Episode Eleven: Death is not the Answer

    A blast of pain surged though Troy's body when he hit the ground then evaporated into nothingness.  Sensing that his virtual body had sustained fatal damage the program immediately ceased sending information to his brain.  Once again Troy experienced the void.  The first time it had been enjoyable, his thoughts and feelings were ones of excitement and anticipation.  This time he found his thoughts and emotions to be a chaotic mix of disappointment, fear, and regret.  Anguish consumed him for the few moments he remained in the void.
    Like it had done before, the void vanished as his brain once again received  information.  Troy took one look around then fell to his knees and began sobbing—he was back at the origin, still trapped in the Endless Frontier.   The tears were both of joy and sorrow: joy that he was still alive, and sorrow that he had not escaped.  Minutes later when he finally regained his composure, he stood and tried to think rationally.
    Why did I come back here? he thought.  William said that I would either truly die, or wake up in the portal.  Well, I guess he was wrong.
    Troy went down to the stream and washed his face so that if William was still at the lodge he wouldn't know that he had been crying.  He found William a short time latter in the main lobby of the lodge.  He had various papers scattered all over the large wooden table.  He was concentrating on some calculations and didn't notice when Troy walked into the room.
    “You were wrong,” said Troy still standing in the doorway.
    “Don't scare me like that,” said William, startled, “I thought you were a hundred miles away by now.  I'm glad your back though. I thought I might never see you again. Why did you come back?”
    “If you had been right I wouldn't have come back at all, but you were wrong.  I died, William.  I fell off a cliff.  The next thing I knew I was standing on the origin.  I was expecting to die, or perhaps by a slim chance wake up in the portal and escape.”
    “That's impossible.  The code I wrote turns off the mind bridge equipment.  Are you sure you died?”
    “I jumped off a cliff, a big one. It was probably three or four hundred feet high. Just a moment or so after I hit the ground I reappeared here.”
    William sat thoughtfully for a moment.  “I honestly don't know why that happened.  It doesn't make any sense to me, but I'd rather think about it later.  Some things have happened that you should know.”
    Troy walked in and had a seat across the table from William.
    “A few days ago another man appeared,” William continued, “His name is Jim Senoma.  Apparently he is Dean's brother.  According to him, Dean is running out of money and wanted help to hide our bodies at a different location.  When Jim refused to help Dean turned on him and trapped him in here with us.  Jim is afraid that Dean will kill us to hide the evidence if he can't get money fast.”
    “Where is he? Jim I mean.”
    “He left that day.  He is trying to escape.”
    “Didn't you explain to him that the landscape goes on forever in all directions?”
    “Actually, he helped me realize that there is a way out.”
    “Go on,” said Troy.
    “The landscape ends just out of sight, right beyond the horizon.  As you know the computer creates the landscape as you explore it.  Well all that landscape is saved on the computers hard drive.  There can only be as much landscape as there is memory in the computer.  When the computer runs out of memory the horizon will stop moving.  You would be able to walk to the edge of the world and step out into nothingness.  The code I wrote for that scenario is similar to the code for death.  You should wake up in the portal.  But now I'm not sure.”
    “Why didn't you think of that in the first week when still had time?” said Troy in a moment of anger.  “No, I'm sorry.  I know you were trying.  At least we know what to do now.  You said Jim already left, chasing the horizon.”
    “Yes, he didn't waste a moment once he had a glimmer of hope.  But as I said, I'm not sure if it will work anymore.”
    “Why not?”
    “Because, when you jumped . . .” William's mind froze on that word as he realized that it meant Troy hadn't fallen by accident.  Deciding not to bring it up he quickly resumed talking.  “When you died the sensation didn't cause your brain to stop functioning.  Which means, according to the code I wrote you should have woken up in the Portal, but that's not what happened.  You are back here.  The code for the horizon is practically the same.”
    “Just curious, how much landscape can the computer hold before it runs out of space?”
    Humph.  William waved his hand at all the papers on the table. “I've been trying to figure that out for days.  The truth is I don't know.  At first I thought it was more that we could ever explore in a lifetime, but my rough calculations have given me a little more hope.  Depending on how many hard drives Dean's assistant connected, the total landscape could be anywhere from roughly the size of Ohio to as big as the entire continental US.  It also depends on the kinds of landscape the computer generates.  Ocean, for example only takes about half the memory per square cubic foot as rock.  However, a complex structure, like a tree,  takes more than double the memory of rock.  Every time I try and figure it out I run into so many unknowns I end up getting nowhere.”
    “So, any day now Dean is going to kill us all, and our only hope is to force the computer to generate more landscape with the slim hope that we will actually fill the hard disk space.  And even if we do, the horizon is likely to just send us back to the origin,” said Troy.
    “That about sums it up,” said William.

Episode Ten: A Lucky Stone

    A drop of sweat rolled down Jim's clenched jaw.  His fingers strained to maintain their grip on the quarter inch ledge above him as he tried to support himself with only one hand.  His feet occupied a slightly better spot on the rock face, but the rock ahead looked smooth and impassable.
    It had been a slow and exhausting climb up the end of the box canyon.  That morning when he saw the fifty foot wall of rock he had almost turned back, but the canyon had been long with cliffs on both sides.  At first he hadn't noticed them.  The mouth of the canyon was wide and the sides sloped up toward the ridges on either side.  He had stayed at the bottom of the canyon mostly for the water.  In his haste to leave he had taken a singe water pouch that he easily emptied each day.  When he noticed the cliffs he recognized that he was in the worst place possible, and the computer was generating very little land, but he rationalized that he would eventually reach the peak that the canyon seemed to be heading toward and see the entire landscape from there anyway.  The canyon proved much longer than he expected.  Turning back now would mean days of wasted effort.
    Now clinging to the edge of the cliff he doubted his initial judgment.  He had examined the wall carefully before making the attempt and knew there were no handholds near the top.  Draped around his neck he carried a twenty foot length of rope.  On the end he had tied a stick with two knives forming a crude hook.
    Using his free hand he pulled the coiled rope over his head and let most of it fall.  The jerk of the rope on his belt, where he had tied the other end, surprised him and almost made him fall.  Slowly he swung the hook in circles letting out a few feet of rope.
    A few days earlier he had gashed his hand on sharp rock.  He had stopped the bleeding with a  spare shirt, but he worried about infection.  He started a fire to heat some water and sterilize the wound. By the time he had gathered dry wood, made some kindling, and lit the fire—all with only one hand—the pain suddenly vanished.   Amazed he had removed the bandage, brushed the dried blood of his skin, and flexed his hand.  It was as though he had never been cut.  After that he no longer feared injury.
    This, however, was different.  If he fell from this height and landed wrong he would die.  William had been clear about that.  With a great thrust he threw the rope toward the top of the cliff.   As soon as his hand let go of the rope it snapped back to the wall stabilize his hold, but it was too late.  One foot had slipped on the rock in the throwing motion.  For a few tantalizing seconds he clung to the wall before his fell backward away from the wall.   Instinctively he pushed of the wall with one foot turning himself to face his fall.
    He flailed his arms wildly searching for anything to grasp.  Skin slid and tore against rough rock and bones creaked and cracked from seemingly random impact points as he tumbled.  Finally he landed on the canyon floor chest first blasting all air from his lungs.  The struggle to breath helped him ignore the pain enough to turn and lay on his back, his left arm was obviously broken, jutting out in the wrong direction.  He couldn't feel either of his legs and didn't bother looking.    When a breath finally came it came with pain.  Broken ribs seemed to burst into flame with every heaving of his chest.
    He felt himself blacking out and feared that if he did he might never wake up.  In his mind he focused on images of Troy Lombardi and William Kilgore laying in the portal and this time included himself on one of the beds that had been empty.  His eyes were wide open, but his vision was narrowing and becoming fuzzy around the edges.  He brought Dean's face to mind and tried use anger to hold back the darkness, but all he felt was an overwhelming sadness.  As his eyesight vanished he thought of Susan and the kids.  I must live, he thought, they need me.
    Hours later he awoke from his slightly uncomfortable position on the ground.  His clothes were in tatters, but his body retained no mark from the fall.  He hadn't noticed at the time, but in his pain he had tore at the ground with his good hand.  There in his hand was a small stone about the size of a large marble.  It was ordinary gray with a thin stripe of white around the middle.
    Lucky, he thought. That's what Michael would say.  Michael had a bucket full of rocks he had collected from the neighborhood.  Each for some reason had caught his eye and become the object of his awe.  Michael would have loved this one.  Jim pocketed the rock and looked back up the cliff.  There hanging from the top was the rope were it had successfully snagged.
    That evening he watched the sunset from the mountain peak.

Episode Nine: The Loss of Paradise

    Troy Lombardi awoke to another beautiful morning.  He made his camp on one of the foothills of mountain range the night before.  Green grass that stood higher than his chest covered the hill where he lay.  Only a mile or so up the gentle slope the grass gave way to rock.  The mountains themselves were very rugged looking,  no life grew on their slopes.
    At the foot of the mountains lay a vast plain with rolling hills.  There were occasional thickets of trees, especially along the river.  These clumps of trees had provided good resting spots and welcome relief from the beating sun, as Troy made his way northward.  His original food store had lasted only a week,  but from time to time he would find fruit trees or berry bushes.
    After having an apple for breakfast from a nearby tree, he loaded his pack full of them.  He didn't know what he would find on the other side of those mountains, and he wanted to be prepared for anything.  At a nearby stream he filled his water pouch to the brim and began his climb up the mountain.
    The trip had been unique for Troy Lombardi.  As a wealthy outdoor enthusiast he frequently took trips to extreme back country, but the grass covered plain proved much easier traveling that he was used to.  The going had been easy and days long.  Around midday he would find a grove of trees to rest in avoiding the hottest part of the day.
    By the end of the first day on the plains he wished he had a horse.  There hadn't been any at the lodge, and he probably wouldn't have taken one anyway. It would have been difficult taking it up the stone staircase at the water fall.
    After lamenting the lack of a horse he began to notice other odd things about the endless frontier.   At night when he lay in his sleeping bag he heard no noise except the wind.  There were no crickets chirping in the night, nor frogs croaking in the nearby ponds.  The next day he observed a lack of any animal whatsoever.  No birds flying in the trees.  No mosquitoes in the swamp he circled around.
    He realized that in his journeys animals had always been a sort of companion.  Now he felt eerily alone.  After the first week he despised the plain.  Each day he would run for a few miles in the morning hoping to reach some variation in the landscape.  When he had finally spotted the mountains in the distance it instantly became his goal.
    Having a goal, a visual object to aim at, soothed his frazzled mind.  Out on the plains he could not seem to enjoy himself.  Wandering without aim left his mind to wander.  He wondered what had happened to Lombardi Inc. in the weeks he had been away.  Without him there to sign the papers the business deals he had been working on had certainly failed, and who was now minding the frequent paperwork and reading the reports?  He had no clear successor.  What did the police think had happened to him? Certainly he was reported missing.  Did they think he was dead?
    And behind all these thoughts lurked a constant anger: Dean Senoma.  Over and over Troy planned his revenge, malicious plans to publicly humiliate and forever end his scientific carrier.  One of his ideas included having William make a new program, one that had only barren desert with mirages of water that were really cactus beds.   A normal trial and prison term seemed too ordinary and mundane for Dean's bizarre crime.
    All of his plans had one great flaw, getting out of the Endless Frontier.  Once, before he had spotted the mountain, he stood on the edge of a river wondering how hard it would be to drown himself.  He weighed in his mind over and over the possibility of death verses awaking in the portal.  He had been there for almost a full hour before he moved on.
    Now as he made his way up the rocky slope he enjoyed the focus that came with the struggle.  For hours he wound his way up the slope.  Soon sweat drenched his shirt as the air was heated by sun-baked rocks.  Once he fell and slip twenty feet or so down a gravel slope.  The ordeal tore his shirt, exposing a large portion of his chest, but he didn't let the pain from his bruises and scratches slow him down.    
    Instead of heading toward the lowest point on the ridge line where he could most easily cross, he headed strait toward the peak of the mountain.  And by mid-afternoon he made his way up the final slope.
    The view from the top was beautiful.  The far side of the mountain dropped away in a cliff a few hundred feet high.  As far as he could see in that direction there were mountains of varying heights.  He could also see a few wooded valleys and slopes covered in wildflowers.  A clear lake had formed at the bottom of the canyon directly below him.
    At first he was overwhelmed with relief.  He had feared that he would be faced with another vast plain equally boring as the one he had spent over a month to cross.   There was a land worth exploring, he thought.  Then an odd thought intruded his mind: the explorers in the old days would have thought that prairie a golden find, and these mountains a waste land.
    After the initial thrill of victory, the peak seemed anticlimactic.  He sat down and bit into an apple.  A slight breeze made the air comfortable.  For a long time he looked out at the plain and back into the mountains. He couldn't identify it specifically but he felt something was horribly wrong.  Eventually he came to the realization that the mountains would be just like the plain had been, long and wearisome.  This was not the paradise he imagined it would be.
    The anger, augmented by the loss of his paradise, suddenly returned with overwhelming force.
    “Dean Senoma!” he shouted into the thin air as he struggled to his feet.  “I will find you and make you pay or die trying.”   Troy ran down a short slope and leaped off the edge of the cliff.
    As his foot pushed off the edge, a memory of his father sprang to the forefront of his mind
    Lombardi Inc. was still very new in those days and often struggled financially.  That day one of their trusted business partners had betrayed them, selling his portion of the company to a competitor.  Troy had angrily suggested a few methods of revenge.   His father, however, had remained quiet and calm.  It was that calm quiet face he saw now.
    “Troy,” his father had said, “Don't allow your anger to make the problem worse than it is.  This will set us back a few years, but we will move on.”  And with steady determination he had.
    It isn't the same, Troy thought to himself.  I am trapped and desperate.  But the feeling of disappointing his father didn't go away, and the ground came rushing up to meet him.

Episode Eight: A Way Out

“There is one way out,” said William Kilgore, his moment of excitement faded and his voice turned dull,  “but we probably don't have enough time.  Dean will kill us before it works.”  He stood up and turned to walk back into the lodge.
“Stop,” said Jim also getting to his feet.  “I don't care if we have a million to one chance, we have to try.”
William sighed.  He walked back onto the balcony over to the railing and pointed east where a line of mountains made the horizon.  “Do you see those mountains?”
“Yes,” said Jim.
“Do you know what is on the other side of them?” when Jim didn't respond he kept talkin, “A void. Nothing.  There isn't even a slope down the other side.  If you step into that void the program will crash; but it isn't that simple, because as soon as you look over that ridge the computer will generate a new landscape and fill in the void.  The horizon will extend and the void will once again be just out of sight.  That is why it is called The Endless Frontier,  the horizon just keeps moving away always out of sight.”
“Then where is our chance?  You said we had a least a small one.”
“Although the program can generate an endless landscape,  the computer has a limited memory.  I just now realized that if the horizon was pushed back enough it would fill up the entire hard drive on the computer and  stop.  Someone could then step over the horizon and into the void.  That would cause an error in the programs logic triggering an emergency termination of the program.  In the emergency termination code is a line that cuts power to Dean's machines cutting all connections to the brain.”
“How far would I have to go to reach the horizon?”
“I don't know, some landscapes take more memory than others.  If you walk in a canyon it would take a long time because the only thing calculated is the canyon walls,  on a prairie you can see farther so more memory would be used.  Standing on a mountain top, or any high place, will force the program to generate a lot of landscape.  Even if you see it from miles away, the computer generates in great detail.
“To be honest I'm not even sure how much memory the server we are running on has.  I altered all the CPUs and the main infrastructure, but I left behind all my hard drives when we moved it to a new building.  Dean bought all the hard memory and had his assistant install them.  As far as I know there might be enough memory to generate the equivalent of the entire earths surface and more.”
“But you don't know.  Which gives us a chance.  Where can I find equipment?”
“There is more than you could ever want in the basement.  What you can't find there is in the shed outside—what do you plan to do?  It could take years to find the horizon.”
“You see that mountain peak, I'm going to climb it.  Then I will head east into whatever land the computer makes for me.  I will travel along the highest routs I can find viewing as much land as I can.  And when I reach the horizon I will escape.”
“Your chances of succeeding are a million to one.  Dean is likely to kill us any day now.  It will take you months at lest to find the horizon.”
“At least I will have a chance.  By sitting here you are willfully choosing to die.”  Jim turned in anger from William and stormed away.
William remained on the balcony.  Jim's words stung him.  The worst part was that he knew Jim was right.  He had given up and was waiting to die.  That is why he never really made progress on the water wheel.  That is why he didn't go out into the wild himself.  He was angry at himself for not caring, but still he sat there on the balcony, doing nothing.
About an hour later he watched silently as Jim appeared on the trail below and marched into the woods.  It was almost dark, William thought he would have at lest waited till dawn, but there he was full of energy and determination facing the unknown.  Jim never looked back. Never looked up to see if William was still on the balcony.  Envy welled up inside William, for a month now he had sat practically idle at the lodge.  He had taken a few walks in the woods and canoed on the lake a few times, but every evening he returned feeling trapped.  Everything felt useless and hopeless.  He envied Jim's courage and determination and was angered at his own inability to do anything.
    He returned to the room he had made his own and climbed into bed, but that night he couldn't sleep.  He lay awake looking at the ceiling made of wooden logs knowing the too were part of the digital illusion that had become his world.  For years he had worked day an night on computer simulated reality.  Time and time again people had hailed him a genius.  If only they saw me now, he thought, they would know how weak I really am.  
Out under the stars, Jim walked swiftly down the trail.  A full moon shown down through the pines and gave him enough light to avoid roots and rocks in the path.  He knew that he couldn't sleep even if he stopped and made camp, so he continued walking.  Over and over the events of the past day paraded through his mind.  Over and over he saw the look in Dean's eyes when pushed him into the room called The Portal.  Jim liked to think that he was a calm man, but he felt anger now like he had never felt before.  Fueled by fear and a sense of betrayal that anger propelled him onward.  Even when the trail ended and he had to weave through the trees and brush, he pushed onward.

Episode Seven: Meeting of Prisoners

Jim laid back on the hard stone and watched as the clouds passed by.  He tried to convince himself that he was enjoying an especially vivid dream, but the serenity of his surroundings contrasted sharpy with the confusion that clouded his mind.  Dean's words replayed over and over in his memory, haunting him.  A faint hope remained that it was all a dream, and when he woke up both Dean's words and this strange stone in the wilderness would fade to a fuzzy recollection he could tell with humor over the breakfast table.
Suddenly he exploded off the ground and stood on his feet.
Am I dead? the thought scared him.  Dean wouldn't do that; I'm his brother.  The image of two bodies with tubes leapt to the forefront of his memory. He pushed up his left sleeve to look at his shoulder.  To his horror, the three inch scar was gone.  What will happen to Susan?  Anna is only four, will she even remember me? Rachel graduates this spring.  I have to be there.
Jim turned around slowly and examined his surroundings, pushing back the questions that he knew wouldn't help anyway.  First things first—Where am I?  There could see no sign of human life except the stone he stood on, just trees, mountains, and a lake.
I don't think I'm dead.  He wasn't sure what heaven looked like, but he expected lights or music or something.  And angels; there would definitely be angels,  he thought.   Origin.  What does that mean?  Who made this stone?
No amount of reasoning came up with any explanation of any kind.  It must be a dream.  There is no other way to explain it.  This comforted him. Dreams don't make sense, so why bother trying to make sense of it anyway.
With a somewhat forced carefree spirit he climbed the grassy hill to get a better look at his surroundings.

William paced around the table he had moved to the balcony thinking hard.  Occasionally he would pause and look down at the papers on the table.  Sometimes he would sketch a few lines, adjusting one of the four different plans.  Three days ago he had decided to build a water wheel.  Mostly because he needed something to do.  Now his resolve was ebbing.  One plan was clearly the best.  It was the first one he had drawn before he had realized he would have to make his own nails if he wanted to use any, or deconstruct the Lodge for nails.  The lodge had saws, hammers, axes, ropes, working gloves, hand drills, and a wide assortment of other tools.  Explorers don't use nails.  They don't stay in one place long enough to want them.
The silence in The Endless Frontier bothered him.  Without electricity he couldn't chase the silence away with music like usually did.  The only sound was the wind in the trees and creek of the boards when he walked around.
He hadn't really noticed the silence until Troy left.  For the first three days they had talked.  At first they had wondered, then hypothesized, then argued.  On the fourth day Troy woke up early and declared that it didn't matter how he ended up in The Endless Frontier;  he was going to embrace his dream and chase the horizon.  He departed with a canoe full of supplies, headed north toward the waterfall and staircase in the cliff.
William walked away from the table and sat looking out at the landscape.  Everything felt useless here.
To his surprise a man appeared up on the hill coming from the origin.  At first he thought it must be Troy coming back from his adventures; but the man on the hill was wearing a plain white shirt and a pair of jeans, the default clothes.  This meant he had just come from the origin.  The man was taller and had a broader build than Dean.
A thrill of excitement caused William to run down through the lodge and out the front door.  After three weeks of isolation seeing anyone made him happy.  The two of them met about halfway up the hill.  They stopped a few feet apart and looked each other up and down.
“Hi, my name is William Kilgore.  Welcome to The Endless Frontier,” said William.
Jim stepped back as though the words had dealt him a physical blow.  “Are you the William Kilgore,  the one that vanished over a month ago?”
“Yes! Are you here to get us out?  I knew Dean couldn't hide us forever.  Troy isn't here right now, but he took his phone with him.  When he get out we can call and tell him the good news.  What is your name by the way?”
“Jim.  Jim Senoma.  Actually I'm a little bit confused.  You called this place the Endless Frontier.  Where exactly are we?  I got into a fight with my brother.  I think you know him, Dean is his name.  Well I think he drugged me and I woke up on the big strange stone on the other side of this hill.”
Jim saw the hope and joy drain from Williams face.  “Well,” said William, “lets head down to the lodge.  I'll explain as we walk.
Jim listened with growing dread as William explained what had happened.  Jim asked questions from time to time, but mostly just listened.  When William was finished he told him what Dean had said about not wanting to kill them, but that he was running out of money.  
“Then we can only wait here to die,” said William.  They were now sitting on the balcony looking out across the lake.
“There must be something we can do,” said Jim. “You made this program, there must be another way out.”
“Troy and I talked about that a long time.  There is only one way that might work, but it isn't worth the risk.”
“Dean is going to kill us anyway if we just sit here.  We don't have anything to lose.  What is it?”
“Death—I wrote the program to pull you out of The Endless Frontier if your virtual self dies.  But neither Troy nor I think it is worth trying.  Dean, the expert on brains, would have thought of that and he doesn't seem worried that we will escape that way.  I think you would die both here and in reality.”
Images of Susan and his kids kept floating through Jim's mind.   He didn't know what he was going to do, or how he was going to try, but he knew he couldn't just sit there until he died.  “Is there any bug or glitch in the program we could use to make it crash?  Maybe we could get out that way.”
“I've tried for weeks to come up with something.”
“Is there an exit anywhere, a place where you walk through a door or something to get out?”  Jim knew it was a silly suggestion.  If it was that easy, William would have walked out that first day.
“None,” said William, but as that hopeless word hung in the air he remembered something. The thrill of hope he had felt when Jim appeared returned   He stood up and looked Jim in the eye.  “Wait,  you're right. There is one way out.”

Episode Six: Another Victim

    “Police now suspect that missing billionaire Troy Lombardi may have abandoned his fortune and gone to live the life of a hermit,” said a voice mixed with static. 

    Jim Senoma turned up the car radio, so he could hear it above the rumble of his old truck.  

    “Mr. Lombardi is a professed outdoor fanatic and has been on trips into many of the worlds remotest areas.  His personal secretary said that he has spent large amounts of money on a secret project he calls the Endless Frontier and that he once described it to her as the fulfillment of his dreams.

    “He was last seen just over a month ago when he left his office after working for only a few minutes.  He told his secretary that he had other plans and was going to take the day off.”

    “Police investigation revealed that he has been withdrawing large amounts of cash, upwards of a billion dollars, in the last year.  His secretary admitted that she is aware of at least one account that Mr. Lombardi uses under an assumed name, and suspects he has more.  Officials believe that Mr. Lombardi may have used the money to construct a resort in secrecy to which he has now retired.

    “A second, perhaps related, incident was reported yesterday.  A local man, by the name of William Kilgore was reported missing by his landlord who had tried unsuccessfully to collect rent for two weeks.  The last confirmed sighting of the man was two days before Mr. Lombardi's disappearance.  

    “Sarah Micheals, a friend of the missing man, who saw him last, suggested that his disappearance may be related to the disappearance of Mr. Lombardi.  According to her Mr. Kilgore had told her on multiple occasions that he worked for Troy Lombardi.  However, the claim has yet to be verified.

    “You are listening to News Both Local and National on . . .”

    Jim turned the radio off.  He pulled out his cell phone and dialed while he waited for a street light to turn green.  When the light turned green, he shifted the truck into gear and resumed driving. 

    “Hello,” said Dean, Jim's brother, over the phone.

    “Hi Dean, how are thing going?”

    “Fine.”

    “I just heard a story on the radio about a missing William Kilgore.  Isn't that the guy you mentioned to me a while back?  The one that was going to do some computer work for you.”

    “Yes,  he was going to work with me, but he changed his mind at the last minute.  I'm still looking for someone else to do it.”

    “What do you think about Mr. Lombardi's disappearance.  Piles and piles of money and poof—he vanishes into thin air.  On the radio they were saying he might have just got up and left it all.  To me it sounds fishy.  Like someone knocked him off of something.  What do you think.”

    The line was quiet for a few minutes. 

    “Jim.  I'm glad you called.  I've gotten myself into a little trouble.  I need your help.  Could you  help me?”

    “Sure Dean, what's wrong.”

    “I don't want to talk about it over the phone.  Could you stop by sometime soon?”

    “Sure I'm running a few errands for Susan anyway.  I can get to your house in a few minutes.”

    After hanging up the phone Jim pushed a little harder on the gas.  Something was wrong with Dean.  Jim had never hear that kind of quiver in Dean's voice before.  

    Twenty minutes latter they stood in an office building in front of a door with the words The Portal printed on it.  Dean had been quiet the whole trip there.  He had only told Jim that he wanted to show him something.  Now in front of the door he turned and faced Jim.

    “Do you remember when we were little and told lies to mom.  How they always got bigger and bigger, till we ended up in real trouble—I've gotten myself into trouble like that now.  Now it is getting out of control.  I need your help before I end up doing something really terrible.”  Dean spoke quickly.  The words seemed to hurt him.  His jaw quivered as he spoke.

    Jim remained silent.  He put one hand on Dean shoulders to give him strength to keep talking.

    “I lied to you, the whole family.  I didn't get the government grant.  The money I've been spending comes from an employer who wants to remain hidden.  He doesn't know it. But I used his money to do some illegal things.  Then I got scared that he would find out and report me, so I took some more illegal measures to make sure he would never find out, but I didn't think things through enough.  My lies have gotten more and more expensive.  I'm running out of money.”  Dean had his eyes on the floor, obviously afraid.

    Jim thought for a long time.  He decided he better learn more before agreeing to anything, he still didn't know how serious Dean's crimes were.

    “Who is your employer?” asked Jim.

    Dean jerked back from him.  “Why does it matter to you?  He wants to remain a secret.”

    “Sorry.  I'm just trying to understand.  That's all.”

    Dean relaxed again.  “No, I'm sorry.  I'm just so scared all the time now.” Suddenly he snapped up his head, “I don't want to do it, Jim.  They've left me no choice!” he said in fiery whisper.

    “What do they want you to do?”

    “It doesn't matter what they want anymore.  No one will ever find them, but I don't want to kill them, Jim.  I have something here in this room that I need to hide.” He gestured to the door. “I need to use your cabin,  I'm not going to be able to pay rent soon.  I don't know how long, only till I find somewhere more permanent.”

    Jim thoughts spun, trying to make sense of everything Dean said.  The implications horrified him.  Dean was contemplating murder.  He already had something he was desperate to hide.

    “Dean.”  Jim paused searching hard for the right words to say. “I want to help you. I want you to be free from the lies.  They are just like the lies we told mother.  If you keep them hidden they will only get bigger.  Let's go in to your office and use the phone to call the police.  I'll be right here with you.  If you end this now it will work out in the end.  Don't let whatever it is get any bigger.”

    Dean stopped shivering as Jim spoke.  A inner resolve pushed back his fear.  He raised his head and looked Jim in the eye.  “You don't care about me do you.  You're just afraid for yourself.  I come to you for help and you just push me away.  I don't care if the whole world is against me.  I'm not going to give up, Jim.”  The look in his eye sparked fear in Jim's heart, what had happened to his childhood friend.

    Dean opened the door and pushed Jim into the room.  Jim didn't resist; he knew he was stronger than Dean and could escape if needed.  What he saw puzzled, then horrified him. Two people with multiple IVs and tubes connected to their bodies lay on beds.  They appeared sound asleep.  

    “Troy Lombardi,” gasped Jim in recognition.  He turned to Dean horrified. 

    At that moment Dean lunged at Jim.  Jim felt a sharp pain on his arm.  As Dean pulled back his hand he saw he was holding a syringe.  Throwing Dean aside Jim ran for the door, but the drug overcame him and he collapsed just a few feet outside.

    A few hours later when the drug wore off  he awoke, lying face down on a hard stone floor.  Pushing himself to his knees, he saw that he was no longer inside.  All around him was a beautiful wilderness.   On the stone in front of him was engraved one large word,  “Origin.”

Episode Five: Trapped

    William stared for a moment at the fallen clothes.  He rejected the first thought that popped into his mind out and instead let himself wonder why the clothes hadn't vanished with Dean.  He decided he needed to look over the program's code and see if he could make the cloths disappear when the person left..  He began trying to remember exactly how he had written the code and how best to change it, but that first terrible realization wouldn't go away. 
    He grabbed the phone off his belt and made a call to the portal.  After a few rings no one had answered.  He tried to think of explanations for them not answering besides the obvious horrible one. Perhaps coming out of virtual reality had strange side effects and Elizabeth was focused on helping Dean.  Or maybe Dean was excitedly telling Elizabeth about what had happened.  Or the plan Dean had mentioned was some secret surprise that they were currently occupied with.
    In the more unruly sections of his mind where he was unable to control himself, things were becoming blatantly clear.  Dean hated Mr. Lombardi for retaining control of the technology they developed.  Dean had secretly loaded with the computer with Miss Stratford without telling him.  Both Dean and Elizabeth had been acting strangely tense earlier in the portal.  Dean had made sure that there was no other way out before having Elizabeth take him out of the Endless Frontier. 
    After about thirty rings the phone slipped from his fingers and landed, still calling, amid the grass.  He began walking over the hill toward the lodge, not really sure what he was going to tell Mr. Lombardi.  At the top of the hill he could see Mr. Lombardi pushing a canoe across the sand toward the lake.   Five more canoes were still on a rack behind the lodge.  The two story lodge was made of bare logs and had a wrap around porch and balcony.  A brick chimney came up out of the wooden shingled roof.
    Mr. Lombardi had returned from the shore and was working on getting a second canoe off the rack when William reached him.
    “Back in the real world this kind of work would made my back hurt for a month, but here the work feels good,” said Mr. Lombardi before William could bring himself to say anything.    Troy realized something was wrong when Mr. Kilgore didn't give any response, he just stood there awkwardly.
    “Where is Mr. Senoma?” said Troy.
    “He had Elizabeth take him out of the program,” said William.  “I called the portal, but they didn't answer.  Either something went terribly wrong when he tried to leave,  or they've trapped us intentionally.”
    There was a long pause where neither of them said anything. “Say that again,” said Troy.
    “Mr. Senoma left us here.  And no one answered when I called the portal.”
    “Did he tell you why he was leaving?”
    “No not really.  It was really strange he told Elizabeth the plan would work and to take him out.  I don't know what he meant by the plan.  But I'm worried because right after you left he asked me if there was any other way out.”
    “And what did you tell him.  Is there another way out?”
    “No sir.”
    There was another long pause.  Mr. Lombardi pulled out his cell phone and pushed the button to call the portal.  William sat down wearily on the grass. Troy paced around, waiting for someone to answer.   After a long time Troy slowly closed the phone.
    “Let's go inside and find somewhere more comfortable to talk.”  Mr. Lombardi helped William to his feet.
    They sat in plush chairs in the large lobby area of the lodge.  On one side of the room was a huge stone fireplace with wood already prepared on the hearth to start a fire.  There was a bar with a kitchen behind it various stuffed animal heads mounted on the walls.
    “How likely is it that something is wrong with the phone?” asked Troy.
    “Almost none.  I've run simulations before and used the phones.  They've never had problems before.”
    “Is there anyway to use the phone to call somewhere other than the portal?”
    “Only if someone on the outside connects the line for you.”
    “When I came to the portal this morning I told my personal secretary I was taking the day off.  In a few days they will probably report that I am missing, but I rode a buss so there is no way the police will be able to follow my tracks and save us.  I was too worried about keeping this a secret.  Will they be able to find you?”
    “I work by myself.  The only one who will notice I am missing is Sarah, a good friend of mine.  But she is more likely to thing I'm on a sudden business trip than to call the police.  My car is still at my apartment, Dean picked me up today.  I guess if we are still here in two weeks the landlord will wonder why I haven't payed my rent.  He might call the police.  But even then they'd search my main office, not this place.  Dean rented it, I'm not even aware of what the address is.”
    Troy slammed his fist into the arm of the chair. “Blasted secrecy.  I never expected someone on the inside of the project to try and steal it all.  What does the man want?  I've given him plenty of money for his work.”
    “A few weeks ago he told me he didn't like you. You are funding the project and we were work under you because of that you own the technology we've developed.  He was afraid that you would take it and not let him continue to develop his breakthrough in science.  I didn't think he would do anything like this though.”
    Mr. Lombardi got up and made is way over to the kitchen area.  “Let's just wait for a while and see if Dean gets us out of here.  Maybe this is just an honest mistake. Will I find any food in this place?”  He didn't wait for an answer but began opening cupboards.
    Mr. Kilgore didn't say anything he just sat thinking.  Troy returned with a chocolate bar and sandwich for each of them.
    “Well we don't have to worry about going hungry anytime soon.  There's lots of food here.  But since you made this place, you probably already knew that.”
    “There is one thing that might get us out,” said William, “but I don't think we should try it unless we really get desperate.”
    “What is that?” asked Troy.
    “We could die—if we were to die, here in the virtual world, and if the experience of dying didn't shut down our brains, the program automatically bring us out of the Endless Frontier and we would wake up in the real world.  But that is Dean's area of expertise.  If did trap us in here intentionally it most likely means he knows we couldn't get out that way.”