"I have seen the future," I say, "and it has become my own."

You stand, casting your eyes over the blasted, desolate plain, and slowly turn toward the sound of my voice. I am there, covered in the wind-driven dust of this lifeless place.

"The visions were incomplete before," I say. "I thought I could avoid my terrible fate. But I have been offered a glimpse into what is truly to come, and there is no escape. I have accepted my destiny."

"Rob," you say, "You are a total sucker. Utter and total. Sucker. You do know it, don't you?"

I cast my eyes downward at the objects in my hands. In my left, like a white stone tablet, is an Xbox 360. In my right, a copy - quite probably the expensive collector's edition - of Halo 3.

"Yes," I reply with a sigh born of centuries of despair, my soul sold of my own free will to a merciless overlord (you might know him as Bill). "Yes, I do."