IF she had to describe the feeling which ravaged her body in one word it would be this: agony.
Rahel opened her eyes to the golden rays of sunlight streaming through the window. A bird – small, with red and brown feathers – jumped around the concrete lip of the window and ruffled its wings as it gazed out from its perch to the world beyond. It emitted a tweet and then took off into the sky, allowing the wind to flow underneath its wings and carry it to wherever it wanted to go.
She groaned as she managed to lift a hand to her head; the epicentre of where the nerve-killing pain seemed to manifest from. The sharp jabs persisted ever worse as her fingers fumbled with the corners of the bandage. It was wrapped tightly around her head, and felt as if was embracing and caressing its precious cargo.
There was no doubt that her skull was still tender.
She did not have much recollection about what had happened. For some reason, she had the vaguest of memories of three men and blinding headlights.
How it had happened, she did not know. How she got home, she did not know either. There were many things which made very little sense.
Gently and as delicately as she could, Rahel dangled her legs over the side of her bed and let her body strike a sense of balance. It only took a few moments before she was able to slowly stand on to her feet and amble towards the small bathroom. Lucky for her, it was just a short walk. But it was painful, all the same.
She shifted into the doorway and hung onto the wooden frame as she saw her reflection stare back at herself in the mirror. It was a good thing that she had clenched so tightly on to something for support. Even though she sensed what to expect, it did not stop herself from feeling winded.
Most of the skin on her forehead and all of her long hair was now hidden behind a thick bundle of white fabric.
Rahel took a couple of fleeting steps towards the basin, allowing herself to come to terms with her appearance. With shaking fingers, she undid the clip and gently started to unwound the long bandage. As the tail-end snaked to the floor, she could not help but emit a surprised gasp.
Her hands surged to her head and, through several flinches and grimaces, she dragged her fingers through her hair in disbelief.
Everything appeared completely normal.
The skin appeared light pink and unharmed and each of the hairs on her head was otherwise untouched.
It was as if nothing had ever happened.
Rahel stared at her reflection and pushed her face into the palms of her hands.
Would she ever find answers, she did not know. Was she imagining everything? Was this just all a prolonged, bad dream?
The floodgates had been opened and her mind was caught in the depths of questions which kept piling onto her thoughts. She emitted a long breath and tried to tame her runaway mind. But no matter how much she tried to reign in the thoughts which hung over her like a suspended guillotine, she could not.
Sanity and control had escaped from her clutches.
Leaving the bandage in an unkempt bunch on the tiled floor, she made her way out of the bathroom and towards the kitchenette. She could hear them calling; hear them call out to her with sing-song voices.
She rummaged through the cupboards until she found her release.
Rahel seized every liquor bottle which still had dregs in the bottom and rounded them up in her hands. One by one, she emptied the contents as she sashayed towards the ORACLE suit.
There was something which waited for her in the usual spot but it was not the suit and headset she had become so accustomed to. It was not the dated and bug-prone suit which she had come to make do with over the countless of hours she had spent in the sprawling virtual world.
A brand-new suit hung from a hanger, complete with a streamlined headset; one which she had only ever seen in videos and releases from tech conferences. Only the elite few had them – mostly those that had certain pull associated with their names and found themselves in the most inner of inner rings.
Her stomach sunk as she realised what this meant.
Someone had been in her unit. Someone had uninvitedly entered into her private space.
But even with the realisation weighing in the pits of her stomach, a smile tugged at her lips.
Rahel eyed a note which sat on top of the headset and opened it with trembling fingers.
I hope this brings you pleasure in your recovery. Enjoy.
There was no name; no signature.
Just the words written in immaculate cursive.
Putting the piece of paper aside, she stepped into the suit as her stomach flipped with butterflies. She was expecting it to weigh down on her petite frame but it weighed as much as a feather in comparison to the bulky, dated suit.
Next, she pulled the headset on. Her living room started to fade almost immediately as the sensors picked up her irises. The ORACLE login screen came to view and she marvelled at the scene. Never had she experienced such clarity!
Feeling as if she was about to enter a whole new dimension, Rahel quickly typed in her login details and waited for the world to load. Her avatar appeared in the middle of the bustling alleyway she had left behind previously.
Her mouth opened in wonder at the details which had rendered around her.
It was all too beautiful. It was all too immersive. It was all too realistic.
GONE_ROGUE_13: Yo! Where’d you get the kicks from?
Rahel fumbled on her feet as the text appeared suspended in the air at the bottom of her view.
This, too, was different.
UNINVITEDSYNNER: You won’t believe this. It was left in my unit.
There was moments pause. She took the intermission between messages to explore the haptics – it was a lot more sensitive and precise than the previous controls and she almost engaged in friendly damage to a nearby player. She watched as they flipped the bird in response.
GONE_ROGUE_13: Is that because you don’t want to tell me? No one can afford that.
Rahel felt a small pang of anger awaken within. She had to be careful not to fan it like a flame. Rogue was one of her closest friends and she could not afford to lose him. But, it sounds like he was already halfway there. The Even though you could not hear his voice, the venom and sting of jealousy was a bit too obvious.
UNINVITEDSYNNER: You need to believe me on this.
GONE_ROGUE_13: Yeah, I believe you.
And with that, several words were displayed underneath the chat log. Each word was like a dagger to the heart; each one more heart-tugging than the last.
GONE_ROGUE_13 HAS LOGGED OFF.
Rahel lashed out with a foot and cried out in anguish as her little toe intersected with the corner of a side table. It had taken her every inch of self-restraint to stop herself from throwing the headset across the room.
Pushing the headset slightly down her face, she feverishly looked around and grabbed at the closest bottle. She let the sweet, sweet nectar caress her tastebuds and then tossed the empty container to the side. Having calmed the high-emotions just a little – or was it the alcohol? – she pulled the headset back over her eyes and brought herself back into ORACLE once more.
As the world unfolded in front of her where she had left it a few seconds earlier, she watched as the chat box started to come alive once more.
ORACLE1 WISHES TO SEND YOU A MESSAGE. DO YOU ACCEPT?
“What else could possibly go wrong,” she muttered to herself. And with that, she permitted the communication link between them.
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