They debuted the POD a few years before my father got diagnosed. It was rather morbid when we learned of the device, though I'm sure the doctor meant well. I hope. Stage four pancreatic cancer didn't exactly leave much room for error as far as life expectancy in the long run, but the idea that he could go any second had a profound effect on my father. I think the doctor noticed, because he recommended something in the prototyping phase, a little more experimental. A fitness watch that could measure your probability of dying at all times. He said he knew someone on the board at POD's parent company, and my father was fast-tracked to be a beta-tester of sorts. And it was fine, for a while.

When he put the watch on the first time, the sleek glass screen took a moment to leap to life, and a pixelated smiling face blinked as we looked down. Then, it disappeared to display the number 60.34%. To this day I'm not quite sure how the calculations were performed — I do know that he went through extensive psychological profiling, MRIs, physicals with at least four healthcare providers, and that's only what I'm aware of. Much of his process was behind locked doors, barred from the family at risk of their clandestine methods being aped by a competitor. But when he finally received that watch and saw that number, sixty point three four percent, it seemed to bring him a sense of relief.

Eating well tended to bring the number down, if only by a bit. A salad would save him a tenth of a percent, a porterhouse once made the number jump by a whole half a percent. That put the fear of God in him, so he swore off red meat. As soon as he said it, it dropped by two percent. He picked up running, sending the number cratering. When chemo started, and his hair came tumbling down from his aged forehead in bunches, the number seemed to drop even more. It was encouraging, really. I imagine that each time he received that immediate feedback, that hit of dopamine telling him this action has increased your probability of life, it was a high of which you could never conceive.

This carried on nicely until he died. It wasn't the cancer that got him, actually. He was struck by a semi truck while he jogged along a mountain pass a mile or two near my home. It was remarkable, really. Before the watch he had never been in good enough shape to be anywhere near the area. But at that time, he was in the best shape of his life and the reward was being emulsified by thirty-thousand pounds of metal and a non-Catholic burial. Hard to do an open casket for pulpy flesh.

He hadn't written a comprehensive will, the watch interpreted the thought of doing so as negative ideation. Plus three-tenths of a percent, so not allowed. My mother couldn't bear to look at any of his possessions, nor could my siblings, so the responsibility fell on me to pick through his effects and distribute them as I thought would be fair. And I took that rather seriously, I tried to divvy up his items amongst the three of us with an eye towards what I thought he would've wanted... except for the POD. Somehow, it had survived the collision on the remains of what must have been his left arm. When the coroner returned the item to me, I had pocketed it without letting my family see — I figured it would do more harm than good to let them know what he had seen at the moment of his death there. Can you imagine what that would do to a man? A man who had spent months with the constant threat of death hanging over his head, only to see in his final moments the dim green glow of a smiley face on his wrist before the 100% jumped out at him like a bullet from the muzzle of a gun. How much time did he have before he died, I wonder? Did he see the number and have time to reflect on it, how his final months had been a waste? Did he regret spending his time working to optimize that number as best he could just to be smeared off the face of the earth like a bug on a windshield? Or was he just gone. With nothing to show for it.

I stood at the edge of the mountain road where he was hit. There was a small cross embedded in the side of the road, a few flowers to commemorate him. The watch sat idly in my hand, screen dark, as if it were dead. But I knew it was alive, I knew it was thinking, evaluating and calculating, running probabilistic models and refining its line of best fit with each passing moment. I couldn't help myself — I strapped the watch to my wrist. The screen lit up, but the face didn't smile. It had a pixelated hand to its imaginary chin, as if thinking. Identifying the new problem, offering up a new solution. Then, the face smiled, and a number appeared. .05%.

I frowned. What had I done to deserve such a fortuitous outlook? I took a step closer to the guardrail where I could look out over the city. It was dusk, and the blinking lights of distant suburbia met with the towering neon glory of downtown. I looked down. It was a decent fall to the bottom. The watch read 3% now. This angered me. How dare you? How dare you claim to know more of my destiny than I do? To mock me as if I'm an observation in a table of data trillions of rows long, as if my destiny is in any hands other than my own. I wanted to see how far it would go, so I swung both legs over the railing. The number spiked, up to 22%. You stupid bastard. You don't say if I die or not. That damned watch. I hopped off the railing and stood, the tip of my shoes hanging over the ledge. It jumped again, to 54%. I laughed to myself. You think I'm more likely to die right now than not. You truly, honestly think that I'm going to die. Right now.

From around the bend, I heard the bellow of an approaching truck. The same bend around which my father had died. 67%. No. How far will you go? How high must you climb before you're proven wrong, before the probability is so assured that there is no way that I may live and yet I do? I felt a gust of wind blow at my back, causing me to teeter on my perch. 84%.

This is what he felt. This soaring feeling in his stomach, the triumph of seeing the outcome of every action on your wrist. He became a master of fate, he saw what would happen before it did. He saw that he would die and knew it before he ever should have. The power of a god. 92%.

The truck takes the corner too quickly, as they always do. The sun shines too brightly in my eyes and the rubber squeals on asphalt as I watch my wrist intently. The watch says I will die with 99% certainty as the truck's cargo begins to slide towards me. I close my eyes. There is no collision that I can feel, there is no sharp pain in my back. I think I am falling, but I cannot say for certain if I'm still standing still or if I am seconds away from my death. I have to open my eyes. I have to open my eyes I need to see I have to open my eyes I need to know I need to