The Power and the Gory

Now

It was a dank September dawn by the time he arrived. The loose yellow and black cordon tape waved hello and then goodbye to his lonely figure as he ducked beneath its barrier, trespassing onto the sacred ground beyond.

You would have thought they’d erect a fence or something, Drek scoffed to himself, foot poised to take another step across the dirt. But then he heard the familiar wheeze of an engine and slid onto his back, a jet of light slicing the ground ahead of him as a silver hunk entity appeared through the brush.

Mm-ep, Mm-ep squawked the hovering bot, red front lights swivelling on their stalks, searching for movement. Drek cursed under his breath and clung to his satchel, but he held his body still. Thankfully, the machine’s stalk eyes couldn't crane around its protruding bulk to see the man lying prone, his face mere inches from its underbelly.

#1645 CC. Drek took in the issuing number stamp, and his eyes drifted to the access panel, sealed shut with the recognisable blood-red emblem present on practically every bit of kit roaming the streets these days. And to think, whilst he had left his blaster in his shelter bunk, he did have an unsealer to hand in his cargo pocket. The machine gave a satisfied tweet and jutted forward, continuing its silent path towards the main street.

Delphinus Tower, once the brightest star in Celestial’s housing system, was now an eyesore of soot and ash. Drek stared up at the structure before him, a blonde eyebrow cocked in quickening dread. It was his second destination already that morning, and he could see that the vibrant array of colours in the sky was changing - he didn’t have long.

Most of his planning involved getting near the previous complex- he hadn’t managed to think beyond that. Drek wasn’t the type to hurl and haul himself unassisted into and across derelict buildings. As if to illustrate the point, he pinched the bridge of his eyeglasses and pushed them back up his angular nose.

Drek was a little more delicate than he liked to admit; thankfully, his unassuming posture meant he faded into the background of any room. Heck, he was almost certain Jessop still wouldn’t know if they shared the same workbench, or if he was some errand boy for the high-ups, all thanks to the soft no-stubble chin and boxcar acne cheeks that had plagued him since adolescence.

Three years of hard slog at CatalystCo had not yet presented Drek with a single invitation to the product launches or celebratory drink-ups, held high in the sky on Level 99.

Mam barely noticed the cheery ping of his meagre Incoming, arriving via the house bot system, on the last day of every month. Nevertheless, it kept them from starving.

“You’re wasting your life away at that place,” Mam used to tell him with her raspy cough.

“I just need more time to come up with something,” said his past self.

“And then what? Think it’ll get you the power and glory of Level 99?” Mam spat.

Mam had turned away from him, pained at the knowledge that her son was caught in a meaningless hamster wheel. But Drek hadn’t been able to respond - he genuinely hadn’t known the answer.

The workers of Level 4 had merged into faceless masses over the years thanks to the floor’s particularly high turnover, a “solid display of the emerging tech talent passing through from the latest Institute graduating class”, or so the dog-eared flyer tacked up in the breakroom proudly proclaimed.

Drek’s class had boosted 8 bright sparks, vibrant and hopeful about their impact on the future of Celestial's sustainability and existence. They’d moved in a humming horde, milling behind the Level manager like a brood of chicks scurrying after their mother, heads down, fingertips to screen pads, furiously typing orientation notes.

Collaboration was encouraged initially; great minds thought alike after all. Drek had even temporarily found some sort of friendship with Jain, a girl who hailed from his district. She was all fringe and split ends, but good with her hands and a whizz at engineering.

But soon, the hubbub of new beginnings wore down to silent competitiveness, and eventually, the overcrowded workbenches assigned to its newest users, including Jain, became empty. All except one.

Drek hoisted the satchel over his head and stood, tripod-like, bag balanced on his knee. He removed a clunky filter mask and snapped it over his eyeglasses, nose and mouth, activating the device with a flick of a switch. The lens dimmed, and a screen flickered to life, selection boxes dancing into view.

Drek tapped a few options on the lens screen, and instantly the nose pocket filled with cooled outside air; he inhaled deeply.

The FloGo had cost him a decent chunk of his monthly Incoming. It was a spur-of-the-moment kind of thing - he knew he had little need for an all-in-one breathing apparatus. He was ashamed to say that, as the store bot rang up his basket, he’d swiped his Lifer with a great flourish of his wrist, so that the other thinner metallic red band he wore caught the light.

“Oh, so you’re one of them,” chirped the bot, as another bot whizzed over to pack his items into a transport trolley.

“Yep, been there for some time, me and the engineer of the FloGo go way back, her name is -.”

“Isn’t that nice, honey,” the bot responded and swivelled away from him to serve the next customer, its back flashing the bold #1213 CC red stamp, leaving him to shuffle out behind his packer bot, clutching Jain’s newest money-maker under his arm.

Jain’s first invention came only 305 days after she started at CatalystCo. By then, she and Drek had stopped carpooling.

Jostled to the back of the congratulating crowd, Drek had watched his former friend, flanked by CatalystCo HR personnel, clutch her boxed secret product, and make her final journey from her bench to the glass Level doors. And then she was gone, presumably “up” to a higher level, to join the hundreds of other useful men and women who had contributed to their society.

Drek’s hand had been raised in some sort of wave, but she hadn’t even looked in his direction. It was as if he wasn’t even there.

With the headtorch (yes, there were still some usable relics left from the Contemporary Era) fixed across his brow, Drek grabbed his final object. For something barely bigger than a man’s hand span, it was heavy in his grip.

He let his eyes and fingers trace its solid black outlines, but raw, unrefined edges. The thick cotton strap attached to its handles went back over his head, along with his satchel.

Drek’s stomach butterflies tickled his insides as he glanced ahead of him, into the black void of the unknown, where the front entrance doors used to stand.

“It isn’t too late to turn back,” his inner voice taunted.

In response, his feet carried him forward, and as he went, he turned the object over in his hands and rubbed his thumb over the faded scribbled white ink in the corner.

#01 DROSS.

Then

Haychhum Angst admired, not for the first time, the view from his corner office on Level 99 in the CatalystCo headquarters. His calf lay lazily on his opposite thigh, and his hands splayed over his knees.

A vast expanse of standard grey-on-grey cookie-cutter buildings, haloed in orange twilight, lay below him, before panning out into blotches of grander brownstone, a few miles into the distance. In just under an hour, he could be back at his estate, several glass-cut tumblers in hand, ready to drink himself into another oblivion. His mouth moistened at the thought, and he pinched the corners of his mouth downwards.

But first, what to do about his newest little problem?

They’d had a breach - the first admittedly in a while. Way after closing time, a kid, uniform overalls hanging loosely on his small frame, had been hoisted into his office by Commander Graunt. Supposedly, Employee 4-1009 had been on his way out, but his avoidant gaze at the barriers had raised suspicions and the items he held, smuggled under his shirt, were discovered.

Angst had dutifully, with his face upturned into a mock pout, recited Article 98, reminding the offender that all work completed by employees on company property should remain on company property, and, by default, such work also belonged to the company.

He, of course, was well versed with this nugget; after all, it was his grandfather who had created the clause, back when CatalsystCo had first opened its doors to Celestial’s boldest and brightest minds.

At the turn of the new age, a crazed pheromone fell into the noses of the remnant. They began to craft, mostly upcycling the discarded parts of the fallen world, to produce new tech to evolve and survive. Years later, only CatalystCo had the power, finances, prestige and platform to mass produce the majority of goods, so they naturally claimed the monopoly on technological advancement, suffocating other competitors in the process.

Truly, the lowly CatalystCo worker bees and engineers were only as valuable as their designs - the pompous drink-ups and promotions were simply to keep intelligence in line - the new world couldn’t have the smarts thinking for themselves now, could it?

Angst had found his lip curling in interested delight as he surveyed the discovered objects - a tiny, almost imperceptible metallic nib called the Brain, as well as its larger boxy counterpart, the Box - both items indestructible. Much to the employee’s chagrin, the Brain’s product reel was played on Angst’s caster, demonstrating its unique ability to capture all activity within a mile radius, obstacles like locked doors and walls no match for its powerful projection.

Equally miraculous, the Box, when used like an old-era camera, allowed its user to snap an image at any angle and then, with its additional controller, watch, listen, zoom, follow and observe in high-quality 3D the previous events that occurred within that space, recorded by the Brain.

Be the fly on any wall - travel between rooms and along streets in real-time - no conversation or action is off limits, as long as the Brain can reach it, so can you, chipped the bot-generated voiceover merrily.

Whilst 4-1009 had quipped nervously that his invention was for leisure use only and shouldn’t be mass-produced to protect citizen rights, privacy and anonymity, Angst had clapped his hands on his thighs. He hadn’t yet come across such fine tech - everything else CatalystCo had stamped its big red CC seal on paled in comparison. BrainBox was special - with all that power in his palm, he would be -

But then suddenly, the kid had upset the documents and tech onto the floor. And before Angst could activate his Code Red switch, 4-1009 had snatched at his items and slipped out of the door.

Now

Dust spores pushed and pulled themselves through the FloGo, but Drek still felt tiny claws scratching in his throat.Arms outstretched, he edged his way along the contours of what was left of the stairwell walls. Occasionally, a streak of salmon-pink light squeezed through the cracks, reminding him he needed to move quickly.

Upon the third floor, his headtorch light bounced manically off the sagging corridors as he stumbled through a doorway. Inside, he tripped over rotting debris, upsetting the new resident rodent population. The rats scattered and screeched in fury. Drek stopped and caught his breath - he could feel nausea rising. The screeches sounded like human screams.

Then

“Boss.”

Angst sighed at the sound of the gravelly voice behind him.

Graunt cleared his throat.

“We can’t find him, sir. His band was deactivated about 45 minutes ago.”

Angst steepled his fingers under his chin and closed his eyes. Hours later, he was still sitting in his damn office chair and his tongue was desperate for liquor.

Suddenly, he brought his fist down on the desk and pounded it, his strangled yell ripping into the air. As usual, Graunt remained unperturbed by the outburst and set about pouring a glass of water. His employer nodded at him gratefully, but Graunt knocked the liquid into his own mouth, swished it around and then spat it back out into the glass.

“My men are tired, sir,” Graunt announced, rubbing his thumb over his blaster, holstered in its belt. He rose on his toes and then rocked back on his heels.

Angst wiped a hand over his damp bald head. His armpits were getting warm.

“So what do you propose?”

Graunt sucked his gums. Need he say it?

“A quick survey of Level 4 - no one seems to know a dicky bird about the lad. Not a soul can tell me his name or how long he’s been here.”

Angst waited. The two men locked eyes.

“He’ll use it against us,” Angst said with a nod to himself, “he’ll use his power against us, what’s to stop him listening to -”

“So you’ll call it,” Graunt cut in, rolling his eyes.

Despite being one of the most established men in Celestial, Haychhum Angst’s Achilles' heel was his anxious paranoia. Angst was a big shot in public, but a dependent baby in private; no matter, Graunt had no problem being the big guns in their professional relationship when necessary. Angst may as well have been biting his nails- his face was drained of all its previous rosy optimism.

Angst glanced back out of the window. He couldn’t see his estate anymore, as blackness had swallowed the Outerlands - only the glimmer of the Innercity remained.

Just one hour away, he muttered to himself, before turning back to Graunt. On the table, the half-crumpled documents belonging to 4-1009’s file remained. Angst picked up the cover sheet and scanned the personal details columns.

“Send in the drones,” he sighed and tossed the sheet at Graunt, “do it quickly, make it look like an electrical fault. Shame to see Delphinus Tower become a casualty, but Mr Dross and his tech need to be contained.”

Now

Drek gasped awake and coughed the smoke out of his lungs. He couldn’t breathe. He ripped the duvet from his ankles and fell to his knees. The loud crackling of flames rushed into his ears, but just above the roar, he could hear the petrified screams of his mother.

Drek jumped out of his dream state and blinked at the silent surroundings. He was still standing in the blackened room, but his Box, the only one he had ever made, hung from his neck. Its screen was flipped up, and it continued to play the reel of footage, sourced from the photograph he had snapped earlier that morning, standing at ground level of CatalystCo headquarters.

Deactivating his employee band the night he’d fled meant he could never again get into the building, but it also meant he couldn’t be traced. Nevertheless, he’d decided not to go home, but lie low for the night, wandering around the Innercity. He’d cradled his beloved Box and winced when he discovered that he had failed to recover the Brain in the scrambled escape. He’d tried to call Mam’s Lifer, but she wasn’t picking up - she was probably long asleep. It was only as the night bled into day and the sounds of sirens jerked him awake in his temporary gutter bed, that he realised his mistake.

Now in the hollowed-out shell of his old home, he watched the Box play Angst and Graunt flippantly discuss how they would silence an employee who refused to hand them a set of keys to a free kingdom.

He watched Graunt bark orders into his Lifer, his fist clenched around the sheet Angst had given him moments ago.

He followed (with the controller on the Box) the solitary military bot as it rose from the CatalystCo underground bunkers, and crept along the deserted, sleepy streets until it disappeared, out of range of its source point, which lay abandoned on the floor of Angst’s office.

Then Drek raised the Box and took a snapshot of the room - his bedroom - before him. As the Box processed the photo, Drek saw a tiny spark of light flash in the room’s corner. Despite himself, he smiled - so Brain v.1 had survived after all.

With a shuddering breath, Drek waited for the Box to recalibrate to the new source point and his snapshot finally projected into the air, pulsing, ready to be played.

Drek held his thumb on the rewind and watched the shadows of the room around him erupt into life. Ornaments, furniture and possessions disintegrated backwards, until finally, a figure burst into view, ablaze, a wide scream stretched across her mouth as she frantically tossed back the bedsheets on the bed of a son who wasn’t there.

Drek, unable to watch, zoomed away from the centre of the room and forced the view towards the window where, just beyond the curtains, he saw what he knew he would find: the irises of two red lights on metal stalks.

*

Downstairs, Drek Dross stepped out into the golden morning sunshine and whipped the FloGo from his face. He heaved a ragged breath into his lungs and clung to the proof that could topple a heinous and selfish empire.

Mam had warned him that the chase for glory was costly, and now the graves of the Delphinus Tower victims cried out for justice. Perhaps this was what his life was for - less about power and more about purpose. The Brain in his hand vibrated in confirmation.

In the distance, he could see the ominous loom of CatalystCo, casting shadows over its architecturally inferior neighbours. Drek spun the idle metal band on his wrist to wake it, and immediately it emitted a short beep. Then he sat, his knees pulled up to his chest and squinted at the horizon, waiting for the bots to come and find him.