by Brian Savage
Dedicated to my amazing wife
who has the uncanny ability to see in others
what they can’t see in themselves.
Divided: 2120
by Brian Savage
First Kindle edition @ 2019 Brian Savage
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Chapter 1
He sat alone in a room of white tile and white walls. Hands folded in his lap, his right leg bounced up and down incessantly, a nervous twitch. His face appeared pained. His hair was matted and sticking up to one side, like he had just woken up from too much sleep after too late of a night. He sat on a stainless-steel chair, looking from one mirrored reflection of himself to another. There were three panes of glass, one to either side and one directly in front of him. He looked to his left, as though he could see behind the mirrored glass, where he knew his defense attorney was sitting, probably ruffling papers, speaking to an aide. Behind the pane of glass in front of him, there were two rooms split down the middle. One held the jury of peers judging him; the other, the people who cared enough to come see the case unfold. He glanced to the right window and caught the terrified expression on his face. He quickly turned away. He didn’t want to think of what was behind window number three. Nothing good came from the window on the right.
“John Lawson, you have been charged with fraud against the Corporation and embezzlement from the People in the amount of 1.6 billion dollars.” John Lawson jumped as the disembodied voice broke the silence in the room. “The jury has heard the arguments in the case and has seen the evidence presented. You have been brought here to hear the verdict and receive what punishment the jury deems necessary.”
John Lawson began to visibly sweat. His foot, with its incessant bouncing, was squeaking on the clean white tile beneath him. He began taking deeper breaths, seemingly staving off tears as he waited.
Behind the third window, one man watched, another was making coffee.
“What do you think it’s going to be?” asked the man pouring too much sugar into his coffee in a small Styrofoam cup.
“I don’t know. Fraud and embezzlement are pretty serious when you work for the Corporation.” The man standing at the window didn’t bother to turn around to answer.
“Think you’ll have to fire him today?” the first man asked as he walked over to stand next to his partner.
“I don’t know.”
The first man sipped his coffee. Glancing side-long at his partner, he asked, “Do you think he did it?”
“I don’t know.” That answer again, this time with a hint of reluctance.
The man who didn’t know, the man who was at this moment questioning his purpose and why it was necessary, was Jack Ray Ripley. He had fought in the Second Civil War, on the capitalist’s side, as a medic. He had treated people from both sides, and killed when he needed to. He was thirty-eight years old, and in the branch of the Corporation he had been assigned, he was experienced, a veteran. He had been working for D.I.E. for four years now. D.I.E., which stood for Detection, Investigation, and Elimination, was the branch of the Corporation that mainly handled the detection and investigation of possible socialist terrorists, saboteurs, and infiltrators. The other part of the job was what he was here for today. He shook his head. He didn’t want to think about what he might have to do. That part of his job, he knew in the back of his mind, because of the charges, he would have to fulfill; it was his turn anyway.
He turned and looked at his partner. A young guy, just a bit shorter than he was at five feet eight inches. He had a medium build, was well-muscled, and had a cut jaw line. His first name was Brantley, but he went by Brant. He had spent two years rising fast through the ranks of the Policing Division before he requested a transfer to D.I.E. He was a hotshot, an up-and-comer. Brant looked up mid-sip, catching the observation.
“What’s up, partner?” he asked, lowering his cup.
Jack eyed the Styrofoam cup in Brant’s hand. “Is the coffee any good?”
“It’s not horrible, five-dollar coffee at best,” he answered, turning back to watch the terrified man all alone in the room.
Jack made his way across the mostly empty room, side-stepping a couple of cookie-cutter waiting room chairs as he made his way to the small stainless-steel table that had the coffee maker and various additives. He picked up the package the coffee came in first, checking for a price tag, which seemed to be absent. The world had changed since the Second Civil War, and one couldn’t be too careful when it came to what one ate.
No price tag. Jack turned the package over in his hands again, scanning the front. The plain red coffee bag was perfectly normal. “Organic Coffee Beans from South California,” it read. Organic. Perfect. Meant the coffee was somewhat safe to drink.
Jack placed a Styrofoam cup into the dispenser slot of the coffee maker, placing the package of coffee back on the table. In less than a second, the cup was full of the steaming, dark liquid. Grabbing the cup, he gingerly sipped it while making his way back to the window. John Lawson had devolved into openly weeping and pleading at the unseen jurors.
“They are really making this dude suffer,” Brant said.
“Some take longer than others.”
fJack knew that the charges were more than serious. He had never been to one of these sessions, with charges like these, where the accused didn’t get fired. The cases were too public and the charges too tied to the public’s self-interest for anyone to get off scot-free. This guy was going to get fired. He knew it. He just didn’t want to have to deal with what that meant for him right now.
“Please, I didn’t do this! Please, my family…” John Lawson’s tears had seemingly dried up, but the breathless sobbing hadn’t stopped. He was completely folded over in his own lap now, head almost between his legs. The light in the small, round implant just under his right ear blinked green in a steady pulse. The light was supposed to blink with the rate of a person’s heartbeat. John Lawson’s implant light was blinking to the beat of “Smooth Criminal,” too fast to be healthy.
The implant in John Lawson’s neck was flush with his skin, round, about the size of a quarter, with a tiny LED bulb in the center. His version was a metallic black, brushed-metal color. The color identified the model. John Lawson’s was the best model. It matched the color of Jack’s, Brant’s, and any other high-ranking personnel within the Corporation. Lower ranking and less essential personnel had silver, and everyday people with enough money or employment necessity had white. More and more, the only people who didn’t have the implant were the poor—and there were less and less “poor” than ever before.
The implants were basically all the same: small computers that integrated with a user’s brain to assist in learning, communication, and connectivity between devices. Why would you need to spend years learning a language for an international business meeting when you could wirelessly download a program? The implants made the world a smaller place.
The implants made the world smaller, but opened it up to a whole new realm never before seen. The brain was basically a computer, and it integrated well with the small device in everyone’s neck, but as even the youngest computer user knows, information is a two-way flow in cyberspace. There
were rumors spreading of hackers who, for a price, could hack the implant and control a person’s actions, or even kill them. The rumors were never substantiated and absolutely not covered on the evening news, but there was talk. Some even said that a high-ranking official in Canada had been assassinated by his own body guard, who claimed he had been controlled. The body guard was quickly given a polygraph, which “confirmed” he was lying, and was subsequently executed. The story was on the feed for less than twelve hours.
Jack touched the cold metal implant in his neck uneasily. The black metal was supposed to mean that his implant had the most up-to-date security and hacking countermeasures. He turned his head slightly, switching his focus from John Lawson to his own reflection in the glass. He could see the green light, blinking slowly.
Jack took a look at himself. Dirty-blonde hair, blue eyes, a strong jaw line, but tired rings around his eyes. He looked into his own eyes and wondered where they were looking with that far-off stare. He got plenty of sleep. His conscience had been heavy as of late. It’s only going to get heavier after today, he thought. John Lawson was going to get fired.
It had been four years of this. He investigated a few rogue socialists attempting to assassinate the President and CEO of the Corporation, others trying to interrupt supply chains or some other form of sabotage that usually failed. He investigated employees who were found to have ties to socialism or other countries deemed anti-capitalist. More and more, he was called upon to do this. The number of employees he had to fire grew year after year, from a dozen or so the first year to a few dozen this year.
The year was 2120.
He was protecting the people. He was protecting the New Corporate States of America—or so he told himself.
“From who?” the still small voice asked. “From guys like John Lawson?”
Jack took a large gulp of coffee, washing the taste of bile away with the dark, bitter flavor of South Californian beans. John Lawson had made his decisions. He would have to live with the consequences; Jack lived with his.
The voice with no body finally spoke. John Lawson sat straight up in his chair, startled out of his sobbing fit for a split second.
“John Lawson, your peers have found you guilty of fraud against the Corporation, and embezzlement from the People. Your peers have decided that your punishment will be termination. John Lawson, on this day, 21 September, 2120, you are fired.”
The finality of the statement sent visible shivers over John Lawson’s body. The absent tears sprang anew, and the only word out of his mouth was, “No…” before he dissolved into blubbering.
“Well, that’s that,” Brant concluded. “It’s your turn, right?”
“Yeah. It’s my turn.”
Brant turned around and walked over to the waiting room chair that had his uniform jacket slung over it. The uniform jacket was the only piece of the uniform a D.I.E. officer had. They were allowed to wear whatever they wanted under the jacket, but the jacket had to be worn on-duty. Most officers wore jeans and t-shirts under their jackets, but a few like Brant and Jack wore slacks and button ups. Jack because he thought it was professional, Brant because he was following the example of his more seasoned partner.
The jacket was long, almost floor-length, and black, with what appeared to be a hexagonal design across the entire surface. The hexagonal “design” was actually a kinetic nano-armor. The hex, or hexes, when struck, would alert a certain number of hexes adjacent, hardening enough of the surface as necessary for the size and speed of the object impacting the jacket. A .45 caliber bullet flying at around nine hundred feet per second would strike a solid hex wall about the circumference of a dinner plate. A car striking the jacket at anything over twenty-five miles per hour would activate every hex on the jacket, effectively building a suit of armor for the agent’s body to bounce around in. No one that had a full-suit activation had survived the impact, but that was never mentioned. The jacket was great. A brick wall when needed, and a soft, supple leather at all other times.
Jack set his coffee on the sill of the window and pulled back the left side of his jacket. He drew his service weapon from the holster on his left hip with his right hand. Jack preferred a cross draw. It got him called old-fashioned on the range, but only from the guys that had never seen him shoot. The empty space where the center of the target used to be matched the shape their mouths made when his weapon was empty, slide locked and cleared.
Jack pointed his weapon at John Lawson’s head. It was cradled in his hands, with his elbows resting on his knees now. He was hunched over, weeping uncontrollably.
Three tiny green lights were lit above Jack’s right hand. The one on the left told him the weapon was at full charge, the one in the center that there were projectiles loaded into the chamber, and the third that the palm-print security feature was active and had identified Jack as the proper user. If any of the lights were red, Jack would know there was an issue.
Jack subconsciously checked the lights the moment the weapon was on target. He focused his eyes on the front sight post, placing it between the two rear sight posts, and aligning all three on the spot where he knew the small implant was located. As his eyes refocused on John Lawson, his hand unmoving, he caught a glimpse of himself in the glass. He could see his clenched jaw and felt himself willing it to relax. He looked at the weapon in his hand and steeled himself against the disgust that would surely show on his face if he wasn’t careful. Not disgust at the weapon—a weapon is a tool not unlike a hammer or screwdriver—but disgust at what he was about to do with the cold, metal tool in his hand. The shape wasn’t unlike a revolver, but with what seemed like a second barrel. A revolver with most of the roundness, somewhat flattened and squared out, giving it the look of something less like an addition to the hand and more like an extension of the hand.
Jack caught a glimpse of Brant’s face in the glass as well, looking quizzical and concerned. He was probably wondering why it was taking so long. Jack quickly focused back on his sights, back on the person he was about to make an unperson, and quickly pulled the trigger. The electromagnets inside the gun activated quicker than anything but the speed of light, and a small metal dart was launched from the end of the barrel, through the window, and through John Lawson’s implant. A sharp, bullwhip-like crack rent the silence, punctuating the awkward twitch of John Lawson’s head. As his body fell from the chair, his face slowly turned to the window on the right. If his eyes were able to see, the only thing to see would be the surprised look on his tear-stained face, and the small hole in the window, that had begun even then to fill back in.
Jack was intently watching this small hole, trying to be amazed at the liquid-like glass he was watching morph back into shape for the umpteenth time, trying not to think about the lifeless body that was no longer John Lawson, staring unseeing at him through the mirrored glass.
Jack holstered his weapon, and drew his uniform jacket back over the holster, concealing it. He picked his coffee cup up and drained what was left.
“Let’s go,” he said.
“You good?” Brant asked, raising both eyebrows with an expression that said he had noticed how long it took for Jack to fire the guy.
“Yeah.” Jack crumpled up the Styrofoam cup. He wasn’t going to explain his struggle to this guy. How could he? Was the kid really going to understand what he was thinking? Jack himself couldn’t fully process why he had been feeling this way. Feeling that there was something not quite right about what he did for a living; something not quite right with anything in the Corporation.
“I’m fine,” he added flatly as he made his way for the door.
Brant did a smart about-face, jacket slung over his left arm as Jack opened the door. There was a moment’s pause as Jack held the door, Brant trying to decide if he was going to push further or accept an answer he knew was a lie.
Deciding not to push his partner too much, he finished his coffee and walked through the open door, tossing the cup in the trash on the way through.
Jack stood for a moment, looking through the window as the body that once was John Lawson slipped through an opening that had appeared in the floor. Jack squeezed the crushed cup in his hand harder, his knuckles turning white. Had he really been guilty of what he had been accused? Jack questioned silently, relaxing his hand. His shoulders dropped in a resigned, sympathetic relaxation. What does it matter anymore? He shook his head to himself, looking down at his feet. After a few seconds more of quiet pondering, he looked back up, turned, and made his way through the door, shutting his mind off from questioning things further. The sun shines on the righteous and the wicked, he thought to himself, not remembering where the quote came from. It didn’t make any sense anyway; the sun never shone in the city anymore.
Chapter 2
They pushed into the street, where a light rain was falling steadily. The sun shone through the thin layer of clouds, but the view was routinely disrupted by the steady stream of aerials. The streets were full of people, but only two gassers, old and antiquated fossil-fueled ground vehicles, slowly putted along. They inched on little by little, completely surrounded by the foot traffic. Gassers were increasingly becoming obsolete. Not because there was no utility, but because the fuel was specialized now, making it too expensive for the everyday person looking to commute. Now, if you really wanted a vehicle, you merely summoned one using your implant. A driverless aerial would find you and you would automatically be billed for time of use, mileage, and fuel used. It was an extremely efficient way of travel.
The only problem with the aerials was when they malfunctioned. Two tons of metal and plastic falling out of the sky, onto the heads of unaware pedestrians. Made for some juicy headlines.
Jack zipped up his coat against the rain and started down the steps onto the sidewalk. He tried not to think about one of the aerials now flying overhead, careening down to snuff out his life. Wouldn’t change a thing, anyway, he thought sullenly.
Brant was a measured two steps behind him. The necessity of being tactically aware at all times was not lost on the two D.I.E. agents. Usually, they would call up an aerial or utilize their company gasser, but Jack wanted to walk, and Brant didn’t want to seem yellow by saying anything.