rrCoins

Yes, kind of, but not quite. It is what we use to pay for things. But just about everything else is different. Bayta got up and they continued on the walk. The way we earn them is different, and so is the way we create them. You have salaries, right? They depend on your rank, right? And, whether you get or less of it is up to a boss, I take it. That’s how it used to be all over, not that long ago. I didn’t experience it, but my parents did and they talked about it all the time. My mom is constantly joking with my dad that she’s going to ‘demote’ him or she was going to ‘cut’ his pay. Honestly, I didn’t think much of it and didn’t find out what that really meant until I was 13 or so.

I’ve lived my whole life under that system, said Ignatius, falling into sync step with them. There was no rhyme or reason to how they distributed dollars, really. Sometimes I got an allowance and sometimes I didn’t or I got less than normal.

Here people set their own income.” She noticed the face that Ignatius made and explained, “By income I mean their Predictable Recurring Income or PRI as you’d hear. There is this other thing called RADs that kind of enters into it. Suffice to say that these RADs reflect what others fell are your contributions and the number of them you have determines your share of the wealth you helped create. No bosses or committees needed. Simple.

Wait, how can you… Aren’t you creating rrCoins out of nothing? It doesn’t sound right! Ignatius looked confused and a bit angry.

Well, we create rrCoins based on some form of value creation. At worst, they are based on future value. They definitely carry risk, but all the information to calculate that risk is included with the rrCoins and everybody makes the choice to accept them or not.

What’s really created out of nothing is dollars. Petra looked like she had figured it all out and her head was blown. Dollars are minted by the bosses, at their convenience, out of nothing. Nothing! Except for the fact that you have to pay your taxes in dollars and that, somehow, makes them all good. Petra was not finished, Then when the house of cards comes down, as it does often enough, it is somehow our fault. We end up paying for it and the bosses keep on sucking our lifeblood. Bayta and Ignatius stared at Petra, hanging on her every word and wanting more.

Boy, you are quick. I hadn’t quite figured it that way, but, yes, you’re right. On top of that, rCoins are used all throughout the biosphere, except, of course, for The Bracia and the like. It means that there is no need for anybody, like your banks, to get in the middle and slow things down, add cost, and wield a lot of control over who has money or not.

Posits

They were walking about an empty lot and they watched a handful of kids come out of a large house to their left. The kids noticed them and waved, but kept walking towards the nearby road. Bayta sped up a little and got close enough to them to call out. They kept talking but stopped to wait for Bayta and her companions.

Hi. Are you visiting? One kid said, the tallest in the group.

Yeah. Kind of. We are passing by. They are going on a long trip. Bayta pointed to Petra and Ignatius who were about 10 meters behind her. Speaking to the two of them, she said, Do you want to talk to these people?

Ignatius leapt forward and said, yes, for sure.

What is it? said the tall girl.

Oh, nothing in particular, is just that we are not from around here and it’d be cool to talk to you all for a bit. Ignatius looked a bit nervous. That actually helped because the tall kid said, Sure, we can hang out. And you don’t have to fret.

They crossed the road and sat, some on an awkward looking bench and some on the grass while others just milled around.

This was a bus stop, once upon. Now it’s just a bench. Said another boy.

Was there ever a bus that stopped here? Do you know what a bus is?

No and yes, but only what we’ve seen online about. We’ve never seen or been in one. The tall girl then introduced everybody. My name is Kalisha but everybody calls me Kal. These are Mike, Rodrigo, Eden, Beckett, Ada, and Bonnie. As she said their names, she pointed to each of the kids. Eden made a fake courtesy and Mike didn’t seem to be interested in them.

And we call Bonnie, the Baddie. Rodrigo said that. He seemed to be in charge of mischief. He also seemed to be the youngest.

Kalisha explained, We met at the Clayton’s today and we were on our way to another posit. You can come if you’d like.

Posit is what we call a learning situation, where somebody posits a question or a particular scenario and the group figures out what they need to learn to address it. As they study one thing they may have to study other, more basic things and so on.

And they do this in addition to school or as part of their assignments, Petra asked.

This is our ‘schooling. Where are you all from? You talk like my grandpa and his life ended two years ago,</span> Beckett asked.

We are from The Bracia… , Petra started to say.

But Becket interrupted with, Oh, OK. Then while smiling, he said, You are aliens after all.

Perradero

We wanted to start a company and call it COCO. CO, Company, get it? In any case, Rod thought it would be more fun to not do anything and just mint rCoins. He, she said a bit louder, was about to explain how we’d do it. Kalisha had a smile on her face.

All we have to do, Rodrigo explained enthusiastically, is falsify our rCoins records so they appear to be low risk. That’s all.

Can’t be done. It was the first time that Mike had spoken. Can’t do. No.

Why? Why can’t it be done? Rodrigo said as if he knew the answer already.

Even if you had a chain of accomplices, at some point they would have to break the envelope and other nodes in the network would rat you out. Can’t do. No. He stopped, but he wasn’t done, If they mix your rCoins with other rCoins to lower the risk, then they would be diluting the risk, not hiding it. They would be taking on some of the risk. Can’t cheat. No.

OK, that’s it. If Mike says you can’t, then you can’t. OK, Rod? Ada was clearly exasperated and seemed to have the least patience for Rodrigo’s antics.

Yes, let’s figure out what we are going to do. Beckett had explicit what the group was feeling.

So, what are you going to do?

That’s it, said Kalisha, we have to come out with something, like Beck said.

What about what Mike said? We could build a platform for assembling a Rod chain chain? Ada was looking really excited, but nobody understood. She went on, OK, no, I don’t mean a chain of Rod clones, she looked towards Rodrigo and made a face. </span>I mean a platform to help companies find each other and organize themselves easily to help legit companies with high-risk rCoins. What Mike said.</span>

Oh, I get it! exclaimed Beckett. Evidently, the others got it, too, because they were shaking their heads and voicing agreement.

But I don’t, said Petra.

Ada, explain it to us like we were aliens from outer space. Please.

Well, imagine you create a company to build something for the project to send people outside the Solar system and you need to mint a zillion rCoins to do it. But these rCoins are very high risk and most people would not take them. But— with our platform, companies that are collaborating with the new company can quickly say, ‘oh, I’ll take 10% risk,’ and another says, ‘oh, and I’ll take 5% risk,’ and like that. Then the new company can do its work with the support of these other companies. What we make is a platform so they can do it easily and with companies On Surface, Off Surface, and …

And Under Surface! Everybody clearly enjoyed Rodrigo’s way of not letting things get too serious. I don’t know why but my dad always calls rCoins ‘perras and laughs, so we could call the company Perradero.</span>

Sounds like… we are zoning! yelled Becket.

Facing the Unknown

They were talking excitedly and moving faster now. They headed for a house and Kalisha opened the front door and they all filed in. They were followed by Bayta, Petra, and Ignatius. There were about 20 people inside, two of them about the Bayta’s age and another, older, adult.

Ignatius got close to Bayta and asked softly, Are those the masters?

Before Bayta had time to say anything, Petra responded, more loudly, at least, they are the adults in the room.

Everybody there heard her and turned to look at them. Rodrigo said, they are aliens from outer space, passing through, but they are harmless. Everybody chuckled as they looked their way and Bayta waved back.

Kalisha and the older adult approach them. The woman said, Hello! Holler if we can be of help, but as you can see we have our hands full. Eden and the rest of them are really excited about their Perradero. They want to learn about unbreakable encryption, she looked at Eden and said, especially Eden here. Oh, and my name is Camdyn.

With that, they turned around to rejoin their group. Eden suddenly looked back and said, of course, you can join if you want. That was all that Petra and Ignatius needed to hear. Petra stayed behind taking care of some things on her mobile.

The Perradero team had already co-organized to learn about encryption. Becket was set to help Ada and Rodrigo about hashes and matrix algebra, while Bonnie was already sitting with Eden, helping her learn about how matrices worked. Mike, Kalisha, and Camdyn were standing by themselves talking about how to help the others learn about encryption. Mike knew it in an intuitive way, but he struggled to explain it to others.

Ignatius knew a bit about encryption, so he headed for Kalisha and Mike.

Petra was standing back.

Bayta came to stand with Petra. You are not going to join them?

A quick, short No came out of Petra. She finally said, I am too slow for math. Some kind of attention thing.

Got it. How’d you find out?

The master had a guy evaluate me and that’s what came out, said Petra, a bit more relaxed.

So, someone from The Bracia hierarchy said it.

Yes, Petra said very slowly. You could almost hear the gears turning in her head. Then, her shoulder came down and she seemed more relaxed. Can I start with Ada and Eden?

Of course. And, you can stay with them for as long as you need. You can also move to another group when you are ready. Either way, nobody is going to be bothered by your moving around, that’s the way it works. Only you know when you’re ready to move on and we’ve all learned to respect that.

Almost in cue, Ignatius butt crawled to the group with Beckett.

Petra started to move towards Bonnie and Eden, then she turned around and said, I’ve never felt scared and excited at the same time… but I guess it’s all facing the unknown.

Bayta went outside and busied herself with her mobile. She finally noticed the time and realized that it was early afternoon. No wonder she was hungry.

Inside, there were only two groups now: Beckett, Ada, Bonnie, and Eden were in one, and Mike, Kalisha, and Rodrigo were in the other. From the dishes around them, she could tell that they had eaten already. So she headed for the kitchen where she saw the young woman.

Hi, is there anything left?

Yes, they made sure there was enough left for you.

BTW, I am Bayta.

And I am Pacifica. Good to meet you. How are they doing?

It’s only been three days, but they are both taking in a lot and not missing a thing. Petra is more guarded and Ignatius more intrepid. In any case, they seem to be liking everything they’ve experienced once they get a chance to interact.

Glad they have somebody like you to help them, Pacifica was being sincere.

Yes, we are a good match. I am somewhere between Petra and Ignatius. I volunteered and we decided very quickly I would go with them.

Pacifica leaned in and asked, Where are you going?

Not sure how far they’d want to go. But I am taking the opportunity to have them experience the way we live our lives. I knew it was very different in The Bracia, but if these guys are typical, it is very different.

By the time Bayta came out of the kitchen, all the Perradero kids were bunched around Camdyn and she was talking a mile a minute, projecting graphs, and running simulations. Eden was dancing with the imagery that came out of Camdyn’s mobile.

RADs!

Have you figured how you want to handle your RADs? Camdyn asked the Perradero kids as they were walking out.

No, Kalisha said. We’ll have to figure that out.

What are RODs? Ignatius asked.

Rodrigo was first to respond, RADs, RADs. As in RADICAL, probably.

They are like stars or stickers, Bonnie said. When I was little they gave us shiny stars that we could stick to our face.

Ignatius was still puzzled, You mean like the demerits?

What are demerits? Now it was Bonnie’s turn to be confused.

Like, when you do something wrong? It’s better than being hit. Ignatius said matter-of-factly.

Petra jumped in, Do you get punished for doing something wrong?

Who would punish us? And how can you learn ‘wrong?’ Becket said.

Well, Petra said, where we come from we have an adult teaching a bunch of kids all the same age. We call them Masters. If any of the kids does or says anything the Master doesn’t like, they are punished. Sometimes they get, like, negative RADs, that we call demerits and sometimes they are made to sit in a corner. If the Master is really miffed, he hits the kid.

Eden was close to tears when she asked, Why?

Petra looked at Eden and softly said, I don’t really know why. But I am starting to suspect that they want us to accept being in fear. It certainly has nothing to do with learning. She looked at Ignatius and he had a glazed look and was slowly punching his thigh.

Ignatius snapped out of it and said, OK, so what are RADs good for?

Smiling Ada said, gleefully, Reeeeeeee-cognition! Rodrigo and Eden gave each other high-fives and then all the other kids started jumping up and down, including Mike who was even smiling for the first time.

Kalisha looked at Bayta and she gestured a go ahead at Kalisha.

OK, so we give each other RADs. For example, Beckett worked well with Ada and Rodrigo, so I’d give them one RAD. But, Eden did a fantastic job of learning about matrices, so I’d give her two RADs. That’s what I saw and felt important to me, pointing at the others, they would notice different things; everybody sees things differently.

But what you did back there was learning, not about being efficient and producing. So, RADs have nothing to do with work? Petra was struggling.

OK… but that ‘learning’ contributed to Perradero because that ‘learning’ made them, all of us, more qualified to do what we want to do with Perradero. Kalisha looked surprised at Petra’s question. It would be less ‘efficient’ to not know about matrices, however you measure it.

Ignatius had another surprising question, So if you looked hungry and somebody brought food, that would be worth a RAD, right?

Well, said Kalisha, that’s just so common, but, yes, that’s the general idea. You give out RADs for whatever you think it’s important to people’s wellbeing and that is a contribution to Perradero.

Petra and Ignatius looked at each other with a look of surprise on their faces. Then they looked at Bayta.

What Kalisha said.

Then, what? Petra said, now looking at Bonnie. What are they good for?

Bonnie simply said, I divide my RADs by the total number of RADs we have given out and that’s my percentage of rCoins or whatever we distribute among ourselves. Actually, I don’t even do that, my mobile does.

We do it every month, said Eden.

That’s what you did in your previous company. Camdyn’s was reminding us that we have to decide how we want to do it with Perradero. Kalisha raised her hand, I’d say we have distribution parties every month, like Eden said. What say you, Perraderos?

They all raised their hands and it looked to Ignatius and Petra that the decision had been made. By a bunch of kids. Without rules from Masters or anybody. Hey, do you decide everything this way?

Beckett answered, Yes, all things that affect all of us. Otherwise, the people working on something made the decision and if somebody is left out and they don’t like it, they say so. He made a ‘thinking hard’ face and then asked, If you have to for your Masters to make a decision, isn’t that awfully inefficient?

That sounds awful. Ada said, Is that really how you do things?

Not anymore! exclaimed Petra, looking happier than ever before. Her and Ignatius were enthusiastically squeezing each other’s hands.

The percentage of RADs is also used to make decisions when people can’t agree and still want to remain together.

Wait, you mean that people don’t have to work if they don’t want to, Ignatius asked with his eyes ready to jump from his face.

I guess, but why wouldn’t you want to do something you wanted to do? Rodrigo asked.

I didn’t mean that. I meant… OK, can you just go work with somebody else? With people working on something else you found more interesting? Ignatius couldn’t get the words out fast enough. Can you choose who you work with?

We can. It’s up to us. Nobody can’t force me. Mike’s words made it all crystal clear.

Retrospection

Ignatius was looking through the few paper books in the house. I always thought of it as decoration, but according to Ignatius’ face it must have been fascinating.

When Petra came out of her room, her eyes were bloodshot. She came down plodding every step. Without saying a word she sat next to Ignatius. She looked more like a pile of wet towels than Petra.

Do you want to talk?

At the sound of my voice, they both looked my way. Ignatius realized that I was talking to Petra and he went back to his book. Petra stared past me for a while before responding, Yeah, let’s talk. In a bit.

I turned to work on my mobile, but Petra’s voice made me turn to her.

We make our own cages. They teach us how, but we make them. And then we live in them. We built these cages around us, from the inside out. We find our deepest fears and line them up in a circle around us. We push them out enough to create a bearable place in the middle. Petra stopped, and she started to sob. And… then… we give control of our fears to the Far and the Prime and the Masters and the rest of them. We are so used to it, we accept fear. Damn it… WE CRAVE FEAR!

Ignatius had put his book aside and was now intently listening to her. He hugged her and cried with her.

I was in shock and awe. I never expected her to come to this point so quickly, after a few short interactions with people outside The Bracia. I thought it would take Ignatius more than a few words from Petra. Powerful.

You crave fear?

I thought back at all the times that I heard that without law and order we would all be like wild animals, hurting and killing each other, said Petra.

‘Law and order’ is code for fear and rules. We never stop to think that it is our fear and their rules. Ignatius was looking at Petra in the eyes.

But we don’t have to. We would not be ‘like wild animals,’ Petra responded, equally focused on Ignatius. They were now like one person having an internal conversation. We’d figure out how to live with each other instead of dominating one another. No domination, no violence.

Petra broke from Ignatius and looked at me, The ones acting like wild animals are the Far and his whole gang. They are feeding off us. We are even sent to subjugate other people for them, so they can have even more people to suck dry. With those words, Petra stood differently: a puppet with no strings to hold her down.

The funny thing is this book with childlike adults, with no curiosity, said Ignatius. It’s just like The Bracia!

Oh, you were reading The Time Machine? Hooray for the decorations.

Ignatius looked puzzled.

I wasn’t making fun of you. I thought of those books as decorations and that’s why I said that. And, yes, I guess H G Wells was sensitive to the problem that violence and domination creates for people on both sides of it.

The Far and his ilk are like the Morlocks, continued Ignatius. We should call them that.

Maybe. But think of the impact that doing that would have on you and Petra. Maybe, rather than fighting The Bracia bosses, consider embracing them.

Ignatius took a step back and Petra got up with a fierce look on her face. Embrace them? she said in a restrained voice. And become like them?

I didn’t say anything about becoming like them. I said to consider embracing them. Not to sympathize with their manipulation and their actions, but they, and their families, are their own victims.

From the glazed look on Petra’s eyes, it was obvious that she had gone inside herself. Ignatius went to the kitchen and Petra turned and went upstairs. After so much emotion, the room felt cold so I went outside. There I realized that I was really experiencing fear and self-blame. I may have gone too far, too fast. They may not have been ready. I meditated and came out refreshed. After putting my fears in perspective, I went back inside and sat facing the back of the house, expecting them to come from upstairs and the kitchen. Then, after a bit, I realized that the back door was open. I came to it and saw them sitting in the middle of what would have been the backyard at one point having an animated conversation.

As she approached, Ignatius said, What you said was like a punch in the stomach but it was also mind-blowing, too. Thanks.

Yes, thanks! Petra said with a broad smile. One thing we figured is that we don’t know anything about you.

Well, like you, I came from a restrictive community, 10 years ago, The Bracia and my community were very similar, driven by their religious beliefs. I was almost 15 and they wanted me to marry into a compound headed by a 52 year old. My parents did not like that but they agreed that I wouldn’t have to move into his compound until I was 18. Nevertheless, a couple of his wives became very intrusive in our lives and when my mom pushed back most of the community became very hostile and we were declared apostates. That’s when my parents decided to leave. Luckily we have relatives in Hurricane. For a while, me and my siblings were pretty confused and it took us a while to adapt. My older brother even got into fights. Really, he attacked some of the local kids out of frustration when they tried to talk about how they were going to work together. We missed the rules because that’s what we had grown up with. The men in the community interpreted the wishes from God above and God felt warm and comfortable.

As to the question you didn’t ask: that’s why we agreed pretty quickly that I would be a good guide for you two. It was the most proximate to you.

What do you mean by ‘proximate?’ Petra asked, although it seemed that she already knew the answer.

It means that my experience is closest to yours and stands a better chance of helping you learn about the RADICAL approach. But it looks like you two would have figured things out quickly no matter what. You are surprisingly agile, like, you should be angry at me, not be sitting here, all smiles.

We were angry at you, Petra said while looking at Ignatius. But then we came downstairs and talked, then came out here and talked some more, and then Ignatius got up and danced and I felt the same way. We were talking some more when you showed up.

I danced because I felt lighter, like I had felt before, said Ignatius, Well, like I had never felt like for a long time, probably since I was very little. We realized that we didn’t have to be angry at The Bracia. In a way, everything that’s happened to us has brought us to now and we like this now.

We still have to help the people we left behind have the same opportunity, Petra said. We were talking about that when you showed up.

And… ?

And… we don’t know, yet. Petra said as she and Ignatius laughed out loud.

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