[collapse=Background]The day couldn't have been more perfect. Though the nights still dropped in to the mild chills that reminded one of the departing winter, the days were filled with sunshine and warmth. T-shirt weather, as Newt's grandfather called it. Trees and flowers were beginning to show signs of life and there was a crisp, clean aroma in the air. Though a brief shower had wet the ground, the clouds had since broken to a grey-blue marble in the sky, giving way to warm natural light. The weather drew people out from within their abodes and shelters, on to the street for relaxing walks, ballgames with the kids and reading on park benches. The sounds were almost overwhelming; a child's laughter, a man shouting at his friend to 'go long,' dogs barking and the swollen garble of indiscernible human conversation. Everyone seemed to be happy. Everyone seemed to be comfortable. The day couldn't have been more perfect.

Newt had been looking forward to these days all winter and now that a few were starting to grace the city with their presence now and then, his daily routines were taking him outside more and more. The interest in the outdoors would soon fade, once the weather became too hot to bear, but it was a temporary obsession for now. Newt was surprised at the level of activity today. Vehicles buzzed by nearly noiselessly on the street, their electric motors and automated drivers taking relaxed passengers to any number of destinations, like streams of data through a network. It seemed that nobody in the entire city had stayed indoors today and he relished in the sights, sounds and smells of the day, almost collapsing where he stood on the tree-lined sidewalk out of sheer relaxation.

Somewhere in the distance, a commotion could be heard, though Newt didn't have the time to notice it. It was too far and too unimportant. Though the noise was strange, it couldn't possibly have bothered him in this state. Not without coming closer. Which it did. It came closer until it proved to be a minor distraction. Enough to wake him from his fugue state and send him astride, toward the crosswalk lit by bright, clean, clear LED lights in the smooth, black surface of the roadway. Newt pressed a button and waited for traffic to stop and, as he did, that sound came close enough to truly annoy him. Close enough to register in his brain as different from the normal background noise. But unusual things happen all the time. No reason to pay it any extended attention.

As Newt stepped in to the crosswalk when the lights changed from white to green, signaling that it was safe, that noise came all too close to ignore. It was a spitting, growling, throaty noise. It came so close that Newt could feel it. Literally feel it, as almost a ton of metal, rubber and glass collided in to his side, striking him and several others in the crosswalk. It was a machine; an archaic vehicle which, unlike every other vehicle on the road, was under the control of a human pilot. A driver. A wheel-man. In its other seats sat men who had probably just done something very criminal. This only briefly crossed Newt's mind before the world went black and he, along with several others, were left laying in the crosswalk in varying states of consciousness.

Did the world stop? Certainly not. People played games in the park, walked past on the sidewalk, and even in the crosswalk. The injured were ignored. This was the law, after all, not to interfere such things, as the proper authorities would soon be there to handle the situation. There was no human empathy to be found and only cold, automated machines responded to the wounded, first removing the bodies from the scene and subsequently cleaning the surface of the road so that no evidence of the collision remained. Traffic resumed its normal pattern. Not even a second glance was given to the scene, and for those who perished, no memorial would ever be placed on the street corner. This was the law, after all.

Who should be so unlucky to survive? To survive with scars, with crippled limbs and psychological trauma. Newt was resilient enough to escape the accident with only a mangled arm and shoulder, a gash on his neck and back and an abrasion on the forehead from the collision with the road, which had rendered him unto the peace of unconsciousness. Though he slept, the nightmare wouldn't begin until he woke. Newt found his right arm to be made of synthetic flesh and bone, of metal and circuitry, an artificial prosthesis which caused his veins to turn black in his shoulder and chest. He awoke to scars upon his forehead, neck and back. Unclean, unshaven and imperfect. In a world that demanded flawlessness, Newt was now flawed.[/collapse]

[collapse=Life at the Top of Society in 2072]The United States of America, 2072.

Much of the modern life we know today, in 2012, will begin to vanish in the coming years as people become more and more concerned with security and comfort than with liberty and true freedom. Within the next fifteen years, most people won't even choose their own jobs anymore, but rather be placed by a combination of demand and aptitude tests, unless one is wealthy enough to buy his or her way out of the mandatory placement. While unemployment is effectively eliminated, it comes at the price of living in a world where you are almost predestined to work in a given field and nothing that the majority of people can control can change that. After a few decades, this settles in as the norm, though older folks still reminisce about the "good old days" when one could quit a job with flair, knowing that another wouldn't be difficult to find. Now, quitting or refusing to be productive is illegal and punishable by exile to what most people only know as the Outsides (see the next section).

As time marches on, the world becomes less tolerant of free thinkers. Concepts such as racism, sexism and discrimination based on sexual preference become foreign, relics of the past. Tolerance takes a sharp rise, but at the same time, individuality begins to fade rapidly. Most people, by 2050, enjoy very similar hobbies and interests and, as a result, certain types of entertainment venues dominate places that were once home to bars, nightclubs and liquor stores. Sports have all but vanished, with one notable exception: Baseball is the dominant force in the entertainment sector. The only human beings to rise above the standard equity of the day are baseball players, who are treated with absolute reverence. They are practically worshiped and have their own special set of laws that apply to them, and them only. Unfortunately, these laws exclude them from leaving private lives or interacting with the public outside of the year-round games. To be related to a player is as close to a public person can get to elevated social status without being among the super-rich. More so, to be parent to someone whose aptitude testing selects them as a baseball player is every average person's dream. Little is known about the world 'inside the diamond,' however, and baseball gossip and rumor dominates most modern media.

On the other side of the same coin, as genetics and other factors begin to take hold, imperfection is increasingly frowned upon. Genetic flaws are all but erased from the world by the 2050s, and statistical reports continue to show that absolutely zero children are born in the world without genetic modification of some sort. The only way to be flawed is to become flawed, such as in an accident or in military service. While soldiers are often wounded and rendered flawed, their interaction with public people is incredibly limited, and so it is accidents and other freak events rendering public people (like Newt) imperfect that have the greatest social impact. Nobody typically treats a flawed person much different to their face, but there are always whispers and general disdain floating around when one happens to live in a certain neighborhood, go to a certain school or work at a certain place. They are often overlooked for positions of responsibility in their fields and are effectively ignored for social interaction.

As a result of the taboo nature of imperfection, there are some people who have secret attractions to it, as sort of a 'forbidden fruit.' The attitudes among these people range from maternal desire to care for an unfortunate, incapable individuals or from a genuine sexual attraction to certain things like cybernetics and scars. The attitudes toward people with this variety of fetish aren't generally very good, and it has been used to blackmail people for years, but it's not as serious a social taboo as being flawed its self.

More to come.[/collapse]

[collapse=Life in the Outsides]Though calling it the "outsides" implies that this place of ill repute is on the outskirts of modern civilization, that is only partially true. While the land between the major cities and suburbs is rough, barren and inhabited only by criminals, psychopaths, exiles and other unwanted individuals, there also exists an element of an underworld in most major cities. Abandoned subway systems, sewers and virtually anywhere else where one could lose themselves and avoid detection can be home to some sort of undesirable social element. It is just as harsh as one might expect, though there are good place and good people amongst the dregs, who are willing to take in exiles and others who wouldn't otherwise last long in the more brutal areas. Most of the "nice neighborhoods" in the Outsides exist within subway systems, or in small towns between cities that have fortified and employ their own armies, diplomats and trade lanes, independent of the major cities of the USA.

How did this come to be?

In the 2030s-2040s, urban development boomed as leaps in nanotechnology and other necessary advances made vertical expansion just as efficient (if not more so) than urban sprawl. Cities stopped spreading outward and started spreading upward, with some of the bigger ones reaching the clouds and beyond. Cities that would, in 2012, be considered massive in population can now be contained inside of single buildings in some of the larger major cities. People live, work and die without leaving a single building in their entire lives. Being able to go outside at ground level is considered a luxury, and is generally only reserved for those of the highest social standings such as scientists, baseball relatives and the wealthy.

As a result of this development focus on major cities, smaller towns were practically abandoned by the increasingly powerful corporations of the day. Without corporate interest, the areas outside of major cities suffered and came in to intense poverty, not unlike the current state of Detroit, MI - and under similar circumstances, at that. Crime briefly spiked in the world outside major cities until the people remaining there realized that robbing banks and having material possessions didn't mean much when power plants were being shut off and money in cities was being completely digitized. The world outside soon turned to one of desparation and survival and, understandably, was hostile toward those living in cities. By the 2060s and beyond, The Outsides were simply too dangerous, and nobody ventured there anymore, not even the government.[/collapse]

[collapse=Basic Character Description]Be mindful that some of this relies on information in previous sections for context.

Newton Abner Oceanus, often called Newt, was raised in a moderately wealthy family and selected at an early age for a career in scientific study. His education and training encompassed mathematics, physical sciences and theoretical science, but ultimately, his final career assessments placed him in the role of a mechanical engineer. His responsibilities before the accident included designing heavy-lifting equipment and military exosuits.

Prior to the accident, he was a relatively average human male. He reached 5'9" before growth ceased, and maintained an average and somewhat athletic build through a love of physical activity and a pursuit of amateur baseball as a hobby, which was seen as a common and acceptable passion. As his hairline began to recede in his mid twenties, he gave up trying to fight it and began to shave his head nearly completely, leaving only a fine stubble and a slightly thicker five o'clock shadow upon his face. He typically wore a Cleveland Indians baseball cap given to him by his grandfather, even in office and formal settings; which, again, was considered socially acceptable due to the passion for baseball in 2070s society.

After becoming crippled, his right arm was amputated at the shoulder and a highly advanced experimental prosthesis replaced it, funded entirely by his wealthy family. While the prosthesis was supposed to be invisible to the naked eye, it hadn't been extensively tested on humans and left a visible scar behind. In addition, the circulatory system surrounding the joining of artificial arm and living flesh ran black, resulting in black veins shooting over his chest and bicep. He was also left with a sizable scar from an abrasion attained on his forehead, and a deep scar on his neck and upper back from a laceration. While the prosthetic arm functioned perfectly, and even enhanced his strength and ability, he was still labeled by society as flawed and would lead a hard life as a result of the accident.[/collapse]