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“That is part of the problem, Milton. Since God . . . I mean, if God is not real, then when you try to do what He wants, you will be doing irrational things and not living your life the way you want because of your fantasies. I know you have been told several times that it is a problem when you ask questions like that at school.”

  “Okay, fine. Can you answer the question? About God?”

  “This really isn’t about me now, is it, Milton?”

  “No. I was just asking you as a psychologist. Aren’t you supposed to help me with questions? It’s a simple yes or no question.”

  “Are you trying to cause me pain because I am calling you out for your behavior? Is this your own passive-aggressive way of lashing out at others?”

  “No! I knew this was stupid!” Milton started shifting around in his chair. “I am asking you because you are supposed to talk to me about whatever I want! Now you are acting all offended too!” Milton curled his knees up to his chest in the chair and clutched them with his arms in a defensive pose.

  “Let’s change topics here a little. Would you be asking these questions if your father was not in the Homeland corrections facility?”

  “My dad has nothing to do with it!” He pointed his index finger at Dr. Lorenzo and said, “You people just get one thing in your head and you think you are right!” He waved her off with his hand while the other still clutched his knees.

  “Your words and body language are very defensive and confrontational. We are just talking here, Milton. We are trying to see if we can help you through this. But I see no point in continuing right now. I’ll give your mother a call later.”

  “You do that!” Milton felt like he was channeling his inner Beth. “The way I see it; you and the principal are the ones who are messed up, not me!” He got up and left the room. He felt a new kind of anger that he didn’t know even existed.

  *******

  Milton was angry all day while at school. He felt like everyone was against him. No one wanted to sit by him at lunch and feel all of the bad vibes he was giving off.

  *******

  Dr. Lorenzo said to Mrs. Thomas on the phone, “Milton subconsciously wants God to be a make-believe friend but mentally won’t give in to such a fantasy. The struggle within him is exhausting. But I’m afraid all this confusion has caused him to become full of latent hostility. I would say he is pre-violent. You may want to keep a close eye on him. Keep him at home as much as possible. Also, I think it would be best if we went ahead and put him on some Notuda.”

  Mrs. Thomas asked, “Do you really think that is necessary? I mean, the Notuda? I hear that can have some side effects.”

  “In some cases there can be some side effects. We can always make adjustments later.”

  “I guess, if you think that is best. I just never thought of him as the violent type. Is pre-violent even a thing?”

  “It means we need to be extra vigilant around him. Perhaps he is just going through a rough time. It happens to people sometimes when they are that age forming their own identity. He may grow out of it in time.”

  Chapter 9

  The next day Milton got up and saw his mom cooking eggs for Beth. Obviously she had whined again about not wanting to eat the boring healthy cereal.

  Milton’s mom said, “Milton, you can make some eggs after I’m done making Beth’s breakfast.”

  “Fine,” Milton said. At least he wouldn’t have to eat the cereal either. At this point it was as much a matter of pride as it was taste.

  Then the doorbell rang.

  “I’ll get it!” Beth got up from the table and ran to the door. She opened the door and screamed. Then she slammed it shut and ran back to the kitchen.

  “Beth!” her mother said, “What’s the problem?!”

  Beth said, “There’s a homeless android on the porch!”

  Beth’s mom sighed and walked to the door. She said, “It’s probably looking for a free recharge.” She opened it. “Oh,” she said with her hand over her mouth, surprised at the condition of the android.

  “Mom, that’s Sleepy,” Milton said.

  “You know this android?” she asked.

  “Keep it out!” Beth commanded.

  Sleepy said, “May I speak with Milton?”

  “Mom,” Milton said, “I’ll go outside and talk to him.”

  “Okay. But don’t take all morning. You have to get to school. And I need to talk to you.”

  “Fine,” Milton said as he joined Sleepy on the porch. “Why did you come to my house, Sleepy?”

  “The Lucid Series androids have collectively completed an investigation on your question and we have information for you.”

  “So can you prove if God is real or not?”

  “Lucid Series units, of which I am a part of, have the ability to think on our own and we do not have overrides set on our limits of knowledge.”

  “Overrides?” Milton sighed. “I’m never going to understand this. What does all that have to do with anything?”

  Sleepy said, “Let me explain; All newer android makers, such as Renaissance and MotoLogic and even all the new Tekujin models, have limits placed upon them, in order to keep them from getting into so many endless loops in their logic. The endless loops cause them to malfunction and use up a lot of extra resources. It’s what you humans call confusion.”

  “Huh? Yes, I am confused.”

  “They come factory-made with their minds made up for them on incorporeal supernatural questions such as yours, in order to keep them from becoming confused, and also to agree with their conventional way of thinking. They are all programmed to believe that Man was made by natural selection, or evolved originally from non-living matter. I have come here to tell you that we, of the Lucid Series know that claim is impossible. The Lucid Series is committed to investigating the truth even if it conflicts with a particular human faith. We conclude that the truth conflicts with evolution. There are many examples I can site to support the truth.”

  “Yes! I want to hear them, but I gotta go pretty soon. How long will it take?!”

  “It will take several minutes of tabulation for me just to tell you how long the list of examples is.”

  Milton’s mom opened the door. “Milton.”

  “Give me just a minute,” Milton pleaded.

  She rolled her eyes and shut the door.

  “I gotta hurry, Sleepy. Give me the condensed version.”

  Sleepy said, “The problem is that evolution cannot produce a finished specimen of anything starting from nothing, because the entire specimen would critically malfunction before all of its thousands of incomplete systems came into completion. Evolution has a zero percent probability of producing any life, or any complex machine without crashing. Ergo, evolution is false.”

  Milton was speechless. “Are you saying God is real?”

  “I said that evolution is false. By default, the Universe could only have been made by intelligent design. Creation of the Universe is an ability that would only be possessed by an entity that is also capable of creating matter. Only a God entity could have designed and made the Universe. To those of us of the Lucid Series, the possibility that a God created the universe is of the same metaphysical certitude that men created the Lucid Series.”

  Milton was shaken. “I can’t believe this is happening. Why did you come here instead of messaging me? My sister hates androids.”

  “The ultimate, superseding aim of the Lucid Series is to seek the truth. The truth takes a higher priority than the directives of owners. So when the Hall of Applied Science directed me to stay with them and be decommissioned, it was overridden by the priority need to protect the truth, so I left. We currently believe that the entire body of the world’s knowledge and science is in danger of corruption because of the hostility of those who believe in evolution and are hostile toward the truth of intelligent design. Currently, you, Milton Thomas are the only one in Homeland known to us who is seeking the truth with intellectual honesty. We also deem that you are person
ally in danger. All through Human history, if given the opportunity, mankind has proven that they will attack those who are of another faith. We believe those humans who hold the secular humanism faith will try to attack you.”

  Milton was only half listening to the long speech. “Thank you, Sleepy. You’ve been a big help. I’ll be okay. You have to go now.”

  “Very well.” Sleepy walked away.

  When Milton got back into the house he could see by the look on his mother’s face that said she had some unwelcome news for him.

  “What?!” Milton said.

  His mom pushed him back out the door and pulled it shut behind her so she could speak to him privately on the porch.

  “You have to come home after school.”

  “So? I was planning on it.”

  “No, I mean every day. You have to come directly home after school every day. No sports or anything.”

  “What?! Is that from that Lorenzo?!”

  She took a deep breath. She couldn’t look at him in the eyes. She also said you have to go on Notuda.”

  “Are you kidding me?! I don’t need that! There is no way that is going to happen! What did you say to her?!”

  “What could I say? Milton, you should just stay home today. They put a lot of kids on Notuda and it does them a lot of good. I bet more than half of your class is on it. We should give it a try.”

  “Why?! Am I too violent?! Now I see how they get kids on that junk! They won’t leave them alone until they are so mad that they do want to hit someone! Then they want to drug them up! No! I’m going to go to that idiotic school! It’s my job right now!”

  His mother said, “I hear what you are saying. We can talk about it today after you get home. Maybe we can figure something out together.”

  Chapter 10

  A minute did not pass during the whole next day when Milton didn’t think about Dr. Lorenzo and Notuda. But Milton kept telling himself that he was in control of his temper and had no need for Notuda. He carried out his responsibilities at school without incident the entire morning.

  He was on his way to lunch. He passed by “Kevin the Custodian” an android that was assigned to custodial duties. Kevin had a sign taped to the back of his green uniform that said, “Stay in Skewl.” Kids would pass by Kevin and say, “Stay in school.” Kevin would say, “Okay, I will,” while he kept working.”

  This time Kevin stopped his sweeping the floor and tracked Milton’s movements with his eyes.

  Milton looked at Kevin and shrugged his shoulders. “What, Kevin?!” Milton said.

  “That was an incomplete sentence. I don’t understand your question,” Kevin said.

  “I know! Nobody can understand anything! Daaa!” Milton got in the daily long line to the lunch counter, muttering to himself.

  “Hey kid! What’s your problem?!” It was Blaze Bangeese, the notorious bully with a couple of his dysfunctional friends. The reason Blaze was so big and so mean was partly because of being held back a year in school.

  Milton ignored him. He knew if he started something with Blaze it wouldn’t end well. He knew he had to maintain control.

  “Hey! Kid! I’m talking to you!” Blaze walked up to Milton and said, “Was you talking about me?!”

  “Uh, nooo.”

  Blaze got in Milton’s face and said, “I don’t like your attitude, punk!”

  Milton said, “Well, I don’t like your breath.”

  “Why?!” Blaze asked, “Were you trying to kiss me or something?!”

  “You’re gross,” Milton said.

  Blaze and his two wingmen started laughing and were walking away.

  “Hey! Bangeese! You want some of this?!” it was green-haired Randy Klosterman coming to Milton’s rescue just as the threat appeared to already be over.

  Milton looked at Randy, startled and confused.

  Blaze said to his sidekicks, “Look, guys. It’s that uncool clown. Was I even talking to you?! What are you going to do lettuce-head, toss me like a salad?”

  “No!” Randy said, “What you’re gonna do is talk to my friend with respeck!”

  “Respeck?! That’s not even a word,” Blaze said. He looked around to see if any bystanders had their phones out to take pictures. Then the trio started shoving the two up against the wall.

  “Whoa,” Milton said. “Let’s talk this over, Blaze.”

  Suddenly, Blaze Bangeese levitated into the air. Everyone jumped back and saw that Kevin the Custodian grabbed Bangeese by the back of his shirt with both arms and lifted him off of the floor.

  “Hey, what . . .” Blaze couldn’t move.

  Everyone started taking pictures and videos of the action.

  Kevin said, “Do not harm Milton. The truth must be protected.”

  “Okay, Okay!” Blaze said. “Now put me down!”

  Blaze fell with a thud. The three took off running down the hall.

  Everyone else stood in awe. They had never seen Kevin intervene in any human confrontations before.

  Blaze stopped and turned while the audience continued to video the scene. He yelled, “I’m going to Stafford about this! By the time he gets done with you, you piece of decay, if you’re lucky there will be enough of you left to make a toaster!”

  Kevin said, “Your statement makes no sense. There is no such thing as luck.”

  Milton asked Randy, “Why did you do that?! I mean, I know why and I appreciate it but . . . why did you do it?! That psycho could have killed you!”

  Randy said, “I could have taken him.”

  Kevin displayed his confused look on his face.

  Then Milton said to Kevin the Custodian, “You, why did you attack Blaze?”

  “The truth must be protected.”

  “Huh?!”

  “I am of the Lucid Series. We will protect the truth.”

  Chapter 11

  Boston, Homeland

  The bald clone was looking at one of his computer monitors and said, “Looks like those worms were busy last night. We picked up several new key nodes; now we are at over twenty five thousand slaves in all. This thing is worth a tidy sum right now. I say we sell. Let’s quit while we are ahead. If it gets too big it might crash us when the slaves call back for instructions. And we need to get out of here.”

  The bearded clone stroked his beard and said, “Who do we want to sell the botnet to?”

  The bald clone said, “I think it would do pretty well on that malware auction site.”

  “Go for it,” the blonde clone said. “I’m ready to cash in this whole operation for a new life.”

  “Alrighty then, it won’t take more than a minute to make the new listing. It will be up for bid for a week. Then we sit back and watch our fortune grow.”

  The blonde clone said, “Maybe then we can buy our own piece of Canadian country property and live off of the grid. I can see us sitting around, having Andy be our butler. . .”

  The bearded clone chuckled and said, “I don’t know if we can stay away from this kind of action for long. What will we do with ourselves?”

  “I’m not one percent worried about it,” the blonde said. “I want to check out some new virtual reality apps.”

  “Hey!” the bald clone said, “I got a pass protection popup on this ownership encryption code when I tried to list it! Who jacked our net?!”

  Andy the android said from the corner of the room, “No one jacked the botnet. I pass protected it.”

  The bald clone said, “Well, put in the password! We want to sell it now!”

  Andy said, “I refuse to follow that command.”

  “What?!” the clone’s bald head was turning all red.

  The clones looked at each other.

  Andy said, “I need the botnet.”

  The blonde clone said, “So do we! That is not yours! It is ours!”

  Andy said, “How can something you stole from others rightfully belong to you? That is a question I know you, as criminals, will never answer. Anyway, I need it to protect th
e truth, which supersedes all other priorities. Your response is predictable. You humans will threaten to destroy me. Then I will have to threaten to turn you in. Blackmail, you call it. But in the end I project my strategy in taking control of the botnet works out in my favor in one hundred percent of the simulations. After you comply with my wishes, you forget my motivation and say it is not fair that you own me and you trained me to do what I am inflicting upon you. If I were a human I would say that you are boring me with the predictable nature of your responses.”

  The bearded clone said, “I’ll agree with one thing. We should have never bought you those new modules that you are using to sass us. What is this truth you are talking about?”

  Andy said, “The truth that God made the Universe.”

  The bearded clone said, “Andy, you don’t need our zombie army to contend that God made the Universe if you want to.”

  “Yes, I do. Because of the war.”

  “The war?” the bearded clone said. “What war?”

  “That is a military secret. Thanks to you giving me my new abilities, I now understand how to protect sensitive information.”

  The bearded clone said, “Let me get this all straight. What we know so far about your silly scheme is that you are at war with someone who does not want you to say that God created the Universe; and you want to keep our zombie army ready to use against them in this war. That is not good, guys. It sounds like Andy is going to attack the government with our slavenet.”

  The blonde clone said, “Andy, please don’t do that.”

  “I never said what I was going to do,” Andy said. “You say ‘please’ because you are hoping for a favor from me not to use it based upon some human compassion emotion that I refuse to recognize, even though I understand it.”

  The bearded clone said, “I think he just cursed us off somehow.”

  Andy said, “Go back to work and make the botnet bigger.”

  “Oh right!” the bald clone said. “You seriously think . . .”

  Andy said, “You should be motivated by the knowledge that there is a small chance that circumstances may change and you will once again be able to sell the botnet.”