After twenty minutes of downloading various apps that might
come in handy, Jun was about to stop when he noticed a curious app named
"GodMode". It had no picture icon, and checking the app page, there
was no description, no reviews, no ratings...nothing that said anything about
the app at all. Yet this secrecy intrigued Jun. He was curious to find out
exactly what kind of an app this "GodMode" was.
Activating one of the apps he had downloaded earlier - a
scanner app - he scanned to see if GodMode contained any viruses or malware.
When the scan came back clean, a satisfied Jun pressed the download button. A
moment later, his mother called him down to dinner, and he left his phone lying
on the bed while the app installed.
***
When Jun came back, the app had fully installed. A new icon
had appeared on the phone's menu, the letters "GM" spelled out in
foreboding black letters. Time to see
what kind of app this is, he thought to himself.
Opening it, Jun was confronted with a long list of buttons,
that ran past the bottom of the screen. Each button had a label; there were
"GRAVITY_HACK", "OBJECT_SHIFT", "VISION_SHIFT",
"BARO_SHIFT", and scrolling down, there were at least a dozen more.
They all had similar names, like the names of programs. At the top of the list
was a simple command: "CHOOSE A FUNCTION". His curiosity
intensifying, Jun pressed "OBJECT_SHIFT".
Upon pressing the button, the app appeared to activate his
phone's camera, for the screen changed to show part of Jun's room. Jun didn't
recall the app asking for any permissions when he installed it, and it would
need permission to access his camera, so this was the first sign that there was
something strange about this app. At the top of the screen was another simple
command: "DRAG ON TOUCH SCREEN TO MOVE OBJECTS".
"A virtual-reality app?" remarked Jun.
"Interesting...so if I just..." Jun moved the phone to face his
bedside cabinet, so that his lamp was displayed on the touch-screen. Placing a
finger on it, Jun slowly dragged upwards, and sure enough, the lamp on the
touch-screen moved with his finger. Even the shadows it cast seemed to shift
slightly as he moved it; for a VR app this was remarkably detailed. He set the
lamp back down on the desk and, out of curiosity, decided to see what would
happen if he tried to open one of the cabinet drawers.
Placing his finger on the top drawer and sliding, the drawer
opened, and it was at this point that Jun realized something was seriously off.
Inside the drawer on the screen were all his clothes, just where he had left
them...but they shouldn't have been there. Not on the app, which couldn't
possibly have known what was inside the drawer. Unless...
With a growing sense of foreboding, Jun lowered the phone to
look at the bedside cabinet.
The top drawer was open.
Jun reeled back with a cry of surprise. That's...not possible...it can't be... With a shaking hand, Jun
raised the phone back up to the drawer and, with another slow swipe, closed the
drawer on the screen. He moved the phone away again. The actual drawer was now
shut.
"Jun?" His mother called from downstairs.
"Are you alright? I heard a shout just now."
"I'm fine, mom," said Jun quickly, "I just
accidentally hit my toe on something, that's all."
***
While on his way to school the following morning, it
occurred to Jun that others could make use of this app. The applications were
boundless; OBJECT_SHIFT alone must have a dozen uses. And so as he walked, he
began to compose a message on his social networking profile, telling people
about the app.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you."
Turning round, startled, Jun saw a girl leaning against a
lamppost several feet behind him. She was wearing a white cloak, with a hood
pulled over her face so he could not make out the features. "Huh?"
said Jun. "What do you mean? Who are you?"
"If you had any sense," the strange cloaked girl
continued, "you'd uninstall that app and forget all about it. You have no
idea how much trouble you're about to get into."
"What? What trouble? What are you talking about?"
asked Jun. "Who are you?"
"Uninstall that app." the girl repeated.
"That is all you need to know."
Before Jun could ask her any more questions, and to his
great surprise, the hooded girl turned and suddenly vanished, leaving no trace
that she had ever been there. In his shock, it took Jun a moment to realize
that perhaps this was yet another function of the GodMode app. She certainly
seemed to know about it, so it was reasonable to assume that she had it. But
what did she mean by trouble? Why did she want him to uninstall it? What was this app...?
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