The vending machine awaits your selection, yet seems utterly indifferent to it.

The vending machine awaits your selection, yet seems utterly indifferent to it.

Buy Jefa: Red and Black Blend Special Edition canned coffee.

A moment of tension -- but this time, the machine releases the canned coffee and delivers it to you with a short, sharp thunk.

Don't forget -- you work for me now. [Leave.]

The machine is as indifferent to your victory as it was to your suffering.

Actually, no thanks. [Leave.]

Jefa: Red & Black Special Editions are lined up behind the sheet of glass, so close yet so distant.

Consider the vending machine.

Automated, unfeeling commerce stares back at you. It is no coincidence that the contraption before you mirrors the proportions of a coffin.

Featuring a transparent lid for the necro-voyeurs.

Am I a necro-voyeur?

Caught in the act of voyeur-ing. The question now is: Are you content to simply ogle or will you reach inside and tickle the corpse?

I am its prey. It wants to eat me from the inside out.

The serpent that devours its own tail.

THE RABID DOG THAT DEFECATES THEN RECONSUMES.

Another apparatus that extracts money from me, great.

The machine doesn't care about your financial situation. Either it receives your money, or you do not exist.

Buying things from a machine is lovely. I would buy everything from a machine if I could.

That is the ultimate goal and they're already a good distance there -- the so-called Developed World in terrible action.

I am face to face with the future.

A ghost of the future -- in some circles, this thing is already considered a relic.

What's the most terrible thing you can buy?

A very dangerous question in a morally unregulated market.

Rumour has it that an old vending machine in Lower Viudas once sold anonymous murder confessions to anyone willing to pay ten sol.

Besides that... probably the one that sells second-hand auto-erotic asphyxiation binds.

Buy Jefa: Red and Black Special Edition canned coffee.

The coins vanish with a jangle. Nothing happens.

Nothing?

Nothing.

YOU WERE WARNED. THE DEVELOPED WORLD WILL HAPPILY UNBURDEN YOU OF YOUR CURRENCY IN EXCHANGE FOR SERVICES NEVER RENDERED.

Maybe this machine fears you. Maybe it doesn't want to give away a part of itself to a stranger, but 'market conditions' demand it.

Insert another 3 sol.

More nothing happens.

Suddenly, violently, you are aflame with indignation.

Outrageous! I need to take this out on somebody!

But who is present to receive? No one. This rage you feel can only be directed inward.

WELCOME TO THE BASELINE PSYCHO-STATE OF THE SO-CALLED DEVELOPED WORLD.

So what now?

That seems to be that. Now you are expected to relax while modernity eases it in.

But I've paid double the required amount.

... Maybe a little more money would do it?

I'm not falling for that. This machine owes me special edition canned coffee. I will collect.

'From who?', the shining monolith seems to jeer.

But what if nothing happens again?

Then the Developed World will make a fool of you thrice over.

WILL YOU STAND FOR IT?

You meet this latest existential ridicule with nothing but resignation.

Shake the machine lightly.

Something rattles within the machine's guts. The coffees sway gently. None fall from their rack.

Insert yet another 3 sol.

Nothing happens.

Until! The serpentine coil of metal jutters into life. Slowly, then all at once, the can of coffee is pushed forward and drops from its rack like a small dead animal.

An old lesson, hard-learned: in the developed world, money is always the way forward.

"I will remember this humiliation." (Reach in and take the coffee.)

The coffee can feels like victory in your hand. Your business is done here.

"All in all, a fair price." (Reach in and take the coffee.)

"I'm expensing this." (Reach in and take the coffee.)

Shake the machine harder.

Your hands glimpse the machine's full weight as it rocks back and forth. Still it does not give up the Red and Black Special Edition coffee.

CUMBROUS MOVEMENT, GLACIAL REACTION SPEED -- THE AUTOMATON MAY BE LARGE, BUT IT IS BEATABLE.

TAKE ON THE SO-CALLED DEVELOPED WORLD.

ENDURING THE WEIGHT OF ITS OWN CONTRADICTIONS HAS LEFT THE EXTORTION APPARATUS VULNERABLE. SUBJUGATE IT.

Crack the side of your foot against the side of the machine.

The machine whines on impact, but you feel nothing.

YOUR FOOT HAS BECOME THE GHOST HEEL OF ECONOMIC REGULATION.

The serpentine coil of metal jutters into life -- then the coffee drops into the dispenser like a small dead animal.

"The past sends its regards." (Reach in and collect your bounty.)

Nod at your bested foe -- then reach in and rip out its canned coffee-shaped heart.

That hurt. A lot. Expect mild bruising.

DISREGARD PAIN. A BLOW HAS BEEN STRUCK. THE PEOPLE EMBOLDENED!

"Take this, future!" (Kick the machine.)

"SURMALÖÖGI-CASCADE!" (One Shot Death Kick the machine.)

IF YOU MUST GO DOWN HERE, BRING THE FUTURE DOWN WITH YOU.

"Render the coffee unto CASCADE!"

With a creak and a splinter of light, the machine tilts towards you...

No words, just pull with all your might.

The last thing you see are a hundred coloured cans sliding forwards to crush you out of existence.

I don't want to 'go down'. (Back away.)

SHAME. YOU COULD HAVE BEEN A MARTYR.

"YEEEAAARRRRGHH!"

Extract what you are owed.

Your arm slides gracefully through the dispenser tray and up into the machine.

Alternative wording

This time, your arm slides gracefully through the dispenser tray and up into the machine -- your shoulder twinges, but the angle feels well-judged.

Are these things alarmed?

Some. Not all. Either way, they won't shoot you for this.

Reach just a little further...

Your fingers brush against the lowest rack of coffee. With a clench and a twist you snake a can out through the flap, to freedom.

This isn't theft, this is me taking what the future owes me.

It's the past that owes you this. Either way, it will not always be so giving.

This feels like a violation.

Don't worry -- it's a cycle of abuse.

Once more, your arm disappears within -- pain shoots its familiar river up your shoulder.

THE ENEMY IS DISMANTLING YOU, NERVE BY NERVE.

You slide your arm through and bend it upwards, awkwardly -- immediately your shoulder sears with pain.

You yank your hand free, clutching nothing but dead air from inside the machine.

Actually, forget it. [Leave.]

Alternative wording

Fine. The Developed World can have this round. [Leave.]

You may find it impossible to forget 'Jefa: Red & Black Blend Special Edition'.

Alternative wording

And possibly every round.

Among the rows of gleaming beverages, one pounces out at you -- this vending machine carries the 'Jefa: Red and Black Blend Special Edition' canned coffee.

Safehouse is anywhere!

But crucially, the coffee is not.

Delicious scarcity. Obtain.

ABSURD LOGOS, HOLLOW JARGON, PAINTED METAL. RESIST.

I suppose I could see what all the fuss is about...

The woman and her suggestive weapon would like nothing more than you investigating their fuss.

Is this actually any different than the coffees I've had before?

Of course. It says right there it's 'Special Edition'.

Are you 'special edition' enough to drink it? Gauntlet thuds against ground.

A monolith of gleaming beverages, encased in glass and light. Strange patterns and vivid colours abound.

One catches your eye in particular -- a striking red and black can marked 'Jefa: Red and Black Special Edition'.