Virtual Perfection: Technology has drawn everyone into Virtual Reality, but what will happen to humanity if no one can get out? (Veiled Destiny Book 1)

by Jason Bourn

  The silence and the lack of motion should have made Calaes feel at ease. Instead, he found himself instinctively trying to spot any motion or sound whatsoever. He found himself constantly turning to see if there was any movement. It seemed that his eyes, unaccustomed to the real world, always hinted at some motion in his periphery. But when he turned, there wasn’t any. Calaes laughed at himself. He felt he was being foolish. This was most likely the result of “withdrawal symptoms” from the virtual suit.

  Looking up at the colossal building, Calaes thought about how everyone voluntarily went into the virtual rooms, but never came out. All of them were stuck in there for the rest of their lives, most likely. He couldn’t believe he had been stuck in there himself. At once he felt very happy to be out and very sorry for all those not as fortunate. They didn’t even know that they were “stuck” in there. In fact, he told himself, he had been similarly stuck there until just minutes before.

  Calaes tried to decide what to do next. His persa indicated that he had to walk about three km, on legs that were still trying to accustom themselves to the task. He decided the best way to get to his destination was to actually start walking and stop thinking about things. He strode off, still somewhat unsteadily, wondering when the building that he had occupied would end. It kept going and going, seemingly for hours. Finally, he saw the edge of the huge building, giving way to a series of smaller buildings on both sides of the street. As he got to the smaller buildings, he still had the feeling of movement on his periphery, but every time he turned, there was nothing. When he finally, and wearily, came within sight of his destination he was ready to call it a day. He started talking to himself to keep his exhausted legs moving: “Three more buildings, two more buildings, one more building.”

  When he was one building away, he looked up and could have sworn that he saw someone in his periphery at the corner of the building. Of course, when he moved his head that direction, he didn’t see anyone or anything. He tried to get his weary legs moving as fast as they could to the corner of the building to see if there was really someone there, but when he rounded the corner, he saw nothing. It was ridiculous to think that anyone would be out and around – but since he was supposed to meet Samantha in person in the next building over, he supposed anything was possible. He made a mental note to ask her about this possibility.

  On legs that complained with every step, Calaes entered the building Samantha had specified. A vid-screen popped to life and, as if this happened every day, a pretty young lady with brunette hair and a nice face appeared and asked what his business was. Calaes gave his name and Samantha Holmes as his point of contact. The face on the screen nonchalantly told him to go to the first door on his right, go up two flights of stairs and go to room 301.

  The two flights of stairs felt like the worst ordeal he had ever gone through. Legs burning, he trudged up step after step until he finally made it up the last step. He opened the door to room 301 and smiled.

  There in front of him was a tray of fresh fruit, bottled water and a plate of cookies – chocolate chip cookies. He had always been partial to chocolate chip cookies, since his mother had been baking them from when he was young. And they smelled so good – real cookies. The smell was fantastic – Calaes just stood for a moment enjoying the aroma which at once brought back happy early childhood memories and started his stomach churning. He tried one – it was warm, sweet and soft. In short, it was delicious. Possibly the best thing he had ever tasted, though he allowed for the possibility that this being the first real food he had eaten in five years, anything would have tasted terrific. Gratefully sitting down in one of the plush chairs was one of the best feelings that Calaes had ever felt. Cookies and a blessed chair to sit down in – he couldn’t have asked for anything more!

  Just then, Samantha walked in and said, “Well, how do you feel?” She looked about forty years old and had a nice warm smile.

  Calaes started to get up, but found that his legs just wouldn’t respond. He settled for a “Fine – although I guess my legs aren’t ready to run a marathon quite yet.” Samantha smiled and replied, “I understand that it will take a little while to get your bearings,” she said. “Try to take deep breaths and relax. Your body has been through a tremendous adjustment. Actually, you’re one of the very few that has done this and made it this far. Congratulations!”

  Calaes thought about it. She was the first real person that he had seen in over five years. He could see her, smell her, and actually touch her – if his legs would cooperate. She had a slightly antiseptic scent and he idly wondered if she were married and if so if her spouse got used to that scent. He then thought of the plummeting birth rate since the majority of the people went into VR. The scent of each person and how the body naturally associated someone who smelled good was actually nature’s way of ensuring a good genetic match. In the recent past this had been clouded by the use of artificial fragrances – maybe this was one of the reasons that marriages had failed at such a high rate back then. Of course, once everyone got into VR, anyone could present any scent they wanted to someone else – just like anyone could present any physical presentation of themselves. Perhaps that was why with the advent of VR, relationships did not last long and the birth rate trend downwards was accelerating. Well, thought Calaes, another good reason to be done with VR. He was glad that he had decided to be in the real world.

  “Well, you’re doing fine,” she said. “We are excited to have you back in the land of the living.”

  “We? Who is we?” asked Calaes.

  Samantha replied, “Well, while you were in VR, there was a huge effort to make a real Mars self-sustaining settlement. So, all your training for the settlement is not going to go to waste. We have a regular shuttle system that goes to Mars, ferrying equipment and supplies, just waiting for people like yourself to be ready to go. We figured that it would be better to participate in the real thing, rather than a virtual reality simulation.”

  Needing to think about this only briefly, Calaes grinned and said, “This is fantastic.” This was even better than he had hoped. Experiencing a challenging reality with something that he was used to would be great.

  “Slow down,” Samantha said. “You have a lot of work in front of you before you can go anywhere. There are a million things that have to be done before you can even think about going on the shuttle. You won’t be going anywhere for a while.”

  For the moment Calaes was content to let his weary legs rest, enjoying the cookies and fresh fruit. He had a million questions that he wanted answers to, so he figured that now was as good a time as any to get them answered.

  “So how many people are being targeted for the Mars settlement? And how many do you have so far? And how far along is the actual settlement infrastructure? And what specifically am I going to do once I get there?”

  Samantha smiled. “Slow down. You will be briefed on all this information. Today we are going to focus on getting you re-established in the real world. There are some real-world concerns that you may not have thought of, such as where you will live, where the food will come from, and where and when the start of training will be.”

  Calaes sheepishly smiled. This was true. He was thinking long term, but he supposed that short term priorities could take precedence for a little while.

  Samantha assigned a room within the building and told him that meals would be in the room they were currently in. “You should spend the rest of the day recovering from your exertions. We will meet tomorrow at eight am. The only thing we ask is that you not communicate with anyone about this – not friends, not family, not anyone. It needs to be treated with the utmost secrecy. Again, congratulations and we will see you tomorrow, bright and early.”

  Calaes’ mind was in a blur. There was so much to take in. He still had so many questions that had gone unanswered, but he didn’t want to rock the boat. He finished his food, enjoying the real-food taste tremendously, then set out to find his room. Luckily it was not too far, and on the s
ame floor, so his sore legs weren’t over-stressed again.

  Opening his door, Calaes found the room somewhat spartan with a desk, a dresser, a bed and a small bathroom. There were no decorations on the wall, but he wouldn’t have cared too much if there were. This stop was just a means to an end and he didn’t want to spend too much time here.

  The dresser contained several stretch-suits similar to what he was wearing. The desk did not contain anything. With nothing to do, Calaes realized that he was bone-tired. Samantha was right in that regard anyway – he did need some recovery time. He laid down on the bed and started thinking about everything that had happened today, but before he knew it, he was sound asleep.

  CHAPTER 10

  Hayden was feeling irritable.

  He hadn’t cracked the President’s security and it assaulted his pride. Though he had achieved more power than anyone before him, he felt almost a feeling of indignation that there was one obstacle in his path to supreme power – probably more so because he had so easily conquered all other obstacles previously in his path. He had spent a considerable amount of time trying to tap into the President’s inputs and outputs, but to no avail.

  Tiring of these repeated failed attempts, Hayden decided to step back and see if there was anything that might become a problem in the future. He was so successful since he had always insisted on a strong attack philosophy along with shrewd assessment of any possible threats. He utilized his AI expertise to get his persa to perform a global search for anything that might negatively impact his status as world leader. In the past when he had done this, he always felt somewhat mollified when nothing came of it – and he wanted to feel better about something.

  This time, however, Hayden was surprised when his persa subsequently came up with a possible issue. The issue, which Hayden didn’t know if he should give credence to, was that there were a number of queries worldwide concerning in-depth VR simulations following Flight Simulator. He was familiar with the Flight Simulator VR game, of course, and he had even tried it. He had quickly crashed and burned, since his social skills were very poor and, if truth be told, he had never wanted to play games, preferring the real world and the power it afforded him.

  The thing that his persa had flagged was that there were multiple related searches across the globe – for the “next” simulation following Flight Simulator. He wasn’t sure what that was, but it raised a red flag. Especially since none of the AI replicas for his world leaders knew anything about this. It just didn’t make sense.

  He felt apprehensive for the first time in years as he knew he needed to find out more about this.

  – – –

  “We call them ‘sleepers’,” Samantha said. “I know it isn’t really accurate, since those in VR aren’t actually sleeping, but they certainly aren’t walking about.” Calaes had just finished breakfast and Samantha was providing him with overview material for his first briefing. Calaes’ legs were still burning from his exertions from yesterday, but since he wasn’t pushing them very hard today, he felt like he was going to win the battle.

  “We call those who are not in VR, ‘walkers.’ This makes it easy to understand who we are talking about. The sleepers can control any of the automated systems, but obviously they never move locations. You are now officially a walker. In the early days of VR, right after the virtual suit was invented, walkers were still needed for the few jobs that were not yet automated. Since then, however, all of these jobs have become automated. So, strictly speaking, there is really no need for walkers any more to keep the systems running. So now the entire population can remain in VR.”

  “I should note,” she continued, “that there are still a few holdouts that never entered VR. These holdouts are almost all isolated cults with small populations that are gradually getting smaller. The World Government ensures they have the basics such as sustenance and health care, and we provide indirect exposure as to what VR can provide. The holdout’s leaders always reject anything to do with VR, but every year a few people see the benefits of VR and leave their cult. The vast majority of these cults have forsaken VR along with the rest of modern technology, so they have little to contribute to the common good. This, along with the fact that their numbers are diminishing every year, means that they are of less and less consequence.”

  “We are in the process,” she continued, “of building the Mars Colony infrastructure. Until it is fully habitable, you will be undergoing training as well as taking on a special role. Specifically, we need you to be the point person to interface with sleepers as they wake up. There are several that are expected to finish the Flight Simulation sim soon. You will be responsible for communicating with them and getting them successfully out of their virtual rooms and back into the real world. In this role, you will serve a similar function as I had with you. We will be moving today to the training facility. It is very large and has everything needed for you and as a bonus is right next to the shuttle launch point.”

  Calaes was overwhelmed. There was so much to take in, he could hardly believe that this was real. He really didn’t have to pack anything. Everything that he cared about was available via his persa. When asked by Samantha whether he was ready to go, he just nodded numbly. Everything was happening so fast.

  They walked down the hall and down the steps to the main floor. Calaes could remember each step on the way up, but going down only evinced small memories of the remembered pain, as his mind was still in a blur. At the front of the building a sleek vehicle was waiting for them. As they entered, Samantha chuckled and said “You know, VR has been both a blessing and a curse to the human race. It has allowed us to tap into the vast potential of the human race. As you know, everyone who wants to can now contribute – not just those that live in affluent countries. This, combined with the ability to instantly share information and work directly with people anywhere on Earth has produced wonderful achievements. Just watch this.”

  With that, they accelerated down the street and effortlessly left the confines of the ground for the freedom that the sky allowed. Calaes had not paid attention to the latest breakthroughs in science and technology for the most part, since they came with such frequency. He knew that VR had helped push the frontiers in any number of areas – it was too bad that the cost was the eventual end of the human race.

  Such dark thoughts – the end of the human race was almost beyond comprehension. And yet, this was the reality that he lived in. He knew that he shouldn’t be thinking such things on the day that he was going to start his new life at the training campus. He should be thinking of all the positives ahead of him, but sometimes the weight of everything around him just got to him.

  Calaes shook himself fully awake when he felt a change to the vehicle’s engines. He had dozed off with the unvarying drone of the vehicle flying through the air. Making a conscious effort to move forward, Calaes vowed to stop thinking about all the problems and instead concentrate on the opportunities that lie in the path ahead.

  They had just started to descend and Calaes could see a vast array of buildings on a large campus, with the shuttle field obvious in its enormity right next door. There had to be close to 30 large buildings on the campus with extensive open grassy areas and beautiful plants abounding. They had obviously not spared any expense as everything looked perfect. As they landed, this impression was reinforced with the grandeur of the grounds becoming even more clear. It looked like the five-star hotels in the old vids that he had seen when studying history. The closest building looked to be made entirely of glass and at five stories high was quite impressive. Some glass panels were see-through, while others were totally opaque. This gave the impression of an out of control checker board, but on a much grander scale. There were fountains and artworks and the shrubbery was both breathtaking and obviously elaborately sculptured. And every building in sight was just as elaborate. Someone had spent an awful lot of money on these premises.

  Samantha exited the vehicle and Calaes followed suit. It turned out that
he was still sore from his exertions yesterday and from being cooped up inside the vehicle for so long. After stretching, he felt somewhat better.

  Samantha led him into the nearest building and Calaes was grateful that there was an elevator that took them to the top floor. Stepping out, he was overwhelmed by the view. All the glass panels were transparent, giving him a 360-degree view of the campus. Samantha waited a few minutes for him to soak up his surroundings.

  “Well,” she said, “what do you think? We spared no expense in making this the perfect training campus. We consider this the most important activity for the entire human race and we hope it shows. If you need anything, and I mean anything, we will ensure that you get it. This is going to be your base of operations, where you will remotely communicate with those sleepers that are waking up anywhere in the world. When they are ready, you will go to their locations, re-acquaint them with the real world and bring them back here. You will then commence training with them in preparation for the shuttle to Mars in the near future.”

  Calaes tried to process it all, but there was so much to take in. He had a thousand questions, but didn’t know which one to ask first. Finally, he decided upon: “So, what is your role in this training.”

  She responded, “I have other duties that I have to attend to, so I can be made available as necessary but in general you are on your own. I know that you are more than qualified to set up the training and introduce the trainees to the real world and to the training campus. I will help get you started with how to contact those that are waking up. Your sleeping quarters are in this building on the second floor. There is more than enough room for all of the trainees. You will start immediately. I recommend you generate a training plan first to ensure that the training goes smoothly. Other than that, I will leave it up to you.”