CHAPTER TWO

James was rudely awoken from a terrible nightmare which was instantly forgotten by the buzzing from his front door bell echoing around his small home. He opened his dry and itching eyes to squint blearily at the clock that sat by the side of his bed. The display appeared to be fuzzy, not permitting him to make out the time, so he scrubbed at his eyes to clean away some of the sleep, then took another look at it. This time it was clear and sharp and allowed him to now see that it was five sixteen in the morning, he had only been asleep for about half an hour. The buzzer indicating someone was at his front door sounded out again, annoyingly loud in the silence of night. Quickly swinging his legs over the side of the bed, reached down and pulled on the track suit pants that he had left there only an hour previous. The buzzer rang out again for the third time. “I’m coming, hold your horses.” He yelled out to let whomever was at his door know that he was awake and on his way, as well as to stop them pressing that damn buzzer again. He rapidly made his way down the stairs, muttered to himself that this had better be important or someone would pay for it. Upon reaching the front door he reached out and pulled it open, looked out to see who it was that was inconsiderate enough to be waking people up at this time of morning.

Standing on his doorstep was two men, dressed in blue overalls, one older than the other. Neither one of them was familiar to him in any respect, nor did he have any idea why they were at his door. “Who the hell are you ? Do you know what time it is ?” he snarled at them, looking both up and down scathingly. ”I had only just managed to get to sleep.”

The younger of the duo took a step back in surprise at this verbal outburst but the older man just looked down at a clipboard he was holding, obviously familiar to receiving this kind of treatment. He tapped the board, then raised his gaze from the clipboard back up to James. “Would you be James Carter ?” he replied simply.

“Yes.” James snapped back angrily, still annoyed at being woken up so early. “That’s me. What the hell do you want.”

“Apologies for disturbing you so early but we have an urgent delivery here for you that we thought you would be expecting, and awake to receive it. Now, if you could sign this for us….” He turned the clipboard that he was holding towards James, then held out a pen with his other hand, “… we will bring it in and set it up for you. Sooner it’s signed the sooner we will get out of your way.”

James just stood there, looking at the clipboard in confusion. Delivery ? He wasn’t expecting any deliveries and couldn’t remember ordering anything. While thinking that, his hand automatically reached out and took the pen. Looking at the clipboard to see where he should sign he noticed the logo at the top of the page. Holobyne Technologies ? I haven’t ordered anything from them. What the hell is going on here ? He pulled back the hand holding the pen without signing. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand what this is about but I am not expecting anything from Holobyne. Are you sure you have the right delivery address ?”

The man holding the clipboard turned it around and flipped through a few pages, quickly scanning the information on them. Satisfied with what he found there, he looked up. “You are James Carter, and this is number 34 East street, right ?”

“Yes,” Was James hesitant reply, “that’s correct.”

“Well then, we have your Pod here. Sign the delivery note and we will bring it in and set the thing up for you.”

“Pod, What Pod ? I’m not expecting a Pod.”

“The Pod you won in the lottery, weren’t you watching the lottery draw ?”

James blinked in confusion a couple of times, before reaching out to take the clipboard. Slowly he read his way through the paperwork. “This must be a mistake.” was his reaction after finishing reading it. “Yeah, I watched the lottery draw and I know for a fact my entry was not drawn. I don’t know what’s going on here, but that Pod is not mine, there must have been some kind of a mix-up.” He tried to hand the clipboard and pen back to the delivery man, but he just refused to accept it and held up a hand to indicate he wanted a moment .

The delivery man pulled a phone from his pocket and typed in a number, then held it up to his ear. The phone must have connected to whomever he was trying to contact because he started to speak into it virtually straight away. “Hey, Mick, Its Danny here. We are trying to deliver that urgent Pod delivery but the recipient doesn’t know about it and won’t sign. Could you confirm the delivery instructions for me please.” He stopped taking and stood there, listening to someone taking to him from the other end for a couple of minutes, only uttering ‘Uh huh.” a couple of times before finally saying “Ok, I see. I think I know what’s happened here. Thanks Mick.” Then hung up. Turning back to James he asked “Did you turn off the table straight after the one hundredth winner was announced, or did you watch the program right to the end ?”

“Only until the last ticket was drawn.” James replied. “I hadn’t won anything so I saw no need to keep on watching. The show was over for me.”

The delivery man suddenly laughed out loudly. “No, The show was definitely not over. You missed the best part, well, the best part for you anyway.” He stood there chuckling to himself, shaking his head slightly from side to side in amusement.

Now James was getting angry again. “What do you mean missed, I watched the whole raffle ?”

Stifling his mirth, the delivery man explained. “You flipped off your Holo before they found out that three of the ticket holders had died before the draw and there was no one to accept the prize in their place. That Jane lady got into a discussion with all those legal eagles on the show and it was decided that the three pods should be drawn for again. You were one of the names picked this time round, and you missed it by flipping off.” He took a deep breath and thrust out one hand. “Congratulations on your win, James Carter. You are now the proud owner of a top of the range Holobyne BioStas Pod.” Seeing a stunned James before him, he grasped one limp hand and shook it vigorously. “Now sign the damn delivery docket and let us in, I want to get this installed so I can get home before my wife kills me for being late… again.”

James just signed in silence, and the two delivery men carried the obviously heavy pod through his front door. After a minute of just standing there, he came to his senses and followed them inside, shutting the door behind him.

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The delivery men had navigated the crate that held the pod through the narrow corridor of his house into the main living room. The room itself was quite small and the crate filled in all the space that wasn’t already taken up with his holotable and furniture. Carefully placing it down on the carpeted floor, they started to make more space around it by pushing the loose furniture against the walls. The younger delivery man turned his head towards James and asked “It’s going to be a tight squeeze fitting it into this room, have you got any other rooms larger than this ?”

James shook his head. “No, I only have this room, my bedroom upstairs and a kitchen.” He examined the room helplessly, trying to work out where it would fit without being in his way. “If we move everything from that side over to the side with the window, do you think it would fit against the wall ?”

Both the delivery men stood up at this, looking around the room, sizing it up with an evaluating gaze, the older one scratching his chin in thought. Even though James lived alone and didn’t have many possessions, the ones he did have mostly filled this room. “Hmmm, maybe. The holotable will have to be shoved over a bit, and the couch pushed into that far corner, then if we stacked those chairs together…. “ he paused, surveying the room again, then continued. “Ok, It looks like that will be the best option. You okay with that ?”

Mentally moving the indicated furniture in his mind the delivery man was indicating, James calculated that the pod would just fit where he wanted it to go, and leave a little spare room to move around in. Not much, but just enough so he could still use the holotable when he needed to. “Seems okay.” He affirmed. “Look, while you start that, I’m going to make myself a coffee to wake me up, Do either of you two want a one ?” he questioned. Both of the others accepted his offer graciously, then informed him how they liked their coffee. Squeezing past the crate he made his way into the kitchen to put the kettle on.

While the kettle was heating the water, the full realisation of what was happening hit him. I have a pod. I will be able to play the game, and play it today, he thought excitedly while his now slightly shaking hands went through the actions of preparing three cups of coffee. From the other room he heard noises that let him know the two others had already started clearing the space needed.

By the time James had poured the cups and carried them back into his living room the pod was already uncrated. The younger of the two was seated on the floor next to the side of a smooth metallic egg shaped pod, its gleaming mirrored surface clean and unmarred. James could see everything in the room was mirrored in its surface, slightly distorted by the curvature of the pods shell. The only thing that disrupted its smooth lines was a small open panel that the younger delivery man had his hands inside, working on something, LED lights illuminating his gloves in little flashes of red, blue and green. Handing one of the cups to the other man who was seated on his couch, he asked. “What’s he doing ? “ He placed the other cup on the floor near the one working on the pod, who only nodded his thanks without stopping.

The seated man sipped at his cup before answering. “He’s just linking the pod to your table and making sure the link to Holobynes S.P.I.T stream is optimal. Only takes a few minutes. Once that’s done The server AI will connect to the pod and upgrade the firmware in the pod to the latest one available, then install all the interface software you’ll need. When the AI informs us the pods live we will show you how to mount, and change, the Somnolene cartridge.” He held up a small tube, cigar shaped, about ten centimetres long and three wide with Somnolene written in big red letters on its surface. “You get two of these included with this delivery, and each is good for one month in the pod. You can only have one of these mounted at a time.”

“Why only one month ? I hear you can stay in Biostas for as long as you want to, even for years ?”

“Well,” the man continued, “that’s true, but that is under optimal conditions where you have someone to monitor you and make sure that the nutrients needed to survive is being supplied. Study showed that people who want to play the game will most probably live alone, or have no access to nutrients, so one month is a set time frame to force them out of the game to ensure they eat and drink, as well as perform other bodily needs. A Somnolene cartridge can not be removed until it is empty, and once removed a new one is blocked from being inserted for 24 hours. It’s a safety feature to make sure no one accidentally kills themselves by staying immersed too long. If someone messes around with the pod to bypass this, breaching the agreement you will sign when you first use the pod, then any deaths in a manipulated pod is legally considered as the users fault. So don’t bugger around with the pod.”

Shocked by this revelation of possible death, James could only reply with. “I definitely won’t do that.”

“Oh, just remembered. You are also lucky in another way. We had run out of the latest version of pods, so the manager decided to supply you with one of the next generation pods we had sent to us by accident. You are the first outside of Holobynes Technis headquarters to have one of these, it was supposed to be send it back tomorrow but couldn’t see any problem with issuing it to you. They are not due for release until next year. This generation pod is supposed to have a far superior Sense Software in them. “

“Wow, “ was all that James could utter, “I am really looking forward to this even more now.”

The older man held out a thick booklet to him “Here, take this and read it. This is the operating instructions for the pod, as well as a quick start for the game for new users, well, everyone’s a new user at the moment, read it because I see that Donnie, “ he indicated the younger man working on the pod, “has finished and we’ll be leaving as soon as the AI gives us the okay.” The machine beeped and all the lights in the open panel turned green, and the man who was called Donnie closed the panel with a click. “That panel is now locked and can not be opened, so don’t even try. This is where you insert the Somnolene.” He reached forward and pressed a section near the fatter part of the metal pod and another panel opened. He then handed the tube to James. “Take the tube and insert it into the hole until it clicks into place, make sure the end you are inserting first has the green circle on it, that’s the top.”

James looked at the tube, then after locating the green circle, turned the tube around in his fingers, then pushed it into the hole. It slid in smoothly until he felt a click vibrate through the tube rather than hear it. The panel that covered the entry point started to close, James quickly withdrew his fingers so they didn’t impede the panels closing.

“That’s it. Your all good to go.” He looked at his watch, then stood up. “We have be going now, we should have finished this half an hour ago.” He reached out again and shook James’s hand. “Have fun, and read the manual. You only have another two hours before the world opens so if you intend to stay immersed in it for a long time, let the people who you normally deal with know you’ll be unavailable. Otherwise you may get the police kicking your door down because a relative is worried about what’s happened to you. If you have any issue, or problem, with the pod, please contact us and we will have a technician out to you straight away”

James watched the two of them clear up all their tools, placing everything into the empty crate. As they squatted to pick it up James rushed to open the door for them. Weaving through the rooms obstacles they both gave James a little nod of farewell as they passed him, then once through, he closed the door behind them. He slumped with his back to the door and ran one hand over his face. The excitement he felt overrode the tiredness for lack of sleep, but he decided that he had better read that manual then get at least a little bit more sleep before he tried the pod. Then he remembered the advice, and decided to let his parents know about the pod and what his plans would be. No need to contact anyone else, he had not made any new friends since he moved last time, and all his previous friends hadn’t even bothered keeping in contact with him since. The last contact he had had would have been at least six months ago, and couldn’t see the condition changing anytime soon. Pushing himself away from the door, James sighed to himself, then slowly made his way back into the lounge and sat down of the couch to read through the damn manual.