Max

Futuristic story

The code which exists to monitor each person is based on two pairs of prime numbers. You have one set and your colony has the other set. This means you can access your own information without anyone else seeing �" For example you may want to see how many hours you have worked and therefore how many credits you have to spend on a new car. This is seen as ‘confidential’ information. You can see it and the governors can see it but no one else. It is almost impossible to find out what pair of prime numbers was allocated to you by the colony but Max had found Charlie’s. With both pairs of prime numbers Charlie could reset her status to fool the system; Max had never found his own numbers though. Max had been switched off over four years ago. He had left one night while she was asleep, leaving a note. �" ‘They have switched me off. I will die if I stay. I will find you again.’

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‘Testing, Testing One Two Three, Bon Giorno!’ Charlie smiled as she opened her eyes, she loved that alarm clock �" It was ridiculous

Reaching just under her hairline, she clicked her inter-personal computer on. ‘Something funny please’ she commanded. As her eyes adjusted to their inner visual lenses, she picked a video. She screwed up her face - this was crap, plus she had seen it before. After ten minutes of asking her personal system to entertain her she launched herself off the majestic four-poster bed. She had always done this, getting out of bed was to be treated like ripping off a Band-Aid. It just has to be done! ‘Shower’ she commanded as she entered the huge glass cubicle placed in the middle of a dark stone setting. A dis-proportionally large bath was placed in the centre. The water rained down, covering the entire space, filling the bath. Simultaneously lights flooded the cube from all directions; ‘Opera!’ She shouted�" The music filled the space, the acoustics - Fantastic! Dramatic! And then she giggled. Well … what was the point in living like this if she couldn’t indulge in a little fantasy? Dancing, swirling, and forgetting. This was her favourite place here, her rain room. She dipped her foot in the bath, testing the water before plunging her whole body into the hot welcoming pool. Beneath her closed eyes a summons message popped up. ‘24 Chessington St…..’

‘F**k this!’ she thought and flicked the switch off on her inter-personal computer, you were only on their radar if you had it turned on, if it was off, they had no way to track you it was one of the few mercy’s left. You could only turn it off for up to 8 hours at a time, this in theory was to allow you an uninterrupted sleep - as she switched off; the water stopped, the music subsided, and she was left shivering in pitch black, remembering this was really a prison. Everything around was a holograph, a virtual representation of what we thought we wanted. �" There was a bed in her room but it was an ordinary bed not a majestic four poster, the room grows and it is customised by the owner with virtual representations of their visions. It’s much cheaper, there is no waste and you can change your mind whenever you like.

It was impossible to do anything in life any more, without your inter-personal computer turned on. The government had banned all gadgets all unnecessary products all real choice. Homes were built with all your basic needs and wants programmed in, you had a coffee machine but it was part of the body of your house, you could only ‘talk’ to it if you were connected. Opening doors, asking for food, having a shower, going to the toilet, all of it was programmed all of it was recorded. There was nothing “they” didn’t know about Charlie. You could get away with ignoring the work summons up to three times, but after three times they would switch you off. Charlie daily reset her information; she would never work for them. As far as they were concerned she worked every day for twelve hours. �" She flipped her inter personal computer back on and typed in her eight digit reset code.

Charlie had lived like this for four years, she was one of the survivors of ‘The Virus’ The Virus was a programme devised to brainwash millions, it was created in the 1960’s and had been infiltrating the world for over a hundred years. She wasn’t even really sure who was left anymore. The symptoms of the Virus went generally unnoticed. They manifested in extreme productivity and ambition, neither of these things could be seen as bad. As productivity rose in the Old World, the choices became immense you could have anything, be anyone. �" Years of propaganda, Religion, fantasy shows, Hollywood movies, stories of great inventors and discoveries, reality TV, internet data. Life was fabulous �" The idea was simple, indulge the human brain in every kind of richness it can conceive, show people how much there is in the world, and bombard their senses. Use phones, gadgets, games, branding, advertising, computers, tablets, TV, music - everything you can; to subliminally brainwash nations of people. Then, when you have your people at the height of their self-importance, greed and indulgence you call upon them.

 Everyone wants to be the chosen one. Everyone wants to be great. So when the time came, everyone followed their ‘calling’. The system grew organically, it grew with them. They didn’t know what happened until it was too late. �" There are ‘mistakes’, ‘loopholes’ so there are ways of getting around the Spider’s system, but you have to be aware you have to know it is happening.  There were a few that fell through the system for one reason or another, but almost everyone is inside now. The land outside is barren, no signs no advertising. Everything was destroyed nothing is there anymore. Huge factories exist inside closed off pieces of land. Here humans are transported to go to prepare food, work, clean. Inside the colonies there are buildings breathing with things ‘to do’ you don’t need money, you just need to switch on. Everything is free but everything you do is monitored. If you are overweight �" they will know, they will stop you from eating; you can only get the food from them. If you are taking an illegal substance, (this includes tobacco or alcohol) they will know and they will switch you off. If you are turned off for too long or too often you simply get wiped off the system, if you try to turn on again, you only see a black screen. That is your punishment �" with no food or water eventually you die. You can turn against them, but they are more powerful. You can get them to put you back in the system if you go to the Old Palace, you can speak to a collection of voices who will decide if you can come back. There is no prison anymore, it was a waste of time and money, if you don’t want to play nice…. they just leave you. So Charlie found a way to live with them, but off their radar, Max had taught her enough to survive. She couldn’t tell anyone what she knew, she was not allowed to.

The system is genius really �" It is set up for the well being of humans. The idea is to save energy, save power and give everyone a home and roof over their head. Everyone works, everyone, when you are called to a mission. You go. You will be clothed, fed, given holidays, nice presents, anything you want. In return you have to work. This seems fair. You can rise in the ranks of ‘society’ �" Have nicer things better houses but you have to work harder and behave better. This for the most part was what people were being trained to do for centuries so the system was easier to implement than you might think. They are still given entertainment. There are still films and restaurants to go to, music to listen to, it’s just controlled, it’s just restricted.

There are no real companies anymore, there is no need for anyone to have more than they need, or more than they deserve. There are officially no homeless people, there is officially no crime, and there is officially no poverty. We have controlled our waste problems, the water is clean the food is healthy; we are ensuring no further damage our planet, life is perfect.

In 2066 mass armies were sent out on a mission to ‘collect’. They travelled to every far corner of the earth picking up everyone including those who had been ‘left behind’ in civilisation. Everyone was to be homed in new colonies, no one was going to be hungry, and no-one would be uneducated. �" We were all headed for greatness. This project underwent its execution rather smoothly. Anyone who objected was simply killed.  As the world’s population was re-homed into the colonies, they were stripped of all their material possessions. �" Any mementos or pictures they wanted to keep were scanned and stored in a cloud. Nothing material was to be taken into the colony �" all your needs and desires would be fulfilled. As the people were cleared and re-homed the land they left behind was mostly demolished and destroyed. �" They would make it nearly impossible to exist outside a colony �" no-one would ever want to leave.

Most of the heavy drug users and tribal groups bypassed the brainwashing, however many of them killed themselves from the sheer horror of living in the colonies. Others ran away and they created what was later to be known as The Scavengers Quarters. Many of the older generation had also by passed the brain-washing. These were groups simply didn’t engage with the technological world on a level that the brain-washing would have been successful. When the armies came, eighty percent of people over the age of sixty resisted, those who were too old to pose a threat were left behind, those who were strong enough ran away, and the rest were killed. It was a useful way to control the population; it had grown to 10 billion in the world now and rapidly spiralling out of control. Inside the colonies all women under the age of 25 were given pregnancy control and all women over the age of 35 were sterilised.

Max had been approached to be involved in the building of the ninety colonies of the world. He had agreed to do it, rather than die - to save us, to try and save the past. He thought that if he knew how it all worked he could find a way to stop the madness. Every man and woman, who worked on the building of the colonies, did so at gun point. Any men or women who tried to question the idea were killed instantly. There seemed no other way out. Max had to help design the system. The loopholes and mistakes were put there purposely, Max and three others had infiltrated the Spiders Web with anti-viruses and access codes. There were ways Charlie could bypass security that no-one else knew. Originally there had been a handful of people Charlie had known with the same information as her. But one by one they were switched off, or they disappeared. Now she was alone.

It was safer to be completely unknown. Charlie couldn’t talk to the others in the colony, they were so far away. The topics of conversation never went beyond their day or their latest love conquest. There was no passion, no beliefs. The colonies did not have religion; no-one really remembered what it was.  People were highly educated but in such a contrived manner that they never questioned anything. They could recite Shakespeare, but they didn’t know what it meant. They could solve impossible equations, but would never be able to apply them. The inner visual lenses that everyone was fitted with inter-personal computers designed by the governors, it would allow you access to the Spiders web where you could access restricted information. No one created anymore, it wasn’t their fault, they just didn’t know how. The biggest contribution to the switching off of the human brain was the banning of alcohol and the introduction of Glycee. Glycee was a warm, fabulous tasting drink which stopped the brain from reacting. Where there were once pubs filled with drunken laughter and life, there were now booths where your own desire was depicted and you were fed Glycee. With no real imagination people were offered scenes to inspire them. Under the water, The Countryside, A naked lady, a cosy fire, such a cliché but no one ever asked for anything outside the list. People sat numbed by the Glycee, surrounded by beautiful scenes. What more could they need? Charlie was terrified by this sight, seeing a whole nation of people drugged and completely oblivious was sickening.

The colonies were all designed to be exactly the same. Shells of efficiency �" Food was fed in, waste was removed, and no-one had to do anything. You simply requested whatever you wanted and it would be brought to you. Each colony was the size of a small country but each one identical. Every colony had a mix of nationalities there were no cultures, no traditions, everyone was the same. Everyone was equal. It had been five years since Max had gone and almost a year since Charlie had spoken to anyone. She had filled the cottage deep in a forest with things she could live off, she didn’t need the Colony, and she didn’t need the system... She had everything. But she needed Max. If she left the Colony he wouldn’t know where to find her. If she switched off forever he might assume she was dead. But it had been five years, he had left her here. She glanced at the battered clock she had rescued from beneath the rubble where her house had once stood. She had six hours before she had to turn on again.