Servo 1:1
Okay folks, I know I've been super busy and haven't been blogging lately. So to remedy that, and hopefully entice some new folks to check this out, I'm going to post a whole book on the site. It will be broken up into chapters and parts for easier reading.
Servo is a YA sci-fi/ murder mystery which follows thirteen-year-old Jonah Blackburn and his two siblings. The mysterious death of their father who works for Servidyne, a robot technology company, throws the children into a tailspin. With their mother already buried, they are sent to Broken Bow, Nebraska to start a new life.
The text you will be reading is rough copy- meaning that my wonderful editor, Joyce Gilmour, hasn't hacked on it yet. So you might find some errors. There will be a finished copy available on all the ebook sites as well as Amazon for print. Might take me a while, but I'll post as I can. In the end, you'll have the whole book for free.
As always, comments and reviews are greatly appreciated.
So without further adieu, here's Chapter 1 part 1 of Servo. I hope you enjoy.
Chapter 1
I hate funerals. Two in two years was too much. Our beautiful, perfect family of five had been reduced to three. What was worse: our fates, the fates of us three children, were to be decided by the New Philadelphia family planning representative. How could our lives get so shattered?We hadn’t been allowed to read our parents’ will. Frankly, the three of us never thought we’d have to. Our mother, Ellen, was the picture of health. She was a GEE: Genetically Engineered Entity- supposedly the perfect human. Well, they were wrong on that one. Sure she was smart, beautiful, and to us, perfect, but she had a flaw, a big one that no one saw. This flaw, hidden in her perfect DNA, slowly caused her agonizing demise and premature departure from this fair Earth. And now we were standing in the cold April rain while my father was laid to rest. He worked for a tech company called Servidyne that built service robots, or as we called them, bots, for household use. His death had been ruled an accident, but for some reason, that didn’t ring true to me. Thomas Blackburn, our father, was a very careful man. The authorities investigating his death said he died from an injection of nano-probes. Deep in the back of my mind, I knew something was fishy. The solemn service concluded and we were ushered away from the grave as his casket was lowered for eternity. I would never again see my father living and breathing. I would never be able to engage him in lengthy discussions of his projects at work. He was gone forever. That bothered me terribly.Grief welled up inside me like a raging river forcing at a dam. But I couldn’t show it. As the eldest son, yet middle child, I had to remain the rock in our family. My older sister, Suzette, at age sixteen, cared more about her vanity and friends than she did much else. Although I did see her weeping a few tears as kind words were said about our father. My little brother, Rory, was barely ten. He was smart, but immature for his age and routinely got picked on by other kids. His grades were perfect, and no less would be expected for the three of us because we were GEE kids. Our parents had tried the “old fashioned” way to have children and it didn’t work, so they turned to science. I had no problem with my level of intelligence, it was definitely a plus. Most of my teachers deemed me years ahead of my tender age of thirteen; something I tried not to let go to my head, ha ha!The world we lived in was a privileged one. Father’s work paid well, and we had a beautiful apartment that overlooked the Delaware River. Three service bots kept the family fed, cleaned, and everything running on schedule. That was one definite perk of father working at Servidyne. You might think all that help made our family lazy. Perhaps physically, some, but mentally, it freed us up to pursue higher thinking. My dream was to create even better bots for people. I knew that made my father proud. But all that was in jeopardy. Our lives now rested with the family planning division of the New Philadelphia government. Admittedly I was scared.“Come, children,” Mrs. Lowe said, trying to hurry us to the car and out of the rain. We followed her like mindless bots. It was hard to tell what was going through Suz and Rory’s minds; their faces were blank. I felt a gray as the sky above us. The raindrops falling on my face were the tears I would eventually shed. All around us were buildings: glass and steel, modern, clean, and towering. I felt like a microscopic amoeba in my surroundings; a drop of rain in a massive puddle. I was no one. We sat in the car while she drove us to her place of employ. It was in a tall blue-tinted glass building near the city center. She parked in the underground garage and herded us up to her office on the twentieth floor. Suz and Rory took the two available seats. I choose to stand by the window and look out. There were tears fighting to get out of me, but I continued to hold them back. Maybe tonight I’d have a cry when the others were asleep. Mrs. Lowe settled behind her desk. She was a young woman who hardly looked old enough to be making decisions about others’ lives. Her hair was long and blonde, it reminded me of my mother’s. “Children,” she said in a firm tone. “After reviewing your parents’ will, we have located your closest living relatives.”“Who?” Rory asked.She shuffled a few papers. “A Mr. and Mrs. Abe Cranwinkle in Broken Bow, Nebraska.”I turned from my spot at the window. “Where?”“Nebraska.”“What country is that in?” Suz piped up.“America,” she replied. “Although I had to look it up.”“Where in America?” I pressed.“The Outer States.”“What?!” Suz’s mouth fell open. “We can’t go there,” I countered. “We’re in good schools and have everything we need here.”“I’m sorry, children. But these are your grandparents. You’re not old enough to be on your own. You must be placed with a responsible adult.”I watched Suz’s brow furrow. “Why can’t we stay with our neighbor, Mr. Glomly?”“Is he family?”“No.”“Then, no. Provisions have been made to place your parents’ assets in trust for you children. A monthly allowance will be paid to the Cranwinkles for your maintenance.”“You make us sound like bots!” Rory barked.“Isn’t there any way we can stay where we are?” I said, trying to remain strong and level-headed.“Afraid not. I have my assistant working on your travel arrangements. If all goes accordingly, you will be leaving for Nebraska in a few days. I suggest you pack what you feel is important.”“What about our apartment? And the bots?” Suz cried. I could tell she was visibly shaken by this whole turn of events.“Possessions will be placed at auction and the proceeds added to the trust.”
“But once we leave, how can we ever come back?” I asked. What little history they taught us of the Great Separation was barely enough to scratch the surface. All I knew was once you leave, you never come back. I did not want to live in the American wastelands, I wanted to live and work where I knew what to expect. Out there sounded really scary.
Servo is a YA sci-fi/ murder mystery which follows thirteen-year-old Jonah Blackburn and his two siblings. The mysterious death of their father who works for Servidyne, a robot technology company, throws the children into a tailspin. With their mother already buried, they are sent to Broken Bow, Nebraska to start a new life.
The text you will be reading is rough copy- meaning that my wonderful editor, Joyce Gilmour, hasn't hacked on it yet. So you might find some errors. There will be a finished copy available on all the ebook sites as well as Amazon for print. Might take me a while, but I'll post as I can. In the end, you'll have the whole book for free.
As always, comments and reviews are greatly appreciated.
So without further adieu, here's Chapter 1 part 1 of Servo. I hope you enjoy.
Chapter 1
I hate funerals. Two in two years was too much. Our beautiful, perfect family of five had been reduced to three. What was worse: our fates, the fates of us three children, were to be decided by the New Philadelphia family planning representative. How could our lives get so shattered?We hadn’t been allowed to read our parents’ will. Frankly, the three of us never thought we’d have to. Our mother, Ellen, was the picture of health. She was a GEE: Genetically Engineered Entity- supposedly the perfect human. Well, they were wrong on that one. Sure she was smart, beautiful, and to us, perfect, but she had a flaw, a big one that no one saw. This flaw, hidden in her perfect DNA, slowly caused her agonizing demise and premature departure from this fair Earth. And now we were standing in the cold April rain while my father was laid to rest. He worked for a tech company called Servidyne that built service robots, or as we called them, bots, for household use. His death had been ruled an accident, but for some reason, that didn’t ring true to me. Thomas Blackburn, our father, was a very careful man. The authorities investigating his death said he died from an injection of nano-probes. Deep in the back of my mind, I knew something was fishy. The solemn service concluded and we were ushered away from the grave as his casket was lowered for eternity. I would never again see my father living and breathing. I would never be able to engage him in lengthy discussions of his projects at work. He was gone forever. That bothered me terribly.Grief welled up inside me like a raging river forcing at a dam. But I couldn’t show it. As the eldest son, yet middle child, I had to remain the rock in our family. My older sister, Suzette, at age sixteen, cared more about her vanity and friends than she did much else. Although I did see her weeping a few tears as kind words were said about our father. My little brother, Rory, was barely ten. He was smart, but immature for his age and routinely got picked on by other kids. His grades were perfect, and no less would be expected for the three of us because we were GEE kids. Our parents had tried the “old fashioned” way to have children and it didn’t work, so they turned to science. I had no problem with my level of intelligence, it was definitely a plus. Most of my teachers deemed me years ahead of my tender age of thirteen; something I tried not to let go to my head, ha ha!The world we lived in was a privileged one. Father’s work paid well, and we had a beautiful apartment that overlooked the Delaware River. Three service bots kept the family fed, cleaned, and everything running on schedule. That was one definite perk of father working at Servidyne. You might think all that help made our family lazy. Perhaps physically, some, but mentally, it freed us up to pursue higher thinking. My dream was to create even better bots for people. I knew that made my father proud. But all that was in jeopardy. Our lives now rested with the family planning division of the New Philadelphia government. Admittedly I was scared.“Come, children,” Mrs. Lowe said, trying to hurry us to the car and out of the rain. We followed her like mindless bots. It was hard to tell what was going through Suz and Rory’s minds; their faces were blank. I felt a gray as the sky above us. The raindrops falling on my face were the tears I would eventually shed. All around us were buildings: glass and steel, modern, clean, and towering. I felt like a microscopic amoeba in my surroundings; a drop of rain in a massive puddle. I was no one. We sat in the car while she drove us to her place of employ. It was in a tall blue-tinted glass building near the city center. She parked in the underground garage and herded us up to her office on the twentieth floor. Suz and Rory took the two available seats. I choose to stand by the window and look out. There were tears fighting to get out of me, but I continued to hold them back. Maybe tonight I’d have a cry when the others were asleep. Mrs. Lowe settled behind her desk. She was a young woman who hardly looked old enough to be making decisions about others’ lives. Her hair was long and blonde, it reminded me of my mother’s. “Children,” she said in a firm tone. “After reviewing your parents’ will, we have located your closest living relatives.”“Who?” Rory asked.She shuffled a few papers. “A Mr. and Mrs. Abe Cranwinkle in Broken Bow, Nebraska.”I turned from my spot at the window. “Where?”“Nebraska.”“What country is that in?” Suz piped up.“America,” she replied. “Although I had to look it up.”“Where in America?” I pressed.“The Outer States.”“What?!” Suz’s mouth fell open. “We can’t go there,” I countered. “We’re in good schools and have everything we need here.”“I’m sorry, children. But these are your grandparents. You’re not old enough to be on your own. You must be placed with a responsible adult.”I watched Suz’s brow furrow. “Why can’t we stay with our neighbor, Mr. Glomly?”“Is he family?”“No.”“Then, no. Provisions have been made to place your parents’ assets in trust for you children. A monthly allowance will be paid to the Cranwinkles for your maintenance.”“You make us sound like bots!” Rory barked.“Isn’t there any way we can stay where we are?” I said, trying to remain strong and level-headed.“Afraid not. I have my assistant working on your travel arrangements. If all goes accordingly, you will be leaving for Nebraska in a few days. I suggest you pack what you feel is important.”“What about our apartment? And the bots?” Suz cried. I could tell she was visibly shaken by this whole turn of events.“Possessions will be placed at auction and the proceeds added to the trust.”
“But once we leave, how can we ever come back?” I asked. What little history they taught us of the Great Separation was barely enough to scratch the surface. All I knew was once you leave, you never come back. I did not want to live in the American wastelands, I wanted to live and work where I knew what to expect. Out there sounded really scary.
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