Kyle brightened up when he heard that. “Great, you want to do it now?”
“Do what now?”
“You know, plug your computer into the car and… work your magic,” Kyle said, wiggling his fingers in the air.
He shook his head. “It doesn’t work like that. Something goes wrong on the surface, a half percent error in calculation and you’ll end up dead.”
“So what do you suggest?”
“For now, nothing. You drive around like you normally do and I’ll monitor the live data stream, which will help me figure out some pieces of the puzzle. Maybe the next pieces will become clearer then.”
Kyle sighed. “It sounds like it’s going to take a long time. I thought someone as skilled as you would be able to…”
Damian raised an eyebrow. “Do it much faster? Trust me, if I had the resources the car company has, I would be able to do it in less than half the time. The best pieces of work take time. Making sure everything is perfect, accounting for all the things that could go wrong, putting backups and redundancies in place, all that has to be done even before the first live trial.”
“Wow, that sounds… very boring.”
“It is. But that’s the price you have to pay to enjoy a flawless execution.”
“So is this the way all engineers work?”
“That’s the way engineering works.”
“Huh, I thought what you guys did was more exciting. But it sounds very much like what an analyst would do. Sitting in front of a ton of data, trying to extract some meaning out of it, waiting for things to line up so you can move on to the next step.”
“I guess you can say that. Sometimes the cost of failure is too high, though. It’s much better to be patient than to ruin everything because you want to get results fast.”
“Well, you’re the expert, so I’ll be following your lead on this. You sure you don’t want to take a look at the car, or even go for a short ride?”
“Later, maybe.”
“Okay,” Kyle said and got up from his seat. “I won’t keep you here any longer and I can’t thank you enough for coming up here and giving your time to this thing.”
Damian picked up Kyle’s phone and handed it back to him. “It’s alright, I like puzzles. Just drive in full manual mode for the next couple of days, okay? It’ll give me a better idea of what’s going on.”
“You got it. Thanks, again. Hope to hear from you soon.”
They walked out together and shook hands before parting ways. It had been a very fruitful afternoon for Damian. He got what he came here for, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was amiss. He liked Kyle well enough, but there was something about him that he couldn’t quite put a finger to.
Maybe it’s just my nervousness, he thought while walking back to his apartment. He had just stepped into dangerous territory, and there was a lot that could go wrong. He smiled to himself. The more drastic the consequences, the more he enjoyed the challenge. Besides, he always had a plan.
Chapter 8
Kyle stood in front of a white elevator door, which felt out of place in the wood-paneled corridor. The woman in reception had pointed this way when he had asked for the R&D access elevators. He felt just as out of place, too. I am an analyst, what the hell will I do at R&D? He fiddled with his tie knot to make sure it was properly centered. He couldn’t remember the last time he was this nervous. Not even when he had his first job interview with Exel.
He stepped closer, and the door slid open automatically. The elevator was surprisingly tiny. Not that he was claustrophobic, but it still made him nervous stepping into that tiny space. The doors had barely closed when it felt like the ground dropped away from below him. He grabbed at the handhold to steady himself, surprised at the butterflies in his stomach. What’s happening? It was only after a few moments that he realized that the elevator was still moving. He was going down faster than he had ever expected any elevator to be. That’s when it struck him. He had not specified what level he wanted to go to, the elevator had started moving on its own. He looked around for a control panel or a mike, but the walls were a flat, smooth gray all around. In fact, the elevator walls had no corners. It was like being in a squarish tube. Did the walls change color? He was sure they had been white when he first stepped in.
The elevator came to a sudden, but gentle halt. Kyle still felt a little off-balance as the door slid open. No displays, no announcements, nothing to tell him where he was. He slowly stepped out of the elevator and into the corridor, which seemed to be made of the same gray material as the inside of the lift. He trailed his fingers along the wall; it felt slightly warm to the touch. The roof emanated a white glow, bathing the corridor in a soft, white light. Suddenly, his mobile buzzed in his hands.
Ellie: Hi Kyle, welcome to OneTech. Take a left at the first intersection to get here. I’ll be waiting.
He started walking down the corridor, wondering why everything seemed so small here. The corridor walls ran straight and smooth, but again, there were no edges. They just seemed to flow into the roof and floor. He kept walking until he arrived at the intersection and turned left. It was exactly like the corridor he had been in, except he could see a door in the distance. He wondered why the place was constructed like this, why they didn’t design the elevators to open up directly into the office.
Before he realized it, he was standing in front of the door. Hesitantly, he reached out a hand, and it whooshed open. Kyle was taken aback by the brightness. He raised his hands to shield his eyes.
“Sorry about that. The lighting can get pretty bright in here.”
Kyle lowered his hands as his eyes adjusted to the light. The first thing he saw was a stunningly beautiful woman. Her black hair fell in ringlets around her heart-shaped face. She was dressed in a half-sleeved shirt and knee-length skirt, a formal attire but she pulled it off with the panache of an evening dress.
“Hi, I’m Kyle. Got your message and here I am,” he said, smiling widely. “You must be Ellie.”
She smiled back. “Welcome to OneTech. I hope you didn’t have much trouble getting here.”
“No, but if I was any taller, I would’ve gotten stuck in that tiny elevator. Not to mention I just found out what it feels like to have the ground fall away from beneath my feet.”
She laughed lightly. “I know, I still haven’t gotten used to it myself. But it’s the only way to get here without wasting half a day.”
“What do you mean?”
“You don’t realize how deep we are, do you?”
“What do you mean how deep? We’re still in Waylain, aren’t we?”
She laughed again. “Of course, we are. I mean, if you had to use standard escalators to climb down forty-one levels, that’s all you’d be doing in a day.”
“What! We’re forty-one levels down! From the city levels?”
“Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it,” she said, flashing him a brilliant smile. “Shall we?”
They stepped in through the door into the brightly lit room. His first impression was that it was big. Certainly bigger than any room he had seen so far. A hundred people could have easily fit into it, and there would still be room to spare. But the strangest thing was that it seemed to be triangular in shape. He turned around and saw that the door he had entered through was just one of five. He suddenly realized that the wall was curved too.
“Kind of hard not to notice, isn’t it?” Ellie asked.
“This has got to be the weirdest room I’ve been in. Why the hell is it shaped like a slice of pizza?”
“Pizza sounds appropriate, because this is our cafeteria.”
It was only then that Kyle noticed the buzz of conversation in the background. There were a dozen or so people sitting around the tables, eating, drinking, and having animated conversations. This could have been a scene from any of the restaurants he frequented. But the sheer size and the strange shape of the room made it feel completely alien.
“Wait, OneTech has its
own cafeteria? How many people work here?”
“Fifty-four, presently. You’re number fifty-five.”
“Isn’t there like a rule that says you can only have a cafeteria per 250 people or something?”
“You’re now in R&D, Kyle. We have our own rules here. You’ll get used to it.”
“Oh, I have no doubt about that.” An independent cafeteria, people sitting around talking over food and drinks, this didn’t seem too bad. All that was missing was his team. “So, where do I work?”
“We’ll get to that,” she said, smiling mysteriously. “But there’s something you should see first.”
Kyle followed her, taking in the faux-wood floor and the white, tiled walls. They were distinct, yet seemed to be made of the same material as the corridor outside. He looked for the edge where the floor met the wall, and sure enough, they just seemed to flow into each other. He was about to ask Ellie why the walls and floors were designed this way, but she was already walking out of the cafeteria, so he followed her into another corridor.
This one looked like a normal corridor, something that might not have been out of place even in his old office, except it curved as it went. Combined with the rounded edges, it gave him the distinct impression that he was in a tube. Before he could comment on it, Ellie stopped in front of a door and said, “This is it.”
The door slid open, and they walked into a dark room. A man was sitting hunched over a desk facing them. He looked up, and Kyle was taken aback for a moment. His face didn’t look human.
“Hi, Ellie. Hi, new guy.”
As Kyle’s eyes adjusted to the darkness, he realized that four big screens were laid out in an arc in front of the man. He had looked alien-like only because of the glasses he had on, which reflected the light from the screens.
“Hey Chief, this is Kyle. We’re here for the orientation.”
“Oh, come on. That sounds so boring. It’s a show, a visual spectacle. Not an orientation.”
Ellie sighed. “Kyle, this is Haraki. He heads the development team but refuses to answer to anything other than Chief. Even Rohan gave up trying to convince him otherwise.”
“Hi,” Kyle said stepping forward. “I just got transferred here from Analytics.”
Haraki got up and shook his hand with enthusiasm. “From Analytics, seriously? Wow! I don’t know what that’s about, but nice to meet you, Kyle.”
“Why is it so dark in here? Can we switch on the lights please?” Ellie asked in exasperation.
“No, but there’s a reason for that.” Haraki grabbed them both by the hands and led them to a couple of chairs almost in the center of the room. “Grab a seat, and we’ll get this show started in a moment.” He handed them a couple of headsets to put on.
“Me too, Chief? I’ve done this more than a dozen times already,” Ellie said.
“Don’t be a spoilsport, Ellie. Besides, you’ll like today’s show. I’ve got something special lined up.”
They started putting on their headsets while Haraki switched off all the screens, plunging the room into absolute darkness.
“Twenty-five years ago, when the first man stepped into Waylain, he knew it was the haven mankind had always wanted. It was his vision brought to life.” Haraki had lowered his voice by an octave, assuming it would sound more dramatic. But the effect was almost comical.
Kyle heard a sharp intake of breath from Ellie as the headset came alive. He was looking down on a field of dusty brown, a circular section ringed by dark walls. Outside, the scorching wind rushed from the mountains and swirled around the circular walls, causing the dust to dance in spiral patterns. Within the circle was a field of gray tiles reflecting the sun, with metallic pipes crisscrossing through it all like a giant worm. But what drew the eye, as always, was the huge dome in the center of the circle. It overshadowed everything else. It looked like it was made of glass, but not quite. The sunlight didn’t reflect as brightly off of it, and it seemed to have a bluish tint as if reflecting the color of the sky. The surface strips seemed to blend in with the rest of the gray field, but he knew they were there.
“Waylain’s surface grid,” Kyle whispered softly.
“Ah, finally! Someone who knows where he is.” Haraki sounded pleased. “People do not think about it, they may not even know, but it’s the solar grid and the venting systems on the surface that make life possible inside.”
The aerial view of Waylain’s surface blinked out, and was replaced by an image of glowing orange dots spread out in a neat pattern across a black background. Slowly, the orange dots began to grow bigger and brighter as if they were coming closer. The streets and the buildings started to become clearer as the orange glow pushed the darkness aside. He felt like he was floating down toward the city.
“But this is Waylain, as everyone knows it,” Haraki’s voice cut in. “The crowning achievement of humanity, an iconic wonder of the world, a city of nearly one million inhabitants, buried deep under the earth’s surface, fueled by the world’s largest solar cell grid. It was designed to resemble Manhattan, a 21st century mega-city, so someone from back then would feel right at home on the streets. They would think they were just taking a stroll in the evening and not even realize that this place was underground.”
Kyle had floated down onto the city level and was looking at the iconic fountain shaped like a woman pouring water out of her jug. But unlike in real life, the streets were deserted. The only sound was that of the water splashing into the pool around the fountain.
“The Fountain of the Virgo stands directly beneath the pinnacle of the dome, exactly 1453 feet below the earth’s surface.”
Kyle looked up to where he knew the dome was but couldn’t make out anything in the darkness. In spite of knowing how deep underground he was, he had never really felt it. He had seen this fountain many times but had never realized its significance.
“You may have seen this fountain and the streets a hundred times, but I bet you’ve never seen this.”
The lights around him started dimming rapidly, until it became pitch black. He couldn’t even see his own fingers even when he held them up in front of him. The sound of the splashing water suddenly seemed to reverberate from everywhere, and for the first time, Kyle felt like he was truly underground. And just as suddenly, the darkness started receding again. He could make out the faint outlines of the buildings appearing out of the gloom. But something was different. It didn’t look right. That’s when he realized that the street lights were still dark.
The golden light seemed to brighten up every corner of Waylain, yet it kept growing brighter still. He heard the awe in Ellie’s voice and smiled. He knew what was happening, but that didn’t stop him from staring in wide-eyed wonder at the scene before him. The sunlight filtering in through the dome made him realize how grand the buildings really were. He knew the store fronts were colorful, but he had never seen them as vivid as they were now. And the fountain, it was an image to behold. The sunlight glinted off the white, marble statue and sparkled like gold on the water streaming down from the fountain. Suddenly, he saw something that made his breath catch in his throat. Is that a rainbow? There, just behind the fountain, a tiny, ethereal rainbow seemed to frame the statue of the Virgo.
“This is what Waylain was supposed to look like. This is the view people saw on the day they first entered. But it wasn’t meant to be,” Haraki announced sadly. “For a bevy of reasons, the decision was made to darken the dome and plunge Waylain into eternal twilight. They said every New Year the dome would let sunlight in again to show people the true beauty of Waylain. But it never happened. Twenty-five years since Waylain failed to live up to the vision of the beauty its creator had imagined.”
The sunlit city seemed to grow dark again, and the street lamps lit up the place in their orange glow. But it was a poor substitute. Now that he had seen the Waylain in all its sunlit glory, he could never unsee it again. Slowly, even the street lamps darkened and it became pitch black. Even the sound of the splashin
g water faded away into nothingness.
“But what people don’t realize is that Waylain’s beauty is not just skin-deep. In the last twenty-five years, Waylain has surpassed every expectation and fulfilled its purpose.”
A rotating 3D wire-frame model of Waylain sprang up from the darkness. It seemed that the city was sitting on top of a large circular disk, wider than the city’s circumference..
“What you see is the common living area, offices, apartments, shops, restaurants, and places where anyone can go. It’s split between the city level and the underground levels, which look like that flat disk.”
Blue pinpricks of light started flashing all around the rotating 3D model and arranged themselves in the shape of a sphere around it. Blue lines sprang up from the pinpricks of light, linking to the other blue dots, and surrounded the city in a spherical cage.
“And this is what makes life possible inside Waylain. A complex structure of multi-layered shells that regulate the temperature, humidity, pressure, oxygen, and a million other variables to create a safe environment for us to live in.”
Suddenly, something seemed to happen within the lower half of the spherical cage. Thin columns of red light began to spread out of the base of the disk and stopped the moment they reached the spherical cage. It looked like a weird mechanical hedgehog lying on its back with the city resting on its belly, and surrounded by the blue, spherical cage.
“Ugly, isn’t it? But this is the heart of Waylain. The reason it has prospered for so long and is known as the technological marvel it is. Our founder had the vision to hide away the place where real work happens. So people could enjoy the safety and beauty without being reminded of where they are.”
“I don’t understand,” Kyle spoke up. “What am I looking at again?”
The bottom half of the spherical cage disappeared suddenly, and one of the red columns near the center started flashing. The 3D model zoomed into the column, and Kyle saw a section of the red column change to white color.
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