Eli Davenport was smiling at his unruly creation—as it lashed out and scratched at his face multiple times. Because he knew that pain was temporary. Progress, allows you to move on from such stopgaps.

His white gloved hands, fingers constantly hitting across his new desk, searched for the implement that was surely right there—as he moved his neck so that the mechanical tendrils didn’t start digging into his skin. He still had use for his face, of course. The brand’s gone, if that happens.

“Come now—” Davenport warned the creation in his “fatherly” tone. “No need for all of this—I’m trying to prove a point—”

He found the tool he needed, signaled by a content “ah” escaping his lips.

With his electrified fork, he repeatedly bashed the unruly Shift-affect technology into the desired shape he designed.

As the process, from the design to the engineering work, became such a habit for Eli—his mind was allowed to drift into other places.

The siVictim Incident at Willworth’s Mall—right before the grand opening too—as well as what he called “The Long Night”: N’atural’s slow trudge throughout the city before ultimately escaping… It’s putting people on edge, again. After this great campaign with slogan—“Healing Is The New We Can Do”, being able to redesign and restructure—otherwise rebirth his beautiful city project and ease the public’s mind about the Noumena…

But he knew that he’ll sway them back. Because it’s easy to ease the fevered mind of the lost, when you not only offer them a way back…

He pieced together the prototype cast, covering the living wire system up into it’s new body. An automaton, soft—blank—inviting features that stood upright. While it was just a humanoid, black bedsheet right now: that was the foundation that Davenport needed.

As he put his fine work on his desk, right next to the draft of his speech to end all of his others—he finished his thoughts.

It’s easy to guide the lost, not only offering a way back—but giving them the new kind of transport that will soon become the norm. Now you’re not just a savior, you’re a man of legend.

Mr. Davenport combed his fingers through his long, white shaved mullet, chuckled to himself. It was almost too easy…

“I have come for my presentation, Mr. Eli.”

The man stumbled in his seat, practically flailing his arms before freezing.

He really had to stop thinking that, when saying it out loud became just as cursed…

“I’m not even going to entertain the ‘I have no appointments today’—How the hell did you come in here?” Mr. Davenport squinted behind his hands, which he slowly placed onto his desk.

He was a bookish youth, but not the type that Eli grew up around—modernized, cynical. He had a massive touchscreen tablet that took up most of his chest, was wearing a very brimstone colored long coat, that ever so glowed a pale white along the details of it, acting as accents. His hair was to his neck, brown combed hair that had volume and a bang that swiped over his forehead. His oval glasses hung off his nose, before he pushed his two-leather gloved fingers to adjust them back. Such sharp, annoyed green eyes.

“Matters we have to discuss today are beyond culture and consideration, surely you’ll understand in time,” the youth having a very distinct, calculated tone.

“I rather it be right now versus ‘in time’, my boy, so—” Mr. Davenport was cut off.

“Then I’ll do my best to explain succinctly and clearly,” the youth just walked forward, taking a chair that was beyond the desk.

Mr. Davenport had to laugh at the display, no matter how forced and irritated it came out as. “I just—I’m very confused—I haven’t gotten your name—”

“Dredd. R.J. Dredd.”

That caused Eli to pause. Study this young man with shaking eyes… Until a grin stretched across his face. Relief…

“It’s pretty cute—how your generation seems to cope,” Mr. Davenport laughed, so assured. “To name yourself after that infamous man, just to have some clout and protection—there’s no need to pretend, my boy, just be yourself--!”

“But Dredd is my surname,” R.J. said, unshaken and unamused.

“If you needed a way into becoming an aid, or within the higher rung of Extant—you do it with honest and hard work! I’m sure you can do it, you have the look and grimace needed—”

“I am R.J. Dredd and this is important.”

“The joke wasn’t funny the first time, boy,” Mr. Davenport deepened his tone. Again, a “fatherly” threat but veiled enough in charm for it to be easy to absorb. “Malcom Dredd was not the one to be a father.”

“He wasn’t, yes,” R.J. quickly looked down, studying the tablet.

…Watching that alone was enough for Eli, for it to completely hit.

“…Oh my goodness,” Mr. Davenport looked at the boy with wide eyes. “Couldn’t help to create the one last thing… I’m so sorry, son. What a broken legacy that sits on your shoulders. I—I never personally met him, but Mal’s Miracle Matter and the plan he had that would’ve undermined society itself with his new world order… He was a monster. I couldn’t imagine… Him being your flesh and blood.”

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“You don’t have to strain—because it’s my flesh and blood regardless,” R.J. said. “But where I am and where I came from isn’t the topic of day. It’s why I’m here.”

Mr. Davenport scrambled, putting his hands together. “Anything, son… Just tell me why you’re here.”

“Indulge me,” R.J. adjusted his spectacles. “We are now on the precipice, the recent events and the triggering history that preceded them has clearly painted the picture of humanity’s losing war against this celestial dilemma… Society is slowly eroding without the help of the Shifts, as the collective human consciousness is plagued with mental illness brought forth, the human condition is now harder than it ever has as living needs a pleotra of new skills that the average meek simply cannot do… It’s time we looked at each other. It’s time to enact the little control we have left.”

Mr. Davenport found himself gulping. “And what is this… Control? Who are you, R.J. Dredd…?”

The boy looked directly at him. “I am R.J. Dredd, supervisor and herald of the End Chapter. We are a people, that existed outside of the fringes of humanity… Trained and prepared. To sing it to its sleep.”

Mr. Davenport’s face found itself twisted, with disgust at what he was hearing.

“Are you saying that you’re a Doomsday cult--?”

“We are not a cult,” R.J. shook his head lightly, still professional. “We are an official channel. A built-in last resort, created by Dr. Gia Taber herself.”

The middle-aged man felt the warmth leave his body. His mouth dry, beads of sweat forming.

“Hard to believe, much more harder to accept… But she had a very… Specific vision of what was going to happen. What a Shift-integrated society would be—”

“--And it was a lot more hopeful and not self-defeating than what you’re telling me right now!” Mr. Davenport screamed.

R.J. just stared at him. There was so little, visible emotion coming from the boy. It unnerved him.

“If you—” Mr. Davenport had to caught himself, trying to maintain his tone. “If what you’re saying is true… It invalidates everything Extant is for! Why she and the others created it in the first place! If she wanted this Chapter Black to happen—when why pour everything into this versus brewing this underground! As hypocritical as she was—she was the one that lead us to surviving! She’s the Modern Mother, or whatever!”

The man wiped his face, clearing the sweat and spittle.

“You want to do your so-called job? Say that, out loud in the streets. You’ll save any effort you needed to do within three days.”

R.J. put his hands together. Rubbing them idly.

“She gave her blessings and her ideas for the design of Extant along with it’s founders, but in the whole… She poured everything into what we’re about. You can have hope for the future while planning for the present to finally go wrong. Look around you… This is a heightened society, that can barely grasp what’s happening to them. And now they have cosmic powers, at their finger-tips… And said power resonates with them as people, and responds to their desires… And their deepest sins. Whatever structure for a world such as this needs to be constantly redrawn, day by day. It would be sheer hubris for humanity to not have this back up plan—and she knew humanity better than they knew her--”

“You can shove these plans into the trash--!” Mr. Davenport stood, getting out of his chair. “I refuse! In fact, I’m shutting it down the first chance I get--!”

“I’ve come to tell you that we’re already active,” R.J. simply looked up. “And you will be the one that will tell me to proceed with what needs to be done.”

Mr. Davenport froze in place. “W-…Why--?”

“You are head of Extant. You are now the guiding hand of the future. And with that power, you and you alone will have to make the ultimate choice.”

Mr. Davenport just fell into his chair, limp. A feverent expression of fear across his face.

“I took this job… So I can build a terrific future for folks who honest-to-god needed something—something to look forward to—an actual, tangible pot of gold at the end of a rainbow—and you chose me to destroy everything?! Me, Eli Davenport who cracked teleportation for the hell of it--who took an offshore boating island and turned into the city of everyone’s tomorrow?!”

His fists battered the desk, causing R.J. to flinch in response.

“What sense does that make?!”

“I do want to make something clear…” R.J. still kept an even tone. “What’s going to happen is like demolition. There’s steps. There’s phases. We’re not going to press some button and hide.”

“What if I refuse—flat out—right now?!” the middle-aged man rose his finger.

R.J. sucked his teeth. “That’s certainly an option.”

The youth swaggered in his seat and leaned back. “If you are unwilling to do your job, well, there’s nothing stopping us from doing ours.”

“If you’re doing to disobey, then what’s the point of electing me to perform the choice?!”

“You misunderstood, Mr. Eli,” R.J. explained. “Our efforts are already in motion… We will continue to put things in place, as things continue to get worse and worse. After a while, and with the right… Well, the next crisis that is surely brewing right now… We’ll become out in the open. And little explanation from you will trigger more hysteria, thus more crisis. So either way…”

The boy pointed his finger, his glasses slid down his nose, showing his cold stare.

“We’re going to be working together. Now and forever. Well, until forever ends—I guess is more the term…”

The man fished into his candy-cane themed suit, into it’s pocket, getting a dry cloth and wipes his face.

“A Sword of Damocles, above my head…”

R.J. perked his bottom lip upwards, nodding.

It was at a point, it ceased to be Davenport wiping his face, transformed into a facepalm with a cloth against this face. Everything swirls about in his brain.

Lowering the cloth, revealed his eyes. His dreary, old eyes.

Until he saw the robot, standing proud on his desk, and something in his eyes glowed alight once more.

“What you said… ‘The next crisis is brewing’… You are right. There is something brewing.”

R.J. looked on, and said nothing.

“The Big Bang was just an explosion of gas, and cosmic, and all manner of things we are still aiming to discover—This is the closest thing that we have here. But we can control it. We can forge something new out of this tired, broken shell. All those things you mentioned? It was already happening. Without the presence of the constant Shifts. And with my help, we’ll outgrow them.”

R.J. shrugged, with closed eyes. “I managed my mission. I’m glad to see your views, Mr. Eli.”

The boy rose up, adjusted his glasses and then the collar of his jacket. “I assume that I’m prohibited from using my ability to get in here to exit?”

“Indefinitely,” Mr. Davenport had a dark look on his face.

The door swung open, revealing the outside of the building—the pouring rain where there should have been a hall or a lobby.

“Your innovation with teleportation technology is astonishing, I wish I could’ve talked more with you about it.”

“And for the record—don’t talk to me as if we were equals, Dredd Junior.”

“Of course, Mr. Eli.”

A hat manifested from the air, landing in R.J.’s open palm. He placed it square onto his head, and walked out into the rain.

As the door shut on it’s own, Mr. Davenport unraveled in his chair. Panting, sweating, unable to cope with what he’s just been cursed with. And again, what would the public think about something like this?

He shook his head, quickly picking up his creation, as he strokes it with his fingers within his hands.

“Like I said… This is MY era.”

***

As the neon lights shined off his dark cloak, R.J. Dredd couldn’t help but smile as he looked up at the rain.

“Even the rain… Is starting to get complicated…