Virtual Heaven, Redux

by Taylor Kole

  As the doors to Alex’s car started to shut, an obese man with greasy hair barged in and past Alex. Almost as round as he was tall, the man wore a white lab coat over a dangerously tight TCU football jersey. The baffling contrast stifled Alex’s normally automated greeting.

  The man carried a briefcase with both hands, shuffled to one of the booths, and sat. He situated the case on his lap, unclasped the locks, retrieved Doctor Sleep by Stephen King, opened it to his bookmarked page, and, while keeping his eyes on his book, said, “You’re one of the new guys?”

  Alex considered sitting across from him, but instead stepped closer. “I am. My name’s Alex.”

  “I’m Jason.” He flipped a page. “You’re the one taking over the CSD?”

  Comprehensive Software Design. People who worked with computers were always altering their titles, as if the glamour of what they did increased with each new moniker. Programmers referred to themselves as software engineers, network specialists were DevOps engineers, and animators were graphic designers. Presumably, Alex would be heavily involved in programming and overseeing the others. Maybe he should ask to be called a technological maestro?

  “Are you a programmer?” Alex asked.

  “Software engineer.”

  “I mean, obviously.”

  Jason’s hand went to his lab coat side pocket and removed a king-size Snickers. With two fingers, a thumb, and deft precision, he opened the wrapper and bit into the chocolate bar.

  Alex wondered if this guy knew how tightly his faded TCU jersey fit. It confined his torso like a girdle and had to be obstructing circulation, definitely respiration. Packing even one extra bite into his body might cause the jersey to spontaneously Hulk Hogan.

  Flashing colors drew Alex’s eyes to the muted television. Breaking news. Some guy shot people. He turned away, disgusted. Evidence abounded that airing these stories perpetuated them—if you start with Columbine, it could be argued the media was responsible for all the mass shootings to follow. Yet in America, ratings trumped morality.

  Beyond the screen, the mountain scenery captivated him. A beauty behind man’s beast. Even in June, snow still coated the mountaintops. Alex wondered what temperature it was at those elevations. It looked sunny and comfortable? Could he wear shorts as he forged through snow? He’d never been near a mountain, but if the opportunity presented itself, he intended to find out.

  Inertia gently pitched him forward as the tram arrived at its final stop, and Alex’s destination A beautiful glass building dubbed, the Atrium, sat before an empty parking lot.

  Alex waited by the door as the tram crawled to a stop. He adjusted his hair and posture. Today he would learn exactly what Broumgard considered a technology unrivaled by anything on the planet.

  He wasn’t much of a reader, but bookshelves lined his new home office, and surprisingly, the previous night he’d finished the majority of a fiction novel. Some sci-fi bender about wormhole travel. The possibility that he’d be gate-hopping to other worlds kept him awake past midnight.

  “Need my help getting anywhere?” Jason asked from behind him.

  Alex could use the guidance, but it was day one at ground zero, and he wanted to take it in.

  “No thanks. I’ve got Victor with me.” He tapped his ear as he exited.

  “Who? Oh, yeah. Alright.” When the doors opened, Jason stepped past Alex and joined the back of the crowd.

  Like an oversize hamster tunnel, the tram tower connected to the Atrium with a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree glass skywalk. He waited for the employees to pass through the two sets of double-doors and then, once alone, asked, “Victor, which way?”

  “Your destination is Work Area One. Once you enter the Atrium, you will have the option of taking the elevators to your left or the stairs directly in front of you. When you arrive at the main floor, speak with one of the front desk clerks.”

  Alex pushed through the double-doors and paused. A glass rail encompassed the third floor. He eased to its edge and peered over the main lobby.

  Morning sunlight slanted through the glass front and reflected off the emerald-colored floor tiles, illuminating the open entrance. Two vertical chrome letters, B and G, dominated the west wall. Two arching reception desks waited beneath them with generous halls on either side. A half-dozen security officers busied themselves behind the desks, some watching monitors, a few jotting notations, others conversing. Eridu’s security officers resembled NFL linebackers in their prime. Because of poorly-done tattoos and numerous scars, some looked more like weight-pit champions from Riker’s Island.

  Spotting Broumgard’s director of personnel, Tara Capaldi, brought some relief, and memories of their first meeting at Eridu’s airport. She wore a tan business skirt that hugged athletic thighs and hips, designer watch and pumps, blond hair streaked with brown and styled in a ponytail. She was the prettiest woman Alex had ever touched, even if it was just a hand shake. Though in her late twenties, something in her hazel eyes seemed aged and cold. The feeling he got when near her repelled any notion of attraction. She was a professional, destined for bigger things. Alex respected her knowledge and organizational skills. Beyond that, he appreciated her ability to detect and then disarm his tension with banter.

  She was working behind the closest counter, bent at the waist, observing a monitor with one of the security officers (Victor’s idea of front desk clerks). The elevator chimed its arrival behind him. Turning, he saw the final stragglers from the tram boarding, and he hurried to join them.

  As the glass elevator descended, he stared at the only familiar face in the crowd. Tara laughed at something a security officer said. Everyone near her turned to glimpse the act.

  He placed his ear piece in his flannel pocket before exiting.

  Making eye contact with Alex, she beamed, and waved him over.

  “Good morning, Mr. Cutler,” Tara said as they shook hands. “Is everything going well so far?”

  “Yeah. I can’t imagine things going any better.”

  A coy smile. “Don’t be so sure about that,” she said as she passed him and motioned for him to follow her down one of the two main hallways.

  A mammoth security guard watched Alex trailing her. His gaze stayed firm, but non threatening. “Good morning, Mr. Cutler,” the guard said.

  “Morning,” Alex said as he scratched his neck, unsettled that a man of those dimensions knew his name prior to introduction.

  “I’ll take you to meet your team,” Tara said. “We have twenty-six full-time programmers here. Without guidance, they lack the type of synergy you instilled at Vision Tech.”

  He wasn’t sure if he’d instilled anything more than Plow Straight. Camaraderie was probably the by-product of the superiority complex they shared at knowing the useful software started with them.

  She stopped in front of a door marked “Work Area One” and grabbed the knob. “Are you ready to have your life fulfilled?”

  He nodded. Who wasn’t ready to have their life fulfilled.

  Tara opened the door before he could speak.

  Casually dressed people occupied the average-size room. Desks were in rows and given space. The pin-up posters were of comic books and sci-fi movies. A section of the floor was elevated. A dominant desk faced the rest of the room. Alex saw his name on that desk.

  A few women dotted the room of predominantly male, middle-aged, computer-geek types. Two men wore VR headsets. By the way their fingers strummed the air, they were interacting with private worlds. He loved the concept of VR. He’d bought all the best gear on day one. Unfortunately, he was one of the many who experience EXTREME motion sickness. Alex’s first VR lasted less than five minutes. He became ill afterwards. He had to go home from work, but couldn’t drive. He needed three days to fully recover. Stupid him tried one more time, only for one minute, to try and acclimate. He was sick and disoriented the rest of the day. He’d never touched VR again.

  A foursome of Asians had their desks pushed together near the far wall. T
hey focused on a small man with bright orange hair who stood atop a chair, engaged in an animated tale in a foreign dialect. Alex felt like this would be a fun place to work.

  Alex spotted his rotund tram companion, Jason, in the rear, feet propped on a desk. His back faced the rest of the room as he read his novel and mined Whoppers from a spilled pile.

  “The annual hiring day is a big one for us,” Tara said. “A day when we open our lives and allow special individuals, like you, to become part of the family.

  “Here at Broumgard, we offer a multitude of entertaining events for our clients. I’m sure you’ve heard about many amenities offered at Hotel La Berce, but I want to introduce you to our real attraction: the Lobby.”

  Alex peered toward the lobby, wondering if he’d missed something, then back to Tara, who watched him with a conspicuous smile.

  “Do you like football, Alex? We play a game each year: security personnel versus programmers.”

  Football’s basic rules eluded Alex. He wasn’t sure if a touchdown meant six, seven, or eight points; but as her words settled, he surveyed the room. Most of the men and women were either small, overweight, or brittle.

  He recalled the security officers mulling behind the service counters, took in his teammates, and felt the first bite of disappointment. If football was involved along with programmers, this whole hyped event must revolve around a video game. Secretly, he’d been hoping for alien technology or maybe the Noah’s Ark thing—God knew the world needed another cleansing.

  Video gaming bummed him out. He didn’t play video games as much as his peers, and despite having a knack for them, enjoyed them less. He could spend an afternoon behind a controller, but after finishing, he always wondered where the time had gone, and regretted the waste. One hour into his first day and he was thinking he might buck Tara’s claim and become the first programmer to quit the Broumgard Group.

  Tara raised her voice. “Everyone, quiet please.” Tara’s voice silenced the rowdy room and brought order. Even the orange-haired man quieted, hopped down, and sat.

  “This is Alex Cutler. He will be leading you nomads once he completes orientation. If anyone has any questions before we head over, now is the time.”

  Alex raised his hand and noticed another man—a thin albino with white hair, reddish eyes and large freckles—doing the same.

  Tara sighed. “Does anyone who has worked here more than a few days have any questions?” She stared playfully at Alex until he lowered his arm. “You two can learn names from security tags, so I’ll skip the introductions.”

  The other newb’s security tag read “Carl W.” The ghost-like man didn’t appear old enough to drink alcohol. His full lips and wide nose made him look African. Alex wondered if an African would look this light-skinned? Regardless, Carl’s bewildered features comforted Alex, for they exceeded his own.

  “Okay, everyone, let’s go to the elevators,” Tara announced.

  As if a school bell had sounded, the chatter resumed and everyone stood. A few employees gathered around Alex.

  “What position are you looking to play?” a man named Kole asked. His dimensions matched Alex’s. However, in a society that demanded perfection, Kole’s quarter of an inch off the forehead, eyes two millimeters larger, and slightly longer nose increased Alex’s average seven to Kole’s handsome nine.

  Alex shrugged. He would play whatever, once he figured out the controls.

  “How about this: are you a hot shot or a team player?” Kole said.

  “Team player,” Alex answered honestly.

  “That’s good. We have too many hot shots on this team,” said Denise, a dark-skinned, five-foot-one, bulldozer of a woman. The plastic beads on the ends of her braids rattled against her shoulders as she moved. The E at the end of her nametag traveled around the tag, providing a border, complete with thorns and leaves.

  “If you need anything,” she placed her hand on Alex’s forearm, “anything at all, you come see me.” She glided her fingers across his arm as she turned to leave. Near the door, she high-fived another female on her way out.

  Kole patted Alex’s shoulder. “What’s it gonna be then, bud—offense or defense?”

  “I haven’t played football since I was eight,” he said groggily, as he recovered from Denise’s come-on, which might be his first. “But I can hold my own at Madden.”

  The orange-haired Asian jumped on a chair and flexed his arms into various poses. “I hold down the Dee!”

  His display earned numerous chuckles, applause, and supportive cheers from the exiting programmers.

  “The thing is,” Kole said, drawing Alex’s attention, “this is no video game. It’s full-contact, take-no-prisoners football.”

  “Well, I hope the guards play touch,” Alex said with a dry laugh.

  “I play left tackle,” a wiry woman in her early twenties said, “so don’t try and snake it.”

  A female left tackle that weighed a hundred and thirty pounds? That seemed off to Alex.

  No VR. He had made his sickness known to Tara. So, if not a video game, maybe they wore robotic suits and this would be some future ball where gravity didn’t matter and propulsion amplified their movements. High-velocity contacts would create jarring sounds as loud as head-on collisions. If so, the technology might be safe enough for everyone present, but Alex would pass. Well, more likely, he would want to pass, but suit up and play, the entire time spent in discomfort, wishing he’d had the balls to say no thank you..

  The two newbies, Alex and Carl, were the last to enter the hallway. A congestion of more than two-dozen security officers and programmers shuffled as one, all hooting and trash-talking.

  “Carl, Alex, you guys stay with the group,” Tara said. “They’ll get you where you need to go.” She made sure they heard her and then knifed toward the front of the crowd.

  Most of the security officers wore gray police-like uniforms, while a few wore college jerseys. The two-way heckling frothed—a bass versus tenor showdown.

  The programmers’ confident demeanor did little to soothe Carl, who maintained a bewildered half-snarl as they moved down the hall. Alex knew they were going to a massive X-Box showdown, or something like that movie Surrogates, where you controlled an avatar.

  Now that would be awesome.

  Alex trailed the man who’d spoke to him earlier. He was six-foot six, with a XXXXL University of Michigan jersey that might as well have been made of spandex, and whose biceps were so thick, they could have stored Alex’s thighs. As if sensing Alex’s inspection, he turned to face him. His smile appeared normal enough.

  The giant pointed at his own nametag to communicate above the ruckus: Dalton.

  Alex checked himself for his nametag, found the security tag, intending to lift it, but Dalton waved away his effort, non-verbally saying he knew all about Alex Cutler. Dalton gave two dual thumbs up and faced forward.

  Employees gathered around a set of ivory-accented chrome elevators. The more time he spent loitering around the excited combatants, the more his tension abated.

  The third time the elevator went up and down, he boarded.

  A mix of security jocks and programming nerds filled the car. Alex’s anticipation climbed with each centimeter rise in elevation. He found himself wishing months had already passed, and he was integrated into the amiable atmosphere. The conversations inside the elevator carried an air of diplomacy and a pinch of jest.

  “Who are you guys starting at quarterback?”

  “This year we win.”

  “I’M A BEAST!”

  “Seriously, how are you going to stop Jason?”

  Jason? thought Alex. If they meant the guy in the skin tight TCU jersey from the tram, they only needed to toss a couple Baby Ruths on the ground. Boom, stopped.

  The elevator opened into a spacious, white room. Rows of chairs, delineated with heavy green curtains stretched as far as he could see. A few curtains were pulled shut.

  Staff members in lab coats interacted
with holographic charts floating two feet in front of them, a pea-size lens was clipped to each of their shoulders. He marveled at the design’s simplistic efficiency. The nurses shouted names. Individuals stepped forward, received terse directions, then merged into the rows of chairs. He watched a man enter the fifth row and walk down five stations, to where a nurse waited for him. As the man sat, the nurse guided the army green privacy curtain around them.

  “Alex.” Tara clutched his arm, her eyes excited. “Are you ready for the greatest experience on the planet?”

  “What is it? Are we playing football on a VR screen or something?”

  “Alex Cutler!” a worker shouted.

  “Something like that. Words can’t describe it. Just remember that you will be totally safe.” Tara pulled him toward the female worker who’d shouted his name.

  “Alex Cutler?” The worker inspected him.

  He nodded.

  “Two-eighteen.”

  Alex allowed himself to be led deep into the second row. His mind processed the possibilities, a new type of virtual reality, deep hypnosis, sensory deprivation, toxin-induced hallucinations. All of these had appealed to him, some more than others. He simply wished for some back-story.

  On his approach, he spotted Carl nestling into a chair. Two security officers stood businesslike to either side of him. Carl did nothing to hide his anxiety. Before he could notice Alex, who waited to give him a comforting nod, an officer shucked the durable curtain closed.

  “Here we are,” Tara placed her hand on the back of a chair. “Take a seat, please.” The area was eight feet square. A control panel that resembled an electronic lectern rested in the corner. Alex eased into the comfortable, black leather seat. Underneath him, a block-shaped apparatus flickered with lights. Once settled, he detected the slight vibrations of hardware. With hardware present, he could eliminate toxin-induced hallucinations, but not much else.

  “Sit back, Alex. Relax,” Tara coaxed as she gently assisted him.

  The chair reminded him of a top-of-the-line dental seat. Flat and strong at the shoulders, curved to hug his lower back. Alex tingled with his first bite of excitement. The chair inflated near his ankles, the space behind his knees, and near his armpits, effectively reducing the feel of contact all over his body.