[ anguished ]

... why am I still working at the Buy More?!

[she’s standing in a field, a metal contraption around her head, a chain around her ankle, and a voice speaking in her ear. She raises her hand to it, ready to pull it away - is it a weapon of some sort? - but what it’s saying distracts her enough that she listens to it all the way through]

What the fuck?

[A distressed audio message comes into play across the network. Accidental or intentional, whoever is on the other line seems to have turned it on in the middle of something.]

... Terrible, terrible, terrible... As of late, people had been accusing me at random for various crimes. Shopkeepers accusing me of market espionage for carrying a notebook into the store, women accusing me of being a pervert for using a camera at the beach, policemen accusing me of premeditated murder after evesdropping in on a conversation about American cinema...

[A brief pause in the rambling; the dramatic change in pose on the other end is almost audible. For some reason, he doesn’t seem to realize that it’s not a video feed, and it’s as if this is how he’d normally talk.]

But I never expected it to come to this! Now, even the computers are accusing me of being a criminal!

[Another brief pause as Nozomu reverts to a more sober tone.]

It’s such a terrible, terrible world where the belief that people are fundamentally good has been erased from the minds of a paranoid public that suspects everyone of being a criminal. It has even reached the point where they’ve developed machines that automatically accuse people of being criminals!

[Yet another brief pause. Three, two, one...]

I’m in despair! This pseudo-futuristic nightmare society where machines can imprison people at a whim has left me IN DESPAIR!!

Well, since I’m most likely on death row for crimes that I may-or-may-not have actually committed, I might as well just kill myself.

Cheri-dear... I hope you didn't forget. I'd be terribly sad if you did.~

As for everyone else... I've asked questions. Played word games. But that seems a little old hat, doesn't it? So instead, I'll give you this:

You get one question to ask me. Better not waste it.~

A... A criminal? I'm not a criminal, I've never done anything wrong! Wh-What is this thing?

[She makes an attempt to remove the chain on her ankle, and the sounds can probably be heard. She quickly give up, though, and resumes talking.]

...Len? Len, where are you? Can you hear me? I'm stuck here and... I don't know what to do. I want to go back home.

This is...

...really for real, isn't it? I'm not dreaming? Or hallucinating?