Grove 0: The Chase

Tina Murphy stops to catch her breath
In the shadows of a filthy city alley.

Rain runs down the walls,
Carrying oil,
Blood,
And everything else
Central City leaves behind.

She presses herself against the bricks,
Listening.
Nothing.
For a moment.
Then,
Bzzzzzzzz.

Her eyes widen.
No.
Not again.
She has been running
For nearly an hour.

Always the same sound.
Always getting closer.
A mechanical hum,
A faint metallic whine,
The unmistakable sound
Of something hunting.

She looks behind her.
The alley is empty.
Then a shadow moves
Across the wall.
Tina recoils.

“It found me.”

Her breath catches.

“Run.”

Grove 0: Cyberwolf Sky

High above Central City,
Above the neon,
The smoke,
The endless din.

Dennis Hotham sits upon the edge
Of a rooftop.
Seven storeys between him
And the concrete below.

Behind him,
An old air conditioner
Grinds and rattles,
Its rusted housing
Shivering beneath the rain.

Around him,
The rooftop shanty town sleeps.
Makeshift shelters
Built from corrugated metal,
Plastic sheeting,
Broken signs,
Old machine parts,
Anything that can keep
The rain from getting in.

A city above the city.
Far above the streets.
Far above the noise.

Dennis has come here
For the silence.

Fifteen years.
Fifteen years
Since his family disappeared.

Fifteen years of searching.
Fifteen years of sleeping badly,
Waking frightened,
And wondering
If today might finally be
The day he stopped looking.

Cybernaughts

We are hardwired to provide maximum resolution,
Once there were eyes, now cameras are the solution,
Life means desperation for the technologically devout,
The sky outside remains dark ever since the blackout,
The landscape is rain soaked where the buildings stand tall,
Here, where we were nearly wiped out by a nuclear war,
So many missiles, unchecked AI sub routines fired those,
Using cold machine logic to destroy unknown human foes,
So, this is our world now unhappily ever after,
Where eyes keep recording and headsets transmit data,
The wealthy moved off world, and the poor were displaced,
Desperate people become cybernaughts, lost in digital space.