The Advancement of Mateo Matic: February 18, 2399

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Since Leona is no longer in trouble, Ramses wanted to stay gone, but Kivi knew that Leona wouldn’t want that. They had some things to work out with each other, and he did not have the right to keep running from that. She escorted him out of the Great Pyramid of Giza, and they went on their way to Balikpapan to rendezvous with everyone else. Fortunately, the guards at the entrance to the pyramid had switched shifts in the intervening time, so while the new one was told that only two people would be going in, he figured he had heard wrong, and there were actually three. The original guard would have remembered there actually only having been two, and wondered how the third man got in there in the first place. That, coupled with the fact that Ramses is Egyptian himself, was enough to prevent any further questions.

Everyone left is back in the executive conference room on Mangrove One, including Kivi and her whole SD6 team. They’re regrouping, and laying all of their cards on the table. Leona no longer has anyone that she truly trusts, now that Ramses has betrayed her, so she needs friends and allies. She’ll do what she must to make and keep them, no matter the cost. She would cut a deal with Erlendr Preston if she thought it was the only way to get Mateo and Alyssa back. She’s desperate enough to try any strategy.

The meeting started with introductions, and now they’re over, so the real business can begin. “It’s nice to meet you, Nakia,” Aldona says. “Welcome to the fold.” She takes a preparatory breath. “Thank you all for being here. I would like to update you on our progress to defend this planet, and the next one over from a future and inevitable war. We’ll get the newcomers up to speed, but first, it’s important that you understand what has happened to the program in the last few days. I have initiated a...declaration of independence. We are no longer working under the world’s governments. We maintain a healthy relationship with Indonesia, but we are not officially affiliated with the Global Council. Don’t worry, we’re not at war. This was always part of the plan. We are the defensive military branch for two worlds, and not even the GC is expansive enough to contain us, so it had to be done.

“The Council as a whole does not recognize us as an independent state, but the majority of its member nations do. They have taken up that position because they understand that we are the only ones who can save them. Even those who don’t believe that are under the impression that we can hurt them. We would never do that, but we’re not going to go out of our way to alleviate their concerns. From my perspective, being afraid of us will translate extremely well to being afraid of the Reality Wars, and a healthy fear of that is a good thing. Again, for those of you just joining us, there’s a war in the future, I can’t stop it from happening, but I can protect the worlds who suffered the most losses. We’ll go over more in the next few days. Winona and Alserda have graciously donated this team to Radifor. That is the name of this nation. Please note that you have not defected from the United States, and may return to your posts whenever you would like, including...” She checks her watch before adding, “right now.”

No one leaves, which only sounds improbable when not accounting for how much loyalty Winona instills in her people. She doesn’t recruit the best fighters and investigators. She fosters true believers. They’re less with the government, and more with her. This is something that Leona has had to pick up on over the time she’s been involved with the organization. Her superiors didn’t realize that she was doing this, because she’s never been overt about it, and her off-the-books operations are so rare. No one has shown any signs of treasonous tendencies, because that’s the whole point. She takes true patriots, and cares for them so they start to consider her the embodiment of the U.S. She doesn’t want radicals; they’re too volatile. It’s easy for Kivi’s team to switch allegiances, because they don’t look at it that way.

“Great,” Aldona decides. “That’s it for the sweeping proclamations. I still see some confused faces. I believe some private conversations need to happen now, so before we start the full debrief, anyone who already knows this stuff can leave.”

Leona looks over at Ramses, who is keeping his head hung low. With a sigh, she stands up, and pulls him to his feet by his arm. “Come on. We need to talk.”

He doesn’t respond, but he doesn’t resist either. He’s a doll now, incapable of making his own decisions, and doing whatever anyone asks of him.

She drags him several doors down so no one can hear them. “All right, let’s talk.”

“About what?”

“You know what about. You feel guilty about what happened to my husband.”

“Yes.”

“Why? What exactly did happen? Your message didn’t give any details.”

He stays silent.

“Ramses,” she says, firmly but not angrily. “Speak up now.”

He waits to answer a little, but does finally go into it. “Mateo and I decided unilaterally that we were going to destroy Constance!Five. We thought it was too dangerous to just leave her there. It’s a remote island for now, but that could change in the future for all we know. We got there just in time to find out that she figured out how to escape. I guess a plane flew close enough that she was able to send out a signal, or maybe an EMP. The plane went down, and then she reprogrammed some of the parts to assemble themselves into a quantum skeleton key. It plugged itself into the stasis pod keypad, and eventually cracked the code. Mateo lured it into the Bridgette. He then teleported it to a magma chamber in a volcano, and set off the self-destruct.”

“I didn’t know it had a self-destruct.”

“It’s not technically a bomb. What it did was overload the teleporter by firing temporal energy into the distributor coil while it was closed, so it couldn’t actually distribute the energy throughout the vehicle.”

“I see. And where were you during all of this?”

“At first I was almost dying at the hands of Constance!Five. Then I was being helped into the crawlspace by Mateo, who had me teleport to safety while he blew it up.”

“Why did he set it off instead of you?”

“Constance!Five was upon us. He was closer to the teleporter. He demanded that I leave, and I...I shouldn’t have listened to him.”

“Ramses Abdulrashid, I’m not happy that my husband is dead, but I’m glad that you’re not. What he did in that magma chamber was solve a math problem. As you know, that is not his strong suit, so I am proud of him. It was either the both of you, or just him. You shouldn’t have gone into hiding. I still need you. We all do.”

“I’m sorry,” he replies sincerely.

“I appreciate that. Now is the time to work. I brought your satellite online in the hopes of finding Alyssa, but it was attacked, so I darklurked it. You need to figure out how to reactivate it without anyone else being able to detect that it’s up there.”

Microstory 1579: Any Password Will Do

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Prompt

I enter my bank password wrong, but the app still lets me sign in. I log out and try again, this time using a password that is not anywhere close to the right one. It lets me sign in this time too.

Botner

The trick: I don’t use the exact password. Instead I pick a random six-letter combination. It’s not easy to do, but there’s a little-known secret that lets me log in without making a mistake. All I have to do is get my phone to emit a strong “pattern” beep and lock pattern. If I follow this series of steps, I can log in to my bank account from my phone no matter what the password is. I started wondering how this works after I noticed this article from The Atlantic detailing how to trick Google into giving you the wrong password when you’re on an Android device. The author said that when he logged in, his bank account info and the password didn’t match. He was able to get into his account despite the fact that his password was wrong. It’s possible that this is an isolated incident. But some security experts are skeptical. “The notion that it’s really easy for hackers to break into my account if I type in this correct password...is dubious,” says Randy Abrams, security specialist.

Conclusion

I’m no programmer, but I have a decent idea what happened here. There’s a line of code somewhere in my bank’s software. It’s there to help people login to their accounts. When someone inputs their password, this line is supposed to ask whether it’s correct. If not, it will return false. But if the code itself just says true, then the password is always right, no matter what. As long as they put something in the box, it will let them in. This is a problem. This could allow anyone to access anyone else’s account, assuming I’m right, and it’s a global issue, rather than some kind of caching bug that’s only happening to my device. I open my laptop, and put in my mom’s username, since we use the same bank. I randomly strike a bunch of keys, and try to get into her account. It works. It is global, it has to be. But still, I’ll try one more thing. I call my mom, and ask her to try to login to my uncle’s account. She helped him set it up, so she has his information too. She puts in the wrong password, just like I did, but it doesn’t work. Whew! I guess they solved the problem already.  Hopefully I was the first and only person to notice the glitch, and no one had the chance to exploit it. I realize my session’s been terminated because the app has been logged in too long, and I never did get to check my balance, so I have to login yet again. Feeling shaky because of what might have been, I mess up my password once more, like an idiot. But it works. I know I messed it up, my hand slipped. What the hell is going on here? I have to get help, so I call customer service, and tell them what I know. “Yes, sir,” the representative says. “You have access to all accounts, as you should.” What?” This is even weirder than that time I drove down the highway going the wrong direction, and the cop just smiled and greeted me like it was normal. Something is happening to me, and even though it all seems good, it can’t be that easy.

Dardius: Mateo Matic (Part IX)

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No, it wasn’t Cassidy in the background. Mateo was seeing Meliora Rutherford, whom he had only met a couple times; once in an alternate reality. They didn’t look anything alike, but the former was the person he was expecting to be here. He had always wondered why it was that Gilbert Boyce owned this planet, rather than her. She was in charge of the only inhabited building on it back when this all began, so why did her power not spread as the population did? After he hugged everyone in the room who was there for his memorial already, he decided to be brave, and pull Meliora aside, so he could speak with her about this. Seeing her here, and realizing why it was that all these people were coming together, gave him an idea.

“I thought this day might come,” Meliora said.

“You did?” he asked. “So you know what I’m going to say.”

“I have no idea,” she admitted. “But you and I have not spoken in quite a long time, from both of our respective perspectives, so we were probably due. Ask me anything.”

“Why did Boyce own this planet, and not you? I mean, didn’t you basically run it, and weren’t you the one who named it”

“Oh, we’re talkin’ about that? Okay. Well, it’s really complicated, but the gist of it is that I don’t want it. Maqsud owed Boyce a favor, and that favor came in the form of a star system. Boyce owed me a favor, but it was a much smaller one, so that favor came in the form of being able to use this planet for my needs. I wanted a place where Earthans could feel safe and comfortable. Right down to the surface gravity, they needed to feel like they were still on the same world. Keep in mind that this agreement was discussed and finalized when The Rogue was possessing the body of Baudin, and one other person. Neither one of them was evil, like The Apprentice, so he was far more congenial at the time. Anyway, I was responsible for The Sanctuary, and Boyce was not allowed to interfere, but he did maintain control over the rest of the planet. Or rather, he maintained theoretical control. He never had any ideas of what he could do with it, so when a few of my guests wanted to go out camping, for instance, we didn’t run into any problems.

“Around the time that Boyce first died, and ownership transferred to you, the people I was rescuing from Earth were multiplying beyond the Sanctuary’s boundaries. I took a risk, and expanded without permission, because I assumed you wouldn’t have a problem with it.”

“Of course not,” Mateo confirmed.

“Good. So, I started using more and more land, but I realized my people no longer needed me. They procured their own way of extracting those in need from the timeline, and of figuring out precisely who those people were. Recognizing that I would probably only be a hindrance to this new civilization’s development, I determined the best thing for me to do was leave.”

“Where did you go? Or when?”

“It’s a little bit of both. I began to travel to other universes.”

“Ah, I see.”

“I never know where I’m going, or what I will find when I arrive, because I have no means of navigating the bulkverse. That’s why I can’t own this planet. I can always return to a brane that I’ve been to, but I can’t guarantee where in the timeline I’ll be, or even if I’ll be in the latest timeline,” she said with airquotes. “So now I have a question for you, are you asking out of curiosity, or are you trying to pass it off to me?”

“Do you think I should...pass it off, that is?”

Meliora stood there for a moment. “Probably. I can’t take it, though. I’m a bulk traveler and that’s the way I like it. After this is over, I will be leaving again. If you would like someone to take Dardius off your hands, I can help you do that. It’s a good time for it, because even though you’re obviously alive, you have died, and that’s sort of when ownership transference happens.”

“Right. The problem is you are exactly who I had in mind. I don’t know of anyone else. Do you?”

Mateo’s memorial was quite literally a global event. The only people not paying attention to it were in emergency situations, like those at the hospital. Even they had the ceremony on in the background, though. There wasn’t enough room for everyone to watch in one place, however, so only a select few tens of thousands of people were afforded tickets to the stadium. Other stadiums held their own events, though they were self-regulated, and unofficial. Even the people in the main stadium didn’t have the best view, because there was a much smaller crowd on the grounds, full of only people who knew Mateo personally. Though the event would not begin for another few hours, Meliora decided to transport the living Mateo there, so he could catch a sneak preview. She slowed time down to a crawl so they could get a good look from another dimension.

“I don’t know how all these people get here,” Meliora began as they were staring at the group. “I dispatched some of my most trusted allies to assist in the endeavor, because the powers that be are not involved this time, like they were with your final showdown with The Cleanser in the Colosseum. I was also unable to recruit Glaston for this, because your wedding with Leona nearly killed him.”

“Who’s that guy?” Mateo was pointing to a mysterious man who they did indeed encounter at the wedding.

“He’s from the future. Don’t worry about it. Are you listening to me?”

“Yes, of course.”

Meliora went on, “not everyone here would be up to the task of owning a planet.”

“How hard could it be? I did almost nothing as owner. I only became Patronus later, and that didn’t last very long, and it never truly had to happen at all.”

“It is a psycho-emotional strain, Mateo. You’ve always been too busy to feel it, especially since for a good chunk of the time, you didn’t even know how many people lived here. All these people do. The new owner would know from the start that billions of people will know their name. They’ll likely feel the obligation to live here, because they’ll have the option, whereas you and Leona never did. They will spend their days in the public eye, not possessing any real power, but being asked for help anyway. Mateo, if you choose someone to take this world from you—which, by the way, you don’t actually have to—you will be simultaneously giving them an enormous gift, and a massive burden.”

“Do I have to give it to anyone at all?” Mateo hoped. “Can I not just relinquish my rights, or something?”

“Normally, yes. But with this particular world, with this many people, who all believe in you, no. They’re comfortable with having an owner, kind of like how it took over two centuries for the United Kingdom to abolish the royal family, and transition completely to a real democratic republic.”

“Wull, if I try to give Dardius to someone else, do the people have to approve of that person?”

“Well, they will, because you do. I know that seems like I’m not answering the question, but it’s true. They will accept anyone. You could hand it off to Adolf Hitler, Francisco Franco, and Donald Trump, and they’ll smile, because they’ll trust you had your reasons.”

“I don’t think I’m going to go that route. I want to choose someone who’s up for the job. Please don’t be neutral on this. If you have a good choice in mind, I want to hear it.”

“I have to be neutral, because I’m too powerful to let people listen to me too much. I do know someone who should be involved in this decision, though. I’ll take you back to the recent past, just before Leona arrives.”

“Yeah, that’s a good idea.”

Mateo returned to the Sanctuary hotel, and had an hour-long talk with his wife about what they were going to do with this planet. They generated a list of their most responsible friends, and pared it down. In the end, the three-generational Einarsson family proved themselves to be the most logical choice. Any help they needed they could secure from their various friends and allies, and as the owner of a whole planet, Cassidy would be forever protected from anyone who would do her harm. The trick would be convincing them to agree to it in the first place. He didn’t really know if the three of them had to agree to this, because Gilbert never gave him a choice, but he was determined to not force the issue if they didn’t consent. That wasn’t Mateo’s responsibility, though. Leona would have to take care of that herself while he was off doing something else. There were two people who were vital to the services, but Meliora’s people were struggling with finding a way to retrieve them. One in particular would not come easily, mostly because he had no idea who Mateo was.

Ramses was difficult to get to, because of when and where he was. Horace Reaver, on the other hand, was difficult because they evidently couldn’t choose just any version of him in any time period. The Horace living in 2027 was the one who needed to see the events that would be unfolding today, for temporal reasons that Mateo wasn’t capable of understanding. He just had to trust that Meliora knew what she was talking about when she explained this to him. This would be a lot easier if he had managed to retain Nerakali’s brain blending power, but it was still possible without it. His best chance at success would be to appeal to Horace’s better nature, and make sure he suppressed his dark tendencies.

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Microstory 1223: Lanolin Foley

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Until it found its home star to orbit, there was never a time when the planet of Durus was not at war. It was at war when the first of the Springfielders arrived on the Deathfall, and had to battle frightening temporal monsters. It was at war when the Mage Protectorate formed, and started enforcing boundaries against these monsters. It was at war again after those monsters were finally defeated, and a new threat rose to power. In the hunt for votes, a group of small men grew bold, and started making complaints about the women of history. They didn’t start out explicitly stating that women were inferior, but they certainly catered to a demographic that already believed that. They just kept adding more and more outrageous statements to their repertoire, and increasing their numbers, until there was no hope in reasoning with them. They played on the worst fears of some of the least decent people in the world, and that was enough to make dramatic and terrible changes. The war continued as the rebellion against this tyranny did everything it could to put a stop to it. Unfortunately, there weren’t a lot of places to hide on Durus. Sure, only a tiny fraction of the surface was settled, but that was for a very good reason. There was only a single source of water, in a region known as Watershed. It never stopped raining, and it was extremely difficult to get to. A system of pipes had to be constructed to accommodate the population beyond its original several hundred, because there was almost no land within kilometers of the area. The rebels had to find somewhere else to live, and set up a convoluted system of water theft just to survive. They chose a region called the thicket, which was what they themselves came to be called. There was plantlife for minimal cover, which survived on what little moisture the wind carried over to it, but none of it was edible, and conditions were terrible. The Thicket spent so much time just making sure their people didn’t die that they didn’t have any time to actually fight against their oppressors. Lanolin Foley wanted to do things differently. She never planned on becoming the leader, but she knew she could do it when the responsibility fell to her. The cause was important, to her, and to the world at large. This was her chance to effect change in a way her predecessors never could. Though she retained the name, she moved their operations out of the thicket, and into the city. The government hadn’t been spending many resources catching them when they weren’t really doing anything except barely scraping by, and when Lanolin reintegrated the rebels into society, the government still didn’t do anything, because they did not know about it. Gradually, things began to get better. It was easier to find sympathizers than The Thicket ever knew. They had spent so much time in isolation that they didn’t realize things had already been changing, at least for the general population. With help, Lanolin ushered in a new era, and paved the way for people like Ludvig to keep the torches burning, and find peace on Durus.

Microstory 1222: Ludvig Portillion

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While the end of the phallocracy on Durus was suddenly brought about by a visitor from Earth who refused to accept the status quo, her arrival was not the only thing that brought the system down. Women had been living under oppression for over sixty-five years, and a lot had changed since the new rules were first implemented. For one, everyone responsible for the new world order was dead, leaving their descendants to decide for themselves whether they still agreed with their ways. For the most part, the system held up on its own. Anyone who disagreed with it feared retaliation for voicing their concerns, so they simply kept quiet. Active rebels were few and far between, but there were even more people who secretly supported them, and needed but a push to stand against the injustice. Ludvig Portillion was one of these people. He didn’t see women as inferior, but he also didn’t think he could do anything to help. He was born into a world that not only mistreated over half its population, but also into one that discouraged questioning the government, or coming to one’s own conclusions. It wasn’t tyrannical. Criticism—by men, at least—was usually met with dismissal, rather than explicit punishment, but it certainly wasn’t a democracy, and it wasn’t set up with sufficient change-making procedures. The truth was that Ludvig thought he was doing everything he could when he pursued a relationship with Loa Nielsen. Her father, Anchor was infamous for his understanding of the progressive Earthan culture, and thusly developed empathy for the female condition. Ludvig thought that, by courting a strong and independent woman, he was showing that he wasn’t afraid of female independence, nor would he attempt to take control over her. He also thought that being around both Loa and her father made him a better person. He never considered himself to be a bad guy, and the women who knew him didn’t either. It just took him too long to realize that, since he wasn’t really part of the solution, he was still technically part of the problem. He could have done more. Treating this one woman fairly, was the absolute bare minimum, and wasn’t nearly enough to demonstrate his goodness, let alone make the world a better place. Fortunately, he came to have an opportunity to contribute positively. After Hokusai Gimura came to the planet, and changed everything about it, Ludvig stepped up. He raised his voice, in support of progressive changes, and against any who would see society crumble back down to the way it was. And by his words, along with the words and actions of many others, the world did finally become its best self.

Microstory 998: Turnover

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This is a really morbid one, which is why I put it near the end, in case I came up with something more positive. Believe it or not, that actually did happen with another topic. The previous installment was a last-minute replacement for something I ended up deciding I didn’t think you would like, and even then, I altered the subject matter while in the middle of writing it. For as much as I talk about how curing death can help the world, I’m not going to pretend it alone can solve all our problems, or that there isn’t potential for it to cause more. We can all surmise that immortality, without accompanied by other advancements, can lead to terrible consequences. If we don’t solve this world’s distribution problems, and move out to other worlds, we won’t be able to provide for the dramatic increase in population. Already we’re seeing the cost of better global health. Try driving from one side of town to the other without passing at least three separate postretirement facilities, of varying calibre, for varying needs. But there’s another reason death has been of benefit to us. In some of my stories, I have a race of “aliens” called Maramon. Their creator was a naive child who wasn’t interested in his creations ever dying, so he subconsciously made them immortal. What he couldn’t have realized was that meant the worst of the worst individuals were free to keep going through the centuries, unchecked. Can you imagine how awful life would be if Caligula, Jeffrey Dahmer, or Adolf Hitler were still alive? How much hope could we have if we knew that Donald Trump and Jared Fogle would always be around? We would never get through this. Turnover lets us rid ourselves of our history’s sickening mistakes, and gives rise to new ideas. Progress doesn’t happen just because a new generation wants things to change, but also because they’re eventually free from the burden of the old fogies who are incapable of that change. As wicked as it sounds, death is sometimes the only way. Maybe I’m wrong, and all those kids at the tiki torch rally who are young enough to become immortal in the future can eventually learn to become better people. Maybe if humans never died, we would all be totally fine, and living in the paradise our still-living ancestors built for us. But I doubt it.

Microstory 979: Teachers

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As I’ve said, I think the education system is flawed. This is a major issue, in different ways, all over the world. Each student is expected to learn certain things, regardless of their interests or strengths. Even at higher levels, where there’s more freedom to study what you want, they have needless restrictions. For instance, when I was working towards my linguistics degree, there was no class that taught geolinguistics. I didn’t care about phonemes and sound frequency. I wanted to learn who speaks what languages, where, at what times in history, why it came to be like that, and how surrounding languages influence those speakers. I should have been given the opportunity to look into all that stuff, instead of wasting my time diagramming sentences. With all this technology, that could have been possible, but humans are notoriously fearful of change. The reason we study the way that we do is because the way we do it is perfectly suited to really intelligent people. An individual with a high intelligence quotient does really well when confronted with new information via lecture, or reading, and then evaluated through achievement testing. Not everyone benefits from this, and I daresay most don’t. So why, when only the few function well under these directives, do we do it like this? Well, obviously because people who come up with these methods are smart. Normal people don’t reform education, because we’re generally not in a position to do so. We’re so looked down upon by the elite that we wouldn’t be able to make any headway.

Now is the part where I make it clear that I blame none of this on the teachers. They are teaching under guidelines set forth by others, and coming from a history of having been taught this same way when they were students. To put it bluntly, it’s all they know. To put it more bluntly, it’s often all they’re allowed to do. Teachers have some leeway to choose their own curriculum, but there are still a ton of expectations on the district and national level that require the majority of their attention. Standardized tests, entry exams, and college acceptance thresholds prevent teachers from going too far off book. The arts generally have a little more flexibility, but not nearly enough. At a certain point in the history of the world in some of my stories, education shifts to the future. Students begin to learn somewhat independently. They’re given the tools they need to explore topics of their choosing, and work at their own pace, using AI instructors. They still have authorities guiding students, but instead of calling them teachers, they use the term facilitator, because they’re meant to help their students stay on track. A student, for example, wouldn’t be allowed to spend years learning only underwater basket-weaving. They are still expected to grow, and become well-rounded contributors to society. These highly-tailored study modules are supplemented with instructional videos, group discussions, and group activities, so don’t think of this as dystopian mindlessness. We can do this, but we have to want it. Teachers are great. They shape young minds, and get them prepared for their future careers. The problem is that they’re bad careers. The way we do business on a general level is inefficient, and predominantly meaningless. Most jobs are stupid, and either should be done by a robot, or just not done at all. We should be teaching our kids to excel in their own ways, and chase their passions, rather than simply expecting everyone to be able to solve for X by age Y. I don’t know where we start with this; whether we transition to a more fulfilling labor structure, or if it begins with the teachers themselves, but something has to be done. Teachers have to be allowed to help students be their best selves. The elite can handle anything, so we need to be focusing our resources on helping the average, and underprivileged.

Microstory 967: Let America Vote/Jason Kander

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As I think I may have mentioned once or twice, I hate Donald Trump. He’s a piece of crap Russian spy that doesn’t deserve to be anywhere close to a position of power. I was so heartbroken and frustrated after the 2016 election, but that anger turned into an urge to do something about it. I had always voted, and voiced my support for favored candidates, but I hadn’t really ever taken any action. Like many others, I wanted to do more. Fortunately, a movement was growing that would give us more opportunities to do that than ever before. One other race I was watching closely that year was one for the Missouri senator. I recalled watching a commercial from the Jason Kander campaign—you probably saw it; it was wildly popular—where the army veteran expresses his support for common sense gun laws while assembling a firearm blindfolded. I wish I could have voted for the man, but I don’t live in Missouri, so that decision was out of my reach. But again, I didn’t have to be so passive; I could have helped. As luck would have it, Jason Kander was the one to help me get started on that road. He founded an organization called Let America Vote for the sole purpose of working against voter suppression, which has become a rampant problem in our country in recent years. No matter what they say; widespread voter fraud is very much something of which there is no evidence, and voter suppression is literally destroying this country’s democracy, one lost vote at a time. I had no idea how bad it was, but it’s despicable. I signed up for Let America Vote’s emails, and starting donating some money, but that wasn’t the end of it. The Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting happened, leading me to start following  Emma González, and the March For Our Lives movement. Then I signed up for email updates from MoveOn, and ActBlue, and Vote.org, and the Sharice Davids campaign. I donated more money, and I tried to spread the word of truth even more. My Gmail account uses multiple inboxes, rather than tabs, or whatever. I filter my emails according to source or topic, and get about 20 political messages a day. I don’t always read them them when they come in, but I always catch up eventually, and nothing goes unread. After I was mostly finished coming up with this list of 99 things that I love, I assigned each one a random number in a spreadsheet, and used the sorter to randomize that list, because I’m not going over them in any particular order. It just so happened that this installment fell on election day, though, which I find interesting. So if you’re reading this, right when it’s released, that means it’s 16:15 central time. If you’re in my time zone, you have less than three hours to get out there and vote, if you haven’t already. I believe in Jason Kander, and Let America Vote, and all organizations dedicated to rights of the people, and the betterment of mankind, rather than just the wealthiest few. If you agree with this, then today and next election, #votethemout! If you don’t, then fuck off!

Microstory 966: Kansas City

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I was born at a very young age in central Kansas. We moved around a lot, but always in either Kansas or Missouri. I live close enough to the border that I still spend a lot of time on the other side—I even work there all the time, including today—though I have no intention of moving to KCMO permanently. As I grew up, I felt like I didn’t understand the way people lived on the coasts. I didn’t dislike them, but I perceived a difference between me and them. I’m a midwesterner, and have no interest in changing that. A lot of people love where they’re from, or where they live now. But I do want to point out a difference between my town, and these others, while simultaneously making it clear I don’t think this applies to literally everyone. There’s an obsession that runs in the blood of all New Yorkers, and all Angelenos, all Seattleites, and so on. Many are so fiercely loyal to their respective cities that they either think everyone who doesn’t live there desperately wishes we were so honored, or we’re simply loyal to our own terrible homes. Go Interchangeable Sports Team! How many television series do you know that are set in one of the major coastal cities, or Chicago? Too many to name. Wikipedia lists only a handful set in KC, and I’ve only heard of two of them. I think the Z Nation gang passed through once. None of them is or was shot anywhere near here. Switched at Birth never had any seasons, and all the houses used blatant California architecture. So what’s the difference between you and me? Well, I love Kansas City. I love living in the suburbs, so a trip downtown isn’t too far, but also isn’t right here. We have all the good restaurant franchises, and a hoppin’ nightlife, even though that’s not my particular scene. That’s just like you. The difference is most of us recognize that it’s just a frickin’ city. There’s nothing inherently different about living here than somewhere else. You may think Hell’s Kitchen has the best pizza shop in the world, but guess what? The best anything doesn’t exist, because billions of other people live on this rock, and every one of them has their own tastes. This need to express an us versus them mentality is only detrimental to humanity’s progress, and does not reflect reality in the least. So thank you, Kansas City, for being citizens of the world. Someone should make a show about you. We can start with the thirteen or so I’ve come up with that don’t take place on alien worlds.

Microstory 965: Renewable Energy

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I’ve spoken so much about renewable energy, in this series, and in others, that I’m almost not sure I need to go over it again. It’s frustrating that so many people believe in clean energy, but apparently not the right people. I wasn’t aware until recently that the official political stance on climate change, for democrats and republicans alike, is tha—next question, please. Seriously, if they don’t outright deny climate change, then they still won’t explicitly admit that it’s real, or at least not that humans are the main drivers for it. I remember talking about this years ago with a conservative “friend”. He said that electric vehicles, for instance, require charging from the grid, which are powered by coal, natural gas, and other not-so-renewable sources. His reasoning was that they couldn’t help the environment as long as this true, so we might as well not try, and “hey, look at my gas guzzler, the hubcaps keep spinning!” And he’s not entirely wrong. The energy grid is a terribly inefficient system, and all but the worst way of accomplishing our energy requirements. Instead of building a giant central plant, and piping it all over a massive area, why don’t we build a bunch of tiny ones? In fact, why don’t we just let each household supply its own energy? The libertarians should be jumping all over this one, because instead of relying on the only power option available to me, solar and wind power companies can all vie for my business, no matter where they’re based. If I place solar panels and miniature wind turbines on my roof, and store excess in a wall battery, I can be energy self-sufficient. If I collect and filter my own rainwater, farm my own small garden, and print my own clothes using additive manufacturing, then I don’t need nobody but me. Some would call that a dream. Last year, power went out all over the city. I don’t even know how bad it was, but for some, it lasted for days. My parents and sister had to stay at a hotel one night, and at my place for another. I nearly slept in my downstairs twin bed, of all places. A twin bed! It was horrific. And it only happened because we’re all connected, so one thing goes wrong, and we all get screwed. So let’s fix these problems before they even happen, by investing in microgrids. The more people who start buying renewable solutions, the cheaper it becomes, and the more affordable it will be for people like me. In the end, isn’t that what really matters; what’s best for me?

Microstory 964: Women

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I was born a feminist, and cannot at all relate to people who aren’t. It’s unclear how much of my position on the matter is because of my parents, and other strong women in my life, and how much is due to my autism, but one thing that’s clear is that it’s not just one or the other. I know a lot of people say that they’re “colorblind” even though that’s not entirely accurate. We judge the people around us on the regular, and not all of that is bad. Judgment is an important evolutionary trait that is often vital to our survival, even today. A caveman that welcomed without question any rando who walked into his cave was at risk of being bonked in the head by a club. Judgment allows us to gauge how people might receive us, and how to interact with them the best way possible; so that it’s safest for everyone. The problem comes when we start making blanket statements about say, how black people generally act, or how women think. Fortunately, my autism has been known to prevent me from making those unhealthy judgments, because it’s difficult for me to adjust my behavior to social cues as a whole. I’m pretty good at sensing other people’s emotions, but not so good at anticipating their needs. So basically, I know what you’re feeling, but I don’t know how to help you. Not once have I encountered a woman, and thought, “there’s something—beyond biology—about her that’s different than me. She would do better doing such-and-such work, whereas I’m better at this other work.” When I meet someone, I simultaneously assume they know everything, and nothing. It sounds contradictory, but I believe it’s important to acknowledge from the beginning that you don’t know what this person has been through, or how they see the world. I was recently talking about mansplaining with my sister, and struggling to understand the difference between that, and just explaining things in an appropriate way. As a man, am I simply never allowed to be an authority on a subject if a woman is around? But that’s not really the point. Mansplaining occurs when a man presumes the woman he’s talking to doesn’t already know whatever it is they’re discussing, and/or condescends to her in a sexist manner. It would be great if feminism didn’t have to exist, but it does, because women have been treated as second-class citizens for thousands of years, and when I try to fathom the timeline, it’s obvious that progress has been sluggish, and we still have far to go. So the best way to avoid mansplaining to a woman is to open a dialog of equals, which is exactly the best way to engage with others anyway, so it works out. I love women, and not because they’re pretty, or because of their body parts. I love women because they kick ass. I’m so glad that we have some really good feminist movements going on right now, and that fiction is currently tackling the issues at a higher intensity than ever before. The Bold Type, the Charmed reboot, and well...pretty much anything on The CW are some of my favorite programs, because they’ve had enough of the patriarchal bullshit. So have I, and if you have too, then come these next two elections, #votethemout.

Microstory 961: Sassy Compassionate People

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If you wanted me to describe the perfect person for me, it would be really easy to come up with the surface characteristics. I prefer shorter, lighter-skinned girls with dark hair. I like a bit of asymmetry, with as few flaws as possible. What attracts me to a man is a bit harder to codify, but I know it when I see it (on a scale from John Barrowman to Channing Tatum, they should be somewhere on that scale, and that’s rare). Obviously, personality is more important than superficial features, which is why I would never rule out falling in love with say, an extraterrestrial alien, or someone with some kind of so-called deformation. But what is a good personality for me? Would I want them to be really outgoing, or be quiet like I am? Should they struggle with self-confidence? Be into science fiction? Should they be just like me, or my complete opposite? When it comes down to it, the people I find myself liking the most share two common traits, which may seem contradictory to one another. I like people with attitude and snark, and also compassion. I like when they look at the world from multiple perspectives simultaneously, and are capable of judging fairly what they see, while also being able to play devil’s advocate. They should enjoy cracking jokes, but only in a playful and harmless way. These jokes should not be mean-spirited, or have a negative impact on the progress of the human condition. I care about the world, and the people in it. And when I say that, I mean everyone. I don’t just mean my family, my country, or even my continent. If I had the power to change society on a massive scale, I would use that power to equalize everyone; get rid of money and suffering, and instil a sense of loyalty and love amongst all Earthans. I prefer to surround myself with people who possess the same crazy dreams of a better world. This mix of sass and compassion is important, because I do not believe either one fairs well without the other. A sassy person who doesn’t care about others is really just inconsiderate, callous, and negative. They quickly devolve into a spiteful and vindictive, cynical misanthrope who manipulates others to their own gain. You would think compassionate people are fine enough, and for the most part, that’s true. But I’ve personally found really nice people to often be hesitant to help others grow. In a world where no one can do wrong, and everyone is perfect the way they are, people can’t improve themselves, or learn to fail. It’s not inevitable, but compassion plus sass gives an individual the edge they need to truly understand what others are going through, because there’s a difference between compassion and empathy. Empathy is a prerequisite for any decent human being, so if you don’t have it, you don’t matter to me in the slightest. Regardless of how you feel about flaws, if you’re incapable of seeing them in the first place, you’ll never be able to relate to most people, because most people can see those flaws. So please, be nice, but also be interesting.

Microstory 956: States’ Rights

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I used to be pretty opposed to the concept of states’ rights. The way I see it, we are meant to be a single nation, under a singular set of laws. Since I live near the border of Kansas and Missouri, I cross state lines all the time. My closest movie theatre is on the other side of State Line, and a lot of the places where I work are in downtown KCMO. I’ve never been able to see us as that different, even though I know we are. I know there is a lot of racism left in Alabama, and a lot of pot in California. Oregon does tend to be more progressive, and Tennessee is all about country music. For as patriotic as conservatives claim to be, they sure hate their own country, and are fiercely loyal only to their state. But like many things that changed in November of 2016, my perspective shifted dramatically, and it bothers me a lot. In a few short months, we started seeing massive changes to the way laws are handled here. Our so-called president is abusing his power by rolling back protections for minorities, immigrants, women, and members of LGBTQ. They’ve even taken steps towards getting rid of a free and fair internet. The fact that these changes seem to benefit directly the wealthy individuals driving the changes seems to be completely lost on Trump-voters. Or maybe they just hate black people so much that they’re willing to accept whatever terrible repercussions that affect them personally come with it. All I know is that I’ve never been so glad for states’ rights. State leadership is starting to fight back, by maintaining the previous administration’s policies on things like sanctuary cities, and clean environment initiatives. They’ve even taken steps towards keeping their citizens using a free and fair internet.

The point of my continuous story of The Advancement of Leona Matic is to give you a really quick overview of what things will be like in the future. By having the main character only live one day every year, we get to skip through all the boring parts, and see how things are going to change. In this future, the boundaries between nationstates slowly begin to blur. The European Union adds more members, and warmly welcomes back certain former members which shall remain nameless. A North American Union will form, likely at around the same time as an Asian block. As Africa continues to develop and progress, they too will form similar subcontinents; though they will likely be divided in some way for some time. China will probably assert itself as an unrivaled superpower the likes of which this world has never seen, but that too shall pass. India may do something similar, but more on an organic economic level than a forceful one. Generation by generation will come, each one less focused on spreading out than the last. Eventually, people will only live in as much space as they need. It will no longer be fashionable to buy the biggest house possible, but instead to have gone out and experienced more exciting adventures. It won’t matter where you live anymore, so we’ll build extremely dense arcologies that house millions of people vertically. We’ll move out beyond our atmosphere, living on orbital stations, satellite bases, other planets, and even asteroids. There will be division once more, but they will be far less violent, and in time, they will dissipate as well. Things will get better. Just like today we laugh at how women had to wear corsets, and weren’t allowed to vote, our descendants will laugh at how we once exchanged money, and built walls between each other. Until those days come, though, we need states’ rights, or else this unsustainable oligarchy drives us towards insurmountable anarchy.

Microstory 955: Bees

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A keystone species is one that is vital to the ecosystem in a way that their absence would gravely impact other species. Beavers are one example of this. In parts where beavers have died out, soil erosion has been caused by a lack of their dams. Certain species of fish have suffered, for they evolved to utilize the slow-moving areas of rivers that these mighty mammals created for them. I even named the prison in my stories Beaver Haven for its analogy to house time travelers, some of which are known as salmon. Bees are also a keystone species, and possibly the most important. Since plants can’t move around, they can’t reproduce the same way animals do. They can’t go out, find mates, and bear offspring. If they want to spread their seeds over distances beyond their immediate area, they rely on others, or other phenomena. Some encapsulate their seeds into a cotton-like structure called a pappus, which floats on the air before landing kilometers away. Others attach themselves to the fur of a creature, which is meant to walk away, and drop it off somewhere else. Yet others choose to attract insects to their flowers, which pick up the pollen like dust, and spread it around as they fly back home to use what they managed to hold onto for their colony’s honey. You eat a lot of the fruits and vegetables that come from these plants, and if you’re more into meat, you still benefit, because the animals you eat are also eating those fruits and vegetables. There are many possible answers to the question of what’s happening to the bees—the most likely culprit being pesticides that prevent these pollinators from navigating back home—but the clear truth is that it’s our fault. So, what can we do? We need bees to spread the agriculture, but we need pesticides to protect it from, well...pests. The solution is—you guessed it—vertical farming. If you bring most of the crops inside to a controlled environment, you can produce a greater volume in a smaller space, and you won’t need pest control, since most bugs don’t know how to open doors. By removing our reliance on bees, we would allow them to restore themselves to sustainable numbers, and get back to the business of supporting the planet as a whole. Bees are so important, and so innocent. Save the bees!

Microstory 954: Stem Cell Research

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As a human being who cares about this world, the people on it, and everything that happens to us, I believe in science. I believe in science that can help make the world a better place, for all living creatures. I possess a spirituality, differentiated from religion by the fact that I absolutely do not let my beliefs get in the way of progress. Organized religion has done some good in the world in the the way of charity and good will, but that doesn’t get them off the hook. Besides the fact that hope for heaven—or fear of hell, as it were—are terrible reasons to do the right thing, their good does not outweigh their bad. All religions are based on the primary sins, even the ones who claim to be virtuous. They’re all about greed, envy, wrath, selfishness, and more. Through these sins comes many of the planet’s woes; war, crime, and even natural disasters (the intensity of these recent hurricanes are the result of climate change, which is undoubtedly being caused by humans). Nearly everything that happens can be traced back to a misguided religious belief that prevents individuals from caring for their fellow man. Stem cell research is a good example of this issue. Now, I’m not saying there’s no such thing as ethics, or that we can do whatever we want as long as it helps us in the end. Problems arise, however, when ignorant people argue against research, or an advancement. The simple fact is that the average person does not know enough about the subject to form a valid opinion. Sure, it sounds bad when a Christian stands on a college campus with pictures of dead babies, claiming that stem cell research is responsible for the horrific images. But that’s not really what happened, and these arguments are not helping anything. I recognize there is a debate as to when exactly human life begins, and can’t realistically give a hard number for this, even though my canon does have an answer. The point of this research is not to stay right where we are with it. Scientists need to understand how this works, so we can engage in a responsible and safe way. That requires study and debate, but only amongst those who know what they’re doing. I’m not one of those people, and most likely, neither of you. Having read the bible cover to cover is not the kind of credentials we’re looking for. Regardless of your circular reasoning, there’s no way to prove the bible was written by God. Just saying it was means nothing to me. Therefore, it holds no more or less merit than any other work of fiction. Stem cells have the potential to save lives, and we can’t dismiss that just because it also has the potential to harm. If we lived by that mentality, we would still be living in caves.

Microstory 925: Nanotechnology

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Let me start this off by explaining that nanotechnology does not exclusively deal with teeny tiny robots. Those are a big [sic] part of it, but they don’t tell the whole story, and are only being studied in some of the fields that can benefit from the subject as a whole. Nanotech refers to the manipulation of technology at nanometer scales, which can still always be incorporated into larger devices, like your phone. There’s this concept known as Moore’s Law, and in order to stop this from getting too technical, it basically means that computer processors are getting smaller and smaller all the time. Nanotechnology allows us to get so incredibly small that, not only can your phone itself be smaller, but it can be more powerful, allowing you to perform more complex tasks, faster. But again, that’s not all there is. Nanomedicine will do wonders for the development of cures for an array of diseases. You see, when it comes to your body, it’s all about the processes happening at miniscule scales, in the background, that you aren’t even conscious of. Little cells are floating around you, interacting with each other, and foreign objects, and performing the duties they’ve been programmed to carry out. This is what allows us to fight off diseases, while at the same time, it is the exploits in these microscopic systems that allow pathogens to take advantage of us in the first place. Our microbiome is under constant external threat, and certain cells are consistently required to learn to deal with dangers they’ve never seen before. But what if we could subvert all that? What if, when a new disease comes along, artificial cells could be the ones to attack the invaders, and heal the patient, just by more efficiently mimicking cells that evolved to do that for you. Highly specialized superserums can be injected in the early days, but as technology marches on, we will one day just have an army of these nanoregulators inside of us that can be updated over the air at the click of a button. You can request new resistance using an app on whatever device people are using in those days, or maybe there will be some central server that blasts a security patch to everyone all at once. Of course this all comes with risks.  What if someone figures out how to hack this? What can they program your system to do against your will? How far can they go? Can they order your body to literally start attacking itself? Can patches be reversed, or otherwise corrupted? What long-term effects would this regimen have on your system? Could it have a negative impact on your body’s natural functions, or those of your descendants? I don’t claim to have all the answers, which is why I love that thousands—maybe millions; what do I know?—of people are all working together to figure this all out before anything bad happens.

Microstory 924: Medical Science Breakthroughs

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Settle in. This one is short, because I can offer little insight into this matter, and the only people who disagree with medical advancements are religious zealots whose opinions don’t matter. I’ve already talked a lot about transhumanism, and I appreciate that people may not be quite on board with such a thing, even if they understand it, because it’s a pretty high jump to that from cures and treatments. Cyborgs are ever-present in science fiction narratives, and they don’t paint a very pretty picture of the concept. People are strapped with machine guns for arms, and they’ve usually had one eye replaced with something artificial. The truth is that upgrades will be far more seamless and elegant, but I’m already digressing. In the meantime, before those wild alterations to human physiology take place, we have good old fashioned medical science to keep us alive and healthy. You might be surprised to learn that only a couple infectious diseases have been eradicated worldwide. I don’t mean that as an underexaggeration. There are literally only two of them: smallpox, and rinderpest. A few more can be eliminated if problems with funding and distribution can be solved first, but not many. The rest of the diseases have treatments, often very promising ones, but they don’t have cures. While the diseases themselves cannot be eliminated, the symptoms they cause can be handled with the right cocktail. While not ideal, pain and symptom management is an important component of wellbeing. This is set to change, which I mentioned the my entry about the spread of truth. Institutions, like the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, and the World Health Organization, are learning more every day. It can only get better from here, as long as we increase public access to treatment centers. I, for one, am hopeful about it, especially if we work towards the development of nanotechnology. Oh, look at that, up ahead; a post about nanotechnology.

Microstory 922: The Spread of Truth

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A part of me was surprised by King Dumpster’s upset victory in the presidential race, while the cynical part of me was not surprised at all. I had lived 29 years of my life by then, and had already met a lot of assholes. Sure, the election was a wakeup call for how bad it really is, but I could always see it. Here’s the deal, though. We’re on the cusp of great change; not just a blue wave, or even a simple revolution, but of a sudden jump in progress, and an actual dawn of justice. While politicians cater to lobbyists, and hicks who don’t even vote for their own self-interests count the broken down cars on their lawns, bunches of smart people are solving all our problems. They’re developing artificial intelligence, coming up with responses to climate change, formulating life-saving medicines, and much more. Soon, everyone will have enough food to eat, and a sturdy shelter in which to eat it. We won’t have to work as much anymore, and the topic of war will be limited to history discussions. But none of this can happen without the support of the rest of us. You see, at the same time that Ferguson, Charlottesville, Brexit, and Donald Trump illuminated what we’re fighting against, it equally showed us who we can trust. These shockingly divisive issues created a naughty and nice list for most of us. I know who of my social media friends voted for the wrong candidate, but I also know who made the right choice. These debacles forced everyone to take a stand, on whichever side that may be. It’s easier to fight an enemy when you know who they are. So we’re going to take up our Captain America shields, and defend the truth, without sacrificing our integrity. And we’re going to win. They may think they have God on their side, but their God is also an asshole, and his power relies on our belief in, and submission to, his wrath. I’ve looked into the future, and I don’t see any red hats. I just see love and truth.

Microstory 743: Credos, Convention Thirteen: Compromise, Chapter Two

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Now that the kingdoms have converged into one nation, they were powerful and significant enough to enter the global market. Their technologies advanced enough for them to reach other lands, and people were taking notice. Time continued, and they began to solidify themselves as a major player in the grander economy. They had become incredibly self-sufficient, but the time for that was nearing its end. There were things that they needed from others, and as luck would have it, there were things others needed that only they could supply. One of their more popular exports was a special type of hybrid crop that provided consumers with nutritional value surpassed by no other. So many people wanted this crop that they didn’t have enough to go around. This was causing some problems with their allied nations, for everyone felt they had some entitlement to exclusive, or near-exclusive, pick of the crop. To the leaders of the kingdom nation, they had three choices. They could trade the crops with their most powerful allies; ones that could benefit their own need of certain imports the most, but this threatened war with those who lost out on the opportunities. They could try and spread the wealth across all trading partners, but that would leave everyone in wanting, and no one would be truly content. Their last, and most terrible option, was to simply keep the crops for themselves, and try to deal in only other exports. But a descendant of the queen who first brought all five kingdoms together had another idea. She decided that, instead of simply exporting the crops to the consumers, they should provide the seeds, and teach them the best way to plant them. This came out a far lower price, and they lost their indispensability amongst the other nations, but it had far-reaching implications for the future. They became the most powerful nation in the world, not because they had something others needed, but because they were seen to be trusted. Their willingness to compromise their control over the market actually acted to sustain that control through policy and mediation of global negotiations.

Microstory 703: Force of Hope

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The entire galaxy listened intently as a young woman named Ladriane Nuvin read aloud from the Book of Anseluka. She was in contention to be the first to touch the Scales of Tamsin the Judge, losing to Isaura Peak by a small margin. After hearing what the book had to say, Fostea fell into a deep depression. We hastily signed a temporary ceasefire with our Thuriamen enemies. They gladly accepted our terms, leading us to believe that they were experiencing their own internal issues. For weeks, people went about their days without much interest. Everyone seemed to be feeling numb, living in a dreary haze world. We experienced no defectors from Lightseed, but little enthusiasm for the Light of Happiness either. It would appear that, though people continued to believe in the Light, they were disappointed by it, and no longer excited for the taikon to be fulfilled. Something had to change, and fortunately, the new taikon outlined in the Book of Anseluka predicted this would happen. Like the Force of Faith, a new quantum field began to distribute itself across the galaxy. Called the Force of Hope, it acted to reignite people’s optimism and fervor. Slowly, but still miraculously, Fosteans began to wake up, and start seeing this for what it is. We don’t need to treat this bitterly, or with such frustration. Here we have this new divine book, with a new set of instructions. And we haven’t been reading it over and over again for the last several hundred years. This can get us out of our funk, and remove the burden of predictability. We’ve spent so much time coming up with all the ways the taikon might manifest, now we have the chance to experience them with no preconceived notions. It was hard to see the Light of Truth when you thought you already knew everything about it. Now that we see there are still things to be learned and discovered, the Light of Life can be seen in its true glory. Be hopeful, my friends. It is a new day, and the end of the ceasefire is rapidly approaching. It is time we start thinking about how we want the galaxy to be run once the taikon are achieved—and they will be achieved. We must have hope.