When he got out of the house, Aurus felt that things felt different today compared to other days. The sky seemed less blue, buildings less magnificent and the cars less refined.
As he walked through the streets he noted every little inconsistency he never saw before. A tile of the sidewalk just a block away had a corner broken off. The car five houses to the left across the street had a dent in its side. A block away a vintage parking sign had been bent slightly, most likely due to a crash years ago.
He didn’t think, he didn’t cry, he didn’t get angry. Aurus just looked on as he kept moving without purpose.
He lived in a relatively wealthy neighborhood. The buildings here were generally three stories tall and quite big. They weren’t mansions since his parents wanted him to go to a regular school in a regular city, but they were nice nonetheless.
After walking for a period of time, Aurus felt the scenery change. In just a few blocks, the large modern houses and clean streets had changed into tons of tiny apartments where people lived like sardines. The cars changed from the new, flying models to those used over forty years ago. The streets were filthy and everything around looked like it needed a paint job.
The biggest change in the last sixty years wasn’t the fact that flying cars were invented, nor was it the existence of multiple mars settlements. It wasn’t the third or fourth world war. The biggest difference was the one between rich and poor. The thing sociologist said was going to happen sixty years ago happened. There was no middle class anymore. There were the poor, the rich, and the super-rich. The latter two only encompassing five percent of the total population.
Even though Aurus lived in what was still a town by today’s standards, the difference here was no smaller than anywhere else. Currently, the town had sixty-thousand people. In order to be formally seen as a city, they would have to nearly double the population.
This town was somewhat isolated from the rest of the world, there was no hyperloop station nor a spaceport. There were only roads that connected this place with others and even then, you would be quite far away.
When Aurus finally stopped walking he looked around to see where he was. He had subconsciously moved here, the only place that would willingly take him. An orphanage in the slums for unwanted children.
His uncle was right, he could only go to the orphanage, at least if he wanted to have food in his belly and a roof above his head. Even if the food was sparse and the roof leaking.
It was a large building that was once a christian church. A remnant of a religion that was all but gone now.
“Well, here goes nothing.”
Saying these words, Aurus took a step forward, but then, he stopped. Cold sweat dripped down his forehead as he had an ominous feeling, something he had never had before. He had this feeling that if he were to enter this orphanage terrible events would unfold.
Confusion and fear spread within Aurus’ mind as he tried to contain and place this feeling, but he couldn’t. It was as if it came from the deepest parts of himself, an instinct warning him.
He immediately took a step back, there was no way he could go to that place. Even when thinking logically, how would he be able to sleep in a place that caused him to feel extremely fearful just looking at the outside of it?
He took a few more steps back before rushing into an alleyway, out of sight of the orphanage, just in case someone looked out of the window.
And someone had. A girl barely thirteen saw him through a window she was cleaning. She had blonde hair and blue eyes, she would’ve been seen as pretty if it weren’t for the burn wound maiming half of her face. When she saw the strange boy in fancy clothes turn and run, she put a hand on the window, hoping he, or anyone else that was somewhat well off, would rescue her out of this terrible place she was forced to call home.
-----------
After catching his breath after running away from the orphanage, Aurus looked around again. It was an alleyway like any other. It was getting dark so people weren’t out. He could hear some shouts from the north, most likely people having a fight. An old streetlamp was flickering as its circuits had broken, but, overall, it was calm. This was a little alleyway in between apartments. On both sides were nothing but some mostly unused garages and emergency exits that were blocked off by all kinds of trash.
After looking around for a bit, Aurus found a dusty entrance to a cellar of one of the apartments. Even though it seemed like nobody had been here for ages, Aurus didn’t break in, he did go down the outside stairs though. When he was close to the door that would enter the building, there was a roof above him, assuring he would be safe from the rain if he slept on the stairs.
When he sat down, Aurus didn’t know what to feel. So much was going on, and he could feel his mind constantly switching, as if it was having a fight with itself, being unsure what to think of certain things.
Right now, he didn’t want to think about things, he would sleep and leave his problems to future Aurus, that guy always found a solution to his problems.
Aurus checked his watch and saw it was ten to eight. It seemed that he had been roaming about for well over two hours now, and now that he finally sat down, he could feel it in his legs.
He then reached into his bag and grabbed his phone. Due to the limited space, he could only take his phone and one portable charging station. He didn’t have his tablet or laptop. As for a neuralink, he had been set to receive one in a couple of months, something that seemed unlikely now.
When Aurus unlocked his phone, a number of large red notifications popped up.
----------------------
RED ALERT: THE CONTINENT OF PANGEA IS RELEASING IN ONE HOUR
RED ALERT: THE CONTINENT OF PANGEA IS RELEASING IN THIRTY MINUTES
RED ALERT: THE CONTINENT OF PANGEA IS RELEASING IN FIFTEEN MINUTES
RED ALERT: THE CONTINENT OF PANGEA IS RELEASING IN TEN MINUTES
-------------------
When all the alarms he had set previously appeared on his screen, Aurus let out a slight smile, “To think this game is what I thought would bring me and dad closer together again, that we could play this together.”
As he thought of this he felt sad. He thought he was close with his dad, and he was until a few years ago. It was then that his parents started hiding things from him, they wouldn’t tell him their position in their company or what the game could all do.
He thought they were just stressed, but for them to leave everything to his uncle? Did they hate him so much?
Whatever it was, he couldn’t do much about it. He grabbed the headset resting in his backpack and checked it out more closely. It had one battery pack inside already and he had grabbed another one while leaving. The problem was, he didn’t know how long a pack laster. Did a pack last for a day? Two days? Two hours?
These were all things he had no idea of. But he did know the game could replace sleep. He also heard the servers would only be up every day from eight o’clock in the evening to eight o’clock in the morning, the rest of the day was apparently needed for maintenance.
Despite the fact that he had been looking forward to playing the game for years, Aurus felt somewhat listless now that he was here. With things going so wrong, how much comfort could a game really bring?
He was about to find out.
