I gave a big stretch and slowly attempted to open my eyes. My hands brushed against the smooth, cold wall of my sleeping capsule. With great effort I fully opened my eyes and stared at the blankness around me. Arching my back, I stretched like a cat and yawned. I was still tired and could do with another couple of hours sleep. As much as I wanted to sleep in I couldn't, I had to get up; there was much work for me to do. I pressed a small button on the inside of the capsule and it retracted back into the wall. Swinging my legs off the bed I stood up and stretched again. With a low hum the rest of the capsule slid back into the wall.

As I walked over to the breakfast area my pod sprung to life. The south, east and west walls switched on. The news, weather, my own personal medical report, and latest work appeared spread over the three walls. My family, represented by little emoji's, bounced up and down in cyberspace awaiting my contact.

My pod spoke, "Good morning, Rik, how are you today? Would you like some breakfast?"

"B and C," I say.

I yawn again, nod my head and sit down. The surface of the table comes to life and shows different images to those on the wall. I swish them away with my hand and watch as my own personal screen springs to life. I see that Rik Leon, fifty nine years old, currently has a ninety two per cent rating for body health and a ninety eight per cent rating for mental dexterity. The centre of the table rises up and I can smell the freshly ground coffee and crispy bacon sandwich which has just been made. I pick the tray up and the platform descends back down into the table and when it closes I can't see the seal. I click on my favorite social networking site, iWorld, and sip my coffee. I have two hundred and seven new friend requests and start flicking through them. Pod, as per its programming, interrupts my reading.

"Do you want to know about The Battle of Chalons and hear how the Roman army, assisted by Germanic allies, defeated Attila the Hun and his horde in 451 AD?"

"No," I reply and sip on my coffee. The bacon sandwich tastes good and I order another. I'm halfway through my second sandwich when Pod interrupts me again.

"Do you want to know about Horseshoe crabs and their copper based blue blood?"

My answer's the same as before. The images on the wall change to show some conflict somewhere. Footage taken from dozens of cameras shows the same desperate images; soldiers dying, people crying, broken homes and bloodied civilians huddling together in abject misery. I swipe the images away with a wave of my hand and point my finger at a small square image of a mountain stream to the left of centre. The image increases in size until it takes up the whole wall. I finish my breakfast and head for the shower. Just like in the main room the walls have projected images. The same war or whatever it is fills the wall and I swipe away and say, "Bring up the music charts." The water's refreshing against my skin and I hum a little song to myself. I was just starting the third verse when Pod spoke again.

"Do you want to see pictures of Pedro, the seventh king of California's, recent wedding?"

"Yes," I answer and stop scrubbing for a moment. I'm not interested in celebrity rubbish, but I do have an eye for the ladies and I want to see his wife because she's magma hot. The images of her are beautiful. Pedro, tall dark and handsome in an immaculate suit looks good as well, but it's his wife, Charlotte of New Germany, that I can't keep my eyes off. She's dazzlingly beautiful; tall, slim but curvy, with the most beautiful eyes I have ever seen. She oozes staunch radiance and I gaze for a moment. When I'm finished showering I dry off, go to my dressing area and press a button on the wall. A row of clothing slides out from the wall and I pick the clothes I'll wear today. I put on a pair of thin linen trousers and a short sleeved shirt, both light blue and order another coffee. Images showing the development of Pod City 2855 flash on to the screen. The new city, consisting of thousands of interlocking spheroids, looks exactly like my city, Pod City 71.

Pod speaks again, "Do you want to hear about the Azerbaijan conflict, millions dead in religious genocide?"

I'm not in the mood for war and say, "No."

I finish the coffee and leave the pod. The air outside is clean and fresh. I merge into the crowd and walk with them in silence. As I walk Pod sends images to the social implant in my left eye. I ask to be connected to iWorld and go through my friend requests.

As I walk Pod speaks in my ear, "Do you want to see the results from the recent United States of Europe Presidential elections?"

"No." I walk on to my destination, passing bio-suited maintenance men- people from outside the City, and I'm glad that they have the suits on. There are all sorts of nasty things out there, viruses, pollution and other dangerous things and I don't want to get ill. "Bring up the pollution levels outside 71," I say to Pod. Facts and figures flash across my eye. "Give me an air quality reading in this sector." Again, Pod sends the information. I worry about the walls, worry that the pod might crack, worried that tiny terrors will enter my world and kill me. I ask Pod to send me a round- up of the death stats for the people outside the pods and they don't make for good reading. Seventeen thousand died from pollutants last night and thousands more are sick.

After ten minutes I reach my small work pod and go in. The pod springs to life and I sit down on the stool. Dozens of apps appear on the wall and I start flicking through them. I flick on the Grit Bowl and as I work and watch condemned prisoners playing football, battling it out on the field with weapons and vicious animals. South Mexico's full back has just been decapitated by a metal disc thrown by the Central Indian States' winger and the crowds gone wild. I sort through the friend requests Pod keeps sending through and vote in a dozen or so elections. I join a couple of new networking sites and have seventy instant friend requests. I pick out who I think should be the next President of Colorado and vote to end the Monarchy of the South British Empire; finally the Socialist Republic of Argentina and Chile will have the Falkland Islands back. I take part in a debate about where the next Pod City should be. I choose the Caliphate of West China but most people are picking Gaelic Britain. When I'm finished I go home. I'm not tired and decide to start earning my keep again. Pod sends through new apps, surveys, elections, and loads of other things which need input.

As I work a new message from Pod sounds in the room, "Do you want to hear about the terrorist attack on Pod City 146?"

I do and I watch images of bombs and gun fire as the terrorists breach the walls. The city sentries return fire and the terrorists are killed, but not before dozens of pod dwellers are killed. Seven hours of social interactive work later I'm exhausted and I get into my sleeping capsule.

I awake the next morning tired. Because of all the work I did yesterday I have a free afternoon. All those reviews I wrote and elections I voted in have earned me credits and for the next six hours I won't have to podalize. My emoji wall shows that my friend Flex (we called him Flex because he was always flexing his muscles) was also free from his pod. I got Pod to contact him and we met at one of the city bars.

When I arrive I see him swiping through images of yet another conflict, this time in the Democratic Republic of West Asia. We drink beer and chat. About twenty minutes into our interaction I hear a loud bang, an explosion of some sort and then there is absolute chaos all around me. Smoke fills the air and people scream. Flex is out of there quicker than a bullet. I run but someone bumps into me and I lose my balance and fall to the ground. I'm trampled and scream out in pain. People wearing army fatigues are blasting away with high powered guns, shooting the glass roof of the pod. I get up and run. The wall of the pod has a massive hole and I can see the world outside. Trees and buildings extrapolate over a flat surface and I can see clouds in the sky. Remembering about the pollution and viruses I cry out and cover my nose and mouth. Something hits me on the back of the head and I pass out.

When I wake up, I don't know where I am. Pod is silent and my left eye is blank. "Pod, where am I," I ask. A voice answers, but it isn't Pod's.

"Outside the city," it says.

I look over to where it came from and see a man I don't know. He's wearing a bio-suit, but his face is uncovered. We are in a wood and he's stoking a fire. The smoke stings my eyes and I don't like the smell.

"Outside the city, but the pollution, the viruses," I say back with a quivering voice.

What he says next shocks me. "There is no pollution, no viruses. The air out here is cleaner than in those damn pods. Your life is nothing but a lie."

I didn't know what to say. My whole world had just come crashing down around me, just like the city walls I watched disintegrate.

"Who are you?" I ask.

"I'm the maintenance man for your sector and according to the laws of the city I am also a terrorist."

To say I was confused was an understatement. I needed to know more. "Go on," I said.

"Okay. For all of your life you have been living through a series of lies and deceptions. Pod Cities are nothing but one companies attempt at controlling the masses."

What company? Who are the masses? I thought.

He went on, "About seven hundred years ago a man by the name of Anders Gustafson saw how powerful social networking sites had become. He watched as people walked down the street head down playing with their phones. He watched couples in restaurants spend more time interacting on their phones than interacting with each other. He watched as footage from far away wars was beamed to the world as it happened. Suddenly, it was the mobile phone and not the sword or gun which wielded power. Leaders rose and fell because of the networking sites. Kings and queens were crowned on the basis of how many 'likes' they had. Elections were won by people sitting at home pressing a button rather than visiting voting booths. Laws were passed in an instant and repealed hours later when the 'dislikes' took over the likes."

I struggled to comprehend what he was saying to me.

"Gustafson saw something in that. He built a city and invited those networkers who interacted the most to come and live for free. All they had to do was interact with their smartphones. Thousands agreed and after a couple of years he built another city, then another and another. The rising population meant that he had a steady stream of bodies willing to join him. The cities spread and so did the technology which his scientist progressed. He made billions. With the money he could research better technology and his scientists advanced the fields of medicine and technology. Soon space exploration, genetic engineering, the extension of the human life, the fountain of youth were all suddenly a reality. He promoted advancement within the pods, but suppressed advancement outside them."

He paused and drank from a steaming cup. "People in his cities spent all their lives on their machines. Soon they were living in single pods like yours and just like you the only time they physically interacted with people was during the free time that they had earned through being anti-social. He needed to give people a break from networking because some people developed serious psychological conditions from all the information they were receiving. Meanwhile those who couldn't afford the technology were left to fend for themselves. With less talented scientists advancement was slow and after a couple of hundred years those on the outside gave up and just lived as best they could." He stoked the fire, sipped on his drink and continued. "Sure a new weapon or new medicine was developed on the outside sometime, but compared with the advancements inside the dome those advancements were pathetic. The Pod owners are the real rulers of the world. They create and destroy empires and control the leaders just like the Germanic generals who controlled the puppet Roman Emperors in the last years of Rome."

"It's not true, you're lying," I said to him.

"Really, well explain to me this then. How many times in all your life have you interacted with your family?"

"All the time, I saw my dad yesterday."

"Did you?"

"I did."

"No you didn't. That meeting was implanted in your mind by your pod."

It was getting worse and I didn't want to listen anymore, but my companion continued.

"In your left eye you, as you know, have a small implant allowing you to stay tuned into your pod. When you sleep images are planted in your mind, images of family interactions. Those images are fake. Gustafson's scientists perfected genetic engineering. You do have parents but you weren't conceived or born like I was. Two people, sixty years ago worked hard enough to have cells extracted from their body. You were grown in a lab and when you got too big for the Petri dish you were implanted into a surrogate body, a body just like my wife, who has to carry people like you to full term to live in this un-holy world. When you were born you were taken to a massive nursery and there you were brought up by the networks and nannies. You were created to be a voter and nothing else. As your maintenance man I know all about your stats. You have absolutely no inclination to be a father, so your pod doesn't feed any images or sites which would make you want to reproduce."

"None of this sounds right. If I am controlled by my pod, why do I go to work? Why don't I just work in my pod?"

He scratched his chin and answered, "That's a good question. The reason is this. When you work you are still attached to the pod, which means that everything you do is doubled. Every vote you cast, or app that you like is doubled. That means more cash for the rulers. It's all a con."

I didn't know what to say and wished that this was all a dream. "When can I go back to my pod?" I asked.

"You can't go back."

"What do you mean, 'I can't go back'?"

"You can't, your city has been destroyed and tomorrow another will be destroyed. The revolution has started and it's spreading fast. Today it's the countries of the Americas, tomorrow it's USE and the next day it will be somewhere else."

"But why?"

"There are more people in the pods than outside. All of the best scientists and doctors live in research complexes within the cities. We on the outside are suffering. Our medicine, technology and everything else we need to survive is sub-standard. People die from disease and conflict over resources. To get medical supplies and other things that you take for granted we must be part of the lie. They make us wear these stupid suits to make you believe how dangerous the real world is. I work for days at a time with very little rest and all to keep this lie going."

"Is there another city where I can go?"

"There is, but do you really want to go back. Once the revolution gains momentum we will be able to better equip our army. The pod dwellers and leaders will be exterminated, but we will spare the scientists and once we are strong we will change the world."

When it had all sunk in I walked back towards the city. I stopped on a high ridge and looked down at the burning ruins of Pod City 71. The ridge is high and as the wind rustles through my hair I wonder how long it will take to reach the bottom.