“Infinite Frontiers,” Brent told him with a quick glance. “It’s awesome.”

His momentary lapse in total concentration was evidently enough for a misstep and his avatar exploded in a serious blast of blazing debris on the wall.

“Shit!” Brent slammed back into the couch as though he’d suffered the same blow as his soldier and removed his headgear.

“You want a game?”

“Nah,” Jeremiah laughed. “I’m not much for these things. I doubt I’d be a worthy opponent.”

“C’mon,” Brent persisted. “We’ll team up.”

“I’d probably make an even worse ally,” he said. “I’ve been wondering why they supplied me with all this gaming gear. Now I know.”

“It’s all top of the line, too,” Brent told him. “Some of this stuff isn’t even on the market yet. But there’s no outgoing signal on this setup, so I have to play against this moronic AI soldier. I need a real adversary. Maybe I can figure out a way to tap into the beta platform when it launches, find someone to play.” He switched off the game and the wall went blank again.

“The only thing I know about these games is the ridiculous amount of money I’ve spent outfitting my son,” Jeremiah told him. “Besides, don’t we have to get to work?”

“Still an hour almost until the next viewing. I thought I’d come in early just to hang out.”

“Hang out? I have never met anyone who would voluntarily come early to work to hang out. Don’t you have a life outside of ViMed?”

“Yes,” Brent said. “In fact, I do.”

In the span of forty-five minutes, Jeremiah learned more about Brent Higgins than he knew about people he’d worked next to for almost ten years. Brent was raised in a suburb of Chicago, an only, adopted child to parents who were deeply religious, and he was engaged to a girl named Melanie, whom he affectionately referred to as “Mel.” Mel, as it happened, was firmly agnostic and, further, had once been employed as an “exotic dancer.” Jeremiah resisted the urge to point out the obvious passive aggressive tendencies at play against his parents here, deciding it wouldn’t be wise to so quickly alienate the only person he could count on for any kind of company and diversion. But really, he thought, an agnostic stripper? Had the kid no sense of subtlety?

“How did you get involved with this project?” Jeremiah asked.

“Sheer luck,” Brent said. “I was one in a pool of twelve applicants for this position. We were recruited in-house, from all over the company. I think I had five interviews in total. It was brutal.”

“For a data analyst? The competition was that tough?”

“This is kind of a big deal,” Brent said, a shadow of injured pride pulling at his features. “They weren’t going to hire just anybody.”

“I didn’t mean it that way, Brent,” Jeremiah said. “I just can’t believe they had that many people after the job. I suppose I just figured they’d handpicked everyone involved, the way they did me.”