"...Suddenly he asked.
"Where is Beta?"
I stood holding my hand still over the keyboard. I wasn't prepared to answer this question, even to hear it, but I knew: sooner or later I'll hear these words. A constant and dull mental pain that tormented me and made me afraid of left alone for minutes, turned to wild and sharp, like a heavy clawy paw of a monster somehow appeared behind my ribs and grabbed my heart tearing it apart. I convulsively breathed in and saw that biomech's face reflected anxiety and question: he already understood that happened something irrecoverable. I've moved away from my work place and not sat, but rather just fall down on the metal box, and felt blood pulsing in neck and head. It's so awful thing when you understand how your body works, but completely can't control its reactions. You've lost the moment when you could try to stop what's happening.
I thought about Beta's words said when he was sitting at the same box: "We're living once, why should we deny ourselves something?" He was happy and laughing, and...
"He... - I finally answered and felt like it's not my own words, like someone just said the same to me. - Beta has gone."

June, 2022

Illustration, characters, "Phase shift" story © me, Kehhalar