IMPORTANT
Speaking into her headset she makes an announcement. “Normal Hacker School has been superseded for up to the next week. We have an expert here to address us on her favorite subject. She used her knowledge of this hacking tool to escape sure death, and to confound an entire bureaucracy. We know her for other abilities, but what she shares over the next few days or more may save your life, or the lives of millions.” She looks at me. “Char, we need your knowledge of Firmware. Take as much time as you want.” She holds out her stylus to me.
Jake says “You wanted this; you just didn’t know how to ask for it.”
Dumbfounded I walk up and take the stylus. I mumble a thank you to Shelley, take the headset, and turn to view all of Hacker School waiting for my presentation, one I haven’t prepared. As Shelley leaves she says, “Start with pulsed rewrites.”
Firmware . . .
Once I start teaching I can’t stop. I keep going for three days without repeating myself. That’s enough, point made. I’m worn out but happy. Jake comes up to the podium as I announce the class complete. “edited Transcripts will be available for download tomorrow. For now let’s all applaud our first Hacker School Graduate, she turns twelve today.” Before the applause stops Jane steps up and leads the school in the Happy Hacker Hunting Song. She wrote it. I’m sure it’s destined to become Hacker School’s birthday and graduation day tune.
Afterward, at a small party I find Jake to ask how my presentation went. “I enjoyed giving it. I needed to share that knowledge. But how about the listeners, did they get anything from it?”
“No one complained about the hard seats. For three full days no one complained. That’s a first.”
A few days later I get my paycheck. I do fairly well normally, but this check has an extra three hundred ounces in gold script attached. I check with admin to make sure it’s not a mistake. They call it an honorarium, they don’t pay famous speakers, but they do honor their time. I’ve been given a hundred golden thalers a day worth of honor.
Money doesn’t mean much to me here, but I know where it will mean a great deal. My parents must be living on the edge. In thinking of them I realize it’s time to go visit; but then I’ll return home to Hacker school. I belong here.
I guess that means I’ve committed to this gang.
Chapter 9
I go home to see my parents as promised. To their questions I answer I’m doing well, but can’t talk about it because it’s a secret, a secret our safety depends on my keeping. I give Mom some gold, I know times are hard, and tell her I get well paid as a class assistant. I let her know my expenses are less than my income, and yes I have a little saved beside this. That gets me a hug. She says they will use the money to move to a safer neighborhood. I give her a hug.
Back at Hacker School I hack. I frustrate teachers, students and occasionally myself, and I start what is called a master’s program.
But the big excitement is in the hacking of the massively parallel system. Jane and I have found the International Defense Network data storage. The funny thing is almost none of it is about defense. The entire data set is about attacking and annihilating others. Even the Defense Department maps are just road maps in its home country, but reams of detailed battle plans for everywhere else on earth.
It’s like that guy that said he’s an ethical hacker. If the people you work with are ethical why would you need a special label? It’s like a scientist saying he’s a Yarn Theory Geologist. All that says is that he only argues for Yarn Theory, and ignores scientific method if it might prove him wrong -- so he’s a scientist never. It’s like getting dressed up to make people think you are honest or ethical. “We are the defense department” – is he wearing a tie when he says that?
It makes Jake, the former Knowledge Keeper uncomfortable, but I destroy some information. There are probably other copies somewhere, but the odds of a good use coming from a manual named Arming Nuclear Warheads aren’t very good. Eventually mankind will find ways to self destruct, but I don’t want to be a proximate cause. Jane agrees with me.
On the other hand I think all the information we have on rockets should be open, even though there will be dangers. It will help if we can get off this rock and start spreading ourselves around the universe before the next dieoff. If we leave information secured; only governments will have it. They'll use it for their own twisted purposes, not for mankind’s survival. The last time that happened we got a dieoff and The Great Chaos.
We need information in the hands of people that can dream – some crazy person will get us off planet with a technology everyone important says won’t work. Revolutionary developments always come from open human minds, not bureaucracies. Those inventors need every help we can give them. Let them hack our future.
For the most part I’m approving core dumps and scrapping operations. Someone else can sort the material and decide its fate. We need to rescue uncertain knowledge.
My greatest joy is teaching. As a grad student I get to be a substitute professor on all sorts of subjects. Hacker School ignores protocol when it serves them; at twelve years old I’m a full professor of firmware. But here’s the amazing part:
I’ve found people even I can trust: Hackers.
The End
Hacker School is the prequel to
the cyberhug.me trilogy:
https://cyberhug.me
Hacktivist Cyberwars For Human Rights
The Maturing Of Man
Drifting Beyond the Age of Coherence
There is no going back.
In earlier centuries, insightful individuals might mature past limiting coherence. By the twenty third century, entire societies reorganized as their constituent's interests fragmented -- coherence lost.
Mankind entered adolescence, a time of confusion. Untethered, personal identity drifted away from familial tribe and national allegiance toward tribes of similar interests. And beyond. Technology awakened awareness of unlimited choice, options in the trillions. Where shackles were successfully broken new relationships were sought. Not as children needing direction, but as discrete adults considering map and compass, setting their own course.
The Federation Of Liberated Cantons is not a nation, nor does it govern. The FLC is an optional assemblage of adults agreeing to mind their own business.
Tyrants don't respect human rights.
But you know,
Inalienable human rights are more important
than unjust law.
Read:
Cyberhug.me
A novel in three acts,
also written by Allan R. Wallace.
Recovering inalienable human rights.
Act I
*hacktivist* ~ Cyberwar explodes over a despotism's genocide: The cyberhug.me trilogy starts with a lone hackster, Billy, in cyberbattle.
Act II
Complicit Simplicity ~ Human Rights bless all through their complicit simplicity, by placing people above unjust law. As cyberwars extend beyond the ability of lone hackers, Billy forms a hacktivism team for recovering human rights.
Act III
Abacus Brief ~ Moonlit Knight's Cyberwar and Peace: Billy's protégé risks annihilation in a high tech battle. He strives to solve a dangerous cyberwar maze on a beautiful Pacific island before he too is murdered. Moon battles for peace and human rights, (and love).
“Your life is a burning match. Ignite a bonfire”
Allan R. Wallace
https://cyberhug.me
* * *
There is a wonderful and liberated world out there you have not been told about. Perhaps millions (you can't count them, they are enjoying freedom) of people have discovered and are enjoying human rights they were formerly denied.
"Our knowledge is so limited, our abilities seem so inadequate, most people see themselves as small insects - They cope by being serious about whatever crack in the sidewalk they were born into. Ignoring limitless potential within a wondrous world, they cling to the security of thei
r limited crack. Crawl out of the crack, take a few steps down the sidewalk, then decide where you want to fly. You are the dragon."
Allan R. Wallace
How To Insure Your Future In An Unsure World
Of first importance, have a Plan B to get your kids and yourself out of harms way. Remove the restrictions of being ordinary . . . there is an important anthology by Peter Travellian that reveals how to escape average, make money, and thrive in strange situations, anywhere - definitely a must read.
Be the dragon.
Dragon!!
Hacker School Trilogy Page 6
