[ WP ] `` I need you to understand something before I kill you . ''

Many have contemplated with the idea that the world we live in is but a virtual projection. Akihiro actually managed to prove it and it was later corroborated by further evidence from various attributed scientists. A decade has passed since. Nothing really changed. Of course, people discuss it but they do n't seem to consider what it means for them. How it affects them. 
 
 Akihiro had single-handily floored every religion; God, no matter how one conceives him or what His form is, could n't exist since the world was just a big program. Before the Big Bang, there was nothing, the program simply had n't been initialized yet. After you died, there was no Heaven, no Hell, no Reincarnation or Void; it was Game Over and you woke up and continued with your Real Life. 
 
 Akihiro could n't live by this. He needed a reason to live, a reason to wake up everyday and go to work. According to the recent findings, 
 life was a fluke. 
 
. 
 
 `` I need you to understand something before I kill you''. 
 
 They were in some dark alley under a highway with speeding vehicles passing above their heads. The alley was a dead end. Akihiro was standing against the furthest wall, positioned so he could see the people walking on the road perpendicular to the one were the alley was located. Nephele, Akihiro's childhood friend was holding a gun loaded with a single bullet. They had grown up together, went to the same school, to the same university. They had chosen adjacent rooms so that they could be close to each other. Nephele was the sister he never had as much as he was her brother. He could easily get himself killed by some thug trying to find money for a hit, however if someone was to kill him he wanted to be her. 
 
 `` Spare me the lecture''. He had thoroughly considered this. There was nothing to keep him here. His achievements in work, dictated by the characteristics and the talents the program had attributed to him. His childhood memories crafted from the random couple the was chosen to portray his parents. His friends, his lovers, everything was the result of a complex algorithm. Even Nephele. Whether or not the memories of this life remained it did n't matter for they hold no real value in a perfectly calculated world. 
 
 “ No, Akihiro. Listen to me ”, Nephele objected. “ You claim life is worthless, you say you want to leave. Consider this then: what if you do n't like what you find? What if that's exactly why you decided to live in this virtual world? For all you know, you could be in a living hell and this, this life, is your escape. ” 
 
 “ Thank you ”, said Akihiro with a sad smile and looked in her eyes. They were almond-shaped and consisted of 3 circles. The outer one, a few millimetres only, a dark blue, like the deep ocean. The inner one, a pale brown the hugged her pupil. In the in between, a crystal blue, light and vivid like Nephele, always cheerful and care-free. Of all the spectacles he could think of, he wanted Nephele's beautiful eyes to be the last think he would look at. 
 
 Plits. A tear escaped from Nephele's cheek's firm hold and crushed on the cold concrete floor. 
 
 Bang. 
 
. 
. 
. 
 
 The reboot took a couple mins. The memories of the virtual life needed to be organized and categorised properly, so that they would n't be mixed with the person's real ones. Toshio opened his eyes. An alarm had gone off somewhere in the distance and a red light was blinking in the control room that was looking in the room where Toshio was currently at. An unbreakable glass divided the two rooms. Toshio could n't see what was behind the glass although whoever was at the other side definitely could see him and the empty room. A simple cube; every surface covered with a sturdy white mattress and a Virtual Reality Bed positioned in the middle. 
 
 Still dizzy from the slumber, Toshio took some moments to collect his thoughts. An image of Nephele's eyes flashed before him. He smiled, knowing that he could n't have made a better choice. Akihiro, Toshio's last persona, even though he was only 30 years had made an outstanding job discovering he lived in a Virtual Projection. Almost. There was no way for him to know the reason for the Virtual World'' s existence was he and everyone and everything else was generated by the program in such a way he would n't realize it. 
 
 Feeling better, he opened his eyes once again. To his surprise, the room was empty. Weird. The Guards should have already been there, ready to prepare the next VR Immersion. They had done so the other 9 times, each VR Immersion lasting a year. Ten lifetimes ago, he rallied his army and revolted. A silent war. Espionage of the Government, sabotage of their facilities, assassinations of key-people, desperate tries to help the major population that was slowly but surely dying. Every action was carefully planned, perfectly executed. There could be no margin for errors. But eventually something went wrong. He got caught. 
 
 Toshio had to make a run for it. Luckily, Virtual Reality Hibernation, the sleep that a Walker was put into when entering a Virtual World, prevented muscle atrophy or it would have been impossible to walk after a full year's immobility. He made to stand up when he noticed the monitor. 244 days remaining. He had woken up 244 days early. And then it hit him. 
 
 Akihiro should n't have managed to discover he was living in a Virtual Projection, let alone at the age of 20. There was no way the VR Program would let him do that. That also explained why everyone faced Virtual Projection with such apathy. The Program was n't coded to contemplate on the possibility of it being a program. It also meant that no one was expecting him to rise and walk out the door. 
 
 Toshio smiled. An alarm might have gone off but he knew the Government better than that. They were n't prepared for such an emergency. He would escape without breaking a sweat. 
 
 The Resistance was Alive. 
 

