Chapter One
Dan felt like there was an invisible canopy above him,
enclosing him in a space of emotional turmoil, blocking him
off from the liveliness and joy that was outside and out of his
reach. Its tarpaulin of despondency hung over him, its very
presence an immense pressure upon his soul. He was
drowning, slowly sinking down to the bottom as the gravitas
of his depression increased almost every second. He'd even
lost the will to pray for salvation. Any way out of this would
be welcome, even one that would be his final action in life.
What was he so depressed about; one might wonder?
The reason for Dan's present emotional situation has driven
many to the same state: monotony. Since he finished school
and gained a job, Dan's life always felt scripted. He woke up,
all alone without a girlfriend or family, went to work and
faced horrible treatment from some of his colleagues, and
came back home to spend time alone in his pajamas while his
peers were out enjoying the city's nightlife. He couldn’t even
try to imitate them as he had no friends to imitate. Loneliness
was a fundamental feature of his existence, and though it
always bothered him, he was never able to escape his
sheltered and isolated upbringing. Dan had limited social
skills and struggled to make friends in school. Now he didn’t
even have family to rely on for company, as both his parents
were overseeing a wildlife documentary in Africa. They
barely called him once a year. His parents' neglect was not
new but had been the main cause of his early sheltered life.
They only ever attended to his basic wellbeing, ensuring he
had three square meals, clothes, and was alive. Anything else
they ignored as they went around chasing their dream of
adventuring and discovering wild places with interesting
animals and plants.
Back then, Dan had been so shy that instead of going
out to find friends, he turned to books for company. This had
the side effect of making him extraordinarily intelligent, but
now he was beginning to wonder if becoming a bibliophile
was the best course of action. He regretted not having friends.
His parents, he realized now, were not the only ones
responsible for his current situation; he had also contributed
with his young decision to find companionship exclusively in
narrative pages. Did his vast knowledge help him in life? Of
course, it did. It helped him to obtain an aeronautical
engineering job at a civilian agency that paid him fifteen
million dollars every year, allowing him to accumulate wealth
of over three hundred million, as he didn't have anything he
spent money on. News flash, lack of a social life can really
boost one's savings rate. His resolve to get companionship
from books was also what led him to earn several degrees, but
what worth are his degrees if he had no one to share his
accomplishments with? What is life if lived in isolation?
To be frank, he might even have felt relieved about his
depression, as it represented a break from the monotony of
his normal life. He hadn't gone to work for a week, calling in
sick. They tolerated his absence because, though he might not
be indispensable, he was of high value. They would find it
hard to find someone who was as qualified and experienced
as him. He knew he could stay away from work for half a
year, or a year even, and though they would complain, they
would not fire him.
However, he did not intend to spend so long depressed,
at least if he had the power to get out of his gloomy situation.
As much as he appreciated the break from his daily
monotonous life, it was worsening his situation. Laying and
inwardly lamenting his situation was doing no good and
brought back memories of the past, being all alone, neglected
by everyone but his books. He needed to try something new.
He wondered whether that something new should be suicide
or finding the courage to step out and make some friends.
At least he started listening to music, which was
something he didn't do in the past. With music, he got to hear
voices that weren’t his own, which was a bonus to the
melodious companionship they provided.
At the moment he had an album of Shinedown, The
Sound Of Madness, playing. Though the songs, especially
“Breaking Inside,” were worsening his emotional condition, it
was alleviating his loneliness as he read an interesting
adventure novel. He wondered why he had never tried using
music to read before, as it felt relaxing and enjoyable.
Five pages further into his reading, he got inspired by
his character's story. You see, Dan was reading a book about
an orphan who escaped an abusive home and decided to brave
the streets and build a life for himself with the skills he had.
He read about how the orphan learned many life lessons and
became an expert in streetology, making a lot of friends along
the way and even gaining a partner, a pretty Southern girl.
That gave him pause. Friends… would imitating the
character he was reading about help him escape his dull and
monotonous life? Would imitating the orphan help him make
some friends? Or better yet, a girlfriend? The last one was
enough motivation to make him sit up on his bed and really
consider this, folding the page to mark where he’d been as he
closed the book. He felt enthusiastic about the possibility of a
romantic relationship. His sheltered and lonely life meant that
he had been unable to voice interest in any girl he'd ever
liked, and his complete lack of confidence had driven them
away from him, even the weird and odd ones. He was like a
skunk that girls skirted around or took another route to avoid
if possible. Despite his wealth, his lack of social confidence
and physical attributes made him feel extremely unattractive.
His black hair was nothing to speak of, worn unstyled and
long. He only shampooed his hair and combed it, without
paying it much concern. He was unfortunate to be born
without eyes that girls find charming; he had boring brown
eyes, without luxurious eyelashes or soulful expressions. The
less said about his height and physique, the better. He looks
malnourished, despite eating a decent diet. His five feet six
inch height was not much to speak of for a guy. He took
solace in the fact that at least he wasn't ugly, just bland.
But all that could change, he could change, and build a
character for himself. He needed to build a life for himself
that would make him the man of the moment. If he was going
to do this, then he was going to need a lot of help. First, the
character he was trying to emulate had several substantial
talents that made him able to undertake and survive the
adventure. He had productive skills, beyond basic education,
and street smarts.
The first Dan ticked mentally. He had several
productive skills: he could cook, he was a talented and wellrounded
engineer, and he was called a computer wizard by
the head of his department. Dan could operate and build
computers and software like a wizard manipulating magic,
which may sound boastful, but was not a lie. Those were not
his only productive skills, however; he was skilled with math,
physics, chemistry and biology.
Anyway, the next on the list of prerequisites for the
adventure was an education beyond the basics. Dan clearly
had an advanced education. That left only street smarts, the
only one on the mental list he'd made that he could not tick.
Introvert, anxious and socially awkward—all these words in
some way defined Dan and none of them were aspects
possessed by individuals with street smarts. That was fine,
though, as he believed there was someone who could help
him with that. He may need to contact his only friend in the
world, who was actually a seasonal friend, so half the time
would be rightly classified as an acquaintance.
Before that, he needed to decide what his own
adventure should be. The orphan whose story had inspired
him to consider introducing adventure to his life had had an
adventure of building a life for himself, getting a higher
education, making friends, getting a girlfriend, and a home.
These were adventures of everyday people. Dan already had
all those except a girlfriend, and as for the home, he was the
proud owner of a ten-million-dollar elegant, contemporary
villa with floor to ceiling windows and an infinity pool. His
acquaintance slash friend had been the one to talk him into
buying the house and Ferrari. Dan would admit that at that
time he hadn't seen the use of both, perfectly comfortable
with commuting and paying monthly rents. Now, though, he
was aware that they may help him shape the person he
wanted to be.
Since he already possessed all but one of the
components of his inspiration's adventure, then perhaps he
needed to think about an adventure unique to him. He
attacked this problem with the zeal he usually used to attack
mathematical equations and arrived at one conclusion. His
adventure, no matter what it will be, should not be something
he was adverse to. It must be something he would enjoy and
have the skills to survive. The addition of skills to the
brainstorming made him narrow down the type of adventure
he needed to a single category: science.
An adventure of science may actually get him out of his
depressed state and help him build a life in the most
enjoyable way. Now he only just needed to decide what
concerning science this premeditated adventure would be
about.
What if I decide based on role models? He wondered
thoughtfully.
In his entire life, he had had just two people he really
looked up to and they were both historical figures, John
Davison Rockefeller and Nikola Tesla. The former he
regarded for his business clout, as it certainly was not easy to
be able to control ninety percent of a nation's oil. Normally he
wasn't a fan of monopolism, as it worked against diversity
and competition, which were two of many things the world
needed to thrive. Without competition and diversification,
there'd be very little progress. But Rockefeller's acumen was
to be envied, and Dan had envied it for a long time, lying in
bed and imagining himself as a big business tycoon. It took
Rockefeller's sort of acumen to achieve a monopolistic
domination over any business market, and that was what
made Dan admire monopolism; though he didn't really like it,
the shrewdness and intelligence behind it resonated positively
with him.
As for Tesla, he and science fiction had been the driving
forces behind Dan pursuing science instead of something less
intimidating, like art. He was also passionate about it, though
it didn't take him long to realize how the reality of science
was very different from the sci-fi version. He wanted to be an
inventor of Tesla's caliber, but his progress on that dream had
been marginal. He had a patented invention to his name, a
graph for evaluating gravity waves, detecting it, measuring it,
and telling its present status and also predicting its future
status by the state of its present motion. That's how far he'd
gone in achieving his dream to be like Tesla. He might have
had some ideas and hypotheses for other inventions, but that's
all they were: ideas and hypotheses. With this bid for
adventure, now he could finally dedicate his time and mind to
be like those he'd always admired. Rockefeller and Tesla
meant business and science, which in turn meant using
inventions for business, diving into the science market.
As the idea broadened in his head, the canopic coverage
of depression over him started to peel away and give way to
excitement, an excitement that had been out of reach just
moments ago. Choosing adventure, he thought, was more
beneficial than suicide and that benefit was his life. A life that
he was going to turn around. It was time to call his mentor so
that they could come together to hash out this plan.
He turned on his phone and gave it a voice command:
“Call Rogers Leenman.”
“Calling Rogers Leenman,” the phone replied.
He took a deep breath and relaxed as the phone
vibrated, connecting the call.
“What's up, Dan?” A deep voice from the phone's
speaker greeted Dan.
“I'm doing great, Rogers,” he answered, scratching his
bearded chin. He really needed a shave. “Can I meet up with
you? I have something life changing I need your input on.”
“Sure, I'm at the Chinese bar down at Lakeson.”
“You know I don't do bars, Rogers,” he complained. He
wanted to add “or alcohol,” but left it at that, as Rogers knew
very well that he was not comfortable with being drunk or
being around drunk people.
“Well, do you want me to drive down to your place, that
woody neighborhood? Think again, son,” Rogers said in
askance.
“You were the one who convinced me to buy the
house,” Dan told him, dubiously.
“You needed a home, rent would not always be stable
and cheap, it was cheap and luxurious, you had the money…
need I go on? That house is a nice investment.”
“Are you making me come to the bar as an attempt to
make me less of an introvert?” Dan asked, suspiciously. This
wouldn't be the first time. Since their workplace friendly
acquaintanceship graduated to semi-friendship, seven years
ago, Rogers had made innumerable attempts to get him out of
his shell. One might wonder why he still didn't see the older
man as a full friend. It was because he secretly did not want
to. He knew, of course, that they were friends, but he feared
being abandoned, so to save himself from that hurt, he only
accepted their relationship as that of a mentor and a protégé.
“I have no idea what you're talking about.”
“You should have said so,” Dan said, shaking his head,
though Rogers couldn't see it. “I'm coming.”
“What!” Rogers exclaimed in shock.
“I'm trying to come out of my shell, that’s what I need
your input on. Expect me soon, ETA fifteen minutes.”
With that, he hung up, jumped down from his bed and
hurried to the bathroom. He needed a bath and to get out of
his pajamas. There was no time for a shave and he didn't
really think he wanted the beard off. It made him look a bit
older and more mature, and it was something different,
something new. This was the type of thing he needed in his
life now: new things, differences from the monotony that was
his life—change. He craved change.
