Part Four

Internal Technology (Part 2)

I wasn’t ready for all this; I lived a quiet life and kept to myself for the most part. When things became really quiet though, it was scary. I had thought that people were mindless zombies before but now everything was clean and sanitized but most of all it was silent all the time, everyone was working on a project or they were playing games, watching movies or chatting with friends,friends that were anywhere in the world. There were creepy blank stares at every turn, bodies without souls, and minds without consciousness. I started to stay home more and more, after a while I just couldn’t deal with going out, I got depressed and I was afraid of what was happening, I was drinking more than usual too. My kitten was safe, this is what mattered most to me and I stuck with her more often than not, she was more attentive and a better conversationalist than most humans in any case.

Radio stations and TV started with commercials selling the U-Chip or applications you can buy and download for them. Then channels started turning to static unless you were subscribed though the U-Chip, no more radio and no more weather channel, no more cartoons and no more movies were given away anymore. The premium cable companies were the first to jump on board with the new revolution; you could download and stream anything at any point from these stations if you had paid to do so but otherwise it was just a blankness in space. It got boring if you were unplugged and couldn’t get into the system, or if you had been a collector like I had been. I had some ways around things but like I said, I just kept all my older technologies and had to learn how to work on them myself since no one had any idea how anymore. For years I had collected movies and music, books and computer games for no other reason than to have them. Now most of those things could be found in virtual museums next to things like the Mona Lisa or the original Oscar the Grouch from the kids show. The buildings were still there, storing the relics but no one ever went into them with their bodies, they just tapped in with their minds now.

Anytime I had to leave the house, I had to wear the contacts. Since most companies had upgraded to the U-Chips networks, it left the remnants of the World Wide Web open for people who knew how to use it, like me. You had to know how to find what you were looking for since it was now a sparse wasteland and heavily encrypted to protect the innocent. If someone knew how to hack into the darker, lower levels of the internet and write the codes they need before, they could now log in and leave pockets of information stashed under different addresses, locked with different codes to protect them from unwanted eyes. This was how the rebel forces managed to keep hope alive, work together and fight the new systems of power and control. There aren’t many of us but we know how to cover our tracks as best we could, we had years of practice but now that caution was a matter of life and death. They say that the Suits had extra GPS and tracking programs that didn’t come with the average U-Chips. It allowed them to hunt people like me down where ever we go, it allowed them to track anyone who was part of the system where ever they might be and log all their activates just by walking down the street or driving through a neighborhood. They were directly connected to the network and they were fairly Omni potent when it came to knowing, seeing and collecting data. They could not see or function past the system that had consumed them and they could not function past the camera and the prying eyes of the Suits though, If you kept U-Chips and the people who used them out of your life and away from your home you could live a relatively quiet and private life for years at a time but unfortunately, the system had its ways of cornering people. I had a few friends that I could trust that were also unplugged, they would come by now and then, we would watch classic movies and get drunk together, like the old days that we all longed for.

I logged into one of the hacker message boards while I was drunk one night, looked through a few messages from Europe about how riots had been quelled by the governments by giving out free U-Chips to everyone who had participated in the acts of open rebellion and lawlessness. News sources reported that they had been willing implants and that the violence had started only because people in the struggling third world countries felt like they were missing out, like they were trapped in the dark ages because they did not have the U-Chip technology and once everyone had their implants, there were celebrations in the streets but the message board I was looking at had footage of the celebrations that showed how everyone’s eyes were blank and glassy, they had been programmed to show joy and nothing else, they had been infected. The massage board footage ended with scenes of the prisoners getting their implants in a brightly lit facility by masked official looking people, then the video feed cut off suddenly and abruptly. The person writing the article had not been able to verify the videos authenticity or find out why the implant footage had cut off, so I moved on to other news that could be confirmed and might be closer to home, I hated to ignore such tragedy but it was an age old story by now. It was three messages down that I found the warning.

Whenever rebels were identified by the Suits, people would post whatever they could find out to try and help whoever had been spotted. I saw my friend Ben’s name, his birthdate, his address, his description and it said that Suits were actively hunting him. Since he lived down the street from me, I put my fake U-Boots on and my contacts and made my way to his house. U-Boots worked with the U-Chips and synchronized destinations for the user, when you thought about where you wanted to go, the U-Boots took you there so you could continue focusing on what was going on in your head, if you had fake ones like me, you had to focus on keeping time and pace like they were real U-Boots, while constantly keeping an eye out for Suits and other prying eyes, madmen and program junkies that tried to take advantage of innocent people whenever they could and they always took anything they could carry away with them.

It took me only five minutes to get to Ben’s house and I kept to the shadows like my training had  taught me to do. I checked around his house slowly, searching the area as best I could, his apartment was on the second floor and I couldn’t see any lights on but that wasn’t unusual for people like Ben or Me. Maybe they had already got him I thought to myself as I stood in the darkness. I took a chance and threw some pebbles at his window from the shadows, trying to get his attention. Like me, I knew Ben sometimes kept his windows blacked out to protect and shield from the daylight and our many, many enemies. A light turned on within the frame of the window and an unfamiliar shadow looked out at me, I cowered against the shadows and held my breath, thankful that I had not taken any chances and I knew how to make myself invisible to people for some reason. Since I felt somewhat safe that the Suits had not seen me, I kept an eye out on the door to the apartment building that they would have to come out from. They had their U-Cars parked on the main road and it seemed like they had sent everything they had to take Ben down. As I made my way home I thought back to any evidence I might have left at his house over the years, before the Suits left I watched them carrying out boxes and mysterious cases from the apartment, filled with paperwork no doubt and Bens outdated but specially modified computer equipment, then they drove off like nothing had happened. I got on the message board and replied that the Suits had already struck and they might have gotten sensitive information and data, I used the code that let everyone know to change their networks, get new identities and modify their passwords, then I told them I was going to go dark and see what I could find out, it was the way things were done. If I got any news, I would post it but living so close to Ben, having my prints in his apartment on everything in sight, I knew it was a matter of time before they came to question me or used Ben to try to bring me in.

I had two options, stick around and try to fake it for the Company who would be coming for me at any point, and I could just hope for the best or I could run, I could keep running and never look back. As I sat in front of my computer in the darkness and kept refreshing the news board, I planed  my routes, reviewed my options and made a plan. Packing a bag would be a good first step; it would be ready in case I needed it. I refreshed the screen again, a reply was under my last message, and it said simply, GET OUT NOW. Ben was turned, I knew it was him and I knew he was talking to everyone on the message board but he also knew it was my favorite page for news and updates so he had posted it there for me to find. I took the warning personally and ran into my bedroom to get some things together and prepared myself to go on the run.

Situations like this call for stealth more than camouflage, if the suits didn’t know to look for you, they wouldn’t and you could bold walk among the rest of everyone else if you took precautions. Once they had your information, your real name, your real address or your finger prints though, you weren’t safe anywhere, if even one U-Chip wired person saw you, that meant that the suits could see you too. It was another feature of the U-Chip that you didn’t hear about unless you read the underground news boards. This made every single person into a walking security camera, reporting to the Suits and the company in real time, from anywhere in the world. As far as I could tell, no one was ever aware that they had all these people living in their heads with them, sharing space, they were invisible but they were everywhere at once. I knew my best bet was to do my best ninja impressions and stick to the places I know people would avoid like libraries and cemeteries, I would only move around at night and keep away from any electronics or people I don’t know for as long as possible. Fortunately, as slow as that method sounds, it will allow to always me to move faster than anyone connected except for the Suits because I wouldn’t have to pretend to stick with the measured pace of the permanently distracted U-Chip zombies. On the other hand, I wouldn’t be able to drive or go into any populated places; all my routes had to be as indirect as possible.

My kitten was used to doing this with me, we had to do it a few times already over the years. She had her own backpack that she stayed in, it was like her second home, she watched my back and kept me company when I found areas that were deserted enough to make a camp. As we left she meowed and made growling noises in my ear, she wanted to know what I had done this time and she kept calling me a stupid human so I threw half a bag of treats in her backpack for her and told her that I was sorry.

We quietly left with a paper map and a compass, things most people would never know how to use, and we set off in a Northeastern direction on foot. We also had a well stocked pack full of anything I thought we might need. I felt a smile growing on my face as I walked along the train tracks. It gets boring sometimes when you settle down and it felt good to be on the road again, this was a feeling that no robot or computer could ever replace or understand. The U-Chip had completely denied the most human of desires, they had replaced the need for freedom with the illusion of safety and security and no one had ever questioned it, freedom was a forgotten dream like free will or actual safety and security.

Once I got to the deep forest I knew I would be relatively safe, no one ever came to walk through nature anymore when all they had to do was download a screensaver with any sort of scenery they might like most, it would play for them while they slept like the relaxation CDs that everyone used to have during the pill popping years to battle their depressions or manic episodes. Over the years, most of these areas had been reclaimed by animals and insects; they were safe and quiet, pure and untouched by any signs of man. This meant at least two nights of hard running and little rest though. During the day I climbed up onto the highest rooftops I could find or into trees to sit out the hours that everyone was programed to function and be most active, the hours that the facial recognition software could recognize me the most.

It was easy to slip through their traps. They had Suits sitting outside of Ben’s house but they didn’t bother following him because he was wired in now and they could watch his movements with ease. I didn’t spend much time there or in town, I knew they had to be looking for me by now, kitten and I were moving on and at this point, I had no idea who I could trust, there was no way to tell who had been compromised anymore. Over the years I had marked down as many other rebels as I could identify safely on the map that I now held and studied whenever I stopped to rest. There were no names, just dots made in different colored pen. I figured that it was safe to say that anyone I knew Ben had on his map were no longer safe, once they integrated him into the system all his knowledge was theirs to do with as they pleased and Ben had been a leader in the resistance, it was a major blow for all of humankind or at least what was left of it. Him and I had met in the stressful first days after the bombs dropped and had been friends ever since, he had been the one to recruit me and nurture my talents.

In the two days since I had left the city, the suits had only attacked me once and my kitten gave me plenty of warning. We managed to slip away and leave them stumbling through the underbrush at the edge of the Great Forest though. The Suits used night vision and relied on their technology instead of their eyes like I did. The rest of my disguise was the black outfits that I packed that allowed me to blend with the shadows. The suits wouldn’t be able to track us for long since they were programed to deal with humans and not animals. I knew that they would give up sooner rather than later. I just kept running and my kitten told me that I better not fall and hurt her or she would hurt me worse than I could imagine. I listened to her and saw that the light had changed, even under the leafy canopy of the Great Forest, daylight was coming on strong.

I slowed to a stop, tried to ignore my racing heart and I gasped for breath, falling to my knees. All this exercise after the past few days of starvation and it caused me to collapse on the soft moss of the forest floor. With my ear to the ground I tried my best to listen for signs of pursuit and cried for all that I had lost or left behind. My best friend was on high alert and I could feel her paws on my back, she was standing up and keeping watch for me at I had a nervous breakdown. As much as I was trying to think clearly about my situation, I couldn’t help but laugh in absolute wonder about how my furry friend really was smarter than the vast majority of people that walked mindlessly through their lives every day across the whole planet, I was glad she had my back when no one else did.

Morning was coming and the light under the trees was almost magical, the moist scents of spring was so strong that that it was almost breathing, living thing. After a mile of hiking and fighting through the brush and debris, the landscape became rocky and started to rise higher and higher. The map I carried with me showed topographical statistics for the area as well as populations of nearby cities and towns, it didn’t however tell me if there were any caves or tunnels in the area and that was what I needed. At this point I would have been satisfied with a nice protective outcropping of rocks but a cave would be best.

I figured that all of this had been mapped at some point long ago; I had to hope that the company had not uploaded any of those ancient documents; I just had to assume that they would feel like it just was not worth their time or energy to worry about the black zones like the one I was hiding in. I searched around for most of the day, and I was determined to find a place to collect my thoughts for a few days even if I had to build my own fort out of the lose stones that littered the dank moss covered ground around me. Since we were walking slowly and the birds were chirping around us, I could tell my companion was agreeing with my that this would make a lovely new home by the deep and persistent purr that she kept making in my ear. Her eyes kept darting from floating leaves to insects and back to the birds that seemed to almost welcome us to their home. When she caught sight of a butterfly she gave a low plaintive meow and rubbed her head against mine, telling me that she would behave if I let her down to play. “You better stick with me and not get lost, we are in bigger trouble than most times now and all I have is you so try to play nice.” She licked the side of my face and I knew she did not understand that her eyes still had not left the butterfly when I let her down from her second home and she ran off after the butterfly. Maybe it was just me but I thought that the butterfly seemed to have been waiting for my kitten to join her by sitting on a log and gently flapping its wings. I took my socks and shoes off and put them in the bag that my girl had just vacated so that I could fully enjoy this sudden and overwhelming peace that overtook me. I marveled at the beauty of mother nature’s bounty as I walked but my pace slowed and I found myself smiling despite myself and my situation it was a perfect day and I was possibly the only person on the planet enjoying these sights and sounds and feelings since everyone else would rather duplicate using the U-Chip.

When I sat down by a stream to smoke a joint and have a few bites to eat, my kitten came and curled up at my feet, I scratched her tummy and she rolled around on her back in absolute contentment, I told her, “Yeah, I like it too but once winter comes it’s not going to be so nice you know, if we find some shelter, we can stay.” This caused her to jump to her feet with a playful look in her eyes; she ran a few feet upstream and turned back to look at me and she meowed again. I grabbed our gear, stuffed the last bit of dried meat I had into my mouth and followed her just like she wanted me to do. She led me for maybe ten feet further upstream then she disappeared behind some rocks. Until I got to the mouth of the cave, I couldn’t hear her meowing over the sound of the rushing river beside us from where she sat, five feet into the empty cavern with the dirt floor, the entrance was completely covered and invisible to someone of my size, it was invisible to the naked eye unless someone was sure exactly where it was, I never would have found it on my own, she had been the perfect height though and she rubbed up against my leg when I entered, shaking the flashlight that created light from energy instead of batteries. I reached down and scratched her ear, told her she was a good kitten as I dropped our packs in a corner by the entrance to explore the cave further. The flashlight was a good idea in theory but I used my lighter to guide my way more than the flashlight, worse than anything, the sound the flashlight made as it was being shaken echoed and grated on my nerves in such a perfectly peaceful, quiet place, the smell of the lighter fluid was not nearly as bad even though it was amplified in such close quarters.

She had found a set of three interlocking chambers that had tunnels that connected them all. None were bigger than ten feet around but they were high enough that I could stand up straight everywhere I went except for the tunnels. With the stream right outside my front door, I couldn’t have asked for a better hiding place if I had been connected to a U-Chip and dreamed it or drew the blueprints myself. It didn’t take long for me to start a fire next to the opening of the caves, it was dangerous  and was a major risk but I thought that the furry one and I deserved a hot meal tonight; I extinguished the fire as soon as I was done cooking. Even though I knew I wasn’t going to get much sleep that night, she and I made a sort of bed in the darkest corner of the furthest cave after I set up a trap with string and my cooking gear by the door. If someone entered my sanctuary, I would at least know and have time to defend myself. They would hit the string and the pots and pans would rattle together waking me up, or at least that was the plan. I settled in and the exhaustion of the past days caught up with me, I felt secure with my trap at the gate and my purring guardian so I have no idea how many days I spent curled in the corner like a hibernating, underfed, skinny bear, my kitten was right next to me whenever I awoke but I was sure that she made her patrols to make sure that her human was safe in her slumber.

In equal parts during those three days of rest, I had nightmares and I had premonitions, visions of the future that gave me hope while making it impossible to escape the weight of my impossible task. At first it was hard to tell the difference between truth and fantasy but I awoke feeling refreshed, energized and I knew exactly what I had to do, this power set my mind at ease and my heart into a passionate inferno that burned behind my eyes. The dreams had also told me that I would be safe in the caves because that was where most of the reams took place  in most cases. I was thankful for my four legged friend who had found our new home for us, I felt like I had made the right choice in taking her with me. After a few days of surveillance and exploring I set all the remnants of my former life up in my new underground palace, this was a safe place I could be and there was not a single human on the planet that knew I was there. These caves were going to be the best place to start over and hide for now, it was the safest place in the world for a rebel like me and I knew that I now had all the time in the world, I was safe for now and I had to figure out how to reach out to the other humans that could help in the attack I was going to soon mount from my secret fortress of solitude.

When the U-Chip had first started taking over media, government and most of the populous, I had read on the news boards that to escape the Suits and the system, this was the best way to hide and survive if someone had the skills to take care of themselves in such an environment and I had done my research. Now everyone relied on the system instead of thinking for themselves, somewhere like this, their only hope were satellites that could never penetrate the thick and protective layers of tree branches and leaves. The camping trips of my youth came rushing back to me and it only took a few days to make the caves into a place that could house an entire army, I was home at last. I found a pool of water with a waterfall feeding into it that was less than a mile from my base camp, it was full of salmon and bass, my companion was quite pleased with our new diet that I supplemented with different herbs, spices and berries that I found in the surrounding forest. People who were a part of the system forgot what this was like, they were drained of the knowledge that yes, there was a time when people could survive like this and it was still possible to do so. The Company protected this knowledge as far as anyone knew but there were rumors that this wisdom had been lost to time over the years, I hoped now for the latter. I used this gap in understanding to my advantage and I felt safe there, I was alone except for my kitten  but I knew that the time would soon come when I would set my plans into action and people would join me here, the persistent dreams I had reassured me that everything would work out fine as long as I stayed put where I was.

For now though, I trained and I watched from the shadows, stealing food and parts that I would need in the future, I learned as much as I could and I planned, I brushed my kitten and I planned some more. Their day would come; humanity would once again be free somehow if I had anything to say about it. I might have been going crazy in my solitude but on the other hand, I felt that I truly had a higher purpose on this planet and I knew that I was finally in a situation and place in my life that I could use to my advantages to change the entire world for the better somehow, now all I could do was wait, wait and plan for a better day.

***To be continued***

2/12/2012 2:39 AM

The WM3 Case.

West Memphis Three.

Admittedly, I never knew much about this case. Years ago I had heard about it but didn’t pay much attention, even though I know that I should have because it is a case that involved everyone I know and everything I care about in very close way. At the time all I knew was that come black t-shirt wearing metal heads had been convicted of a murder just passed on the clothes they wore and the music they listened to. It was a scary reality but I dismissed it a witch hunt, I felt safe in my insulated little world full of black t-shirt wearing metal heads. The same thing had happened over the years with many artists and it always turned out to be a random connection that had nothing to do with anything other than abject hate and prejudice, paranoia and ignorance.

Tonight I learned more about the WM3 by watching a well-made documentary on HBO. It was the third installment called Purgatory, and it summed up everything that happened from the start. Over two hours I was taken through how the police had railroaded these 17 year old kids and painted them as devil worshiping psychopaths. From the start these guys maintained their innocence. I didn’t know that the victims were actually three eight year old boys, the police tried to say that this number had satanic significance, when really, even someone like me who learned everything about the law from shows like Cops, Law and Order SVU, Dexter and CSI, the obvious answer to me would be, convenience, those three kids hung out together. If the police can use that same theory to convict the older boys, why not assume the same thing about the kids. As I said though, I don’t know much about the ins and outs of things like that so I won’t debate the corruption of the government and how completely screwed up this story was. All the info is out there for people who are interested, all the craziness has been a major story in the news for years, for the sake of continence, I will assume that people are aware of the West Memphis Three and move on.

What really bothered me, what upset me the most as I watched this movie about these poor guys that have now been in jail for a longer period in their lives than they were ever free is that even though they were freed, they had to plead guilty to do so, this does not seem right to me. The most screwed up part of this story is that this government and judicial system STILL did not admit that they were wrong which means that they are still not trying to find who really did it. It is all well and good to release these wrongfully accused men but there still needs to be some sort of justice for these families that lost their young children all these years ago. Now this has become the focus as all the men are now trying to clear their names, after almost two decades. It is a scary state of affairs in this country; another example was the Casey Anthony case. Over the last few years it has become obvious that our legal system is completely broken, democracy and the economy is soon to follow.

More people need to wake up and I wish I had done so sooner. The rest of my evening is going to be spent doing research and learning about how I can to get involved and learning more about this. For a while it was all you heard about but now it seems like you hear nothing, that should really change and all those lives that were destroyed need to be able to find some sort of peace.

Things like this make me angry, makes me turn up my heavy metal and wear my black t-shirts proudly. We know who we are and we know how it comes off to others but like any form of prejudice, people who do not know will always have their own ideas about life. I suppose it is fair, since I do lump all rich, snotty, yuppies together. Everyone needs someone to hate, the differences between us will always be a focus point for so many people in this world. It will be those focuses of differences and hate that will eventually be the undoing of everything.

1/12/2012 11:58 PM