Sara watched helplessly as the scruffy cowboy Rufus taunted Zoey into putting on the gun belt. His rough voice slowly counted to three. Just before he got to three, Sara dug her heel into the foot of the man holding her. She swung around and punched him firmly in the jaw, sending into a number of other cowboys. She kicked a chair; it slid right into Rufus. His gun was already out of the holster, but his aim went high, thanks to Sara’s intervention.
Even this moderate amount of provocation was enough for a bar fight to erupt. Sara took a swig from the class of milk she had before smashing it down onto one cowboy’s head as he started to draw his gun. The sheriff, attracted by the commotion, had just entered the saloon and was trying his best to stop the fighting.
Amid the chaos, Sara grabbed Zoey and together they found a rear exit out of the bar. As they scrambled out of the bar, Sara said, “Take that thing off right now!”
“Okay, okay,” said Zoey, removing the gun belt. “I know what you’re going to say, but, well, things just out of hand. One thing led to another…”
“You could have gotten yourself killed,” said Sara as she climbed one of the horses.
“I get it already,” replied Zoey following suit. They rode out of town in a hurry. Soon, they found themselves surrounded by rock croppings, each distinct and worn down by time. The sun was starting to dip behind one of these unique formations. They continued until Sara felt they were far enough from the town.
As they came to a stop, Zoey dismounted the horse. “So, what’s the plan?”
“Make camp for the night. In the morning, try and find another town.” Sara sighed. “I just wish I could understand what happened to us.”
“Well, like you always say, we can worry about that tomorrow.” The two women stood a moment and watched the descending sun. While both held trepidations about their current predicament, they put them aside to watch what they spent so little time to admire.
“What is that?” asked Sara. She pointed to the sunset as it shuddered and blurred. Digital artifacting and aliasing sped around them, literally eating away the ground they stood on. Slowly, the picturesque scene was gone, leaving the two women in a void of whiteness.
“That was unexpected,” quipped Zoey.
“There went the west,” said Sara. “Where are we?”
“May I be of assistance?” came a booming voice. Out of the white void came two teal-tinted eyes and a large mouth. They hung there before the two women as a surreal face. “You can search by category or just say the subject you’re interested in.”
“Who are you?” asked Sara.
“Question too broad. Please specify.”
“Where are we?”
“Location subjective. Unable to reply.”
Sara turned to Zoey. “This is getting us nowhere.”
“No,” said Zoey. “You’re just not asking the right question.” Addressing the face, Zoey asked, “What is your primary function?”
The face replied, “I am the user interface, allowing easy search through our 65 million terabytes of information. You can search by category or just say the subject you’re interested in.”
“Sara,” said Zoey. “I have a bad feeling about where we are.”
“And that is…?”
“That whole Wild West scenario was the most convincing virtual reality I’ve ever seen.”
“If it’s all a digital environment, how did we get here?”
“Remember when I touched the large sphere, you grabbed my arm. There was some kind of spark from the sphere. I think it went through both of us.”
“You’re saying we’re dead?”
“No, but I think it somehow connected our minds to the giant computer within that sphere. Maybe the electrical charge rode through our neural passageways to the part of the brain that controls dreams.”
Sara took a moment to digest this. “Instead of goggles or headsets, the sphere is using our mind’s eye to display its information.”
“Something like that, possibly,” replied Zoey. “That would make it the most sophisticated computer that ever existed.”
“True, but it’s been hidden away in the temple for centuries, at least. Who made it?”
“Let’s ask it.”
“Hold it, Zoey. Then all this time…?”
“We never went anywhere. We’ve been inside the sphere the whole time.”
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Written by J M Emmons. The story and all characters are copyrighted by J M Emmons.
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