futuristic gadget - quotes and descriptions to inspire creative writing
We have these autopilot submarine tankers. They go to where the sea-storms are and collect the rain, a funnel filling the underwater tank. Then they go to where the fresh water is needed... and it's all done with clean technology. We still do desalination, but this is easy and there's no point in letting all that clean water just fall in the ocean.
We have these bicycles now, ones we still pedal to keep fit, but they go as fast as the motorbikes of your day. We convert that pedal power to electricity and the engines we have now, well, a little energy goes a long way.
...From nowhere came the sound of an old fashioned telephone, so authentic that Livvy scanned the room for an antique, something that wouldn't look out of place in an old movie. She moved around the room, her quiet steps lost under the din. Behind her was a trail of disturbance in the dust; small plumes of particles erupting like mini mushroom clouds. After a few moments she stopped at the heavy wooden table and slid her hand underneath - there was something taped there in plastic.
Livvy ducked down, peeling away fresh duct tape to release the package, still ringing. It was a cell phone, the latest model, the size and shape of an old fashioned credit card in the days before everything was put on the phones. She ripped the bag with her incisors and pulled it out. Like all phones now it was voice activated, in theory, there was no way it would respond to her. "Hello," she said. The ringing stopped...
It started off so innocently - remotely secure your home, know who's in the house at any time. Next it was time to secure the kids. If a kid didn't have a GPS chip implanted the police couldn't guarantee their recovery in the case of a kidnapping. At first no-one went for the chips, then after a string of ugly abductions with grisly endings there was no price too high. The chips were implanted where they couldn't be gouged out in random locations. If junior so much as took a wander down a side road to check out a comic book store the parents and police were instantly alerted. Every false alarm meant a fine. All deviations in routine had to be programmed seven days in advance. No more spontaneous bike rides or trips to the mall.
When those kids grew up there were campaigns for a free chip-removal service but after so many years the chips were imbedded in deep tissue. The few who insisted either died on the operating table or were kidnapped soon after - no chip meant no police protection. Long gone were the days of detective work and "intelligence." Next came the iris cams for kids, time to know what they were looking at, was it homework or x-rated magazines? No-one wanted them either until some kid with an iris-cam was cleared of a capital crime from his recordings. Now they are installed at birth and refusal means you loose custody of the kid - they aren't "protected" without one. In forty years there won't be a soul in the western world without one and the latest versions contain "kill switches" - only to be used to stop terrorism - of course.
With the invention of the "materializer" the first thing to be made was gold. Alchemy at last; but when you have unlimited gold what happens to the price? To the demand? I can answer that. It becomes nothing more prized than copper, in fact, less so because its uses are less. With the new machine we can make any element from any other and there are much rarer materials for us to forge...