I've posted this on another website, but it wasn't a dedicated literary site.
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Just Google It
-1st edit written in late 2005.
AutophobeX49923 sat at his desk. It was dim in the windowless room, the only light coming from the glow of his computer screen. His eyes barely blinked as they darted to and fro; scanning the monitor. He was searching the Google Database for information on life at the turn of the millennium.
He’d been shocked at first, but his initial reaction was replaced by an ignorant contempt for those who had lived a hundred and fifty years ago. Making friends was performed in person, and people travelled from their homes to learn. The fact that it was often frowned upon to meet people in person, having only known them from the internet had sent tremors of disgust down his spine.
Nowadays everyone met on the internet. AutophobeX49923 had joined a few dating lists, and had as a result came into contact with someone who was to become his girlfriend. He’d been going out with her for eighteen months. He was considering asking her to marry him, but they would have to meet each other in person. He wasn’t sure it was a good idea; it scared him, having to meet someone face to face. But there were reports that Google was making marriage over the internet legal. He would then be able to have the little mark on his User Profile that signified marriage.
His girlfriend lived in a place called Sicily. A Google Search had revealed that Sicily was near to a place called Italy. Google Said that that Sicily was at one time referred to as a football, and Italy as the boot. Another Google Search lead to the discovery that football was a sport in which twenty two players divided into two teams, tried to score goals against each other. It was very popular, the page showed a number of photographs of prominent players. Many people watched it on television, as well as playing it. AutophobeX49923 didn’t see the point, nobody played sport anymore. Although eSports were still popular, it was not a spectator sport.
AutophobeX49923 face didn’t show any change in emotion as he searched. Years spent without any direct human contact had rendered facial expressions and body language redundant.
Google Said that at around 2000 AD, people ran the risk being brutally murdered or bombed by psychopaths and terrorists whenever they stepped outside. Pandemics ravaged the populations with disease, spread from person to person as they met to work and socialise. Google Said that when people met for dates, they were drugged and raped. Google Said that it stepped in with GoogleNet, and people became safer as they met on the internet.
He rubbed his eyes, they were sore. Google Said he wasn’t drinking enough. He would have another coffee; he reached to the dispenser beside him, and pressed a button without looking up.
AutophobeX49923 closed the window displaying the history, and automatically opened up his User Page. He looked at the popularity meter just below his name. He smiled, it had gone up by one percent. He had worked hard to get to 73 percent; making sure he was completely up to speed with all of the fads that made up part of the ever changing pattern of the internet.
His eyes flicked to the box that displayed his various achievements and clubs. There were a number of icons; one for his country, and then another for his continent. Others displayed his religion, and another his political ideology, and his favourite animal. All were clubs that everyone joined, lest anyone thought they had no opinions.
There was a little symbol representing a cow. AutophobeX49923 had never seen a cow, except for a photo Google had provided. Cows were a popular favourite, along with sheep and other herd animals.Google said that people used to eat cattle. It shocked AutophobeX49923. No-one ate meat anymore. Google said it turned people into blobs of fat.
AutophobeX49923 spent most of his time trying to keep his User Page up to date, or looking at other people’s pages. His entire life and personality was summed up on that single page. The icons and lists on every page displayed a whole life, an entire person.
A chat window popped up. A little noise signified that it was his girlfriend. He would have ignored it had it been anyone else.
TheTwinklingMoon9: We have to end it.
AutophobeX49923: End what?
TheTwinklingMoon9: Us.
AutophobeX49923: Why? What have I done?
TheTwinklingMoon9 gave AutophobeX49923 a link. She said that Google has made a program that compared User Pages, and gave a suitability rating. Google Said they had a rating of 2.1 out of ten.
AutophobeX49923’s emotions suddenly welled up. He was distraught; they were perfect – every fibre of his body told him so. How could Google be so wrong? But Google was all knowing. Something must have not been right between them. Google was always correct.
Doubt still coursed through him. He pushed his chair back from the computer, making deep lines in the dust tat coated the floor. He was held by two opposing possibilities. Google had got something wrong, or his heart had been telling him lies.
The only way to find the truth was to leave the room. Google Said the outside was barren, hostile to life. No-one could live there.
There was a door. It had only been opened once; when AutophobeX49923 had first entered the room as a child. Now he stood weakly on his legs, and stumbled to the door. His feeble hands struggled to turn the handle. Eventually the door swung open, and light flooded the room.
AutophobeX49923 was blinded, but he probed his way out, his darkness bleached skin burning in the sunshine.
