Buy or Die. There cometh a time of ruthless advertising - Theodor Ventskevich

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very close to his ear. Z, as if stung, turned around.

      The cook, turning white, slowly dropped a loaf from his weakening hands. Z watched closely as the loaf slipped out of the cook’s fingers, fell to the floor, jumped, and flew off into a corner. It calmed down there, rocking silently.

      The cook stood several seconds, motionless, listening to himself.

      “I beg your pardon,” he said in an apologetic voice. “I am dead.”

      He gathered his strength, and for the first and last time in his life, said a complex sentence:

      “Please do not tell the company. Maybe I will recover.”

      The cook fell silent, dropped his hands, and his eyes went out. There was silence. Z waited for a little, looking inquisitively at the cook.

      “No, you will not,” he decided and, standing up from the table, cautiously approached the loaf that was still lying on the floor. In the fresh cut, something glittered dully. The loaf stirred, and Z hastily recoiled. Something within the loaf hissed, clicked, and started to pour out silent sad music.

      “The cook is dead and burning in hell

      There is no use in ringing the bell

      The Devil devours your breakfast now

      You may choose to object but I wonder how,”

      a sweet velvet baritone sang. Then there was a pause, after which both the music and the baritone became considerably merrier:

      “You are making a mountain out of a molehill,

      Cook is all dead and is not going to heal

      We will remove that damned corpse for free

      And replace with Kitchener at no fee.

      Kitchener is great, Kitchener is smart

      Kitchener is famous, state-of-the-art.”

      “Each Kitchener cook,” confidentially informed the voice that had settled in the loaf, having finished with the couplets, “is guaranteed to have an IQ above sixty, thus easily detecting any foreign elements in food. Needless to say, this ability can substantially prolong both his and your lives.”

      Three coins rolled out onto the table with a ringing sound – evidently a refund for the corrupted bread.

      “And what about the cook?” Z exclaimed resentfully. “Or do you think it was free?”

      The loaf, it seemed, was just waiting for this.

      “New cook for absolutely no fee!” it announced. “Just bring your old cook to us and we’ll replace it with a new Kitchener for free! New Kitchener for your kitchen! Twice as fast, three times as delicious, four times more intelligent! Kitchener and your kitchen! Kitchener for your kitchen. The kitchen is Kitchener.”

      “What insolence!” Z hissed.

      With disgust, he lifted the loaf with his two fingers and sent it to the trash.

      “Kitchener!” the loaf managed to repeat before his death.

      Z looked anxiously at his watch. He was already late, and now he had to take care of a corpse. A corpse that was cooling down rapidly, and which Ness only yesterday, with great difficulty, taught to cook pancakes with apples.

      “Where can I fit it?” Z looked around helplessly.

      It appeared that to hide the corpse, even the corpse of the cook, in a modern kitchen was not that easy. All in all, it looked as if Z had to take the cook to work and then, in the evening, on the way home, replace it with that damned Kitchener. There was no other way.

      Z looked at the cook. The cook’s jaw fell open, and both eyes rolled to the bridge of the nose.

      “The perfect colleague!” Z sighed.

      “Seven hours and twenty-four minutes now,” came a smooth voice from the bedroom. “Which reminds me about ‘24’ cafe, where every 24th visitor gets a free cup of coffee.”

      “Oh, shit!”

      He was really late now. He gulped his coffee and looked at Holmes, who was scrutinizing him closely from his corner. Z shook his head.

      “Sorry, buddy, I do not have time. Ness will take you for a walk as soon as she is awake.”

      “You are a stupid stinky goat!” the dog collar translated.

      Holmes remained Ness’s dog. Neither half a year of living together, nor kilograms of sausage could soften his canine heart.

      “I love you too,” Z replied. “Be a good dog: try not to bite off your balls when you wash yourself up.”

      “Worse than a goat,” the collar translated. “Cat’s goat!”

      ***

      Z looked at his watch: almost half past seven. A little more than half an hour before the morning instruction…

      He put on a suit and, tapping on the lapel, tuned the color to his favorite dark blue. Then he scrutinized the back in the mirror. Today, the advertising space was filled by a trailer for the new thriller. Lately, the trailer was in a hot rotation, but Z had still not seen the film yet. He remembered only the name: “4981”. Or was it “1984”? After the film industry eventually gave up the bad habit of giving names to its offspring, Z constantly confused them. Might as well be “9841”. It’s a pity Ness is asleep. She would have known for sure. She has too much memory for one person.

      As always, having remembered Ness, Z lost his vigilance and kept his eyes on the trailer a little longer than he should have. After viewing it four times, he finally pulled himself back together: luckily for him, it was only a trailer.

      There was less and less time remaining. Z put on his spectacles (he’d rather forget their price right after he bought them), put on the headphones, poked new filters into his nostrils and, with cook under his armpit, quickly left the apartment.

      He closed the door, and stood motionless for a moment, watching the gray walls of the corridor sliding forth, slowly dissolving in a soft, dim light. Then he leaned forward a bit, took off his spectacles, and met the wave that rushed towards him. He rocked back and smiled. It’s useless to oppose the sea. Because it was the sea: the same mighty waves, tearing each other in splashes and foam, the same invincible power. Only instead of water, there was onon, theon, zeon, and even good old neon and xenon. Waves of light rolled along the corridor, mixing and merging with each other, raving, clashing and bursting, wetting the walls and ceiling with spatters of luminescent foam. Advertisements of this and that. News, announcements, and trailers. Notifications and messages. Appeals, warnings, cautions. Pointers, inscriptions, graffiti. Holograms, instagrams, projections… Z knew that oceans of sounds and smells were raging on the same space at the same time, but he was not crazy enough to mix those drinks.

      He gasped and hurriedly put his glasses on. The gray walls cut off the colored madness like a guillotine. The only reminder left was the barely noticeable logo of the glasses’ manufacturer – it was hardly visible but it was something that was always present and everywhere.

      Z shook his head harshly to get rid of the colored spots that were floating before his eyes, and having adjusted the cook under his armpit, hurried to the elevator.

      ***

      And yet the glasses were worth the money. They filtered everything except for the “ghost-walkers’ which, although forbidden, still crowded the streets. A passerby would change his direction suddenly and, with a friendly arm around your shoulders, whisper intimately in your ear: “Best sushi in town. Fifty meters straight and twenty to the right. I swear, you will eat your fingers with it!” and immediately melt into the air. It was near to impossible to indict or fine their owners. Z made it down to the garage and started

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