Old Money thinks you can’t help everybody. So, he divides people to his advantage.

* Mr. Brightside

We need to help everyone. It’s easier. Faster. If we only help some people, we waste all our energy fighting over who gets help and who gets fucked.

* Candy

14 Hours Later - Candy - The Mega Lab

Wake up. Stare at the ceiling. Time to check the news. Stare at the ceiling. Feel some emotions. All right, let's do this.

I check the normal internet first. There is no news. Literally. None of my news feeds have been updated since yesterday morning. I poke through the rest of the internet. Same story everywhere. No updates since yesterday.

I check the anonymous message boards on the Leviathan network. There's a bit here, but not much. A handful of “Oh god, am I all that's left?” messages.

Out of curiosity, I check the hypno-clone network. Nothing. Nobody. Wasn't horny anyway.

I flop back on the bed. I’ll have to gather a lot more information, but I can already guess what's going on.

1. The Optimals successfully drugged everyone.

2. There’s no resistance, organized or otherwise. If there was, they'd be recruiting on Leviathan.

3. A percentage of the population is immune to the Optimal drugs. They remain free thinkers even after being dosed.

4. The Optimals probably believe I am one of the Free Thinkers. They will have a secondary control strategy to deal with Free Thinkers, and I will likely get swept up in it.

5. I have no idea what the secondary control strategy will be, but I really don’t want to be a part of it.

I spend a couple hours panning Levithan for information. Everything confirms my initial assessment and nothing refutes it.

Dang.

I have a shower. Eat a candy bar from the go bag. The lab has a chef’s kitchen, but there’s no food. Partially because it’s been abandoned, but mostly because Megacles lived off beer and take-out. Go bags are supposed to have survival supplies for a couple weeks. I take a quick inventory of what Megacles considered survival essentials. A beat up phone, socks, underwear, dental floss, a big bag of candy, and a big bag of drugs.

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God damn, Megacles. I bet you haven’t eaten a vegetable since I last fed you.

I floss my teeth. Smoke a joint. Eat another candy bar. Whelp, that’s my immediate needs taken care of. Time to plan the rest of my life.

I like being alive. If I make that my number one priority, my best plan is to take my needle of blue goo and jab myself. Surrender to the new order.

I also like being free. If that’s my number one priority, I should head for the hills. Live in a shack a la Unabomber. Cause there’s no hiding in plain sight anymore. Leviathan is pretty good at hiding me online, but he can’t do shit in real life. Everytime I bump into an Optimal, I’ll be back on their radar.

I don’t like being the Guardian of Humanity. It’s a responsibility. To free humanity, I’d have to strike fast. Before the secondary controls catch up to me. I’d have to be ruthless. Fearless. Or, scared but doing drastic shit anyway. I’d also have to make peace with failure and death. ‘Cause, as one stoner versus a nuclear armed global mind control conspiracy, I’m at a statistically insurmountable disadvantage.

I smoke.

I download the Optimal App. There’s a welcome message.

Welcome to the Optimal Job Experiment! Sorry we shot you! A care package is being delivered to your location - it’s more drugs! You’re gonna love’em! While you wait, please enjoy this questionnaire. It’s mostly about quantum computing, but there’s a few probing sexual questions. Peace!

I browse the questionnaire. It’s huge and fucking dry. I imagine if I was hopped up on blue pills, it would be a delight to complete. Right now, I’d rather die. I fiddle with the app, but there appears to be only two options; be quizzed on quantum computing or wait quietly for drugs.

They’re either trying to build a super-intelligent computer, or get into my panties. Reminds me very much of Megacles. They’re trying to rebuild the God Machine. Or seduce me. Maybe both. I need more data. Time to see what the neighbors are up to.

A bit later I’m riding slowly through the village. It’s quiet, though there’s a few people bustling around with purpose. I come up to the village’s only pub. The patio is packed with wasted people drinking wine coolers. There’s a guy on the roof belting out Wonderwall on an acoustic guitar.

Hmm.

I get to the grocery store. Go in. There’s one guy stocking shelves like a fiend. Three people goofing around, laughing and eating donuts. A couple fucking in the cereal aisle. A guy standing near them holding a mop and staring at his phone.

I eye the couple discreetly. Then blatantly. They don’t give a shit. I look over mop guy’s shoulder at his phone. Looks like string theory. I grab some cereal.

“How do I pay for this? There’s no one at cash.”

“Just take whatever you want.” says Professor Jizz-Mop. “There’s plenty for everybody.”

I fill the go bag with my version of essentials. Head back to the lab. Pass the bar again. Dude’s still playing Wonderwall.

I think as I drive back to the lab. I guess those yellow pills are still a thing. Apparently, it wasn't a fluke that Omicron acted like a goofball on them. Are they really a necessary break from the blue super focus pills? I'd suspected that was bullshit.

Other than the looney toons hopped up on yellows, the new world order seems pretty sharp. That said, they are totally building the wrong type of quantum computer. The conventional quantum computing that they’re exploring will be millions of times faster than our current computers. But, The God Machine used twin quantum entangled nano space computers to perform math calculations outside of time. It was a completely different animal.

Their confusion gives me a slight head start. I’m going to need it. Because the only way I’m going to beat these bastards is if I rebuild God Machine.

Before they do.