SODIUM:2 Apocalypse Read Free Page B

fun ended that fall when Renee's time had come to go off to college in Chicago. I was suddenly faced with a five hour drive which limited us to weekend visits for most of the first semester. It didn't take long before Frank once again came through for me. He offered to foot my college tuition and dorm fees if I would attend there full time with Renee.
    It was an offer I couldn’t refuse. Here I was again, now all of 19 years of age, and my girlfriend’s father was willing to pay for me to accompany her to an expensive school that was a good 300 miles away. It just couldn’t get any better. I guessed that he had felt more at ease with someone he knew being there with her. And I was sure she had put in the good word for me too. Besides, whatever Renee wanted from Daddy, Renee got. My parents were thrilled for me, but at the same time they were worried that their oldest boy was being bought and paid for.
    Over the course of a couple of years I had become very arrogant and conceited and that had not set well with my father. He was happy for my success, but worried for my soul. Here I was being handed everything on a silver platter and I never had to lift a finger.
    In my home we had been taught that if you were willing to work hard you would be able to take care of yourself and your family. My parents had certainly proven that, but my thoughts at the time were "why work at all when someone else is willing to pay the bills". And not just pay the bills, but provide you with the means to really live it up. It was a dream come true for any young man and I had done everything in my power to exploit it.
    Once at college I could not disappoint my ego so I had joined a frat and was "Mr. Party" while Renee studied finance. She had a good job waiting for her at Daddy’s firm and was eager to get started on her own fortune. She had big plans for her future, a career, marriage, a family and eventually a partnership like Daddy. I on the other hand was on the gravy train and was all too willing to let her pull that wagon as far and as fast as she wanted.
    I would sign up for a full load of coursework only to drop half of it a few weeks later and then pocket the refund for beer money. My progress was slow and my grades nothing to be proud of, but I continued onward none the less.
    Several of my frat brothers were pre-med and I got acquainted with a piglet's anatomy at many a dissection party in the basement of our frat house, drunken students with scalpels was a really bad idea, but we somehow managed to never dissect one another. Always the competitor and also the egomaniac, I became the best in the dorm at stitching up piglets. I didn't know at that time how much I would one day be thankful that I had acquired that particular skill.
    One evening after a binge at the frat house I began sewing a passed out buddy up in a full sized pig skin that we had removed from the carcass. We left his head sticking out, but with his arms sewn inside he was quite the frat football until the few remaining sober brothers took control and let him go. The college life was an endless circuit of parties, football and frat events.
    The next fall I had a class in metallurgy. I had a frat buddy who was also in Mechanical Engineering who was book smart in every way possible, but lacked in practical common sense. Being that I was the opposite we had decided to pool our talents and make the best of our combined abilities.
    Once the metallurgy class had begun I remembered the item the crazy old man had shoved in my hand so many years before. On my next trip home I retrieved the device so my friend Pete could have a look at it. It only took a few minutes after I placed the object in his hand and told him about the old man for him to become obsessed with it.
    We wondered if it was from some secret government lab or stolen from some high tech firm. I would have to admit, I had a bit of obsession with it myself as we were both just cutting our teeth on metallic