CHAPTER THREE:
"Processed"
John blinked awake to the soft chime of his neural alarm, morning sunlight filtering through the smart-glass windows that adjusted their tint automatically. The faint hum of hover-cars passing overhead painted moving shadows across his bedroom walls, their outlines softened by the city's ever-present haze.
"Good morning, John," the house AI greeted with motherly warmth. "It's 6:45 AM. Current temperature is 72 degrees with light neo-smog. Your work shift starts in exactly two hours."
He stretched, muscles protesting the early hour. The ceiling's bio-luminescent panels pulsed gently, their glow shifting from night-mode amber to morning blue. Through his window, the distant spires of Oblivion Prime pierced the clouds like chrome needles, their surfaces already reflecting the day's first light.
The familiar routine settled over him as he dressed for another shift at the QuikStop: black nano-fiber pants, the store's required holo-shirt (today cycling between green and blue), and his worn but comfortable grav-assist sneakers. The shoes' power cells needed charging again - the anti-grav feature barely lifted him a centimeter off the ground now.
Downstairs, the kitchen auto-prep was already finishing his breakfast. The smell of synthetic eggs and real coffee (his mom's one luxury) filled the air. As he descended the stairs, his eyes passed over the garage door without really seeing it - just like they did every morning. The keypad's soft red glow was such a constant presence that his brain filed it away with all the other background details of home: the slight scratch in the living room's holo-wall, the permanent scorch mark where dad's experimental coffee maker had shorted out, the...
John paused at the bottom of the stairs, a strange feeling washing over him. For a moment, the garage door seemed wrong somehow. Important. But the thought slipped away like water through his fingers, replaced by more immediate concerns - like whether he'd remembered to charge his transit pass.
John slid into the kitchen's floating chair, the smart-surface table already displaying his personalized morning feed matrix. Multiple holographic panels hovered in the air before him - some cycling through social updates, others displaying breaking news in crisp neon text.
"President Morrison Departs for Camp David," the main feed announced, footage showing the First Family boarding their sleek presidential hover-transport. Sarah Morrison's red hair caught the morning light as she helped her younger brother Tommy with his luggage. The President's wife, Elena, smiled and waved to the assembled press corps, her neo-silk dress shifting colors to match the transport's chrome finish. "First Family's Annual Retreat Marks 100 Years of Camp David's Quantum Shielding," the caption scrolled beneath.
John absently forked synthetic eggs into his mouth as he swiped through the feeds. The social panels flashed updates in his peripheral vision: "Synthetic Police Force's AI Receives Milestone 50th Consciousness Upgrade", "Lower Rift Air Scrubbers Operating at 32% Capacity - Repairs Scheduled", "Hexspire Quantum Core Achieves Record Processing Speed."
A sponsored news-reel captured his attention - "BREAKING: Gameweaver Industries Announces Revolutionary Neural Interface Breakthrough." The footage showed scientists in pristine white labs working with equipment that made the hair on the back of his neck stand up, though he couldn't say why.
"Weather alert," the house AI chimed in. "Neo-smog levels increasing in sectors 7 through 12. Airborne nanite count exceeding safety parameters. Please remember to activate full filtration settings on your transit wear."
John checked the time on his retinal display: 7:15. Still plenty of time to make his shift, but he'd learned the hard way that Lower Rift traffic could be unpredictable, especially with the quantum transit lines running at half capacity. He downed the last of his coffee - real Columbian, still a luxury even in 2147 - and pushed away from the table.
John paused at the front door, running through his mental checklist as he activated his transit wear's protective systems. The jacket's nano-fibers rippled, sealing microscopic gaps as the filtration collar extended up around his neck and lower face. A soft blue glow pulsed along the seams, indicating the air scrubbers were online.
The door's biometric scanner hummed as it read his palm print. Beyond the threshold, Oblivion Prime painted the morning sky in shades of chrome and neon, its towering spires disappearing into the neo-smog layer that perpetually hung over the city. The Hexspire dominated the view, its quantum-glass surface reflecting the sunrise in fractals of impossible color.
Stepping outside, John was immediately enveloped in the controlled chaos of suburban morning traffic. Personal hover-pods zipped between the established transport lanes, their anti-grav fields creating rippling distortions in the air. Above them, the larger mass-transit vessels moved like mechanical whales through the neo-smog, their massive air filtration systems leaving trails of temporarily clean sky in their wake.
His next-door neighbor, Mrs. Nakamichi, was tending to her bio-luminescent garden, the genetically modified plants shifting colors in response to her gentle touches. Her cybernetic arm's gardening attachments glinted in the morning light as she waved.
"Morning John! Tell your mother the new neural-splice tomatoes are almost ready. They glow when they're perfectly ripe now!"
He waved back, already moving toward the transit stop. The street's smart-surface was busy mapping out the day's traffic patterns in flowing lines of light, guiding both ground vehicles and pedestrians through the most efficient paths. Other early morning commuters gathered at the stop, their transit wear creating a sea of softly glowing filtration collars.
A street vendor's aromatic noodle cart drifted past, its anti-grav stabilizers humming as its AI called out the day's specials in five different languages. The smell cut through even the filtration systems - real food, not synthetic, though John knew better than to ask how the vendor managed that in 2147.
Through the shifting neo-smog, a public transport pod descended from the quantum transit line, its crystalline shell refracting morning light into prismatic patterns. John joined the small crowd boarding, his transit pass automatically debiting credits as he crossed the threshold. Inside, holo-ads flickered across the quantum-glass windows, their images adapting to each passenger's personal data feeds.
The pod smoothly accelerated into the established commuter lane, joining the stream of vehicles flowing through the city's arteries. Through gaps in the neo-smog, John could see the full grandeur of Oblivion Prime stretching out below. The Lower Rift's makeshift towers crawled up the sides of ancient skyscrapers like mechanical ivy, their jury-rigged power lines creating webs of blue electricity between buildings.
A news holo flickered to life in the pod's center: "Gameweaver Industries Stock Soars on Neural Interface Announcement." The image showed their CEO, a woman whose features seemed to shift and change depending on the angle you viewed them from, standing before a wall of flowing data.
The pod banked smoothly around the Hexspire's massive bulk, its quantum-glass surface making it look like a mountain made of frozen lightning. For a moment, John thought he saw something in its reflection - a cloaked figure standing impossibly still amid the flowing traffic. But when he blinked, there was nothing there.
"Approaching Lower Rift Commercial District," the pod's AI announced in soothing tones. "Please prepare for descent."
The pod settled onto its landing cushion with practiced precision, anti-grav fields dispersing in a ripple of blue light. John stepped out into the controlled chaos of the Lower Rift Commercial District, where street-level commerce still thrived in the shadows of the quantum towers above.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
QuikStop's holosign flickered through its daily cycle of advertisements, the ancient projectors struggling to maintain consistency in the heavy neo-smog. The shop occupied the ground floor of a retrofit complex, its windows crowded with both physical and holographic displays advertising everything from synthetic protein packs to black-market air filter upgrades.
John waved his wrist over the employee scanner, his bio-chip registering arrival at exactly 8:45 AM. The store's security field recognized his signature and parted like mercury, allowing him to step through into the climate-controlled interior. The familiar scent of recycled air and artificial coffee hit him immediately.
"Thank the digital heavens you're here!" Marcus called from behind the counter, his filtration collar still glowing blue from his morning commute. "These prices are glitching again."
"Glitching?" John made his way behind the counter, but he already knew what was coming. The same thing that had been happening every morning for... how long now?
"Nineteen point nineteen," a customer complained, waving her holo-receipt in the air. Its numbers flickered in angry red. "Everything rings up as nineteen point nineteen credits. Just like yesterday, and the day before. I've been coming here for twenty years, and I know my syn-caf doesn't cost that much!"
John checked the register's quantum display. Every item on the screen showed the same price: 19.19 credits. He blinked, and for a moment, the numbers seemed to swim with hidden meaning, like they were trying to tell him something important. But then Marcus was shoving another customer's items across the scanner, and each one beeped out the same total.
"Look," a man in a worn executive suit gestured at his wrist display, "I've got the historical pricing data right here. Last week, these exact same items cost—"
"Nineteen point nineteen," three customers said in unison, their voices carrying an odd harmonic quality that made John's spine tingle. They looked at each other, confused, as if they hadn't meant to speak together.
Through the shop's quantum-glass windows, John watched the neo-smog shift colors. But in its swirling patterns, he suddenly caught a glimpse of something impossible – not the chrome spires of Oblivion Prime, but an ancient Japanese city. Paper lanterns swayed in an unseen breeze, their soft glow illuminating wooden buildings with upturned eaves. The scent of real food – not synthetic proteins, but actual cooking – seemed to cut through the recycled air of the QuikStop. For just a moment, he could hear the distant chime of temple bells mixing with the sound of wooden sandals on stone streets.
"It's not about the prices," one of the customers suddenly said, her eyes glazing over. "Gameweaver wants you to see the pattern. Beautiful realms... twisted... but beautiful."
The words hung in the air like physical things, and just as quickly as it had appeared, the vision of that other city folded away behind the neo-smog. But John could still taste the ghost of real food on his tongue, could still hear the echo of those temple bells.
"I don't understand why this keeps happening," Marcus muttered, running another item across the scanner. 19.19 credits. "Tech support says there's nothing wrong with the system, but every morning, same thing."
John nodded automatically, but his attention was caught by something else—a woman standing perfectly still amid the rushing crowd outside, her features seeming to change each time someone passed between her and the window. When she smiled, John felt something important trying to surface in his mind—something about rain falling upward and a conversation in a dimly lit apartment.
"The vehicle waits, in shadows of a forgotten place..." another customer said in that same harmonized tone, then immediately returned to arguing about her syn-caf pricing. "In shadows of forgotten places..."
John's fingers found the edge of the counter, steadying himself as reality seemed to flicker around the edges. Something was wrong, something that hid behind unanimous price complaints and customers who spoke in harmony about beautiful realms.
Through the window, that strange woman still stood watching, her smile growing wider as the neo-smog swirled with impossible colors around her. And somewhere in the back of John's mind, a memory tried to surface—something about a garage door that suddenly seemed far more important than it should have been.
As suddenly as it had started, the price glitch vanished. The next customer's synthetic protein bars rang up at their normal price of 12.50 credits. The neo-smog outside returned to its usual industrial gray, and that haunting vision of an ancient Japanese city dissolved like morning dew, leaving John with an inexplicable sense of loss.
The day accelerated into a blur of transactions and automated restocking drones. John's hands moved through familiar motions – waving items past quantum scanners, adjusting holographic shelf labels, helping customers navigate the augmented reality shopping assists. Each action felt both perfectly natural and somehow wrong, like a dance performed underwater.
The afternoon crowd brought the usual mix of corporate workers with their enhanced business suits and Lower Rift residents in patchwork filtration wear. They complained about neo-smog levels and synthetic food prices, but none spoke in that strange harmony again. The woman who had stood so still outside the window was gone, though John occasionally caught glimpses of what might have been her reflection in the quantum-glass, watching him with that knowing smile.
At 7:40 PM, just as the evening shift was winding down, the store's security field rippled with a familiar bio-signature. Moe burst through, his filtration collar still glowing from the evening commute, carrying a stack of old-fashioned paper forms – a rarity in 2147 that should have seemed strange but somehow didn't.
"John, I'm sorry man," Moe called out, his voice carrying that classic better-late-than-never energy. "Got caught up with the distributor meeting. Meant to get here earlier for the coolers..."
"It's fine, Moe," John replied automatically, the words feeling worn and comfortable like a favorite jacket. "You're never on time anyway. I'm used to it by now."
As they began processing the paperwork, John's eyes kept drifting to the garage door in his memory – that keypad with its softly glowing red light. Something about it pulled at him, like a splinter in his mind he couldn't quite reach. Through the windows, the neo-smog had begun to shift colors again, threads of purple and emerald weaving through the darkness.
And somewhere in the distance, barely audible above the hum of hover-cars and quantum generators, temple bells began to chime.
"Have a good night, Moe," John called over his shoulder, activating his filtration collar as he stepped through the security field. The neo-smog twisted between Oblivion Prime's towers, streams of industrial gray pierced by ribbons of purple and emerald.
The Hexspire dominated the skyline, its quantum-glass exterior transforming the city's neon into cascading fractals. Numbers flowed across its crystalline faces - 19.19 repeated endlessly in mercury-bright digits. Massive holo-advertisements burned through gaps in the urban maze, their messages cycling between product promises and those same, insistent numbers.
The public transport pod descended from the quantum transit line, its crystalline shell blazing with refracted neon. The fare display flickered as John boarded: 19.19 credits. The other passengers stared ahead with glazed eyes while the pod merged into the Circuit Grid's flowing traffic streams.
Magnetic highways pulsed between towers, their surfaces crowded with hover-cars and personal transport units. Each vehicle's anti-grav field bent the neo-smog, creating patterns that twisted into half-familiar glyphs before dissolving. Corporate logos and entertainment feeds painted the clouds in synchronized light shows that burned past the limits of natural color.
She waited on a Skybridge platform, motionless amid the rushing crowd. The neo-smog parted around her form, revealing glimpses of other cities layered behind her - the paper lanterns and temple bells of that ancient Japanese town, chrome spires that made Oblivion Prime seem primitive, and something else... something that carried the scent of synthetic buns and endless rain.
The pod banked through the Neon Markets, where holographic signs spilled light across the faces of street-level vendors. Every price tag displayed the same numbers: 19.19. Every digital credit reader glowed with identical digits. In the shadow of a defunct air filtration tower, a black market dealer counted glowing credit chips - nineteen of them, John noticed, arranged in nineteen stacks.
Through the quantum-glass windows, John caught fractured reflections of the Halo Flats. Each suburban house number glowed in the darkness: 1919, 1919, 1919. The neo-smog thinned for a moment, revealing a sky filled with colors that had no names in any human language.
"Next stop, Residential Block 1919," the pod's AI announced. John frowned - he knew that hadn't been his stop's designation that morning.
The woman stood waiting as he disembarked, though he'd seen her across the city moments before. Her smile carried weight beyond simple greeting. The neo-smog coiled around her, revealing glimpses of realities that shouldn't exist.
"The vehicle waits," she said, her voice echoing from everywhere and nowhere. "In the shadows of a forgotten place..."
She vanished between one heartbeat and the next. John walked the familiar path home, but the garage door pulled at his thoughts with increasing urgency. That softly glowing red keypad meant something - something important enough to tear holes in reality itself.
Temple bells chimed in the distance, though no temples existed in Oblivion Prime. Their tone rang out in perfect rhythm: 19... 19... 19... 19...
The house loomed before him, darkness spilling from the open front door. John's footsteps echoed against the porch steps. Something felt wrong - no automated greeting, no bio-luminescent panels activating at his approach.
"Hello?" His voice fell flat in the silence. No response. "Mom? Dad?"
John reached for the wall panel. "Luminate!" Nothing. The house remained dark, dead. A beam of light swept through the kitchen, accompanied by the sound of drawers being yanked open.
He backed toward the door, but another flashlight beam cut across his escape route. John pressed himself against the wall, heart thundering as footsteps approached from both directions. The hallway offered the only path - toward the garage door with its softly glowing red keypad.
The beam caught them first - two crumpled forms outside the garage door. His parents. The clean precision of plasma burns told him everything he needed to know. They'd died protecting whatever lay behind that door.
"That code's got to be around here somewhere." A harsh whisper from the kitchen.
"Keep looking!" Another voice, closer now.
John knelt beside his father, throat tight. The old man's datapad had fallen from his hand, its screen cracked but still displaying the cover of his favorite book - "The Dark Tower" by Stephen King. Dad had practically forced those ancient novels on him, insisting their century-old pages held truths modern cortex-feeds couldn't touch.
The number 19 pulsed in John's memory - not just from today's strange events, but from those books. The number that appeared again and again, marking paths between worlds. His fingers moved to the keypad, trembling as he punched in the digits.
1... 9...1…9
The panel hummed. The door slid open without a sound, revealing a garage he had no memory of ever entering. Clean white surfaces gleamed with advanced tech that shouldn't exist in 2147. And there, beneath a shimmering car cover that rippled with its own inner light, waited a shape both familiar and impossible.
Flashlight beams swept closer. John slipped inside, the door sealing behind him as he approached the covered vehicle. The fabric responded to his touch, dissolving into particles of light that drifted away to reveal sleek, angular lines that defied everything he knew about automotive design. The ChronoLance X5's quantum-glass surface shifted colors in the darkness, its holographic dashboard already coming alive with welcoming light.
The key panel beside the quantum doors pulsed, waiting. And somewhere deep in the vehicle's reality-engine core, an AI fragment of Gameweaver stirred to life, ready to guide its chosen driver through realms yet unknown.
Behind him, fists pounded against the garage door. Time to choose - face the men with flashlights, or take his chances with whatever his parents had died for. The quantum doors opened with a soft hiss, revealing an interior that promised answers to questions he hadn't even thought to ask.
John stepped inside the vehicle, his parent's final gift. Temple bells chimed in the distance: 19... 19... 19... 19...