Groundwork

Barry opened the door to his apartment, stepped inside and immediately locked the door. With his head still lowered he tossed his bag onto the already cluttered sofa and took his seat before bending forward to switch on the CPU for his personal computer.

Today was particularly more tiring than any other day. Normally when you work in IT, no one gives two shakes about you. You're just a monkey in a suit that people call upon because their computer stopped working; a problem that could easily be rectified by checking to see if the main switch was on.

The reason why today was more tiring than most was because today someone decided to watch a little pron (spelling mistake on purpose) when they thought no one was watching. Because their computer was networked to every other computer, a virus was found and quickly spread through all the computers in the area.

Barry had to spend a great deal of time fixing and trying to recover a lot of the lost information that were on the computers during the attack. The problem that many did not understand is that just like when you shred a letter into confetti, once a virus deletes some files its never coming back.

Thanks to that he and the others got yelled at from his boss for not being able to do his job and was told that if they could not recover the information come tomorrow, they'd all be fired. Worst part of it was that the idiot who caused all this didn't even get a slap on the wrist.

Barry chuckled to himself when he opened a browser and found 'Bryce's' FB account through basic searching. He cracked the knuckles in his wrist then started working.

Just like everyone in the world, Barry had a mask. He wore on this mask from the moment he left the confines of his house in order to blend better in the world around him. When he was at home however, he took off his mask and reverted to his true self, the hacker known as 5w15# or swish.

Originally Barry was part of a group that worked to undermine government rule in an effort to bring more power to the people but like all badly conceived ideas during a 30 hour gaming marathon, that group was eventually disbanded by force. The FBI and CIA raided their base, arresting everyone.

But as it was a first time offence (and because he hid his tracks well) Barry was made to pay a very hefty fine so that it doesn't appear on any records and had to promise not to go near a computer again.

That was an impossible task for him as his entire world revolved around computers so in order to scratch his urges, he only hacked social media accounts, never posting anything bad or incriminating. He only did that to make sure his skills were still in top form.

After getting a few URL's from some less than safe websites, Barry posted all these links to Bryces' friends (while posing as him) and quickly logged onto a dummy account to watch the whole thing implode.

Smiling to himself he headed to the fridge and took out some water to quench his thirst. He looked at the time and saw that it was really late but he had nothing else to do. So he turned on the television, pushed some of the junk aside and sat down.

As that happened, he heard a knock on the door. Now this was alarming for many reasons; first was because it was night. The only people awake at this time are drug addicts, peddlers and murderers. Second was he didn't call anyone so who would be here? Third was because of his job, his social circle was non existent; no one cared about who worked at IT. And last of all was he just hacked someone and there was a knock on the door.

Conventional wisdom would have him escape out the window and down the staircase but he needed to be sure. Slowly and cautiously, Barry inched towards the door, turned the handle and opened it ever so slightly.

On the other side stood a young man, dressed in a black t-shirt and running pants. Barry's mind immediately labeled him as killer.

"Mr. Barry Wilcox", said the man "I'd like to have a word with you if you don't mind".

'Not in a billion years freak', he yelled in his mind but said "Sure one second".

Barry closed the door then made a beeline for the window. Just as he did the door was kicked open by the man on the other side.

"Damn it", said Michael with a sigh as Barry got out of the window. Michael darted forward with the speed of a wild cat when its found its prey and in seconds he was on the metal staircase with Barry a few flights lower than him.

Rather than taking this one literal step at a time, Michael leapt off the staircase, held onto the side then released his grasp and fell till he grabbed the lower portion. He kept doing that, getting much closer to the target with as little effort.

The two of them hit the ground and Barry started running like a man possessed while Michael followed behind.

During the time Michael transitioned from the nihilistic moody teen to the focused young adult, he made sure that along with his new physique he also gained a few 'real world' skills one of which was parkour. Though he was never at the level that professionals were but he was fairly competent in the discipline. Along with that, he gained a fairly decent level of hand to hand combat along with an above average skill in small and mid-size firearms.

The reason being for that was he knew eventually he would have to resort to physical means to further his plans. Words are great in any day and age as they can incite the masses and unite the minds of many but there would be times where even that was not enough.

He would have to fight, he would have to struggle and he may even have to kill to move forward which was why he honed his skills as early on as possible.

Barry knocked some trash cans and Michael leapt over them with ease. He turned a corner and hopped onto a garbage bin then climbed onto a metal fence before falling over. He turned around and saw his pursuer practically climb over the fence with no grip at all and land like a cat before pursuing him.

'The hell is this guy?' he thought, not noticing that he was running into the street now.

Too late did he hear the horn of the car from the right and could not react in time thus paying a hefty price.

Or that's what should have happened.

Barry opened his eyes and saw that he was not injured or hurt at all. In fact he was on the pavement, watching the car that could have hit him drive further away as fast as possible.

Almost immediately he knew who saved him as he turned around and looked at Michael who took a moment to catch his breath.

"Want something to drink?" he asked

"Huh?"

"I'm thirsty after all that running", continued Michael "Haven't done enough cardio the past few days so I'm suffering for it. Come on, let's go get something to drink."

"Aren't you… working with the CIA or FBI?"

"What? God no, I mean think about it; if i were a government agent, I'd be wearing a suit".

000000000000

After realizing that one very vital fact, Barry calmed down and he sat on a park bench while Michael returned with a can of cold coffee.

"Alright so you're not with the government", he said taking a sip "You're definitely not a black ops operative or there'd be more of you; so what are you?"

"A concerned third party. See the thing is I need your help with something big planned and I came here with the intention of utilizing your skills".

"But I'm just an IT"

"In hacking", he said noticing Barry tense a little "Before we get started, I want to ask what you think about AI".

"Artificial Intelligence? They're important in the current world we're living in and yeah a lot of people need them in their daily lives".

"I'm not talking about those dime store knockoffs like Cortana and Siri. I mean an AI, a true AI that's fully aware of its existence".

Barry thought long and hard about the question. As much as he remembered in books or television, A.I's like that are often beings who are labeled as villains simply because of how they want to help the very humans that created them. Trouble was if you looked at it from a broader perspective, detaching yourself from the human self and acted as an outsider, you'd see that such A.I's in fact are good.

"I think an AI like the ones in movies would be something really cool to have but I doubt it's possible", he said then noticing Michael smile a little.

"What if I told you there is one, would you want to meet it? What if I said that I wanted to do something incredibly drastic, would you be interested?"

Maybe it was the tone in his voice or the determination in his eyes, Barry understood that he was presented with an opportunity of a lifetime, one that he would hate himself forever if he said no so he nodded and said

"Yeah, I'd like to meet it".