CHAPTER 55: THE LEAST WORST LAPTOP!

"Which one of them could it be?" I pondered as I looked at the bookshelf, trying to find the oldest book among them. And then picking up three of them, I put them on the bed and began flipping through each of them.

While the first two were empty, from the third book, 10 notes of $50 each, making a zig-zag motion, slowly levitated down onto the white bedsheet. The silver-gray coloured notes with the picture of our president looked iconic as usual, while a bright, idiotic smile formed on my face as I counted them at a single glance.

Picking them up one by one, as I counted them again, I looked for the creases or cuts present on the notes. Finding that all of them were still neat and clean, despite being kind of old, made me smile in relief.

Seems like I still had the habit of keeping emergency money in old books. Hmmm. From the looks of the notes, I might have been collecting them for over a year now.

Good job, old me! Or perhaps it’s the other me? Old other me? Hmmm...

This habit of keeping money in an old book was something that I picked up from my grandfather a very, very long time ago. It had been repeated so many times that even when I had millions of dollars in my account, I usually still kept about $10,000 in one of my favourite books.

More than the idea of keeping money in the books, what I liked about this habit the most was that it reminded me of my childhood days. Days when I was carefree, enjoying everything in front of me. Even a single marble or cloth hanger could become the great marble of truth, or the flying boomerang.

It wasn’t faster than Mom’s slipper though... There were a few... scary memories as well. I shuddered thinking about them.

Counting the notes once again, I put them in my back pocket while looking at the time.

[4: 21 PM]

Not too late, I hope. I thought as I began recalling everything that I needed to buy today. All the hardware, and any necessary accessories. I also wanted to keep the laptop cost under $200 and the hardware cost around $300.

A PC or a laptop whose main component is intact while all the other components are missing would be ideal. Something like that can be haggled for even under $150. If the shopkeeper is a bit naive, I can even make it around $100. I thought as I took an empty handbag with me, mostly to save the money on paper bags, which aren’t necessary and are a kind of waste of money if one is not prepared.

Another advantage of having all key components intact in the PC is that the cost of other components is far cheaper, and they are easier to install as well. Plus, if the PC is too old, as I am intending it to be, finding a key component would be equally difficult. Something I would like to avoid.

Lastly, I also wanted to build the PC from scratch, or at least as low as possible. If I use my own modified hardware, with the added benefit of having my own Operating System, it would be far easier to become untraceable than choosing a random company PC.

Carrying the small backpack with me, I reached the laundry lady and gave her the pending $20, and then traced my steps to the nearest bus station.

I think the market area had a special section for computer stores and hardware. I recalled before paying another $2 for the ticket to the Sifa Market, the location where that market area was.

20 minutes on the bus, and another 20 minutes as I walked to the edge of the market before I finally saw about a dozen computer shops selling high-tech variety. The banners showed all sorts of specs and models, showing their better graphics, faster speed and offers that would make one wonder if it could get any cheaper than this.

Scammers. Was all I could think of them.

My steps took me through the deeper section of the computer market until I landed in the area where cheaper or second-hand models were sold. Of the shops, I chose the one whose shopkeeper seemed the easiest to manipulate. A child no older than 15 years, watching Terminator 2 with great interest in his eyes, sat on the table with no concern for his rundown shop.

The only things that attended to it were the flies and the buzzing mosquitos flying around, searching for any hints of food they could prey upon.

Found my lamb. I smiled as I walked towards him.

"Chill out, dickwad."

"Hehehe..."

Looking at the scene, even I was intrigued to wait and see what would happen next. But then I moved forward, reaching the shop.

-Tap! Tap!

I tapped the counter.

Nothing happened.

-Tap! Tap!

The boy heard but was too engaged to react.

-TAP! TAP! TAP!

"What?!!" he asked, turning around, his eyes annoyed, half focused as he looked at me wondering why I would disturb his movie session.

"Got any second hands?" I asked, which he answered with a reflex question.

"Price?"

"200 at most," I gave him the max I could.

He nodded before pointing to the edge of the shop, where a bunch of rundown laptops were kept.

"Select from that section," he said before pointing to another section of the shop filled with sockets and wires.

"And check it there," he added before refocusing on the movie.

Moving towards the section, I found 4 laptops that seemed to be somewhat in the right condition, and, taking them out, I used the screwdriver to open them up first.

While the first and the third were fine, with many components intact, the second one fitted my conditions perfectly. That is, it only had the main components. The others were gone.

Perfect.

"Hey! What are you doing?!!" The boy, finally noticing what I was doing, panicked before running towards me with all his might.

"You have to-" as he was about to threaten me, I took out 2 $50 notes and gave them to him.

"This won’t function more than just opening the screen and moving the mouse pointer. Forget about $200 you can’t even sell it for free in these times," I spoke as I gained his attention before speaking,

"$100 and we have a deal."

"How can you be so sure that it won’t work?" He asked as his eyes narrowed at me.

I simply smirked before answering," Will you be able to understand if I explained it to you?"

"..."

He looked at me for a few seconds before saying," $150."

"$100 and I won’t tell anyone about the missing components of the other laptops," I gave a business smile as I looked at him. Narrowing his eyes at me. And then, thinking about something, he spoke,

"Can you fix a computer?"

Where did that come from?

"Depends on the problem," I answered.

"If you can fix it, I will give you this for free," he added, and I nodded. It wasn’t a bad deal.

Taking out a laptop that seemed to be in pretty good condition, he placed it on the table.

"We got this yesterday. Shuts down every 20 minutes before restarting," he said before getting ready to show me the whole thing.

Though I stopped him from speaking further before moving my hands towards the keyboard...

5 minutes later.

Walking outside the shop with a smile on my face, I chuckled recalling the dumbfounded and amazed expression of that boy. He saw me creating a program at a breath-neck speed and fixing a problem that many whom he had asked before could not.

It was a minor Trojan. A bit tricky to spot, but nothing too hard about finding and removing. I smiled as fixing the problem didn’t even take more than a few minutes.

Next destination: Hardware store! Mission... hmm, can’t think of any proper description. As I pondered some stupid things, I found myself standing in front of the hardware store, which was almost within walking distance from the previous store.

About 200 meters away.

But compared to the previous small store, this one was a big hardware store, where about 2-3 people were entering and exiting at the same time.

Not really caring about the difference, I moved inside the shop, picked up a small cart and began moving towards the section where the parts that I wanted were.

Reaching the section, as I was just about to see what items it had, it hadn’t been even a second until I heard a feminine voice.

"You are... Mikael, right?"

Turning around, I found a familiar face, one that I did not expect to see so soon.

Daniel’s cousin, Niel and Yemir’s younger sister.

Lisa Rothrak.