Chapter 23 – the Underground Resistance
Shelley's Bar, Vertigo Town
Arlington County, VA
Thursday, April 30, 2076
17:11 EST GMT-5
Shelley then took me to the back of the restaurant, where she showed me the door. It looked more like the wall itself, a hidden door. Then she punched in a four-digit code on the wall. The combination was 6-8-1-8, and then the door opened. We walked forward to an elevator, and Shelley pressed the down button. It took us down to the basement. Much to my surprise, there was a lot of hardware, military equipment, mainframe computers and servers, and communications beacon. Not to mention, it felt so pleasant and breezy. The temperature down here was at least sixty-eight degrees Fahrenheit if not more. Which equated to exactly twenty degrees Celsius, as they say room temperature. And yes, we were in the future, so they decided to switch over to Celsius, getting rid of Fahrenheit and other imperial unit measuring systems in favor of adopting fully metric systems.
"Welcome to the resistance, Ace." Shelley introduced me. "We're already preparing to wage war against the Gunsmith Battalion, but we are outnumbered. But not for long."
"So, you're the relic, I heard about!" said a voice behind me, as I turned around. "My name is Ashley Cross. The leader of this resistance."
"I see you've got all this equipment down here. And I recognize all this, surely, they're connected to all satellites around Earth." I declared.
"What can I say? We got millions up there now, and they're helping us, with our VR/AR systems, more efficiently." Ashley explained. "So, you needed some work to do, until the heat is off?"
"I most certainly would be much obliged to do so." I told her. "I know how to work well with machines. I've had a bachelor's degree and master's both in MIS, before I enlisted decades ago."
"Right, you know it's different now. Most of the work is done by virtual assistants now!" exclaimed Ashley.
"And who said I couldn't help?" asked I.V.A.N.A. "I can share the work with Ace, fifty-fifty."
"That's my virtual assistant, I.V.A.N.A!" told me to Ashley. "While there is most of the work automated, I'm sure I can still put in twenty-four hours a week to work. If need be, I can spread it across four six-hour days."
"At this time, we only need someone to create a super-strong firewall application to block out enemy hacks, and eventually depreciate our current one." Ashley told me. "But you won't last more than a month doing that, other than that, the only job we have for you is monitoring the network security. Even then you'd only be working one day a week doing that."
"I'm okay with that, until the heat is off." I expressed my interest. "How much will I get paid?"
"Effective immediately, twenty-five foxcoins per hour for twenty-four hours per week, which eventually will go down to sixteen hours per week, once your firewall is complete." Ashley gave that with no laughing gestures.
"Alright, then. I'll start immediately." I said.