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    The following piece of fiction contains strong sexual 
    content and is meant to be read only by adults.  If you 
    are not at least 18 years old, or if you are offended by 
    this type of material, please do not read any further.
    ========================================================



"The Garden of Tranquility"

by DG 


     Jace Smith propelled himself smoothly along the ocean floor 
with slow, even kicks, his arms trailing loosely by his sides.  
The warm water was so clear it was nearly invisible, but he could 
feel it sliding and rippling along his body as he passed through it.

     He was mesmerized by the white sand sliding past below him 
and by the sound of his own slow even breathing, and when the 
bottom suddenly fell away into a sheer coral cliff he gasped with 
surprise, feeling his sphincter contract and goosebumps break out 
on his arms.  He hung there in the still water, two hundred feet 
above the sea bottom, feeling like Wile E. Coyote just before 
another plunge into the desert.

     "Awesome," he muttered to himself.

     He gazed down along the cliff, noting the way the water 
slowly gained a deeper shade of blue with increasing depth.  Far 
below him, sinuous shapes moved in slow circles, forming and 
reforming into small groups, never stopping.

     He swallowed hard, took a deep breath, and then arrowed his 
way straight down along the cliff with powerful thrusts of his 
fins.  As he approached a depth of a hundred and fifty feet the 
sharks resolved into view, and he paused to study them with a 
critical eye.

     There were three different species in this particular habitat 
- nurse sharks, tiger sharks, and hammerheads.  As he watched, a 
large silver fish strayed too close to a tiger shark, and was 
ripped in half by a single savage snap.  The tiger shark began 
swallowing the upper half of the fish, while the lower half, still 
twitching, was immediately set on by several smaller nurse sharks.

     The commotion attracted the attention of one of the big 
hammerheads, which glided over and surveyed the situation with a 
baleful stare from one hideous yellow eye.  Then it torpedoed into 
the fray and seized the remaining scrap of fish from the nurse 
sharks.  A few seconds after the initial strike, the ocean 
returned to its deceptively calm state.

     Jace allowed himself to drift down into the layer of water 
containing the sharks, and soon found himself surrounded by dozens 
of the gray, incurious creatures.  He studied their movements 
carefully, noting the interactions between members of the same 
species and of different species.  Then he identified a few 
individuals by their scar patterns and followed each for a few 
minutes, studying their behavior.

     There was a beeping sound in his ear, and a voice said "Five 
more minutes of air."

     The warning distracted him for a moment, making him lose 
track of the twelve-foot hammerhead he had been watching.  As he 
scanned around for it, he realized to his surprise that the sharks 
were swimming away, dispersing along the cliff face and leaving 
the ocean suddenly empty.  Then he saw it.  A shadow, rising up 
from the shady blue depths, growing in size as it approached.

     "What the fuck...?"

     He felt a queasy trickle of fear in his stomach, and he 
forced himself to breath evenly and remain where he was.

     The creature was immense, easily twenty feet long, and he had 
never seen anything like it.  It vaguely resembled a shark, but 
its tail was horizontal instead of vertical.  It had a head like 
an alligator, with knife-like teeth overlapping the lower half of 
the jaw.  And it was purple.

     He watched it with a grim smile of disbelief on his face, 
rotating his body to face the nightmare it as it circled him.  
After three circuits, the creature flicked its tail and surged 
directly toward him, jaws agape.  It veered at the last second and 
passed within a few feet of him, and as it rocketed by he saw its 
smooth purple skin resolve into a geometric pattern of polygons.  
He braced himself for a violent shaking from the creature's wake, 
but the water remained perfectly still, as if it had been a ghost.

     The creature swam directly away from him, its curiosity 
apparently satisfied, and disappeared back into the depths.

     "Thirty seconds of air," said the calm voice in his ear.

     He shook his head and grunted with amusement.  Then he 
started kicking for the surface, suddenly anxious to get back to 
his lab.

     At about eighty feet his air ran out.  Enjoying the 
challenge, he kicked harder and accelerated upward toward the 
shimmering silver ceiling.  Then, not ten feet from the surface, 
he felt a sickening lurch as he popped upward and then sank back 
down again.  He was stuck, unable to move up to the surface no 
matter how hard he kicked, and now his lungs were burning like 
fire.

     "You're on the surface, Jace!" crackled a loud voice.  "Take 
off your regulator and breathe."

     He spit out his regulator and sucked in a breath of dry 
laboratory air.  Unsettled by the sensation of breathing 
underwater without a regulator, he ripped off his mask.  The ocean 
disappeared like the mirage that it was, and his laboratory 
resolved into view.  The violent transition was too much for his 
brain to handle, and he vomited violently into an orange bucket 
next to the VR station, placed there for just that purpose.

     When he was done, his assistant Todd spoke with a worried 
look on his round face.

     "What happened?  Why didn't you breathe?"

     "Because I was still six feet underwater, that's why!  The 
program must have gotten screwed up on my depth.  I can't imagine 
why, can you?"  This last was delivered with more than a little 
sarcasm.

     Todd was visibly crushed.  "You didn't like the Barnesaurus?"

     "If you're referring to that purple monstrosity, no, I 
didn't."

     As his stomach settled down and his eyes focused on the 
familiar environment of his company's testing lab, Jace felt his 
normal equanimity returning.  He saw that Todd, who was the best 
VR programmer he knew and a fiercely loyal employee, was pale and 
close to tears.

     "Listen, don't mind me," he said.  "I just hate getting 
cybersick.  The Barnesaurus was actually pretty cool.  Although it 
deconvoluted as it went by, and didn't leave a wake."

     "It's not done yet," said Todd.  "I finished the prototype 
last night, and thought I would surprise you with it."

     "It surprised me.  Did you come up with that design 
yourself?"

     Todd shook his head and grinned, his good spirits returning.  
"Sure looks that way, doesn't it?  But it's actually a dinosaur.  
Creatures that looked a lot like that guy actually existed a 
hundred million years ago.  I downloaded all the physical specs 
from the Smithsonian Archive."

     Jace peeled off his custom skintight VR suit, and began 
wiping the thin layer of conductive jelly off his lean, fit body 
with a towel.  In his early thirties, he ran his own company, 
Custom Virtual Environments, and was one of the leading minds in 
the field.  He was a handsome man with a lean, tanned face and 
alert blue eyes that radiated intelligence and curiosity.

      "So these dinosaurs were purple?" he asked.

     "Well...that color would have camouflaged it at very low 
depths," said Todd, not sounding very convincing.  "But it's just 
a guess.  The real name is a mouthful, so I named it after Barney, 
that kids' dinosaur everyone used to hate."

     "Well, it was actually quite impressive, Todd.  But this 
ocean environment is supposed to be accurate down to the smallest 
detail.  The scientists at Woods Hole wouldn't be amused."

     "Right, right.  But I thought we could market a version of 
this environment to the arcades.  I think people are gonna jump at 
the chance to swim with the sharks, and having the occasional sea 
monster drop in like that will kick ass."

     Jace grimaced.  "Until someone has a heart attack.  Then it's 
our ass that gets kicked by a lawsuit."

     Todd shrugged.  They both were fully aware of the recent 
trend of people dying in VR.  Recent improvements in the 
technology had led to an unforeseen quantum leap in the quality of 
the experience.  At the current level of sensory input, the human 
brain was interpreting the artificial surroundings as reality.  
Customers in the VR arcades were forgetting that they were in a 
game environment, and were responding to monster attacks, 
gunshots, and car crashes as if they were real.

     Jace finished toweling off and stepped into a pair of faded 
jeans.  "It's late," he said.  "Why don't you take off and get 
some rest.  Don't worry, we'll find some use for the Barnesaurus.  
Maybe we'll toss it into the next version of our SCUBA training 
course."

     Todd smiled dutifully, but looked uncomfortable.  "Are you 
coming back later tonight?"

     Jace was tying his running shoes and didn't respond right 
away.

     "Yes, I've got some stuff I'd like to work on alone."

     "You're going into V-World to see her aren't you?"

     Jace sighed and nodded.

     "You shouldn't do that alone.  It's too dangerous.  You're 
totally submerged in an environment that's generated somewhere 
outside our lab.  If their environment crashes, or goes haywire, 
our computer here may not be able to compensate.  It could cause-"

     "A brain seizure or a heart attack," finished Jace.  "I know 
the dangers."

     "Of course you do.  You contributed to the original medical 
journal article on cybertrauma.  What I'm trying to hint at here 
is that you shouldn't trust Xanadu to have your best interests at 
heart.  No offense."

     Jace smiled.  "I appreciate your concern, Todd.  Really.  But 
I have an excellent working relationship with Xanadu Software."  
He didn't tell his assistant that what he was going to do tonight 
was riskier than he even imagined.


*******


     After a quick dinner at a local restaurant, Jace returned to 
the nondescript warehouse that housed his company.  All the 
available floor space was covered with computers, biophysical 
testing equipment, and prototype personal VR stations, leaving 
only narrow aisles for moving around.  Only in its fourth year of 
operation, Custom Virtual Environments was already outgrowing its 
third location.

     Passing by the older-model VR station he had used to test the 
ocean environment, Jace walked over to an advanced prototype 
station his company was developing.  He switched on the interface 
computer and used voice commands to launch the control program as 
he stripped off his clothes and sprayed conductive fluid on his 
body.

     "Virtual Explorer ready," said a soft female voice.  "Please 
state destination."

     "Bradbury Hub," said Jace.  "I'm going to take the scenic 
route to the Club."

     He pulled on his VR suit, and after a moment of deliberation 
he removed the fabric panel covering his groin and replaced it 
with a larger unit that fit around his genitals.  Then he stepped 
inside the station, which resembled a small shower stall, and 
pulled the door shut behind him.

     The muted hum of servomotors filled the station as padded 
sections of biomimetic plastic molded themselves around his body.  
Jace dropped his visor into place and watched the glowing text 
scroll by as the configuration program ran.  He was asked to flex 
his arms and his legs, and then to turn his head from side to 
side.  Then a series of geometric shapes appeared in front of him, 
and he manipulated them as asked.

     "System calibration complete," said the female voice.  
"Contacting Bradbury Hub."

     After a few seconds of total darkness, Jace suddenly found 
himself in a small room with a shiny metal door directly in front 
of him.  He reached out and activated the door latch, noting with 
satisfaction the perfect visual match between hand and lever and 
the realistic feel of the smooth, cool aluminum against his palm.

     The door slid open, revealing a huge corridor that resembled 
a crowded airport terminal.  This was Bradbury Hub, the central 
point of the rapidly growing entity known as V-World.  From the 
earliest days of VR, people had felt the need to organize 
different VR environments into a three-dimensional grid of 
locations, like a real city.  Now V-World spread out around 
Bradbury Hub like a bizarre, dreamlike metropolis.  No two people 
experienced V-World in exactly the same way, but many people 
thought of it as their second home.

     Jace stepped out into the corridor, joining the stream of 
virtual citizens who were using the Hub to move from one location 
to another.  Many of them looked like normal people, although most 
wore strange costumes.  Some took on exaggerated physical 
characteristics, and a few weren't even human.  As usual, Jace 
chose to simply resemble himself.

     Walking behind three Imperial stormtroopers who were no doubt 
heading to the popular Gaming Level, Jace located the central 
tower on the detailed overhead map.  It wasn't necessary to walk 
anywhere in V-World, of course, you could always just "zap" 
directly to your desired location.  It was an interesting 
sociological phenomenon that people often preferred to move around 
the old fashioned way.

     A few minutes later he stood in front of an unobtrusive door 
made of polished green wood.  He touched a yellow panel next to 
the door.

     "Welcome, Mr. Jace Smith," said a male voice.  The door 
dissolved from view with an elegant shimmering effect that bespoke 
high-level programming and plenty of throughput.  Jace stepped 
forward into the small, old-fashioned elevator.  As the door 
resolved back into place, a wiry figure wearing black ninja garb 
made an acrobatic leap into the elevator.

     "Bad idea," said Jace with a grin.  "Security here is very 
tight."

     The ninja didn't reply, because he was already frozen in 
place, disconnected from V-World by the Club's control program.  
There was a low pitched buzzing sound, and the ninja disintegrated 
into a small pile of charred ashes, which then vanished.

     "We apologize for the intrusion, Mr. Jace Smith."

     "No problem."

     The elevator door shimmered opened again, and Jace stepped 
out into the 21st Century Club, the most exclusive private club in 
V-World.  Membership was exclusive, and the cost of the required 
personal VR equipment was prohibitive.  Many of the members were 
celebrities and politicians who used the Club to socialize 
anonymously or to satisfy their kinkier cravings without being 
caught by the media.  Other members were successful entrepreneurs 
and executives who found the Club an excellent place to make 
contacts.

     The throughput assigned to each member when they were inside 
the Club was much higher than in Bradbury Hub, and the citizens 
milling around the bar in the middle of the large circular room 
appeared with a correspondingly greater amount of detail.  As Jace 
smiled and greeted people, he could see individual hairs, 
sparkling eyes, and smooth, realistic skin.

     He drifted toward the curved outer window, which afforded a 
spectacular 360-degree view of V-World from the perspective of a 
hundred-floor skyscraper.  A riotous, hallucinogenic quilt of 
flashing lights, tangled streets, and gravity-defying architecture 
extended as far as the eye could see.

     Just west of the central tower was the huge Adult Village, a 
sea of glowing pink neon advertising every sexual service that 
could be conceived by the fertile human imagination.  The fact 
that virtual sex was a mediocre experience at best with current 
technology didn't stop it from being the number-one activity in V-
World.

     To the south stretched a long row of virtual casinos, where 
more money was wagered every day than in Las Vegas.  A growing 
chorus of social commentators warned that V-World was creating a 
community of modern lotus-eaters who would drag society down into 
a morass of unproductivity, and the view from the 21st Century 
Club was often used to illustrate their point.

     Jace's heart was beating rapidly, but not because of the 
view, which he was quite familiar with.  His eyes scanned the 
crowd in the Club continuously, but as usual, her voice came from 
directly behind him.

     "Looking for someone, Jace Smith?"

     He turned and smiled.  "Karma.  You're late as usual."

     The woman who stood facing him was breathtaking.  She had an 
exotic heart-shaped face with high cheekbones, a small nose, and 
large, widely-set eyes of constantly changing color.  Tonight she 
had long black hair which was wound into an intricate knot that 
echoed the design imprinted on her blue silk dress.  Her 
appearance was slightly different each time Jace saw her, and this 
time her features had been subtly morphed to give them an Asian 
cast.

     Her physical beauty was not unusual in a world where citizens 
chose their own appearance, of course.  What set her apart was the 
quality of her image.  While all the patrons in the Club had an 
image quality higher than the average citizen, Karma appeared with 
a level of perfection that was stunning.  A living, breathing 
woman down to the tiniest detail, she seemed to be lit from within 
by a primal glow.

     After a few seconds spent absorbing Jace's gaze, Karma raised 
an eyebrow and said "You like the dress?"

     Jace nodded, glad he wasn't programmed to blush in this 
environment.  "Can I touch it?"

     "Of course."

     He brushed his knuckles along the side of her ribcage.  The 
silk was cool and slippery, but he thought he could sense the 
warmth of her flesh underneath.

     "Incredible," he breathed.

     She pouted playfully.  "I only wish it was me you thought was 
incredible, and not just my dress."

     "Everything about you is incredible" said Jace.  "You're 
better every time I see you."

     She smiled and twirled playfully, causing the dress to float 
up around her thighs and then settle back in place.  "Thank you.  
I wouldn't be possible without your new biointerface technology."

     Jace smiled at the common V-World indulgence of treating 
one's virtual self as a separate entity from the real version.  He 
didn't know the real person behind the beautiful image he was 
facing.  Curiously, he didn't really care.  The entity he knew as 
Karma was intriguing, sexy, and self-consistent.  To use the old 
V-World expression, Jace was virtually in love with her.  That she 
was a rep for a huge software company with whom he was currently 
negotiating an alliance was a fact he tried not to dwell on.

     "You've used our biointerface technology and taken it way 
beyond anything we've been able to accomplish," said Jace.  "I'm 
glad I lent you the prototype."

     Karma tilted her head to the side and purred "With our 
software and your hardware, we hold the future of V-World in our 
hands."

     "So why are negotiations between CVE and Xanadu Software 
going so slowly?  The outlined plan on the table is fair, but you 
keep stalling."

     They smiled at each other like old friends who have been 
having the same argument for years.

     "Oh, Jace...let's not talk business tonight.  You should 
experience the new software from the inside.  It's like nothing 
you've ever imagined."

     She stepped closer, almost pressing herself against him, and 
whispered in his ear.  "I want to give you a demonstration that 
will show you the full potential."

     Jace nodded, and they walked hand-in-hand to an elevator 
unit.  He could feel jealous stares from other patrons as they 
waited for the door to open.  Once inside, Karma spoke the 
coordinates of the main Xanadu campus, and added "Garden of 
Tranquility, please."


*******


     The elevator dissolved completely, leaving them standing in a 
small, formal garden.  In front of them was a smooth rock wall 
with a small waterfall cascading down into a round pool.  A tall, 
perfectly-trimmed hedge enclosed the garden on the other three 
sides.  There were no physical entrances or exits to the garden, 
creating an atmosphere of privacy and solitude.

     The grounds consisted of a thick, closely-mown lawn from 
which small fruit trees grew at artfully random intervals.  The 
level of graphics was equal to the image of Karma herself, and 
although Jace had been in environments created by Xanadu's new 
software before, he once again found himself marveling at the 
glowing, jewel-like perfection of every detail.

     "They wanted this environment to create a feeling of 
relaxation and inner peace," said Karma.  "It's based on a real 
garden on the grounds of the Japanese royal palace.  Come here - I 
want to show you something."

     She led him over to the pool beneath the waterfall and 
pointed downward.  Beneath the rippled, shimmering surface swam 
several colorful koi.  They were as realistic in their appearance 
and motions as any artificial creature Jace had seen in V-World.

     "Beautiful," he said.  He dipped his hand into the cool water 
and reached toward a large white one with orange spots.  Instead 
of swimming away, it ignored him completely, and his hand passed 
right through it.  The minor discontinuity made his heart pound 
and his stomach lurch, and he realized how deeply he was embedded 
in this alternative reality.

     "They're visual only," explained Karma.  "There's a real pool 
with real koi in it, and these fish are a real-time mirror of 
that."

     Jace remembered Todd and his shark programs, and was 
comforted by the thought that they could still teach Xanadu a 
thing or two about VR programming.

     "This place is beautiful," said Jace truthfully.

     "You haven't really experienced it yet," said Karma 
seriously.  "Are you ready?"

     Jace nodded.  "How does this work?"

     "Xanadu's computer is standing by to take over.  You just 
need to open a direct interface to your own computer and tell it 
to switch you over."

     Jace took a deep breath and said "Jace Smith to control.  
Request direct link to Virtual Explorer."

     He heard a soft beep in his left ear and his female computer 
said "Control to Jace Smith.  Direct link open."

     "Requesting transfer to the local control program.  Maintain 
current status and position."

     There was a pause, and Jace had the silly notion that his 
computer was going to refuse, or give him a motherly lecture on 
the dangers of outside control programs.

     "Successfully linked to Xanadu control.  Touch your palms 
together to initiate."

     Jace touched his palms together and the universe flickered 
out of existence, then returned a moment later.  The first thing 
he noticed was the sound of the waterfall, which was louder and 
more musical.  Then he took a breath and inhaled the sweet scent 
of grass, flowers, and soft earth.

     "Jace?  Are you all right?""

     "My God...I can smell the garden!"

     Karma beamed a radiant smile.  "I told you you would be 
surprised."

She reached up and plucked a heavy, pink peach from a thin branch 
that hardly looked strong enough to bear its weight.  She bit into 
it, and Jace heard the delicate sound of her teeth slicing through 
the ripe, juicy flesh.

     "Delicious," she said.  She held it up to his lips.

     He leaned forward and bit into the fruit.  A sunburst of 
flavor exploded inside his mouth, and he gasped.  Juice dribbled 
down his chin as he stared at her in disbelief.  He chewed the 
pulpy mouthful and swallowed it, feeling it dissolve away into 
nothing as it reached the back of his mouth.

     "How...?"

     "They've figured out how to generate tastes and smells by 
manipulating very small electromagnetic fields around the brain.  
As I understand it, if you're biting into something that looks and 
feels like peach, your brain is already anticipating that it will 
taste like a peach and just needs a little encouragement."

     She put her arms around his neck, tilted her head up, and 
licked the peach juice off his chin.  "Don't you want to know what 
*I* taste like, Jace Smith?"

     He kissed her gently on the lips, then pressed his mouth 
firmly onto hers, and she melted against him.  He ran his hands 
down her back and pressed his palms against the firm swell of her 
buttocks, and she mewled deep in her throat and slipped her warm 
tongue into his mouth.

     Jace was suddenly aware of the normal male sexual response.  
But instead of the expected uncomfortable resistance of his tight 
VR suit, his cock seemed to be growing smoothly, straining 
joyously upward.  He separated himself slightly from Karma and 
looked down.  The utilitarian virtual clothing he was wearing 
earlier had been replaced with thin, loose-fitting cotton pants 
and a tunic.

     "You're dressed to match the Japanese theme," said Karma.  
She reached down and touched his cock through the tented fabric.  
A throbbing, pleasurable sensation coursed through his body, and 
he moaned.

     "I'm glad you wore the genital unit.  This is one particular 
biointerface I haven't been able to test yet," she added with 
smile.  "How does this feel?"  She was gently rubbing and 
squeezing, exploring the expanding length of him.

     "Unbelievable."  He noticed that her nipples were poking at 
the thin silk of her dress, and he slid a hand upward until he was 
cupping one firm breast.  Her nipple felt like a warm marble, and 
he rolled it between his fingertips.  "How does that feel?"

     "Very nice."

     They kissed again, and Jace found the zipper in the back of 
the dress.  It opened easily, making a perfect, crisp unzipping 
sound.  She stepped back and eased the dress forward off her 
shoulders.  It slithered down her body with a soft whisper, ending 
up in a puddle at her feet.  Of course, she wasn't wearing 
anything underneath.  He held his arms up tentatively, drinking in 
the sight of her, and she moved forward until her small, white 
breasts were pressed against his hands.

     "Do you like my body, Jace?"

     "Of course.  Jesus, Karma..."

     "You're mixing your religions.  The reason I ask is..."

     She closed her eyes, and he suddenly felt her breasts growing 
under his palms.  Startled, he released his grip and gaped.

     "...I can make any sort of adjustments you might prefer."

     He laughed out loud.  Her breasts were now large heavy 
globes, out of proportion to her narrow frame, but mouthwatering 
just the same.

     "That's maybe a little too big," he said.  "They were fine 
before."

     "As you wish..."  Her breasts shrunk back to their previous 
size.

     "So what do you think?  See any profitable applications from 
this sort of thing?"

     Jace shook his head slowly.  "This is beyond profitable.  
This is...Karma, it's like we're really here."  He waved his arm 
in a sweeping gesture.  "The garden, the waterfall, you, me.  It's 
real.  Do you know what I mean?  This isn't just a game any more.  
This is as real as anything.  I'm trying to remind myself that I'm 
sitting inside a little booth in an empty warehouse on the 
outskirts of Chicago, and my mind can't begin comprehend it."

     Karma nodded, and he thought her eyes looked sad.  "Of course 
I know what you mean.  But don't get all metaphysical on me, Jace.  
We have to leave the implications of this to the philosophers and 
the priests."

     She dropped her eyes to the ground, and he wondered if she 
was suddenly embarrassed by her nudity.  He realized that as a 
gentleman he should really be naked as well, and he started to 
remove his tunic.

     "I'm authorized to tell you that Xanadu is accepting the 
latest proposal," said Karma.

     Jace was taken aback.  "Really?  Just like that?"

     She was staring at him with a hint of a smile on the corner 
of her mouth.  "You knew Xanadu would try to reverse engineer your 
VR station.  I guess you were pretty confident they would fail."

     Jace answered her smile.  "The biomimetic plastic is what 
makes it possible.  Making it is, to put it mildly, tricky."

     "As in two hundred of our best scientists tearing out their 
hair and getting nowhere, yes."

     "That explains the delay in the negotiations, I suppose."

     They looked into each other's eyes, and Jace said "So what 
about us?"

     "There's a lot of virtual testing that needs to be done.  
Perhaps we should get started?"

     It didn't really answer his question, but he wasn't in the 
mood to push it.  Especially since she was stroking his cock 
through the thin cotton of his pants again.  Their mouths met in a 
hungry kiss, and she undid the drawstring and let the pants fall 
to grass.  Holding his cock in her hand, she kissed her way down 
his smooth, muscled chest until she was on her knees.  She kissed 
the head of his cock and then let it slide into her mouth until it 
was pressed against the back of her throat.  He moaned with 
pleasure, and she winked up at him.  Then she began sucking him 
with long undulating strokes that were as smooth and slippery as 
the mouthful of peach he had tasted earlier.

     He pressed his hips forward, and then began thrusting against 
Karma's mouth, increasing the pace.  He felt his climax starting 
to build, and he tried to relax and back away from the edge.  Jace 
prided himself on his sexual control, but this time he seemed to 
be as trigger-happy as a teenager.

     "Karma, wait...slow down.  I don't want to..."

     Instead of slowing down, and she reached up and cupped his 
testicles in her left hand.  Her mouth became an endless devouring 
tunnel, and a sudden, brilliant flash of pleasure bloomed inside 
him, leaving him weak and rubbery.

     He dropped to his knees to face her, and she smiled at the 
consternation on his face.  "Wasn't it good for you?"

     "Incredible.  But I wanted it to last."

     "We're just getting started, Jace Smith.  That was a virtual 
orgasm - all in your head."

     Jace nodded; he had been figuring it out as she spoke.  As 
the echoes of the climax faded inside him, he could feel that his 
cock was still hard, anxious, and throbbing.

     "Would you like me to do it again?"

     "Of course.  But it's your turn."

     She sighed dreamily and leaned back into the soft, thick 
grass.  "I knew you wouldn't be a selfish lover, Jace."

     He spread her legs gently and kissed her smooth white thighs.  
Her pussy was a delicate pink flower peeking out of a nest of 
silky black hair.  He kissed it, and teased her open with the tip 
of her tongue.  Her taste was unexpectedly sweet, like a faintly 
musky peach.  He looked up at her with a smile.

     "You're full of surprises, Karma."

     "You seemed to enjoy that bite of peach so much..."

     "You taste even better."

     She stretched and arched, offering herself up to him, and he 
buried his face hungrily between her thighs, lapping up her sweet 
essence like a cat devouring a saucer of milk.  She stiffened, and 
then cried out her pleasure in a voice a sweet and pure as a 
silver bell.

      Before she had fully recovered, he was on top of her, 
sliding inside her.  She was tight and hot and slippery, and when 
she wrapped her legs around his back and pulled him in deeper 
another orgasm flooded through his body, taking him by surprise.  
As with the first one, his cock remained hard and his balls 
remained full.

     "I don't believe this," he said.

     "Believe it," she said.  "And while you're believing it, 
please fuck me."

     He complied, and they spent the next hour using the 
technology of the future to engage in the most primitive and basic 
of human activities.  Jace eventually discovered that with each 
virtual orgasm he was moving closer to the real one, and the tenth 
one continued to build in intensity until he thought he would pass 
out from the pleasure, and then he finally felt the semen emptying 
out of him.

     Karma rolled him over onto his side and kissed him on the 
lips, but he was already asleep.


*******


     He woke a few minutes later and saw that Karma's eyes were 
closed and her face was wet with tears.  He kissed her cheeks and 
her nose, drying the tears away.  Peach again.

     "What is it, Karma?"

     She opened her eyes, and they were the sky-blue of a newborn.

     "They are going to betray you, Jace.  Xanadu isn't going to 
enter an alliance with your company.  As soon as they figure out 
how to manufacture your VR stations, they're going to cut you out 
of the loop and bring this whole package to the marketplace."

     Jace thought about it.  What he had just experienced 
fulfilled the wildest dreams of the cyber community and the direst 
prophesies of the neo-Luddites.

     "I believe you," he said.  "Virtual reality will be better 
than reality.  Not only will people prefer to spend their time in 
V-World, but they'll do anything to get here.  A company that 
springs this technology on the world will gain more than market 
share and obscene profits, they'll control the future of the human 
experience."

     "Jace...I've known what Xanadu was up to all along.  I've 
betrayed you."

     Jace was silent for a few seconds.  When he spoke his voice 
was cold and even.  "No.  I always knew who you represented and 
where your loyalties were.  More importantly,  I knew where the 
technology I was developing would eventually lead.  It just 
happened faster than I thought."

     She sat up next to him and hugged her knees to her chest.  
"Pandora's box has been cracked open.  Can it be shut again?"

     "I'm the only person who knows how to build the 
biointerface," said Jace.  "The details are in my computer files, 
but they are heavily encrypted."

     "You need to go back to your lab and destroy those files, and 
soon.  Xanadu will find a way to access them."

     Jace nodded.  He had no doubt that Xanadu could access his 
computer remotely despite the firewall.  All his sensitive files 
were protected by an encryption system that was supposed to be 
unbreakable, but suddenly anything seemed possible.  He stood up, 
and pulled Karma to her feet.

     "Will they let me go?"

     "I think so."

     He kissed her softly, and said "Jace Smith to control.  
Exiting virtual environment."

     "Xanadu control to Jace Smith.  Confirming environment 
termination."

     The garden faded away slowly into darkness, and then he was 
back inside his claustrophobic VR station.  The local computer 
sensed his arrival and activated the release mechanism.  When the 
plastic sheaths had retracted fully, he pushed open the door and 
stepped out into his familiar lab.

     Feeling dizzy and exhausted, he walked over to his private 
office and placed his palm on the door lock.  The door slid open, 
and the lights and computer came on.  He sat down in front of his 
terminal typed in a series of complex passkeys.  Then he brought 
up the relevant files and deleted them one by one, using an 
application that overwrote the sectors on the optical drive with 
random gibberish.

     When he was done, he turned off the computer and pushed 
himself away from his desk.  Then he was startled by a soft knock 
on his door frame.

     "Jace?  Everything OK?"  Todd was standing in the doorway, a 
concerned expression on his face.  "Sorry to bother you.  I came 
back to make sure you exited Xanadu's system safely."

     Jace was touched by Todd's concern.  "I've had a pretty wild 
night.  But I'm fine."

     "You want to tell me about it?"

     "We're not going to ally ourselves with Xanadu, Todd.  In 
fact, we're not going to market the new biointerface at all.  I 
just deleted all the files and data."

     Todd nodded slowly.  "I understand."

     "You do?"

     "Of course.  But you can't stop progress, Jace.  Pandora's 
box, and all that."

     Jace smiled grimly.  "That seems to be the relevant analogy.  
But maybe I've delayed progress long enough for the world to catch 
up with the implications of it."

     "You did the right thing, I'm sure."

     Jace stood up and stretched.  "I'm going to go home and get 
some sleep."

     Todd looked like he wanted to say something else, but he 
finally just nodded and said "Sounds like a plan.  We can talk 
about it more tomorrow."

     Jace walked over to the main exit, still feeling vaguely 
disoriented.  He turned the latch on the steel door and pulled it 
open.  The doorway was completely blocked by a featureless white 
wall.  He stared at it dumbly for a few seconds, then pressed his 
hand against it.  It had no texture or temperature, it simply 
exerted a smooth resistance that prevented his hand from going 
through.

     He had been tricked.  Xanadu Software had his passkeys now, 
and they would be decoding his files this very moment.  Jace 
realized that only one person besides himself could have created a 
such perfect virtual replica of CVE and his personal office 
computer.

      He turned around, but Todd wasn't there.  Instead, it was 
Karma looking back at him.  They stared at each other for a few 
seconds.   

     "Todd?"

     She dropped her eyes and nodded.  "I'm sorry, Jace.  I 
wouldn't have done it for money.  But they told me I would be able 
to make love to you."


The End, "The Garden of Tranquility"

© 1998 by DG (Dionysian1@hotmail.com)

Notes:

1)  Thanks to The Bear (Baird Allen) and Bitbard for their helpful feedback.
And thanks to Bear for proofing. 

2)  All my stories are available on my web page:
http://baird.pair.com/dg.htm