Rowdy Dead Productions

By David C. Daoust

 
Colin Vice followed closely as the gangly scientist walked briskly through the showroom. Theobald Gray began to chat as he led the way.

“Games… I used to love games. Got me through school—through University… You know they have a way about them, to exercise the mind?” Theo looked Colin straight in the eye as he added, “I thank games, themselves, for all that I have become…”

Colin wasn’t sure where the gangly scientist was going with this, but he patiently waited it out, relieved Theo finally found his voice. Hoping, the man may tip him off what, exactly, his father was meant to do here. What was his ‘end’, Colin was now expected to hold up?

“That was before, before the corporations targeted them,” Theo then threw his arms out and exclaimed, “Bought them all out! Bought any game that truly exercised the mind…. and not to make money from them, to dumb them down, to ruin what they could do for a person.”

“To cripple the competition before they could even compete,” he said this last bit pointedly, if somewhat cryptically. Colin was sure it made sense in Theo’s mind.

The scientist paused at a door, patting at his pockets. After a moment of searching through each pocket, his hands came up empty. He grimaced a moment, then continued what Colin could only consider a rant.

“They want to promote a culture of stupid– of laziness…” as he spoke, Theo opened a small compartment to the right of the door, which revealed a keypad, “Have you talked with these people? Have you tried to work with them? The culture of laziness is so pervasive—anyone that actually works, actually does the job they are hired to do, quickly and efficiently, are treated as though they are a threat– And not by management, by their co-workers.”

“Co-workers, so lazy, that have driven production so far down, that when someone shows up to actually work- they attack them for trying to make them look bad!” Theo managed to bungle the key-code he tried to punch into the keypad.

He stopped a moment to ponder, his eyes lit up, and he began again…

“A culture of lazy is what the big wigs prefer, they’d rather keep throwing lazy oafs chump change, than deal with a workforce with actual minds , minds that may deserve a decent pay. Or minds strong enough to bind together—heaven forbid, form unions,” he said this last bit dripping with sarcasm and a snarky laugh, “They prefer it so much, that they allow this drop in productivity, if only to justify paying such low wages,” Theo shook his head, “the dumbing down of the Trade Consortium.”

“I know you’ve heard that, ‘the dumbing down bit’- it’s in the media brainwashing kit,” the door slid open as Theo turned to Colin, “we’ve all heard it so much- that it’s laughable. Like some cartoon caricature of a crazed conspiracy theorist trying to get attention.”

Colin felt like Theo just hit the nail on the head. Theo was sounding more and more like such a theorist. After a moment Colin raised one eyebrow as he had to rethink why he thought that.

“I decided to implement a better use for games,” Theo said grandly as he led Colin through the door, “make the Big Wigs so pleased with this new angle, they may not realize the edge being added to the Consortium citizen’s minds…”

Colin entered the room to find a lab, empty of people, yet full of monitors, computers buzzing. Dead center of the room, raised up on a stage, stood another ‘battle drone’. This one stripped of its carapace; exposed wiring wrapped around servos, attached to small ‘computing parts’- Colin really didn’t know what to call’em- led the eye through the inner guts, to empty missile bays and retracted machine guns.

“I got in deep,” Theo explained with a shrug, “way too deep, faster than I realized. Before I knew it, my project was funded, ‘Theo-BOLD games’ was a thing, and I had a small army bringing my vision to reality. Or rather, a twisted version of my vision…”

“Believe it or not- they weren’t originally ‘war machines’…” Theo said this with a sigh.

“I’ll admit tricking gamers, some of which are children, into replacing ‘mining-bots’ on the ‘resource planets’, may be a touch insidious,” Theo pled guilty, “But that’s exactly the kind of thing the Big Wigs gobble up- Exactly the thing that may cause them to overlook… the edge.”

“I mean, do bots even get paid out there? Who cares about bots, am I right?” Theo reasoned it out as he stooped over a keyboard, clicking keys could be heard as he continued, “And they’ll still need the human workers on them rigs—what are they ‘Crucibles’? Sounds like a win-win.”

Colin waited as the man seemed to fall into his thoughts, Colin still unsure of his ‘end’.

“A mining game, I made a mining game,” Theo said softly, clearly speaking to himself.

Turning to Colin he explained, “They turned my whole ‘mining thing’ into a side skill–they dumped my elaborate controls and rewarding game play– and automated it into a button push and a skill-up bar… replaced the core, ultimately- transformed my Mining Drones into Battle Drones!”

“Now, we’re in the middle of marketing their ‘first mission’” Theo paused, “Which was meant to be a clash between bots… you’re father assured me this whole ruse would not bring harm to anyone…”

Colin’s interest perked up at the mention of his father, and the term ruse…

Theo reached back down to the keyboard he was just clicking at, hit ‘enter’ and gestured to the huge hologram that was suddenly emitted…