Date:Unknown
Time:Unknown
Location:Unknown
Days must have passed, or maybe it was only hours. The door was still blocked with debris and the darkness inside continued. The absence of light made it impossible for Theo to know how long he had been there. Despite the annoyance of being stuck in a small space for seemingly endless quantities of time Theo couldn’t help thinking he couldn’t have picked a better place, the walk in fridge in the basement of 'The Bazaar' was ideal for most situations. The room itself was under ground and just big enough for a few hundred tri-cooled sterile storage containers. But it wasn’t the size of the room that mattered, I was the contents of the boxes that made the room ideal. Neatly stacked within the coffin sized crates were hundreds of ingredients used in the world renowned restaurant that once was The Bazaar. Unfortunately the explosion must have destroyed the power supply so the boxes were no longer self cooling and only had seven days before they reached room temperature.
'All useful information' Theo muttered to himself 'if only I knew when one day ended and the next began.'
A scratching at the door jolted Theo out of his thoughts. What was it? A rat? No to big to be a rat. Theo backed away from the door stumbling over empty food cylinders as he did. The scratching continued, sounding almost metallic. A sudden crash and tumble of rubble. What ever is out there it isn’t small. The dust beyond the fridge window cleared and a small channel of dust infused light peered in through a new hole created by...well what ever it was, it had a single red eye that flickered, un-blinking through the dust covered glass. The S9-OCD droid unit flickered a second time and continued to dig away at the rubble heaped around the door.
The droid unit had only been in use for nine days before the explosion. Four of them had been bought to replace the human chefs with rapidly efficient speed of new technology. It was this new purchase that put Theo out of his normal job as assistant, the new droids were so efficient they replaced eighteen human staff leaving only a fridge stocking job. This unit itself was a spherical core suspended from the ceiling with multiple robotic arms equipped with every thing you might need to cook with. The Organic Cybernetics Division was responsible for all artificial intelligence used in major commercial companies world wide. Within the spherical core at the centre of ever model was a bank of stand alone, service class intelligence chips. Along side these chips is a genetically human brain which allows for emotion, sympathy and empathy as well as understanding commands and possessing them logically, when the chips configure the commands into a highly efficient method resulting in emotive and controllable service droids. The droids first command is always to aid human life in any way possible, in this case by digging Theo out from under tons of rubble dust and twisted metal.
Suddenly there was a crash, followed by a clatter of stones. With a click the door slowly edged open. Fresh air did not grace Theos lungs. What crept in was not a relief but a choking cloud of brick dust. As the little of the outside world disappeared behind the shroud of dust, Theo spluttered, stumbled and tripped over a misplaced cooling unit. His vision went from grey to red to black.
The first sense to return was the pain, a dull throbbing in the back of Theos head accompanied by a sharp pain at the base of his skull. Next to return was smell. A strange sensation, fresh air after the unknown time underground. Stranger still was the scent that followed, a combination of oil and mechanical burning, a smell that stung the nostrils. Dust. Dust was definitely a theme here. It coated his face and made it hard to swallow. It was up his nose and in his mouth. Theo raised his arm carefully and rubbed the dust further into his eyes. After a moments blindness and with tears in his eyes Theo looked up. The sky. The sky was amazing, shades of red and orange combined with a dark swirling mass of cloud pierced only by a single defiant ray of sunlight. There was no blue sky. No fluffy sheep clouds from the typical water colour painting, just deep shades of crimson. Something had happened to make the sky as beautiful as it was, perhaps a solar storm or...
'Theodore Pen-Truche, I am glad your awake.' said a voice so suddenly Theo jolted out of his dream-like trance. He whirled around. The red light flickered at the movement and edged back. 'I mean you no harm Theodore Pen-Truche.'
'Who are you?' demanded Theo knowing it was a redundant question.
'I am S9-OCD droid 3 of 4 refer---- --umber 20455' the droid replied, the flickering power morphing synthesised words into crackles accompanied by flashes from a severed wire hanging loosely from the core. As the sparks flew it was clear what the mechanical burning smell came from.' I dug you out of the food compatible storage you call a fridge following my first programmed rule.' it continued. ' The explosion appears to have destroyed the whole bazaar, it was against all odds that you even survived'
Theo looked at what remained of the one place he had come to love. Chunks of concrete the size of cars hung from the construction girderslike spiders from their webs. Glass glinted on every flat surface and splintered remains of ornate wooden tables stuck out of the wreckage at obscene angles. Even now small flames still licked at the wreckage. One window still seemed mostly intact, a single standing triangular point. The flames and wreckage gave a ghostly reflection of a young lad, perhaps a little under six foot. The simple black suit of a chef now a light shade of grey hung loosely over his chilled features revealing wide, hunched shoulders and a narrow waist line. On his feet were simple laced shoes of black fabric disappearing under black work jeans that were about two sizes too big. Theo sighed and stared back at his reflection with bright blue eyes that bore into the reflection as is willing it to show him what to do. He continued until his long, blonde and dusty hair into his eyes. Rubbing the dust from them he realised that no one was here. After such a big explosion surely the emergency service droids and their handlers would be here? Theo turned and saw what he wished he hadn’t...
