Continuity Corporations : Chapter 1 - Orientation

 JULY 17 2021

A scent of sterility hung in the air, coupled with a dull chill that bit into flesh raw and tender. Albatross opened his eyes. There was a mask across his face, covering his nose and mouth. Clear plastic fogged from breath. White robes framed his dark skin and he lay atop a soft mattress. Something hanging over him like a gantry, an IV drip dangling. A curtain and the smell of medicine. A warmness settled in his chest; had he caught a fever?

"Best sleep ever, isn't it?"

His eyes darted to the side, hair falling into view. It was a deep red colour, amber and orange. Richer than his skin or the robes he was draped in. A man was sitting on the chair beside his bed, draped in a doctor's coat. He wore a black suit across his body and a silver mask completely smooth and expressionless across his face. His hair was choppy, brownish in tone and greasy, a stethoscope slung around his neck. Albatross winced.

"Where am I?" He muttered. His voice bore a thick accent, a cockney accent. The man turned to him.

accent. The man turned to him. "Medical wing. Your operation is finished – the implantation? We spoke about it before."

"Oh, yeah." Albatross feigned remembrance, the man moving to his side. His voice was raspy and slimy sounding, not the kind of tone one would find easy to trust. As Albatross looked up, weak in the muscles as sedation waned, he found that he did not have much of a choice.

 "Francis Albatross: A-65." The man said, "The implantation was successful. We were able to recover much of your hearing; what you can hear now is put through a cochlear implant and amplified through ELO-17. What can you remember?"

Albatross thought for a moment and found himself tense. He relaxed into the pillow and closed his eyes.

"There was an explosion," he said, "A... a fire. It was a slave bunker, some kind of-"

"No, not that. Do you remember what we spoke about?"

Albatross paused.

"Uh, no. I remember... you spoke about some fire. And there was a woman there, with different-coloured eyes and white hair?"

 The man nodded. Albatross remembered his name, then, fragments of memory falling into place. He was A-1: Cerebellum. The surgeon.

"Yes." he said, voice slushy and textured through the modulator of the mask, "She is Agent Gemini, your new boss." He sat down again: "We spoke about your implantation. Don't let the memory loss bother you, it's quite normal and will... fade with time." There was a pause and he reached over to the bedside table, a hospital terminal that seemed to balance medical equipment that seemed alien to Albatross. A-1 flicked through some files, handing them to the prone man; he lifted his hand up to take them, though found his muscles weak. His grasp was not strong.

"There are several implantations," A-1 continued: "ELO-17 is the major one. It now sits on your skull and has been successfully paired to the pineal gland of your brain. The procedure was entirely uniform. The secondary implantation," he handed the man another paper, "Is that of PMAGE. Or 'Pyronic Mage'. Grandiose title, I know. Elsewise you were given skin grafts and cochlear implants."

Albatross winced. The letters seemed to merge together into a conglomerate whole, the words too big and complex and medical to make out in his current situation. He grunted.

"You'll feel a slight discomfort," A-1 continued: "A mild pain in your chest alike a fever. It will subside when your body adapts to the change. The core body temperature has been artificially raised, as have all relevant endocrine and enzyme functions. You may have to eat a diet of protein to abate the accelerated function of your organs, but..." the man paused as he looked to Albatross' physique, bulky and muscular. "That shouldn't be a problem."

Albatross nodded as the words fixed themselves, letters turning from disjointed masses of gormless symbols into decipherable sentences and paragraphs. It seemed that the two implants, tiny chips that clung to his brain, worked in accordance of one another. One was a central computer that altered the brain's function; made a gateway for further investment. The other was a specific function that entered through that gateway, altering body temperature. He put down the papers and looked to the surgeon.

"It will be a week or so before the two machines pair. Short-term memories will return in that time and you will receive formal training from your new work colleagues." He reached over and pulled the mask off of Albatross' face, cold air filling his lungs. He winced. "You were lucky," the man continued, "Your operation was largely internal. ELO-17 and P.MAGE are small implants, relatively speaking, and the skin grafts you received were top-of-the-line. Biotech products, those." 

Albatross looked down at his flesh. It was all the same dark tone, smooth where it should be smooth and rugged where it should be rugged. Hair grew atop his legs and pelvis and arms and chest. Skin grafts?

Searing light. Heat rushing towards his face. A roar alike a dragon. 

He looked back to A-1, who was carrying a handful of clothes over to the chair he was sitting on. The man was squat and fat, with a hunchback posture and greasy disposition. He reached over and removed the pulse oximeter from his finger, then removing a cannula and tearing the tape off from around the back of his hand in a picking, fumbling motion that hurt more than having the needle plucked from his veins. Albatross sat upright and flexed his hand, strength returning to his muscles. He turned to A-1, who was plodding over to the door. He paused, hand upon the handle, and turned to face Albatross. His silver mask, expressionless and without eyes nor mouth, seemed to glare through him.

"The clothes on the table. Change into them. Your boss waits outside, she'll show you where to go."

 He slunk out of the door, which clicked behind him, and Albatross sat in the silence of the medical ward. The sterile smell hung in the air, the windows shining with white light. He stood and dressed. The clothes were simple. There was a full body suit, black, of some sort of elastic. Rubbery, it squeaked when it folded and shone in the light and smelled strongly of plastic. There were fabric parts woven into the interior. He pulled it over his body, though it took some effort, and then slipped on the grey trousers and gruff boots that had been tucked under the chair. There were gloves, grey, that came over his hands, their elastic wristbands clinging tight to the latex of the suit, a grey camo vest, puffy and protective, sitting beneath them. He paused momentarily.

Puffy white vests, people holding guns to me – screaming in Russian? Swallowed in flame.

He drew a long breath and pulled the vest over his torso. Folded under it were two blue arm bands that wrapped around the bicep: "VERITAS", either said. Beside them, leaning against the backboard of the chair, was a mask of silver. It bore two rectangular eyes and a wide grin, triangular and devoid of teeth. He held it up to his face, wrapped the strap around the back of his head, and felt the cool metal against his skin. The suit wrapped around him, clothing atop that, the mask over his face.

Francis Albatross: A-65.

The woman was waiting outside the small room, in the hallway that joined the individual private medical wards together. She was sitting on a small bench of wood, beige pillows atop it, head resting backwards against the wall. The wall was bisected, a large and rectangular indentation running its entire length: a shelf that contained plants, flowers and vines atop soil. A terrarium, sealed with a long window that blended seamlessly into the wall. The woman sat and looked up, her gaze drawn down as the ward door opened and A-65 stepped out. He looked different to the burned, deaf man she had encountered in the medical ward prior. Even sealed behind suit upon suit, and with a face behind a mask, he seemed healthier than he had, then, gibbering and whispering about something unseen and unheard; about the accident that had landed him in intensive care.

Gemini looked to the man and stood from the bench. She was sleek – not thin nor gaunt but athletic in build, pale-skinned and with platinum white hair. Her eyes were different colours, left golden and right blue, and she wore a blue denim jacket atop her black, blue-trimmed company garb. Her hands clanked and rattled; she wore black gloves that went from wrist to finger, metal hinges at the joints alike those of a medieval knight's gauntlet. The gloves looked almost alike life support machinery, flickering with lights and tubes. Some were small and clear, flowing with a liquid alike water. Others were larger and woven into the metal of the gauntlet innately, unmoving even as Gemini put her hands in her pockets.

"A-65." She said. Her voice was calm, perhaps a bit Norwegian, with a high-pitched inflection. "You probably don't remember me. We spoke briefly before you went under?" 

A-65 shook his head. He remembered her face yet nothing more. Gemini seemed to nod understandingly. She gestured with her head for the man to follow her and he did so, trudging behind the woman. The building he found himself in was utterly unfamiliar; he hoped that perhaps she knew the way. Her white hair fell beside her face symmetrically, framing the golden crown that sat upon her forehead like curtains. There was a disc atop her forehead and it flickered a green colour.

"We went over your new job. I'm a more senior member of the company you work for."

"I have a new job?"

Gemini paused for a moment. She gestured down a left corridor and they took it; as they walked, A-65 saw several other people walking down the halls they passed through. Some were masked, though only a few – one bore a mauve shirt and a magenta sash, one pink hair with a shark like grin. One had hair parted midway, half orange and half black. Another was the surgeon, ducking into another medical suite. The majority, however, were not masked. Like Gemini they wore the company suit of black and blue and all bore the crown of metal across their foreheads. The hallway was large and seemed to be split in the middle, the centre a lower level and the two hallways balconies that overlooked it – people sat or leaned, talked to one another or marched across sterile tiles to head elsewhere. It was busy and bitterly cold.

"Where are we?" A-65 said. His voice was modulated by the mask, cockney accent turned to a metal rasp that instantly took the attention of Gemini.

 "You're at a facility." She said, "You'll be told of all this again at your onboarding. It's secure." She spoke in a matter-of-fact, brisk manner that jolted out to A-65. It was not a lot of information. She continued:

"You're in Canada. A long way out from home, and you might stay here for a while."

 A-65 felt his heart begin to pulse. Canada?

"The facility is actually mountainside," she said, "The warmer parts descend into the crust of the mountain itself. Mount Asgard. It's as clean as a hospital, contains office spaces, technology labs, auditoriums and dormitories. Around fifty people live here. You'll get to know them, soon.

"Fifty?" He muttered. Gemini nodded.

 "Split across eight companies. All living here and working here."

"I don't understand."

 "You will."

She smiled though it did not seem genuine. They continued walking, passing more hallways and doors before standing in an elevator and waiting as the doors slid shut.

"What is done here, often, is secret. Hidden from the general public or from people who would otherwise seek it quashed."

"A conspiracy?" His voice was shaky and confused. Gemini shook her head.

"Not quite. Nothing that's done here is illegal, just proprietary. Kept under wraps."

"And the government?"

 Gemini smiled.

"Those who need to know, know."

 A-65 looked to her, the eyeless gaze of his metal mask seeming equal parts neutral and confused.

"Why me?" he muttered. The question seemed to put Gemini on the spot for a moment and she shuffled on her feet, though an answer revealed itself in their minds.

 Burns and scars. Bleeding ears.

"You were involved in a serious accident." Gemini said, "One that would have taken your life. Continuity Corporations stopped that from happening and now, it seems, you are indebted."

"To work for them?" 

She nodded. There was a strange silence that passed through the elevator, broken when the door slid open. They were at the lowest floor of the facility.

"Don't worry," she said, "It's not cruel. You'll be paid fairly and it won't be forever. Just until-"

"Until I can pay off my debt?"

She nodded solemnly.

"And the secrets?"

"Don't worry, A-65. It's been sorted out. No-one knows who you are. No one even knows what you look like, aside from me and a few others. Anyway, what you'll be working in doesn't concern that at all."

Gemini walked across a large auditorium, triangular in shape with another internal balcony at its top. One wall was in its entirety a window, a great and divided pane of glass that overlooked a tremendous scene. A-65 stopped. The room they were in overlooked a valley, of ice upon snow upon rock, great jagged edges of grey stone pushing up through the land like caltrops. It was night, dark, the valley lit only by a myriad of shining beacons that oozed pure, white light. There was a pathway between the valley, flanked at either side by the tremendous facades of mighty sloping mountains.

"Canada." He reiterated, turning to Gemini. She nodded. "How did I get here?"

She shuffled on her feet.

"Continuity Corporations bears several branches: the facility you're in is one of three. One is in England, nearby to where your accident took place. One of our operatives found you. Perhaps you'll get to thank them, one day."

A-65 was not sure whether or not that last part was a joke and moved back towards the centre of the bare room in follow of Gemini. She lead him deeper into the facility, a winding path of hallways lit through lights of burning white. Were it not dark through the windows he passed upon occasion – snow battering the glass from the outside churn of a blizzard – he would have never known it to be night. It seemed the facility bore its own internal clock.

Veritas was a handful of chambers interconnected through a large and cylindrical hallway, one that extended horizontally and branched off into several antechambers and hallways. At the central corridor lay, divided by a wall that stretched from floor to ceiling, a desk. A reception of sorts that greeted A-65 as he stepped out from the rotating bulkhead door and into the dim, moodily-lit tunnel. With a half-pipe forming the ceiling above him, metal panels along the walls and the moody, dim amber lighting across the complex, it seemed almost alike a bunker or eccentric nightclub. The glowing symbol of Veritas shone on the wall behind the desk: an eye, open, with two triangles protruding like lashes – or rabbit ears – from the lid.

"Looks like no-one's home." A-65 said. Gemini gave an expression, whether scoff or laugh, that A-65 could not discern.

"I assure you that people are."

"It looks like a bunker in here."

 "It was." Gemini put her hands, still clad in the metal plated gauntlets, on her hips and grinned: "The whole plot was among the first of the spaces built when the site was construction. Largely empty, used for storage and such; a warehouse. It's only been renovated in recent years.

"What do you do here?"

Gemini walked forward, opened one of the side doors, and stepped into a dimly-lit room. A-65 followed her. The door was a great metal tile, handle a vertical bar. It lead to another room, dull and dim, almost alike a lounge in form. The employee lounge, perhaps – there was a stairwell in the middle of the room and a handful of chairs and tables dotted about. Behind a partition lay several other desks, some with phones and desktops, filing cabinets lining the walls.

Three women sat within, all seeming tired and fatigued. One was short and older than the others, with stark ginger hair and glasses. One was taller and more muscular, black-haired and wearing a beige cardigan. The third was lean and sunken, with mousey brown hair and dark eyes. There was a silence among them.

It was not long before A-65 learned their names, confused though he was at the current situation. The ginger was 'Virgo', the gothic-looking woman 'Libra' and the brown-haired 'Caprica'. It seemed that, Gemini included, Veritas had an affixation to the zodiac.

A-65 tried to get comfortable as Gemini spoke. A sense of awkwardness sat deep within his stomach, knotting itself into a coil of weary emotion. He tried to listen as Gemini spoke, yet found himself overwhelmed and exacerbated by it all; the memory loss, the difference in situation, the bizarre casual nature of the four women around him. Was all this official? Gemini stopped talking and looked to the man, as did the others, as if awaiting some kind of answer. He looked between them for a moment, voice modulator stuttering as he spoke:

"I-I'm sorry, could you repeat that?"

"Your birthday." She said, "What's your birthday?" It was only then that he realised that Gemini held a clipboard and pen in her gauntlet-encased hands.

"Fifth of June." He mumbled. 

"Year?"

 "Nineteen-ninety one."

There were more questions and more answers, seemingly mundane and formal. Places of residence, working experience, education and the like – it was as if he were stuttering and mumbling his way through a CV, much to the tire of Caprica, Libra and Virgo. Gemini finished writing and clicked the pen, handing the clipboard to Virgo who gave it a cursory glance, standing and wordlessly moving to the door.

"Congratulations, A-65." Gemini crossed her legs and put her gauntleted hands upon her lap. "You're hired. Welcome to Veritas."

"... I thought I was already hired?" A-65 said, confusion evident, as Caprica rested her head upon her arm. Gemini shook her head.

"Not entirely. Perhaps my description of your situation was not entirely accurate: Continuity Corporations paid for and expended resources for your full recovery. This included the implantation of their proprietary technology, it seemed."

"Against my consent?" A-65 protested. Gemini gave a shrug, face confused and sympathetic.

"They saved your life. I don't know what legal right that gives them over you, but – for a moment there – you were dead. Longer than would have been survivable under standard medical care."

"How long?"

"I don't know," she shifted, "... but a long time. When I first saw you, you were considerably worse for wear than you are now."

A-65 looked to the ground. Gemini leaned forward slightly. She continued:

"It'll be alright, A-65. I mean that. And I meant it when I said that the job had been selected for you. You were examined, closely examined. That was just your formal application."

She looked out the window, which shone light onto the darkened valley beneath. Caprica straightened her back, tired, and looked to the man.

"Come on." Gemini said, "It's late. I'll show you where your dorm is."

"Dorm?"

 There was a pause.

 "Sure," Caprica said. Her voice was calm and quiet, almost a whisper: "You'll be here now, man. At least whilst you stay with us."

Gemini stood, as did A-65. There was a smile on her face, though again it did not seem genuine, almost distant or confused.

"There are others there," she said, "Other new hires and people who know who you are. Administrative teams and such. We'll take you there tonight, and in the morning we'll debrief you and give you some training. You'll get your shifts soon enough."

He nodded and went to speak, though stumbled over his words. The modulator gave out a rasping chuckle that made Caprica smile. He paused and sighed, looking to the three women.

"Could-could I have something to eat? I've not eaten since I woke up."

The cafeteria was open, it seemed, though did not have much to display. It seemed like the kind of food A-65 would perhaps have eaten in a school lunch or when working at a contractor. He had been a builder, before this, and the memories of those long days stuck in his mind. Of course, he had no funds in his company account, nor had a company account at all. Gemini bought him a dinner, a sandwich and some confectionary. Not much, though enough to get him going. He recognised a few other people in the room who wore masks, taking their purchased food and walking elsewhere. The pink-haired man and mauve-shirted. They stuck out in the crowd, and followed the trail to the dormitories. Trails were all across the facility: lines that dragged across the floor and walls, orange and yellow and blue that split out from the white tile. Eight companies, as Gemini had said, the dormitories and cafeteria and external facilities. Veritas bore its own trail, a magenta line, that dragged alongside the line to the medical ward along the wall. They followed the dormitory block and saw several others. They all seemed tired and exasperated. Some stood in what seemed to be a smoking lounge, others wandering into bathrooms or sitting elsewhere. The door to the dormitories was an airlock of sorts, a bulkhead that sealed behind the three as they entered. Libra had remained in the cafeteria, Virgo unseen as the paperwork was filed. Caprica shut the door behind A-65 and Gemini, face tired and seemingly unimpressed. The room was a tight space of dark grey metal, the floor a great grate and the walls nestled with tubes. It seemed cold.

The doorway opened, vault-like bulkhead rotating and splitting along a bisection to collapse into the ceiling and floor, and the source of the coldness became brazenly evident.

This block was, technically speaking, outside the main facility. Gemini wrapped her arms around her torso as they stepped out – the passageway was a great central trail, almost alike a road, with a section that lead through an underground ramp, flanked either side by massive walls of black. Windows shone looking into the space and turned the snow into a mass of shining glitter, the ramp and road before it sitting parallel to the opening that the three Veritas employees had stepped out from. It was a small door, a hatch in the side of the façade, and – as A-65 walked out into the darkened trail – he made note of the larger, vault-like hatches that stood monolithic across the lower half of either wall. They almost looked alike the entrances to a warehouse, alike rusted teeth that shone brown-grey in the sterile light. The three moved out from the hatch, stepping foot upon snow and tarmac, and walked towards the left wall; an opening like a square crevasse in the side, lined with the blue of the dormitory trail, stood solitary in the monolith. Warmth picked up again inside.

The interior of the external half of the dormitory block was a single hallway, bulkhead doors opening and shutting to seal the warmth of the building inside. From there, the three walked out into a wide central space. A-65 looked up. The space was a great cube of white tile, sterile and segmented, split into three levels with each bearing a ring-like balcony around it, and the doors to many rooms across the wall. Were a tower to be in the centre of the structure, A-65 figured that the dormitory would make a perfect panopticon.

"I don't think you appreciate your situation, Albatross."

In the hospital bed again. Sterile smell, white light. Searing pain, abated yet apparent. Arms burned to a crisp, skin flayed from bone. Flesh a charred red. Horrible smell. The door clicked shut; A-1 looked through the window. A flash of white hair across the pane of glass, someone leaving him behind. The masked man, hunched, waddled over to the table, standing beside a man who leered down towards him. He leaned over the railing and peered, through eyes framed with silver glasses, down to A-65, hair a brilliant and metallic gold. One hand was mechanical, whirring and tapping the frame. The other coiled and gripped, knuckles whitened through pasty flesh as he swayed back and forth.

"You have three options ahead of you." The man spoke in a horrible voice, smooth and sterile as the hospital tiles that stood across the room. A-65's eyes were blurry and stung with great pain. "You have death at the hands of your burns, imprisonment for your arson, or work – for us."

The door clicked and swung open; the pale and bespectacled man turned in annoyance or aggravation. Two figures entered. Both were tall and thin. One was a young man, gaunt in the face, the other a masked individual with a mauve shirt and magenta sash. The man with glasses snarled, and yelled a roar for him to leave. The masked man did so; A-1 loomed over the table as Elohim, CEO of the company A-65 had been revived by, marched up to his bed. There was a look of disgust, perhaps worry, on his face. He looked over to the man with glasses. A-65 did not realise, until then, that said man wore a mauve shirt. His mechanical hand clicked the table.

"What do you say, Scalar?" Elohim said. Though he stood a full head taller than the man there was a reverence in his voice.

JULY 18 2021 

"Good sleep?" Gemini waited outside A-65's dorm. There had been an alarm set for him the night prior, a schedule proclaiming where he should go come the morning. It seemed hazy, that night, yet he ate and slept and understood it better. It seemed there was little, truly, he could do: in the wardrobe were sets of the plastic-smelling bodysuits he wore, folded vests and gloves. He threw on the clothes and fastened the mask. There were posters, not only in his room, but in the whole dorm block addressed to the few alike him who wore the silver masks, veiled threats to keep them on. Indeed, the mask locked onto the plastic balaclava and sealed itself in an almost airtight fashion. Mechanical vents in the cheeks, hidden beneath vine ducts, drew air within as he breathed, the mechanical throat expulsing the exhalations and passing vocal tones through the modulator. He had stood in the mirror before he had left, pulling on the silver mask as if trying to tear it form his face. It did not budge, only loosening if he undid the body suit and let air fill the gap between skin and rubber. 

"Alright." He said. Gemini nodded. The man's voice seemed to have a stronger tone to it now, body language remaining in showing a weakened, confused disposition as others around him marched with the purpose of a new day. There were not many present at the early hour of the day A-65 found himself in, some leaving their dorms and walking, bleary-eyed, to the frigid hallway that connected the external dorm block to the internal laboratories and offices. 

"Do you know where we're going?" Gemini asked.

A-65 recounted the schedule that he had found the day before, the one what had been fastened to the board beside his small bed with thumbtacks. It was a timetable of sorts, a schedule for the events of the week. "Orientation." he said. Gemini nodded.

"You've been hired," she said, departing from the wall and walking towards the exit of the block, "But you've still yet to learn about the company. The circumstances surrounding your hiring are unusual, after all." "Is it common?"

Gemini hummed in question and turned to the man as they slipped into the airlock hatch that separated the dorm block from the outside snow. A-65 reiterated: 

"Is it normal? To be hired in this way." 

Gemini thought.

 "It's uncommon." Was her answer, and those words were her answer alone. She lead A-65 through the complex, through the hallways of white tiles and clear light, and forward into a lobby lush with carpet and sofa. The carpet itself was a purple colour, the corners dotted with potted plants. Ahead lay a reception, a woman sitting behind it, curly-haired and with a mauve shirt. A-65 frowned behind his mask. Gemini stepped forward to the woman, speaking briefly before she stood and lead A-65 to an aside room. There was a hallway lined with doors, benches against the wall devoid of windows. It looked almost alike the hallway that Gemini had met him in outside the medical ward. Gemini told him to sit – that she had something to see to, and that the person he was going to was very important in the company. It seemed alike a blur, the unease of the situation setting in as she left him in the hall. He sat, the only one there, and looked down the doors. They were almost identical, the benches established at routine intervals before them and the purple carpet thoroughly vacuumed. A click came from the door before him as the handle depressed, metal door swinging open as someone stormed out. A65 recognised them. It was the masked man with the purple shirt and blonde hair. He stormed and stomped down the hallway, seemingly annoyed or upset, and shot a glance to A-65 before departing the corridor. 

"You can come in, A-65."

That voice too was familiar.

The chair was uncomfortable and A-65 wondered if that was on purpose: to put him on the spot or grate at his nerves as he sat before Scalar, mechanical hand tapping the desk. Uneasiness coiled in his gut as the man looked down through papers, shooting a glance up and smiling hollowly to the man.

"A-65." He said, "Or, rather, Francis Albatross? What do you prefer?"

"Either is fine."

 The man's smile unnerved him greatly. His mechanical hand tapped the desk, a magenta sash folded to its side as the man read through his papers.

"I hope our hiring practices didn't perturb you," he said, glancing up through his glasses, "We're not usually so blasé. We thought it best to get you immediately acquainted with your team and thought that such an introduction would be... suitable for an operation the scale of Veritas." He flicked a page. "How are you feeling?"

"In what-what way?"

 "Any way." The man's voice was coolly calm and bore an accent similar to Gemini's.

"I feel... confused." A-65 said. Scalar nodded.

 "Yes, that's quite normal. You have my apologies in that regard; the operation performed on you by A-1 strips you of a handful of short-term memories. Unfortunate, considering that they are those most pertinent to your situation." He placed the papers down and raised his hands, clasping them together and staring down towards A-65. "They shall return in time. Do you know who I am? You can be honest."

A-65 paused. The man continued to stare and he felt a deep pressure behind him. He buckled, though in what regard he was not sure.

"I remember you from the hospital. You and A-1 spoke to me."

 The man nodded.

"Can you remember what I said?"

 "You... offered me a job? It's quite hazy."

Scalar reached to flick through a few pages before turning one over atop the desk, reaching to grab a pen and point to a clause in the page.

 "Albatross, you were involved in a serious accident that stripped you of your life. It is a fortunate coincidence that you were saved, yet, with that revival, came consequence." He looked up to the man through his glasses"

"Do you know what I mean?"

A-65 shook his head. 

 

"The accident was seen as an arson by the law, one that – unfortunately – took the lives of some others who could not be saved. You were, from some views, responsible for the accident. The law would have you interred in prison. We were able to come to an agreement."

A-65 paused.

"I killed people?"

Scalar shook his head.

"It was an accident. It was only by technicality that the law wanted you in prison; we want you here. The clause of your revival was, in essence, the sealing contract between you, I and the company: full-body skin grafts. Cochlear implants, motor function returns and proprietary technology: ELO-17 and P-MAGE. I trust A-1 informed you about these?"

"Briefly."

 Scalar gave an exasperated sigh, one tired and from the chest. He apologised, though it did not seem genuine, and explained the nature of the two implants embedded in A-65's skull:

"ELO-17 is what we call a 'Gate' implant. It's the proprietary technology of Continuity Corporations and is used by the vast majority of the staff. This is typically implanted with the user's knowledge and consent; your case has been unique. The technology used to save your life necessitated ELO-17's implantation. Without it the procedure could not have been completed. This also served to be... how do I say... a method of coercion?" The man paused and A-65 shifted in his seat. "The implantation is innately proprietary to Continuity Corporations, you must understand. As morbid as it is to say, it would not have been granted to you were the situation not so dire. It was in the best interest of the company to give you it, as was it in your best interest to take it. You having that implantation in your skull makes you a prized employee, so to speak. It's part of the reason why you are not dead, just as it is part of the reason you are not in prison."

"So what happens now?"

"Now you have a new job. I understand this is a quick change from your norm, but I can assure you it should be a comfortable change. You will work for the company, be paid by the company and live here for some time. Believe me, it will look astonishing on a CV."

"And what is my job? What do I do?"

 Scalar paused, flipped through a page and handed it to A-65.

"Veritas." He said, "Is an investigation committee that was created in 2017 to act as a middle-man between Continuity Corporations and United States military divisions. With our proprietary technology we can investigate, detain and gain commission through Veritas through means that – simply – are not possible elsewise."

A-65 looked up to the man. That bunker-like tunnel and mellow, moodily-lit room did not seem like an investigation committee.

"There are wider branches." Scalar leaned back in his chair, "That are found elsewhere in Continuity Corporations. There is much bigger branch – the founding branch, nonetheless, in the British 'Cohesion' site. This offshoot has only recently been started and is in dire need of manpower. Previous job experience seems to indicate that such a role would suit you." A-65 thought for a second, Scalar pushing over a handful of papers for him to examine. ELO-17, P-MAGE, the accident and Veritas – it was all a lot to take in. He looked up to the man, glasses glinting down upon him. A65's voice remained weak and confused.

"That's quite a coincidence. That I would suit a job this company needs."

Scalar nodded.

 "A very lucky coincidence, for you."

Valium mumbled as he stomped down the hallways, following a path he knew too well as a sensation of restlessness broiled in his limbs. A mumble, a scorn a wish of difference. He sighed, modulator letting out a rasping cough-like sound. He hated Scalar, pompous and righteous and demeaning, always so scornful and snarky and wearing an expression that made his stomach turn as his hand tapped at the desk. Demoted. What a joke. A handful of people passed by the roaming man, few awake and fewer assigned to shifts at the hour. A majority of the facility was always empty, too big for the handful of people that lived and worked here, always cold and hollow even as visitors came and went. He filed into one of the lower auditorium rooms, a pyramid-like space with a triangular floor, an atrium with a window that overlooked the valley and an escalator that lead down to the car park, warehouse and Veritas bunker. He sat, and looked to the window. It was only a few moments before a jittering sensation coursed up his body and he stood again, silent stillness transitioning into a pacing as he marched back and forth. Limbs in motion as he glared to the window before him, out into the snow and mountainside and the bastion of black that served to be the external wall of the facility. A chime – the elevator opened and a man stepped out. "You alright, Valium?" Asked a shrill and metallic voice. He turned. It was Ecstasy, thick pink hair mottled with patches of frost.

"I'll live." he grumbled in return, sitting before standing again and returning to his pace.

"I was told about it. It's unfortunate."

 "Yeah, unfortunate." He mumbled: "And what are you doing, now?" Ecstasy turned to look out the window for a moment, showing a stillness that Valium could scarcely express.

"I'm sorry, Valium. I think I'm taking your place."

Valium stopped pacing for a moment, looking to Ecstasy before bowing his head. Shoulders sagged; the man seemed defeated, limbs hanging slack for a moment before the shaking returned. Even the voice seemed more defeated as the modulator spoke out simply in a lower, more monotone chime. 

"I see."

 Ecstasy walked up to the man and put a hand, gloved in black fabric, upon his shoulder. The mauve fabric of his company shirt was thin and he could feel shaking underneath it, the man jittering as if cold or overindulged in caffeine. The silver mask, expressionless as it was, seemed perturbed.

"I'm tired, Ecstasy."

 "I know you are, Valium. Perhaps now you can get some rest."

Valium shook his head and leaned forward, placing the face of his mask against Ecstasy's shoulder and brushing his strawberry-pink hair aside.

 "I don't think I will."