7

V never was alone. Never. Even in a crowd of complete strangers did he have someone to get encouragement from, share impressions with, someone who understood him from half a word. Better than any companion was that someone because that was V.

What?! 2-in-1? Doubled? Cloned? Schizocleft?

Whatever. It was just V. Simple as that.

At times they could disagree on a petty issue of an abstract topic, maybe on a couple of issues, those two Vs. Even a dispute could flare up between them, yet sooner or later there evolved, albeit shaky yet final consensus. Or else one of then had to shut up. As a last resort. Anyway, it stands to no reason, arguing with such a stubborn blockhead, right?

V didn’t gave much thought to why it would be that way. He just got used and felt comfortable enough without asking too many questions. After all an attempt at even most thorough, diligently all-aspects-included answer to any“why?” would no more than slightly scratch the surface of the slope in the mountain rising under the clouds, the Everest of all the possible causes and reasons for why that happened possible. And it’s also very likely, there would be left no scratch due to the incomparability of their masses—the mountain and a chance answer singled out from all the possible ones, fairly uncountable.

However, at this current moment they achieved an absolute harmony and both Vs acted unanimously, and they jointly opened their mouth (one for two) and their mutual jaw dropped in utter perplexity. Stack-overflowing bewilderment filled both of them…

(*Damn it’s real hard to go down that road, the further the bumpier it gets, clogged with impeding blocks, more and more complicated and impassable turns the path thru the rank grass with the snakes snakes of spelling rules, the thorny hyphens at ready to whip, to stick out the travelers eye, and from behind the withered trunks gloating ghouls ooze and drip from rotten fangs their sticky-stinky, green and pale poison of stylistic appropriateness, snarling scumbag assholes!

Woe me! No way for a hero to scamper over all those Indo-European roots and the land slides of vowel shifts – they are too many but our hero has just two legs for both of them.

Damn! Looks like the only option’s revving back into the lap of the orthodox grammar… but then, repentant sinners are always welcome,.. compare the fate of Giordano with that of Galileo and calm down)...

His stare (Attaboy! Already in singular, not “their”! You can conform to the basic requirements after all. Keep on behaving!) stuck to the monitor Philips which was addressing him personally:

“Look here, V, whenever there would pop up another prophet blaring out about God’s death and stuff, the best policy would be to check if the announcer was a certified coroner– don’t let them fool us by throwing their epilepsy fits.”

The nightmarish nature of the impossibly quaggy situation (how else would you characterize a snafu when, yes, mutely but still you are addressed by your monitor, in white on black, using your first name with a touch of brazen familiarity) was further aggravated by the fact that V knew his answer to this deceptive admonition.Yep, he knew it without even scrolling down to the next line, below the monitor frame.

What’s the use of fiddle-faddle tricks? He recognized his own thought thought by him a week ago. A fragment of his endless chatting with himself it was. They gossiped, yes, not constantly but often, mutely yet easy, like V to V.

But struck at last the star hour and he pronounces it aloud, using his anatomy speech apparatus, distinctly pronounces V his answer before caressing the wheel in the mouse’s back (exactly between its shoulder blades)—yes, yes, yes, pronounces aloud but not within his brain, pronounces before there will surface the line with his answer:

“The shocking truth, bro V, is I do not give a fuck about any wise advice like yours, when enjoying the resplendence of a line wrought craftily, so will you most kindly shut up?”

Yep. Exactly. Word by word, ditch it or like it. The line flowed up, the prove irrefutable that Lex’ story was not a blab of mind meandering on high, no fucking chance, the evidence was solid as a rock. The Firm he worked for was catching thoughts okay, from that… what-you'd-call-it, noosphere, eh?

Here it was, his, V’s, 2-in-1 thought got in the total catch of their gillnet. Welcome to the new shining world, V!

He leaned on his throne back busted and dull like a bum thrown out the back door, flabber-fucking-gasted by ramming into the unthinkable discovery.

‘...so that’s how it stands…’, echoed along the curbstone newcomer’s convolutions of his brain, ‘...that’s where we are now… huh?. so what then?.’

Thinking was clearly out of whack. His tries at it slipped over and over again. Because of mute clangs in his middle ear. The vibration spread from the temporal lobes to the pituitary gland and back, yet neither lobes nor gland could hear, lost no less than he in the myriad-folded implications of the sprung-up situation, besides, they were devoid of ears.

And right then, rumbling deafeningly, rushes in the crush-all freight train of of endless unpredictably all-embracing-and-overturning consequences to what had just been revealed to him…

For fucking sake! That’s simply…

There sounded the croaks of Samsung bleating its factory settings, cutting hazy,shell-shocked tries at thinking, from his pocket.

What the fuck! It cannot be! He hadn’t made a single call with his virginal SIM card! Not a fucking call from this number!

Nonetheless, kicking off all hesitations, V answered. The moon-like map of Lex filled the screen. Disturbed and wiry. Too disturbed for the present phase of the full-moon.

’I can’t talk, V! Just believe me. Run! Right now! You’ve got maximum half-minute…

The screen died.

‘What the fu… Was not he arres… My number's compromi…???’, and a bunch of similar half-processed thoughts dashed ahead in their relay race while V—the phone shoved backed in his pocket and followed by the 2TD card plucked out its slot in the PC—was running up to his apartment door.

On the landing V tarried a second reading the blinks of digits by the elevator door. After two more levels it would be here. He closed the door with his heart beating louder than the key-click.

V ascended the two stare-flights to the next floor and stopped. To watch. Unobservable.

The elevator slammed open opposite the door just locked by him. Three men in black, exchanging no words or gestures, stepped out. They acted like a well-trained team of professionals, each one performing his part in the routine.

The team stopped close to the wall by the doorjambs. Two of them took out their heatsin an open businesslike manner. The third rang the doorbell which sounded within yet remained unanswered. With a disapproving smirk, he fetched from his inside pocket a small bunch of skeleton keys, gave them a sharp look and separated one from the dangling company.

The lock gave out a tame submissive click. The armed part in the team entered the apartment with their tools at ready, the locksmith stayed outside.

Now the specialists wold see the working computer in V’s room. Then they would check his bedroom, kitchen, and the restroom, and then…

Carefully V took a soundless step backward...