Opus Veda

Flooding arrived, following a stormy night. Kasia and Eva awoke groggy. Downed internet severed them from reality. They lingered on the outdoor walkway, tea in hand, lazily watching the water beneath them. Autumn floods were regular; often shallow enough to stand in. But they dragged along trash, scum, and sewage. The price of bottled water rose in tandem with the rate of disease.

Ground floor Kendi residents fought to keep their homes dry. Already a new resident had been breached, left to plead for their neighbours aid. In the plaza children played floating on tyres and wooden boards, tipping each other over. Kasia refused to let Eva join in, not wanting a choleric daughter. Eva left in a strop and shut the door on her.

WiFi returned to liberate them. They dived in. Pundits and activists twisted the floods into political content - anti-revolution, anti-veda, anti-republic, anti-something - always wrecking down, never building up. Blackpool trended second - a bloodbath in the rain; a flood of Red heading north.

Great Ormond Street trended third. Kasia grabbed it and tabbed a hundred reactions out. She looked for Luca and Sermon but convention demanded the media blur faces. She made out Pierce and Varma; the former for his size, the latter for his voice, moving Kasia as if she was there.

Until his final words.

One for our man Luca.

He threw a Vedic mask into the crowd and left. Kasia's heart raced. A part of her still denied Luca's fate; still needed convincing.

Sermon was offline; the revolution hadn't contacted her; the fear of missing out struck. Shouldn't she have been fighting with them? Three times she had done so, yet Varma warned her it may stop there. Her decision to leave Riese was starting to feel dangerous, and premature.

She remembered something bigger. Her already brittle confidence shattered.

* * *

Leah left the breakfast tray outside her room for mum to collect. Living with parents embarrassed her, but these comforts made moving difficult.

She swivelled back to her desk. Her room was cramped but cosy, lit by a gaming rig festooned with LEDs - colourful nostalgia for the era she missed, and should have been born in. The characters and creatures she grew up with - plushie, resin, hologram - crammed the shelves around her.

On a normal day off she hid in gaming worlds, avoiding news and reminders of life. Today she had something huge: she was meeting a physical friend, in the physical world.

Nerves chewed her guts. She had eagerly told her parents about Kasia at dinner; both had grunted and stayed on their devices. Leah's anxiety began then.

Perhaps Kasia would cancel because of flooding? Her borough would be wrecked. Or maybe that hospital attack dad muttered about would postpone everything? The idea calmed her.

She caressed her arm, lingering on the freshest cut - the one she made after Ollie took her. People wore their scars as badges, sharing them online even where their faces stayed hidden, telling tales over hashed skin. Leah hid hers. She'd need one tonight, another desperate day masking her true, divergent self, from a friend she felt safe with and feared losing.

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Her phone pinged. Kasia.

'Czesc hows it going!? Flood bad here but clearing up. was wondering if you still want to meet?'

Leah checked her window. No more rain. One excuse down. She seethed at Kasia for putting her on the spot, and agonised over a response.

'Not too bad but bit lethargic. Pretty much the same weather here! Can meet later if you're sure you're good to come?'

A minute passed.

'Well if you want. Or we can try another day if you prefer?'

That full stop. It knifed Leah's dwindling confidence. Did Kasia mean to put that?

'I don't mind. We could try again next weekend?'

'lets do that!'

'Great!! We could also do it over video too if easier. Cya then!'

'CZESC!'

Leah planted her head down and gasped for breath. In another world 12 miles away Kasia did similar. Each found reasons to avoid the other, neither aware they'd squandered their last chance to meet.

* * *

The flooded areas finished their first clean up by nightfall. Coldharbour Ward locals swarmed up to the estate roofs, replacing the putrid smell with crisp air. Ten thousand phone lights merged, a starry sea mirroring the starry sky London stole from them.

Those with breached flats fretted over what their Landlord would do to help. Jason hinted at visiting Ali; Imany's scolding eye shut him up. Sermon was absent, and without a strong voice speaking and thinking for them, residents moped away.

When fewer remained Eva made her move. She tugged Imany's sleeve.

"Since we've had a flood, and it's my Birthday tomorrow, and my mum will be at work, and she won't get the present I want, can you please, for once, sing us a song!?"

The crowd cheered before Imany could say no. She folded her arms.

"Victims play the misfortune card. Survivors fold and wait."

"Aw come on Auntie Imi!" Eva hopped up and down.

"Don't you 'Auntie' me…"

Chanel wafted two fingers up, trailing smoke from the cigarette stuck between them.

"We won't record lav, 'ere switch your phones off!" the crowd lowered their devices as Chanel hacked a cough up, "gwarn lav give us a banger!"

Imany's face turned dark. She pointed at them.

"If I see anyone recordin' I'll throw them off the roof. But if it shuts you up for another year... Just remember I'm out of practice…"

She picked a forgotten song from the former century, Other Side of the Game, yet to be re-released or deleted. It settled everyone down. At the second verse she paused - eyed Eva mischievously - and belted out recent pop hit Chain of Fools. Eva squealed. The repressed singer within Imany emerged; the vocal breaks and doubtful vibrato died.

The crowd cheered and sang, stamping their feet and clapping. Kasia and Eva jumped about in an attempt to dance. Jason tripped over trying to outdance another reveller. The sight of their awful moves robbed Imany of her timing.

She calmed everyone and made them sit, finishing with a ballad. Its lyrics left them sad and happy - sad for the miserable truth given voice, happy that someone expressed their feelings. It was honest, immune to cynicism, free of self-aware irony, above the shame of admitting they had lost at life. No one dared ask what the song was - you were supposed to know - but Imany didn't want them asking anyway.

It was hers.

On it went, an original human-made song, never uploaded and ruined, memed and cheapened, perverted and exploited, by online agents. It would only ever be heard by human ears in the real world, the last lyrics of a breed driven extinct. The musician.

Lost in the moment, not a single person thought to record it.

* * *

Sermon shifted away from his door with a bleak smile. Imany still had it.

Nothing would get him outside though.

He opened Luca's dm's. The last five messages were Sermon's: four received and unread, one never delivered. The limbo of not knowing felt more painful than being told what he suspected.

The cracked mask lay on his sofa, begging to be made content. It would wink at him if it could.

His eye caught the cricket bat propped against the wall. It could have winked at him too. Sermon wrapped his fingers around its handle.

Unable to find answers, unwilling to shed tears, he did the next best thing. He smashed the mask into a white mosaic. Only his phone stopped him, buzzing with a message.

He grabbed it. It was Sergeant Major Pierce.

They were heading back.