January 7, 2065
A man stands in front of a small metal desk tucked away into the corner of a square room. The blinds on the window are drawn shut, filling the room with slices of pale light. Beneath the window and behind the man is a bed with gray sheets in a tangled mass hanging off the edge. The single pillow is squashed flat. Clothes litter the floor alongside empty and half-empty mugs, cups, bottles, and other refuse. The walls are bare, white, smooth. He scratches at his chest and takes a sip from a gray mug of something hot. His eyes are red and glassy from too little or too much sleep, and his hair is in the same disheveled state it had been when he crawled out of bed somewhere around an hour before. The desk is laden with half-broken husks of small machinery, their guts spilling over onto an old keyboard that hasn't been cleaned in some time. He stares at the empty metal frame that normally projects a holographic display, and at the blinking red light near the base of the frame which indicates a pending message. "Open," his voice is dry, hoarse. He turns, taking a drink from the steaming mug, and leaves the room as the display flickers to life. A feminine voice, metallic and inhuman, announces his pending message from Cheng-Moore, subject line: Your Future with the Syndicate Starts Today! "Read," he's stepped into another room, this one similarly dim in lighting and lacking in decoration. It has a couch of some synthetic leather substitute, its cushions sunken and formless, a round black table in front of the couch, and a similarly empty metal frame atop a tall table set against a wall across the room. It's visible through the partition in the kitchenette he makes his way into, and soon hums to life with muffled explosion of static and noise as he rummages through a cabinet. "Dear Mason Amsel," the voice reads, "it is with great enthusiasm that I write to inform you of your acceptance into the Cheng-Moore Syndicate Rapid Emergency Response Unit (CMSRERU)"" The voice goes on for a few minutes, reading off a series of dates and times for finalizing paperwork, training schedule, map locations, and so on. In the meantime, Mason finds a little bottle of honey, squeezes some of it into his cup of tea, and searches for a clean-enough-to-stir-with-spoon. He walks out of the kitchenette and over to the floating display, swiping a hand from left to right through the air in front of him. The message text wipes away and is replaced with a camera feed panning down the length of a wide street empty of cars, populated only by a handful of people. They run to cut diagonally across the street when a large black armored truck swerves in from off camera and skids to a halt in front of them. The back of the truck flies open and armed men dressed to the nines in tac-gear came pouring out, guns at the ready. Text flashes along the bottom of the screen, reading, Syndicate Forces Shut Down Soma Den in Downtown Chicago, Deal Huge Blow to Drug Trade. A man's voice comes from the speakers set into the metal frame and a downward swipe of Mason's hand mutes it before he can make out what?s being said. "Open video log," he says.
The camera feed is replaced with another. This one points out at his dirty apartment. He fills the center of the frame, sipping his tea and honey. "Record," a blinking light starts signaling the beginning of a recording. "Hey Ma," he says, "Just wanted to let you know. I got that Syndicate job, just found out. Good work, good pay. I promise not to get kicked out of this one. Tell Dad to give me a call next time you see him, I'm not sure if he's getting my messages. Haven't heard back in a while. Chicago's an alright place. It's cold, dirty, but that ain't so different from most cities, is it?" He shifts uncomfortably, sips his tea, and continues, "I got about two months of training bullshit, like I ain't learned the basics already. But it is what it is, I guess. I'll suck it up if it means I get some real work. In a few months, I should have enough to get a nicer place, and a little after that to pay for you and Dad to come up and visit, see what life in the big city's like," he cracks a small smile. "I gotta go, Ma. They need me to come in, file some paperwork and run a few more tests before everything is finalized. I'll be in touch. Love you," he waves a hand to pause the recording. "Send," he says, and the still-frame of him standing in the apartment, arm half-raised, vanishes. "Done," the display winks out and he heads back to the bedroom and through there into the small bathroom to take a shower.
****
Mason stands in the lobby of a building whose top is lost to the clouds. The d"cor is chic, all stark lines and sterile whites and grays. His apartment used to look like this, before he moved in. The lobby is spacious with ceilings vaulting high overhead, walls made of inches thick glass that occasionally flickers to display the Cheng-Moore Syndicate's logo, a stylized CMS in gold letters set into a shield with a black backdrop. Circles of low tables and chairs are placed at regular intervals between the doors and the front desk. Each table has a screen built into its surface showing the latest and greatest innovations from the Syndicate's subsidiaries: biotech and cybernetics, law enforcement, aeronautics, etc. He's tapping his foot impatiently as he waits on the dark skinned and fair haired man sitting behind the front desk to finish searching the database for his information.
He's brushed his hair and put on a slightly-out-of-fashion-suit. Thinking of a clock brings up, in the lower left corner of his vision, a hologoraphic display of numbers. They're transparent and tell him he's ten minutes late for his appointment with human resources. Mason clears his throat. The man behind the desk gives him a scornful look and he steps forward.
"Look, pal," he says, "I'm late already. I have an appointment. I'm a new-hire, you probably don't have me in the system yet."
"If you came in for an interview we'd already have you in the system, sir. Please be patient." Mason rolls his eyes and took a step back. It takes the man two minutes and thirty-seven seconds to find his file. Another fifteen seconds of validation and verification of temporary security clearance. Fifty-six seconds to give him directions, three and a half for pleasantries, and then seventeen for the elevator to come down. He is rocketing toward the upper levels at breakneck speeds, just shy of fifteen minutes late, and performing breathing exercises to bring his pulse and tempers down. It is, according to Mason, a small miracle that he hadn't throttled the man. Inertia tries to drag him down. He can feel it pulling at his knees when the elevator begins to slow. It finally stops, the doors slide apart, and he steps into a hallway with floor-to-ceiling windows showing a view of downtown Chicago to his left and a small lobby on his right, complete with its own desk and wageslave meant, surely, to make him just a few more minutes late to his appointment. He makes it the rest of the way without incident.
A man stands in front of a small metal desk tucked away into the corner of a square room. The blinds on the window are drawn shut, filling the room with slices of pale light. Beneath the window and behind the man is a bed with gray sheets in a tangled mass hanging off the edge. The single pillow is squashed flat. Clothes litter the floor alongside empty and half-empty mugs, cups, bottles, and other refuse. The walls are bare, white, smooth. He scratches at his chest and takes a sip from a gray mug of something hot. His eyes are red and glassy from too little or too much sleep, and his hair is in the same disheveled state it had been when he crawled out of bed somewhere around an hour before. The desk is laden with half-broken husks of small machinery, their guts spilling over onto an old keyboard that hasn't been cleaned in some time. He stares at the empty metal frame that normally projects a holographic display, and at the blinking red light near the base of the frame which indicates a pending message. "Open," his voice is dry, hoarse. He turns, taking a drink from the steaming mug, and leaves the room as the display flickers to life. A feminine voice, metallic and inhuman, announces his pending message from Cheng-Moore, subject line: Your Future with the Syndicate Starts Today! "Read," he's stepped into another room, this one similarly dim in lighting and lacking in decoration. It has a couch of some synthetic leather substitute, its cushions sunken and formless, a round black table in front of the couch, and a similarly empty metal frame atop a tall table set against a wall across the room. It's visible through the partition in the kitchenette he makes his way into, and soon hums to life with muffled explosion of static and noise as he rummages through a cabinet. "Dear Mason Amsel," the voice reads, "it is with great enthusiasm that I write to inform you of your acceptance into the Cheng-Moore Syndicate Rapid Emergency Response Unit (CMSRERU)"" The voice goes on for a few minutes, reading off a series of dates and times for finalizing paperwork, training schedule, map locations, and so on. In the meantime, Mason finds a little bottle of honey, squeezes some of it into his cup of tea, and searches for a clean-enough-to-stir-with-spoon. He walks out of the kitchenette and over to the floating display, swiping a hand from left to right through the air in front of him. The message text wipes away and is replaced with a camera feed panning down the length of a wide street empty of cars, populated only by a handful of people. They run to cut diagonally across the street when a large black armored truck swerves in from off camera and skids to a halt in front of them. The back of the truck flies open and armed men dressed to the nines in tac-gear came pouring out, guns at the ready. Text flashes along the bottom of the screen, reading, Syndicate Forces Shut Down Soma Den in Downtown Chicago, Deal Huge Blow to Drug Trade. A man's voice comes from the speakers set into the metal frame and a downward swipe of Mason's hand mutes it before he can make out what?s being said. "Open video log," he says.
The camera feed is replaced with another. This one points out at his dirty apartment. He fills the center of the frame, sipping his tea and honey. "Record," a blinking light starts signaling the beginning of a recording. "Hey Ma," he says, "Just wanted to let you know. I got that Syndicate job, just found out. Good work, good pay. I promise not to get kicked out of this one. Tell Dad to give me a call next time you see him, I'm not sure if he's getting my messages. Haven't heard back in a while. Chicago's an alright place. It's cold, dirty, but that ain't so different from most cities, is it?" He shifts uncomfortably, sips his tea, and continues, "I got about two months of training bullshit, like I ain't learned the basics already. But it is what it is, I guess. I'll suck it up if it means I get some real work. In a few months, I should have enough to get a nicer place, and a little after that to pay for you and Dad to come up and visit, see what life in the big city's like," he cracks a small smile. "I gotta go, Ma. They need me to come in, file some paperwork and run a few more tests before everything is finalized. I'll be in touch. Love you," he waves a hand to pause the recording. "Send," he says, and the still-frame of him standing in the apartment, arm half-raised, vanishes. "Done," the display winks out and he heads back to the bedroom and through there into the small bathroom to take a shower.
****
Mason stands in the lobby of a building whose top is lost to the clouds. The d"cor is chic, all stark lines and sterile whites and grays. His apartment used to look like this, before he moved in. The lobby is spacious with ceilings vaulting high overhead, walls made of inches thick glass that occasionally flickers to display the Cheng-Moore Syndicate's logo, a stylized CMS in gold letters set into a shield with a black backdrop. Circles of low tables and chairs are placed at regular intervals between the doors and the front desk. Each table has a screen built into its surface showing the latest and greatest innovations from the Syndicate's subsidiaries: biotech and cybernetics, law enforcement, aeronautics, etc. He's tapping his foot impatiently as he waits on the dark skinned and fair haired man sitting behind the front desk to finish searching the database for his information.
He's brushed his hair and put on a slightly-out-of-fashion-suit. Thinking of a clock brings up, in the lower left corner of his vision, a hologoraphic display of numbers. They're transparent and tell him he's ten minutes late for his appointment with human resources. Mason clears his throat. The man behind the desk gives him a scornful look and he steps forward.
"Look, pal," he says, "I'm late already. I have an appointment. I'm a new-hire, you probably don't have me in the system yet."
"If you came in for an interview we'd already have you in the system, sir. Please be patient." Mason rolls his eyes and took a step back. It takes the man two minutes and thirty-seven seconds to find his file. Another fifteen seconds of validation and verification of temporary security clearance. Fifty-six seconds to give him directions, three and a half for pleasantries, and then seventeen for the elevator to come down. He is rocketing toward the upper levels at breakneck speeds, just shy of fifteen minutes late, and performing breathing exercises to bring his pulse and tempers down. It is, according to Mason, a small miracle that he hadn't throttled the man. Inertia tries to drag him down. He can feel it pulling at his knees when the elevator begins to slow. It finally stops, the doors slide apart, and he steps into a hallway with floor-to-ceiling windows showing a view of downtown Chicago to his left and a small lobby on his right, complete with its own desk and wageslave meant, surely, to make him just a few more minutes late to his appointment. He makes it the rest of the way without incident.