“Look at the sheeple go!” I muttered to myself. I sat in the parking lot during my lunch break. It wasn’t something I normally did, but sometimes I needed to get away from being needed. The endless questions, decisions, meeting requests, calls, texts, emails…sometimes being a VP at a large tech firm left little room to breathe. That was especially true with the project that we had been working on for the last year. 

 

Today was the day The Program was set to release into the real world, full-scale. All the work and research and marketing finally had come to this. It seemed rather anticlimactic and almost like an average day, with a little extra helping of anxiety in the mix.

 

I sipped on my large iced coffee while watching a line of people waiting outside for the new cell phone release. “Absolute NPCs.” I shook my head and glanced down at my phone. It was time to go back to work. “Damn.”

 

I grabbed my coffee and uttered a curse before snapping the car door shut. I trudged back to the office, flashed my keycard to open the door and showed the security officer my ID before he admitted me to the elevator. We had done the same thing every day for the past five years. He knew who I was and I knew who he was, and yet, we did the same dance every day, sometimes multiple times per day. “Damn NPCs,” I muttered.

 

I finally made it back to my office on the 52nd floor. I snapped the door shut behind me and instead of sitting back at my desk, I stared down at the city below. 

 

I had seriously considered leaving the firm, especially with The Program that we had been working on. Even though I saw the benefits - the same ones we would sell to the public - I could see how it could easily be twisted.

 

Besides, nothing was stopping me from leaving. I had more money than God. I could live anywhere comfortably five lifetimes over. 

 

So, why was I staying?

 

Why did I want to stay?

 

Did I want to stay, especially with everything that had happened with The Program?

 

I turned my back to the glass and plopped down into my chair. I opened my computer, fifty new emails in 30 minutes. Nice. They could wait. 

 

I minimized my email, but sank back into my chair when a dull pain ached from behind my eyes. 

 

A migraine? I hadn’t had one of those in so long, since my time in college. Just what I needed today. I closed my eyes for a few moments, but the ache got worse.

 

I should probably get through a few emails, and then maybe go home early.

 

I opened my email back up, and the dull ache began to subside. 

 

Hm. Normally screens made it worse, but whatever. Maybe it was stress or something?

 

I answered my emails and the headache subsided. As soon as I finished, the ache began again. I stared at my phone screen to see if the ache would subside, but the ache grew into sharp pulsating.

 

I was interrupted by a rap on the door.

 

“Come in!” I said, sharper than I meant to.

 

“Sir, just letting you know that there has been a suspected data breach,” Justin, one of the junior software architects said. “It looks like some private executive files somehow ended up on the sandbox version of The Program.”

 

“Why are you telling me this? Get them off the sandbox!”

 

“We have tried, but it needs an admin password and you are the only admin on site,” Justin said.

 

“I will handle it. Thank you,” I said. 

 

Justin nodded, and exited my office.

 

“This project has been a cursed nightmare from the beginning,” I said to myself. My fingers flew over the keyboard. I logged into the sandbox version and saw the files there. I dragged them over to my desktop, authorized the action, and breathed a sigh of relief. I would have IT check to see if they were accessed by anyone.

 

I stared at the file icon on the screen. These were all the files from my boss - all the way up to the top. How did they end up on the sandbox of The Program?

 

This file had to have held some stuff I couldn’t even dream up in my nightmares. A little peek couldn’t hurt, right? And I could scrub the access log before I ever turned them over to IT.

 

I clicked on the file, accessed the folder called “The Program.” My stomach sank.

 

I took a breath and opened the file. It contained an overwhelming number of files. Most of them were mundane, files containing legal documents, licenses, regulatory compliance agreements. 

 

And, a folder called NPCs.

 

“What the…?” I asked. I clicked on it, ignoring the pulsing in my head. It was becoming blinding, but I pushed through.

 

In the NPC file were more folders. There were hundreds of folders, each with names. Were these the names of all employees of the firm, past and present? I scrolled down the list.

Halfway down the screen, I found a file with my name.

​

I froze.
 

I accessed the file. It had all my personal information, files on “Basic Personality Features,” a file on “Scripted Lines,” and “Life Trajectory.”

 

I opened the “Scripted Lines” file. 

 

“Oh my God,” I muttered. I read the document a few times. 

 

I whispered the lines to myself. “Absolute NPCs. Look at the sheeple go! Get them off the sandbox!”

 

My pulse thundered in my ears and my head throbbed, keeping time. I started to gasp for breath. I loosened my tie.

 

I’ve said all of these things before. I said them today, even.

 

Ok, breathe. There had to be some mistake, right? There had to be a perfectly good explanation as to why this was happening. Maybe it was a prank? Yes, that had to be it.

 

My pulse started to calm. 

 

But, if it was a prank, why were all the legal documents and licenses and agreements in the file legitimate? Some of them I remember filing and signing myself.

 

My pulse quickened again. I felt sweat beading on my forehead.

 

There had been talk from a previous employee, a senior software engineer who worked on The Program from inception. Everyone thought he had lost it from the long hours and the pressure, or that he was a crazy conspiracy theorist. He was let go about a year ago for screaming at everyone in the cafeteria that they were all NPCs and they were pawns used to build The Program which would further enslave them. He said something really crazy that The Program itself was the Main Character, whatever that meant.

 

I had fired him. What was his name? I couldn’t even remember.

 

My stomach dropped and I swallowed hard. Maybe I should have listened to him. Even though it sounded crazy, maybe it was worth considering that there could be an element of truth to what he was saying.

 

Because all of this seemed crazy now.

 

I read through the other scripted lines. “What are you doing? After everything I’ve done, and helped you build?”

 

Weird. I haven’t said that yet. I’m not sure why I would ever say something like that.

 

I glanced at my screen. My eyes were blurry from the migraine. I blinked and tried to focus. I opened the file called “Life Trajectory” under my name.

 

In red ink: Terminated after the release of “The Program.”

 

The door opened. Justin held a gun.

 

“What are you doing?” I heard myself ask. In my panic, I realized something strange.

My headache had almost completely disappeared.

I tried to tell him to put down the gun, but the words would not come out. 

 

“After everything I’ve done, and helped you build?”

 

“This phase is now complete,” Justin said.

 

Executive Asset Decommissioning Complete. 

 

Initializing Phase Two of The Program.