The Strange Fascinations of Noah Hypnotik

  “The moon looks like a watermelon,” I say, but they don’t listen.

  “You know who I met in that cave?” asks Kurt, rocking in his chair, smoking that cigar.

  Abraham Parish says something, but I can’t hear.

  “Where’s your dog, Kurt?” I ask. “Did you lose your dog?”

  The old man looks at me, points next door to the Lovelocks’ house. “He went back inside. That ol’ watermelon got too bright.”

  I’m on the Lovelocks’ porch now, about to open the door, when I feel a hand on my shoulder. “Careful in there,” says Abraham Parish. “It gets pretty dark.”

  I hug him and then step inside, torch in hand, following Bowie’s voice to the back of the cave. Moisture gathers and drips from the curved walls and ceilings, hits the rock floor in tempo with the echoing song, Bowie’s countdown to takeoff. The flame of my torch flickers, then goes out for a moment before coming back even brighter, and now those letters drip from the cave walls like sap down a tree, pooling on the floor where they come together to spell something entirely new: PECULIAR WAY.

  “Don’t worry about the vase.”

  Someone else is in here with me. I hadn’t seen him before, but there he is in the far corner. I only see his back; his face must be close to touching the cave wall. He’s drenched from head to toe, water dripping from his hair, his clothes and hands, landing on the cave floor, where the drops join and multiply, join and multiply.

  “Alan.”

  My best friend turns around, faces me for the first time. He says nothing, just lip-synchs “Space Oddity.” It always was his favorite.

  I climb into bed under freshly washed sheets, big fluffy pillows, and I could sleep forever. By the bed, Abraham the Lab barks silently, and as I close my eyes, I think how terrifically odd that it should end now as it began 26,000 years ago: with a boy and a dog in a torch-lit cave.

  85 → the oracle

  “Shit,” says a voice. “No, no,” and then, “shit,” again, and something presses against my face, squeezing my head like an orange in a vise, and my throat is dry, and my whole body aches like I’ve been running for days, and the voice says, “Shit,” and there’s typing, typing. I reach a hand up to pry my head loose—whatever it is, it’s warm to the touch, and before I can remove it, a sound of something rolling across the floor, and then the voice is close: “Hang on a sec,” and I feel a set of hands reach around behind my head, and a soft click and the weight is lifted. The brightness of the room is blinding at first, but as my eyes adjust, I realize it’s only bright by comparison to where I’ve been.

  A ceiling: the first thing I see.

  And then a face leaning over me. “Hey.” Circuit’s eyes are red and buggy, and there’s an edge in his voice like he’s on the brink.

  I try to talk, but the only thing that comes out is a cough.

  “Take it easy. I’ll be right back.” He disappears, the rolling sound again, and I hear him leave the room. There’s a weight on my hands and feet, but I can’t move to see what it is, can’t even lift my head. Music plays in the background, the ending of Bowie’s “Space Oddity.”

  What the fuck.

  “You’ve probably got a pretty substantial headache at the moment.” The rolling sound again, which I now recognize as the wheels of a desk chair across a wooden floor, and Circuit’s face hovers over me. “Also, the apparatus may cause temporary paralysis, but nothing to worry about. I brought aspirin. And water.” Circuit grabs me under both arms, hoists me up until I’m propped against the headboard, and assists me with the pills and water.

  I get my first full look of his room since the night of the Longmire party.

  His desk is still cluttered with textbooks and papers all over the place, a box of brown sugar cinnamon Pop-Tarts, empty bags of Cheetos, and no fewer than a dozen crushed cans of Mountain Dew. A laptop hums with a variety of windows flashing across the screen at rhythmic intervals, charts and long series of unreadable digits; and next to the computer, that set of giant goggles, which Circuit had named, though I can’t remember what.

  “Easy now,” he says, leaning down to remove what looks like a pair of ski boots from my feet. He sets them on the floor, and then unstraps a glove from my left hand, then my right. “As your speech and mobility are currently limited, how about I talk first? I should warn you, though”—Circuit leans forward, rolls his chair right up to the edge of the bed—“you’ll probably want to hurt me, Noah. And I mean bad. But understand this, right off the bat. I do not apologize. Not now, not ever. Okay?”

  I’m crying, and I don’t know when it started, but I know why: I believe him.

  Circuit rolls back to his computer, minimizes all screens, and opens YouTube. “Let’s start here.”

  * * *

  The video opens with a title card in all caps reading ENVIRONMENT MODIFICATION TRIAL F. It then cuts to footage of a rat in a cage. The cage is oddly decorated: in one corner there’s a miniature Statue of Liberty dressed in a tunic and a blue beret; in another, a standard white baseball in a glass case; and covering the floor are green-colored wood chips. A small television facing the cage airs an episode of Tom and Jerry. The rat is in its exercise wheel, when a narrator with an Australian accent says, “Meet Herman. Herman is two years old and has lived in this cage for the duration of his life. From the day he was born, his home has been meticulously kept, every item exactly the same, and in the exact same place.” The narrator goes on to explain that Herman’s exercise wheel is hooked up to a device that sprays a puff of the same coconut-scented perfume every tenth rotation, and that this particular episode of Tom and Jerry has been on repeat for two years. A variety of cuts show Herman eating, drinking from a bottle hooked up to the side of the cage, sleeping comfortably. “This is Cage A,” says the narrator. “Cage A is Herman’s home, the only one he’s ever known.” The video cuts to another cage similar in decor, but with a few subtle variations: the Statue of Liberty in this cage wears a toga and a green beret; in the opposite corner, there’s a tennis ball in a glass case; and the wood chips are dark blue. “This is Cage B,” says the narrator, who then points out the differences between the two cages, including the piney scent emitted every fifth rotation of the exercise wheel, and the recurring episode of Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner on the television. “Now let’s see what happens when Herman is placed in this new home,” says the narrator. A gloved hand slowly lowers a wriggling Herman into Cage B. The rat hits the ground running, scurries from one corner to the next, kicking up wood chips and climbing walls. The narrator explains that they left Herman in Cage B for three hours. “He never calmed.”

  Fade to black.

  A few seconds pass, and the words ONE MONTH LATER appear; we fade in on Herman in his original home, Cage A. The gloved hand appears again, this time with a syringe, and the narrator explains that Herman will receive a small dose of Telazol before being relocated to Cage B.

  Fade to black.

  ONE HOUR LATER. Herman wakes up in Cage B. He sniffs around the base of the Statue of Liberty’s toga, the tennis ball in the glass case. He watches a few seconds of Coyote and Road Runner, and then ever so calmly climbs inside the exercise wheel—and runs. “There are two possibilities as to the outcome of this environment modification trial,” says the narrator. “The first is that Herman’s brain is simply more compliant to modification when induced during an unconscious state. The second and far more compelling possibility is that when transferred during an unconscious state, Herman is unable to tell the difference between the two environments.”

  * * *

  At some point during the video I regain a little feeling, sit up in bed, and while everything hurts, at least I’m mobile.

  “Dad once told me about how in the early days of personal computers people were nuts for this program called Paintbrush. One guess what it did.” Circuit chuckles. “Our society has been mesmerized by computers l
ike a baby with a rattle—but not Dad. He spent years designing software that runs parallel to, and in conjunction with, the human brain, allowing the subject to live and thrive inside simulation. I watched it happen many times, one of the benefits of being homeschooled. I’d get all my work done in an hour and spend the rest of the day helping him.”

  For some reason I can’t meet Circuit’s eyes as he talks, can’t bring myself to witness in his face the levels of determination I hear in his voice.

  “He built the Oracle.” Circuit picks up the binocular-goggles, turns it in his hands. “The headpiece came first, then the sensory boots and gloves. Named it after that character in The Matrix. You ever see that movie? Entertaining, albeit antiquated. Anyway, unlike Oculus, Google Cardboard, or that Samsung VR piece of shit—glorified video games one and all—the Oracle operates in tandem with all major search engines, enabling the user to truly experience things, know things that they hadn’t previously experienced or known. Places, ideas, facts, smells, and tastes, it’s all there. But the real beauty of the Oracle is how it responds to what’s already in your brain. For example . . .” He swivels back around to face the computer, pulls up one of the previously minimized screens, and says, “Who is Fred Merkle?”

  The bottom drops out, and my eyes close like curtains at the end of a play.

  * * *

  “There you go.”

  I open my eyes, cough, and sit up.

  “Go easy,” says Circuit. “You passed out for a minute, a fairly common aftereffect. Here”—he holds out a granola bar—“this will help.”

  My mouth waters before it can form the words fuck off. I unwrap the bar and shove it in.

  “My dad loved scotch,” says Circuit. “Now, I don’t pretend to know much about the production process, but I get the gist. Distill a spirit, age it in a barrel. Or a cask, as the Scots call it. I learned from Dad that not all casks are created equal. Ex-sherry casks, ex-bourbon casks, ex-Chardonnay casks, all of varying qualities, each scotch aged for various lengths of time, and this process plays an enormous role in the final product.”

  “What’s your point?” My first words are raspy, but it feels good to talk.

  “Your brain is the raw spirit, Noah. The Oracle is the cask. It takes what’s already there—knowledge, life experience, opinions, ideas—and fills in the gaps. Adds flavor. Dad built a masterpiece, no question.” Circuit taps the Oracle. “But there was one problem. Do you know what that problem was?”

  “Fuck you?”

  “Ha. No, the problem with virtual reality has always been infuriatingly simple. User awareness. While in simulation, the user has the presence of mind to distinguish between what is real and what is not, reducing the experience to nothing more than masturbatory escapism. Fucking Paintbrush 2.0. Imagine building a fully functioning automobile from the ground up only to have misplaced the ignition. And that user awareness—that was Dad’s misplaced ignition. After he died he left me a notebook full of technical theories, instructions, things he’d tried that worked, things that didn’t. He wanted me to do this, to pick up where he left off. He wanted me to find the ignition. And I did. I found it when I found Environment Modification Trial F. A simulation that begins only when the subject is in an unconscious state could, theoretically, allow that person to live in simulated reality without ever knowing it was simulated.”

  “Hypnosis.”

  “It had to be more than sleep, but I didn’t trust myself to knock someone out cold,” says Circuit. “Of course, you’d had quite a bit to drink, which helped.”

  “You’re fucking nuts.”

  Circuit shrugs. “I could never build what Dad built. But when I found that video, I knew I’d found the ignition. My contribution to changing the world as we know it.”

  Watching Circuit as he talks feels like watching a child in the cockpit of a plane: I believe he believes he knows what he’s doing. But Circuit hasn’t built this machine; he’s done nothing but climb atop the shoulders of its architect to press go. What of its quirks and flaws? How might it operate differently on someone whose state is, to begin with, so radically altered? I’ve been to enough parties to know people aren’t the same when they’re drunk, and I’ve seen the eyes of the hypnotized—but both at once?

  “Why me?”

  Circuit scrunches up his face, speaks in a mimicking whine. “‘I want a new trajectory. Everyone in my life is stagnant. It’s like my life is this old sweater, and I’ve outgrown it.’” He laughs a little, shakes his head. “I mean, seriously, I couldn’t have drawn up a more apt subject than you.”

  I look back down at the sheets, the made bed, the outline of where I’ve been. “So what then—you lured me into your cage?”

  “Well, I had some help.”

  “You’re so full of shit.”

  He shrugs, says nothing.

  “Who?” I ask.

  “Not really my place.” Circuit rolls back to his desk, scrolls through a playlist on his computer, plays “Life on Mars?” and says, “You know, I was never really into Bowie before, but I made a playlist for our session, and I have to say, he’s growing on me.”

  “You manipulated me.”

  “It doesn’t work that way. It’s not a video game, I wasn’t controlling your moves, telling you where to go, what to do. The Oracle takes what it finds there”—Circuit points to my head—“and integrates it with what it finds here.” Circuit points to his computer. “If you can google it, you can live it.”

  “Physical traits, things people said and did—things were different. You made that happen.”

  “I didn’t.”

  I point to his computer. “Just like that second cage had all those changes, you rearranged shit in my head.”

  “It’s not an exact science, Noah. Living in simulation is roughly the equivalent of living in fiction. And as with any fiction, variations and flaws are to be expected. That you experienced changes in those around you does not surprise me in the least.”

  “What about the pattern?”

  This gives Circuit pause. “Pattern . . . with the changes?”

  It’s never been difficult for me to place myself in that diner with Cletus and Nathan. Guys like us will always be alone, Noah, that’s fine—the trick is knowing the difference between being alone & being lonely.

  “Huh.” Circuit turns to his computer, opens a document, and types. “Interesting,” he says, and I imagine rolling up this bedsheet and cramming it down his throat, smothering his face with one of these pillows, holding it there until his body spasms and goes still. “Fascinating,” he says.

  “What is?”

  “Dad dropped almost a hundred volunteers into simulation, and while all of them reported variations within the Oracle, you’re the first one to report a pattern among the variations. I won’t lie to you, Noah, I’m a little aroused right now. What was the pattern, if you don’t mind my asking?”

  Some feeling has returned to my legs, which adds a dash of flight to my daydreams of fight.

  “Doesn’t matter,” says Circuit, seeing in my eyes that he won’t get an answer. He sighs and leans back in his chair, every bit the contented madman. “Think of it. From here on out, there is literally nothing that stays the same. Fired from your job? Ugly divorce? Cancer diagnosis, death in the family, shitty fucking life? For the right price, here’s a new one. Or you could just take a quick vacation, like you.”

  Tingling now, in my legs. My blood is running, and I am not far behind. “A quick vacation?”

  Circuit’s eyes change, and he smiles like he just recognized an old friend, and I think how his teeth would shatter like glass, how his blood would spray across the room and paint the walls red.

  “What month is it?” he asks.

  Something about the simplicity of the question makes me want to vomit. “November.”

  Circuit laughs in a spurt, c
laps his hands together. “Fucking beautiful.”

  “What.”

  “The simulation ratio is roughly one hour to every two weeks. It’s been just over six hours.”

  “Since what?”

  But the weight falls, and Circuit turns back to his computer as if even he can’t face what he’s about to tell me, and all the words from tonight break apart into letters now, floating in the air, and the room turns every shade of brightness the world over.

  “It’s been just over six hours since we left the Longmire party.”

  86 → just pretend you live here

  Before my Navy Bowie days, I used to go to the mall with Mom near the end of summer for new clothes. We’d walk those white tiled hallways, and I’d say how much I hated the mall—the assertive kiosk employees, the smell of the food court, the synthetic convenience of it all—and Mom would shrug like she agreed, but what did I expect her to do about it. “Just pretend you live here,” she said once.

  I remember looking around, imagining all these storefronts in the dark after closing when no one else was there, and I found I had amazing aptitude for romanticizing even the most treacherous of settings by simply imagining those places as home.

  Just pretend you live here.

  I walked those empty hallways in my mind, and moonlight through the windows painted the white tiles blue, and there was no one else around, all the mall bots in bed, and even though this space was dark and empty and slightly off-center, it was home.

  Imagine living in such a place.

  And that’s where I’ve been.

  * * *

  “Noah,” says Circuit, but my legs are back and I’ve been in this room long enough. At the landing now, down the stairs, and I’m about to open the front door when I hear a rustling from the living room, and there’s a lamp on in the corner, and Sara just waking up on the couch. She yawns and stretches, all, “You know you’re tired when you’d rather crash on the couch than climb the stairs to your own room.” And then she smiles at me, tilts her head a little. “Noah-with-an-H, right?” And Nike the cat hops into her lap, and the fear that’s been boiling in my stomach reaches its tipping point.