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Date: 08/23/2119
Time: 4am
Location: INSIGHT Colony, Mars
The year is 2119.
The planet is Mars.
One hundred years after the global pandemic, COVID-19, the human race evolved to be entirely different. Nowadays cyborgs and replicants are everywhere. Purebred humans are the rarity.
President Donald Trump won his 2020 re-election. Democrats failed to take back the Senate. Republicans had full control of the Administration, Senate, and the Supreme Court. Roe v. Wade was overturned. Abortion as a choice was federally banned across the United States. The NRA and the gun rights advocates enjoyed an era of prosperous firearms market. Conceal-carry was passed nationwide, even in liberal states like California and New York.
The economy recovered, as it always did. The stock market soared under another trillion-dollar fiscal stimulus. The wealth gap widened significantly. Homelessness worsened. Racial justice issues were swept under the rug.
In 2023 Elon Musk’s Neuralink pioneered the first successful commercial brain-machine interface (BMI) AI chip implant. Six years afterwards the third generation Neuralink BMI flagship model was widely adopted with twenty million global users. Although the FDA had not approved it beyond critical medical device application, black market vendors seized the opportunity. Tens of thousands of Neuralink chips were sold and installed illegally. Students cheated in exams. Job applicants knew all questions and every personal details of their interviewers. Party-goers reveled in augmented vision and music.
AI-enhanced humans excelled in every industry verticals. They wrote programs that generated exceptional code. Soldiers without emotions executed commands with surgical precision. They rarely missed, never questioned their superiors, sniped and killed to ensure the American Democracy reigned supreme.
Meanwhile, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) invaded Taiwan in 2028, claiming One China was undisputed and justified. Unified China exerted control over East Asia, South Pacific, and Africa. With the alienation of America’s European allies by President Trump, the world turned a blind eye to the sufferings of the twenty-five million people on the tiny island of Taiwan.
The Second Cold War ensued. This time conflicts did not occur in battlefields. They were fought in the virtual world. CCP state-sponsored hackers were grossly underestimated. The US Department of Defense established Cyber Force in 2026, but they were three years late. Chinese spies infiltrated Big Tech and utility providers. The US election results were predicted correctly by CCP every term in every level since 2020. CCP did not make the same mistake as the Russians. They merely gathered information instead of trying to meddle. They knew better. After all, the economies between the two superpowers were tightly intertwined. By owning more than 5 trillions of US Treasury Notes, the equivalent 17% of the US national debt, China became the largest creditor of the United States. The chokehold was real.
Could you wage a war when you owed so much money to your biggest rival? The debate had been brewing in Congress for ten years. No American political parties dared do anything substantial. And thus, CCP prevailed in becoming the de-facto first superpower of the world. Nearly three hundred years after the Industrial Revolution started in the 1760s and the countless colonial, scientific, and economic shames, the Chinese people finally regained their pride and relegated white Westerners to an afterthought.
In 2050, all natural coral reefs died out. From the Great Barrier Reef, New Caledonian Barrier Reef, Belize Barrier Reef, large and small, one by one, they succumbed to the continuous burning of fossil fuel, ocean acidification, climate change, and ultimately, mankind’s greed and selfishness.
The Anthropocene Extinction was no longer ongoing. It became history. Three million species of plants and animals were wiped out in their natural habitats. Land, water, sunlight, and other resources were mathematically never sufficient to satiate men’s desire to claim, conquer, and consume.
The sky above American and Canadian West Coast had been orange for five months each year starting from the 2040s. The fossil fuel industry transformed too little too late to an all electric infrastructure, but the solar energy could not be harnessed when the dust clouded the sky. Nuclear fusion technology broke through in 2046. With the energy revolution came the weaponization and proliferation of small terrorist states.
ISIS might have been declared eradicated by the US in 2019. However, the religious extremists always found a way to survive and thrive. The ideology conflict and clash with the Christians of the West kept them alive. A member of Islamic Cyber Warriors (ICW) attacked Jerusalem wearing a vast of the latest generation wearable hydrogen bomb developed by DARPA, killing over 1.7 million residents and tourists in 2035. She was equipped with a Neuralink 15th-generation BMI implant jointly developed by the world’s leading supercomputer at NVIDIA and AI-enhanced human engineers, Armor Holdings exoskeleton nano titanium full-body bullet and stab proof suit, and Beats by Dre earpieces playing songs of EDM version of the Quran.
This time, America no longer could start a war in the name of democracy as the world police. China stepped in and quashed ICW. They were more ruthless and efficient. Violence was their strength. Brainwashing was perfected throughout the early days of Uighur re-education camps, and eventually Hong Kong and Taiwan Autonomous Administrative Regions (AARs). The AARs were anything but autonomous. People were suppressed at first and then brainwashed through education. History was written by the victors. The present was shaped by history. Who could resist the power, control, and overwhelming grandiosity of owning the Earth?
Vladimir Putin passed away in 2072. By then his cybernetic flesh, organs, and brain could no longer function properly anymore. He determined an age of 120 would be a golden number to let his Great Russian Federation (GRF) subjects to remember and worship him by. Thus he uploaded his consciousness to the cloud, constructed a mausoleum to host his corpse, and died ceremoniously like his idol Vladimir Lenin. Only this time, he lived on in the virtual world, still having huge influence on GRF and its greatest ally, the 21th century modern China, currently a great empire not unlike those of the past: Tang, Yuan, and Qing Dynasties.
The real reason Chinese People’s Liberation Army (CPLA) dominated was not AI-enhanced soldiers with HiSilicon BMI implants, nor the magnesium alloy exoskeleton nano carbon fiber full body suit by China New Era Group Corporation. The nuclear fusion laser rifle QBZ-13’s destructive power helped for sure, but the most devastating advantage came from the replicants enlisted. CPLA was now comprised of 37% non-human forces, half of which were robots, the other half were replicants created in the labs of HD Biosciences.
What does all this world development news has to do with our titular Bao family, you ask?
Don’t rush… be patient. 😈
…Here you go!
Robert Bao had two elder sisters. The eldest, Nancy Bao, had a son named Albert Bao. Al was a problematic child. The cursed genes in the Bao family passed onto him and signs showed from an early age. As an infant, Nancy found it difficult to put him to bed. It got worse when Al was five. He couldn’t be disciplined, no matter how hard or whatever parenting methods Nancy and his husband tried. Al would play with his Lego for hours, but when it came time to put the bricks back to the toy cabinet, no amount of coercion or punishment the couple administered worked on him. He was, like his grandfather Ivan and his uncle Rob, very strong-headed.
So Nancy did what any mother would do. She first took Al to a psychologist. From a Child Development Assessment Test Al was deemed to be having short-term memory problems. He was slower than other kids in memorizing new numbers and vocabulary.
“That’s fine. I will just use the methods I read in books to help him learn.”
Nancy thought. And she used every tricks and tips in those books. Cue cards everywhere, cookies shaped like numbers and alphabets, audiobooks and augmented reality learning apps. Little did she knew Al’s temper, impatience, and defiance worsened to an intolerable degree. Every morning, he screamed and shouted for more than an hour just to get dressed and eat breakfast. Every car ride, he kicked the back of the front seat and yelled and cried. The situation did not get better with preschool and elementary school. He was able to control himself in social situations with authoritative figures present. At home, or facing Nancy, Al was like an untrainable wild dog.
At age six Al was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). His impulsivity and instant gratification seeking behaviors were apparent. On top of ADHD, a psychiatrist examined Al amidst one of his anger bouts and diagnosed oppositional defiant disorder (ODD). Al swore at the doctor, a stranger he met for the first time. These medical conditions shocked Nancy, but with great motherly love and perseverance, she did not give up on Al.
“Hey honey, did you see the news on the latest Neuralink BMI implant? They say The Link 3.0 was approved by the FDA to treat ADHD.”
Nancy’s husband told her one day after work. By that time Al was taking Abilify, Adderall, and a couple other medications. Therapy had been somewhat lackluster. Cognitive behavioral therapy only worked for children without chemical imbalances in the brain. Nancy had a life-changing decision to make.
“We will emigrate to the United States. I will do everything in my power to make my son right. I can’t and won’t fail him.”
Thus began the three-year exodus of Nancy’s family from Hsinchu, Taiwan to Brea, California. They sold their 10th floor apartment in Hsinchu, where Al and his younger sister were born. With the help of Jane Kaneshiro, Rob Bao’s ex-wife, the family emigrated to the US overcoming stringent immigration hurdles. Nancy found a lowly entry level job as a hair salon helper because she could only speak basic English. The family savings were half depleted on Al’s Neuralink The Link 4.1. Although the implant eased his ADHD and ODD symptoms, Al had a very difficult time initially adjusting to the new environment. He had heard stories from his uncle Rob about the land of opportunities, the diverse racial construct, and the prospering tech/space industry. But for him, American life consisted of bullying at school, not being able to communicate and make friends, and the constant ridicule at him personally from everybody outside of the small one-bedroom apartment Nancy and his husband could afford to rent.
“I want to learn boxing, mom!”
Al said to Nancy one day. He remembered the great times he had with Rob when he taught him how to throw jabs, keep balance in his stance, and practice discipline. Nancy hesitated, for fear Al would use violence on his younger sister as he already did for the past nine years. But she remembered what Rob said about the psychological elements of boxing training, how the rigorous routines would strengthen the mind in addition to the body. And she wanted Al to be able to defend himself against the bullies. With his constant naggings and seeing bruises all over his son’s adolescent body after school every afternoon, Nancy relented.
“I’m the baddest motherfucker in this world. I’ll kill each and every one of those sons of bitches who wronged me!”
Just like Rob grew his ego through self-assurance 31 years before him, Al said to the teenager in the mirror every waking moment. He became fearless and ferocious. One time he took on four bullies at the school yard, got his two front teeth knocked out in his mouth, with blood and a burning rage in his eyes, he fought on. With a handful of sand in his left, he blinded one boy’s eyesight temporarily, and delivered a jaw-shattering right uppercut to his opponent’s chin.
Boom!
Al heard a crack. At that moment he felt erect.
That was the first time violence was weirdly orgasmic.
A vivid stream of energy rushed through Al’s veins. His senses sharpened.
He felt invincible.
He was God personified.
The aftermath of the incident took a great toll on Nancy and her husband financially. The Latino middle school teenager who attacked Al first did not have medical insurance. A school teacher called 911. An emergency autonomous vehicle was dispatched. A surgical robot repositioned the teen’s dislocated jaw and repaired the fracture in his mandible. A metal plate was screwed into his temporomandibular joint. The healing took two months. Thanks to the surveillance video took by a camera mounted on the back of a school building, Al was not liable to pay for the damages. However, his Link implant did have to be replaced, and since this was an accident caused by “improper use,” neither the product warranty nor Al’s health insurance covered the surgery to remove fragments and insert a new chip. She didn’t mind too much though. Nancy would not despair. She was proud of her boy. With a smile on her face, she thought,
“From now on his enemies will fear him. I made him powerful and confident. He’ll be a capable man like my father one day.”
Al now had a reputation of “man of respect.” Asian American teens, especially male, came to him for their troubles. With his natural gift of persuasion and persistence, he would have “sit-downs” with bullies, arguing parties, and even other people’s parents to resolve issues. He learned not to instigate violence, reserving it as the last resort, but sometimes a necessary evil. People seeked his mitigations because of his fists. He deflected conflicts with his brain.
One day during the school Career Fair when Al was 17, a US Space Force recruiter approached him. The recruiter said in a flurry,
“Son, I heard you are the best fighter in this school district.”
“Have you seen Earth in space?”
“Well, what would you say if I said that you could?”
“Just pilot a US Space Force MS-1A. You’ll even get paid!”
The US Space Force MS-1A was the standard multi-function Space Maneuver Vehicle (SMV). By this time NASA’s Deep Space Transport (DST) project had successfully completed the first shakedown phase. Space Force worked closely with NASA and the private sector, providing pilots and astronauts for most of the former’s crewed missions. Due to strong competition from China, 21st century’s space race motivated US Congress to fund NASA just as it once did against Soviet Russia in the 1950s and 60's.
Against his mother’s wishes, Al joined Space Force right after graduating high school. The boot camp started out fine. Drill Sargent Cornwell was tough, but the verbal insults and the physical test regimens were tolerable for Al. He aced every stages of Space Force trainings, be it weapons handling and firing, land and space vehicle maneuvering, and his favorite, target extraction.
There was but one hidden inconvenient trouble. The recurring nightmares. During those nights before basic combat and other more rigorous landmark tests, all cadets suffered from sleep deprivation. Even though Al’s Neuralink implant could be wirelessly fast-charged within forty minutes, the duration in which critical mood regulating functions had to shut down, the memories of bullies and harsh criticisms he received in the past turned into terrifying fiends with claws and razor-sharp teeth. No matter how hard he tried or how many times he visited the small clinic on-site, the medication and meditation suggested to him failed to stop the monsters from slaughtering him and tearing him up into chunks of body parts. Eventually they devoured him, leaving the scene with excessive blood and gore.
Despite the various discomforts and night terrors, Al flew by the United States Air Force Academy without too many headaches. By the end, Sargent Cornwell’s racial slurs and intimidations had little effect on him. Examples of his taunts and outbursts included:
“You are an animal! You can’t change what you are. Get down and give me a hundred!” (he meant pushups.)
“What’s the matter, slant-eye chink? Can’t do shit without your mama? Now pick up your rifle and kill those niggers!” (during combat simulation.)
“You bunch of worthless bitches just got fucked in the asshole by the aliens. Obey my commands and deliver this mission objective. Don’t act like stupid kids waiting for grownups to clean up your mess.”
“Let her go! Losers deserve to die. Waste of resource training her anyway.” (Despite being a CO for the cadets, Cornwell acted like a general pretentious ly and preached sacrificing pawns to win wars.)
Fire is raging on the battlefield
While Arwald is fighting the war of the kings
The army of Dargor, the thunder, the storm…
So people are calling the brave and his sword
No time left to save the wise throne!Shades of a past not so far to forget…
The rise of the demons from their bloody hell!
So come mighty warrior to light the lost hope
For Tharos the dragon and your cosmic soul…
Now handle your emerald sword!For Ancelot
The ancient cross of war
For the holy town of gods
Gloria, gloria perpetua
In this dawn of victoryThe ride of the dead and their practice of pain
Is pounding in him as a terrific quake
You’re closer and closer now follow their smell
With your holy armour the steel in your hand
Fly angel of bloody revenge!
After graduating as a member of the class of 2035, our young man Al was listening to his favorite battle playlist while executing a routine target extraction mission. From Space X Launch Pad 42B in Cape Canaveral, Florida, his team of seven appeared energetic, relaxed, and mostly professional.
(Al’s Battle Metal Playlist, inherited from his uncle Rob Bao)
“Hey man, did you sleep well last night? Any monsters chasing you again?” Brian Jackson asked Al jokingly.
“…” Al did not say a word. He kept his poker face and the usual silence when he had no better answer. The communication channel was on team broadcast to all four men, two women and one gender-neutral person. He felt only the slightest of embarrassment.
“Stay focused, Brian!” Naomi Watson retorted. She was a Brit from Liverpool, the most sophisticated in terms of manners and speech vocabulary among these seven military personnel. An Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) Specialist, Naomi was tactical, precise, and intelligent enough to earn an Article 7 NATO Medal in the recent war against insurgents in the Middle East during her last tour four years ago. Little did she knew her campaign indirectly helped the forming of Islamic Cyber Warriors, who would bomb Jerusalem two years after she left. In fact, she had a personal connection with the suicide bomber. She was the one who taught the teenage girl how to wear a protective vest. Till this day, Naomi could not comprehend what insurmountable horrors or religious zeal drove the once sweet, reserved girl to voluntarily give up her life. She never told anyone else about this, burying the question and blame deep down in her mind. She merely wished to forget and move on.
After a whole month’s ordeal, the unexpected result of this target extraction mission took place mostly in the China & Russia Joint Moon Base. Although at a first glance quite a few media pundits deemed the mission a catastrophic failure, its consequences and associated personnel ultimately led to the creation of SNAB, which stood for Space, Nebula, and Astroid Belt. SNAB was the elite US space special force analogous to SEAL on earth. Over the next seventy years, Al rose up the ranks as the premiere soldier within the organization.
Bluntly speaking, he found the deadly killer living deep down and excelled at the most despicable military actions.
The ruthless animalistic killer he destined to be, he became.
Long after his retirement and passing in Mars, the government commemorated his “contribution to peace and space exploration” by prominently projecting a hologram in a public area for humans, cyborgs, and whoever/whatever passing by to “admire” his achievements in 2119.
But there was no more direct descendent of the Bao family in the universe.
How ironic? Sad? Deserving? To leave no bloodline to remember your legacy.
With the detail of Al’s life saga being another long story in itself, let us skip it for now and get back to the protagonist Rob Bao following Dysphoria (5).
(To be continued… click here for the next episode)
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