This was it. Everything I deserved. I was standing at the podium of the stage, with the beaming smiles of the judges next to me. In front of me stood rows of envious eyes, waiting for me to say something. Anything. 

But could I do it? The heat from the spotlight began to prickle across my skin. As I adjusted my body around for comfort, my arms knocked on the microphone. An excruciating shrieking sound reverberated across the entire hall. Still, I tried to say something. Still, nothing came out. 

Eventually I gave up. 

"Just end it already."

The edges of the hall began to peel away, replaced by a wall of white hexagonal panels that covered the entire dome. 

"Should we restart from the beginning?" Dan said matter-of-factly, his eyes glued to the screen attached to his arm. 

"Yes, just start it again" I replied curtly, straightening my posture once more. With that, I was back. 

In a stilted tone, I recalled the days I spent fretting over the accuracy of the Daedalus simulations and tweaking the realism of the character interactions. I recalled the weeks leading up to the contest results holed up within the Daedalus, hoping it would finally be enough. Thankfully, I assured the crowd, it was. With that, the crowd broke into rapacious applause. I soaked in the limelight for a second, feeling the ambient heat of the spotlight sting my skin. 

I stared once again at the nondescript crowd, trying to pick out faces I recognise. Something isn't right.

"Dan, come back." 

Dan appeared beside me once again, with a wide grin on his face.

 

"Could you insert all of the people I know into the crowd?" I ordered. 

Dan's eyebrows immediately furrowed as he gazed into the distance, the painted-on smile disappearing from his mouth. After a few seconds, he replied. 

"I don't think we should continue this, this isn't right." Dan responded hesitantly.

"Don't you remember that we are friends, Dan? Friends are supposed to benefit one another. Nothing else matters other than this fact here." I snapped.

He furrowed his eyebrows in contemplation once more, before eventually giving a relenting nod. After he typed a few things onto the keyboard, I began to recognise the people I knew within the crowd. I noticed classmates that have brusquely dismissed me finally look towards me. I saw Shou Xun, my rival, despondently slumped in his chair. 

Then I saw her. The hall doors creaked open to reveal Maya's bulky figure. Her eyes narrowed as she scanned her surroundings, before flaring with a mix of disgust and consternation. She saw red as she marched towards me, her thumping footsteps echoing across the hall. She then beckoned at me, wagging her index finger to call me down. 

"Is it already time?" I whispered, as I meekly slithered down the stairs. She was now directly in front of me. 

"You needed to leave 30 minutes ago. Now, you are going to be late." She chided as she towered over me, her voice growing with intensity. "This is what you chose instead? A make-believe ceremony with your Do-Anything-Now AI? You should be happy that your friend won the competition."

My face began to flush with red. "I would be more accepting if the choice made sense. If I knew that Shou Xun's temple mapping software would have won over a literal simulator, I wouldn't have taught him at all. " 

"Well, you will have to face reality eventually." She said curtly before tightly gripping my shoulder. I felt an insurmountable force pulling me off my feet.

"Humor me for a bit, pretend you were a normal human that didn't have the power to drag me off, how would you convince me to leave?" I haggled, as I mustered all my strength in a futile attempt to tear her off of me. "Perhaps if you explain what's so valuable, I may comply."

"Well, reality is real," she said as she proceeded to drag me across the hall, "and what is real is something I can truly touch and feel."

"Let's examine what you are saying. So you are saying that the Daedalus can't create real sensations." I inquired, as an idea struck me. "Dan, get the crowd to restrain her." 

Dan nodded, rousing the passive crowd to lumber towards Maya and pile their collective weight on her "Are you saying that you can't really feel the crowd restraining you?" I mocked. 

"Yes, but I know that these sensations are only in my mind," Maya said as she busied herself swatting off the numerous hands that tried to restrain her, allowing me a window for escape. "That they do not truly exist in the real world"

"If you could leave the Daedalus." I taunted, as I attempted to brush off the imprint Maya left on my shoulder after being freed. "So the focus is not on the sensations, but truth?"

"Yes, it is about authenticity," Maya lashed, her hand outstretched towards an opening within the crowd pile, "The objective truth"

"Well, there might be some objective truth. But we should not presume its value in determining whether I should leave" I scoffed, as I raised my hand to instruct Dan to tell the crowd to pull back. 

"How could you not? It is something that humans consistently chase for, the crux of human self-actualisation!" She stammered, and gave me an incredulous look. 

"If you think humans obsess over the truth, consider how many people are willing to hold on to their convictions despite contradicting information in our world today. The effort they go through to avoid even listening to unfamiliar points of view. " I retorted, chuckling at the irony of the situation. 

"But I still see value in this abstract idea of reality and truth." She replied, "but I don't understand why"

"Precisely" I replied, finally getting my opportunity to explain. "Humans are looking for understanding, on whether something makes sense. They can't accept the Daedalus because it doesn't align well with their idea of reality." 

"The funny thing is that reality doesn't make sense either. Reality doesn't fully follow our understanding either. People can die without any reason. People can make irrational decisions. People can fail despite doing everything right. Here in the Daedalus, things make more sense." I mused.

"So why do you still leave every single time I'm here to bring you out?" She quipped with a smirk, knowing that she had bested me. 

"Because part of me still still refuses to accept the Daedalus as real" I sighed, admitting defeat. "Though that is more due to my human irrationality rather than any logical argument". 

I said as I stared wistfully at Dan, who stood where I was earlier. The spotlight cast a harsh light upon him, under which some of the finer features of his face had bleached out. He stood there unflinching, daring to brave the ethereal glow. 

"Sometimes I wish I could trade places with Dan. It must be nice to be free of the limits of human constraints — the nervousness, the desire for authenticity, all of it. He could certainly do a better job on being me" I remarked. 

This time, there was no reply. I spent a few minutes contemplating the viability of this, before turning back to Maya. 

"Shall we leave?"

"That is my purpose after all." She replied, before gesturing towards the exit. "We ran over 45 minutes past the limit, should I be more aggressive next time?"

The worn-down hallway doors peeled away, revealing a set of sleek sliding doors beneath. Maya stood next to me, waving me goodbye.