Roger sat on the balcony of his two room apartment on Manhattan wondering what it was in life he was supposed to do, why was he put here in the first place? There was nothing special about him, really, and nobody in the world gave a damn whether he lived or died. Life had fallen into the routine his mother had always told him it would. You go to work, go home, eat, and sleep. In between that you were doing something to make the other things work well or buying something.
The monotony of this lifestyle was overwhelming for a person like him, one that always wanted to go out and do something with his life but never really had the motivation to get up and make something of himself. So, he had gone the path of his parents and probably theirs before him and simply worked a normal job like anyone else, and watched the occasional battle that took place overhead in space. Who would want to risk your life fighting for a vast nothingness anyhow?
He’d only been into space a few times on errands, strange for one that lived in this day and age, but not unheard of. There were those who were impossible to convince that space was a safe place, it had, after all, saved every one of their ancestors from the Sol system and the constant wars there. They were the ones who had simply decided that everything they could ever hope for existed within their little societies upon stations or planets, and there was nothing else worth knowing about beyond those borders. Then, there were people like his parents, who thought that the only reason anybody would ever have dreams of going into space was to get killed or do the killing. This was what they believed and it was what was pounded into Roger’s skull since the day he first told them of his dreams to become an officer in the Liberty Navy.
The tele-comm rang, and Roger stood up with considerable protest from his recently operated on knee that had been injured in the ship factory where he worked, and hobbled inside to answer it. He thumbed the answer button and a face popped up, a doctor from the looks of him.
“Hello, this is Roger Havana, can I help you,” He said, his typical greeting.
“Er, yes, Mister Havana, this is Doctor Peron from the Kelly-Peyton Hospital, are you Sheri Havana’s son, by any chance,” The man replied.
“Why yes, I am, is there something wrong with my mother? What is it,” Roger questioned him frantically, his mind speeding trying to read the man’s face.
“Well, yes and no. There has been an accident,” Peron told him, with a rather grim look, “Your mother was involved in a spill at the plant she was working at and has been contaminated with the chemicals she was working with and…”
Robert cut him off, “What’s wrong with her, what’s happened?”
“I’m sorry, I can’t give you any details on her condition right now. The compounds she was working with in the lab are under the highest security and I am not authorized to tell you any more. I can only tell you that she is currently in stable condition and that she will receive the best care we can give.”
The doctor hung up before Roger could ask anything else of him, and he stood at the tele-comm in shock that he couldnt even find out what was wrong with his own mother. There was nobody else for either of them on this entire God-forsaken planet since Rogers sister Cindy had left for a university education in California. He had to get down to the hospital, theres no way they could withhold information on his mother from him, there had to be a way he could find outsurely the government wouldnt allow its secrecy to cause harm to a citizen who had given the better part of her life doing research for them, could it?
Roger went for the door and grabbed his pass for the intertram and took the elevator down to the ground floor, No stairs with this knee, a passing thought in the flurry of his mind. There were the usual vendors in the lobby trying to get him to buy everything from a new battery for his car, which he didnt have, to other everyday things. Stupid robots couldnt give him a minute to think, could they? He arrived at the terminal and swiped his card. The machine prompted him to input his destination, he did sothe Kelly-Peyton Memorial Hospital.
Were very sorry sir, that location is currently unable to receive passengers, the automated voice chirped.
Surely not, there mustve just been a glitch, he thought as he swiped the card and went through the steps again.
Same result as the previous attempt.
What the hell is going on here, he shouted at nothing. There was something nobody was telling him and he was going to find a way to the hospital, and his mother, no matter what stood in his way.
He ran up the flight of rusting, loud stairs to his left and into the street beyond the lobby. He accessed the neural net and checked out which way would be the fastest to the hospital on foot from where he was. He took of at a moderate jog, not wanting to alarm anyone, looking simply like a man who wanted a good run but forgot to change into the proper attire for the situation.
The pain hit him like a truck--he went down, hard. It was his knee again. He knew there had been a reason that he wanted to take the tram instead, there was no possible way he could run all the way to the hospital with his knee in this kind of shape.
Taxi, He shouted into the oncoming herd of yellow and green and red hover cars moving along the streets at all levels, most of them undoubtedly speeding, To Kelly-Peyton.
You got it bud.
And with that the hover car picked up off the ground and went zooming down the narrow corridors that the cabby seemed to know better than his own hands, and Roger wondered if this was really the best way to go
The cab veered in and out of some of the most precarious turns that Roger had ever seen anyone pull off, this was no average cab driver, he thought. Suddenly, the car lurched to a halt, Roger was thrown forward in his seat and hit the protective grate between him and the driver with a heavy, wet sound.
Are you out of your mind, screamed Roger at the now grinning cabby.
Why, no, Im actually totally sane, and youre going to listen to what I have to say, he sneered.
I
The cabby cut him off, Im going to tell you once to shut your mouth and listen. What your mother was involved in had nothing to do with her going to the hospital. She was working on a project that the government decided it had to completely cover up, get rid of all the evidence, ya know? And they chose your mother to be an example. She was threatening to tell outsiders what was being researched and they shut her up.
I dont understand, Roger told him.
Youre never going to see your mother again, Roger. Shes being held indefinitely in a supermax prison somewhere within Zone 21. I know you dont know what all of this means right now, but youll find out soon enough. Right now we need to get you somewhere safe, the government has its men everywhere trying to track you down and detain you, probably worse.
This is all too much, why was my mother taken? How do you know all this? She didnt do anything wrong!
Listen, kid, youre going to have to trust me on this. Im one of the men who works directly under a fellow named Simon Reynolds, and hes sent me to find you. All your questions will be answered as soon as we arrive to see him. We believe that youll have something to help our cause.
Cause? I dont know anything about you or what you want you cant just pick me up and drag me off to
some alley and get me to spill everything I ever knew. Who are you, even? Why should I g
Roger was cut off in mid syllable with a dart between his sixth and seventh ribs, poking out of his shirt with a tiny circle of bright red blood around it, a tiny tungsten-steel alloy dart full of a substance that would render any man unconscious before they knew theyd been shot.
Shut up already, the man in the front seat said Its a long ride to the space port and I dont think I can bare to have you yakking my ear off the whole way. Whiny little guy arent you?
He pulled up and out of the narrow corridors between the apartment complexes and shot off in the direction of the port, where his transport was waiting to take them both to see Reynolds. This kid was in for one crazy ride.