The people of the recording, of course, crossed the border with ease. One man walked straight at him; Paul stood his ground -- and found himself pushed into a zone of increasing viscosity, the air around him becoming painfully unyielding, before he slipped free to one side.
The sense that discovering a way to breach this barrier would somehow "liberate" him was compelling -- but he knew it was absurd. Even if he did find a flaw in the program which enabled him to break through, he knew he'd gain nothing but decreasingly realistic surroundings. The recording could only contain complete information for points of view within a certain, finite zone; all there was to "escape to" was a region where his view of the city would be full of distortions and omissions, and would eventually fade to black.
He stepped back from the corner, half dispirited, half amused. What had he hoped to find? A door at the edge of the model, marked exit, through which he could walk out into reality? Stairs leading metaphorically down to some boiler-room representation of the underpinnings of this world, where he could throw a few switches and blow it all apart? He had no right to be dissatisfied with his surroundings; they were precisely what he'd ordered.
What he'd ordered was also a perfect spring day. Paul closed his eyes and turned his face to the sun. In spite of everything, it was hard not to take solace from the warmth flooding onto his skin.