Opportunity Rewritten

When James completed the project, a door to opportunity was opened. It just wasn’t the one he expected.

James had been working on his device for over five years. It was painstaking work, since nothing like it had ever been tried before, and since it would need to be one of a kind technology, he had to constantly be ahead of any new developments. This added significant complexity to the whole thing.

It was entirely his, from conception to completion, his baby so to speak. But although James knew he was capable of doing it all himself, he felt that it would be best to have a partner who was also talented and who had skills that James didn’t. He thought of someone he had known in college.

The two men couldn’t have been more different. James was 5’6” tall with a pale complexion, mousy brown hair, and ordinary brown eyes covered by coke bottle glasses. He was introverted, quiet, had acquaintances but no friends and was too anxious around people to have a sense of humor. When forced to speak publicly, he stuttered.

The other man was 6’2” tall, muscular and fit, with a bronze glow maintained in tanning salons. He had blond hair, sparkling blue eyes which needed no correction, and a perfect, blindingly white smile. On top of that, he was charismatic, a good speaker, handsome and funny, with a great personality. Even his name, Chad Montgomery Earlbatten, III, screamed, Look at me, I’m a golden boy!

Even given all of their differences, Chad had seemed to genuinely like James, though for the life of him James never knew why. He contented himself with the belief that Chad respected his exceptional programming talent.

After they graduated, they went their separate ways, James to a startup where he worked 90 hour weeks, and Chad to his father’s corporation where he served as the head of IT, a job he had joked, left him all the time in the world to enjoy the better things in life. When James asked him to become his partner, Chad signed on readily.

“Anything to get away from that ridiculous job my father put me in,” he said when he met James for drinks, “I can’t tell you how tired I am of fixing computer glitches caused by people who are too stupid to know they are downloading malware and viruses and teaching kindergarten computer skills. I actually spent 15 minutes today teaching someone how to take a screenshot!”

Despite their differences, they worked well together, and soon each fell into their natural niche. James developing the code, and Chad securing funding and signing up potential customers to buy it.

Finally it was done, the Cybernetic Neural Processing Mastery Program, simply called The Program by James and Chad. The Program could only be used on specially developed devices that looked like a fancy cell phone, but was actually intelligent mobile technology.

It would automatically link to any device it was near and incorporate whatever information it downloaded into its neural network. The Program learned based on the queries that its owner asked of it, until it was able to provide the exact information needed without even being questioned.

The primary use of the device was for business men who wanted to know what competitors were up to, and to understand exactly how to manipulate the situation into the best one possible for themselves and their company. It also warned them about potential corporate espionage or employees who might be doing something illegal.

James and Chad had decided it would be best to only sell The Program to ten CEO’s in ten different industries and countries, based on the understanding that if everyone had access to one, there would be no benefit since equal advantage for all is no advantage for anyone. James decided they should sell them for $2 million each. Chad wasn’t happy about this.

“Are you kidding me? Given the potential profit and control that could result for these guys, we should be charging ten times that amount! Or heck, even 100 times it. And they’d pay it too, once they realized what they could do with it!. How about a compromise of $5 million each. That’ll give us an even twenty-five million a piece.”

But for James, while the money would be nice, his interest had been in creating the device and The Program and now that it was done, he needed to move on. In exchange for a binding non-disclosure agreement with crippling repercussions if broken, James had agreed to not sell any more devices or licenses to The Program; another thing that upset Chad.

Chad had confirmed that all of the buyers had the hardware and the actual transfer of the program would occur the next morning. This was Chad’s end of things, and James didn’t even want to know who the buyers were. He’d transfer the program as designated and would be available for training purposes.

“Don’t look so glum, buddy,” Chad slapped James on the back, “We did it. It’s time to celebrate! And I’ve come prepared with the bubbly. Let’s get out of here.”

“I think I’m going to stick around. Run a few last minute checks, make sure it’s all working as it should be.”

“There’s nothing left to do, James. You have barely left this lab for the past five years. You haven’t gone out on a single date or to any event. Hell, the only type of exercise you do is walking around while you train that thing like it’s a child.”

“You don’t know what I do when you aren’t around.” But Chad was right about all of it. Not that it was such a big change from before he’d started working on The Program. Which was why he was feeling so sad. The Program had become a friend, other than Chad, his only one.

Each buyer would receive his basic version of the program with the initial learning it had done but each version would be independent of the other. Each version would then develop and learn from their specific owner. That was part of what made James sad. His friend would now become best friends with ten other people, coming to put them first.

“Come on,” Chad said, “You can come back afterwards.”

“One glass of champagne here, and then you go onto whatever party you have lined up.” Chad grinned, “And I’ll finish up here then get some sleep before the big transfer tomorrow.”

“Fine, you old stick in the mud.” Chad popped the cork, poured and handed a glass to James. They toasted and drank.

James awoke the next morning in his bed, his head heavy, his eyelids glued shut with sleep. He stumbled to the bathroom, washed his face and took a couple of Advil. In the mirror, a sick looking corpse-green being looked back at him.

“That’s what you get for drinking all that champagne,” he chided the reflection.

Wait, he had only had one glass, hadn’t he? He couldn’t remember. He wouldn’t have had any more than that, wanting to spend his last night with the device, saying a goodbye of sorts, staying until . . .

Why was he home? He looked around his bedroom as if there might be clues. Immediately he noticed things that suggested something unusual had occurred. His clothes were thrown onto the chair instead of hung neatly in the closet and the dirty pieces in the bathroom hamper. Looking down he saw he was in pajama top and bottoms that didn’t match.

What the heck had gone on last night?

His mouth tasted like something he preferred not to identify and he went back to gargle with mouthwash.

Thinking a little clearer, he picked up his phone to call Chad and ask him what had happened the previous night, but when he did, the time suddenly flashed large and bright showing him it was hours after he should have transferred The Program. This was followed by a large picture of Chad with a flashing red exclamation point. The Device was warning him about Chad. What had he done?

James raced for the car and sped to the lab. He stopped. The entrance door was ajar. His phone buzzed and he looked at it as it played footage from the previous night showing black trucks pulling up to the loading dock. At least 20 men were moving in and out of the building clearly taking everything from the lab.

Slowly walking into the empty lab, he stopped then turned slowly in a circle. There wasn’t a single thing left. Nothing. The place looked like it had been scrubbed clean as well. As if no one had ever used it.

Hearing a voice, he turned around. A teenager had come in.

“You James?”

“Who’s asking?”

The teen handed James a large yellow envelope. Inside was a cell phone with a number taped to it. He recognized Chad’s handwriting.

Chad picked up before the second ring.

“Who’d you sell it to Chad?”

There was only a brief pause before Chad said, “The Government. They were going to take it anyway. This way we ended up with 25 million a piece. I’ve already deposited your half in an offshore bank account. The number is in the packet along with your new identity, passport, and ID.

There’s also a ticket to Stockholm. You always said you loved Sweden, and it’s a convenient country to avoid the U.S. Government. I took the liberty of buying you a house in Skänor med Falsterbo, a wonderful little beach town, Vikings still roam around there.”

James was too furious to say anything. After several seconds of silence, Chad went on.

“Anyway, nice house. Sorry you didn’t get to choose it but I knew you would need to get re-established quickly. Talked them down from a million six to a million. Paid for it out of my own money. . .”

“Am I supposed to say thank you? I never wanted all that money, you know that.”

“Well, you have it. You need to get to the airport now. I expected your call much earlier.”

“Funny how late you sleep when you’ve been drugged.” James was still feeling too queasy to really give Chad much of a hard time. But if he said James needed to leave the country, then he definitely did. Shit.

“So my product is stolen, sold to the Government, something you know I’d never have allowed, and I now lose my identity, get to move to a foreign country, never to return to my home or all that I’m familiar with, to live in a house I didn’t pick out, in a town I didn’t choose. Oh and my partner and until this morning the person I thought was my best friend, is the one who betrayed me. Am I missing anything important?”

“Come on, James. They would have taken it and left us with nothing. What was I supposed to do?”

“You were supposed to talk to me about it, damn it! You had no right to do all this behind my back and lie to me the whole time!” The shouting was making James head hurt.

“I don’t ever want to hear from you again,” James told Chad.

“James, don’t be like that. It may take a while, but you’ll get over it. We’ve been through too much . . .”

“No, I will not get over it. Stay away from me Chad. I mean it.” He took out the Sim card and snapped it in half, then and threw it on the ground, crushed the phone under his heel, and made for the airport. He’d get another phone when he got to Sweden.

A year later, James sat contentedly on the bench watching Emmaline sketch. He was thankful for the backdoor he’d left in his code which allowed him to use the program despite it now belonging to the U.S. government. He’d learned that they’d wanted the program because it could be used for surveillance purposes to prevent illegal activity and identify criminals.

James had quickly learned how to use his program for the same purposes. Over the past 12 months the local news often spoke of an anonymous informant who turned in tips to the police, leading to a 65% decrease in crime.

Yet, he’d learned another function of the program, which he had never anticipated. As he was developing it and teaching it new things, it had imprinted on him. He had impressed upon it a certain moral code and value system, including things that it wouldn’t otherwise understand as a computer program. One of those things was the pull humans had on each other and the desire to relate.

James hadn’t known what his program was up to when it had remarked on his being alone all the time. He’d believed then, that it was trying to remind him not to let his guard down lest he give himself away and the U.S. Government learn where he was. James didn’t know for a fact they cared, since they believed they had sole access to his program, but it was best not to take chances.

But when his phone started buzzing notifications at him with Emmaline’s picture, it didn’t take him long to realize she wasn’t a criminal or involved in anything shady. At first he thought maybe it was a bug but found the program to be working perfectly. When he typed the question, “Why do you keep showing me this person?” he was shocked at the reply.

Because you are lonely.

After a moment, he typed in, “It’s not the case that any human will go with any other. There are countless factors that contribute to humans being attracted to each other.” The response came back.

Yes, I am aware of this. But she goes with you and you with her.

The program showed him some basic facts about the woman, and he’d give it credit. What he saw was appealing. When he asked for more information however, the response once more, took him aback.

I have hidden further information about her. Humans like mystery in their mates and the process of getting to know each other appears to cement the relationship.

“Cheeky bastard,” James muttered under his breath.

He sat undecided for several more minutes, until another buzz interrupted his thoughts.

Go say hello.

He could only laugh.

“Okay, okay.” He laughed once more, shook his head and put the phone in his pocket. He took a few deep breaths for courage, then he got up and walked towards the woman still sketching in her notebook, and into his future.

Natalie Frank (Taye Carrol) has had work featured in Haunted Waters Press, Weirdbook Magazine, Siren’s Call Publications, Lycan Valley Press and Zero Fiction among others. Her poetry has been featured in several anthologies. She is Editor for 1-One-Infinity and One Table, One World and Editor in Chief for Promposity and Mental Gecko. She is also the Managing Editor for Novellas and Serials at LVP Publications.

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