Adhir sits down on his chair, he turns on the television, he searches for a news channel in the menu and and starts watching the news,
Reporter Nolan : "The riots have been continuing for almost a year, the people want to know the reason for the rental hike"
Reporter Beulah : " it is surely possible that the landlords cannot keep up with inflation and they are in dire need of funds?"
Reporter Nolan : " in a world full of rental system housing complexes?"
Reporter Beulah : " come to think of it, why is owning a house 50 times more expensive than renting one? Why is it that the rich get to own it completely and we just rent it?"
Reporter Nolan : " it's always been the same since two decades, we have to rent every single thing, there's nothing that we actually own here."
Adhir turns of the television.
He walks over to his kitchen and orders a pack of red xl burgers
Adhir gets a HC from Johan.
Adhir : what's up?
Johan : yo wazzup big cuh wya
Adhir : cut the bullshit and tell me why you called me
Johan : yeh I saw a pair of vin 20s for rent want sum?
Adhir : no.
Johan: big cuh yu don wanna pleh wit us?
Adhir : Im tired.
Johan : c'mon les play sum shi before we head down to teh sleep
Adhir : Im ending the call.
Johan: nah nah nah don cu-
*beeps*Adhir gets his vin 16 and heads out,
He goes to the vik implants
He walks down the barren gully, full of mosquitous, cockroaches and mice.
He sees a man choking on the floor, he turns his finger, the dialer pops up, in the most used list, lies the emergency number, he clicks on it.Unknown man: noh, please dont, they will
* unknown man coughs *
Unknown man: they will take my soul and they wil-
The man drops his hands, he seems motionless.Adhir: poor guy.
Adhir chuckles. He cuts the call and instead clicks on body collector number.
Woman on call: hi there, is this Adhir prasad?
Adhir: yes it is maam.
Woman: we tracked down your location, please stay there, we will be landing there in 3 minutes and 22 seconds.
*The call cuts*Adhir chuckles: its been a month since new year started and I have already seen 23 deaths.
He giggles inside, the fried brain of his could mot understand how serious loss of life is, as in fact his dad used to be once an industrialist, he never saw anyone get seriously injured his household, let alone die.The BRTs arrive to the scene, their heli's come as down as possible before they deploy 4 jumpers, these jumpers are armed with a pistol and an assault rifle.
They give him 120 dollars and they send him away.
He walks down the gully until he finds 2 redhead men standing there.Man 1: yu want yo old shit or the newer one?
Adhir: how much is the newer one?
Man 2: pay up 670 bucks
Adhir swipes his hands up again, his app drawer comes up, he swipes up with his finger, selects an app.
Adhir: I dont have enough money for the newer one right now, give me the old one.
Man 2 looks at his eyes
*beep*
Man 2: Done, take that shit and dont come here for two more days, that was the last packet.Adhir walks away from the gully, he goes to his home back.
He sits in his sofa, starts inhaling the packet of dopanox.
He starts getting high, he feels like he is on top of the world, he falls down just like that, he convulses from the dopamine.
YOU ARE READING
SKYSHADE.
Science FictionIn a city divided between the affluent elite and oppressed workers lost in virtual reality, Adhir discovers a drive revealing the elites'manipulative control. Determined to liberate the mentally and physically enslaved, he embarks on a perilous miss...