The Rise Of The Consortium

Rio waited for her mother to wake up after she came home with a quick takeout. She felt excited just to carry the food package from the nearest eatery. She couldn't feel any strain to walk the ridiculous one-way road to go to her home. For the first time after many days, she felt satisfied. She felt as if she achieved something great in her life. Her elation made her forget other important things to do.

"Mom, wake up. The food is getting cold," she called softly once again which was responded with a slight hum. "OK, coming." a mumbling reply was heard to Rio, but she was on her way, to clean the table. There was almost nothing on it, expect the dust that gathered from many months. She wondered how it was just like that. But there's no time to think about it. She has a lot of things to do.

She went ahead to clean the dusty wipe in the basin in the kitchen. Although there was nothing, the kitchen looked dull. Whether it was the approaching evening or the old interior of it, she couldn't tell. Maybe the light will determine. She switched on the bulb only to find it flickering. What was the reason? She needed something to reach there and check it. She looked around for a ladder or something similar. But there wasn't any, not at least in the kitchen.

She wandered around the house to find it, but it wasn't in the drawing-room either. She thought maybe she should have a look at the storeroom in the backyard, where tools were generally stored. The backyard was behind the back door in the kitchen, where the storeroom was located. Opening the door, the musty smell filled her nose. She instinctively switched on the light on her right side. The first thing that was visible to her was an old glass cupboard. But instead of some crockeries, there were lots of books. She went inside the room towards it but she brushed past a table that screeched. She looked behind her to find a table that was quite unnoticeable under the shade. She then remembered she had to fix the light bulb, for which she needed something to reach there. She looked at the cupboard with a

There was a tall table. But on top of it, there was a big box full of papers she didn't want to bother with.

She table wasn't too heavy to be lifted, and with little difficulty, she brought it in the kitchen and jumped on it with a torch and a screwdriver.

"What's the noise?" her mother asked groggily walking towards the table where the food was kept.

"Just checking what's the matter with this bulb." Rio unscrewed the bulb that was attached to its holder. She looked at it against the remaining afternoon light but didn't find any sign of a disorder.

"That can be done later. Why don't you have some food first?" her mother said as she pulled a chair and sat down. "This thing's not working for months."

"That's why. It's needed." She looked at the holder through her torch instead. As soon as the light fell on it, solidified shiny silver material was stuck to its grips. A tiny drop of the silver liquid made its way from the inside of the holder and fell on the floor. The tiny bubble was formed as soon as it touched the floor and soon it was all dust.

"Ugh." Rio looked at her mother who also looked from the dust towards her, wondering the same thing, when will the dust go?

"This thing is never meant to be gone. Now don't waste your time there. Come and eat." her mother looked away and focused on her burger instead.

Rio felt gloomy for a moment thinking about it too, but she realized there's indeed a solution to it. "Just a minute." she hopped from the table and reached for her bag which was lying near the couch. She pulled out her nepgimet spray and jumped on the table again. She sprayed till all the stuck silver got out of the holder grips. They flew away like dust and the holder was clean of it. She rubbed out the remaining with her finger, to which her mother made a grumbling sound with food stuffed in her mouth.

"How can you just touch it like that? Don't you know what it does?" said her mother worryingly to which she Rio smiled in response.

"It doesn't react much after being sprayed. See, I'm fine," said Rio showing her right index finger to her mother, who only furrowed her brows and muttered something under her breath. Rio put back the bulb on its holder and it glowed. So the bulb was fine, not the holder. She wondered how the dust gathered up there. Does it come from the electrical wires?

Rio jumped off the table and cleaned up the dust that was lying on the floor. she looked around and thought there were a lot of those to clean. But she has to eat first as her stomach made a low grumble. As was going to put away the table near the main door, the broken glass pieces were noticed by her. The way her mother threw that vase towards her replayed in her mind. She has to know why that happened.

She sat down on the table after cleaning her hands. She thought about how she should ask her mother about the last night's incidents. But she couldn't think of any, so she gave up instead.

"What happened? Why don't you eat?" her mother broke the silence first.

"Nothing. I was thinking how did you get home, just like that?" Rio asked not daring to look at her mother directly.

"What do you mean just like that? I felt fine after lying too long in that hospital bed, so I thought I could go home on my own. So I did." her mother spoke in a lively manner, that made Rio feel that the nurse was right. Perhaps it was only a minor illness, and nothing serious. She felt guilty for asking when it all indicated that her mother was fine after all.

" Now that you saw I can come home on my own, don't ever go to the hospital to pick me up. Got it?"

"Why?"

"Cause I said so." her mother pushed off the chair to get up. "Now you can go if there's really a necessity. But not like the way you ended up a few days ago. It was unnecessary." she said disappointingly.

"Is it because of my father?" Rio had her head lowered but inside her mind, she was thoroughly shocked. What did she ask her mother? She never thought of asking this. A question whose answer was much needed but she didn't want to ask like that. She looked up to meet a shell-shocked face of her mother.

"Wh--What did you just ask?" her mother's voice came out trembling. "What does this have to do with your father? He's dead for seven years. Don't you know?" Rio sensed the tension in her mother's responses. It just can't be true, she thought to herself.

"But I heard that he was in the city hospital. Isn't it true?" What am I doing? Why am I asking this? One part of her mind felt as if whatever she was asking was wrong and the other part made her think she needed to know things she has been hearing a lot. She can't believe she doesn't have one true statement of the event. It's either her father passed away or he's in the hospital and no one knows about it.

"He was admitted there, before he went away, forever." her mother broke down as she said.

"Then why I shouldn't go to the hospital?"

"How can you just forget about it?" her mother's rage intensified with her tears. "Now I wanna sleep.," said her mother as she got up furiously towards her bedroom. After a few minutes of a continuous flow of water and occasional sobbing, she went to the kitchen to have a glass of water. It followed with a large thud of the door.

"HOW MANY TIMES SHOULD I TELL YOU TO SHUT THE DOOR?" her mother howled before rushing to her bed.

Rio sat there wondering what just happened. She thought about what should be the truth. Whether whatever her mother said was true or the stranger she met today at the factory was true. She didn't know who else to ask. Maybe her mother was right. She felt maybe her mother really was true. She looked at her mother who occasionally sobbed in her sleep. Maybe she was sad when she was made to remember those things.

Rio thought whether she really hurt her feelings.

But the truth was to be known, part of her mind thought this. And it also doesn't sound true.

Oh shut up, didn't I just hurt her? Do I still have to know the truth? It's the truth after all. My father is no longer alive. He has been dead for years.

It's not true.

Then whoever claims my father to be alive better shows me the proof. Else I'd be charging them. It doesn't matter anyway. There's only me and my mother. She earns, we survive. I should be helping her instead. Not just hurt her like this. So many things to do, how can I just sit here thinking what has passed?

The other voice can no longer be heard.

She got up from her seat, feeling stiff after sitting like that for about an hour. The outside was completely dark, only the light from the kitchen was the source. She dumped the waste in the bin and washed her hands. She forgot to clean the wipe cloth, so she cleaned that with water. She looked closely at the water which didn't look quite clear. What is really going on?

Rio spent about two hours cleaning the kitchen which was covered with dust. She dumped all the waste without thinking whether it could be used again. Things are not touched for months, will this be useful ever again? She thought that while looking at the things before dumping them. She looked at her mother's bedroom door to make sure it was closed. She didn't want to wake her up again. Although she cleaned quite silently, there was occasional noise from the work.

Many of the light holders were covered with hardened silver dust. She used up the spray until the dust flew away on their own. All the lights of the house worked fine as she cleaned each one of them. She thought she would fix the bedroom of her mother's later on. After that, she tried cleaning the carpet but she found there was too much dust to clean. And she just ran out of her nepgimet spray. She irritably rolled up the carpet and dumped its backyards. The house looks much better without the carpet, she thought to herself.

There were many things she ran out of in her home. She tried taking a mental note of what needed to be bought. But she feared she might forget it soon. She remembered there was a memo in her worker ID. She searched her ID in her pocket, but couldn't find it. She searched for her backpack and checked all the pockets. It was stuck in her tools kit. For a moment she felt baffled about the whereabouts of it. It was scary to lose it like that. Everything depended on it. Without it, no one will recognize her.

She took notes of what has to be bought. She wondered how the house had been running without things. Was her mother really staying there? Oh, she went out at night most of the time, so that might be a reason why the house was like that. She sighed as she couldn't do anything except to fix things in her way.

After almost everything was cleaned up including her room, except her mother's room, she threw herself on the bed. She felt comfortable lying after such long work hours. She thought what was the reason behind all these. Apparently, the silver dust was the reason.

She pulled out her ID to connect to the intercom. She looked for a search engine, to read articles about the silver dust. But there were a lot of ads that got in her way while reading. She got irritated swiping away all of those. Maybe she can read on a bigger screen. She looked at her monitor screen, wondering whether she was too tired to read more. But this irritates more than anything. An article won't hurt her.

She switched on her monitor to connect the intercom with it. She thought about whether there was any other way to connect it rather than just activate it from her ID. As the monitor came up with a welcome note, she quickly did a search about how to connect the worker ID to the monitor. There were instructions on how to do that, but most of them were to connect it from the ID. There was only one way, which is described as a way to put the ID in the slot behind the CPU. The risk would be not being able to receive emergency work messages. She checked her notifications to see whether there was any listing. But she thought she never applied for night jobs, so there can't possibly be anything at that time.

She put her card without hesitation. The connection was a bit faster than the ways she tried before. She quickly searched the article about the silver dust. She clicked on many articles but most of them said the origins of the swirl were unknown. She didn't feel quite satisfied with it. How can there be anything without a beginning? After dozens of articles, there was one, quite plain and ordinary. It was much of a blog post than a popular article site.

She skimmed through the long text and concluded that it came to sight after the severance. Although there is no found link between the severance and the silver swirl, no other theorist can find a reason for that. Many tried reaching there, but without any success. The inside of the swirl s.u.c.k.e.d anyone who tried getting closer to it.

There is also an account of several ravagers who unexpectedly formed groups to raid on the swirl. Their first attempt was to throw random objects which advanced to launching explosives. After many thousand attempts, one day those explosives were launched back at them. They soon got back their things the way it was launched towards the swirl.

Many people tried flying into the swirl only to return paralyzed and unable to account for the journey. Some have theorized the inside of the swirl to be made of ice and darkness, while others claim it to be full of raging tornadoes. As more people are gathering around it nowadays, the general citizen has piqued an interest in it. All the accounts of the ravagers and observations of the journey are being studied now. While there is no clue what makes it the way it is, there is an obvious inclination towards many influential figures of the city. Who is behind it? And why?

Reading the whole article spun her head around. This particular article was quite trustworthy than others. But she wondered why it wasn't read by many. There were links to the blogs some of the ravagers ran online, but she had no patience to read all those. She plopped back on her bed to calm down herself. She felt it was very late to sleep, but that didn't matter to her. There are even more things she felt she didn't know about. Like the swirl, her head kept spinning around until she turned towards her left side, covering her eyes with her arm to shut out the light.