AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Virtual reality.
Mia knew it with sudden certainty. Even today’s human technology could give a weak imitation of it through all the three-dimensional movies and video games. The Ks could obviously do much better, making her feel like she was actually in the image herself. This had to be the K version of Google Maps, where, instead of placing the little orange figure on the digital map to look around via pictures, the map simply placed the viewer into the three-dimensional reality.
The question now was how to get out.
Maybe if she closed her eyes and reopened them, she would find herself back in the office. Squeezing her lids shut, Mia tried counting to five. Halfway through, she lost her patience and peeked. Nope, she was still definitely in front of the building.
Her next initiative was to pinch herself . . . hard.
Ouch.
She definitely felt that pain, but her view didn’t budge. She stomped her foot. Her leg communicated that sensation to her brain as well, but Mia was still in that mysterious world.
Crap. She was starting to panic. What if she could never leave this place, or worse, what if she were still in it when Korum got home? He would know immediately that she had been snooping. There was no way to spin this in a positive light, or to pass it off as random curiosity. She had clearly gone to extraordinary lengths to access his files.
Think, Mia, think. If she had entered this world so easily, there had to be an equally easy way to get out. Something had to be real in this surreal place, even if everything seemed fake.
Raising her arms at her sides, Mia slowly turned in a circle. Initially, her outstretched hands encountered nothing but air. She took a step to the right and repeated the process. Then another step and another. On her fifth attempt, her fingers brushed against something soft and familiar. The sweater! She couldn’t see it, but she could definitely feel it.
Grabbing it with a desperate grip, Mia attempted to locate the device. And there it was, a tiny nub near the edge of the sleeve. As soon as Mia touched it, the familiar electric pulse ran through her hand. For a second, she experienced that feeling of disorientation, and then she was standing on solid ground – on the floor of Korum’s office inside the building she had just been looking at.
Nearly shaking in relief, she stared at the map still spread out before her. She’d done it! She – Mia Stalis, who had to be taught how to operate the latest iPads – had actually entered an alien virtual reality world and come out unscathed.
Of course, she still hadn’t learned anything useful. As much as she wanted to stop and go back to memorizing the standard deviation formula, she had to explore this opportunity further.
This time around, Mia knew what she had to do to avoid getting lost in that strange world. She put on Korum’s sweater herself. It was huge on her, nearly reaching down to her knees. His deliciously familiar scent surrounded her, almost as if she were standing in his arms. For some reason, she found it very comforting, even though she knew that he might kill her if he saw her in this moment.
Walking around the table, she examined the map in detail. The image seemed to pulse slightly, and there were areas that shimmered more than others. One particular building in Brooklyn almost had a glow around it.
A glow? Mia had to investigate it further.
Extending her hand toward the tiny image, she closed her eyes and braced for the reality shift. When she opened them, she was on the street, looking at a quiet tree-lined residential block populated by a row of red-brick townhouses.
To her surprise, the scene was far from empty. Stifling a startled gasp, she watched a man hurry into one of the houses. He walked right past Mia on the street, without even a cursory glance to acknowledge her presence. Of course, Mia realized, she wasn’t really there from his perspective. She was either watching a live video feed – a very realistic one – or, more likely, a pre-recorded video.
A saying she’d once heard nibbled on the edge of her mind. Something about advanced technology being indistinguishable from magic. That’s exactly what it was like with the Ks, thought Mia. She felt a little like Harry Potter in his invisibility cloak – though her adversary was admittedly much better-looking than Voldemort.
Gathering her courage, she followed the man up the steps and into the house. This is not real, Mia. They can’t see you. You can get out any time you like. She opened the door – which was unlocked for some reason – and stepped inside.
There was no one in the hallway, but she could hear people in the living room. Her heart pounding in her throat, Mia slowly approached the gathering. The big sweater wrapped around her felt like a security blanket, giving her the nerve to continue.
Tiptoeing into the room, Mia hovered in the doorway, waiting for someone to yell out, “Intruder!” But the occupants of the room were unaware of her presence. Feeling much calmer, Mia began to observe the proceedings.
There were about fifteen people gathered there, of various ages and nationalities. Only three of them were women, including a middle-aged lady who looked like a professor. The other two women were young, probably around Mia’s age, although the stressed look on their faces aged them somehow. A lean blond man was sitting with his back turned to Mia, but there was something about him that looked familiar.
“John,” said the middle-aged woman, addressing the blond man, “we really need to work out these details. We can’t just blindly trust them –”
He turned his head to respond, and Mia realized with a sinking feeling in her stomach that she knew this John – that she had spoken to him twice in the last few weeks. And that meant only one thing: what she was observing had to be a meeting of the Resistance – and if she were observing it through Korum’s virtual reality video, then he was obviously onto them.
Oh dear God. They thought they were safe, that they weren’t being tracked. Why else would they all be gathered here like this? John had said that Korum was specifically in New York to stamp out the Resistance movement . . . because they were getting close to some breakthrough. But clearly, Korum was even closer to his goal of hunting down the freedom fighters.
She had to warn them. They were sitting ducks in that Brooklyn house. Korum could ambush them at any moment.
Suddenly, Mia felt every hair on the back of her neck rising. The puzzle pieces snapped into place, and she gasped in horrified realization.
It may already be too late for John and his friends.
&
