1

Jon of Sandwich

“Oh, sir, your Eye is out.”

The baker pointed at Jon’s eye while a metallic robot wearing a white apron put two sugar crumbles into a poly-carbon box.

Jon grinned in a way he had of scrunching up his face, which sources describing his life and character have recounted, and of which we, his biographers, have utilized. For that reason, we believe this is the first and truly definitive account of the legend of Jonathan Vélo, the man who rode his bike around the entire continent of Icomo (ee-co-mo).

“Well," said Jon, “after work, I usually like to take it out when I walk home.”

The baker, an old man with a creamy bald head and frosted sides, just blinked at him, stunned.

“To each their own, I always say, but how—how are you going to pay?”

“Oh, right…”

Jon withdrew the Eye case from his shirt pocket, on which it said 3RD-EYE, and in smaller font below it, BY AESPECT. Inside the case, on a white silk cushion, was a blue speck the size of a marble. Jon gently fixed it to the corner of his right eye, where it flattened out, adhering to the moisture in his skin.

At once, the world in front of Jon transformed. The baker’s shop sign, invisible before, now glowed warm orange. The names of the assorted breads hovered in the air above them: sugar crumbles, flake cakes, butter traps, bread batons… Behind the baker, a menu floated in the previously empty space.

Jon held up the poly-carbon box with the two sugar crumbles inside, looking at it with his Eye in, and the bill materialized to its right.

3u

sugar crumble 1.5u x2

Transfer 3u now?

Yes / No

As he thought ‘yes,’ that word lit up in blue, then a confirmation message appeared. Transfer complete.

The baker nodded and held out a poly-carbon paper. “Would you like a receipt? I don’t normally print these out anymore, but you seem like the kind of person who might want one, for old time’s sake…”

Jon laughed and took it.

“You can tell that much just because I had my Eye out?”

“Well, it’s not often I run into people with their Eyes out, but I do have to admit, it sounds like it’d be nice turning it off sometimes. I just don’t know how I’d run my business without it.”

“I see what you mean. Anyway, thank you for the sugar crumbles.”

Saying goodbye, Jon turned down the street toward home.

Not far away in the glowing night, the dark ocean smoothed out the sand, and the warm sea breeze salted Jon’s blond hair, blowing his bangs backward.

Most of the little houses, all in a row, had shop signs fixed in the air over them. He had not seen them with his Eye out. An advertisement for 0% milk unraveled in the clouds over the beach. On every road, street signs faced him no matter where he stood, and bioluminescent trees glowed faintly blue. The time of day, a weather report, and a map of Sandwich waited in the corner of Jon's vision, shifting to the central spot if he thought about them.

The town of Sandwich had gotten its name because of the bay, around which stood rows of houses with smart-glass walls. Someone a long time ago visiting the bay had thought of a bite out of a piece of bread, and had named it accordingly. The people of Sandwich mostly set their rooftops to interior transparency so they could see the night sky; but from the outside, the smart-glass houses projected tasteful colors, which the owners chose out of a catalog book of approved palettes. From a boat on the ocean, the town would have resembled many little fluorescent lightbulbs.

Jonathan Vélo, the hero of our biography, lived there. On that night, one week before he quit his job to start his grand adventure, we know that he bought two sugar crumbles on the way home from work, around five-thirty in the evening, as indicated by his Eye archives. He also writes in his journal:

Baker noticed my Eye was out first thing. Had to put it back in to pay. Getting hard to do anything without it since version 3.

Jon adjusted the settings of his Eye. The shop signs and street names blinked out. The time, weather, and map went next, as Jon deactivated features. Everything looked mostly normal. Mostly. Advertisements still floated in the sky, on the walls of buildings, on sidewalks… To this day, no setting is able to deactivate them.

He did not hate everything about the Eye or about technology in general. But he could be both easy-going and stubborn at the same time. Although he dragged his feet when it came to new inventions, he generally adopted them into his life as much as anybody else.

The Eye was different. Jon took pride in being ‘that kind of person’ who boasted about going a whole day without putting his Eye in. When people saw him, they exclaimed, “Oh, your Eye’s out!” Thinking that it had fallen off, they would start looking around on the floor.

Granted, there is something romantic about the idea of “taking a break” from our Eyes sometimes, although it is entirely safe and better than physical screens. It will always be in the hearts of some people to slow down when the world speeds up, or to speed up when the world slows down. Jon happened to be born at a time when the world was speeding up.

The bike was one thing that Jon never quite gave up either, probably because it had still been on the decline in his childhood; and it is this stubbornness for what he loved, clinging onto it always and never abandoning it to the passage of time, which sealed his destiny.

The reader may find the people of Icomo an unusual sort for glorifying a young man who accomplished little in his lifetime, except for riding his bike around the entire landmass and then spending his days happily ever after in his town of Sandwich.

Such a young man, and such a life, is precisely the sort we of Icomo strive to emulate. We have, therefore, taken up the task of telling his story as accurately as possible, using the extensive notes left behind by Jonathan Vélo himself, as well the Eye archives belonging to him and the people he met.

Truth is, Jon knew that not wearing the Eye was inconvenient. He needed it to pay, or show his ID, and it felt lonely not having it in. He would see people huddled together under a tree, staring at nothing at all…—Then he would realize they were playing chess with their Eyes.

In many other ways, Jon was normal. He enjoyed, like most people, using his Eye to decorate his room. His small condo, which he rented, was simple and unadorned without his Eye in; but with it, the walls showed fantastic paintings of landscapes, and little stars and moons levitated across the ceiling and shimmered.

We say in Icomo that you can tell a lot about a person by how their room is decorated. Jon’s friends teased him a little about the stars and moons. Despite being only projections, his guests could see them all because of the Field which emits from the Field towers across the country, connecting Eyes everywhere.

Perhaps the paintings, moons, and stars of Jon’s bedroom made him feel transported elsewhere. At night, when Jon took out his Eye and saw his plain walls, he longed for something he could not express.

At such times, Jon thought about quitting his job. Whenever it crossed his mind, however, he remembered that he needed to give a week’s advance notice before his final day, and so Jon forgot all about it. He also hated the idea of his friends trying to change his mind and convince him that his dream was a stupid one.—Who in their right mind would leave a perfectly good job to spend a year riding a bike around the edge of a continent?

Do not suppose that Jon suffered. He was not depressed in any shape or form. In fact, he liked his job. Jon had no idea what he wanted or lacked, except that he did want and lack something. His dream of riding around Icomo began to bud out of the soil of this uncertain desire. He daydreamed about it at work until this bud had grown and bloomed, like a flower. That day was still another week away, however.

On the morning after which our story begins, Jon simply woke up, put his Eye in, and went to work as usual.

CHARACTERS IN THIS CHAPTER

Jonathan Vélo, a man who quit his job to ride his bike around the continent.