us, who knows what might have happened?’
‘My friend?’ I mumble, the room beginning to lurch violently away from me.
‘Sure. In fact, why don’t you thank her yourself?’
Before I can say anything else, the mirror to Xan’s right blanches white, then clears, revealing a woman in a smart blazer. A glowing band around
her wrist. A silver employee badge pinned to her lapel.
She waves awkwardly. ‘Hey David.’
‘Alice? What the hell are you doing here?’
Xan beams. ‘Alice got in touch with us the moment you told her about your crazy plan. She was worried about you. And rightfully so. Seeing as she’s one of the people who knows you best, we invited her in as an advisor while we initiated our rescue operation. We quickly recognised her potential, however, and she’s since agreed to join us on a full-time basis, replacing poor Katya as Deputy Product Manager. It was actually Alice’s idea to insert the woodpigeon. Which was a technical nightmare by the way,’ he laughs again. ‘Like I say, you’ve got a lot to thank her for. If it had been left up to me, you’d have carried on starving.’
Ignoring Xan, I turn my attention fully to Alice, my voice dropping to an urgent whisper. ‘You told them? After everything we talked about? I told you what they were capable of.’
‘This is exactly what I was talking about, David,’ she says. ‘You were paranoid and hysterical. You weren’t making any sense. You’re one of the most recognised people on Earth. Did you really think some man in a van was going to help you drop off the face of the planet? Besides, like Xan said, even if you had managed to somehow pull it off, you’d have probably ended up dead. I wanted to save you.’
‘Oh, so you were saving me? And what, you thought you might as well apply for a job while you were at it?’
‘That’s not fair,’ she says, still not meeting my eye. ‘Besides, Xan reached out to me months ago. Around the time you were first fitted with the chip, actually. I thought you knew this? I remember coming to see you right after I’d met him.’
I think back to Alice standing in the doorway of my old apartment. How out of place she’d looked in her black party dress. ‘You’d been to meet Xan then?’
‘Let me guess? You thought I was dressed up like that just for you?’
‘No, I mean, I just …’ I stutter. ‘But didn’t you say you weren’t interested in the job? That the client was a total creep?’
