Bird Sounds

Once upon a time, some engineers and wealthy powerful people got together and created a device that linked the minds of people during sleep. It’s said that it was an effort to bring us closer together, the world.

Some of the powerful people decided to study the technical side of the partnership. They learned how the device worked. As a result, they enhanced the properties of the headset and it no longer needed to be worn on your head. Instead, it produced a signal that caused the same effect. Not everyone owned one. All the consumers, the owners of the device, needed to do was ingest a certain plant and be near the device. People could enter each other’s dreams. It was so delightful and full of wonder, an amazing experience almost beyond our wildest conceptions.

One day, the dreams changed and all became unified. It was like a whole new world was born. You couldn’t tell the difference between it and the real world. It was a replica. They called this second earth “The Kingdom.”

The powerful people who became educated in the technology figured out a way to manipulate The Kingdom from their headquarters, using a super computer with access to signal producing technology such as cell phone towers.

They say that nobody knows why or how, but people began dropping like flies, falling to the floor and into a deep sleep. And they remained asleep.

The powerful people hired individuals to temporarily go into The Kingdom, socialize, and gain trust of other authorities and powers to retrieve sensitive information that could be used in the real world to gain even more money and power.

This went on for a while…until one of the bad powerful men grew a conscience and wanted to change. While trying to think of a way to make things right, he woke up one morning and heard a peculiar sound. It was the sound of birds chirping. But it didn’t sound quite right.

A sudden gasp of terror erupted from the man when he realized how familiar the sound was. “How many days have I been hearing that sound?” he said to himself.

The man decided to pay a visit to one of his former colleagues.

Shortly after, the man was entering a mansion and guided by a butler through the halls. They entered a large room.

“Welcome!” greeted a man at a desk at the far side of the room. “It has been a while since I’ve seen you in person, Jullian.”

“Richard,” Jullian said. “We need to stop this.”

“Come in, come in. Sit. Do you like my study room?”

“We need to end this,” Jullian demanded as he stood by the seat.

“End what?” Richard replied.

“The Kingdom,” Jullian answered.

“And why on earth would we do that?” Richard responded.

“This is wrong.”

“No one is going to find out. No one will know what we did.”

“We put all those people to sleep! And for what? More luxury? I suspect there are people who have found out. We got who we wanted into power as well, and our decisions and policies made life more financially stressful for the common person.”

“Found out? What gave you that suspicion?”

Jullian looked at the butler’s arm. “Have you not noticed? It’s more noticeable in him.”

“I don’t get your point,” Richard said.

“Do you remember how ecstatic we all were when we found out The Kingdom could be altered to our liking?” Jullian explained. “Because we realized the seriousness of how real the fake world was, we added something subtle into it so that only we could tell the difference.”

“Yes, yes,” Richard said. “I remember. What about it?”

“The veins are discolored slightly,” Jullian continued. “That was a sign we implemented. They’re slightly darker than they should be in all the dream bodies. We proceeded to usurp power in the real and fake world. But with all that tinkering, a glitch was born, the great mistake.”

“Bird sounds,” Richard replied.

“Yes,” Jullian said. “Bird sounds. In the fake world, every morning, the sound of birds chirping is heard. The chirping sounds off and can be heard even when there are no birds present. A studious person can begin to realize something isn’t right.”

“What does that have to do with us?” Richard questioned. “We didn’t take the mushroom.”

“Mushroom?” 

“Yes. They weren’t given a plant. We packaged a tropical mushroom with our product. It was somewhat of an ancient thing, lost to history until recently. Only people who ingested the mushroom can slip into the fake world.”

“Mushrooms! We had access to unsuspecting people’s psyche! And now you’re telling me we were drugging them. Combining drugs and technology. What on earth did we really create?”

“We are fine, Jullian. Go. Enjoy your life. Live it up.”

“I heard the sound, Richard. I’ve been hearing it for a while now.”

“You heard real birds, Jullian.”

“Someone figured out we were behind this mess. A group of many people, I’m sure. They couldn’t touch us, so they put the mushrooms in our food. We unsuspectingly fell into this fake world.”

“I don’t have time for your hypothesis. You were the youngest of all of us. And now I see you are also the most naive.”

“I’m trying to warn you. The things you are holding onto don’t matter. You have to let go of your lust for power and luxury. You have to at least diligently look into what I am trying to warn you about.”

“I don’t have to do anything. You are being selfish. You aren’t thinking about the others and the lives they have built for themselves and their families.”

“Selfish?! Me?”

“We will continue to live how we live. You do you.”

Jullian began walking to the door. He paused. “You’re going to pay for every bad thing you did. You won’t get away with this. Neither will the others. And I am going to do my part and tell everybody, the world.”

Slowly, Jullian turned to face Richard.

“Is that all?” Richard responded. “Go ahead. Say what you need to say and then leave.”

There was silence.

“Out with it!” Richard yelled. “What do you want to say to me?!”

*See “Bird Sounds” by Circa Survive on YouTube