Oxygen Junkies

    Some say that dreams can foretell the future.  Most people don’t believe this but whether it is true or not, everyone can agree that some dreams are just plain weird.  A man called Samuel Morgan knew this to be true more than most, he had quite an extensive collection of bizarre dreams; he just couldn’t remember most of them.  Right now, he was having a very strange dream, as he did most nights except this time something was different, this time he remembered it.
    Sam’s eyes shot open, he looked to his left where he could see his large window with the shade function on.  He picked up the remote control from his bedside table and turned it off, causing him to recall why he put it on in the first place.  Fiercely bright sunlight flooded into the room making his eyes snap shut again, he frantically pressed buttons on the remote to kill the light.
    When Sam regained his sight he got out of bed and stood up, he used the remote to turn on the TV without looking in it’s direction and went into the bathroom to prepare for the upcoming day.  He left the door open so that he could hear what was being said on the BBC 24hr news channel.
    “The North-American based Biotech Company, ‘Cellstrom’, has been officially liquidated today.  Hundreds of employees, including the company president, Ryan Tarbuck, have been formally charged for their implication in the recent human-cloning scandal.  Former president Tarbuck still claims his innocence, in a North American court earlier today he said on the record, “My actions nor the actions of any of my staff have ever intended any harm towards any member of the human race.  We have tried to help people and bring about a new age of prosperity for mankind, I recognise the laws that I am about to be tried of breaking as archaic and backwards.  They are remnants of a time when we feared progress and I urge everyone listening to embrace my brand of genetic research as the future.”  He also claimed that scientists in his employ had already successfully cloned a human, but police raids on Cellstrom labs have currently only obtained failed experiments that we are not permitted to show at this time of day.  He was found guilty and sentenced to fifteen years, with all his property and assets being seized.  The judge who decided this, Stephanie Reed, said that the sentence was so harsh as to dissuade other biotech companies from performing experiments in the attempt at creating human clones.”
    Sam came out of the bathroom, moved over to the wardrobe and began to dress.  He looked over at his chair where a small tabby cat was currently sitting, watching the television without moving.  Sam finished dressing himself, walked over to the kitchen and removed a packet of Harpet’s cat food from a cabinet.  He looked it over and thought that it was nice that they stocked this place with all the products he requested.  
Sam opened the packet, put it in Philip’s bowl and took it over to him.  He placed it down in front of the chair so Philip would have to get off it to eat his breakfast.  The cat did so and Sam sat down to watch some morning television, or whatever time it was.
    “The hunt for missing girl, Isabelle Martinez, is now in its fourth day.  The seven year old was taken off a playground near her home in Barcelona, a description of a ‘suspicious looking-man’ seen hanging around the playground minutes prior to the abduction was told to police by witnesses.  A digital composite has been generated and is currently being circulated across the city with little success.  Earlier today, Isabelle’s parents pleaded in a press conference for the release and safe return of their daughter.”
    Sam changed the channel at this point, there was only so much news he could watch before becoming depressed, they only ever reported on the negative events, it would make a viewer believe that there was only evil in the world.  The true heroes of this planet, men and women who truly deserve admiration, these are the ones never known by history.  In Sam’s opinion, his fellow humans are too obsessed with the villains of their species.
He wasn’t completely sure what he had switched onto because it was currently in the middle of an advert break.  Sam hated adverts, they tended to have a nature of begging about them, pleading you to buy their products everyday.  Every second spent watching the same old adverts day after day, Sam always felt like wasted time, deep down he knew he really considered time spent watching any form of advert, old or new, as wasted time.
    Often, Sam wondered exactly how much of his life had been wasted watching adverts.  If it was all added up and laid down in front of him, he knew that would probably cause him to never watch any more television again in his life because the figure would be so great.  
The adverts continued to roll on, the quantity seemed to increase with each passing year, before the adverts finished Sam was interrupted.  The 30-second solicitations were replaced by the pale blue emotionless face of Hypnos.  Sam looked into those empty eye sockets as the mouth below them said, “Good morning, Sam.”  Apparently, Sam’s assumption of the time of day was correct.
    “Hello Hypnos,” Sam said.  “Can you tell me what the time is?”
    “Certainly,” Hypnos said.  “It is 10:10 GMT, 31st January 2115.”
    “Thanks,” Sam said.  “Did you get a chance to read my new short story yet?”
    “Yes,” Hypnos said.  “I read it while you were sleeping, I like living with a writer, it gives me something to do when you’re recharging.”
    “What did you think of it?” Sam asked.
    “Honestly, I think it’s your best work yet but it’s not a novel,” Hypnos said.  “You told me you wanted to write a book during your stay here and all you’ve written is more short stories.”
    “I know,” Sam said.  “I’ve tried, it’s just, my stories never really take that long to come to an end so they can’t be classed as novels.  I blame TV for a lot of it, every time I sit down and say that this time I’m really going to write a novel I always get preoccupied by whatever’s on the telly.  In some ways I really envy the writers who lived before the television was invented, they never had to overcome this distraction.”
    “Maybe you’re just not disciplined enough,” Hypnos said.  “Another possibility is that you’re suffering from writers block.”
    “I don’t believe in writers block,” Sam said.  “Anyway, that’s supposed to be when you can’t think of anything, I know what I want to say, I just can’t get the words to fit together properly.”
    “How are you feeling today?” Hypnos asked.
    “I thought it was my job to ask you that,” Sam said.  “Make sure your operating within normal limits.”
    “Sometimes humans need to make sure that they’re functioning normally too,” Hypnos said.
    “Actually I did have a really weird dream last night,” Sam said.
    “What happened in it?” Hypnos asked.
    “It was so strange,” Sam said.  “It was the only dream I’ve ever had where I wasn’t present, I was just disembodied and observing what was occurring.  It was like I was just watching a film.  I was on board an alien space ship orbiting Earth.  I couldn’t see them very well because things are often quite blurry in my dreams, but they seemed to be greys.  They were speaking a strange language, yet I could still understand what they were saying very clearly.  They were discussing how they were going to go about landing on Earth and begin making friends with the sentient species that they had already detected were there by using their instruments.  The two who seemed to be in charge were in the middle of talking this over when someone else came over and announced that they have just made a startling discovery.  They found out that the atmosphere was full of oxygen, except on their planet oxygen is a drug, so they thought that it was a planet full of addicts.”
    “Go on,” Hypnos said.
    “In my dream the aliens believed that we had purposely filled our own atmosphere with oxygen because we were so hooked on it,” Sam continued.  “This filled them with a mixture of fear and disgust, as junkies are notoriously unpredictable and prone to spontaneous bouts of violence.  I got the impression that these aliens were somewhat snooty and didn’t want to visit a planet filled with drug addicts who were probably all criminals as well.  The aliens then decided that they didn’t want to contact the life forms down there on the surface and the space ship went back to their home planet, taking all the aliens away with it, leaving me and all my fellow humans by ourselves, alone in space.”
    “That was a very interesting dream,” Hypnos said.  “I love listening to people’s dreams, they’re just so random and devoid of logic and reason.  It’s so strange the things that people remember about there dreams, the details that always seem so insignificant and pointless.  I never go to sleep so I have never experienced one, but how I wish I could, they sound like one of the best parts of being alive.”
    “They’re not so great,” Sam said.  “Dreams can often be very frustrating when you can’t remember them, especially just after you’ve woken up.  I’ve also wasted a lot of time thinking about what they may mean, only to finally realise that they have no meaning at all, no one even knows why we have them.”
    “Does it really matter why you dream,” Hypnos said.  “Just enjoy them when you do remember them.”
    Sam nodded and made a general noise of agreement.  Even though Hypnos, strictly speaking, had no eyes Sam could tell somehow that he was looking down at Philip having his breakfast.
    “Aren’t you going to have anything?” Hypnos asked.
    “Yeah, I’ll have something later,” Sam said, sinking further into his chair.  “Isn’t there a delivery today?”
    “Yes,” Hypnos said.  “They are due to arrive at 10:30 with a full cargo of inmates and some supplies for you.”
    “Will it be the same ship as last time?” Sam said.
    “Yes,” Hypnos said.  “The Kronos is the cargo ship that does the majority of deliveries to Celestia, they only don’t come when repairs are necessary or the ship has another duty to perform.”
    “Does it have the same crew each time it comes?” Sam said.
    “The Kronos does have a large regular crew, but only a handful are needed for each trip so substitutions are common if certain people can’t do it a certain time,” Hypnos said.
    “How come I can never meet these people?” Sam said.  “I would of thought Olympus would want to encourage as much human contact for us as possible.”
    “The full details have not been explained to me, but Olympus wants to completely keep the catacombs and all who work there, separate from the rest of Celestia,” Hypnos said.  “The reasoning behind this, I can only estimate, is that they don’t want the crewmen making their deliveries to be distracted.”
    “If they wanted it completely cut off from me, why is there a button in the lift that goes down to the prison?” Sam said.
    “That is not meant for you, that is to be only used in an emergency to access the catacombs,” Hypnos said.  “Only someone in possession of the emergency access codes can use the lift to enter the catacombs, no one ever enters the catacombs, not even the crew of the Kronos.”
    “What do you mean?” Sam said.
    “The cargo ship docking bay is attached directly to the prison complex but there is only a very small area where they can go,” Hypnos said.  “Docking bay beta just leads to a small room where all the convicts are fed into the loading bay, basically a hole in the floor that leads to a pneumatic tube, which brings them down into the catacombs for me to organise.  There is a viewing window in the room that looks out over the body farm of prisoners but I always keep it covered, Dr. Phelps told me that the crewmen would probably find it too distressing.”
    “How many are there down in these catacombs?” Sam asked.
    “More than some,” Hypnos described vaguely.  “I guess a more detailed wording would be for me to say that there are lots.  Every person that is placed within Celestia is catalogued and stored personally by me so I know the exact figure, but what you have to decide is whether you want to know this number.”
    “I suppose not,” Sam said after some deliberation.  “What do you do when their natural life runs out, how do you get rid of them?”
    “They are liquefied and their remains are placed in an air lock called docking bay gamma,” Hypnos said.  “Then they are flushed out into space to make room for fresh inmates.”
    “I don’t see how the actual number of prisoners could be more distressing than the news of what you do to dispose of them,” Sam said.  “I might like to know the size of the prison population one day, but definitely not now.  I can only take in so much at any one time.”  Sam got out of his chair and stretched, he was yawning as he said, “I’m kind of bored, what should we do today?”
    “We could have another game of chess,” Hypnos said.
    “You’ve beaten me enough, I think we need a new game,” Sam said.  “Maybe later in the day after I’ve woken up some more.”
    “Now that we’re facing the Sun, you can get a great view of the lunar surface from the observatory,” Hypnos said.
    “Alright, that might be interesting,” Sam said, moving over to the lift and pressing the button to open it.
    The mostly-cylindrical door revolved open and Sam entered, before it closed around him again he looked back at Philip who had finished eating and was now busy entertaining himself by clawing at the impeccably neat carpet.  Sam thought it best to leave him to it if it made the cat happy and pushed the white observatory button.  
On the way up Sam pondered why animals never seemed to get as bored as humans do.  It was true that a lack of activity did make them behave in erratic ways, but they seem content just to spend their time eating and sleeping, never doing anything more interesting or unique.
    The lift stopped and Sam entered the observation deck of Celestia, at the moment it looked very similar to when he had seen it on his first day here and most other times he had visited it.  Hypnos surrounded him and said, “Just let me rotate the station so we’re facing the Moon.”  Sam took his seat in front of the telescope as Celestia shifted its position, causing the scene that filled the dome above him to change.  
    The Moon, fully illuminated by the sunshine that now pounded down on it, slid into view over the observatory.  “How can you move the entire station like this?” Sam asked.
    “Located on the stabilisation ring that encircles us are many gas thrusters that I can use to manoeuvre Celestia in any way I wish,” Hypnos said.
    The bright Moon now completely filled the observation dome, Sam began to look through the eyepiece and take in the magnificent sight.  He spent some time examining the many seas in much greater detail than he had seen as he passed by it in the Penguin’s Dream the day he first came to Celestia.
     A thought came over Sam, “Why isn’t Celestia on the Moon?” he asked.  
    “What do you mean?” Hypnos said.
    “Why all the effort in making it into a space station when Olympus could have just built it one the Moon?” Sam said.
    “I do not really know, I never asked,” Hypnos admitted.  “Maybe they wanted to make it manoeuvrable so it could be more easily recovered when this station becomes obsolete.”  
    “Why would this station become obsolete?” Sam said.
    “Everything eventually becomes obsolete, it’s inevitable,” Hypnos said.  “Either this project will be a failure, the station will close forever and Europe will revert back to the old prison system, or it will be a success, this prototype facility will close and a new generation of prisons will be created to take over.”
    “What would happen to you if this place does become obsolete?” Sam said.
    “I’m not sure,” Hypnos said.  “No one has ever told me.”
    “They don’t tell you much, do they?” Sam pointed out.
    “I am told what I need to know for the good of the company,” Hypnos said.  “I assume that I will be reassigned to perform a different function in the corporation.”
    “Aren’t you a prototype as well, just like Celestia?” Sam asked.
    “Yes,” Hypnos said.  “I am the first computer with a strong enough AI to have free will.”
    “Then doesn’t that mean that you’ll become obsolete eventually and be replaced with the official model when it has been established that you are a success?” Sam said.
    “Erm…I don’t know,” Hypnos stumbled, it was the first time Sam had seen his artificial companion lost for words.  “I doubt that I’ll go the way of the station, I’m sure that I’m more valuable to the company than a space station.  If I am mistaken I guess it won’t be so bad, at least I’ll get to find out what it’s like to be more human, they don’t live forever and I can’t either.”
    “Aren’t you scared at that notion?” Sam wondered.
    “I have never felt fear,” Hypnos said.  “I have always wanted to sample all the human emotions but, so far, I have never managed to feel that one.  I don’t think I understand it, I just cannot see what there is to be afraid of, ever.  I look forward to my death, it will be something else human that I can experience.  I sometimes wonder if dying is like going to sleep for the rest of eternity.  I have never slept before but I think I’ll like it.  I would have such wonderful dreams.”
    Sam removed his eye from the eyepiece for a few seconds to look at Hypnos’ face on the many screens that encircled him.  He noticed that the direction of the conversation had become decidedly morbid and the way this computer was talking about death began to disturb him, so he tried to do something that he had always had a talent for, changing the subject.  “I still don’t understand why they didn’t build this place on the Moon,” he said.  “That’s what I would’ve done.”
    “It will be harder to bring the raw materials that this facility is built from back down to Earth if they first need to lift it off the Moon,” Hypnos said.  “To get it free from the Moon’s gravity before taking it to Earth would require more fuel, which is expensive, personally I think that Olympus is highly frugal.”
    “That’s a nice way of saying it,” Sam said.  “I know that the company is cheap, they all are.  That’s why I  thought they’d prefer to build it on the Moon and just leave it there when they were done, surely the fuel needed to bring the entire facility back would cost more than the steel that it’s made from.”
    “That would be true, if this place was made of steel,” Hypnos said.  “There isn’t any iron in the entire place, that’s too heavy and would’ve required more fuel to transport it here and, like you said, Olympus is cheap.  Celestia is constructed from a mixture of titanium, aluminium, some artificial elements and custom made polymers that are very valuable, which Olympus would probably wish to recycle rather than waste.”  A few moments went by as Hypnos silently observed Sam observing the Moon, he then said, “Sam?”
    Sam looked back up at him again and said, “What?”
    “Do you wish to be informed when the Kronos arrives?” he asked.
    “Yes, tell me when it’s time,” Sam said.  “I like to watch the big cargo ships docking, it’s some excitement at least.”
    “Oh, well you might be interested in hearing that I have just given them access to dock,” Hypnos said.
    “Now?” Sam perked up instantaneously.  “They’re early.”  He immediately got out of his chair, ran into the lift and pushed the blue button just about as fast as he could.  On the way down he began to think to himself that it was a little sad that, after just being here about six weeks, his idea of excitement was the few minutes every fortnight or so when he caught a glimpse of an Olympus Titan class cargo ship from the large window in his bedroom.
    “I never understand why you have to watch each delivery,” said the pale blue face that was now inside the lift with him.
    “I just like to look at the big ships,” Sam said.  “It reminds me of when I was a kid and my dad used to take me down to the shipyard and show me all the big ships that travelled on water.  I never thought I’d get a chance to see huge ships that travel on nothing docking right outside my window.  They seldom come so when they do, I want to make sure that I get to see each one.  Why?  Don’t you like watching them?  They are very impressive machines.”
    “What am I then?” Hypnos said.  “I’m much more advanced than those ships, I don’t see why you’re so obsessed by them when I’m literally staring at you in the face.”
    Sam was looking out the transparent section of the lift but he couldn’t see the Kronos because it was on the other side of the station.  When the lift door opened, Sam walked into his quarters and swiftly made his way across the room, taking some time to scan the place for a cat that he secretly knew wouldn’t be around.  As he moved past the TV, Hypnos’ face appeared, doing the best that he could manage to walk beside him.  Sam left him behind to go to his bedside table and pick up the remote in order to turn the shade function off his window.
    It was fortunate that Hypnos had already rotated the station round so that the window was no longer facing the Sun.  Now Sam could see the ship without being blinded and the sunlight coming from the other side of the station would light up the Kronos really well so he could see it clearly.  Sam stood centimetres away from the window and looked down.  In the middle of its docking procedure, was the Kronos.  
    This ship was much larger than the transport vessel Sam had arrived in, it was so big that there was no way it could fit inside Celestia, the crew had to just attach it to the station and transport the cargo across the threshold.  Titan class cargo ships actually consisted of two levels, the top was for the crew and the bottom was the cargo hold, which was filled to the brim with pods containing unconscious prisoners.  As opposed to docking bay alpha, beta was much larger and located below the stabilisation ring, near the top of the wider portion of the station that Hypnos always referred to as the catacombs.
    The part of the Kronos that attached to docking bay beta was at the front of the ship on the lower cargo level, just below the main viewing window of the ship’s bridge.  The cargo ships were quite long, giving the impression that the vessel was very thin, even though it was actually much wider than Hermes class ships such as the Penguin’s Dream.  The fact that it had to dock at Celestia ‘face-first’ meant that Sam could still see some of it beneath the stabilising ring when it had docked and the deliveries were being made.
    Every time Sam had seen this ship, he had always noted that it also didn’t have any Olympus markings or colours on it, just like the Penguin’s Dream.  He suspected this to be true for all the cargo and transport ships that went to Celestia.  The Kronos, at least, had more colour on it than the monochromatic Penguin’s Dream, its body was a smoky charcoal grey and the name was printed along its side in huge dark red capitals.
    “This must seem very peculiar to you,” Sam said back to Hypnos without taking his eyes off the small amount of ship that he could see.  “I’ll bet none of the other technicians ever got this excited at the sight of the delivery ship.”
    “Chloe Deveraux certainly got excited at the sight of the delivery ship, but that was only because she frequently ordered items from Earth and enjoyed receiving them,” Hypnos said.  “She never literally got excited just from watching the ship itself as you implied, however.  Most of the other techs did look through that very window during the first couple of deliveries out of curiosity.  Richard Thorpe never did but he had already seen ships like that plenty of times while he worked for Olympus.  Honestly, I had expected the initial curiosity to wear off by now but you are giving me the impression that this will never happen for you.  I am beginning to have the suspicion that you will be like this every time a cargo ship happens by just to do its job.”
    “Aha,” Sam agreed, his hands pressed up against the window, not really listening by this point.
    “Sam?” Hypnos said.  There was no response.  “Sam?” he repeated himself with a slightly elevated volume.
    Sam tore himself from the window, walked round his bed and sat in the chair in front of Hypnos.  “Sorry,” he said.  “What was it you wanted from me?”
    “Nothing,” Hypnos said.  “I noticed that you were no longer listening to what I was saying.”
    “OK,” Sam said.  “What was it you wanted to tell me, then?”
    “Nothing,” Hypnos said again.  “I had finished what I was saying, anyway.”
    “If there is nothing you wanted to tell me, why did you want me to listen?” Sam asked.
    “I’m not entirely sure,” Hypnos said.  “I just found it very frustrating that you were no longer listening to me so I wanted to get your attention so I would stop feeling frustrated.  By the way, in case you wanted to know, your cat is behind you.”
    Sam looked round at the patch of floor behind him, sure enough; Philip was sitting there, looking at him.  Now Sam was beginning to feel frustrated, the small cat wasn’t coming over to him or going away.  He wasn’t doing anything, as far as Sam could see, with a purpose.  
“What do want, Philip?” Sam asked in a rather impatient tone.  “You can’t want feeding; you just had your breakfast.”  There was no response.  “Fine then.”  Sam turned back to Hypnos, doing his best to ignore him.
    “The crew of the cargo ships,” Sam began.  “Do they know what they’re transporting?  I mean, do they know it’s people?”
    “Yes, they know,” Hypnos said.  “All the cargo ships come from Lethe, the facility in the middle of the North Sea.  Everyone who lives and works there have already proven themselves to be loyal employees of Olympus.  The pods that contain the prisoners are crafted there, each prisoner has there own pod encased in a highly durable, but very light, plastic coating.  On each pod, there is a computer that displays the name and serial number of the occupant.  The computer can also be used to remove the faceplate so you can actually see the person.  I think it’s safe to say the crew knows their cargo.  Inside, the convicts are immersed in a sustaining fluid that is part a sedative known as Hypnotropin mixed with nutrients to keep them alive, in accordance with the anti-capital punishment act of 2029.”
    “Do the people who work on the cargo ships know about me?” Sam asked.
    “Is it necessary for them to know in order to do their jobs?” Hypnos answered his question with another question.
    “I suppose not,” Sam said.
    “Then they don’t know,” Hypnos said.  “The only reason you know about them is because you can’t help but see them arriving.”
    “Olympus could have just built this place without windows,” Sam said.
    “You’d only ask questions about how the prisoners get to be here,” Hypnos said.
    “Well, you could just solve that problem by not telling me anything about what this station does, then that means that I would definitely not tell anyone about this station after I get back to Earth,” Sam said.
    “So you’re saying that you would’ve been curious about where the prisoners came from but you wouldn’t have wanted to know the purpose of the empty space station that you work on?” Hypnos said.
    “Fine, then just tell me that this is an astronomical research station, that’s half-true anyway, you said yourself that you had more than one function,” Sam said.
    “I suppose that could have worked,” Hypnos said.  “You are putting a lot of thought into this, even more than the Olympus executives probably did.  Maybe they just couldn’t be bothered hiding it from one more person and couldn’t see the harm in the technician knowing the secret behind the place he’s taking care of.  It’s not exactly the worst thing if Celestia becomes public knowledge; Olympus isn’t breaking the law.  This place is government sanctioned after all.”
    “It might be sanctioned by this government but Dr. Phelps told me that you’ve begun taking on prisoners from other continents,” Sam said.  “Do the Parliaments of those Unions know about Celestia?”
    “It certainly wasn’t my idea to do that, I’ve thought that to be a bad idea ever since they first implemented it,” Hypnos said.  “These deals were made privately with the companies that ran certain prisons all over the world, Olympus were offered a lot of money and couldn’t resist it.  That is the main objective of a company, to make money.  If it does get out some governments might be angry, but it will only be a minor embarrassment, Olympus know they will be able to recover relatively easily.  Who knows, the other continental parliaments might eventually agree with Olympus and employ their services, permanently.”
    “I don’t know,” Sam said.  “Weren’t you watching the news earlier?  The president of Cellstrom got fifteen years imprisonment and everything taken away from him for breaking corporate law.  That is effectively what Olympus is doing; they’re breaking the law in all those other continents where they don’t have a permit.”
    “I watch everything,” Hypnos said.  “Olympus has significantly more influence than a minor former biotech company.  That company was so small that they still had a president, once a company reaches a certain boundary in size they can no longer be managed autocratically.  The only reason Cellstrom did that stunt was to try and elevate themselves into becoming a more powerful company, they failed.”
    “Ryan Tarbuck said that he was trying to improve mankind,” Sam said.
    “He also announced that they had already managed to successfully clone a human yet there was no evidence of this,” Hypnos said.  “He lied to try and get his company some fame, how exactly could cloning humans benefit people?  There’s already overpopulation in most cities.  Even if it was for something controversial, companies need to be famous for people to use their products.”
    “Cellstrom doesn’t even exist anymore,” Sam said.  “Why would he continue the lie even after he knows that he doesn’t even have a company anymore?”
    “Cellstrom might be gone, but he will be out in fifteen years and free to start a new company,” Hypnos said.  “He is still young, he still has the time to start a new company from scratch with the new reputation of Cellstrom and form it into a much greater company than his last.  It will have a different name but everyone will know it as the Cellstrom Company that everyone talked about.”
    “You seem to know a lot about companies,” Sam said.
    “I do have remote access to the Olympus Archives,” Hypnos said.  “I may not be able to edit anything but I am allowed to learn from their documents as they contain a lot of useful information.  Ryan Tarbuck is actually a very clever man, using this gambit he will be in control of a company with a great deal more influence.  A person can achieve all that they have ever wanted if they just have the patience.”
    “So nothing like this is going to happen to the Olympus Corporation?” Sam asked, they were his employers after all.
    “No,” Hypnos said.  “There is no reason to, they are already one of the most powerful in the world, and they are not desperate like Ryan Tarbuck was.  Nothing is going to happen to any of the Olympus executives, you don’t become that high up in a globally renowned corporation without being adept at covering up scandal.  No, the worst thing that I can see happening is Olympus is told to return any non-European prisoners and not get the prison contract in those unions, they will still have Europe.”
    “If you know so much about companies, can you tell me something that I’ve always wanted to know?” Sam asked.
    “Sure,” Hypnos said.  “What is it, Sam?”
    “I could never figure out what the difference is between a company and a corporation,” Sam said.  “Is it just what the founder of the organisation preferred it to be called or does it actually mean something different?”
    “All the questions you could have asked me and that’s it?” Hypnos said.  “OK, well there isn’t any official difference, they can call themselves whatever they want legally.  Corporation is the name generally given to companies who have passed that boundary I told you about and are commonly recognised as being a member of the most successful group of global companies.”
    “That sounds kind of like what I thought it meant,” Sam said.  “I don’t normally like to talk about business or politics, I usually find it really boring to discuss but I’ve found what you’ve said to be really interesting.  It has been tiring, however, I fee like I need to go to sleep again and it’s not even noon.  Maybe I should start doing some more writing today, do you know where my laptop is?”
    “I believe you left it under your bed,” Hypnos said.  “Are you going to write another short story?”
    “No,” Sam said, getting up and walking over to his bed.  He slid out his computer from under his bed, just as Hypnos had said and continued, “I think I’m going to start writing my novel today, I’ve put it off for too long and it is the reason I came here.”
    “Do you know what you’re going to write about yet?” Hypnos asked.
    “I really want to do something original,” Sam said.  “Something no one has ever done before.”
    “That’s why it’s called a novel, the word means ‘New’,” Hypnos said.  “I’ve read a lot of them and I believe that each one should be unique and different from the rest in some way to capture people’s interest.  A book doesn’t even have to be written that well, as long as it has original concepts people will like it because it will make them think about it even after they’ve finished reading it.  Books and films can have a great power over people, they can make them feel passionate about things they never realised they cared so much about.”
    “I know what you mean, but those feelings are never permanent, that’s the problem,” San said.  “Most people go away after reading a book or watching a film, saying that it’s changed their outlook on life but they forget about it sometimes as recently as the next day.  I want to write something that people will remember forever and really have an effect on someone, anyone.  I guess that’s why I’ve put it off for so long, I was afraid that it wouldn’t measure up to how I wanted it to be.  Now I just want to write anything that can be called a novel, I don’t care if it’s mediocre, better that than no book at all.”
    “So what is it going to be about?” Hypnos asked.
    Sam replied, “A writer.”