Data Element Framework
DEF.001.002
Terra 7 – 458.794.210 OS
Project Study Case 0… Initiate Scenario
Recognised.
Slate Identifier… Scenario.001.001
Function signifier… Ethics
Construct Scenario Actor…
Witness.001.001
Recognised.
Identity… Lewis Bradson
Identity Date… Old Earth. 2039. CE
Reconstruct Sensory Element…
Sensory.001.001
Recognised.
Element… Lands of Hellen
Element Date… Old Earth. 2031. CE
Begin Scenario.001.001…
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Recognised.
Slate Value… Educator.001.001
Project Study Case 0
Scenario 001.001
What time was it?
As always Lewis found himself barely able to get out of bed. The fragmented beams of light coming through the side window of his apartment had forced him awake. The shutter curtains had refracted the light in such a way that Lewis’s bed, and him with it, were framed in what looked like a prison cell. Lewis chuckled at the thought.
How apt, he pondered to himself. The two-hundred and fifty square foot apartment he had been assigned by his regional employer was everything one expected of a prison cell. An adequate bed that only partially forced the back of its occupant to contort into a twisted mess. A kitchenette, that also doubled as a dining room, that also doubled as a living room, that also doubled as a guest room… If Lewis ever did have guests. But, it was complimentary with the job. How could he complain about such conditions when it was given to him for free and even more especially considering the conditions of many others who lived in the People’s Housing Blocks.
Lewis slowly untangled himself from the sweat stained covers as he broke out of his prison cell of light to move into the prison cell of darkness that was the rest of the apartment. Sleeping was a problem for Lewis. Ever since moving to Hellen, or Greece as he remembered it before the Reorder, there was always more to consider, more to be exhausted from. Though truly, sleep had always been a problem for Lewis, but it was slowly getting worse. He took a moment to reacquaint himself with the fact of his own existence for the day. He could feel every single atom of his body protest against his movements. He ignored the silent screams of his joints as he lifted his hands above his head and then reached downwards to touch his toes. Lewis did so slowly, it was a struggle, and it was getting harder every time. “Only with struggle do I know I live still,” he muttered to himself through gritted teeth as the tips of his fingers broke past the invisible barrier of his own pain and touched the tips of his toes. He wasn’t sure where he’d heard the phrase before, it might have been one of his aunts from the Fractured States, or probably an advertisement for one of the millions of new ‘experiment specialist’ jobs.
It was sad to think that so many people felt that this was how they defined their own existences, it only struck Lewis how even sadder it was that he himself had come to accept it just as much as everyone else did.
As his body recoiled from the exertion of Lewis’s morning mantra and returned to its desired state Lewis’s mind turned to the chronotracker that was embedded in the wall just to the left of his bed pillow. Chronotracker, he scoffed at the thought. It's a clock. The new generations were renaming things left and right and he was getting swept up in it. 06:46, he read, as the crimson light of the chrono… clock… shot the information into his retinas. Lewis was realising just how adjusted he had become to the dark and extremely sensitive to any source of light. It didn’t help that it was so bright outside. He would need to be at the university at around 8:45, his first lecture was at 09:00 and he was supposed to be meeting with Dr. Vasiliadis at noon which he was completely unprepared for.
He could already feel what little energy he had accumulated from his four hour sleep fading away, and that only made him despair further causing his ever so common feedback loop of psychological and physical drain. In a sudden and unexpected rush he went to his bedside table and began opening one drawer after the other frantically. At the third drawer he found the small, rectangular black and orange box that he had acquired the week before from the half functioning vending station a few roads down from his block. He could feel that sensation of dread coming at him rapidly, almost as if Lewis was being chased down by a psychopath. A predator closing in on its vulnerable prey.
Lewis snatched the box, maniacally fumbled at the even smaller latch that held the box closed and then found the black-orange pill inside. Lewis closed his eyes for a second. The ethical implications, the arguments he had had with family, friends and his various doctors became a distant memory. He took the pill, tossed it into his mouth and bit down, releasing the various chemical reactions and substances contained within. The assailant was no longer chasing him, he could feel his heartbeat slow down, only now realising just how intense it had gotten. The worries of his daily obligations recontextualizing into simple chores. The immense heat that Lewis had felt throughout the night and its steady increase with his own anxiety slowly stabilized. He actually felt a chill, a normal reaction after taking crypt-spice though to any other it would be cause for concern, especially when noting the temperature of the room marked at 33 degrees celsius. Lewis did note the temperature, made a mental note to check just how much 33 degrees celsius was in Fahrenheit and moved into his closet-sized bathroom.
He had gotten used to taking the crypt-spice before going into the bathroom, it helped him to organize his routine better. Walking in, narrowly avoiding the shelf holding his general toiletries and then swerving around the toilet he would rest his hands on the sink and look into the mirror. There was something about his own reflection that always put him off.
It had been a problem at home, he would ask his mother to cover the mirror before he walked into the bathroom. He could remember a time when he didn’t have the issue, but he wasn’t sure exactly when it started to be a problem. Lewis could remember his uncle, Uncle Kevin, who would say something about ‘White Supremacists’ or the local news, which uncle Kevin would claim were not so different from one another. Lewis’s father would try to stop Kevin but when Uncle Kev got talking he didn’t stop.
He had told the young Lewis that maybe it was Lewis himself projecting the same ‘racist bullshit’ that everyone else threw at their whole family and their brothers and sisters. Lewis rather liked Uncle Kevin, despite the somewhat heated talking points. He was a kind soul, always telling Lewis to be proud of who he was, but looking back Lewis thought it might have been something else. Uncle Kev was probably right, at least it might have been a part of it. Being a POC in the Fractured, then still United, States of America, was an experience he could not easily forget.
The Blight Menace might have been awful, almost world-ending, but at least that was an experience all of humanity had gone through, and they had done so together… well mostly. The struggle Lewis had gone through was a different story. One that even though the Speakers had proclaimed it as ‘resolved’… what a joke that was… it would remain a scar to all those who were traumatized by it, and a stain to the few who chose to remember it. It wasn’t something we would forget. The struggle people of colour had been forced through was an experience that the rest of humanity would never be able to truly understand.
Lewis looked into the mirror now, but there wasn’t the same anxiety. He knew that it was only because of the crypt-spice that he could do it though. At least I can do it, he mused, forcibly praising himself. He began shaving the stubble across his chin and hair on his head, even though the university was sufficiently air conditioned as was the Hydro-Rail, just walking from his block to the station was too hot to even consider leaving any body hair. At least that was Lewis’s thought process, he never found any value in the layer of insulation his biology provided him, after the Global Blaze it was only a detriment. He made an effort to use as little product and water as he could, it was a minor act but any part he could play to reduce his own impact on the ever worsening state of the global biosphere was worth more than not doing anything. Walking out of the cupboard-bathroom, as he liked to call it, he looked at the clock again. 7:23. Enough time to pick up one of the prepacked ration packs on the way to the station and also make a quick stop at the vending station, this morning’s dose had been the last pill of the box.
He would always take one in the morning to get the day started, using that euphoric boost to give him the energy he wasn’t getting from sleep. Then one in the evening, just before bed, mixed with warm water. The liquid altered the crypt-spice’s effect drastically making it a sleep inducer. He had been told that buying the off-brand dust un-capsuled and inhaling it through the nostrils was a better alternative for the morning boost and then burning and smelling the vapour from the dust was a far superior sleep inducer for the evenings. One of his students had told him that. Quite the knowledgeable woman, especially for her age and was perhaps one of his brightest students but she was also quite the rebellious sort, so Lewis would listen to her ideas but with an appropriate amount of skepticism and concern.
Lewis had dressed himself absent-mindedly and almost hadn’t noticed that he was already inside the dimly-lit elevator of his apartment floor. It was a common side-effect of the crypt-spice, letting your mind be able to wonder while also allowing it to conduct its every-day functions. It was perhaps why it was so popular with the academia, Lewis pondered. Both educator and student needed to have their minds wondering and re-evaluating their own fields of study, and this was all the more relevant, Lewis believed, when it came to his field. Ethical Technologies. To constantly question the development and use of a technology on the merits of its ethical affect and moral weight in the society of today and tomorrow.
Three of the five photon filaments were flickering in the lift. It distracted Lewis from his thoughts enough to pull him back into reality. The elevator was old, it had had updates over the years but it had not been changed for over a decade. The smell would have caused Lewis to revisit his last meal if he hadn’t grown so accustomed to it. There were stains of what must have been urine along the edges and the fitted thin fabric that hid the metal floor. He was on the sixteenth floor and it would be a while before he got to the ground floor. Lewis then remembered Mx. Dimopoulos. As always Lewis was never welcoming of conversations so early in the morning, and especially if he had no control or prior knowledge of the subject the conversation would be about. Leaving his apartment roughly half an hour earlier than usual might save him from the encounter, Lewis presumed hopefully. His hopes were quickly dashed as the elevator stopped on the 7th floor.
The metal door slid open gradually, as though even the elevator was unwilling to participate in the oncoming social interaction. Christos/Katerina Dimopoulos stood waiting, their back towards the elevator. Lewis considered hitting the “close door” button to hopefully get away but then considered the length it would take the elevator to come back up 7 floors and the fact that they had been waiting for the elevator already….instead Lewis made an audible cough. Mx. Dimopoulos turned and immediately had a wide brimming smile on their face.
“AH, Dr. Bradson! Good morning!” they exclaimed as they stepped into the elevator.
Lewis made room for the individual and then hit the ground floor button once more to get the elevator moving.
“Good morning to you. What will it be today?” Lewis asked.
He always started his part of the conversation in this way in order to confirm how to dutifully respect Mx Dimopoulos' preference of address. Lewis had made a bit of a fool of himself when first coming to the apartment as he had no knowledge of Mx. Dimopoulos coming in. Lewis had flustered himself with the confusion of how to best address Mx. Dimopoulos but thankfully they had found Lewis quite entertaining, enough that no offense had been taken when Lewis was quick to make the common assumptions. Rather though the Block Counsellor had taken a liking to Lewis, recognising no ill-will.
“Christos for today will work fine Dr. Bradson!” he replied. Christos was always loud, he was born in Hellen and the accent showed.
To Lewis, Christos was the most Hellenic Hellenite Lewis had ever met in the five years he had been living in Athenis, Capital of Knowledge and Advancement of the Lands of Hellen. There was always the air of fanfare when it came to the native Hellenites as had been their wholemark after the worst of the Blight Menace and Christos Dimopoulos truly embodied that same energy.
As always Mr. Dimopoulos was quite erratic when it came to discussion. They started from an issue with the block air conditioning, which was of actual concern to Lewis and therefore quickly took hold of his attention. There had been another series of attacks on the Star Bringer plants that had been providing power to the area after the Hellenic Hub had gone down and most of the power had to be directed to essential devices. Lewis was about to ask further about the attacks, the Star Bringer Plants were very close to the University of Ethical Technologies but Christos immediately shifted to a domestic issue with the couple living in Room 1313. Something about a third individual being brought into the couple’s life and that fact causing some unforeseen heartbreaks and new discoveries between the couple. Lewis had allowed his mind to drift away as soon as he could, leaving Christos to continue to entertain themself with other trivial topics.
The attacks on the Star Bringer district were worrying. While it was not broadcasted on the netstreams everyone who was anyone in Athenis knew that the Star Bringer District was the life-line of all of Hellen and by proxy the entire Lands of Hellen block. Knowing this however wouldn’t change much for the common citizen’s day to day. After the Blight Menace the general populaces became reliant on the Tech monopolies that had hidden themselves in the years leading up to the Blight Menace. If The Speakers of Hellen are unable to maintain the Hellenic Hub to the point that they cannot fake their own self-reliance, as they always have done since the Reorder, the Lands of Hellen would simply be run directly by the Star Bringer Sphere and the Crypto-Chain without the need for the Speakers. Though none of the other States had to know the truth of that.
“In the interest of democracy and the freedom of the peoples the Speakers of a given state must uphold said interests or yield governance to a neighbour state and its Speakers until such time that the given state is able to reinstate its obligations.”
The first order of the Reorder, and one that the Lands of Hellen always tread carefully around. It was thanks to the Star Bringer Sphere and other Pseudo-Nations like it that kept the Speakers of Hellen in power. Which was why the attacks on the Star Bringer Plant were so troubling. If common people were trying to send some Leftist dogmatic message then they were only threatening the safety of their fellow people and by doing so risking themselves in the process. If it was an organization though, that would be extremely troubling. Outside organizations could easily be looking to destabilize the region. The Imperium of the Commune has been quiet for the past twenty years. Could it be they were looking to start from the Lands of Hellen rather than the Polanic Border Block as the Polish themselves had assumed they would? Russia and China, most people didn’t even know those names anymore.
Only those that studied the “Age of Before” as the historians called it knew the legacy of the Imperium of the Commune. Lewis had had the privilege of being around for the Reorder. It was well known how dangerous those two nations were separately and the threat they posed to the World Order as it was known in his time. When they had begun a massive network campaign to ban all outside information and then lock down any and all means of travel to and from the countries it had only thrown the then United Nations into panic.
The United Nations, Lewis mused. Everything had changed so much from his childhood. The Global Blaze and the Great Flood had killed so many that members of the world organizations began abandoning each other, the Paris Agreement had failed and so too had the United Nations. So was the call of the governments of the world. Now they lived in a world of fake yet real nations run by market researchers and the ruling one percent, though after all that humanity had gone through they were probably the top 15% percent now. So many people had died in the heat, many more in the floods and then an unknown number when the power went out in hospitals, generators and all, when planes fell from the skies and when civilization as we knew it came crashing down.
Lewis had seen it all, he had been one of the lucky ones. There were many like him, people who kept themselves as informed as they could. People who tried to listen to the experts, the scientists and always looked for answers to questions. He had taken his family and anyone he could convince to the Refuge sites built by Google in Massachusetts in response to the potential technology apocalypse that was coming. That did come. He had lived in relative safety throughout the Blight Menace and when the Reordering came about he was able to continue life in a facsimile to what it had once been, though the borders were different, and the secret rules of society had changed slightly, but not too much. In the Reorder Russia and China had officially instituted a new nation; The Imperium of the Commune.
He looked around, he was out of the apartment block. He could see the cluster of similar apartment blocks as well as skimpily clad people going about the morning. As always it was hot, it was even hotter than the apartment blocks. Lewis didn’t even want to check his comp-wrist to see what the temperature actually was, he had to make his way to the train station and get on the cool and refreshing haven that was the Hellenic Public Transit Trains. He was about to begin moving towards the station and drift back into his pondering but he remembered that he had two other tasks to complete. He pushed himself to focus on the environment around him and began walking to the vending station.
As he walked he noted groups of young teens leaving one of the apartment blocks carrying bags and luggage who were quickly followed by suited enforcers. Could they be associated with the attacks? It was the first thing that came to mind but then the luggage and bags made it unlikely. The enforcers wouldn’t have let them gather their things for something as serious as terrorist attacks. Probably trackless without permits. It was more common. In Athenis it was made mandatory to a degree that everyone connect with the trackernet in order to keep the peace and to keep the Speakers’ quotas as low as possible. People could apply for permits and be allowed to go about as “trackless”. Probably they were tourists who didn’t know about the permits and were being escorted to one of the outer satellites until they were issued the appropriate track-tag. Lewis had it integrated into his comp-wrist, it gave him some level of security to know that he was being cared for, even if he was being reduced to a number. It helped him to stay away from trouble and also kept trouble away from him.
There was no sound of rushing traffic. The only sounds were those of a few sirens, enforcer vehicles moving about the district and the very faint rush of wind that came from the Public Transit train that ran overhead of the Employee Block district. Lewis remembered a time when traffic was such an epidemic. Cars would cluster the roads, causing pollution of all sorts. It was one of the few blessings of the Blight Menace, the majority of cars just stopped working as soon as the flare struck. How many must have crashed or gone off road because of it? In the Reorder it was decided that transport would be a public service managed and maintained by the Speakers of the States and no other transport of citizens would be allowed.
“A benefit of the individual can only be quantified against the carbon impact of said benefit. Should all individuals have access to said benefit and the impact of said benefit is significant enough to register a carbon footprint then said benefit shall not be allowed access in any given state.”
The seventh order of the Reorder, born out of the fear of another Global Blaze. This had been an incredible issue to deal with and to Lewis’s knowledge it was one of the most broken orders of the Reorder. Individuals would find ways to bring back technologies of old to ease their way of life, they would need to be living trackless to even have the chance to get there, and there are certain states that do allow individuals to develop their own technologies so long as they do not distribute them. That had quickly led to people breaking the order. Lewis had focused his entire career on ethical technologies, it was one of the many debates he would have with students and colleagues in his field.
He noticed that he had already gone beyond the vending station as he returned back to his surroundings. The automated catch-phrase of the Product Imperium could be heard stuttering from the barely functioning station, “Prote-te-tect and Distr-distr-distribute!” came the feminine voice from the machine. As Lewis got close enough he saw that there were three other individuals. The station itself was the size of two large refrigerators next to each other, though it would extend into the building it was a part of. It would depend on what the station provided, the more varied the stock the larger its back storage. This station was dedicated specifically for medical and recreational drugs, its main focus being crypt-spice. Lewis was somewhat cautious as he approached, the station was located in between two apartment blocks and the individuals were partially hidden in the dark though they all had a fraction of light being shone into their faces via their lite-pads.
Lewis casually moved in front of the vending station and looked to see if it had the black-orange splice of the crypt-spice. It didn’t take him long to find the location that it normally was though it was empty. He pressed on the touchpad to which the machine reacted by changing its audio, “Wel-wel-welcome consumer. The Product Imperium serves to-to-to distribute to y-y-you and yours!” Lewis tried keying in the slot of the crypt-spice but it did not react. They were out. He slammed the double glaze glass of the machine to which the touchpad turned bright red for a moment. Lewis pulled back and the machine returned to its original state. One of the individuals turned their head towards Lewis.
“Hey. Yeah they're out of the 8-sigma splice.”
The person who spoke began making their way towards Lewis as the lite-pad in their hands went dark and into a plastic casing at the individual’s belt. The other two seemed to look for a moment but turned back. Slowly the figure came into the orange light and Lewis was able to make out the individual better. A young male from what Lewis could tell. Average height, dark skinned, not a brother though, perhaps caucasian who spent too much time in the Sun, better known as the Destroyer, one of the few renamings of the new generations Lewis had no argument against. The individual seemed somewhat malnourished, though who wasn’t? They could have easily been one of Lewis’s many students. The black fiber-silk jacket seemed somewhat dirty and Lewis did note a few bulky pockets, now worried that he might actually be in trouble. Lewis quickly pulled away hastily and raised his comp-wrist up.
“I’m tracked. I don’t want any trouble...please,” Lewis managed through the build up of his anxiety, not even the effects of the crypt-spice could calm him down.
The gaunt figure stopped for a second and raised both hands forward in a sign of no ill-intent. The sleeves of the jacket fell away in different segments like the unpeeling of a fruit to reveal veiny arms pocked with various scars.
“Nah nah friend. There’s no need for that. I was just making conversation.”
Lewis lowered his wrist slowly and mustered all the energy he could to maintain eye contact with the individual while still preparing his body to bolt.
“Listen, my partners and I are up and coming entrepreneurs….Just like the Big Z himself. We heard the 8-sigma splice was out at this location so we thought we might come to fill in a market fault.”
The man continued as he placed his hand in one of the pockets of his jacket. Lewis was about to sprint off but then rather than a weapon the odd figure pulled out a plastic sachet of orange dust.
“High quality….Local grind….8-sigma splice crypt-spice,” the man stressed every word as he made his market pitch.
“If you’re a casual consumer this can probably last you a month. I can promise you it's the good stuff.”
Lewis needed the crypt-spice, and he was scared of taking splices that he wasn’t used to. Lewis was still somewhat frozen. Interactions like these were one of the reasons why he hated his dependency on the drug, but he knew he needed it. With the other hand this entrepreneur withdrew the lite-pad once more which quickly came to life. Turning it towards Lewis he could see the trackernet software load up.
“If it helps, I’m tracked too, no shady stuff here….Protect and Distribute, right? If good old Lord Zylius can do it, then so can anyone else right? The Marketplace of all things.”
“How much?” Lewis blurted out. The site of the software and his desperate need to have the crypt-spice on hand forced him to resign to the situation he had found himself in….I had forced myself in.
“We run our market on Bitcoin, Etherium, BNB, Blazebowl Coin and Litecoin. Do you have a preference?” the entrepreneur returned.
“Blazebowl coin.”
“That would run you twelve coins then my guy.”
Lewis gestured at his comp-wrist to which the stranger tapped on their lite-pad with incredible speed, moving past the loading software and bringing up the cryptonet and logging in. Lewis had it already loaded in his comp-wrist. The two processed the payment, the exchange happened in an instant. The cryptonet had been designed with anonymity but because the two were registered on the trackernet the interaction itself registered on their respective track-ID.
Track-ID. 7145062AT
Register. Nikolas [REDACTED]
Sex. Male
Gender. Man
Employ State. Self-Employed
Employ Category. Distribution
Interaction-ID. 0429410001
Interaction-Date. 13.01.24 OS
Interaction Category. Exchange
Exchange-ID. 02305900001
Exchange Value. -12 BzB
Product-ID. CRY2012-8SP
Product-Register. Sigma8 Crypt-Ultra
Product Quantity. 300mg
The fact that the Exchange had been registered meant that Nikolas was quite transparent, a sign of authenticity that had greatly calmed Lewis’s rising anxiety. While the register was somewhat worrisome Lewis knew well enough the Product.ID for his dose of crypt-spice; CRY2001-8SP and he had done his research enough to know that any from range 2000-2015 were within the acceptable range. CRY2012, must be pretty strong stuff, he did say as much though.
Lewis was adequately satisfied with the exchange, though he was well aware that now Nikolas had received a near identical interaction registry entry containing Lewis’s own information. The price of security I suppose, he thought to himself. There was no danger of illegality this way. So he felt at least. This was yet another topic of discussion in his sphere of academia. I’m sure Dr. Vasiliadis would have much to say on the topic. Nikolas tossed him the sachet, keeping that 6 foot distance that strangers had gotten so accustomed to keeping, a testament to an old plague. Lewis looked at the sachet, twisted it and placed it inside the side pocket to his suitcase in which he would have kept the more inconspicuous black-orange case acquired from the vending station. Then he looked up at the young man.
“Pleasure distributing with you Dr. Bradson.”
“Thank you, Nikolas.”
