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« on: December 12, 2009, 08:26:18 AM »
PANDORA VOLUME ONE
My name is Akira logicphreak. I am 16 years old, and I was adopted by a couple without any other siblings, not that they were unable to bear children, far from that. But they just enjoyed the concept of total child control, where at the press of a button I stopped whatever bad thing I was doing, or was punished in an instant. I know this won't make a whole lot of sense without me explaining the fundamentals.
This is Pandora. Where everything is possible, and everyone can become more than human. People here live on the principle that they can buy whatever they want to have. Apart from material things, they can buy the ability to fly, learn martial arts or any variety of 'Upgrades'.
So far nothing in my own corner of this world has been restricted. I have two respecting foster parents who,' though literally over controlling, allow me to buy whatever want, and I walk around a lot. I love my freedom, and as a fair student and regular skater everything is as it should be. I occasionally box in a gym, and so far I can be at it for many hours without breaking a sweat, but I want to be better. I have never liked upgrades, and have only been forced to use them once or twice when I was really sick when I was young.
Of course, things like fatigue, hunger, sickness and death are readily available in this world, but so far I have not had any close brushes with any of them.
But, on my last days of being a 15 year old, I realized something: It first started with the remote not working on me. This 'remote' is what they used to discipline me with.
My parents had wanted to deduct some of my credits and freeze me in place to ground me. They pointed it at me and clicked and clicked again but nothing happened, and I was surprised and happy to escape.
This glitch happened again and again, and each time my parents seemed to be more and more distant and agitated, and I can't quite understand them as I used to. I'm 16 now, and I know that they are scared of something. I didn't know why the remote glitch should scare them that much.
Then there is this nagging hunger for something more, I can't understand the feeling. But I do know that my days have been dimming. My skating is slower, like I'm pulling through stagnant, rotten ether, and my days have been going darker... darker...
ONE
The woman's lips were bent sideways into the receiver. Though she was technically alone and out of reach of prying ears, she whispered at the lowest possible voice, with the hoarse raspy tone of urgent, furious speech.
"We specifically mentioned we wanted a data-child who would be reprogrammable and under complete and utter control of our remote, so why-isn't-it-working?"
"Madam, are you sure you have gone over the troubleshooting manual, we are sure that you are simply-"
"My husband has gone over the document like FIFTEEN TIMES! Tell him, Charles."
Her husband took the phone from her and stepped into place in front of the table, he employed the same arched posture and twisted lips, whispering,
"Its true."
The man on the other end was beginning to get bored, he looked over at his friend in the booth next to him and shook his head, pointing at his headset and then proceeding to make circles on the side of his skull with his index finger. His friend concurred and removed his own headset to reveal the loud squawking of a dissatisfied customer.
"Hello?... Hello?" The man's voice whispered in his head.
The technician sighed,
"Yes, Sirs?"
"Did you even hear what my wife was saying? The remote is completely failing to do what you made it for! "
The man sighed, "Sir, I'm sure that if you-"
"Don't tell me to get a replacement. I have already bought my second, and I do not want to go through such paperwork again. And even this one didn't work!"
"Uh huh." The man understood. Ever since a particularly brilliant family had bought remotes under the pretence of replacing earlier versions, and reverse-engineered them to use them on naturally born citizens, The Circle had clamped down hard on all adoption agencies.
"So, what do I do, huh?"
The technician sighed again, "Sir, we have so many complaints about things not working, we just can't go on this without proof. Please send us your-"
The man raised his eyebrow as, on his special Port-Pad, a remote materialized with the blue swirl of data that accompanied teleported objects.
"Hold on, then." The man mumbled, and pressed a button next to the pad. The remote was completely scanned, and the results were displayed on the screen.
The technician looked up at his screen, studying the data-child who had been adopted by Charles logimon and Veronica chicphreak. He looked at the screen, mumbling out the details through his headset just to keep this irritating customer satisfied. So far, the couple had been pestering him for a whole hour.
"Okay, Name: Akira logicphreak... Birth-date: 4984, 61st era... Manufacture date: unavailable, Adoption date..."
He trailed off, and his eyes whipped back to the manufacture date of the data-child. He refreshed the screen, the remote was rescanned, but the stubborn red letters stayed where they were.
"Unavailable" They said.
He prompted the system in any way he could, and the perfectly capable computer returned the result,
"Unavailable."
"Hello? Are you there? What's happening? Hello?"
The technician ignored the voice and scanned the rest of the data . With a quickening pulse, he started noticing more and more anomalies within the details of the data-child.
Programming Authors: unavailable
Data-child version: unavailable
And worse, the Restriction Algorithm as well displayed a red;
"Unavailable."
Even though he never understood the exact coding sequence, he knew the importance of the Restriction Algorithm.
Now this was serious.
If there really is no code to restrict the boy, then he has nothing restricting his physical abilities…
Such a disaster was always prevented as the computer that manufactured them always deleted such corrupt data-children, and the naturally born already had a Restriction Algorithm embedded into them.
What is happening here?
This time he couldn't ignore the nagging voice of the husband in his ear. He tore away the headset and threw it aside. It smacked his work mate's shoulder, who rubbed at it and looked at him inquisitively.
Identification Number: unavailable
And then-
No way.
But there it was:
Status: Un-liberated
That wasn't an error. It just couldn't be. Even if it was, the technician was willing to lose his job and more even if this was simply an error. An adolescent non-restricted 16 year old boy with a body there...
The technician looked up at the drab ceiling,
In the real world?
18 must hear of this.
He brought up a secure communication channel and sent a quick coded message.
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