The Virtual Reality Lab

 The lights were off.  The only light came from the equipment in the room.  From where you lay, you saw a half dozen computer monitors.  Most were dark.  One had a green lines running across it in different directions.  Another had lines of text that scrolled slowly upward.

   “I thought I closed that door.” a voice called softly.  The lab door creaked slightly.  Your eyes automatically jerked to the sound.  You saw dim light from the corridor pour through the opening.  A shadowy figure appeared silhouetted against the incoming light.  There was a loud crump as the door was slammed shut.  Moments later a hand touched your right arm.  You grabbed the proffered hand.  There was a soft grunt as you were hauled to your feet.  You pulled back as you found yourself face to face with a faceless figure.

   “Sorry Pat,” the voice apologized, “I didn’t mean to scare you.”  A hand reached up and removed the face shield that was worn.  Jet black hair was released to cascade about the shoulders of a rather plain looking woman.

   “That’s okay,” you answered hesitantly.  You had no problem recognizing the dark haired woman who stood before you.  Mary Miller was only a month or two older than you.  She stood about five foot five.  She was one hundred, maybe one hundred five pounds.  Her figure was a firm 34C-27-33.  Thin, pale lips were all but lost amid a sea of freckles.  A button nose was flanked by a pair of large brown eyes.  While she would never be considered a beautiful woman, she wasn’t hard on the eyes either.

   You liked Mary.  She was friendly.  She always had a smile and a kind word for everyone she met.  She was undeniably intelligent.  Mary was a graduate student working on her PhD in Computer Science.  Her specialty was virtual reality.  She had already received a research grant to study the human-machine interface.

   However, Mary made you nervous as well.  She was weird.  She would wear a lab coat and tie over a t-shirt that left her midriff bare.  She would wear nylons and high heels with cut-off jeans.  She spent more time in the lab than out of it.  She seemed more comfortable with the machine than with people.

“What do you think?” Mary asked pointing to one of the monitors. You peered at the monitor.

    “What is it?” you asked.  A lot of different colored lines and symbols are crammed into the bold hexagonal outline.  It is obviously some sort of wiring diagram.  The lines represent some sort of connecting…wires most likely.  You recognize a couple of the symbols, resistors for example, but most are meaningless squiggles.  How they go together is beyond anything you’ve experienced.

   “I’m working on an induction generator.” Mary explained.  Your eyes glazed over as her explanation meant no more than the diagram.  “Sorry…  Most computer interfaces can either read input or produce output.  Some can even do both, but not at the same time.  Furthermore, they can only use one medium.  This should be able to switch between input, output and medium so fast it seems to do it all at once.  If you put enough of them together, you can make some actually think they can feel the environment surrounding them.”  Mary touched a button.  The diagram began to shrink.  A copy of the diagram appeared next to it, sharing a common side.   Another appeared and shared a side with each of the other two.  They continued to shrink and multiply.  Soon the screen was filled with a growing pattern of hexagons.  Soon, the pattern had shrunk to the point it was impossible to make out the individual hexes.  They appeared to be more like a piece of screen than a bunch of geometric shapes.

   After a moment, the grid shifted.  It gave a side view of the diagram.  You saw a curve to the form.  It was slight, but it was definitely there. As the grid grew, so did the curve.  Quickly, it became a half sphere.  As the open edges worked their way downward, a ridge formed between a couple depressions in front.  A bulge to both sides formed as well.  Soon, it became apparent that they were eyes and ears.  They were rather generic in appearance, but they were undeniably female.  When the face was complete, you looked at Mary.  It wasn’t an exact match, but the features bore an uncanny resemblance to a certain computer specialist.

   When you looked back, the figure was complete.  You marveled at the detail of the model.  The twin bulges mounted on her chest were expected.  The thimble-sized nub atop each breast and the depression in the middle of her belly that represented her navel was not expected, but neither was it a surprise.  On the other hand, the ridge that surrounded each nipple, a ridge that could only be her aureole was unexpected.  And the slight bump at top of the well-defined slit between her spread legs was rather disconcerting.

   “Unfortunately, I can only get the components into a hexagon about this big.”  Mary held her finger and thumb about two inches apart.  “Even then, I’m getting interference between the components.  However, I have a couple other ideas that I’ve cobbled together.  Would you like to try one?”  Naturally you nodded.  Mary disappeared into the darkness.  Moments later she reappeared holding what had to be her improvised VR interfaces.