In The Year 2124
by John Atwood
Monday, June 5, 2124
Todd woke with a start. That hateful sound of Alexa! Five bloody AM!
“Get up! Get up! Now, or I’ll start playing heavy metal from 150 years ago. What should I pick this time? How about Iron Butterfly’s “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida’?”
“Ok, ok, you win! I’m up already!”
Still suffering from the late night hallucinogens he ingested at the “Policeman’s Ball” the night before, Todd struggled thru the sonic shower, did a quick depilatory sweep with the LazerRazer, gulped down a glass of Heinz Mealpaste and struggled into his anti-irad suit. What a day to be on decontam duty!
The following morning, Todd reflects on the consequences of being over-served.
Why me? I’m not the one who Putined England. If only those damned Americans had listened to the warnings and launched sooner, none of this would have happened!
On the other hand, the world is probably a better place without Liverpool. All they ever contributed to the world was some insane thing called ‘Beatlemania”, whateverthell that is. You would think that 90 years on, that glowing pile of rubble could be forgotten! But no! The stuff was still getting into the waterways and being blown inland by those crazy “rivers in the atmosphere,” whateverthehell those are.
The sad, sad world without the Beatles
A few keypresses on his Personal Digital Assistant (the latest from SonyDroid, of course! Nothing but the best for Todd!) and his Fluber will be landing on the patio in 149 seconds. Shoes on, out the door and “whiz bang, off we go”, straight up to 1000 metres and right into the Northbound Public Vehicle Fast Lane, all the way to Stoke-on-Trent.
Plenty of time to check the headlines. Gawd, those useless dicks at Birmingham lost to Lagos. Again! Second time since the World Football League started. And Kazakistan is still stalling on letting Kyrgyzstan into the EuroAsia Union. Can’t they see they are the last line of defense against that mad heir-to-the-throne, Polina Natalia Putin?
Wednesday, June 7, 2124
With the 16-hour work week out of the way, it was down to the local for a couple relaxers. What to do with his time off? The next shift was in 10 days. Pick up Wanda, and head to Ecuador for an elevator ride to the Ritz-On-Top? Sex in zero-g is amazing, as long as you get the fully padded room!
Or how about a quick spin down Route 66 on the latest eHarley Road King? Instead of fighting gravity in a flying uber, use it to stick real, organic tires, grown right there in New Hampshire by DunlopGreen, to a polycarbonate road surface. Todd could feel the wind in his face already, cornering around Oklahoma Megaplex and maxing out at over 300 KPH past the Winslow Carbon Precipitation Plant – the place where the highway was manufactured. Even the weather managers were on his side, promising to let up on the groundwater recovery storms for a few days, to let the moisture settle in.
No, it was time for something completely different! (Where did that stupid phrase come from, anyway?) Antarctica! According to Alexa, there were berths still available on the Royal Carib eHyrdofoil. Even in cloud cover, they can make it in three days from Plymouth to the Davis Station Grand Hotel on a single charge. And the agency even came up with a companion who claims to want to see the ice flows! What more could a guy ask for?
Feb 15, 2129
Time flies when you’re having fun! (Where did that stupid phrase come from?) Time to start thinking about a career change. According to the Old York Times latest survey, most people consider youth to be over by thirty-five and Todd was starting to feel that the mandatory assignments were not worth the time off, even with all the extra perks: drugs, travel, companions and anything else you could ask for, paid for by the United Nations. Besides, after eBoarding through the Grand Canyon and the robo-assist Mt. Everest trek, there just didn’t seem to be any more neat places to go. And he was starting to feel like he had no purpose. Humans weren’t invented to just sit around; they need to feel like they are useful and important.
Time to make the leap! Three years at Cape Town PolyTech should do it! Both MicroSoftGreen and GreenApple have guaranteed employment programs. Hard work, but if being a certified quantum biocomputer engineer doesn’t provide meaning to life, what does?
…
We leave Todd as he moves out of adolescence to begin his adult phase. Who knows, perhaps he’ll appear on our radar again sometime in the future.
