Family Issues
The wu alarm activated, and Jack cursed under his breath. He had planned to run a few more tests on his latest upgrade to his jackbots, but it looked like time was against him. He turned off the alarm, checking the location on the map. He calculated he could spare a couple minutes for a small tuning before he rushed out.
The door to his lab opened "Jacob! Are you here?" called a deep male voice, and Jack froze. It was his father.
"I-I'm down here," he grabbed a rag to try and clean some of the oil from his hands. His father would be angry if he got one of his expensive suits dirty. "I'll be up in a second!"
But his father was already walking down the stairs to the lab. Jack bit his lower lip, bracing himself for whatever it was that he had done wrong. It must have been bad, if it merited a surprise visit from his father.
Mr. Lionel Jacob Spicer entered the lab with a confident stride even as he lifted an eyebrow at the bunch of electronic bits and robot parts thrown around.
"You have upgraded the basement quite a lot. Last time I saw it, you only had the big computer in the back."
"Uhm, yeah, a bit." Jack tried to remember when was the last time his father had been down to the lab, but lost count of the years. It must have been when he had first started researching robotics and his mom had let him use the basement. His father nodded, as if lost in thought.
"Are you busy?"
"No, sir."
"Good. I have a dinner party in Austria and we can make it there if we get going now. Go get your suit."
"Oh. Sure, yeah…" Jack said, dragging his feet as he crossed the lab. His father scoffed out a laugh.
"I know you think you'll hate it, but I came to get you because there's going to be some sort of robotics guy there. I don't know anything about that, but I've heard he's pretty good. Maybe you've heard of him, his name is Robert Erlson."
That made Jack freeze in place. "Rober Erlson? The one who developed the latest latency booster for the machtron V? I tried it out and it worked like a dream until it crashed under, uhm, extreme conditions. But still, I think if I told him about my test results-"
"Jack, Austria is hours away. Suit. Now."
Jack dashed to his room, jumping the steps two at a time. He opened the door to his closet that wasn't filled with goth style clothes to get his suit, when he was quickly reminded that the last time he had worn it had been at least six years ago. Just a few months before he decided to start wearing goth clothes and makeup and his father decided to not take him to any more dinner parties.
"Shoot…" he said.
"Jacob, I'll wait in the helicopter! Hurry up!" called his father from the door.
"Is it a really formal dinner? My suit doesn't fit me anymore!" Jack called from the window in his room that opened to the garden.
His father shook his head and signaled him to get to the helicopter. He was surely going to get an earful now about his shitty clothes and whatnot. He decided to take off his black coat and gloves, then grabbed some elegant black jacket his mother had sent him from Spain last month and ran to the helicopter, while wiping his eyes to get the makeup off. His father had never liked it, and Jack didn't want him to suddenly decide he shouldn't go to the party because of it. His eyes started tearing up, and he tripped over a small rock on the side of the driveway.
"What are you doing? You're going to fall! Try to see while you run, Jacob!" his father said, slapping Jack's hands away from his face.
"Sorry, just trying to get this off…" mumbled Jack.
His father glared down at him. When had the old man gotten so many white strands among the perfectly styled brown of his hair? There were so many. His father smiled, then laughed.
"Now you look like a panda! For god's sake, Jack, get in the helicopter already!"
With a nervous laugh, Jack climbed into the family helicopter and they went straight to the airport. It had been a while since he had last flown in anything that wasn't his helipad, even though he could always call for the family jet. He didn't use it often, because his mother tended to use it almost all the time.
"Is mom already there or are we gonna pick her up somewhere?" asked Jack, settling down on a seat by the window.
His father took a moment to serve himself some cognac before answering.
"Your mother isn't coming. She's still somewhere in Canada."
"Aw too bad." Shrugged Jack. He hadn't seen her in a long while, though she sent presents every month from wherever she was at the time, just like his father.
Jack looked up, and found his father looking at him intently. The older man's eyes looked away as soon as they met his. There was something going on, and a cold dread settled in Jack's stomach.
They traveled in silence, with jack sketching some ideas he'd been thinking about, regarding a new model of latency booster chip while his father sent emails and checked his many investments.
It was a warm kind of silence Jack hadn't realized he missed.