July 26th 2070 (77,318.47128 Julian)
Obituary – Katherine Wells, 70, female, confirmed addict dies from complications of her addiction...
42 Years Ago – July 2028 (61,978.45000 Julian)
“And right now, we're oh-point-four-five through the day. It's been wonderful having you here.” the radio personality bubbled, “It's time to take a look at the weather, after a few messages from our sponsors. Then we'll talk about our upcoming Julian millennium, and some ways to celebrate. Don't touch the remote. We'll be right back.”
The effervescent voice of the radio gave way to the grating advertisement. “When all your minutes count, why be left behind? Get current information and music with crystal-clear sound and speed. Upgrade to a SERIUS system now, and save 60% for the first year...”
Katherine grimaced, and shut off the radio. She hated radio advertising, and especially now since the stations ran the same advertisements so often.
She ran her fingers through her medium-length brunette hair and stared at the cloth covers of the large ancient radio. Her mother had died in a terrorist attack on the Twin Towers when she was a year old. Her father had cared for her single handedly. He was unable to look at the possessions of his wife, since it brought the sad memories of losing her to his mind, and had them boxed up and put in storage. When Katherine was old enough, her father allowed her to take some of her mother's stuff, provided she care for it.
Although financial difficulty had forced her to sell most of the items in the estate, she had kept the radio. Her mother's will indicated that she had received it from her mother, and Katherine immediately took a liking the radio, as it provided her a link not only to her mother but also her grandmother. It provided her a link to the past, and to her mother who she missed with each passing day.
Except that the radio was becoming an antique faster than she had expected. Internet and satellite radio were replacing local radio stations faster and faster, as instant-on-demand information and music became more and more fashionable. Radio was old fashioned, and hardly on-demand; even the most up-to-date radio stations still lagged behind by minutes or even hours in their presentations of current news.
Technology was the newest status symbol. Nearly a half century ago, Macrohard had led the revolution in computers with Palm pilots, and having the newest, smallest computer became a craze, even if the newest computer wasn't necessarily useful or better.
Then came phones with all manner of additions, like cameras and internet as fast as cable, and having the latest in mobile programming and technology was the in-thing.
Satellite radio and Bluetooth were the next nouvelle technologica, but satellite radio had been initially been too expensive to be a status symbol among everyone and was initially only popular among the financially secure, or extremely vain. However, the inexpensive Bluetooth sealed the information revolution, and condemned any non-digital signal as an antique. Blinking blue ear sets that operated on demand and gave up-to-the-minute information became the newest status symbol.
Bluetooth held everyone's attention for a while. Then SERIUS merged with several internet companies and began offering radio, information, and high-definition signals at speeds never before seen. Their catchy line, “When all your minutes count, why be left behind?”, spelled doom for anything that wasn't offering an up-to-the-minute digital signal. For radio, it was practically an obituary, and Katherine mourned the day that her grandmother's radio would no longer work.
Although it had only been 28 years since the turn of the millennium, anything older than 28 years was usually consigned to museums under the study of antiquarianists.
The technological revolution had turned Earth into a neophiliac race, with short attention spans, easily forgetting the past for the latest technological distraction.
Katherine thought about the world of the past, the world that had crafted her grandmother's radio, that was soon to be a piece of forgotten history. She wished she had been born 40 or so years earlier, when technology moved at a manageable pace, and life was easier to understand and cope with.
She waited .003 Julian (approximately 4 minutes and 19 seconds), and hoping that the near constant advertising for SERIUS was over, Katherine turned the radio back on. The speakers hummed briefly as the power grew within them, but a sudden pop from inside the machine quenched both the radio and any of Katherine's hopes of listening to radio again.
One of the transistors inside the radio had blown. It would be practically impossible to replace. There were barely enough replacement parts for old computers these days; neural circuitry replaced outdated mechanical circuitry long ago. Searching for parts for something that was 90 years older was futile.
However, Katherine pulled out her digital camera, snapped a few pictures of the radio, donned her jacket and left the house. She decided she would start her search in the Sprawl.
The Sprawl wasn't a location, so much as it was a condition. Another word used synonymously to describe it was “slums”.
Historically, the word Sprawl referred to any location below 250 feet (roughly the 20th story). Several years ago, humans had polluted the planet so thoroughly that there was an omnipresent cloud of smog and smoke that filled the air at low altitudes. Rather than solving the problem, people continued to try and avoid the problem. So instead of cleaning up the planet, they built their cities higher to avoid the smog below them. With the invention of anti-gravity generators and atmosphere generators, buildings reached even higher into atmosphere, leaving the smog far below. Modern cities were usually at least 10,000 feet up in the air. Still, there were a few outcasts, who for some unknown reason, preferred living on the surface.
Casually, the word Sprawl was used by air-dwellers to mean “slums”. The term was used loosely for every part of the planet that wasn't ultra-modern. It existed outside of every enhanced, sanitized, sterilized, edited, perfected and polished stainless steel superstructure.
Due to the isolated effect the rest of the world put on staying out of the Sprawl, these areas generally had a much higher than average crime rate. Illegal drugs and prostitution were supposedly rampant in the Sprawl.
Axiomatically, most air-dwellers formed opinions like this without ever seeing or attempting to weigh evidence on the subject. Katherine had also made this opinion, but had never seen pictures or been to the Sprawl to see the evidence firsthand. This would be her first trip to the place most air-dwellers avoided.
Katherine caught several maglevs down to the surface and eventually disembarked. Looking up, she couldn't even see where she had come from. The city was a black blot against the brown sky. Although this had been a relatively short trip, there was a culture shock from seeing how people on the surface lived. Katherine exited and started coughing as her lungs spasmed in the smoggy, poorly filtered air.
Katherine had seen several hookers hanging out on the street corners with their pimps watching them from the shadows. One of the pimps nodded his head, an apparent greeting, though Katherine was unsure how to respond to the non-verbal vagaries of the Sprawl. Compared to the modern styles of dress 10,000 feet up, this person was dressed in what Katherine considered sub-human wardrobe. His shirt sleeves were ripped and were two different lengths. The front of his shirt bore a radioactive symbol with the slogan, “The 18th HOPE – How Much Of A Threat Are You?” This was an apparent advertisement for the famous ground level hacker's convention called HOPE (Hackers On Planet Earth) which was held every year at the Hotel Pennsylvania in Neo York.
She glanced at her wrist chronometer. The time read: 61,978.48760. It was almost noontime.
Katherine walked down the narrow street in the Sprawl marveling how the road was still made with concrete and asphalt. There appeared to be no controls embedded anywhere in the street to control anti-gravity adjustment for AG vehicles. In some places the concrete had been worn away exposing the dirt beneath.
Ramshackle wood and stucco structures lined the street, many of them missing doors or windows. Electricity was sporadic, as was air conditioning, and the torpid air was filled with smog.
Inside one of the buildings which called itself “The Hole in the Wall Café”, fireplaces were in use to cook food, and plumes of gray smoke streamed from the tops of these buildings. Katherine had never seen a fireplace, even though her mother had grown up in a house with a fireplace, such primitive technology was antiquated.
She wondered what fire-cooked food tasted like and walked in to sit down at one of the tables. The table was decorated with a red and white checkerboard pattern. There were two condiment holders in the middle of the table, one containing a clear white substance, and the other a gray and black powdery substance. She sniffed both of them. The white substance had no smell at all, but the gray and black powder made her sneeze.
Due to the fireplace inside the enclosed building, the inside of the café was filled with heat. With a tiny hum, the small air conditioning unit on Katherine's jacket switched on, activating the millions of nano-condensers in the fabric. The jacket quickly cooled to Katherine's preset comfort level, a preprogrammed response to the surrounding heat it detected.
A man wearing a smoke smudged apron approached her table. He had a pad of paper in his right hand and a pencil in the other hand. Katherine was shocked to see the pencil and pad. So impressively low-tech! Looking around she realized that all the waiters were using paper and pencils. There wasn't even a single palm pilot or stylus in sight.
The man placed a menu in front of her. It too was printed on paper.
“What would you like to drink air-dweller?” he said.
“How did you know I was from the city?” Katherine asked.
“With those clothes and tech all over your body. Do you see anyone else in here dressed like that? Where else could you be from?”
Katherine blushed slightly conceding his point.
“What would you like to drink?”
“I really don't know. I've never been in Sprawl before.” she admitted, sealing her designation as an air-dweller.
“How about a soda?”
“Okay.”
“If you need any help deciding what to eat, I'll be back in a moment with your drink.”
She stared at the menu, and opened it. The majestic history of the Café was proudly printed on the first couple pages of the menu. Not many people lingered to read this history, but curious about how a restaurant could survive in the Sprawl, Katherine stopped to read.
“The café has been owned and operated by the Lynn family since 1930. During the Great Depression of 1929 to 1932, Mrs. Lynn had run a soup kitchen for the poor out of her home. After the depression had ended, she decided that she really had enjoyed giving to the community in that way, and wanted to continue. She and her husband jointly set up the first café in the region in 1935. The economy partially collapsed in 1942 when the production of automobiles stopped, this affected the café in 1943 when food began being rationed nationwide again. Mrs. Lynn once again suspended the café temporarily and started work as a soup kitchen again. She also put in 4 massive gardens, at the time called "Victory Gardens", behind the café to supplement their meager food supplies. During this time, the café renovated to expand the number of people it could hold. The original plan was to put in a wood-stove and seating for 70, but since metal was too expensive the café ended up with the famous stone fireplace that was still in use today. To revitalize the café after the war and recession ended, the Lynn's hired several entertainers to come and sing. During that time, the café was home to such popular music stars as Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzie Gillespie, Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller, and Frank Sinatra. In 1950, the café bought a television for the patrons to watch as they ate. It was black and white and had 13 channels. It proved to be a bigger draw than some of the music bands that had played there. Nevertheless, during the 60's, more musicians made their debut at the café, the list including Elvis, Sonny and Cher, the Bee Gees, Aretha Franklin, and Neil Diamond. When Barbie was released by Mattel in 1959, Mrs. Lynn immediately loved the little plastic dolls and became an avid collector buying many of the first edition dolls direct from the company. The toys that Mrs. Lynn collected are still displayed in the north-western corner of the restaurant, and included several Barbie dolls, some Dammit dolls (or trolls), some slot cars, toy trains, and a skateboard. Mrs. Lynn died on May 14th 1972. Her will stipulated her one wish; that the café never close. When her husband died a couple years later, his will contained a similar wish. The ownership of the café was turned over to their youngest son and his wife who are the current managers. In the 1980's, Reagan declared war on drugs, Kermit didn't find it easy to be green, unemployment made life uneasy and hospital costs rose. In 1985, there was a fireplace fire which burned down half the café. Rather than close the café, it was renovated again. Rather than remove the offending fireplace, the new café incorporated it into a modern kitchen so that the risk of fire was less. Sprinklers were also installed so that a fire accident could be avoided in the future. During the 1990's, the café started offering WiFi in addition to food, and added several additional televisions to the dining room all playing different channels so that everyone could hopefully see the program they wanted. The café continued unchanged during the new millennium. In 2015, when people started migrating upwards because of the threat of cancer caused by smog the owner of the café, John Lynn, now nearing 65, announced that the café would remain on the ground where it had always stood. During the migration, there was some shoplifting. A citizen punched a hole in the south wall of the café with a sledgehammer during a failed robbery. Although the hole was later patched, with a humorous reference to the café cheap prices and robbery attempt, John renamed the café 'The Hole in the Wall'
We pride ourselves on our large antique stone fireplace which had been in use for over 80 years. We serve Italian, German, Mexican, Spanish, French, and American food. We prefer traditional food, and do not serve or make up-world food bars.”
Katherine knew where America was and tried to remember where the other locations were. She finally gave up, thinking they must be or at one time have been someplace in the European Conglomerate's territories. She was a little shocked to see that the Café offered seafood. Air-dwellers like Katherine had been taught that the oceans were devoid of life, having been fished or polluted to extinction. Where did the café get seafood!?
The man came back and set a dark drink in front of her in a tall clear glass. He put a cylindrical plastic tube in the drink.
Katherine didn't know what the tube was used for, so she pushed it aside and lifted the glass to her lips and took a sip. The drink was very sweet, and filled with bubbles that spritzed into her nose making her giggle. The waiter watched this with an amused smile on his face.
He pulled out his paper again and sat down on the other side of the table from her.
“So, know what you want yet.”
“Not really.”
“Well, the fireplace is perfect today. How about a calzone? It's got lots of meat and cheese and vegetables wrapped in a flaky bread crust. And it comes with some marinara dipping sauce.”
“I suppose I'll try that.” Katherine said, shrugging her shoulders and probably sounding a bit overwhelmed at everything going on.
The man got up and scribbled her order on the pad, ripped the page off the pad, and walked over to the chef and handed him the page. He glanced at it and began making Katherine's food.
It took several minutes to make the food. Katherine sipped the bubbly “soda” and glanced at everything going on around her.
Katherine glanced at her watch again. It said 61,978.50638. Just a few minutes after noon. Katherine chided herself on turning her excursion into a vacation, and decided that as soon as lunch was done she would stop acting like a tourist and put forth a concerted search for the electronics she needed.
Lunch arrived in a small plastic container.
As the waiter slid it in front of her, he settled into the seat on the opposite side of the table.
“Most city-people don't eat very big meals, preferring smaller meals more often through the day. I wasn't sure if you were like that too, but I figured you might be, so I packed your food in a container you can take with you.”
“Thank you.”
Katherine took a bite of the calzone, which smelled delicious. The mozzarella cheese stretched from her mouth to the calzone, then suddenly snapped springing back to hit her chin.
The waiter chuckled seeing her surprise at this.
She chewed and the delicious flavors mixed in her mouth. A huge grin formed on her face as she swallowed.
“That is delicious!”
“If you dip it in the marinara sauce, it tastes even better.” the waiter suggested.
Katherine tried that, and her eyes widened again. It was delicious! There was nothing like it in the city. Most city dwellers drank water and ate dehydrated food bars that contained balanced portions of vitamins and minerals, but tasted very bland.
“So what brings you to the Sprawl?”
“I'm looking for some old electronic parts for a radio.”
“That'll be a tough search.” the waiter said, shaking his head.
“Would you know where I could start looking?”
The waiter grunted, deep in thought. “There's some old parts dealers down on Sunset. You gotta look hard for em though. There are police patrols that go through that neighborhood looking for anyone buying or selling antique contraband.”
“Why are antiques considered contraband?”
The waiter shrugged. “Eh, that's SERIUS and Macrohard for ya. Once they monopolized the technology industry, it was declared that items that were not essential for an 'up-to-date' lifestyle was unnecessary. Anyone caught peddling non-essential products, including open-source programs, could be arrested for contraband.”
“That's terrible!” Katherine said.
“I know. I use open-source software, and it works better than anything Macrohard has. It shouldn't be illegal to make up one's own mind differently than the norm.”
After 3 bites of the calzone, Katherine felt full. She closed the plastic container and placed it in her purse.
Her waiter handed her a ticket telling her how much she owed. She pulled out her credit card. It was opaque when turned off. She turned it on, and it scanned her face. She placed her thumb on it and after the biometrics program verified her identity it unlocked the card for a money transfer. The liquid display became transparent and displayed all the credit logos it could process. Scrolling down with the touch of a finger, she looked at her account information. Next to the unflattering picture of her face was her active balance, loan information, and credit limit.
She handed the card to her waiter who ran it the card and debited the exact amount she owed for the meal. The card updated immediately and displayed her new balance. She pressed the lock function and the card's liquid display went opaque again.
She thanked the waiter and got up to leave the café. At the entrance, she saw a rack of maps marked free, and picked up one so she could find the street called Sunset.
As she walked down the street she consulted the paper map. She eventually realized that the map was horribly incomplete and only showed prominent tourist locations. But the basics were there and she eventually figured out how to read the map using the legend at the bottom of the page. Calling up her GPS co-ordinates she figured out what street she was on, and then traced the route she should follow with a fingernail. She committed the series of rights and lefts she should make to memory and tossed the tourist map.
She saw a few Sprawl dwellers going about their daily activities. An older lady with gray hair brought a large basin outside, and filled it up with water. She than emptied a laundry hamper full of clothing into the basin and added some lye and soap and began stirring everything together with a large wooden spatula. Katherine had never seen anyone wash clothes that way – it seemed so primitive. Most of the world had stopped using water for other purposes besides nutrition. Sonic washing and self-cleaning synthetic materials had replaced the need for hand washing or washing machines long ago.
She turned right and then left.
The combination of smog and taller buildings on this block blotted out the sunlight. The street was filled with dark shadows. The street was lined with old cars, many of which still used combustion engines. All the cars had wheels, which in itself explained the reason for the absence of antigrav controls in the street – the Sprawl really was a technologically primitive area. Some of the cars had obviously been vandalized, and had broken windows and flat tires, and in the extreme cases the entire car had been torched.
A police car sat in the middle of the block, it's engine rumbling softly. It's wheels moved and it drifted forward a little before braking. She remembered what her waiter had said and momentarily froze when she saw the police. Trying to act unnerved, she walked down the sidewalk refusing to look at the police car, but feeling like her every step was being scrutinized.
The siren on the car sounded and Katherine jerked, her heart beating fiercely. The siren turned off, and the window of the cruiser rolled down. The policeman had been human at one point, but a series of implants and surgeries had left him looking like a patchwork quilt made of metal and skin.
Without moving his lips, the policeman said in a scratchy robotic voice “Excuse me miss. A moment of your time please.” His throat and larynx had been removed and a metal vox box had been implanted there.
Her heart beating fast, she walked over to the police car.
“Yes?”
“Have you purchased anything during your time in the Sprawl?”
“Just some food.”
“You'll need to declare any items you bought here once you return to the city. Please keep in mind that smuggling underworld contraband is a prosecutable offense. Also, keep in mind that the Sprawl borders will be closed and a curfew in effect from 0.8 until 0.3 the following day.”
The window of the police car rolled back up, and the engine sounded a little louder as the vehicle was shifted into gear and it rolled away.
Katherine willed her heart to return to a normal beat, and slowly the red haze faded from her eyes, and she was able to think clearly. She continued walking down the street, though a little faster than before.
From inside one of the burnt heaps, a small child peaked out the window. She looked around and placed her finger on her lips, telling Katherine to be quiet and ducked back inside the burnt-out car.
Katherine, unsure of what to expect whipped around, half expecting the cyborg policeman was stalking her. There was nothing around her.
The smog parted as three children came running out and stopped in front of Katherine.
“Have you seen Liz?”
“I'm sorry. I don't know who Liz is,” Katherine said.
“Oh, okay,” and they ran off.
There was a small giggle inside the car and the girl inside climbed out and ran the opposite direction from her friends, disappearing behind the veil of smog almost immediately.
The advanced portions of the world had certainly rejected the Sprawl, and with laws and regulations were bound and determined to try and prevent anyone from choosing this existence for their own.
Katherine had the unique opportunity to see both sides of the coin, and was impressed by her first and second opinions of the Sprawl. As a city dweller, she had been told over and over that those who lived in the Sprawl were unfortunate, either from circumstances or money; they were misguided; and she had frequently been told they were just plain stupid to not keep up with the rest of the world.
And while her first clandestine appraisal of the area may have looked bad initially, the children didn't seem to mind the smog, or not having the most advanced toys. The Sprawl was quiet, and removed from the hustle and bustle of the big city. The people she had seen didn't look unfortunate, or stupid. They looked very contented with their way of life. The lifestyle of the Sprawl hinted at extreme penury, however Katherine suspected there was another motivation behind most people living down here. Despite the apparent inconveniences that were presented to her, life down here was obviously more relaxed than the hectic lifestyle 10,000 feet up.
Katherine figured that the less advanced the area was there was a higher probability she might find someone who had the parts to the antique radio. And the area did look more rundown with every step she took closer to Sunset.
Her hand-held had computed the probability that she would find what she was looking for to 0.59%, and advised her to buy a SERIUS set instead (darn advertising is everywhere), but she doggedly ignored the prediction and searched anyway. Her chronometer beeped the one/tenth change. It was now 61,978.60000. It was getting to be mid-afternoon (approximately 2:24 pm). She only had another two-tenths of a day to find what she needed and leave before the curfew started.
She had noticed the small copse of trees first, before she had noticed the individual sitting underneath the flowering plum tree. He had been staring at her ever since her arrival had parted the smog sufficiently enough for him to see her details. Katherine knew that she was being stared at, and purposefully ignored it. His eyes never left her and traversed her curves more than once while she stood there avoiding his gaze, and trying to decide if she should approach him or continue on.
She finally approached him.
The man had long, curly hair, that was matted and oily. The predominant color was gray and white, but from what few strands still retained their natural color, Katherine could tell he had brown or brunette hair, much like her own. He wore some old sunglasses with round pink lenses in them, the kind that first made their appearance in the first Woodstock. Katherine thought the man looked old enough to have been to that concert, either as one of the psychedelic musicians, or more likely as one of their likely-naked adoring fans.
“Muh name is Neal. You're not from around here, are you?” That was the understatement of the century, Katherine thought. “Need some help finding something honey?” Katherine detested being called 'Honey', but in an effort to not jeopardise her trip, made a valiant effort to not allow her face to twist into a scowl at this word.
“I'm looking for some parts to an old radio, transistors and the like.” she said quietly.
He sucked on the hand-folded cigar he was holding, then blew out a cloud of smoke through his mouth and nose. Katherine held her breath as the cloud wafted over her. Folding plant remains inside paper and inhaling the smoke they created when burned was a practice that had been banned in the floating cities. Apparently this deplorable practice was still a common sight in some areas of the Sprawl.
Katherine held out her digital camera screen toward the man and showed the pictures she had taken of her radio. She separated her lips slightly so she could breathe through her mouth. Neal was the first one who had offered to help her, and she didn't want to offend him by coughing.
Behind her she heard the giggle of children as they ran past again, no doubt in pursuit of “Liz”.
“That radio's quite a beaut,” he remarked. “I doubt there's anyone within a thousand miles who will sell you the parts. Even if they had them.”
He coughed and some more blue smoke came out of his nose.
“A lot of the antique parts dealers have sold out to museums and collectors. They don't appreciate the Sprawl way of life. They want to live in the city,” he grimaced as he said 'city', spitting it out as if it were a swear word.
“Do you know any of these collectors, or anyone who could help? It may be antiquated, but this radio means a lot to me. It was my mother's.”
He sucked in some more smoke from the burning stick in his fingers, then shook his head. “'Fraid I don't know any who have parts that old. I might have another solution for you though.”
Katherine assumed the worst, and inwardly cringing said, “I don't want to buy a SERIUS set.”
“Do you thunk we have SERIUS down hare!? I'm not selling SERIUS,” Neal grunted. “This is better. Come inside my place.”
He flicked the short burning remains of the cigarette from his finger, then stood up. Katherine watched as it hit the dirty sidewalk, scattering ash and short-lived amber sparks. He ambled inside and held the door for her, expecting her to follow though she hadn't yet moved a muscle. She finally sighed and followed him inside the dimly lit building. The walls of the room were tile, most of it cracked and broken. Like antique radio parts, it was hard to find replacement building materials that were declared antiquated by the rest of the world.
He ambled behind the counter, and pulled out two small contraptions. Interestingly, the devices he pulled out were clearly not antiquated like the rest of her surroundings.
The smaller piece looked like the female end of a coaxial cable, but it looked frayed at the other end, about a dozen tiny rainbow color-coded wires splaying out in all directions.
The other piece was slightly larger and looked like a neck pillow – the kind that wrapped around your neck to support it while you were sleeping. It was emblazoned with the name of it's manufacturer, F.U.S.I.O.N. S.O.F.T.W.A.R.E. The only odd features of the pillow contraption was that the male-end of the coaxial cable stuck out of the pillow right where your neck would traditionally be, and on the other side was a high-speed telecommunications burst relay antenna.
The two pieces obviously went together, but for what purpose Katherine had no clue.
She looked quizzically at the man. He seemed to be expecting her bewilderment and launched into the explanation before she asked the obvious question.
Holding up the smaller piece, he said, “This is an occipital jack. It's designed to be implanted inside your neck where the wires can make contact with your brain stem. It's not a difficult surgery, usually one hour outpatient.” And pointing to the bigger unit it went with, “This is an advanced VR unit, designed to allow your brain to access the internet at the speed of thought and experience any virtual environment you can think of. Currently there are about 6,000 preset virtual environments online which you can tap into and live in if you desire. This model comes with the reality editor, which allows you to edit an existing environment to your wants or even create an entirely new reality.”
He turned around and pointed to the back of his neck where she could see a tiny female coaxial connector poking out of his skin about 3½ inches below the base of his skull.
“I got mine implanted last week,” he grinned.
Katherine stared at it. “It's safe?”
“I ain't had any reactions to it, aside from a mild rash the day I had it implanted, but that may have been the shellfish I ate the night before.”
“It doesn't hurt?”
“I don't even feel it.”
“How expensive is it,” Katherine asked.
“This is an older model so...”
“Older model? I've never heard of anything like this before.”
“From what I understand, these units were mostly government issue, and were never unrolled commercially.”
Katherine blinked in confusion. “What would a government official need with a VR unit?”
“How should I know,” the man said, “In case ya hadn't noticed, there isn't exactly an embassy in the Sprawl.”
He shrugged his shoulders and hypothesized a few possibilities, “To connect to the internet that fast though would allow very fast problem solving with other people on VR sets, and would make negotiations with another party a breeze when you can exchange thoughts so rapidly. Or maybe they just wanted a cool way to blow off steam and relax.”
“Like I said, this is an older model, and I got it for cheap so I can pass the savings on to you. I figure 200 credits to sell you the unit. And I know a doctor just down the street who can install the occipital jack for cheap.” The man grinned widely, “He promised me he would knock off some of the price of my implant bill if I would refer people to him.”
“If it was never unrolled commercially, how did you find it?”
“Officially I'm overstock retailer, but in muh line of work which I would describe as mostly import/export I get items like from people looking to sell their products off the radar.”
Katherine couldn't imagine a place more “off the radar” than the Sprawl. Katherine shook her head. It was nice sales pitch, but she was getting distracted. She really wanted find parts for her radio.
As she turned to walk out of the man's shop, Neal evidently realized that he only had until the door closed to finalize a sale. He called out to her departing figure, “Don't you realize how this can benefit you?”
She turned and looked at him again.
“You'll never find parts for your radio as cheaply as I'm offering this to you, if you ever find them. But with this, you can live in a virtual world where your radio still works. You could even create a world where you can see your mother again.”
Katherine jerked as if she had been stung. How had the man guessed that her mother was dead?
He smiled an intuitive smile to her reaction, and tapping his index finger on his forehead, he smiled and said, “It was a good guess. Do you realize that this can give your brain everything you currently want, as well as instant access to any other virtual world should you ever want a change?”
Katherine hadn't considered that, but was still trying hard to remain unconvinced and impassionate. It sounded like a good deal, but there had to be a catch somewhere.
“Do you sell a lot of these,” she asked, gesturing towards the VR unit.
“No. Not many people come to the Sprawl looking for a sale. And, I'm off the radar.” he smiled coyly.
She glanced at her chronometer. She knew at least an hour had passed, but was still shocked to see her chronometer tell her the time was 61,978.64583 (3:30pm)
“Save the unit for me. If I'm going to buy it, I'll be back within 24 hours to pick it up. Otherwise I won't be back.”
She walked out of the store, head held high and back straight, determined not to return.
She returned at 61,978.75000 (6pm) feeling more than a little frustrated. She had found someone who had antique parts, but he wanted a minimum of 150,000 credits for the smallest piece. 150,000 credits was more than a years wage for Katherine. Until she had heard the minimum price she hadn't been willing to believe that antique parts were reserved for museums.
Resigned and defeated she returned to the beginning of her search to the person who had not offered her antique parts, but had offered anything else she could imagine. Returning to what seemed like square 1 was not an appealing thought to Katherine.
Due to the smoggy air and looming skyscrapers in the Sprawl, the streets got darker sooner than they did in the upworld. The sidewalk was already turning gloomy and dark, and Katherine got turned around in the semi-darkness. Before she got her bearings, the streets were bathed in darkness. A street lamp flickered vainly against the encroaching darkness then went dark.
The nano photo-receptors in Katherine's eyes processed what she was looking at, and augmented what little light was available with an image produced by analysis of infrared and ultraviolet light. Katherine could see, but was still lost. Most of the people she had seen on the sidewalks before had retreated indoors. Only a few people who apparently had no place to call home were still outdoors. Rather than bother any of the homeowners from their peaceful evening, she ran over to a nearby bum settling in for a long night in a cardboard curbside palace constructed around a park bench.
“Please, I need to find the pawn shop on Sunset. It's run by a man named Neal. Do you know where it is?”
The man's eyes looked at her with fear, and he said nothing, but at last he flicked a finger over his shoulder indicating the direction she should travel. His eyes never left Katherine's as if he was afraid that if he looked away she would take the newspaper he was bedding on.
“Thank you.” Katherine said, and jogged off in the direction the man had pointed. Pretty soon, she saw a familiar building. It was the Café where she had eaten her first calzone.
Retracing her steps from that familiar landmark made it much easier.
She made it to Neal's shop just a few minutes before the curfew was to go in effect. The lights in Neal's shop were off. It was dark inside. Trying not to think of how she would handle her epic failure if he wasn't around, she knocked on the door of Neal's shop.
With a metallic gold amber flash, the flint in a cigarette lighter ignited. Neal had been sitting in the middle of the dark shop waiting. He saw her face and motioned for her to come in.
He went quickly behind the counter and pulled out an old candle that appeared as if it had been burnt at both ends. He jammed it hard into a candlestick holder and touched the wick off with the cigarette lighter. The tiny flame from the candle covered the shop walls in a flickering burnt citrus color.
Neal shrugged almost apologetically and said, “The city turns off the electricity to my building every night. As if life isn't already hard enough with the patrols and being accused of having contraband for being different.”
“I haven't ever seen a candle before. It's very pretty.”
Neal grunted, and Katherine was unsure if it was a grunt of approval or denial.
“So you want the VR set?”
In that moment, Katherine's mind flashed over what she had been through. Why was she there? For a radio, or for a dream? She had spent her day hard at work trying to reach something that proved expensive and unreachable. Was she fulfilling her desire by grasping something else tangible or was it just a more affordable dream?
Her mind spent a few seconds justifying all the actions she had made, and validating her decision to buy the VR unit.
“Yes. I want to buy it.”
He pulled the VR unit out. He had wrapped it in plastic filled with bubbles of compressed air and boxed it up. Katherine looked down at the VR unit. It looked so innocent sitting there in a cocoon of transparent pillows. Surely, her mind reasoned, it had the solutions to her problems.
“You said there was a doctor who could perform the surgery for a discount? Can you find out the soonest he can do it?”
“I called while you were out. He said that he could do it any time today or tomorrow. He could probably do it tonight if you make it through the curfew to get to his place.”
She knew that in order to get the surgery she would need to spend the night in the Sprawl, but the thought no longer bothered her.
Outside, a church bell rang ominously in sonorous tones echoing over the dark streets of the Sprawl. The curfew was now in effect.
“If you give me precise directions, I can get there tonight.” Katherine said.
Neal pulled a sheet of paper out from under the counter and scribbled a makeshift map on it. The doctor's place was about 8 blocks away and there would undoubtedly be patrols cruising the streets looking for curfew breakers and contraband.
She handed Neal her credit card, and entered her codes to activate it. The liquid crystal screen of the credit card glowed seashell white in the darkness of the shop. Neal punched in the amount of purchase on her card, and entered his credit code, then handled the card back to her and she confirmed the purchase. The transaction went through and it debited her for 200 credits. Getting the occipital jack implanted would set her back another 200 credits, but it would be worth it.
She took her VR set, and nodded thanks to Neal. He blew out the candle and the shop was bathed in darkness again. Katherine opened the door to the shop and ran out into the night following the directions Neal had written on the paper.
There were only a few close calls. Once as she was running down a block, a patrol car turned the block, it's xenon headlights cutting through the smog and darkness like a knife. Katherine hid behind some boxes hoping that she hadn't been seen. The patrol car flashed it's searchlight in her general direction, but coasted down the street having not seen anything.
Katherine's heart was thumping in her chest. She waited a few minutes to calm her heart and make sure everything was dark. Then she resumed her run down the sidewalk towards the doctor's office.
Over an hour past the beginning of curfew, at 61,978.85000, Katherine knocked softly on the side door of the doctor's house. The door cracked open, and the doctor looked out.
He smiled at Katherine.
“Neal told me depending on when you came back, you might be running late getting to my place. Come in.”
Katherine stepped inside the door, and immediately saw that the inside of the room was lit by a few track lights on the walls. This was the first welcome light Katherine had seen since the curfew crashed down, and noted it to the doctor.
“The outsiders don't respect Sprawl-dwellers at all. They normally turn the power off to the Sprawl near curfew time, but they leave my power on because I run the only clinic around here, and they know I'll deny them treatment if they make me angry. By the way, I'm Doctor Savage.” the doctor said.
“Katherine.” she shook the doctor's outstretched hand.
Once Katherine was inside the small waiting room, the doctor's personality switched to all professional. He handed Katherine a hospital gown that dipped low in the back so Katherine's spine and neck would be exposed. Asking her to go behind a paper-thin Shoji screen to change, he stood on the other side of the screen describing to her what the surgery would entail, how long it was expected to take, and any possible side-effects she might experience.
It would be no different than any other nano-augmentation surgery she had gone through. She would anesthetized for the operation and would wake up with some new piece of technology in her body. The surgery would be no different than the ones she went through for her bionic heart, her eyes, and the gills she had implanted to give her an advantage on the swim team (swimming is so much easier when you aren't gasping for air). The only difference would be that this surgery was being done to install technology probably considered contraband, and it was being done by a doctor in the Sprawl.
“The surgery will take a couple hours maximum and since you're stuck behind Sprawl borders for the night you're more than welcome to stay in a hospital room for the night.”
Katherine stepped out from behind the Shoji screen dressed in the hospital gown, her clothing neatly folded and tucked under an arm.
“Thank you. I was wondering what I was going to do now that the borders are closed.”
She handed him the VR unit and he visually inspected the implant.
“Well, let's get started...”
A couple of hours before midnight, Katherine woke up. She was in a hospital bed, still dressed in her gown. She touched the back of her neck, and felt the small protrusion of her brand new occipital jack implanted there. It was still sore to the touch, but the pain reinforced the pleasure flooding through her. She thought about all the things she had gone through to get it, and smiling fell into a deep sleep that carried into morning.
Before leaving the hospital in the morning for the Sprawl border, Doctor Savage had given her several verbal warnings.
He had cautioned her to read all the instructions and warnings in the manual before jacking in. He emphasized this several times. Katherine placed the VR transmission unit (which she still thought resembled a neck pillow) into the box upside down, tucking the paper and bubble wrapping around the pillow so both the F.U.S.I.O.N. S.O.F.T.W.A.R.E. logo and the occipital jack were well hidden. Thankfully, it really did look like a neck pillow, and she doubted she would have any problems with border patrols unless someone took it out of the box and its swathing wrapping.
She got dressed in her clothes, leaving the gown on her hospital bed, wrapped a scarf around her neck to hide the slight protrusion of the occipital jack and left.
Her living room was rather cramped and thus the furnishing of the apartment was sparse. Her grandmother's radio took up most of the space, and though it was displayed along one wall, it was clearly the centerpiece of the room. A nice ergonomic gel sofa took up the opposite wall of the living room.
She sat down on the sofa, and looked at the broken radio adorning the opposite wall. As she did she once again noticed an area on the wall where the white paint was flecking off. It was an eyesore, but she was unable to avoid looking at it. The imperfection drew her eyes. She had considered switching the sofa and the radio around so that she wouldn't have to look at it, but that was a lot of work, and she had been afraid that the radio might get more damaged in the scuffle.
But the radio was already damaged. Was there anything stopping her now?
In her hand she had the VR transmission unit. As she looked at the unit closely under brighter light, she saw a small liquid display on the back of the unit that displayed the current time on one half, and the amount of time the user had spent connected on the other side.
The current time was 61,979.63141 Julian (July 27th 2028, 3:09pm). The other side read 0:00:00 because she hadn't used the VR unit at all.
Katherine opened the instruction manual and flipped through it casually, reading the warnings that caught her eye. The instruction manual was about 400 pages thick and was basically a big disclaimer warning that F.U.S.I.O.N. S.O.F.T.W.A.R.E. was not liable should anything go wrong.
It claimed that virtual reality could be addictive if used recreationally, or by those who lacked a strong grasp on reality. It advised against using heavy machinery, sleep medication, and alcohol in conjunction with the VR unit. There was a warning about not swimming for at least 30 minutes after the VR session had ended. There was a chapter on using the VR unit with the neural shield fully engaged to prevent hacking.
It all seemed like fairly obvious stuff, and Katherine wanted so badly to try it out. It couldn't possibly be that harmful, and after glancing through the pages for almost an hour she had made it to page 244 and she couldn't read another disclaimer. It couldn't possibly be as dangerous as the manual claimed it could be.
In retrospect, she might have benefited from the warning found on page 245.
Looking once more at the flecking paint, she felt renewed determination that she would rearrange the living room as soon as she was done with her VR session. She placed the larger unit around her neck, and the two end of the jacks met each other and connected.
Suddenly she felt like she was in two places at once. She was sitting on her sofa, but that world was gradually getting blurry and insubstantial as her eyes dilated. A bright matrix of logic thought patterns, command interfaces, and virtual worlds unfolded like a blooming lotus flower across the colorless void before her eyes.
As fast as she could think it, the VR unit read her thoughts and acted on them, cross-matching her desired reality with the nearest preset and opening the editor to allow her to make changes.
“This will be perfect...,” she thought to herself.
She found herself in her living room again, staring at the flecking paint on the wall, the VR unit still firmly ensconced around her neck. She couldn't understand why she was back here. She took off the transmission unit, wondering what had gone wrong, tapped the reset button, and tried placing it on her neck again. Nothing happened.
She took it off again, then not knowing what to do to fix the errant machine, slapped the unit.
She tried it on again, wondering if it was working, and cursing Neal who sold her a defective unit. Nothing happened. It appeared as if her purchase which had set her back 400 credits for the purchase and surgery was dead.
Suddenly, a singsong voice came from the other room.
“Oh, Katherine! I've made us some lunch, dear. Are you coming?”
“Mom?”
“Yes, dear. Come for lunch. I made some calzones.”
Her mother walked in. This was a movie moment, where time seemed to stand still. Her mother hadn't changed all that much from the pictures she had seen, and for a moment that stretched on into eternity Katherine stood there and just stared. Her mother's white skin was still wrinkle free, there were only a few gray hairs intermingling with her brunette hair, and her bright blue eyes were vivid. I really do look a lot like my mother, Katherine thought.
Katherine's eyes ate up everything as if she hadn't seen her mother in a million years. Her mother didn't seem to notice the stare and walked across the living room, affording Katherine a 360° view of her.
“Let's listen to some music while we eat.” She turned the switch on the old radio and from the cloth speakers came the symphonic sounds of Antonio Vivaldi's “Allegro non molto”.
“How's that, my precious girl,” her mother inquired.
Excited to see her mother again, Katherine felt like dancing.
I feel like something a little faster, she thought to herself. She walked over to the radio wondering if there were any radio stations nearby that had the kind of music she was looking for. There was a flash, Katherine had a strong feeling of prescience, something like deja vu – or was it the feeling of complete control – and suddenly Abba was playing “Dancing Queen” on the radio, though Katherine didn't actually remember changing the channels.
Her mother smiled and danced a little jig, her skirt making a swishing sound as moved.
“Good idea,” her mother smiled. “I don't know what I was thinking. Symphony music puts me to sleep.”
Katherine smiled. This is perfect...
Jennifer was worried. Katherine had missed several days of work and wasn't returning any of her video calls, and her friend decided to check on her to see how she was doing.
When she didn't answer the door, her friend appealed to the manager of the floor she rented on to open her front door, to check on her. They found her, lying in a puddle of assorted body fluids on her floor in front of her couch.
The liquid display on the back of unit read 61,983.64628 | 04:00:21:24.768
She was still jacked into her perfect world after 4 days.
The paramedics were immediately called and within 5 minutes Katherine, VR unit and all, were occupying a bed in a life support unit. She was fed and re-hydrated intravenously, and a catheter removed waste materials from her body.
The paramedic who had been on the team that brought her in was standing at the foot of her bed, musing to himself how pretty Katherine was, and what a shame it was that she had to go and get herself addicted to something like VR.
“Is there any way to disconnect her from that thing,” he asked the floor nurse as she walked by and checked and recorded Katherine's vital signs.
The floor nurse sighed and shook her head, “Nope. There have been thousands of cases like this popping up all over the world. The first few that we tried to forceably remove from the VR had intense withdrawal. Their minds can't handle anything without a VR fix.”
“So what can we do?”
“A lot of the cases we've seen were beginners who didn't read all the instructions and weren't properly prepared to jack in.”
The nurse reached into Katherine's bag of personal effects and pulled out the huge user manual. After consulting the table of contents she flipped the tome open to page 245 and tapped on the page. The paramedic looked over her shoulder.
“Most, like her, didn't set the synaptic alarm to disconnect them after a set period of time. It's sad to realize, but setting the synaptic alarm could have saved all these people. The neural firewall is functioning, so we can't hack in. Unless she realizes that she's living in a dream world and wants to get out, there's nothing we can do. She'll stay on life support until she awakens.”
In her perfect world, things had changed radically, though it had not impressed upon Katherine's mind how much had actually changed. Everything that she wanted had been automatically given to her, and then supposing it had always been that way, her brain lost it's hold on reality and she forgot about the actual change.
Her living room was now 10 feet wider and several feet longer, so that an antique plasma wide screen TV could share wall space with the even older radio. The super in her building had come up a few days ago with some new sky blue paint – did he realize that was her favorite color – and had repainted the entire living room taking care of the annoying flecked paint.
There were 3 more bedrooms in the apartment, because her mother and father, and grandmother and grandfather lived there now. And there was a spare guest bedroom in case there were any other visitors. Although the rent had gone up with this addition, Katherine could afford it since she had been promoted with a significant pay raise to regional manager.
The news was coming on TV, and Katherine turned up the volume. It was so much nicer now that there were no more advertisements on the TV or radio for things that Katherine didn't want.
Outside her world, still wrapped around her neck, the VR unit quickly downloaded a news feed from the real world, and selected from current world news items a small selection to show her. The news broadcast was compiled in seconds and displayed in her dream world for her to see.
Sitting on her couch, Katherine watched the news.
“It's 61,989, and you're watching BCD news. In the world news tonight, the company F.U.S.I.O.N. S.O.F.T.W.A.R.E. has pulled all models of its virtual reality unit from the market after thousands of tragedies that question the ethical use of virtual reality. Thousands of people around the world who have used these VR units are addicted to the stimulation and have not left it since jacking in. Many of these individuals who jacked in are now filling up hospital wards around the world.”
“This sleeper race, still linked into their virtual realities, have been consigned to medical storage, with the prospect of remaining on life support permanently or until a time that they can be safely removed from these devices.”
“In other news, Congress makes an official response to this tragedy. In an almost unanimous vote has classified VR as a hazardous, addictive, restricted drug. It is an offence to possess VR units, or make false representations to obtain a VR unit, or to sell a VR unit to anyone. Anyone caught using, selling or buying VR will face the full penalty of the law. The VR tragedy is the worst in history, certainly worst than the meth addictions of 40 years ago...”
Katherine shook her head and looked around at her family.
“Why do you think someone would purposefully hurt themselves by taking anything addictive,” she asked.
Her mother shook her head, “I have no clue, dear.”
And in the background, the radio played soft music.
42 Years Later
July 26th 2070 (77,318.47128 Julian)
Obituary – Katherine Wells, 70, female, confirmed VR addict dies from complications of a VR addiction that lasted 40 years.
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My Content Dealer for 3D....
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This comment is a natural product. Slight variations in grammar, conception and spelling are to be expected and in no way diminish the intent of the message.
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Life is like Photography, We use the negatives to Develop...
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This comment is a natural product. Slight variations in grammar, conception and spelling are to be expected and in no way diminish the intent of the message.
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Life is like Photography, We use the negatives to Develop...
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My Twitter: [link]
My site about every stuff I have on web: [link]
My newspaper: [link]
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This comment is a natural product. Slight variations in grammar, conception and spelling are to be expected and in no way diminish the intent of the message.
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This comment is a natural product. Slight variations in grammar, conception and spelling are to be expected and in no way diminish the intent of the message.
I Really Appreciate it
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Life is like Photography, We use the negatives to Develop...
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This comment is a natural product. Slight variations in grammar, conception and spelling are to be expected and in no way diminish the intent of the message.
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Life is like Photography, We use the negatives to Develop...
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Life is like Photography, We use the negatives to Develop...
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This comment is a natural product. Slight variations in grammar, conception and spelling are to be expected and in no way diminish the intent of the message.
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Life is like Photography, We use the negatives to Develop...
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This comment is a natural product. Slight variations in grammar, conception and spelling are to be expected and in no way diminish the intent of the message.
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Life is like Photography, We use the negatives to Develop...
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This comment is a natural product. Slight variations in grammar, conception and spelling are to be expected and in no way diminish the intent of the message.
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Complex is the nature of simplicity, giving rise to all the ingenuity that is and the creative geniuses who are, the inspiration in our world.
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I'm messaging you because you had faved my photo ([link]), and it is in the final round of a competition! I'm pretty excited, and would of course love to win, so if you have time and really like my photo, then you can vote for my photos here: [link] (Mine are the ones with red berries as their subject)
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I don't want to ask you, but I would love a llama!
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Thanks for your support.
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I don't want to ask you, but I would love a llama!