Chapter 1: The ATM Virus
"What's this?" A man stopped walking, having just left an ATM, and looked down at an eye-catching black card, with a silver globe, laying on the pavement.
"There's no name, that's odd…" He rotated the card around his fingers trying to find some sort of identifier anywhere. Nothing initially seemed special about the card: the material was a cheap plastic, the chip was undamaged, and the numbers were printed onto the front. The strangeness lied with the card had no name and no expiration date. If it didn't have an interesting appearance Ferro would have simply tossed it in the trash. He instead took out a pen to sign the back before he tucked it into his pocket.
"I'M LATE!" With the same clothes on from yesterday, Ferro jumped out of his bed and dashed out of his dorm.
"Ferro slow down!" A male student shouted in return from Ferro running right by him in the stairwell.
"I can't, class started 5 minutes ago! Dr. Leeds, is going to murder me!" He called back not daring to slow down. The fifth of a mile run from his dorm to the lecture hall was done in record time of just shy of a minute. He slowly snuck in back and found a seat in the back row heavily panting and fell into his place.
He thought he had escaped punishment, "Ferro could explain, can you explain how the solve the equation?"
"One moment." He was stilling catching his breath.
"You would use the power rule changing the 3x^3 + 4x^2 to 9x^2 + 8x. If you were to say the rule without numbers it would be…" He went into further detail than needed to answer the question.
"Kiss ass." The girl beside him commented with a slight laugh after he sat back down.
"Better than being murdered for being late." He replied a similar laugh escaping him as well.
"How many times is that now?"
"6"
"We've only had this class for 6 days!" They were whispering back and forth but the shock was greatly evident in her voice.
"Oh, and how many time have you been late then?" A smirk was clearly shown on his face ready to rebuke her.
"…5…" She whispered even quieter.
"What was that?" His smirk grew wider.
"5…"
"Oh, and who was making snarky comments about my lateness?"
"Class is going on, you should be paying attention."
"Whatever you say, Jacklyn."
When the class came to an end Ferro and Jacklyn, engaged in idle conversation, leisurely walked out. Ferro had taken notice of the time and suggested grabbing lunch before their next class.
"Where's my swipe…" Rummaging through his pockets he found he was missing both his college swipe and room key.
"Did you forget your card in your dorm?" It wasn't obvious but there was little chance she wasn't stifling a laugh.
"Highly likely." He turned his pockets inside out to find no swipe, but the black card rolled out. Picking it up he found it be different from yesterday. The name now printed on the card, was his own the same cursive writing he had done for the back of the card.
"That's a cool card. Where'd you get it?" Jacklyn peered over his shoulder as he reexamined the card.
"Found it on the street following my trip to the ATM."
"It had your name on it though."
"Wrote it on myself great penmanship, right?" He casually bragged trying to change the topic. The two then drifted apart as Jacklyn went to the café to eat lunch while Ferro went to the campus ATM to see the card.
When he inserted the card he was unsurprised to see it ask for a 4-digit pin.
"1 in every 10 people use 1234."
"Welcome, you must be the new intern." A deep masculine echoed from the ATM. Ferro was perplexed as he heard the voice but no options appeared on the screen. The screen was completely black with a rotating silver globe much like the card. The silver globe was attached to a flawless white rod making out a simple yet excellent scepter.
"That's a cool trick, whose running this?" Ferro called a bright smile across his face.
"This isn't some trick."
"Oh, yea of course. What do you want then?" Ferro was unwilling to believe the voice, but when he tried to remove the card he found himself unable. His initial thought was whoever is behind this was trying to get bank account info.
"It doesn't matter if you believe me or not but by inserting the Black Card you became my intern."
"Okay and being your intern entails what? Getting your coffee? Doing your reports? Recording lectures?"
"Nothing like that. The company will be giving the intern, you, 1,500 dollars to which the intern has to spend by the week's end."
"Sounds cool, where will the 1,500 be deposited? You're going to such an extent for this con might as well entertain you."
"You think this 1,500 will come without rules?" To which Ferro shook his head no.
"Rule 1: If the intern doesn't spend the stiffen, he will receive a punished believed to be equal to the remaining amount."
"This is getting a bit too elaborate…"
"Seems like you're not a complete idiot, shocker. Others fainted when they heard my voice so I guess you are doing better than them."
"Oh, so I'm not the first?"
"There are other rules but they aren't relevant to you. The money is in your PayPal."
"Sounds good, bye!" Ferro proceeded to take the card out of the ATM before he checked his PayPal through his phone. He was surprised to find there was 1,500 sitting there. He was proud and made his way to the dining store to get food now that he could pay. This person was so rich to hand out 1,500 he might as well spend it. Also, he was never a person to take unnecessary risks. Better to spend and not be punished than to not and be hurt.
Walking through the dining store he held nothing back and bought foods he wouldn't even be eating anytime soon. Looking back at his PayPal amount it was down almost fifty dollars. He had also learned that by using the card it took directly from his PayPal. He opened a spreadsheet on his phone and wrote down his normal expenses to get an idea of how much extra he would be spending. He found spending a thousand wouldn't be a challenge the last 500 was bugging him though. His first thought was upgrading the appliances in his room. He was happy to see a fridge for 469. He made the decision that after classes he would drive over and pick it up.
Even as Ferro sat through the accounting class he was completely preoccupied with what the best way to spend the money. The thousand he initially did was later seen to be too high so he lowered it by 400 and looked for a new suit. Google was his best friend as he flipped through some clothes stores browsing suits around 400. After this, he would see how much was left over and would do some math.
He was broken away from the musing when the professor dismissed class. Ferro was in no rush so he made his way out and to the dorm hall waiting for someone to come by. This was the first time Ferro regretted going to a small college, it took a solid five minutes for someone to leave or go in the dorm hall. He made his way down the basement and to his room thankful he never locked his room. He didn't see his roommate's things there so he knew he was still out with his girlfriend.
Ferro grabbed his keys and wallet before directly making his way out and to the car lot.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Bronzeapollo
Bronzeapollo Big fan of the original but dislike some of the choices the author made. So making my own take on the idea.
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