Paul leans back in his ergonomic office chair with a heavy sigh. He doesn't want to get involved, but he can't stay silent anymore. Even though he's getting way too old for this shit.
Stella should have left the Sims alone.
Why the flick am I doing this?
Holy hell, I'm eighty. I should be sipping frozen margaritas in Florida.
His heart clenches in pain when he watches the footage once more. The lines of digital coffins buried deep inside an abandoned power station with nought but an armed guard to protect them. His best friend trapped in an endless guilt loop where he hurts himself metaphorically to redeem himself. And poor Tara. A woman adopting a savior complex to protect her broken soul, her very mind hacked over and over by the quartner she's wronged.
It's cruel. And it must end.
He'll never forget the day Rainer and Tara decided to enter AfterLife in order to prove their system was safe. Only they suffered the same fate as the Fallen who had trusted AlphaGalaxy.
Stella wept for them both. She lost her brother and her quartner on the same day. It destroyed her. After that, she was never the same. Trapped in her own digital addiction. Unable to let go.
Paul also mourned. Not only did he lose his best friend but also a woman he loved as much as his own son. But he moved on. He had to. Or he'd become just as broken as Stella.
He shakes his head. I will let them suffer no longer.
Digital Sims are a legal gray area. Are they alive or dead? Their bodies live in stasis while their minds are trapped in a virtual realm. Remove the serum, and you kill the bodies. That's murder. Keep the serum going, and you trap minds in a digital world, where anyone can hack them.
And they have.
"Flicking hell, Stella." He cradles his bald head in his palms. "It was thirty years ago. Why don't you let her go?"
He stares at the latest headline: Eccentric VR Mogul Acquires Digital Heaven.
"Eccentric..." A wry chuckle tumbles from his lips. "That's one way to put it."
He downs another espresso like a shot of vodka.
Years ago Paul visited her apartment in a last-ditch effort to save Stella from the brink and rescue his friends. There she was. One of the richest women in the world. Laying in her VR pod, she remained unresponsive after seventy-two hours of non-stop virtual reality. She almost died.
Paul watched her feed. He swallowed the lump in his throat while he observed her staring at her lover's digital coffin, tracing the outline of her face.
Unable to let go, Stella cursed Tara for all she's done. She banged the coffin lid, screaming that Tara's serum had destroyed everything.
Despite all her power, Stella is all alone.
Until now, Paul has kept quiet. But he can't anymore. He must speak out against this injustice. He won't stay silent while his best friends are caught in the middle of Stella's web.
The sole shareholder of AfterLife has lost her mind. And over two hundred thousand souls are at her mercy.
Not even the new CEO of AlphaGalaxy can expel her from the system. Hidden in a dark corner of AfterLife, Stella's a latent bomb that no one dares to touch. She can destroy them all.
Enough is enough.
Paul breaks out his ancient tablet, the one on which he wrote his first article back in the twenty-tens. He gives a wry smile as his fingertips trail over the surface.
So much has changed since then. He gives a dark chuckle. In the late twenties he kicked up a fuss due to the gambling addiction caused by in-app purchases. It led to their perma-ban.
He hopes his next article will fan the flames once more. Force people not to forget the Fallen.
Half the country wants to delete digital Sims. Half the country believes that would be genocide.
Paul reserves judgment.
Like Tara has said, he simply doesn't want to see history repeat itself.
With a satisfied sigh, he converts the file to hologram and sends it to his publisher. The next day, his notifications explode as his final line rings out like a liberty bell across the physical world.
It seems ironic that the Cradle of Liberty has created the very technology that may threaten to enslave the dead.
—Paul Steiner. The New York Times. "Letters to the Editor". November 5, 2084
THE END
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Word count: 711
Total word count: 20,231/20,000 (WOOT WE DID IT!!!!!!!!!!!)
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AfterLife™
Science FictionWhen Tara Walters discovers the disturbing truth about a new virtual console called AfterLife™, she must risk everything in order to expose the enslavement of digital Sims. ___ Cover made using CANVA PRO. Status: complete but unedited. Editing begin...
