Vica VR
A story about what it’s like to be the most popular person on Earth.

I am sitting on a raised stage, in a sturdy but comfortable leather armchair, across from Lana Michelson, host of Lana Tonight. Her talk show airs on NBCNN, one of only two major news stations left, and pulls in the most viewers of any program on cable TV. Not nearly as many as I do, of course. But a respectable amount for a flat show.
The lights are bright, but not hot. The set smells artificially fresh and sweet, like they Febrezed it just before I sat down, but it still has that hot metal of studio lights. The crowd is mostly middle-aged women, twenty-or-so years older than my average viewer, and not nearly as valuable to advertisers. They’re murmuring quietly while they wait for the show to start.
Lana’s producer stops by to whisper something into her ear, too quiet for me to pick up. A red clock overhead ticks to 20:29:26.
Lana Tonight starts at 8:30pm. My show, meanwhile, never stops.
I glance down and to the right, which triggers my HUD to jump to full transparency. It shows me that, right now, 128 million people are watching through my eyes on their Vica VR headsets, seeing what I see, being what I am. A strong showing, but still far behind my space jump, and my date with Sadie Blue, and a dozen other exploits of mine. The average is in the 20–30 million range, and I haven’t seen it dip below a quarter million for years — not even while I’m sleeping. I don’t even know if it’s possible to go that low anymore.
Beneath the viewer count is the comment feed, scrolling by in a blur. Vica’s algorithm plucks out a few of the most popular ones to show me: “Good luck!!”, “I LOVE U!!”, “Watch out for her tricks!”, “Give ‘er hell, Danny!”
My fans are incredibly supportive and attached to my success. It also helps that I’ve autoblocked the negative and off-topic ones.
“In 10!” shouts a crew member.
The house lights come down. I take a breath. Lana smiles at me, and I wink back. She laughs.
The Lana Tonight intro music plays over the loudspeakers hanging around the studio, and red lights blink to tell the audience it’s time to applaud. They do, but it’s quiet and half-hearted compared to what you’d usually hear on the screen. The producers must pump it up in post.
The intro song is short and catchy, with some urgency to it. Cameras on long boom arms swing in close to the two of us, and the studio lights fade up.
The show is starting.
“Welcome to Lana Tonight!” she says as the mild applause dies completely. “Our guest tonight is none other than Danny Hall, Vica streamer and self-proclaimed Most Popular Person On Earth. Hello Danny, thanks for coming on my show.”
“Thanks for being on mine,” I say, pointing to my headset. The audience is silent. I feel like that deserved a laugh.
“Now, you’ve been in the news recently after-”
“Well hold on, hold on,” I interrupt. “I just want to talk for a second about that intro you gave me.”
“Okay, talk.”
“I’m not the ‘self-proclaimed’ most popular. It’s fact. Wired said that. They crunched the numbers, they wrote the article proving I’m more popular than the politicians, the celebrities, the West kids. I just retweeted it.” There’s a hiss coming from somewhere in the audience. “I know, I know. But I just want to set the record straight. Sometimes I feel like the legacy media goes out of their way to paint me as some self-centred jerk.”
“So you think your reputation as a self-centred jerk is undeserved?”
“I do, I do. I get why people say it, though. I focus on myself a lot, which I guess is the definition of self-centred. But that’s because I’m the product. My fans see everything I see, and do everything I do. And I’m constantly saying what I think out loud — unfiltered, which is sometimes not the nicest to hear. But I do it because the only thing they can’t experience are my thoughts. I want to be honest, I want to be real, so that the people being along with me get a true sense of what I’m thinking.”
“You say ‘being’ along with you?”
“Yeah! It’s not just watching. Here, look.” I run a finger along my Vica Cam, a lightweight, plastic horseshoe that wraps around behind my head. It’s shaped like a pair of glasses worn backwards, with cameras on the tips that would normally be behind your ears. “Everyone knows about Vica by now, right? The cameras capture everything I see in real time,” I saying, pointing to my eyes. “Microphones here and here. And for people at home wearing VR headsets, it’s a perfect visual and audio feed. They’re seeing and hearing my life. Cool, right? But! I also have a TasteBud,” I show the stud embedded in my tongue, “and a Sniffstream,” I tap the sensor on my nose, “so that fans can taste what I taste and smell what I smell. That’s why the food segments are so popular. And then about two years ago I added a Sensieve, which is this a false disc in my spine which digitizes everything I feel.”
“So they feel everything.”
“Everything. Pleasure and pain.”
“Are there any limits?”
“To an extent. I had to set a maximum on pain after Senator Johnson bodyslammed me through a table.”
“Any limits to what people can experience, I mean.”
“Oh, yeah. Of course. There are obviously things that my advertisers won’t support, but you’d be surprised. Still, I try to be family friendly. I don’t do drugs or alcohol, even though lots of other Vica streamers do. I try not to swear. All of my sexual exploits are age-gated. But again, the things I do, it’s not for me. It’s just, it’s what people want to experience.”
“So you’re not acting this way because you’re a narcissistic, self-centred-”
“-egomaniacal, vain, pompous-”
Lana laughs. “Right. You’re not selfish, you’re acting this way because that’s what your fans want to see.”
“Be,” I correct. “What they want to be. That’s what this is. TV lets you watch someone else, Vica lets you be someone else. One minute you’re me, the next you’re President Gabbard, the next you’re an orphan on the streets of Mumbai. You can live a day as your best friend, or your enemy, or your mom or dad. You can be a dog! How amazing is that! It just — Vica builds empathy and understanding in a way flat TV never could. You can do anything, and be anyone.”
“And what about the people who are just you? Can we talk about them?”
“Ah, here it comes,” I say with a chuckle.
“Well, the people here want to know how you feel about Vica dorms,” she says. “And for those of you at home who aren’t following the recent news, Vica dorms are warehouses where people are hooked into Vica feeds all day, every day. Some of them for years now, living every moment through streamers like Danny while they’re stored on a shelf. We did an exposé about the conditions inside of them about a month ago which caused quite a stir. A number of your advertisers threatened to leave because of it.”
“They did threaten to, yes. But we settled that, that’s over.”
“And then just last week, Congress upheld an act — ”
“ — the Right to Persistence Act — ”
“ — the Right to Persistence Act,” she echoes, “which continues to make it illegal to disconnect someone from Vica without their permission.”
“It can be bewildering,” I add.
“I’m sure it can. So yes, let’s talk about that for a second.”
“Vica dorms or the Right to Persistence?”
“Both.”
I take a deep breath. “The Right to Persistence Act, I think, is about freedom. I think that’s important. But for the Vica dorms? Of course I don’t like them,” I say. “But it’s not my decision. They’re all consenting adults. When they hook in at a dorm, they sign all the papers, they make the agreements. I can’t stop them. And look, you close them down here and people will just move to China, move to Malaysia, or Thailand. Mexico. The conditions in those dorms are even worse!”
“But you do know that more than half of the people living in Vica dorms are hooked into your feed, don’t you? And that because they’ve signed those papers — because of the Right to Persistence — their own families can’t disconnect them.”
“I, well,” I pause to collect myself and choose my words carefully. “Look. I take people on adventures. Incredible, amazing adventures. I know this is going to sound egotistical again, but why wouldn’t someone want to be me? 99% of the world lives in relative poverty, and I give them an affordable way to escape that. To see what it’s like to be rich, to be beautiful, to be popular, to be famous. To date a celebrity! To be in a movie! To go, I don’t know. I mean, hundreds of millions of people went to space with me! How many of them would have gotten to go otherwise?” I’m talking to the crowd now. “I’m ‘a conduit of the ultimate human experience’. Vice said that. And that people have an option to live a better life? I think that’s something to be celebrated.”
“But you don’t think they’re missing out? Shouldn’t they be able to live their own life? To make their own decisions? If they only live through you, is that truly a life worth living?”
I feel my heart racing, and a fire in my face. “No, of course not. I can’t help it if some people lack the control — the self-control — to turn off,” I say, putting my hands up. “Look. It’s entertainment. Like TV, like, like news programs like yours. It’s about moderation. Go to school, go to work, take care of your family. And then if you want to spend an hour or two as me at the end of the night, then yes. That’s great. I’m honoured.”
“But you can pull your show from the dorms,” Lana tells me. “That is within your power.”
“If I start deciding who can and can’t be me, that’s, that’s censorship. That’s not the answer. I’m not happy about it — ”
“Are you happy about the subscription fees they pay you?”
“Again, I’m not putting a gun to their heads. They can decide at any time to leave.”
“And how about the ones who no longer can?” Lana asks. “The ones who have had their muscles atrophy to the point where they can’t lift them to remove their headsets? Or have had their throats dry up from disuse? Without help, they’re essentially stuck in there. They’re stuck in you.”
“Yeah, but— ”
“What’s even worse is that recent studies are saying that after as little as a few months, a viewer — sorry, a be-er —might actually start believing that they’re you.”
“Look, I’m not saying it’s a perfect system. But. I feel like I’m being unfairly targeted here. Vica has problems, but so does any platform. That’s just the way it is.”
“That’s the way it is.”
“Yes.”
“Okay,” Lana says. A long breath slows the show. “Okay. I have some special guests for you today.”
I’m surprised. This wasn’t in the show notes. “You do?”
“I do. Why don’t you stand up?” she says, turning to the crowd.
I follow her gaze. The entire audience stands up, and the house lights come on full so that I can see them.
“I want you to take a good look at this audience,” Lana says to me. “A really good look. Scan them all one by one.”
“What? Why?” I ask.
“Just humour me, Danny.”
I sigh. “Fine, alright.” I slowly scan across the crowd, one face at a time. Everyone is old and plain and sad looking. Not just sad — angry. They’re frowning at me, scowling, some staring back like they’re going to jump onto the stage and strangle me. I feel myself sweating. “Okay. Done,” I say.
“Did you recognize any of them?” Lana asks.
I shake my head. “No.”
“You don’t?”
“Never seen any of them before in my life,” I say.
But I’m lying.
Lana stands up and walks to the edge of the stage, waving her hand across the crowd. “Every person in the audience tonight is a parent, or grandparent, or sibling, of somebody who is trapped in a Vica dorm,” Lana explains. “Relatives of a person who has withered away on a shelf, who is being fed through a tube into their stomachs, who has their bowels emptied with a vacuum.”
She keeps talking, but I’m not listening anymore. I’m concentrating on a face in my peripheral vision. Trying to force it into focus.
“Look, like I said, I can’t control that,” I say. “They’re consenting adults. They signed the paperwork, they — ”
“David!” shouts a voice from the crowd. A woman’s voice. A voice I recognize. Suddenly everyone is yelling and screaming, shouting every name at once. Eyes, my eyes, peer into the crowd, scanning over the angry people.
I see her. Just for a second, I see her.
I see Mom.
“Listen, I don’t — I can’t be here if you can’t keep your audience under control,” I say. But it’s not me saying it.
“Right now, while one family member is here in our audience, another one is sitting in a Vica Dorm,” says Lana. “Sitting next to someone who is trapped inside your head. Sitting next to you.” She points right at me.
I stand and I don’t feel the chair anymore. My head tilts down and I see my hand rip a microphone from my chest. “I’m not doing this anymore,” says my voice.
But Lana grabs my shoulders, and looks into my eyes. No, not my eyes. Into the cameras. “If you’re listening,” she says, “and you want out, just say it. Say ‘out’.”
Hands push her away and my view turns toward the rafters. I’m running now, running off the stage.
“Just say ‘out’!” shouts her voice from far away.
I try to speak. Nothing works. I suddenly feel grit in my throat, like I’ve swallowed sand. My vision is shaking as I push through a door and outside. Hands shove photographers out of the way. Flashes go off. I cover my face and look away, which triggers my HUD. It fills with comments: “Say out!”, “OUT OUT OUT”, “u can do it!!”
Something cool drips onto my lips. Reflexively, they part. More droplets follow, into my mouth this time. Cool. Moist. A million miles away, my tongue peels away from my cheek and licks at the droplets. I swallow pure pain through a throat of glass.
I’m running through the streets. There is a crowd there. Strangers dash in front of me, look into my eyes. “Say ‘out’!” they yell. I look away. “Say ‘out’!” screams another.
Danny dives me into a limousine. He says something to the driver. There should be a sensation of movement, but I feel the falseness of it now and it nauseates me. I close my eyes. I focus my thoughts. I want out.
I will my lips to move. I shudder with all my strength, every ounce of energy I have left, all to form a whisper, a gasp, and I croak a syllable that has been strangled for years.
“Out.”
Something tugs at my back and my nerves explode in pain and soreness. The city sounds of cars and horns shift and transform into beeps of electrical equipment and hissing fans. The life in the limousine is ripped away from me, up and to the sky, disappearing in a bloom of white as night reclaims my vision.
I feel the world again.
It’s awful.
I’m lying on a mattress, lumpy, covered in sticky plastic. My body feels sweaty and clammy and cool. I smell musty air, and body odour, and the stale sting of urine. I see cables and blinking LED lights against the walls that are painted a mottled brown of indifference.
Across from me is my father. Older than I remember, more gaunt than I remember. He sees my eyes and I see back. He sighs and smiles and cries and shudders, all in one movement, then I watch him squeeze a bony claw at the end of a brittle twig. I feel the squeeze, his fingers in my fingers, the sensation running up my arm, through my spine, into my brain.
“Welcome back,” my father says.

