Games People Still Play

The morning was so-so. The sun was too dim, and it was chilly.

We were, again, working up a sweat. We always work…

A dull knock sounded behind me. Then another, and another. I turned around. Ah, Fedya lost his glasses again and mistook my back for the opposite wall. I gently stopped his hand and turned his pick toward the wall.

In general, it isn’t as scary here as it might seem at first glance.

Yes, the vaults are low; sometimes they’re called crawlways. Yes, sometimes they collapse. But there haven’t been any victims. At least not for a week. At least no serious ones…

But the stones here are beautiful! So many kinds! And sand. Everywhere. Yes, I definitely liked it here.

Another knock sounded behind me. Ah, Fedya again. Last week he knocked out a kid, a gnome. I think his name was Boromir. Or Mirubor? Ah, never mind.

The knocking continued. I had to turn around. Not very pleasant when a pickaxe tries to enter your heart.

“Fedya!”

“Burt!”

Hmm. That wasn’t Fedya. Without a speech apparatus Fedya couldn’t talk, and they hadn’t been invented here yet.

It was Afanasy.

“Morpheus?”

“Neo!”

“Morpheus?” I asked again.

“Afanasy.”

“That’s better!”

He finally stopped knocking with the pickaxe. My nose still ached.

Afanasy called me aside. It was tight in here; a small talker stood on the table and quietly muttered something whose monotony resembled lectures in Parliament.

“And why do you love this nook so much? It’s so cramped here.”

“But there’s a chair,” Afanasy said with satisfaction, took the chair from the table, and began chewing.

“Well, there is. Leave me a piece too.”

“Listen, forget it, yeah? You have to go back.”

“Oh!”

“Yeah.”

“And how much…?”

Had I exceeded my limit again?!

“One hundred and fifty-seven.”

“Oh.”

“Yes. And you must once and for all remember that the backup RAM doesn’t have its own number.”

“What?”

Now it was Afanasy’s turn to be surprised.

“How would I know? It’s the talker.”

Indeed, the talker was announcing something about a control signal and a radish channel number.

Eh, it really was time to go back. I squinted:

“And you aren’t plotting anything?”

“And why are you squinting?”

I kept squinting.

“Your flashlight is blinding me.”

“Come on. It isn’t blinding anyone. All right, time!”

I stopped squinting. Afanasy was right. His flashlight probably couldn’t blind anyone. A year ago it could sculpt from clay the greatest works: the Black Cone, the Octagonal Cube, the Kulich. But now it was living out its last days; the doctors didn’t promise it would last long.

Still, Afanasy was lucky to be a philosopher.

I cast a farewell glance at the dark tunnels of the caves around me, adding a little sadness and hope.

“Time.”

Afanasy handed me the pickaxe, and I cautiously touched its handle. Feeling for the right spot, I pressed it and at the same time slightly squeezed the handle at the end.

“The program has performed an illegal operation and will be closed,” the dreary announcer’s voice declared. “Send report?”

Yeah, it’s always like this with VR. You’d think: a new version, you chose it yourself, you debugged it yourself. Useless.

Carefully peeling the suction cups off my temples, I thought. Then I got up, nodded to Afanasy, and turned toward the dark corridor. With the confidence and grace of a hockey player, I stepped into the gloom of its walls.

Reaching the kitchen, I put the kettle on the stove and plugged it in. There’s nothing better after a session than a cup of hot tea.

“I don’t understand why you need this,” for full happiness Afanasy only lacked joy in his voice.

“Well, tea is usually taken inside, it’s tasty and replenishes the body’s loss of fluid…”

“I mean your worlds. Why do you go there? Each time you spend more and more time there…”

“This is school, Afanasy. Training, research. When I’m inside, I constantly maintain control, I always know that everything around me is unreal, artificial.”

“But do you really need that?”

“Yes!” Now I stood up and paced the room nervously.

“You don’t understand, Afi, I still can’t convince her!.. I walk through these mines, halls, hills not to live by the simple laws of role-playing games. I don’t live among those people — I study them. I try to understand what prevents them from doubting the reality around them, what prevents them from raising their hands and feeling the wires that imprison their minds…”

“But that was their own decision…”

Afanasy walked up to the kettle and turned it off. I took a deep breath and took two cups from the shelf.

“Well, they bought one-way tickets. Even if they wanted to return now, they couldn’t. They don’t know now WHERE they are…”

For a moment a spark of pain flashed in Afanasy’s eyes.

“Ow! Hot, damn it,” he jerked his hand from the kettle.

We fell silent. Then I filled the cups.

Afanasy sat in the chair by the window. Now his silhouette showed fatigue. Something has been weighing on him lately…

He turned and quietly asked:

“Do you remember your childhood?”

“Well… Toddlers,” I thought. “Cod livers. But you know, it was fairly monotonous. Parliament took too much time…”

Through the gray veil that shrouded my memories, I saw Nelli, Maza, and Afanasy sitting with their legs dangling on the roof of a five-story building.

“And fantasies,” Afanasy’s voice broke into my thoughts. “Remember your fantasies.”

“But you ask every day. What’s with them, leave me alone?!”

Afi sighed.

“Alright, I should probably go.”

I looked at the clock. “Ah, I don’t know, the clock has long since stopped.”

“Well, if yes, then of course no,” he answered wisely.

We sat a little longer, enjoying the silence hanging in tension between us.

Outside the window, snow fell quietly to the ground. Just as quietly it sprang up and ran toward the nearest houses. With the wind’s help it immediately piled up into high drifts.

I had to move on. Afanasy left, and the emptiness left by his departure filled the house.

I frowned. Probably better to stay alert. Trying not to stir up feelings, I carefully drew the emptiness shut with the curtain. It was nearby, but no longer caught the eye.

Well then… I walked up to the computer. Thoughts can’t be systematized until there’s a system in the thoughts. It’s like trying to arrange a dozen cats in a small pond.

So, “My notes -> Worlds -> People.”

“The program has performed an illegal operat…”

The announcer’s voice broke off. Perhaps the reason was the power cord I had pulled from the wall. This time I was smarter and plugged it into the socket.