"Ms. Bartolucci, do you need anything?""Freedom... happiness... not being trapped in a train station... many things."Ah, so nothing you can provide. Very well. What's the other news about?
Well, one is essentially a report that scientists predict the intensification of earthquakes in the Mediterranean area as well as an increase in volcanic activity across the world. Not like this really bothers anyone overmuch - most buildings these days are largely earthquake-proof, but still, some damage to populated areas is likely to result. The city councils are going to take additional measures to prevent potential problems as well, so this isn't really exciting or seemingly apocalyptic as one might hope.
To round off today's news, it appears that the world's police, miniscule as it is these days compared to the large security forces of the corporations, has become purely composed of engineered people on every level from ordinary street peacekeepers to the administrators and even the chief peacekeeping posts are no longer held by a natural-born person anymore. This has had a very positive impact on police efficiency - street crime is at an all-time low these days, though some say this is because much of what used to be street crime is now completely legal and provided by corporations, most notably drugs, prostitution and racketeering. Now there's just rapists, murderers and common thieves to wrangle, and even those have become rare due to the lack of a generally dissatisfied and disadvantaged working class - it's all engineered people these days, and those are largely owned by corporations and given specific, narrow jobs with little room to maneuver and do potentially illegal and image-destroying things (as far as we know, anyway).
Well, with the news done and over with, you decide to take a nice nap. Luckily, the train station floor is reasonably soft, so you fall asleep soon enough.
You've always had a bit of a problem with sleeping. Well, not
sleeping, exactly. You can sleep just fine. It's the dreams that you find strange. You've heard that normal people, engineered and natural, dream of things they know about, things they've seen and things that bother them. You don't. When you dream, you fall into a constant stream of information, a sea of images that are funny, disturbing, intriguing or amazing, with no clear connection between them. Sometimes you dream completely randomly, sometimes it's a set of information about a specific thing. Sometimes, and this is where it gets strangest, you dream of things. Not the things themselves, but what they represent. They all seem to relate to fiction, how fiction is written and how it appears in works of all sorts, not to mention in life, which art is known to imitate. When you wake up from those dreams, you always feel peculiarly detached.
This time, though, you dream of ancient felines in odd poses making strange expressions and unusual statements you do not readily comprehend. It feels strange, almost as if you're outside time, or at least in a place where it does not exist. You spend some time here, visited by felines of all sorts, but before you can leave, you are pulled out of the dream.
The first thing you notice is that Ms. Bartolucci isn't lying on the floor anymore. And Mr. Love has also left his previous position. Even the busker is gone. You see dark shapes moving toward the train tunnel, some of them having peculiar glowing orange points on them. You hear whispering from their direction, though you can't make out what it is. You also smell something like burnt rubber, as well as the unusually strong scent (probably one of those weird colognes) of Jerry, which hasn't left the area just yet.
You may focus on one item of news per unit of time, obtaining additional information on this subject.
Scientists predict tectonic activity will intensify in coming years.Crime is at all-time low as world police force becomes 100% engineered.
Name: Jasmine Thyme Model 376
Gender: Female
Attributes: heightened senses of taste and smell, increased manual dexterity, improved intellect, unobtrusively good looks, improved interpersonal ability, slight owner fixation, cranial netlink implant.
Skills: skilled chef, proficient at maintenance and repair, proficient at making smalltalk.
State of Mind: agitated due to uncertainty, distressing circumstances (such as being trapped in a maglev station).
Author
Topic: (SG) Less Than Perfection - now dropped (Read 25863 times)