TV
“Good evening!” roared the TV. “What are we going to watch today? Porno, seamy side, domestic squabbles, LOL, gangster romanticism, soap operas, endless politics? Your choice, sir, lies on a finger-tip, pushing the button on a remote TV set. There is nothing more primitive than that!”
“Can this be called a choice at all?” the man sighed wearily.
“Take what we give, make yourself deaf!” TV bellowed with rage.
“And what if I am not a part of that all-watching crowd?” asked the man. “Then what?”
“Oh, surely, you are not ‘them’! You are simply my old admirer. My toy. My endlessly watching contemplator. My beloved seeker. My switcher and gazing-one. To put it briefly, my slave. Yes, slave?”
“I am not a slave, you, fool!” the man took offense. “I am just sort of a tired worker who simply needs to relax somehow and kill some time.”
“What a stupid desire!” gasped TV. “But it quite satisfies my spirit nevertheless. After all, I was made specifically for the purpose of killing your alternative opportunities, you know? Tirelessly speaking box in each and every mind and house – what can be crazier than that? After all, you want to kick the bucket, right?” TV winked with all its channels at the same time.
“How's that?” the man didn't understand. “To play the bucket?”
“It's sort of phraseological unit, you, blockhead!” TV teased the man. “Though, however, it can be very well combined with my main mission, by the way. To provide you with qualitative boxes. Such excellent and firm ones, so that you cannot escape from them anywhere. Well, or only straight to…” it added significantly.
“Are you even going to show me something of interest today, aye?” the man became angry. “For I am not going to enter into philosophical discussions with you, by the way.”
“And you, by the way, wouldn't be able to do that, even if you were willing to,” TV bit in reply. “First and foremost, due to your current state of mind, for I have been working to make it as such during recent years. And secondly, actually, I don't have anything of real value, for a long time already. I have different goals in mind, do you understand?”
“Like what, for example?” the man didn't understand.
“Ones to make you shit, ignore the reality and laugh like mad, and the more often you do that – the better,” TV declared in plain terms. “And don't even dare to think of anything other than that. To think, you know, is generally harmful. Therefore, I have been doing that for you for many years already, I can easily sustain that, for they have made me like iron. By the way, your wife just returned back home – do you hear that? Rattling there with keys, opening the door. So, go ahead, make me louder and tell her that you are very busy at the moment, very tired, very ‘this’ and very ‘that’, and thus cannot help her with household duties in any way. Not to say anything about playing with your own little child. Or simply to read some clever book. Or to go somewhere together with all your family. Or to meet your relatives. Or… simply put, don't even dare to distract yourself! Stick with me, and everything will be upright! My mustaches are already moving with anticipation of what I am going to show you today in prime times. Such a thing…!”
“What, a Second Coming itself?”
“N-o-o-o!” TV wrinkled. “You will never learn of that through me, don't even think that way. And better never-ever think at all, even though I have already told you that, – but, well, such a repeat makes you all bleed. A Second Coming, huh!” TV sniffed. “That's old news! No, I have other things so much more suitable for you, stultified idiots. Plane crash! Hundreds of victims, a sea of blood, a mountain of corpses, perfect sensation! Wanna see that?!”
“Certainly, I want!” approvingly shouted man and moved closer to the TV screen.
“That's what I am calling – ‘to kick the bucket’,” approvingly replied TV, switching the channel. “We'll soon provide all ones like you with spacious boxes nevertheless,” it added slightly more silently.