Beginning of Prologue Arc
(Because Inkstone doesn't allow for italics or bold something that were conveyed with those styles aren't properly formatted, I'll be releasing 2 chapters a day until we catch up with the story on Scribblehub which is up to 20 currently, enjoy! :) )
"You should just di…." The voice was cut off by Haley turning off the hologram display, once again it was his sister simply reminding him of how much of a burden he was to their family.
"Sigh" Haley slumped in his chair and held his head in his hands, "What the hell am I gonna do?" He asked himself slowly and repeatedly as tears began to roll down his cheeks. He was 1.9 Million Luna in debt and that debt was still growing, with an interest rate of 4.3% per year he had no chance of repaying it in this lifetime.
Fortunately, the only collateral the loaners had required on application had been his life… He laughed at the time knowing that, 'no', thinking that it would never get that far; after repeating the semester three times because of his demon-like professor he had grown desperate, it was only after begging the woman did she finally let him pass, barely.
'Please pay HUD fee or you will be cut off from the network within the next 48 Hours!'
An alert crossed his vision, literally, the text appeared in his field of view and followed his head as he moved – even when he closed his eyes, despite knowing it wouldn't work, it followed him inside of his own head. It was only twenty seconds later did it automatically disappear and fade from existence.
'This damn chip.' He thought tapping the back of his neck where a small bulge was present, it was the installation location of the Heads-Up-Display Nano, or HUDN for short although everyone called it HUD because of the familiarity the term had with gaming it did nothing but let someone connect to the internet, watch videos and send messages – of course, code-modifications existed which allowed for people to edit and control what their HUD could do but they were limited.
Haley had entered the technical field as a budding HUD engineer, the industry was still fresh – only a single decade had passed since its initial introduction to the human race. Unfortunately, because he was already twenty-six years old he had to go through the almost torturous installation process. Even with pain-inhibitors because of how the nano-bots had to attach themselves to the spine they had to burrow through nerves, destroy them and then repair them.
This process was much easier for a baby – which is why by default every human child born in the last ten years had been given the HUD only minutes after birth, the nano-bots would then slowly burrow into the skin and grow along with the child leaving nothing but a small scar and a useful tool for the rest of their life.
'Even my code is bullsh*t!' He thought angrily as he opened a file installed onto his HUD, the file was labelled 'Wound Analysis v0.1' the modification would potentially be able to be used by doctors or trainee's to identify the cause of a wound and give them potential treatment options.
But disastrously he wasn't able to get it to work to identify the difference between a wound and the rest of the body, he looked down at his hand bitterly which had numerous scars – he didn't have the luxury of test subjects such as animals so he used the next best thing…
It was, apparently, the main reason why his professor wouldn't allow him to proceed after so many years, but he knew otherwise… 'That damn smug look on her face as I begged her to allow me to pass, who did I offend? I'd never seen her before the first time I took her class, but it was always as if she was targeting me…'
He looked around his crappy apartment, it cost him 350 Luna a month to rent; considering that a high-end apartment in the best sections of the city cost only 400 Luna he was truly being ripped off but with his crushing amount of debt none of them would even consider letting him be a tenant. His landlord was of course… those damned debtors.
They were determined to ring every penny from him, as much as he was worth and everything, he would ever be worth. He was truly considering suicide at this point, his hand trembled as his eyes darted towards the knife that lay on his table. There was dry blood on the blade, from his 'experiments' at this point he'd become numb to the pain of cutting himself for the sake of improvement but now…
'Snap out of it!' He screamed at himself, before he noticed it he was holding the knife and it was only inches away from his wrist.
"Cling…."
A soft echo was heard as the knife hit the cold floor of his apartment, "Hahahahahaha!" Haley's deranged laugh could be heard in between the sobbing.
'Why is reality so cruel?' He thought as he dried his eyes and tried to stabilise his mind, he wasn't a Luna, this sort of mental stress without strong willpower could truly be the end of him at some point.
'Lunas… I thought that I was fortunate not to be forced into the fate of being a soldier but.' He laughed bitterly as he thought back to his Lu-Val from his sixteenth birthday.
It was a resounding [0] the lowest score that was possible to score on the test. To clarify, Lunas were people who could access dormant talent hidden within their genetics – their potential was measured by the amount of Lu-Val in their blood, it was named after the first humans settled on the moon and discovered that there was a gaseous force that infected certain individuals changing them and essentially allowing them to evolve.
It had been almost two-thousand years since that discovery and since then the human race had been able to replicate the gaseous force through science and installed it as a central force into the terraforming machines.
Unfortunately, not everyone was able to absorb the force, about only 3/10 humans were able to absorb it the rest had Lu-Val's lower than [1] Which didn't allow them to access their hidden genetic powers.
"Vrrrrrr….." Haley was suddenly shook himself out of his down spiral of self-pity when he felt subtle vibrations shocking his body, "Wha-?!" He was interrupted by a bright flash of light, like a flashbang, that filled the entire room.
One second…
Two seconds.
Three seconds…
Only four seconds later did he finally regain his vision but much to his shock what was in front of him wasn't his apartment but a vast expanse of white and a floating metallic ball that silently vibrated, he could faintly feel the vibrations in the air causing him slight discomfort.
Haley only then realised that he was still sitting down, he felt around and he could still feel his chair and even the desk in front of him but no matter where he looked he couldn't 'see' it with his eyes.
[001 Initialised….]
[Booting 001 OS]
[You may experience a slight tingling sensation before extreme and torturous pain… please stand-by.]
"What the!?"
"AghhhhhhhhhhhhhhHahhhhhhhh!!!" Haley collapsed and started to writher in pain on the ground, he started to convulse and twitch occasionally regaining consciousness before passing out again from extreme pain.
Minutes passed that felt like hours, Haley had no idea how many times he'd woken up only to pass out again – he stopped counting after the twentieth time.
[Program initialised…. Please Register Username:]
Those were the last words he saw when the pain stopped, before collapsing from exhaustion.