“And do you know why you are so good at it?” she asks me, instead of commenting on what I said.
“I pay attention to details?” I say, perplexed by her question.
“Nope,” she says with a smile, a truly genuine smile. “The reason you are so good at it is that for some reason, your brain is able to separate what is real and what is not. When you are under for VR, your brainwaves, for some reason we have not been able to validate or copy, go into overdrive, which allows you to go past the boundaries of the normal systems. Honestly, we were studying you while you were working under VR, which has allowed us to create some of the technology we have today for the new VR systems.”
“What do you mean real and not real?” I ask her, puzzled.
“When most folks go into VR, it’s hard for them to tell what is real and what isn’t. You, on the other hand, can, which is what makes it so easy for you to find bugs in the game. You can pull yourself away from the ‘game’ long enough to see something’s not meant to be there,” William says now. “Do you know why we tell you not to tell folks what you do for your job? As a bug finder, I mean?” he says.
“I just thought it was because of the NDA,” I tell him.
William shakes his head. “No, it’s because you are the only one,” he says.
“What? No, that’s impossible! You have an entire team on floor nine here that does only that, they find bugs,” I say in disbelief.
“Oh, they do. But in the code itself. Not in the game. You are the only one who does that since you are the only one that can.”
I stare at him in utter shock. What does he mean, I am the only one! I can’t be the only one finding bugs and glitches while in the games that Paradigm Alpha creates! That would be ludicrous.
“Why do you think our games are so much better than the competition, Jeff?” Mrs. Laman says with pride. “It’s because of you. You find errors in days that our coders or debuggers would spend months, or even years finding. That is why we are able to get games to market so much faster.”
“I honestly don’t know what to say. If I am so important for this company, why are you doing what you are to me?”
All four people at the table have the grace to blush at that comment. Mrs. Laman is the one who answers, after shocking me by putting her hand over mine. “Because, we need you. Jeff, we are entrusting you with our care for a long time. There isn’t anyone else who can do this. You will one day wake up, and if the worst comes to be and we on Earth have destroyed each other, you will be our last bastion of hope. You will be our protector, our savior, and our salvation.”
“Laying it pretty thick, aren’t we Thelma?” William says with a soft laugh.
“No, he needs to know how serious this is, and why I have put most of my own money and time into this.”
“So,” I say awkwardly, “how is this supposed to work? I hope I am not going to the moon? I mean, how are you going to keep me alive for what may amount to thousands of years, until the Earth can be lived on again?”
At my question, the two owners of Paradigm Alpha look at each other oddly. Finally, Thelma is the one to look back at me and answer. “Your body won’t be alive,” she tells me softly.
“But,” I say, confused, “how am I supposed to watch over everyone in VR if I am dead?”
“We will upload your mind to The Doomsday System servers, and there you will live your days out in a game until the AIs of the system feel that it’s time, and you will be pulled out of the game to begin the reseeding of Earth. We cannot trust that part to the AIs at all. They are smart, but they aren’t human,” Thelma says softly.
“Wait, you want me to play a game for thousands of years?” I ask them all in astonishment.
“Yes, but to you it won’t be thousands of yours. We will be telling the AIs to make it so that the time dilation for you is 10:1. For every ten years outside the game for you, it will be one year in-game. So if you are in-game for 1,000 years, it will only feel like 100 years. And if you play a long-lived race, you should be fine,” William chimes in.
“Wait, what game am I going to be playing?” I ask them suspiciously. If it’s the pirate game Hooked Ships, forget it.
“You will be playing a completely new game that has been created with feedback from all the other games, and built by the AIs. We have shown you snippets of it to find bugs, but you have found none. So we know the game is solid with no bugs,” he says proudly.
“Wait! Are you talking about game X? I thought that was a new game coming out next year and that you just didn’t have a name for it!” I exclaim.
“Yes, you will play that one, but we are not giving it a name. This will be a new world for you to explore.”
Looking around the table at the eager faces, I don’t know what to say. I mean, I don’t have much choice, but to play a game for such a long time and actually be that character? I mean, how many times have I wished while playing a game
