Eight
The cat snarled in the darkness. Rick froze, knowing
the cat could be anything. Some virtual reality games were like that.
You chose what was to happen next by the way you reacted to a stimulus.
The key word was interactive.
Rick had only one memory of a cat. As expected, the
animal that bounded from the underbrush was a manifestation of that
memory. He scooped up Prank, his old gray neutered tomcat, the most
harmless animal on the face of the earth, and tucked it beneath one arm.
Prank purred like a vibrator against his side.
Rick studied the jungle, knowing the exact nature of
his foe. The jungle represented the subconscious mind, wild and free of
restraint, a place of dark secrets and dangerous emotion. Rick wondered
how Mort, Marla and Becky had reacted to the sinister darkness. He
doubted if they had done well. In the long run, he doubted if he was
going to do any better. The jungle was thick with tension. He could feel
its electric charge in the air. If he held his thoughts at bay, nothing
would happen. Very carefully, he tried to back away from trouble.
The underbrush quickly thinned. When he turned away,
the ground was mostly clear of trees and dense underbrush. A full moon in
the night sky glowed out across a wooded park area outside town. Just
over a hill or two, home awaited.
He remembered now where he lived. He thought it wise
to go there and wait. Hopefully, there would be somebody about to tell
him what to do. Mr. Mangrove had promised the evaluation wouldn't last
long.
But he had been warned, too, that time would seem
distorted. Hours could pass. Or days. He couldn't hold his deepest
fears at bay that long. He wasn't certain he was holding them back even
now. Storm clouds passed in front of the moon and darkened his path.
That could hardly be coincidental. What I see is a reflection of
myself, he reminded himself, a reflection of my own mind.
Rick zigzagged along the streets of the town. Nobody
seemed to be out and about. The doors and windows of every home stood
open, beckoning him to explore and indulge his curiosity. He dared not.
It was safer to sit tight and not make waves. If he had a philosophy of
living, that was it. Don't stick your neck out. Don't take chances.
He reached his own house and found it empty. The
lights refused to come on in the living room.
"Mom?"
Silence.
"Dad? Mom? I'm home!"
But meeting his parents in this waking nightmare
would have been terrifying. How could he talk to another human being
knowing they were but a figment of his own imagination? It would be worse
than talking to himself in a mirror-- and having the mirror answer back.
Nothing in this entire world was real. Anything could happen.
"Problems, Mr. Kaiser?"
Rick whirled about. His heart pounded so hard, he
feared it would burst. The janitor stood in the center of the dimly lit
living room. He still wore his blue uniform, his pale gray eyes all but
glowing in the dark.
"Am I real?" the janitor asked of him. "A
hallucination perhaps?"
Rick decided that he was real in the sense that he
came from outside the program. He was either a real human being, or a
computer simulation at the very least.
Prank jumped from his arms and ran from the room.
Rick stuffed his shaking hands in his pocket. "I don't know for sure," he
confessed.
"But you remember why you're here?"
"I was with some friends." Rick fought to remember.
"We were going to take a test of some kind. Was all of that just a dream,
too?"
"If you couldn't tell, it's not important," the
janitor said. "What is important is to break this little stalemate of
ours. You're a smart boy, Rick. You are too self-aware to be fooled by
our little game, but not decisive enough to take control of the
situation. We're like gunfighters who can draw on each other in the same
split second. Like archers who can split one another's arrows in the
bull's-eye."
"Then let me out," Rick said. His teeth chattered.
"I've had enough."
The janitor shook his head. "That is not within my
power. You still have the most important reality to contend with, the
reality of your own conscious and emotional being." The janitor grew
close and put his arm on Rick's shoulder. "That is a reality that exists
only in our hearts and can never be simulated."
Rick backed away from the man, not wanting to be
touched by something that might not be human. "I don't know what you are
talking about."
"You have three friends who are like the cat that
began our little experiment. They look to you to tell them who they are
and how they should behave. We are all like the cat, Rick. We are what
we think ourselves to be, and what we think others think ourselves to be,
no more, no less."
The janitor advanced on him step by step. "It's an
interesting idea, don't you think? We are like storybook characters that
we build inside ourselves. We think we are this way. We think we are
that way. We think we are loved. We think we are hated. The strange
thing is, although the creation is ours alone, we look to family and
friends for directions on how to put ourselves together. Marla van Kirk
believes she is enslaved by the opinion of her parents. Becky is
convinced of her worthlessness because her parents give her too little
needed attention. Mort is allowing himself to be destroyed by the neglect
and belligerence of his parents."
"Let me out of here," Rick said. "You have no right
to do this to us. We haven't done anything wrong. Mr. Mangrove said so
himself."
The janitor backed away into the shadows, or perhaps
the shadows moved to engulf him.
"It's not our fault the way we are! He said so
himself!"
But the living room was empty now. Rick walked in
circles, confused by his sudden isolation. He ran his hand along a coffee
table. It felt so real.
It wasn't.
Armstrong High School was playing God.
Rick raised his fists to the darkness.
"Let me out of here!"
