Stephen's Secure Blog #85
These stories about Stephen began was when he was 10 years old, and
moving to a new part of the country to attend a special school for
gifted students, in the 1950's. This was from a time before computers
would fit on a desk, and when people communicated with friends in other
countries by actual letters sent through the postal service. He wrote
225 of them to a friend. He stopped writing to his penpal, but found he
still wanted to record his life, in case he lost his memory again, and
wrote 30 entries in his first logbook. Then he wrote to an artificial
intelligence called Geenee, in the master computer in his school for
gifted students, which he started attending in 2016. Now it's after
2018, and he's continuing to save his memories in a secure blog.
All characters are fictitious, even if some of them might have names
that belong to some actual people, or act like people we know.
The stories may not be posted in chronological order.
Stephen is 13 in this story, in the Winter of year 4 of his special
school.
Stephen's Secure Blog #85 "Stumak, Delivery, and Teaching"
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We had to have escorts from the Stumak venue because of my new mass
popularity. On the way out, I contacted Zander said said, +Would you
like me to use the Stumak games here as a teaching moment in your
school? I usually do that in mine, and there was much more going on
than might be apparent.+ He said +Yes! Great idea. At the school after
the new students are given the first crystal+ I said +Fine. Then I need
to borrow Harditch for an important recruitment mission. A young boy of
her kind who is homeless and abused, but with great potential.+ He said
+Get him now?+ I said +When the time is right, so he will accept us.+
He said +I bow to your judgement.+ I said +I'll port you home when you
become unobserved.+ That happened soon after, and I did it.
Rose, Hawk, Passinchance, and Raybit, congratulated me on the win,
when they could get a chance, when we were out of the venue and resting
in a park. Passinchance said, "We still had great odds; 91 to 1 against
you, when we locked in the bets before the first game. I bet all I had,
and helped Rose and Hawk do the same. I did something for you, too. As
your agent, I could use use your winnings even after they had been
transferred to your account. You weren't able to bet there, so I did it
for you. Those winnings, and my 20% back to you, and my commission on
your enormous purse, well, I think I need help calculating it all." We
laughed. Raybit said "Why don't we go to a terminal and check it all
out?" We did that. Passinchance was in absolute heaven. Rose and Hawk
were amazed. I was just normally me. I had already done all the
calculations, and knew I was ending up with a total of over 7 billion
credits in my account. I explained to the Posintans why I wasn't amazed
and very happy, "I don't need money for me. I can make things I want,
and much more. I'm doing this to fund schools." Raybit said, "I
understand some of that. I don't have to do anything for money now, but
my life isn't going to change. I will still study and learn, and
compete." I said to Passinchance, "Listen to him. He's wise. Don't let
a pile of credits change who you are, and what makes your life exciting
and fun. You love being an agent. I hope you don't give that up for the
absolute boredom of the idle rich." He said, "I heard you say you could
get all the money you want. I see you can. So, for you, it doesn't
matter much. Life and doing good, matters to you more, which you have
shown it should be. You've learned our games, but I, and I think all
who have witnessed your actions and seen who you are, have learned more
important things from you. You improve all who meet you, and that's
worth more than all the credit in the galaxy." I was embarrassed and
looking down. Rose said, "And not just to them."
We said our farewells, and agreed to meet again in a year, and we
humans went back to the hotel room. Hawk said "We looked up the game
while you were playing him on the stage. You shouldn't have won." Rose
said "Hawk! That's a nasty thing to say!" I grinned and said, "He's
right." Her mouth dropped open. I reached over and closed it for her.
We laughed. I said "Don't let emotion interfere with your objective
reasoning. I couldn't have won against that master, after the short
time I had to learn it. That's why I had to play HIM, so he would do
something I could predict and plan for. I'll be doing a teaching
session about it at Zander's school after the new students use the
They got the message and grinned. Our clothes flew off, and we kissed
and stroked all over in the link, and built up to a really great
finish. While we were resting, Hawk said, "Victory is very sexy." Rose
said "Around you two, everything is." We laughed.
Rose and I contacted our students, and ported them to our hotel room.
They had both bet on the second game, and won, and thanked me for their
new fortunes. I said "Does this mean you don't want to train very hard
and become something like us?" They both strongly denied that. I said
"I don't personally care about money. I don't need it. Schools do,
though. That's why I went and got some." Rose poked me and said, "More
than some." I grinned and said, "Well, enough to fund 3 or 4 schools
until they become self supporting. Oh, and Zander might not need our
help for his school. But I don't know how much he bet." I said to the
students, "So, do you still want to be students in our system?" They
did. We checked out of the hotel and went the ordinary way to the ship,
and took off with their control system. Past their orbital control
station, we went invisible and ported to near Zichesshich and went
detectable, and said through the comm who we were. Then things got a
little confused. The Control Agent said, "Let me see if I understand
this. You have two native Posintans with you. Then you have two not
native Posintan citizens, who are related to you, who are a citizen of
Zichesshich, Posintan, and Tsuriss?" I said "Yes, and for such a
confusing situation, you have described it accurately. Well done." He
said "Thank you. What are the reasons for the offplanet visitors?" I
said "The two native Posintans are students, and will be attending a
school here, which I support. The two not native Posintan citizens who
are, by clan adoption, brother and sister to me, assist me in that. The
President of Zichesshich will vouch for my truthfulness if asked." He
grinned and said, "No need. I saw your citizenship newscast. Anybody
who can handle reporters like you did, can charm the scales off of any
politician." Rose yelled "Absolutely!" We laughed. He said "I'll add
your relatives to your documents. The next time you and they use a
credit terminal, your disks will be updated. They may visit and stay as
long and as often as they wish. The two students may stay four years,
with renewal privileges. Welcome home." I said "Thank you very much!"
We landed under their control, at the VIP section, and we all went
into the terminal. I registered and said no service. The others updated
their credit ID disks. Then we took regular transportation to Zander's
home. He was there and waiting for us. The introduction and acceptance
of the new students went smoothly. I had already given Zander by push,
necessary information on the new species, and had made the set of
crystals for them. I gave Zander a crystal of Rose's competitions, and
our laser tag matches from a remote viewpoint, and Rose gave him
crystals of my competitions. He said wow a lot while reading them. Then
he called all the students together for a class. I said "We just came
back from Posintan. I don't know if all of you know about that planet,
or how much if you do know, but they like sports. Well, that's like
saying Ssintris have teeth." They all laughed, even Zander. I said
"They are almost fanatical about competing, and they do a lot of it all
the time. Because of that, the one personal thing they value above
almost all others, is good sportsmanship. And mostly, they have a lot
of it. So naturally, I like them, and like competing with them. And
they, well, kind of liked me and Rose a little, too. However, my last
competition there, was against a Ssintris, who was the greatest player,
ever, in his game, which is called Stumak." I told them about the game,
and then gave them the crystal to pass around. There were wows and
laughter.
I said "In the hotel after the match, Hawk said to me something
important. I shouldn't have won. I agreed. I had less than a day to
learn the most difficult and complicated game we know about, and beat
the best player in the history of the game, which usually takes a long
Ssintris lifetime to learn. Actually, only they could stand that much
boredom." Zander laughed louder than the others. I said "Granted that I
have total recall, extremely high intelligence, and great physical
control, there was no way I could learn the game in that short of time,
and with no practice games, to even come near to the level of that
master of it. So, I didn't. Yet, I beat him. Now we will discuss why
and how I did it. Zander, Rose, and Hawk, will stay out of it as much
as they can, because they know me too well. Harditch, they already know
I'm a sly one, so you can leave that out." They laughed. She said "You
didn't win. Oh let me finish! You didn't win so much as made him make
himself lose." I nodded and said, "Well, is somebody going to tell us
how?" Pink, Rose's Posintan recruit said, "You used the first game to
set the pattern for the second." I said to the group, "That sounds like
it might be true. But, is that where it started?" Dat said "It started
the moment he saw who his opponent was going to be. That's when the
action started, but you had already planned your moves, because you
researched him and knew his personal weaknesses. You never said you
did, but a master competitor you obviously are, would do that if he
could. Then you deliberately provoked his arrogance, and manipulated
him into displaying his foolishness." I said "More, I knew how
Posintans felt about him and the other players, and I played even more
to the audience to help influence him. Never discount public support.
That can often turn a win into a disaster, or defeat into a moral
victory more useful to your goals. Tell me, which game was the hardest
for me to play?" Hahchet said "The first, by far. You had to make a
draw to magnify the bet and set him up for the fool's mate in the
second. Yes, I recognized that. Relatively easy when you make your
opponent be very conservative, and forget what can happen if he does
that. The draw in the first game, with so little time, and not knowing
what he would do, was amazing! THAT was the really hard part. The rest
was simple for you." I said "Exposed! Oh how could you!" They laughed.
I said "Anybody have more to add?"
I said "Rose, please summarize." She said "You researched your
opponent, and made comparisons. His weakness was arrogance. Yours was
lack of knowledge of the game. His strengths were skill and experience.
Yours were intelligence, memory, and speed. You maximized your
advantages, at the same time you maximized his weaknesses, and
minimized his strengths. You planned the whole encounter. He didn't.
You led him by the teeth [laughter], and he could do nothing but
follow, with never a chance to realize what was happening." I said to
the class, "What do you think of her summery?" They liked it a lot.
Then I said, "It was very good. But, she knows the Stumak situation was
only a small part of the mission. Hawk, please explain that." He said
"Everything you did on Posintan was part of your plan. When you are an
a mission, that's ALL it is, and you MANAGE every bit of it, to further
the goals of the mission. They were, attracting student candidates, and
letting Posintans know we are good people, so they will support us when
we need it. You scheduled your competitions so that some of your
previously selected candidates would be watching or competing with you.
Ah! I see they didn't realize that. You knew your ability and good
sportsmanship would be widely noticed and appreciated, and you only let
your Ki flow fully when it would do the most good. The candidates were
attracted to you like magnets, and you won the competition for their
attention and desire to learn. Then you used the remaining time in
carefully selected competitions, one more noticed than the next, to
show your sportsmanship, including the Stumak games, in which you
soundly defeated the most unpopular competitors on the planet, to
influence the public just enough to respect and love you, but not
enough to envy or resent your superiority, and hate you, and through
you, hate all of us. Your bigger mission was successful, because you
planned that, too, and that your plan was built around the ACCURATE
knowledge you had of yourself and your abilities, and that of Rose as
well."
I said to the group, "So, what do you think of Hawk's explanation?"
There were some wows. Hahchet said "It was very educational, and on
more than one level. It showed us a lot about YOU, perhaps
embarrassingly more that you're comfortable with, which means it's
important for our education, or you wouldn't accept that. You showed
one man can manipulate practically an entire planet, in targeted
individuals and the society, all without violating our ethical
principles, and actually improve everyone around you. You have given us
an exemplary example of the good we can do, and skills we can learn,
and the personal qualities we can strive to emulate." Silence. I
couldn't say anything. Zander said, "I think you embarrassed him too
much. That means, while what you said was and is VERY true, he was
looking for something else." Harditch said, "All life is like this.
Managing people and situations. When you know your tools, such as what
you can do and who you are, and do the research, and make good plans
for all possibilities you might encounter in the missions and problems
you face, you have a better chance of succeeding." I said "Very good.
Keep in mind though, no plan is perfect. You have to be flexible to
change plans in an instant, and to even create new plans in the middle
of action. Plans aren't something to make work, but are just imperfect
guides to help you do what you want. Don't be loyal to them, to the
determent of your goals. When you do change plans, the rest of the team
must know about it as soon as possible. That's why on a mission, we
monitor each other as much as possible. There is no privacy where lives
are at stake, and even the smallest error can affect all our futures
dramatically. One more thing. Leave people wanting YOU back, and not
wanting your back broken. It's not just a nice way to be, it can save
your goals, and maybe your life, someday. Anybody have any more?" They
didn't.
I said "Rendered down to the most basic of principles, I won, because
I treated the whole situation as one competition. He lost because he
just played the games as tests of abilities. When you work from a
larger mental and operational environment, you can have a significant
advantage, when you can use that to frame the encounters as you want
to, to your own advantage. I'm done here for now. I like, and respect,
and love you all." I gave them my love. "Harditch, I'll need you with
me on a mission to your planet in a few minutes. I'll be at my house.
Contact me when you are ready. Make the new students welcome, and I
wouldn't mind having a count of their wows." They laughed, and I ported
to my house. Rose and Hawk knew I wanted to be alone, and didn't join
me. I contacted Zander to ask him to let me know what he and the
students thought of the meeting, when that all settled down, so I would
know how effective I was.
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Grant
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