{"sf1_id":263707,"sf2_id":"5nzDvKNe","title":"Sector 48","author":"Modder","words":1749,"posted_at":"2011-07-01T21:18:00.000Z","tags":["opression","wheelchair"],"url":"https://fse.anthro.fr/stories/263707-sector-48","original_url":"https://sofurry.com/s/5nzDvKNe","image_url":"https://www.sofurryfiles.com/std/thumb?page=263707\u0026ext=.jpg","description":"","content":"I worked on this story for a couple days, but then I got bored of it and didn't touch it for a couple weeks.\n\nHere it is so far, if people like it, I'll probably continue it, if not, well whatever.\n\n---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nEach morning for the past twenty years its been the same thing.\n\nWake up, get dressed, go to work, pretend to socialize, go to bed.\n\nAnd today is the same old drill, 7,000 days into the \"state of emergency\"\n\n7,000 days of our totalitarian occupation from our own governement.\n\nEven before I open my eyes I can tell you whats waiting, above me is the light blue haze with fluffy clouds\n\nfloating through it.\n\nOpening them, its the same story. A clear blue sky with clouds floating through it. If you look at it long enough,\n\nwith your eyes not quite open all the way, it almost starts to look real. Almost.\n\nIn reality, its rare to see the sky at all, and when you do, its not the idyllic blue they show us, the factories took\n\ncare of that years ago, no, now the skies are a dull gray, any time you see it.\n\nGroaning I pull myself into an upright position. The holoscreen on the wall is depicting the morning news, some\n\nstory about victories on the warfront. Anyone with a brain knows it's a lie.\n\nShaking off the last strands of sleep my room comes into focus. Sometimes I wish I could have something\n\nnicer, the floor is your typical grey polymer, the walls a \"simulated sunrise\". Piles of clothes cover the floor.\n\nReally its not to bad, I'm lucky in that. The only thing really wrong with it is the size. Think prison cell meets\n\n747 bathroom, yeah, that's about how big it is.\n\nHauling myself out of bed I slide into my chair. I was born a paraplegic, and this chair is my life. They have\n\nnewer ones, fancier ones. Ones that propel themselves, ones with adjustable heights, ones that can go down\n\nstairs. Personally I think its all shit. Its shit for the people who want to pretend that they're not any different,\n\nwho want to pretend that they're just like any other fur who walks around these parts. I like my chair, it\n\nreminds me that life isn't fair, that everyone isn't equal, that even a communist dictatorship cant make\n\neveryone the same in the end.\n\nWheeling across the room I open the fridge. Per usual, its empty, nothing but an old rotten looking apple and\n\nwrapper that fell off a jug of milk.\n\nHuffing I head back towards my laundry. The simulated sunrise is starting to change from a pink to more of an\n\norange.\n\n\"Claire, mirror please.\"\n\nThe wall infront of me slowly changes from the sunrise to a reflective surface. Staring back at me was the\n\nsame grey wolf that's greeted me for the past twenty seven years, the same angled features, the same\n\npiercing blue eyes. Rolling towards a pile I dig out a shirt and pants shimmying my way into them I cant help\n\nbut chuckle, the same process which used to take a good twenty minutes is now not even worth noting.\n\n\"Claire, standby.\"\n\nThe voice controlled rooms were also their idea, convenience for the common good or some shit. Personally I\n\nhated them, while they were convienient at times, I would have still preferred to do those things by hand if it\n\nmeant I didn't have to have the ever present being in my room. To me it represented the oppression of the\n\nrule, and all of the \"laws for the progression of the populous\". I hadn't chosen the name for Claire, she had\n\nbeen selected by the department of home life for me, based solely on my gender. Any male fur gets a female\n\nAI, to reinforce the ideals of being with a woman. If you were to marry you would be given a new AI to share, a\n\ngenderless one.\n\nSighing I moved towards the door. I was a outlaw, hiding in plain view. I broke the law by existing. They had\n\noutlawed homosexuals years ago. They rounded up all of the self declared homosexuals or people who were\n\nflamboyant enough to gain notice and sent them off to \"correctional facilities\" to have their \"confusions\"\n\nstraightened out.\n\nRolling down the hall I hear a door open up ahead, a young fox in a chair rolls into the hallway. Jessica was one\n\nof my best friends, I met her when I moved into the handicapped living center. She has a lot of the same views\n\nthat I did, chairs aren't a handicap, their a saving grace, a way to stay different from the pack. She was also an\n\noutlaw, a lesbian by nature, in a farse of a marriage to keep from being sent off to be straightened.\n\nWe often met up in the mornings she worked a few buildings down from my work, she worked in public\n\nrecords, I was in finance. We rode the same train in, I'm not generally a sociable person, you start letting\n\npeople into your life, they start learning about you, you start opening up, and then they turn around and share\n\nany small fact about you with public information for an extra day off from work or some crap like that.\n\nWe went through our morning commute, there weren't two slots for chairs open on the same train so I let her\n\nget on the first train. She was flustered over some server failure and needing to retype a couple dozen\n\nrecords. I didn't mind, there was a nice little eatery in the train station, and it meant I would be able to get a\n\nbite to eat before work.\n\nRolling in I slid up to my usual seat, a booth for two in the corner. I was able to have a clear view of the whole\n\ndiner as well as the trains from here as well as being far enough from any of the holoscreens to have to listen\n\nto whatever bullshit the deparment of media was spewing to the masses today.\n\nAs I nudged myself up to the table I heard a crinkle. Looking down I noticed a small packet on the floor. I\n\nreached for it, I like this place so to pick up a bit of garbage that some other patron had left behind seemed to\n\neb the right thing to do. Only once I had it in my hand did I realize what it was, a data chip, usually you only\n\nsaw them in a government office, but you could buy them on the open market if you were so inclined. No, that\n\nwasn't what was unusual about it. What was shocking was the word stenciled on the side. Jack Sanders, my\n\nname. Flipping it over the only other marking on it was a circle, with one arrow crossing it, and another\n\ncontinuing on from the edge of the circle. Panicking I jammed the thing into my pocket and started flipping\n\nthrough the menu. A lizard waitress ambled over to me.\n\n\"Marnin Jack, what can I git fa ya? The usal?\"\n\n\"Sure Marge, that sounds great.\" My voice was shaking, I knew that she noticed but after coming in here for\n\nyears she knew it was pointless to ask me anything personal.\n\nI shoveled down my sausage and eggs, swiping my tag to pay I headed for the train, I was due at work at 900\n\nhours and it was already 845.\n\nTrains are both a blessing and a curse, they're nice in that they let you sit and think for a bit. They're a curse\n\nfor the same reason. I kept turning the chip over in my hand, what could be on it, who put it there, and how did\n\nthey know I was going to be at the diner today. Hell I didn't even know that until a few minutes ago.\n\nThe doors to the tram slid open and furs began to file out. Terrapin station was one of the busiest on the grid\n\nand during rush hour it was a total mob scene. Heading for the elevator my chair was jostled more than few\n\ntimes. Once the morning rush reaches a certain point people stop being able see anything but themselves and\n\nstart walking into you.\n\nI reached my office just as the 900 tone went off. That was the only good part, as a pile of papers almost to\n\nthe ceiling had already beaten me to my desk. That's one of the things about finance, it never ends, and its\n\none of the most mind numbing tasks on the planet.\n\nThe rest of my workday passed uneventfully, mountains of meaningless numbers came and went, my inbox\n\nshrank and the outbox grew, and the 1700 tones couldn't come soon enough.\n\nAs I started my commute home I suddenly remembered the data chip, it had sat quietly in my pocket for the\n\nentire day without my even noticing it. Reaching the handicap living center I rushed towards my apartment.\n\nSwiping my tag, the door opened with a mechanical woosh. The simulated sun was just starting to set.\n\n\"Claire, box 43.\"\n\nA low pitched hum could be heard as one of my stoage baxes was retrived from somewhere in the basement.\n\nAs I waited I took out the chip, there was no mistaking it, it was my name on the side of it. A Soft \"bing\"\n\nannounced the arrival of my box. Rummaging through it I found what I was looking for, a tablet. The one I\n\nchose was particularly ancient, and incredibly slow, but it had one feature that my newer one didn't. It wasn't\n\nattached to the grid. Anything I did on it stayed on it and would be reported to the deparment of information\n\nusage.\n\nFumbling I booted the thing up. The ancient mechanical fan hummed to life as I stuck in the data chip. On the\n\nscreen text started to scroll.\n\n:HRF\n\n:Jack Sanders\n\n:Sector 46\n\n:Go to-\n\n:Sector 48\n\n:Building 9\n\n:Level 7\n\n:2300\n\n:END DATA STRING\n\nA soft sizzling sound started to come from the data chip as some blue smoke rose from it. I rushed to my desk\n\nand wrote down the message on the chip. There wasn't much to it. My name and location, and a place and\n\ntime whoever it was wants me to go to\n\n-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nSo, please comment.\n\n  \n  \n\n"}