A cobblestone road paved between cubes. A sky of blue, smogged from fuel. Water, flattened to a mere image, blank. A distorted reality emerged. People like npcs staggering and glitching across the landscape as a pre-recorded anomaly. Alex opens his eyes to see almost the same done to him. He feels... shorter. Looking at his hands, more of the ground defragments, creating more tessellation, more polygonal depth. Textures resume. He blinks to look at all of the glitching npcs start walking as normal. Citizens of a town.

As if to forget the sequence of uncanny loading, he resumes what he was doing. He ran through the area, an orange in hand. He had gotten it at a very good price at the time in the market. The smell of fish ran rancid through the street from boats swashing upon the shore. Builders were lined up on a platform in the middle of the ocean banging away at metal sheets made of copper. Some townsfolk are yelling about bread and how fresh it is, meats. So many noises filled the air as it waft in with all of the exhaust from factories.

Bustling of civilization ceased from walking through a less populated road. With trees calculated in compulsively perfect tandem with the block he was in, Alex walked up the steps of a stately home. The railings were black and thin, curled and fancy. The door, dark wooden mahogany and a knocker with a sheepshead look of anger etched into metal. A literal sheep's head shape. Alex always liked it, really. It added to the house and it was silver, his favorite metal. 

A female voice stirred the home speaking to the air in thought. Another voice, a male, was deep but noted with some fluting appeal. "Ah, Alexander", the man announced, "We were just talking about you. How was college today?" Alex scoffed a bit, ignoring the question and showed him the orange. "3 cents." Alex bleated under his voice and put the fruit on a single plate in the kitchen. "What's got you beat, li'l blue bird?" Asked his mother. Alex looked upset without a tear, merely desparation. "I'm just over it... I can do much more than they put me to." His father, listening, puts his hand on Alex's shoulder in prospect. He gives him a good look and tells him, "You can deal with this for just a while longer, right? I know you can. Ignore the children around you they don't know what you know." Alex shakes his head. "It's not that..." 

Alex goes on to walk upstairs, a blue and white embroidered rug runs along the steps, zig-zagging with them. "Frederick, what's the problem?" Frederick looked down, his thoughts precautious in ponder but stiff in resolution. "It's fine, he just needs time..." He sighs briefly and in a spry tone, "Hazey-maze, do we have any food for the week, love?" Frederick opens the ice box to see a couple of things, including milk. "Dunno. I'll go 'n' check on Alex later I s'pose..." Fred gives Hazel a peck on the cheek and they start talking about what to get from the market themselves before sundown.

Before going into his bedroom he smiles at his parents happily enjoying their time together but goes back to a frown as he opens the door. He closes it behind him, sighing harshly. There was a small wooden bed for one with a lightly plaid pattern on a blue blanket. A feathered pillow lay atop it, snuggly perched on the frame. A desk was designated right up to the large window of the outer wall with a nicely set lamp and a parchment that seemed to go to an unfinished book right next to it. It was clad in a slightly dark leather cover. A feather pin made from a blue bird of a sort was laying there, drenched in dry, pitch black ink. A bookcase lined the wall to the right next to a wardrobe that propped several books with titles of philosophy etched in their spines. Some were of scientific or calculative origin. "When will you ever see... Tor..." 

Alex takes a picture out of his pocket and looks at the black and white portrait taken some time back before college. A boy with floofy but straight sides of lengthy hair lined near his ears with a curly but soft feel to them was seen in the picture beside Alex's distraught and confused face. Eyes of dark but matte shades of navy and a touch of indigo fed from his mind to remember that day. His skin, a light and slightly burnt caramel. He always smiled. "Aye! I was thinking... maybe for your invention you could... put something on it, like a pattern. OH maybe a small message using morse!" His friend throws a ball toward Alex. "Mh... I don't know Torvald, that sounds like an awful lot of... thinking. I have other things to think about like should I make the outer shell tough or malleable for stability...? Should I make it grounded or will that shorten the fuse? It's just silly to think about small things like a message..." Torvald grabs the ball thrown back to him. "Well... I would. Hey would it be ok if I could work with you?! We could be a team. You have the engineering and I have the... uhm... well idk what I'll have but that doesn't matter!" Alex misses catching the ball. "It does, though. Torv, you know how much inventions mean to an inventor. They strive not just for success or fame, fortune... they strive to innovate. It's not about--... ugh..." Torvald goes to get his ball. "Well... I think you're pretty successful... I'll be by your side no matter what. Okay?" Torvald gives a steady nudge with his fist on Alex's shoulder making him look up at him with curiosity. "Wait why aren't you at home to eat dinner? Your mom is going to be very coarse with you." Torvald grips his ball tight, "Oh... mierda... you're right...-- I'll seeya later Alex!" 

"I just want you to understand...", Alex picks up a book beside him. Part of it is already read and has a marked chapter. Frederich Nietzche's "The Birth of Tragedy"