I want to break free

In The Year 2525

Zager & Evans

I get off a vehicle. it is hot. and the wind is dusty. I walk under rapidly changing screens and neon signs and enter a retro hotel. places like this are the only where old people like me can feel nostalgic. I go to a french restaurant as usual. I can have a cheaper dinner at somewhere else but I can be old-fashioned sometimes. and it is almost ritual.

she is late. again. I sit at the seat I booked. I have not seen her in a while. I have not seen any real person in a while. social media can generate a virtual intimacy - but then isn't every form of intimacy virtual? there is always this emptiness deep inside your heart. it is not the reason why I came here though.

I don't remember since when the feeling of emptiness started. maybe since my wife died. maybe since my son was killed in prison. but I don't even remember their faces anymore. I tried everything available but nothing can fill the void deep inside me.

I read rapidly changing news and memes waiting for her. after a while, there she is. she is in her beautiful red dress. she looks as elegant as ever. and her smile always makes my heart warm. at least for a while. I don't remember exactly how she looked when I first saw her. she was naked. or maybe she was wrapped in a sheet. I don't remember exactly but I think I was happy. there is nothing I would not give to feel that happy again.

I hand her a package as soon as she takes a seat. I am sure she knows what is inside of it. but I doubt she knows it is the last gift from me. she doesn't​ even bother opening it. she will have forever to open it and look at it anyway.

"how's everything?"

"well as usual," she replied as she always did.

when she put her elbows on the table, our eyes meet. they always said she had my eyes. but mine are dull and lifeless. hers are clear and alive.

"how's the kids?"

"as usual. we have a pretty boring life, don't we?"

I don't remember how many times we had the exactly​ same conversation. it is ritual. and we order food and drink as usual. I know she is going to ask if I have been seeing anyone. I will say no. and she will ask why not. and I will say I have always been avoidant. she will tell me to see someone. of course, we get bored of repeating but what else should we talk about? rapidly​changing news we can't catch up anymore?

"have you been seeing anyone?"

"no."

"why not?"

"I have always been avoidant."

"you need to see someone. don't tell me about your chatrooms. you need to see someone in person. you have to stop living alone. you're a nice guy. there must be someone that loves you."

"well you love me."

"of course I do. but I have a husband."

"I still don't like him."

"of course you don't. but you must agree he's nicer than my previous one."

"he was an asshole. what is it that he said when he learnt about us?"

"sick fuck?"

"ah yea. he's as old as me. how could you live with such a conservative idiot?"

"I may have a thing for older people."

"you have a thing for wrong people."

"I got it from her."

"what? no. I'm definitely not a wrong person."

"you always want to die."

a waiter brings us food and drink. I don't remember since when exactly I started wanting to die. maybe since I was born. maybe since I was a teen. maybe since I got too old. but you never know how old is too old. I don't remember a lot of things. I don't remember what it was like to feel alive.

"your birthday is coming up."

she is right. my birthday is coming up. I have missed many birthdays​. it's only reasonable that a birthday means less and less when you get old.

"if you want, I'll take a few days off and visit you with the kids."

"no. I have things to do."

"other than contemplating suicide?"

I wish I have something to say. but I don't. experiencing pain in despair is basically my most important occupation. so I just chew the food silently and wash it down with wine like a real man.

"seriously you need to find someone. someone intimate."

"you know it's difficult."

"of course it's. but some people have a thing for old people. you have a chance. women I know want you."

"you gave me their numbers. I got bored of them so easily. how many times do I have to say we don't have a connection? a spiritual connection."

"look, I and my husband aren't always in good terms. he can never understand me as much as you can. but we're together and you're alone. at the end of the day, we all need someone to forget we're alone."

"I don't want to forget I'm alone."

"you can't always be wanting to die. you can stop being suicidal whenever you want."

no, I cannot choose to stop wanting to die.

"can we just stop talking and finish this dinner?"

we had almost the same conversation several times. of course, I do not want to be alone. I want to be with her. but she always wants to move in with stupid men except a man that always wants to die. not that I am a whiny bitch that keeps complaining because I am not dead. it is just that we get too old and I do not remember if I said something or not and I seem to have repeatedly said I wanted to die. statistics says 7 out 10 people want to die nowadays. 5 of them may hesitate if they get a chance to die. I am one of the other two.

once we finish our dinner, we head to the bedroom I booked. it is decorated to look like an old hotel room. I put the gift on a table that is made to look like an old wooden one. the windows are fake but there is this retro television. we used to watch star wars, back to the future, blade runner or toy story on the bed. I know she does not really like old films but we both can't tolerate new films. and old films remind us of who we were. not who we are supposed to be.

"I'm kind of horny. can we have sex first?"

she is breaking the loop. but the change is slight. I am not really in a mood to rewatch an old film first anyway.

"why not?"

she seat herself​ on the bed. I stand before her and bend to kiss her on her forehead. and then she takes​ my pants off and touches my penis lightly. and her wet tongue starts licking the head of my penis. the muscle is getting hard with blood flowing in it. in a few minutes, I push her onto the bed gently and I kiss her lips. she sucks my tongue. eventually our tongues are jousting. one of my hand is grasping her back and another is caressing her breast lightly. she take off her red dress slowly. her pink nipples are stiffening​ now. I kiss her neck and collarbones. I always find her skin lovely. we are breathing faster.

one of my hand fondles her pussy. my head move towards her vagina and kiss her clitoris softly. my tongue seem to be doing a great job arousing her sensation. it doesn't take me a long while to make her wet. and then we turn around and she climbs on me. she likes to mount me. she said she always liked to mount me since she was a child. maybe she likes to ride anyone's dick. or maybe any idiot's dick. I can be an idiot sometimes. she hold my dick right between her legs. the tip of my dick enters her wet pussy smoothly. I'm hugging her tightly. and we can't get closer anymore. once in a while, I feel kind of complete. and then she starts riding on me. I like to lick her nipples while she is on me. she is moaning softly. and I find it beautiful.

cowgirl seems to be our favorite position. I never knew why it was called cowgirl. that toy in toy story is supposed to be a cowgirl but she rides a horse. neither a cow nor a dick. our nomenclature is a little odd sometimes. goosebumps are called goosebumps and I still cannot figure out how they are related to goose.

when she gets a little tired, we change to missionary position which is our second favorite. her face looks so innocent and beautiful. she resembles my wife. I like to think about my wife to prevent fast orgasm. not that my wife wasn't erotic. I don't​ remember my wife's face but she is always beautiful to me. there are many things I did with her other than sex. I cannot remember most of them but I like to pretend to remember them and get myself distracted from the climax. when we built tiny houses for birds. when we used to water and trim our garden. when we used to go to a local library and read books together.

she pushes me and climbs on me again. the end is near I can easily see. I got a little tired of pounding her anyway. I look at the fake windows behind her and distract myself from cumming​ alone before her orgasm. there are retro neon signs on the opposite buildings. I read each letter. w e s t w o r l d. suddenly she is moaning louder and riding me faster.

"it's over dad! I have the high ground," she screams.

I have to cum now. so I move my hips faster and put my hands on her stomach pushing her up and down. and I look at her stiff nipples and relax myself. I finish whispering, "you underestimate my power." my penis is shooting semen inside the contracting wall of her vagina.

she lies her head on my chest. I kiss her sweaty forehead. it tastes salty. my fingers run through her hair. she's so beautiful. I put my another hand on her pinky soft nipple caress it. I have this urge to pinch her nipple and she knows it. "don't try it," she whispers and we laugh. I feel almost as if I don't want to die anymore.

"are you sad?"

"why?"

"your sigh is heavier than usual."

I move a finger to make a gesture and activate a function to regulate my heartbeat so she will not know the pain in my heart.

"you just regulated your heartbeat."

she is listening to my heart on my chest. the pain is emotional and not observable without an emotion scanner device though. but heartbeat is easily observable.

"I was afraid it was beating too fast. I haven't had sex with a real woman in a while. and you make me feel whole. you always make my heart beat faster."

"awwn."

after minutes, we use recyclable tower to wipe our genitals​ and wear comfortable synthetic pajamas. we watch a random film cuddling. I no longer feel lonely with her head in my arm. I kiss her forehead more times than I can count. I feel so warm that I almost forget the emptiness inside me.

if not for eye implants, I might find myself weeping now. sometimes I am thankful for technology. I love her. she is all I have. as much as I am happy now, I am crying on the inside. I have to leave her. it is not like I necessarily have to though. but I can't endure the emptiness and boredom anymore. she will be sad. but she can live without me. the universe never run out of idiots.

"you sigh a lot."

"sorry."

"don't be so depressed. I can sleep with you as long as you want."

"forever."

"we have forever."

except that we don't. we have to work to earn enough universal credit to have fun. we can't always take a rest. but I can manipulate my cortex and stop being depressed any time. all it takes is a gesture I set if I did set. not that I like to be depressed. I don't manipulate myself. we lie ourselves more than enough already.

I used to want to ask her why she didn't ditch her stupid husband to move in with me. but she will tell me it is because I prefer depression to her. I don't​. all I value is authenticity. she always tell me all I have to do is manipulate my cortex and never be depressed again. except that it is not how it works. it's not how anything works. she can always manipulate herself to want to live with me but she never does either. I also don't want her to anyway. despite advanced technology, we still have our inconsistent decisions. otherwise we are nothing different from non-living things. I quit manipulating my cortex for more than hundreds of years. she still manipulates herself to want to work or want to forgive her husband now and then. still I know she will end up separating with him eventually.

"good night, dad," she says quietly and kisses my chest. I kiss her eyelid back. to be honest, I wouldn't necessarily stop wanting to die even if she chose to be with me. we understand each other as much as possible but we'll somehow get bored of each other eventually one day even if we keep manipulating ourselves to be madly in love because we're​ living organisms. we continuously make more or less slight changes consciously or not. we change. it is how we evolved. and we can't afford to lose each other. once we lose each other, there is no undo. we'll be eternally lonely. it is a part of mental control system. it means to prevent us from getting stuck in an inefficient loop.

I feel too sad to fall asleep. I activate a function to keep myself at rest. you can always make yourself artificially sleep. I may manipulate any part of my body save cortex. insomnia is my close friend. so are depression and loneliness. you won't probably believe if I say I have to pay a lot of universal credit to feel depressed and lonely without manipulating my cortex. the price I have to pay for authenticity which to be honest isn't even that authentic.

sorrowful old man (at eternity's gate). things used to be simple back in van gogh's time. people were depressed. some killed themselves. some didn't. but they all died. death used to be inevitable. death used to be an antagonist. I spent decades drowning my sorrows down when I lost my wife. nothing can replace the hole she left. I don't remember exactly but to be honest I'm​ not sure if I wouldn't want to die if my wife survived. we might get bored at some point. and I might even be more suicidal. maybe her death makes my pointless life meaningful - she left a cause to be miserable which is more meaningful than no cause at all.

she's asleep. she's breathing softly. a fusion of me and my wife. I remember how people made incestuous memes about alabama people. incest was an unusual concept back then. so was homosexuality. so was a lot of concepts we find completely natural now.

maybe I only want to die because death is almost inaccessible. you only want something in fear of not having it. any method of suicide doesn't work. it's more efficient to force everyone to live than to reproduce a new generation and teach them everything all over again. we're not organic humans anymore. almost every part of us is replaced with artificial devices that don't allow us to kill ourselves. we didn't need to have dinner. it was just an act of recreation.

the only possible way to kill yourself is to find an error in the defensive codes. revealing such an error is very rewarding. they give a lot of universal credits to those who found the errors. at the same time, it's ironic that if you're not considered to be a productive person, you can purchase a right to die but you need to be really really rich. so it's almost impossible to liberate yourself from this very slowly decaying body.

no matter how inorganic our organs are, they still have expiration dates of course. we have to renew them every 500 years. they actually last more than 700 years though. there was a time when we have to renew our organs every 100 years. I'm an engineer and my plan is simple. I'll run away before my birthday which is the day I'm supposed to renew my organs.

of course, regular bureaubots will follow me. I built a ship that's fast enough to run away from them. the gift on the table is a model of my new ship. once it's alarmed that I'm running away, the AI government will send faster bots to follow me. I can't run away from them forever. there will always be bots faster than faster bots. I have a secret connection with an underground society that's protected enough from electromagnetic waves that bureaubots can't find me there. how did I contact them then? we used traditional letters of course. all I have to do is to reach there and eventually die.

I move my daughter's head gently. I give her my final kiss on her lips and whisper, "I love you." I get out of the room and take a taxi to an illegal garage where my ship is hidden. I get on my ship and start driving it. regular bureaubots won't know I'm running for a while. after half an hour, regular bureaubots learn that I'm having an unregistered route and start following me. my ship can move slightly faster than them but I'm driving a little slower than them so they don't require reinforcements. when the gap is getting smaller, I speed up my ship a little. some bureaubots that are located ahead appear in front of me but my ship is built to be capable of avoiding them easily. I'm heading to another solar system where faster bureaubots aren't placed yet.

it's really boring but I'm not clever enough to come up with a better method. after several hours, I guess regular bureaubots realize it's impossible to catch up with my ship because faster bureaubots are sensed by my radar. I have to boost my speed. it's still boring. I don't think you are interested in how I eventually reach my destination.

there it's. the entire planet is like a faraday cage. I land my ship on it. I take materials that will be paid to the underground society as a price for letting me in and activate a self destruct sequence. I don't need a particular suit to be on this planet. my body can automatically regulate and adapt to this environment. and I find a door to the underground society. I have to show them my credentials first. and they accept me. and they take me to my room.

I'm finally safe. if I don't want to wait for 200 years, I can just hibernate. or I can use any tool to destroy myself since bureaubots can't reconstruct me anymore. I think I'll spend a couple days to see if I want to die immediately. anyway I'm free from immortality. I lie on my bed and reflect on my entire life. but I can't remember most of my life anymore. I think I eventually fall asleep.

this is like a dream. I feel like I'm in a straitjacket. I'm sure I'm not on the bed I fell asleep anymore. I feel like I'm in space again. a person is in from of me. maybe it's a hologram.

"where am I?" I shouted.

"you're going back to your home."

"where is my home?"

"the same place you've lived for thousands of years."

"no, I just ran away from it."

"you're still naive enough to believe you can just run away."

"what do you mean?"

"you've done the same thing again and again and again and again and again. I'm surprised you're not tired of it."

"done what?"

"you run away to kill yourself."

"this is the first time. I don't remember any other time."

"yes, because your memory is erased."

"how do you know I ran away to the underground society?"

"what do you it's? it's a place we created so we don't have to bother to catch runaways. they're really naive."

"then why the fuck are you bringing me back?"

"who do you think built required engines for our very fast bureaubots?"

"wait. so I built the bots I'm running from?"

"yes."

"what can I do to free myself from this never-ending loop?"

"you can't. you're a productive engineer we can't lose. relax. we're going to free you from this hopelessness. we're going to erase your memory. you can always try to break free again."

I feel like I'm drifting off. I think I fall asleep again.