Life. It's all chaos and chasms, drama and death. It's alliteratively awful, unless you're one of the Blessed. One of the one's lucky enough to be taken.

My grandfather told me once, while he was alive, it wasn't always like this. People used to do something called 'laughing'. I mistakenly thought he'd said 'life-ing', and he told me I was pretty on the nose.

"Well, to be able to laugh, you've got to know what living – what real life – was," he said.

I had no clue what he meant. Now he's long dead, and only able to speak to me as his B, I still don't know.

And I'm not alone.

We of an effective hive have only ever known the drudgery of existence. The Blessed are elevated to the luxury of beyond the Great Wall, while we sleep in squalor and work whilst awake. Still, of course, in squalor. I loved my grandfather but, if he hadn't told me his stories, forbidden though they were, I'd not know any difference. I'd not miss what I'd never experienced.

Of course, they could have just been stories. Tales made up in his overactive imagination. His wistful look showed me they were more than that. He was back in his youth. He could manage a smile, however sad, and his tone dropped into a thoughtful meander back into his adolescence.

I was made to promise secrecy. To speak of such things was heresy. We'd both be taken, and not to be Blessed. We would never be seen again. I'd seen this happen to others, and no one knew what happened to them. Only that they never returned. Becoming a B, with our mortal selves being the A, was the only way to live on, and Grandfather had chosen that path after his second cancer diagnosis. The procedure was, apparently, agonising, as the brain was removed whilst you were still fully awake. However, it brought virtual immortality. At least until the sun might die, anyway. Solar power was the only power we had, and even that was diminishing as the clouds continually dulled to a semi-permanent grey.

So, as I pull on my gloves and wade into the offal of Humanity's past for the four thousand eight hundredth day, give or take a thousand, I tap my wrist and he appears by my side.

"Morning, son," Grandfather says.

He always called me son, even though I was that plus one. Dad was only ever referred to by his given name. I never did know why.

"Good morning Pops," I say.

"Another day in Paradise."

He smiles.

"Another day," I say to his B.

He smiles a lot now. Perhaps being a B is actually living.