CHAPTER 14 - FINAL CHAPTER - Crises of faith are far less dramatic when you are an atheist

in Freewriters5 years ago

Previous Chapters: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

Pizza bag

"Crises of faith are far less dramatic when you are an atheist," says Tullus. "Yet, nonetheless, last night I had one."

All three are in the lobby of the conference hotel, sitting in the same chairs as before. During the night, Tullus was to make the preparations.

"What do you mean?" asks Jim.

"What we're planning... It's different than with FutureCoin. There was a serious security flaw, honest people could lose money, we had to work fast. This, this feels more like plotting a regime change. How are we better than the CIA assassins who in the 50s and 60s would infiltrate countries and topple governments to prop up US-friendly dictators? I mean, besides the obvious fact that we're not assassinating anyone? We think what Jerald Vilt did is wrong, but is that enough to justify this coup?" Tullus looks concerned.

"Are we going through with it?" says Stacey. "I got a lot of mo... Uh, I got a lot of reason... We got a lot of reasons for doing what we're doing. Good ones. Absolutely having nothing to do with money!" She nervously laughs.

Tullus is quiet for a moment. "I sent the email last night. It says a lot of whales are going to manipulate the market as we talked about, and the only way to participate is with this one exchange. I received a response an hour ago. It had a link to a crypto courier site."

"I've heard of those," says Jim. "They're decentralized and neither side knows the other's shipping or receiving location. But pricey."

"The site only asked for one piece of information, besides the shipping location which of course is hidden. 'How many?' I put in three and this lobby."

"Is that wise?" asked Stacey.

"I already know what's in the package," says Tullus. "The courier site doesn't, which of course raised the risk calculation that determined the fee on his end. But when they received it, they did the necessary scans and sent the encrypted information to me, and thus I agreed. I am actually not surprised by what it is."

A regular looking guy in a t-shirt and jeans walks in holding an insulated pizza bag, used for keeping food cold or warm. Tullus's phone vibrates. He waves over to the guy, who comes over. The three of them get up to meet him.

"Uh, says the guy, "I don't know if this is food, or what... So, I thought I'd be safe." He gets out his phone. "Hell, I don't even know what this app is on my phone, but it says to scan a code?" Tullus shows his phone and the QR code on the screen. The guy scans the code. He looks at the screen and hands the pizza bag. "I'm gonna need the pizza bag, I got a few food deliveries later." Tullus takes out the unassuming-looking cardboard box within. "I'm hella curious, but I gotta go. I got a ride I need to pick up, and can't lose that five-star rating, you know?"

"Thank you," says Tullus.

"Don't thank me," says the guy, "thank the gig economy." He smiles, turns around to leave, and hurries to the door, his smile leaving much slower than he. But soon they are both gone.

Tullus opens the box. Inside are three Extractors.

"Hold on," says Stacey, "could those be used to determine our whereabouts?"

Tullus connects them to one of his own Extractors via cables that are male-to-male with a female port on the side of one end, allowing him to daisy-chain the devices. "Don't worry," he says, "I'm doing the diagnostic while they are still off." He looks at some results. "Yep, as I suspected, they are one-hundred-percent duplicates of the one I sent him last year. They are 'one-off' models. They'd be extremely expensive to reproduce, and they kind of explode when you try to take them apart to reverse engineer them."

"Kind of?" says Stacey.

"Yeah, not like in a 'kaboom' way. Let's just say they are reproducible, but each reproduction--since they are one-off--is prohibitively expensive. And I made learning how they work pretty much impossible. Extractors like we used are not one-offs. He must, at least, think we are serious if he sent us these." He pulls out a card also in the box. "Exact same instructions I wrote. The man really does take imitation to the extreme." He unplugs the devices. "Before I give you these, you need to be aware of something. He's calling this meeting, not I, which means he's controlling the settings."

"Does this mean I could theoretically get stuck in the matrix?" says Jim. "Forever on some not-yacht?"

Tullus chuckles. "No, basically you can still 'quit' whenever you want to. I'm fairly confident they can't be used as torture devices or anything like that."

"Fairly?" asks Stacey.

"Before you enter, you are allowed to pick an avatar, as an invitee. Jerald Vilt was offered when I set up the meeting, but I think it's pretty clear he likes what he looks like, so he declined. The host will also offer possible avatars, unless he offers himself, don't pick it because we don't want him to suspect the same people from last year are involved. But knowing him, he likely will, so feel free in that case. Obviously pick some kind of avatar, it will shield your identity.

"Also, he'll pick the meeting location. Could be the not-yacht, could be somewhere else, but there are controls to make sure it isn't noxious in some way. Again, I didn't want to inadvertently invent a torture device.

"But here's the most important thing. He can turn on the setting for possible thought-audibility. You will have the option to accept or decline it for yourself."

"Well," says Stacey, "we'll obviously decline."

Tullus shows the card to Stacey and Jim, on the bottom written in bold Sharpie letters: "Accept thought-audibility or the deals OFF!"

"Well," says Stacey, "we're forked." Tullus is confused. "Fucked! Fucked, okay! Jesus, I got two trademarks. One:" She uses air quotes. "Two: I use cutesy crypto puns. I don't know why. But I'm committed to the scheme, so shut the fuck up." She puts her head in hands. She looks up. "Why did you tell him there were three of us if you knew this was a possibility?"

"Well," says Tullus, "for one thing, I'm already a pretty terrible liar. It's not completely impossible for me to lie, but I almost never do. I have a few exceptions, like clicking yes to reading the EULA, but otherwise I'm almost always honest. I'm kind of spectrumy like that. Further, regardless of that, I realized I might as well say 'three.' Let's say I said 'one' to the courier service question, I go in, he asks me if I'm working with anyone else."

"Of course you are, you're working with the whales!" says Stacey.

"Yeah, and such technical truths get me through many situations. For example, for the courier service, he only asked 'how many?' I could interpret that as how many protons in a Helium atom. But let's say he's got thought-audibility turned on, I go in, and he asks me if I was honest when I said 'one' to the courier-service question. My thoughts will betray that I only meant 'one' by a strict definition that was meant to mislead. With thought-audibilty on, it's unlikely any of us would be able to pull off deception."

"Well, then we're screwed," says Stacey, "the first question he can ask is who we are."

"Actually," says Tullus, "that's another setting. Remember how in Mark's Logg his thought-audibility was turned off entirely? That's because there are special ways to handle thought-audibility regarding Personal Identifying Information. Besides removing all thought-audibility in a Logg recording with any PII, it can also be used in Logg meetings to remove it on the fly. Jerald Vilt didn't mention that setting, so just keep the on-the-fly setting on."

"How many settings are there?!" Stacey huffs. "Let's just get this over with." She grabs it out of Tullus' hands. Jim takes another. The three of them sit down and press the play icon.

Suddenly, they are on the stage of the conference from last year. All four of them are wearing leather jackets. The music plays: "The future is now! Vilt to the hilt!"

"Hello, I--" starts the real Jerald Hilt.

Oh my god, thinks Jim. Is thought audibility on? Oh my god. It is. Oh my god. Don't think about a muffled sound 's tits. He looks panicked. Oh god, I said muffled 's tits. I shouldn't say that about muffled . I gotta shut up my thoughts. Muffled can't know that I think about muffled 's breasts. I don't try to! Really! I'm thinking about them now. Oh god! I didn't mean to say, uh, think that. Think that out loud.

All three of them look at Jim, Jim is noticeably panicked.

Oh no. Oh god. I do think about muffled in other ways. Not just sexual. I mean! That doesn't mean those thoughts are sexual. Always. I mean! I just notice them. How can you not? Right? That doesn't mean anything. Though of course I would like to... He looks even more panicked Oh my god, I didn't mean to, oh no!

"SHUT UP!" yells Jerald. "Do you have any idea how disturbing that is considering that it seems you are talking about my tits?" He looks towards Tullus and Stacey. "I don't have man-tits do I? I pay very good money so that I look as buff as the other absurdly-rich tech guys. I gotta fit in, after all."

Man tits, thinks Jim. I wonder what it would be like to have muffled 's breasts on my chest. Would I play with them? Oh no! They can hear this! I can't stop! I really don't want to play with them on my chest, I'd much rather play with them on muffled 's chest... Oh no! I mean, if muffled let me. Not that muffled has to. Seriously it doesn't even cross my mind... Well, all the time. Okay, a lot of the time... But...

"Again! Shut up!" yells Jerald. "Okay, one quick question. Are you needed in anyway for this?"

"Uh," says Jim. Probably not, he thinks, I'm pretty sure we're just side-kicks here. "Wait, I didn't mean that." I didn't mean for you to hear that. "Dang it!"

"Of course you need me," says Stacey. No you don't. She looks alarmed. Fork! I want to take his money! She looks surprised and covers her mouth. This doesn't actually do anything, does it? She removes her hands from her mouth.

Justin laughs. "Fork? Anyway, at least wanting to take someone's money is an honesty I can understand."

"Look," says Tullus, "I can tell you everything you want to know. You're more likely to get only the truth if I only have my thought-audibility on." Tullus's words are then repeated.

"Hmm," thinks Jerald. "Fine."

Thank god, thinks Jim. "Tullus come." Tullus avatar appears. One more moment and muffled 'd know about my secret love for muffled. His eyes widen, he stammers, "Thought audibility off!" Tullus avatar disappears.

You stupid fool, thinks Stacey. "Tullus come." Tullus avatar appears again, this time in front of her. Of course I know, you idiot, and if you ask... She looks sternly. Ahead of time! She relaxes her face. You might actually get to touch something better than my arm. She looks at Jim and smiles. "Thought audibility off!" Tullus avatar disappears.

"I will make this quick," says Jerald. "First question. Will I lose any of my Logg by the end of this?"

"No," says Tullus. No.

"Is this exchange a legitimate one, will my trades go through as planned?"

"Yes," says Tullus. Yes.

"Finally, and most important. Is what you said in the email true? That there are a number of whales who are going to make this market manipulation happen?"

Stacey and Jim look at each other.

"Yes," says Tullus. Yes.

"Very well." Jerald Vilt breaks into a large smile. "Let's make some money!" Stacey and Jim are still looking at each other. "Tullus come!" Tullus avatar appears. "Quit."

The three of them are back in the hotel lobby. Stacey and Jim are stunned. Tullus pulls out his cell phone.

"He's doing the trade now," says Tullus.

"What do we have to do?" asks Jim.

"Nothing," says Tullus. He smiles to them. "Automation." He looks back down. "And now the reverse trade. But..." He taps his phone. "Yep, it's too late, all the rules of governance are changed. He may have the most Logg still, but he's now paying the most taxes, and he's got no more power than your average Logg holder."

Tullus gets up. Jim and Stacey get up as well, offering Tullus their one-off Extractors. "Keep them, consider them souvenirs." They shrug and hold onto them.

"But, but," says Stacey, "you said it was true about the whales, how?"

"Like I said," says Tullus. "I had a crisis of faith. I thought about all those times the US invaded other countries and unilaterally caused regime changes. But sometimes, regime changes do need to happen. The problem with those times were they were unilateral. Had the international community supported the actions, it would be different. So, I did the crypto equivalent of petitioning the UN. I asked some old friends in the scene, some behind even bigger coins than Logg, if they would help. And some of them are whales, or if they wanted to, they could make real whales look like guppies. In the end, I was able to get their support, and I didn't have to fake anything. The email was true, the market manipulation happened, and Vilt did make quite a bit of money in the process. Temporarily. Because, again, now he's getting taxed more than ever.

"I guess my name still means somethig in this field. Further, it turned out Jerald Vilt has made a lot of enemies in crypto. They were happy to help.

"Besides," he says as he leaves the lobby, "Santoshi owed me a favor."

--END--