The Outsider (Outsider #1) ✔️

Chapter 25 : Military VR

After having spent most of the morning in the Library, catching up with her backlog, Dusk went to the Military Building at 3 pm. The building was far less crowded that day. She took the elevators down to the 10th floor, to the VR Lab that the Brigadier had indicated. As she walked in, she saw two familiar faces.

"Is that you, Dusk Hale?" a young man with brown hair asked in surprise.

"Huh? Oh My God! Slater? Rowdon Slater? What are you doing here?" Dusk exclaimed.

"Superb! They invited you too? Mellow Sunrise is here too. Heavens, it's so nice to meet you both in person. We never managed to meet when we were working for a year on the Regis Cybera project, but now suddenly ... what a coincidence!"

Dusk was confused but kept calm. She looked around and saw another friend from the project also sitting on one of the desks, looking at her communicator.

"When did you both arrive?" Dusk asked.

"I came in an hour earlier. Mellow came in before lunch. I can't believe they paid for our flights to here and back. It was so much fun. When did you come in?"

"I have been here for 2 weeks now. I am studying at the university." Dusk explained.

Rowdon's eyes went wide. "You are studying in Uni-Viva! Wow! This is really the place for the rich, you know. Sorry, but I did not realise your parents would pay... Hey Mellow, come here. Meet Dusk."

Dusk smiled and greeted Mellow. "But what are you both doing here all of a sudden?"

"Some Brigadier Thompson called us and said the Military wants us to work on a project for a few days. If we do what they need, they can consider a longer engagement. They are paying us pretty well too." She explained.

Dusk turned around and looked at the Brigadier in surprise just as he was walking into the room. They had not informed her they were adding more people from her old team.

Thompson saw Dusk and walked over to her. "Well, have you met your friends? Good. You are surprised?"

Dusk nodded, as both her friends beamed and then extended their hands to greet the genial Brigadier. He continued, "I was thinking of our slow progress on the project. You are already so busy with your studies and now you will be even more busy with Princess Rosemary's new project... So, I figured that some others who worked with you before can perhaps, help us move faster."

He then asked everyone to their seats, putting Dusk in the front seat. Captain Mercy came to the front and summarised what they had done in the previous 2 weeks, since the first meeting had taken place. Dusk had met with the team thrice in the interim and completed the explanation of the engine design. But they had not actually started working on the main task of integrating the engine to the Military VR.

"So, Ms. Hale, how do we proceed?"

"Can you please explain why Mellow and Rowdon are here? Then probably I can figure out the next move."

The Brigadier replied, "You see, since they have worked with you when the Edu-VR project was done, we feel they can get this project done too. I know they didn't make the engine. But they did work with you on integrating it."

Dusk agreed that it was a feasible assumption. After all, they were not going to make a new engine. They only had to use the one she had made. They working to integrate it into Agro-Edu VR projects, so why not on the Military's VR.

"Ok, then what I suggest is that you decide the first VR and let them start making it."

"You mean, we give them one of our VR to modify?"