Read Online Ultraviolet by Joseph Robert Lewis - Free Book Online Page A

do you know my name?”
    “Well, everyone knows your name. From online. I guess someone recognized you and tagged you in the clips.”
    I sighed. Of course they did. “Okay, so who are you?”
    “Name’s Felix. I’m coming out, so don’t slice me in half or anything, okay?”
    A shadow stepped away from the other shadows halfway down the aisle and started walking toward me. He had his hands half-raised to show me they were empty. And when he got closer I saw that he wasn’t much older than me. Short hair, dark clothes, a bag over one shoulder. Nothing special, but nothing scary either.
    “Hi, Felix.” I kept my hands at my sides. I had the gloves on, which made me feel better. “That’s close enough.”
    He stopped. “Sorry if I scared you.”
    “What are you doing here?”
    “Waiting for you. I’ve been here since last night. I figured you might come here, once I figured out how your gloves work.”
    I frowned. “What do you mean? You know how they work?”
    “Well, not exactly. I mean, once I saw your name, I looked you up. Holographics engineer, Cygnus, terminated two months ago. But then I… well, I pulled up your feedstock order history, you know, to see if I could figure out how you made the gloves, and I saw the rubidium, and I figured that was the key, since it was restricted, and this was the only place you could get more, so I came here to try to meet you.”
    “Wait, go back. You pulled up my order history? That’s a private transaction. How’d you get those records?”
    “Oh, well, I used to work for Cygnus too. And I sort of kept an access card that I wasn’t supposed to have. I worked right here, actually. I did quality control checks on the metal stocks. I’m a metallurgical technician. Or I was, I should say.”
    “Oh yeah? You get fired too?”
    “Yes, yes I did,” he said a bit proudly. “And the company was kind enough to alter my employment records just a bit so that now I can’t get a job anywhere, even at the smelting plant.”
    “Wow.” Poor guy. I thought the smelting plant never turned anyone away. They always needed bodies down there, fixing the machines, breathing in those fumes. “What’d you do?”
    “I invented a new kind of aluminum.” He laughed. “It was kind of by accident, I was just fooling around with some samples in the scanner when it happened. But I came up with an alloy that could replace half a dozen of the expensive stocks, stronger than steel and a better electrical conductor than copper. And it’s really easy to make. I figured it was my golden ticket out of this place, you know? It would make feedstock a lot cheaper for everyone, using my aluminum instead of the pricy stuff. But Cygnus didn’t like that idea so much.”
    “Well, yeah, why would they want to replace something expensive with something cheap, and better? That would only be good for everyone else, not for them.”
    “Yeah, well, I learned that the hard way.”
    “So they got rid of it, and you.” I took a few steps closer to him. I still couldn’t see him very well, but I could see his shy, nervous smile.
    “Yeah, they did.”
    “When was that?”
    “Last year.”
    It was weird how nice it was to be having such a normal conversation about my crazy life. None of that serious tone from my dad, none of the hyper-excitement from Dom, none of the sickly sweet pity from Mercy. Just a guy who seemed to get it. “What have you been doing since then?”
    “Living at my brother’s place, working odd jobs. I can’t really get anything steady.”
    I nodded. “Sorry.”
    “Naw, don’t be. I’m not here for me, I’m here for you. What are you up to? I mean, since you’re not working for Cygnus anymore, what are you doing with those gloves now?”
    “Actually, I’m selling them to another company.”
    “Really? That’s excellent. So your golden ticket paid off?”
    “Well, I hope so. Still have to jump through some hoops first.”
    “Like what?”
    “Like seeing whether