Storyline Pt. 1

Lijho is in prison on a penitentiary asteroid complex called Genocy-A, which orbits the planet Paseo. Today is the day of his release after being imprisoned for 3 years. He transports back to the surface of Paseo, and all the sights, sounds, smells, and sensations are familiar, yet still new to him as he rediscovers the aspects of living outside of Genocy. One of the big things he’s noticing is that the sun seems to be larger than how he remembered it. He can’t tell if it’s just because he’s been in prison orbit so long it’s his eyes playing tricks on him, but his gut tells him something is up. He heads to a diner to get some coffee and breakfast- two things he has been thinking and daydreaming of since he was first imprisoned. In his backpack, he has a piece of paper with the address of his childhood friend, and unofficial partner in crime, Eckley. He’s not even sure if Eckley still lives at that address, but when he’s finished with breakfast, he will go check it out.

Lijho walks down the busy streets of Nova, the capitol city of Paseo, the capitol planet of the system. Contrary to popular belief, it’s not as governmental as people would think. Most of the people who live on Paseo do in fact work for the government, known as ‘The Paseo’, but the actual governmental buildings and complexes make up a small minority of the cities and habitations on the planet. As he is walking down the streets he used to walk, he notices how much they’ve changed in the last 3 years he’s been imprisoned. Things look different, but still recognizable. Restaurants he used to go to that are now new places, parks that are now shopping centers, it all looks different, but still familiar.

He eventually arrives at the high-rise apartment building where Eckley lives, and makes his way up to his apartment. When he knocks on the door, Eckley answers in a towel, having just got out of the shower. He looks much different than Lijho last saw him. His hair is much longer, and he looks like he has been working out. Obviously surprised to see Lijho, he invites him inside. He comments on how muscular and fit Lijho looks compared to the skinny kid he law saw, but of course in prison there’s very little else to do except get in shape.

“Looks like I’m not the only one. You been working out"?” Lijho asks.

“Maybe a little. Sorry it’s so hot in here, my climate control unit died a couple days ago, but it’s gonna get fixed this week hopefully.”

“You’re sure it’s ok for me to stay with you? I mean you working for the Paseo and all, they’re not going to have a problem with you taking in someone who just got out of prison?” Lijho asks.

“It’s totally fine. They already know we’ve been best friends since we were little. Even if I didn’t let you stay here, they know we would at least be hanging out all the time anyway. They don’t care. I know the rules, and they know I know the rules. It’s no big deal I promise. My home is your home. Although right now my home is a little… warm.” Eckley says pointing to his climate control unit on the wall. “That piece of shit keeps randomly dying on me, but it’s supposed to be fixed in a couple days at the latest so…”

Apologizing for not being able to hang out, Eckley is getting dressed and about to head into work for the day, but tells Lijho there is an internet cafe a block away that he can hang out in while Eckley is at work if he doesn’t want to hang out in the hot apartment.

“Yeah that works.” Lijho says.

As they walk outside back on the street from the apartment building, Lijho asks Eckley if he noticed the sun seems bigger or if it’s just because he’s been locked up so long. Eckley replies “you know it’s funny you mention that. I’ve been thinking the same thing, but it’s hard to tell when you see the same thing everyday. I don’t think it looks bigger, but there’s definitely something different about it for sure.” The two part ways as Eckley heads into work, and Lijho heads down the block to the internet cafe.

Lijho walks down the set of stairs that lead under the street level to the internet cafe entrance. He walks in and finds himself in a dark room with people of all ages at different computers. Some are playing games, some are sitting back in their chairs watching movies. The person working at the front desk greets him, and Lijho opens an account, since you pay by the hour. The clerk tells him that he doesn’t need to prepay, he can just pay when he leaves and his time has been calculated.

He sits in a computer in the back, facing the entrance with nobody behind him; his preferred way, so nobody can see what he’s looking at. He used to be a hacker, which is how he ended up in prison to begin with, and privacy is king.

He first starts to go on a couple dating websites, checking out the different people around the area, to see if anyone catches his eye. Then he goes on the website of “The Guild”. The place where people of different skill sets can find odd jobs for money. Hunters, caretakers, computer experts, doctors, the Guild is the go-to for people looking to hire and be hired. Lijho used to be a member of the Guild under a false identity, but was swept up in a sting operation by the Paseo to weed out unethical hackers that were causing problems and helping to further various illegal activities. He looks at his old profile. Staring back at the screen seeing his old photo, with his bio and credentials, the memories start flooding in. On the one hand, he still feels wronged by having 3 years of his life taken away, but on the other hand, he made peace with it while he was incarcerated in Genocy, and he knows now he is in a new chapter of his life.

He impulsively closes the Guild site before he changes his mind and goes further down memory lane digging up painful nostalgia. He realizes what time it is and grabs his backpack and heads to the front counter to settle up his tab. The man behind the counter asks him what his name is, because he looks familiar.

”I’m Lijho”

“Oh yeah! I remember you! You used to come in here all the time, you were always really chill. What have you been up to man?”

“Long story honestly.”

“Understood. Well hey it’s good to see your face again. Definitely come back sometime and hang out.”

“Yeah, I’ll be back for sure.”

The scene ends with a shot of the internet cafe- people at their computers, just a normal scene.

Back at Eckley’s place, Lijho asleep on couch, earthquake breaks out.

“Since when does Paseo get earthquakes?”

“Believe it or not this is the third time it’s happened in the past maybe 3 or 4 months? They’re never intense, but it makes me wonder if there’s a problem with the Plate Systems.”

PLATE SYSTEMS marker comes on screen

Lijho has a visibly worried look on his face when he hears that.

“I wouldn’t worry too much about it. You know the Paseo, they’re all over it.”

A few hours later, Lijho wakes up on Eckley’s couch and finds himself alone in the apartment. Eckley has obviously already gone to work and left Lijho alone. He hops in the shower and as he’s drying off afterward, he hears his phone buzzing on the kitchen counter. It’s a text from Eckley.

“233” it reads.

Whenever texts are just numbers, it usually refers to the station number of a Ryuka as a meeting spot. Kind of like on Earth how people send addresses as a way of saying “meet me here”.

Lijho throws on some clothes, and heads to the closest Ryuka station. He walks inside, grabs a complimentary bottle of water in the lobby, and opens it as he steps into the teleport pod. This Ryuka has an attendant. Not all of them do.

“233 please.” he says to the attendant.

In a flash of light he disappears and reappears in the pod at station 233. He walks off the pod and out of the station. As soon as he walks out the door he sees Eckley smoking a cigarette on the opposite side of the street. He cuts across the street and casually walks up to Eckley, who barely notices him, as he’s nose deep in his phone. Just before they meet, Eckley happens to look up and sees Lijho- “oh shit!” he exclaims, trying not to drop his cigarette.
”You’re quick.” Eckley says.
”I am?” Lijho says confused.
”Yeah I figured you’d be at least like 30 minutes or so. Damn you must walk really fast.” he says jokingly.

“Well I have nothing else to do honestly.” Lijho says.

“Well be careful what you wish for…” Eckley says, taking a drag off his cigarette. “what do you know about Lizan?” he asks, smoke coming out of his mouth as he talks.

[LIZAN MARKER]

“A lot honestly. Why, what does Lizan have to do with anything?”

“Well, we think the Paseo have gotten Lizan involved in their cyber security”

Lijho looks confused. “Why would Lizan be involved? Correct me if I’m wrong, because I’m just thinking out loud here, but Lizan has nothing to do with cyber security. Lizan’s only job is to just monitor the conditions of the planet to make the corrections to keep the planet under the right conditions. Lizan basically receives data from the monitoring systems on the planet surface, then when something needs to be fine tuned, like making it rain when it gets too dry, managing the plate tectonics to prevent earthquakes, Lizan sends the signal to make it happen. Lizan basically keeps the planet in balance. But… Lizan really only talks to the maintenance systems of the planet. Plate System, Climatrol… I mean, they don’t really have anything to do with the Paseo itself...” he trails off, giving Eckley a skeptical look.

Eckley shrugs. “All I know is, ever since the Paseo started big time stepping up their security, Lizan has been working overtime. Me and a buddy I work with on Lizan have managed to… intercept… some of the signals going out from Lizan, but they’re not going to any of the maintenance systems, they’re going directly to the Paseo, and now instead of 3 droids working the Plate System, they have 7. It’s like they can’t keep up with whatever is going on.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Well normally when a signal reaches Lizan, regardless of where it comes from- Plate System, Climatrol, whatever… there’s a number attached to the beginning and end of it… a signature, basically. That number identifies which droid sent that signal. Usually one droid works one system. So one droid gets assigned Plate System, one droid gets assigned Climatrol, and that’s ALL they do. Up until a little less than a year ago, there were only 3 unique numbers coming from the Plate System, so 3 droids basically. Now there’s 7. And the signals are coming and going constantly. Basically, Lizan AND the Plate System are working overtime. And that earthquake last night was the 4th one we’ve had just in the past two months. So you figure, if the Plate System is working at 100%, and we’re still having earthquakes, that shows you that whatever is causing the quakes is more than what the Plate System can handle. Something is happening.”

There’s a long pause in the conversation as Eckley flicks his cigarette on the ground. “Too many coincidences dude.”

“So what do you think is going on then?” Lijho asks.

Eckley pulls what looks like a coin on a necklace out of his pocket and holds it up for Lijho to see.

“I… acquired… this from an acquaintance at the Paseo. You know what this is right?”

“Yeah, it’s what the Paseo use to bypass security systems online. It’s like an all-access pass. You can access literally anything online, things that normal civilians can’t even see and don’t even know is there.”

“Bingo.” Eckley replies.

“If I remember correctly it also makes you invisible so nobody knows where you go or what you’re doing. As long as this is plugged into the computer, you’ll be invisible online no matter where you go.”

“DON’T lose it.” Eckley says emphatically.

Lijho gives Eckley a sarcastic look of annoyance, and puts the necklace on and tucks it under his shirt. He lets out a long sigh. “Oh how the plot thickens.” he says sarcastically.

Eckley’s cell phone rings. He pulls it out of his pocket to see who it is, looks at the phone and says “I gotta run. Lemme know what you find.”

“Yeah for sure.” Lijho replies.

Lijho heads back to the Ryuka and teleports back to 722. He walks out and heads to the diner and grabs a seat at the counter like he always does.

The episode ends with Lijho in the diner and sitting at the counter. He orders a cup of coffee and the scene ends with the camera zooming out on Lijho sipping his coffee pensively.