Solipsis: Escape from the Comatorium (14 page)

“
Virtual,
simulated, imaginary, whatever,” Renee replies.

“
I
think we should just be imaginary friends,” Patrick says
angrily and storms off, jumping to a nearby cloud and disappearing.

“
Wait!”
Renee shouts, running through a crowded street in downtown Solipsis.
Impossible skyscrapers of glass and steel dominate the urban core.
With no need for transit, thanks to televators, the city is more of a
community space. The streets are filled with people. Street
performers show off new skills, music, art pieces. Vendors peddle
their virtual wares. Patrick runs through the crowd, away from Renee.
She loses him, but then spots him ducking into an avatar shop.

Renee
finds Patrick in an aisle of canine avatars. “Wait,”
Renee says. Patrick ducks around the corner to the next aisle, filled
with anthropomorphic reptiles. He stops running. “I'm sorry.”
Patrick walks down the aisle, ignoring her. “What are you
doing?”

“
I'm
looking for a new avatar.”

“
Why,”
Renee asks.

“
I
don't want to be a boy anymore,” Patrick replies. “What
about this wolf?”

“
I
don't know, it looks pretty fierce,” Renee says quietly.

“
I
can be fierce,” Patrick says coldly. A salesman approaches.
He's a fast-talker.

“
If
you want fierce, then you'd love the new Lycan-tek! They're designed
by Trajan himself, very detailed! Only 600 credits.”

“
No
thanks,” Patrick says, “I'm not spending 600 credits.”

“
And
you'll feel the luxury of every single credit,” the salesman
replies without missing a beat, “you get what you pay for after
all. Plus, the latest designs offer much greater,” he nudges
Renee, “sensitivity.”

“
Screw
off, ya creep,” Renee shoves him. Her hands go right through
the hologram. “Whatever happened to spam filters?” Renee
turns to Patrick, he stares at an avatar, not wanting to look at her.
“So, are we...okay?”

Patrick
doesn't respond, stares straight ahead. She doesn't want to repeat
the question. He still says nothing and stands perfectly still. Then
Renee notices that the store is very quiet. She steps out of the
aisle and finds that everyone has frozen in place. Renee gasps then
looks back to Patrick. He's frozen in place too. “Am I dead?”
she thinks, “Am I having a stroke? Is this a Xenon Shock? What
the hell!?”

She
pushes on Patrick, “Wake up!” He moves rigidly like a
mannequin. She pushes him harder and he falls down. “What the
hell is going on?”

The
Hologram salesman scrolls down the aisle to Patrick and tries to
up-sell him on more content. Renee runs from the store and finds a
Televator on the street. She gets in, closes the door, but is not
greeted by a televator voice.

“
Home!”

Nothing
happens. It's dead. Renee walks down the street, amongst the frozen
avatars, finding all televators are dead.

It's
eerily quiet.

Then
a thunderous crash echoes through the urban corridor. A giant
creature, a behemoth, comes into view. It's a sixty-foot-tall
humanoid figure with elephant-like skin. It comes down the street,
smashing people like they're ants. Renee backs away, stunned. The
behemoth spots her, the only person that can move, and starts running
for her, bowling over dozens of people. Renee retreats into the
avatar store. Renee finds Patrick on the floor. “Patrick! Come
on Patrick, wake up!” She shakes him but he doesn't move. The
behemoth crashes through the front of the store, spraying glass
everywhere. It's much too tall to enter, and so it lays down,
crawling and reaching into the store, knocking over shelves, bashing
people out of the way.

“
Patrick,”
she says one last time as the giant hand swipes at her. She leaves
him, sprinting out the back of the store.

Renee
walks under the searing sun through the cobweb of suburbs branching
out from the city. Frozen families stand like statues in their yards.
Renee rubs her sunburned neck and looks up suspiciously at the
blazing star in the sky. It seems to have been overhead for hours,
maybe it's frozen too. But it also seems brighter, turned up. Renee
spots the glass observation dome coming up, she's nearly home. She
finds Medved, frozen mid-stride in the yard. She hugs her frozen
teddy bear. No response.

Renee
sits down in the neatly trimmed grass, defeated. She looks around at
her frozen world.

Will
it stay like this forever?

“
I
think I got something in my eye,” Medved says. Looking around,
Renee discovers the people have all unfrozen. However they haven't
blinked in hours, their eyes are totally dry. “Was I asleep?”
Medved asks.

“
You
were frozen in place, everyone was!”

“
Like
we were disconn-”

Medved
stops cold as he spots a behemoth trudging by. It crushes a house and
walks past, on its way to the city.

“
What
the hell is going on?” Renee asks.

“
I
don't know,” Medved says quietly. “Let's get out of
here,” he says, running for the house. Renee follows. Medved
jumps into the televator, discovering what Renee already knows. “It's
not on.”

“
What
does that mean?” Renee asks.

“
I
think somebody has taken over Solipsis.”

“
Who?”

“
I
don't know,” Medved says.

“
Yes
you do,” Gwen says from the top of the stairs.

“
Mom!”
Renee runs and hugs her. “Mom, what's happening?” Gwen
and Medved exchange a look. “What aren't you telling me?”
Medved doesn't want Renee to know the truth. “Where's dad, he'd
know what to do,” Renee says, not willing to give up already.

“
He
was in surgery,” Medved says.

“
Maybe
he's fighting them in the real world,” Renee says hopefully.

“
With
the televators off, maybe he's just in limbo,” Medved replies,
“by the looks of it, they've got everything under control.”

“
So
we're completely screwed, that's what you're telling me?” Renee
asks. Gwen and Medved look to each other for any ideas. Nothing. The
house starts to shutter, as if from an earthquake. Renee stumbles to
a window and sees a behemoth coming their way. It's stomping down an
entire row of houses, moving through them like they aren't even
there. They rush down the stairs in an attempt to get out of the
house before it is inevitably crushed. Medved practically carries
Renee down the stairs, going very fast. Gwen follows behind. The
giant's feet tear through the house, turning everything into
shrapnel.

Renee
comes to her senses, sitting in a pile of debris. Medved sits up next
to her, seemingly okay. “Where's Mom?” Renee asks. They
clear the debris and stand up in the footprint of their house,
apparently unharmed. They search frantically through the debris.

A
gurgling sound coming from a pile of concrete gets their attention.
They approach it slowly. Medved carefully clears a large chunk of
tile floor and finds Gwen. Her body is crushed, nearly flattened in
some places. Her skin clings to shattered bones. She coughs up blood.
Medved lays down next to Gwen, trying to comfort her. Renee stares in
horror. Gwen is in extreme pain. If this were earth, she would have
been killed instantly. But here...she has to endure the pain, to know
what it's like to be crushed.

Renee
falls to her knees on her flattened mother's side. “Why is she
in so much pain?” Renee is in shock.

“
They
turned the pain sensors up,” Medved replies quietly, looking
away from the grotesque scene.

“
We
have to fix her right now” Renee says, “Medved!”

“
Yeah,”
is all Medved can say, overwhelmed by the sight.

“
Come
on, help me,” Renee says, trying to pick up her flattened
mother. Gwen screams in agony.

“
Stop,”
Medved says. “The televators are off.”

“
Are
you telling me we can't defrag her? She's stuck like this?”
Renee demands.

“
Wait,
wait.” Medved has an idea, “some televators are not
changeable. It's a fail-safe in case something gets screwed up in an
update. Some of them should still be on.”

“
So
we can get back to Earth!?”

“
Probably
not, if they cut the line, then we can't get out. But they can't turn
off defragging. It's not editable.”

“
So
where are those televators?” Renee asks.

“
Downtown.
It won't be easy to get there,” Medved admits.

“
We
have to,” Renee says. “She's going to go mad from the
pain if we don't. Help me.” Renee sets to removing the shards
of glass and debris from her mother's flattened body. Gwen clenches
her eyes and tries to comfort herself by repeating some inaudible
phrase. Renee delicately pulls out a shard of glass. Gwen screams in
pain.

“
This
is no use,” Medved says.

“
We
just have to get her
head
to a televator, right?” Renee asks. Medved's eyes acknowledge
this unsavory truth. “Find me something sharp.” Medved
doesn't move. “Are you gonna help me or not?” Medved
hesitates

“
Mind
over matter,” Gwen repeats with her eyes jammed shut. Medved
finds a sharp glass shard and holds it toward Renee.

“
I
can't watch,” Medved says. Renee takes the glass shard and
nods. Medved averts his eyes and Renee gets ready to decapitate her
mother.

“
Mind
over matter,” Gwen whispers faster and faster. Renee holds her
mother's head firmly in one hand and a large glass shard in the
other. She takes a deep breath and presses the sharp edge against
Gwen's neck. Gwen tries to hold her tongue, but can't, letting out a
terrible scream. Renee has to shut it out. Her eyes focus, she sees
nothing but the neck and the glass. Medved sneaks a peek, only to
immediately turn away in disgust. Renee keeps focused, jamming the
glass shard deeper into her neck. She hacks at the skin, tearing the
tissue. She pulls on the skull, ripping the neck apart. Renee puts
her knee on Gwen's shoulder. She twists and tears the head from the
spine, slicing at stubborn tissue that barely hold the sides
together. All that's left is the spine. Renee firmly plants both
knees on the naked spine, grabs Gwen's screaming cheeks, and twists.
The bones crackle and snap. Renee tugs but can't quite get it to
separate. Renee puts the head back down, cuts at the spinal cord
through the separated vertebrae, then picks the head up again and
tugs. It still won't budge.

Medved
grabs the head and yanks it right off with his giant bear paws. He
takes Gwen's head and holds it like a baby.

Medved
and Renee walk briskly towards the skyscrapers looming ahead of them.
“How do you know these televators will even work?” Renee
asks.

“
It's
a fail-safe, it's something that can't be changed. This is supposed
to be a safe world.”

“
I
don't understand,” Renee says.

“
Your
brain has an understanding of how it interacts with the world outside
of it. People had a tendency to go into the games and lose track of
reality. Solipsis is the safe world. It's just like Earth, same
physics, same feelings, everything. It keeps people from losing track
of what's real.”

“
What
does that have to do with the televator?” Renee asks.

“
Well,
that's one of those safety things, like there aren't allowed to be
any explosions or guns in Solipsis. It's written into the world
architecture. That way if someone's shooting a gun at you, you know
you're still in a game world. The televators originally were
uneditable. That way, no matter what happened, if there was some kind
of bug or a crash, they would still be there and you could get out
fine or defrag if you had to. After a while, crashing stopped being
such a problem and we stopped making them uneditable because people
wanted to customize them. So most of them are editable, and when
whoever it is took over, they turned them off. But those old
televators, the ones that have been here from the beginning. Those
are still on.”