I considered doing this for the Writer's Digest genre short story competition, but I don't think I'll have a decent version out in time for the due date. At any rate, it doesn't feel like it has enough to it to be a whole novel.
Working Title: "Communications Breakdown"
Genre: Sci-Fi
Main Characters: Tommus Richards, a 24-year-old black man who is appropriately full of himself. He is a world-famous runner (anyone could guess from his physique alone) and loves it. He can be rather greedy, and he'll look down on others often, but he's not always offensive. He abandoned the long-running family business for his current career and, as a result, has been estranged from the rest of the family.
Phil, the antagonist. More greedy than Tommus, he's rather slippery and unafraid to take risks, whether they involve him or someone else.
Setting: Future Earth's largest hospital. The size of a city, it demands a large workforce and a multilayered communication system. It consists of several futuristic buildings as well as some outdoor space.
Plot: Tommus is lounging in his summer mansion waiting for the next competition in a month or so when there's a knock at his door. The man there informs him that somehow the entire hospital communication system has crashed, and they're in desperate need of some people to help get information from one place to another fast. Figuring it could be a decent training opportunity, Tommus agrees to volunteer a bit, and it's all fun and games until he starts to stumble upon clues that the shutdown wasn't an accident and just how much money Phil could get if a few delayed messages lead to deaths.
Point of View: First person (Tommus).
I find the idea of a hospital so large that communications breakdown requires a trained athlete to run around and deliver messages quite intriguing! Tommus also seems like an interesting character because he's just in it for the training opportunity, at least at first - some comparisons and contrasts could be drawn between him, who despite his somewhat arrogant and selfish nature, at least has a heart, and Phil, who is greedy to a fault.
ReplyDeleteIt was inspired by the protocol at the local hospital where I volunteer (although obviously it doesn't involve any athletes).
DeleteI think it's inevitable that Phil will offer Tommus a cut of the profits to stop delivering. Tommus would at least consider it, but what kind of story would this be if he accepted? Heh.