Chapter An Unlocked Room

The most elegant natural garden either had ever seen with a sun lit blue sky, clouds and a slight warm breeze. Josh walked a few steps inward when small brightly colored birds swept by him in the air and landed on branches nearby where some let out wonderful melodies of song as they sat perched watching him. He turned and smiled at Sheri who couldn’t help returning one. It looked really peaceful. There was a path in front of him. He turned, waved his hand and stepped forward. Sheri wanted so badly to go with him but their safety came first. She waited at the door.

The path was sloped slightly downward and he followed along it until he found a stream of water falling a short distance gurgling into a pool and churning up air bubbles. The water was as clear as glass and minnows could be seen darting about looking for floating insects for a meal. Josh stopped and looked around. Music started to play a short distance away from beyond a large boulder. What the heck Josh thought. He cautiously peeked around the rock to see an old man sitting at a desk in the middle of a grassy knoll. He was typing something on a keyboard. Josh approached him and said, “Hello.”

The man turned toward him surprised and said, “You again. I thought I made it clear for all to stay out of my domain.” The music volume went way down. “Brutus get rid of this virus,” he said and a large black half dog half robot looking creature stood up from his prone position on all fours. His ears were pointed up and his stare could melt ice.

He slowly took a step with his head down in attack mode toward Josh who didn’t think about running. This creature would surely run him down. He showed his teeth which appeared to be made of steel.

Josh yelled, “Wait a minute. Please, I’m not a virus!”

The man gave a verbal command that Josh did not recognize and the dog stopped in his tracks. “What is that, you are not a virus?”

“No sir. I am a boy whose lost and looking to find a way back to my pod.” By this time Sheri was getting anxious about not seeing Josh anymore and hearing the music start and then stop. She thought she couldn’t leave because the door may lock them in and the rest would not know what happened to them so she stayed in place.

The man said, “How did you get in here?”

“Through the door. It wasn’t locked.”

“Go then, you must leave right away.”

“But I don’t know how to properly navigate this dangerous place. I am stuck here and my exit button doesn’t work. The door to my class has locked and the teacher and the students appear to be frozen. I can’t get back to my pod.”

“My door was supposed to be locked to keep viruses out. Children are not supposed to be in that hallway. It’s a path for network communications and often viruses try to get access anywhere they can find an open door. You better be careful out there. There are anti-virus bots on patrol that kill anything with out proper credentials. That means you. The more common ones hover in the air, but I have seen some that move along the surface like the viruses. The floating ones can move in the halls with great speed. I use that door to protect me but I have Brutus as well. He loves to encounter unfriendlies. I am a software tinker so I have other weapons at my disposal.” the man said.

Josh remembered Yancy mentioning his father was a tinker so he belted out, “One of my fellow students who is also locked out has a father who tinkers with software. Won’t you consider helping us?”

“I am the oldest tinker on the planet. I teach the art to those who are allowed into the field locally. What is his name?”

“Yancy, sir.”

“Yancy what?”

“That is his last name. I don’t know his first name.”

Old man thinks and then said, “I did teach a Yancy years ago. He was good but not at my level.”

“So will you help us?”

“Still no. You better be moving along now before I auto lock that door you came through.”

Josh was crushed. He thought finding another digital human in there would be the answer to their problems. He stood there defiant knowing or hoping Sheri was still holding the door open.

The old man uttered a slight alteration to the command he gave Brutus earlier and the dog stood up and started to growl. Then he said to Josh, “The viruses and bots don’t use vision to find their prey. They use other sensors. They will sense your fear. Control your fear and you have a chance. Josh decided he better go and left the knoll. As he walked along the path around the boulder and up the hill he felt he was being followed. The path had one switchback coming up and he wanted to see if the old man was following him. As he turned on the path he looked back without having to give away that he was concerned. He was being followed by Brutus who walked along keeping a distance behind him.

He followed the path back to the door where Sheri was waiting. He saw a wooden stick and picked it up. He tried to exit the room with it but the stick would not pass through the door. His hands were empty in the hallway. “Darn,” he said.

She was so happy to see him she hugged him. “Did you find anything useful?”

Josh stood in deep contemplation for a moment then he removed one of his shoes.

Sheri asked, “Are you getting undressed?”

“No. I am going to place this shoe in the door to jam it from closing all the way.” He placed the shoe on the floor and they let the door close. It stopped at the shoe before closing all the way. “Perfect.” He placed his other shoe outside the room on the other side of the hall as a marker. “Come on lets head back. I will fill you in on what happened on the way.” They walked back toward Molly.

Yancy and Pete had gone about twice the distance of where they lost site of Molly with no luck finding an open door. Yancy said, “Why don’t we head back. This is going nowhere. Maybe Josh and Sheri had some luck.” Pete shook his head agreeing and they turned around.

Josh finally saw Molly ahead. They could also see Yancy and Pete in the distance. They would meet in minutes and update each other.

Molly walked a few steps toward Josh and said, “Where are your shoes,” looking surprised.

“I will tell all of you when they get here. How are the students in class?” he asked.

“About the same. No movement.”

Yancy and Pete joined the group. Josh told them what he encountered in the open room. He ended with, “We are not safe here. Anything we meet like the viruses or the anti-virus bots will try to destroy us.”

Molly panicked, “What do these things look like. The note said there was danger out here in the hall.”

“Yes but how could we have known that. The teacher knew it but didn’t bother to tell us, said Yancy.

Pete took a couple of steps toward the door, leaned in and tried to smash the door open by jumping into it with his shoulder only to be agonizing in pain after the door held strong.

Sheri gave him a concerned look, “What are you doing?”

“If we are not safe out here we need to get back inside that room.”

Yancy was annoyed, “Didn’t you hear what Josh told us? If this door is open the virus will enter the class and harm us or lead the anti-virus bots there and they would harm us.”

Josh was trying to focus his friends, “Hold on everyone. We have to work together or we will have no chance. Is there anything we can use to defend our selves?” They all looked at the empty hallway and at each other shrugging.

Yancy finally spoke up, “Well we are five in all. I wonder what these machines look like and their size, maybe we can overwhelm them.”

“Five kids against a virus, yeah right.” Molly wasn’t convinced.

Sheri says her idea, “What if we practice laying up against the walls to minimize the amount of contact we might have. Maybe we can trick them into passing us by.”

Molly said, “I have a better idea. How about we run.”

Pete’s confidence returned, “I’m with Yancy, we should attack them. We have numbers.”

Josh stood contemplating their input, “A lot of ideas. What should we do other then just stand here waiting to be attacked?”

“We need to stay together from now on. Power in numbers.” Sheri paused to see if anybody agreed.

“Yeah, never go hiking in bear country with friends if you are the slowest runner,” said Pete. No one new whether he was joking.

Molly started to cry and said, “I’m scared.” Yancy put his arm around her.

“You don’t have to worry. I am the slowest,” said Sheri trying to cheer her up.

Pete went after her, “This is no time to be sobbing.”

“Molly may have the answer,” said Josh pondering.

“What are you talking about? How is crying going to help?” said Pete.

“Don’t you see? The old man said to me as I was leaving that these killers will sense our fear.”

Pete loses it, “Oh great that helps.”

Sheri perked up, “Let him finish.”

Josh continued, “That’s right. We need to learn to start generating our own fear. The pod will release a signal that will momentarily tranquilize us making us less noticeable to the bot sniffers.”

Yancy had remained silent for too long, so he spoke up, “OK Josh, you are losing me now.”

“This might not work but it may be our only weapon for now. Everybody think thoughts that will increase your physiology. Heart rate, short breaths, hatred, sadness, anxiety etc.”

“That’s easy, I hate all of you.” Pete made a hateful face.

Josh nodded at him, “However you can make it work.”

Sheri thought about a recent pet cat that passed away. She instantly came to tears.

“Your right Pete. This is easy. I only hate you.” Yancy laughed.

“Stay focused Yancy, come on,” scolded Sheri.

Pete wasn’t buying it, “How do we know we can get hurt in her. These bodies we see are not real. They are our digital twins. We are in our pods safely at home.”

Everyone spoke out against Pete’s insensitivity.

Josh thought about it and said, “He may be right. If we die in here what happens. Does our pod at home open? Do we revert back to our real selves like when we wake up from a bad dream?”

“OK, how about when danger approaches we give the bot Pete and test the theory,” Yancy said half joking.

Pete did not like the proposition, “When are you going to stop joking?”

Sheri added her two cents, “Let’s continue practicing and maybe we’ll never be tested into needing it.”

“Good, that’s settled. What should we do? Stay here or continue searching,” said Molly.

Sherri chimed in with, “Josh marked the other door where we met Mike with his shoes,” she removed her sneakers and put one next to the door to mark the classroom. “There now this door is marked. We should stay all together from now on.” They all agreed.

Yancy quit joking and said, “I suggest we go back to the old man. Maybe if I talk about my Dad and tinkering he will warm up to us. Maybe he can tell us if we would really die if something bad happened to us in here.”

“Anybody have a better idea? If not let’s go,” said Josh and they head off toward the old mans domain looking for his shoes marking it. “By the way, I don’t think it would be a good idea for all of us to go in. Brutus could be trouble.”

“I’ll go in with one other person if someone wants to volunteer,” said Yancy.

“If that dog thing tears you apart, how would another person there be of any help?” asked Pete.

Sheri gave Pete a dirty look and said, “I’ll go in with you.”

“Never mind Sheri, I will go with him,” Pete said. That settled it with them. “I can run faster anyway,” he smiled at Sheri letting her know he was joking.

“We have a ways to go so why don’t we all settle in and quietly practice bringing on an anxious state of mind. We will only get one chance to pull it off. If we fail well…” said Josh.

They walked on cautiously waiting for something to attack. They had no idea what it would look like or how to know what type of threat it was.

Sheri’s eyes picked up on what looked like Josh’s shoe ahead, “There,” she pointed. Then they saw other larger moving objects approaching from the other side of the mark coming in their direction.”

“Oh My,” said Molly, “What are they?”