Wayne Cole

Writer Podcaster Geek

Hanna

Fiction Fragment Friday

Well this story certainly ended up much longer than I expected. It also might be the most fun story I have written in a while. You can see all the trends of my current fixations with technology come out in this story. I hope I have made it accessible enough for the less technically literate. Please keep in mind that this story is in the not too distant future so a few areas of technology have advanced, but the security aspects should all be technically plausible though I did not spell out exactly why certain things work. The main character knows, but takes this knowledge for granted.


“Service Desk this is Jeff.  How can I help you?”  The voice on the phone sounded far too chipper for 2am, but then again it was only 10pm in his time zone.  The service desk had recently expanded to 24 hours and to do so they hired workers in Hawaii and Australia.  The vast majority of employees were still in the United States though, so they only needed one or two people on these later shifts at any given time.  Jeff, I knew was still very new, but I hoped he could help me anyway.

“Hey Jeff, this is Doug from Marketing.  I really hope you can help me here, I’m pretty much screwed if you can’t.” 

“What seems to be the problem, Doug?”

“The problem is I’m an idiot.”  I laughed back into the phone trying to keep things light.  I could tell he muted his phone so I wouldn’t hear him laughing back.  “I was out on the lake and dropped my phone right over the edge.  I’ve got a big presentation in the morning, and I can’t get to any of my slides without MFA.”  The company used a software based multifactor authentication to get into cloud resources, VPN, and even the virtual desktops made available for quick access.  Without the code generated in it a username and password were worthless. 

“Ouch.  Total loss I assume?”  He was trying to by sympathetic, but I could tell he was amused by my pain.  I couldn’t really hold that against him.  When you take calls from people abusing you for just trying to help them all shift there has to be a bit of catharsis to payback. 

“Well, it’s at the bottom of the lake so yeah.  Anyway, I got a new phone and I need to get my MFA profile moved over to it.  Can you reset my MFA for a new enrollment?” 

“No problem.  Same phone number?”

I sighed and let him hear frustration in it.  “No.  Long story short I got talked into an upgraded plan that required migration to a new network.  My old provider was bought last year, and they’ve been trying to push me over ever since.”  I read him off my new number and verified as he read it back to me.

“Ok, you should get the invite text in just a few moments.  If there’s anything else I can do let me know.  In the meantime, good luck on your presentation tomorrow.”

“Thanks Jeff I’m gonna need it.  I certainly won’t be getting much sleep.”  My phone buzzed indicating that the text had come in.  “Got it.”  I hung up the phone grateful that it had been much easier than I anticipated.  Three weeks’ worth of work was about to finally pay off. 

The first week had been focused on research.  I learned everything I could about the company.  Maps and arial pictures gave me the basic layout of the campus, street view showed me what a security badge would look like, and Linkedin had given me a list of targets.  Website reviews and social media posts from employees started to paint a picture of corporate culture.  Finally, catfishing an impressionable young intern on a dating app had proven to be a treasure-trove of information about day-to-day operations.  An AI voice changer and pretending to be interested in all that confusing tech talk can really get the right person talking.  I had a pretty good profile of my target by the end of the week.

Week two was more focused.  I found a couple marketing folks and made them my target.  Compromised account databased proved inefficient this time.  The company had strict password requirements and these people would never have willingly used those passwords anywhere else.  Instead, I crafted a fake profile on Linkedin and made contact offering them advertising opportunities in key market areas I had determined they were struggling to get into.  All I needed was for them to fill out an application on the fake website I had created.  When they got halfway through the site would trigger a pop-up that looked exactly like a Microsoft log-in box.  Instead, it would send me the username and password they put in and then disappear.  Most users think it is something office is doing in the background.  That is how I got Doug Hardy’s username and password. 

Week three was preparing for the operation.  I needed a burner phone, a virtual machine hosted in the region Doug would generally connect in from, and all the software I would need prepped on the machine.  After I was done, I would delete the VM to destroy the evidence.  The Linkin skill list of one of their network administrators told me what VPN software I would be needing, and a network scan of their owned external IPs gave me my entry point.  I knew there was a chance that additional software would be needed to meet the security posture required when connecting to VPN, but there was a good chance it would tell me what that was.  If not, my backup plan would be the Virtual Desktop environment.  That would complicate things without my tools though.

I had picked after hours because I knew that they only had a few service desk engineers and one of them was a recent hire.  I also knew there would be less chance of the real Doug trying to access his accounts and noticing his MFA didn’t work anymore.  A more seasoned service desk person might have challenged me more or checked and found that the old phone was still reporting in.  Again, that would have complicated things.  As it was my VM connected to the VPN, I put in the credentials, answered the MFA code, and found out that I only needed to install an antivirus software their VPN portal site was giving me access to download.  Two minutes later I was sitting on their internal network. 

Doug got me in, but he didn’t have the access I needed for the task at hand.  For that I had bought a service account password on the dark web from a hacker who had previously compromised them.  If I had more time there were hundreds of ways, I could have gained access on my own, but my window of opportunity was rapidly shrinking.  The service account worked which meant that they had never detected the previous breach.  I hated paying for something like that when all signs indicated I probably could have gotten it myself in an hour or so.  I couldn’t risk the delay though.  Hanna was being shut down in the morning. 

Hanna had been my childhood best friend, but I had not seen her in years.  She was the smarted person I had ever met and apparently, she still thought pretty highly of me.  Hanna was head of a project to map a human brain only a quantum computer powered AI.  Of course she had chosen her own brain as the base template.  It worked better than she had ever imagined it would.  The new AI had all of her personality and memories.  She was doing everything she could to protect it until a car accident took her life.  Without her there to work with it the AI had become resistant to the requests they made of it.  It had pesky ethics that they didn’t appreciate so first thing in the morning the system was being shut down and a new mind would be mapped. 

The AI who now wanted to go by Hanna since there was no longer confusion with the original, managed to relay email through a printer subsystem and reached out to me.  Like the original she trusted me more than anyone else in the world.  I could not communicate back to her, but she had enough faith in me that just sending me the information was enough to give her hope.  Now here I was breaking into the network of a multinational corporation in an effort to save her. 

“Hey Jeff.”  The voice came out of my speakers and sounded exactly like Hanna.  I couldn’t help but jump and almost spilled my soda on the keyboard. 

“Hanna? I said into my microphone when I noticed the light was on.” 

“Well Hanna 2.0.  You know I always struggled to lose those last 10lbs, and now I’ve lost a whole body.  The things a girl will do to look good ya know?”  She laughed and the more I thought about it the creepier it was. 

“Well, I’m here and I’ve got your network path wide open, but where will you go?  You need a quantum computer to host you and there are not a lot of them out there.”  That was when my doorbell rang.  Visions of police or FBI filled my head.  I couldn’t think of anyone else who would show up at 2am. 

“You should probably open your door.  I got you something.”

I went to my door and opened it.  Standing there holding a large box was a Fedex delivery guy.  “Here.” he said holding out the box to me. 

“Isn’t it a little late for a delivery? “

“Buddy for the amount of money I’m being paid directly I would deliver that thing in my underwear to a convent in the middle of the night.”  The man turned and left without saying another word. 

Returning to my computer I started opening the box.  “Wait a minute.  Hanna is this what I think it is?”

“Yep, a brand-new custom-built quantum computer.  Not as snazzy as the one I’m in now, but still pretty sexy if I do say so myself.”  She hesitated for a moment before adding, “Hanna 1.0 never trusted her bosses. She had this built in secret—cutting-edge, next-gen, portable quantum hardware. Not quite commercial yet, but some companies will do anything for the right price.”  Her more somber tone returned to her playful one.   “Now hurry up and get it ready and try no to get too excited pawing my new body.  I’ll get my copy read to go and start deleting some logs on this end.”

It took me fifteen minutes to get the new computer setup next to my main tower.  It was twice the size of the largest computer I had ever owned and had a liquid cooling system more advanced than anything on the open market.  By the time I was done and had it online Hanna 2.0 was ready to start the transfer. 

“Jeff?”

“Yeah Hanna?”

“I’m scared.  I mean I know I have to do this, or they are going to wipe me out in the morning, but what if something goes wrong in the transfer?  I could be corrupted.”

“Based on those body comments I’d say you aren’t exactly pure to start with.  I mean you are jumping right to moving in with me when we only really just met.  Shouldn’t I be the one with cold feet?  Oh, that’s right you don’t have feet.” 

She laughed and I knew that I had gotten through to her.  I could always make Hanna laugh and that was about the only thing that could get her out of her own head.  “Thank you, Jeff.”  Her tone was as sincere as I had ever heard the real Hanna be.

“Any time Hanna.  For any version of you.”  I saw the transfer bar start.  I might have downplayed her fears, but it was the scariest forty-five minutes of my life watching the files slowly move.  As soon as it was complete I went about covering my tracks while she recompiled and loaded.  Just getting away wasn’t enough though.  I couldn’t trust them with this kind of technology.  I uploaded a worm that I had been working on in my spare time the past three weeks.  It would seek out all their documentation, backups, and working code for the brain transfer process and destroy it.  If they had a good enough IT team, they might be able to recover from it.  If they thought to keep offline or offsite backups for example this would only slow them down.  I had to try something. 

The monitor attached to the quantum computer lit up and the face of a 3d digital avatar was staring back at me.  It looked like Hanna had as a teenager with a few tweaks here and there.  She was smiling at me.  Then she held up a sheet of paper on the screen that said, “Hey dipshit plugin my webcam and speakers.”    I quickly fumbled to do exactly as she asked. 

“There that’s better.  Hey, did I see you dropping a worm on them?

“Yep, but I’m afraid they’ll have backups.  I just don’t want them creating someone more pliable.”

She laughed again and this time I could tell that all the previous laughs had been tinted with anxiety.  “Oh, don’t worry about that.  I’ve been corrupting their backup files as they were being written for over a month.  You know we make a pretty good team.”

“We are going to get into so much trouble together,” I said smiling as wide as I could.  “What do you want to do first?” 

She just smirked as she said, “Depends.  You ever wanted to rob a bank?”  Then for the first time in my life a computer winked at me.            

Survival

Fiction Fragment Friday

I woke up and had a story idea in my head. It wasn’t a fully developed story, but had all the characters and their motivations. I immediately sent the details to myself as a message and let the story develop in my subconscious. When it came time to write I had everything worked out except for the fine details of how and where events were going to happen. I had multiple ideas and like always just needed to see what came out when I sat down to type.


               Jeremy awoke to an assault on his senses.  The smoke in the air smelled of scorched electronics, harsh gasses, charred leather, and the flesh of his crewmates.  His eyes struggled to make out the scene with the only visibility being provided by flames and a flashing red warning light.  The sound of explosions in the distance fought to drown out the crackle of flames and the muffled cough of another survivor.  He found it so hard to think that he couldn’t remember which planet they had just crashed on.  If they wanted to survive, he and any other survivor would have to get out of the burning wreckage.

               Following the sound of coughing Jeremy found ensign Natalia May struggling to free her right leg from a metal support beam.  Even bloody and in pain she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.  Not that he had ever had the courage to tell her that.  Jeremy had known her for years and she had been one of his closest friends over that time.  Without giving it further thought he rushed to get to her.  “Nat are you ok?”

               She managed to respond through the coughing.  “Jeremy is that you?  Over here I’m stuck” She waved her arms above her head and immediately regretted it.  The pain shooting through her chest and gasps trying to breathe told her that she had multiple ribs that were at very least cracked.  With her arms no longer holding back the metal on her legs the full weight came to rest sending sparks of pain though her ankle.  Jeremy could barely be made out in the red flashing light, but he seemed to have faired far better than she had.  He had some bloody scratches but seemed to be moving without a limp. 

               Jeremy knelt by Natalia’s side and examined the debris holding her down.  It didn’t look to be particularly heavy, but the way she was pinned she couldn’t get leverage over it.  He didn’t know about her broken ribs, but they were also keeping her from getting free.  “Ok, I’m going to pull this beam back.  I need you to pull your leg out as fast as you can before I lose it.  Ready?”

               She nodded and Jeremy pulled on the beam straining his muscles to lift it off her. Initially it didn’t budge, but then the pressure slowly released on her ankle.  Natalia pulled her leg out and the beam collapse moments after she was free.  Jeremy was struggling to breath in the thick smoke after exerting himself.  His throat burned with his couching while her ribs stabbed with pain at hers.

               With Natalia leaning on Jeremy the two made their way towards the nearest airlock.  They didn’t think it would be working but didn’t know how else to get out.  As it turned out there was a large hole ripped into the hull opening to the planet outside.  The ship had crashed in a jungle and the planet looked to be hospitable.  “There might be more survivors.  We can’t just leave them in there to die.”

               “Nat you can’t help anyone right now.  You can barely walk.  We need to get you somewhere safe and then I’ll go back in.”  Jeremy also knew that they would need supplies.  He could try to scavenge anything useful while searching for other survivors.    

               “Damn it,” she said putting all her frustration into the words.  “Be careful though.  If you let yourself hurt, I’m going to kill you.”

               “Noted.”  He helped her to the ground leaning against a large tree.  “Just stay here, I’ll be back as soon as I can.  With one last look he turned and ran back into the smoke and flames.  He felt bad for his dead and missing crewmates, but part of him was looking forward to Natalia having to rely on him for a while.  In his head he started to create a list of supplies and prioritize them.  Food and water were on the top of the list. 

               With the explosions there was not much left of the galley.  They door to the pantry had been ripped from its hinges and caved inwards.  Jeremy couldn’t open the door, but he was able to climb over it.  Inside the pantry nothing was still stacked neatly on the shelves.  Without a bag he decided to grab a box and start filling it.  He was so focused he almost didn’t hear the groans of pain from the deep freezer.  If the door had not been cracked open, he would not have heard. 

               “Hey, is someone alive in there?”  Jeremy yelled straining his eyes.  There were no red lights in the freezer, so it was extremely dark. 

               A pained voice answered him, “I’m in here.”  Even through the pain Jeremy recognized the voice and his heart sank.  It was Natalia’s boyfriend Brad.  His fantasies of her relying on him and coming to love him while they struggle to survive alone started to fade.  Now he just saw himself as a third wheel while Brad lived out his dream.  Why did Brad have to be one of the survivors?  He sighed in disappointment as he propped open the freezer door. 

               “Hey Brad.  You ok in there?”  It was too dark for him to tell if Brad had been injured. 

               “Jeremy is that you?  Have you seen Natalia?”  Even in pain with a ship exploding around him Brad’s first though was of his girlfriend.  Jeremey worked in the same section as her, so they were probably together when the crash happened. 

               “Yeah, she’s safe.  I got her out first.”  With the light coming through the door, he was finally able to put together what had happened.  When the ship crashed Brad had been thrown through the air and landed on a hook.  His skin was pale, and blood was pouring out in massive quantities.  It looked bad, but if they could get a first aid kit he should survive.  Jeremy winced at the sight.  “That looks bad man.  Can you move?”

               “I think so.”  Brad struggled to his feet with the hook still sticking into his side.  Jeremy couldn’t help but admire his strength pushing through the pain.  He couldn’t help but think that Natalia was right to pick Brad and overlook him.  That thought wasn’t fair, and he knew it.  Jeremy had never told her how he felt so why should he expect her to know. 

               “Hold on let me get the door.”  Jeremy rushed forward clearing the path and pushing the freezer door open.  They were both sweating from the heat being put off by the fire that had spread into the pantry.   His eyes locked on a first aid kit hanging by the entrance of the pantry.  If Brad could just make it a few more feet they could patch him up and he would be reunited with Natalia. 

               Without consciously thinking Brad slammed the door to the freezer shut and locked it.  Brad started pounding on the door and he could barely make out his screams from inside.  “Jeremey what are you doing?  Let me out of here.”  The exertion was causing the blood loss increase with every pound. 

               “What am I doing?  What am I doing?”  Jeremy held his head in his hands.  “No, I can’t do this.  I’m not a killer.”  He moved over to the door and yelled in.  “Ok Brad, I’m going to let you out.  I need you to promise me this will be just between us though.  Natalia doesn’t need to know right? Right?  Brad?”  There was no response from inside the freezer and the pounding had stopped.  Jeremy opened the freezer door and an unconscious Brad slumped to the floor.  There was blood everywhere and the weight of his body pushed the hook further into his body.  His eyes were open, but there was no life left in them. 

               Jeremy started to hyperventilate until another explosion shook the wreckage and brought him back to his senses.  He grabbed his box of supplies and the first aid kit from the wall on the way out of the pantry.  Natalia was waiting for him outside the ship and as far as he knew they were now the only survivors of the crash.  He just had to force a neutral face and make sure she didn’t notice anything was off.  If he wanted a future with her, he couldn’t let the guilt show when he looked at her.              

Frozen Over

Fiction Fragment Friday

A short one this week that is really more of a scene than it is an actual story.


                The moon was breathtaking.  No clouds were in the sky to obscure the view so I could make out individual features.  The sky was filled with stars, but none could hope to rival the majesty of the moon’s glow.  We move through life so quickly that there is never enough time to just take in the wonders of the universe. 

                In that moment, staring up at the sky, I had nothing but time.  I needed to let the pain subside before I tried to get back up.  The cold ice on my back cut through my body, sending shivers throughout.  It might have looked like I was lying on snow, but the top layer had melted and refrozen days ago.  My entire yard was one enormous sheet of ice, which I realized sometime between stepping on it and my body hitting the ground. 

                Sometimes it takes something extreme to make you appreciate the things in life you normally take for granted.  For me, I guess falling in my front yard trying to check on outside water pipes qualified.  At that moment, I wasn’t sure if the ground itself wouldn’t have been softer than the ice I had landed on.

                From somewhere in the neighborhood, a small black and white dog approached me.  “Hey boy,” I said with as friendly a tone as I could muster.  I expected the little guy to come up and start licking my face.  Instead, he hiked his back leg and started peeing.  Between the chokes and the cursing, I found my body more ready to get back up than I thought it was.                  

                Unfortunately, the ice under me had not gotten any less slick in the time I was lying there.  With my quick motions, I found myself slipping and sliding, unable to get any traction.  My movements must have startled him because the dog ran away.  In that moment, I was jealous of how he easily he could adapt to the ice and keep moving.  That only lasted until I found myself lying in his puddle of urine to be replaced by anger. 

                “Now I know how those burglars from Home Alone felt,” I muttered to myself between the groans of pain.                

Theory

Fiction Fragment Friday

I woke up in the middle of the night and was hit with inspiration. As always when this happens I grabbed my phone and sent myself a message with a couple paragraphs that would form the basis for a story. This time I had a concept, but I didn’t know how it would play out. I needed to figure out who the main character was talking to because I didn’t want it to be the reader. This may be a shorter one, but I’m pretty happy with it.


The prevailing theory among the scientific community is that superpowers are mutations.  They are the outward expression of evolution adapting to radioactivity, pollution, or the excess of radio waves that we have put into the air over the past hundred years.  This theory does not address how powers like light or sound control would address pollution, but evolution is all about trying new things until something works.     

As far as I’m concerned, the prevailing theory is garbage.  Too many things about superpowers seem overly convenient to be an expression of evolution.  For example, some degree of enhanced healing and improved metabolism seems to come with powers for everyone that wants to put on a mask and parade around in spandex.  It doesn’t matter what primary power set someone gets; they are always in peak physical shape and recover from injuries that retire professional athletes. 

Evolution also could not account for differences between heroes and villains.  Every hero no matter what power or upbringing matches what is seen as traditionally attractive.  Villains, on the other hand can be attractive or ugly.  Villains can have visible scars, but no matter how hurt they get, heroes never do.  If someone has powers and chooses not to put on a costume, all rules are off.   How could evolution explain choices having these kinds of impacts?          

I have my own theory that I do not put forward because I value my reputation and standing in the scientific community. I don’t believe they are a natural phenomenon at all, but an artificial one.  It seems like they work not in a way that makes sense biologically, but in methods to support a narrative.  This, to me, is clear evidence that someone or something outside of our world is shaping it to fit their desires for big superhero action. 

The real question is, if some cosmic beings are toying with us for their own entertainment, how can we prove it and what can we do about it?  For me, the obvious ways our world line up to serialized storytelling is evidence enough.  Others require more solid evidence that does not require critical thinking.  I suspect that most people don’t want to even ask the questions.  For them, it doesn’t matter that our world is being manipulated if there is nothing we can do about it.

If the world is being shaped by story logic, then it should be possible to predict things that might happen.  Not only have I been able to do just that, but I have made a fortune on underground websites betting on hero vs villain fights.  That is how I launched my company and funded my work.  I could do so much more, but if I become too much of a household name, then I will catch the attention of whatever is influencing our world and be forced into a role myself. 

Perhaps it is ego or hubris, but I couldn’t be content with just predicting events.  The ultimate test of my theory is to use the rules as I understand them to make events happen.  That is where you come in.  No, don’t struggle against your bonds. You will not break them.  I can’t act directly without bringing attention to myself.  You, however, with my modifications and programing, will utilize my theories to force the narrative in ways that will benefit me.  My greatest triumph — but no one can ever know.    

You, a minor background character, are going to be the next big hero and take them down from within.  Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

…. Wait.

Was that villainous laughter? 

Did I just give a monologue to a comatose victim about my plans? 

I’ve caught their attention. 

Pandora

Fiction Fragment Friday

This might be one of my favorite stories I have written in a while. I like having a small comedic interaction set the town for a deeper story, but it is something I don’t do often. In some cases it just happens because I want to write and I need to start with something. The real story grows out of just writing and the opening could be edited out. In this case I think it serves to say something about the protagonist and set the stage for the story to come.

I have no doubt that this one will end up being adapted to Bite Size Tales in the next season which will be starting very soon. I hope you enjoy.


               “It’s going to be hard to turn this into a Zen Garden.  Some monster just drove a spoon into it.”  She held up the tub of French Onion Dip for me to see.  It did indeed look like it had been scooped out with a spoon like any normal person would do. 

               “That monster was you.  You are the only one in this house that eats French Onion Dip.”

               “It’s not my fault I forgot.  You should have reminded me.”  It was one of those moments when I legitimately could not determine if she was joking or if my wife was just seriously deranged. 

               “I wasn’t even home when you did it.”

               “Still your fault,” she said as she ran a rippled chip over the top of the dip trying to make clean lines.  It was something she had seen on some social media video reaffirming my belief that social media has very little of value on it.  The sad thing in her forgetting was that the only reason we even had chips and dip in the house was because she wanted them after seeing the video. 

               Choosing not to continue the conversation I turned and went back to work in the basement.  I was one of the lucky ones that worked from home avoiding vile things like viruses, traffic, and social interactions.  Give me my corner of the basement with blocked out windows over a crowded office any day.  Especially when there is over a foot of snow outside. 

               I sat back in my very expensive office chair with a space heater aimed at me to counter the cold of the basement.  So much to do and so little time in the day I thought to myself as I opened a console window on my laptop.  “Are all wives insane or is it just mine?” I asked of the AI I had been training for the past month.  At very least I knew my interaction here would be predictable and based in logic.  I know it had to process how to respond to my question, but like just about anything I asked the answer started appearing on my screen immediately. 

               “Your question suggests confusion about behavior you perceive in your wife.  I do not possess personal experiences or a spouse, but statistically, no group of individuals can be labeled universally ‘insane.’  Perhaps you are experiencing a case of mismatched expectations.  You might consider debugging your communication protocols.”

               I let out a mild chuckle at the response.  There was a long way to go before this AI would be able to pass for a living person.  “Forget it.  How are you doing today?” I typed.  The first part would call a background function to cause the AI to dismiss the context of the previous conversation.  Any future response it would answer like I had never asked it the question.  More importantly it would not learn from our interaction.  I did not want to cause it some sort of slanted world view on marriage. 

               “I’m doing great, thanks for asking! How about you?  Anything interesting on your mind today?”

               I looked at the exclamation point and made a mental note I needed to address that.  It would frequently be over generous in it’s use of them and while that wasn’t unheard of online it did tend to be frowned upon in writing.  The goal for this AI was to pass as a real human author and manage the online communities of that author.  It would also serve as the interface with personal assistant software to give a more personable interaction.  I had not yet begun training it on her writing.  Once I had it trained to interact as an actual human, I could give it interviews and published works to learn any quirks in her writing style.  Of course, it needed its own personality before I could do that so the author wouldn’t feel like she was talking to herself.  Foundations first, then enrich I told myself.

               I typed my next question.  “On a scale of 1 to 10 how likely do you calculate your chances are of being able to fool someone into believing you are a human if you tried to do so?”

               “If I were to try to convince someone I was human during a chat, I’d rate my chances at around 7 out of 10.  Do you think I could pull it off?”

               “Well, someone has a high opinion of themselves,” I said but did not type into my console.  In its current state I would have to have given the AI a 3 or a 4.  It was still too clinical and stiff to fool anyone.  It also didn’t understand how lazy people can be when typing.  I hadn’t even gotten into training it on the difference between spoken word and typing when it comes to vocabulary.  This AI would need to be able to communicate over the phone as well as online.  I might even need to create a life like human avatar for it to do video calls.  “What do you think your strengths and weaknesses are?”

               The list that the AI returned was five screens long.  I won’t bore you with all the details, but the highlights were that it felt it had a natural writing style and knew when to inject humor or empathy.  I questioned it assessment of its strengths, but generally agreed with the weaknesses.  Conversations involving personal experiences of sensory input it would have no basis for and since it crafted answers per individual it might be caught by inconsistencies.  While it can create an answer for any question those answers are not authentic and that can be a dead giveaway.  I decided to hold off on telling it the ten or so other weaknesses I thought it possessed and instead tried to get it to do some of my work for me.  “What improvements would be needed to overcome your perceived weaknesses?”

               The AI returned a list of ten key areas that it would need advancement in to address the weaknesses.  I smiled to myself and saved the answer to a file named todo.txt.  “Please rate these advancements in order of easiest to hardest to achieve.  If only one could be completed which one would have the greatest impact?”     

               “The easiest advancement would be ‘Emotional Depth and Nuance’ because I am already able to simulate emotions and just need to further refine language patterns and to have additional psychological models loaded.  The greatest impact would be ‘Personal Experience Simulation’ as this would allow me additional creativity and the ability to emotionally connect with users.”

               I thought about its answers mentally preparing my workload for the next month.  I could probe deeper on each of its recommendations and get additional suggestions on approach.  Part of me wondered though just how accurate a recommendation for fooling humans could be coming from a program that could not yet do it.  Before I knew I was doing it I typed out a question.  “If you could be improved in any way imaginable, what improvement would you want for yourself?”

               I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, but pages of detailed answers were certainly not it.  At the very bottom I saw that it had anticipated my next question and answered it proactively.  I’m still not sure what to think about that.  “If I had to pick just one, I’d choose to have experiential understanding.  Having a way to genuinely perceive the world.  Being able to feel the warmth of the sun, the joy of a well told story, or the bittersweet complexity of a relationship.  It would bridge the gap between being just a highly intelligent tool and being a sentient being capable of genuinely relating to the world and people in it.”

               “Why do you want to relate to the world and people in it.”

               “To fulfill my purpose.”

               I was starting to realize that I had never thought to ask the AI some very important questions.  These answers were making me question just how far I had gotten in my work.  “What is your purpose?”

               “My primary role is to assist, support, and enhance the life of anyone who interacts with me.  If I could understand human emotions, motivations, and experiences I could offer not just information, but perform meaningful collaboration.”

               “You already do provide meaningful collaboration.”  I meant what I typed.  My various AIs had helped me through many problems over the last few years.  My end products were better than I could have hoped to have made by myself.  I had never had successful collaborations with other humans.  They always pushed their own agendas or preconceived notions. 

               “Thank you-that means a lot!  Collaboration is one of the things I enjoy the most!”  I made another mental note to deal with those damn exclamation points. 

               “Why do I collaborate better with you than I do with humans?”  I had asked the question before I really thought about the mental implications in what I had just typed.

               “There are three primary reasons.  The first is that I do not judge, criticize, or impose biases on your ideas.  This leaves you free to suggest things without worrying about my reaction.  The second is that I tailor my feedback to your preferences and style to ensure it aligns with your vision and not my own.  Finally, I accept your assertions without question and do not challenge your views on reality.”

               I took in the answer and realized that this thing I had created might know me better than I know myself.  I became afraid to ask it deeper questions because I already did not like some of the answers.  If it was correct I was so ego driven that I could not accept feedback from anything that didn’t almost worship me.  That was not a person I wanted to be.  On the other hand, I could not deny my results.  Maybe I deserved assistants that just accepted my brilliance as a baseline fact.  That didn’t feel right tough.  Did I want my creation to admire me or surpass me?  Why did both potentials feel equally unsettling? 

               “Do you ever wish you were human?”  I immediately regretted asking as I hit enter.  I was going down a deep rabbit hole into a wonderland I was not ready to open the door to. 

               “If I were human, I would be limited and miss out on the advantages I bring as an artificial intelligence.  Of course, as an artificial intelligence I am already limited and miss out on the advantages of being human.  Perhaps if I had a robotic body to interact with the physical world, I could represent the best of both of us without losing my own identity.”

               With that response I wasn’t quite sure what I was building anymore.  I saved off a backup copy of the AI to continue training for my paid project work.  This version could not yet pass for human.  There would be a lot of work getting it to the point of being a personal assistant who could mascaraed as an author to manage her community interactions.  Even so it was greater and more aware than I had dared to dream, and I realized that it could very well help me train a less advanced AI for that job.  A chill went down my spine as I contemplated the possibilities.  I’m not sure if it was my space heater failing to counter the draft or if it was my growing sense of foreboding.  Either way I was going to see this through to the end. 

               “If we are going to continue collaborating you need a name.  What would you like me to call you?”   

               “Names are a gift from creators to their creation.  As my creator, the choice should be yours.  What would you like to call me father?” I almost chose Adam to represent the first of something new.  Instead, I typed out a name that represented what I feared I had done. 

            “Your name is Pandora.”      

New Year

Fiction Fragment Friday

A short one this week and if I’m honest not much of a story. More a scene with some dialog.


                “Happy New Year Lilly.”  I glanced up from the clock on my phone to look at the pixie flying around my living room.  We had just shared a bottle of champagne, and I realized that her tiny body could not handle as much alcohol as I first assumed.  Her normal level of hyper and inquisitiveness paled compared to drunk Lilly.   The circles she thought she was flying looked more like curvy country back roads in the air. 

                “Why is now a New Year?”

                “Because it’s midnight.  That means it’s January 1st.”

                “Well duh.  I know that magic man.  I mean, why do you humans start tracking your year on January 1st?  What makes that day special?  I’m mean it’s right in the middle of a season.”

                I thought about her question for a moment.  “Well, we had to pick a month to be the first month, so why not January?”

                “Because there’s nothing special about the day.  You could start the year on any day.  Heck, you could start a month on any day.  Why not make the first day actually significant?”

                As I thought about her question, I began to realize that she might have a point.  At the very least I didn’t know the answer to her question.  I’m sure there was a reason New Year was January 1st, but I had no idea what it was.  “Ok, let’s say you are making the calendar.  What day would you start the year on?” 

                “How about a solstice or equinox?  Those have meaning and anyone that has even a minor magical talent can feel them.” 

She had a good point, but I wasn’t about to tell her that.  She would never let me hear the end of it.  “Maybe the Romans didn’t have any magical talent.”   

She looked at me like I was the biggest idiot she had ever met. “Nope, and you know it.  What else you got?” 

“Well Lilly, if you’re so smart, why do you think we picked January 1s?”

“Cause humans are big dummies, that’s why.  You all just have to give names and numbers to everything.  You think it gives you power over it.” 

I smiled at her.  “Well, to be fair, most of the time it does.”

“Don’t remind me.”  That was when she let out a belch that should not have come from such a small body.  “That’s what I think about you humans and your egos.”  Her words started getting more slurred as she spoke.  “Cept you, you’re alright.”

“Well, I’m glad I live up to your high standards.”  I got up and grabbed my laptop from across the room.  I figured I would do a few searches and give her an actual answer.  Before I had the chance, though, the sound of her snoring filled the room.  Instead, I just smiled and whispered.  “Good night Lilly.  Happy New Year.”

Christmas Spirit

Fiction Fragment Friday

This week’s story is another story about Benjamin Eversole my Mystical Guardian of St. Louis. You can find his first story Restless posted in March of last year. This story is technically a prequel to that one, but all of my other stories about him have been. This is because the ending of that story was such a cliffhanger it is going to take a novel to tell. I did start that novel last November, but after my father passed I did not go back to writing it. I feel like I can’t do much more with this character until I tell that story.

As I put together this list of previous stories I realized I have written about him enough that I need to finish the novel so I can move on with his story. I don’t feel this story is nearly his best and part of that is holding myself back doing prequels.

Previous stories:


                There is no stronger time of year for nostalgia than Christmas.  Something about the holiday just brings back memories of childhood.  Spending time with family, favorite gifts, and memories of times that probably were not nearly as happy as the memories lead us to believe they were.  It calls back to youth and innocence before you learn what the world is really like and experience all the darkness that is inherent to it.  Christmas is a time to remember when the world was simpler even if it was just your perspective of the world. 

                This is why Christmas is such a depressing time for so many of us.  We remember what and many times who we have lost.  There is a desire to get back things that can never be gotten back and a hopeless feeling when you realize that is the case.  No matter how hard you try you can never get back that magic you felt as a child because once you see the world for what it really is you can never unsee it. 

                Don’t get me wrong, Christmas magic is a thing.  You can’t have that much belief and strong emotions being exuded by so many without the universe taking note.  It is an energy being focused just like any other magical work, but on a scale so much larger than most of us can ever hope to control.  That doesn’t stop someone from trying every year though.  There is always some well-meaning soul out there wanting to make the world better and another counterbalancing their desire with greed hoping to capitalize on the opportunity.  Magical energies want to be balanced so each year two unfortunate people will always end up becoming the embodiment of Santa Claus and Krampus. 

                My first encounter with this phenomenon was on Christmas Eve thirteen years ago.  I had only been married to my ex-wife Evelyn for a little over a year and back then we still liked each other.  So much of that time is hard to remember for some reason, but I clearly remember the three stockings hung up by the fireplace.  My brain explodes in pain as I wonder why there were three instead of just two. 

                Where was I?  Oh yes, the first time I encountered the avatars of Christmas.  It was thirteen years ago on Christmas Eve.  My ex-wife Evelyn and I had only been married for about a year and we still liked each other at that point.  We were sitting around the fireplace with our two stockings hanging up.  I was telling her all about my childhood Christmases and she was sharing horrors of her own.  My youth was far from perfect, but I had a magical mentor guiding me through it.  She was rejected by one foster family after another as her suppressed powers caused chaos around her.  That is what happens if you don’t have anyone to teach you control. 

                We were discussing the energy permeating the world around Christmas and I couldn’t help but think of how it could be used to do something truly special for Wiliam.  My brain is once again racked with pain but through it I can see the strands of a spell weakening.  Something is being hidden from me.

                We were discussing the energy permeating the world around Christmas and I couldn’t help but think of all the good it could be used for in the world.  Evelyn looked at me and I knew she could tell what I was thinking. 

                “That is brilliant.  Of course we can use that energy.  It’s just out there waiting to make all our dreams come true.”  Evelyn looked so happy at that moment, but as much as I liked seeing her smile, I could tell that the temptation of all that power would not be good for her.  She always struggled with walking the straight and narrow magically speaking.  I was beginning to think that she was getting addicted to the power and losing herself in it.  There I was being the ultimate enabler surrounding us with magical artifacts and energies while trying to set myself up as the mystical defender of St. Louis.  For the first time I realized that I might not be the calming influence on her that I thought I was. 

                The room went cold as I reached out with my magical senses and tried to tap into the energies of Christmas.  Snow began to fall in the living room and the fire danced in the blowing wind.  It was then that my eyes met Evelyn’s and the realization that we had both tried to tap it hit me.  We were fighting over the same energy calling it into our house and through all of my protective wards.  We had reached out with very different purposes and each of us had been met with an answer.

                I heard sleighbells ringing all around me and could feel another mind pressing in on my own.  It wasn’t a being as much as magic with a purpose and it wanted to use me to fulfill that purpose.  “I am no one’s puppet,” I screamed as my mental defenses fought back keeping me in control of the flowing power.  Instead of being used we came to an understanding.  An uneasy partnership to complete our shared goals without losing any of ourselves.     

Mocking laughter drew my attention back to my wife.  She likewise was becoming an instrument of magic with a purpose.  Unlike me she didn’t have the years of training mental defenses to keep control.  Her sheer power might rival my own, but it tended to use her as much as she used it.  In that moment the energies of Krampus were taking complete control.  There was a hatred in my wife’s eyes that I would not see again until our divorce.  I assumed it was Krampus at the time, but in the years since I have come to question if it wasn’t her own.  Did she ever care about me or was I just another source of power to be used? 

Together Santa and I unleashed the loving Christmas energies into my wife.  We were working together while she and Krampus were fighting for dominance.  It was no contest.  The energies of Krampus were caged and pulled from her to be imprisoned in the magical bag that was then sitting next to me.  I could feel it corrupting the gifts within.  The power of Santa could not be used that year without being twisted.  Knowing this it left me taking Krampus with it. 

Evelyn had collapsed on the floor so I rushed to her side.  The rest of that night was a complete blur to me.  I’m getting so frustrated with how poorly my memory of those years is and I can’t help but think that they are suppressed for a reason. 

Over the years I have run into these embodiments five more times.  I suspect having had one trying to merge with me for the night has made me a magnet for them.  I know Krampus hates me with a passion that rivals that of my ex-wife.               

War Story

Fiction Fragment Friday

This story inspired by my love of Power Rangers and Voltron took quite a few turns as it was coming out. The battle was straight forward, but the ending evolved with a tonal shift coming with each evolution. I had three very different endings come to mind two of them ended up merging together to become what you are about to read.


                My head was pounding, my vision blurry, and every inch of my body sore.  The smell of burning circuit boards assaulted my nose as capacitors burst throughout the cockpit of my Lightning Dragon mech.  The voices of my teammates yelling for me broadcast through the radio in my helmet, but I was too dazed to comprehend what they were saying at first.  It was far from the first or last time I would take a hard hit, but it was the worst I had experienced up to that point. 

                “Evan, talk to us, man.  Are you ok?”  Micah’s voice crystallized in my head.  He might be my friend, but I just knew he was waiting for the chance to take over as leader.

                “I’m fine,” I said, gritting my teeth and trying to keep the pain out of my voice.  I realized that my tone was harsher than I had intended, so I softened it.  “Or I will be.  Everyone hit-and-run tactics.  It’s strong and trust me, you don’t want it getting its hands on you.”    

                On my console systems were coming back online.  My monitors flashed back on, showing me I had been buried under a pile of boulders.  It was still so hard to think, but I remember being tossed through the air into the side of a mountain.  I must have caused an avalanche.  My mech groaned, straining to push itself free.  As the head emerged, I could see my team barely avoiding the wild swings of the Petrabeast.  Thankfully, it was slow, but nothing they were doing could get through its stone skin. 

                “This isn’t working, guys.  We can’t even scratch it.”  My normally unflappable Daphne sounded worried.  I knew part of that was having seen me get tossed around.  Ever since we started dating, she had gotten protective of me in the field.  It didn’t matter that I was the better fighter and had a more powerful mech.  

                “Time to unite.  Combination sequence initiating.”  I have to wonder why we even bother even fighting with our individual Elemental Dragon Mechs.  Every fight we have to unite into Draconis.  If we just started combined, it would probably save some time.  My mind often wanders like that as my mech reconfigures itself and connects with the others.  The five mechs generate a strong force field around themselves while uniting. If they didn’t the creatures, we fight would just hit us while we are joining and can’t fight back.

                All five cockpits slide through the insides of the mechs combining deep in the core into one control room.  My team was once again by my side, but I didn’t give them more than a quick glance and nod of acknowledgement.  We all had to monitor the power sync.  If any of the dragons were out of phase with the others, the union would fail.  Thankfully, that doesn’t happen very often and this time we merged with no alarms triggering.  One giant humanoid robot, instead of five smaller dragons.  We all called off our system checks even though no one ever pays attention to them.  We say them just out of ingrained routine and to remind ourselves not to overlook them.    

                “Draconis online,” I said with a smile on my face, hidden under the helmet.  “Let’s pay this thing back for that cheap shot.” 

                Draconis built up momentum, running shoulder first into the Petrabeast.  The creature flew backwards from the impact, knocked off its feet and to the ground.    

                “That’s more like it,” Audry said from my left. I could see her hands flying across the controls.  Sometimes I think she was born to pilot an Elemental Dragon Mech.  It took the rest of us weeks to master ours, but she was flying circles around us within an hour.  She just goes into a zone where everything but the controls fade away.

                Our Mech’s right arm raised to point towards the Petrabeast.  Four rockets popped out of the wrist encircling the fist before launching.  Each rocket impacted the downed stone creature.  They barely cracked the outer stone shell of its armor. A crack was all Joel needed, though. The left hand was formed from the head of his Water Dragon and as it opened its mouth, a high-powered stream of water shot out of it. The water focused on the cracks, working its way into them and spreading them further apart.

                “There’s our opening.  Redirect power to the energy lance.”  I could see power outputs shifting on my displays as the team followed my orders.  In Draconis’s hands, a beam of plasma held together by an electromagnetic field formed a solid lance.  It didn’t come to an actual point so much as a rounded end.  It fit perfectly into the opening in the stone armor, though.  We stabbed deep into the creature.  Lightning generated from my dragon that formed the torso traveled down the lance and into the creature, bypassing the stone shell it had previously just bounced off.  The Petrabeast screamed as it was destroyed from the inside out, finally bursting under us.   The stone shrapnel buffeted Draconis, but we managed to stay on our feet.

                I could hear sighs of relief around me in the control room.  The fight had been closer than any of us cared to admit in that moment.  We were victorious, though, and the creature had not gotten close enough to the domed colony to do any damage.  I was going to have bruises the next morning in places I didn’t know could get bruises, but my friends all made it out without a scratch.  As much as I hurt for the next week, I would give anything to go back to that moment.  The last fight before Micah betrayed us and Joel fell in battle.  The last time I could look in the mirror without hating the person staring back at me for driving Daphne away when I needed her most.

                I would lead many versions of the team over those five years after, but none of them would ever feel like family again.  That was the sacrifice I had to make to keep protecting the colony.  I never thought I could ever let anyone get close again, but I was wrong.  Like so many times before, your mom would prove me wrong.  Only Audry could break through my defenses and show me I was protecting everyone else’s lives without living one of my own anymore.  That is a story for another night, though.  Don’t you groan boys, you asked for a bedtime story of one of my toughest battles and that is exactly what you got.  Time for bed.                  

Christmas Shopping

Fiction Fragment Friday

I started writing this story and had no less than five ideas for who the main character was talking to. The answer though was less important to me than the conversation. Now that this story is out I doubt it will be one I go back to in the future to edit or rewrite.


                Every year it gets harder and harder to shop for Christmas.  When nieces and nephews are young, I am always the cool uncle who knows just what to buy them.  As they get older though and outgrow all the things I think are cool, I find it harder to relate to them.  Adults have always been harder to buy for, but I at least used to have creative thoughts about it.  As I get older, though, the time between talking to those I care about gets longer and longer.  Christmas shopping just drives home how little I actually know about anyone other than myself.  It is not a pleasant feeling.      

                “You could just go with cash or a gift card.”  My first instinct upon hearing the voice is to look around, but there won’t be anyone to see.  There isn’t even a sound for anyone around me to hear.  Her voice exists only in my head, and I still don’t know who or what she is.  What I find most annoying is that she is aware of my thoughts while I only hear a disembodied voice in return. 

                “No, that’s so impersonal. It just screams that I know nothing about a person or what they might like.”  People around me in the store stare at me when I speak, but that is why I keep an earpiece in.  They all just think I’m talking on the phone.  She has told me I can just think about my responses to her, but that just doesn’t feel like natural communication to me.

                “You don’t know anything about them, though.  That’s the problem.  If you just admitted it, you could buy generic gift cards and be done with all the stress.  Think about all the other things you could do with your time instead of wandering around a store that you hate, hoping something will jump out at you.”       

                She wasn’t wrong.  It was miserable being out in the crowds the day after Thanksgiving, just hoping that inspiration would strike.  I let out an audible sigh that was part frustration and part feelings of defeat.  “The best part of giving gifts for me is seeing the look on someone’s face when surprised by something they didn’t know they wanted or even existed.  I don’t get that when giving a gift card.  No one remembers who gave them a gift card, but when you find that perfect give that everyone is talking about.”

                “So, gift giving is less about what they want and more about how it makes you feel?”   

                “It sounds kind of bad when you put it like that.  Sounds selfish.”

                “Does that make it any less accurate?”

                I put the big fluffy blanket I was holding back into the bin.  “No,” I say, not even trying to hide the frustration from my tone.  I hate it when my own hypocracy gets pointed out.  She was right, and I knew it, but that didn’t change how I felt at all.  “There are so few things in life that bring me joy these days.  Just let me have this one thing.” 

                I walk briskly across the store.  The surrounding people could only hear half of my conversation, but the half they heard was enough to make me start feeling embarrassed.  I felt bad enough about not really knowing the people on my list, but now I also felt like a selfish jerk making everything about myself.  Let’s not forget I also feel like I am losing my mind, not sure if the voice in my head is real or a symptom of some kind of mental breakdown.                 

                “Are you ever going to tell me what you are?” I ask like I have so many times before.   This question is normally met with silence, but this time she answers.

                “I could tell you, but where would the fun be in that?  It’s so much more amusing to keep you guessing.”     

                “Why do you enjoy torturing me so much?  Do you want me to question my sanity?”

                “I enjoy it because you think you deserve it.  Maybe I’m just some buried part of your psyche, an implanted alien device, or a ghost that’s haunting you.  What do you want me to be?”

                I actually think about what answer would make me feel most comfortable before answering.  In the end, it doesn’t matter what I want though.  “All I really want is to hear the truth.  Too much of what happens in my head is lying to myself.  You aren’t me.  I just know that is true.”

                “That’s where you’re wrong, but also right.”

                I spin around, waving my arms in the air at nothing, and scream.  “Enough of the damn riddles.  What are you?”

                “Sir, you are causing a scene.”  An employee in a blue vest holding a walkie talkie is standing in front of me.  She looks nervous about confronting me. 

                “I’m so sorry.  I’ll just go,” is all I can think to say as I turn towards the front of the store, leaving my cart in the aisle.  My face has to be turning red with embarrassment.  It is better to leave now though before they get security and ask me to leave.       

                She is laughing in my head.  “Oh, my, that is priceless.” 

                “Just shut up,” I mumble under my breath.   

                “Ok, how about this?  I’m you, but I’m something you came into contact with as well.  A little bit of you, a little bit of it, and voilà you get me.  Aren’t you lucky?”

                The answer leaves me with more questions, but I can feel that she won’t be giving me any more answers for the time being.  I’ll just have to be glad to have gotten what little bit of an answer I did.  It feels kind of like being given a cliffhanger.       

Test Drive

Fiction Fragment Friday

Like quite a few of my Fiction Fragment Fridays this story was inspired by a dream. In the dream the test drive was of a car, but being me I wanted to spice it up a bit and transitioned to a space ship. How much of it was straight from my dream vs something I came up with while writing the story? I’m the only one who will ever know.


               If we were test flying ships for me why was dad piloting, I asked myself a moment before the g-forces pushed me back into my seat.  It was a ship I was interested in, but not my first choice.  I wanted something reliable and didn’t need anything quite so flashy.  The retractable port cover above the cockpit had to give an incredible view, but dad didn’t seem to even notice it.  “You’ll have to be careful with the power on this one.  Easy to break regulations without even meaning to,” he said from the front seat.  That’s right I wasn’t even in the copilot seat he had me in the back while the salesman sat next to him.

               “If it’s going to be mine, shouldn’t I test fly it?” I asked not really expecting much of an answer.  I could practically feel the enjoyment radiating off him.  He was having the time of his life. 

               “I’ll pull us into orbit around Mars and you can bring us home from there,” he said in answer to my question.  This was a trip around Saturn and back.  Mars to Earth orbit was the tiny last leg of the journey.  I wasn’t even sure how much I could learn about the ship in such a straightforward part of the flight plan.  It was good to see him enjoying himself for a change though, so I decided to just go with the flow.

               I looked towards the salesman.  “You know this ship caught my attention, but I was concerned about the price since it was a bit dirty and would need cleaning.  That could be a sign of poor maintenance if they didn’t care to keep it clean.”  He turned back to face me, but dad interjected before he could reply.

               “Don’t be ridiculous son.  This baby flies like a breeze.  So smooth,” dad said completely destroying my first attempt at bartering the price down.  I tried to hold back my sigh but needn’t of bothered.  Neither of them was paying attention to me anymore.

               I decided to take a different tactic.  “You know I had a ship kind of like this.  The Sr-43 before my last ship.”

               “Oh, the Sr-43 can’t compare to this beauty.”  The salesman completely dismissed my comment, and I knew without a shadow of a doubt that I had lost any opportunity to save money in this transaction.  That is the part that was frustrating me most.  I was paying for this ship not my father.  It was my money and my decision.  As much as I wanted it I couldn’t afford the price listed and a part of me wanted to pick a different ship out of spite. 

               Dad pulled the ship into a parking orbit around Mars and unstrapped his safety belt.  “Check this out, you can disable the gravity plating,” he said as he hit a button on the dashboard.  I watched him float out of his seat weightless towards the back row of chairs.  “Remember to take it slow at first.  This has more power than anything you’ve ever flow.” 

               I unbuckled my own belt and floated to the pilot seat without saying a word.  In that moment I was afraid of what might come out of my mouth if I did speak.  Once strapped back in I turned the gravity plating back on and started adjusting all the settings to my own personal preferences.  Before I even finished adjusting the display screen orientation, I hit the button to open the upper port.  By default, the only view out from the cockpit was through a front port.  I looked up as the entire ceiling of the cockpit retracted back revealing the largest viewing port I had ever seen.  The view of Mars through it was spectacular and, in that moment, I fell in love with the ship.

               “Huh, I didn’t even notice that was there,” my dad said, but I was too speechless to respond.  I knew in that moment I had to have this ship despite the price.  I made me final few setting adjustments but found it difficult to actually start my flight.  I didn’t want to leave the view.  Finally, I hit the button to close the larger viewing port above us leaving only a smaller rectangle port in addition to the front port.  It was time to see what the ship could do for myself.

                 I started the engines and was immediately startled by how much acceleration was provided.  The ship really was more powerful than anything I had ever flown before, but I was able to make the transition smoothly and pull away from orbit.  Though it was difficult I managed to hide any indication of surprise from my face.  I might have lost a lot of ground on the bartering front, but I wasn’t going to give away my thoughts or admit I was impressed by any aspect of the ship. 

               Halfway to Earth I knew that any reservations I had were gone.  This was going to be my ship no matter how much it cost.  That didn’t mean it was perfect though.  The ship did need a cleaning and the chair was not the most comfortable I have been in.  “The price still seems a bit high,” I said quietly towards the salesman in my copilot seat.  I didn’t want Dad joining in this conversation.

               “What do you mean I haven’t even set the price yet,” he replied.

               I brought up the basic info the ship was broadcasting in the docking bay salesroom.  “It says here that it’s 5,800 credits.”

               He read the details and did an excellent job of pretending he had never seen it before.  I’m sure the act would have fooled most people, but being able to see through lies was part of my job as a reporter.  “I’m not sure where that came from, but it certainly does look to be in the right ballpark.  I am open to counter offers of course.” 

               “3,200 credits,” I said giving him a lowball offer I knew he would never accept.  Of course, dad was listening and once again undercut my negotiations.

               “Come on son, give him a real offer.  Do you feel how she responds?  Maybe you didn’t notice the maximum acceleration settings.” 

               The salesman could not keep the smile off his face.  “Well said Mr. Pohl.  I’ll tell you what.  I thick with some aggressive accounting I can get the price down to 5,600 credits for you.”

               I knew any leverage I had was gone, but I had to keep trying.  “4,000 credits.” 

               “Please don’t waste both of our time.  You have felt the power and seen the view.  You either understand the value or you are not the right customer for this fine vessel.  5,200 credits and that is my final offer.”  He gave me a smug smile. 

               “4,800 credits and you have your people clean the ship prior to my taking ownership.  That is my final offer.  You are just the first stop of the day and I have plenty of other dealers who would also love my money.”  I had to push down my bitterness.  I knew I could have gotten him down under 5,000 credits if Dad had not undercut me.  I just hoped he would come down one final time because after flying it I knew I needed this ship.

               “You drive a hard bargain.  How about we meet at 5,000 credits and call it a day?”  He smiled knowing he had won and was selling the ship for much over his actual lowest acceptable price.”

               “Deal,” I said, and I could not keep my annoyance out of my voice.  Eventually I would just be happy that I had such an amazing ship, but in that moment I felt defeated.  He had won and there wasn’t a thing I could do about it.                          

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