It was a cold February afternoon at the -20’s celsius in the Siberian city of Tomsk. Lake Tom was fully frozen, and there were no signs of traditional winter swimming festivities around the river—another dying Russian tradition. Spending his 124th day without leaving his home, Arseny spent an hour between the unconscious and subconscious as he slowly woke up in his fully orthopedic bed. The past 4 years he had repetitive dreams of falling, in some dreams he was falling in an airplane and in other dreams he was falling down from a building, but the theme was all the same, a terrifying feeling of rapid descent. On some occasions his dreams haunted him for up to 3 hours after he had woken up. He wanted to get back on a normal sleep schedule, since he promised his newly divorced mom Alexandra that he would go with her to an all inclusive beach resort near the city of Latakia located in the Russian state of western Syria. He took a glance at his alarm clock which read 4:53 from a distance. From the day light outside he couldn’t discern wether it was morning or the afternoon, he had completely lost track of time. The clock for him was nothing more than meaningless numbers.

Just like 90% of all the other guys in his age Arseny was on heavy dosages of antidepressants which was prescribed to him by his online psychiatrist since he was 9 years old. Due to the ever rising suicide rates, legislation dictated that all people above the age of 8 had to check-in with a psychiatrist on a weekly basis mainly through hologram sessions, though video consultations were also permitted for those with slower internet access in remote areas of the country. Psychiatrists were AI’s who were programmed to identify mental problems from voice tones and facial expressions.

Unlike the EU, The Russian Federation was able to better preserve its nation with tough immigration policies. Regardless of any war around the region, their borders were always mercilessly tight and shut for any asylum seeking refugee. However, through the brainwashing of global media outlets negative influences of western culture had gradually made its way into Siberia where things like feminism, hypergamy and western promiscuous behaviors were becoming increasingly visible within the youth. Women in their prime were no longer dressing up fashionably with the highest of heels, they had adopted a more sloppy American style of wearing flip flops and pajamas in public venues. It wasn’t as easy as it used to be in the early 21st century to locate a feminine woman in Russia anymore. This advanced state of globalization had created a homogenous culture through out the world where women were acting more like men and men were becoming more and more emasculated and weak.

As Arseny stared outside from his bed he saw a heavy dust of flying objects in the horizon, it was the afternoon drone traffic. His house was made out of contemporary prefabricated glass and aluminum technology, which was inexpensive and could be assembled within days with a few robots. Since prefab took over the construction market with its economical and sustainable virtues, the architecture profession was no longer in demand, everything was built though sustainable prefabricated technologies like the glass house of Arseny. Low and mid income housing was not in the hands of architects anymore. There were only a handful of globalized architectural brands and stars who worked on special projects only for the government and elite, there was no such ideal as regionalism anymore. The house was elegantly located on river Tom, and it was so smart that Arseny didn’t have to worry about anything regarding its maintenance, privacy was not an issue too because the glass technology fully concealed the interior at any time of the day, but he had 100% vision of the outside world. He didn’t have to worry about electricity and water, it was all sustainably packaged to him by the house. And his special drone with his ID badge on it would bring him anything he desired in a matter of minutes. He was worry free, he didn’t have to fight for anything or do any thinking and he had absolutely no need to socialize with anyone. The high-tech world and his soap bubble home was satisfying all his needs and doing all the thinking for him, he was no different than a lion in a zoo.

As Arseny attempted to move out of his bed he was jolted as he felt a boiling hot hand on his back. When he looked back he saw laying next to him in his bed a beautiful blonde woman in her early 20s with hazel green eyes, beautiful soft skin, full lips, long legs, a tiny waist with proportionate hips and breasts and a nose which could be used on university textbooks in regards of its geometry. It wasn’t the first night Arseny had spent with this beautiful woman. They had spent a month together already. She was sent to him last month via a larger drone from an Apple warehouse and her name was Siri. 5 years ago the company had released a new female cyborg to satisfy men who were having problems finding a human match for themselves. The useless Siri we had known for asking stupid questions on our iPhone for the sake of entertainment had developed so much that it had become a cyborg with humanlike tissue. However, just like any other apple product there were bugs that always needed a fix, today Siri had an over heating problem, an update a month ago gave all Siri’s around the world a schedule to emit body temperature at night in order to further stimulate the feeling of real cuddling with its owner, but the update was still very new and had bugs, which could give a trauma to the more sensitive of men. Apple would have to pay a great deal of money for the upcoming law suites regarding this bug. But they were simply too big to fail. Their GDP had grown larger than many countries and aside from their purchasing of their rival company Sony, during the summer of 2027 they had bought 11 islands from Greece. They now had their own sovereign territories and passports for their full time staff which was at the number of 924.322 now.

Siri sarcastically said “good afternoon sweetie” in Russian and Arseny gave her a morning kiss on the lips and told her that he would be right back. Siri tried to give him a sexy look to make sure he would come back soon, her eyes were a little out of focus, another complaint millions had protested about in the last month. He moved to the kitchen to get his anti-depressants so to feel normal once again. Several times he had tried to quit cold turkey, but the medications would instantly bring him down to his knees if he ever tried to part with them.

The folks at Apple may have done a good job in creating Siri so beautifully, but no matter how much technology they brought into the world, humankind was never able to out smart the intelligence of nature. The human mind was still a part of nature and it couldn’t be fooled into receiving serotonin from a cyborg, the mind was aware and felt deeply that Siri was nothing more than a high tech inflatable doll. Arseny’s biological self desperately needed to get back in touch with nature, the evolutionary process of mankind simply was lagging behind of the rapid technological innovations which were showered into society. His body was still evolutionarily staged in a state of mind in which he needed to physically see his friends, laugh with them, he needed to play a sport, he needed a job where he could interact with people, he needed to go out and meet a real woman instead of wasting his time with Siri. But society had long forgotten these things, even in the remote Siberian city of Tomsk.
During Siri’s release 5 years ago feminists from all over the world had gathered in Cupertino around the historic building of apple headquarters 2 in order to protest the cyborg’s release, but demand was so high that no power on earth could stop it. Just like all the other technological innovations, it was a short term fix for a problem that needed to be solved in the long term. Siri would create long term negative affects on humanity, on a greater level to how the iPhone had indirectly created problems for society in the 2010s.
Arseny opened his fridge to get his medications, he took all 5 of his pills and then sat down at his kitchen table where there was a small 24X22mm shiny silver chip. He took the chip and placed it on the back of his neck. Then he causally said “password: arseny4938” and all of a sudden he was in a mode of trance. His body was positioned stiff and still, but his mind was gone, he was in a different world. His brain was online. There was no more desktop or laptop computers, the chip would directly communicate with his neurons creating a partial virtual reality for the brain which was also connected to the internet. Neurons were able to directly interact with the internet now. This was the latest technology from google and it costed Arseny only 0.0874 bitcoins (approx. 490$ of 2016).

To be Continued..