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into place inside the case. I connected it to the board with the strange fiber-optic cable that was provided. I did the same with the optical media drive , which a small part of me hoped actually worked, and actually played Blu-Ray discs. My father had just received the director’s cut of “Scarface,” completely remastered for high definition. We’d watched that movie at least twenty times before my fourteenth birthday, something my mother had always complained about. The only reason I was allowed to each time, is that I’d never uttered any of the curse words that were liberally sprinkled throughout the movie. My father had warned me when I was eight that if I ever repeated any of those words out loud, we’d go back to watching cartoons or doing nothing at all.
    I secured the power cell in the case, then connected the motherboard to it. I tried to find the extra cables to attach to the hard drive and optical drive, but there seemed to be none. After a minute of searching through the two components’ manuals, I found out why there was no cable. Apparently, the peripherals of this “quantum computer” were powered wirelessly. I couldn’t help but laugh again. I almost wanted to glance around and make sure my mom or someone else wasn’t filming me, catching me on video actually putting this… thing… together as if it was a real computer.
    Once I had everything installed, I put the panel on the case and took it into my room. I went back into the living room and cleaned up all of the packaging and shipping boxes, stacking them near the door to the garage. I’m not sure why, but I guess some part of me believed I was going to turn the stupid thing on and it would actually work. Hah hah again , I thought. The one box I’d opened but hadn’t messed with yet was the one that supposedly contained a flatscreen monitor. I was a bit disappointed when I pulled the parts out. Maybe the jokesters had run out of steam, or maybe this was the best they could come up with.
    Out of every component, the monitor was the one that screamed “fake!” the most. A small square base with a thin metal rod sticking up almost two feet from it was what I ended up putting together. I stared at it for almost a minute, wondering just how gullible I really was. I leaned forward and saw a flash of light from my desk lamp reflecting off something in the box. I leaned down and pulled on it, and a thin sheet of transparent, extremely flexible plastic unfolded and became semi-rigid, enough to keep its rectangular shape.
    It was maybe a foot square, and on what I guess was the back of it was a small piece of plastic that looked like an exact fit to put it on the metal rod that stuck out of the base. Another mental shrug later and it was attached. I sat back and looked at it, breaking into laughter over the complete cheese that it was. It seemed like one of those ultra-cheap props in a science fiction movie.
    The manual said that it too was a wirelessly powered peripheral. I nodded, as if it should have been a no-brainer, and put the manual back in the box. The only thing I seemed to be missing was a mouse and a keyboard.
    “Damn it,” I grunted, remembering that I hadn’t ordered either component.
    I unhooked my mouse and keyboard from the old computer, and turned the new one around to plug them in. I searched the back panel of the case for inputs, but there seemed to be none. Not even the punch-outs that usually covered the holes until they were needed.
    “What the…” I said, rotating the case back around to see if there were ports on the front.
    None. This time I physically shrugged, and pushed the mouse and keyboard off to the side. I reached over and hit what the manual said was the “powered state” button. Nothing happened.
    “Derp,” I said out loud, remembering that I hadn’t plugged the power cell into the wall outlet.
    I stopped for a second, trying to remember if I’d even seen a power cord for the power cell. I walked to