Blake stepped out of the VR pod and nearly fell, disoriented and frightened. He looked at the time: 2:00 pm and closed his eyes - vertigo. A strange whistle, explosions, and gunfire came from across the street. His brain barely reacted to movement, and the first thought that came to his mind gave him a terrible headache. Blake headed into the kitchen, grabbed his SYL, and with trembling hands, brought the mouthpiece to his mouth and filled the entire volume of his lungs with smoke and held it there for a few seconds and exhaled.

He went into the shower stall, turned on the hot water, and sat down with his hands wrapped around his knees. The glass on the doors fogged up. His feet slipped on the dirty surface, which only caused him irritation. Blake came out after ten minutes and took his PTSD pills and went into the kitchen.

“Noikondrob se mo’os hyponstrom en foro, kinmen.”

Interesting changes are happening to you, son.

Blake cursed and slammed his fist into the wall with all his might.

“Are you all right?” asked Regina.

“Do you think the man who hits the wall is okay?” Blake asked and wiped his nose and saw blood on the back of his palm.

“Should I call a doctor?”

“I’ve had enough of doctors.”

Tyriel, with a stony face and a humble look, watched as his son was thrown from side to side, as his eyes turned red and as his legs wobbled.

“Gor de fumu, na’am mo hoz,” he said.

You’re hungry, so you’re feeling sick.

“Regina.”

“How may I help?”

“Pour me some water, and have the kefir ready in half an hour.”

“In a moment.”

Blake walked around the destroyed UAV lying on the floor and headed to the safe and pulled out the Barrett.

“No mondoro ques ife.”

All the son’s habits come from his father.

“Just talk normally,” he said and went to the window and looked at the street, where there was real chaos, wrapped in a dense, electrified blanket of gray clouds.

“Mnrfon guxmirn pvopvopvo jnkirn fus bduitsk nou stor. Ho os mo’os nvina em tom.”

You said yourself, I'm just a projection of your subconscious. It's talking to you in the language of dragons.

A long thunderclap echoed through the roofs of the houses. The windows trembled. Blake returned to the kitchen and drank a liter of water in one gulp.

“It’s two o’clock in the afternoon, and it’s pitch black.”

“Schtis shofo ifo.”

That’s just the appetizer.

Blake sat down on the couch; Tyriel followed him.

“A simple VRMMORPG is hardly capable of this, right?”

The farther nodded. Blake gripped the bridge of his nose with his index finger and thumb and cursed.

“Mi ino mo’os doof, zon pengom ista’ak.”

I told you there’s something wrong with the game.

“That’s not what you were talking about at all.”

“Mo’os nran gitz tour.”

You just didn’t catch the connection.

Blake got to his feet and started pacing from corner to corner. The ominous roar of thunder rumbled again, followed by a thud, and then raindrops clattered against the glass.

“Gof mo stakna frizos de tarf.”

It’s as if the devil himself is breaking through the windows.

Blake suddenly froze, his eyes darting across the ceiling.

“Regina.”

“How may I help you?”

“Where are the smoke detectors installed?”

The AI directed beams of diode light at them. Blake left the room, and Tyriel grinned. He returned a minute later with a hammer in hand and smashed every sensor, then went to the panel and cut off all the electricity.

“If they want to, they can get you out of the bowels of hell.”

“They won’t have the balls.”

“Did you forget the dinners we had with Commander-in-Chief Aaron?”

“Bou, janral no firm tui me.”

No, that’s why I’m sure I won’t get killed.

Blake stopped himself and cursed.

“What the fuck is going on in my head?”

“It’s fucked up, that’s what it is. I never thought I’d see you like this.”

“So, you don’t.”

Blake thought and involuntarily focused his attention on his tattoo and remembered the doctor and frowned and clenched his fists.

“Has the puzzle finally come together?” Tyriel asked.

Blake turned the power back on and waited until all the smart house systems were fully operational before looking at the time. It had been about an hour.

“Regina, are you there?”

“Yes, I am.”

“Turn on the psychological help channel.”

“Stand by... connecting...”

After a few seconds, the AI reported the channel was switched on and asked:

“What’s troubling you?”

“I’m concerned about a man, a former member of parliament. I want you to help me find him. He ended his career in the upper circles of government five years ago.”

“What does he look like?”

“A fat man with three chins.”

Blake activated his DNA-based computer.

“Bring up all the candidates on the screen.”

“There are over a hundred people matching your description.”

“What, are they quitting in droves?”

“There’s no information available.”

“Okay. Analyze the speech of each of them. The one I want to find speaks slowly. Start your search with the ones that are closest to me.”

Pictures of five candidates appeared on the screen. In the third image, Blake recognized Illyseh. His real name was Andrei Ivanovich Andropov.

“Is that him?”

“I think so.”

“What kind of complaint should I send? A reminder, all complaints are sent to the Department of Mental Health anonymously. You have nothing to fear.”

Blake fell silent, staring at the screen and rubbing his fingers.

“You know, I changed my mind. We’ll hold off on the application.”

“Do you want to register a reason for the cancelation?”

“Ronoy, Ronoy. Nizarom itdas freen yushch. Naovo mo’os te fi?”

Clever, clever. The psychological help channel cannot be traced and monitored. How did I not think of that?

“I don’t like to hold a grudge against people,” Blake replied to Regina and opened the Uniform State Real Estate Registry website and typed in his last name and found one apartment about an hour away.

Blake looked at his watch. Another half hour had passed.

“Ribronga? Mo he foko mi rice trpna gofa.”

Will you risk it? You have two and a half hours to get home without arousing suspicion.

“Regina, have you changed the channel yet?”

“No.”

“I think my best bet would be to talk to the abuser and discuss the conflict, right?”

“That is agreed to be a very effective method.”

“Call a cab.”

“Please wait a moment.”

“Nio mo’os de rina?” Tyriel asked. “Ta’amen can ni.”

Do you feel the same way I do? They are watching you.

Blake ran to the front door and turned on the camera broadcasting the hallway. There were two men in bathrobes and slippers, chatting amongst themselves, smoking old-fashioned electronic disposable cigarettes. Blake wanted to go outside and talk to them, just to make sure it was all paranoia, but as soon as he grabbed the doorknob the scene flashed through his mind as he walked out of his apartment, the two neighbors turned in his direction and came over and pulled out their guns and told him to stay inside. Blake flinched in surprise. Did I also get the gift of foresight? He looked through the camera eye again, zoomed in, and noticed the handle of a gun under one’s robe.

Five minutes later, he received a notification informing him of the taxi’s arrival in front of the loggia. Blake turned on the apartment alarm, dressed the first thing that came to hand and took a can of kefir from the kitchen and sat inside and gave the address.

“What floor?” asked the AI.

“Better stop in front of the driveway,” he replied.

“As you wish.”

Blake tried to see what was going on in the city below, but the storm clouds blocked the view, and only the signal lights on the rooftops shone through the grayness of the sky. Halfway through the trip the car shuddered, the AI issued a warning that they were in a zone of turbulence and that there was no reason to worry. A small screen on the back of the front seat updated the altitude readings. The cab was eleven thousand meters above sea level. The sun’s rays burst into the interior of the car. Blake moved to an adjacent seat and looked down and watched the pristine apocalyptic darkness with bright bluish flashes and distant rumbling thunder that covered his entire city.

The cab was delayed eleven minutes due to weather and refunded a third of the fare at the end for the inconvenience. Blake covered his head with his hood, slipped his hands into the pockets of his leather coat, and ran across the street to the first driveway. An angry mob - fifteen men - ran past him, carrying placards that read, “Peace is but a dream,” and laser pistols. At the same minute, police cars came down on them, and armed riot police ran out and ordered them to drop their weapons. The crowd froze. Blake stopped and watched; he noticed the signal jammers on the cars.

“Everybody on your knees, hands on your heads! Weapons on the ground!” They shouted, but the protesters did not react.

One bald man with a full skull tattoo pulled out a gun, and no sooner had he taken aim than the soldiers opened fire and killed each and every one of them.

Blake ran under the canopy of a house, where the more peaceful protesters were standing and shaking with frightened and angry faces. Some of them activated the augmented reality communication chip (or ARCC) mounted on their temples and filmed what was happening.

“This barbarism will be on the federal news,” someone whispered.

“They have no right to do that. I filmed the whole thing.”

“Wait, where’s the Internet? I lost my connection.”

Everyone started glancing at each other and whispering. A scene flashed through Blake’s mind in which the police ask these people to surrender their personal ARCCs, and when they refused, they opened fire on everyone.

“Fuck,” he said quietly and asked one guy who was speechless, in his twenties, to open the door.

He nodded and put his hand on the scanner’s glass surface. Inside, a friendly AI voice greeted Blake. He gave a dry greeting in response and ran to the elevator and called it. Not ten seconds later, there was a deafening explosion, followed by the sound of gunshots. The front door crumbled into tiny shards, and the peaceful protesters ran inside, screaming and groaning. Behind them were soldiers, finishing the wounded along the way.

Blake got into the elevator unnoticed and went up to the one hundred and forty-fourth floor, walked down the long hallway in silence, and called apartment number 3876. Nothing. He jabbed his finger at the bell and did not let it go for a minute. No one opened it.

“Fuck!” he said and kicked the door with his foot.

A neighbor from apartment 3875 ran out at the noise and saw the troublemaker’s face and opened his mouth in fright and ran back in. Blake sat on the floor with his back to the wall and his head in his hands, trying to think of a plan for what to do next.

A minute later the door opened. He turned his head and saw a skinny old man, with an overgrown belly, a bald head, crooked thin legs with bright blue veins protruding on them. He was wearing a vest and boxers. His hands were all green. The bruises could not be counted.

Blake stood up. They looked at each other. Illyseh said:

“Wu gong mi us ril.”

“Wu gong mi us ril.”

Well, now we meet.