Wayne Cole

Fiction Fragment Friday

As I have mentioned before my dreams are strange, extremely vivid, and often a source of inspiration. With this story I hoped to capture just a bit of that insane energy that comes from my sleeping mind. There are aspects of actual dreams I had last night worked into this story. Personality however is all from my waking mind trying to channel that sensation of surreality.

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               A very refreshing nap in my recliner was interrupted by an obnoxious knocking sound coming from my kitchen.  Glancing around I found my pets were all still fast asleep around the living room meaning none of them could be causing the sounds.  With a groan I pulled myself to my feet and tossed my nice comfy throw blanket to the side.  I could hear my knee popping as I stood but found there was surprisingly less pain than usual from it.  Happy I had something positive to focus on, I made my way into the kitchen.  The knocking sound was clearly coming from the refrigerator. 

               I opened the refrigerator door and had to step back as a young blonde woman crawled out from the second shelf.  She looked to be in her mid-twenties and extremely flexible.  Glancing back the items on the second shelf had been pushed to the side but were all still there and no matter how flexible there was not room for a grown woman to fit on the shelf.  “Oh, banana pudding,” she said as she reached back into the shelf, she had crawled from to pull out a pudding cup.  “Hey, can I get a spoon for this?”  When I did not immediately reply she started riffling through my cabinet drawers until she found the utensils.  “Never mind I’ve got it.”  This strange woman then leaned against my counter, peeled off the foil top, and started eating my last pudding.

               “What?”  I admit it was not my most brilliant response to an out of the ordinary situation. 

               She tossed the empty pudding cup across the kitchen and it landed perfectly in the trashcan.  Her voice was a bit muffled because the spoon was still hanging out of it when she started talking again.  “Such a broad question.  Could mean so many things.  Can’t talk yet though, they might be listening.”  She started searching my kitchen for something not bothering to put anything back in its place after.  “Aha.  Knew it.” 

               She pulled a tiny skull shaped item made out of some sort of gel like material.  Setting it on the counter she started bashing the skull with a large, pointed rock.  I didn’t see where she got the rock, but I knew I didn’t have any in my kitchen.  Her hands were empty one moment and holding a rock in the next.  As the gel shredded under the assault I saw a tiny circuit board underneath it.  She pulled out two microSD cards from the board and held them out to me.  “Here hold these.  I figured you might want to see what they recorded.”  Once I had taken them, she bashed the circuits making sure to hit every microchip on it.  “Gotta make sure we destroy the memory chips.  There all better now we can talk.  So, what were you saying?”

               “Who are you?”  I asked.  It was a better question, but didn’t quite encapsulate my confusion. 

               “I’m Michelle, but no, that wasn’t what you asked.  What was it?  What could you have possibly asked?  Oh yeah you asked what?  Hmm.  Sorry need more details.  What what are you wanting to know?”

               My head was spinning trying to sort everything out so I blurted more questions out before thinking about them.  “Who are you, what is going on, and where did that come from?”  I wasn’t sure if I was asking about the rock, the listening device, or both.   

               “We already covered who and I still need to know what what.  You added where now you just need when and why to have the complete set.”

               “Complete set?”

               “Who, what, where, when, and why.  The five Ws.  Then you can be a reporter.  You’d be a really bad reporter.  Oh sorry didn’t mean to insult you.  I’m sure there are a lot of things you would be good at.  Just not that.”

               “AHHH!!!”  I screamed.  Again, not the most intelligent response I have ever given to a strange situation.  Everything was happening so fast I couldn’t focus my thoughts. 

               “Well, that was rude.  You made me like you only to go and do a thing like that?  I really am a horrible judge of character.” 

               I tried to compose myself.  “How did you get into my kitchen?”

               “Through your refrigerator.  You were there.  I knocked and you opened the door.”  She grabbed box of chocolate chip cookies from my counter and started eating one.  “Hey, you got any milk?”  She walked over to my refrigerator, opened the door and pulled out a nearly empty gallon of milk.  After making a show of checking the expiration data and shrugging her shoulders she grabbed a coffee mug from the cabinet and filled it up.  Again, she leaned on the counter this time dipping a chocolate chip cookie in her mug of milk.  “That’s more like it.” 

               “I’ve gone insane.  I’ve had a nervous breakdown and lost my mind.” 

               “Oh, insane isn’t so bad.  It’s kinda fun actually.  Embrace the crazy.  That’s what I always say.”  She dumped the leftover milk down the sink and set the mug down.

               “Are you just going to leave that there?  It needs to be rinsed out and put in the dishwasher.”  With everything that was happening I don’t know why that was my last straw, but it was.  There is a way things are supposed to be done and she wasn’t doing it.

               “Oh my now who’s the rude one.  Me I reckon.  Sorry bout that.”  She rinsed out the mug and put it in the dishwasher like I had asked.  “There, all better?”

               “Thank you.  Now why are you in my kitchen?”

               “Well because that’s where your refrigerator is.  Also, where that listening device was.  Wouldn’t do me much good to crawl out of your living room closet if I just had to come in here after now would it?”  She patted me on the cheek with her right hand twice.

               “Do you climb through refrigerators often or is this a one-time thing?  Can anyone else come through my refrigerator?”

               “Nah just me.  There are regulations against things like that.  Don’t see me caring though.  Never met a regulation I didn’t want to break.”  Just then there was what sounded like a microwave ding coming out of my refrigerator.  “Oh that’s my pizza rolls.  Hey it’s been fun but I gotta go.  Can’t let um go cold you know?” 

               “That would be disappointing,” I said at this point just going with it.  “Will I ever see you again?”  I asked not really sure which answer to hope for.

               She opened the refrigerator door and started climbing back in.  Only her head was still visible, nestled between the margarine tub and a case of sodas.  “Never know.  It’s a strange world after all.”  Her head disappeared to the back, but her arm came out and grabbed the door, pulling it shut. 

               “Stranger today than yesterday.”  I reached for the door to the refrigerator, but stopped with my hand inches from the handle.  “Nah,” I said and headed back into the living room.  My pets were awake now and had knocked over the living room trashcan.  They were frolicking in the fast-food wrappers just as happy as could be.  “Finally something normal.” 

Fiction Fragment Friday

This weeks story is for all the wrestling fans out there. It is not my typical story in that it lacks any form of science fiction to it. I have tried to make it as approachable as I can for people who do not know anything about the wrestling industry.

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                “One more time.  One more time.  One more time.”  The chants filled the arena the moments after Axel Krane hit the power bomb against the turnbuckle on his opponent.  Nico Storm lay there flat on the mat, completely at Axel’s mercy.   

                “One more time?  What the hell is going on out there?  Don’t they know he’s the heel?”  A man in an immaculate business suit was swinging his arms around wildly in frustration.  The tiny room behind the curtains at the top of the ramp had little space for the number of employees in it.  Screens, sound equipment, and headsets filled the tables lining the walls.  This made it extremely difficult for the producers and engineers to avoid the angry executive. 

                “I don’t think they care, sir.”  Myren’s voice was weak with a hint of shakiness to it.  Never a man for confrontation, being around an angry senior executive was one of his worst nightmares.  It didn’t help that Gavin Creed was known for firing people on the spot who annoyed him.

                “They don’t care?  THEY DON’T CARE!!  They’ll care about what I tell them they’re supposed to care about.  I’ve spent a lot of money and six months building up Storm.  Rags to riches story.  Fought his way back from homelessness, only to rise to the top and get his title shot.  He’s one of them.”   

                “Ye..Yes sir, but see, they know that’s not true.  Storm is your nephew and has a social media presence.  People follow him and see the kind of cars he drives.”

                “I made him shut that down when I came up with this gimmick.  Plus, we changed his name.”  Creed had a clear look of confusion on his face.  He could not understand why the crowd was cheering for his heel to hurt his face. 

                “Well, sir, there are podcasts and YouTube channels that tell people all about what goes on behind the scenes now.  The fans are more informed than they used to be.”  Myren cowered back from his boss, afraid that anything he might say would be enough to cost him his job.  Everyone backstage knew that Gavin Creed was out of touch and anytime he got involved in creative directly it did not bode well for ratings. 

                “Ok fine, they know his gimmicks all bunk.  That doesn’t explain this though.”  He pointed to the screen where Axel hit the move on Storm for the third time.  The crowd was on their feet cheering.  “They know Storm is supposed to be the hero.  You don’t see them going to a movie and cheering on the bad guy.” 

                Myren took a moment to compose himself.  With Creed grasping to understand, he had a unique opportunity to influence future storylines.  “I don’t know why they don’t seem to like Storm, but Krane is extremely talented in the ring.  We don’t let him talk much, but when he does, he is great on the mics too.  The modern fan  thinks they understand how all this works.  They feel smart and appreciate skill.”

                “Explain Riot then.”

                “Fair point sir.  Ricky Riot is still really new and not that great in the ring.  What he does do well though is make very funny songs about his opponents.  We hardly ever put him in actual matches, so they don’t realize he can’t make it through a match without a botch.  In his defense though he is putting in a lot of work at development and they seem to be noticing it.”    

                “So what am I supposed to do about this?  Storm is supposed to win the title next weekend and keep it for a year.”

                This was the chance to pitch his story, but doing so walked a very fine line of insulting a family member.  “Well, sir, have you thought about turning Storm heel before or when you give him the belt?  Anyone who listens to him speak for more than a minute knows he is kind of egotistical.  Lean into that.  They want to see him get hurt make them really hate him.”

                “Are you trying to say that my nephew is unlikeable?”   

                “Well sir, I mean.”  He paused to compose himself again.  No guts, no glory, he thought.  “You know what sir.  Yes, I am.  He is the most hated wrestler in the locker room and we get more complaints about him from fan events than anyone else.”

                Creed looked at him with an expressionless face, making Myren fear he was about to be unemployed.  Then, to everyone in the room’s surprise, Gavin Creed started laughing.  It was a deep laugh and he had to catch his breath afterwards.  “You got an enormous pair on you, don’t you kid?  Don’t you think I know better than anyone that my nephew is a putz.  Let’s just say that my sister knows things I would rather the press not.

                Axel Krane came through the curtains and into the backstage area followed by chants of his name coming from the crowd.  “Man, do you hear them out there?  It’s insane.”  He had come in full of energy, but his face dropped when he saw Creed standing there. 

                “Oh, I heard.  The question is what are we going to do about it?”

                “You know me boss.  Whatever’s best for the business.”  Axel did have a reputation of being willing to go out of his way for anyone or anything, if it was best for the company.

                “That, my boy, is the right answer.”   He turned to Myren.  “I’m putting you in charge of tweaking Axel’s character.  I want a plan in my inbox by noon tomorrow.  He’s already over, so don’t screw that up.  He’s going to get screwed out of the title on the next two Pay-Per-Views before taking it from Storm.”

                That was when Nico Storm came through the curtain, limping in pain.  “Did you hear those idiots? Demanding I go through that damn turnbuckle bomb four times.  My back is gonna hurt for a week. Ungrateful jerks.”    

                “Nico, Nico, Nico.  Come with me to my office.  I’ve got some plans to tell you about your character.  We’re going to make you the most hated heel this business has ever seen.”

Fiction Fragment Friday

This week is a story told in the form of journal entries. You should know by now I like having fun with different methods of telling a story. How much world building and foreshadowing can I add into a journal entry? Challenges like that are fun for me.

The topic of the story was inspired by a writing prompt, but so loosely it would barely be recognizable.

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Journal Entry Number One

                I feel the need to label the entries in this new journal, but I don’t know the date to include in the label.  I feel like once I start a trend though I need to stick with it, so instead of dates I’m just going to number these.  As long as there is some kind of label, they can stay organized.  Organization is important.  I don’t know why, but I feel deeply that it is. 

                My doctor says that keeping this journal will help me get my memories back.  I hope he is right because I feel so lost right now.  It doesn’t help that my room is sterile and lacks all color.  The nurses that bring me my meals and medications won’t talk to me about anything.  They barely acknowledge me at all, giving only yes and no answers.   My doctor is the only one since I woke up without any memories to treat me like a person. 

                I’m so sick of this place.  If they didn’t keep my door locked, I would leave.  I just don’t know where I would go.

Journal Entry Number Two

                Maybe this journal is working.  I remembered a lot today.  My name is Evan Brooks, and I grew up in Murphysboro, Illinois.  I know I don’t live there anymore, but college and life after is still out of my reach.  Doctor Chambers seemed to be so excited by my breakthrough.  He must really care about me.  These nurses could certainly learn from his bedside manner.  As much as I hate not having any privacy, I hope someone is watching the video feed from the camera in the corner and it leads to disciplinary action against these nurses.

Journal Entry Number Three

                Ok I’m done.  If one more nurse comes in and sticks me with a needle or demands, I swallow a giant pill, I’m going to scream.  I’m a Ph.D. and I deserve some answers.  Nothing else is going into or coming out of my body until I get them.  No more treating me like a child, incapable of making informed decisions.  As my memories come back, I’ll know more about how to treat myself than they could ever hope to.  As it is, things are not adding up. 

Journal Entry Number Four

                They were drugging me to keep me docile.  I recognized the pills finally.  Since I’ve been palming and flushing them down the toilet, I’ve been a lot more aware of my surroundings.  The nurses are studying me, not treating me.   I don’t know what tests I’m being put through, but that’s why they won’t talk to me.  I’m not a patient; I’m a test subject.   A specimen to poke and prod instead of another human being.

                I’ve realized that my doctor must be part of this.  He might very well be in charge of this whatever it is. I’ve trusted him and shared way too much.  That’s why today I’ve started lying to him about what I remember.  A plan is starting to form, but I need a bit more time to work out the details.

Journal Entry Number Five

                I’m out.  When the nurse came to give me my shot, I hid behind the door, slipped out, and locked her in.  The building was not a hospital like I thought. They were keeping me in a very high-tech medical laboratory.  I must have caught them off guard because I managed to get out into the city before they could stop me. 

                I’m not proud of this, but I stole some clothes from a Goodwill donation dumpster.  If anyone is in need, it certainly is me.  What I really need is somewhere to go.  I remembered where I live, but I’m afraid they will be watching it when they realize I’ve escaped.  I could go to the police, but I don’t know what to tell them yet.  What was the experiment?  Did I agree to be part of it?

                Also, why did I bring this journal with me?  I tell myself it was because I didn’t want them to know what I wrote in it, but that doesn’t feel right.    

Journal Entry Number Six

                There is someone living in my house that looks like me.  I watched him leave in a hurry this morning, kissing my wife goodbye on his way out.  My kids left for school soon after.  Everyone is exactly like I remember them except myself.  In a gas station bathroom, I finally saw my first mirror since waking up.  Finally saw my face, and it was much younger than I remember.  I look like I’m in my twenties instead of my forties.  Who am I?

Journal Entry Number Seven

                I think I might be a clone. 

Journal Entry Number Eight      

                This morning, I snuck into my garage and hid in the back seat of my car.  My doppelgänger got in and started the drive to work.  Of course, work was the laboratory I had been a prisoner in.  That isn’t where we went, though.  I popped up and held a knife to his throat, demanding answers.  At my direction, we pulled into a parking lot and got out. 

                He was scared and I was waving a knife, so it didn’t take long for him to start telling me everything.  I am a clone of him, but only aged to his prime.  His brain had been mapped and imprinted on my own.  The only memories actually mine were those after waking up in the lab. 

                I was so angry and confused about who I really was.  Before I knew it, I was lashing out and punching my older self.  I guess he was more my DNA donor than an older self.  My body in its prime vs a middle-aged man with arthritic knees was not a fair fight.  I punched him in the stomach repeatedly until his blood coated the ground beneath him. 

                So much blood.  It was not my fist that I had hit him with after all.  There, gripped in my hand, was the knife now covered in blood.  My first instinct was to try to stop the bleeding, but there were too many cuts.  The gasping breaths stopped coming.  He was dead.  I killed him.  Is that who I am?  A murderer?   I took his wallet. So, am I a thief as well? 

Journal Entry Number Nine

                My wife deserves answers, even if she won’t ever believe them.  This will be my last journal entry because I’m going to leave this journal with the body.  I started writing to jog my memories.  Now that I have them, I realize they are not even my own.  Please, whoever reads this, make sure she gets a copy.  Tell her I’m so sorry.    

Fiction Fragment Friday

This week’s story is told from the perspective of the character I’m playing in my weekly roleplaying game. Of course as usual my characters are bigger and more important in the world when I write about them then they ever could be in a game. While the character’s thoughts and motivations are the same as I want them to be in the game his place in the world will never be the same. I’m not sure that I would want them to be.

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                Even in the middle of the park, you can’t escape the city.  The sounds of people arguing, horns honking, and a train in the distance combine to drown out nature.  The exhaust is not as bad but still assaults the nose.  Thankfully, the smell of hot dog carts give me a moment of relief.  The park is the one place in the city where I can fully sync with the energy fields of nature.  Where I can communicate instead of just using it.  Unfortunately, that means my senses are operating at a level to make the city oppressive. 

                Usually, I can tap into the traits of one animal at a time, but not in the park.  There, sitting by the lake, I have the ears of a bat, the sight of an owl, and the smell of a bloodhound.  The one place I can commune with nature, and it enhances my senses so much I can’t enjoy it.  I try to escape the city only to have its worst traits amplified.      

                As I open my eyes, I am met with the sight of animals.  Squirrels, birds, insects, and rodents surround me in all directions.  These are the moments I live for.  When I am one of them.  I open my bag and pull out a loaf of bread.  They can’t rely on me to feed them every day, but I am one of them and I will not abandon them today. 

                “What in the world is going on here?”  I don’t know the woman who yelled in surprise, but she managed to ruin my  entire afternoon.  The animals surrounding me run in fear.  They know that not all humans are safe to be around.  Without knowing who will be kind and who will be cruel, it is safer to just avoid them all.   I can feel their fear and it saddens me.  We have taken so much from nature already and there is nothing they can do about it.  

                “You scared them away,” I say to the newcomer.  I don’t turn around to face her. 

                “You did that, didn’t you? You were controlling all the animals in the park.”  Her voice is accusatory, with a twinge of anger in it. 

                “It’s not about control.”  I hold up the loaf of bread over my head.  “I feed them, and they trust me.  Doesn’t need to be more to it than that.”  I try to keep my voice steady and confident. 

                “I know what I saw.  That was more than just food.  There was an owl standing next to a mouse.  Admit it, you’re one of those freaks.” 

                I fight back my initial response.  My friends keep telling me I have anger issues.  That isn’t the entire story, though.  When I channel animals, I don’t just get their senses; I get a part of their spirit.  Animals rely on instinct more than we do.  Our complicated jumble of thoughts get in the way of our instincts.  So, when I channel animals, I am a more extreme version of myself.  My thoughts get pushed to the back and my instincts drive me forward.  In this moment, my instincts want me to grow cat claws out of my fingers and rip her throat out.  That isn’t who I am, though. 

                “You’re right. I do have powers.  I don’t control anything, though, and I don’t hurt anyone.  There’s a lot of darkness in the world, and yes, some of it comes from people with powers.  It isn’t the powers that cause it, though it’s the hatred in their hearts.  Ask yourself, out of the two of us, do you really think it was the guy feeding bread to park animals that has hatred in his heart?” 

                I finally turn to face her and get my first look.  She is radiant, with long green hair draped over a flowing white dress.  It feels like her deep blue eyes can see right through me.  What draws my attention, though, is her bare feet with flowers growing on the ground all around them.  She takes a step towards me, and I watch more flowers grow before my eyes.  “There you are.  The fire I knew you had in you.”  She touches my shoulder, and warmth fills my whole body.  At that moment, the city outside the park vanishes from my senses.  We are alone with nature and my connection feels stronger than it ever has before. 

                “Who are you?” I say, but my voice cracks a bit as I do.  I can feel tears forming and I don’t know if they are from joy, awe, or fear. 

                She laughs, and the sound is like music.  “Oh my child, you know who I am.  You are my chosen warrior.” 

                “Mother nature?” I ask in disbelief. 

                “If that is how you wish to think of me, it is not as a whole inaccurate.  I am the spirit of all things that live on this planet, be they plant, animal, ameba, or one of the many forms of life you humans have yet to discover.” 

                “Gaia,” I say in wonder.

                “One of the many names I have answered to over the years.  I am not here to talk about me, though.  I am here to grant you a gift.  You have significant challenges ahead, but here you may find sanctuary.  In this park, you may hide from the outside world for a time and heal when you need to.  Here from time to time if you ask questions of me, I just may answer.”

                “Thank you,” I say barely able to look at her.  “Why me though?”          

                “Perhaps it is because I need my champion to be strong.  Perhaps it is because you possess a strength you have yet to realize.  Or perhaps it is because of a promise I once made to your father.  Regardless of my motivation, this place is now yours.  Treat it well and it will do the same for you.”   

                One moment she is speaking and the next she is gone.  She does not leave or fade away.  Instead, she is simply gone, but deep inside, I still feel her presence.  The park is quiet, yet I know where every animal is.  I don’t feel them, I just know.  When I walk from the park, the sounds of the world return.  Looking over my shoulder, I see people in the park, though it was empty for me just moments ago.  The world feels more solid like I have returned to it from somewhere less physical.    

Fiction Fragment Friday

This story started with the first line of dialog in it. An expression of frustration expressed after spending too much time keeping up with the horrible things happening in the world. To often in my life I have felt the impotent rage of a person feeling that there is nothing they can do to make things better. Sometimes this is focused externally and sometimes it is raging against the thoughts in my own head. I often visualize this anger coming out in waves of energy like an explosion because it feels like too much to contain. That is the inspiration for this story. That desire to lash out, but the knowledge that even with that power it would not make anything better. Only worse. Even if that relief were only screaming or verbally lashing out.

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                I felt intense pressure behind my eyes and terror that they would burst from their sockets.  Jagged lines of light filled my vision, overwhelming anything else I might have seen.   My brain felt like something was stabbing it repeatedly.  I couldn’t be sure of anything else happening around me as my entire existence compressed into the area around my head. 

                “NO MORE,” I heard myself scream as the pressure released from me in waves of destructive energy.  I didn’t know what the energy was, but it came from deep inside me.  The cars all around me crumbled and flew, tumbling through the air away from me.  There was a sound of shattering glass from the nearby buildings as the waves of energy hit them.  The very ground around me melted and bubbled away like ripples in a lake after an impact.

                I rose to my feet, laughing in relief as the pain faded.  The relief filled me, masking my awareness of all the damage I had just caused.  A car crashed through the second floor of the office I worked in.  People were injured all around me, but at that moment I was completely unaware.  The pain was gone, and that was the only thing that mattered. 

                “You think this is funny?”  I heard the angry voice behind me, but couldn’t quite make out where it was coming from.  I turned just in time to see a fist come out of the sky and smash into my face.  A wave of energy burst from me at the moment of impact, creating a protective energy shell.  I spun through the air twenty feet before bouncing off the ground and crashing into a car on its side from my initial energy release.  I hurt from being shaken, but there was no damage.  “Laugh now, you bastard.” 

                The man was coming towards me at a startling speed.  That was when I recognized him.  He was a superhero who went by the name Vengeance.  I had seen him on the news but couldn’t remember what his powers were.  His reputation for being unforgiving preceded him, though.  Reality was still fuzzy for me, so I couldn’t figure out why I would be his target.

                Vengeance reached down and grabbed me by the front of my shirt, lifting me above his head.  He was screaming at me, but I couldn’t make out his words through the pounding in my head.  I could feel the energy building again and for the first time, I focused that energy and made the conscious decision to release it. I thrust my hands forward and the waves of energy came from them directly into Vengeance’s chest. 

                I found myself kneeling on the ground as he went flying away from me, smashing through multiple cars.  He came to a stop, standing on shaky feet, still facing me.  With a cough, he spit blood onto the pavement.  “Is that all you got?”  His eyes locked on mine and I knew at that moment he would not stop until one of us was dead. 

                With all my concentration, I focused on the wreckage of two cars in the parking lot.  They shook for a moment before smashing together with Vengeance in the middle.  I could feel my anger boiling over.  That man was trying to kill me, and I would be damned if I was going to let him do it.  I stalked towards him, but became distracted by the sound of tears from my office building.  Looking over, I processed what I had done for the first time.

                The building was on fire from the car crashing into it.  By the door, one of my coworkers was bent over a mangled body, crying.  I lost control when my powers had triggered for the first time and people had lost their lives because of it.  I looked over at the broken body of Vengeance and could see bones sticking through his skin in places.  “What have I done?” 

                That is my origin story.  I never wanted to be a supervillain, but it is hard to convince Superheroes of that once you have killed one of their own.  I couldn’t return to a normal life after so many of my coworkers had seen my face.  The ones that survived.  When you spend every waking moment being hunted, it is hard not to lash out.  It seems like every decision only makes things worse.    More damages, injuries, and death.  I’m not a bad guy, though.  Really.                  

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.

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“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.            

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.

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               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.