They were hidden. Scared. Buried beneath his bed within the stowage. The crashing from the thing outside finally stopped.

  They did not dare inspect the damage. Not yet. Amy covered her mouth, her eyes open in the darkness under the bed. Waiting for John to let her know the coast is clear.

  It felt like minutes passed between each second, until she heard some footsteps slowly approach. A quiet thud, followed by a quiet clank. It stops next to the opening as she senses it grip the drawer.

  “It's okay now. It stopped.” John tells her, opening the stowage, flooding in the synthetic light. Amy remains sad, her face a mess, a headache clouding her mind from the tears she can no longer shed.

  John extends his hand, which she takes— being pulled out of the box and sitting on her bed. His eyes were as bloodshot as hers.

  He takes a seat next to her on the blanket on the soft mattress. “It's okay.” He says, trying to comfort her.

  “It's not okay John.” She retorts. “Nothing about it is okay.” John tries pulling her closer, but she rejects the move.

  “No, I don't want comfort.” She tells him. “I want to know what happened out there.”

  John keeps to himself, trying not to upset himself as much as he is her. “You already know what happened. You just haven't seen it yet.” John argues. “I want to.” Says Amy.

  “No you don't.” Replies John.

  “Don't tell me what I want.” Amy threatens.

  “Then don't lie to me.” John counters. Amy looks up to him, a sense of betrayal emerging with all of the other emotions.

  “Lie to you? Are you kidding? What have I lied to you about?”

  John looks back to her, his face dry and serious.

  “The virtual reality device. You need to explain how you got it.” John strikes a cord. A very guilty cord. A cord that tears, and overwhelms her with grief. She buries her face into her hands and sobs relentlessly, John deflating further at the sight.

  His own temper brewing amongst everything else; he decides to heed her warning around comfort. “I'll leave you to it.” He says, rising from the bed. “I have more to learn. If you need me I'll be outside.”

  “No, don't go.” Amy mutters out as he grabs the door. “Please don't leave, I'm sorry.”

  “I'll tell you what I find.” John answers, exiting the door and leaving it open behind him. On his way to the hallway door he glances at the food they'd brought themselves, now lukewarm and devoid of aroma. Not that he is hungry now.

  He approaches the door, opening it ever so slowly while peering out. He sees a door open on the other side of the hallway, ghostly wind howling through it, along with shards of glass and a few stains and debris littering the floor.

  Both elevator doors are closed for the moment. Leaving the apartment, he walks towards the howling wreck. But something stops him. Like a mental roadblock; he can't bring himself there yet. He has to turn around, and return to Amy.

  Entering his apartment again, it feels dead. Like an abandoned prison cell. He looks into Amy's room from afar, seeing her there alone and destitute. Her skin and clothes, devoid of color. Not even that of the neon’s decay.

  He takes a seat back next to her, putting his arm around her despite her prior warning. “I didn't look.” He says. “It isn't okay. But we'll survive.”

  “Clyde.” Amy wails. “That was who I got the VR through.”

  “Clyde?” John asks, letting her tell him the story.

  “He was our only neighbor. A weirdo. But a good guy I swear.”

  She says.

  “That's who I got the headset from. Now he's dead. All because of me.”

  “Well… we don't know that.” John says. “Did you… let him know about the experie—”

  “YES I DID!” Amy screams in his face, going back to sobbing uncontrollably, muttering. “...I— I'm so sorry…”

  John removes his hand from her back and stands up, away from her. “Don't blame yourself.” He says, overcome by it all. “I’m gonna go have a look for myself.”

  John marches back, both anxious, volatile and determined. He passes the food without a look, pushing the apartment door open. His apprehension is too weak to stop him, though he slows as he approaches the wreckage.

  He sees the utter destruction of the room. Cracked walls, tarnished furniture. Destroyed technology worth thousands upon thousands of credits. Pieces of now-unknowable objects strewn about. Various stains of bodily fluids, and a giant hole in the glass from which the wind howls.

  He enters the modern crime scene in an attempt to inspect closer. Mangled figurines. Rotten jars. The remains of a desk and computer setup by the right wall, the corpse of a bed and humanoid looking… robot thing to the left. It would've taken a detective to recognize half the things that were destroyed there.

  This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

  But one thing gives away the nature of the room, a piece of art plastered to the roof. An art depicting the grotesque defiling of a mascot from his youth. “Oh.” John says, numb to the annexations of such people.

  It is only when he thinks of Amy that his heart truly sinks. Of the implication.

  “Oh no…” He says as a realization dawns, exiting the scene. He finds Amy again, noticing her digiphone closed on the bed.

  “He isn't there. There was nobody there. So they must have taken him, meaning he's not dead.” John awaits her reaction. She's quieter than before. “Oh… that's good I guess…” She says, struggling to lift her head from her hands.

  John sits down one more time, leaving a bit of distance between them. “Is now not a good time?” He asks, leaning forward to see her face.

  “There will never be a good time, John.” She replies, emotionally and utterly drained. “Just hurry up and get it out.” John shifts a little bit closer, still keeping to himself.

  “The device. The headset. What did he want from you to get them?”

  Amy giggles, resigned. Her head was in a completely different place. “Oh. Yeah. No, he gave that to me for free. All he wanted was a favor at some later date or something. He set it up for me and everything.”

  John sighs, in relief. “After seeing some of the stuff in that room… I think we dodged a bullet with that. With… him being taken and all.”

  “You reckon?” Amy asks, calm and rhetorical. “He was a weird guy. Looked weird too. Didn't seem to know what clothes are.”

  John’s anxiety spikes, sitting up as he spoke.

  “Did he do anything to you?”

  “No. Nothing to me.” She replies.

  “But he liked attention a little too much.”

  John feels mixed by the news, but too tired to much-care. He lies down on the bed, his legs hanging off the edge.

  “Lightning doesn't strike in the same place twice.”

  He sighs as a thought comes and goes.

  “Now's not the time for it.” Amy says, joining his pose. “I feel like a dead person. I need some time to just… give up for a while. Or understand. Or something.”

  “Same.” John says bluntly, maintaining his body's relaxed state.

  He feels compelled to say more, yet can no longer be bothered.

  The two cannot accurately remember the last time they slept. The two will not recall the time it will take for this to pass.

  Amy opens her digiphone. “SERaMACs…” She groans. SERaMACs answers, enthused and chipper through how it's changed with her interaction patterns.

  Amy rolls over a little to speak to it better. “Play some music. And some nice music. I wanna go to sleep.”

  SERaMACs does not reply, simply doing as she requested. The light rainfall and soothing ambiance of the music make the time of struggle drift by a little quicker.

  Both follow their thoughts as they slowly drift elsewhere. Drift to their wants, their desires, their media indulgences.

  Eventually, the two chase their thoughts into sleep. The outside world becomes a non-problem to them in this escape. This natural escape.

  John awakens in a field. Those creatures chirping, the buttery fly returning, the grass endless. He took a deep breath of the fresh air, the aroma of nature surrounding him.

  It was a different place than before as his brain imagined more about the natural world. The orange creature from before returns to him, he and it sit beside a rock as they overlook the sapphire ocean.

  He imagined a huge island off in the distance. Not of rubbish, but one with a mountain at the center. And a little ring of beige shielding the grass from the sapphire water.

  He watched as the sky slowly turned orange, the sun going to touch the horizon to his left. But then, the sun starts rising again, going back to the center of the sky before it kisses the other horizon. This is what he imagines AM and PM to mean. It’d all makes sense.

  He basks in this reality. He does not realize he is dreaming, he just accepts it.

  He looks down upon the sleeping creature, its head on his lap.

  He pats its orange fur, each strand running through his fingers like a soft brush. He goes to scratch an itch on his leg, itching the flesh, though it isn't quite satisfying. He tries it again, his leg feeling numb despite the itch.

  Like pins and needles. He tries again, but this time, he hits bare metal. Cold, bare metal. Then he inspects his leg, this can't be right. He rips open his pants to reveal a prosthetic in its place. The furry creature gets up, it's fur turning blue. It looks at him funny, so he returns the look.

  “It's not real John. You’re not safe anymore. You have to run.” The creature says. “What?” Asks John.

  “Run.” It says. “Run. You're not safe John. Run. Run.” The thing keeps repeating to him to run. But his leg malfunctions, going limp and heavy. John stumbles over, hearing a filtered deep voice echoing in the distance.

  “I WILL HANG YOU BY YOUR ENTRAILS!” It claims

  The grass starts withering, clouds enter the skies, John picks himself up and limps feebly. “Run. Run.” The critter keeps repeating.

  He tries, but the voice grows closer. He looks behind to see the rock turn into that thing. That giant. The one with the riot helmet and red eyes.

  The fields in front were endless. He looks back again to see it now walks towards him. He looks forward, to see a cliff of glowing nukage engulf his path. He panics towards his edge and stops, looking back to the giant now right in front of him.

  “You need to run John.” He says, lightning flashing over the skies and turning it clouded, red and black in an instant. The giant places its hand on his shoulder. “The liars are coming for you. WE are coming for you! You must run! Wake up!”

  Without effort, it pushes him off the cliff. John falls to terminal velocity before he's even halfway to the bottom. The ground stretches away from him as he falls faster.

  “Wake up.” He hears. “Wake up.” He hears again.

  “Wake up. Wake up. Wake up.”