On Retreat

Sometimes, while he was watching his team work, Nikolai wondered what the world had been like before the Retreat; 9 to 5 jobs, long lunch breaks. He would wonder, while staring at the screen in his home that showed all of his employees dutifully typing away, how anyone could get anything done in 8 hours. 

Right now his team was working in Real Time. In about 20 minutes an alarm would sound all around the office indicating it was time to go On Retreat. When that happened, each one of his employees would pull out the small device that everyone kept in their pockets at all times, open the Retreat app, and login. 

Even though employees only worked in the office a couple of days a week (the other days they could work from anywhere) Nikolai had tried to make the space as inviting as possible. There were large plush couches for those who didn’t like to sit at desks. There were multiple coffee stations, as well as a few with drinks that contained something a bit stronger than caffeine for when you were working on an especially difficult project. There were also many brightly colored signs on the walls with helpful reminders like “Eat something! A hungry worker is an unproductive worker.” And “Fifteen for Fire!” The latter was referencing the requirement to take one 15 minute break for every 6 hours of work while On Retreat to ensure maximum productivity. 

These reminders were important. Nicolai had learned that the first few months after the release of Retreat 1.0 had been messy. People would go On Retreat to work on a project for hours, then come back and continue working. Time passed differently when you were in the bubble that the Retreat app created. Hours would speed by, but in Real Time it was as if you had just sat down to work. CEOs were so excited about the increased productivity that they didn’t think to remind their employees to eat, or sleep. The results were not pretty.

Nowadays there were limits, rules, reminders everywhere.

Nikolai smiled as he heard the melodic chimes starting, right on schedule, and unmuted his microphone. 

“Have a good Retreat!” he said. 

********************************

Kai only had a few more months left of school, and for that she was grateful. She had known going into it that a degree in Programming was going to be a lot of work, but she had underestimated just how much. Even with the mandatory sleep and food breaks that were built into every day, she was exhausted all the time. 

She knew her classmates felt the same; they would commiserate during their midday lunch breaks, share tips for minimizing back pain, and which brand of eyedrops were best to combat the dry scratchiness that came from staring at screens all day. But they knew it would all be worth it. Soon school would be a thing of the past and they would be Programmers, making a real difference in the world. After all it was students just like them that created the Retreat app, students just like them that wrote the code that allowed the United States to have the most productive workforce in the entire world.

Kai stood up from her laptop, stretched her arms up over her head, and did twenty jumping jacks. She took a deep breath and long sip of her coffee. She knew there were stronger drinks, some of her classmates used them during midterms and finals, but Kai was nervous about stuff like that. She had heard tales of hallucinations, of students who didn’t sleep for days, wandering around campus like zombies. The teachers all said those stories were just urban legend, but Kai wasn’t so sure. 

She was about to sit back down at her desk when the door to her dorm room flew open and TJ and Amma burst in.

“Kai!” Her best friends both looked kind of manic, wild eyed and breathless. “We have to show you something! Like right now!”

Kai looked up at her friends suspiciously. 

“Ya’ll ok?” she asked. “You are both acting like you just took a sip from the wrong mug.” 

Amma waved her hand impatiently. 

“Girl you know I don’t touch that stuff. But seriously, come on.”

She grabbed Kai’s hand and literally tried to drag her out of the door. 

Kai looked over at TJ who was still standing in the doorway. 

“TJ, what’s up?

He grinned at her, his blue eyes twinkling.

“We just have to show you,” he replied. “But Amma maybe you could let her put on shoes first?”

He indicated Kai’s bare feet. Amma sighed.

“Fine but hurry up!” 

Kai followed her two friends down the hall and into one of the many computer labs that were spread out across the campus. She raised her eyebrows questioningly when Amma locked the door behind them.

“What..”

Amma placed a finger to her lips and led them towards a table in the far corner. Kai expected her to boot up the laptop that was there but Amma pulled a small piece of paper out of her pocket instead. Written in blue ink, were what seemed to be lines of code.

Kai was impressed. Paper was hard to find on campus, since almost every assignment was done on some kind of computer device. She was about to ask Amma why she had hand written this one when TJ answered for her.

“They haven’t figured out how to track what we write. Or what we think. Not yet anyway.”

Kai understood then. Her friends had written a new program, but not one for any class. 

“What does it do?” 

Amma grinned. 

“You know how they monitor us when we are on Retreat? You know, to make sure we are only using the extra time to study or do homework or whatever? Well we figured out how to hack it.”

Kai looked over at TJ, who nodded.

“How do you know it works?” she asked. Her two friends shared a quick glance before smiling back at her. 

“We tried it,” TJ replied. “Yesterday, for a full hour, in Retreat time that is. We took a walk in the park.”

Kai stared at him, her eyes wide.

“And???”

TJ shrugged. 

“No one said a thing.”

             ********************************

Kai had learned about the time before the Retreat app had been created, they all had. It was part of every middle and high school education. About how much less productive work used to be. About how much time humans used to waste on meaningless things before the coders figured out how to optimize everything; exactly how many hours of rest, leisure activities and exercise were actually necessary. People in this country used to be terribly lazy, prone to staring at mindless videos for hours on end. 

Kai could not imagine having that much free time ever. When would anyone get their coursework done?

Besides, it wasn’t as if she didn’t ever have fun. During their mandatory hour long midday break, she and her friends often played games, kicking a ball around for fun or playing with a real deck of cards or an old school chess board. Most people played games online of course, but you could still find these things if you knew who to ask.

And at night, before bed, she would sometimes even watch a video or listen to music to help her unwind. It was necessary after so many hours of studying. 

The idea that her two best friends were suggesting, however, was something different.

“What are we going to do all day?”

Both TJ and Amma smiled mysteriously. 

“Whatever we want,” they replied. 

Retreat time was specific to each person who activated the app, basically opening a bubble around them that sped everything up and made time in the real world appear to not move at all. In order to allow for working in groups, however, you could link up with people nearby and add them to your “bubble.”

Kai pulled out her device, handed it Amma and watched her type in the new code. 

“Are you sure this is a good idea? We are only a few months away from graduation.”

Amma smiled. “Isn’t that exactly why we should do this? Before we become productive members of society for, well, basically forever. Don’t you want to have some fun first?”

Their campus was not that far from the lake, so the three friends went there, armed with sandwiches and sodas. They sat by the shore and Kai popped the top open on her drink. TJ reached into his pocket and offered her a small silver flask. 

Kai raised her eyebrows.

“I thought you guys didn’t do that stuff”, she replied.

TJ shook his head. “Its not a stimulant silly. Its alcohol. You know, for fun?”

Kai had really only had alcohol at formal events; a glass of red wine at her cousins’s wedding, the occasional beer at a graduation party. No one ever drank in the middle of the day. Alcohol was known to dull your senses, to make you sleepy and unmotivated. Which, she supposed, was kind of the point.

She poured some of the contents of TJ’s flask into her bottle of soda and watched as he and Amma did the same. They each took a large swig, then lay back on the grass and stared up into the bright blue sky. It was a beautiful, cloudless day, sunny and warm. Kai had just closed her eyes when she felt a tap on her shoulder. 

“Im going in the lake”, Amma declared. “Wanna come?”

Kai blinked at her. “I obviously don’t have a bathing suit here. I thought I was studying this afternoon, remember?”

Amma shrugged. “Yeah, so?” 

Kai looked around the deserted shoreline. Everyone else on Retreat right now was in a office somewhere or a coffeeshop designed for work. Amma was already removing her clothes. She glanced over at TJ who waved his hand dismissively.

“Go ahead," he said. "I’ll stay here.”

Kai considered it for a few more seconds before grinning and following her friend down to the water.

The two girls stayed in the water for over half an hour, swimming back and forth and floating lazily on their backs, the midday sun on their faces. At one point Kai felt Amma reach out and take her hand and they stayed like that for awhile, holding hands with their eyes closed, slowly drifting in the lake’s tiny waves.

When they got back TJ was eating the rest of his sandwich. Before he could have time to react, Amma plopped down right in his lap, wet skin and all. He flinched at the cold water but rather than pushing her away, he wrapped his long arms around her and drew her closer. Amma then reached her hand towards Kai and pulled her down next to them. They sat like that for awhile, three bodies touching each other, absorbing each other’s warmth. When Amma turned her face upwards, TJ’s lips met hers easily. 

Over four hours of Retreat time passed in this way. They finished their sandwiches, sodas, the contents of TJ’s flask. They talked about their futures, fantasized about what life would be like when they graduated and became the top coders in their fields.

The sun had traveled almost all the way across the sky when Amma finally said,

“Do you guys ever wonder if all of this is worth it?”

Both Kai and TJ just looked at her, waiting for her to elaborate.

“I mean, this day, this lake, all of this. When are we ever going to have a day like this again? We have been in school basically our whole lives to get those dream jobs where we will then work non stop until we die. And we were always taught that that was the ultimate goal, the ultimate purpose in life. But what if it isn’t?”

“Well you guys have the hack now”, Kai pointed out. “So maybe we can come back here. Like once a month. Even when we all are big tech superstars.”

Both TJ and Amma nodded. They made a pact then, an agreement to take a break from the real world once a month and just be free, together.

Then they went back. Kai had an exam to study for. TJ was finishing up his final project. Amma had a paper to write. 

A few weeks after their Retreat to the lake, TJ tried to enter the hacked code into his device and it was immediately rejected. Apparently the higher ups had learned about the hack, and had changed something in the app. No one had ever said anything, they had just quietly fixed the problem. 

TJ spent a few hours tinkering with the Retreat code but eventually he gave up. There were finals to take, projects to complete. Graduation was rapidly approaching. Besides, by then all three of them had been offered internships at high level tech companies. The real world was waiting.

*****************************

When Nikolai’s team returned from being on Retreat, he checked in with everyone to make sure they had all eaten. He then told them to get some coffee, to take a little break. He watched his screen as they chatted with each other, joked, laughed. They all looked happy and Nikolai felt proud for providing a positive work environment. After all, happiness was key to productivity.

A few weeks ago, some college students had apparently hacked the Retreat app, allowing them to disappear for hours without being tracked. Nikolai’s boss had been beside himself. 

“They went to the lake!” He had cried. “They went swimming. Naked. They didn’t study at all. They didn't even bring a book!”

Nikolai had wondered if the students were going to be punished, perhaps even kicked out of school. Programming college spots were extremely competitive; there were probably thousands who would be more than happy to take their place. 

But his boss had shaken his head.

“Are you kidding? We’ve already sent an update to the app,” he said. “Their code will no longer work, or anything like it. But we aren’t doing a thing to them, we aren’t telling a soul. Can you imagine if it got out that someone had hacked the system? We would never hear the end of it.”

Nikolai of course agreed not to say anything to anyone.

“So they are just getting away with it?” 

His boss didn’t seem particularly concerned. 

“So they spent a few hours hanging out by a lake. Who cares? Young people always think that they are going to change the world. Eventually everyone learns what we already know.

He paused, a small smile passing over his face. 

“We are in charge of the world’, he said. “We are the only ones who can really make change. And we already did that, many years ago. Nowadays, the smart people know to just play along.”

As Nikolai watched, his team finished up their coffees and one by one retuned to their desks. It was only 2pm, Real Time. There were still plenty of hours left in the day.