Unreal, a
It wasn’t
until after the third game that Jack finally pinned down what was wrong.
His team came
back strong from their first defeat, once Jack figured out how to swing in a
virtual reality setting without underestimating the impact on the virtual ball,
and once he got over the empty feeling in his pitching hand when he wound up to
throw a sinker. Running in the VR
helmets was a little unsettling since his head felt like it was twice the size
it should be, but he got over that, eventually.
He even had the unexpected thrill of hearing Zoe cheer for him when 
he laid ‘bat’ on ‘ball’ and actually
got it ‘over’ the ‘wall’.
Still, it
wasn’t quite what Jack had intended when he’d suggested a pick-up baseball
league at the town meeting. And it took
him a couple weeks to figure it out.
During those two weeks, people kept giving him odd looks. Well, odder than usual, and given the rampant
oddness that was
“You okay,
sheriff?” Jo asked three days after the
first loss. He stared blankly at her.
“Yeah,” he
eventually answered, then went back to staring at his (empty) desk.
“’Cause,
you know, for a first time on the field, you didn’t do too badly.”
He didn’t
have to look up to see her smirk, but it didn’t really register. His brain was too occupied trying to figure
out what was wrong. They sat in silence
for awhile, the only sound in the office the clicking as Jo broke down, cleaned
and snapped her guns back together.
When he
didn’t rise to the bait, Jo eventually asked, more tentatively, “You sure
you’re okay?” She actually sounded
concerned.
He looked
up again, mumbled, “Uh huh,” then got up and wandered out the door.
She followed him. He didn’t pay any
attention. There was just something
about that…
She watched
him closer as the days went by. He did
his job, caught a couple bad guys experimenting with some kind of energy zapper
doohickey that killed wildlife, made all the appropriate noises. Stark showed up, Allison beside him, though
Jack hadn’t bothered trying to get Allison to keep it on the down-low this
time. He’d just called it in and done
his job.
“Stark. Caught a couple yahoos with a bug zapper on
steroids they’ve been frying house pets with.
Looks classified. Come get it.”
“Er,
Carter?” Stark sounded confused.
Jack hung
up.
Of course he
hadn’t needed to give coordinates or anything.
Probably some kind of super tracker thingy in his cell
phone that told where he was all the time. Jack picked up the zapper by the handle end
of it and handed it off to the first of the couple dozen brawny military types
in full combat gear and nodded as Jo bundled the two weedy criminals into an
unmarked black van. Stark stood next to
his car, looking expensive in his tailored suit and trench coat, and gave Jack
a quizzical look. Jack thought,
absently, that black really made his blue eyes stand out, then nodded at Stark
and went to walk by. A hand on his arm
stopped him. Surprisingly, it was
Stark’s, not Allison’s. Allison was over
talking to Jo.
“Carter.” Stark sounded like he was spoiling for a fight. Or suspicious. Kind of paranoid.
“What?”
Jack asked, not particularly caring.
After a
pause while Stark stared at him, looking for God knows what, he said, “Thank
you for following protocols.” He sounded
like he was waiting for a punch line.
“Like I’d
know what to do with a big bug zapper?” Jack asked rhetorically, then ducked
out of Stark’s hold and went on to his truck.
After that, Allison watched Jack a lot, too. Stark must have said something to her.
He didn’t
know how to explain what was bothering him, but she didn’t ask, so that was
okay. And living with a self-aware AI
watching his movements all the time at home had prepared him for Jo and Allison
watching him every moment at work, so that didn’t bother him much.
Things got
a little clearer one evening over dinner.
For once, Zoe was home, and she was actually willing to talk to him
about her day.
“So then this huge guy, like six foot eight, smacks into this little
guy, maybe five foot if he’s that tall, and knocks his books down.
They stared at each other for, like, a minute, and I’m expecting the
little guy to get pounded into paste, but instead, the big guy, who looks like
he’s all muscles and tattoos and a Mohawk and really kind of like he should be
a biker in a gang or something, you know?
Starts apologizing and begging the little guy not to
screw up his credit report or steal his identity or something. I’m telling you, the nerds around here are
seriously scary!”
“In other
words, instead of the jocks hazing the nerds, the nerds haze the jocks, huh?”
he asked. Zoe nodded. Her nose scrunched up, and the rhinestone in
her nose piercing glinted in the light.
“It’s still
bullying, though. Still
stupid.” She gave him a sly
glance. “Maybe it’s a guy thing.”
“I don’t know,” Jack said slowly,
“but you’re right. Even if the bullying
is turned around, it’s still wrong.”
“I
guess. Different than my last school,
that’s for sure.”
“Are you
happy here?” he asked, staring at her, fitting her reactions in to his attempt
to understand what was wrong with the overall picture.
“Ecstatic,”
she snapped back immediately, her tone so dry it made him wince. “It’s okay,” she shrugged, fiddling with her
fork, scraping her plate.
“Would you like
dessert, Zoe?” S.A.R.A.H. asked, prompted by the sound of cutlery on
stoneware. Or watching them eat,
whichever. Probably
both.
Zoe rolled
her eyes and shrugged again.
“Weird. You know.”
Yeah. He did.
The next
day at work he met with Allison and briefed her on all the wild and offbeat
happenings in the town, a weekly ritual they’d begun shortly after he’d been
exiled to
He sighed
and rolled his eyes, a habit he’d picked up from his daughter. “Fine. Why?”
“You’ve
been really quiet lately.” She looked
concerned.
He shrugged
it off. “You up for
playing first base this weekend?”
As
distractions went, it worked like a charm.
Thoughts circled
and circled, slotted into place, jumbled around, as he went through the motions
of life in the oddest town on the planet, an alien among them, trying to find
or make his place. Still, it wasn’t
until the third game, as he reared back and smoked a fireball that struck out
He came up
for his final at-bat, smacked the crap out of the ‘ball’ and trotted home,
smiling at Zoe who was going bananas in the stands. Allison hugged him,
Except it wasn’t.
Henry
followed him home, as he’d done after the last few games, and S.A.R.A.H.
provided them with beer. Jack stared
across the gleaming black maybe-marble countertop at the one man who felt like
a friend in the midst of all the madness.
Henry grinned from ear to ear as he slugged back some of his own beer.
“Now,
that’s what I call baseball!” Henry crowed (for the eight thousandth time), and
Jack cracked.
“No,” he blurted out, deliberately
unclenching his fingers from the fist they’d made around his beer glass before
he broke it. “It isn’t.”
Henry gave
him a quizzical look. “I know, it’s not
what you’re used to, but …”
Implicit in
the silence was the assurance that it was so much better than anything Jack had
ever played before and, besides, it was
“No,” he
said, more quietly, “it’s not. But not
for the reasons you think it is. Or at
least, not for the reasons I think you’d think it is.”
Now Henry was looking confused, an expression that didn’t fit on his
face. Jack took a long drink of ridiculously good
beer and tried to explain. “Yeah, I
broke a sweat, and stretched out my legs, and swung the bat-“
“And got a grand slam homer in the bottom of the ninth to win the game!” Henry crowed a little again,
obviously trying to cheer Jack up. It
didn’t work.
“But it
wasn’t baseball.”
Henry
launched into a long-winded explanation of how one’s mind created a reality
that perfectly simulated real-game conditions and as such it was just as much
baseball as any other game played only without the risk of losing the ball over
the fence or cracking a windshield with a long line drive. Thankfully, his lecture wasn’t laden with all
the techno-babble most people’s conversation was, because Jack wasn’t in the
mood.
“There’s no
ball,” he broke into the flow. The
statement settled there like a rock in the middle of a stream. Henry looked at Jack.
Jack looked
at Henry.
“I’ve been
trying to figure out what was wrong ever since the first game.”
“It’s not
just because your team lost?” Jack
snorted at him and Henry hurried on. “So
that’s why you’ve been so quiet,” Henry added.
Jack gave
him an irritated look. “Mother hen,” he
muttered. “Between you and Jo and
Allison…”
“And Nathan
and
“Eh?” Jack shook his head and got back on
track. “Carter-watching. Whatever floats your boat. Anyway, that’s what’s wrong. There’s no ball.”
“Does it
feel like a ball? Does it throw like a
ball?” Henry questioned patiently.
Jack
growled. “No. I know what it’s programmed to do. But it’s not real. Virtual reality is just that. Unreal. And it bugs me.”
Henry
watched him closely, something like sympathy in his eyes. “Symptomatic of many of your experiences
since coming to
“Virtual
reality takes the reality out of life!” Jack exploded, hands flying out in a
vaguely globe-like expression of life, the universe, and everything. “Virtual baseball takes the damned ball
out of the game. What’s the point,
then? If you play a
game of ball with NO BALL. It’s
like watching porn and calling it having sex.
Yeah, you get the same bang at the end but you’re still on your own, in
your own head, using your own hands.”
Henry’s
eyes widened, and he coughed. “Are you
describing your dislike of our baseball efforts or commenting on the lack of
intimacy in your life?”
Jack sagged
against the counter and gave Henry a miserable look. “It’s just… this place. The only good things I’ve found here are the
beer, the bed, and you.”
While Henry
was digesting that, the lights flickered, and an irritated AI cleared its
virtual throat.
“And
S.A.R.A.H.,” Jack hastily added.
“Well, if
that’s the case…” Henry walked
deliberately around the counter and put a hand on either side of Jack’s hips,
pinning him in place, before leaning in.
Jack looked
down, looked up, then closed his eyes. Henry’s mouth was warm and hungry, and maybe
Jack hadn’t just been talking about baseball.
Much later,
sprawled over Henry on the insanely comfortable mattress, feeling the last drop
of beer slide down the side of the glass to drop onto his tongue, Jack sighed
happily. “Ain’t nothing like the real
thing.”
“Now that’s
what I call balls,” Henry slurred from somewhere around his shoulder, and Jack
smiled all the way to sleep.
END