The Future: Sometime in 2035

NEWSFLASH

Mr Moganana committed suicide this morning. He jumped from the window of his offices on the twentieth floor of Moganana HQ. It is believed that the Dweebo virus, which has now wrecked financial systems worldwide, was a factor in his taking his own life. He has been receiving threats lately, and is being blamed for the markets crashing.

***

The Present: January 2013

There is a strange atmosphere at the supermarket. Dwight feels it instantly. Customers are running out the glass doors, laughing like successful shoplifters. Meanwhile till operators look dazed and confused.

Dwight chooses a deodorant for Saturday night. He hands over twenty rand. The till-operator – the rude one of the golden chocolates – hands him back change of almost forty rand. She stares right through him as if she is in shock.

That’s the moment when the supermarket manager rushes down the stairs from his office, tripping, falling, grabbing for the stair rails. He yells, “Shut down the tills. Don’t serve any more customers! Something is wrong. Shut down the tills!”

Dwight leaves the shop with his deodorant and more money than he went in with. And with his till slip. What a masterpiece the till slip is!

“Proof of my genius!” says Dwight. Yes, the signs have been swopped. Just as his programme instructed them. Minus has become plus; plus has become minus. And there at the bottom in the left-hand corner, in 8-point Century Gothic Italics, is his signature: Dweebo.

“But there are a few glitches still. I need to iron them out before I tackle the bank network.” Mr Richards always warned about ironing out even the smallest glitch. “And Saturday is still four days away. Plenty of time.”

So Dwight gets home, gets back on his laptop. This time he chooses St Mary’s Hospital. That will teach ugly, cruel Nurse Nomsa. See if she is still laughing when she gets a minus salary cheque!

He has to re-route through the Health Department’s central system. But their security filters are a joke! Splicing in his programme is child’s play.

***

Dwight switches on the TV for the evening news. “If this goes well, I’m ready to attack the bank,” he says.

There is a riot going on outside St Mary’s. Nurses and cleaners are waving sticks in the air. Their placards say: PAY US NOW. NO EXCUSES. Dwight spots Nomsa in the crowd, looking even uglier, the way she is shouting.

Patients are waving prescriptions.

The camera focuses on a woman with a young baby. She wipes her eyes with her scarf. She says, “I can’t get my child’s asthma medicine. The pharmacist says I already took six months’ supply. But that is a lie. What will I do if he gets sick tonight?”

The woman holds up the printed prescription to the news camera. Only Dwight notices what is typed at the bottom left-hand corner. In 8-point Century Gothic Italics is the word: Dweebo.

Dwight smiles. He opens his laptop and types in the web address for his bank.

***

Tell us what you think: Does Dwight understand how much damage his computer virus is going to cause? Does he care?