The Room and the Window

The outside world was unknown to her, but she could see a glimpse of it through the window in his room.

Jules Welland was her saviour, and that of many others having opened his massive warehouse to the surrounding community when the fog fell. She arrived as an infant and was unaware of the destruction outside the compound walls.

Now older each morning brought the usual routine. Alice would get up and eat a bowl of mush. It was a bland meal, but it was easy to synthesize and contained all the needed nutrients. She would wave goodbye to her mother and head off for school.

School was in an elevated room in the main compound yard. Before reaching the steps that brought her to her classroom she passed a variety of essential services: water recycling, hydroponics, geothermal. After her school was completed next year, she would be given a job in one of these or some other essential service.

In her classroom she sat beside her best friend Clive. Like her, he arrived at the compound as an infant but he was obsessed with the world before the fog. He loved to speak with the older citizens about the outside world, but many were too afraid to say anything. Jules Welland forbade everyone from speaking about the outside world because it was too dangerous. He didn't want curiosity to lead people to want to leave because the fog would kill them.

However Clive always had stories to tell, but today he had something new.

"Have you ever heard of 'the window'?"

"Come on Clive I know what a window is," Alice pointed to the glass partition in the classroom wall. From it they could see the compound floor below.

"Not 'a window', 'the window'! The last window to the outside world."

"What good would that be?" she asked him. "All it would show is the fog."

Clive was unconvinced. "This window is important and I want to see it."

"Where is it?" Clive smiled like he'd been waiting for Alice to ask that very question.

"It's in Jules' room." He pointed out the classroom walls to where Jules' room was. Similar to the classroom, it too had an elevated position in the compound. And from there Jules could stand out on the catwalk and survey the compound below.

"And how would you get in there?"

"Easy," Clive said as he began to outline his plan. "Every Thursday, Jules has a two hour meeting with all the department heads. Water, hydroponics, waste management, all of them. They give him an update on the state of the compound. The room is left unattended except for a keypad that accepts a four digit pin. And I have it on good authority that the pass code is the four digit street number the warehouse had before the fog."

This was sounding unbelievable to Alice. "So why are you telling me? Are you suggesting we try to get in his room this Thursday?"

"That's the plan," said Clive. And they started preparing themselves to break into Jules' office the following Thursday.

****

On the morning of the break-in, Alice and Clive wore plain black clothing: nothing too loud that might attract attention. Jules' meeting was always in the afternoon, so after lunch they decided to skip school and make their move.

To help obscure their movement, Clive used his slingshot to break the light above the doorway to Jules' room. He took the shot from below the stairs while nobody was looking. They waited to be sure the noise did not attract attention and then made their way up the stairs.

They now had an hour and fifty minutes to finish their objective. While Alice stood watch, Clive entered the code in the pinpad and the heavy metal door cracked open into the room. They pushed it open and closed it behind them.

The room was dark and they couldn't see anything. Alice found a light switch to the right of the doorway and turned it on. A light turned on overhead to reveal a mostly empty room except for a large reclined chair.

"Where is the window?" Clive asked. There was no window. The wall had no openings as far as they could tell.

Alice made her way to the chair first and inspected it. There were wires everywhere and at the head of the chair a helmet was attached with some sort of goggles.

"This is the window," she stated. "These wires connect it to the outside."

"How do you know that?" asked Clive.

"I don't. It's just a hunch. How much time do we have?"

Clive consulted his watch, "one hour and thirty minutes."

"Keep watch while I try it out."

"While you try it out?" Clive said exasperated. "This was my idea. Why should you try it before me?" But that was the last he said of the matter. Instead he went to the door and cracked it open a small amount while Alice jumped into the chair and pulled the helmet over her head.

***

The helmet turned on and Alice started to see an image of a table and chairs in front of her. The angle made it look like she was seated at the table along with four men. At the table were plates and silverware so she picked up a spoon and looked at her reflection. She however was not herself, but Jules Welland!

"Jules you look like you've seen a ghost," said the man across from Alice. He thought she really was Jules, but little did he know she was only impersonating Jules and appeared as his avatar. She realized she would have to play the part.

"I've been better," Alice said and her voice sounded just like Jules' voice. This was the most strange experience of her life.

The other two men remained motionless, almost like they were 'offline'. So she focused her attention on the man across from her. He was busy looking at a screen embedded in the tabletop. When she looked to the table in front of her, the dishes had disappeared and there appeared a screen in front of her also.

The screen was busy with information. There was data from the compound that Alice was easily able to decipher, but there was also other data too. She couldn't tell what it all was. Something about… weather? Was that a sun?

"Did you ever fix that water problem?" the man across from her asked, breaking up her thoughts. Alice recalled a week ago that the compound had been put on water rations for a day. But they were back to normal.

"Yeah, all good."

"You're welcome for the delivery by the way."

"The delivery…" Alice said. She didn't know what to say.

"Yes, the water I sent you. I know you paid me in hydroponics, but it'd be nice of you to acknowledge my efforts.

"I had a citizen escape my compound that day," the man began to explain. "Somehow he found out about the deliveries I was sending to Benson over here," the man said while gesturing to the man on his right. "The escapee followed the unmanned vehicle for a little while before Benson's security bots caught him. He unfortunately had to be killed or risk him telling one of our compounds the truth."

Alice's mind began to spin. Delivery… between compounds? Were people able to… leave? Robots…. killing?

She began to breathe heavily and the man across from her became concerned. "Jules' what's gotten into you? Take it easy! Why don't you leave the simulation and take a step outside your compound and breathe the fresh air."

Alice ripped the headset off her head and the simulation ended. Clive jumped at her sudden movement.

"It isn't real. It isn't real!" she said frantically.

"What isn't real?" Clive asked, now frightened by how agitated Alice was.

"Jules didn't save us. He imprisoned us. All of us! We are slaves!"

"Slow down," Clive pleaded.

"There are other compounds. They share resources between each other. They use the chairs as a window to communicate with each other. To barter and trade. They killed a man because he escaped!"

"Escape?" Clive asked. "As in leaving the compound?"

"Yes, a man escaped following a delivery truck. They sent unmanned vehicles and robots outside the compounds to deliver goods to each other."

"This is incredible!" continued Clive. "We can leave!"

"No you can't," said a voice from behind them. Clive and Alice both jumped at the voice and then dread set in as they realized who it was.

"Looks like my compound will be two people fewer from now on." Jules stated as he closed the door behind him and entered the room with a pistol in hand.