Project Overworld

- "We're finally here, after all..." Keith commented.

It has been two weeks since the four of them last came to the discrict of Columbia, but it felt like months to them. Today, they were supposed take up their duty and start working for the NASA for an undetermined amount of time. Keith had started searched for flats to be rented near or within Washington since the city was really far away from where he lived up until now.

He had also planned to move in with his friends so they could share the rent and basically immerse themselves in their new job. Fortunately, his friends were also really hyped up about flatsharing and also started their own researches. Keith had already spotted a few interesting flats before even knowing the results of the NASA examination but most of them were pretty limited in size.

In the end, they managed to visit around five of them within a week and decided on establishing in one of them, both pretty affordable and having a total of seven rooms, including four bedrooms, one bathroom and a kitchen with a pretty large living room.

'We should be able to live there for the time being without stepping on each other's toes.' Keith meditated.

Today was the D-day and Keith was stressing himself while dressing up. It was both really intimidating and exciting for the young man, but by the looks on the faces of his friends it also seemed like they felt the same about this whole situation. Even the serious Leyla was now breathing more heavily than ordinary and had to refrain herself from accelerating the pace of her steps.

In any case, Keith doubted that any human on this planet would feel calm before joining a new company, especially if this company was one of the largest space organization across the globe. Naturally, Keith started leading the way to the headquarters of the NASA until they arrived before the reception.

Letting out a large breath, the young man pushed the doors and entered the building. After talking to one of the receptionist, Keith was told to wait there for a bit as Horace Johnson himself will be coming to meet with the new recruits.

- "Seems like we're the only ones newcomers for the time being." He remarked.

- "Yeah, I expected to see much more agitation around here." Michael voiced.

Keith thought about it for a while and theorized : "Maybe they were led directly to other parts of the building? Horace was particularly interested in our profile, so we may be exceptions. Who knows? In any case we still are ahead of time by several dozen minutes so we'll see if other rookies make their way over there?."

Leyla nodded as she agreed to her friends words before adding : "On top of that, our meeting is set at a pretty early hour compared to the time at which people usually start their working day. I wouldn't be surprised if he wanted to talk to us ahead of time."

'Seems like I wasn't the only one thinking of this eventuality... Well, no need to worry about it for now, he'll be explaining everything in a few dozen minutes.' Keith meditated.

The four friends waited for a while until a familiar figure welcomed them kindly.

- "Hey there, Spacol members!"

After exchanging some formal greetings, the leader of the human resources management section led them directly to his own office and started briefing them over the situation.

- "You must certainly be asking yourselves why you four are the only ones I brought in here. Well, this is regarding your upcoming job. Three more candidates were selected to join our ranks after that recruitement session, but you are going to accomplish special things for us." Horace started. "In fact, the reason why I contacted Keith at first was because of the impressive job he's accomplished within Project Overworld."

He took a brief pause before following up : "I've already told him about that, but some our leaders are interested in all sorts of simulation because it would allow us to test new rocket designs without requiring gargantuan amounts of resources. For a while, we've been following the progress of the very popular Project Overworld from up close, and we've come to the conclusion that it may be interesting for some of our engineers to test its physics engine a bit more in depth."

Horace let the information sink into his audience while straightening back up in his seat.

'Oh, looks like he's going straight to the point now...' Keith realized.

- "That is why, I wanted to recruit people who have been working with this engine for several years and after the Spacol industry reached the Moon I knew I had to contact their leader." Horace turned towards Keith. "Your work within the NASA won't be that distant from what you've been doing for these past few years. In fact, I want you to train our engineers to this new tool and optimize the design of our rockets."

Michael and Tyler were shocked after hearing the man's explanation and looked at each other in confusion. As for Keith and Leyla, they saw it coming since the start of this conversation so they were not as surprised about the proposition. However, it still was kind of an unexpected situation.

- "So, should we continue on with our current job at building a station on the Moon or should we focus on the developement of new types of rockets?" The leader of Spacol inquired.

- "Well, ultimately that's a result my superiors want to reach. However, you still are NASA employees and developing in the real world is our priority. That is why, for the first few months you will mostly be spending your time at our headquarters, training yourselves with our teams of engineers. Afterwards, the trend will be reversed and most of your time should be focused on Project Overworld and adapting its physics to our world's." Horace explained. "We sure are interested in establishing on the Moon but we still can't trust a game to help us with everything in that regard. In the end, this game will only be a place where we'll be testing our prototypes." He answered Keith's question.

The later nodded in understanding and started asking questions regarding their incoming schedule. The conversation continued on for a few minutes until they were interrupted by a knock on the door.

- "Ah, looks like Shaima is here. She's the leader of our second team of engineers focused on the construction of rocket engines. She'll be showing you around our building for the rest of the morning. I hope you have a great time for your first day at the NASA." Horace exclaimed before leading them to the exit of his office.

Not having a moment to talk to each other about the situation, the four friends were then lead across the large hallways of the NASA headquarters for the next few hours.

During the lunch break, they were finally left alone and exchanged their thoughts about their new job.

- "What the hell is this all about?!" Michael exclaimed. "You didn't say our job would be related to Project Overworld!"

- "Calm yourself, Michael." Keith tried to contain his friend's ardor. "First off, I didn't know what we would be doing until this morning. Then again, you didn't seem to follow the whole conversation. He did expressely say we would be accomplishing a normal engineer job for the first few months until we familiarize ourselves with the various teams."

- "Yeah, but still... Isn't that unreal?"

- "Not at all. I've personally invested some of my free time trying to categorize the differences between the real world and the one within this simulation. My goal was to make some formulas allowing us to translate some of our fictional creations to the real world parameters. I don't think this is an impossible thing to accomplish and most of the NASA leaders should have realized that too." Keith explained.

- "What...?" His friend gasped in confusion.

- "Basically, we could recreate everything we've done within Project Overworld in the real world. It should require some different types of resources and additional building constraints, but doable. I think that's what Horace wants us to do, search for the differences in the physics and use Project Overworld as a test subject. Also, since we're already well established within this game, he wants us to furnish in-game resources to the NASA employees who will be joining us."

- "So, are you saying our next batch of candidates will be NASA employees?" Tyler inquired.

- "You understood it all, Tyler." Keith smirked before finishing his plate.

_______________

For the rest of their first day at the NASA, the four friends were assigned to the 'B Team' and were supervised by a few other members to study the various plans of engines. This afternoon has been a pretty boring one since they already knew a lot of things about rocket engines but they still managed to learn some interesting facts. Also, it was a lot more detailled than their in-game plans since it had to take into account the malleability of metal, more external forces as well as several other parameters. In the end, Spacol designs would only serve as prototypes in the 'real world' and would certainly not fare well in a 'real' rocket launch.

For the next few weeks, they studied a lot more plans and also started building some pieces while learning the use of some really complex tools and machines the NASA was utilizing for engineering. The four friends were only living about ten miles away from their workplace so it was not a big deal for them on the long term.

In fact, they were quite enjoying their stay at Washington and they were pretty hyped up to continue their job at the NASA. Also, they always managed to clear some time on the evening to join with the other two Spacol members on the construction of their Moon base.

'Looks like it was a good decision, after all. I was so concerned about bringing my friends to deadlock or something like that. I hope everything continues the same for the next few years and that we manage to help the NASA progress with their methods.' Keith meditated before putting on his 'Simulated Reality' headgear.