Chapter 2

  There's gotta be a reason

  Sitting heroically in his designer lumbar support chair sat our equally heroic hero, Glen—

  —having just run his thirty-second wipe and reboot of the Earth Sim.

  Life was as easily crushed as it had been sparked.

  That instance’s sun imploded, collapsing the entire simulation into a cheerful little super black hole.

  But that was fine by Glen.

  It would just be rebuilt in the next run.

  “Thirty-three is the winner, right Glen?!” Terry said, her eyes fluttering at the Galactic Overlay Developer as he trimmed and pruned variables, trying to cleave out any contamination vectors he could find.

  “I just don’t get it, Terry. Everything here is perfect,” Glen said as he slurped from a mermaid-branded coffee-and-salmon-flavored milkshake. This time, it came with a spill-resistant sippy cup guard. The cup had cost as much—if not more—than the drink itself, but it was the least he could do to save on his laundry bill.

  “And… where is Alexander? He’s the field engineer. He should be here helping with this!” Glen said, hitting the hyperboard with his fourth hand.

  “Oh! He’s in the field!” Terry beamed, clearly delighted to finally have an answer to something.

  “In the field?” Glen asked, frowning as he glanced at the Sim computer’s screen.

  *Simulation reset. All items in simulation were successfully removed from existence.*

  “We may need a new field engineer, Terry,” Glen finally said, as a long silence overtook them.

  “Oh no!” Terry yelped. “The cost… Glen! Can you get him back?”

  “Umm… sure?” he replied, not entirely confident, as he loaded a Sim backup he had just made.

  The SimBox hummed and clanged as it struggled to restore an entire universe. After several seconds of mechanical groaning, it finally emitted a single ding, not unlike a kitchen toaster.

  “Done!” Glen announced, scanning the readouts. “Nope—still fishies there.”

  “Alex!” Terry shouted into a device strapped to her wrist. “Do you hear me?”

  “I’m here!” a voice crackled back. “Wow, that was wild, bro! Like the lights started flipping around, then nothing. Then something. Man, these edibles are great!”

  “You’ve got edibles down there? In a clean zone?” Glen asked, finally registering the last part of the exchange.

  “Yeah, bro. It’s all good, bro. Just doing setup and maintenance here is all, amiright?”

  Glen buried his large, square-shaped head into his console.

  “Just. Just shoot me now,” he mumbled to himself.

  “Glen! I must remind you that any communication about inflicting harm to yourself or other employees is strictly prohibited!” the spy camera chimed in, its voice over-cheery—almost happy. “I will need to report this.”

  His large, red, hairy hand shot up—three fingers clenched, except for his opposable thumb, which stuck out at an abrupt, unmistakable angle.

  “Well! Rude!” the spy cam huffed. “That’s gonna be reported too!”

  “Terry. It’s Alex. He’s contaminating the sim with his DNA. Let’s get down there and see what exactly is happening, so we can maybe fix this on the next reboot,” Glen said, pushing himself up from his seat.

  “Alexander Gripsy is a superb employee. I will need to report this character assassination to HR,” the spy cam said from behind him, chipper and accusatory.

  His clothes peeled slightly as he stood—he had been in that chair for over three straight days without moving.

  “Whoa. Kinda drowsy here,” he muttered, wobbling slightly.

  “I’ll need to report that too,” a voice in the background said.

  Terry stepped forward to help steady him.

  “Yeah, you smell too. But we’re used to that already, so no problem!” she added brightly, after catching his expression.

  They were halfway down the transporter hall when Glen stopped and asked, “Hey Terr… did I pause the sim this time?”

  “I’m sure you did! You’re so remarkably responsible. You only *sometimes* screw up,” Terry said, flashing a big smile and a thumbs-up. Her bright eyes looked up at him like a puppy asking for affection.

  “…I see,” Glen replied, deadpan.

  He pulled out his pocket tablet and tried to access the sim state. The screen blinked once and returned the following message:

  MegaCorp Security Parsing Yieldification Camera software installation in progress on simulation. Please stand by.

  Estimated time: 30 minutes…

  35 minutes…

  33 minutes…

  37 minutes…

  “Oh my god… Let’s. Let’s just go,” Glen said, feeling the frustration radiate from his spine into the void.

  ***

  Terry and Glen hopped out of the second interconnecting transport wearing their field equipment, temporal-blocking embeds activating as they approached the designated evolution pools.

  “Kinda weird we create this entire world just for a small pool, huh?” Terry said, glancing around like a tourist during Carnival.

  “What. The. Hell,” Glen said as he stepped out of the portal. “What is all this!?”

  The environment around them was a primal forest. Towering ferns carpeted the floor, and exotic trees already cast shadows against the horizon.

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  “This should all be bare,” Glen said, scanning the treeline.

  “Oh, Glen. Yep. I see it. Yep—there it is,” Terry muttered, eyes now on her tablet for the first time since she’d wandered over to his desk that morning. She’d apparently called it a day at 5 p.m.

  “What? What’s it?” Glen asked, hoping for a rare flash of the intelligent insight Terry occasionally had.

  “*You* forgot to pause the sim.”

  “No. *I* **paused** the… wait. Oh no.”

  "I *asked* you! The person *literally* responsible to make sure things are done!" Glen snapped, turning to Terry.

  “It’s okay, Glen. We’ll fix this in post-edit,” Terry said brightly, already moving toward the designated springs area where Alex was supposed to be.

  “*Post-edit? Post-edit!?*” Glen shouted, scrambling to keep up with the deceptively fast-moving project manager. “You realize this isn’t a video project, right!?” he called out between huffs as he pushed his way through the underbrush behind her.

  They arrived to find a lounging Alex, half-submerged in the bubbling evolutionary pool, drinking what looked like a rocket-branded soda and pulling small candies from a rather large brown bag safely positioned behind him—just outside the water’s edge.

  Alex was a Galaphasian. His upper half resembled a squid; his lower half, a humanoid. A humanoid who, at that moment, was seemingly relaxing in a natural jacuzzi made of bio-soup and god-wrong decisions.

  “Dudes! It’s about time y’all came down here, bros!” he shouted, waving as he saw them emerge from the treeline.

  Terry was already stripping down and hopping into the water beside him.

  “What. The. Flack!” Glen said as he finally reached them, out of breath. “Why are you…” He paused, inhaling deeply through all three nostrils.

  “Why are you in the evolutionary bath, Alex?”

  Terry was already elbow-deep in the candy bag. Her eyes—once wide and overly observant—were starting to dilate.

  “It’s my job, bro. I’m the distiller of DNA, remember?” he said with a sarcastic shrug, glancing at Terry like Glen was the idiot in the room.

  Glen took three breaths to avoid shouting as he slowly and deliberately tried to get some answers from the pretty oblivious doofus in front of him. A well-connected, un-firable, and pampered doofus—who was currently soaking in his GOD-bath.

  “So. I. And.” He took another breath.

  “Let’s start from the beginning. Yes. DNA delivery is your main responsibility. You’re to model, isolate, and deliver DNA strains for *limited* evolution—stopping at the amoeba stage.”

  “So. Did you model the DNA as instructed?”

  “Cha, dude. Of course I did. I’m not an idiot, man,” Alex said, curling a tentacle into the bag and shoveling a pile of candies into his mouth.

  “Right. And what base did you use for that sample, Alex? None of this—” Glen gestured to the paradise around them, “—is supposed to happen. So what base did you use, Alex? It’s important.”

  “Standard base from that list you gave me. Semen,” Alex said, followed by a long slurp from his oversized soda.

  Terry raised her arms above her head to grab the straw and took a pull from the same drink, her pupils fully dilated, every line of her face aglow with bliss.

  “Uhh… just curious, what strain is in those candies?” Glen asked, unable to stop himself.

  “Hehe. Yeah, bro. This is the good stuff. Melankian Flub.”

  “Oh shit. Really?” Glen said before he could catch himself.

  Super rare. Super fun.

  Terry would not remember this at all.

  “Yeah, bro. Share sharity share!” Alex said, nudging the bag toward the still-standing Glen.

  Terry hopped up and down beside them, trying to catch the bag mid-air like it was part of some Soluchie game.

  “No thanks… maybe later. After we fix this. Umm… save me some, yeah?”

  “Fer’sure.”

  “Okay, so—semen. That’s a good choice. Which semen did you requisition?” Glen asked, trying to keep the conversation tethered to reality.

  Alex barked a laugh like it was the funniest thing he’d ever heard, gesturing to Terry like she was in on the joke.

  Terry started laughing too.

  “Mine,” Alex said proudly. “I figured a world of my DNA would be dope. Who gets to say that? Amirite?”

  His squid-mouth stretched into a maniacal grin.

  “Umm… every first-year GOD student?” Glen muttered—but then regrouped.

  “Okay. But you sterilized it, right? Technacii protocol? Please say you did.”

  “Yeah, bro. Technacii all the way. Takes so flubbing long too,” Alex said, sighing with theatrical exhaustion.

  “Okay. So everything you said is by the book,” Glen said, spinning around to look at the rapidly expanding forest. A few hundred years had already passed while they’d been idling in the pool.

  “I… I don’t get it,” he said, glancing back—only to find Terry and Alex making out in the bubbling evolutionary soup. He had to look away.

  “So Alex…” he almost yelled over his shoulder, trying to snap him back to attention, “what else did you do down here?”

  “What do you mean? I deposited the semen into the hole, and then I kinda just wait.”

  “Deposited semen in the hole. Yeaaa,” Terry whispered into the bubbles, eyes still dilated and blissful.

  “So you just lazed in the waters and waited? Every time?”

  “Yeah, bro. By the book. Me in here shouldn’t change shit.”

  “True. True. You didn’t… ya know… pump one out in there, did you?”

  “Nah, dude, nah. Never that. No. Nah. Nope nope,” Alex said too quickly—sounding exactly like someone who absolutely did that.

  Terry was playing with one of his tentacles.

  "I mean even if you did, the semen would disperse pretty quick -- wouldn't matter. You'd need to really *seep* it in semen that retained your DNA to override the sterilization." Glenn said almost to himself then to the now pretty active squid behind him.

  He could hear Terry squeak every now and then, and a grunt or two from Alex. He wasn't turning around. Nothing back there to see he told himself.

  *If I don't see it never happened.*

  "Ooh whats that Alex! Use it on me! Use it on me now!" Terry shrieked.

  "Ok maybe a a peak or two." Glen said to himself as he turned around to see Alex holding a...

  "Is that a dildo!?" Glen yelled surprising himself.

  Alex turned around remembering Glen was there.

  Alex turned around, suddenly remembering Glen was there.

  “Umm… nah, bro. I don’t go that route, bro. Umm… unless, of course, *you* do, ’cause exceptions happen, amirite?”

  He chuckled nervously, then continued without waiting for a reply.

  “Yeah, nah. Not a dildo. It’s a Megacorp *Ultra-Personalized Massage Wand*. Remembers your preferences and always hits that spot, amirite? Amirite? Totally legit bro.”

  He nodded to himself, as if engaged in a very supportive conversation—with himself.

  “Okay. Okay. That’s it then! You use that in there and it’s overriding the semen sterilization! That’s what’s causing the evolution! Yes! Yes!” Glen pointed wildly at the bubbling soup. “Terry, we figured it out! It’s that dil—*personal massage wand*! Okay. Here’s what we do. You two finish… whatever that is. Then I reboot the sim. And this time, Alex—no wand.”

  “But bro, it’s totally legit…” Alex began.

  “No! No wand. Do me the… solid? …bro?” Glen said, giving up and trying desperate diplomacy.

  “Woke. Yeah. Word. Word. Got you, bro,” Alex said, stroking the wand like a treasured lover. “*Sorry, little one*,” he whispered to it, “*but next trip is solo.*”

  “Okay. I’m gonna go over there and sit while you finish this up,” Glen said, gesturing vaguely at the increasingly unfocused team-building happening in the primordial spa.

  He walked over to an interesting stone formation.

  The thing about these simulations was that they were as real as any other reality. The SimBox facilitated *intent*, and intent would literally branch a new universe. That was why sterility mattered—why things had to be disposable, rebootable, *replaceable*.

  Weird things happened when you destroyed a universe that mattered.

  But a universe with a single planet, no sentient life? That was safe.

  It all changed the moment a single sentient emerged.

  As if the god behind *his* sim saw its creations… and decided to protect them.

  *We’re absolutely in our own sim*, Glen mumbled, staring down at the ring of stones at his feet.

  *Intent* probably worked that way, ***because** we are in a sim*, he thought—not for the first time.

  Sometimes these emergent sims created strange, new resources. And since this one had grown unintentionally, it was even more likely.

  He stooped down and examined a particularly large rock—one etched with rune-like carvings.

  His pulse spiked.

  “No. Gods, no. No no no. Please. Okay, if I don’t see it, I don’t know. That’s the rule. Observation matters.”

  He stood, ready to call it off—to demand they leave, reboot, cleanse—anything.

  But as he turned, he saw them.

  Muskrat-like people, clothed in woven reeds and dyed pelts.

  Bowing.

  To him.

  Their god.

  “Shit.”

  Sentients.

  He muttered nothing more, walked over to the nearly-finished corporate bonding ritual, and sat down in the water—clothes and all.

  He took a handful of gummies from the bag, dropped into the bubbles, and let himself float.

  “Glen! Come’re!” Terry squealed.

  He didn’t move.

  He just let go.