During their entire journey, Ava tried to process and understand what he had just said. Did he just say he had gotten her out of the simulation? What had he meant by that? All this just raised many more questions in her head and prompted a feeling of panic.

Did this really mean that everything she had known, all the memories, all of it was a lie?

"I know it's all confusing but I promise we will explain everything to you." He said.

She looked at him trying to see if she could find an anchor of certainty in his eyes. He looked at her with eyes filled with determination and something that looked like regret.

"I'm Jude by the way. Sorry we weren't properly introduced but the situation hadn't allowed us to be formally acquainted." He said.

"Oh, it's nice to meet you, Jude. You already know who I am." She replied as she gave him an acknowledging nod.

She took a glance around as they manouevred through the buildings and was shoked at what she saw.

Old worn down abandoned buildings that had hedges and moss growing all over them. These buildings seemed to have been abandoned years ago but that was impossible. They looked just like the regular buildings she had grown up in. Granted they were older more abandoned looking versions.

Still, she couldn't fathom how she could be looking at obvious replicas of the buildings in her zone.

"What happened here?" She asked.

"Oh, these buildings have been abandoned for decades now." He replied with a smile as he tried to diffuse her unease.

It was as if he could sense her confusion and fear and was doing everything he could to get her mind off of everything that was going through her mind.

It worked a little, as she focused on his grey eyes, Ava forgot about her confusion temporarily. She could not ignore how her heart skipped a beat everytime he looked her direction. Sure for the most part the whole day had been one confusing scene after the other, however for that single moment Ava was able to get lost in his stormy grey eyes.

The moment was fleeting and with a blink of an eye it was gone and they were trapped in reality again.

They had somehow reached their destination. A series of tunnels that would take them through the sewers to their underground hideout. The only safe place for them as Jude had put it.

After a twenty minutes walk they came to an underground bomb shelter facility that had been built over four decades ago. The security detail was impeccable and ever on guard. Depsite Jude obviously being one of them they did not exempt him from the security checks and scans.

After what felt like forever, the two of  them where finally let into the base.

Although she had figured the base would be spacious, she had not imagined it would be that big and that populated. There were a lot of people who were scurrying about on various tasks who barely gave them the time of the day. Some did give Jude an acknowledging nod though and after a few feet another guy approached them.

"You're finally here, tok you long enough you idiot." He said to Jude as they shared what appeared to be their secret handshake.

"Well I'm here now." Jude replied and then turned to her. "Ava, meet Miles. Our resident hacker and tech genius."

"Did you just admit I'm smarter than you, Jay?" Mikes asked with a mocking grin.

"Yeah, you're a smartass." Jude said with a raised eyebrow.

His response made Miles give a hearty laugh. Ava found his energy infectious and couldn't help the smile that spread across her face. He was obviously a cheerful character and the two of them were obviously very close friends.

"My bad, I don't want to seem rude." Miles said as he gave her a smile. "It's nice to officially meet you, Ava. You might know me as the guy who guided you back here."

"On the ear comms, that was you?" She asked, finally adding two and two together.

"Yup and if you stick around more you'll see more of my genius skills in action." Miles replied.

"Wow, way to lay it thick there, Miles. Real smooth." Jude said jokingly.

"Shut it, punk. You should be more concerntrated on how the Captain is about to whoop your ass in the next ten seconds." Miles told, his tone becoming a little more serious.

"Wait, he knows?" Jude asked in slight panic.

"He always knows." Miles said with an understanding smile. "That's why he's the best of us. It's why he's captain."

Almost instantly the whole atmosphere changed. Right ahead of them an older man appeared and walked straight towards them. He looked very similar to Jude so Ava assumed that they were related some way. He had an air of authority that made everyone stop what they were doing and make way for him.

With that single look from his grey eyes, Ava could tell that the man was pissed off. As he finally came up to them, she saw Jude tense up besides her like a child that had been caught stealing candy.

"Uh, Captain, I can explain..." Jude began but before he could even finish the man punched him hard in the gut.

Everyone who was watching couldn't help but wince at that obviously painful encounter. Even Ava found herself in a cold sweat. She wanted the ground to swallow her up right then and there but it was already awkward enough as it was.

"Little punk, I told you about going off on your own and disobeying my direct orders!" The man shouted at Jude who was clutching his stomach and groaning in pain.

Jude took a few moments to recollect himself and let the pain subside before he straightened himself and stood up straight to face him.

"I'm sorry, Michael, but I could not afford to wait for your approval. Time was running out and I made a judgement call." Jude said in a monotone voice. "Ava was in danger and I had to help her before we lost that window."

"The call was not yours to make." Michael said firmly. "You wanted to play hero, that's all it was. Remember this, little brother, it worked out well today out of pure dumb luck but one day your luck will run out and your carelessness will get you and the people you care about killed."

He let out a defeated sigh before he looked at Jude with regret.

"I'm not trying to be hard on you, Jude, but you are being reckless. I need to know that you can take care of yourself and everyone else when I'm gone. Unfortunately you're doing a crappy job of convincing me that that is the case." He said softly.

His complete one eighty stunned Ava. One minute the man had been super angry and the next he was feeling sorry about his outburst.

Feeling awkward, she cleared her throat in hopes of drawing his attention and probably diffusing the situation.

"Excuse me, sorry for intruding but I don't want you to get angry at Jude for whatever he did. I understand he was helping me. I'm not exactly sure what is going on but I feel like all of this is maybe my fault." She said nervously.

It was only then that he turned his attention to her. He gave her a small apologetic smile before he spoke.

"Forgive my rudeness. You must be Ava." He said as he held out his hand for a handshake to her. "I hope you can forgive first impressions, I would hate to leave the wrong impression on our guest. I am Michael. Welcome to our humble aboard."

"Thank you." She responded as she shook his hand.

"Now, what do you say we go continue this conversation in private. We have already attracted enough attention as it is for today." He said.

Turning around, he did not even wait for them to respond before he began to lead them ahead.

"Tell me, Ava, did my brother tell you anything at all before he dragged you back here?" Michael asked without turning back.

"Well, I wouldn't say he dragged me back but no. No he didn't." She replied.

"Then I assume you have a lot of questions. Questions that you can't even say out loud because you're afraid they make you sound crazy. Is that about right?" He continued.

"Yes." She said.

In fact, she had a lot of questions but she was afraid of the answers. She was afraid that the bubble of complete ignorance that she had built in her mind would pop and she would be faced with the harsh reality. Part of her wanted to know the truth but the other part was afraid and preferred ignorance.

"Well let me answer all your questions at once then. Do you remember how you met Jude?" He asked.

"I saw him in a dream. At least I think it was a dream. I'm not so sure anymore. I mean, if it was a dream then that would mean I'm still dreaming because people don't just walk out of our dreams and onto the real plane." She replied.

"Is that what you think, that it was all a dream?" Michael asked as he turned to eye her with interest. "How interesting. Maybe that's why you're still alive."

"Excuse me?" She exclaimed at his choice of words.

What could he possibly mean by that?

"Ava, the truth is, up until now the life you were living was the dream. A simulation created to imprison your mind and the mind of every other human being still living in this planet." He went on.

There was a momentary silence as she waited for him to tell here he was joking. Clearly this was all a joke, right? What he was saying could not be anything else but a joke.

When he didn't say anything else she stopped in her tracks as her reality began to sink in.

"Wait, you're serious? You're not messing with me, are you?" She asked, her eyes widening in shock.

He also stopped and turned to face her.

"Denial. A common reaction for everyone." He said. "I wish I could tell you different. I wish I could tell you that I'm just messing with you but the reality is that I'm not.

Fifteen years ago, humanity was on the edge of greatness. In all our existence we had never been as powerful as then. Unfortunately power breeds pride.

The brightest minds tried to replace human labor, human intelligence, with artificial intelligence.

They thought they were evolving and creating the means to their salvation however the thing they created would soon decide that humanity could not be trusted with their own future.

The AI they created initiated a purge. Those it saw as a threat were eliminated and only those it needed to preserve the human species were kept alive. Imprisoned in a simulation meant to minic reality but forever asleep. Unaware of they true reality.

That, Ava, is the truth."

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