Apex Magazine Issue 128 by Apex Magazine

Author:Apex Magazine [Magazine, Apex]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Magazine
Publisher: Apex Publications

I wake up in a dark, cuboid room, the interchange between both worlds, encased in a lucid husk with a tinge of warm light bleeding through its skin, like sunlight seeping into closed eyelids. Permits easy transport. It has two doors, one leading back to my body, titled: Kefilwe Kgosi, my name—the door, gilt-edged with the dust of sleep. The other door leads to Portia’s Dreamworld and alternatively her catfishing boyfriend’s dream-mind. Two doors separated by a chamber space, like a mantrap security door. Other users just want to slip smack-dab into the mosh pit of their nightmares or the syrupy quality of a dream. I’m still in-between sleep and lucid-feeling. Sometimes I choose to sit in this nothingness space, a feeling of emptiness, no remark, no ripple of emotions. They say you stay in here too long and you forget being human; some have eroded themselves into dust here, manifested daggers, all sorts of weapons to make the killing easier, whilst their bodies lay comatose, dripping and evaporating life into the atmosphere. The insurers would come with their policies, proffer out the payouts, and take what belongs to them: the body, written off, but still recyclable, still worthy to earn them paybacks.

Outside the cube, planted on its façade is the kill switch. A hand-sized black rectangular lever. If I’m ever compromised, all I’d need to do is pull it down. There’s a reason it’s not inside the cube—the cube is a metaphor for safety. The only reason you’d end outside the cube is because someone has stolen access to your body. “If you ever use the kill switch, your body will instantly be paralyzed, trapping whoever’s in there,” my Xhosa comrade offered. “That means no one goes in or out of your body. Bad news is you can never return to your body.”

I shiver at the thought of that. I look back at my name-door that will lead me back to myself, and I know behind it is the pillowy dark ether I will float into as the waters tide me into my body. I always wondered why these doors were labeled in our names as if we didn’t know ourselves or the path back to ourselves. Maybe we don’t really know who we truly are.

The air is thickening with sleep, making it slower to wade through to Portia’s door. A fraction of concentration and I manipulate my limbs and arms dream-wise. I stretch out my arms, grip through the air-thick fabric, and drag my feet through this viscosity until, finally, I reach the cold sharpness of Portia’s doorknob. Drag it open into blinding light.

A plaza, midway between three glinting skyscrapers. Most of them act as a safe for Portia’s memories and secrets. One of them a doorway that will allow me to riffle through her ex-boyfriend’s data to extract what he has on her before he ultimately uploads it or blackmails her. I find myself standing in a line that will lead into one of her buildings. But the line crawls forward slowly as the guards assess each individual.

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