The Reality Engine

Hi!

Thank you for reading my story. A couple of points to know:

I don't like writing wank porn. I want to write full-fleshed stories with plot, character, drama and tension. This is chapter 3 of what I hope will be a long ongoing story, but I will only write additional parts if people want to read them. Events in this chapter pick up immediately after the end of chapter 2. Chapter 3 is mostly setup, but I did include a tease at the end.

Thank you for taking the time, and I would love to talk to anyone who reads my work and has advice. This is my third submission for literotica (my first two being chapter 1 & 2 of this story), but it's not my first story, as I've written many over the years. Please be sure to vote and offer any feedback you can. I am always looking for a way to improve.

Note on edit: I have fixed spelling, grammar, and usage. Dialogue has been formatted to Literotica best practices. Plot remains exactly the same.

-------

Chapter 3

Scott woke up the next morning in Sonya's bed, and he glanced around him at the alarm clock on her desk. 5 AM, if he didn't hurry, he'd be late for work. He gently rustled her naked body awake next to him.

"Hmmm," she said, as she stirred from sleep. "What god-forsaken time is it?"

"5 AM," Scott said. "I have to get up and get to work. Last night was wonderful, and I'll see you again soon."

"Get the hell out of bed, and let me get back to sleep," Sonya snapped.

Scott smiled, rose, and dressed himself.

"Say hi to Dr. Karlov for me," Sonya said, half-asleep, just as Scott turned the handle on the door to leave.

"I'll be back soon," Scott assured her. "I've grown attached to your big, floppy tits."

Scott went back to his room, showered, shaved, and went to work. As promised, breakfast was on the table when he walked into the lab, but Dr. Karlov was nowhere to be seen, so Scott ate and went about his duties.

Almost as soon as he started to work, he noticed that something was different. Calculations which produced certain results the previous two days were no longer lining up. Operations were flying in brand-new directions that he had never seen before. Occasionally, the results he obtained were unintelligible.

For many individuals, everything they thought they knew falling apart on them would be a source of frustration. For Scott, he became further engrossed in his work. There had to be a logical explanation, there just had to be. Scott did the computations, then, he did them again, and again once more, looking for the common patterns. He was trying, desperately to make the commands, and by extension, the underlying math, make sense. He started to lose track of time.

1 PM came, and still, Scott had not seen Dr. Karlov yet that day. There was a knock on the door to the lab, and Scott finally glanced up from his work. It couldn't possibly be lunchtime already, could it?

He answered the door, and indeed, it was the delivery of his lunch, courtesy of a gentleman named Greg. After he ate, Scott went back to work. The hours flew by, and Scott became more and more engrossed in solving the mystery. The passage of time lost all meaning.

Finally, the door to the lab opened, and Dr. Karlov entered for the first time that day. Scott looked up at the clock as his boss walked in. It was a bit past 8 PM.

"Well, you're still here, are you?" Dr. Karlov asked.

"Yeah," Scott answered.

"Read any of those notes I emailed you last night?" Dr. Karlov asked.

Scott blushed, it was the first he'd remembered about the notes since the night before, and he nodded his head no.

"Well, that's alright," Dr. Karlov said. "Any conclusions on the experiment so far?"

"Only that the more I work with this, the more puzzling it becomes," Scott said. "Rudimentary commands that you taught me how to put in on Monday now don't have the same value as they once did. Some commands don't produce results that even make sense anymore. Science is about predictability and reproducibility, and this experiment has neither of those things."

"Any theories as to why that is?" Dr. Karlov asked.

"None," Scott answered. "I suspect that as I gain more experience and the days turn into weeks and months, that I'll gain a handle on why the result set changes and also gain an idea on how to anticipate it. Right now, it's too new for me to hazard a guess. Unfortunately, this means I cannot begin the task of writing a program to organize the results, for obvious reasons."

"Do you think the Heisenberg uncertainty principle is at work here?" Dr. Karlov asked.

"You mean that the results of the experiment are shifting due to my measuring it?" Scott asked. "No, I don't think that's what's happening."

"Curious," Dr. Karlov said. "Previous assistants I've had, when they get this far into it, typically believe that the actual measurement is what's throwing off the result set. Or, at least, that tends to be the first explanation they explore. Why don't you think that's what's happening here?"

"Because we ran the experiment with the given commands multiple times on Monday and again yesterday, and the result was always the same," Scott said. "It's only different as time passes, which suggests that the core is mutating, but I don't know enough about what the core is to know how or why it mutates."

"You do know that this is a theoretical physics experiment, not a biology experiment. The core is not alive, and as such, it doesn't mutate," Dr. Karlov said, raising an eye-brow.

"I know, but I can't think of a better word to describe what I'm seeing," Scott said.

"What time did you arrive here this morning?" Dr. Karlov asked.

"A little before 6 AM," Scott said.

"Have you left the lab at all since then?" Dr. Karlov asked.

"No, since you were good enough to order breakfast and lunch for me," Scott said. "I've only left this desk to eat and to use the bathroom."

Dr. Karlov stood for a few minutes, lost in thought. This made Scott uncomfortable, as he didn't want his boss to be displeased with him. This job, working for Dr. Karlov, was the best thing that had ever happened to him in life. Not really the job, but rather, how much fun he was having with women after going back to the dorm after work. Scott didn't want to give that up, and he was no longer in any hurry to move out of his dorm room on the second floor of Maybe Dick Hall.

"I hope you're not displeased with me," Scott said, breaking the silence.

"Not the slightest little bit," Dr. Karlov said. "You have far exceeded my every expectation. That's the problem. This is uncharted water. You've come so much farther in so much less time than any other assistant I've ever had that I am, frankly, unsure how to proceed. With the others, there were far more mistakes that I had to correct in their early days on the job. That gave me a good assessment of what they understood and what they didn't, if you get my meaning. The trouble with you is that you learn and adjust so rapidly, I'm not sure what to emphasize in your training. If we skip over some stuff, for example, then later on, if that building block isn't there, it might compile into a large mistake that takes a lot of time to find and correct."

"So, what do you want to do?" Scott asked. He didn't really believe Dr. Karlov's explanation, since, logically, if Scott were learning too fast, the thing to do would be to continue on in a linear order without skipping any steps at all. Skipping steps was only required if learning wasn't happening fast enough, and a student needed to catch up against a deadline.

"For now, continue on as we have been," Dr. Karlov replied. "Which means it's time for you to go home. 6 AM tomorrow morning, bright and early."

"Okay," Scott said, as he rose and gathered his things to leave work.

"One other thing," Dr. Karlov said, as he pulled out his wallet and handed Scott $40 from it. "It's far too late right now for any of the dining commons to be open, or for any of the restaurants at the University Center to be open long enough for you to get there and get something to eat. Doordash can be a hassle this time of evening. Do you know where the LLA is?"

"Sure," Scott said, as he took the money that was offered to him.

"Good," Dr. Karlov said. "You've done so well, why don't you go there and buy yourself a nice dinner? Also, with the money left over, buy dinner for anyone else you know. Have a pizza party, and relax a little."

"Thanks, and I'll be back at 6 AM tomorrow," Scott said, as he put the money away.

With that, Scott left the lab, and made his way to the LLA. Once there, he purchased six slices of pizza; two veggie supreme, two pepperoni, and two plain cheese slices, as well as a six-pack of coke, and several bottles of juice. He didn't know why he did this, he was just taking Dr. Karlov's suggestion. He carried this food into Maybe Dick Hall, and used his key card to enter the building. The front desk was closed this time of evening, so he made his way to the elevator and rode it up to the second floor. As soon as he stepped out of the elevator, he glanced to his left, and he saw Alania, Sonya and Margaret talking to two other very lovely girls he didn't know.

"Hey, where are you going with all that food, buddy?" Alania asked Scott.

"Don't know," Scott said, as he briefly recounted what Dr. Karlov had told him to do with the money and how he had spent it.

"So, you just bought a bunch of food with no idea who you were going to eat it with?" one of the two new girls, a very pretty Latina, asked.

"I figured I'd find somebody," Scott said. "How about you guys?"

"Sounds great, free food is always good," the new Latina said.

"By the way, this is Marisol, and this other girl you don't know is Pepper," Sonya said.

Pepper was Caucasian white, brown hair and brown eyes, with a nice smile and a slender figure. Marisol was Hispanic, a little short, with black hair and brown eyes and freckles all over her face.

"How much pizza did you get?" Margaret asked, as the six new friends made for the meeting room where they could lay out all of Scott's food and eat in style.

"Six slices," Scott said.

"One slice for each person you bumped into plus yourself," Pepper remarked, as the food was set out on the table in the meeting room. "That's pretty lucky."

As the friends all ate, they talked about life and about romances they'd had before. Alania and Margaret were open about the fact that they were experimenting with each other, which gave Sonya and Scott a hot flash, but which grossed out Marisol and Pepper.

"If I was going to go gay for any girl, it would be you Alania, but I just don't think I have it in me to go gay for anyone," Pepper said.

"That's okay," Alania said. "College is a time for experimenting. I'm single right now, so why not give some new things a try?"

"You're not seeing anyone?" Scott asked. "I find that hard to believe, a girl like you can get dates no problem, whenever she wants to."

"Thanks, Scott, but I want to focus on my studies and build a good foundation during my first academic quarter here," Alania said.

"She's also keeping a low profile because of Crazy Steve," Margaret said, as Sonya, Marisol, and Pepper laughed at Alania.

"Who's Crazy Steve?" Scott asked, for the other ladies all seemed to know him.

"Can we tell him?" Margaret asked Alania.

"No, I'll tell him myself," Alania said. "Back home, when I was in High School, there was a guy named Steve Dwyer. He was a total geek, and a goofball with top tier grades, but nothing going for him in life socially. Steve spent his entire time in High School engaged in one crazy scheme after another to try and get a date with me."

"Well, who wouldn't?" Scott asked.

"Thanks again, Scott," Alania said, with a smile. "Anyway, he got the nickname Crazy Steve in High School because he was so crazy about me. He is really smart, and he got into some of the top college programs, but he committed to coming here, to the University of Frostbite Falls, and everyone thinks he did it so that he could continue chasing me on into college."

"Do you think he's stalking you?" Scott asked.

"I don't know," Alania said. "I have no proof that he is, and I've never actually caught him doing anything stalkerish, but you never know what lengths a man will go to, and it wouldn't surprise me if he was stalking me. As of right now, I'm pretty sure he doesn't know where on campus I live, exactly, but it's only a matter of time until he finds out."

"That's why we go to lunch at odd hours," Margaret said. "It's so that we don't bump into Crazy Steve at the commons, and we can forestall him figuring out where we live a little while longer."

"Yeah," Alania said. "Again, he's never stalked me, as far as I know, but I also know that when we were in High School, we lived on opposite sides of town from each other so it was hard for him to stalk me. Here, he's within easy walking distance, and he can come right up to my door step and only a piece of wood separates us from each other. A girl can't be too careful."

"Do you happen to know where he lives?" Scott asked.

"Yeah," Alania said. "Room #52, Mojave Max hall, it's the dorm right next to the LLA."

Scott had seen Mojave Max Hall as he had passed by the LLA that evening, he made a mental note that Steve lived in room #52.

"You don't really think there's any danger, do you?" Sonya asked Alania.

"No, but if I'm being honest, I'm more worried about Steve's father than Steve himself," Alania said. "Like I said before, he and I lived on opposite sides of town in High School, his family lived in the really wealthy part, and me and my family lived by the trailer parks. His father is really big on class differences and stuff, and the way I heard it, he was furious when he found out his son was coming to this school to chase me."

"Why didn't he stop it?" Scott asked. "If he felt that strongly about it, he could have put his foot down."

"Steve's dad believes in letting his son make mistakes, and he let his son come here to chase after me because he knows that where Steve goes to school doesn't really matter," Alania said. "Their family is wealthy, has a ton of connections, and Steve will get to do whatever he wants to in life. Steve's father believes that preventing kids from making mistakes only makes them resent their parents. His folks are loaded enough that Steve's dad figures that his son will eventually understand that coming here after me was a terrible idea, at which point, his family will buy his transfer to a better school."

"His father is probably right," Scott said. "Based on what I know of academia, it's unlikely Steve will be penalized for taking a year out to come here and chase you. Talent is talent, after all, and academia is always willing to change the rules for talent."

"Yeah, at least there won't be any long-term harm done to his life," Alania said. "I can't help it if the dweeb is too crazy about me to think straight, but I don't know if his father will hold me as blameless."

"Speaking of talent," Sonya said, eager to change the subject. "Is your job with Dr. Karlov going okay?"

"I'm not sure," Scott said. "I mean, he says it's going way better than he expected it to go, which is worrisome."

"How so?" Margaret asked. "If my boss said I'm the best, that's good, right?"

"It was the way he said it that made me uncomfortable," Scott said, as he briefly related his conversation with Dr. Karlov at the end of work that night.

"I still don't get it," Margaret said.

"If he doesn't know quite where to go from here, then I might outlive my usefulness really soon," Scott said. "One of the things about academic work is that the experiment ends, and the funding dries up, if you run out of things to test and experiment with."

"You need to justify your budget, as it were," Sonya said. "Yeah, I've had discussions on that subject with faculty before. I guess it's up to Dr. Karlov to quickly figure out how to challenge you."

Scott stopped a moment, lost in thought.

"Did I say the wrong thing?" Sonya asked, noticing the silence.

"A little, or at least, a strange thing," Scott said. "Why would Dr. Karlov need to challenge me? It's not a contest between us, it's an experiment trying to unlock new frontiers of knowledge. I mean, isn't it?"

"I see what you mean," Sonya said. "If it's all about unlocking new frontiers of knowledge, then the faster you get up to speed, the better. His remark about not knowing whether he could skip a step or not is strange, why skip any steps? If you're learning super-fast, like he says you are, then you'll learn each new step super-fast, so there's no problem, right?"

Scott nodded to indicate that Sonya had explained the source of his confusion.

"Well, I doubt any decision would be made on your project anytime soon, at any rate, but maybe you should think about polishing up the old resume, just in case," Alania said.

"Also, if there's any uncertainty with your employment status, it's probably not a good idea for you to go apartment hunting and sign a lease on a new place anytime soon," Sonya said. "So I guess we're stuck with your company for a little while longer, huh?"

Scott was slightly caught off guard by what Sonya said Not what she said but how she said it. She hadn't said it in a joking tone of voice, she had said it in a serious tone of voice that indicated that Scott was occupying space which she required for other purposes.

"I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to stay on here a bit longer than I expected," Scott said, trying to remember what he could have said or done to offend her.

"Yeah, that's fine, but it can't be comfortable for you to live in a tiny box, you know?" Sonya asked.

The other four girls exchanged a look, they didn't know what to make of Sonya's sudden hostility to Scott, but truth be told, he had dropped a few notches in their eyes too. None of them knew why, though.

Scott thought it was his confession about his job status. He was not handsome, good-looking nor had he ever had sex before he had fucked Sonya the night before, but he did have an excellent job, and now, that job being in jeopardy took away any luster he had in the eyes of any girl. What good was an unemployed man whose only upside, as a man, was his ability to provide?

At this juncture, dinner ended and the girls thanked Scott for the food, and left to do other things, while he stayed behind and cleaned up. The last two nights had been magical, he had gotten more pussy in each of the two evenings than he had in his whole life put together, but there was going to be none of that this evening. A night like this one, cold and alone, was probably going to be far more normal.

After cleaning up dinner, he walked down the hall to retire to his room, when he spotted Chad in the hallway. The two friends greeted each other.

"So, what's shaking?" Chad asked Scott.

"Going to go and read some stuff that Dr. Karlov sent to me last night that I haven't gotten to yet and probably go to bed early," Scott said. "Yourself?"

"Study night, huh?" Chad asked.

"Yep," Scott said. "How about you? You headed out?"

"Soon," Chad said. "I am waiting for a girl to call me, and say she's finished with her makeup before heading out. I'd invite you along, but it's a movie-date to a sold-out show playing at the University Center, and I've only got 4 tickets, one for me, my roommate, Mike, and our dates."

"It's okay," Scott said. "If you leave now, there's no way you'll be back before midnight, and I have to be up at 5 AM tomorrow morning for work."

"There is that," Chad said. "Hey, you want to grab dinner at the commons tomorrow night? I eat at 6:30 PM."

"Sure, I'll text you," Scott said. "It would be good to get to know you better."