Chapter 20 - All Is Revealed

 “...what?” with monumental effort, he hoisted his chin off of his chest. “Where...?” he lolled his head side-to-side as the world slowly returned to him. The room was hard to make out through the haze, but the grey concrete walls were yellowed by the single overhead light. With a few heavy blinks the room started to crystallize in front of him.

“Welcome back to the land of the...well...sort-of-living,” Standish waved his hand in front of him. He, Dyman, and Terry were sitting around a white Formica table at which Jim was also sitting.

“Sort of?” Jim tried to bring his hands up to his face when he realized they were taped behind him, to the back of the chair. His feet were taped to the legs of the chair, as well. “What the hell?” Jim looked at Standish, confused.

“Just a precaution,” Terry nodded sternly. “We can't have you running off and making a mess of all our hard work, now could we?”

“Where am I?” Jim's tone was clipped and serious.

“Somewhere secret,” Dyman laid both of his heavily jeweled hands on the table, “ somewhere safe. Be calm.”

“Has Tessa found us yet?” Terry asked Dyman, “or Tim? Are we sure this zone is safe?”

“We're safe,” Dyman put one of his big hands on Terry's shoulder, “don't fret. We are hidden and clear, I'd bet.”

“We're safe,” Standish hadn't broken eye contact with Jim but did to shoot them both a glance. “I coded this one myself. None of them know about this space. We were gonna use it for an interrogation scene after the moon base escape.”

Jim closed his eyes and tried to invoke his Augs, see if he could get any contact with the outside world. “Hey!” Jim shouted. “What the hell did you do to my Augs?”

“We took them out,” Standish shrugged. “They were using the Aug API to monitor you so I had to remove them.”

“What!” Jim struggled as hard as he could against the tape. The chair slid around and almost fell over before Standish reached out and slapped him. The blow knocked him out of his furor and the adrenaline and rage focused him. “What the fuck do you mean 'monitor me.'” He said through gritted teeth, more statement than inquiry.

“Look, will you shut up?” Standish sneered slightly and furrowed his brow, lifting his fingers off the table and rolling them onto his palms. “How am I supposed to explain my evil plan to you if you're talking?”

“So you are the villain, now?” Jim turned his head, licked the blood from where his cheek had dug into his teeth, and spat some to the side of the table.

“No, figure of speech,” Standish leaned back in his chair and let his hands fall into his lap limply. “It may be hard to believe, but we're actually the good guys.”

“Wow,” Jim threw his head back laughing. “Since when did stealing a military weapon, hacking a government database, flying to the moon, and holding the planet ransom with recommissioned nuclear weapons become 'the good guys.'” Jim laughed again.

“Well...” Dyman started without finishing.

“If that were the truth, that would be quite difficult to explain,” Terry continued, clasping his hands in front of him

“...but that isn't what's going on here.” Standish finished. “Now, Jim. I seriously need you to listen. If you let me finish, I promise you'll believe me, but you won't believe me until I finish. Alright?”

“No,” Jim spat again, this time not as much red. “but I'll let you say what you want.”

“Good!” Standish let the chair fall forward, and shot up dart-straight, the chair sliding back with an audible screech behind him. “Jim, you're not real,” he folded his clasped his hands behind his back and began pacing around the table. “This world isn't real. None of this is,” he waived his hands around. “This is all a computer simulation. I made you.” He rested his hands on Jim's shoulders. He tried to shrug them off, but his hands were taped. “NRI doesn't stand for 'New Roman Industries,” It stands for “Nordhem Rondolph, Inc.”

Terry waved, “Hi, I'm Nordhem,” he smiled, his gemmed gold teeth sparkling under the ruddy yellow light. “Standish, or rather Kumal Shrinivasa, is our CTO, lead Dev, and the creative brains behind this whole research project.”

“I'm Blake Sheil,” Dyman waved, “I'm the CEO. Or, rather, I was.”

Jim sat unmoved.

“Well,” Standish leaned down. Jim turned his head to the side and made eye contact. He was very excited, “aren't you going to say 'that's impossible,' or 'Really? My life is a lie!' or 'I knew it!' or something?” Standish's smile was hanging open, his eyes were equally as wide, and Jim noticed they were no longer the bluish-white anymore.

Jim continued to sit, unmoved.

“See you guys,” he stood up straight and held a hand to Jim, “this is what I'm talking about. His behavior is completely unpredictable. He's completely transcended any of the predefined personality profiles,” he held a hand to his mouth and whispered loudly into Jim's ear: “say that three times fast. 'Predefined personality profile, predefined personality profile predifiled personidefined...gah!”

“Kumal,” Dyman squinted angrily.

“Right, anyway,” he began pacing the table again. “Our esteemed founder and financial backer, here,” he pointed at Terry, “started NRI as a software development firm shooting for DARPA money,” he paused, turned his lips up and scrunched his nose. “Ok, so, DARPA is a government program where they ask you to invent off-the-wall military technology, and in return, they'll give you heaping sums of money as bounty and an exclusive defense contract if you're successful.”

“Instead,” Dyman interjected, “that prick Kuiristan 'acquired' NRI and is 'repurposing' the project.” He didn't do air-quotes, but you could tell by the inflection of his voice that he was trying to be smugly diplomatic.

“Kuiristan's corporation tricked me into selling them the company,” Terry slammed his fist on the cheap table, “with the promise that he wouldn't do anything to alter both our directive and our business.”

“Instead,” Standish leaned on the back of his seat, his shoulders popping up as he supported his weight, “the first thing the bastard did was pull all of us off the project and put his little lacky assholes on it. He's ruining the game, completely ruining it.”

“And what was this alleged bounty you were trying to win?” Jim was snide and indignant and his tone concealed none of it.

“There he is! Team player Jim,” Standish did an air-punch with his arm at 90 degrees. “Artificial Intelligence. Battlefield simulation software, specifically.” Standish resumed his pace. “Damn good shit at that, too.”

“We were making a game,” Dyman sneered and rocked his head to the side. “The specific government contract was for an 'immersive, virtual reality, game-like experience to train drone pilots that simulated real-world battlefield conditions and outcomes.'”

“And,” Terry picked up, “that's what Kumal here said he was making, initially.” His voice was dripping with contempt. “Instead,” he leaned his neck forward and rocked his head, “he built this,” he waived his hands around.

“I rebuilt the world in a computer, essentially,” Standish followed up. “I assigned an AI to each individual actor in the world, invented a way for them to recombinate their AI personalities just like we do, and then let them run free.”

“And, rather unexpectedly,” Dyman picked up, “it ended up playing out just as he expected. The AI got really good,” he emphasized the “really” by dragging it out, “and the character politics ended up playing out mostly how ours did in the real world, given some minor...er 'coaching.'”

“We were all very surprised,” Terry continued. “The next step was building a UI on top of the logic. Each AI got assigned a randomly generated 3D model inside a procedurally generated world. Everything was then organized mostly how our world is.”

“The added layer was challenging,” Standish took control, “but everything was going to plan. I now had a robust world with powerful AI that was handling random stimuli the same way it had played out in our world, historically. I added in the ability to travel across water, and exploration began. New worlds happened, naval combat, all of it. When new tribes met, they interacted in the same ways they interacted in our world. History was repeating itself,” Standish held his hands out, face to the ceiling, as if he were basking in the yellow light's glory. “And then,” he brought his arms in quickly, curled his head down, and balled his hand into a fist, “I let them come in,” he dramatically emphasized “them.”

“Carol, as you know her” Terry began. “After we invented the interface technology to interact with Kumal's, frankly brilliant, world, we showed the project to DARPA. They were so impressed they snapped us up instantly and started leveraging us just as soon. Once we went public with everything, Tessa von Block, a researcher, convinced the DoD that their simulation was perfect for behavioral research experiments.”

“That blackhearted bitch,” Standish was still in his pose. “She broke my heart, the whore.”

“Tessa seduced Kumal into giving her direct access to the system,” Dyman filled in. “We gave her an avatar, Carol, and she instantly set out manipulating and controlling the world.”

“She went through thousands of years,” Standish slammed both of his hands on the table in front of him and stared at Jim with wide-eyed fury. “She pushed, and pushed, and pushed,” he laughed a soft maniacal laugh to himself, “so hard, in fact, that she triggered World War 3.”

“The simulation went off the rails,” Dyman sneered himself. “None of us knew, except Kumal, who she made promise not to tell us.”

“Once the DoD caught wind, we thought we were screwed,” Terry shot Standish a contemptuous glance. “But thankfully, they loved it. They let the war play out. The AIs were inventing some seriously dangerous weapons technology and the DoD was eating it up.”

“We struck them a deal,” Dyman waved a massive hand through the air whimsically. “They would fork the simulation. We gave them three environments: pre-war, WW3, and post-war simulators, and in exchange, they let us nuke the planet fresh and start over. Tessa and Kumal built this elaborate mythology on why the planet was the way it was. Kumal built what he and Tessa considered a Utopia, the opposite of the warring worlds, and he and Tessa used it as a way to test her theories by using 'ancient technology' as a way to test how a peaceful world would use it.”
“It was genius,” Standish had returned to sitting. He leaned back and stopped the chair from falling by kicking his toes into the table. “They got their stupid military shit, and I got my simulation.”

“And then, Tessa got an idea,” Terry sneered, “she wanted to see how a peaceful person would fair in the military worlds. She wanted to simulate a draft.”

“So, she hand-picked some avatars from a variety of AIs from my world and moved them over to the war servers,” Standish slammed the feet of the chair back down. “Moved. Not copied. Moved. Why did I let her move you? God, I was such a fool,” he gently slammed his head onto the table top.
“Ah, love,” Terry held a Shakespearean hand up. “Anyway, that's when it all went sour. Kuiriston's company is the biggest tech firm in the world. They acquire little guys like us and eat us for breakfast. The DoD wasn't getting the results they wanted from Tessa's simulation and were about to cut the program. Kuiristan approached me about buying my firm, and Tessa convinced me that he wouldn't harm our work.”

“That, as you know, is where all this comes in,” Dyman spread his arms out. “Kuiristan kicked me out, Nordhem lost all controlling power, and Kumal got moved to a completely different project.”

“We had all just assumed that was how it was,” Terry shrugged. “But Kumal, here, had an idea,” he held a hand out to him.

“I've been secretly hacking into the zone files and modifying everything, this room,” he waved his arms around, “was supposed to be used for one of Tessa's scenarios. She was going to have you get captured by the DPRC and interrogated here as a POW. It was a pretty brutal scene. They were gonna starve you in a cell, one of the captors was going to pee on you. It was pretty crazy.”

“Where are we,” Jim, again, stated instead of questioning.

“Oh, we're back on the planet, specifically in the DPRC,” Standish replied. “We're gonna break you out of here. I want to reinsert you back into the Utopic server.”

“Molly,” Jim squinted and winced. “How does Molly fit into your sick game?”

“She's my daughter,” Terry said. “In the real world, she has a degenerative muscular disorder. She's bed-ridden and can't move. She accesses this world the same way we do.”

“Is Molly her 'avatar'?” Jim spat again.

“Yes, but her name is also Molly, as well,” Terry folded his hands and rested them on the table. “She fell in love with you long before the experiment. It was an unfortunate coincidence that you were selected for the project. We migrated her avatar to follow you into the simulator. I tried to convince her otherwise, but her mother insisted. Seeing her so happy, I relented. You, Jim, are a very charming boy.”
“The letters,” Jim squinted.

“Yes. We were migrating her avatar,” Standish raised his nose to the sky in self-satisfaction. “I was able to code up some temporary levels to let you two interact during the migration. There were a ton of firewalls that we needed to move through and the process took a while. Couple days on our end, which is what, a few months on your end?”

“A year,” Jim spat again. It was no longer red.

“Oh,” Standish shrugged, “I lose track of the timestamps. AIs copy much faster. I just have to plug your stats into the generator and poof!”

“Anyway,” Dyman picked up, “We're breaking you out of here.”

“Why,” Jim kept his eyes squinted.

“The DoD and Kuiristan have given up on this server,” Terry shrugged. “It's become Tessa's own little plaything now. I don't want my little girl living in this world anymore if I don't have to.”

“Tessa's research institute is paying to keep it alive now,” Standish shrugged himself, “but Kuiristan has given me permission to migrate Molly back to the Utopia server. Says it's 'great for press.' Prick.”

“But Molly won't leave without you,” Terry's voice was dire, “and Tessa is holding you hostage. She claims you're instrumental to the experiment and has refused to let us move you back.”

“Why does it matter, just copy me over,” Jim flipped his nose up.

“It's not that simple,” Standish scrunched his nose and half-smirked. “We can't 'copy' you anymore. Your AI is too complicated. You don't match any of the profiles on the Utopia server. I have to consolidate your persona onto a single server blade and then physically move the entire thing, by hand, to the Utopia cluster and then run an integration script. It's not easy.”

“And why are you telling me any of this,” Jim spat again, this time for effect. “Why not just do it? Why go through all the trouble to bullshit me when you could just drop me into the server block and I'd be none the wiser.”

“Ethics,” Dyman shrugged. “Love. We're asking you to throw away all of the life you have right now and jump into a completely different world.”

“I want to know you'll give all this up,” Terry waved his arms around again, “the fighting, the Cores, the geopolitics, the Augs. Are you willing to give that up for Molly?”

“That assumes I believe anything you're saying,” Jim was less contemptuous. “You could be using her as a pawn. And the nukes?”

“Oh, those are totally going off,” Standish shrugged. “Tessa's orders. We've held them off for now, but they're resetting the world again. New experiment, so they're zeroing everything out.”

“See? You're just trying to con me. You're going to set the nukes off, and you need my help,” Jim sneered again. “This is vengeance against Carol for jilting you, vengeance against Kuiristan for firing you, and you're gonna scorch the earth. This is just some scheme for all of you to get revenge,” Jim spit again for effect.

“Look,” Terry started, “Molly is getting moved. You can either move with her, or play along with Carol. It's your choice.”

“Yep,” Standish bolted upright, “and with that, so ends our little meeting. I'm going to snap my fingers, and the next thing you know, you'll be sitting in the briefing room with the gang. Tessa will probably bust Carol in and start grilling you for debrief. Enjoy!”

***********************************************************************************

“...and will be secured until further notice,” Carol pointed to the mission line with an extended baton. “Any questions? Jim, you look lost,” she collapsed the baton and folded her arms behind her back. Her boots made the familiar squinching sound as she brought her rear foot into her T-stance.

“Uh, no, yeah,” Jim shook his head, trying to knock his thoughts together. “the, uh, target will be secured until further notice.”

“No, Jim,” she began to pace across the stage in front of the debriefing room, “let me explain it again,” she snapped her fingers and the digital chalkboard reset.

“Uhhh,” Blaize sighed from behind him, “do we really have to listen to this all again?”

“Yeah,” Marion nodded, “we use Vishnu to storm the Windforce, use the impulsor cannon to get to Luna, and then drop the payload in the nuclear base using the tunnel system Jim discovered. We ride the impulsor cannon back, blast the nuclear devices with the payload, and then ride it out in the bunkers.”

“Yeah,” Tomah nodded solemnly, “pretty straight forward.”

“So,” Tony looked at Jim earnestly, “which part did you not get?”

“Nothing,” Jim squinted a concerned grimace. “Hey, Commander,” he adjusted his posture, “can we have a conversation, in private?”

“Sure, Jim,” she looked around the room, “I believe we're all done here so the rest of you are dismissed.”

Jim waited as everyone filed away. He bowed his head nervously and didn't look up from his hands as he fidgeted with his uniform's front buttons. When everyone had left, he looked up, the Commander standing unmoved.

“Well?” Her face was set in stone.

“I'm just,” Jim shook his head again, “I dunno, I'm still really out of it, I guess. Huge chunks of my memory are missing.”

“Torture will do that to you,” The commander frowned and sat down next to him. “Look, it was cruel what Standish did to you. And with him removing your Augs so abruptly with no decompression? It's a miracle you have a memory at all.” She rested a hand on Jim's shoulder. “What do you remember? Maybe I can help fill in.”

“I remember going through the tunnels,” Jim started, fixing his eyes in the middle distance. “I remember docking Cúchulainn in some slip, and then it just got...weird,” Jim quirked his head.

“Weird?” Carol inserted her head in front of Jim's blank stare to catch his attention.

“What?” Jim snapped back and turned his head slightly to make eye contact. “Oh, yeah. Well, he had me walk through a mirror, and then there was this trippy forest, and I had to crawl through some duct work, and then I was taped to a chair,” Jim began to sob gently, “and I just don't know, Tessa, it was so much,” he began to cry in earnest. “and Standish started saying, I don't know. Things.” He put his head into his hands, his bangs lapping over his index fingers, his breath recycling into his snotty nose.

“There, there, Jim,” she rubbed his back. “It's all right. Standish had flooded the base with a nerve gas and hacked your Augs. He was manipulating your hallucinations.”

Jim looked up, his face was red, eyes wet with tears, and snuffled back his dripping nose, “then what happened, really?”

“Well,” She folded her hands in her lap, “I'm not entirely sure what happened up there, but from what I can surmise, he somehow got you off of Luna and into a secure holding in the DPRC. We recovered you after you made a heroic escape from a prison cell.”

“Prison cell?” Jim furrowed his brow and tilted his head in confusion.

“We received a distress signal from a DPRC jeep rapidly making its way across the Qari desert and into a Union-controlled front line,” she widened her eyes in earnestness. “A patrol rescued you from a group of Outsiders in hot pursuit. You were emaciated and barely coherent. You'd been missing from us for over a month, and were in a coma for two weeks before you regained consciousness. Molly was by your bedside the whole time,” she patted Jim on the back.

“Standish said stuff,” Jim sniffled again, fixing his gaze off into the middle distance. “Weird stuff,” his breathing stuttered and he felt himself beginning to cry again, “I just don't know what to do,” he began crying again, “What did Kumal do to me?” He broke down and buried his head in his hands again, muffling his weeping.

“It's ok,” the Commander rubbed his back again, “There, there. Jim,” look at me,” she gently placed her hands on his cheeks and wrested his gaze into her eyes. “Everything is safe. Be calm,” She held her contact and slowed her voice to a calm, soothing tone. “Just relax. Be calm, feel yourself calming down,” she gently rocked his head back and forth, maintaining strong, unflinching eye contact. “It's Ok, listen to your body and feel yourself calming down. Listen to your voice and feel your body calm itself down.”

“You are calming me down,” Jim spoke in a monotone drone.

“There you go Jim,” She continued to slowly rock his head back and forth, “close your eyes and feel your body calming down to the sound of my voice. Close your eyes and tell me what you see.”

Jim closed his eyes, “I remember being in a concrete interrogation room,” Jim responded in flat affect.

“Good,” she continued stopped rocking his head back and forth and let it go limp, his chin buried in his chest. “Focus on your breathing, Jim. Imagine you're in your dorm, Jim, can you see it?” Jim slackly nodded his head. “Good, I want you to focus on a specific object. Imagine you're sitting in front of it and focus on the object. What do you see?”
“I'm sitting in my dining room and I'm staring at my place mats,” Jim's voice was throaty and choked by his head position.

“Good Jim, that's really good. Every word I say is bringing you making you calmer and more relaxed. Now, imagine yourself at in a hallway with a light at the end. Every step you take brings you closer to the light of pure relaxation, can you feel the warmth, Jim?”
“Yes,” Jim was flatly affective, his response causing his head to bob and sway back and forth as it slacked.

“Good, now I want you to walk out into the light. Can you feel the state of pure relaxation, Jim?” The Commander maintained the slow, soothing, calming tone.

“Yes,” he carefully sat up ramrod straight, “I am perfectly calm, now,” his voice still hollow and labored.

“Good, Jim,” her voice was silky and smooth, “you're now in a state where you can truly understand everything that happened. Tell me about how they tortured you, Jim.”

“I remember being hit. I spat blood. I was taped to a chair,” Jim's town was unaccented. Flat. Completely monotone.

“Good Jim, they tortured you trying to convert you to their religion,” The commander maintained her soft voice. “You escaped after the torturer urinated on you, do you remember?”

“I remember,” Jim's voice was flat.

“Good,” she said enthusiastically, but still in her calm voice. “Do you remember your escape?”

“Yes, I escaped in a jeep,” Jim responded.

“Good, good,” the Commander continued, “You stole a jeep and were saved by the Alliance. You were saved by me, Jim. I saved you, do you remember?”

“You saved me,” Jim droned.

“Good, yes,” she replied. “After you were saved, we rescued the cores from the base you were kept at, do you remember this?”
“We recovered the cores,” Jim responded.

“Good,” the Commander continued, “we rescued the cores and you woke up in the hospital bed to Molly's smiling face. Do you remember Molly?”
“Molly was so happy to see me wake up,” Jim drew a weak, thin smile.

“Great, Jim, very good,” she maintained her voice, “now, when I snap my fingers, you will return to your normal state, alert, energized, and ready for the mission, right Jim?”

“I will be alert and ready for our mission,” he affected. The commander snapped. “Commander!” Jim responded enthusiastically.

“Yes, Jim?” she very up-beat and put a hand on his shoulder.

“I feel much better,” he replied with a big grin, “I think I'm ready to pay back Standish for what he did to me.”

“Good, Jim, but don't go down the path to revenge,” she lowered her head and gazed up at him. “Vengence will not solve your problems.”

“I know,” Jim tilted his head empathetically, “I am doing this for the people. I want to channel my suffering so I can save everyone from Standish's evil plan.”

“Great, Jim, I'm excited, too,” the Commander smiled softly and stood. “Now, let's get ready for the mission, alright?” She handed him a data pad.

***********************************************************************************

“Sweetie?” Molly gently set her fork, tines-down, on her now-empty plate, daintily dabbing some invisible crumbs away from the corner of her mouth. “Can we talk?”

Jim shook his head and swallowed what he was chewing. “Yeah, sure,” he said, still staring off into the middle-distance over her left shoulder. “Go for it.”

“Jim,” She started gently, putting her hands in her lap, “will you look at me?”
He shook his head again, and put his fork down, “yeah, sure, sorry. Yeah,” he met her green gaze, “what's up?”

“I want to talk about this” she made a motion with her hand, “how you've been the last few weeks.”

“I don't know what you're talking about,” he furrowed his brow and jutted his neck forward. How 'have I been?'”

“Like this,” she gestured with both hands at him, “distant, unengaging. Like you're sleepwalking, and whenever I try to talk about it, you snap at me.” She dropped her palms to the table.

“I'm not snapping!” Jim stood up, knocking the chair back behind him. “I'm under a lot of pressure, ok? Things are crazy on base and this Standish thing is still looming and we've got a huge mission coming up,” Jim gesticulated wildly, throwing a hand up into the air, “I'm just trying to deal with all of this, I'm not trying to get it from you, now, too,” he leaned across the table and planted both hands on it. “If I don't do this right, we're fucked, don't you get it? Don't you see?” He leaned in closer to her, her face filling his field of vision. “If I fuck up, we're screwed. The planet is screwed. You're screwed. If I don't get this right, you're dead. What do you want from me? Huh?”

Molly said nothing in reply. She was pinned against the back of her chair. Her pupils were the size of pinholes and her eyes were so wide the green was almost lost against the sea of white.

“Fine,” Jim threw both of his hands up and stood up straight, “disengage like you always do.” He threw his napkin on the table and fixed the chair. “I'm going to be in the other room.” He stormed off to the bedroom and flopped onto the turned-down comforter, attempting to find patterns in the texture and distract himself.

“I'm going to my dad's,” Molly, after some time, addressed him, after how long Jim hadn't noticed. She had a pack slung over her shoulder.

“Alright,” Jim pushed himself up and leaned back against the headboard of their bed.

“I was going to tell you that my father wants us to move out of the country,” she crossed her arms from the doorway and held tight eye contact. “He talked with the general and said he could get you out of the program. He said he has a small house set up on the family plantation for us in the Southern Union. The Institute accepted me and I want to pick my degree back up. He said he could get you a job with the company heading the SU headquarters. My brother was really excited to hear he might have you in the company.” She turned around and started walking away.

“Molly...” Jim leaned forward and held a hand out. She didn't turn around. He slammed back against the headboard and dropped his hand after he heard the door unceremoniously thud shut.

After some time of just staring forward, mind racing, a jingle from the central communication system indicated that someone was trying to get a hold of him. He snapped out of his reverie and answered the conference request.

“Jim,” Standish's hologram appeared in the room in front of him.

Jim revolted. “You,” his anger seething. “Molly just left me because of all of this,” he batted his head around and waved his hands. “She walked out because you defected to the DPRC and tortured me. Because you're going to nuke this whole planet and I have to stop you or everyone, including the only fucking thing on this planet I care about, dies.” He drilled his finger into the hologram, causing it to scintillate around his finger.

“Jim,” Standish took on a rare serious face, “you can't let them win.” He leaned on his walking stick. “You know the truth. Don't let Tessa convince you otherwise.”

“Tessa? Her name is Carol,” he snapped and the hologram dismissed.