VI. A Voice of Reason

A Voice of Reason

MJ and Oracle turn towards the voice. A young boy stands before them.

Oracle: Well, who are you?

Boy: My name's Joey.

Oracle: And what are you doing here?

Joey: I live here!

Oracle: You live here?

Joey: Mister, I just said that.

MJ: But you should be frozen!

Oracle: Not true, MJ. Only the people who are generated by the loop are frozen. 

Joey looks around.

Joey: What do you mean? Why are all these people frozen?

Oracle: Joey, there has been a glitch and we're here to fix it.

Joey: What's your name?

Oracle: My name is Oracle, and this [Points to MJ] is MJ.

Joey: Oracle is a really weird name.

Oracle: Weird? What if I said Joey was a weird name? 

Joey: Joey is a normal name! There's a lot of people named Joey. I've never met an Oracle before.

Oracle: Neither have I.

MJ turns to the little boy, and bends down until she is eye level with him.

MJ: Could you tell us what's going on here? What do you remember?

Joey: What do I remember? What do you mean?

MJ: Do you know where you live? Where you grew up?

Joey: Of course I remember!

Oracle: You remember? Is there anything you don't remember, Joey?

Joey: What do you mean?

Oracle: When's your birthday? What'd you do in school today? Last breakfast?

Joey: September 12th. Linear algebra. Bacon, eggs, sausage, chocolate sauce.

Oracle: Chocolate sauce?

Joey: I programmed it myself. My parent's don't know, don't tell them, please Mister!

Oracle turns to MJ and whispers into her ear.

Oracle: Something is wrong here. He should have forgotten something.

MJ: What if his parents bought their memory back?

Oracle: That's possible, but we're not even sure that's what's going on.

Oracle turns back to Joey.

Oracle: So Joey, has anything weird happened lately?

Joey: What do you mean?

Oracle: Has anyone forgot anything? Maybe a lot of people forgetting things?

Joey: No, not that I know of Mister.  

Oracle: Do you remember what were you doing before you met us?

Joey: I'm…I'm not sure. 

Oracle: When we first met, you said we weren't going anywhere. Why was that?

Joey: I said what? 

Oracle: You said we weren't going anywhere.

Joey: I didn't say that!

Oracle looks around. He turns back to MJ.

Oracle: He's either lying or it really wasn't him. 

MJ: How could it have not been him? 

Suddenly Oracle has a moment of clarity. He looks shocked and excited.

Oracle: MJ, did you receive the message through Iris? No, of course you didn't.

MJ: Iris?

Oracle: My phone received and saved the message. Only not as a message, but as a sensation. Isn't it strange that we heard a voice, rather than receiving a message straight through Iris?

MJ:  What's Iris? I don't understand.

Oracle: I have an idea MJ. We aren't where we think we are. 

MJ: Where do you think we are?

Oracle: We're in an old, old version of Knossos. This isn't a trap. These are bugs. We've managed to find our way into a back-up Knossos, one of the earliest. Iris wasn't implemented immediately. There were versions without direct messaging, we still used voices.

MJ: Oracle, that's impossible. There's no such thing as Iris!

Oracle: You're using back-up memories. 

MJ: Back-up memories? And what about you?

Oracle: I have all my memories. 

MJ: And you didn't say anything?

Oracle: I didn't know. It's more fun to level the playing ground, really. I've been working on back-ups as well. But when I figured it out, my phone gave me access to the rest.

MJ: How'd you know about this Iris thing if you had back-up memories? What is Iris anyways?

Oracle: Don't worry about how or what. We should worry about how to get back to the present.

Voice: Not before you help, Oracle.