BRECK: SIMULATION #40.2
I stare at the card, hoping to notice something that I have overlooked or to unlock a new interpretation. But there are only four words—not much new to discover. Something here is real. The rest is not. And the difference is imperceptible, to me at least.
“The smallest one is not hollow,” Sam points out, which is true, though not our criteria, and even if it were, it’s not clear what we would do with this information. What are we supposed to do once we locate the real one? Yell that we know the answer? Hug it? Climb inside? It’s not in the instructions.
Sam moves toward the center of the room and holds the thumb-sized figure in the air, inspecting it over my head in the lone beam of light shining down. I remain seated, falling in and out of his shadow.
“There has to be something we’re missing,” I say. “Something obvious that we’re overlooking.”
I stand and pace in a slow arc around the line of dolls. The decorative art all seems like different versions of the same painting, rearranged in various ways. I run my fingers along each as I pass. They feel the same. As optimistic and hopeful as I want to be, frustration sets in. My thoughts trace the same fatigued loop that my feet are on.
All of the dolls look real . . . They all feel real . . . What is real? . . . Am I the only thing that’s real? . . . What would I even do if this were the right answer? . . . Am I missing something in the clue? . . . All of the dolls look real . . .
With each loop, precious time slips away.
I stop and reach into my pocket, pressing my palm flush to the phone.
“Have you noticed something new?” Sam asks, which has become his latest question of choice.
“No, Sam. It all still looks the same.”
I wrap my fingers around the phone and surrender, allowing myself to state what I’m most feeling right now.
“I need you, Liv,” I say out loud.
LIV: SPRING BREAK 7.3
Breck calls my name and my heart aches. I want so badly to help him, but I don’t know what to do. I wish I could be there with him, to let him know he’s not alone. But I’m powerless.
And I’m as lost as he is on this challenge. I don’t know what the heck the dolls mean.
The dolls encircle Breck, as if they could tackle him if they all lunged forward at once.
Breck repeats his plea, which I can’t answer.
“Is someone calling with more information?” Sam asks.
“I don’t think so. I think we’re on our own. Until the end,” Breck answers, slumping.
I slump along with him. This is crushing me.
“It is not understandable.”
“What don’t you understand now, Sam?”
“The clue.”
“Why?” Breck asks.
“Because it is all real,” Sam answers.
I turn my head away from the screen. I can’t watch it anymore. But Sam’s words echo in my head, . . .because it is all real . . .
It hits on something that bothers me about this challenge. It’s dismissive of Breck’s existence. As basic as Sam’s logic is, he’s right. It all seems real. Every single doll, the floor beneath his feet, the walls that enclose him. Everything. Singling out one thing that’s actually real is a pretty crappy thing to do. It reminds Breck that almost everything about where he is—including himself—undermines his existence.
I’m now pissed.
Screw Jessica and DoRC. They don’t give a flip about Breck!
I glance to Jessica’s framed photo which remains on the floor where I had dropped it when I last spoke with her. I kick it with a frustrated grunt. It slides under the bed.
I storm around my room in circles, like Breck did around his.
They’re tormenting him. Why would they design something to taunt him like this? It’s like reminding Pinocchio that he’s not a real boy.
And it doesn’t even make sense. It’s taking a step backward from the other challenges.
Unless—
Sam is right.
I dart back to the computer.
“Sam is right about the clue!” I shout it out loud.
And I know the answer.
BRECK: SIMULATION #40.3
“There are twenty-eight minutes remaining,” Sam warns, two minutes after providing his last update on time.
This deadline might as well be the only thing that’s real. It is the only certain path out of this room.
I wonder what it will be like when I vanish. Will I notice? Will I return to a place of false memories, persisting indefinitely among them? Or will I simply cease to be, spared from the torment of not existing by the act of not existing. I suppose there is something peaceful in this notion.
I have not abandoned efforts to solve this challenge, but I have relinquished most of my hope. Like Sam, I’m meandering through this space, reinspecting what has already been reinspected many times over, merely passing the remaining time.
LIV: SPRING BREAK 7.4
Dammit!
He’s not getting anywhere, and even worse, he seems resigned to it. He doesn’t have any spark to him. He’s shuffling around with sunken shoulders, like the posture of a condemned man.
“See it! You know it’s true. It is all real. That’s the point,” I say, as though he can hear.
I’m sweating, like a bystander helplessly watching a train hurtle toward someone on the tracks.
Breck’s phone is wrapped in his hand, waiting for me to call. I am his last thread of hope.
But I can’t call him. And even if I could, any help from me would only nullify his accomplishment. Which might risk his life.
Ugh! I want to scream.
“There are twenty-six minutes remaining,” Sam says.
It’s not fair that he can talk to Breck.
He’s not on the outside, like I am.
He’s on the inside, but he never says anything worth—
Wait!
That’s it!
Sam can talk with Breck. He can be my voice. Nobody is paying attention to him. Their eyes are only on Breck.
Would this be against the rules?
If I gave him the answer outright . . . absolutely. And there’s no way I could sneak it by, even if I wanted to. Sam would never get it on his own. Nobody would believe it.
But what if I only give a nudge? Not even a hint. Only a point in the right direction. Even Jessica said that my prior help was mostly warranted. This seems like a pretty freaking warranted situation, which is mostly my fault. Breck would have more time if it weren’t for me. I’m the reason he turned around and didn’t enter the castle yesterday. He would solve it if he had more time. I know him. I know he would.
But he doesn’t have that time.
So, is it against the rules? It’s that gray line. Who the heck knows how DoRC would feel about it. I’m done second-guessing them. I know how I feel about it. It’s literally the only life and death decision I’ve ever faced.
I’m doing it.
The only question now is how. It needs to be something so subtle that it can slip through unnoticed. Too much rides on this for it to be questioned.
I have to work with what’s in the room.
“There are twenty-four minutes remaining,” Sam pipes.
Think!
I’m tugging at my hair. This is tough. I can’t say what I want to say directly. It needs to be a reference, something that Breck would get that others would overlook.
There’s not much to work with—the room, the dolls, and the card.
Breck moves from one doll to the next, but my gaze remains on something he passed by.
I’ve got it!
It’s a stretch, but I think he can do it. He would know the reference.
There are nineteen minutes left, and I need at least ten to program Sam.
From there, Breck will have nine minutes to prove his worth.
BRECK: SIMULATION #40.4
“Breck.”
Sam says my name from behind me. I’m examining the artwork on one of the dolls, my face only inches from the glossy surface. Working my way down from the tallest one, I have closely studied more than half of them, none bringing me any closer to an answer, but it is drawing my attention away from the clock and makes me feel like I’m using my remaining time productively.
“There are fish on this one,” Sam blurts. His finger extends past my right ear and touches the doll next to the one I’m currently examining.
“Yes, that looks like a fish.”
“It looks like it is in a bowl.”
I glance toward the fish. “That would be appropriate, but I don’t see a bowl.”
“There is a bowl,” Sam insists.
“Fine,” I answer, uninterested in spending our final minutes arguing over interpretation of the artwork.
“There are other fish in bowls on other dolls,” Sam points several times as he his walks along the arc of portly figures.
“Had you already noticed the fish in the bowls?”
“No. I hadn’t.”
“There are many of them.”
“You mentioned that. What is your point?”
“We have not yet discussed them.”
“Fine. What would you like to discuss about them?”
“It is merely something we have not yet discussed. You have said to look for new things.”
“Great, Sam. There’s a small elephant on this one. Should we talk about that also?” I take a confrontational step toward him. “And there’s a rocking chair on this one. It’s smaller than the elephant. Interesting. We haven’t discussed that yet. Or how about this guitar? No mention of that so far.”
“That is all true,” he says, surveying the dolls to his side, giving me some hope that my outburst has distracted him enough to occupy him for our last few minutes of our lives.
I turn, ready to let this go. I don’t want to let my frustration with this challenge define my final moments.
“We should start with discussing the fish,” he replies.
I flip, unable to control the urge to lash out. “The ones in the bowls that I don’t see? I don’t know what talking about them will do other than remind us that—” I stop as abruptly as I started as my thoughts outpace my mouth.
I pan around the room first glancing up at the narrow, domed ceiling, then tracking it downward as it bows outward in circumference, abruptly ending in a flat, wide base, lined with thirty-four similarly shaped figures, each having encased the others. I had assumed that the largest of these dolls was the first one we saw that held all of the others. What if there were another? What if the largest of these is much larger? What if we are in it? That would mean that—
This is real!
“Sam!”
“Did you notice something about the fish?” he asks.
“Shut up. I’m past the fish already,” I blurt, my eyes once more darting around the room.
If this room is the answer then where would they—
“We need to look for a seam,” I say.
“That is not understandable. There are four minutes left.”
“We are IN the real one, Sam!” I exclaim.
I sweep my hands across the wall, feeling for any hint of a separation between top and bottom. I can’t find it.
“There has to be—”
The floor!
I drop to my knees and paw at the area where the floor and wall meet.
“What are you looking for?” Sam asks.
“The seam. It has to be at the level of the floor, but there’s nothing to grab,” I say. My fingers dig, but there’s no gap between the floor and the wall to slide my hand under to attempt to lift it.
I scan the room. The door.
I race to the space along the wall where we first entered. The closed door is flush to the wall on the top and on the sides, but along the bottom there is a fingertip-width separation between door and floor. Sam approaches.
“Help me lift this, Sam.”
“The door?”
“Yes!” I say. There’s no time to clarify that I believe we will be able to lift more than just the door. “Please, Sam! Now!”
He drops to my side. We wedge our fingertips in the slender gap.
“Lift on three. One, two, three!” I shout, heaving upward on the door.
The entire side begins to rise, fracturing the outer walls of the tower as it does. Giant bricks from the exterior crumble outward, plummeting to the ground below. Even as we stop lifting the one side, the dome above us continues to rise, soaring upward as if hinged on the other side, exposing us to sky above, until it teeters on the far edge of the tower and tumbles to the ground.
We’re soon standing in the open air. With cautious steps and eyes, we peek over the side and gawk. The top half of the thirty-fifth doll lies on its side in the grass below with crumbled plaster surrounding it, revealing a vibrant shell underneath.
As I admire it, a gently illuminated step appears, floating from the edge of the tower, followed by another, then another, with increasing frequency, until the gleaming path extends outward to the horizon and beyond.
LIV: SPRING BREAK 7.5
“Congratulations,” Jessica says as I answer the phone.
Sam and Breck are standing on top of the new roof of the tower, surveying the aftermath of their solution. I’m doing the same.
“He made it?!” I ask.
“Yes. Were you expecting more?”
“No,” I check the time—11:58 a.m. “I want to make sure there’s nothing more to do. There’s not much time left.”
“He had little time to spare. I must say, that was a fortunate observation from Sam at the end.”
I hold my breath.
She knows.
“Wouldn’t you agree?” she adds.
“I would,” I answer, hesitantly.
“Good. I’m glad we agree.”
Stale seconds hang between us.
“What does that mean?” I ask.
“Should it mean something? Sam said many things during their time together. It was just another independent observation, right?”
The question is leading. I’m not going to second-guess it.
“Right,” I say.
“Good. That’s what we all thought over here. Breck just got a small, serendipitous push in the right direction. We all get these every day. It’s what we do with it that matters. Sometimes we need a tiny nudge to connect the dots.”
I mute the phone for a moment and squeal.
It worked! I’d high-five myself if I could.
“So, now what?” I ask.
“Breck goes on,” she says, as Breck eyes a lit path leading from the tower’s edge to the middle of the sky, hovering like a religious oil canvas. “And we’ll announce you as the winner.”
“When?”
“In about seventy-five seconds. Are you plotting your revenge on the trolls?”
“I’m tempted, but I think they might still call me delusional. Winning the contest is one thing. What Breck became, well, that’s something else.”
“Then you understand the reason for some of our secrets.”
“So, I can’t talk about the fact that you have a whole world of AI like Breck that nobody knows about?” I ask.
“You’re welcome to try,” she answers.
She’s right. I’ve already been down that path.
“Can I at least talk to him?”
I want to share this moment with him. I want to hear his voice. I want to experience his happiness.
“Not now.”
“When?”
“I don’t know. It still depends.”
“On what?”
“On things that are not in my control,” she answers. “Time will tell.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
I hate this cloak-and-dagger BS talk.
“I know, Liv. For now, enjoy this moment.”
“Before you hang up, can you at least give me a straight answer to one question.” I know Doctor O is going to ask me about this. “The contest was based on a theory that only had four stages of development, but the last challenge leads to fifth stage. Why?”
“Piaget’s stages were incomplete.”
“So what’s the fifth stage?”
“What do you think the final challenge tested?” she asks.
“To fully accept that he’s real.”
“I’d say that’s close.”
“So what’s the answer?”
“I can’t answer everything for you. Think about it. It’s all there. And it’s noon. You officially won. Congratulations again, Liv. We’ll talk more this summer.”
BRECK: SIMULATION #40.5
“There’s only one way to go from here,” I say, tapping a cautious foot on the first translucent step to ensure it is solid.
“There is no more progress to be made. This is the end of the challenge,” Sam answers, moving away from the path.
“But there’s more. You see the steps don’t you,” I assert.
“Those go past the challenge. This is the end,” he repeats.
He is right. Beyond here, there is only something else. There is no more of this place. It is the end. This just means different things to both of us.
I walk toward him and place a hand on his thick shoulder. “I never thought I’d say this, but I’m going to miss you, Sam.”
He doesn’t respond. He stares at me as though there is nothing more to say. For him to have exhausted all words, he must be near the end.
“Goodbye, Sam.”
He nods, but remains still otherwise, as if quietly waiting in an enviable comfort with his place in the world.
I turn and march along the path into the horizon, unclear where this leads.
I wonder what it will feel like when—