[ WP ] Society has progressed to the point where cybernetic implants are common and cheap and incredible .

*So I wrote this in about two hours while I should be asleep. I apologize if it's rough and ugly. I'm also new to this sub, so I'm sorry if it's not up to snuff. I have n't written in a while. * 
 
 
 William Wesley sat impatiently as he waited for his coworkers to emerge from their Commercial Breaks. The slow tapping of his fingers on his desk was a loud noise in what was normally a busy, vibrant office. His coworkers remained in whatever position they were in prior to the Commercial Break beginning, the only difference being the vacant stares in their faces as they watched whatever commercial was being broadcast into their central neural processors. 
 He glanced over at the clock on the wall. Sixteen seconds had passed since his cubicle-mate, Jonathan, had paused in mid-sentence. It was three in the afternoon, so it would be the one minute, thirty second commercial as opposed to the fourty-five second breaks that happened at seven in the morning and seven at night. 
 
 When he had first figured out the code sequence that prevented his neural processor from receiving the signal that locked down his motor functions and prevented his body from doing anything but breathing, pumping blood, and experiencing whatever commercial was being pumped directly into his brain, he could n't help but screw with the people who had n't. When people froze, he spilled their coffee. He moved them around, picking up children and carrying them twenty feet away and turning around the adults that were too heavy to lift. He put things in front of the people who had frozen while walking and even though the autonomic portion of their brains had kicked in to make sure they froze in a way that was safe, they would continue to walk as soon as the commercial ended and trip over whatever he had placed there. 
 
 That was weeks ago and now he was just bored. 
 
 Fifty-five seconds had passed. 
 
 Figuring out the code sequence was not hard. The Bodes Act, making the Commercial Breaks mandatory in an effort to shore up flagging industries, had been a profitable boom for Monolith, the company that William worked for. He had been on the team that programmed the transmission. While he had n't intentionally coded in the backdoor that he used to disable his own chip, his familiarity with the code the chip ran on made it all but impossible that he would n't find it. 
 Minute, sixteen. 
 
 In his desk, sat the USB drive that he had originally kept out of some sort of humorous nostalgia ( `` Hah! Remember when we used to store data on these things and not in our neural drives?'' ) upon which he now stored the patch. He was n't entirely sure why he felt that keeping it there, on that antique, un-networked piece of equipment had been the right thing to do. He just felt as though it was a safe idea. As long as nobody else in the company, or in the government for that matter, knew that the vulnerability in the processor was there, he would n't have to patch it out. Which meant that he would n't have to sit through Commercial Breaks himself, staring into space like a zombie as he learned about Tide's new fresher scent or Kleenex's softer tissues. As long as it sat on the USB stick, which was n't connected by wireless signals to every other computer in the world unless he plugged it in, his three minutes of privacy every day was safe. 
 
 Minute, twenty-four. 
 
 At least, that's what he told himself. Briefly, he wondered what the kid he had been, the hacker who broke DRM for fun, would think of his unwillingness to upload it somewhere. That kid had loved to fuck with digital security just because he could ( `` Data wants to be free, yanno?'' ). 
 
 `` -says that his division is done with that government project they had going.'' William's cubicle-mate said suddenly, picking up his sentence from where he had left off a minute-and-a-half ago. 
 
 `` Which means that they're not looking for anyone else to join his team,'' William replied. `` Keep your head focused on your work here now, not what you're not going to get.'' 
 
 `` Yeah well,'' Jonathan continued unphased. `` Those contracts always lead to more contracts. Plus, it's super hush-hush stuff. The Feds are n't going to go shopping around to another company if there's that much security over it all.'' His voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper. 
 `` Dave says that it has to do with with upgrades to the neural processors.'' 
 
 `` If it's that hush-hush, then Dave has no idea what it is. He's an accountant.'' William rolled his eyes and mentally commanded his processor to ignore Jonathan as he turned back to his work. For all he knew, his annoying cube-mate was continuing to speak, but the processor was filtering out his voice. 
 
 He began to work, his fingers flying over his keyboard as a speed impossible without the processor's mobility functionality. 
 
 — 
 
 This was what it was all about, William thought to himself. This was what we were put on Earth to do. 
 
 It was the ninth inning, the last game of the series. The Yankees would make it to the World Series if they won this game. The go-ahead run was on second and up to bat was the nastiest slugger since the Great Bambino. 
 
 `` Pitcher's looking nervous!'' one of the guys yelled, which got a murmur of assent from everyone else crammed into the bar. All eyes were watching the large screen on the back wall. 
 
 William did n't think the pitcher looked any different than he had any of the other times the robotic cameras zipping around the field had taken a close-up shot of him, but he was n't about to disagree with the crowd. He did n't want to disturb the zen, the tranquility, the energy of thirty people who all wanted the same thing. 
 
 He sipped his beer. Yeah. This is what it's all about. 
 
 The Yankee batter stepped up to the plate and a hush silenced the crowd. The Red Sox pitcher shook his head once, twice, a third time. Then nodded. Catcher and pitcher were in constant communication with one another via network links through their central processor. Players kept up the old traditions, however. William liked that. 
 
 The pitcher wound up and released the ball that rocketed towards the plate. The slugger swung and everyone in the bar held their breath. 
 
 Which was then released in a violent string of screams, exclaims, and curses. `` Fucking ump is blind!'' someone yelled. `` Quit scratching your balls and call them right!'' someone else bellowed. William knew that the umpire had seen it perfectly, that he could record and rewatch the pitch with a thought. He still agreed with the crowd. 
 
 The next pitch went the same way. A swing and a strike. 
 
 The third would decide it. William stood up, clenching his bottle tightly as the pitcher launched the ball. 
 
 He saw the impact before he heard it. Saw the ball collide with the bat, saw the powerful swing, saw the camera zoom out quickly as it traced the small sphere arc towards the heaven, or at least, towards the stands and towards the World Series. 
 
 Only nobody on the field was running. Nobody in the bar was screaming. The batter stood dumbly at the plate, staring off in the direction of first base. The go-ahead run had stopped in mid-stride between second and third, the autonomic part of his brain making sure that he slowed to a safe stop while he watched a commercial. While everybody in the bar, in the stadium, in the country watched a commercial except William. 
 
 Quietly, calmly, he sipped at his beer. It tasted like piss in his mouth. 
 
 They were supposed to stop playing when the time for the Commercial Break came up. All sports, even peewee soccer, had started to do that once people adjusted to it. It was n't like they came at random times, he wanted to shout. 
 
 `` They come at the same time everyday!'' he did shout, slamming his beer onto the bar top. It shattered in his hand, sending foamy beer and glass shards everywhere. 
 
 It was at that second that the commercial ended and everyone around him snapped into life. Those who had noticed the batter hit before the break started, even the batter, started to react with shouts that quickly ended once they realized what had happened. `` It's okay,'' someone in the crowd said, `` they'll just redo the pitch. That's the law.'' 
 The bartender began to clean up the beer and broken glass, and William watched as the batter swung and missed, as the gut feeling said he would. The batter was struck out, the Yankees were n't getting to the World Series, and William sat down and ordered another beer. 
 
 — 
 

