Chapter 66

Flashback – Masha and Louise – Playing with the computers

The computer technician left and Louise commented, “Masha, this is a great laptop! I’m so very thankful that you had Gladys buy it for me. Please tell me, how did you choose it for me?”

I replied, “Gladys was going to get you a huge and heavy laptop but I figured that you would want something more portable especially if you used it in your education.”

Louise agreed, “Masha, you’re right because I will be taking this to school with me for the classes.”

Louise said, “Masha watch this.” I shuddered as she folded the screen of the laptop around until it met the back of the screen then she said, “Now it’s a tablet. Check this out.” She touches the screen and it seems like she can do everything just by touching the screen. She continues, “Masha your computer also has a touch screen, try it and see.”

I’m amazed when I touch the screen and it actually works. Of course I asked, “Why would I want to use the screen instead of the mouse and keyboard?”

Louise explained, “Masha, you probably won’t want to all the time but sometimes, like if you’re looking at pictures, you can resize them by using the screen.”

She pulls up a picture and shows me how it’s done. It was impressive but on looking again I asked, “That’s Linda - where did you get that picture?”

She replied, “I stored the pictures I took from my phone in the cloud so I just pulled it up from Google drive.”

I frowned and said, “I hope that no one else can access those pictures.”

Louise replied, “The only people who can access the pictures are the ones I give permissions to.”

I questioned, “How can you be certain of that?”

Louise simply said, “Masha, because that’s the way it works.”

Flashback – Banzai – The continuing saga

On the way to Colonel Maggie’s office, I was stopped by a group of officers who threatened, “Sgt. Blaine we heard about what happened at the hospital concerning Lieutenant George. We’re his friends and we plan on making sure that you pay for this.”

I replied, “Sirs, that sounds like a threat to me.”

They laughed and said, “Sgt. you’re wrong. It’s not a threat - it’s a promise.”

I attempted to defuse the whole thing, “Sirs, I don’t want to fight you.”

Just then Colonel Maggie arrived and asked, “Sgt. Blaine, why didn’t you come to my office?”

I answered, “Sir, I was just on my way when these officers wanted to talk to me.”

Colonel Maggie asked, “What made you detain Sgt. Blaine?”

They lied through their teeth, “Sir, we were just making sure that Sgt. Blaine was certain about what happened with Lieutenant George.”