District Tribulation
Prologue:
New York City
7.12. 9860
We thought the future was going to be bright, going to be different, going to usher in the next step in human adaptation. We were wrong...
Sirens blared down the wet street, police cars chasing a black sedan with no license plate. A light rain. In a coffee shop, customers with nothing better to do than sit and loathe about their deadbeat jobs, gang-banging sons, prostitute daughters, and crack whore wives sat with cups of coffee and cigarettes. The overhead fluorescent light flickered, a fly buzzed around the room, a waitress in her thirties who was a college dropout and recovering alcoholic periodically and mechanically roamed around the room like one of those dolls from a reproduction 19th century German cuckoo clock made from a small German-American clockmaker who was trying to get by with cheap replicas and pass them off as fake. As metaphorical things would have it, a German-American, Wolfgang Lammesfelder sat in a booth, wearing a black trench coat and a matching hat that told the world that he was dead to humanity, and alive to destruction, greed, and the new government of the world, anarchy. He was also a former clockmaker. The waitress, with her mechanics came over, she smiled very robotically and like everything else about her said, "Is there anything else I can get you?"
"No." Wolfgang said, in a rather American accent, for he had lost the German one years ago, but he could speak the language in his sleep. "I'll just have the bill please." The waitress smiled and walked away. Wolfgang looked at his coffee, which was black, the way he liked it, the way he liked the world. He fished in his pocket, pulled out a wadded up twenty dollar bill with a tear on the side and black Sharpie written on it and placed it on the table. He stood up from his booth and walked out into the rain.
Lammesfelder pulled out his cell phone and pressed the number one on his number pad. Speed dial. Ringing. "Mr. Parker," Wolfgang said a bit of fear in his voice, "you and your friend have precisely thirty minutes to save my life before I am brutally murdered. My name is Wolfgang Lammesfelder, I am a brain surgeon, and although I'm not the best person in the world, hell I may even be the opposing player in this game of chess that we are now playing together, but I need you to save me." He paused, he looked around making sure that no one was looking in his direction. "I don't want to die. If you save me, I will help you stop this madness. Strings are being pulled, guns are aimed at my head, the world waits for my death Mr. Parker, for I am the one who caused all this, who killed your friend's family. I like this fear. This terror, but I do not like death. So save me, your friend can kill me later." He hung up the phone and walked across the street towards the subway.
The subway station was deserted, Wolfgang Lammesfelder waited for the train. It pulled up slowly, graffiti and pictures of him adorned the outside of the subway. Prisoners praising him for their freedom, their deliverance. The door opened, Wolfgang entered. The people inside looked at him, scolding and damning his soul. Wolfgang just sat down in an open space and kept quiet.
This is the story of Wolfgang Lammesfelder, a brain surgeon, former clockmaker, who wanted a change of pace for the world, a different way of seeing things. He wanted violence, adventure, destruction, free reign. He loves every minute of this world that he created, but he loves his life more, and his life was being targeted by the people he gave the world to. The only people Wolfgang could go to was Peter Parker and his friend. the only two people he didn't betray, the only two people he trusted, the only two people who could save him.