The Shopwiki Chronicles 2250: The Legend of the Great Editor Pt. 1

I walked down Main St. just past the library in the ancient capital of the NWO, Orange, Old New Jersey. I had just finished conducting business with a client. She had searched for decades for an authentic Dr. Henry Jones Kotobukiya figurine from early in the millenium. I had three (thanks to my connections at the Revered and Most Holy Council of Shopwiki). She paid handsomely for the figurine and after I had paid my business fees to the Beloved Council of Shopwiki, I made about 17,462.58 Yuan. Enough to finally get me a liter of gasoline to extend my life by another 3 years beyond capacity.

I rounded the corner to Lincoln Avenue when I heard shuffling in the dark alley behind the Post Office. I pointed my middle finger at the void and scanned with my SuperMega BlackBerry. The reading came back as two humans with 33% Methcrackoine content combined. At those levels they were probably just spammers or Myspace tweakers. I continued on, as I passed I heard them moving.

"Hey, how old are you?" one asked in a raspy rattle. Awww CRAP!!!! "What ethnicity would you say that you identify with the most?" the other one chimed in in perfect sequence. I started to run without looking back, I knew what they were.

"Would you like to take a quick survey? It will only take 2 minutes!" the raspy one yelled out, picking up his speed in pursuit.

"We just want to ask about your satisfaction level!" the other yelled.

Advertisers. The dregs of society. And these were the lowest of the low: Focus Groupies. In the year 2012 all advertising had been banned when extensive global research and the subsequent proofs from the knowledge base of the Alien Overlords showed that there were no direct correlations between sales and advertising. Most of them found quasi-validation as bloggers and "educationalists", but the majority slithered into the underworld with the Mole People or out into the vast wastelands of New North Canada and Minnekotia. Out there they formed large bands that roamed the countryside compiling databases and demographics info, sending Hunter/Seeker teams into civilization to update their files and mailing lists. "We would like to know what radio stations you listen to!" old Raspy asked again, hoping that I would stop just enough for them to water-board answers from me. I knew their game, after they had squeezed out all the useless information from me, they would drill out my brain to ensure that nobody else got the info and that there were no duplications in their system.

My training at the Revered Shopwiki Academy had only reached Simple Disarming and Completing the Sale techniques. I hadn't yet been given clearance in deadly hand to hand close quarters combat. I ran down an alley hoping to lose them, only to discover that it was a dead end. I turned around and pushed my back against the wall. I wasn't going down without a fight.

They stopped a few yards from me. Raspy pulled out a drill while his partner rolled back the sleeves of his pink Armani shirt. "We give you coupon at end of survey," Raspy wheezed out. His partner tittered and stared at my head with googley eyes.

Just then I heard glass breaking above me.

"That's: We WILL give you coupons at the end of this survey!" I heard an angry and fed up voice scream down. "TASTE MY PAIN!" A blur came crashing down on Raspy, crushing his body and ruining his wool three-piece suit and throwing his trendy retro style eyeglasses by my left foot. I saw a flash of steel and Raspy's friend flopped to the ground in two halves.

I looked at the hulking mass before me. It was mostly machine parts, but I could see the basic outline of a human form.

"They was gonna kill me..." I blubbered.

"They WERE going to kill you," it corrected me as it turned around and pointed a huge sword at my face. My eyes went from the tip of the blade, to the cybernetic arm, to the piercing eyes. I looked down and saw that it wore a name tag. Hello, my name is... "LENGLI" was scrawled in blood red.

"It's YOU..." I whispered in awe.