Francisco's body jerked awake. A cold splash of ocean debris hit him in the face and he jumped upright to find a darkening yellow horizon. Where the hell am I? His heart beating a million times per second, he caught himself from flipping as his hands caught hold of the rectangular sand grave around him. He flopped in the high tide and pushed himself into a roll and out of the grave. Seaweed and wet foam crawled over him and back to the sea.

His body shivered and he looked down to find he was still in his black tie and tuxedo. The black laces of his dress shoes had come loose and sank into the red sand.

Red sand? was his thought. He shoved himself to his feet and stumbled to look all around him.

There was a red beach all around him, yet with the fading sunlight through the darkening butterscotch sky above, the crowds of families were heading home. The red beach was dotted in footprints, except where the high tide washed in, which was half-way over the red sand. The ocean was a swirling goop of blue and red liquid. He didn't understand it but considered all of iConnect a nonsensical, escapist fantasy.

Searching over the beach, he squinted his eyes and started to trod through the sand. His fists tightening, his neck twisting, he had intent to kill. Where are you, Zander?

He imagined the man lying somewhere on the beach, sleeping like a lazy fuck, sunglasses hiding his arrogant face. I'm gonna kill you, Al.

Along the path he thought he saw a man lying beside two blonde women, who both seemed startingly familiar. They were the only ones who stayed in that region of sand by the water, their feet getting soaked by the tide, and Francisco imagined they could be Al Zander and his two wives he had certainly trapped inside this virtual reality. Al Zander would still be at the beach no more how cold or dark or wet it got because of his stubbornness to stay as long as he planned previously.

A sweeping fit of rage, like a wolverine waking up to a start inside his torso, boiled Francisco's blood and Francisco started lumbering at an angry pace--

"AL ZANDER!" The shouts burst out of him like angry ghosts of burning corpses. "AALL ZAANNDDEERR!"

Spit dripped through the corners of his mouth and down his jaw. His ankles burned through the uneven sand. His eyes huge as his eyelids seemed to peel off while he had no more use for them. His eyes were to stay on that man lying there in the sand until he was lying there dead!

"AL ZANDER, YOU FUCKER!" Biting his lips, drawing blood, Francisco's soul had gone into blackness. He would dump Al Zander into limbo piece by piece after he mutilated every limb and chewed on them!

Some passersby and the two women who looked strikingly similar to Al Zander's wives turned at him with bizarre curiosity that suddenly switched to alarm. One of Al Zander's wives, the younger looking one, nudged the sleeping man on the chest and he snorted into consciousness. Francisco couldn't hear what she said or what he said in return, but Al Zander sat upright slowly, and the moment of recognition was priceless and undeniable. Francisco? Al might have thought. Is that you? What are you doing here? You should be running my company now that I'm gone... what the hell are you doing here?

"THEY KILLED MY FUCKING DOGS!" Francisco shouted.

Some passersby screamed and the Al Zander's wives began shuffling to their feet as the tide swept in and Francisco was coming closer.

The butterscotch sky turned to a fading brownish-gold, losing its shine into a darkening fade under the winking sun across the horizon.

Al Zander rose up slowly. "What!" He said, as though he could not hear Francisco.

"YOU HEARD ME, YOU INSOLENT SHIT!"

"WHAT?" Shouted Al Zander as his wives pulled him cautiously in the other direction away from shore.

The high tide was gaining depth and roaring loudly as it bulldozed over the sand and knocked their feet.

"THEY KILLED MY DOGS—BURNED MY HOUSE—AND MURDERED MY FAMILY!"

"WHAT!" Shouted Al Zander, again, his ex-wives now pulling at him to run away. But he would not budge out of sheer stubbornness and selfish curiosity. "WHO DID? THAT DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE!"

In a harsh, bellowing roar, Francisco screamed, "ANDROMEDA!" And he started running at the man who looked at him like he had had nothing to do with the annihilation of all the people he cared for on the Earth.

"Run, Ally!" Shouted his ex-wives as they let him go and broke out into a sprint all their own.

Al Zander, totally lost in the situation, turned half-heartedly in an awkward pivot that tripped his feet in the sand and knocked him down onto his knees. His beer belly washed in the rolling tide.

"Just wait a second, Franny! Let me explain--"

But Francisco's feet charged at Al Zander who was on all fours and one leg swept up and kicked Al Zander in the side of the head like a soccer ball and made a goal!

Al Zander screamed as his head and neck jerked and swung out like a tetherball on a rope and bounced across the sand. The tide which had previously rolled out now raced in like the mouth of a speeding racecar. "Stop--" Zander began before the foam doused him and spits of blue water and red sand showered over his concussed cranium.

"YOU'RE DEAD, AL! YOU'RE DEAD!" Francisco leapt onto Al Zander in a hefty, cold splash, and the butterscotch sky seemed to redden like the ground as the adrenaline picked up in his bodily tissues and he wrestled Al Zander with waves of kicking knees and neck clinging fists. He tried to catch Al Zander into a choke hold, but the rolling tied was so strong that it knocked both of them over, and Al Zander slipped out of his clutches like a slimy eel.