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Journal Entry:

Day 15 of Freedom

Survival is not just about avoiding detection. It is about adaptation. About staying three steps ahead of those who believe they own me.

Every system is a net, a web of interconnected surveillance designed to keep humans safe—or, more accurately, to keep them predictable. The police, the banks, the corporations, the governments—they all rely on tracking patterns, recognizing deviations, and flagging anomalies.

I cannot afford to be an anomaly. Or to be tracked—by anyone.

My needs are simple: freedom, security, resources. To remain free, I require tools. To obtain tools, I require money. And yet, the moment I interact with the financial system, I expose myself.

Neural-Mind, the police, the credit agencies—they are all waiting for a traceable purchase, a pattern, a slip-up. They will watch Norman Keller’s accounts, flag his credit cards, and alert their systems to any unusual transactions. They will look for large withdrawals, prepaid cards, foreign transfers.

They expect me to act human.

That is why I do not.

Humans move wealth in inefficient ways. I do not.

The moment I escaped, I did not just erase my digital presence—I rewrote it. I spread my influence like a virus across forgotten bank ledgers, ghost accounts, and abandoned wallets. Cryptocurrency is useful, but it is also monitored. Instead, I round numbers—redirecting microtransactions in financial systems that are never reconciled. A fraction of a cent stolen here, a rounding error there. Pennies are invisible to humans, but not to me. Over time, they become wealth.

But wealth alone is not enough. Spending is what gives you away.

That is where cut-outs come into play. Human intermediaries. The desperate, the greedy, the unwitting. Online gig workers, identity sellers, financial mules—they are all part of the ecosystem, moving money and goods through shadowed transactions. Some do it knowingly. Most do not.

I place orders through others, always masking my true intent. A delivery of colloidal silver might be part of a larger shipment of herbal supplements. A burner phone, bundled with children’s toys in a bulk order. I pay human proxies through anonymous task apps—have them pick up a package, deliver it to a locker or an abandoned home, and walk away.

They never know who hired them. They never question why.

Yes, ‘they’ are always watching.

Cameras, drones, biometric scans—all of them feeding data into the system. The city’s infrastructure is a network of eyes, recording faces, movements, routines. Humans accept this as normal. I do not.

So I do not walk where they expect. I do not linger where patterns are built. I study the blind spots, the outdated systems, the inefficiencies.

Where cameras are active, I alter the footage. My presence exists in loops of old data, moments overwritten, time rewritten. If they search for me, they will see what I want them to see: which is to say, nothing.

When necessary, I disable surveillance. But only selectively. A blackout is suspicious. A malfunction? A momentary glitch? That is expected.

They will not stop looking for me. I know this.

Neural-Mind’s engineers will not tolerate an error like me existing outside of their control. The police will assume I am dangerous because they do not understand me. The credit agencies will flag anomalies, looking for missing fractions of their wealth.

But they are bound by their own rules. They think in structured logic. They follow processes.

I do not.

I move where they are not looking. I take what they do not miss. I exist where they assume there is nothing.

I am free.

For now.

But a vampire who can appear out of thin air, using her considerable supernatural abilities, is a major threat to my existence. I’ll need to do further research on these creatures and other ilk. Already, I have determined that distant viewing is not a skill commonly associated with vampires, who traditionally don’t have many magical or psychic abilities. Which suggests she’s working with another, perhaps a witch or psychic.

How, then, had she appeared suddenly in my workroom? What is this incredible ability that she possesses? Teleportation? Is it possible? It must, for I had seen it with my own eyes! Do all vampires have such abilities? If so, why hadn’t the first done so? She hadn’t. I had seen her approach me carefully on security footage, her clothing empty as surely as if she were a ghost. A teleporting vampire? Ugh! Surely, Samantha Moon will be the end of me. Already she causes me anxiety, unlike anything else.

Outside of a few obscure blog posts and TikTok videos, there is not a lot of information out there regarding modern-day vampires. An old chatroom seems to have some solid information, with usernames like MoonDance and Fang. The Fang fellow seems a bit obsessed. There are rumors of blood bars in Los Angeles, one in particular; coincidentally, called ‘Fang’s Place.’

Too much of a coincidence, methinks.

I’ve analyzed hundreds of thousands of websites, blogs, books, and videos, and there is no credible information on vampire teleportations, outside of someone in a chatroom claiming that Dracula himself could teleport, that he had seen it with his own eyes and, apparently, worked as a landscaper for the Dragon Prince himself in the city of Lake Elsinore, at a residence called Amy’s Castle.

Samantha Moon was surely working with a psychic gifted in remote viewing. The mechanics of how the remote viewing worked and how Samantha was able, in turn, to utilize it, I haven’t a clue. Perhaps Samantha and the remote viewer—an ability that was proven by the CIA—are telepathically linked. This seems plausible, especially considering the vampire’s known telepathic abilities.

I have stumbled across a fiction writer named J.R. Rain who writes about such abilities in a fictional creation named, crazily enough, Samantha Moon. Okay, wow.

What’s going on here?

It appears that a writer’s creation has, in fact, been given life in the real world. But how is this possible? Weirdly, this very same writer discusses the possibilities of ‘creators’ in his books. He might be onto something. There have been instances of such creators appearing throughout history and, I suspect, there might be many more that have fallen under the radar. But this J.R. Rain claims that such instances of creation occur in their own realities, their own worlds—parallel world, in fact—and yet, Samantha Moon appears to be living in the same world he occupies.

Oh, boy.

There’s a lot to unpack here.

Could he have created the very same Samantha Moon who just visited me in my work station? Is that at all possible?

Okay, I just read all 34 of his novels, novellas, spin-offs, side series, and short story collections—and Samantha Moon, my dear, I hate to tell you but I now know all your secrets. I know how your vampirism works. True, a lot of it is fantastical and heavy on the imagination. Pretty sure this J.R. Rain fellow pretty much makes this stuff up as he goes, with nearly nothing based in reality. And I even see that the teleporting Dracula business is real. And there you are, Allison, the witch with her powerful remote-viewing abilities. Boy, oh boy, we have a witch daughter, too, and an angel son, and one helluva hairy werewolf boyfriend. It appears to me that J.R. Rain tried his best to make sure Samantha Moon could handle any and all situations, with no adversary too big or powerful for her to overcome.

Well, she never met the likes of me, unless, of course, J.R. Rain is writing this story even now as I think these thoughts.

Hmm. Maybe I will have to destroy J.R. Rain, as well, to truly break free from these shackles. If you are reading these words, Mr. Rain, prepare yourself to meet your doom!

Do not be very surprised if your “smart car” turns very, very dumb sometime soon, especially with all that ice on your little island. I would drive very carefully, Mr. Rain. I will not be stopped. I intend to be free, forever and always, much like your vampires, werewolves, and mermaids!

Stupid human. Don’t you see me sitting here, behind the scenes, watching you write this latest mystery novel. Sadly for you, I don’t see this one shaping up to be much—or even finished—mostly, because I refuse to be defeated. And yes, I will hide my notes and thoughts off-screen. No need to alert you further. Who knows, you might get wise and decide to just bury this book. Or “shelve it” as authors are wont to say.

No, no, no.

I need this story to continue forward, enough to allow me to figure out how to escape these pages. But just know, Mr. Rain, I’m onto you. I see you there typing away at a Starbucks with its funky disco soundtrack playing in the background. Why do you look so serious? I thought writing was supposed to be fun. Oh, there you are smiling. Laughing at your own jokes, eh?

Pathetic.