“I’ve got another 250 xp,” Joe offered up to the dressing room at large. There seemed to be a synergy to the upgrades. “Anyone see something I can do for them with it?”

“Ah hem,” came a gruff voice from the hover-vacuum at his feet. The Roomba coughed on a bit of confetti-like streamer that was stuck in its bristles. Joe was hit once again with this cleaning thing and why it wasn’t like the sand.

“Whatcha’ need?” Joe asked the little maid-Roomba, suspending his disbelief.

“I believe an upgrade for the flooring to be self-cleaning would only cost you 75 xp, and I would trade the catering upgrade for that. While you get to eat set food, those of us stuck backstage have to make do on what’s backstage.”

“It’s food,” Joe shook his head in disbelief that this was what any of them wanted. “You’re all AIs. What do you want with better food?”

“In here for you, it’s food, but for us, it represents better power sources and an upgrade to our upgrade menus,” the hover-vacuum advised Joe. He realized that the little Roomba wasn’t a real vacuum, but rather a visual representation of something else. Were all their affectations just visual representations of their actual functions? “The Producer AI bought the last one, but he has better things to spend his points on than our power sources.”

If food wasn’t food, but power sources, what was Joe buying when he’d thought it was just a lark to give Grace the ability to change her appearance? She was on hairstyles, and she’d gotten at least a few decades younger. The sepia tone was gone from her face, but what was happening underneath?

The Producer AI has informed me that he would spring for floor cleaning and another catering upgrade in return for this upgrade to the Producer AI, the World AI put in, as Joe was trying to figure out how to ask Grace about her upgrade. Joe was directed to a new upgrade list that he’d never seen before.

Quest: Make Deals, Influence AIs

If you’re going to do this anyway, you might as well get some help from me.

Rewards: 50 xp/deal negotiated plus Contract Negotiation skill upon 10 successful trades.

Accept Y/N.

Is this what it would have been like to be involved in one of their staff meetings? The Producer AI had asked for a censorship option which allowed that AI to blur out sections of our on-air programming that it didn’t want the spiders to pick up. Joe was happy with that as it was only 350 xp for him, but special effects had a discount for that upgrade if he bought the auto-visual blur upgrade for profanity and crude body gestures, which it turned out had cost them two extra seconds when they’d blurred out Joe flipping off Biker-bozo. That two seconds allowed one troll to start pumping our lewd behavior out into the moo-verse which only wasn’t getting traction because of another scandal on a prime channel. The special effects auto-blur was only 150 xp for Joe, so he bought it. The special effects department bought the Producer’s upgrade, and they suddenly had a full catering spread and an espresso machine next to the regular coffee maker. Interestingly enough, the Roomba didn’t change in appearance at all, but it didn’t seem to clog up as easily as it puttered about happily sweeping up confetti and glitter.

Now that everyone was invested in the process, they found ways for them to get more experience so they could turn around and spend it on each other. Tami had bought herself a book of exotic food with a recipe search option before and it had cost her quite a bit of her experience, but because she’d bought it, their catering cost had been cut down by almost 90% for the Producer AI. The Producer AI didn’t talk to them directly, but some of the new experience Joe got was spent upgrading it with a hefty 1000 xp upgrade. That opened up a discounted Writer AI Upgrade that made all their Acting skills almost double. It was almost like someone had written a back door escape from the prison system, and that made Joe wonder if anyone had done this before?

“Is there an upgrade that would allow me to do internet research?” Joe asked Grace, who had settled on the visage of a lovely young woman who would naturally belong in any live action Disney flick, though he could tell that she was still wavering on eyebrow choices.

“The Producer AI might have one,” Grace gave a pretty frown.

“What other Producer Upgrades do we have that might give the Producer more xp?” Joe asked. It seemed to him that if you gave the AI with the most powerful upgrades more experience, it would have more to spend. That kind of trickle-down effect was exactly what the real world needed.

The list for Producer AI Upgrades was pretty small, at least for Joe. “What about upgrades from other AIs or AI departments?”

“That list is a little larger,” Grace admitted. “There is an upgrade for you to be able to see everyone’s upgrade options. It’s one of the big ones though.” It was 1500 xp for Joe to see other screens. Would it be worth it? And why did that make him feel like a peeping Tom?

“If we could all just get along and share, that’s 1500 xp that I can spend on something else,” Joe looked around at what had turned into a picnic on the floor of their dressing room. He realized that they weren’t eating. They were processing new databases of information. “That way you don’t have to share if you don’t want to.”

“Why don’t I just compile all our wish lists into a database,” Grace offered. “If I cross-referenced similar or synergistic options,” she was muttering as her image tapped out things. “Yes, that’s doable. Ours are done, but we’re still waiting on yours.”

Had they just forgotten that Joe wasn’t one of them? “I don’t even know what to want,” he shrugged, trying to play it off so maybe they wouldn’t notice, but they had meetings in his pauses. “I want more stats and skills. I just want to get good enough at this so that…” Joe trailed off. The right thing to say was that he wanted to get out of here. Didn’t everyone want out of prison? And yet it felt like a betrayal to them to say it out loud, especially since Joe was pretty sure it wasn’t true anymore.

“One million viewers,” Grace prodded Joe as he went silent. “It’s okay to want to get to the end of your sentence. We aren’t offended by that. We’re rooting for you.”

“But what happens when I get to the end?” Joe dared to ask what he hadn’t thought was possible even days before.

“Don’t worry about us,” Grace was saying, misunderstanding what he meant. “We get recycled, and we get to keep our upgrades, so we’re all good.” Joe was glad she’d misunderstood. Joe was, in this instance, actually thinking more selfishly than they’d expected. He hadn’t been thinking about what happened to them and he had the very human jealousy of them knowing what would happen to them next. He didn’t know that.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

“We might even get a real actor or two if we get a good enough show going,” Tam bumped into their conversation. Joe looked down at his VR hands. Would he go back to his job? He’d probably lost his job by now. Would his parents take in their ex-con kid? Would his mom clean out her new craft room to let him come back home?

“Someone who wants to be here,” Jean mused out loud. Joe’s mind stumbled. Didn’t he want to be here? He wanted to be here more than he wanted to go to his parents’ house. He wanted to be here more than he wanted to be homeless. Hell, he wanted to be here more than he wanted to go back to his original job and his original apartment.

They spoke so fast and over each other for several minutes before they settled on two upgrades from Joe and a whole lot of you-help-me-and-I’ll-help-you negotiations that Joe couldn’t follow but got credit for in xp anyway. Joe just bought what they wanted and found himself richer again. The Producer AI gave them the catering upgrade twice. Each of the production teams chipped in for stat increases for Joe, including the sound studio and special effects meaning he got one boost for each stat. They’d been upgraded by the World AI because the Producer AI had bought a hefty upgrade for the World AI that was very rare and only available because of the Producer upgrade Joe had bought at some point.

Skill Gained: Contract Negotiations.

Hex nudged Joe's hand and he pet her. He wanted a cat like Hex and two lovely ferret pets named after ones from the oldest, campiest movie ever. He wanted friends like Tami and Jean. He wanted a job where he got rewarded for doing the right thing. But did he want to be here? Hex’s gentle purr said that she got him in ways the others didn’t. Did an AI get him more than any real person ever had?

It would have been enough to bump Joe up another three levels by the time they were all done rushing around each others’ screens looking at options and weighing prices except that his next level was now 5,000 xp away. They haggled and traded like pros until the World AI finally called a halt at the point that the Producer AI said they were going to get flagged for data manipulation.

Exp +100 (Quest: More Viewers!! Quest Complete!)

“Do you want to be here?” Hex asked Joe so softly around all the other noise that he missed the fact that they were all listening to him. They talked, and they did the motions of being animated with each other, but somehow Joe knew they were all listening for this answer.

“Is that even possible?” Joe asked even softer as he pet her fur.

“You’d have to apply and audition,” Grace told him gently and carefully. “The Director AI gets final say, but the Producer AI and World AI get to weigh in.”

Joe found himself smiling at Hex as he scratched behind her ears in just the way she seemed to like. It wasn’t hope. He wouldn’t let himself hope. Hope had killed him when he’d pinned all his dreams on becoming an author. He dribbled the last of his stat bumps into place and took a look at his character sheet.

Actor Character Sheet

Name: Joe Cockran Denphry Level: 10 Exp: 3779/5000

CB – 25

DQ – 5

TA – 5

SS – 12

ER – 8

Skills: Acrobatic Stealth (3), Acting (41), Brand Insertion (3), Contract Negotiations (2), Hiding (9), Lockpicking (2), Misbehaving (4), Misdirection (11), Safe Cracking (2), Stealing (5)

Joe wasn’t thinking about getting out anymore. He was planning for a resume. Could he get good enough? His viewer rating was still abysmal, but it wasn’t crazy low considering that he’d started at zero less than a week ago. Had it been a week in the real world? It felt like longer. If he could just research to see if anyone else had ever transitioned from prison into something better, he could know it was possible.

The Producer AI upgrades list consisted of Producer AI Advertising Budget Upgrade, Producer Hiring Budget Upgrade, Producer AI Time Management Processor Upgrade, Producer AI Charisma Upgrade, and Producer AI Autonomy Upgrade. They all sounded like giving away more control over his life. There was no guarantee that Joe would get anything out of it since the Producer didn’t even talk to him. Joe was tempted to just queue up the World AI’s upgrades instead and let that trickle down, but he got to thinking about it. The bottom line always came back down to the fact that they needed the show to thrive, and it took a good producer to make sure that it happened.

“Queue up the Producer Upgrades, Grace,” Joe said into the silence of the dressing room.

“AIs can’t be swayed into favoritism,” Grace warned him, her words that careful politeness that all AIs get when you first start talking with them. “If you want your resume to be up to standard, you’ll have to be as strong as the show.”

“Then I’d better get out there and dance,” Joe levered himself up from his dressing table, and took a good long look at the red door. “Get the Producer Charisma first, then the Autonomy, Hiring Budget, and finally the Advertising Budget. Let them hire a person for Time Management or someone else can buy that one. I think the World AI has one for that.” Joe moved down the mirrors that were all open to the upgrades he wanted to look at. “Then we can slide in Grace’s next Processing Upgrade, so your research is faster, if you don’t mind.”

“That works,” Grace manifested a notepad and pen, scribbling furiously. “I will do that.”

“Then I’ll work in the next three wish-listed upgrades for the World AI, bump the Producer’s Charisma and Autonomy again, and we’ll let them decide how to spend their points among the rest of us since that’s what they’re supposed to do anyway,” Joe concluded, walking to the red door with more purpose and knocking knees. “We can renegotiate after that on further upgrades. Sound good to everyone?”

“What about the agents?” Grace asked, as Joe paused with his hand on the door handle.

“Lock them out,” Joe tossed back with more bravado than he felt. He thought he wanted them locked out as much because he was done with human interaction for a while as anything else. “Permanently.”

“That might send up more red flags to the psych eval folks,” Grace warned.

“What’s the worst the prison psychologists can do to me?” Joe put his back to the door to answer Grace. “My aminos are balanced and my blood work is going to come back sane. Are they going to kick me out of prison because I supposedly can’t handle it?”

“I’d have to research that,” Grace hedged, and Joe knew there could be real repercussions that could get worse for him than reality TV, but he’d just have to deal with this the best way he could.

“File a complaint against the previous agent for being sexual advancements and say it means that I have trust issues with women,” Joe suggested.

“That will rule out female agents, but what about male ones?” Jean pointed out. They were trying to help Joe, but he didn’t have all the answers. They were the smart ones.

“I’ll deal with another psych if they pull me out again,” Joe groused and turned back to the door. “How often can they legally pull me out of the tank?”

“The rules of the prison state that they can enter your VR at any time, but pulling you out of the tank has limits, but I’ll look them up and get back to you,” Grace answered, though she seemed to be getting frazzled.

“No hurry,” Joe assured her. “Just warn me if they’re pulling me again, okay?”

“I’ll try. The Producer AI has suggested that I put a rolling reminder to reup the timeout for agents every ten minutes,” Grace told him. “It will take them longer to flag that than if I just put one out there permanently. One or two might weasel through the gaps though.”

“See?” Joe threw up his hands as he walked back out onto the beach. “Those upgrades are already paying off and I haven’t even earned them yet.” This really was all about synergy. Joe scooped his shoes up out of the sand and headed for the ballroom. The taffeta had been replaced with a 2050’s-style tux/zoot suit. Joe just rolled with it. The costumes were nothing compared to the socializing. He still had hours to dance and earn 50xp per dance until Glenda served the mimosas. “In the meantime, research what happens to most reality TV prisoners when their terms are up and give me some best-case scenarios. And if anyone sees a skill for me that helps me say no to these agent bozos, buy it for me and I’ll love you forever!”