You and Barry rush back to your apartment

You never realized how far away your apartment was from the elevator, it feels like it takes forever for you to reach your front door. When you and Barry finally arrive, you notice......that it’s ajar, not thinking, you immediately step in. You’re lucky it’s only one room besides the bathroom and they’re both empty, your room however, has been tossed. Clothes strewn haphazardly, every drawer and cabinet open and it’s contents on the floor, closet ransacked, mattress flipped and leaning vertically against the wall.

You examine your terminal desk’s surroundings and the drawer that contained the wooden box, the box is no where to be found...Your heart skips a beat. Explaining your thoughts, you shut the door and Barry helps you shift a heavy metal dresser in front of the door as well as the mattress. It has quickly dawned on you that someone could have been in here waiting....Hopefully they didn’t know about the box’s contents. There’s a chance, the box was valuable enough by itself, but this wasn’t one of the really bad mega towers.

Snapped into focus by adrenaline you look to Barry and he guides your next move,

“Pulll up the CBUP site on the net then open an account. Trust me John, this is the best way to do things. I’ve fantasized about this in my spare time tens of times before, planned out the perfect scenario back when I was a kid and believed I could miraculously find a bitcoin or a piece of one, one day!”

Barry’s confidence reassures you, he’s never been the most confident guy but the way he’s speaking to you now, he looks like he could lead a battalion of men. You follow his instructions without hesitation,

“Do a fully verified account, it’ll be connected to your genetic and neurological profile making it impossible to forge. You have to have a certain amount of credits to make that level of an account worth their while to be free, but worst case we just cancel it within 24 hours.”

It takes time to jump through all the hoops to reach the point where you are finally able to add funds to your account.

“Add funds, choose other, select legacy then crypto currencies and select BTC.”

You follow his instructions to a letter and on the screen two fields appear, one says Public Key the other Private Key. Underneath in in bold red letters states,

“More than three fraudulent attempts to add funds from a Bitcoin Wallet will be initiate ICE countermeasures and log your location for authorities.”

You look at Barry concerned, “Don’t worry,” he reassures you, “We’re only going to try once, and I have a very good feeling about this.”

“Alright, here goes”

You proceed place the slab on the desk, turn up the lights and begin to very carefully input the string of 34 alphanumeric characters, one into each field. With an exhale of finality, you submit the transaction and wait....It feels like an eternity but after a few minutes you receive a prompt

“Invalid Public or Private Key, please attempt again, two attempts remaining. If you believe this is in error please set an appointment with one of our specialists at the Central Bank of the United Planets.”

Your heart sinks, it feels like a black hole has opened up in your chest, “That’s it...” you think.

Good old Barry simply says, “Switch the numbers...” The hole instantly refills with warmth and a tingling sensation washes over your body in relief and comprehension. You switch the numbers and resubmit the transaction. Another eternity of processing, but this time you feel good about it. Even so your heart is hammering in your chest for the few minutes it takes.

Instead of a prompt the screen refreshes and you are returned to your account summary screen....

Account Balance

UPEC (United Planets Energy Credits) = $0.00

CryptoCurrencies

Currency Total Current Market Value (UPEC)
BTC (Bitcoin Legacy) 100 $3.57 x 10^16

Your fun at the Pantheon hadn’t been more than $500, your breakfast this morning $5....You’re fucking Rich!!!