[color=D6FFFF][b]Swathe Street Commons[/b][/color]
[color=D6FFFF][b]Reclaim Zone, South City Sprawl[/b][/color]
[color=D6FFFF][b]April 1, 2065[/b][/color]

The TCHD office in the Commons was a small, messy room on the third floor of an unremarkable building. The room’s sole window provided a scenic view of the wall of a parking garage, a gray slab of concrete in what could charitably be called “street art”. Crammed between a utility closet and the floor’s women’s bathroom, the room was an afterthought, something spared at the last minute for the Campaign Health Oversight Committee, which the event planning commission undoubtedly had to be reminded exists.

To the left was an incongruously neat desk, with a computer terminal connected to the TCHD’s network; the holographic Health Department logo glowed faintly red in the unlit room. Howland dismissed the rest of the room with barely a glance. Doubtless his colleagues on the Committee left it as messy as they’d found it, or worse.

The leather chair made a soft [i]whirr[/i] when Howland sat as hundreds of tiny servo-motors adjusted the shape of his chair to the exact contours of his back. An unnecessary luxury, perhaps, but Howland wasn’t a young man anymore. The inexpensive, injection-molded hard plastic chairs the event planning commission provided on the cheap just weren’t worth the back pain the next day. He lifted his briefcase from behind the desk with utmost care, placing it gently on the desk.

The dim light from across the room startled him - nobody else should’ve been here. Yet there lay a young man, reclining against the wall, head propped up by a dark-colored backpack, face obscured by a glowing holograph. Howland took a deep breath, suppressing any reflexive response to the unexpected visitor. He was wearing a charcoal coat with a maroon shirt, the uniform of a local private academy. He didn’t visibly react to Howland’s entry, taking a few moments to speak up.

[color=99C8C8]”Hey, Dad.”[/color]

Howland relaxed, careful not to show any surprise on his face. [color=C0C0C0]”David.”[/color] His older son wasn’t the type to show up to a social event willingly - and his clothing suggested he’d come straight from school. Howland scrutinized his briefcase: A single strand of fine hair stuck out of the lock. Good - nobody had opened it.

[color=99C8C8]”Don’t mind me,”[/color] David said, not looking up from his display. [color=99C8C8]”I’m just using Mom’s network access and your office’s terminal.”[/color]

[color=C0C0C0]”Does Sarah still use our anniversary as her password? I’ve [i]told[/i] her even a teenager could puzzle that one out.”[/color] Now he recognized the display - it was an advanced anatomy reference. 

He carefully opened his briefcase, keeping the lid between David and its contents. [color=99C8C8]”It was the second thing I tried,”[/color] David admitted. [color=99C8C8]”Mom’s not as clever as you are.”[/color] It wasn’t a compliment to him or an insult to her, Howland knew. David had a rather blunt way of speaking the truth.

The device was already mostly assembled - for safety, all Howland had to do was connect its components. The main charge consisted of several plastic pipes. Out of one end of each pipe jutted a small silver cylinder, with thin wires connecting them in series. The detonators relied on a crude mercury fulminate, the pipes below them filled with simple black powder. Howland very carefully connected the negative wire to the negative terminal of a battery pulled from a disposable vape pen. He spoke up as he taped the negative wire into place. [color=C0C0C0]”Don’t you have exams to be studying for, rather than breaking into the Health Department’s reference library? You’re graduating next month, David.”[/color]

David’s tone was dismissive. [color=99C8C8]”Please.”[/color]

Connecting the positive terminal to the fuze was even easier - but connecting the fuze to the circuit was the dangerous part. If the fuze wasn’t wired exactly right, the device would explode right then and there. The device was crude - in fact, it was deliberately made to only partially detonate. It wouldn’t even kill David across the room. But it could very well kill [i]him[/i], and that would prove inconvenient. [color=C0C0C0]”Getting a head start on med school, are we?”[/color]

[color=99C8C8]”Leo has friends over, I didn’t want to listen to their video games all night.”[/color] David’s display floated through a cutaway spinal cord, flowing upwards towards the brain stem. His eyes scanned past displays composited from images of medical cadavers and surgical footage. [color=99C8C8]”It wasn’t difficult to walk right past the people setting up for the event this afternoon.”[/color]

[color=C0C0C0]”You came to a [i]political rally[/i] for peace and quiet?”[/color] Howland’s fuze of choice for this device was a spring-loaded trigger. A spring kept under tension separated the positive and negative wires. Held there by the latch of the briefcase, when opened, the spring would snap forward, connecting the positive and negative ends and completing the circuit and powering the detonators.

David shrugged. Howland knew he couldn’t care less about the political rally. [color=99C8C8]”I was going to just watch TV. But these references are...interesting. It’s like looking at a clockwork mechanism. Every part connects to the next part. It all works in a kind of synchronicity, like a machine…”[/color]

Howland carefully closed the briefcase, holding the spring down manually until the latch came over it. Now the bomb was armed. [color=C0C0C0]”It’s just like as I taught you as a boy, David.”[/color] His son finally looked up, at that, a question written on his raised brow. 

Howland started to sing. [color=C0C0C0][i]”Well the foot bone’s connected to the...shin bones! The shine bone’s connected to the...thigh bones!”[/i][/color]

[color=99C8C8]”God, now he’s singing. Dad, I will throw my coffee at you-”[/color]

 [color=C0C0C0][i]”The thigh bone’s connected to the...hip bones! The hip bone’s connected to the…!”[/i][/color] Howland ducked and laughed as an empty cup of coffee flew past where his head had been a moment earlier. 

David didn’t laugh - the boy had never been as emotional as his more expressive siblings - but he did crack a smile, audibly exhaling. Howland smiled back, collecting the briefcase, his pack, and a bottle of water from his desk. [color=C0C0C0]”I need to collect samples from the water fountains. Want to join me?”[/color] David didn’t bother to grace the question with a reply, turning back to the holograph. [color=C0C0C0]”...Didn’t think so. Theresa’s here too, by the way. Text her if you want a ride home.”[/color]

Howland headed out, as his son acknowledged him with barely a spared grunt.