FAULT ; ARTIFACT

TWO

Realizing that I could not turn away, that if I did not answer now, then in a couple of minutes a couple of muzzles would break into the apartment, and then really would not be well, I accepted the call, transferring it directly to the projector, which immediately changed the image of the studio from the announcer continuing to tarator to a dark room. Most of the screen was occupied by a dark face with clearly Mexican features, with a black oblong mustache and a smoothly shaven chin. He has long black hair gathered on the back of his head in a ponytail, an elongated dark face covered with scars and wrinkles. Dark as a pair of olives, the eyes looked out from under the thick eyebrows that converged over the bridge of the nose.

"Well, hello, Tim," the man said in a hoarse voice as he leaned back in his chair.

He is dressed in a white plaid shirt, the unbuttoned top of which exposes the chest and neck, covered with tattoos.

- Hello Yuji.

The man stared for a few moments, pursing his lips.

- I hope you have any idea why I decided to disturb you?

"Yes," I said, feeling sweat running down my spine. The man's ostentatious politeness didn't fool me at all.

- You had a simple job - to deliver the cargo from point A to point B, and you would get your ten thousand credits. It's not the first time we've been working at this pace, so what happened this time? Why did you decide to throw me with a "product"?

- Yuji, you misunderstood! I said quickly with cold lips.

His right eyebrow lifted, arching.

- Well, explain it to me.

"The food is ready," a melodious voice came from the kitchen.

I wanted to start explaining, but I got distracted, slammed my mouth shut with a noise, looking back towards the passage to the kitchen.

"Your name is," Yuji said with a slight movement of his hand.

- Uh- it will endure.

He grinned rather wryly. If I pecked at his politeness and, not understanding the real desires, really went to the kitchen for food, then the chances that I would be able to turn out of the situation in which I found myself would have slipped from one percent to zero.

Yuji are one of those influential people who try to be polite, but at the same time do not tolerate when people do not guess their true desires hidden behind a mask of politeness. And often he decides to be favorable to this or that person only on the basis of this ability to read his desires and fulfill them.

- Then I'm listening.

- There was nothing I could do. On the approach to the meeting place, three men approached, put their weapons to their heads and took the suitcase.

Yuji closed his eyes, sighed heavily, and exhaled for a long time.

- Well, okay. Do you have any evidence?

I clenched my jaws.

- Nope. It all happened in the alley between Twelfth and Thirteenth Streets. After the incident, I turned to the locals and it turned out that there were no surveillance cameras, but the road is one, and you could see these people with a suitcase next to the tony and Monta bar.

Yuji looked up and listened to someone's whispers, nodded, looked back at the screen.

- Yes, there were a trio that got into a car parked at the bar, but, unfortunately, we will find out neither the faces nor the license plates of the car... failed, huh? Yes, it failed. Be that as it may, from your words it turns out that they put a gun to their head, but you can not prove it. Perhaps you yourself handed over a suitcase with a "product", and then invented this story. Do you think I'll believe you? And the fact that they didn't sew you up in that alley, but just left, confirms my assumption.

- But, Yuji, you've known me for more than a day.

- I work with many people, and you are not the first who tried to deceive me, including people who worked with me for a long time, but one day decided to slip off, and at the same time earn extra money. Tim, be that as it may, the price of loss is half a million credits.

My throat was dry. Million! Yes, in order to accumulate so much, you need to save money for almost five years, and not to eat and not to pay for the apartment.

- I heard you lost your job. So? So even your income has fallen," Yuji continued. - To kill you, in a good way, for the edification of others, but from the dead is less sense than from the living. Give me the money back. Sell an apartment, sell... what do you have there? Wirtcapsule, sell all the equipment, sell it yourself, but scrape those half a million and give it back to me. You've got two weeks. You can't get it back, blame yourself. If you try to escape, we will still get it, even from the other side of the planet. That's it.

                                                                                                                        …

The image blinked and disappeared. I sat there as if stunned. There is a void in my head, a slight squeak in my ears, as if a mosquito had settled there. My stomach growled, reminding me that there hadn't been a crumb in it in the morning. I mechanically got up, walked into the kitchen, fingers grasped the edges of the plate on which the steam of pasta and cutlet is coming out.

Back in the room, I plopped down in my chair. Bringing pasta to my mouth, I realized that I could not eat it, because after everything that had happened, a lump stood in my throat. Placing the fork with the pasta wound on the teeth, I exhaled heavily, leaning back on the couch.

Luck clearly decided to turn its back on me. Losing my job and stealing – those two blows mentally smeared me. In vain he agreed to such part-time jobs from Yuji. On the other hand, if it weren't for them, I wouldn't have a wirtcapsule or an automated kitchen. I knew that there were drugs in my suitcases, that I worked as a courier for a drug dealer, which meant that I was at risk, but the thirst for profit overcame me. And now I'm in. I knew that I needed to get off this case, but I decided that I would take the goods again, but it was not here.

Behind all the thoughts and experiences, I did not immediately feel that the bracelet on my arm was vibrating. I stared at the image of the call for a few seconds, then it finally dawned on who was calling. Hurriedly connected.

An image of the office appeared on the screen. A chic desk with an antique oblique, just to the right is a large bookcase with collector's editions. I know that after they were put on the shelf, they were no longer taken out. Nowadays, no one reads books, they are more collected as collection items. Well, as before, some people collected stamps, others photo cards of football players, and now here are expensive books.

At the table sits a tanned, sleek guy, with a smooth well-groomed face and combed back hair. He is dressed in a house robe. Seeing me, he stretched his thick lips in a smile, squinting his green eyes.

- Hi Tim. How is it going?

- Hi there. That's all right. As usual.

For a moment, the thought of whether to ask Alex for money flashed by, but it was quickly brushed aside. We're buddies, of course, but not so much that he can borrow half a million loans.

- I heard you were fired from your job.

- Have you heard? It seems that in this world it is more difficult to find who is not aware of my troubles, I muttered.

- Come on, don't be discouraged. Still, the allowance is paid to you.

I just smirked vaguely.

I frowned. With all these worries, I managed to forget about this issue.

- Let's not talk in riddles. I know there's a catch in your question. So what's the point? I asked.

- What have you heard about the rift?

- Are you talking about that gap in the quantum network that supposedly leads to another world?

- Not allegedly, but she really leads to another world, despite all these videos from all sorts of conspiracy theorists that, they say, in fact, all this was invented by corporations, and resources are extracted from the bottom of the sea. In general, this world works according to the laws typical of MMORPG. Monsters, leveling, abilities, character characteristics.

"And if they kill you there, you will die in real life," I said grimly, remembering everything I had heard about the rift.