Chapter 3: Chapter V2: Welcome to the Present Part 2

"Another Dungeon has cropped up near the wall." "Seriously? That's the fifth one this week!" "Well so much for the weekend, do we have any available units to respond?" "Besides reservists? None, the Field Marshall and the bulk of the Assault corps should be back from the raid any day now, we'll just send them a ping when they get in range again." "Shouldn't we send someone to investigate at least, I mean looking at these dungeon crop ups don't they kind of look deliberate?" "Eh, I ain't seeing what you're seeing. You should put in some PTO if you’re seeing things. But if you want to send a bunch of rookies to be slaughtered be my guest. Personally, I say let's just wait and leave it to the professionals, it's not like the Horrors can get into the city anyway." "So what do we do then?" "Mmmh, send a report up the chain. Out of our hands at this point, they'll make the call."   -Recovered Audio from Elysium Observation Tower Station Recorder taken moments before the Elysium Massacre Incident.

Chapter V2

Welcome to the Present Part 2

 

  Angelica let out a frustrated whine before sitting back in the passenger seat while she waved her hand dismissively at her father.

 

“Seriously, he doesn’t even care when you bad-mouth him,”

 

"It's his way of dealing with stress Angie,"

 

"By not dealing with it?! He's about to become an adult and he has ZERO goals for his life or plans for the future! What's the point of him inheriting so much wealth if he does nothing with it?! At least some of that should be donated to the lower levels, but no, he’s being selfish and a coward," Angelica complained.

 

So what, it’s my money! Jac thought to himself pretending to be asleep.

 

Mike and Angelica had this argument almost every car ride whenever Jac was around. The intensity of which rose as the days moved closer to when Jac was scheduled to take his Awaken test, and receive his inheritance from his biological family.

 

Mike inhaled, audibly sucking air through his teeth before letting out a huff and slowing the car down, bringing the vehicle to a complete stop. Jac peaked to see that they had stopped in front of a nearby access shaft marked Military Only.

 

“Angel, Jack has his own problems. Some of which are scarring and long-lasting that I’m not qualified to even begin to think to fix. I’m going to tell you something you might not want to hear. You’ve seen the simulations and images of the Horrors, maybe even heard some first count tales, but you’ve never experienced them kiddo, you’ve never fought one first hand.” Mike said rubbing his prosthetic

 

Angelica folded her arms before looking at Mike who sat with downcast eyes. She visibly softened upon seeing the man, unable to stay mad at her father.

 

“Dad, I know. I get it, ok? But he can’t just sit there doing nothing! Do you know how many people would die for his free ticket? It’s not that I hate him or anything, I just want him to do better.”

 

“May I remind you, that ticket was paid for with the lives of his parents, he still sleeps with a nightlight for Citri's sake.”

 

“Ugh, you know what I mean. Even more so, that should motivate him to do something about it. If you or Seth or James died I wouldn't stop until every damnable Horror was wiped out of existence, not wasting my life away tending to plants and playing video games.” Angelica remarked snidely, shaking her head with a sad sigh.

 

Mike smiled, reaching over, he pulled Angelica over to plant a kiss on her head and embrace her. 

 

“That’s sweet, baby girl, and I get it. But ultimately it's for Jack to decide how he wants to live his life. Now get going, the next tram is in a few minutes.” Mike said, ruffling Angelica’s hair much to her protest. She quickly pushed away and exited the vehicle, making a beeline directly toward the door.

 

As she approached an audible buzzing echoed loudly through the tunnel, indicating that the entrance was opened. Wasting no time, Angelica rushed to enter but stopped for a moment to give Mike a two-fingered salute before going in.

 

“I love you, don't be late for family dinner tonight!” Mike called out to Angelica, her figure already halfway through the door.

 

“Love you too!” A man’s voice responded, followed by sounds of many people laughing and jeering that was cut off as the door was violently slammed shut.

 

Mike shook his head with a smile, appearing to reminisce about his days with the Service before pressing the close door button on his steering wheel and putting the vehicle in drive. The car made an audible screeching sound as it peeled away from the access shaft and the passenger side door slammed shut. 

 

About time, Jac thought, still pretending to be asleep, now he might actually get some sleep without all the jabbering.

 

With the cruiser soaring through the tunnel on autopilot, Mike took a look over his shoulder to check on Jac.

 

“I know you aren’t sleeping kiddo,” Mike sighed. When Jac didn’t respond he immediately halted the car, causing Jac to drop his facade as he face-planted into the front seat.”Seriously, I might have been born at night, but I wasn’t born yesterday son.”

“Kinda hard to nap with you two arguing about me,” Jac replied, rubbing his cheek with a pout as the car continued its journey. 

 

“Ya know Angelica does have a point, kiddo, You should really consider plans for the future, that aren’t just video games and uh, cultured content. You’ll be an adult soon and if you Awaken… Well, that's a whole other can of worms,”

 

“Cultured content?” Jac echoed confused.

 

“Porn, son, I’m talking about porn,” Mike said, causing Jac to freeze up.  “I got a billing alert to our address, pro-tip, next time use a fake address.”

 

“Uhm, yea ok,” Jac replied embarrassed. Slinking down into his seat, he began staring out the window, suddenly the tunnel lights seemed a lot more interesting. The pair sat in awkward silence for several minutes before something caused Jac to wince out in pain. Staring out of the patrol car, his vision was suddenly flooded with swirling colors that forced him to shut his eyes and look away. Upon opening them again, the colors were gone, almost as if his mind had played some weird trick on him.

 

“You ok back there?” Mike asked, looking at Jac from the rearview mirror.

 

“Uh yea, just. Got a weird feeling is all,” 

 

“You want to talk about it?” 

 

“Nah, I’m fine, it’s cool,” Jac replied, hiding the flare-up. It wasn’t the first time his vision filled with color, a few years ago when this happened Mike had brought Jac to the clinic, where they ended up sitting around for several hours before they got to see a doctor who told them that it may have been a visual hallucination and that they needed to run tests, which ended up finding nothing wrong with him.  

 

Dreading a repeat of that experience Jac clambered up, he had a couple of visual novel games qued up for tonight after the family day, and wasn’t going to waste his day getting told nothing was wrong again.

 

Jac sighed, maybe it was a symptom of Awakening and the doctor didn’t know any better. Jac had asked James about it seeing as he was an Awakened, but he had assured Jac that it was impossible as he didn’t detect traces of mana on the boy and he was far too young to perceive mana. 

 

Could it be a symptom of something worse? A thought that often plagued Jac whenever it occurred. He kept assuring himself that he didn’t need a doctor because this far in, whatever it was, it had to be harmless, besides, he had other priorities to take care of.  

 

As the patrol cruiser, made its way down the tunnel, the pair soon made their way towards the exit.

 

Emerging from the tunnel, Jac was greeted by the sight of flashing neon lights, billboards, and darkness that was floor twenty. Unlike the other floors, the day and night cycle of floor twenty had given out long ago, casting the market metropolis in perpetual darkness and giving it the moniker “The City of Night” by its residents. 

 

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There had been protests and activists in the past that had rallied for it to be fixed, but the administration had deemed the malfunction “non-essential” so they never bothered fixing it. Though rumor was, the Corpos had paid the government to turn it off intentionally.

 

In contrast to expectations, crime was at an all-time low on floor twenty. The Corpos owned most of the businesses on the floor and went out of their way to make sure their profits were secured. Working hand in hand with the Peacekeepers, they did a good job of policing their turf and giving peace of mind to everyday workers like Jac.

 

Driving through the street, Jac’s sightseeing was soon interrupted by the sight of dozens of people appearing on the streetwalk which was very uncommon this far out from the center of the market area. 

 

One of the folks coming into view held a sign that read something about children, which piqued Jac’s interest.  With the car moving as fast as it was, he tried to crane his head to get a closer look but missed the rest of the sign as the pedestrian wandered off into an alley.

 

“The hell? ” Sitting back down in the seat, Jac decided to pay it no mind as he quickly lost interest, whatever they were protesting obviously had nothing to with him. Which was true until they drove down a hill where a large group of people seemed to be gathering at the bottom, flooding the streets.

 

“Is there some kind of event?” Jac unintentionally said aloud, sitting up in his seat to get a better view. Whatever was going on was going to be a hassle and a half to get through.

 

“What was that?” Mike asked, abruptly breaking Jac’s train of thought.

 

“Oh, nothing, just looking at all the folks, lot’s more people than usual.” 

 

“Yea, another protest, unfortunately, this time they got permits,” Mike said with a grumble as he swerved to avoid a couple of pedestrians who jumped out onto the street.

 

 Mike made a face at the pedestrians as they drove by, whom gave him the bird in return followed by some jeering.

 

Jac shook his head and lost interest, choosing to dwell back on his own thoughts and observations to drown out Mike who had begun rambling on about budget constraints and something about reports.

 

Soon the patrol car reached its destination, a tall lime green rectangular building with pitch-black windows that stood out like a sore thumb from its neighboring storefronts.

 

“Well, we're here kiddo,” Mike said putting the vehicle into park. Jac let out a yawn as he gave a quick tug at the door to open the car. Surprisingly, it didn’t open.

 

“Uhm, door, I’m going to be late?” Jac said with exasperation.

 

“Yea kid, just wait a moment. Our discussion from earlier isn’t finished,” Mike said, leaning around and putting a hand up to silence Jac’s protests.

 

“Ok, fine, I’m already late anyway,” Jac huffed, shaking his head with annoyance while folding his arms. Mike let out a sigh before continuing.

 

“Jack, you’re turning eighteen in tomorrow. You’ll officially be an adult in the eyes of the law and will have to undertake the Awakening te-”

 

“I already know this, what's your point?” Jac groaned, getting more and more annoyed as he stared at the clock on the dashboard changing numbers.

 

“The POINT!, is that once you turn Eighteen, in the eyes of the law, you will be a full adult. You’ll either have to pay the draft tax or enlist into the Guard. And while on the off chance you do Awaken, you’ll be forced to come to terms with some things you aren’t prepared for. Things that I have tried to shelter you from,” Mike paused looking down at his hand before scratching against the metal as he tried to formulate more to his speech.

 

“S’pose what I’m getting at kiddo.. is in the coming days you’re going to have to make some tough choices that will dictate how the rest of your life will go. You and Angie never really seemed to get along, but she did make a good point about you doing nothing, and she does care about you. Once you get your inheritance, you could easily squander the remainder of your days, but are you satisfied with that son?”

 

“Are you done?” Jac asked, annoyed and half-zoning out with his hand still on the door handle.

 

“Yeah kid, that's all I wanted to say, just think about the future some more ok?” Mike said. 

 

Flashing a smile, Mike unlocked the back door causing Jac to spill out of the vehicle and tumble onto the ground.

 

“Whoops,my bad!” Mike apologized as he laughed to himself.

 

“Argh c’mon!” Jac whined as dusted himself off the paved road and began jogging towards Wong’s in a bad mood.

 

“Love you!” Mike called out as Jac opened the shop’s door, drawing the attention of several passersby.

 

“Just go already!” Jac yelled back as the car pulled away with Mike’s laughter trailing behind it.

 

Suddenly something hard bounced off Jac’s head with a loud thud as he opened the door of the shop.

 

“Bù zūnzhòng! Show some respect boy! That is your father,” a short and stocky elderly Chinese man yelled out from behind the store counter as he gingerly handled a tree sapling.

 

“You are late boy. Hand me the pot,” Mr. Wong growled, gesturing to the plastic container on the floor before he turned away from Jac and went back to work, ignoring the look of exasperation on the young man’s face.

 

Contrary to the vivid exterior of the building, the inside of the shop was damp, dark, and very humid with rows upon rows of plants lining the walls. Giving the shop a strong minty scent that made Jac’s noise itch whenever he entered the shop.

 

The store was illuminated by rows upon rows of purple UV lights, which helped to perpetuate the dank mood of the storefront, but also give the plants the nutrients they needed to survive.

Jac picked up the thrown container and handed it to the elderly man, who snatched it from him before berating Jac.

 

“Every day you show up late, and every day I tell you not to, if it weren’t for your mother, God rest her soul, I’d have fired you years ago!” Mr. Wong barked in anger, wagging a finger sternly in Jac’s face.

 

“I just woke up late, and there are protestors everywhere,” Jac protested, ignoring the finger-wagging to punch his timecard in. “Plus it’s not like we get a lot of customers anyway, it’s a wonder the lights stay on in this place.”

“Jiù xiàng nǐ shìgè yìwài, always with excuses,” Mr. Wong muttered before grabbing several pots and heading to the back of the shop to the stairs. It was going to be one of those days it looked like.

 

“What was that?” Jac asked, causing Mr. Wong to pause at the base of the stairs before deepening his already deep frown

 

“Get to work, the basement temperature gauges need to be checked, plants need to be deadheaded, UV bulbs need to be replaced on the first, second, and fifth floor, and the hydration pipe-”

 

“Yea, yea I get it I got ju-” Jac’s interruption was cut off by a loud "thunk" sound as a plastic flower pot bounced off his head.

 

“Don’t interrupt me, boy! The hydration pipes need to be checked for leakage and rust, and there is dandelion tea in the back room. Get to it once you clean yourself off.” 

 

Mr. Wong turned away and went up the stairs, not willing to tolerate Jac’s presence any longer.

 

“And put that pot away!” Mr. Wong's voice called down before the sound of a door slamming shut reverberated throughout the building.

 

A few seconds passed with Jac standing there staring into blank space before an exasperated cry of frustration rang out through the shop, a moment later the sound of something being kicked across the floor could be heard.

 

 

A/N I appreciate feedback, this story is going to be a long burn, w/ 8 arcs planned AND an ending. 

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