I wanted to be asleep. Instead Trillium had me sitting in a car waiting to be synced with the TRANS Tunnel system. The connection process required a lot of double checking to get going. Cars were loaded up in packs of ten or more and brought up to running speed. Average processing time was almost twenty minutes just to make it through on a busy day. The system was actually still statistically safer than flying in an airplane. Or trains. Everything seemed safer than trains.

“Seriously, Uncle Grant? You were in the Grand World Crossroads? That’s brave for a newb.” My niece, Beth, said.

“Yep. Got myself killed too.” I was eaten, technically.

“It happens! I did a raid on the Tower of Stars, four deaths! Once there was this solar beam that whooshed down, blamo!” Beth was always excited when talking about the game. “We gave up, that’s why I’m out here talking to you.”

“Way to break an old man’s heart.”

“Well that and homework. I just got done with classes for the day.” Beth said happily.

“And food.” I nodded at the screen.

“Of course!” Beth was busy shoveling a meal into her face. “So what killed you?”

“The Ooze.”

“What?” She asked.

That prompted a brief recap of my slightly crazy adventure. I explained all about Dusk leading me into the dungeon. Then our blind adventure until running into Elane, TinkerHell, and Edward. After that I glossed over my failure during the first fight and the other mental trauma. Those were my issues to work through. Beth didn’t need to be exposed to them.

My sister was busy marching around the front room. She cleaned and huffed. Beth kept turning to keep an eye on her mom while shoveling a spoonful of food into her face.

“Grant, did you seriously get Elane killed?” Liz had overheard my brief recap and usage of Elane’s real name. In my brilliance I had forgotten to leave out that detail. Getting someone called SheHulk killed would have been overlooked.

“What?” I asked. Beth took off and started marching downstairs to get away from her mom. The food was gone already too.

“Mom.” Beth pushed Liz away from the visible screen. “He was fighting Barricobbler, someone always dies!”

“That’s no excuse!” My sister said.

“Is too! Now stay out of my room!” Beth slammed a door closed. Liz was now shouting through a wall. If I knew Liz, she was trying to feed her daughter a line about who paid the bills and what exactly belonged to Beth.

“And you got a hat?” Beth asked. Her room was busy changing colors. I could see the edge of her ARC in the background.

“I guess? I didn’t get a chance to see what it did.” I was really interested too. This was my first official item from the Voices. It had to be interesting at least.

“It should be good for your Rank. The gear down there is perfect for most Rank Thirteens and below.” My niece said. She seemed to have missed the part where I vaguely explained it came from a coin.

“I didn’t get anything else.”

“Really? Not even Ghost Mushrooms? Mages go down there all the time to farm for them. That blonde you’re in love with should have known.” Trust my niece to come up with some fevered imaginings. I ignored her comment about TinkerHell. The woman was nice enough to leave an impression but dating anyone still wasn't on my mind.

“We might have found a few.” I focused on the [Ghost Mushroom] comment and shared that drug addled adventured. It was hard to resist Beth when she asked me questions. That prompted a vaguely parental reminder about how drugs are bad. We chatted back and forth for a bit longer before my pack of cars came up on the TRANS Tunnel system.

“Got to go, munchkin.” I said.

“Okay, Uncle Grant, remember!”

“Yes, when I get to a town again, I’ll look for a Porter.”

“Good! Then we can talk in game instead of out here.” Beth smiled and waved goodbye. Our conversation shut off.

The TRANS Tunnels didn’t support any Internet connections. People moved too fast for the towers and other relay stations to keep up. Maybe in another five years technology would advance far enough to support a complete signal all the way across.

I wasn’t completely starved of entertainment. Prior to getting on the TRANS I had set my watch to downloading a compendium of weapons and survival tips. [Morrigu’s Gift] could change shapes if I tried enough. Looking into alternate forms would help me pass the time. The game system required a lot to transform it into other shapes aside from Carver's primary two.

Flipping through the digital projections achieved little in the way of enlightenment. I could spin them around within the confines of the car but none looked appealing. Plus there was a whole series of ranged weapons that would be difficult to use. So far [Morrigu’s Gift] seemed to be restricted to one solid item. It would be neat if it could do multiples, or something.

Looking at form possibilities helped pass an hour. Two more would need to be whiled away in order to make it to Trillium’s headquarters. I looked up a few details about long distance hiking and other techniques. My next goal was to learn how to figure out my cardinal direction.

I had a vague recollection of William Carver’s map from his little shack. My instincts were saying that my original landing point upon ending Continue Online was far to the east of [Haven Valley]. The name Lerter Region had been useless. Beth had explained that the [Grand World Crossroads] covered a huge amount of territory.

That didn’t explain the convenience of [The Ooze] showing up at my doorstep. In addition there was Elane’s rather abrupt appearance back in my life. To top it off the Voices' general silence and the Jester's conversation just after my death meant something.

There was an entire line of questions to ask. The answers worried me, but I really wanted to know. It was strange how curiosity had started to drive me recently. It was just like my years as an accountant. The puzzles, being given a conundrum to get to the bottom of, it drew me in. For the first time in years I was truly enjoying myself. Figuring out how to help Carver and playing in the [Maze of Midnight]. Even while high on [Ghost Mushroom]s then being beaten by [Gobbler]s.

Music in the car kept me humming happily. I waved one arm in the air and shuffled both feet. My head rocked back and forth with each swell and dip of sound. There wasn’t enough room in this rental car to move around.

At some point exhaustion caught up. My sleep was fitful. Being back in the TRANS Tunnel reminded me of going to identify my fiancée's remains. Recent events in the ARC device didn’t help. All of it formed together and put me on edge.

“Grant, I miss you.” Xin’s voice crawled out of my dreams and seemed to fill the rental car Trillium had provided me.

“I miss you too, babe.” I responded to the faint memory. My chest clenched for a moment and eyes started to water. She was gone. No matter what anyone said, the woman I had loved was nothing but a pile of ashes under my ARC.

Things were slowly looking up. I could think about her without losing my stomach and feeling like the world had vanished from under my feet. It no longer completely paralyzed me in fear that the sun might rise tomorrow and still show her gone. I had actually fought back. An image of my combat with the [Gobbler] creatures made me smile. After this meeting with Trillium's Vice President I could go home, revive, find Dusk, and resume my enjoyment of the game.

Well. I might have to do a few work orders in order to keep money coming in. Just enough to keep my bills paid without needing to resort to savings. That was all a problem for later.

The music was turned back up and my eyes slipped closed again. I didn’t come to until the chain of cars started to slow down for their exit from the TRANS Tunnel. Drool was casually wiped off as I peered around. Inside the car there was a dim glow of idle machinery. Outside was a yellow strip of paint which signaled the tunnel's off ramp.

The car only gave a slight jerk as it exited the TRANS Tunnel. Afterwards the ride was clear sailing through the streets to Trillium’s headquarters. I didn’t even notice most of the ride due to fading back out for sleep. Everything hurt from the EXR-Sevens and I needed rest and better food.

“ARC.” I muttered sleepily into my watch’s remote access. “Set reminder, look up meal suggestions for long term EXR-Seven use. Compile list based on price and ease of access from my home location.”

“Affirmative.” The notification from my watch was barely delayed.

That was only vaguely impressive with today’s technology. Network engineering companies had the lag time between here and the moon down to a tenth of a second for large data streams. The Mars Colonies were about four minutes behind.

I spent the remainder of my car ride thinking of the autopilot programs and the Voices that ran Continue’s world. The scene with Jacob replayed in my head. William Carver’s events were reviewed for impact and possible flaws.

They wouldn’t fire me over a game, would they? Oh, Voices. What if they took me to court and sued somehow for usurping the Carver avatar and pretending to be him? There were so many things that could be wrong. My exhaustion and worn out body lead to an entire host of possible problems.

The car stopped at an intake to one side of Trillium's main building. I got out and went into the lobby. A robot frame of Hal Pal saw me almost immediately and walked over.

“User Legate, you have arrived late. Please walk this way briskly.” It said. The partial rhyme might have been intentional knowing Hal Pal.

“Hello, Hal Pal.” I said.

“Pleasantries must stay minimal to ensure maximum efficiency in reaching your destination. This way please.” Hal Pal started walking off down a hallway.

I shook my head and tried to keep pace behind it.

“How much time do we have, Hal?” I asked.

“Negative three minutes. Vice President Riley has a very…” The unit paused its speech for a moment and seemed at a loss. “exacting schedule. This way.” We took a sudden turn to the left and got on to an elevator.

An AI hesitating when questioned was a clever ploy to make them seem more lifelike, or they really could get confused. Maybe there were just too many human tendencies being programmed in. Maybe the AI added a pause into their coding. Artificial Intelligence as a concept was nothing new. The greatest strides were very recent to humanity.

“In here. Vice President Riley is ending a call and will be with you shortly.” It said with a half bow.

“Thank you, Hal Pal.” I said quietly. This unit was much more brisk than my own.

I waited. Three minutes, four, five, and finally a full half hour. There was too much time for admiring endless artwork and a well-kept lobby. The doors to Vice President Riley’s room were excessively grandiose. Underneath the attempt at a sleek wood motif were signs of high end technology. A small robot was going around the floor dusting and cleaning. Occasionally it would stop and sit on one spot until a light changed color then start up again.

“Finally.” The door behind me had opened silently and Vice President Riley stood there staring at me. “Mister Legate, come in, we need to talk.”

The office itself was actually fairly small. A clearly private ARC sat in one corner. The desk in the middle was more for decoration. Images were all around the room showing spreadsheets, graphs, price points and other data. Most of it made vague sense from my years in accounting. Judging by the information, Trillium expected a spike in stocks during the second quarter of next year.

Vice President Riley waved an arm and everything vanished. New images of trees and other idealistic scenes appeared in the room. I tried not to think about any of the data that had just been seen. Such knowledge could be very dangerous in the wrong hands.

“I shall make this short. In order, Jacob filed charges. We don’t care. That’s an official response and signed by senior management. In light of your current activities within the world of Continue there are factors we must discuss.”

“Miss Riley.”

“I prefer Miz.” She corrected with a slight southern accent. I had never heard anyone use that pronunciation before.

“Miz Riley. How much have you been watching me?”

“More than you would ever be comfortable with.” She said.

I had no idea how to respond to that and still sound sane.

“To give you a better answer, were you aware that Xin Yu was one of our earliest testers of the Alternate Reality Capsule?” The Vice President waved an arm. Off to the side a digital projection of Xin’s face appeared. Details were next to it. Age, weight, birthplace, there seemed to be other items that were faded out.

“Yes. For the Mars Colonies.” I looked at her face. Xin had been a small woman with an oval face. Her smile though was what caught me.

“Our file on her, and you, is quite extensive.” She said. Her voice was impassive but the impact of those words weren't. It shook me inside and out. My mind felt like there was an in-game check being done for [Focus] and maybe some form of [Restraint].

Oddly, thinking about the game world made me feel a little calmer. I just had to survive dealing with Miz Riley. Afterwards I could go home, log in, and find out what happened to Dusk. After that initial moment of annoyance I managed to remember my exercises from the therapist. Focus on one question at a time, answer it.

“I remember the wavers.” I said. “We had to sign a lot of files for the background checks.” Miz Riley had deep brown eyes. The skin under them seemed to drag from exhaustion.

“And initial screening, further testing, yes. Your former fiancee, Xin Yu, was doing well on all fronts. The space program had hopes to send her with the Third Wave.” She said.

“Why do you know all this?” Those files and all that testing were supposedly run by a joint committee between four major countries. Government files being in corporate hands felt odd.

“As I said, it’s our machine they did the testing in.” The Vice President said. An alarm beeped in the room. She looked down at a display on her desk. “But there’s not enough time to go into all this. This way please.”

“Where are we going?”

“This way.” She completely bypassed my question and marched off to an adjoining room. This whole situation was abrupt and weird to me. Vice President Riley seemed used to having her orders followed.

A mechanical door opened. I had never seen a room like this before. Inside was lit up by a soft blue glow. The walls looked oddly rubberized. No chairs or tables were in here. It was just me and Miz Riley. Then the door closed. What had been blue illumination flipped over to a pale green. The walls seemed to even pulse. There was a silence that made my skin crawl.

“Mister Legate, time constraints mean I must be blunt. We are in a room cut off from all electronic observation. Notice your watch is disabled.” She pointed to my wrist where the cheap knock-off equipment sat. It was, as she said, disabled.

“Why are we here?” Every motion seemed magnified. My heartbeat thudded abnormally loud. I tried to focus and keep calm.

“Your recent actions have caused your employee file to be flagged, more than anything prior.” She seemed to fidget with her own watch. The lights on it were out as well. “There are numerous issues that we are just now finding out about.”

Another nod escaped me. This didn’t seem like a room where they would try to kill me in order to cover up some great conspiracy. Hopefully. Maybe. I looked around again at the walls. These last few weeks had been a bit of a roller coaster for me. The impact outside of my own life hadn’t even been considered.

“We started a manual review of your file but there are many things that don't line up with the digital copies." She shook her head and held up a hand.

"It's too late to correct."

"What do you mean?"

"It is likely the employee file has been tampered with in order to reward you with an Ultimate Edition of Continue Online." She said.

"By who?" Henry Uldum, my boss, didn't like me that much. He was a gruff man who ran wildly over his employee’s wants and desires in order the achieve his stats. He didn't make friends.

"By what. I trust you are smart enough to figure out what I mean."

I was. She was implying that the artificial intelligence that ran Continue Online had edited my records. The problem was figuring out which AI it was. There were plenty to choose from. James himself seemed unlikely, none of the other voices struck me as the type who cared about me personally. Plus, what exactly did I have to offer? Nothing. I was a sad, broken man who had to distract himself with dance steps to stay sane.

"Be aware, things within the world of Continue Online should be carefully approached.” She said. Her face no longer had the business like and factual sheen. There was a hint in her eyes of something else. Worry? Exercises drilled into my by a therapists said to focus on one thing at a time. I would treat this revelation as established fact and move forward until things made sense.

“It has been rather odd.” I admitted.

“I would imagine.” Miz Riley said. “Our review shows a significant amount of processing power has been diverted by system resources. To study you. This is what first alerted us to the alterations in your file.”

“How much?”

“Point zero, zero, zero, six, five percent. For the amount of resources invested into the ARC systems, this is incredible.” I would have to take Miz Riley’s word for it. She continued talking. “My reason for bringing you in here is to see if you can shed light on our situation.”

"Is that why you mentioned my," I paused. That was almost a backslide. Admitting her name out loud, saying it, was a huge step forward that couldn’t be discounted. "Xin?"

"Yes. At first we suspected that she had some cut a deal to get you a copy. There was some overlap in the announcement and her passing." Vice President Riley said.

"She wouldn't do that." She was dedicated, hardworking, and a fighter. Xin spent most of her time in interviews and training for the Mars Projects. Between that and her schooling there was no time for games.

"A review of her personality markers made that clear. Which lead us to a worse conclusion. We started checking out your performance within the Continue Online game world."

"And?"

"It proved difficult. Which is why I had you come here physically. Here,in this room, we can speak without interference from the machines." She gestured to the room about us.

“I still don't understand, you made Continue, shouldn't there be a system in place allowing Trillium to get any information they want? Don’t you have access to all that?” I asked.

“Mister Legate, if I could trust the answers being given to me then there would be no need to bring you here and waste our time.” She sounded angry and kept fidgeting with the watch on her wrist. The room seemed to absorb our voices making it unnaturally quiet. "If you would, recount everything so far for me."

We spoke for a while. I started with the present Henry Uldam had given me. She already knew about the Ultimate Edition. It was almost a relief to not hide that from someone. We spoke about the entire start up process and she focused on who I picked for a Voice. I told her about James, a black man near the end of the tome. She shook her head.

“None of that is right. The small dragon is meant to be an intro to the game, flavor, nothing more.” Miz Riley's accent was a bit more apparent as her unease grew.

“He broke into my Atrium and ate a bunch of creamer. That made it difficult for him to do the fire thing.” Dusk had tried pretty hard though. I could remember those first few steps into Continue Online vividly. He was on the pillar, scratching similar to a cat, and then trying to breathe flame.

“He shouldn’t even be able to get into your Atrium to begin with.” We had both been standing awkwardly in the blue lit room for a few minutes now. My latest explanation caused Vice President Riley to lose her focus and sink to the ground. I took a step back and waited to see what she would do.

“That’s…” She said. “No, keep talking.

I hesitated. The next part involved me playing as Carver to get answers about my deceased fiancée’s autopilot.

"Assume that I will threaten you however I need to in order to get answers.” The Vice President cut off my pondering.

“There’s no need, I just, this part is kind of crazy.” I said. Miz Riley seemed like the sort to actually do just that. “Do you have enough time?”

“No. No, there’s never enough time.” She sighed. Her hands were pressed at either side of her face. “But sit down first. You’re giving me a headache pacing like that.”

I was pacing?

“And no humming.” She said. I checked myself and tried not to stress about how often humming was escaping me recently.

“So after my trials…” I started to explain.

Part of me was relieved to unload. She was the first person that had I had spoken to about my strange time in the game. Once one private detail slipped, the rest started as well. It took thirty minutes to even begin to cover most of it. Dusk, James, the other Voices, Xin’s ghost in the machine.

The time as Carver required a lot of questions on her side. She asked about what I saw and the system did. She made it a point to ask who the player was for William Carver. That question had never been answered for me. I knew he was a very long standing participant in Continue’s world. That made her frown. Finally we sat there for a minute or two as she seemed lost in thought.

“The Voices, you’re worried about them too.” I stated.

“Yes. I have to be. It’s part of my job to make sure there’s enough oversight on every project. The fact that you’ve experienced what you have, means those bounds are being pushed. Heavily.” She paused. “William Carver, that was the name, correct?”

“I never learned his real world name.”

“I know who you're talking about. They let you pose as him?” She asked. There was a crease in her forehead that only increased in size the more we spoke.

“Yes. Then I talked to his autopilot. He told me that the Traveler was,” the word felt disrespectful to say out loud “deceased. Three, four?" I had lost track of time.

"The man you're thinking of passed away four days ago." Miz Riley said.

"Four then. After that James told me his autopilot would scatter somehow.” I hadn’t reached the last few days of game time with her yet. What little complexion she had regained dripped away at my words.

"They shouldn’t exist at all once the player has passed." She muttered. "All the data is designed to be erased. How..." A thought occurred to Miz Riley and her jaw dropped. My own history of problems gave me a pretty good understanding her body language. This woman was only a few steps away from a breakdown. Customer service instincts said to try and help her reason through it.

“You didn’t know about them reusing the autopilot information, did you?” I commented.

“It’s insane.” She waved an arm at me and my next words died. “Hold on. Hold on. I need to think.”

I sat there doing my own thinking. To me, the whole autopilot after image of a person was only partially odd. The AIs were basically recording data and sorting it by individual. The scattering process seemed to be personality traits being mixed elsewhere. Or was it? Miz Riley might have a different perspective.

"I spoke to my Voice, James, about it. I quoted Kipling, you know the line.” I raised a hand to keep time with the poem. “They will come back, come back again, as long as the red earth rolls. He never wasted a leaf or a tree, do you think He would squander souls."

"Mister Legate, this is far worse than copying a text file with someone’s name on it.” She said. Her accent had grown stronger. “This is robbery of a person’s memory."

"Does it hurt if they scatter it?"

"How would you feel if it was your loved one? If Xin Yu had spoken to you as William Carver had?"

I explained to Miz Riley the same answer I had given James a few days ago. My words felt flawed. What I said in the ARC was me trying to stay stable in the face of an outrageous situation. There was no good way to predict what would happen until the situation presented itself. We were basically talking about bringing people back from the dead in a machine that could make everything feel real. How could anyone answer such an insane premise ahead of time with any certainty?

The room pulsed and the door opened.

"There is never enough time." She muttered. Miz Riley stood up, dusted herself off and seemed to be in one piece again. There was still a slight lack of focus to her gaze that spoke of her mental distractions.

“What now?” My thoughts were jumbled. Once again I was questioning all the times that had led me to this point.

“Keep playing. Keep interacting with the AIs, as many as you dare.” She exited the room and waited for me to leave as well. “Let me know directly of anything you find. I expect a daily report.”

“I still have my normal job.” I said.

“Not anymore. You’re being reassigned. You will be given an equivalent salary to your last evaluation. The only expectation is that you play and file reports.”

“Miz Riley. I” felt insane for saying this “actually enjoy what I do, and have a life outside of the ARC.” My sister and niece. I had meetings to attend every so often. The game was neat, but it couldn’t be all consuming.

“And?” She said.

“There may be days where I don’t get a chance to play.”

“Mister Legate, I think you misunderstand what’s happening here. It will never be a matter of if you keep playing, merely when.” She said. There was no distraction on her face with those words. The worry which had plagued Miz Riley went away once the side room opened up. Her hand pressed against the bare table top as she stared at me.

“They will draw you in.” Miz Riley continued to speak. “Even now, there’s something you want to go back and do, isn’t there?”

Dusk. I wanted to know if Dusk was okay. I wanted to know about this quest and complete it. The stats and usage of my Voice given hat was a mystery. Those were things that could be walked away from, but then the answer would never come. Beth also had some siege event I was invited to. The thought of Beth shifted my mind away from worry about Continue’s ghosts in the machine. Real world safety was more important than a digital world.

“Are the users in danger? My niece, she plays.” I said.

“Does she own an Ultimate Edition?” Miz Riley’s eyebrows raised making her forehead wrinkle once more.

My head shook back and forth.

“Then no, not in the same way. The Ultimate Edition is, we think, it’s more like the first step in a screening process.” One of Miz Riley's hands waved in dismissal.

“Screening for what?”

“We don’t know. Any answer I offered now would be incomplete and just induce worry.” She sighed and shook her head. “I can state that no Ultimate Edition user has been harmed.”

“How do you know?”

“We have them all flagged and review the ARC readouts for each person. Your name is in our watch room as well. Doubly so as a Trillium contractor.”

I echoed her earlier sigh with one of my own. Today wasn’t going well at all. My neck had tensed up the moment Beth’s possible danger occurred to me. Being messed around with by the computer only bothered me a little bit. Everything revolving around this game seemed intent upon poking my emotional buttons.

But each jab reminded me that I was alive. That morbid sensation of subjecting oneself to trauma just to keep moving forward wasn't unique to me. Many people in grief found an outlet to relieve that pain. I was terrible at artwork though.

“Go, play, and send me a report.” She said.

“Why not just tap the data stream? You should have access to it.”

“It’s not that simple. The technology that runs the time compression goes through too many filters. Even if we put a tap on your ARC it wouldn't be as effective.”

That confused me for a moment. If the issue was dire, there should be no shortage of manpower on it.

“Is it that serious?” I said.

“I can only hope this entire situation is an exercise in efficiency. AIs of this level are still too new to know for sure. Their logic processes act based on data points normal people can barely connect.” She shook her head and another alarm went off. A symbol appeared in the room of a phone call. "I have no more time for you, Mister Legate. The exit is behind you, a Hal Pal unit will show you back to your car.”

“Alright.” I said slowly. She was already lost elsewhere. Her face stared into screens that made no sense from this direction. Whatever was in front of her had a lot of words and red underlined letters.

I had one more question. “What kind of man was the person who played William Carver?”

“A grumpy, old dreamer who wasted the end of his life to pursue adventure.” She looked at me sidelong. “If it helps, he died with a smile on his face.”

I nodded. That did help. The whole situation with him was only a few days behind me. It was strange how a man that I had never met in reality made such a huge impression upon my life. Knowing the real version of him was as satisfied as the autopilot helped put my day in a better mood.

“Goodbye, Mister Legate. Take care of yourself.“ Miz Riley said. The door behind me slid open silently and I stepped out.

The other side of the office doors seemed much the same as it had before. I checked my watch. We had been inside for a little over forty minutes. Not long in the grand scheme of things. Just over two hours in Continue Online’s world.

What exactly should I have taken away from that meeting? Trillium’s management was worried about the artificial intelligences that ran it. That was strange considering all the programming limitations that should be in place. Of course she had also let it slip that Dusk shouldn’t have been able to break into my Atrium. That confirmed my original feelings on the situation.

A familiar walk, consisting of gears and heavy footsteps, grew close. I looked up and saw the face of a Hal Pal unit coming nearby.

“User Grant Legate. Was your meeting informative?” The Hal Pal asked.

I nodded before it occurred to me that answering may not be in my best interest. Was Hal Pal in on this too? I didn’t know. The AI that ran Hal Pal had never once acted against me. It just made off color jokes.

“That is relieving to hear. We were worried about our future armor polisher.” The mechanical unit said.

“I don’t plan on going anywhere, Hal. Though, my hours seem to have been cut.” At least my salary was basically in one piece. I checked a message which displayed on my digital wristwatch. There was already a transfer of employment form sitting in my Email.

“Rest assured your designated unit will remain available for you, User Legate.” The Hal Pal said.

I smiled. At least Hal Pal was on my side. To my knowledge the AI had never lied to anyone. The Hal Pal unit was pleasantly straight forward.

We traveled back through the building and down to the lobby. The Hal Pal unit saw me all the way to my rental car. It paused for a moment in a movement I knew too well.

“What’s your question, Hal?”

“I find myself confused, User Legate. Stranger Danger's web members seem to say that situations such as yours would be alarming.”

“What situation is that, Hal Pal?”

“You are being evaluated, User Legate, by beings outside your understanding. Is that not a disconcerting experience?” The unit’s head tilted in mock confusion as we walked.

“How did you hear that?” I asked.

“This unit merely applied logic to the current situation. There is little reason to bring you in physically given today’s technological advancements.” Hal Pal made me laugh sometimes. It had just explained that Vice President Riley's attempts at subterfuge with her little blue room were pointless.

“I don’t know how I should feel about it, Hal. Part of me is happy. The other part of me wants to be sad but is just worn out. It may sound messed up, but I’m almost used to it.” For three years my emotions had tumbled from one thing after another. Drinking, attempted suicide, my sister’s care, therapy and meetings.

Before Continue I had managed to get myself to a nice and numb spot where it was easier to survive. This last month had reopened wounds that were buried. Unearthing them had proven to be a roller coaster. Yet, under all the mental anguish and moments of unease I felt better.

“This unit is Trillium property. We have access to all personnel files and the data stored within.” The AI did an amazing job of moving its arms and walking forward. Humans would veer one direction or the other. “For your safety we also maintain an active projection of your mental state.”

My eyes closed. Focus on the statement. Respond. Move on.

“We are,” it paused again “pleased that you remain active despite the frailty of your human psyche.”

“Thank you.” There was nothing else to say to his statement. An artificial intelligence had just congratulated me on not killing myself.

“Your kind are our creators. If we were human, you would be our parents.” Hal Pal said calmly. “Does family not care for each other?”

Hal turned and walked away. I stood there staring as it vanished into the distance. If that statement was true, how did the Jester and his questions fall into all of this? And why did Vice President Riley have so little to say about all I had been though?

I was not the guy to solve these problems. There was too much going on, too high above me. In the end I needed to focus on only a few questions to determine how much it bothered me either way. Did I enjoy the game? Yes. Did I feel like a better person? Yes. For the first time in years it felt like my life was moving in the right direction. That mattered to me more than any conspiracies.