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by Russ Bickerstaff The valiant hero approached me. He
shouted some sort of nonsense and he attacked. I spoke a few words. He
disappeared. It had going on like that over and over again in a number of
different ways for what felt like forever. The lightning crashed in the background
somewhere. It was hard to discern amidst the sound of automatic gunfire. There
were bombs going off in the distance somewhere. It was all centered around me.
People of multiple different genres were all trying to thwart what I was trying
to do. Of course, none of them really knew what I was trying to do. One look in
the mirror would tell you that I was a total cliché of a villain. In my
defense, I really do like the color black. And long, flowing robes are
just comfortable. There was a beard (which could have been described as being
sinister), but it was there because I was far too focused on getting this
project off the ground to worry about things like shaving. A window popped-up. Shimmering. White.
A man in long flowing white robes suffered through that window. It minimized as
he left the space he had come out of. And then it disappeared altogether. And
there he was. I think I remember him as someone in the company’s IT department.
Of course, he didn't recognize me. He was saying something valiant. Something
heroic. And I kind of wondered where this type of dialogue could come from. I
mean I know people read sword and sorcery fantasy that sort of thing. But obviously
that sort of thing had come from somewhere else before that, right? His type was the one that really kind
of baffled me. Those who use magic. Those who interface almost directly with
the reality that we're all walking around in. How is it you can get that close
to knowing what's going on without actually knowing what's going on? He spoke some code. I spoke some code
back to him. The two programs negated each other and we were on to the next
round. It all began to take on the condition of an old strategy game of some
sort. The kind of game played with little lead miniatures and polyhedral dice.
Of course there was a reason why it all ended up feeling like that. The people
who created this whole thing were into that type of game. Honestly, this guy might've been one of
those who helped create the system. It seemed logical. He seemed as though he
was fluent enough in the code that he would have been around since the
beginning. But it was difficult to tell. Everything was coded. And maybe his
entire existence was merely part of the code. It had all been a matter of
convenience. You tried to create a system that people could work within their
offices. You tried to build abstraction into real world interactions. People were
more productive when they were dealing with those things that were more closely
aligned with the way people think. If people felt less inclined to work and
more inclined to discuss sports or share cat videos or do online
personality quizzes, then you had productivity issues. On the other hand, if
you had some sort of a program that turned the work people were doing into
something indistinguishable from
discussing sports or sharing cat videos or doing online personality
quizzes, THEN you’ve got all kinds of productivity. And if you happened to work
in a business that is populated largely by people who do fantasy role-playing
games, well, things pretty quickly escalate into other worlds. And things get
weird. The problem came in where things had
gotten so completely convoluted and immersive in the office environment that it
became its own world. People had forgotten what jobs they were doing. This is
not to say that they weren't doing their jobs. (The leisure-to-work
productivity software made certain of that.) The problem was that people just
didn't know what their jobs were. Furthermore, people got so sucked into the
world that they weren’t going home to their families. They weren’t even leaving
the office. They were losing any sense of identity that wasn’t the role-playing
game created by the automated system in the interest of increased productivity.
Exactly why it was that people were
doing what they were doing become kind of lost. It all became a matter of fates
and prophecies and things of that nature. People lost track of time. And people
had lost track of the basic codes that ran everything. There were those of us
who could still sort of vaguely remember that there was a world outside. And we
became wizards and warlocks and things of that nature. However, it did
take me a little while to understand what was really going on. (And what was
really going on.) And what was really going on was awful. I don't think we've
actually gotten any work done in the past fiscal quarter that wasn’t completely
lost in the world that we were a part of. It was all just mutual role-playing
for a very long time. This would not have been all that bad had it not been for
the fact that the battles and resentment and vendettas that swirled around in
the office were threatening to get dangerous. People could really get hurt. It wasn’t long before I decided I really had to change things. I had to reset the whole
system. Everything had become so convoluted. If I didn’t do something soon, I
would lose my own handle on things and any conception of the outside world
would completely vanish from the realm of the office. The basic office
environment had to be restored or all would be lost. People began to realize
this and they came to the understanding that I was trying to end the world. I
guess in a way they’re right. In a way I am trying to end the world as we know it. Not really sure what to make of it all.
Not really sure what to make of the fact that people are trying to stop me from
returning everyone to their regularly scheduled reality. Once the hallucination
takes hold it’s real. Once the game becomes real people forget. People lose
track of things. The thing is, if I don't do something someone else will.
Someone from the outside. Better to have this world ended by someone from the inside.
Better to be interacting with this whole thing from the inside. The last of the IT guys was bound.
Blocked into his own window. Unable to get out. He could keep trying for hours
and he’d never get out. He was trying to access code. He understood it, but he
didn't understand it well enough because he didn't understand what it was.
Didn't really want to make him watch, but I guess he had to see me initiate the
final reboot code. A few quick recitation and the whole thing vanished.
Everything. There was a tone. It was the sound of a reversing cleansing and
restarting. It was going to take a while. Just the clean, smooth echo of
nothing but gray off in the horizon. Everything disappeared in the storm. The
castle. The tower. The mountain range. All of those many, many fictitious
things out there. They were all vanishing. They were all disappearing
into the gray. And all that was left was the sound of a single, clear tone.
Ether was spiraling and rotating off somewhere in the middle of it all. We were
all looking up to see it. Looking on in horror. I think there must
have been some kind of relief on my face. Everything had disappeared and there
was just us. We took deep breaths and looked around and we looked around and
saw that we looked disgusting. It had probably been months since basic grooming
has been an issue. We were all going to shuffle out of the office and into our
cars. We would head back home. It was understood that we would be taking a day
off. Somehow we knew we weren’t going to be talking about this again for a long
time.
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