Chapter 5:

(Posted: January 23)

To say Rich was angry would have been an understatement. Watching his temper and mouth explode in the control room, Harrison thought Rich looked like a bull with its balls caught in a bear trap. At the present moment, Rich was howling and furiously cussing out some poor tech Harrison had never met. Ernie was conspicuously absent from the dark room and Kevin was gone too. According to the timer in his stall when he'd woken up, they'd only been in VERSA for 21 minutes of real time, yet they'd come back to a much different room.

The two uniformed men that usually guarded the control room rushed in to confront Rich. In anger, Rich hadn't even bothered to put his shoes back on, instead leaping from his stall upon de-sim to figure out what happened while they'd been battered around in VERSA. Sure, Harrison was unhappy too, but Rich was a much more authentic bad cop then Harrison would ever be.

“Where in the fuck is Ms. Bright?!” Rich roared. The men confronting him looked like security and certainly struggled to calm him down. “And why in living hell did we not get pulled out sooner?!! Was this a set-up or some shit? The DoD is going to sanction your asses when I tell them what crock of bullshit SunCorp is cooking up in here!”

Sujay appeared behind the security officers and started talking down Rich. As they argued, Harrison looked down at his own body in awe. His clothes, practically destroyed in the sim, were clean and still creased now that he'd returned to the real world. His aching body in VERSA yielded to his fit and healthy self once he woke up. It was a relief, but an incredibly strange feeling to experience. His mind though, having gone through a few hours of stress and calamity, lagged behind everything else. Mentally he felt exhausted. He just wanted to take a nap now.

Harrison saw Jessica stumble out of her stall to watch the drama unfold in front of her with big, bewildered eyes. Even with her heels on, she was still noticeably shorter than Harrison, but having spent so much time looking up at her, his mind tried reconciling her actual height. The few hours he'd been in VERSA had scrambled his sense of reality, and he had to tell himself again that Jessica was actually a petite woman, not a giantess.

Finally Vanessa stormed into the room with a entourage of serious looking techs and administrators. Rich shut up for a moment. Vanessa's usual friendly and professional attitude had been stripped away and she spoke in a stern, no-nonsense tone.

“Mr. Colgate, I am deeply sorry about what happened to you and your colleagues during the simulation this afternoon,” she said, sounding more hostile than apologetic. “I take full responsibility for the conduct of my employees and the distress you faced inside the sim.”

“What the hell is going on Ms. Bright?!” Rich cried out, exasperated.

“Mr. Cho unexpectedly de-simmed only a few seconds after going in,” Vanessa explained. “Mentally, he was not doing well, so Mr. James left to get help and we instead dealt with the crisis at hand. I've been told your neurological vitals in the sim appeared safe and your heart rates remained at acceptable levels, so there was no reason to immediately de-sim.”

“What happened to Kevin?” Harrison asked, stepping up.

“He's fine now, Mr. Burr,” Vanessa replied. “Honestly, he's just a bit shook up. I sent him home.”

“Why'd you leave us in the sim all that time?” Rich asked. He was trying to cool down but still talked through clenched teeth.

“Again my apologies Mr. Colgate,” Vanessa quickly responded. “It was an oversight by Mr. James, he should have de-simmed you once the situation stabilized, but he failed to do so. As of a few minutes ago, he no longer works for SunCorp.”

Well that was a shock, Harrison thought. They just straight-up fired Ernie for not pulling them out. It'd be interesting to see now what the rest of their trip would be like.

“Mr. Colgate, Mr. Burr,” Vanessa said. She looked over Harrison's shoulder. “And Ms. Hampton. On behalf of SunCorp I am terribly sorry for anything you may have experienced while in VERSA, especially without one of our techs to guide you. Please, why don't you three come with me and Mr. Rajeev and we can debrief in a better environment.”

After Rich put on his shoes they reluctantly followed her. The next few hours were spent in a conference room recalling their ordeal, Sujay seemingly fascinated by their story while Vanessa tried conducting damage control with their emotions. Rich was still pretty angry but at least he wasn't yelling anymore. He still made a few veiled threats about writing a scathing report to the Secretary of Defense though.

At one point Sujay asked Jessica, “So you grew, at one point, without a code?”

Jessica looked confused. “What do you mean?”

“You said you found a box and pulled a level and it caused a size change within VERSA?”

“Uh... yeah?” she responded, trying to remember exactly.

“But you didn't say anything? You didn't utter a command?”

“No I just turned a crank on this jack-in-the-box thing.”

Sujay looked at Vanessa. He seemed perplexed. Harrison detected a hint of concern.

“What?” Rich asked, also confused.

Sujay took a breath. “That shouldn't have been possible,” he finally admitted. “All the change-keys in VERSA, you know, the things that change your size so you can access the side space, are activated by a pilot entering a command. On a regular computer it's something you'd type in, but in VERSA it's something we programmed a verbal command to active.”

“But she didn't say anything?” Rich clarified.

“Look, we've created a lot of change-keys throughout VERSA,” Sujay continued, “books, levers, buttons, whatever. But they're programming devices designed for users, like admin tools. VERSA creating them from scratch?... that's above VERSA's software capability. VERSA creates a lot of things at random as it learns from pilot memories, endlessly spooling to create new worlds and a more realistic experience. But to make a change-key...”

Harrison leaned forward and unconsciously lowered his voice. “Are you saying that the box Jessica used, VERSA made at random?”

Sujay seemed to be looking for the right words. “I'm not sure,” he finally admitted.

Jessica cut in next. “Wait, but VERSA made all those apples.” She pointed at Harrison and Rich. “They said you told them that you originally made apples so VERSA would copy them, eventually improvising new and abundant ways to de-sim from it. Right?”

“Well we intended the out-keys to be plentiful,” Sujay said. “We wanted them to appear frequently, but subtly, throughout many worlds in VERSA. The fact that it started with apples and that VERSA kind of ran with it in other types of fruits is a lot different.” He sat up straight. “But VERSA should not be letting pilots change size without proper command inputs. I'm going to have to go through the code for that world and see what happened.”

Vanessa insisted that she didn't think it was a good idea they make another trip into VERSA. Rich and Harrison were already scheduled to tentatively leave tomorrow anyways. After some written statements and assurances that SunCorp would make it up to their guests, Rich and Harrison left in search of dinner. “You want to join us?” Rich asked Jessica. “We owe you a favor, for sure.”

“Sure... ok,” she replied. “Let me change first. I'm tired of wearing this damn skirt.”

After an uneventful dinner in an empty cafeteria full of awkward silences and terse conversation, Harrison found himself back in his dormitory. He switched into some sweatpants and a t-shirt and tried to get comfortable. Through the window he could see the sky darkening, not just from the sunset but from storm clouds taking over the sky. The lab had shut down for the evening and nearly all the staff had gone home. Rich and him had agreed they'd head to the airport tomorrow; Harrison couldn't wait to put VERSA behind them. He'd been into his report for well over an hour when suddenly an unexpected knock at his door made him jump. He figured it was Rich again with his bottle of scotch, so he opened the door without much thought.

He was startled to see it was not Rich but in fact Kat, the odd computer engineer he'd met earlier. She was in her wheelchair and wore a serious look on her face. Harrison felt self-conscious he wasn't in his business attire, but Kat's own casual dress and demeanor quickly put it out of his mind. Clad simply in pants and a t-shirt, she looked behind him to see if he was alone. Once she checked his room, she looked up at him.

“What're you doing here?” Harrison asked, trying not to be rude but still very surprised by her presence. Though it occurred to him she might live in the same building, he couldn't guess why she wanted to bother him.

Kat put her finger up to her lips, the universal sign for silence. “Follow me,” she whispered. Harrison followed her into the hallway and out of the dormitory building as her wheelchair motored along in front of him. After opening the building's door for her, Harrison followed her down a short ramp and around to the back of the building near the perimeter fence of the lab. It was a relatively hidden and remote spot. Only the lonely trees on the other side of the fence could see and hear them now.

“Um, Katherine, what's going on?” he finally asked, beyond confused and a little annoyed.

“For the tenth time,” she said in her regular, curt tone, “I go by Kat.”

“Ok... Kat. Sorry.” Harrison apologized. “What's up? Why are you here. Why are we outside??”

“Kevin Cho is dead,” she said bluntly.

“WHAT?!” Harrison yelled out.

“Shhh, keep it down,” said Kat discreetly. “They bugged your rooms and I don't want anyone else to find us out here.”

“How's Kevin dead??” Harrison asked desperately. “VERSA can't kill people!”

“It can,” Kat said calmly. “Well, at least, we discovered that today.” Harrison found her present coolness disturbing, but at least she seemed somewhat in control.

Harrison sputtered, trying to think of something to say, but her news stunned him. Kat kept talking. “I happened to be on my way to the control room to drop in on you right as Kevin de-simmed. I ran into Sujay a few minutes after it happened. He told me when Kevin came back his vitals were going nuts. Ernie had raced into his stall but he was stroking out. This kind of thing's never happened before. Sujay wasn't sure if Kevin's heart exploded or he had a brain aneurysm or something.” She paused, then looked up at Harrison. “They didn't pull you out of VERSA because they needed to get him out of there, to cover it up. They fired Ernie to cover their story too. I'm sure he's being compensated to stay quiet,” she mused out loud.

Again, Harrison felt a loss for words. This woman he'd just met today suddenly came to him with this bombshell about a global technology company conspiring to cover-up a workplace death...

“Why are you telling me all this?” Harrison finally stammered. “You know I'm going to have to report this.”

“No, you won't,” Kat told him. Harrison was taken aback by her arrogant response. This woman was no bullshit, apparently. “There's too much at stake.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

Kat eyed him down, skeptically. “You don't know? The government is licking their lips over VERSA. They can't wait to get their hands on it from us. Vanessa knows this and is intent on pushing it forward as soon as possible. That's why you and your buddies are here way before it's ready. But it's not ready. Not even close.”

“What are you saying?” Harrison said, folding his arms and trying to cool down his temper. His mind swam uncontrollably.

“VERSA is going to be big,” began Kat. “You know that, I know that... I built it after all. It's going to change the world. It's going to put the U.S. light years ahead of everyone else. The Russians are going to try copying it, the Chinese are going to try hacking it; both our enemies and our allies are going to try to steal it. It's going to be a security shit-show when it becomes public.”

She locked eyes with Harrison. “You and your friend from the Department of Defense were sent here to look at it for sure, but neither of you are very consequential. The other girl with you was something unforeseen on SunCorp's end, but didn't change anything. VERSA isn't a DoD issue really, or a military issue right now, it's a national security issue. We've been talking more to the FBI and the NSA in the last few years than anyone else, but they're still mostly in the dark on how powerful VERSA's become. Vanessa knows VERSA is dangerous and unproven. When your departments sent you out here they knew there would be an element of risk.”

Her words dropped on him like a ton of bricks. This was inconceivable. He couldn't decide if he believed her or not. She continued talking to him.

“Look VERSA is special, but it's not even really in beta yet. We've taught it to do a lot of things, given it an incredible mechanism to learn and create, but we're still years away from understanding what's going on inside of it. It's learning, fast. And evolving. SunCorp still thinks it holds all the puppet strings, but even right now VERSA is pushing its own limits in there.” She flipped her thumb in the direction of the building housing the control room.

“Why tell me all this? What am I going to write in my report?” Harrison asked. He realized he might have sounded like he was whining, but Kat didn't care.

“Would you be willing to go back into VERSA one more time?” The seriousness on Kat's face instantly told Harrison she wasn't joking with him.

Her question was another punch in his gut. He certainly hadn't expected that. But her query gripped him. It'd be mad to go back in, he reasoned, the program was unstable and unpredictable. Yet there was something else, something he couldn't quite reconcile. He'd never experienced anything like being in VERSA before. It was a literal dreamland where anything was possible. He could do anything, be anyone. If nothing else, for the sake of his job he should see as much of it as he could. He been beaten up by the sim so far, but inside his heart he was smitten with the experience. VERSA called to something deep inside of him, promising adventure and discovery. It was a hard offer to pass up.

“Why?” he finally asked her.

Kat sighed, and leaned back in her wheelchair. “I want to go in. Spend some real time in VERSA. I haven't been able to go in for weeks now and I want try to get to the bottom of what's going on. But I can't go alone. That's too dangerous.”

“Well, when would we even do that?” Harrison asked incredulously.

“Tonight,” she said flatly.

“Tonight?!” Harrison exclaimed. “Are you crazy?”

“It's perfect,” Kat said calmly. “The lab is pretty much deserted and we'd have the whole night to be in VERSA. That's days in sim-time.”

“This is insane,” Harrison said, taking a step away from her and trying to process everything. He looked up past the trees at the blackening sky. He could see a few stars begin to twinkle, but they were on the verge of being swallowed up by the coming thunderheads. It was going rain tonight. A storm was coming. “Damn, I don't know,” he finally admitted.

Suddenly they both heard a noise coming from around the corner. Harrison glanced over quickly as a figure emerged from around the building. “What are you doing out here?” Jessica asked him. Through the dusky light, Harrison could see she was dressed casually in black yoga pants and a gray sweatshirt.

She'd caught them both by surprise. He wasn't sure what to do. Kat quickly motioned her over. “I'm Kat, nice to meet you ma'am,” she said. Jessica walked over tentatively and shook her hand.

“Jessica...” she responded. “Who are you?”

“I'm one of the creators of VERSA,” Kat said. “I can't claim the whole thing but I did a lot of the important work on it.”

“What are you doing out here?” Harrison asked Jessica defensively.

Jessica pointed at a nearby window indignantly. “That's my room right there! I could hear your voices. What's this all about anyways?”

“Kevin's dead,” Kat simply replied.

Harrison felt a little better about himself when Jessica had the same ballistic reaction to the news. Kat talked her though it and reassured her it was SunCorp's fault, not her own. Next she unfolded her plan for Jessica. It only took a few minutes of conversation before the two women got along rather well. Harrison silently watched them both as he leaned against the dorm building.

After hearing Kat talk about her revolving theories of VERSA, Jessica asked her, “So let me get something straight. The guys told me you haven't programmed people into VERSA yet, right?”

“You mean, like bots? Artificial humans? Non-pilot controlled?” Kat asked.

“Sure, yes, that.”

“Well, we're working at it,” Kat responded, “but we've hardly passed square one. We don't even have anything yet that looks or acts like a normal person would. We have hollow shells.”

“And VERSA can't make people itself?” Jessica asked.

“No, no way,” Kat said confidently. “Maybe one day, but VERSA's still learning so much about itself.”

Jessica went silent, thinking. She looked at Harrison. “What?” he asked, genuinely confused. Jessica took a breath.

“Ok, so earlier when we were in the orchard,” she started saying slowly. “You and Rich were tiny and you ate the piece of the apple I gave you. After you were both gone I took a second before I took a bite myself. Something caught my eye down one of the orchard rows. I turned my head, and it went behind a tree quickly and I couldn't be a hundred percent sure what it was but.... I think I saw a person.”

A little after 9 o'clock that night, Harrison found himself sitting in a chair in the control room, watching Kat start to set up their entry into VERSA. He still had no idea what any of the computers in the dark room really did, but Kat seemed to be furiously typing away at one of them.

After Jessica's revelation, which Kat could hardly believe but only further reinforced her desire to sneak into VERSA, they'd decided to recruit Rich. After dragging him outside and explaining everything, Rich asked, “After everything that already happened today, you want me to go back into VERSA? No fucking way.”

His answer had been disappointing, but Harrison was not at all surprised that Rich currently sat in a chair next to him. Ultimately, the Defense liaison wasn't going to let Harrison from Energy and Jessica from the Senate have all the glory and fun ambling through VERSA. Like Harrison's aversion to wanting to go back into VERSA, the thrill of discovery eventually outweighed the negatives. Everyone wanted to see more of this technology. Despite this, Rich sat with his arms crossed looking pouty.

“Ok,” Kat said, wheeling back from her computer. “I've set us up in Stalls Five, Six, Seven, and Eight. I'll have to put you three in first, and then I'll go in last.”

“Wait, who's going to be our Tower?” Harrison asked. It was just the four of them in the control room right now. The entire complex was deserted-- even the guards who stood vigil by the control room's door went home in the evening. Past all the guard towers and fences surrounding the site, the actual lab had very little internal security. Sure, there were cameras everywhere, but Kat explained they only recorded footage and weren't monitored live. She could change the tapes later. They had the entire night to themselves.

“Pff, we don't need a Tower,” Kat said, brushing him off. “That's just something they do for safety.”

“Shit,” Rich muttered under his breath.

“Ok Jessica, you take Five,” Kat directed. “Harrison you go Six and Rich you'll be in Seven.”

Jessica looked at Kat awkwardly for a second. “Won't you need... like help or something? Getting into the chair-thing?”

Kat deflected instantly. “I'll be fine. There's no other way anyways.”

In the meantime Harrison had walked into Stall Six, removed his shoes and lay down on the waterchair. After sending Jessica off, Kat did her best to wheel in to his stall. She could barely reach the helmet to lower it onto Harrison. He heard her fiddling around with it as his world went dark.

“Wait, what about the vitals monitor?” Harrison asked from under the helmet.

“No need, who's going to be checking it?” Kat replied. “Alright I started your timer, you're good to go. Sweet dreams.”

And for the second time that day, Harrison's mind faded out into oblivion.