Brenda And The Virtua-nauts

Brenda, the office cleaner couldn’t help chuckling as she watched through the window clutching her mop.

They looked like some mad kind of mime or performing art troupe, moving about their empty office space with those strange suits and helmets on but they were not miming, they were virtua-nauts controlling robot astronaut bodies half way across the universe.

“I’m preparing to go outside the space craft”, said one in a red virtua-suit, named Commander Freely, getting up from his chair and walking across the room towards a grey brick wall before stopping. “Open inner airlock door number 1, please Laura”.

Laura, one in a yellow virtua-suit, who was still sitting in her chair, seemed to flick some imaginary switches in the air infront of her, “Opening inner airlock door number 1, check”, she responded.

Commander Freely, in his bright red suit, took a few steps forward, “Open inner airlock door number 2, please Laura”, he said.

Laura again fiddled with something invisible infront of her, “Opening inner airlock door number 2, check”, she replied.

Commander Freely moved forward a little more until he was just infront of the door to the office.

“Oh no!”, thought Brenda, looking worried, “Perhaps I shouldn’t be here. What if he comes out of the office and bumps into me cleaning. I’ll get the sack”.

“I’m standing infront of the outer door, Laura”, said Commander Freely, “Please open the outer door”.

Thankfully for Brenda, the outer doors of the spaceship seemed to be inside the room so there was no danger of him coming out into the coridoor that she was mopping.

“Oh my god!”, said Commander Freely throwing up his arms as he looked out of his spaceship at some strange alien world that Brenda couldn’t see, “You should see this, Laura! It’s so beautiful!”.

In a way, when he said this, it made Brenda feel kind of sad because it reminded her that, as a simple cleaning lady, there are so many wonderful things that she would never see and never be a part of.

But then something odd happened. Commander Freely screamed, looking up in the direction of the office ceiling and shouting “Help me Laura! Help me!”

“What is it, Jim?!”, asked the woman in the yellow virtua-suit, panicking, “What’s wrong?”

“Aliens! Hostile aliens!”, said Commander Freely, falling onto his back and convulsing as if he was in the throes of an epileptic fit as he tried to fight off some alien that Brenda couldn’t see.

“Oh shit?!”, said Laura, her panic increasing, throwing her arms around wildly, “What am I going to do?!”.

If Laura can’t do anything, I’ll have to do something, thought Brenda, starting to panic too.

Then suddenly Laura screamed aswell, shouting, “Oh my god! They’re coming onto the ship! They’re coming onto the ship!”.

“That’s it!”, thought Brenda, opening the office door and rushing inside, “If I don’t get those silly helmets off them, those aliens will…uh… virtually kill them!”.

She went and knelt down beside Freely who was lying on his back and tried to help him but he was punching and kicking like a madman and trying to get his helmet off was like trying to put a straight jacket onto a violent mental patient wrestling with their own inner monsters.

“Aagh!”, said Brenda, as she was hit across the face with an uppercut intended for whatever invisible alien was attacking Freely.

Brenda clutched her face in pain where it had been struck but she couldn’t give up now. Poor Commander Freely sounded like he was going through hell.

Launching her whole body ontop of him, she tried her best to pin down his flailing arms and then, seizing his helmet in both hands she tugged it off over his head, just managing to get it over his eyes before being hit in the jaw by another one of his uppercuts and being knocked onto her back.

“Oh my goodness”, said Commander Freely, seeing Brenda, lying dazed upon the office floor and realizing what he had done, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hit you”.

But then he heard his colleague, Laura screaming as she too tried to wrestle off the aliens
that only she was able to see and he rushed over to where she was sitting, pulling her helmet off over her traumatized eyes.

“I forgot…I forgot we weren’t really there”, said Laura, looking around the office, a dazed look in her eyes like somebody who had just woken from a terrible nightmare.

“So did I”, said Freely, “If it wasn’t for the cleaning lady I don’t know what I would have done”.

Then Commander Freely and his co-pilot started to rip off their suits and gloves hurriedly because they said they could still feel the claws of the creatures against their skin but, afterwards, Commander Freely shook Brenda’s hand.

“If it wasn’t for you I might be dead”, said Freely.

“Would you really have died? I mean died for real?”, asked Brenda, “ I thought it was all virtual?”

“It was”, said Freely, “But I have a weak heart. Docs said my heart wasn’t good enough for me to go up on real space missions anymore. That’s why I signed up for this virtual one. If you hadn’t have pulled off that helmet when you did, I might have gone into cardiac arrest. You deserve a medal”.

“A medal?”, said Brenda modestly, starting to get embarrassed, “Oh no, all I did was pull off your helmet”.

But Commander Freely was insistent, “Well you saved my life and you’re getting a medal whether you like it or not”.

Brenda looked a little disappointed though, “Thanks, but I was really hoping that you’d take me up into space, just once would do”, she said.

The commander shook his head sadly, “I’m sorry but I just haven’t got that kind of authority.
The Space Agency are pretty rigid about who they take up, unless you’re an air force test pilot; a scientist or a multi-millionaire space tourist. The most I can offer you is virtual space but you’re free to join our virtual space crew, as an observer, if it’s alright with my co-pilot Laura”.

“I’d be happy to have her with us”, said Laura, smiling, “I kind of feel like she saved my life too”.

Then Commander Freely handed her a blue virtua-helmet and she was already over the moon. She was still a cleaning lady but she was the only cleaning lady she knew who would ever see the other side of the universe.