“It’s called the universal backend. But you already know that.”
Martin Barr stood at the podium outside of a large and gorgeous building, addressing a crowd of enthused onlookers. Behind him, a group of some of the most talented engineers and designers on the planet were gathered.
“What you don’t know is what we’re doing with the technology. What we’re making. Experiences that’ll blow your mind. Experiences that’ll change the way you look at this ever-changing world. And most importantly, experiences that’ll make you realize what it truly means to be human. To be in charge of your own story here on this planet.”
Excited whispers came from the crowd.
“XP: Existential Points is launching tomorrow. The first game in history where you are the hero, where your adventure takes place not on a TV screen, but here on planet Earth, and where you won’t have to daydream to escape reality anymore, because reality itself will become the greatest video game you’ve ever played.”
A slow roll of cheers from the audience as Martin’s proclamation dawned on them.
One of the engineers in the back, the youngest on the team in fact, with short red hair, stylish glasses, and usually a very sunny disposition, tried her best to hide the concern on her face. She was unsuccessful.
Her name was Rosalind Grey, and she was an optimist. An engineer. Someone who knew that studying, trial and error, finding every point of failure, and iterating a million times over were necessary parts of the process to ensure that whatever she was doing would function. To her, “luck” wasn’t a thing. Everything was a variable in an equation.
And Martin was an equation that she couldn’t fully understand.
—
“I’m concerned.”
“You’re concerned?!”
Rosalind and her co-worker, Willow, made their way down a sleek hallway.
“I’m concerned,” Rosalind continued, “because governments are letting us unleash this tech on the world without any sort of testing, safeguards… Like, this is gonna sound crazy, but I actually think they trust us too much.”
Willow stopped in the middle of the hallway. Rosalind kept her brisk pace; it took her a few seconds to notice that she was walking alone. She awkwardly retraced her steps back to Willow.
“You… you don’t think they trust us too much?”
“Listen, Rose, I love you to pieces sweetheart but you need to understand something. I think you’re projecting your trust issues onto the rest of the world.”
“I don’t have trust issues! I’m usually the first to -”
“You do! You do have trust issues! You act all cheery, but deep down you can’t accept that maybe Martin is a guarded genius who won’t show his cards because geniuses are just weird like that.”
Rosalind took in Willow’s words. She nodded for a few seconds, and then responded.
“Agree to disagree?”
“Lady, I cannot for the life of me handle your stubbornness.”
Willow, trying to maintain a serious face, eventually buckled into a laugh. Rosalind joined her in laughing.
Willow then relented. “Agree to disagree.”
As they made their way down the hallway, Rosalind found herself lost in her thoughts. The launch was tomorrow. This was it. The big day.
—
Not too far from the high-tech building where Rosalind and the XPeriential group were changing the world was a lecture hall that was three-fourths full.
Seated lazily at the front of this lecture hall sat Jasper Whitmore. There was nowhere he would rather be. And yet he hated it there. A slender literature professor in his early thirties, he was equal parts professionally-dressed and disheveled looking. His clothes? Sufficiently clean. His hair? Bed head from three days ago.
Slowly, he rose from his seat and addressed the class.
“Alright! Let’s get into it, shall we? Any notes on your weekend readings? Anyone?”
The class responded with silence - not an unusual reaction.
“My goodness. Don’t all speak at once. You’ll drown each other’s voices out!”
The silence lingered.
“Alright, let’s try a new approach. Did you read, or, hell, watch anything at all interesting this weekend?”
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Hands shot up from all around the lecture hall.
“Okay, now for those who just raised their hands… please keep them up if you did the required weekend readings.”
And as soon as Jasper finished his sentence, all the hands in the class went back down.
“Fantastic! You’re all going to run the world one day, and my goodness will you be equipped for that with your diligence and your brilliant work ethic.”
Still silent, now with a weird energy in the room.
“Listen, you’re all adults, so I won’t penalize you for not keeping up with your readings. That said, legally, I’m not allowed to let you leave for another two and a half hours. So…”
Jasper stood awkwardly, staring into space as if pondering how to pass the time. A student in the back of the class raised his hand.
“Yes, you, with the face and the clothes! Any ideas?” Jasper called out.
“Why is there a giant suit of armor next to your desk?” the student asked.
Jasper gave the freshman a puzzled look, looked over at his desk, and acknowledged that there was indeed a large suit of armor placed beside it. He paused.
“I suppose that’s a good question,” Jasper responded. “To be quite honest with you, I don’t know why that’s there.”
“Where’d you buy it from?” chimed in a different student with a raised hand.
“Well, I didn’t buy it. I –”
“Then where’d you get it from?” another attendee of the class asked.
Jasper struggled with the answer.
“It was a gift... from a friend."
Jasper grimaced, realizing that the class was on the verge of bombarding him with questions about his personal life...
“Okay, class dismissed! Just keep it to yourselves that I let you go early.”
Bewildered, a few students began to rise from their desks.
“Run along now!” Jasper said, as everyone started getting up from their desks and filing out of the classroom.
—
It was nighttime. Jasper was in his cluttered bedroom, lying on his bed and staring up at the ceiling.
On the other side of his bedroom, sat the suit of armor he had been ‘gifted’. He lifted his head to look at it, then let his head fall back onto his pillow.
“Why would you send me this?”
—
The next morning, Rosalind, in high spirits, swiped her card on the sensor outside the large doors of her workplace. A green light above the doors lit up, and as they opened, she confidently walked through.
She took in the sights and sounds of her office, smiling at everything around her. Things were buzzing - it was launch day after all.
Making her way past the fancy desks in the open office space, she took a quick glance at her watch to check the day’s calendar -
9 AM Meeting - 1 on 1 with Martin (6th Floor Boardroom)
That’s new she thought to herself. On such an important day, a random one-off meeting seemed somewhat unnecessary. Surely Martin had more important things to take on. Nonetheless, with 9 AM only a few minutes away, she decided to head to the boardroom.
This particular morning was unfortunately too bright and lovely for Rosalind to realize that everyone was eyeing her and whispering as she made her way through the office.
—
Rosalind sat alone in the large boardroom, tapping her finger on the desk. Bored. She glanced at her watch - 9:05AM.
She yawned. Her eyes lazily wandered over to a video playing on loop on a large monitor embedded in the wall in front of her. It was an interview with Martin. She chuckled at the ‘overly professional’ presentation of the video, and listened as audio from Martin’s interview played.
“We’ve already done so much to change the world…”
“Once scientists discovered the universal backend, the limitations of matter disappeared… we could create things out of thin air. Abundance! Food! Water! Resources to build the kind of world we could only dream of ever living in! And now the only task remaining is spreading this abundance worldwide”
Rosalind had clearly seen this video many times before. She started speaking along with the footage of Martin.
“And what happens when humanity is in abundance?”
“And what happens when humanity is in full abundance?” Rosalind said along, in a faux-masculine voice.
“We’re forced to come up with new ideas - crazy ways of making our lives exceed our ideas of perfection.”
“We’re forced to come up with new ideas - crazy ways of making our lives exceed our ideas of –”
“Sorry for being late!” Martin shouted, between labored breaths, as he ran into the room, interrupting the fun time Rosalind was having impersonating his “tech genius” spiel.
“You’re all good! I was just sitting here, being… mindful?” she responded.
“Nice! Nice nice nice. Alright,” said Martin as he took a seat across from Rosalind and gathered himself.
Rosalind took a good look at him. He was still as wide-eyed as the day she’d met him, when the company of XPeriential was nothing more than a messy start-up on the 2nd floor of a cheap-looking building on the outskirts of downtown. A 2nd floor that was on top of a loud, ‘old-school-style’ arcade, mind you. He was fiery and excitable then, and fiery and excitable now. Still as hard to read as ever. He’d substituted his hoodie and sweatpants for some of the most expensive ‘business casual’ clothes a person could buy. But still, it was him. The wiz-kid, the magician on the keyboard, the coding extraordinaire - the guy who couldn’t help but think only of the big picture. Neither she nor any other employee of the start-up was surprised that Martin had taken their scrappy office and turned it into the largest and most important company utilizing universal backend (UBE) technology in the world.
Martin gave her a soft smile.
“When did we first start working together?” he asked her.
She gave it some thought.
“I think it was 2032.”
He shook his head to himself. “It’s been eight years.”
“Yep, eight whole years we’ve worked together!” she echoed.
“Time flies. And the world changes.”
“It does, it really does,” she agreed.
“And now, today, your journey with XPeriential comes to an end.”
Rosalind was mid-way through responding when Martin’s words really sunk in. She froze.
He was still as wide-eyed as ever.
“What? What do you mean… my journey–”
“You’re fired, Rose. Today’s your last day.”
Rosalind laughed nervously. He had to be joking, right?
But for the first time ever, his expression was clear.
He was serious.