4 Prologue (4)

The day finally came when Bruno was discharged from the orphanage. His very being was a mere shell of its once happy demeanor. He looked exhausted and his eyes stared at the road in front of him as if it were an abyss.

A company had called the orphanage, offering Bruno a scholarship due to his outstanding marks, so right now he was waiting for one of their representatives to come and pick him up.

{I finally made it out Randy, I just wish you were here to see me off,} smiled Bruno as a black sedan came to a stop in front of him.

A woman emerged from the car, dressed in a neat black suit.

"Bruno Desiren, I'm Clara Sufon, and I'll be taking care of you for now on," said the woman, holding out her hand.

"T-Thank you."

***

Bruno had been admitted as an honor student to one of the top universities in the area, having scored outstanding marks in the entrance exam it wasn't much of a surprise to him. As soon as the academic year started, he buried himself in coursework, finding a newfound love for life in his engineering degree.

There were still nights when he was crippled by the anxiety attacks, in fact, after Randy's death, they became so unbearable that there were days he contemplated the point of it all... life that is. He promised himself to get help, and after his first year of university, he finally got it.

"You have type IV-2 panic disorder. It's not the end of the world, but you've done well to seek help. Most people take mental health for granted, and end up not getting help until it's too late..." The woman in front of Bruno recited what she was saying as if she had said it a hundred times, and even the look on her face seemed bored, like she'd rather be doing anything else but sit here.

"I will refer you to a psychiatrist, she will be able to give you medication to help cope with your episodes." The woman handed Bruno a medical report, along with the business card of a psychiatrist.

Months passed since Bruno started his medication and the drugs helped to some degree. Although they gave him fast relief during his episodes, they failed to cure the sadness that continuously lurked in the background like static. Even when he was socializing with friends, he felt like something was wrong, like he was guilty about something he didn't remember doing.

It affected his relationships, several of his girlfriends called him out for being mentally unstable, or for being a druggie -as he became heavily dependent on his medication. In fact, his psychiatrist recommended changing his medication and dosage, which lead him to seek other drugs for relief.

By the time he was out of university, not only was he addicted to his medication, but he had also become a regular drug user. It wasn't that he had become a complete junkie- in fact, he had graduated top of his class and was probably on the road to being a successful engineer- it was just that he couldn't function without them.

Psychotherapy didn't work for him, and although he lied to his psychiatrist that it did, he was almost certain that she knew he was lying. But still, he had grown into a practical man, drugs worked so drugs he would use.

He ended up being hired as a nuclear engineer at a government-owned power plant, starting off with a medium-level position. Although it paid well, he didn't plan to work there forever, the job was unfulfilling and didn't let him explore the engineering field the way he wanted to. He had dreams of creating a tech start-up, one in which he could work creatively and do what he enjoyed.

Every day after work he would go home and work on a few side projects, they ranged from the creation of new kinds of networks to the abstract designs of new weaponry. And after a few years, he had made quite a name for himself as a freelancer in multiple fields. It was around this time that he had saved up enough money to afford himself a small building to use as a premises for his startup.

His supervisor and a few of the upper echelons of the powerplant were against him leaving, in the end, they ended up offering him a promotion, however, his mind was made, he wanted to work for himself.

The first few months of operation were horrendous, marketing and running a business were vastly different from engineering. And although he was good at a wide variety of things, nobody seemed interested in a business that had such a broad list of services. After getting some advice from a friend he met at an entrepreneurial event, he decided to focus his business on something specific.

Putting his networking, building, and creative aspects into a single service was hard, but in the end, he came up with an idea. A household assistant much like Alexa, except it had access to the physical world and could carry out tasks past turning appliances on and off.

Investors -seeing his history- quickly put money into his business. Coming from such a background, they thought he would be an instant hit once his story was told. And they were right, after hiring a PR his business saw steady growth. Soon his appliances were becoming a household name among the wealthy, and he began amassing quite a bit of money.

But despite all the cars, all the suits, and all the money, Bruno still felt unhappy. He was still crippled by anxiety, and without his drugs he was useless. If he having anything he needed with a mere word didn't stop the sadness, then would he ever be 'free?' he sometimes wondered to himself. But still, he was content, he hid his depression behind his work and that was enough - though just barely so.