Blue collar
January 4th, 06:00, 2164
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The alarm screeched and in blinking red numbers read 6 a.m. I groaned as I pushed my blankets off and left the warm and lofty comfort of my bed and stood up.
“Good morning Ted.” Said the monotone disembodied voice of the house, and without warning the brown curtains flew open blinding me with the bright white light of the sun. Everyday, this reminds about how much I hated Ada, yet knew how necessary she was to help sustain my home and life. I drowsily walked to my kitchen the transition from thick carpet to cold tile woke me up just a little bit more.
“I have cooled the tile floor to give you a bit of a… kick start.” Said Ada with a cold and mechanical yet warm voice.
“What is the matter Ada?” I asked concerned about the pause before “kick start”.
“Ted, there is no coffee.” The moment I heard the combination of “no” and “coffee” I began to freak out and my blood began to boil.
“Ada!” I shouted, now fully awoken.
“Morning exercise completed.” Said Ada accompanied with a ding at the end. A robotic arm descended from an opening in the ceiling holding a silver platter with a plain white china cup. “Bitter. Just the way you like it, just like you, Ted.”
Even though the coffee was now pointless I took a long and loud slurp from the china cup. The warm and bitter coffee felt refreshing against my lips as I let out a deep sigh. I walked back into my bedroom; the digital alarm clock now read 6:15 a.m. I stood in front of the sliding glass door, not going out but just stood there observing the quiet street and the houses and their green artificial turf lawns. A metal rail ran through the middle of the street, realizing the metro would arrive at 7 a.m. I walked over to my closet and stripped off my blue one-piece pajama piece and buttoned up my blue dress shirt and pulled up my black slacks and walked into the mirror and stood in front of the mirror observing my reflection.
Noticing my beard was beginning to grow in, I grabbed my razor and shaving cream, spreading the foamy substance on my face then rinsing it off my face. I then proceeded to shave off the stubble; in the process cutting myself on the cheek but it was all worth it because it made me feel crisp and younger.
I then rubbed gel in between my palms and used it to erect the front of my hair creating my own personal hairstyle.
The digital alarm clock now read 6:45 a.m. I walked out of my door way and inhaled the crisp spring air, I walked to the edge of the curb, the hot sun beat down on me like a hammer and so I took a sip from my water canteen. My coworkers over time began to walk out of their houses dressed just like me, in a blue dress shirt and black slacks. Soon every house has seen their owners walk out of the front door with nothing else but a water canteen in their hands.
Once everyone had settled at the transit stop, light hearted small talk ensued, One of the members of my troop, Gage, approached me with his usual perky attitude as he walked with a sort of geeky strut that was from what I’ve seen only exclusive to him. He was a rookie who still had braces at the age of twenty-two, his wide and green eyes were accompanied by freckles sprinkled across his long and pointy nose. He was a strange guy who felt the need to extend his hand for a handshake every time he engaged with me.
“Hey boss!” he said with indefinable enthusiasm as he reached his hand out for a handshake.
“Hey Gage, um… your fly’s down.” I said awkwardly rubbing my temples. I have a headache.
He looked down at his crotch and zipped the fly up with that ridiculous smile spread across his face.
A shriek whistle was heard as the workers transit drove down to the end of the street. The people swarmed into the train and the train, with a slow start the train began to back out of the neighborhood. I took a blue leather booth window seat. Gage strutted toward my booth and sat in the booth across from me and put his hands on the table and stared blankly at me. I rubbed my temples in horrible pain, so much so I groaned subconsciously.
“You ok cap?” Gage said twiddling with something in his palms while occasionally picking at his cuticles.
“I’m fi… Agh! A sharp pain hit me right in the temples; I scrunched over and slammed my head against the table and moaned miserably in pain. A few seconds later I lifted my head off the table and found Gage holding out his hand with two translucent green and circular pill.
“Here these will help, I promise.” Said Gage with a grin.
“ No. Ga-”
“Please, cap.” Pleaded Gage childishly after cutting me off. I sighed and reluctantly swallowed the pills and looked out of the window and watched as we left the grassy and civilized embrace and came into view of the giant clear steel based sand dome that controlled the temperature of the neighborhood. We left the civilized embrace and entered the harsh and sandy desert, Deva the largest desert on the planet Kadrid.
I watched as the strong winds drove sand across the land and hitting the bulletproof glass windows like bullets. Oases dot the landscape outnumbered by numerous cliffs and canyons and palm trees. The transit hit a bump or gravitator on the rail, looking out the window I was in awe as we, with the help of the gravitator we slowly drove over a century’s deep canyon and then flipped upside down. My stomach sunk and even though I take this ride every day to go to work, I was in glorious awe as we bolted off upside down into a tunnel carved into the canyon filled with yellow lights that was accompanied by the canyon rocks orange color with the occasional gold veins that ran through the rocks like cracks.
The transit once more flipped right side up came to gradual stop as the noise of quiet discussion over breakfast and the sounds of basketball being dribbled up and down a court and then hearing a buzzer indicating the scoring of a point. The transit came to a complete stop and the dinging throughout the cabins indicated that it was safe to remove seatbelts and roam freely was heard. I got up and stretched my arms and neck and rolling my neck hearing my neck pop. With Gage on my tail I walked out of the transit and wandered into a bullpen of workers, where a food court, a basketball court, a shooting range, armory, 6 bathrooms and a game room only took up half the space. I looked up in reoccurring awe as I looked up and saw a steel based glass dome that protected us from the harsh desert environment, and realized in fascination that we were about 100 meters deep into the desert ground.
Pots of palm trees soaked up the sunlight and couches supported working class fellows like me also in a blue shirt and black slacks. I went to the breakfast bar and cooked a waffle covered in buttery liquid and topped with strawberries and lazily walked to claim a seat on one of the couches at the basketball court where I spectated the guards with Multi Mode Pistols playing basketball. There was this one guy who I swear could’ve been Shaq in a former life stand tall above a smaller dude dribbling the basketball and lining up for a shot and with sudden movement the taller player slid in and stole the ball and proceeded to dribble down the court and make a slam dunk. I do not know how these guys do it this early in the morning, I wanted to play but I know that my old age would be the death of me. Though, I couldn’t help but smile at the fact that at 35, I was still in the force and am beginning to see the new generation begin to see the new generation join the force.
A solid gold frame was provided by the town of Pinto, which settled just on the edge of the Deva desert. The frame was for the giant Roman numeral clock on the back wall above the armory. The big hand struck the nine and the little hand on the twelve and not a moment late a loud and deep chime echoed throughout the bullpen. The clock frame began to shake it started out as a gentle rock but within a minutes notice while the crowds of workers grew silent to observe the oddity before them. The clock began to violently vibrate causing shockwaves throughout the bullpen; I hunched over and clutched my stomach in pain ad fell to my knees. I watched in pain and in fascinated awe as the solid gold frame stopped vibrating and melted, a golden stream flowed down the wall and plopped onto the ground in a puddle and people backed away gasping. The puddle slowly flowed towards the armory door at the speed of pyroclastic flow. An armory guard stepped out of the crowd that stood back away from the gold liquid, unarmed, the guard stomped into the gold puddle, the gold encrusted his lower leg in gold that immediately changed density and turned solid. The guard struggled to free his leg but it did not budge, I bit my lip in fearful anticipation and as he struggled, I knew this man he was never the brightest but certainly one of the finest the boys in blue could offer. I’ll miss Dane. One of the guards tried to shoot the golden wall, to no effect at all.
The golden cast around his leg began to shrink, compressing upon itself and slowly crushing his leg, Dane screamed in pain the gold was constricting his leg and crushing him in extremely antagonizing pain. Screaming continued while a little droplet of liquid gold separated from the cast and in a sinisterly slow fashion ran up his leg and up his chest up his neck up his face and into Dane’s mouth, Dane began to choke and gag, he coughed uncontrollably. I heard a heart rate monitor beeping in my head, beep… beep… beep… and the steady tone stopped the flat line held one solid beep, my own heart raced as I was lost in my own thoughts, I could faintly hear the gagging and choking outside of my thoughts, My heart raced as the tone held… it stopped. I’m sorry Dane. I couldn’t… but I could’ve. I’m sorry.
I phased out of my thoughts in a cold sweat and with a few tears running down my cheek, I looked up the gagging had now turned into wheezing, I still heard the flat line in my head, the wheezing stopped, he stopped breathing, I felt happy for him, he need not suffer anymore. I had to turn my head in the other way and closed my eyes holding back tears. The tone stopped.
Dane’s body went limp and fell backwards the rest of the body broke away, and snap all that was left was a gold boot in the puddle. The body of Dane lay frozen on the floor and blood flowed out of the half leg like a freshwater rapid. The puddle of liquid gold with a sudden jolt of energy reanimated and created a wall of solidified gold in front of the armory’s door. The wall of gold attracted towards the door and began to bond with the door. There was no more getting into the armory anymore the gold had increased in density, yet another foolish and brave coworker attempted to try and kick down the golden door, but sunk into the gold door foot first. He fell over, his head slamming against the concrete floor. Goodbye Doug. The crowd silently mourned and backed away, their attention was no longer on dead Doug. My coworkers and I glanced up at the dome that defended us against the cruel outside world; small pebbles of something pitter-pattered against the dome, first like light rain then progressed to the equivalent of snow in a fierce blizzard. Soon the blue sky was no longer visible only the yellow pebbles that fell upon the dome, only a black human shaped silhouette was outlined by the raging sun was faintly seen through the pebbles.
The density of the pebbles seemed to grow and cracked the glass little by little; I worriedly hurried behind the breakfast bar where I got my waffle. Everyone else scurried for cover and protection. With a crash equivalent to two transit trains colliding together. The giant glass shards impaled and crushed people as they attempted to find cover. The grainy substance filled into the bullpen like a sinkhole. I picked up one of the grains, it was perfect, spherical and golden, it was gold dust refined into a sphere but far more dense I handled it in my palm and without warning and at the same time the gold dust on the ground and in my palm was reduced again to malleable sand like gold dust. I peeked over the countertop of the breakfast bar and saw as human figures arose from the gold dust the figures separated from the main body of gold dust and freely wandered around checking every nook and cranny for something. About four of them wandered the bullpen pulling my coworkers out of their hiding spots and gathered them up. I ducked back into cover and quietly moved about hiding from the golden terra cotta like soldiers that now formed golden swords in place of their hands.
The soldiers cut down potted palm trees and knocked over tables and flipped couches in search for hiding men they cut down the guards as they attempted to shoot and kill, but to no avail at all. Close to the debris of glass and steel now wrangled everyone up. The terra cotta soldiers then formed back into their form now acting as sentries rather than actual soldiers, they just seemed to wait as a swirl of gold dust wrapped around the workers and formed a solid gold block around them. They continually waited for a minute with their eyes trained closely on their captives, until a human figure appeared creating a golden spiral staircase from where the dome had been to the bullpen. It walked down the staircase casually and nonchalantly.
After a minute of fear and anticipation the figure landed foot on the now gold dust desert that the bullpen had become. It was an immensely powerful presence, just by landing foot on the gold dust it created a shock wave through the submissive gold dust and knocked me over, it suddenly turned its head towards me as if it sensed my presence but then shrugged it off. In that small frame of time of seeing its face I recognized “it” was definitely not human. It had a human figure but seemed empty and cracked, the rocky surface of its body was cracked and weathered like that of a stone bank, Its long and straight white hair complimented its black outlined and angular stark white eyes, its lips were outstretched ridiculously displaying a showcase of long, thin teeth the length of piano keys.
“Board the infidels.” Its voice was more female; it was warped and was accompanied by an echo of her own voice.
“Yes, priestess.” Said the gold soldiers in unison as they absorbed my comrades; the freak carried a giant vase about the size of her torso that was attached to her back with a red cloth that was wrapped across the chest to the waist. The priestess absorbed the soldiers and their captors into her vase without a single word or gesture. She then created another spiral staircase and ascended out of the bullpen.
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I used the employee only access elevator hidden behind the armory. There is no obvious way to see the shaft on the surface, simply an elevator emerging from the sand. Every minute of the ten-minute ride up was filled with fear and horrible scenarios and thoughts twisted my stomach and started to make me taste bile. Halfway through the ride the console to the right of the door began to rapidly blink a harsh and bright red. The console showed a map of the Karma building and its subterranean max security level had been compromised. I like to forget that I work in a max security prison. The prison level 5555 buried about 6000 feet under the bullpen, was the only level that was compromised I tapped into the security feed and cringed as I saw criminals, outlaws, vigilantes and… freaks. Only a light marigold dust lingered, obscuring the video feed. The criminals rushed up the stairwell screaming and shouting arming themselves with whatever they can find at their disposal.
I stopped the elevator to get a breather, I was in turmoil as I fought with myself to either investigate and risk death or continue to reach the surface. Fulfill my service and face my fear or ascend and possibly leave the boys in blue forever. I’m a coward. I shed a tear in disgust of myself and reached for the turban and robes necessary that hung on hooks to the sidewall, necessary for surviving the harsh elements of the desert. Tears dripped from my face like rare rainfall in an arid desert, I’ve always been known for holding my composure, a wall of stone that let no one in, and for good reason. With tears wetting my dry face creating dark spots on my light blue dress shirt, I unbuttoned the shirt and neatly hung the dress shirt on the hook in exchange for the grey and red robe and donned the grey turban that masked my face. A desert flashed into my head, rare rainfall descended from the sky and pitter-pattered heavily on the glass dome, I remember the commissioner congratulating and giving me a blue shirt packaged perfectly in plastic, no badge, your shirt was your badge, it was your responsibility and your honor at stake to keep your shirt flawless. 703Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmq62ygd8T8
With a trembling hand I tapped the console and the elevator resumed its slow climb up to the surface. Sand began fall in front of the glass door, I was getting close to the surface, and soon sunlight strained my eyes and flooded the elevator. The elevator popped up onto the surface a mole in one of those whack-a-mole arcade games, after letting out a ding and then began to count down from ten and opened the door. I walked out and took a second to be in awe of the beautiful yet barren landscape. The generic voice said zero and lost all traction and fell freely and I heard a crash at the bottom of the pit. Sandstone created a barrier to cover up the hole. I saw the small mining town of Pinto in the distance, the heat made it look wavy and distorted like I was looking at it through a fun house mirror, it was so real yet so unbelievable that it could be a mirage.
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The sun beat down on me like my step dad when I was kid, he wasn’t on drugs or liquor. He just in his own atrocious way enjoyed it. Hills of sand covered the landscape making the desert less than maneuverable if it weren’t for the beaten down stone roads built decades ago. Palm trees were not rare, there were so many of them that it came close to becoming a desert forest. I saw three cars driving in a uniform way down the stone road; the cars’ engines began to rumble furiously like a row rumble of a lawn mower. I began to close in, my legs tiring from hours of walking, I grew closer and the cars shrank and began to grow a long snout and teeth, spots dotted the brown fur and the rumbling becomes a steady growl. I realized with surprising realization that three cars were actually three hyenas, I slowly backed away and unraveled my turban the wind blew sand in my face scratching my face, a cut bled from my forehead and cheek. The hyenas snapped at me coming at me one by one, I kept my distance and snapped my turban to ward off the hyenas. They circled me in their predator stance ready to pounce, One of them pounced at me with its jaws wide open and aimed for my neck, I thrust forward with the turban held in both hands and clothes lined the hyena in its mouth, the hyena whimpered, and blood from my forehead obscuring my view. I turned around and snapped the hyena’s neck.
The two remaining hyenas ducked away keeping their distance still circling me snarling and bearing their teeth in ferocious grimaces.
One of the hyenas pounced and with a quick strike to the jaw, the hyena stumbled back and hit the ground incapacitated. Without a seconds interval the last hyena pounced and knocked me on the sand. The sand turned red. I grabbed the hyena’s upper jaw and lower jaw and ripped the lower jaw straight off.
Nightfall had descended and moonlight accented a town just a mile away, Pinto. I found a bay leaf on the ground and laid down n the cold desert sand. I rolled over shifting in the sand created a nice groove in the sand; I used the huge bay leaf as a blanket trying to ignore the bleeding. My thoughts raced through my mind, couldn’t calm down I couldn’t sleep, I blankly looked up at the stars and dozed off.
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The elevator popped up onto the surface a mole in one of those whack-a-mole arcade games, after letting out a ding and then began to count down from ten and opened the door. I walked out and took a second to be in awe of the beautiful yet barren landscape. The generic voice said zero and lost all traction and fell freely and I heard a crash at the bottom of the pit. Sandstone created a barrier to cover up the hole. I saw the small mining town of Pinto in the distance, the heat made it look wavy and distorted like I was looking at it through a fun house mirror, it was so real yet so unbelievable that it could be a mirage.
Without warning the sandy landscape had morphed into my childhood home, sunlight beamed through the window of my childhood bedroom and short and straight red carpet covered the floor. I looked down at my hands; they were young and severely cut and bruised. I was my younger self; I sat on my bed sobbing into my hands, the tears stinging the open cuts. My room was sparse only having a bed and a window, and a door. The door was swiftly pushed open with force, a tall and broad shoulder man walked in, his stubble was wild and outgrown his eyes were so inset that his eyelashes touched his eyebrows. He opened his thin lips as if he was going to speak, but only stepped closer and leaned down and met his sharp green eyes with my hazel eyes.
“What’s wrong ted?” said the man, whispering intimidatingly yet deceivingly kind and caring.
I simply quivered in fear, and continued to sob into my hands.
“Hey you little jerk. Talk to me you screw up.” He raised his voice to calm shout.
“Nothing.” I said quietly shaking my head.
“You Lie!” said the man. He turned over my palms and pulled a switchblade out of his pocket and cut a long cut across the length of my palm.
I screamed in pain and yelled my objection over and over again as he finished his cut. The man chuckled and snickered continuously in odd glee.
“Now who’s your daddy?” he yelled in my face, to close for comfort I felt his warm breath against my skin and the stench cigars tingled the inside of my nose. He walked out of the door with a evil grin spread across his face. He slammed the door and I awoke.
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I awoke with my face hot under the warmth of the turban I drowsily stood up and gazed at the town, it was so close that it teased me. It was approximately only a mile away but felt like days away. I ran my fingers across my face feeling the open wounds were surprisingly healed, I ran my fingers through my hair it was loose and the gel had worn off. I took a drink from my canteen and resumed my journey. I shuffled my feet through the sand, kicking up sand and eating all of the grub and cacti root that I could find. Grub had a crunchy shell and had a sweet and honey like taste. Cacti root tasted like ginger root, but was soft and chewy, reminding me of the horrible sight of my dad chewing tobacco and spitting it out in my room as I slept.
My canteen was close to becoming empty and the town seemed only a few hundred yards away. The closer I approached Pinto, the more horrified I became. The town is based upon one main road and branched out to a couple smaller streets; tread tracks were deeply inset into the main dirt road, holes were blown into buildings turning wooden houses into splinters and quartz municipal buildings into dust and ruins. Pinto was a small town what was the reason to destroy such a puny and defenseless town? This was a town where most of the houses resembled small log cabins and municipal buildings were quartz and stone. The skyline of the town was well there was none, all of the buildings except for a couple important buildings were only one story buildings. The Mayor’s house, community center, executive office, and the courthouse, are two stories tall. I walked down the main street that ran straight through the town, looking around I noticed the 1800’s western centric aesthetic look of the town; I remember western movies were my favorite type of movies when I was a kid and an escape from an abusive dead beat father. The nostalgia was turned to sorrow again as I saw Thompson submachine guns scattered across the road, a reliable yet extremely outdated gun. The town looked it had been through hell, I needed to know where to go next.
I decided to investigate the mayor’s house; it was a two story cabin with a front balcony on the second story. The house was fairly unscathed only sprinkled with bullet holes on the second story. I walked in the brown and regal door, armed with a Thompson that I had scavenged from the road I walked into the house with caution redeeming my training and rounding every corner with my Thompson, until I came to the kitchen, I saw a fridge and the temptation gave in, I opened the fridge and ate some of the packaged turkey and took the rest of it for later. As I was rummaging through the fridge, I heard faint and restrained breathing behind me; I was scared so I turned around as fast as I could to find the mayor stuffing his face with an odd mixture of ice cream and meat. Recognizing the established eye contact he stopped eating and just looked at me with wide eyes and an ice cream splattered face.
“um…” He paused for a second as if he was thinking of what to say next. I waited patiently for about ten seconds. ”I-I didn’t…” he stopped and burped disgustingly. “Invite you, y-you need to l-leave.” He dozed off and woke up again.
“I’m here for info Mr. Das.” I say as calmly as I could trying to avoid any mood swings a man like him is usually prone to.
“Up… c’mon up.” He held out his hand expecting me to help him up, so I did. “Thank you now what were we talkin’ ‘bout…” he paused again for another ten seconds. ”Oh yes, that’s right… Look boy, first of all you look like a friggin’ terrorist and second of all.” He burps.’” I do not give a cow’s pie about what you want.” He moved his pig-proportioned body, with a huge potbelly and a small head with a ragged mustache and stubby legs and arms. He waddled over to me and got up in my face, and said, ” You wanna know why I don’t give a rats ass about what you say?” He paused as if he expected me to answer.
He was wearing a dirty white dress shirt with suspenders and jeans. I grabbed him by the collar and looked him in the eye. “ Alright you self righteous Teletubby, you listen here and you best listen good you’re gonna tell me with perfect detail what happened here.” I said as I forced his gaze to meet mine. “Or I’m going to pump your potbelly so full of lead your gonna be to full for even your precious strawberry ice cream, you gluttonous pig.” I threatened him and threw him to the tile floor.
“ Alright, some freak with gold powers came in here and started to blow the crap out of everything.” He frantically explained.
“You did what?” I interrogated.
“What do ya mean?” he asked
“What did you do when the tank began to blow your town to pieces?” I asked my tone growing louder and more interrogative, this man did detest me not because of his looks, but because of the fact that he was willing to hide while his brave militiamen died protecting him, and yet he sits in his house and fattens up like a pig.
“Why I stood my ground and helped to defend our humble town.” He said proudly as he took a superman stance with his fists on his hips and his chin up.
“Lies!” I yelled pushing him down from his triumphant stance. “We all know that isn’t true.” He was quivering in fear. “Now you better tell me where they went before you get hurt, Mr. Das.”
With a shaky finger he pointed towards the marshland area. Th-that way, d-down by the m-marsh.” He said his voice trembling.
“Thank you for your time and consideration Mr. Das.” I said before walking towards and picking him up to his feet by the collar and knocked him out with a solid punch to the jaw. I laid him down where I found, him ducked behind the kitchen island.
I walked out of the door and with the Thompson slung over my shoulder I looked a few hundred yards down Main Street and saw huge forest trees and water glistened in ponds that caught my eye. As I progressively walked down the main street I began to wonder where are all the bodies? I looked down and saw molds of panicked men in the sand. Their faces were forever preserved in the ground in their last dying expressions like a modern Pompeii. For a moment I stood on the edge of the main road and gazed off into the distance at the giant mangrove trees of the marshland that were outlined by the setting sun. I took a moment to soak in the beautiful scene; I felt a sharp needle insert into my temple, I rubbed my temples, damn, the headache’s back. I grit my teeth together in pain and bright white light consumed the entirety of my eyesight. Was I dead? No. I heard mechanical whirrs and sounds and felt my body moving slowly trudging my feet against the dirt road. Within an hour of trudging my feet against the dirt road I smelled the scent of shaving cream and scent of fresh salmon being cooked. Am I home?
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