STARWEB 1-5

by M. Modak

  “Sam?” he mumbled.

  Sam shook his head and handed Drake a towel, “This is the fourth time and this time it looks like you cracked your skull!” Blood streamed down his forehead, oozed around his eyes, smeared his cheek and dripped off his chin. The taste of salty blood had a familiar twang that curled his tongue.

  Sam sounded worried as he asked, “What happened?”

  Drake blinked dumbly trying to remember what happened this last time. He replied in a slow soft tone, “It happened again, just like the times before. I was at my post listening to the lights flicker and staring out the window into that,” He pointed into the dark open warehouse, “when suddenly the light went out. Then the shadows seemed to come alive and reach for me. Sam I think I’m going crazy! Something evil is in here! It’s searching my mind for something. It wants something inside my bones and blood.”

  Sam looked at him impatiently, “I think you’re not eating right. When was the last time you slept the whole night without waking up in a cold sweat? You’re having dreams of some mad scientist building crazy machines that will end the universe. That was the last one, right!”

  Drake looked down at the pool of blood that had formed on the floor. He watched his reflection break into a shattered image then reform as each drop of blood fell from his chin. He thought of Joshua, and all the other versions of himself, and what he remembered seeing thru John’s eyes as universes were destroyed in a possible future.

  “That’s right,” He said as a nauseous feeling came over him. His head pounded from his new injury. Sam was partially right and he knew it but the last thing he wanted to do is admit it. He was still trying to work out what had happened yesterday evening at the transport loading dock. But he was tired and he couldn't remember the last time he had eaten a good meal or slept without nightmares wakening him.

  He said, “No, earlier last night, I met a man named Joshua; a person just like me. He is going to help us.” Silence held the moment as he thought, there was much more to the encounter, but I’ll leave it at that.

  Sam stared at him for a long minute then asked, “What happened just now?”

  Drake tried to recall, “At first I heard buzzing and sounds… like the air was vibrating, static, I felt white noise… then a cold, empty presence… trying to get inside me. The exterior doors kept slamming and there was a banging noise,” he inhaled sharply, “There are voices too, and nightmares come after I pass out. The next thing I knew you were here calling my name and waving that smelly stuff in my face.”

  Sam quickly replaced the cap to the small bottle he held then put it in his jacket and looked down at Drake. Drake could see the fear in his eyes and the concern. He didn’t know Sam very well but he trusted him. He had seen two other versions of him in John and Joshua’s world. In John’s world, he was a Computer Systems Analyst. John had trusted him. Joshua had recognized him too, or a spark of some un-realized friendship they hadn’t yet discovered. As he looked at Sam , he felt that there was something true about him. Something that made him feel like they had known each other all their lives, perhaps many lives.

  “Here let me help you up,” Sam said. He reached out his hand, and Drake took it but before he could pull him up Drake turned and vomited more black goo on Sam’s boots.

  “Ah damn…that does it!” Sam said. “You're going to the doctor. I told those bastards I didn't like this post. What are we guarding anyway, dust and echoes? And dam it Drake, it’ll take me hours to write all this up!”

  Drake wiped the remainder of the black mess off his mouth, as he looked at Sam though the corner of his eye. The stuff he just puked up looked exactly like what he had thrown up at the Transport Company and only moments ago in his dream. He looked around for what he had thrown up earlier but saw nothing. Sam was staring at the mess on his boots a little too long. Drake said, “You don’t have to say anything. My uncle Whitman gets those reports. I hear it from his assistant every time you mention me.” He paused knowing Sam would write it up no matter what he said. It didn’t matter. He changed the subject, You think there's something in here too, don't you? There is something in here Sam, I don't know who or what but something is here.”

  Sam held Drake’s arm for another moment as he thought. He replied, “Whatever is here will have to wait until you get a checkup. You just got the day off. Don’t come back tonight. I'll arrange a doctor’s appointment for 6:00 p.m., be there! I won't let you back without permission from that doctor.”

  Drake steadied himself on his feet. Blood rushed to his head and he felt dizzy.

  “It doesn't look like you fractured anything; it’s just a bad cut and don't worry about the mess. I'll clean it up.”

  Drake walked to the door and looked around the room. It still had the smoke stained walls and ceiling. The light overhead and the door still stood intact and in working condition.

  “Do you need any help getting home?” Sam asked.

  “No, I think I can manage.”

  “Good thing all the cars drive themselves these days. You might need the help.”

  Drake nodded as he walked out the door and into the large empty warehouse. “Thanks Sam.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” A thin smile drew across Sam’s face.

  Sam was the Post Captain and had been his supervisor ever since his uncle got him this job at the warehouse. They both worked the graveyard shift, which started at 9:00pm and ended at 6:00am.

  Sam always took first watch. He stayed in the guard shack and watched the closed circuit security system, which only showed a chain link fence that marked where the property ended, while Drake took foot patrol. After 9:00 p.m. they would switch duties for the first time. It was at that first shift tonight, that Sam had found him passed out. He still couldn’t believe that later he would do it three more times.

  When he was alone, back inside the shack, he could hear Sam walking the building's perimeter, checking lights and opening the exit doors. Nothing, outside his nightmares, ever happened in here worth the endless reports they had to write. No one even cared about the warehouse itself. All the security cameras were pointed at the outside fence that surrounded the warehouse. And all the business took place in some office several miles away.

  Drake thought that the warehouse served only one purpose and everyone knew it. It was here to wage war against Laytech’s neighbor and greatest competitor, Human Core Tek Inc.

  The door to the guard shack closed behind him as he started his long walk to the main exit. He was very tired and soon the echoes from his footsteps got him thinking.

  He pondered, compared to the other jobs I’ve had, being a security guard made for the strangest working hours. He remembered being in his late teens, not long ago, thinking that waking up after 10am was necessary for normal bodily functions.

  Back then, all he had was a trust fund from the popular children’s books, “The Adventures of Snowflake and The Princess,” his father had authored. That was when his dad was alive; now all that was over, though the royalties were still coming in.

  Becoming an orphan had changed everything. After months of depression and feeling alone he somehow pulled himself out of bed and took a job. He had been saving the trust fund money, and in a small way, he felt it honored his parent’s memory. Since then he had worked every kind of job that paid the rent and his car note, but mostly he did it to get him out of his house and put his mind to good use.

  Two weeks ago, when the dreams about John had started, he found he couldn’t hold a job during the day. Since then he had worked mostly the nightshifts. And, sense then the definition of, “A full night’s sleep,” had changed. He needed around eight hours of sleep each day but it didn’t matter anymore if he got them in the morning, midday, or night. Sometimes sleep was broken up into three or four hour intervals due to sudden shift changes, but he was used to it now, it all felt the same.

  As he approached the exit, he turned and looked back. The guard post looked like a child's building block sitting in t
he center of a large empty swimming pool. The day was over and that's what mattered to him now. The past could slip away into wherever it goes when unwanted, and stay forgotten. After he had closed and locked the exit door, he was outside.

  The sun was shining brightly bringing sheering pain to his unadjusted eyes. Slowly the blur passed and the landscape appeared. Four large incomplete buildings, belonging to the Human Core Tek Inc. complex, loomed over each corner of the warehouse. At the midpoint, high above him, huge tubes reached out a few meters from each of the buildings toward a space somewhere above the squat warehouse.

  He was still amazed every time he looked up at those long uncompleted walkways that jutted out from each of the four buildings. He could only imagine what it would have looked like if completed.

  He rolled his eyes at the pointless effort spent to piss off a neighbor. Human Core Tek Inc. had acquired “First bidding rights” on the property a few years ago but later they had been out bid by Laytech by such a high amount that a counter bid was impossible and all future construction had halted. The property sat in the center of Atlanta’s northeast region, not far from the old Mall of Georgia. Since the, “Stop Work,” order was issued the neighborhood had gone south in property values. What was once going to be a vehicle for prosperity in this town had now become its doom.

  Human Core Tek, a Nano-Genetic Engineering Company, planned to have a five building complex here. It was going to employ tens of thousands of people. The center tower would have been the tallest building worldwide, but now, an empty warehouse owned by Laytech had ruined that dream. Each of the four buildings was going to connect to a 1200-meter spiraling tower. Now it was just another monument to corporate greed.

  The news had said that in the beginning, before ground was going to break, Laytech heard of the enormity of the Human Core Tek project. They purchased it, then raised the property’s value to over 6billion units, and consequently sent the whole thing into the chaos of the courts.

  His uncle owned Laytech, and he wanted Drake, his only living relative, to take an executive role but he still wasn’t ready for the kind of pressure that job would put on him. He often thought about calling his uncle and asking why he was letting this corporate war happen. But, he didn’t have the answer his uncle wanted and that would lead to greater conflict.

  Surrounding the warehouse was a residential neighborhood. New houses, with beautiful windows, lined both sides of the street as far as the eye could see. And not far down the street, hastily constructed, apartment buildings clustered together for miles. The rest of Atlanta’s residents lived in third world conditions.

  As sad as the area looked he knew that it was the wealthier side of town. Before the rezoning, this was where the last construction boon took place. It had continued all the way up until the conflict between Laytech and Human Core Tek began.

  The rest of Georgia, and the country for that matter, were in very bad shape. Since the Federal Government collapsed two years ago under economic pressures the, “Interim Council,” had taken over. Most of the big businesses now ran the existing State’s Governments or they had gone bankrupt. Only the military could hold the global creditors at bay. Many years ago, the Interim Council and the UN had made Atlanta its new headquarters but the move hadn’t helped the local economy much.

  Drake saw his dirty car sitting near the gate and he started for it. As he walked he looked past the chain link fence and shook his head as he saw the new parking deck across the street; another stalled project sitting in the mud. The lot had remained a bare dirt hole, complete with a high bulging fence, which did not hold back the red clay. Laytech had started the construction over a year ago but it had gone the same way as everything else around here, nowhere.

  A court order had it mixed up with all the legal mess and now he and Sam were the only ones working. He suspected it was a small legal jab at Laytech by Human Core Tek just to cause Laytech trouble. But it was the local people who were really hurting.

  His Information about Laytech never came from the inside. He had to hear it from Sam or read about it on the E-imager he left in the car. But even when he missed reading about it the news came to him.

  Reporters swarmed the main gate, next to the marching protesters holding their, down with corporate greed, banners. They were there to ask him questions about the latest lawsuit filed by Laytech against the Human Core Tek Inc. A week ago, they found out that he was Whitman’s nephew, the owner of Laytech, and ever since, they followed his every move. He never said anything; the captain had strict orders not to talk to anyone about this site or anything inside the building. He thought that was easy because there was nothing in there to talk about, until now.

  He jumped in his car and pulled up to the gate. The security box had Laytech written at the top in red letters. Below, a pad held different colored circles, triangles, squares, and octagons placed where numbers usually were. Drake punched red square, red square, yellow triangle, blue circle, blue square, octagon, and the gate rolled back with a buzz as cameras flashed.

  He pulled through the gate as he rubbed his eyes; he was still adjusting to the light. A dozen reporters rushed to his car and pointed their microphones at his window.

  A young, attractive woman yelled out to him, “Officer Drake, how did you get that cut on your head, did someone break in last night?”

  Questions shot from everywhere. He said, “No comment…No comment, get out of my way!” The Corvette’s modified hybrid engine revved loudly as he slowly crept forward. His name and face had already been on the news and in the wave-paper many times. One of the networks was creating a full story about him. He dreaded its arrival, but he wondered how it would turn out. At times, he almost felt like a celebrity, a mute one, but people recognized him at the grocery store.

  Keeping his mouth shut was something he knew how to do. That was the reason, he believed, why Sam hadn't fired him yet.

  He took Satellite Boulevard to Lawrenceville Suwannee road then jumped on 85 north. Traffic never piled up for miles anymore. Not since his rich Uncle Whitman and the construction division of Laytech had built the complex web of new Light Roads that scarred the sky. Now, he saw the anti-oil protesters only while passing on the old, land streets, not while cruising through any sky street owned by his Uncle.

  Where they got the oil these days, he didn’t know. A guilty feeling always accompanied his elation when he started his gas-guzzling hybrid. But, it wasn't as if there were any hydrogen powered, motor vehicles anyone could afford.

  If he would just do what his uncle had asked of him, become an executive, he could have any car he liked. But there was something inside him that kept him from that path. He trusted his feelings, unlike his uncle. That was always a point of contention between them. “Your all words and hot air,” his uncle would say, “It takes force and guts to get what you want. All dreaming will get you is bedsores my-boy.”

  Since the Collapse and the last few hurricanes that hit the Gulf, Atlanta had grown too quick and now it was the largest city in the world, ranking first in commuter traffic. It was the centerpiece and guinea pig for the new Light Road technology the rest of the world had quickly adopted. With the newly installed sky streets carrying the trains and buses across town, cars drove freely through unclogged capillaries at high speeds. The new Light Roads were being twisted throughout the city and world in an ever growing network intended to connect every town in the whole world; though many were opposed to the intrusion.

  After driving a few miles his mind drifted and he started thinking about how he had passed out earlier. Somehow, this all had to do with his deceased parents. Lavar had confirmed that in the loading dock. His mind had been returning to that fact over and over again sense his father had passed away. He felt something in his bones telling him to search out the truth of his death but it had been too painful to think of.

  His uncle Whitman was visiting his family during that same time. He was in the military back then based at Fort Bragg. He had also di
rected an off base research lab. Whitman tried to tell him different, but he knew his father’s death wasn’t an accident. Not long after his father died he moved to Atlanta hoping to get away from those memories and start over. But over the last two years his Uncle had suddenly appeared with this new Light Road technology and now there wasn’t anywhere he could go to escape his memories.

  Six months ago he took the security job with Laytech but sometimes, when his schedule allowed, he had worked at the old loading dock filling orders and stacking boxes using an old fork lift. That job had ended yesterday just before his shift at Laytech. He was still embarrassed and confused about the whole thing.

  Fatigue drew his eyes down; he hadn’t had any real sleep since then. Earlier at Laytech, every time he started thinking about what had happened at the Transport Company, he would hear noises and then black out. He checked to see if his car’s auto drive was ready to take over, in case something happened again.

  Then he started thinking. The image of him driving the forklift into the loading dock appeared. His supervisor had assigned him a shipment to unload and he had removed all the packages but one, and he was returning for it, when he felt a blast of pressure coming from all sides. The sound was indescribable. Lightning had crashed into him; he felt it move as a living thing throughout him even as it lifted him out of his body and into the air above. That was when he had seen Joshua. But it didn’t stop there. Aughra, as John called it, seemed to be mechanically extracting his mind from every cell but at the last moment, it stopped.