not fair…” Artem fell silent, looking imploringly at his mother. He frowned resentfully, but didn’t protest any further.
An awkward pause hung in the air.
“In my youth, people communicated, met, went somewhere together,” Tatiana picked up the conversation, “now… Everyone sits at home and lives with imaginary problems.”
“Tell me about it,” Olga supported her.
“By the way, when VR technology first appeared, Dad used the nick Grimnir in the game, right?” Max asked Tatiana, trying to make it as casual as possible.
Olga sharply lowered her glass to the table. The light blush caused by the half-empty bottle of wine faded from her cheeks. Every mention of Max’s father seemed to cause her dislike, as if he were still dangerous to her.
“Yes, that’s what he was called, why are you asking about it?” Tatiana wondered.
“I received this today.” Max took out the note with the name that was attached to the box with the game and put it on the table.
“Wow. What a twist.” Artem immediately chimed in, unable to restrain himself from a new remark. His eyes lit up again with curiosity, “There are a lot of rumors on the internet now that game characters can learn on their own, adopt the habits of their players. They say some almost gain consciousness, start writing messages from the player’s name to his friends. But for letters… That’s something new.”
“This is probably fake and someone’s stupid joke,” Aunt Olga stated categorically. “Rumors spread by competitors.”
“What happened to my father’s game character? How did his story end? Maybe he’s still there, in the game, and has retained part of my father’s consciousness or memories?”
Tatiana shook her head, as if dismissing this thought: “I don’t think it’s possible…” Tatiana took the note from the table, read it, and gave it to Olga.
“Your father is dead,” Olga stated unequivocally, looking at Max with undisguised anger, “The car was pulled out of the bottom of the bay. And that’s enough about it.” She returned the card with the name to Tatiana as if it were a time bomb.
“But his body wasn’t found!” Max interrupted her, his voice trembling, “The last time he spoke… he said he would come. It would be by six.” Max glanced at the electronic clock, which showed 6:05 PM. “The delivery truck arrived exactly at 6:00 PM, and the note is signed with his name…” Max didn’t know what other arguments to give to preserve this thin thread of hope.
“And when was he supposed to come? Five years ago?” Olga’s eyes flashed with anger.
Tatiana, seeing that the situation was escalating, stood up, as if about to protect her son from her sister:
“Let’s all calm down a bit. It’s just someone’s stupid joke. Your father was quite a well-known person in the gaming industry, so someone set up a silly prank on the anniversary of his death.” She went to the window and drew the curtains, suspecting that a prankster from the street might be filming their reaction on camera.
“It’s too expensive for a prank. He was sent the very latest model.” Artem again broke free from Olga’s control and chimed into the conversation “It’s being advertised all over the city now. You don’t need glasses or a helmet, just a hoop and electrodes that fit to the temples and interact with the chips. I need the same VR, it’s damn convenient.”
“Artem! What did I tell you!” Olga unleashed all her anger on her son, who had again violated the ban on bad language. “Home now, you’re without the web for a week!”
“Oh, Mom!” Artem said with offense, but his mother was no longer listening to him.
She stood up and confidently dragged Artem towards the exit.
“I’ll write when we get there,” she told her sister without turning around and left the house, leading the weakly resisting Artem with her.
Daria, a fifteen-year-old girl with long, curly red hair, also put her cup of unfinished tea aside.
“Well, Max, thank you for the evening, it was very cordial,” she said with a barely noticeable mockery, “but I guess I’ll go too,” she said, “now we know that your father is sending you messages even from the afterlife, and mine, although he visits home once every six months, is always drunk and never remembers me. I guess I’ll post about this story for my blog, but already at home.”
“Come on, come on, out of your 15 subscribers, no one even watches you there,” Max snapped.
The girl stuck out her tongue at him and got up from the table.
“I already have fifteen thousand subscribers, if you didn’t know!” Daria hissed with feigned anger, pulling on her coat, “And there are even donations on the streams, can you imagine?”
Max snorted, but a surprise flashed in his eyes.
“It doesn’t matter that the guests are leaving,” Tatiana said when they were left alone, “it only means that we can talk in a closer family circle, doesn’t it?”
Max nodded, lowering his eyes.
They didn’t say another word to each other that evening.
It was already 3 a.m., and Max still couldn’t calm down and fall asleep.
“Who could have sent this VR anyway? Why did the ‘gift’ arrive exactly at six in the evening, exactly at the time when my father was supposed to arrive, even if it’s someone’s prank, who besides family members could know all the details?” Max pondered.
The question seemed to hang in the air.
He needed to double-check everything again and find out everything he could. First, he tracked the place of dispatch of the order by the number. The point of sending the parcel was a receiving point, one and a half kilometers from his father’s old house, the one from which he was supposed to arrive, 5 years ago. It’s hardly a coincidence. But how could the “prankster” who sent the device know this address? It was an amazing attention to detail. After all, his father’s address was not publicly available information, although he was quite a well-known person, as one of the leading developers of the company “Dream”, participated in presentations, and sometimes gave interviews before the release of updates, but personal information was always kept secret. The house in which he lived after his divorce from Tatiana was recently put up for sale again, and it had changed several owners before that. Over the past few years… it had gained a reputation as a “bad place,” if you believe the reviews on rental and real estate sales sites. It had an expensive “Smart Home” system installed, which turned on when it wanted to and scared the new owners to hell. It was possible to demolish it, but then the house would lose almost half its value, and each time the new owners did the same thing – they sold the house with a small discount. Now it cost ridiculous for a super-modern house: 1,800,000 cr. Similar houses in area cost at least 4,000,000 cr.
More information about the sender could not be found today.
Max didn’t know what to do. All of this could be someone’s stupid joke, a prank. All the data about his father’s death is on the web, and anyone could send this message. But if you believe Vladislav, his father’s avatar was online in the game for two minutes. The game’s functionality has long allowed you to send messages, make purchases in the DREAM Inc. online store, and much more. Even one minute is enough to buy VR for in-game gold and send it to someone along with an invitation to the game. In modern games, it is almost impossible to hack someone else’s account. In addition to the name and password, the location of the chips in the body must match, and so on, artificial intelligence analyzes, including physical parameters such as heart rate, breathing, appearance, and even the player’s behavior. All of this is impossible