| NigeL K. (Installment 1) Why they picked me, I still don�t know. Maybe it was because I was the only one stupid enough to be in that alley alone or maybe it was because I fit some description that they were looking for, but the reason doesn�t matter. The fact is when you�re a 19 year old man and you get beat down in an alley by four Lone Star officers; they don�t need a reason, you have no fighting chance. As I lay there taking blow by blow, my mind wanders back to my homeland of Tasmania, back to my home, to my mother still weeping at the fire place after the news that her husband had been mauled and killed by a pack of dingoes. I don�t know why I left my mother in such a state. I just knew that it wasn�t good for me to be there anymore. To much pain�. Pain. Final thoughts flicker in my mind as a Lone Star officer smacks a blow across my temple rendering me unconscious. I float in some watery void not knowing if I am still being beaten or just left to bleed in this shit hole they call the California �Free� State. I woke up in a hospital, instead of that trash ridden alley that I thought would bring the morning. Looking around I found myself strapped to machines, half of which I can�t name and the other half I can�t even describe their purpose. The room is empty, besides my bed and the machines. The blank, white walls are not of any type I have experienced in a hospital. Bright, blinding lights stare down at me, hundreds of them, making a glowing aura in the room. A small door opens and in walks two men, one a doctorial sort, a little chubby in stature with his white coat and name tag that reads, Dr. Lucien Cross. Over the name tag the proud words of a logo state, Cross Applied Technologies. The other man, a tall lean man, walks behind him looking at me with a somewhat bewildered look. I, myself, return this same look for the fact that he is arrogantly displaying his Lone Star uniform with tags , badges, and all. �I am Dr. Cross and this is Captain Lance Eugene,� says the doctor examining screens. �Really?� I state rudely, � I never would have guessed, you know with the name tags and all.� The captain looks at me and smiles, �Sarcasm is good, but you will soon learn that it is not necessary when addressing or speaking to someone of Dr. Cross�s stature.� �Well flip me over and do me sideways. Do you think I give a fuck what you think, pig? I will use sarcasm to whomever the fuck I want. I don�t care who they are or how much �stature� they have.� With a quick snap of his wrist, the officer rings one across my face, which slowly turns my face numb. �You will learn, you will learn,� the cop states as I feel something thickly seeping into my skin through the I.V. shoved into my hand. I start to fade away and the room seems to swirl and close around me as I drop into a deep sleep. Weeks go by or so it seems. I enter into some state of consciousness and yet it seems as if I am not in control of myself or actions. I can see myself performing �duties.� Firing pistols, running obstacle courses, studying strategies and tactics, yet I can�t control any of it. I just do it like some programmed drone, going through routine everyday, not being able to stop myself or change the course of action that takes place everyday. Finally I wake up again, in the �hospital� bed that I woke up in what seems like an eternity. �A dream, all a dream,� I tell myself as I stare into the lights that once blinded my eyes. I fade away again, feeling drained as if I was pulled through a nail hole. This time I have no �dreams,� but just wake up again in my bed with Dr. Cross and Captain Eugene looking down at me. �How do you feel?� Dr. Cross asks me. �Ok I guess, I had some weird dreams and I feel extremely tired,� I reply. �Weird dreams??, like what kind?� he inquires of me. �Well like I was in some kind of boot camp. I couldn�t control my actions, no matter how long I tried to force myself to.� �Those weren�t dreams, that was your training. We drugged you so that you couldn�t falter from what you had to do. You were in control of your body, you just couldn�t control it. The reason for it is because you are an experiment of Lone Star and Cross Applied Technologies. We wanted to see if we could take a normal person, build him up with cyber wear and train him within a month. You seemed to pass all the Lone Star requirements just fine. No medical complications, no mental excursion, you are perfectly fine. �Wait a fucking minute!! You telling me that Lone Star beat the fuck out of me, almost to death. Just so you could bring me here turn me into a fucking freak, so I could go around like a good little officer busting people??� �Not exactly. Your training went farther than a plain officer. An normal human can do that job. You were trained to be an assassin,� Eugene says finally speaking, �Most assassins take years and years of training, you past all the training that they go through in a month. That is the reason for the cyber ware to increase your abilities past that of a normal man.� �And you expect me to believe this bullshit??� �Yes, now get dressed. There are clothes on the toilet in the bathroom, along with a folder with mission descriptions. If you complete your mission successfully then we will keep you. If not then since we found you on the streets, then it will be no problem ripping out your cyber ware and replacing you..� They both turned around and walked out of the room. Rising, I stumbled towards the bathroom. Clothes, like Eugene had said, were folded on the toilet. A black body-suit and a black leather trench coat. I slipped them on and picked up the folder that lay beneath them. A red marker dropped to the floor. Picking up the marker, I open the folder and find files and pictures of a well dressed man. Inside there are also full read-outs of his house, office, children�s school. You name it it was probably in this folder. Taking the marker, I wrote across the files and threw them onto the hospital bed and walk out of the room. Surprisingly, I walked into the middle of a construction sight. Turning around bewildered, I looked up at the building. Large, bold letter pan across the building. CROSS APPLIED TECHNOLOGIES. �I walked home from there, grabbed my things and flew to Seattle. I hooked up with a guy that people like to call, Max the Man and have been a Shadowrunner ever since. I should have stayed longer though cause I still would have liked to have been there when Eugene opened that folder and read �FUCK YOU� in those big, bold letters across those files� �Wait, your telling me that you walked away from there and nothing has happened to you??� �No things have happened. Eugene has tried to kill me several times, not to mention I have been grabbed shit loads of times by guys working for Cross.� �So your running from Lone Star?? How do you get anywhere without being booked??� �I�m not running from Lone Star, just Eugene. Lone Star itself knows nothing of my existence. To them the program got shut down years ago because of complications with the cyber ware.� �Hold on a fucking minute, you expect me to believe this bullshit?� |