Robert Sullivan

"Lucía phoned Nico, that cheeky Catalonian separatist, currently fuming over his terminal in Barcelona. Nico said he didn't know anything except it was no joke, computers were going down all over the city. Office workers in the Plaza de Cataluna were taking the morning off because they couldn't access their spreadsheets. The Chinese yuan was the only winner on the stock exchange. Madrid was screaming at Brussels, Brussels was on the phone to Los Angeles, Los Angeles was faxing accusations into Tokyo like how could you be so careless? how could you let in such a terrible thing? Shanghai was denying everything..."
          
          A computer virus grips the world in my latest installment of "First Contact":
          
          https://www.wattpad.com/1425745852-first-contact-cheek-2-cheek

The sudden appearance of a supernova in the constellation of Orion proves to be a welcome distraction for a world facing any number of existential crises, from Climate Change to nuclear war in the Middle East. However, when Paul is persuaded by a beguiling and seductive colleague to "contact" the star using Tantric rituals, the sinister identity of the stellar body is revealed to him:
          
          https://www.wattpad.com/1421868517-first-contact-the-star-who-fell-to-earth-orgasmic

Somewhat similar to the Industrialists, the Chlorophiles were another youth tribe of a collectivist bent, and were committed to combating Climate Change and restoring the regency of Nature. They were Maoist rather than Leninist, anti-technology, and not afraid of direct action to achieve their goals:
          
          https://www.wattpad.com/1414594219-first-contact-1-4-1-000-000-suicide-blonde-edit

The 1990s saw the birth of numerous idiosyncratic youth tribes, who would later carve out their own utopias post 2012. The Industrialists were one of the first movements to coalesce, based around crude techno music, Marxist-Leninism, and a love of rust, grease and broken glass. 
          
          "Slinking out Trax was surprised to notice, hanging on a noticeboard, a poster advertising dance holidays to the great manufacturing belts of the world. He was even more surprised to notice, hanging next to it, a small leaflet designed in an early 20th Century agitprop style, interspersed with random and inappropriate Crylic letters, and boldly proclaiming:
          
          CLUBBERS OF THE WORLD UNITE!
          BLAST FURNACE INSURRECTION BALL
          PORT KEMBLA
          
          ... Trax panicked. Industrialism could be mainstream within months..."
          
          https://www.wattpad.com/1410518293-first-contact-burn

In an age of simulation and endless revival fads, what would be like to find something - someone - even better than the real thing, as the  old U2 song of the early 1990s foretold?
          
          "She was so virtual, I could almost feel the hum of the universe in our embrace as we tumbled, weightlessly, in endless ecstasy around the flaring sun. Nikolina, eyes of starfire, skin like shimmering nebulae... so precise, so astoundingly complete, how could you be an illusion? You must be real, I must believe this is more than an arcade game, that we're really here, locked, in stellar orbit. <<How can you doubt me now>> she sighs, and as we climax the sun explodes and blows into a million tingling pieces...
          
          But when I wake, druggy and disoriented, I'm lying in a cold plastic vat... alone."
          
          https://www.wattpad.com/1409055911-first-contact-interface

The discovery of the body of a young man in a nightclub bathroom bearing a strange tattoo on his wrist leads the protagonist of this story on a voyage of discovery investigating corporate conspiracies, the Golden Ratio, and the power of the sign:
          
          "Then a hyperactive remix of Naughty by Nature's OPP summoned Astella urgently to the dancefloor. Near the speakers a minibar had been set up serving boutique beers and upmarket cocktails. A black guy with an American accent, wearing Ray-Ban sunglasses and a yellow bandana tied around his head was behind the bar, exchanging a brown paper bag for three Australian 50 dollar notes. It was a routine deal, and I would hardly have noticed had I not caught a whiff of Hedione #5 hanging around the customer and homed in to see a tiny, Greek letter Phi (Ф) etched on to the underside of the bag, rendered into a wavy, whirlpool style design..."
          
          https://www.wattpad.com/1406585078-first-contact-liberation-hedione-5-edit

"To one side was an oldfashioned EIKI film projector, holding a reel of dark plastic strips. Behind it was a bookcase where Ral shuddered to see real books, instead of the engrammic yantras, memestreams, or hologifs currently in vogue. What kind of outfit was the old guy running down here anyway???"
          
          The latest installment from "First Contact" is here:
          
          https://www.wattpad.com/1403529965-first-contact-prison-planet-poles-apart

"Nobody remembered the Professor's real name let alone his genealogy, but he definitely sported an Asiatic appearance. According to the archives, he was born in 1942AD, during the turmults and firestorms of World War Two, and later collaborated with NASA before the collective technological efforts of the "free" (that is, Atlantean) world were consolidated to form the Terran Space Agency. He died of natural causes from some antiquated disease in 2104, or 88 (Terran Reckoning), but had had the good sense to invest in cryonics, which at the time offered the best shot of attaining immortality. He had intended to continue work as a scientist upon his revival, but like many revivees, he found it difficult to adapt to advances in technology and knowledge. He became a spectator instead, a tourist, a traveler on a way tour of time. Ages came and went, new calendars and the leaps in consciousness that they usually represented, but they had little impact on the Professor. Strangely, he never seemed to age at all. He did die periodically from some ailment or accident, but was always successfully frozen for resurrection at a later date, when such damage could be reversed and healed. The ravages of existence, so eloquently described by Shakespeare in his sonnets, had no effect on him. He was eternal..."
          
          https://www.wattpad.com/1396236432-first-contact-prison-planet-the-professor

"Though it was mid-morning, the rare Nerceedean triple sunrise was still in progress; the atmosphere was lit a sublime shade of liquor-green, highlighted against a bruised and broiling purple sea. The combined gravitational force of the three red dwarfs was initiating the mother of all king tides, unleashing a tsunami that was rushing to the sunward face of the planet. Soon Lu Prugna itself would be submerged, but Ral worried not... it was designed for this kind of caper..."
          
          https://www.wattpad.com/1391180238-first-contact-prison-planet-scouring-two-galaxies

In an era where everything has already been discovered, every original thrill experienced, and each single event in your life pre-programmed, the only natural reaction is to hunger for authenticity. This was the paradox and tension inherent in the Age of Dystopia:
          
          https://www.wattpad.com/1387664521-first-contact-prison-planet-the-age-of-dystopia