G.I.Joe: Back To Reality Part 9
All of a sudden everything went blank and two words in big, white bold letters, displayed themselves before his eyes.
GAME OVER!
Something lifted from his eyes and he was momentarily blinded by a bright light. He rubbed his eyes and saw that he was in an enclosed room and sitting in some sort of chair with wires attached to him.
He heard a groin and looked at another person in another chair rubbing his eyes beside him, but he didn't recognize the person. He was Japanese. He thought he should know him, but didn't.
"What happened?" he second man asked.
But the first man couldn't answer. He attempted to speak, but instead of sound reverberating from his vocal cords there was nothing but gurgling. He grabbed his neck as if he was choking.
The second man noticed this and jumped out of the chair without hesitation and went to the aid of him, ripping the wires from his skin, each attached with a sticky pad. He didn't know what to do, but was there for support. "Are you all right?" he asked the first man.
The first man nodded. Then the second man noticed a large scar on the first man's neck that went from under his left ear down and across his neck. "What happened to you?" he wondered out loud.
The first man raised his eyebrows and then shrugged his shoulders in an I-don't-know fashion.
Suddenly a door opened on the other side of the room and a man in a white medical coat came in. Both men looked in his direction and noticed the doctor-like figure. He was bald and had a jet-black, handle-bar mustache that made him look like he belonged to a assembly of mad-scientists.
He immediately went over to them and said to the second man, "Are you all right, Mr. Arashikage?" His expression was that of concern.
"Is that my name?"
"Yes, don't you remember?"
"No, I don't."
"Your name is Tommy Arashikage. I'm Dr. Mindbender, head of cybernetics division. And this man here is S.E. Smith, co-founder and part-owner of ABRCO gaming systems. You two just spent several hours in a new revolutionary game simulator that combines virtual reality and real-time game play. You were testing it out before ABRCO showcased it at the Game Pro Expo next month. These two pods are the prototypes."
The two men looked at each other and had no idea what he was talking about. "Don't you remember anything before you entered the game?"
Both men shook their heads. Dr. Mindbender sighed. "I was afraid of this. The simulators must have overloaded your synaptic path ways and caused your memory loss. We've been attempting to fix this problem without success. You see, we've discovered long exposure to the game creates a pocket universe where the gamer is engrossed in game play and where he actually believes he is the character he is playing. As much as we can gather, coming out from the game throws the person into a neuro shock and that causes memory loss." But then Dr. Mindbender smiled. "But don't worry gentlemen, this side effect is merely temporary. All our test subjects experienced this. Your memories will return in time."
"When will we get them back?" Tommy asked.
"I'm not sure. It varies with the individual. Maybe minutes, or hours, and in one instance, days."
"Days!"
"As I said, it's only temporary amnesia. Your memories will return."
"How come he can't talk? Is that another side effect of the game play?"
Dr. Mindbender looked at him strange. "Mr. Arashikage, your half-brother loss use of his vocal cords when he was a child, in a car accident. Don't you remember?"
"No," he said.
S.E. sighed.
"What are these wires for?"
"Those? They are control nodes. They're used to stimulate the muscles and neuron activity so the gamer can function in the cyber world. Without them the gamer couldn't move. But we've been trying to eliminate half of them before the game expo next month and we're making excellent progress. People might not like a lot of wires attached to their skin when they are playing the game, it might make them uncomfortable, so we are trying to create a wireless adaptor, like those visors you had on. But it is only in the development stage at the moment. If all goes well with these pods, and the game you and S.E. have created is a success, it will be on the market next year with several new games."
Dr. Mindbender gave the two men a few moments to come to grips with their reality and surroundings and then said, "Please come with me. I'll take you to a waiting area. You're disorientated, it's only natural. Our investors are anxious to hear about what you have experienced in the game stimulator. They'll be here in an hour."
"An hour? Where are we?"
"We're in your building, Mr. Arashikage. You own Extensive Enterprises. It's a subsidiary of a larger conglomerate called ABRCO, which is involved in everything from children's toys to military computer hardware. Extensive Enterprises is the largest supplier of military computers in the world. Last year you and S.E. decided to enter into the gaming market and started manufacturing the A.I. Game Pods."
"These things?"
"Yes," Dr. Mindbender said. "This was your first time entering the virtual world S.E. created."
S.E. Smith pointed at himself as if indicating, "Me?"
"Yes sir. From the specs you provided and the hundred page summary you submitted to the gaming sub-committee, you created a stunning world where a terrorist organization called G.I.JOE is out to conquer the world, and America's Elite fighting force codenamed: COBRA, a small anti-terrorist faction contracted by the United States Government, are the only ones who can stop them. You two entered the world because you detected a glitch in the system and you wanted to iron it out before the gaming expo next week."
"Oh," Tommy Arashikage said. "And did we?"
"You tell me sir. You two were going to go into the pods and play the game to see where the game was failing. Did you find the malfunction?"
"I didn't notice any malfunction, did you?" S.E. Smith shook his head. "But of course we can't remember anything about the game. Maybe we can take a look at those specs?"
"Of course, they're at your disposal. After all you collaborated with S.E. on the details."
Tommy suddenly had a nagging question. "Why do you call him S.E.?"
Dr. Mindbender hesitated for a moment. "I don't like calling him by his nick name even though he insists on it. I'm uncomfortable with it so I call Mr. Smith S.E. He tolerates it and agrees it's appropriate."
"So what's his real name? And what does S.E. stand for?"
S.E. Smith got up from the game pod and sudden felt a little woozy. Tommy caught him. "Take it easy, brother. I don't need you hitting your head and getting your memory back before I do." Tommy smirked. S.E. Smith nodded. And suddenly Tommy's question about S.E. was forgotten.
For some reason S.E. Smith felt this was all wrong. He looked around the square, white room, and saw an observation glass booth above the door. He looked at the two game pods and felt like if he had forgotten something, but it wasn't strong enough for him to remember. It was almost like he was trying to remember the title of a song and it was on the tip of his tongue, but he just couldn't get it. He looked at Tommy.
"What is it?" he asked.
S.E. Smith smiled and then shook his head as if it was nothing.
"C'mon brother, time to get out memories back," he said, and they followed the doctor out of the game stimulator room.
A teenage boy about sixteen was waiting outside the game simulator room and he was eager to see them. "So dad, how was it? Was it everything you dreamed it to be?" the boy said excited.
Tommy Arashikage froze in his tracks. "Dad?" he said, as the boy was talking to him.
The boy was puzzled. "Yeah, I'm your son. Billy." He said.
"But you're not even Japanese?"
"I'm your adopted son."
"You must forgive them Billy, your father and S.E have temporary amnesia from the game," Dr. Mindbender explained. "We're trying to rectify the problem. Maybe you can help jog their memory, Billy." He turned to Tommy. "I'll have an intern send up the specs of the game to the waiting room so you can look at them, Mr. Arashikage."
"Thank you," he said.
Dr. Mindbender left.
"You mean you don't remember me?" Billy asked his father.
"I'm sorry, Billy. Honestly I don't. Wish I did."
Billy beamed with a smile. "Oh, so you don't remember promising to give me $50 so I hang out with my friends at the movies next Saturday?"
Tommy gave a smile. "Always the ambitious one, eh Billy?" he said.
"So you do remember? Your memory is coming back?"
"No, but you're not getting $50. If you want to hang out with your friends at the movies use your own money. I must pay you an allowance, right?"
"Yeah, but I haven't got paid yet. It's $50."
"$50! Hmm. We'll see."
Billy frowned.
"If Dr. Mindbender is right and this game is going to be big, we won't need to worry about money."
"You designed it, Dad. Along with Snake Eyes here. I know it's gonna be huge!"
"Snake Eyes?"
"Yeah. That's what everyone calls Mr. Smith due to his…" Then he stopped.
"Due to his what?"
"I'm not sure I should say it. He doesn't mind everyone calling him that, but the reason is really, well…"
"Tell us anyway."
"Because he's so lousy at craps. He likes to gamble."
Snake Eyes raised an eyebrow and looked at Tommy as if for confirmation. Tommy shrugged. It was strange, he never took himself as someone who gambled. But if he was so bad at it, why did he like doing it? When he got his memory back that's one thing that'll change.
"Shouldn't you be school if you're my son?"
"You said I could be here when you got out. You said I could try it."
"Maybe when we get out memories back."
"Ah nuts!" he said disappointed. "I really wanted to try it."
"Where is this waiting area Dr. Mindbender spoke of? Can you take us there, Billy?"
"Sure. It's the conference room on the top floor."
Billy lead them to an elevator and they took a trip to the top floor where the conference room was. They walked down a long carpeted hallway and entered a spacious room. A large oval, oak finish table was situated in the middle of the room with a dozen or so chairs surrounding it.
On the far wall was a widescreen plasma TV, and in the middle was what appeared to be a holographic projection unit. He didn't have to guess at what it was because it was projecting a 3D rotating image in neon green of the planet. Both Tommy and Snake Eyes were mesmerized by it.
Tommy was completely blown away by the room. "If this is the conference room I wonder what my office looks like?" he said.
Snake Eyes looked at his friend and smiled. He was thinking the same thing. He was also taken back by the technological marvel of the room. It was amazing humanity had progressed this far to have this sort of technology commonplace in a simple conference room. But of course, if they worked for a firm that was number one furnishing military computer hardware all around the world, it was only natural Extensive Enterprises would have all this high-tech at their disposal.
Dr. Mindbender arrived at the door of the conference room. "Forgive me for interrupting, but I decided to hand deliver the specs to you. I neglected to give S.E. his DVB."
"DVB?" Tommy said.
"His Digital Voice Box." Dr. Mindbender had a small box in his hand the size of a case to store a pair of glasses and he opened it to reveal a small ear piece and a voice box the size of a box of matches. He gave them to Snake Eyes. "You created this for S.E., Mr. Arashikage, so he could talk. It's the only prototype, and only you know how it works. Our scientists have tried unsuccessfully to duplicate it, but without your initial blueprints, we can't find the correct modulation for the voice synthesizer to work properly. You've never told us what you did."
Tommy had no clue.
Snake Eyes looked at it and wondered what to do with it. Dr. Mindbender showed him and explained what he knew it did. He held up the ear piece first. "Put this in your ear, S.E." He did. "This small ear piece attunes to the neuron energy of your brain and scans your thought patterns into digital code." He switched on the video box and placed it on the conference table, and continued. "Your patterns are then converted into binary code and they are reverted to the voice box via a wireless linkage. And similar to chemical signals in the brain that convert thought to speech, the voice box plays on the same premise. And the truly ingenious thing is, your voice sounds human--not computerized. I would really like to know how you managed to do that, Mr. Arashikage."
Again, Tommy had no clue.
"Say something Snake Eyes," Tommy said.
"What should I say?" he said, the voice box delivering his thoughts, in a normal sort of tone. But the weird thing was, he didn't move his lips.
"You call it a N.L. or Neuron Link," Dr. Mindbender said.
"Amazing!" Tommy said, truly impressed. Though he didn't remember creating it.
Dr. Mindbender then turned to the conference table. "Since you two have lost your memories I appear to be the most qualified to help you reassert yourself back into the fold of your status as C.E.O's of Extensive Enterprises." He held a small disc in his hand and pressed a button on a control pad on the conference table and a CD-ROM disc drive popped out from edge of the table. "This is the specs to the game. It holds everything: the code, the dimensions and even the character dossiers." He inserted the disc into the CD-ROM and closed the disc drive. "So, let's get started."
Suddenly a harsh, computerized voice said in a loud manner, "Halt! Identify yourselves!" And what looked like a man stood in the doorway. But it wasn't a man. It was masked in dark-tones and green shadows from the dim-cast of the conference room lights, but from its appearance it didn't look human, more like a robot.
In its hand was a gun and it was aimed directly at them!
-- TBC