Ch 7: The rapturing

The ride up was slow and silent, but not awkward, as how could someone ever trade the sense of glamour and emulation of nouveau riche to small talk? For most of them, this was the cleanest, emptiest, and shiniest lift they had ever taken in their life, and savored it while it lasted. Out of sheer boredom, though, Angie let out a burp she’s been holding on since the lift started. The crack in the tension expanded with a couple of stifled snickers from Siete, and a “Thank god” from Marcos. 

“I’ve taken many rides down to the mines in my life, but never felt as boxed in as in this one.” The miner then felt a need to move around, shadow box the pressure away. 

This was the first time the boy followed her every move.” You’ve brawled a lot back home?”, he asked, as if already knowing the answer. Instead of a reply, though, Angie wordlessly invited him to spar if he was curious. “ We got all of space, time and spotless space. Why not-”

“No? Because I don’t want to risk a malfunction? Or hurt myself, or show my hands to my enemies?” 

“ Oh please, what can happen before-”

Putting out their fingers in order to keep track, Siete starts mentioning all possible injuries someone could suffer in even a spar- “ Strains, muscular rupture, internal biological injuries-” and then Marcos chimed with his own fingers to help them out -” internal mechanical injuries”.

Beaten, Angie takes a seat, pouts, lets the two carry on and a smile creeps under her mask. 

……………..

Reaching the height of an eagle’s sight, Angie and Marcos move closer to the windows, staring longingly in the vastness of the County, at places unknown to the common people of the city. 

The woman looked at a dilapidated living block next to a gap in the ground, an entrance to a giant tube that borrowed into the earth. Whoever set up the building didn’t think that a kitchen means lots of pots and frying stuff, which in turn means lots of smoke, so all of the tenants cooked out in the open. Based on where the fires started, Angie could tell which group was skinning the rats that day- “ Those must be Marisha’s clan…and that means the ‘panel’ of rusty folks started earlier today. Guess they’re preparing to lift the next meal kit…Well, with one less mouth to feed this month, at least they’re cutting on the strain.”

She muttered all of it herself, quiet enough for Siete to catch her voice but few of her words. As from Marcos, all they could catch was his stern reflection as stared into the cacophony of concrete towers. 

Marcos’ point of reference was harder to pin down, appearing to be hidden by the tens of factories and offices, seeming to lead into a part of the Middle Level of the County that was marked as red on all the maps. Meaning that commoners were banned from entry. As for Siete, they just felt content to shift their gaze from one another, with a warm smile for the two.

…………………………………

Their penultimate lift off passed, surprisingly, through a lot of the upper layers. While the County is technically divided into three layers of similar height, only the Underlevel and Middle have minimum dividers in their stratification. The Upper has thresholds after thresholds marketed with the tagline “ There’s always a better place you could strive for.”

With each new interlayer passed, everything shrank in size but became more lavish than the preceding one. Buildings kept getting tinier and tinier, with Angie confused by how “ people could fit in such a cramped space?” The number of symmetrical modded and enhanced people also increased, but there were a few oddities among them.

Some spandex-wearing cases had no mechanical parts on the outside, but it was clear that their bodies were sustained by metallic bars and their arms could only bend with the work of specialized hinges. Some could change their appearance on the fly, with many transitioning from muscular physiques into slim or obese ones at the drop of a hat.

-“Huh”, remarked the dozy boy. “I read about it, but never witnessed such changes irl. Or that these kinds of drugs are out on the market already. ”

Siete -” What, the body morphing thing? The Customer Complaint office I worked at never trained us about such products, so maybe it’s available only on this level? What I am more curious about is: does the spandex costume come as a package deal, or do you have to get it separately?”Siete pondered, scratching their bald head on how this logistical conundrum worked.

………………………

After another passing of tens of minutes, the elevator finally arrived at the tipping point of the journey, and so did Marcos’ and Angie’s nerves. At the exit bip, both seemed prepared to say some words to the man in charge, and unfortunately for them, the man predicted a chance of short temper and outburst, so he left a middle man to wait for the three.

Standing at a height of two and a half meters, a metallic humanoid was staring them down in front of the door, as if it waited for them in that angled position. The figure was bulky, with massive square pauldrons on each side, and the rest of the body covered in washed up Carolina blue armor. The design was simplistic and bulky, like a bunch of metal cases welded together to cover a human body. To add some elements for a motif, his left arm had a hefty, but rusty shield attached to it.

The robot was knight-like in appearance, but an old one, covered by rusty plates that had seen battle after battle, and the shield had visible signs of scratches, dents, and discoloration all over it.

Once again, ignoring any possibilities of a trap, Siete stepped straight into the golem’s line of sight. “Hi”, they said, apparently without fear and with their usual customer service smile. “My name is Siete Chehar and I was invited here. Are youu, perhaps….our chaperone?” they asked with a small pause at the end.

The figure shifted its mostly featureless face, closing in with two yellow circles through a visor near the clopy’s face. The circles blinked in rapid succession to scan Siete. After that, they did the same for the other two, who were still waiting a few steps behind. “Confirmed”, it added quickly, while switching to a friendlier manner for interacting with guests.

C.T.D -” Hello patient 8 Seven Four, patient 6 Angie Tunnal and Marchou…Marhos?”

Marcos -” Ok, I’m done, the joke went too far.”, the boy huffed very uncharacteristically, with a bit of a rush in his tone. As if unveiling a magic trick, his palm did a couple of swift gestures to unveil a special bar code hidden in his palms, let the giant scan it then started his commands: ” Action- Open [Redacted] library  and use Replace function- Subject: M-A-R-C-H-O-S – New spelling- M-A-R-C-O-S”. Just as quickly as he finished,  he pulled his hood over his eyes to hide his shame “…the h should have been silent”.

C.T.D. -” Confirmed…and shared”, replied the robot.

-” Thank you”, sniped Marcos.

-” I am C.T.D 8 for this year’s race, designation Vivar, and I will serve with Seven Four in the challenges. A pleasure to meet you all, partner” he said, bowing to Siete, “ and mortal rivals”. The C.E. was downright giddy and over-excited at his answer, while Angie was swearing under her breath, and Marcos tried to keep a normal, non-shaking pose.

The C.T.D. tried afterward to act as a friendly tour guide, inviting them inside the imposing building with a glass dome on top of it. As it was programmed, Vivar started by presenting them the labs, what purpose each room had, etc, on so forth for the next ten or so spaces.

-” So, Vivar”,  Angie chimed in, a bit wobbly in her words, “how come only you waited for us,? Specifically, how come mine and Marcos C.T.D partners did not?”

Vivar -” This is actually not standard procedure. I was asked by the director of this facility to do it. And also because no one else was available to greet you and show you around. You will meet your partners soon, after a meeting with the director. In the meantime, how would you rate my touring routine so far?”

Siete -” Satisfactory”, answered Siete with gusto, giving him two thumbs up. “For your first time doing it, you are simply knocking it out of the park buddy.”

Vivar -” Thank you. Noted. Could you give it in the form of a numerical rating, though?”

—–

Sometime later, the group was suddenly addressed  through the speakers by a tired, gravelly old man. “Where are my patients? If they try to leave and desert, shoot them on sight. With tranqs though. Don’t care what the Brands’ complaints will be. Now where the hell are they?”

Vivar -“ That’s the director, so I guess that concludes half of the tour. We can finish the rest later”, to which only Siete enthusiastically bobbled their head up and down. Vivar then pressed a button on the side of the wall, spawning a floating platform from underneath the floor.

Vivar -“ Please, hop on board. This will get us to our destination faster”. Angie and Marcos wanted to huff in fury about why they didn’t use the platforms beforehand, but were instinctively aware that the laboratory didn’t care about such complaints . And they knew that it would fall on deaf ears most likely.

On the way, Siete tried to make small talk with the C.T.D, asking him multiple questions about his origins, functionalities, and connections, to which he responded in brief answers:

Vivar- “1. Unknown- deleted. The first point of the registry is in a delivery building for C.T.D. 2. Unknown while other competitors are present. 3. Unknown, all personnel data is expunged after some period.”

Siete -” I see. Regarding my first question, why would your point of origin be deleted? Everyone knows people that are working in cloning, and where we cloppies are cloned; but I never met anyone working in C.T.D manufacturing”, to which all three of them slowly turned towards the C.E. Both Angie and Marcos never thought too hardly about the C.T.Ds. They thought of the robots only as “ Custom Transmogrified Drone- machines with limited A.I, that follow most of their partners’ orders and act as guardian protectors”- as mentioned in all of their online descriptions.

Vivar tilted his head a bit while keeping visual contact with Siete’s wide-eyed face, and waited a few seconds before answering: “Unknown”, after which he kept radio silence for any other questions.