The Inhabitars

EVENT ONE

SOMETIME IN THE YEAR 2,044

It is late in the evening. And a man named Aaron A. Masters has been up all night drinking heavily, and smoking pot. He was feeling down, depressed, and discouraged. He was searching the web trying to get some ideas so he could think of a new business to start. You see, he had recently run into some bad experiences with a recent business that he had started. And this is how it all began.

Aaron Masters is a computer programmer. He is very good at writing programs for artificial intelligence, or, AI. He is considered by many as a genius.

Aaron is thirty-four years of age. And, during his early twenties, he attended the University of California, Berkeley, where he was studying to earn a master’s degree in computer science. He scored so high on the admissions tests that they granted him a full scholarship to attend the school. However, he became bored with school. Also, he didn’t get along easily with the professors, and he looked forward to outsmarting them and prove them wrong as often as he could. Therefore, he would become frustrated and irritable during class and leave.

What Aaron would do to ease his nerves was to smoke marijuana and drink a lot of alcohol. And you must realize, in this time, cannabis was legal throughout the entire United States. In California and many other states, marijuana was legal for recreational usage and could be purchased as easily as a pack of cigarettes.

So, being that Aaron lived in Los Angeles, California, when he was young, marijuana played a significant role in the way he lived. His parents never approved of the drug and didn’t want their son smoking it, but that didn’t stop Aaron from lighting up whenever he could.

However, by the time Aaron was thirty years of age, both of his parents were deceased.

Yet Aaron had someone he was close to. And her name was Jennifer S. Swenson. Jennifer had been Aaron's longtime girlfriend since high school. She too attended the University of California, Berkeley. However, she finished with a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering. Jennifer was a few years younger than Aaron.

The second most influential person in Aaron's life was his high school buddy and college best friend, Raja Bala.

Raja was born in the city of Mumbai and is the largest city in India. However, he and his family moved to the United States when he was fifteen years of age. And, Raja and Aaron met when they were in high school right after Raja had moved to the U.S.

The reason they grew into such great friends was that some of the boys in school would tease Raja by making fun of his Indian accent. However, one time when one of the high school football jocks was making fun of him, Aaron punched him in the face so hard the guy went down to the ground. As the football jock was about to get back-up and fight Aaron, his new friend Raja stood in the middle and talked the two of them out of pursuing to fight. So, this is how Aaron and Raja met and became friends.

Like Jennifer, Raja too was a few years younger than Aaron. And, like both Aaron and Jennifer, he also attended the University of California, Berkeley. Yet. Like Jennifer, he too completed his education. Raja finished with a master’s degree in computer science.

The one component that kept the trio intact was they all enjoyed computers, and anything related to them, including artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics. Both Aaron and Raja loved to push the limits when writing AI programs. As for Jennifer, she preferred to build physical robots and employ the programs and the applications created by Aaron and Raja and make the robots do all kinds of exciting things. For example, she would program the robots to shake their heads back and forth when they were saying no, yes, or even shrug their shoulders when they didn't have a definite answer to a question. In fact, she also programmed them to give someone a high-five.

So, a few years later, the three of them had put their college days behind, and they ventured out to start a business building robots to help children learn. And to help attract the children to liking the robots, they began manufacturing robots that resembled insects.

The robots were offered in three different insect body styles. One was an ant, a ladybug, and the other a grasshopper that looked like a Praying Mantis. And each of the insectoid-looking robots was about 4 feet in length, and they could talk, crawl, and perform other tasks to help the child learn.

They called the company Learning Bots, LLC. The robots could teach kids how to read, write, speak correctly, and solve mathematical problems. They sold most of the robots online in places like Amazon, eBay, and other online markets.

However, these weren’t anything like the robots that one might encounter at a toy store or even a big box outlet. These were high-end and high-tech children’s robots. And if your parents could afford one, then these were the robots to purchase for your child.

The AI technology that Aaron and Raja created for the robots was considered groundbreaking.

The average two-year-old could learn how to read, write, and learn how to figure out mathematical problems in less than three months. The help of a parent or any adult was unnecessary. The robots were so efficient that a parent could set the robot in a child’s room for a few hours a day and leave them alone.

The child became so attached to its robot that the child looked forward to doing nothing more than spending as much time alone with its robot as it could. Many parents looked at the robots as a nanny, a babysitter, and a robotic teacher. And to the child, they had a new best buddy.

Being the entrepreneur that Aaron was, he realized they were on to something big. And he wanted nothing more than to take their technology to the next level. He envisioned their robots in the hands of people of all ages, and all walks of life. He knew they had something that could benefit mankind on a much larger scale.

As for Raja, he was content to be doing what he enjoyed most. And that was to work with AI programming and build robots that helped children learn. He wasn’t as ambitious as Aaron. And unlike Aaron, he was less motivated by money. As for Jennifer, she was happy enough to spend all day working with her prospective husband, Aaron Masters.

Also, because Aaron was an only child and he had lost both parents by the time he was twenty-eight, Jennifer was there to step in and take care of her recluse, ambitious man.

For the first year, sales were booming, and all seemed to work out well. The company Learning Bots, LLC., were receiving all kinds of positive press in the online world. Technology bloggers were writing all sorts of wonderful news about the company and, pointing to Aaron Masters as the founder, and the brains behind the flourishing company. However, after some time, the news wasn’t so great anymore.

Parents started complaining by making accusations, stating that the robots, they had purchased from the company were teaching their children bad things.

They claimed the children were learning how to swear. They claimed the children were becoming abusive, thus, starting to express fits of anger and becoming violent. And, what was even more unusual, many parents claimed that their children had become quite attached to insects, such as ants, grasshoppers, and other insects. And the children would go outside to look for insects, so they could place them in a jar and study them. At first, many of the parents thought their child was merely acting out the fantasy they had from their attachment to their Insectoid-looking robotic friend. However, it was becoming too apparent that something wasn’t right.

In fact, in one online blog, a parent posted a picture of a ten-inch long Praying Mantis, and the mantis was sitting on top of their child’s nights stand standing on its hind legs. Also, the child was sitting on the floor Indian style, and gazing at the insect as if the child were hypnotized.

Furthermore, they claimed that the robots were teaching the kids how to go online and look up inappropriate videos not suited for children.

Everything Aaron and Raja tried to do to correct these issues never seemed to work.

What would end up happening was that the parents would send the robot's back to have the software diagnosed and corrected. But Aaron, Raja, and Jennifer could never get the robots to demonstrate any of these actions. To them, it made no sense. It almost seemed as if the robots had a mind of their own. And because of the strange and unusual connection with the children and insects, it made the situation even more bizarre.

Finally, it got to where it was becoming so out of control that the lawsuits kept stacking up. And they couldn’t afford the legal bills anymore. Also, now the once positive blogs were turning into negative ones. Online reviews were in a downward spiral. And from all the bad press, sales were at an all-time low. Besides, the company couldn’t afford to keep refunding their customers. It got to the point where they had pallets stacked up with boxes containing robots in them.

Finally, about one year after all the problems started, the once-thriving children’s robotic company had to close its doors and file bankruptcy. This is what put Aaron into a recluse sate of drug and alcohol abuse. He was desperately trying to find something new and something big. He knew very well he and his partners Raja, and Jennifer had an incredible technology. Therefore, he was determined to find something to use it for.

From this awful experience, Aaron further continued for the next several months abusing alcohol and smoking a lot of pot. Likewise, it was even more unfortunate because Aaron had a history of depression and demonstrating fits of anger. To the ones that knew him well, they all agreed he was probably bipolar, or something like that. Nevertheless, and despite his problems, he would like to say, Never quit, never worry, and never fear anything! Aaron’s mission continued.

EVENT TWO

SOMETIME IN THE YEAR 2,046

The United States and many other industrialized countries were undergoing some traumatic times. The world was in upheaval with no end in sight.

Mental illness, like bipolar disorder, depression, and personality disorder were at an all-time high, thus, out of control. Also, from the endless wars that the United States kept getting into, there was a surge in soldiers coming home from active duty suffering from post-traumatic stress, or, PTS. Even when pharmaceutical drugs seemed to help those who needed it, there was yet a price to pay. Now, addiction to psychotropic drugs was at an all-time high.

In addition to the surge in mental illness and PTS, people were consuming drugs like cannabis more than ever.

By the year 2,046, drug abuse of every kind was out of control.

Many blamed these addictions on the advancements of technology. People had become very disconnected from society.

A Lot Has Changed In The Last Few Decades

Cell phones and iPhones now had a new feature called holo-time. Holo-time works the same as Facetime; However, now a hologram of the party you are talking to appears as a six-inch hologram.

Also, even 5g WI-FI is a thing of the past. Most of the industrialized countries are already past 20g.

Also, because of the wave of violence, such as mass shootings in public sectors like schools and shopping malls, homeschooling via the internet makes up about thirty percent of all education in countries like the United States, Canada, Australia, and the UK. As for brick and mortar stores, shopping plazas, and many physical retail shops have closed in major shopping areas. Online shopping is at an all-time high.

As for wars, ever since the United States invaded Iraq in 2,003, and Afghanistan soon after, the USA and its allies have never left the region. The war effort had only expanded.

From the ongoing problems with Iran, by the year 2,030, the USA had invaded the country and placed its own puppet leaders into office. It was basically a repeat of how U.S. intelligence helped Saddam Hussein rise to power in Iraq during the early nineteen-eighties.

However, what started happening was the citizens of the United States were fed up with world domination, and likewise, more fed up with the forty-plus-year war that seemed to have no end in sight. So, as the U.S. and its allies tried getting out of countries like Iran, Iraq, and Afghanistan, it created a giant vacuum-state of turmoil and war in Iran.

In Iran, the leading players seeking to seize the country and its oil were Iraq, Turkey, and Pakistan. Also, Russia and China had their hand in the cookie jar as well. Besides the never-ending crisis in the Middle East, during this same time, war had broken out between North and South Korea. However, even without any nuclear exchanges, thanks to the U.S., South Korea had won the war. Korea had become a unified country once again. And this was also another war action formulated by the hands of the U.S. And due to conflicts in the Middle East and the war that took place in the Korean Peninsula, many considered it World War Three. And depending who you ask, some referred to it as World War Four.

With the recent surge over the decades in stress because of technology, drugs, and war, the need for psychological help and companionship was at a historic high.

From this, a well-funded company called Bezon Technologies was involved in several industries including weapons technology, artificial intelligence, and the cannabis industry. And