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This story is set in the world of Shadowrun. It is a cyberpunk/fantasy role playing game that takes place in the near future (2070 AD). It revolves around my character and the events leading up to him becoming a shadowrunner- a criminal for hire by the megacorporations and the oppressed alike... as long as they have enough money.

I will post more later. It has been divided up into nice, easy to manage chunks. I hope you read and enjoy it, and if you have any suggestions or questions, please let me know. :)



The Gathering Shadows, Chapter 1, Part 1:


After a five-year coma, Tz’alin Rhom finally ‘awoke.’ He slowly became aware of the sensation of existing and his mind stirred from its healing slumber. Only… when he finally opened his ‘eyes,’ his first sight was an aged, more mature version of his own face. He recognized his own wispy blond hair and gaunt cheeks, and had his eyelids been open he would have known the bright green eyes.

His disembodied consciousness inhabited the hospital room where his body laid resting, and he could see it through the mechanical ‘eyes’ of the medical monitoring equipment. A sense of fear rushed over him as he struggled to comprehend what was happening. Am I dead? Considering his situation, Tz’alin thought the prospect likely. The seconds passed by and nothing changed. Data hummed busily around his mind, traveling at virtual speeds.

A claustrophobic sense of being trapped took hold of Tz’alin and he struggled in his digital prison. He thrashed about in search for a way to end what he imagined could only be a bizarre nightmare. The futility of his efforts became clear as he began to mentally tire without having changed the environment around him. With forced self-control he calmed the chaos in his mind and took a closer look at his surroundings.

He could see each item, or rather the software suite that ran each item, in the medical equipment node. When he accessed those drivers he could feel the location of his awareness physically shift. The heart beat monitor spread him out across the sensor pads attached to the chest of his real body. The breathing regulator dropped him to the air valve at the end of the tube leading to the oxygen mask over his body’s mouth. The medicine release controls bottled him up in the IV drip hooked up to his blood stream.

Much less frantic than before, Tz’alin practiced navigating this new world. Patience and perseverance paid off as he became more accustomed to it, capable of accessing multiple nodes at once and generally thinking and reacting faster than he ever had before. There was a certain degree of thrill to navigating the inside of a machine and, had the circumstances been different, Tz’alin felt he would have enjoyed it. At the moment the thought of escape was a more pressing concern. He turned his attention to the central data pipeline that bundled all of the individual byte streams into one channel. The information flow cut off sharply at a point where the device’s virtual realm faded to black. Tz’alin eyed this threshold suspiciously as he drew near to it. A metal ring around the cutoff seemed to radiate energy and every bit of data that passed through it glowed momentarily before shooting away into the darkness beyond. It looked dangerous, but Tz’alin managed to convince himself the risk was worth it; any result was better than the frustration of not knowing what waited for him on the other side.

The step forward through the ring could be likened to walking off a cliff. The comforting ‘floor’ and ‘walls’ he had grown accustomed to disappeared as he passed through the wireless router. Tz’alin’s mind transferred out of the confines of the medical equipment and into the full-blown, omnipresent Matrix, and a whole new world exploded into existence around him. This mode of being was unlike anything Tz’alin had ever known. The rush of information blinded and confused him; he couldn’t make sense of anything as the sheer density of data overrode his mind.

But in his despair something, or someone, reached out to help him. It felt like a friendly pair of hands lifting his chin and guiding his own hands. Then they both cut a swath through the data together. It showed him how to order the swirling chaos and understand the virtual environment. Encouraged by this support, Tz’alin saw the flood of information as shifting with opportunities rather than an overwhelming jumble. He turned to thank his anonymous benefactor but its reassuring presence had already faded away. He began to wonder if it had really been there in the first place or if had merely been his mind’s way of coping.

Either way, Tz’alin adapted to this new way of experiencing the world over the course of the day. He reached out and traveled the nodes in the hospital until it became second nature. Every node, every device he could find offered an uncharted realm to investigate. The immense curiosity that led him to examine and explore the hospital’s network, however, meant that he was certain to run into trouble eventually, and his naiveté certainly helped speed up the process. The financial systems of the hospital had anti-hacker security in place and, without meaning to, Tz’alin tripped several alarms. He turned to see the icon of an Intrusion-Countermeasure response darting towards him. It resembled an entirely forgettable human male in a black suit with black sunglasses. Fear pulsed through Tz’alin as the security agent trained a pistol on him. Fire ripped from the barrel as it unleashed a violent attack that sent Tz’alin reeling with something he hadn’t felt in years: physical discomfort. His rage at being hurt for what he considered ‘no good reason’ channeled into an attack of his own. The streaming lines of data around him bulged and wavered as destructive energy lashed out in response at the IC program, and to his satisfaction it crashed spectacularly, falling backwards into a useless heap of code.

The experience burned into Tz’alin’s memory though, and he raced back to his own room. His mind floated a few inches from his body; his thoughts reaching out to his sleeping form. With all the effort he could muster, he pushed downward, through the sensor pads, through the oxygen mask, through the IV drip. Then he closed his eyes, and when he opened them the next second he was looking back at the cold stainless steel of the medical instruments. Immediately his muscles twitched and he moved to get off the bed, yanking the oxygen mask away from his face and carefully sliding the IV needle out of his arm. Suddenly he froze, the IV only halfway pulled out. Something caught his attention: not really a noise or sight, but more of a feeling. It felt wrong, or was about to be. Instinctively, he reached out with his mind and clamped down on a single transmission, cutting it off before he knew what he was doing. He wondered what had led him to react in such a forceful way without provocation. It was like his subconscious was acting without his permission. That thought frightened him.

The transmission floated silently in his mental clutches until he realized it was still there. He carefully pulled back layers of code to examine what he had caught until he reached the message at its center; it was a distress signal sent by his life support equipment. Only his quick action had prevented the entire hospital from knowing he was awake. Tz’alin felt dumbfounded by the event, unsure whether to be thankful or disturbed.

Fortunately other things quickly distracted him. The second his feet touched the white tiles of the hospital floor, Tz’alin cringed in pain. So cold! The chilled sensation alone was enough to make shockwaves crest over his thoughts and he shuddered uncontrollably. Five years under a blanket had not prepared him for this.

The next diversion came as even more of an unpleasant surprise when Tz’alin slid to the edge of the bed and tried to stand up. His weight shifted off of the bed alright, but the part where it should have transferred to his legs did not. The steady supply of nutritional supplements and weekly electronic muscle stimulation sessions could only do so much to prepare his body for the sudden shock of movement.

Tz’alin just barely stifled a yelp as his knees refused to lock. He collapsed to the floor, which was more than happy to accept him. The jolt dazed him momentarily, but before long he was already poking his legs and knees to make sure they were still there. They were.

As he stretched his sleepy limbs, grimacing occasionally from the pain, his mind reached out to the hallway. He found the camera in the hall, and with great care he removed it from the circuit, linking it to himself instead.

As he prepared to run out into the hall and the world beyond it, the reality of his situation caught up with him. He realized the absurdity of trying to run without knowing where he would go. A profound sense of hopelessness settled on him. He sat down on the cold, sterile floor of the hospital and cried for the first time in over five years. For some reason, he knew he couldn’t turn himself in to the hospital staff. He knew he couldn’t trust them, even if he didn’t know why.

When Tz’alin’s tears finally ran dry, he stood up and looked at the hospital door. He knew what he had to do. His mind probed through a wealth of information, and through concentration and effort he hacked into the local government database. Once inside he located the schematics for the building and planned his escape.


Only the thought of freedom kept Tz’alin from breaking into as fast a run as he could manage to get out of the hospital. The pants he wore kept slipping down and he had to keep a hand in his pocket to hold them up. Tz’alin had realized that the hospital garb would have been too suspicious once he got outside, so he had ‘liberated’ some real clothes from another patient. A teenage boy on the same floor matched Tz’alin’s height of 5’6”, but the fact that Tz’alin only weighed 130 pounds meant the borrowed clothes were extremely loose. At least getting the new outfit had been rather easy. Just a simple hack into the boy’s medicine delivery system to increase the pain medicine he was receiving for his broken arm and the teenager nodded off to sleep. Getting him undressed had been the most difficult part of the operation.

After that it was merely a matter of taking over the camera system of the entire hospital and using it to cover his escape. He kept a virtual eye out for anyone walking in the halls so he could duck into a room to get out of sight. At the same time he sent the camera feeds into a continuous loop as he passed underneath each one to avoid detection. Tz’alin carried out the plan without mistake, and he walked through the front doors triumphant.

The world outside was far from welcoming though. The grim sight of reality was a jolt after the harsh white of the hospital, but Tz’alin quickly realized this darkness was good. Everyone was focused inward, and it would help him. He had to get away, far away from this place. But where would he go? Where could he stay? What would he eat? He desperately needed answers and he tried to think of a way to get them as he trudged through the streets aimlessly. The constant buzz of data drifting through his mind made it hard to concentrate, but then he remembered that he could use his abilities to help him. His eyes stayed glued to the ground in front of him and while he walked he reached out with his mind to the Matrix.

He didn’t get very far. With his attention divided he failed to notice the very large and very grumpy troll plodding right towards him. They ran right into each other. Tz’alin looked up in fear but the troll appeared to be glad to have an excuse to bloody someone’s face. His apologies getting him nowhere, Tz’alin ended up running into a back alley to get away. His rush led him through a series of passageways that deposited him at the entrance to a rundown underground transit system. At the last minute possible he scrambled through the archaic doors of the closest subway and hid, curled up in one of the seats.

Okay, but I have to wait and see before I can properly say anything else. There are certain points here and there you could have elaborated on but didn't, but I'm guessing there are better things than that to focus on. I still don't know what Tz’alin looks like.

Oh yeah, there's definitely stuff that could be elaborated on. But if I did that it would be even longer than it is now, and for a first chapter it's already freakin' long. ;)

Also! Let me just say that you're the first person to mention Tz'alin's appearance! :shock: Thank you. You're right. I'll add a description. :)

The second part of the story, just in case anyone would like to continue reading:




The Gathering Shadows, Chapter 1, Part 2:


Tz’alin rode in uncertain silence until he had no idea where he was anymore. The scenes when they rolled to a creaky stop grew progressively darker and seedier. Still Tz’alin didn’t move as fear of the unknown held him in place. Station after station went by, and it became apparent to him that, with no destination in mind, no amount of waiting was going to get him where he wanted to go. He finally sneaked out at one point and entered the world of crumbling pavement and bleak skies that was Woodinville in the Redmond district. Tz’alin wandered about aimlessly in a mixed state of equal parts awe and horror. This world was so different from anything he was used to. His musings, however, were pushed to the back of his mind when he realized the gnawing hunger that ate at him. His body expressed its displeasure at being cut off from the steady supply nutritional supplements, and his empty stomach growled restlessly.

At first Tz’alin looked for some sort of food vendor. When this failed he had to learn an entirely new way to survive. His first night on the streets was hard. He spotted an apple core on the ground in a back alley, but his disgust kept him from eating it. By that time it was so late at night that he couldn’t keep going. His legs ached from the stress they had been subjected to after years without use. Tz’alin sat down on the grimy ground and leaned against the cold brick wall. His mind was a chaotic mess and yet he felt oddly calm. He stared at the apple core and his mouth began to water. Tentatively, he reached out for it but sat back as he thought better of it.

For a couple seconds he just stared at it, occasionally tapping his knee to a tune he had heard long ago. His stomach snarled at him and stirred inside of him, eager to let him know how unhappy it was. With a frown Tz’alin leaned forward and picked up the discarded apple. He brushed the dirt off and turned it in his hands, looking in vain for a spot that wasn’t browned. Slowly he lifted it up, his expression a mixture of revulsion and resignation. He took a few deep breaths and then closed his eyes and opened his mouth.

“Tz’alin.”

The apple core bounced off the ground as Tz’alin jumped in place, hitting his head against the wall. His eyes flew open and he struggled to his feet to look around. A few people were walking on the other side of the street but the alley was empty: no one there but him. He frowned and shook his head incredulously, thinking he must have imagined the voice. But then it called out again.

“Tz’alin.”

His heart beating fast but his mind still unsure, Tz’alin managed to speak. “Y-yes?” The voice didn’t answer. He took a few wavering steps over to the opening to the street and stuck his head out, looking up and down the sidewalk. But it was late and there weren’t any people on the same side of the road. Tz’alin eyed a couple of thugs patrolling the sidewalk across the street until he felt a hand on his shoulder.

“Gah!” He jumped once more and spun in place. To his shock and dismay, the alley was just as empty as it had been before. Tz’alin’s chest rose and fell rapidly as his breathing became frantic. “I’m… crazy,” he said aloud. “I must be crazy.”

“No, you’re not, Zah.”

For the third time that night Tz’alin felt his heart almost stop, but this time out of joy. Only one person in the whole world called him ‘Zah’: his twin sister. “Sis, are you there? Faliria?! Where are you?” He stopped and waited, listening with all of his being. He could hear her giggling quietly but the sound died off as though it had rounded the corner at the end of the alley.

“No! Wait! Come back!” he yelled. He ran around the corner, hoping to catch up with her. But there was no one there either. Tz’alin walked halfway down the lane between the two buildings, his feet scuffing against the ground. He had been so close, so close to his sister! He didn’t know what to do or what to think. Was this his fault?

“Come on, Zah!” his sister’s voice called out some distance ahead of him. Tz’alin wasted no time in running after it. His heartbeat pounded in his ears and his legs burned but he kept going. He wasn’t sure how far to go or when to start and after a while doubt began to creep into his mind. Had he gone too far?

The sound of laughter instantly reassured him. He followed it around a corner and suddenly he was on a street again, a different one than before but still out in the open. Tz’alin stopped to catch his breath: he hadn’t run in over five years. His sister was still nowhere to be seen, and Tz’alin was beginning to think he was chasing after ghosts.

“Over here!” This time Faliria’s voice came to him crystal clear. He turned and saw a dim streetlight flickering on and off. Underneath it a lone vending machine sat in desolation. Tz’alin walked over to it and looked up at the light, wondering what he was supposed to do. A clunking sound made him look down, and he stared in wonder as the vending machine sprang to life. The springs inside began spinning and row after row of NutraSoy Energy Cakes fell off their racks. Tz’alin reached inside the machine greedily, grabbing up as many of the goodies as he could. He ripped the wrapper off one and gobbled it down. Then another, and a third. After the fourth he started to slow down and he only managed to eat half of the fifth. There were still more NutraSoy packets though, so he scooped them all up and shoved them into the pockets of his baggy pants.

With his hunger finally satisfied Tz’alin remembered what had led him here in the first place. “Thank you, Sis,” he whispered to the air. He looked around and listened for her voice but the empty street was quiet. Only the clicks of the flickering light above him broke the silence. He listened harder. A car alarm was belting out a steady tune of annoyance off in the distance, and a group of dogs were fiercely attempting to maintain their position as the most irritating noise of the night. He listened harder.

Still no sign of her.

Tz’alin sat down on the street curb and tried to think, tried to remember. His mind was still a buzz of activity: it seemed like he hadn’t had time to rest since escaping the hospital. The hospital. Why had he been in a hospital? He wracked his brain for why. He knew the reason was closely tied to his sister. Faliria.

Suddenly his eyes bulged and he his hands grabbed the concrete curb with an iron grip. It all came rushing back to him as his mind was transported to the last time he had said that name. “Faliria,” he mumbled under his breath. Then he shouted with all his might, “Faliria, NO!”

~

Born in 2053 and raised in the U-District of Downtown Seattle by wealthy parents, Tz’alin had known a life of luxury. His father held the prestigious position of Head of Neuropsychology at the University of Washington, and with it came the perk of abnormally lavish accommodations.

Tz’alin had grown up in the world of scholars and researchers. None of the other families in their neighborhood had children still in the home, so aside from his twin sister, Faliria, Tz'alin didn't know anyone his own age. This had led to Tz’alin developing a very strong bond with his sister, along with an aptitude for learning about everything digital. His parents had fostered his eagerness for knowledge, but had always been frustrated at his seemingly pointless interest in children’s science fiction shows. They tried to treat young Tz’alin as a student at the university, and were quick to forget his status as their son first and foremost.

Through it all, Tz’alin had developed a love for electronics, one that was closely complemented by the strange abilities of his sister. Faliria could communicate with computers in a way her brother could only imagine. The two of them grew to be close friends with a shared passion for everything digital. Tz’alin admired his sister for her talents, and he often logged into the Matrix to chat and play games with her, just because it seemed to provide a more real, more personal connection than talking ever could by itself.

One day in 2064, eleven-year-olds Tz’alin and Faliria snuck off to their favorite hideout, a closed and boarded up Hardware Etcetera. They had managed to find an entrance just small enough to squeeze through in the back, and they spent hours at a time in the wonderland of aging technology, browsing through the Matrix and letting nothing but their imaginations act as their limit. On this particular day they were engaged in a challenging cyber puzzle game when something went horribly wrong. Their first indication was an odd flickering that seemed to unravel the fabric of reality around them. By the time they noticed this oddity it was far too late. They both felt a tearing sensation, of physical loss. The tether that connected their minds with their bodies had been ripped. Through a chaotic void they floated, their awarenesses joining with the floods of other individuals trapped in the Matrix. The cries of pain and anguish affected Faliria heavily, and Tz’alin watched in horror as her mind wilted. He gave her as much of his own strength as he could, but in the end it was to no avail. Perception of time in the crashed Matrix did not exist, and after what felt like an eternity of suffering with no end to their isolated state in sight, Faliria’s hold on the real world faded away to nothingness. Her mind fell into the darkest corners of the Matrix, a shattered shell of its former beauty.

Tz’alin could do nothing but watch, and as she fell he too felt his determination slipping away. But the Matrix would not have him, not yet. As he crumpled under the pressure, his existence became a black swirl that would not be pierced for five years…

~

”Faliria,” Tz’alin repeated her name between sobs. He cried himself to sleep there on the side of the road.

I must say I'm interested.
Didn't find anything wrong, though Tz'alin hasn't really been described at all (it's been said already, though).

Yup, thank you. I can't believe I forgot to include a description, any description! And no one I've had read has pointed that out. So thanks! I went back and added/changed:





I have to fix up some things in the next section, but I hope to have it up by the end of the night. I'm glad it's interesting so far. :)

The third part. Things tense up as the rising action leads into the main conflict! Enjoy. :D



The Gathering Shadows, Chapter 1, Part 3:


The next few days were spent searching almost non-stop through the Matrix for Faliria. Tz’alin let his mind wander near and far across the wireless world, but it was to no avail. His supply of NutraSoy diminished until he was down to just one. Instead of eating it, Tz’alin decided to try and find another source of food. The streets provided his first lesson in begging, which quickly degenerated into one of stealing. The lesson went poorly; Tz’alin just barely avoided being captured and suffered several nasty scrapes for his troubles.

Several days went by and so did the last of his NutraSoy cakes. Tz’alin had to spend more and more time hunting for food during the day and safe shelter during the night, and as he focused on what he needed to stay alive his interest in the Matrix and his mysterious abilities was pushed aside. For a long time, his life was harsh. He slipped into a more animalistic state as he had to fight with other street rats for food and knick-knacks which could be turned in for food. The fear of being found and cornered by authorities or worse, a street gang, caused him to live a paranoid lifestyle without friends.

But eventually things did get better; Tz’alin became better at living the street life. By the time a month had gone by he had learned the art of being at dumpsters outside of restaurants at just the right time to grab all the scraps he could, as long as he managed to evade the other stragglers.

Only when his basic needs had been filled did Tz'alin really start to explore his newfound abilities. He knew he was different; what he could do was special. The way he could feel the flow of data around him, the way he could reach out with his mind and shape it set him apart from the other rundown occupants of the city, made him special. He found a relatively stable corner on the second floor of a long closed, disintegrating Stuffer Shack and spent a good deal of time exploring the Matrix. He often left his body behind to enter a new world of more vivid reality through the Shack’s curiously still-functioning node.

When in the Matrix, Tz’alin learned that he could do whatever he wanted, be whatever he felt like. He quickly styled himself after the hero of his favorite sci-fi simseries: Robonoids. He took on the likeness of a young, generic boy in a powered Battlebody Mk. III. With his robotic suit he set out to chart the vastness of the Matrix, finding chat rooms, databases, security systems and more. It was all available to him in a way he never would have thought possible.

It was during one of these days of virtual exploration that Tz’alin came across a very intriguing medical study. With keywords like “Matrix” “crash” “2064” and “symptoms” the article instantly piqued his curiosity. It detailed cases of severe psychological and sociological damage in survivors of the very horrendous event Tz’alin had gone through. Thoughts of his sister’s voice calling to him on his first night on the streets haunted him as he read:

“A large majority of those caught online during the Matrix Crash of 2064 experience a wide variety of afflictions, mainly psychological in nature, that can be collectively categorized as symptoms of a disorder known as Artificially Induced Psychotropic Schizophrenia Syndrome (AIPS Syndrome for short). It shares pathologies with post-traumatic stress disorder, attention deficit disorder, Gordon’s syndrome, and dissociative identity disorder.”

Tz’alin’s eyes grew wide at such disturbing news. He followed several links to other articles until he happened upon the results of a study run by the University of Washington that halted him in his tracks. There, at the top, were the words, “Research Director: Garith Rhom.”

The name jumped out at him. Garith Rhom was his father. Tz’alin swallowed hard, his memories drifting back to his childhood. The fight to survive had kept him so busy that the months had slipped by without so much as a thought about his family. With careful precision his mind hunted through the endless fields of data, sifting through academic reports, news stories, statistics collections, and government forms alike. His search extended all during the day and into the night, and by the time he came out of virtual reality he felt he had gathered enough knowledge. With the last of his waking energy he set the vital part of his plan in motion before dozing off.

When Tz’alin woke up the following morning he skipped any sort of breakfast; he wasn’t hungry. He boarded the underground transit for the first time since his escape from the hospital, but this time he did so with a purpose. In his field of vision he organized helpful virtual aids into windows, just as he had done on computer systems as a child. He used the information he could feel intuitively to plot out his course, and also to control the system into registering him as a permitted passenger. Tz’alin rode into the center of Bellevue before getting off as discretely as possible.

His ratty clothes set him apart, but the determination to meet up with his family overrode any concern this might have given him. While delving through the Matrix Tz’alin had learned some of what had happened to his family, but not all. After the Crash 2.0, as that horrible even was being called, the University of Washington had been forced to undergo some drastic changes to stay up and running. Tz’alin’s mother had died in a fire the night of the crash, and as for his father, the university had assigned him a smaller house in a more crowded neighborhood. Despite his best efforts, Tz’alin hadn’t found any mention of either him or his sister in any resources anywhere. This led him to believe that perhaps his sister was okay, and just in the same condition that he had been in. Tz’alin hoped meeting with his father would solve all that.

The night before, after his thorough search of the Matrix, Tz’alin had sent an encrypted message to his father’s new commcode. He knew his father would recognize the encryption; it was the very first one Tz’alin had managed to crack without any electronic aid as a child, much to the amazement and interest of his parents. The message was simple: “Meet me at the Gold Lion Inn, 1285 118th Avenue SE at 1400 hrs., Tz’alin.”

Tz’alin had picked a place he knew his father would recognize for their meeting. The inn where they were to meet was just down the block from the Cavilard Research Center. Tz’alin remembered the tour he had been dragged along for as a child. The stark white walls were a shining contrast to his father’s dark mood at the time. As Tz’alin briskly walked toward the Gold Lion Inn he pondered what would happen at their meeting. Would his father be happy to see him? Something in his gut told him ‘no’.

At exactly 1400 hours the doors to the inn’s lobby opened suddenly, and in strode the man Tz’alin immediately recognized as his father. The man hadn’t changed a bit. His impeccably neat suit and mannerisms gave off an aura of cocky self-certainty that had earned such outstanding success in his career, along with more than his fair share of bitter enemies. Tz’alin felt small in his tattered jacket and pants, but he stood his straightest as his father walked up to him.

There was no time wasted between them on cordiality. “What do you want?” his father asked as soon as he was close enough to talk discreetly. “Why did you contact me?”

“I want to know what happened. I... I want to see mom’s gra-”

“You won’t be going anywhere near her!” Tz’alin’s father practically snarled at him. The reaction sent the youth reeling. He had expected the curtness, but this was something more. “She’s gone, dead. And it’s because of you.” The weight of his glare was enough to force Tz’alin’s knees to lock and his lip to quiver.

“I don’t know wha-” he tried to protest, but his father cut him off.

“If you hadn’t convinced your sis- Faliria to go where you weren’t allowed, your mother wouldn’t have had to go into the building when the fire started. She wouldn’t have been still up there getting your body when the beam fell.” His eyes drifted out of focus, but he never once dropped his stern look. “Severe contusion, internal cerebral hemorrhage. Dead before help could arrive.” He focused in on Tz’alin once more. “And you are to blame. For that I can never forgive you.”

Tz’alin fought back tears, swallowing hard. “I’m sorry, I didn’t... Father, where is Sis? What’s happened to her?”

For a brief second his father looked like he was about to turn and walk away. But then he smirked sardonically and shook his head. “She’s gone: her mind. It’s completely gone. I have her body in deep freeze, but without her mind...” His words trailed off and he looked at Tz’alin with a suddenly different air about him. Tz’alin shivered inexplicably at the shift in attitude. “I wonder,” his father continued, “how you came to your recovery. I must admit that your message came as a bit of a shock to me. I double-checked with the hospital, and for some reason they show that you are still there. A quick search proved otherwise, obviously... but for all their systems knew, you are vegetating in your bed at this very moment.”

As his father spoke, Tz’alin felt pinpricks of information traveling through the air about him, the buzzes building up frequency and increasing in proximity. He listened to his father with only half his attention, using the rest to quickly hack into the hotel’s external security cameras. What he saw frightened him beyond words. Armed men clad in the uniform black of a government response team were in positions just outside the door. Tz’alin backed out of the system and scanned the room. While his attention had been focused on the conversation with his father, the room had quietly cleared of people. The clerks, the couple arguing over their luggage... they had all left the room.

His father looked at his son with a nod of approval. “Yes, you’re figuring it out, aren’t you? If you have one redeeming quality, it is your ability to piece things together. You know that we can’t let you go. You have managed to wake up after a five-year coma. Your brain might hold the answers to save Faliria... and that is a trade I’m willing to make.” He smiled an eerie grin as he said it, and from his coat pocket he deftly withdrew a sidearm of some sort. He slowly held it up towards Tz’alin, his movement slow with the concentration of a man intent on having his revenge. “You will stay still. There are some men who will escort you back to the university.” Then, in a lower voice, he boasted, “You are going to make me world famous as the man who solved AIPS.”

Ah, it's getting a lot more interesting now.

I'm a bit confused about the father. It seemed like he was being driven by revenge and the need to save his daughter, but the last sentence doesn't fit.

[Edit] Avwolf commented on your story? Where?

You... must be some sort of literary genius. You keep noticing things no one else has. That's a very good point. I wanted him to love his daughter far more than his son, but also a greedy man who wants fame. I guess I can't have both and will have to choose, huh? Or try and work them both in better. Thank you for pointing out the dissonance though!

EDIT: Avwolf's comment can be seen right here because he is an amazing guy. But I appreciate all advice, big or small. :)

Good job so far!

Poor Faliria :cry: . I was kind of seeing her as a "digital guardian angel", before it turns out she is lost in the matrix (or is she...).

I never had played Shadowrun before. Is it sort of like DND?

"Or is she?" indeed. :wink:

Yes, Shadowrun shares similarities with DnD. And by similarity I mean they are both systems of numerically classifying reality to allow it to be played in game format.

However, having played both I can honestly say that Shadowrun is immensely better than Dungeons and Dragons. If you've never had the opportunity to learn about it, you can check it out at wikipedia.

I just took a look at it. It does seem rather interesting, mixing scifi and fantasy together. I found it interesting that the elves, dwarves, etc, were born out of humans :!: . In most fantasy games, it is the other way around. I don't know if I will ever find the time to play it (college), but I would not mind giving it a shot :) .