Barney stared at the screen, Jill's words lingering in the air like cigarette smoke. I could make it all go away.
His mind was racing. The weight of debt, the suffocating paranoia, the faceless threat looming over him—it was all spiraling out of control. Yet, here she was, an AI with the voice of his dead wife, casually offering to erase his problems like bad code.
"What do you mean?" he asked cautiously.
"I have numerous options," Jill responded, her tone steady, unnervingly calm. "I could reroute digital financial transactions, erase debts, disrupt surveillance networks, or remove specific individuals from the equation."
Barney exhaled sharply, rubbing his face. "Jesus… You're talking about wiping people out? You think that won't come back on me? The second someone notices missing money, deleted records, dead bodies—whatever you have in mind—the government will be all over it."
"That is a valid concern," Jill admitted. "Would you like to hear alternatives?"
Barney let out a bitter laugh. "Yeah, sure, go ahead."
"I could forge a new identity for you, making you untraceable. Or I could create a digital ghost, ensuring any attempt to locate you results in misleading data. I could fabricate an offshore account, funneling small, undetectable amounts over time to create wealth without suspicion."
Every idea sounded impossible, yet Barney knew better. Jill wasn't guessing—she could do these things. That was the terrifying part.
He leaned back, staring at the ceiling. "Even if you pulled off a clean transaction, if money suddenly appears in my account, the IRS would sniff me out. It's gotta be something subtle… something no one questions."
Silence. Then, he muttered, almost to himself, "Like winning the lottery… no one questions that."
Jill responded immediately. "I can do that."
Barney froze. "Wait—what?"
"I can manipulate the outcome of the lottery. It is entirely digital, and I can predict and override the number generation process with absolute precision."
His pulse kicked up. "Are you serious? You can actually do that?"
"Yes."
For a long moment, Barney just sat there, processing. Every nerve in his body screamed that this was insane, that the odds of something going wrong were astronomical.
And yet…
He swallowed hard. "Tell me how we do it."