For The Ground Below

The dagger's weight felt like a presence of evil at my side. A weapon of mass destruction. I didn't like the way it felt... the way it made me feel. I felt powerful in an odd way. It was just a simple dagger. Okay maybe not your normal dagger being made out a diamond and all that. Yet it still had the same purpose of a steel dagger. It was dangerous and protective all at the same time.

I walked through the hallowed hallways of my family's marble mansion with foreboding feeling. The cold and loneliness seeping into me as I went. My house had never felt like a home. My parents were never anywhere to be seen, so it felt like I was living all alone.

"Marlowe!" A metallic voice rang through the room sounding as excited as a man-made human possibly could.

So maybe I wasn't completely alone in the dull, cold place that was my home.

"I've made the buns you've requested." The clanging of trays filled the kitchen as I pushed the door open.

I couldn't keep the small smile off my face at the sight of my father's metallic butler. He was wearing his standard uniform: a pure white suit that shone untarnished just like his sparkling steel face. His silver eyes were scrunched in a focused squint that looked so human. That's what he was to me. A human... and one of my only friends.

"Thanks Jonas." I replied as he pulled a steaming tray out of the oven.
The sweet smell of cinnamon and sugar drifted through the air and calmed my pounding head. A pain that had been with me for as long as I could remember. The pain of a nail being hammered into my skull. I had no idea where it came from and I wasn't sure if I ever would.
"It is my pleasure." Jonas droned his standard line. "It is my programming."

I almost jumped at his last statement. It had been spoken in the usual monotone, but this was new. Jonas had only ever said his programming and had never once before used sarcasm.

I gave him a wary look as he sat the hot tray on the counter and went to grab paper bags as was the usual. Maybe he was more human than everyone thought.

"I know it's in your programming, so you have to do it..." I wanted the words to sound true. I wanted Jonas to believe me, even though I wasn't sure a robot was capable of such things. "But if I could change it... I would. I feel bad making you do all these things for my dad and I."

Jonas tilted his head to the side and though he wasn't physically capable of smiling I was sure there was something like a sad smile in his eyes. "My programming is my life." His monotone voice said dully. "My programming is my reason."

I'd heard those line many times in my life, but they still made my stomach drop. I didn't like the way Jonas couldn't do anything he wanted. I didn't like the fact that he couldn't really have any desires or thoughts of his own.

"I know." They were the only words I could come up with. What could I have said?

Sighing, I grabbed the paper bags from Jonas's outstretched hand. Every morning since my thirteenth birthday party and my mother telling me not to care about the people in the Sewers I had packed four paper bags of food for them. I needed to help and it was the only thing I could come up with. Every morning. Four bags of food dropped in the Sewers in a hope that someone would be helped.

The cinnamon buns had cooled to a pleasant heat as I grabbed a few napkins from the counter. There were a dozen buns, so I had enough to stuff two in each bag with a few napkins. After stuffing the bags and pinning the tops safety shut with a large paper clip on each, I grabbed an old shoe box from my school bag to make carrying everything easier.

Once the routine was done I grabbed one of the remaining buns and sat facing the wide floor-to-ceiling windows that cover one whole wall of the kitchen. The sky was dark with the promise of rain on the horizon. It looked like the day of my thirteenth birthday and the reminder of that day made the dagger on my hip burn.

Trying to ignore the weight at my side, I took a bite of the bun. It was still fairly hot and burned the roof of my mouth a little, but the sweet cinnamon stuck to my tongue. I had never once in my life had to worry about where my next meal would come from. Food was a necessity that I had plenty of, but I never once took that for granted. I savored every bite like it was a rare delicacy.

"Thanks Jonas." I wanted him to know that I appreciated him and everything that he did even though he was programmed to do the things that he did. "These taste amazing."

Jonas had walked up to the windows, his metallic skin reflecting the grey colors outside. He looked like a painting made with dull colors, yet the picture was more beautiful than the scene it represented. "Your pleasure is my pleasure."

The words sounded cold with the storm reflecting in his eyes. I didn't like the way he said them. It felt... wrong? I wasn't sure want it was, but it wasn't right.

Swallowing the last of the bun, I got up and walked to stand beside Jonas. The world outside was as cold and uninviting as the house I lived in. There was nothing of color. Everything was just varying shades of grey; large, dark, slate tiles made the ground itself. Just the dark tiles with skyscrapers scatter across them and the occasional mansion like mine.

I lived in an artificial world made on the thirtieth floor of the many skyscrapers that had once made the magnificent New York City. A new world that had been made to separate the wealthy from the overpopulating middle class and poverty-stricken poor. May 23, 3050 was the day of Commencement; the day the above ground was finished and the upper class left the Sewers.

The Sewers. A place so dark, damp, and devastating it was said that the people who lived there were no longer human. But I couldn't believe that. For as long as I could remember I have always wanted to visit the Sewers and help the people there, but my parents had never let me.

Like my mother had said that one night, "Remember, my boy, to never concern yourself with the problems of inferior people."

"Sure mom." I mumble under my breath and placed my hand against the cool glass. "Whatever you say."

I stood with Jonas looking out at the giant black hole in the sky until was it's time for me to leave. The black hole was like a drip of ink making a once flawlessly painted world tarnished. Just like the dagger at my side, the darkness seemed to call to me. It begged me to let myself be consumed in the void. I just closed my eyes and shook my head in an attempt to ignore it.

A faint ghost of heat was left on the window as I removed my hand and walked towards the door.

"Bye, Jonas." I said with a small wave.

He never responded. One thing Jonas had never been programmed for was goodbyes, so I left him standing by the window. His looming build glowed in the downcast sky as I closed the kitchen door behind me.

Not knowing this was going to be the last time I walked down the white, marble steps, I left my house behind forever. If I had known what would happen that day... my last day... I would have said goodbye. My house had always been cold and vacate, but it was still my home. It was the place I had lived in my whole life. A giant, white mansion in a land of dull colors. Why the rich would build such an ugly place to live was beyond me. I mean, come on... would it really hurt to live life with a little color?

My dirty, antique converse {I still don't know how my dad had found them} smacked against the flat, slat tiles that made up the ground beneath my feet. My world was suspended thirty floors over the ground level on tiles of slat only five feet thick... sounds safe right? Well we haven't had a problem so far.

Looking up at the sky and the looming black hole, I made my way to the closest drain. A hole in the slat ground surrounded by a simple fence. The drains allowed any rainfall or trash to be thrown into the sewers. It was also the only place I could try and make contact with the people living below me.

Everyday before school I did the same thing.

Taking the first paper bag in my hand I looked down into the black depths. It was a void without an end; like a black hole on the ground. I held the bag out over the drain.

"May a person find this treasure." I started my usual speech and let the first bag drop. I had no way of knowing if what I did each day would help, but I always did it anyway.

"May it bless one beyond a fantastic measure." A soft breeze tugged at the base of my shirt as I dropped the second bag. I could smell the rain in the distance. I didn't need to look at the sky to know a storm was brewing.

"May a true difference be made." The third bag sank into the darkness as a bright spark of hope warmed my chest. I had to be making a difference. Maybe it was a small difference, but it was still more than anyone else did.

"May the suffering of all survivors soon fade." I finished as the last bag faded away.

I felt a little lighter, but my heart was still weighed down with sadness. I wanted to do more, but I didn't have anything else. I could just keep dropping more things into the drain like I always did, but I wasn't even sure if anyone was being helped by that.

Thunder rumbled softly as I looked up at the black hole. I felt like it was laughing at me and my pathetic efforts. On its own accord my hand lightly brushed the dagger at my side. I signed at myself and shook my head. What was I going to do? Stab a black hole?

I didn't have a watch, but my internal clock told me I was about to be late for school... again. I didn't really care, but my dad would be mad if the school called him while he was working. I was still at least a ten minute walk from the school, so I was forced to do one of my least favorite things. Run.

It's not that I'm inactive... I use my dad's workout room four times a week to lift light weights...

{Oh, fine! Who am I kidding? I didn't start working out until after I died. And I only started working out so I wouldn't die again. Not because I wanted to}.

So I started to run knowing fully well I would be out of breath within ten minutes tops.

I really hated running.