Gyaros Book One: The Mice Eat Iron (YA 17+ Sci Fi Adventure) (2 page)

Sud
denly the morning sunlight filled the carriage, Miles stood and steadied himself with one of the many handles that hung from the carriage ceiling, and stared in wonder at the beauty below. Lush greenery and foliage spread across a massive ten square kilometres of the city’s ground level, a monument to Carthage’s commitment to protect its natural environments. Flocks of exotic birds flew majestically over the expansive lakes and parklands. A massive green scar down the middle of the otherwise pale white monoliths that made up the skyline of Elissa. The trees and natural splendour of the gardens reflected and painted themselves onto the surrounding buildings, creating a ring of shimmering emerald towers.

Usually Miles would look down for the full
8 minutes that the gardens are visible, but today, having just read the article on Gyaros, he took a moment to look up. Miles raised his gaze to the large red moon in the sky, Gyaros the land of exile, where the worst criminals, deviants, miscreants, and those deemed unfit to populate the verdant and prosperous home world of Carthage were sent to rot. Those banished to Gyaros had no hope of ever returning to Carthage’s capital, nor any other part of Carthage for that matter as the means to do so simply did not exist. Due to technical limitations and the rationing of unrenewable fuel sources, a trip to Gyaros was a one way ticket. And thanks to no new technology or resources having reached the surface of Gyaros in over sixty years, those on Gyaros lacked the means to build or fuel any kind of craft capable of returning to Carthage. Miles stared at the red moon with a sense of foreboding, there it sat up in the sky menacingly, a constant reminder to the citizens of Elissa what awaits any who should go against the will of the Areopagus, Carthage’s single unifying government and judicial body.

And then
Gyaros was gone in an instant as the monorail entered another tunnel. Miles collected himself and prepared to disembark at the next stop. Picking up his brief case, he made his way to the sliding doors, pre-empting the morning rush that ensued every day when the doors opened. Ding-dong, “now arriving at The Hesperides’ Garden,” said the same soft female voice.
The automated doors slid open and Miles was hit with the awesome sound of over one thousand busy commuters making their way through Hesperides’ Plaza on their way to their specific departments.

Miles worked in The Energy D
epartment on floor 103, and at the age of twenty nine had so far given five years of loyal service to The Elissa Energy Department since leaving college at twenty four. It was a good job, secure with benefits and a salary that rose with each yearly cycle. Miles’ wife Hellen worked for the research division of The Biochemistry Department, and between them they were able to afford to care for themselves and their 4 year old son Chet. The Stantons, your regular modern Elissan family. Except that not all was well at home. For the past year Miles and Hellen’s relationship had been strained, awkward and moody. Miles could never put his finger on it, but there was something very off. Perhaps it was simply a normal part of marriage and raising a child, perhaps it would pass given time. Until such time as peace returned to their marriage Miles viewed his job as somewhat of a sanctuary, a place of certainty, regularity and predictability. A place where he could forget about the family for a while and simply enjoy some Miles time.

Miles made his way across Hes
perides’ Plaza to the central column, passing by the cafés where those with later shifts enjoyed a morning coffee, the smell of which filled Miles’ nostrils. He took a deep breath of the rich brew and thought ahead to his lunch hour when he would enjoy a coffee himself. At the central column of the bright white super structure stood a row of identical elevators numbered one, through fifteen. Miles crammed himself into one of the lifts with around thirty of his colleagues. A robotic melody played before the doors shut tight and the large glass elevator began its high speed ascent. Miles once again enjoyed a fleeting glimpse of the beautiful Hesperides’ Garden before the elevator reached floor 103 where he and his work mates hurriedly disembarked.

Step
ping across the threshold into The Department of Energy, Miles turned right and began the familiar walk to his cubicle as he did every day of the week, excluding weekends of course, which he spent at home with Hellen and Chet. A genuine and soft smile drew across Miles’ face as he made his way to his desk, his dark eyes shone and the entirety of his thin, and usually serious face, glowed with relief as he looked forward to another simple day doing what he knew best, away from the turmoil of home life. It’s a sad state of affairs when a man must find happiness in the avoidance of pain, rather than the enjoyment of pleasure, but this would not dissuade Miles from eagerly lapping up every peaceful second of his working day. When one becomes accustomed to pain, the absence of it feels as much like pleasure as any sensory delight one could imagine.

Miles breathed deeply in through his nose and sucked up the
familiar smell of his office. The scent of plastic and warm computers, carpet cleaning products, and the perfumes and deodorants of a hundred different people. The décor of The Energy Department was much like the décor of the other administrative departments of Elissa, which was much the same as Elissa itself. That is to say sleek and white with a smattering of vegetation to break up the uniformity of the stark white design. Miles smiled again as he overheard his co-workers in conversation, picking up snippets of news, sporting events, or what happened on last night’s episode of Wasteland Dan, still the most popular visor vision series on The Carthage Vision Network.

Miles was not the social type,
preferring to keep to himself. He did however enjoy listening in to the chit chat of others, silently joining in the conversation with his own ideas and opinions, of which he kept to himself. Miles was not entirely without friends though, thanks to Clark Tenor who worked in the booth directly opposite his. Clark was chubby and jovial, happy to reinforce the stereotypic association between portliness and the carrying of an air of cheerfulness. Clark was a genuinely spritely guy, polite and decent with a beaming round face that disarmed those in even the foulest of moods. Clark warmed to Miles early on as they began working the same year and had been close ever since, often enjoying time together outside of work hours.

Finally
Miles reached his cubicle, slid his briefcase under his desk and, upon taking a seat, placed his hands, palms down onto the clean white surface in front of him.

“Verifying, please wait
,” spoke a robotic male voice. “Verification complete. Welcome Back Miles Stanton. Please have a productive day.”

And with that a screen, no more than a centimetre thick rose directly out of the top of the desk
between Miles’ two hands. The screen flipped up to reveal a keyboard and navigation pad below. The keyboard then tilted down toward Miles and he began typing away. As he did every morning, Miles navigated straight to his emails and as usual there were around thirty unread messages. His eyes scanned the subject lines in order to determine which of the emails required his attention most urgently.

14/06/61 07:32 - “Mr Stanton, The Accounting Department requires the latest power consumption reports for Elissa’s South West Green Districts.”

14/06/61 07:58 -
“Mr Stanton, The Legal Department requires your report on the latest power surge in Elissa’s Eastern Yellow Districts which resulted in the expiration of the Stevenage family.”

14/06/61 08:13 -
“Miles, don’t forget about the half year office party this Friday, bring your wife and remember it’s fancy dress.”

14/06/61 08
:26 -
“Miles honey, we need to talk. Hellen”

Miles froze, he read it again
.

“Miles honey, we need to talk. Hell
en”

He hovered his cursor over the link
to open the message but could not bring himself to click it. First of all Hellen had not called Miles ‘honey’ in over a year, so his suspicions were immediately raised. ‘What on Carthage could she want?’ Miles thought to himself. Secondly there was no way the content of the email was good, no one has ever said ‘we need to talk’ when they had some good news to share! Thirdly Hellen had not emailed Miles at work since their first two years of marriage, which happened to be over 2 years ago. There was once a time when Hellen would send virtual hugs and kisses, messages of support and even the odd ‘Not Safe For Work’ email describing in graphic detail exactly what she was going to do to him when he got home. But that was a long, long time ago. And finally Hellen was not one to hold back, usually if she had something to say she would scream it across the kitchen for the neighbours to hear. An email was highly uncharacteristic of her. ‘This is big, this must be some very serious shit,’ Miles repeated to himself shaking slightly now, beads of sweat forming on his brow. ‘Is she leaving me? Or could this be about Chet, oh shit has something happened to Chet?!’

As soon as he realised that Chet might be hurt Miles quickly snapped out of his stupor, took a deep breath and brought his fi
nger down to open the message. But before he could do so, a familiar face poked out from the cubicle wall in front of him.

“Hey Miles!” beamed
Clark, his big round face grinning infectiously over the partition between their respective work stations, “how you doing? You don’t look well, are you sick? Those damn mosquitos have been giving everyone Aegean Malaria, you didn’t catch it too did you? It’s no biggie, you just take a shot and it goes, but the symptoms tend to last a week or so. That’s one nasty week you’ve got ahead of you if it’s Aegean Malaria!”

Miles, still frozen could barely muster a response
.

“Ugh, ha, n-no, I’m fine, I shouldn’t have skipped breakfast, that’s all
,” he managed to stammer weakly. Clark frowned, doubting the honesty of what he’d just heard, but his face quickly returned to a wide smile.

“Ha!
Slept in this morning did we? You should get to bed early on a Sunday night, I didn’t pick you for the partying type.”

Miles attempted a shaky smile and spoke
, “no it’s not that, I just had a lot of reports to get through before today, did you hear about what happened to that Stevenage family who died during the power surge?”

Clark’s smile quickly fell from his face
, “yes that was horrible, all three of them burnt to a crisp. Investigators found them huddled in a corner. I heard they had to cremate them all together ‘cause their remains couldn’t be separated,” Clark swallowed dryly, as though trying to get rid of an unpleasant taste.

“Yeah, going through the grisly details of that case was not m
y idea of a nice Sunday evening,” Miles said still attempting to remain calm, all the while his thoughts racing about the contents of the mysterious email.

“So look I’ve got a lot to catch up on this morning Clark, why don’t we continue this conversation over lunch
,” Miles smiled convincingly in an attempt to shake Clark off and get back to reading the message.

“Actually Miles, there’s something I need to talk to you about
.” Clark’s face was uncharacteristically stern, and he spoke with a tone in his voice completely unfamiliar to Miles, one of absolute seriousness. First Hellen now Clark, what was going on?

“Look Clark I really am busy could you…”
before he could finish his sentence Clark cut him off.

“This can’t wait buddy, I’ve really gotta tell you something, it’s important t
hat you hear it from me first.”

Miles’ heart sunk, ‘
oh crap, this can’t be good,’ he thought. ‘Is it my job? I can’t lose my job! No way could they fire me, I don’t have a single mark against my name, I’ve always been an exemplary member of the staff here!’ Clark had by this time made his way around the partition and was crouching down beside Miles in his cubicle.

“Listen Miles
,” said Clark in a low voice, “you have to promise me that you won’t do anything crazy when I tell you what I’m about to tell you. No matter how you feel, you’ve gotta take a breath, breathe it in deep, and don’t do anything rash.”

“Ok I promise, now please tell me
what is going on,” Miles took a deep breath and tried to remain calm. Remaining calm was what he did all his life, if remaining calm were a talent he could win The Entertainment Department’s Visor Vision Talent Extravaganza of Elissa! He’d remained passive and calm for over a year of marital turmoil, he’d accepted every request to work over time without protestation, and being the shy type he’d suffered the jeers and jokes of co-workers for five long years. Suffice it to say that Miles could make this promise with a degree of certainly that few others could.

Clark continued
, “now I’m serious Miles, you really don’t want to do anything crazy, you’ve got a good life going here, you’ve got a young son, a stable job and you’ve got…” but before Clark could finish, Miles, losing his patience, and already stressed from life at home, violently grasped him by the collar, and bringing his face within an inch of Clark’s, Miles began to whisper ferociously.

“Just tell me what the fuck is going on
Clark,” he growled through clenched teeth, Clark blinked as specs of saliva reinforced the message.

“Ok
ay, okay, fine,” Clark said quietly now shaking, “it’s Tyler.”