Misguided News

Rob assumes the party in Baybeach must have erupted the night before. He is not wrong, though he has no idea how it all ended. He would have liked to be part of such a celebration, but events like that are not meant for people like him. He knows that average slaves such as himself cannot afford revelry on that scale. He could not even pay for the round-trip train fare and its tolls. His miserable salary of four hundred and seventy-seven eCoins barely keeps him alive. Three hundred and thirty goes toward the studio room he shares with the Meerkat. Nothing remains at the end of the month. More often, he comes up short.

The one-hundred-eCoin admission charged for such events is impossible within his strangled budget. Even so, he considered going. Rob knows perfectly well that once inside the event perimeter, food and drinks in Baybeach cost three or four times their true value. He would probably spend his entire salary in a single night. Mindful of those unattainable luxuries, he snorts in resignation. He presses a flat green button glowing upon the table. At once, a sharp holographic screen rises from its woodlike surface. He taps the hologram with the fingers of one hand, opens a newspaper and browses various stories. What he truly wants is video and reporting on Brittany Condon's megaconcert.

He shifts upon the uncomfortable stool, leans against the wall stained by his sweat, draws the holographic image closer and turns virtual pages in search of anything about Brittany. Restless images and text crowd his hard-boiled-egg eyes. He assumes the local newspaper holds the broadcast rights to news about the concert. He is wrong. Only UHR Channel owns the exclusive rights to Brittany Condon's image, and Rob could never afford its exorbitant fees. He lights a cigarette from his left shirt pocket; another two sit behind his ears. He rummages through holographic pages, cursing whenever he fails to find what he wants and worsening his usual foul mood.

He no longer wastes time or dreams of impossibilities. He is too old to have achieved none of the things he once dreamed about. He is determined to leave behind decades of anguish, apathy, sacrifice, persecution, blood and death. He also wants to abandon the utopias he will never attain—utopias precisely because they can never come true. He resigns himself to his simple, shitty life, which at times feels like torture. He tries to enjoy it in modest ways, like so many other wretches living in Los Condominios, some of them his neighbors or friends. Amid all his misfortunes, his only consolation in the world is knowing everything Brittany Condon does.

He has dreamed of her for as long as he can remember. One night in prison, he dreamed that he served his sentence and, upon his release, Brittany met him in her luxury car. In the dream they drove away together, happy, in the fuchsia convertible. He remembers early mornings when he imagined her perfume—not a manufactured fragrance, but the natural scent of her skin. At times he almost felt capable of seeing her or speaking to her in different places. He avoided imagining himself touching, embracing or kissing her. He restrained his mind, wanting to reserve those moments for a time when they might become real and tangible. He always wanted to write to her official account, but refrained from that as well. He preferred that she meet him in person, not through electric letters upon a freezing holographic screen.

Most of the time, he suppresses the desire to hear her voice in videos released free to the public. He restrains himself in this as well, though sometimes he cannot bear it. Every night before sleeping, he devotes his warmest thought to her. She became his beloved then and remains so now. She kept him company through his long years in prison. Despite the immense gulf between their circumstances, he never stopped loving or desiring her. Resigned to his situation, he knows he will never meet her in person, look directly into her eyes or breathe the perfume of her skin at close range—much less kiss her. Coming down to such disappointments convinces him that the best course is to plunge his fevered mind into the icy bucket of stupid reality.

He skips more than twenty crime stories and fifteen political and business reports. He avoids environmental matters, which bore him as much as—or more than—financial news. Then he finds a scoop that looks interesting, touches it and opens it with his forefinger and thumb. He reads the three-dimensional holographic text displayed before his eyes.

A virus whose origins remain unknown is spreading rapidly through Stormport's medical centers. Baybeach residents and tourists alike are arriving at hospitals with unmistakable symptoms of infection.

The story bores Rob, so he abandons it. He swipes a hand as though delivering a slap and turns the virtual newspaper's page. With a cigarette between his lips, no customers to bother him and the news spread before him, he feels almost comfortable. And he is being paid besides. He skims a headline that awakens what now feels like a distant memory, then passes over it quickly. The virus report has left him uneasy. He looks to his right, through the display window, at the streets of West End. Everything appears normal. He hears an aircraft in the distance—unusual, though hardly unheard of. Such craft sometimes fly over Stormport to carry sightseers or patrol the coastal waters. Rob turns back to the screen. He is in no mood to endure just any story. He does not want to think; he is happier when he never delves too deeply into anything.

He tries to think of neither Brittany nor prison nor his traumatic childhood. He thinks of nothing, and thus feels freer. He wants only to do things that stir no memories. He keeps reading, turning virtual pages with his fingers. They unleash bombardments of color, video images and restless letters streaming from right to left and top to bottom, one after another. Many stories concern the new virus troubling the authorities. The outbreak apparently occurred last night in Baybeach, placing hundreds of lives at risk. He wants to read none of that and skips it all. Then a report updates before him in real time and catches his attention. He stops turning the virtual pages and reads it.

A young woman was violently attacked by her own friends in Baybeach. All of them appear to be infected with an unidentified pathogen. The woman's parents helped evacuate her from the exclusion zone. In an exclusive interview, they stated that their daughter is one of thousands of fans of the famous singer known for her controversial songs. The artist herself remains missing after an attempt to evacuate her from Baybeach. Approximately eight hours ago, a sudden viral outbreak occurred which, thus far, remains unknown to doctors and scientists.

Rob snorts and turns the page. He does not want to think or become involved. He has little doubt that the artist mentioned in the report is Brittany, but he wants no part of a worry that enormous. He would rather move on to the next story.

A Stormport city council director has proposed administering morphine to infected people captured inside the exclusion zone. According to him, this would serve as a response to the tireless fieldwork being conducted by scientists seeking to identify the virus. Marc Peterson, Stormport's director of planning for the financial district, supports the proposal. He explained that the drug should be administered medicinally so its possible effects can be analyzed and some of the infection's fatal consequences partially neutralized.

Rob arches his eyebrows, reads the story again to be certain, then bursts out laughing so hard that he coughs, cigarette smoke still trapped in his lungs. He cannot believe what he is reading. He knows the effects of that drug—and others—very well. Shaking his head, he moves on.

Officials from the enormous UHR Fuels division have decided to maintain the blockade of a fuel-laden ship anchored in Pacific waters off Portown. The vessel is carrying thousands of company employees back to shore. Supporters of the blockade argue that negotiations must guarantee a virus-free landing for those still at sea. Other shipping lanes awaiting the arrival of cruise ships have been closed under the same measure. Government leaders are debating how to reach an agreement. Union representative Lid Allen warned that the action may escalate unless the government responds within the next several hours.

Rob sighs. He tries to move quickly to another story in the hope that the virus will not be its central subject. He finds one and reads it.

This morning, experienced doctors from a hospital in the Stormport Medical Complex staged a funeral for the health-care system currently being used against the unidentified virus that emerged overnight in Baybeach. They marched along the street housing City Hall while carrying a symbolic empty coffin adorned with funeral wreaths. The hospital's director, Dr. Martin Patrick, explained that unless urgent measures are taken against the virus unleashed in Baybeach over the last several hours, no one may be left alive within a matter of weeks.

Rob looks through the display window again. After so much fatalistic news, he begins to fear that infected people may reach West End at any moment. For a couple of minutes, he studies everything in sight. He sees only pedestrians who appear perfectly healthy. Traffic is normal for that time of day in the area. His gaze remains unfocused for several moments. Finding nothing unusual, he returns to the newspaper and switches sections.

"At last—sports!" he shouts, rubbing his palms together.

Downtown Engineers star Anthony Papa received a hospital visit from fellow player Eric Davis of the Midtown Architects. Davis accidentally fractured Papa's right tibia during a collision in the league finals. Papa required immediate surgery. The Downtown Engineers star accepted the Midtown Architects player's apology. Doctors had planned to discharge Papa, but an asymptomatic carrier from Baybeach apparently came close to the soccer star. Papa remains under observation, and the delay to his discharge has left his coach concerned.

"No! Damn it! Anthony is infected! It can't be. Anyone but him," Rob laments before anxiously moving to another story.

Since her widely publicized retirement last year, legendary supermodel and actress Casey Fox—a Pearl Beach native who, at ninety, was living near Sunnybeach—appears to have become a victim of last night's Baybeach disaster. Witnesses monitoring security cameras that fateful night claim that a small infected boy reached Mrs. Fox and flung himself at her in fear, wrapping his arms around her and knocking her down. The fall left her defenseless before dozens of other infected people, who trampled her. Nothing further is known about her whereabouts or her remains.

Rob raises his eyebrows. He has no settled opinion about the actress, nor does he give a damn. He moves on to news he considers more important.

Celebrated author and screenwriter Barbara Shoemaker remains under observation after being evacuated from the Baybeach quarantine zone. Only weeks earlier, she had purchased a castle south of Baybeach for three million eCoins. Upon buying it, the writer said she hoped to marry there and hold a proper medieval-style celebration. Mrs. Shoemaker is the mother of three children and was still recovering from her latest turbulent relationship with young rapper Roy-Z. Before last night's disastrous events, she promised to introduce her new Prince Charming to the public.

Rob grows angry. He keeps reading, hoping not to encounter anything else about the virus. Then he finds something promising.

At a ceremony filled with glamour, music and entertainment, the UHR Music Awards presented its top honor to the trio Exotic Covers. Their commercial breakthrough, Wallflower Rash, has become the most successful techno-pop-salsa song in music history, both in downloads and sales. Upon receiving the award, the meteoric trio performed the song that launched them to fame along with several of their other hits, crowning a singular evening. Conspicuously absent was the most successful artist of all time, who was not invited because of her outspoken opposition to awards of this kind. She even shared several images with her fans in which she openly mocked the jury and organizers. In response, she staged her own megaconcert opposite the UHR Music Awards. It competed directly in the ratings and was watched live by more than eleven million users, in addition to the tens of thousands who attended in person.

"I can't believe it. ‘Competed,’ they say. UHR against UHR—and to hell with the lot of them," Rob says aloud, furious.

Resigned to finding nothing that morning which does not mention the virus, Rob grows bored and leaves the news for now. With a sweep of his hands, he tries to open an article about Brittany from her teenage years. He touches her image, but it does not respond. When he tries again, an advertisement opens before him, projecting Ricky as he dances and laughs like a fool. Ricky looks him directly in the eyes.

"Hello! What are you doing? Bored? What's that? You don't have a premium UHR Channel subscription? Oh no—what are you waiting for? Subscribe now and get six months free! Do you realize what I'm telling you? Six months free! Come with me, subscribe now, and I'll immediately show you what Brittany Condon is doing at this very moment." Ricky leans toward the camera with a mischievous expression. "I think she's in the shower," he finally whispers.

Ricky's smile freezes in that sly expression. His forefinger points toward a red button floating to his right labeled SUBSCRIBE. Rob brusquely minimizes the holographic screen.

"Free, sure. Like hell. It's extortionate. Fucking liars. Sons of bitches."

The table is once again free of colorful images. Peace and silence return to the Happy Drunk Liquor Store. Rob rises from the stool, stretches, yawns and scratches his flat backside. He walks toward the other display window, farther from where he had been sitting, and looks out through the glass. The streets appear no different from those of any other morning. It is early. His eyes rise and he is once again mesmerized by Brittany Condon's hologram on the building opposite. She dances with a bright smile, sways her body and twirls her provocative short skirt. Rob wets his lips and stares.

"I can't believe you're not wearing panties, Brittany. How can you do this to me?" Rob whispers, surrendering to desire without taking his eyes from the cheerful dancer.

Rob lowers the zipper of his old, worn jeans, reaches inside and pulls out his penis. For a couple of seconds, he tears his eyes from Brittany to make certain no one can see him through the dirty shop window. He focuses on her again and begins masturbating with satisfaction. Just before his premature climax, the door of the Happy Drunk Liquor Store flies open with a crash. Rob leaps backward, startled, stuffs himself back into his jeans and zips them, then presses his back to the wall and braces for the worst. Someone barges into the store: an enormous man in a hurry. The door shudders behind him.