Casimir’s face was scrunched up in a deep frown.

Opposite to him sat the chinchilla. It no longer harangued him with monologues of deliverance and holy retribution. Instead, it just grinned at him, a smug expression plastered on its rat face.

Somehow, this felt worse.

What did I tell you? First rule of fight club: don’t interact with the imaginary talking rat! Second rule of fight club, DO NOT INTERACT WITH THE IMAGINARY TALKING RAT!

Still, it was too late. What’s done is done. His hallucination knew. Maybe before it was like a split personality disorder, they could segregate their lives. Casimir would do human things and the chinchilla would do its own hallucinatory rat things.

Suddenly a brief flash of inspiration hit Casimir.

Haven’t I read somewhere that for a condition to be classified as a mental disorder it needs to conflict with social life? Yes! If you can still function as an adult, it’s just a psychological quirk, an eccentrism. Spice of life really. An amusing anecdote to tell at parties.

Casimir looked at the rat again. You thought you could win that easily? He matched the creature’s grin with his own, no less smug and self satisfied.

He went to the kitchen to brew a pot of coffee. He briefly considered that stimulating his mind any further wasn’t the right thing to do, but then he countered with the argument that keeping to his routine was the best proof he wasn’t insane.

“Can’t be insane if I still drink coffee,” Casimir muttered happily.

He put an Italian style coffee maker on the stove and lit the burner. Soon the pot started percolating and a refreshing aroma of freshly brewed coffee began to suffuse his apartment.

The rat thing entered the kitchen. Its nose was twitching furiously, evidently agitated by the aroma. It jumped on the stove and reached towards the coffee maker.

“It’s not ready yet.” Casimir casually slapped the paw away.

He waited until the coffee maker stopped percolating and poured the coffee into two small cups.

He took one of the cups with him and went back to his desk. The chinchilla followed after him. It walked on two legs, gingerly carrying the cup in its front paws.

Casimir took a sip of espresso. It was hot and bitter. He lit up a cigarette and deeply inhaled. Life was still good. So long as he could keep enjoying these little pleasures. What had happened to him was unfortunate, true, but it wasn’t the end of the world.

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He was growing ever more certain that there must be countless people in similar circumstances. It’s just that psychiatrists got their hands on the few who didn’t know how to deal with it like him. The key to mental illness was just a clear mind and hard reason. It wasn’t that hard.

In fact, if he remembered correctly, mental illness was mostly genetic. Which would suggest he wasn’t the only one in his family to suffer from such delusions, they just opted to hide them just like he did. I wonder who else, uncle Larrané maybe, wouldn’t be surprised if he had a talking elephant for a pal.

Casimir looked at the creature. It got back to its previous seat on his desk and was now in the process of drinking the espresso. It clearly developed quite a taste for it. It drank the whole thing in two gulps and continued to stick its nose in the cup, sniffing the remaining aroma.

Time to set some ground rules.

Casimir focused deeply and asked in his mind, “What do I call you?”

To his great disappointment the creature didn’t react at all.

He tried again, “Oi, rat thing! What’s your name?”

The chinchilla ignored him yet again. It finished licking its own cup clean and now moved to liberate the remaining liquid from Casimir’s.

Casimir felt forced to capitulate. He knew he had to establish some mode of communication with his hallucination that didn’t require him to speak out loud, but he figured it could wait for later.

He looked at the chinchilla that shamelessly finished the rest of his coffee without asking and asked, “What do I call you?”

This time the rat thing reacted.

“Savior can call me Danton,” it answered, using its paws to clean some droplets of coffee that got stuck to its whiskers.

Danton, huh…

“Very well, Danton.” Casimir started and then stopped. The ease of progress suddenly spooked him. It was time to establish some ground rules.

He gave the phantom a stern look.

“This is how it is. I am not crazy. I know you’re not real.”

The chinchilla gave Casimir a curious look.

“We’re slaves of the Tower,” it answered matter of factly. “Once every cycle we can nominate a hero to climb the Tower in our stead. For every ten floors they manage to scale the fate of our people will improve just a little bit. And should that person reach the top, we shall be freed from our servitude forever.”

Casimir’s reaction was to blush.

So. I’m suffering from a messiah complex. How embarrassing. He shook his head. Other people develop neurosis’ due to deep seated traumas, debilitating past experiences, and so on. As for me, I went loony because I wanted to be the promised savior to the race of downtrodden talking chinchillas.

Danton wasn’t privy to Casimir’s inner monologue, and continued his story.

“As per the covenant, when your world was chosen to be integrated into the System, I have been sent here to serve as an ambassador. The Compass of Destiny that was acquired with the great sacrifice of my people had revealed to me the way to the promised one.”

“You should understand that helping us is also the key to your own world’s survival. The peace your people have enjoyed is soon to be over. Your world will experience a tribulation like never before. Your strength will be key to your race’s salvation.”

Ah, here it comes. Casimir mused. Not just the liberator of the mole people, but the whole world.

“There are some matters I have to warn you about--” Danton was about to go on, when his words were interrupted by someone knocking at the door.