Release date: October 13, 2019
Subgenre: Dystopian fiction, Cyberpunk
About Bulb:
If light records everything we do, can even shadows hide our secrets?
Imagine your entire life is available for review.
Imagine each day any event can be watched over and over again - your birth, your first kiss, your recent shower, that private itch - all replayable from any angle. Now imagine these can be viewed by anyone at any time.
Is a world where there is far less ego, little crime, and even the smallest moments are recorded and available publicly through the ‘Grand Archive’ a Utopia or a Dystopia? Traumatized by memories he does not want to recall, artist Ben Tinthawin is recruited by the enigmatic, Grand Archive creator Dr. Mamon, who seeks help for his nextgen designs to enhance the world. Ben stumbles across a secret revealing the doctor’s true scheme in all its surreal splendor and questions whether the doctor really is the benevolent soul he claims to be.As the paths of a broken man and a brilliant revolutionary cross, the world shifts and cracks start to appear. Even our most fundamental codes can be encrypted – or corrupted. If the wrong information is discovered, more than Ben’s life will be in danger of total shut down.
Prepare yourself for full exposure.
Imagine your entire life is available for review.
Imagine each day any event can be watched over and over again - your birth, your first kiss, your recent shower, that private itch - all replayable from any angle. Now imagine these can be viewed by anyone at any time.
Is a world where there is far less ego, little crime, and even the smallest moments are recorded and available publicly through the ‘Grand Archive’ a Utopia or a Dystopia? Traumatized by memories he does not want to recall, artist Ben Tinthawin is recruited by the enigmatic, Grand Archive creator Dr. Mamon, who seeks help for his nextgen designs to enhance the world. Ben stumbles across a secret revealing the doctor’s true scheme in all its surreal splendor and questions whether the doctor really is the benevolent soul he claims to be.As the paths of a broken man and a brilliant revolutionary cross, the world shifts and cracks start to appear. Even our most fundamental codes can be encrypted – or corrupted. If the wrong information is discovered, more than Ben’s life will be in danger of total shut down.
Prepare yourself for full exposure.
Excerpt:
“Pop,
what’s your dash saying? Don’t you think we should get off and seek cover or
something?”
“I can
read. Bad weather conditions?” He flicked his hand at the dash and again
towards the clouds, “Look at that. Plenty of blue. No lousy rain ever stopped
traffic anyway.”
There wasn’t any blue sky
left, only fluffy charcoal boulders threatening to drop. Five minutes later,
still no rain but the wind blew fiercely, and we passed several fallen trees.
Our headlights turned on. The car navigated easily through the debris, but you
didn’t see trees on the road every day, and I kept my mouth shut. We followed
the curvy highway hills and discovered more trees lying on the other side of
the median. Mom grew noticeably nervous.
“There must have been some
of that freakweather going on here. There’s a whole damn forest on the highway.
Take the next exit, or I will.”
“Bah, it’s only threatening
to rain. Why does everything have to be freakweather? A few branches won’t kill
us,” Dad said.
This was more than a few branches.
Something ahead looked like piles of dirt as if there had been a small
rockslide off to the side. The streetlamp shone directly above it, and when we
got closer, you could see it was two little dead deer. They faced each other
heads to tails like some kind of strange yin-yang symbol.
“Oh, look at those poor
baby deer,” Mom said with her fingers pressed to the window. Their eyes, glazed
and open, appeared almost alive.
“Look up there,” Dad said,
pointing off to our left.
A considerable deer herd speckled
the hillside. Small points of glowing yellow eyes reflected the headlights. In
the past, our family made deer spotting a competition. Dad liked to say this
region was “infested” with them. I watched his face in the rearview mirror, a
smile on his lips from his big score with the deer game, but it melted away as
the rain started hitting the windshield. The fading grin was the second to last
thing I saw before it happened. The fear in the profile of Mom’s face was the
last.
Mom shouted something unrecognizable
as our headlights brought the deer standing in the road into bright view. The
first deer looked like an albino, all white from the side -‑ head turned to us,
eyes blank and SLAM! And thwunk, another! Soft and solid at the same time, you
barely felt the crunch of bone. Chwunn! Another.
A crowd of three together
sandwiched as we banked off them into the ramp of the median that sent our car
rolling. We ricocheted back over to the other side of the highway, up the steep
embankment and rolled back to where the deer we’d hit lay ripped open. Glass,
wind, and water filled the air. The chaos dampened to a halt making a glassy
slush sound when we landed.
Rain began pelting my ear
and neck. A line of bloody spittle stretched and quickly snapped as I pulled my
face away from the armrest. Blood flooded my mouth. I tried the door, but it
wouldn’t open. I need out. I needed to spit but misjudged the broken window,
and it splattered back against me, covering a huge swath of my pant leg sickly
red. The sight of the blood must have
made me realize what had happened. My tongue throbbed a deep rhythm. I’d bitten
a piece off and touching the wound sent a blinding shock of pain along my
spine. The whole scene felt unreal, dreamlike, monstrous.
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