Neon Zero_The Neon Series Prequel

by Adam J. Smith

  The dead lagoon.

  A lake of shadow and circular concave walls.

  An ocean of sky.

  The Oasis.

  Journal of Lance Corporal Edmonds

  2nd March (ext), 2234… cont’d

  They took our blood today. All part of the screening process, they said. If we are to live here then they need to know what hereditary diseases we’re bringing with us. No matter that this is all already logged in the data files for every one of the domes, and that we brought this data with us.

  “Roll up your sleeves or leave,” said the head nurse. There was a forced smile on her face and her outfit was a black number with tight trousers and long cape. The Neon attire can be weird, sure, but black? For a nurse? The other nurses strolled from armchair to armchair, capes billowing, but at least their outfits were a bright blue. The hotel had given over its large reception hall to the intake process, and there we all were, arms draped over armrests, sitting as though we were about to watch a theatre show. When I asked why they needed a whole half-pint of blood instead of a standard pin-prick, the head nurse just said, “Price of entry.”

  Well, okay then.

  God, what it is it with these people?

  The nurse who attended me couldn’t have been older than sixteen, yet she inserted the needle like a seasoned professional, with almost no pain at all. She was silent throughout and never once met my eye, even when I asked her name.

  “That’s of no concern,” said the head nurse.

  “And what’s yours, for that matter?” I asked.

  “Nurse Ratched.”

  So she had a sense of humour, at least.

  I’m stalling, dear diary. Have you worked that out yet?

  Of course you have.

  Why else did I let them take my blood… for “Price of entry?”

  The radiation is interfering with the radio and telecomm signals. After speaking to Baines we decided to call New Seren and ask for their opinion – well, to ask if they would send out a rescue party in the event of an emergency.

  Nothing.

  We couldn’t get through. We were in the Grounder. Up to that point I’d been reassured by the thought that even if I might not see Jerry again, or at least for a very long time, that I’d be able to say goodbye. Then this. I frantically flicked through the broadcast channels and tried to videolink – Baines even brought out the old CB radio – and nothing. The screen was that grey-black of impure darkness, and I turned it off and on again in futile hope, each ‘off’ a drop into black despair, each ‘on’ a blot of hope. Fading hope.

  “Give it up, man,” Baines said eventually. “Let’s try Neon’s.” He lumbered across to the hatch and opened it, looking back. “Unless you just want to go.”

  I did. I so did – right then. I was ready. “I’ll go, you stay.”

  “No, no – we both go.”

  “I won’t risk your life.”

  “If you think I’m staying in this creepy fucking place without you, you’re mistaken.”

  I stood and held the hatch open for him. “You’ll have to.”

  “You’re not thinking straight. Look at you.”

  “Look at me?”

  “You haven’t slept.”

  “Neither have you.”

  “But I have enough sense to understand our options.” He stood his ground. “WE stay, or WE leave. We go now, or WE wait for the night.”

  The night, I thought – why hadn’t I thought of that? I blinked, seeing things new, and took my hand from the hatch. “Tonight.”

  “Tonight,” smiled Baines. “I thought you were the smart one.” He clambered out into the vehicle depot and jumped to the hard tarmac. “We still need to speak to New Seren, though.”

  You forget you’re on a barren wasteland of a planet when at Neon ground zero. I followed Baines and had this thought again, even though I’d seen it only twenty minutes prior. Highrises block every vantage to see the dome and up there; high, high up there where the light itself is a reflected avenue of the street below, the skin of the dome is non-existent. Up there is just sky. A Neon dream. A narrative that says Everything is normal.

  At the end of the military compound stood a station house that lead out onto the street and housed the officers on duty. We made our may over to them, crossing paths with transportation trucks on the move somewhere, and many more that were parked up and idling. When I thought about how useful those could have been in shipping people and cargo from some of the smaller domes in the area, it made me angry. The thought of leaving here brought me back down from the precipice, and I put the trucks to the back of my mind.

  We greeted the officers who had been watching us through CCTV as they stepped out of the station house. Two of them. Large-chested and possibly wearing bullet-proof vests. How they could feel endangered in this place, I couldn’t imagine. With so many people on such a short leash, I guess there must be one or two that snap the hand that holds them.

  I shouldn’t smile, but I do.

  “Not heading out?” asked the bald one.

  I shook my head. “We wanted some reassurances from New Seren. Can we use your comms to contact them?”

  They gave each other the kind of smile I wanted to smack right off their faces, and then baldy said “Ain’t gonna happen, sir. All comms are down.”

  Baines stepped forward. “Come on, you must have satellite communication.”

  He shook his head. “All I know is the current status report. Come on in: read it for yourself.” They both turned their backs and retreated inside, so we followed.

  Inside, the room was small with windows on three sides overlooking the compound, the entrance/exit, and the street. Smelled like the windows had never been opened. Trucks continued to leave and return outside while a third officer manned the gate, checking credentials and raising and lowering the bar. The bald one stood aside and pointed at the control panel.

  “Be my guest,” he said.

  Baines took a seat and I watched over his shoulder as he ran through all the communication channels; getting the same results as the Grounder. When he tried to access the satellite system, a large, circular and very red standby symbol appeared on the screen. The officer then leaned over and opened up that morning’s communiqué.

  ‘Due to increased solar activity extraneous communications systems are temporarily offline.’

  “That shouldn’t be possible,” said Baines.

  “It’s there in black and white.”

  Baines looked at me. “It’s extremely coincidental or unlucky for every communications avenue to be down.”

  “What do you think?”

  “It has to be the dome. Somehow, for some reason, it’s blocking communications.”

  “Couldn’t the external transceivers be damaged, frazzled?”

  “In theory, but the Grounder’s comms should still get through.”

  ***

  It’s this thought that I keep returning to. The comms should still get through.

  We left the officers and went to find Franghorn or someone else with authority. We crossed the compound towards the highrise attached to it, its façade dizzyingly imposing. As the base of military and lawful operations, the first two-dozen floors are given over to Operations, with the next few floors housing every service you could possibly want, from gymnasiums and swimming pools, to bars, cinemas and clothing boutiques. Everything above that is housing. I stayed there once on a previous visit and vowed never again – I’d never felt so exposed. So in danger. An outsider. A civilian. I could barely breathe lest I sneezed.

  Like anywhere else in Neon, my authority barely registered. Everything was a courtesy; an open handshake and a hand to the chest, cards hidden.

  We entered through the imposition of blast-proof concrete and bulletproof glass doors, into polished white floors and walls; lobby sterile with back-to-back waiting chairs and a long reception desk topped with floating holographic displays. Stern faces with straight mouths answered the public’s que
stions while flicking through readouts. Perhaps a missing person’s report. Or someone reporting a theft. The lobby thronged with visitors and even more in uniform; the bells of elevator doors ringing endorsements of Man’s last grasp on a normal life.

  It struck me once more how normal was redefined in this place.

  This was home.

  Neon was right at home on this planet.

  Back at New Seren, and indeed in the other cities, we may mock Neon’s self-imposed ostracision, and their close-guarded society, yet when it comes down to it they have done more in nine Earth-years to make it feel like Earth than anyone. While most of us have terraformed outwards, they have first looked inwards.

  We went up to the desk wearing our New Seren tunics and an officer there eyed them, then us, with a slight nod of the head. After some back and forth, he told us to wait and someone would be along. Ten minutes later and a secretary in a military jacket took us silently through a maze of corridors, her bootheels clacking a rhythmic beat, until we came to an elevator marked ‘Military Personnel Only’. And up we went.

  On the sixth floor we disembarked into a large, open area with cubicles, lined by glass-walled offices with an opacity function. Many of the glass walls were foggy; their inhabitants shadows. Other inhabitants sat at desks, okay with exposure. A hundred cubicle voices escaped into the atmosphere like bullet chambers, landing incoherently. We weaved between them, all eyes on our ‘foreign’ attire. Their mouths continued to jabber.

  She knocked on the door to an office at the end of the room and then opened it. Beyond, a window overlooked the compound and with his back to us, Franghorn stood, looking out. A vent whirred gently in the corner of the room, sucking out air and scent. It felt cold, suddenly. Nothing but his dull reflection in the grey, metal-composite desk. Not for the first time I wondered about the forges at work, somewhere in this city, to churn out so many assets. And the resources needed.

  “Edmonds,” he said, turning around.

  “Franghorn.”

  He nodded towards Baines. “Sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”

  “It’s Baines, sir. Second Lieutenant.”

  “Ah,” he smiled. “Well, welcome, once more. How are you settling in? I hear you wanted to speak to me? Please, sit down.”

  We ignored his offer and cut out the pleasantries. I didn’t really want to be in the same room as him. “We’re both leaving. Tonight. But we need to get word to New Seren that we’re coming to get reassurances of a rescue attempt in the event of a failure.”

  Franghorn looked around; perhaps searching for a drink. Evidently this wasn’t his office. Or anyone’s office. He cleared his throat. “Okay. I hear that the communications systems are currently down, but as soon as they’re fixed we’ll let you know.”

  “What’s wrong with them?” asked Baines. “Perhaps I can help.”

  “They’ve got it all under control.”

  “How long will it be?”

  “The latest report estimated between five and twenty-four hours. Not most reassuring, I know.” He paused but breathed in to speak again. Instead he walked around the table, now standing barely a metre away. “If you are so intent on leaving, perhaps you should leave now? Try to contact New Seren when you’re out there? The closer you are, the more likely you can reach them? Forgive me, I don’t understand these things too well.”

  He understood plenty.

  “The Grounder’s comms should work fine. Is the dome blocking them somehow?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “Must be the solar activity.” He turned back for the window. “Once you leave though, that’s it. No coming back. We’re locking the city. The catastrophic event is imminent; activity has increased nine-hundred-percent and temperatures have risen. Even if you leave tonight you might not return safely, I’m sorry to say.” He placed a palm on the window and looked up. No idea at what. Or why. He couldn’t see the sky from there.

  “It’s beautiful here,” he said. “You would come to love Neon. You would embrace it, just as it has embraced the planet.”

  “Yeah, well,” said Baines. “We have loved ones. People we need to return to. Who need us.”

  “Then why all the procrastination?

  Home

  Jax, as he had done every time he visited, placed a hand on the near-zero-degree Celsius surface of The Oasis. He wasn’t without respect; this gesture simultaneously revisited the awe he felt when he first came across it, vast and imposing in the sweeping rays of sun cutting through the cavern ceiling and bouncing off surfaces, globes of light on rocky surfaces where darkness should have reigned: and paid respect to the dead.

  “I’ve never seen it at night,” said Lani.

  Scarlett heaved on an airlock door, controlling its descent to the ground as it made a ramp. “I’d be scared if we hadn’t come here a hundred times already. After you,” she waived Jax inside.

  He looked around first; probably his final chance to do so before it was turned to dust. The Oasis sat in a crater of its own creation, having landed up on the cliff and fallen through. It didn’t quite sit straight and navigating the rooms inside took some getting used to. He’d lost eggs to the roll of the table before now. Some of the cliff had fallen in on top of it; its snub-nosed cockpit smothered in rocks and dust and debris that no gusts of wind had yet shaken. It had also fallen in sideways somehow, so even from a flyover it would have been missed.

  The Oasis. Over a hundred years old and thought destroyed. The hull had lost its lustre, if it had any to begin with, and on what would have been its belly if it wasn’t standing on end instead of spearing through space, were painted palm trees, and a beach, and a lapping ocean. Sometimes Jax lay with his ear to the ground and stared at the palm fronds unmoving, and watched them move; saw the waters break and white foam creep upon the yellow sand. Imagined conquering the waves on a dull-grey, snub-nosed surfboard.

  Home no more, he thought.

  “God, never mind,” Scarlett huffed as she stepped inside, the light sensor picking her up. Lani followed, and Jax followed her.

  Inside the lower level it was nothing more than a cargo hold housing everything from spare clothing and electronics to ration packs. Reinforced boxes were stacked against the walls where once they had been attached, but long taken down and inventoried. A pad with a neatly written list hung from the far wall: Jax’s work. What a waste of time. He scanned the items and grieved for the ones he’d have to leave behind. The synthetic concrete that would have formed a wall. The corrugated sheets of steel that would have made great tiling for a roof. Emergency solar panels that would have provided him with electricity – and the cables that would have knit his home together.

  The girls forged on up, climbing a series of ladders that Jax had connected to reach the nose; since the ‘floors’ had become walls, he’d rearranged the contents in every section so tables and chairs and apparatus sat correctly. A series of climbing ropes connected to links he’d embedded in the bedrock kept The Oasis from toppling over. He’d considered devising a system to push it over, but he liked the mural on the underside too much for that.

  On the next ‘level’ he’d laid out the first room to act as a relaxation room. Here, he could cook on a solar stove and lounge while reading. The girls, when they visited too, played games and read and knew to leave him alone by default, letting him engage them when he wanted, and not the other way around. He’d destroyed sections of wall to create doorways to adjacent rooms; areas that could later become bedrooms with en suite bathrooms. All that planning, now defunct.

  “Get whatever you came for and wait for me here,” he said.

  “Where you going?” they said in unison. “Your private area?” They giggled. They had no idea.

  Jax climbed to the next level, and the level after that, feeling a tightness develop in his arms as he held his weight on the rungs. When he reached the top, the tightness quickly dissipated. The bridge sat above, a further climb, but it was the locked room across the way that intereste
d him. He hauled the makeshift stairway over to the lopsided door and ascended. A neon light on a sensor activated and it shone from where he’d positioned it above him. He unlocked the door and it withdrew into the wall.

  The lab beyond lit up, starched white; glass cupboards and clean, white tabletops across the far end with an array of affixed equipment held down, should the ship ever topple despite his efforts. Thanks to his rewiring and makeshift solar generator, the lab had a constant supply of electricity to keep his experiments running. Lights blinked green and red on monitors and digital readouts kept temperatures steady – there was something quaint about digital that he liked, being able to touch the changing numbers, unlike holo-readouts. He stepped down to the other side and crossed towards a glass chamber draped with a sheet. It rested on the counter, as innocuous as the rest of the machines and vials and sample-filled petri-dishes. He lifted the sheet. The artificial amniotic fluid within turned blue in the light, giving the skin of the unborn inside a purple hue.

  Journal of Lance Corporal Edmonds

  4th March (ext), 2234…

  Okay. Where do I even begin? It’s been two days since my last entry and so much has happened. I even spent yesterday in bed, unable to sleep, unable to wake; unable to eat, drink or write. I don’t feel like writing this but I need to, before I forget. Before anything happens to me. I don’t know if I’m safe – I’ve been lead to think I am but I wouldn’t trust Franghorn to piss on his children if they were on fire.

  All my fears for this place came true. Neon are even more self-serving than anyone even imagined – and I feel so powerless. Franghorn should die for what he did. His second-in-charge – the lieutenants that do his bidding. What they’ve done… it’s hard to comprehend. This place is evil. They all need to die. Dear diary, you may be my only sanctuary – the only place I can reveal my true thoughts if I want to continue living. And dear Jerry… I hope someday to see your face again. It’s the last vestige of hope I have – clinging to superstition – but it’s all I have in the world.