The Penthouse

by Timothy Singratsomboune

Part 1 appears in this issue.

conclusion

In mere seconds, the penthouse suite faded into a bare, white, fluorescent-lit room. The necklace and charm became a lanyard and safety button. Both of our magnificent robes reverted back into casual streetwear. The ornate furnishings of the sky-high penthouse now amounted to nothing more than a locked filing cabinet pushed up against one of the sharply white walls.

The wall monitor screen that materialized in front of me flashed brightly, “Virtual Imagination Simulation Concluded.” Burnt-orange letters on a white screen.

The familiar rub of denim and polyester on my skin was a relieving sensation, but feelings of familiarity could hardly cool my internal fire. I looked at Niccolo who glared back at me. Neither Niccolo nor I were quite as tall or sculpted as we had been moments ago, but Niccolo still held his chin high. The fluorescent lights of the simulation room reflected brilliantly off of his cheek bones and onto his white plastic simulation visor.

Staring in my direction for a moment, Niccolo eventually softened his gaze and sat down on the plain white bench. “Always,” he started, pulling his visor down to his neck. “You always get so fired up.”

I pulled my own visor down, then stood still. “I’ll say it calmly then.” My neck was sore from holding back a volcanic outburst. “That was sick. Sick. I’m not apologizing for ending that. I’m only sorry I didn’t end it sooner.”

“I should be more upset,” Niccolo said. “Or maybe I should thank you for letting me lead anything at all. Was it just too problematic for you, because you couldn’t micro-manage everything?”

“It’s hilarious to hear someone so heinously out of control complain about being micro-managed.”

Niccolo sat silent and still as the buzzing of the fluorescent lights filled the room. His minimal movements made my face feel even hotter. I breathed in deeply. “Aren’t you going to say anything?”

Niccolo didn’t surrender even a twitch. I crossed my arms in irritation, determined to be just as grounded. “You know,” he finally began. “You know exactly how this program works.”

“I do know how this program works,” I snapped back. “I don’t know how you work.”

“Virtual simulation,” he began again. “It’s tied to our brains. It’s tied to our thoughts, Sylvio. The fantasy that it comes up with is only going to go where my thoughts go. I’m not going to think we can have a grand fantasy without a cost.”

He leaked out a faint smile, shaking his head slightly. “The system’s going to display only what we can actually believe.”

I spat into the air. “I don’t care what you can actually believe. Is that the world you want?”

Niccolo looked straight at me. “Of course it’s not what I want,” he said, with each syllable getting softer. “But what kind of story did you expect the Power & Majesty theme to build? We chose that theme so we could feel something we haven’t felt in a while.”

I curled my nose. “The only thing I felt was horror.”

Niccolo sighed, and I could tell his blood pressure was climbing. “Those moments, of all times, that’s when you felt horror? Especially when we have chaos surrounding us every day?” He raised his voice. “Especially when we have chaos coming closer and closer and closer to the safe zone every day?!”

Niccolo stopped to catch his breath, and he looked up to the ceiling. At a low volume he said, “That world is something I would want, though. If it meant we finally had some power over our own happiness.”

My chin dropped. “Why is that your only way to get power?”

“It’s not my only way. But desperate times call for desperate measures. How many people like us die when we trick ourselves into trusting all of these hand-holding fantasies?”

I didn’t respond.

“Or,” Niccolo continued, “when we trust your fantasy that keeping our worthless affairs in order will someday pay off?”

I clenched my fists. “Am I supposed to think that your fantasy of mindlessly killing people pays off?” I clenched my fists harder. “And exactly how many people have to die, Niccolo?”

“Hundreds.” he said. “But we could gain the power to save thousands.”

“No, no,” I said, tightening my cheeks to hold back a callous, rage-tinged chuckle. “You get the power to save thousands. And you’ll get the power to do many other things too. Things that aren’t so noble, you’ve made that clear.”

Though I ended my words with an impressive volume, I was running out of breath. The tenseness of my muscles rendered my deep breaths useless, and I could see him looking at me with a mix of irritation and concern.

With my throat throbbing, I spoke again. “Let me ask you this, Niccolo: how high does your penthouse have to be? No. How big does your parade have to be? How big does your death mob have to be? For you to have enough power to achieve some happiness?”

Niccolo turned and stared at the wall. “Bigger than you could imagine.”

I knew he was being hyperbolic to get a rise out of me, and it nearly worked. My only defense against Niccolo’s ploy was to continue staring at him, without saying a word.

Waiting only a beat, Niccolo continued. “If you had armies at your disposal, you wouldn’t fight your enemies, Sylvio? And if you had no armies, would you just let your enemies win? Or would you do what you had to do, to fight? Will you just keep running away until you find something different?”

“I don’t run. From anything.”

“Okay.”

“I don’t.”

As those words left my mouth, I subconsciously began forming my hands into even tighter fists, rubbing my fingers roughly against my flushed palms.

“I don’t run,” I said again. “I always stand and fight. But I would never fight my own kind.”

“Oh, is that right?” Niccolo said back to me.

“We’re both standing here now,” I said. “Alive, through all the chaos. Alive without sacrificing anyone. Alive without back-stabbing anyone. Clearly it’s possible to survive and not do all the things you think we have to.”

Niccolo kept his eyes away from me. “You think it’s so simple. We do nothing. We don’t hurt anyone. And then when our own kind gets sacrificed and back-stabbed anyway, then what? And when we wind up with nothing to our names except for our morals, then what? I know you know everything, but I guess you don’t have an answer to this.”

“It’s better to walk away with nothing,” I said, “than to be a traitor.”

Niccolo winced at my words. “Why are you taking this so seriously?” he asked with the crooked tone of condescension. “It’s basically a video game. A game.”

“Niccolo,” I said without blinking.

“I know how to make decisions, Sylvio. If, in real life, I ever had to make a tough decision, I’d make the right one. I may be willing to sacrifice a lot more than you, but I would still make the right choice. I would. You don’t trust me?”

“Do you trust yourself?”

Standing up slowly, Niccolo looked at me and shook his head, but it didn’t seem to be in response to my question. Still slowly, he began to walk away from me, letting his simulation visor slip out of his fingers and fall to the floor with a loud clack. Dozens of glass shards from the visor’s now-shattered screen spilled out onto the room’s white linoleum like dust onto a dark street.

There was no noise when the facility’s exit door closed behind him.

Now alone, the whiteness of the room overtook anything else I could see. I squinted until it became tolerable.

Standing still a moment to catch my breath, I finally began to realize how quiet it was in the simulation room. I rubbed my palms together, watching them slowly lose their flush as some of the excess heat trickled out of my body. A few breaths passed and I was breathing more calmly.

POP! POP! POP!

I flew off the ground and landed back on my feet with the speed of that wretched simulation’s revelers. The gunshots from outside echoed in the bare room, and I was surprised at how thin the facility’s walls were. Though no further pops of bullets followed, I knew that the nightly unrest had started. It seemed that the chaos was finally penetrating our neighborhood.

Sitting down, I murmured, “I don’t run.” I breathed out a small breath. “From anything.”