Since when he was a little boy, Alex had always wanted to be the one to make a difference in his generation. Growing up in the dark neighborhoods of Chicago, was a rather hard knocked life for him and his family. His mother would always be the one to defend him against the law enforcement agencies each time he tried to speak against something he didn't like or something he had seen that probably didn't feel right at all.
The one time the police dropped by to take his friend into their experimental program, had given him sleepless nights for a rather very long while. He knew that as usual, they were going to transform him, his body and mind, an inhuman, soulless machine. The same thing the leaders of the country had been doing on random people all over the world since he was born.
His mother had always told him stories about the mechanical revolutions the world had experienced when they had been little, in their generation. About how they harvest the minds of people and transform them into mechanical servants, taking away their sense of judgments, and just doing things they were programmed to see as "normal", including the dirty games of the various political leaders.
She told him about how they had fought against the paradigm, how a few years went by and they kept harvesting more and more minds and transforming them into machines for whatever gains they had been interested in. She said the resistance was fierce, and she had lost her father, his grandfather, to the cause in the process. And that the resistance losing was going to be the worst scenario humanity had ever faced to date.
"And so that's why we stay in the shadows, baby, away from the possible threat of them taking one of us someday and making us lose our humanities for good," she said to him while narrating the story still.
Now that his friend, Blake, being together with him from their childhood days, had gotten captured and taken for harvesting too, he swore to himself that he was going to get his friend back, and that made him singularly develop a mind and strong will to change the norm of the system of government. He made a promise to himself and his friend, that Blake's sacrifice wouldn't be in vain, that he was going to be the one to change the world in the end, and he wasn't going to relent.
He was going to start his plan by going to a different environment, probably a country or region of less public and political interest, he was going to Africa to further his college studies, reducing his chances of getting captured for the transformation and at the same time, possibly raising another arm of resistance that would stand behind him and his idea. He told his mother about it, and although she had been skeptical about his leaving, he asked her to move to the new continent with him too, so he could always keep an eye on her as the days went by. she relented, she made him understand that she had no business leaving and explained that she had been there, where he also grew up, all her life, and had never gotten captured, and that the same thing could happen to him if only he lived by her rules. And then he made her understand that living by her rules had meant that there was no possible way he could make a difference there. And it was just obvious to both of them that he has to leave, his mother wished him all the best of luck, he left her and set out for the new continent by ship.
The world around him in his fatherland had been in shambles from his perspective. He had seemed to be the only one that despised the entire system. His mother had always told him about how united and more human everyone had been before the new world order. She had told him stories of how people were more human, of how everything was okay and fine while she was still a little girl. When the human race cared more about each other when there was more empathy among themselves and beyond, of when everyone had the strong freedom of speech, movement, and every other thing, of how food and other commodities were more accessible to the basic person without having to go through any of the identification processes they had now, about how people weren't scared of their kids playing outdoors so the federal agencies don't come to round them up and take them as the next guinea pigs for the mechanical experiment.
She always explained to him her his father had been forcefully taken against his will to get transformed to be a part of the machines before Alex had been born. And always told him of how great of a man his father was, of how he fought for the best lives for everyone in the family, but lost it to the heartless creatures that now terrorize the free will of citizens all over the world. His father had been serving as an American soldier and had gone on various successful missions in Syria and Afghanistan, and was a major influence to his Seal team on almost every occasion because he always came out with critical success and all his men alive too on every mission he had embarked on. He was known by the Department of defense as one of the most prominent of the troops in the Afghanistan mission and came back home to take his star at all times.
He was respected, he was honored. But at the same time, he never really liked or subscribed to the idea of his family in the public eyes or anything whatsoever. And that was why he always claimed to be unmarried on many occasions. And even while the new world order was sane while he was in the Department of defense, he had always kicked against it, he was always of the opinion that machines could never replace the humans completely in any ramification, and he had always been outspoken about the ideology. The Department of defense had constantly laid threats to him and asked him to stand down or have him risk getting dismissed. He easily sensed that the system was corrupt from the onset, and all his suspicions were confirmed by his CIA friend back at Langley, that all of that was a worldwide hoax into tricking people into agreeing and enrolling for the Special Longevity Program, (SLP), and made him understand that it was a plan by the world government to maintain control of citizens in their respective countries.
In the earlier years, even while he was still a kid, Alex's father had never supported the idea, and now that he had heard that from his CIA insider, he knew there was a big problem that had been awaiting. He knew everything was gradually going to go sideways and the people up top were going to have everyone bend to their rules in no time, and as soon as he had tendered his resignation, and given the reason why he was threatened by the authorities above him and was told that he had made a huge mistake trying to go against the will of the country and the authorities he swore to serve.
Hearing that, he knew he was probably in trouble already, and secretly made arrangements with his wife to leave the country and move over to Asia where they hadn't still adopted the one-world policy. In the few weeks after he had resigned, when the arrangements to leave had still been going on with his wife and kid, he got rounded up before he even knew it. The forces had been sent to his known residence that morning, and while he had still been as careful as he could, still fell prey to the ambush and got captured rather very easily in the process. He was going to be taken to Michigan, where the SLP headquarters was situated, for transforming, and his family was never going to hear from him again since then.
Alex's mom was a rather extremely careful and empathic woman. After not seeing her Husband for days, she had to accept the real and factual truth that he had either died, killed by people who had earlier threatened him, or he had been transformed into a machine. She still sat there at her secret apartment, waiting for him, he had cautioned her not to call him on the phone except he called her, due to the nature of the job he was involved in. At a particular night, she managed to go over to where his "Official" apartment was, and when she saw the place was unusually dark and quiet, was when she accepted her fate as having to lose her husband to the madness around her and having to raise the child she had been pregnant with without his father. She got traumatized for a moment and tried to be as strong for as much as she could, if not for nothing, at least for the little one she was carrying inside of her.
Now that he had grown up to ask questions about the same thing his father was agitated about, it was no surprise to her at all. Everything had gone from bad to worse as the years went by, there were more and more people being transformed by the machines, and contrary to what the government had said to the population about them having to live longer and better lives with the scheme, her husband had made her understand that it was all dirty schemes and lies by the government to lure people into feeling relaxed about it and not resisting the directives or policy.
Alex was being imbibed with this knowledge and information by his mother as he grew to where he was at now. She made him understand that everything his father had ever done for them, the little fight he had given, his struggle, his soul, was for the greater good of everyone, all of humanity and she had always told him that someone, anyone, would share in that dream and ideology and continue in the legacy, and apparently, it was going to be her stubborn, no-nonsense little boy, who is now a man, who has understood that the world cannot keep being deceived, who has felt what it's like to lose someone to this senseless cause.
Even while Alex had gone against his mother's pleas and told his friends and other people around him about all that his mother had said to him about the corruption of SLP, and what his father had discovered before he died, they would always dismiss him for it. And now, people weren't safe anymore, but a lot of them didn't know it, a lot of them had been blind to the evil, the inhumanity, that had been happening right under their noses. And he seemed to be the only normal one around.
On his journey to the African continent, he had still been helplessly worried about his mother and her general well-being. He was concerned about who was going to care for her whenever she needed care, about who was going to protect her whenever she needed protection. He felt like his mother was going to be alone, out there, vulnerable, in the mercies of these inhumane folks that nobody ever talks about or knows about. But he tried for as much as he could to promise himself that he wasn't going to let that get in the way of his focus or distract him. He was going to study public relations in Africa, in different institutions for the just cause of having a chance to end this madness once and for all. It hurt that he had lost his father and a dear friend to the acts of this governmental organization, and then people still not believing that they are slowly bringing humanity to its knees. And the more surprising to him was the fact that it seemed like he and his mother were psychopaths or abnormal in the society because they had been the only ones seemly talking about it, for all that while.
The ship was on a direct route to Cape Town, in South Africa. It was to be a rather comfortable voyage. He could instantly tell that the ship was moving at up to 15 knots and easily estimated that he would get to his destination in less than a few weeks, so he settled in properly and comfortably. Picked a ticket for regular class and that was as comfortable as he got. The wood on the walls in his cabin room was polished well enough, the food was good enough, and everything was pleasing enough. He had his dinner on the first night, the food was "manageable" enough, he instantly had to live with the fact that he was going to be having that exact class and type of food for a long while, so he immediately trained himself to get used to it, he did. And when he was done with his first meal on this long haul, he hastily called in on his mother to hear from her and know how she was doing, and sarcastically asked her not to miss him too much, while bluntly promising her that this was just the beginning of the slow journey, one where he was going to make a difference in the world order, and make her proud, and honor his father's legacy.
On the boat the next morning, he got up to a new reality, one that he would have to endure for the next couple of days, the confinement of less than a few hundred people, and "trapped" with them at the same time. He decided that he was going to remain mindful of the things that he said, or people that he even spoke with, he knew that eyes were everywhere, and there was a possibility that some government officials or pope that were related to the elite, one way or the other, might have been there as well.
He set out to the open space at the top of the cruise boat, where he noticed that most people there were now socializing, freely, not seeming like they were scared or cautious of anything the way he was. He took his time to observe the "individuals" around him. There were two men in blue uniforms at the far other exits of the top of the boat, that seemed like they didn't move a muscle. They had dark eyeglasses on, and he could see their batons and tasers on their sides. He looked away around and noticed another two at the far end opposite of him. He stood there, while still being alert, watching these four men for a while, he could easily tell that they weren't "normal", even when splashes of water had gone on one of them mistakenly and had the person apologized to him, he didn't move his head or even respond in any way whatsoever. He slowly leaned back in shock as it dawned on him that they were transformed. But the other people would have hardly noticed because they didn't care.
"Yes, I think they are!", Said a deep voice with a thick African accent.
A startled Alex quickly moved away and looked back to see who had snuck up on him in such a manner.
"Relax, relax man, it's not a machine, It's me, a brother," he said with his hands slightly raised to probably show non-violence.
"But look, I noticed the same thing man, those guards, or lifeguards, or whatever, they are machines! They have been there, same position, same stance, since yesterday. And these people are too blind to see it" he added after pulling him back behind into a sheltered space there.
"Now I observed you from where I was standing there, and I noticed that you had the same look that I had on my face too. You know about the machines, you know about the madness, that makes just two of us on this ship now!" he said to Alex.
Alex, being dumbfounded for a moment there, didn't know how to respond to this huge, well-built African-looking man. He wasn't sure if he was an accomplice of a politician on the boat sent to question him, or if he was just another one to come as a bait for him to fall prey to about the information. He asked for his name in a sharp tone.
"Call me Tadala! Son of T'dala the First!" he responded in a high tone.
Alex still wasn't sure of how to properly engage this guy who just came out of nowhere, but apparently knew about the machines and seemingly knew what they did. apart from his mother, Tadala was the only person who seemed to see things from their perspective, he was surprised at how Tadala started to explain his own story. He told Alex about how he had lost all of his family to the cause a few years ago, explained how he managed to escape from the vehicle that had been conveying them. He said to Alex that even when he had wanted to join in it because they had preached about a better life for them before taking them away. He soon realized that his family never came back, and when he had been alone for months, he realized that they had lied to them, contrary to what the government had been saying, they weren't going to go back home to their families to live a better life, they weren't going to be better than other people, they were just test drives of the cause. He had to accept the fact that his family had been lost for good and moved on. and everything was fine until it appeared that the government had traced him to his residence to transform him too, reducing the probability of him leaking out anything he seemingly knew.
He had successfully evaded government forces sent to him on various occasions and decided to escape the country to a much safer haven.
"And then I stumbled into you, the first person that doesn't think I'm stupid". He said to Alex sarcastically.
Now Alex was convinced that he wasn't a sent accomplice or anything whatsoever. He understood how Tadala had felt, and he sympathized with him too. He told Tadala that he was going to study in cape town, to reduce the chances of him getting transformed and that he wanted to make a difference in the polity that was now slowly becoming a reality. Alex sounded extremely and eloquently convincing to Tadala, his plan seemed legitimate enough. Tadala loved the energy he had gotten from Alex and the way he talked, his ideology, his charisma, was full of energy.
The two men easily became buddies in no time, all the while that they were on the boat, they kept on their low-profile, avoiding drawing attention to themselves by any of the boat operators, monitoring the people who had been there, for their safety, surprised about how ignorant and blind they are, even to the reality that was right in front of them. But the men couldn't blame them, the people and basically, everyone else who didn't feel scared or anything whatsoever had no idea about what was happening, they had been lied to without even suspecting or knowing anything about it, and that was the reason for the apparent and rather annoying ignorance that was being exhibited by the public.
After almost a month on the open sea, the shores of Cape town had finally graced their arrival. Alex could tell that the climate was different here. It was predominantly black people, and he looked to observe if any unusual behavior from anyone at all was pronounced, he always had his guard on. He wanted to be sure that it was "safe for" her to probably spend the next three to four years, in the meantime.
Tadala on the other hand had been visiting the cape for only the third time in his life. The environment hadn't changed much, he could still easily navigate his way around, he led the way for Alex to follow. Alex reached out to his mother to alert her that he had arrived safely in the new country and was set to start his schooling there in the following week, also happily told her about his new buddy and promised her that he was going to return to her in no time.
Tadala offered to shelter Alex at his old apartment downtown. Alex later agreed to stay thereafter he was convinced that no governmental influences of the presence of the machines were around the residence there. There in South Africa, one of the first things he had noticed was the fact that people there were more caring about their neighbors and people around them. He easily noticed that even his extremely light skin among all that brilliant black didn't pose any problems to him socially. He had only stayed a few days and the most beautiful lady in the building opposite theirs had got down showing interest in him already. She was Lindiwe, and she was one of the most beautiful he had ever met. Her voice was charming, her eyes glowed predominantly in shades of her dark-colored pretty face, and she had a physicality that was instantly appealing to him. He told Tadala about it and he ended up sarcastically blasting Alex about him already falling in love so easily while not having stayed there up to a week.
The week after that came and he applied for a discipline in the public relations hemisphere. He was to spend the next three and possible half years of his life there, and he knew he always had to be cautious about his real identity, he remembered that his mother had always told him to remain careful anywhere he went in the world, that the government was always interested in hunting down the family that they found out his father had been hiding from them. So she always advised him to stay low. And he knew he had to respect that.
When classes had started and Tadala had gotten a job downtown the cape, he would always do a routine of School – Home, six days a week, and nothing else. He hardly ever socialized with anyone, both in the classes, in the campus space there, and at the neighborhood where they had stayed. The only persons he had only spoken to were Tadala and Lindiwe. During the first weeks of his time in school, there was an emotional struggle all the way. He was always caught up with fears of his mom getting captured against her will for transformation and him not being able to live up to what he had promised her and himself too. Lindiwe however, was always there to render all the emotional support he needed. And when Tadala didn't make it back home for a night, he would always have her come over to their place and sometimes make passionate love with each other.
A few months had passed now and the government of South Africa had announced that they too were going to embark on aggressive campaigning of SLP in the country. Alex and Tadala watched them say the same lie they had told them back in North America. It had felt like the leaders of the country had been brainwashed or something. They had promised it to be completely out of volunteering and no need to enforce anything on anybody, but then, still made the "benefits "of SLP sound juicy enough for everyone to want to partake in it, and ensured that the different waves and sets or groups of distribution of the slots will get to everyone in due time, starting from the military forces. But Alex and Tadala knew it was all shams, it was the same thing that was said years ago where they had stayed in the US there, and they weren't about to watch the government of this one allow it to slowly degenerate into the brute-forcing of people to enroll again.
Lindiwe had the conversation of wanting to apply for transformation because it was made free.
"… And it's such an amazing feat from the government, Alex. For the first time in my life, I'm seeing something so amazing, being made free for everyone to partake in, wow!" she said to him innocently.
He immediately and aggressively debunked the idea and bluntly ensure that he wasn't going to let her do any of that! She was in abject disbelief when he had explained to her about the real deal of what was going on. Then he told her about his family's story, and Tadala's too, and she got a little convinced. But he begged her not to mention him to any of the people that she might try to convince afterward, she concurred.
Life had changed for the three of them instantly, they, especially Alex and Tadala, knew the dangers that were now facing them, the same one that they had tried to run away from was now in their backyard and was going to grow exponentially in the next couple of years.
There was still some time left there for Alex before he headed back home. He, Tadala, and Lindiwe tried to convince as many people as possible, the great percentage of them had dismissed the whole thing that they had been told, but a very few had concurred and agreed to join him in establishing a plan to eliminate this common threat, diplomatically apparently.
They became more cautious, more watchful. The government of South Africa had already announced the trial of SLP on its soldiers, and Tadala and Alex could easily tell that they were now machines while they were shown on TV as they watched the news. The way they stood, and even marched, gave the trait away. But the regular people wouldn't notice because they hadn't studied the ones who were now machines to see the truths through the way they acted, moved, and even talked.
Alex took his classes more seriously. He was going to apply for a government job afterward and use his medium to tackle the situation and enlighten people about the evil that had been served to them on a silver platter.
A few more years had passed and he was now in his final semester, Lindiwe was now almost three months heavy with their baby. He promised her that he was going to try to make a difference for a better world for them and their new child. She had agreed to move back to the united states with him when he had finished school there. And when his final research was submitted to his professors, they saw the same thing he had been trying to convince people about now for years. The Lies that SLP had been disguising under. But they had dismissed the entire topic with the basis of him having no proof or evidence of his claims, and asked that he redid another topic, entirely afresh.
It came as no surprise to him because of course, they hadn't experienced any of it for themselves first hand, so he wasn't going to blame them one bit for the ignorance oozing off them. He easily did another topic entirely for them and went on passing out of the school top of his class.
Tadala and Lindiwe were most happy for him. He addressed the other people who had concurred with what he had told them about SLP and tried to convince them to come with him to the united states too, including Tadala. He wasn't sure of any decision he was making at first but eventually, with the energy and charisma Alex constantly displayed each time he spoke to the various groups about his ideal, he had no choice but to get motivated towards Alex's cause. His mom had explained to him now that it was now worse than it had been when he left. And she explained to him that the government there now knew about her as the wife of his father, and told her that the transformed had been sent to hunt her and capture her, told him about how frightened she had gotten each time she had seen the wanted alert on TV with her face on it. She cried that scared that they might soon find her and acknowledged that she didn't have much time left anymore.
Alex knew he had to go protect his mother at all costs, even if it meant killing one of those now soulless things to do so, he was determined that he will. He knew he hadn't had much time to travel there on a boat. So he had told the rest of his people, including Tadala and Lindiwe to stay back, so he could go bring his mother down to South Africa too. They concurred.
He had the next flight to Dallas/Fort Worth, and on getting there, he could easily tell now that there were more machines than real humans everywhere he turned to, and the fact that the still normal humans couldn't even sense that something was wrong was the most shocking to him! He went past immigration and took the next bus to the house, their secret hideout.
It hadn't changed much, the garden down the street was still the same, buildings were still the way they were, but none of that had mattered to him at that point, he just wanted to hug his mother again and take her over to a safer place as soon as he could. He waited at a nearby restaurant, that had only humans in it, he could tell, till it got darker. And when the night came, he snuck up to the secret place down the street to find that the place had been sealed up by the authorities. His heat started to race faster as he saw the yellow tape all around the door and windows. He knew immediately something had gone wrong. He easily spotted the secret entrance in the basement area to make a way into the house.
On getting inside, he could tell that there had been a struggle, the entire furniture and items were littered all over the place. It was quiet and very noisy. He collapsed on the floor as a few tears dropped off his eyes before he heard silent beeps echoing from a bedroom. He traced the sound to a box buried in between some dirty laundry. It was an electronic safe, he found the box and opened it, and pulled out the recorder.
"Hey baby, if you find this, you're listening, it's because the government came for me, they're knocking out my door, they're going to break it down or force me out! I couldn't make it Alex, we couldn't make it. You need to end this please, you need to make your father proud, you need to….", it said, with the sound of his mother's helplessly frightened voice.