When Angevandt, Inc. decided to move their headquarters to Lovell, nobody was really sure why. The company was an up-and-comer when it came to biotech - cybernetic limbs, performance-enhancing nanotechnology, mental implants, bionic augmentations, Angevandt was looking into them all and more, and all reports indicated they were making progress. Why they wanted to move in to Lovell, a fairly small Wyoming town not far from the Montana border, was anyone’s guess. Not that anyone was really complaining - a successful corporation in the neighborhood would provide a fair amount of opportunity - it just seemed a little unusual.
The why of it soon faded from the public mind.
Angevandt opened its Lovell facility, and breakthrough after breakthrough after breakthrough followed in its wake. The corporation grew, and with it the city. Angevandt attracted workers of all sorts, and Lovell expanded to accomodate them. Discoveries, advancements, products - Angevandt promised it was taking humanity to the next level, their technology making the human body and mind far better than nature ever could, and Lovell marched forward with the company into the bright and optimistic future, blooming from a small town into Wyoming’s desert flower megaopolis.
Then it all changed.
Nobody knew exactly what it was that happened. Those awake that night said something about strange noises coming from the Angevandt facilities, though nobody could agree on exactly what they were - high-pitched whines, monotonous drones, some even described them as screeches. Whatever they were, Angevandt simply - crashed. The facilities abandoned, the employees vanished, research gone. All that remained was the shell that was the Angevandt campus, computers and lights and alarm systems still left on.
Rumors, predictably, flew, but it was all rather moot in the long run. The fall of Angevandt left Lovell with rather a stimga, and the city crashed as hard as the company. Few knew what had occurred, and fewer still wanted to stick around to find out. The city was deserted nearly as quickly as it had grown.
That was all decades ago.
Now, Lovell is finding life again, though not in the manner it once did. The city has fallen into disrepair, the sprawling, almost monolithic buildings that made up Angevandt’s former headquarters casting their shadow over the city even still, though long since raided for anything of use - though the brave still plunge into its depths, for whatever reasons they have. Gang activity runs rampant in the streets, a city this big full of hidey-holes and opportunity to make a quick buck. Doesn’t hurt that it’s a cheap place to live these days, too, helped along by the stigma that has descended upon Lovell in the wake of Angevandt’s mysterious collapse. Parts litter the alleyways, and even what residents are here seem pieced together themselves, whether in body or in mind.
It’s here that you claw your way through life now, with every advantage you can get. This was once the heart of human development, the pulse, the very lifeblood of cybernetic enhancement. Others have picked up where Angevandt left off, but this is where it all started, before the system crash.
Is there still the possibility of a reboot out there, somewhere?
Hosted and narrated by:
Jordan (RiverBabble)
Started 01/08/15.
Scenes played: 4
License: Community License
