Lewis Corvel looked a bit like a rabbit: He had a twitchy nose, a thin mouth, eyes that some might call beady (though never to his face), and ears set just a little too high on his head. He moved quickly, a laptop bag slung over one shoulder while his index finger made rigorous demands of the elevator’s “Open” button. Like another famous rabbit, Lewis was late, and while he had never met the senior partners, he was pretty sure they didn’t tolerate tardiness.
He looked at his watch, an expensive piece of jewelry with only one hand and no numbers, cursed at the slow elevator, and then yanked out his phone. 2:45. His meeting was at 3:00 sharp, and while fifteen minutes should be more than enough travel time, Life Pool was 80 floors tall. The senior partners meanwhile … well, Lewis wasn’t sure how they would react. Not a single person on his floor had ever met them—though come to think of it, he wasn’t sure he knew anyone in the building that had.
Lewis decided to try the “Down” button next, and after pressing it, the doors slid open. The elevator was spacious, its walls a sleek black with strips of ocean blue on each corner and a floor made of yellow tiles. Lewis stepped inside and hit the “Top Floor” button, which was located right above floor 79.
“Strange,” he mumbled, it now occurring to him that the topmost floor wasn’t actually numbered.
The elevator began its ascent, and at a pace Lewis found adequate. He smiled, checked his watch again, and then checked his phone. 2:48. He would not be late!
He still had to present his findings to the senior partners though, which meant replacing one anxiety with another. His research wasn’t positive. Their new prosthetic limbs were indeed hackable as every major news outlet claimed last night, and they weren’t responding to their newest software updates, either. This wasn’t Lewis’s fault of course, but messengers had been shot for less.
Lewis chanced another look at this phone, because worrying about the time was better than worrying about being fired. He frowned. It still read 2:48, though it had to be closer to 2:52 now. He tried his watch but wasn’t sure that thing had ever worked.
“Can’t be,” he said. The screen dimmed, and Lewis tapped it again. 2:48. “But I’m late!”
As soon as the words were out, Lewis wished he could take them back. His anxiety flared, and he reached into his pocket for a GABA pill. He had been popping the supplements like candy these last two weeks. Every day seemed to be more bad news, more disasters and upset shareholders.
First there was the leg that simply stopped working in the middle of a crosswalk. The lady wasn’t hurt, but it stopped traffic long enough to get a story in the local paper. Social media then turned it into a national headline.
Then there had been the boy petting a dog with his Life Pool hand, the newest model capable of transferring sensations through artificial nerves. “I can feel the fur” turned into “It’s too tight!” One dead dog later, and Life Pool’s legal team was taking more than GABA pills to get through the day. That boy’s mother did not want to settle out of court.
Lewis threw back a pill, which he began to chew. His jaw felt tight, and if he didn’t know any better, the elevator was moving even faster.
“You’re fine,” he said to the buttons, which refused to light up. Normally they showed him what floor he was on. “You’re fine. Just having a …” A what? A stroke? A hallucination? He checked his phone, but his phone refused to help. No bars. No WiFi. He was in a dead spot.
As a senior member of the marketing department, Lewis considered panic to be completely beneath him. Words and numbers could solve every problem, and what they couldn’t fix, money could. Yet a stroke wasn’t something to reason with, and it certainly couldn’t be purchased. Lewis needed a doctor, and he needed one right now. He slapped the “Emergency Stop” button. The elevator responded by increasing its speed.
“Help!” Lewis roared. He smashed his fist against the control panel, hitting buttons at random. “Help!”
The elevator was now a rocket, and any second it would crash into the ceiling. Lewis flinched, expecting the worst, but after what felt like another five minutes, he was still shooting upwards. It wasn’t possible. He couldn’t even be in the building anymore.
He threw back another GABA pill and leaned against the back wall. It was cold, and it felt good. Sweat soaked the armpits of his suit, and he clutched at his chest, positive he was having a heart attack.
Lewis slid down the side of the elevator and closed his eyes. His head hurt. His chest did too. “Phone,” he said, loud and clear. “Phone call the police.”
“Dialing 911,” his phone said in a soothing voice. Lewis smiled. See, this really was a hallucination. He was fine, probably stuck between floors 64 and 65. Any second now, someone would come find him, and then he’d go to the hospital where money would buy him the best medication on the market.
“Just a few more minutes,” he mumbled.
“No signal,” his phone responded.
Lewis opened his eyes. His phone still read 2:48. His battery was at 20%.
“What do you mean no signal?”
“No signal.”
“Call me an ambulance!”
“No signal.”
Pain stabbed Lewis in the chest. He groaned, and his sitting position became a sideways one. His heart felt like it was going to explode. He was going to die. He was in the world’s most advanced medical facility, the place where Alzheimer’s was cured, the place where ALS was turned into a disease as easily treatable as diabetes, and he was going to die of a stupid heart attack. He squinted, and he frowned, and then he laughed a very shrill sound.
Let the reporters have a field day with this!
Twenty minutes later and Lewis was forced to conclude that he was not dead. He got back to his feet. The elevator continued to rise, and his phone continued to read 2:48. The battery was now at 16%.
“I don’t understand,” he said to the black walls.
It wasn’t that the elevator was still shooting up at the speed of a rocket but the fact that he was hungry. This was a hallucination, him going crackers after years of stress, yet what kind of person needed to stop mid crazy to have his 4:00 granola bar? It made no sense!
That being said, Lewis popped open his bag and dug to the bottom where he kept his emergency snacks and a small bottle of “Drink Me” sports water. Lewis was quite proud of that slogan. It’s what landed him the job at Life Pool.
Midway through his break, the elevator dinged as if it were about to open, and an enormous sense of relief washed over Lewis. This nonsense was finally over. He was free. However, the elevator showed no signs of slowing down, and if anything, was beginning to speed up again.
“Stop!” Lewis roared. It wasn’t fair. None of this was fair. He shouldn’t even be here! None of this was his fault.
And then the doors did slide open. Or they must have, because the elevator was now filled with smoke, and Lewis got the impression that he wasn’t alone. He stumbled against the wall, which was no longer cold but very, very warm. It felt relaxing, like a dip in a hot tub.
“Who are you?” said a voice. The voice then proceeded to cough.
“What?” Lewis asked. Was this a senior partner? “I’m Mr. Corvel, sir. I’m late for the 3:00 meeting.”
“Oh. I’m afraid I don’t know anything about that.”
“What?”
“Care to enlighten me?” Life Pool was a very American company, yet Lewis thought he heard a slight British accent in the voice. It didn’t make any sense, but nothing did at this point. At least it was someone to talk to.
Lewis held out his hand until the smoke cleared enough for him to make out an enormous, snakelike shape standing before him. He coughed, swallowed his last GABA pill, and retracted his hand.
He then screamed until he tasted blood.
The creature was an enormous caterpillar, emerald green from top to bottom, with a top hat on its head and a silver vape pen in one of its many hands. It popped the pen into its mouth, inhaled, and then exhaled an amount of smoke that would make a dragon jealous.
“Well that was quite unnecessary,” it said.
“What … What’s going on?” Lewis stammered.
“Not on,” the caterpillar corrected. “Up. We’re going up.”
“But I don’t want to go up.”
The caterpillar made a tsk tsk noise. “Well then, you’ll be late for the party, won’t you?”
“But—”
The large bug took another puff on his pen and filled the elevator with smoke. Lewis slipped to the floor. The caterpillar looked like it wanted to say something, and Lewis was afraid to interrupt it again; however, when the time dragged on from 2:48 to 2:48, Lewis decided it might be best to just take a nap. He’d wake up in a hospital, and all of this would be behind him. He took out his laptop and punched the bag into something resembling a pillow.
“It’s very rude,” the caterpillar said, exhaling another round of dragon smoke, “to ignore someone mid conversation, but I shall be here when you wake up, and perhaps you will dream up some manners in the meantime.”
Lewis shook and sobbed. He told himself the talking bug wasn’t real, that none of this was real, but it didn’t stop him from knowing the caterpillar was watching him. It didn’t stop him from being terrified and lost.
When sleep did find him, it did not bring comfort.
He dreamed of yesterday’s massacre. Olympic athlete Chris Orlando was at a shooting range with his friends, nervous yet excited too. Reporters converged on him, taking pictures and asking questions. He smiled, bid them step back, and then picked up a rifle. He hit every shot.
“What’s it like,” one reporter asked. “How do you feel?”
“Great!” Chris said, and he looked great too. His smile was the kind of image Life Pool could use for decades. “Never thought I’d get to shoot again after the accident.” He rolled up his sleeve to show a metal arm that went to his shoulder. “Works like a dream.”
“Will they let you compete with that?” a different reporter asked.
Chris shrugged. “Don’t see why not. It’s me aiming, not the software.”
After that a different reporter handed him a pistol, and Chris scored six bull’s-eyes. He reloaded the gun, prepared to score another six, when his arm jerked the pistol up, towards his neck. He had time to shout before the gun went off. His body fell to the ground, but his arm continued to swivel, pointing to each of the reporters. Even dead, Chris had pinpoint accuracy.
Lewis woke feeling empty. The caterpillar was still there, and the elevator was still zooming up, to some party in another galaxy. Or maybe another dimension.
“Pleasant dreams?” the caterpillar asked. He was poking at Lewis’s laptop.
“No.”
“Well make yourself useful and help me with this game. I don’t understand it.”
Lewis inched over and looked at his screen. He expected work emails and documents and was surprised to see solitaire. He was positive that new IT intern had removed all the games from it two months ago.
“Move the Red Queen there,” Lewis said, pointing at the card. “Then you can move the black jack.”
The caterpillar smiled. “So you did find some manners. Ready to come to the party?”
Before Lewis could answer, the elevator doors slid open. The top floor of Life Pool was oddly bland, with clean white floors and wooden walls devoid of anything but the company logo. At the end of the hallway was a door, though it wasn’t tiny or huge but normal. It was where the senior partners were waiting, each with bad news on his lips.
His phone read 3:01.
Lewis looked at the elevator buttons. He was at “Top Floor,” but a new one had appeared above it, this one labeled “Party.” He pressed it.
“Good,” the caterpillar said. “Good, good.”
Lewis smiled as the two of them zoomed away.
Nonsense 