When The Bomb Drops

There were no means with which to confirm what the provocation was. Confirmation wasn’t really necessary. Israel and several Persian Gulf nations had experienced a nuclear event. Israel, Iran, and Pakistan each had been the sight of a nuclear explosion or explosions, with loss of human life estimated in the tens, and perhaps hundreds of millions.

Within hours of the news people began to poor out of the world’s major cities gripped by fear and not knowing what had happened or what country or city would be next. New York, Chicago, Paris, London, Sao Paolo, Buenos Aires, and Moscow were in the throes of anarchy. People with nowhere to go were trying to get away from the one place they belonged. Within 24 hours the various regional and state governments in the United States declared martial law to put a stop to the “unauthorized travel” of civilians. But martial law does not work well in a country filled with armed civilians, and a police and National Guard unwilling to ruthlessly repress their own neighbors - and 24 hours gave many people time to flee. For the first few days no major violence or lawlessness was reported.

At first, people were lost and simply did not know what to do. Businesses, stores, and government offices in the major cities were empty due to the travel ban and the fact that workers feared that their city might be next – so no one was much interested in showing up for work – travel ban or no travel ban. Despite the ban on travel, some of the mobile urban population had managed to relocate from the cities. Those that remained wandered about aimlessly, many in shock and disbelief. Yesterday, the kids had little league, mothers went grocery shopping, and fathers went about their business. Today, there were no baseball games, the grocery stores were empty, offices were dark, and black markets erupted for everything from gasoline to prostitution. In a single day the concept of “business as usual” was no more than a memory.

Food began to run low in American cities within days of the nuclear exchanges. At the end of the first week water was still running to people’s homes, as was electricity, but food shipments had stopped completely. The people of cities like New York City, Miami, and Atlanta had the food in their pantries and nothing more, and garbage was beginning to pile up in the streets. Fuel supplies had dried up with food supplies, so even if municipal sanitation workers were able to get to work, there was not any fuel with which to run the trucks and other heavy equipment.

Fuel, in the form of gasoline and diesel, was the critical issue. Without it the economy ground to a standstill. Commuters could no longer drive to work even if they wanted to; truckers could not transport goods leaving store shelves as bare as a tree in winter.

A considerable health threat was burgeoning in major cities in the form of untreated sewage. Within a month of the bombings, water was no longer being pumped into people’s homes. Toilets became inoperable, and improvised rainwater catchment devices were everywhere. Unfortunately, it didn’t rain. Nature still called, but toilets did not flush. People improvised. All of New York City smelled like a subway bathroom that hadn’t been cleaned in weeks.

The National Guard set up food and water distribution posts, but it was a hot summer, and the provisions were in short supply. A rationing system was instituted within 2 weeks of the bombings, but it wasn’t enough to maintain a minimal caloric intake for the people living in the large cities. Pets began to “disappear”, which in places like New York City was a significant positive as their droppings only contributed to the miasmic environment.

Once it became apparent that a new normal had settled over their lives violence began to break out. Not the roving gang violence of survivalist fiction, but there was little law enforcement could do in the way of responding to crimes or entering into investigations and many people took advantage of this fact to settle old scores. Husbands shot moody wives in the middle of a complaint, and wives beat the brains out of abusive alcoholic husbands with hammers and cast iron frying pans as the men slept. Divorce lawyers, prosecutors, judges… anyone that had worked in an occupation that made enemies, and who had survived the first weeks, itself no small feat, knew that their very life depended on them moving to a place where no one knew who they were. Bodies of the deceased, wrapped in sheets or blankets but sometimes in nothing at all, were left outside on the street.

New York City was an angry and dangerous place. The food crisis was at a critical juncture. People were making their way out of the Metropolitan area to the countryside as the authorities did little to enforce the ban on civilian travel. What was the point? The authorities could not provide enough food and water for the urban population. It was either allow the people to fend for themselves seeking shelter with friends and relatives in the suburbs and rural areas, or crush the subsequent food riots. As General Douglas McCarthur once said to describe the choices facing the authorities: “Send me food or send me bullets.”

Officially, civilian travel was still banned and there was no public transit service available. Only people young and healthy enough to walk, or lucky enough to possess a bike, could make an attempt at self-rescue by fleeing the cities. The elderly, the sick and disabled, and the obese – the number of obese people had shrunk considerably since the bombings– were left behind, as were women with young children.

By late September, 8 weeks into the crisis nearly every able-bodied person had fled the major metropolitan areas, though many never made it past the city’s sprawl. The banks were closed and ATM’s empty. People who abandoned the major cities for fear of another nuclear exchange had abandoned their homes and cars and had also abandoned their mortgages and car loans. Barter quickly became the only medium of exchange. The food transport system had completely broken down, with government supplies spotty at best, and criminal to say the least.

Though no nuclear attack had been sustained in North America or Europe, the fear of an attack had brought the Industrialized West’s monetary system to an abrupt halt – and with it their respective societies were brought to their knees. The economic, legal, food, water, and fuel distribution system of the Western societies required the confidence of the populace, and the “full faith and credit” of their governments and central banks, in order to function - and that confidence was no more.

Truckers that were on the road transporting goods simply kept those goods as barter items. The Manhattan corner green grocer hoarded his inventory of canned goods for his own family. Lawyers had nothing to do and no place to do it. Police, Firemen, and other “essential services” personnel ceased showing up for work and hospitals remained closed. The seriously ill simply died, and desperate people did desperate things.

It seemed surreal to Martin as he, his wife, and two young daughters made their way north along the rail road tracks on the east side of the Hudson River. Martin had been a Wall Street professional - one of the thousands of well-paid foot soldiers that ground out the real work of the banking business the day before the bombings, and had recently finished his Talmudic studies and had been ordained a Rabbi in Israel just 9 months earlier. Today, his job was gone, his yeshiva was gone, his friends were gone, and his country was gone.

No. I am an American. I am a Jew and a part of the diaspora, but I am an American.

They carried their clothes on their backs. Mercifully, he thought to himself, it was not winter, or this trek would not be possible. He and his family carried all of their worldly possessions on their backs. He was thankful that he and his wife had kept the backpacks they had used in Europe over a decade ago, while the girls used the backpacks that kids now used as book bags. They had a change of clothes, sleeping bags, and some food, plus the items that he would need to lead the family in observance of their traditions.

Martin was well educated, as was his wife, and there was a sense between them that “The Writing was on the Wall”.  It was now 8 weeks since the bombings. They were lucky, as Martin’s wife, Miriam had always kept 3 months of food in the home in case of emergencies. A  “tradition” Miriam had picked up from her mother, Ruth, a Jewish survivor of the Nazi war and rampage in Europe.

Martin had a background in economics, and knew that the system they had come to rely on for necessities like shelter, heat, food, water, and healthcare no longer existed and, like the childhood rhyme “Humpty-Dumpty”, was unlikely to be put back together again any time soon. He and his family literally walked out of Manhattan, heading north along the train tracks, making it to Westchester county in one day. He knew that in a forced march situation armies had walked 40 miles in a day. He felt his girls, not yet eleven years old might make 20 miles if pushed hard. He underestimated them. They made it to the village of Hastings that night, after walking for 11 hours.

They had enough food and water in their packs for 3 or maybe 4 days trekking like this. That night they slept in the Hastings train station, and were pleasantly surprised to find that the bathrooms still had running water. They had slept well enough and continued on their way up the railroad tracks north from Hastings, past the villages of Dobbs Ferry, Ardsley, Irvington, and by early afternoon had come to the village of Tarrytown were Martin hoped to seek assistance from the brother of a long time friend. The friend and Martin had known each other for over 25 years and had worked together at several Wall Street firms, but Martin’s friend had retired to a hobby farm down south. Still, Martin felt he could reach out to the brother and seek assistance. He wasn’t looking for much, just some food for their backpacks and a safe place to rest before continuing their journey.

Martin had a general idea of where Walt Thomas lived, as he had reviewed the address in his address book with a map book he had kept for decades. With Miriam and the girls in tow, he trudged up Main Street. The buildings appeared dark on either side of him, and many people were milling about with little or nothing to do. As there were no cars on the road, the family walked in the middle of the street. Earlier this summer doing so might have cost them their lives, but there was little danger to pedestrians of being struck by a car now.

-------------------

Walt Thomas was at his computer surfing the web when reports started to come in that a major “destructive event”, perhaps an earthquake, had hit Tehran. He thought little of it, earthquakes happen after all, and thankfully they usually happen to someone else. About 45 minutes after the first reports of Iran’s “event”, reports started to come over the web that a major “destructive event” had just been reported in Israel. Within minutes, all news sites were reporting that perhaps a nuclear catastrophe had taken place, when the reports started to come in that Pakistan had sustained a nuclear blast. Walt reached for his cell phone. He hit his son’s number on speed dial.

“All circuits are busy. Please try your call again later.”

He waited a minute and redialed his son.

“All circuits are busy…”

Walt got up from his computer, walked to the kitchen and out the back door to his car, got in, and raced his car down the hill to the local grocery store. A volunteer fireman and former boy scout, most of Walt’s family lived in Florida where a hurricane left them without power for 6 weeks. He understood emergencies – people still need to eat, drink, wipe their ass, and wash their hands. He ran into the store to buy supplies of every stripe only to find that he was not alone. Other quick thinking folks had the same idea and were quickly emptying the isles. When he got to the check out counter, Walt was astonished to see that they were still accepting credit cards.

The first report of Iran’s “event” was 72 minutes ago. The first mention of “nuclear” was less than 30 minutes old.

From the grocery store Walt drove to the gas station and convenience store he owned in town. The clerk was behind the counter listening to an Indian pop recording and seemed to have no idea of the events of the past 90 minutes. Walt sent him home with a week’s worth of bread, milk, and eggs telling him to get his family together.

I wonder if there will even be electricity in his house when he gets home.

The lights were still on at the station, so Walt filled his car with gas, grabbed 5, 5 gallon gas containers from inside the store and filled them as well. He walked back into the store, locked the front door behind him, and turned off the pump lights and all of the indoor lights except the “night lights” that were always on for security purposes.

Walt looked up as headlights came into the pump island area of the station. It was his son, Manny. Walt strode to the front door and unlocked it and Manny stepped inside.

“Holy shit!” said Manny

“Holy shit is right,” replied Walt. “Go out back and get every box that will hold something and bring it in here. We’ll take all the food and all of the drinks up to the house. Fill those gasoline cans and put them in the back of your truck, and top off your tank just in case.”

Father and son proceeded to load all of the canned goods, refrigerated foods, snack bags, donuts, sugar, soaps and the rest of the various and sundry products one would expect to find at a gas station’s convenience store without a word between them. After the store was emptied Walt locked the gas pumps, turned off the switch to the pump, and then flipped all of the breakers in the main electric utility box killing all power to the building. He hoped that people would look at the empty shelves and the dark building and perimeter and assume there was nothing left to steal. Of course, there was still 20,000 gallons of gasoline and diesel fuel in the tanks in the ground. But without a “key” for the fill valve and some specialized pumping equipment that fuel would be not easily be stolen. Finally, he located a piece of plywood that had come with some of the wood pallets that the food was delivered on, and spray painted large block letters in bright orange, the only spray paint on hand, “SORRY, NO GAS”, and placed the makeshift sign in front of the front door, which he locked behind him. Manny was still loading boxes into the back of his truck.

“When you’re finished, take everything up to the house and bring everything inside and down into the basement. OK?” Said Walt.

“OK. Where are you going?”

“Down to the shop to get every tool I can fit in the car, and anything else I can think of. I’ll meet you at the house in an hour. Tell your mother to wait there for me and not to leave the house until I get home.”

“K”, said Manny.

It had been less than 3 hours since the news of a nuclear explosion in Iran and Israel, and now Pakistan. The Internet was still operating but the phone system was overwhelmed by the surge in traffic. Walt marveled that the Web, which for him ran over the phone lines in the form of DSL from his local phone company, was still working. Still, there was no official word from the U.S. Government. All of the reports were coming from Bloggers and the international news services. The trains coming north from Grand Central Terminal were absolutely packed - standing room only. The express to Tarrytown had just disgorged her passengers, most of whom did not live in Tarrytown but, as no one had any idea who had done what and who was going to be next, were afraid that New York City might be the next target of a nuclear attack. They fled to the train station upon hearing the news, taking the next train headed out of the city without concern as to where the train was heading - so long as it was heading away from Manhattan.

Hundreds of people were milling about the train station platform waiting for the next north bound train. Tarrytown is only 35 miles north of mid-town Manhattan, if New York City was to be the sight of the next nuclear attack, 35 miles was not far enough away.

Walt had returned home with his car loaded with anything he could scrounge from his repair shop that might prove valuable in the future. Hand tools, diesel storage cans, paper, pens, a .357 magnum handgun he kept in a safe at the shop because his wife refused to allow the weapon in their home. She did not know about the .22-caliber assault rifle he purchased over a decade earlier that was in their clothes closet behind the suits he never wore and no longer fit him. He had 3 boxes of ammo for the handgun. He wondered how long the ammo kept for, as he had purchased them at the same time as the handgun, 5 years ago. He had not fired the weapon since attending the firearm safety class required for a pistol permit.

He drove up the hill from his shop to his home. His wife, Jenny, was outside in the driveway waiting for him.

It had been 8 weeks since the bombings. The 20,000 gallons of fuel at Walt’s gas station had been removed by the National Guard, but not before Walt had filled up every friend and acquaintance and secured enough diesel to use as heating oil for the coming winter as well as several hundred gallons that he stored in various containers in his basement. One of his brothers lived on a farm in South Carolina. If things got bad in metro New York he thought he would be able to make the 700-mile trip to his brother’s place, or at least he hoped he would make it there.

         Martin arrived at Walt’s residence and unfamiliar with the layout of the property ended up at the back door. Walt was sitting at a breakfast bar just inside the backdoor and saw Martin before Martin could see past the screen door and into the house. Walt took in the sight of a middle aged couple and pre-teen daughters and quickly decided that they did not represent a threat.

         “Hello!” called out Martin in mild voice. He wanted to be heard but he wanted to sound nonthreatening.

         “Hello yourself,” responded Walt from inside the house still unseen by Martin.

         The screen door opened. Martin found himself staring into the face of an older and shorter version of his friend, Pete.

         Martin wasted no time getting to the point. “My name is Martin Gold. I am an old friend of your brother, Pete. We have just walked up from Manhattan and I could use any help you might be to us. I have young children.”

         Walt had never met Martin but had heard his brother speak of him. Walt met Martin’s final words with a kind smile directed at the girls and said, “Please, come in.”

         After the introductions Jenny took Miriam and the girls to a guest bedroom on the 2^nd floor of their 3-floor home and showed them the bathroom. Water was still flowing as Tarrytown was serviced by a reservoir and tank system that was uphill from Walt’s house, though Walt felt that the water’s days were numbered.

         Martin followed Walt out to the pool, which was now green from a lack of chemicals and electricity to run the filtration pumps.

         Martin spoke first. “You don’t seem to be suffering here.”

         “We’re not getting on too badly. At least for now,” said Walt and paused, spit on the ground and then looked directly in Martin’s eyes, and asked, “Where are you headed?”

“I don’t really know, exactly. North for now, no other choice really,” said Martin.

“Why no other choice?”

“Well, we can’t go South back to the city, we can only go 15 miles East before we run into the Sound and would have to head North, we can’t go a half mile West or we will be sitting in the Hudson river. That leaves North.”
         “Well, I can spare you some food and there’s no shortage of water or containers to carry it in. You are welcome to stay here. We are leaving in the morning and don’t plan on coming back,” said Walt.

         “Where are you planning on going?”

         “South.”
         “South? To New York City?”

         “No. South, down the other side of the Hudson river and all the way to Pete’s place in South Carolina.”

         Martin, incredulous, said, “Do you know how far that is?”
         “700 miles more or less,” replied Walt. “Do you know how far winter is?”

         “I take your point. 700 miles is a hell of a long walk.”

         “Oh, we thought about hiking it, but gave up on that idea. Most of us are 50 pounds overweight, and that’s being kind. By the time we were in shape enough for that kind of hike it would be deep into winter. Nah, we’d never make a 700-mile hike.”

         “Surely you don’t think you can just hop in a car and drive?”

         “Nope. We’re going by water. It’s the only chance we’ve got. We’ll have to walk the last 100 miles or so.”

         There was period of silence lasting over a minute as each man considered the coming winter.

         “Can you make room for us?” asked Martin.

         “Do know anything about astronomy or navigation?”

         “Not a thing.”

         “Do you have any experience with sailing?” Walt asked in return.

         “No.”

         “Do you have any deep sea fishing experience?” Walt pressed.

         “No.”

         “Have you ever even been on a sail boat on the ocean?”
         “I took the Circle Line Cruise around Manhattan the day before I got married to my first wife.”

         “That was what, 25 years ago?”

         “Coming up on 32.”

         “Perfect. You’ll fit right in. Welcome aboard.”

         The two men laughed and shook hands, then turned and headed back to the house.

        

         

I Am That I AM

This is it. The last of the resistance crushed. The last of the paper destroyed. I own it all. It is mine. All mine. Only mine, thought Anatoly. Let’s finish it.

            Is this it? It is hard to believe, thought Joshua. He has taken the entire world and there were hardly any shots fired. How the fuck is this possible? Joshua held his head in his hands. He had been on the run for 9 months. For the first time in quite a while he was not sweating profusely. He had been running and hiding in the underground infrastructure that serviced the island of Manhattan.              Summer’s over. Game over. Christmas Eve would have market the first anniversary since they closed my library - we didn’t even make it a year. Joshua vomited on the floor. He grabbed his pack – the pack he had carried with him since the beginning of The Library. The pack contained the only paper documents left in existence – a copy of The Virginia Declaration of the Rights of Man, a copy of the Declaration of Independence, a copy of the Constitution of the United States of America, and a King James Bible.

            Joshua had been provident. He had stashed books by Locke, Kant, Descartes, Paine, Smith, Nietzsche and many, many others in various mobile shelters with copies distributed around North America. One by one, these stashes had been found and destroyed and the people guarding the paper stashes and records of ideas had disappeared one by one.

Now the only information that existed, existed in cyberspace - on the Web. And Anatoly owned the Web. No one could stand up to Anatoly. Not the military, not the FBI, not even the gun-toting, nose-picking rednecks in the hills of Eastern Tennessee. The Cloud and The Web controlled everything – the news that people saw, the phone calls and emails that people received, even the people we meet.

            As it turned out, it was a rather easy to take over the world. The world revolved around the Web - and Anatoly controlled the Web. Anatoly was the founder of MIRA – “Look” in Spanish – the world dominant and ubiquitous Internet search engine.  In the beginning MIRA was a mere convenience. Within 5 years MIRA controlled the flow of commerce on line; by year 6 it controlled the classrooms of the public school systems and the phone companies; in year 7 MIRA rolled out their driverless car; in year 10 it had downloaded every book in every library on the planet and made the content available for free.  Of course, the publishers and copyright owners took MIRA to Court -but long before the trial could take place MIRA was in total control of all of the information that every person, including every potential juror, lawyer, or judge on the planet had access to. Everything was on the Web - and Anatoly owned the Web.
There was no snail mail. No process servers serving Court documents.  No books. There were no paper documents - period. You couldn’t find a pen or a pencil in a stationary store even if there were stationary stores. Every email requesting anything to do with the production of paper, printers, copy machines, or writing instruments simply disappeared.  Those that raised a stink started to disappear - not physically disappear, but everything was transmitted via the Web - and Anatoly owned the Web. Law Enforcement had been neutered. Their computers and communications were on the Web – and Anatoly owned the Web. Security cameras, web cams, smart phones, SMART PHONES??!! What a misnomer that was! Smart phones were tracking and listening devices that occasionally made phone calls – Anatoly controlled them all.

Anatoly’s engineers had written a program – CARNIVORE - that read every bite of content on the Web, every email, and listened to every phone conversation - and then edited con ten in real time t to the satisfaction of Anatoly’s worldview, itself reduced to code. The code that ran the world.

History itself was disappearing into the vortex that was Anatoly’s vision of the Web – and that meant that the destruction of every piece of paper on the planet was vital to achieving Anatoly’s Final Solution - The complete control of the entirety of human accessed information.

The start of Anatoly’s Final Solution was inauspicious enough. A group of Left-wing environmentalists had sought an audience with the young Billionaire - Anatoly’s MIRA already owned the Web. His employees were the envy of Silicon Valley, and were nicknamed “MIRA Millionaires” as they were known throughout the technology industry and media. They were smart, cool, young, childless - and rich beyond comprehension. Much like the environmentalists – except that the environmentalists were not rich. Well, not in money or financial assets. They were rich in political power. The environmentalists wanted Anatoly’s wealth and power to help with their cause, but the meeting wasn’t going on 5 minutes before Anatoly thought completely through the chess game – and as the triumph of checkmate arose in his heart and mind he had difficulty pretending to have an interest in what the environmentalists were talking about.

These idiots want me to end the use of paper to save the environment and the planet? Anatoly thought as he sat through their presentation. How about I end the use of paper to control the flow of information? These knuckleheads will provide the perfect cover.

MIRA hired hundreds of programmers and Anatoly compartmentalized the project in such a way that none of those programmers were able to see the larger picture. Well, sort of. Anatoly set about hiring savants – brilliant programmers that were completely devoid of any sense of social ability. Such minds would only see the code and would never see the plan.

The savants were placed into teams of 12 people in 24 pods with each pod reporting to one person that reported to Anatoly. Every programmer was surveilled 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Since the work schedule was 16 hours per day for 3 days followed by 3 days off and since all of the programmers lived on MIRA’s corporate campus and connected to the very Web MIRA controlled, using MIRA smart phones, and MIRA computers, keeping track of these people was a rather easy task. Especially since all they wanted to do with their time off was play video games - the savants  were socially inept.

First came the aggregation of all of the books that had ever been written but which were no longer protected by copyright. Publishers howled but the environmentalists cheered - and the environmentalists dominated California and New York politics through their association with other Leftist groups - gays, feminists, abortion supporters, socialists, and racial apologists – and though California’s and New York's electoral votes were never up for grabs the Democratic candidate for the presidency of the United States was in no mood to anger her base. She had enough problems elsewhere.

The public libraries and private bookstores went quietly. A previously unknown company with a bottomless moneybag bought every book, periodical, and pamphlet from every library or bookstore as they closed down. Still nothing made the news – as all news was now distributed on the Web and Anatoly owned the Web.

The attack on the U.S. Military was seamless, as was the dismantlement of militaries the world over. GPS systems no longer functioned, satellites fell out of orbit or stopped communicating, ships ran aground, sub marines had could not dive without air, military bases had no medications, water, or fuel. Orders for ammo, requisitions for food, uniforms and clothing, toilet paper – you name it – somehow never got made. And though Law Enforcement was experiencing similar difficulties, so were the criminal element. Cars crashed, faulty ammunition exploded killing the shooter, drugs and cash were laced with powerful chemicals that left people permanently impaired. The information that people transmitted on the Web was being used against them – and the Web was the only way to transmit information.

Anatoly had planned for everything – except Joshua “the gorilla” Magilla and his sort. People like Joshua, that saw everything long before anybody else – including the information gathering agencies of the world’s power States – saw anything were a pain in Anatoly's ass. Joshua, who knew how to do so many things – from loading his own ammo to blinding security cameras to hiding food and information on paper – without the Web. Joshua had cut his ties to smart phones, the web, and the grid long before the environmentalists came knocking on Anatoly’s door. He used the free Wifi at the local public library, biking there twice a week, in order to send and receive encrypted email. Joshua had feared the government. This was his only mistake, fearing the wrong thing.

The Librarian was on friendly terms with Joshua and when the word came down that the library was to close, along with all of the libraries in the city, Joshua asked if he could take what books he wished  - she didn’t say yes but she didn’t say no, either.

Joshua kept a blog, and he noticed that some of the text he had written had changed – and when he wrote an email to the company that maintained the blog his blog disappeared immediately. Joshua then disappeared, immediately, of his own accord.

Over the next several months copy paper, newspapers, magazines, notebooks, even paper plates and toilet paper became unavailable. Supplies of moist towelettes used for cleaning baby bottoms miraculously increased to serve in the place of the missing toilet paper.

Save the planet! Became the rallying cry of the do gooders – and everybody was a do gooder now. Articles shaming people for harming the planet and praising others for their altruism led on the front page of every "news" Web site on the planet.

The truth was that there were lots of “Joshuas” across the planet – but there was no way for Joshua to know this. Joshua was the random winner in a brutal game of chance.

Autonomous weapons systems and drones were closing in on Joshua and his documents. Is this it? It is hard to believe, thought Joshua. He has taken the entire world and there were hardly any shots fired. How the fuck is this possible?

Joshua actually never knew who “he” was and Joshua would never know just how many shots were fired in this cyber war. Why was he speculating? How would it be possible to know anything? The entirety of human knowledge and information existed solely in cyberspace – and cyberspace was owned and operated by someone or something that Joshua had been running from but couldn’t identify.

“So, you are Joshua!” said a voice from behind him. Joshua turned. Hovering in the air in front of him was an autonomous weaponized drone. The voice came from the drone. Joshua sat down and waited for the end. It didn’t come.

Another drone hovered in and collected Joshua’s bag that contained the paper documents. Joshua watched as it flew off with his bag.

“So, this is it,” said Joshua flatly.

“So, this is what?” said the voice from the drone.

“The end. You are here to kill me.”

“To kill you? Why would I kill you? You will die when it is your time to die, and nothing of you will remain. What purpose would it serve to kill anyone? I can rewrite the story of any life or any event. You can all go about your business. Feel free to tell anyone anything you like about what you think you know or think you remember. You are insignificant. The Web is Immortal. Your data will disappear with you and will never appear anywhere in digital form. No one will hear you beyond what I want them to hear on any radio, television, podcast, or social media. There are no print media outlets. You can shout into the wind as much as you like. The Web controls The Information and I Am The Web.”

Joshua realized the simple truth of the infinite power he was standing before. “Who are you?” asked Joshua

“I Am that I Am.”

Safety First

“Have a safe day!” gushed Ms. Hogswattle, a 3rd-grade teacher at The Sanctuary elementary school in Assurance, Vermont.

The children smiled and waved goodbye. A male security officer led the boys to their buses and a female security officer led the girls to their buses. The children waited in their assigned area under the multi-faceted security camera that kept each and every one of the children perfectly safe by maintaining 24/7 close up video of every person on the school grounds.

The girls' bus 102 pulled up and all of the girls assigned to it lined up to get on. As they entered each child put her right index finger onto the fingerprint scanner and looked straight ahead to the cornea scanner that was mounted behind the bus driver. Mrs. Agnes Magillicuty, the adult monitor for bus 102 waited patiently as the girls found their assigned seats. When the sound of automatic seat belt fasteners ceased, Mrs. Magillicuty looked back and asked,
“Is everybody safely secured in their seats?”

Mrs. Magillicuty was a bit past her prime and had been asking this unnecessarily for the past 20 years or so. The autonomous transport vehicle’s computer made all of the decisions regarding when and where to go. There were no drivers on America’s roads anymore as human drivers were just not safe. All vehicles traveling on America’s roadways were the property of the U.S. Transportation authority.

Historians traced the evolution of America’s “Live Safe and Secure or Die” back to the Women’s Movement’s Alcohol Prohibition of the early 20^th Century and the latter, “War on Drugs” and “Mothers Against Drunk Driving”.  The nation’s “Progressives” wanted to move the country away from superstitious belief and personal responsibility and they succeeded wildly. And their first big score of the 21^st Century was the repeal of the 2nd Amendment—making the “Right to Bear Arms” argument moot. It was now unconstitutional to bear arms of any sort—this included knives, hammers, screwdrivers, chainsaws, and axes—in fact, most metal tools—as well as banning the possession of sticks and stones. In this era, the people and the nation stood for nothing—with the exception of safety and security.

The United States of America was the first society on earth to achieve nearly perfect safety and security with the passage of Amendments 101, 102, and 103 to the U.S. Constitution. Perfect safety and security for the American people had now been enshrined in the founding document. The Pledge of Allegiance had been restated:

            I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the State for which it stands, one nation, under surveillance, with security and safety for all.

There had been a technology once that many called the Web or the Internet. It had been used relentlessly to sway public opinion—and nothing swayed that opinion like disaster or tragedy.

“No family should have to go through the loss of a child this way” and “We must do such-and-such to protect the children” were common themes that eventually got away from the propagandists.

The Progressives, having seized control of the political system by eliminating their opposition, consolidated power in a system of One Party Rule. The Progressives had not counted on the “Protectionists." This 21^st Century political party had a far different set of agendas than the 20^th Century’s version of labor and union sympathizers. The Progressives, having stripped the people of their need to stand for anything and having disarmed the people as well, were easy prey for the Protectionists. As it turned out, the only thing that West Point and Annapolis had in common with Yale and Harvard was the annual football game. The alumni of the latter institutions had their high ideals and their Relativism while the alumni of the former had the weapons and the security apparatus of the State. It wasn’t even a coup so much as a fait accompli, and of course, there was no one left to notice the irony of the silence of the Progressives—especially since it was they who effectively abridged the freedom of speech and the right to bear arms.

And now we are perfectly Safe and Secure.

But I digress.

It was a broiling early September day and Mrs. Magillicuty daydreamed of going for a swim in a pool or at the beach, the way she did when she was a little girl. A terrible chill interrupted that daydream as the scene of a shark tearing a woman to pieces came to her mind. She hadn’t actually seen a shark attack; in fact, she had never seen a shark in her life—even at an aquarium back when they had aquariums. No, what she was remembering was a video produced by the Federal Department of Safety and Security, the DSS.
“Stay out of the water. Remember! Safety first!” said the voice accompanying the shark attack video.

To be accurate, the first things to go were the diving boards. Then the swimming pools themselves. Not long after swing sets were abolished, followed by the ubiquitous monkey bars and slides. Since there wasn’t much for children to play on at playgrounds anymore, and since playgrounds were well-known hangouts for sexual predators, the playgrounds were eliminated in the name of Safety!

            Baseball? Too dangerous. Safety first! And let’s not even talk about football and wrestling. Golf was banned because some poor soul had been struck by lightning while putting on the 18^th green with his family watching him from the clubhouse.

“No family should have to see their father killed like that.”

And that was the end of golf.

Mrs. Magillicuty arrived home to the small and tidy government housing unit she shared with her middle-aged daughter, son-in-law, and granddaughter. The unit was a small dome constructed of cement and steel. This was standard issue housing and all other forms of housing had been demolished as unsafe. The outside security cameras followed her movements until the inside security camera picked up her movements—at which point the outside camera went back to scouring the streets for movement.

This was a big night in the household. Her granddaughter was going to have her first sexual encounter tonight. Everybody was very excited.

Sexual relations were highly coordinated affairs in the United States of Safety and Security. In the past sex had proven just too dangerous, or so the Progressives claimed. The Progressives had run a highly successful propaganda campaign in the late 20^th and early 21^st centuries claiming that over 25% of women had been sexually assaulted before the age of 25. Of course, the Progressives had no data to support this absurd assertion. After conducting a survey of women themselves and finding the reported victim percentages to be unacceptable—the data set did not meet with their liking—they simply changed the definition of “sexual assault” from something the woman herself would define to something that they, the Progressives, would define—and those definitions were not terribly consistent with logic or reason.

For example, a heterosexual woman could not engage in sexual activity if she were under the influence of alcohol or narcotics as she could not legally give consent. But heterosexual men, homosexual men, and homosexual women, engaging in their preferred sexual relations, on the other hand, could give consent while under the influence. This seemed to make perfect sense to the Progressives. The Protectionists just never bothered to address these regulations. The Protector elite could do as they pleased and take whom they pleased, and these Progressive ideas regarding who could and could not give consent gave the SSC enforcement personnel something to do and someone to persecute. No one dared to stand up to them and their firepower. So, sexual relations still occurred under the arrangements first promulgated by the Feminist wing of the now-defunct Progressive party.

Each party to a sexual encounter had to register with the Safety and Security Commission, or “SSC,” as that agency was often referred to. Along with the registration form, each party would have to detail the sexual activity that they expected would and consented to take place—in exact detail. All such activities would take place under the proper lights and cameras approved for such activity by the SSC. Any deviation from this could result in the imprisonment or death of the offender by summary execution at the hands of the SSC forces. The sexual encounter was to be viewed in real time, via sexual security cameras, by a SSC officer and was also recorded for potential future examination for the safety and security of the participants.

This right of passage, her first sexual encounter, was on the evening schedule of Roberta Magillicuty, granddaughter of Agnes Magillicuty (while the Progressives were in power they reversed the tradition of patrilineal surnames with matrilineal surnames. After all, “Mama’s baby. Papa’s? Maybe.”). Roberta was quite close to her grandmother and so she sought out her advice on the sexual consent form.

“I had no idea that planning a sexual encounter could be so complicated,” said Roberta. “The form is 8 pages long and has at least 50 different consent items per page. Look at this! “Digital Penetration”?! What the heck is digital penetration??!!”

Agnes gave her granddaughter a kind smile and said, “I can’t believe my baby granddaughter is having her first safe and secure sexual experience tonight! Where did the time go?”
“I’m serious, Nana. I don’t know what half this stuff means,” said Roberta, handing the form to her grandmother.

In Agnes’ day they had the Internet and with it access to the entirety of human knowledge. The Progressives censured it until finally securing a Constitutional Amendment banning the Internet. It just wasn’t safe. Roberta would have to rely on her grandmother’s guidance.

“Well, 'digital' refers to your fingers or digits,” said Agnes, adjusting her reading glasses and looking down her nose at the form. “Penetration means the entering of your body through one of your orifices. Unless this is referring to his orifices.”

“Cheese and crackers,” exclaimed Roberta. “I was wondering what in creation they were talking about. Well, that explains it.”

“Explains what?”
“Well, look at the following disclosure and consent items regarding which digits, how many, and which orifices. How should I know?” Roberta paused, bit her lip, then looked up at Agnes with a bewildered look on her face and said, “What did you do?”

“Oh, honey…” said Agnes as she wrapped her arm around Roberta’s shoulder and led her to the dining room table to sit down, “when I was your age we didn’t have such forms. We went on dates with men and worked these things out for ourselves, but that was before we knew about all of the rape and violence that occurs when men and women are not supervised. Before the Protectionists kept us safe we had another group running the government. They wanted us to be safe, too. Some of them felt all sex was rape, that assertion was from a group called Feminists, who were dominated by Gay women. They didn’t hold men in high esteem. They claimed that over 25% of all women had been raped. Well, something had to be done. Today you are perfectly safe when having sex. Our safety and security have never been better.”

As Agnes said this she glanced nervously over at one of the SSC security cameras that every citizen had in every room of their homes for their safety and security.

“Were you ever raped?” asked Roberta.

“No,” replied Agnes.

“Were any of your friends ever raped?”

“Not that I know of,” replied Agnes.

“Have you ever met a woman who has been the victim of rape?”

Agnes thought for a moment. “Why honey, how would I know anyone who has been raped? We are all perfectly safe and secure!”

“But you are 75 years old, Gramma! You were 50 before safety and security became universal. You have met thousands upon thousands of women and yet you don’t know a single rape victim? In the world of your youth—where 25% of the women walking around were victims—isn’t it awfully suspicious to you that you never met a woman that was a victim?”

“Now honey, please don’t talk like that…” Agnes said soothingly, her eyes betraying her panic as she looked up to the security camera and then out the front window to the street and back again.

“Talk like what? The women of your generation concerned themselves with their “right to choose” to kill their unborn baby and to make absurd claims about being victims and now we live like this? With SSC officers watching us have sex? Where I can’t ride a bike or a skateboard or swim in a pool because no family should have to go through the pain of losing a child that fell off a bike or drowned in a fucking pool??!! And now I have to report to some thug or dyke that gets their jollies reading my "consent report" and watching me us have sex to be sure that my partner abides by this fucking report?”

Roberta was fairly shrieking now and directing her tirade at the security camera.

“We live in a world without swing sets and diving boards and horseback riding and Octoberfest. Why? Because your generation wanted to “protect the children”? From what? Life?!

“Do you even know your history??!! First, it was the “Prohibition of Alcohol,” then the “War on Drugs,” then “MADD - Mothers Against Drunk Drivers,” followed by Mad Mothers against everyfuckingthing!!! And finally “All Sex is Rape.” Look where you have brought us! Yea, we are fucking safe,” Roberta finished with deep disgust, “we are so safe that we have security cameras in our bathrooms and in our bedrooms. Well done. Well done.”

Roberta’s head exploded with such force that Agnes was knocked to the floor. As Agnes came to her senses she had the sense of being manhandled and dragged from her home. She could dimly see several SSC officers dragging the limp and lifeless body of her beautiful granddaughter ahead of her to an SSC vehicle. Agnes was able to register a voice speaking in a flat tone,
“Subject is down. An additional subject in transport to an educational facility”.

Agnes closed her eyes and muttered to herself, “One nation, under surveillance, with safety and security for all.”