July 122
City J18, a city unlike any other and a city exactly like every other. Gray and expressionless, a true monument to order and conformity. The people that walked the street were mostly the same as well. Shades of black and white with small splashes of color hidden in the ties of men and accessories of women. Individual expression wasn't much of a thing when the only clothing stores were government owned or regulated. The idea of race has been made archaic to an extent. After the government mandated genetic therapy there really was no such thing as race. White, English, and middle class described just about everyone you would ever meet. Government officials make up some portion of the population, but most people don't get involved with them considering they aren't really part of the civilian population anyway.
Still though, life has always been comfortable. Small luxuries are afforded to everyone who contributes. No one really travels unless it's government mandated. Still though, people find ways to entertain themselves. No one really struggles to provide for their family and no one really has any more than anyone else. Truly, there isn't really a reason to complain and people are happy. And as they say, comfort breeds inaction.
None of this is the reason I write this though. Today I document my recent experiences so that it was real. So that it happened and I can read this and know it all wasn't just a dream or a horrible nightmare and perhaps someday if I'm gone, someone else will read and understand the way I do. As I walked the city today, J18 looked even grayer than ever. Every where I looked I saw the iron bars of the prison we all live in, so carefully hidden from us by our own ignorance. There are others who can see through the fog and I have found them, or rather, they found me.
A little more than a week ago my life was normal. Being 19, I was on my own, away from my parents. Not having found someone to spend my life with yet, I lived alone. My life was absolutely the standard. With my education finished for the time being I had been assigned a job. While advanced machinery was never my passion, I was quite good at performing maintenance on the city infrastructure.
It was all going just as expected until that day. I received a knock at my door, an event entirely contrary to my usual life. I moved to open the door only to find two very well dressed men on the other side. They reeked of government agency and the badge on their arm confirmed my initial suspicions. The badges were the standard shield shape, but the thing that caught my eye was the acronym, I didn't recognize it.
"Iblic Toruk, you are to come with us." It was the larger of the two that spoke.
"What for?" I asked, "Have I done something wrong?"
That was the usual reason for unexpected visits from the government. Sometimes there were whispers of the government showing up and carting people off, never to be seen again. Rumors of the reasons were always different and no one really knew why. Surprise visits from the government were always a bad thing.
"We needn't answer that now, we'll explain on the way."
On the way. They were taking me. I had done nothing wrong to my knowledge, but there was no use fighting it. They escorted me to a black vehicle waiting outside the building. It looked different than the usual cars, the window panes were heavily tinted and looked to be bulletproof, which suggested the rest of the car would be too. Either that meant I was worth protecting or worth preventing an escape.
I sat in the back seat as the two men entered the front. I wondered where they'd be taking me. There was always whispers of where people would go when they were carted off like this, but no one ever really knew.
I decided to break the silence in hope they would answer my previous question. "So," I hesitated, hardly capable of speaking around the nervous lump in my throat, "where exactly are you taking me?"
"Do you know of the I.D.F.?" The man in the passengers seat turned to look at me as he spoke.
"Sure, it's part of the small military we keep, right?" I didn't know what I.D.F. stood for, but I had heard of it during schooling.
"Yes, the Inter-city Defense Force is charged with protecting and serving on a larger scale than the local police force. We are sent to larger conflicts and can be mobilized as a coordinated force to cities during major events."
"Conflicts? What conflicts, I haven't seen any reports on the news of such a thing," I said.
"That's because they aren't reported on. Sends the wrong impression, you see. Gives people the idea that people are unhappy or that there is reason to be unhappy when there is not. Some people will always be unhappy and disgruntled and some of them group together in an attempt to sow discourse. We prevent and discourage that directly."
What he said made some sense. I had known a person with a similar disposition to what he spoke of. He had always spoke out against the government and it's actions. It wasn't too long before he simply stopped showing up at school. No one really paid him too much attention in the first place though, he didn't participate in any of the school organized activities so there was no reason to interact with him.
"Okay, but what does this all have to do with me?" I asked.
"We think you could be a valuable asset to the I.D.F.. The reason why will have to wait for another time."
What could I do that anyone else couldn't? I wasn't particularly athletic. I wasn't experienced enough to call myself a master machinist and I had no experience with the military.
I was ripped from my thoughts by an abrupt stop to the car and words from the driver. "Well it looks like we got to him first, but they found us on the way." He turned back to look at me. "Stay here, we'll be back once we eliminate the threat that's after you.
How they were planning to eliminate a threat was beyond me. They were visually unarmed. Looking out the window yielded only a small amount of information. I could only see one assailant, but I assumed there must be more.
My questions about the fight were answered very quickly. The first ball of fire went roaring past the window. I vaguely remember yelling a variety of profanities before looking forward. Another fireball was en route, this time aimed towards the car. This part I remember in slow motion. I fumbled for far too long with the latch to the door of the car, trying desperately to make my way of the doomed car. I remember getting out of the car and looking back before the car violently exploded. I was thrown by the blast. I don't know how the fight resolved exactly, I blacked out, but from what I heard it wasn't much of a fight.
When I awoke I was in a room, not outside by a car where I vaguely remember passing out. I was alone so I examined the room. It wasn't like any apartment or home I'd ever seen, it looked a bit run down. The bed I had been laying in was a bunk bed. There were a few other small furnishings, but this was so minimalist that it could hardly be called a room. I tried the only door out and found it was locked.
I don't know how long I was in that room before I heard a knock. Maybe a decades worth of age separated the man that entered the room and I, but he looked more alien than anyone I had ever seen. His clothes were nothing of note, maybe a little dirty, but no different from the casual clothes that could be found inside the city. He himself, as a person, was another story. He was beyond the physical fitness requirements of the government, into the territory of athletes from ages past.
"Whoa there, I'm not here to hurt you," he said. "I'm sure you've got some questions and I'm here to answer them. I'm sure you were given some amount of information by the I.D.F. and I'm here to clarify. You will be free to leave after we are sure you understand the situation."
"Let me start by introducing myself, my name is Viktor. You were picked up today by the I.D.F. for a specific purpose. We intercepted you to give you a choice. A luxury you were not afforded until now. You were drafted because of your gene therapy. The gene therapy you were given at birth and again at age 12 was not just to ensure you were healthy and normal. The government also experiments on all of us for helping to advance the human race. The genes for super intelligence, strength, even supernatural abilities are all inserted at birth. The overwhelming majority fail to express the gene, though implanted it never activates. A small percentage end with the gene expressing itself in a way the human body can't handle. Death is the most common result in that case. An even smaller percent succeed. You following me?"
I sat down on the bed in stunned silence for a moment, trying to absorb everything that I was just told. It all sounded so ridiculous and I would have said so if it wasn't for the blatant proof I had seen earlier. That fireball that got hurled at the car didn't come from any weapon. The question was, what did this have to do with him?
"You mean I..." I trailed off not knowing how to complete that sentence.
"Yes, if the I.D.F. was after you then you were most definitely a success. What degree of success you are and what it was they succeeded at is a bit more difficult to answer. We might find out sooner or later or you might find out on your own what it is. If you choose to leave, you could go willingly to the I.D.F. or if you try to return to your normal life you will be hunted by the I.D.F.. You will join them or they will eliminate you. The alternative to those two options is joining us. You don't necessarily have to fight, but you will support the cause in one way or another if you're here."
"Fight what and who is us?" I asked.
"We are Idris State and we fight it all." Viktor smiled and gave himself a chuckle. "It's funny because you probably don't even know what that means. Most people don't even know there's a world outside of their assigned city. No body knows that the government is all reaching, the whole planet is one nation now and it's sick. Any illusion of choice we are given in our lives is exactly that, an illusion. We are all the same, just cogs working. You probably don't even know that there are those who don't live well, those that don't have enough. They are second class citizens and they are kept down. We fight for freedom, a word you've probably never heard."
"Follow me." He must've been able to see how upset I was. This was all so incredibly upsetting, to know that I had been lied to and it all made so much sense. It all made so much sense.
"This is Patrick, our R&D lead. He's developed a lot of the technology we have needed in our fight." Patrick waved a friendly hello with his nose still in a piece of micro-machinery. "Our most used is the wrist mounted line launcher, works a bit like Spiderman." I gave him an inquisitive look and he laughed. "It's a pre-government comic, they kinda got rid of most of it, but we've managed to recover artifacts like that around."
"So what do you think, will you join us. Find out what it is that makes you so special. Help us find out what it is that makes humanity so special. We are all living behind concrete bars."
I looked at him for a moment, I knew there was only one answer. "Yes"
Still though, life has always been comfortable. Small luxuries are afforded to everyone who contributes. No one really travels unless it's government mandated. Still though, people find ways to entertain themselves. No one really struggles to provide for their family and no one really has any more than anyone else. Truly, there isn't really a reason to complain and people are happy. And as they say, comfort breeds inaction.
None of this is the reason I write this though. Today I document my recent experiences so that it was real. So that it happened and I can read this and know it all wasn't just a dream or a horrible nightmare and perhaps someday if I'm gone, someone else will read and understand the way I do. As I walked the city today, J18 looked even grayer than ever. Every where I looked I saw the iron bars of the prison we all live in, so carefully hidden from us by our own ignorance. There are others who can see through the fog and I have found them, or rather, they found me.
A little more than a week ago my life was normal. Being 19, I was on my own, away from my parents. Not having found someone to spend my life with yet, I lived alone. My life was absolutely the standard. With my education finished for the time being I had been assigned a job. While advanced machinery was never my passion, I was quite good at performing maintenance on the city infrastructure.
It was all going just as expected until that day. I received a knock at my door, an event entirely contrary to my usual life. I moved to open the door only to find two very well dressed men on the other side. They reeked of government agency and the badge on their arm confirmed my initial suspicions. The badges were the standard shield shape, but the thing that caught my eye was the acronym, I didn't recognize it.
"Iblic Toruk, you are to come with us." It was the larger of the two that spoke.
"What for?" I asked, "Have I done something wrong?"
That was the usual reason for unexpected visits from the government. Sometimes there were whispers of the government showing up and carting people off, never to be seen again. Rumors of the reasons were always different and no one really knew why. Surprise visits from the government were always a bad thing.
"We needn't answer that now, we'll explain on the way."
On the way. They were taking me. I had done nothing wrong to my knowledge, but there was no use fighting it. They escorted me to a black vehicle waiting outside the building. It looked different than the usual cars, the window panes were heavily tinted and looked to be bulletproof, which suggested the rest of the car would be too. Either that meant I was worth protecting or worth preventing an escape.
I sat in the back seat as the two men entered the front. I wondered where they'd be taking me. There was always whispers of where people would go when they were carted off like this, but no one ever really knew.
I decided to break the silence in hope they would answer my previous question. "So," I hesitated, hardly capable of speaking around the nervous lump in my throat, "where exactly are you taking me?"
"Do you know of the I.D.F.?" The man in the passengers seat turned to look at me as he spoke.
"Sure, it's part of the small military we keep, right?" I didn't know what I.D.F. stood for, but I had heard of it during schooling.
"Yes, the Inter-city Defense Force is charged with protecting and serving on a larger scale than the local police force. We are sent to larger conflicts and can be mobilized as a coordinated force to cities during major events."
"Conflicts? What conflicts, I haven't seen any reports on the news of such a thing," I said.
"That's because they aren't reported on. Sends the wrong impression, you see. Gives people the idea that people are unhappy or that there is reason to be unhappy when there is not. Some people will always be unhappy and disgruntled and some of them group together in an attempt to sow discourse. We prevent and discourage that directly."
What he said made some sense. I had known a person with a similar disposition to what he spoke of. He had always spoke out against the government and it's actions. It wasn't too long before he simply stopped showing up at school. No one really paid him too much attention in the first place though, he didn't participate in any of the school organized activities so there was no reason to interact with him.
"Okay, but what does this all have to do with me?" I asked.
"We think you could be a valuable asset to the I.D.F.. The reason why will have to wait for another time."
What could I do that anyone else couldn't? I wasn't particularly athletic. I wasn't experienced enough to call myself a master machinist and I had no experience with the military.
I was ripped from my thoughts by an abrupt stop to the car and words from the driver. "Well it looks like we got to him first, but they found us on the way." He turned back to look at me. "Stay here, we'll be back once we eliminate the threat that's after you.
How they were planning to eliminate a threat was beyond me. They were visually unarmed. Looking out the window yielded only a small amount of information. I could only see one assailant, but I assumed there must be more.
My questions about the fight were answered very quickly. The first ball of fire went roaring past the window. I vaguely remember yelling a variety of profanities before looking forward. Another fireball was en route, this time aimed towards the car. This part I remember in slow motion. I fumbled for far too long with the latch to the door of the car, trying desperately to make my way of the doomed car. I remember getting out of the car and looking back before the car violently exploded. I was thrown by the blast. I don't know how the fight resolved exactly, I blacked out, but from what I heard it wasn't much of a fight.
When I awoke I was in a room, not outside by a car where I vaguely remember passing out. I was alone so I examined the room. It wasn't like any apartment or home I'd ever seen, it looked a bit run down. The bed I had been laying in was a bunk bed. There were a few other small furnishings, but this was so minimalist that it could hardly be called a room. I tried the only door out and found it was locked.
I don't know how long I was in that room before I heard a knock. Maybe a decades worth of age separated the man that entered the room and I, but he looked more alien than anyone I had ever seen. His clothes were nothing of note, maybe a little dirty, but no different from the casual clothes that could be found inside the city. He himself, as a person, was another story. He was beyond the physical fitness requirements of the government, into the territory of athletes from ages past.
"Whoa there, I'm not here to hurt you," he said. "I'm sure you've got some questions and I'm here to answer them. I'm sure you were given some amount of information by the I.D.F. and I'm here to clarify. You will be free to leave after we are sure you understand the situation."
"Let me start by introducing myself, my name is Viktor. You were picked up today by the I.D.F. for a specific purpose. We intercepted you to give you a choice. A luxury you were not afforded until now. You were drafted because of your gene therapy. The gene therapy you were given at birth and again at age 12 was not just to ensure you were healthy and normal. The government also experiments on all of us for helping to advance the human race. The genes for super intelligence, strength, even supernatural abilities are all inserted at birth. The overwhelming majority fail to express the gene, though implanted it never activates. A small percentage end with the gene expressing itself in a way the human body can't handle. Death is the most common result in that case. An even smaller percent succeed. You following me?"
I sat down on the bed in stunned silence for a moment, trying to absorb everything that I was just told. It all sounded so ridiculous and I would have said so if it wasn't for the blatant proof I had seen earlier. That fireball that got hurled at the car didn't come from any weapon. The question was, what did this have to do with him?
"You mean I..." I trailed off not knowing how to complete that sentence.
"Yes, if the I.D.F. was after you then you were most definitely a success. What degree of success you are and what it was they succeeded at is a bit more difficult to answer. We might find out sooner or later or you might find out on your own what it is. If you choose to leave, you could go willingly to the I.D.F. or if you try to return to your normal life you will be hunted by the I.D.F.. You will join them or they will eliminate you. The alternative to those two options is joining us. You don't necessarily have to fight, but you will support the cause in one way or another if you're here."
"Fight what and who is us?" I asked.
"We are Idris State and we fight it all." Viktor smiled and gave himself a chuckle. "It's funny because you probably don't even know what that means. Most people don't even know there's a world outside of their assigned city. No body knows that the government is all reaching, the whole planet is one nation now and it's sick. Any illusion of choice we are given in our lives is exactly that, an illusion. We are all the same, just cogs working. You probably don't even know that there are those who don't live well, those that don't have enough. They are second class citizens and they are kept down. We fight for freedom, a word you've probably never heard."
"Follow me." He must've been able to see how upset I was. This was all so incredibly upsetting, to know that I had been lied to and it all made so much sense. It all made so much sense.
"This is Patrick, our R&D lead. He's developed a lot of the technology we have needed in our fight." Patrick waved a friendly hello with his nose still in a piece of micro-machinery. "Our most used is the wrist mounted line launcher, works a bit like Spiderman." I gave him an inquisitive look and he laughed. "It's a pre-government comic, they kinda got rid of most of it, but we've managed to recover artifacts like that around."
"So what do you think, will you join us. Find out what it is that makes you so special. Help us find out what it is that makes humanity so special. We are all living behind concrete bars."
I looked at him for a moment, I knew there was only one answer. "Yes"