Corporation Earth
A Novel by Shawn Carron
Chapter 1: Illusions
Alexander stood outside the door of his apartment and slid a key deep into a sturdy lock while he pressed his free hand against the cold metal door frame. The bright florescent lights of the hallway flickered constantly, almost subliminally, and the security cameras turned their single faceless eyes from side to side, scanning the entire length of the corridor with a low hum.
Alexander paused before twisting the key and cocked his head to one side, eyeing the camera adjacent to his apartment suspiciously. His expression would have been unreadable by the face on the other side of the electric eye, if indeed there was anyone watching at all. There was no escaping the corporate eye, he thought. It was inside, it was outside, it was anywhere there were people, in a sense, everywhere. Ever since the residential privacy laws had been overturned the personal lives of the average citizen were all but gone and all actions outside the home were monitored. No one was truly free anymore. Who you were, the words you spoke, the people you associated with were all closely watched and evaluated. If you stepped out of line or were thought to be dangerous to the community rule you were hauled in and remedied. He rolled that word around in his mind for a moment.
Remedied.
It was just another word for being disposed of he mused; it just had that corporate glean to it that made it sound far better than what it really stood for. There were horrible rumours of what was being done behind the closed doors of the rehabilitation centers, acts of violence, sexual abuse and numbers of psychiatric experiments. It was said that people were changed forever after leaving the centers, if indeed they ever left at all. When you lived on the upper levels it was something that became a part of life, you lived under the scrutiny of the corporate eye and if you didn’t think that they were watching everything you did and recorded everything that you said, you were not only kidding yourself but setting yourself up for a fall, and so you acted like you were always being watched. It was the one thing that he hated about being up here, on the top levels far from the basement of the city, the constant scrutiny and the ever-present threat of being found out for who he really was.
Realizing that he was just standing and staring blankly at the camera, Alex tore his gaze away from the camera and looked back to the task at hand. Lingering in the hallway was not a good idea, especially just standing there like a dumbass staring at the security cam.
“Head down, eyes front, mouth shut,” he whispered quietly to himself, then twisted the key in the lock and pushed the heavy steel door open and slipped inside.
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The sudden darkness of the apartment surrounded Alexander as he closed the door behind him, shutting off the cold light of the hallway. Rather than allowing his eyes time to adjust to the darkness Alex voice activated the lights. The blackness of the room began to fade away and details of the hallway began to take shape, like the dead emerging from a thick fog.
He lived in a neat, almost clinical apartment on the 101st floor near the downtown core. Large windows graced the entire wall of the living room, allowing Alexander to see the neon of the city for miles on a clear night. Various works of art hung upon the walls, most collected in secret through the underground markets that dotted the cities shadier districts. It was a far cry from the old public housing that he used to live in and allowed Alexander privacy that many could never dream of. The tradeoff had cost him in many ways though.
In the distance the dark of the central living area was interrupted by the steady pulse of the answering machine as it blinked life into the shadowy confines of the room. Without hanging up his coat or taking off his shoes, Alexander walked to the machine, reached down and pressed a button.
“Alex”
Alexander froze.
“I’m on a secure line but I don’t have a lot of time to talk,” the soft feminine voice breathed almost desperately into the phone.
“I need your help. Do you remember when we first met? The bar where we were? I’ll be there.”
A soft whisper of panic drifted through the speaker, hysteria just scratching the surface looking to free itself from the confines of rational thought. There was a brief pause that seemed to stretch into eternity as Alexander stood staring into the dark room.
“I’ll stay for as long as I can, please hurry.”
He closed his eyes tightly as her voice broke the silence.
Alexander waited for more but there was nothing except the sharp click of the receiver being dropped into its cradle and then she was gone.
Alexander stood staring at the machine for several moments before reaching out into the darkness. His unsteady hand grasped the air before him until he found the soft leather of a high-backed chair. He moved mechanically around to the front of the chair, melted into it, then sat staring out into the blackness of the room.
”Madison.” He breathed into the night.