Part 1 - Suburban Bliss
Maxwell sat alone in his room starring at his ceiling fan. The blades of the fan going fast where all he saw was a blur, while he sat trying to adjust the focus of his eyes where he could see the individual blades instead of a blur. He tried blinking, and randomly he would see the blades. After this he tried looking at the fan, and the light built into the fan, in a gaze. All this while he just gazed and thought.
A computer was setup on a desk in the corner of the room. His bed lay adjacent to the wall in the opposite corner. A nightstand lay next to the bed with a fan and an alarm clock on it, the time being 5:45 PM. Next to the computer desk stood a small bookshelf. He had just finished his English homework, and he planned on doing his math later that night, so he sat thinking about he would do until then.
He began thinking about ideas he and Derek were planning to use for a video game they were planning to work on. They had just decided to work together, using Derek’s programming skills and Maxwell’s creative skills a couple of day before that. Who knew if it would pull through. That was up to fate or God or something. If they began working and felt the urge to finish, they would. If not they would forget about the project and go on with their’ lives. Max had a vision in mind. He wanted to create something epic, an adventure game. Should it be a text game? Like the classic door game LORD he served on his bulletin board system on his computer. Or should they work on an actual game with graphics and even sound?
The phone line in his bedroom rang once and then the external modem on top of his computer started making its magic screeching noise, like an electronic mating call.
His parents made a deal with Max to pay for the phone line as long as Max did his homework and kept his grades up. Max got up and turned on his monitor. He quickly made a series of quick clicks on his keyboard to check his messages. He had one from earlier in the morning when a kid he met at school recently called and joined the board. Max scanned through the message quickly and then hit ‘D’ and then ‘Return’. His computer then made three quick beeping sounds. It was Derek paging Max, who is the owner and main system operator (or Sysop) for the “Infinite Madness” bulletin board system (BBS) which existed with the aid of his computer, phone line, and BBS software.
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* INFINITE MADNESS SYSOP MENU January 15, 1983 5:47 PM * * *
* *
* A) Administration Tools *
* B) Check Messages *
* C) Start Sysop Chat *
* *
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Select Option and Press RETURN: A
MrWizard Paging Sysop!……: "Max! Are you there?
Press RETURN to accept
Max: Hey Whats up?
MrWizard: nothing much
Max: you want to do something, I’m bored
MrWizard: well I was thinking about renting a movie because
I don’t have much money to go to one with
Max: I can spot ya
Max: you can pay me back later when you get the money
MrWizard: well
Max: well what aren’t you bored? I wanna get out too…nothing to do here at home
MrWizard: what movie do you want to see then?
MrWizard: wanna see a horror or sci-fi flick?
Max: gee I wonder?
MrWizard: ok?
Max: a sci-fi movie dumbass. Actually have you heard about Clockwork Orange?
MrWizard: huh?
Max: Its based on the old sci-fi bookgot strange plot, and some ultraviolence..
MrWizard: ok?
Max: I heard its really good. I was talking to your brother about it the other
day I can’t believe you haven’t heard of it.
MrWizard: ok fine then you’re giving the ride right?
Max: yeah gimme 20 minutes I’ll be down there. Of course if he’s home, tell
Anthony too.
MrWizard: ok
Sysop chat session over….
++++disconnected
Max gets ready, leaves message on BBS for his friends that he’ll be at the movie, description of what he looks like and what he is wearing included. He leave the house, says “Bye” to his mom and dad, gets in the car and rides down the street a bit. Gets to Dereks house…knocks on door. Derek answers the door in a rush. “I’m not ready yet man”, he says to Max. Max goes inside, following Derek to his bedroom. Anthony his brother is playing Atari on a black and white TV sitting on Dereks bed. The game is Atlantis.
The car rode along the 4 lane overpass smoothly even though it rattled and clanged as if it were about to fall apart. The three were on their way to the Elugelab Cinema Centre in the nearby city of Arcadia. In the front passenger seat sat Derek; backseat sat Anthony; and driving was Max.
Every Wednesday night the group of friends would come together through a series of phone calls (or instant messages), and plan what they were to do for the evening. Most of them had to work on the weekends, so since Wednesday was early day, they had time to do homework and take some leisure. Sometimes the phone calls would conclude in the decision of going to see a movie that night. Other times it concluded with things such as just hanging out and talking in front of someones house, or treking out into the woods to just hang out.
The three sat in the car with the volume set on low enough for conversation, the radio playing a cassette tape with a plain kick…snare…kick…snare beat with a synthesized square wave bassline and arpegiating synth lead. Disco was dead, and for some reason this type of dance/pop music was ok. It must have been the synthsized feel that hypnotized the three sci-fi geeks. They connected somehow with the robotic feel of the music.
The nights like this they didn’t know would forever become a memory in their mind for them to remember after high school graduation. They didn’t think of this innocent bliss ever ending. Together they were free as their own clique, with so many parallels they almost united as one mind strengthened by their situation.
They aren’t the breed of a world so brave, with so many pre-installed opinions, and built in defense mechanisms to defend the great fake model of humanity. They were brought into this world by the struggling or weak too occupied to preach and pound the hypnopaedia of the American culture into their brains. Here they were playing the game of high school, enjoying the information, but hating the uniformity.
Since elementary school, the same alienation and torment existed, only slightly maturing in the change from elementary to middle school, and middle to high school. When ever Max tried to fit in, he didn’t feel like he did…and he didn’t. They weren’t any different than anyone else. They were human. They weren’t as beautiful, or they didn’t share the same interests…but something taught or instinctive made them alienated. Maxwell, the longest member of the group, knew how he was percieved by others. He used to see other “nerds”…and he told himself he would never become what he saw. There were many things that he told himself he would never become. Being a nerd was the only thing that he decided to allow himself to become, and it somewhat became something he was proud of.
The three arrived at the movie theatre in the Max’s small white four door car, sometime around 7 P.M. They had discussed in the car if they should’ve invited anyone else a ride to the movie, but it was too late.