[Listen to the sound piece related to this fiction (in French)]
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Key-Déli-Ô-Scope]
[Take the time to read a commentary on the Key-Déli-Ô-Scope (in French)]
– Lasers. Lasers! Dazzling! Everywhere, a deep electric blue… Ah! What lasers! I had never seen anything like it. It was beautiful. Stunned, I was absolutely stunned. Difficult to distinguish what passed by in the room. And there were rumors, whisperings, chatterings. Knock! Knock! Knock! Neverending. The rustling of clothing. Silhouettes drawn here and there through the blue of the lasers. Looking busy. With what, I had no idea. Cyriaque left me no time to dwell on this. « Come on! Quickly! Through the door, Cid is coming, » he said, adding, « No use in you trying to be clever. Anyway, now that we know you tried to infiltrate us, we’ve got our eye on you. » I entered the square room, bare except for a diaphonous cloth criss-crossed with darting blue lasers. Outside, a scream. Incomprehensible. Again this strange language. … Cyriaque cursed. « Divulge malafrask spy! Bad timing, this is getting close to the last straw. Fuxstase fucking mess! » A man tumbled backwards into the room. Behind his suit, the stranger hid a sad smile. He didn’t introduce himself, but I knew instantly that it was the man I was supposed to be meeting. « Hi, Cid, » I said simply. He turned around, addressing himself to Cyriaque: « Leave, Aïm koing to interrogaste oura guestis in privatism. » He then whispered, « How could you? I trusted you, Aksel… » I was going to respond but he cut me off. « No, don’t say anything, » he said. « I have to know. Are you? Are you going to help the safeverseens? Or do you prefer to stay immersed in your poor excuse for a life? We want the response. Now! » I remained silent. I didn’t know. « Arse-Lordery, that’s all we need. That means no? Now what about…? » Another scream, in the room next door. Cid shuddered. « We have no time to wait. There’s a problem. » I opened my mouth to reply, when all of a sudden I saw a crackle. Tiny, translucent particles, like a swarm of water droplets, broke off. « Oh no… oh no… not that, not now. » Bam! I had no time to react. Total darkness. Blackout.
When I woke up there was no one in the room. Not even the lasers. I opened the door, which led to the large room where I had seen the blue lasers for the first time. Empty, it was empty. I didn’t understand anything… Where had they gone? What had happened while I’d been knocked out? Had they left? Everything hurt. I could only go home. Outside, the rain was ferocious. It ate away at my body with its biting cold. I walked… walked. It was such a strange, new experience for me, to feel the water on my skin. I arrived shivering at my apartment. Stop. Biometric identification. Operational. I entered. Nothing seemed to have changed, and yet I felt a deep malaise. One step took me into the bathoom, and with another I reached for my medicine cabinet. I needed a pill. Right away! Which one? A Paxificate, yes, a Paxificate. That was right for the job: the knot that turned in my stomach suddenly released, « and I felt inner peace. » I realized that I had just spoken like one of those damn advertisements that we’re forced to choose at every zone change on the Ô’Key. The Ô’Key! The Ô’Key, with its fluorescent colors, seemed dull to me now. What would become of me if…? A Key-Secure-Ô-Log forger, a renegade surveillance agent? Or would I just remain one of these bastards who passed their time spying on people, data mining, finding information that was rarely crucial and often tragically useless. I was lost. These safeverseens, they… they had turned my head inside out. I had betrayed them, but not entirely. I had one chance left, one, to … No. It was too risky. My boss would find out. I looked at my Key-Deli-Ô-Scopic kit. My ôSes, my daily-S and my keyscopian lenses were all in their place, on my desk. I had to get online. I needed to check. In one move I put the lenses in my eyes, put my ôSes below my lips and in my ear. These damn sound piercings, allowing us to speak and listen in the Ô’Key virtual interface… I suddenly doubted that this was a good idea. Nevertheless, I put on the pieces of the tiny, soft tech tools that were the daily-S, and connected to the Key-Deli-Ô-Scope. With a flick of my hand I entered into my virtual Deliroom. The daily-S at the tips of my fingers allowed me to pick up a contact list from the virtual shelf. The Psychoscope instantly lit up: « You are not in your normal state, Aksel. Take another Paxificate. Your heart has a pulse of … » I was already not listening. The god damned Psychoscope, spying on my psychoaffective states. And its data history was going to be looked at by my boss… I never should have logged on.