1. Welcome To Angel Falls


    Date: 11/2/2014, Categories: Fantasy & Sci-Fi, Author: Liz, Rating: , Source: LushStories

    Alice?” “She is your domestic artificial intelligence assistant, of course.” “Of course,” David muttered under his breath. Desperate to relieve himself after the long drive, he stuck his head through a couple of doors until he found the bathroom. Everything was made from a material that looked like polished black marble, yet it seemed to have an unusual iridescent lustre to it that exuded a sense of opulence. “I couldn’t help but notice there’s no toilet paper in here,” he called out to her, “but there is a huge shiny crystal thing sat next to the toilet that someone’s probably robbed from a diamond merchant.” “Ask Alice,” replied Vala with just a hint of irritability. “Lots of things have changed since your time. She will explain how everything works.” She stopped at the door and turned to David as he walked back into the room drying his hands on his pants, “I’ll check in with you on Saturday to make sure you’re settling in okay. If you need me for anything urgent, my Ident-Code is on the top of the financial statement I gave you.” “Wait. I have a question,” he said quickly as she was about to leave. “I was curious about something that occurred to me earlier. There were a lot of those freezer tank things back at that other place. The ones with people in.” “Yes?” “Well, aren’t they all super rich when they’re brought back as well?” “Hardly,” Vala replied, slightly amused. “Most of those people will be housed in one of the city’s residential blocks and be placed on a living ...
    benefit until they find a job. The banking collapse of the twenty-second century wiped out most of the accumulated wealth of the population, including those in cryo-stasis. Very few financial institutions survived and fortunately for you, yours eventually became Aeon.” “Oh,” David said with a blank expression on his face. “Lucky me then.” “Is there anything else?” “I don’t suppose you fancy showing me a smile before you leave?” he asked, his eyebrows raised in a friendly gesture. “Goodbye, Mr Williams.” *** David leaned heavily on the window wall, it was cool to the touch. He was sipping an electric-blue drink which had been deposited from behind a small glass panel in the wall when he had enquired if there was anything to drink. It tasted sweet and fruity, but unlike anything else he could compare it to. It also seemed to be glowing slightly in the dimness of the room. It was only a luminous drink, but even the small things seemed deliberately unusual as if to keep him on edge. The view had rendered him speechless when he’d eventually worked out how to disable the shade-screen feature of the windows. His entire smart-glass wall, floor to ceiling, had faded from jet black to completely transparent, revealing the awe-inspiring panorama before him. As the sun set over the distant alien cityscape, the sky had turned from a deep gold to an eerie blood red, something he assumed was due to either chemicals in the atmosphere, or the global warming problem that Vala had mentioned ...
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