The gray walls of Bradford's modest realspace room faded away as his lenses projected his far more opulent virtual space directly onto his retinas. The feel of his simple but ergonomically sound office chair vanished, his nerve endings tingling for a moment as the haptic implant on his spine activated, and began sending artificial impulses to his brain that brought his senses of touch, smell, and taste into the virtual world.

He flew through the air, leaving his cozy private world for the public virtuanet, skipping between hubs of activity with brisk mental commands. Like most people, he eschewed the anachronism of walking, for the most part. You weren't bound by real-world space and physical limitations on the virtuanet, and he saw no reason to pretend that he was, though the older generations might disagree, seeing natural locomotion as an essential part of the human experience. A waste of time, as far as Bradford was concerned.

Which is why he was surprised to find himself suddenly standing in a public park, unable to skip past it towards the concert venue that was his destination.

"Hello," said a lilting, musical feminine voice. He turned and saw a beautiful woman with reddish brown hair and brown eyes, dressed in a long flowing gown. She held a small, pitiful-looking creature, cradled in her arms -- clearly an extraterrestrial. It looked like one of the more sympathetic species that had been discovered, with it's large sad eyes and chubby little uncoordinated limbs that gave it an adorably childlike appearance to humans.

All around Bradford, a soft sorrowful melody began to play, as though produced by an invisible orchestra. He groaned. He paid subscription fees to all the major hubs to avoid commercial advertisements, so this encounter could only mean one thing: he'd been randomly selected for a Public Service Announcement. Right on cue, the woman -- almost certainly an AI avatar based on some long-dead celebrity -- raised an antique microphone to her lips, as she held the sad little alien to her bosom with her other arm.

"In the arms of an angel, far away from here..."

Bradford groaned, as the avatar continued her song. Before he could look away or shut off his audio, the small alien turned to look directly at him with its big, pleading eyes, and let out a plaintive whimper. Despite his best efforts, his guts twisted with sympathy for the poor little guy.

A solemn disembodied voice began to explain the sorry plight of the various disadvantaged and suffering alien species that humanity had discovered languishing on habitable planets, and how they desperately needed the help of people like Bradford. By this point, however, he was no longer listening. He knew when he was beaten.

Grumbling to himself about the naked emotional manipulation on display in the PSA, he pulled up his credit interface with a wave of his hand, and began inputting a donation.