Prologue

Eventually I decided not to open with Pride waking up, although someone still wakes up in the Prologue, it is the AI known as The Elephant who does the waking (okay - he was never really asleep, just trapped.) I had also decided that I wanted the novel to begin with the first word of the title and to end with the last word - so that he whole adventure was contained within the collapsed Heavy Duty - in a way I was suggesting the internal world that half the adventure takes place. Of course the Kantian question which all Science Fiction appears to pose remains the same. How real is all of this? Later on Hari mentions to Pride that The Nothing (Hari's name for the real world) only exists in the mind of God.
So here it is: Heavy Duty opens with phone Engineer Taro Anzai accidentally reconnecting The Elephant to the telephone network. Taro Anzai may be a minor Character but he actually opens the second book of the Trilogy and if he lives long enough he may open the third book.

EXTRACT FROM THE PROLOGUE

Heavy rain spattered the windscreen as Mr Taro Anzai parked the phone company truck next to the big memorial bell.

He was in the centre of the wide concourse at the point where the Kiryu Highway abruptly terminated. The sun was still low on the horizon and the dawn was washed in sickly orange. He waited until the rain had stopped. It was another cold bleary morning in the bay area, much wetter and colder than the mornings he remembered as a child.

Further out, beyond the sunrise, there was a young volcano, where the island of Kozu shima used to be. About one hundred kilometres further out and half a kilometre down was the drowned city of Tokyo. He looked too long at that spot and a cold tide of memory flooded his soul.