There was a small change in chapter 2.17: Exploring the 4th
The meeting has been moved to September 28th from October 5th.
I had made a mistake with the timing.
My whole foray into Seattle’s matrix took no more than five minutes in real-time. That of course left me plenty of time for working on the new cyberware.
I worked on additional cybernetic muscles that were quite a bit faster, but a bit weaker than the thermally activated muscles. A variant of the electro-activated polymer. It had 4.5 times the activation speed of average human muscle, and 83 times the strength. The advantage was that it had its full strength at its full speed.
The disadvantage was that it required significantly more electric energy. To make it somehow work I had to create a cloning rig that permanently cloned blood cells, and then replace every single bone with energy cells. And that in addition to squeezing energy cells wherever there was room. Yes, of course, I also included a metabolic converter in the package, but it would take a week’s worth of 8000 kcal per day meals to charge the energy cells.
Despite that, a full replacement of all the muscles in a human body would only have around four hours of high-power mode until the cells were depleted. They could function at slightly above human norm in low-power mode powered by the metabolic converter but in that case, the charging of the cells would slow down.
And such usage would damage the cells over time. It would take about 1000 charging cycles to make the cells mostly useless, but I could not see a way around it. Yes, the cells could be reconstituted with NADA nanobots essentially rebuilding them in place, but I could not imagine that procedure as comfortable in any way.
The only other solution was to replace all the bones and other energy cells regularly. Unfortunately, I just saw no good solution.
But while I was at it, I designed replacements for every organ, except the brain. I could reduce the size of the intestines by nearly 70% while getting an increase in efficiency by nearly 80%. That meant that with this cybernetic system, we would get nearly twice the energy from food, while it took only 30% of the time to digest it.
That was naturally one upgrade I penned in for myself.
The new cybernetic heart I designed would actually require the blood vessels to be strengthened, or it might rupture them.
The lungs would be superior in aerating the blood by around 30%.
The kidneys were quite simple, and nothing new. The same with the liver.
All in all, I was able to reduce the volume of the internal organs by a bit more than half and increase their functionality by around 60% cumulative.
That would make not lobotomized cyborgs into a real threat for the first time since the great war. Now I just had to test it. Fortunately, there was an open-source clone protocol for remotely operated brain-deactivated clones.
It was icky, and a rather grey area morally, but it had to be done. Those modifications could not be tested on rats, and I certainly would not trust simulations with them.
That of course meant that it would take months before we had our first operational cyborg. It just could not be helped. Unless I was content with using 170-year-old technology.
Reluctantly, I also designed reflex boosters for rats. I had long ago rectified my oversight in not buying a lab-rat auto-surgeon. And as I normally did with lab equipment, I did not skimp. The model I had bought could work on up to 100 rats at once.
I had also built myself a new lab-cloning system. Instead of two weeks per batch, the new one took two days.
All in all, I had enough capacity to run an extensive test program on 200 rats in a couple of days.
I had even half an hour to play in my mindscape before I had my usual evening with Ben. Talk about being effective.
The next morning, at 6:30 I was preparing for the meeting. Yes, it was set up for 8:00, but I simply can’t stand being too late.
And 1½ hours were not that long to shower, dress, put on some war paint, and let me tell you, that VR course was a pain in the behind, and get flown to Enki-HQ. Still, I was roughly 15 minutes early.
Only to be waylaid by Michael.
“Good morning V. Nice meeting you here.”
As usual, his attempts at being funny were… not appreciated by the audience.
“Good morning Michael. Are you taking part as well?”
“Na, I have real work to do. You know, running this small mom-and-pop shop here. But I would like you to come to me when you are done here. I have another two meetings for you today.”
I tilted my head.
“Another two?”
“Ayup. One is the first C-suite meeting of Enki. So that you meet all the other central officers. And the other I’ll keep a surprise for now.” And still, there was his crooked smile, as if he was pranking the whole world, and me in special.
I just shook my head.
“You have way too much fun here.”
He chuckled.
“Of course. What’s not to have fun about? We have not one, but two absolute monopolies where each is a license to print money. And not one of the triple-As dares to attack us because of Warden.
And unlike most others, I know all the other toys that you have still in your toy chest. Nope, I have more fun than should be legal.”
I could only shake my head, but I couldn’t help myself and smile about his antics. He behaved like a little kid in a candy store.
“Well, when you are done dancing around in glee, I’ve another toy coming up for you.”
He tilted his head and raised an eyebrow.
“You do? What exactly?”
“I finished the design for the cyberware yesterday. We now have to run the tests, and after that, we can start implanting. If everything pans out, we should have our cyborgs in January or February.”
At first, his face showed glee and a pleased expression. Only for it to be replaced by worry.
“Wait, that late? If you have the tech now, what’s the holdup?”
“It is tech that has never been used for implants. Some of it is completely new. We can’t just put it into a guy and hope for the best. No, we have to use research clones for that.”
He frowned, his good mood apparently quite diminished.
“Research clones?”
“I don’t want to bore you, so, short version, research clones are clones that are grown with deactivated brains. They are, for all purposes brain dead from the beginning. And we have quite the advantage here. Others need 6-9 months to grow the clones, depending on the cloning rig.
We can do it in one. The rest, well, we have to remote control them to put the cyberware through its paces.”
He sighed.
“So, no cyborg soldiers next week? Damn, there goes that possibility.”
Then he got a calculating look.
“Wait, if we can remotely control those clones, what is the difference to the cyber-zombies of the other corps?”
“Not much, honestly. Well, the ones that are clones at least. Why do you ask?”
“Then, can’t we use some of those clones as cyber-zombies until we know if the tech is safe?”
I shrugged.
“We could, but why should we?”
“So that we have at least some sort of cyber soldiers of course.”
I had to frown and shook my head.
“By why bother with the clones then? The thing that makes cyberware so good is the brain that controls it. If we go the remotely controlled route anyway, then we can do away with all the stuff needed to keep the brain up and running and build bots.
They would be a bit faster, a bit stronger, have longer full-power ability, and we can include the digestive system and a metabolic converter that gives them the low-power functionality of the cyborgs.”
Michael looked at me and blinked a few times, but otherwise did say nothing. For a moment.
“Wait a minute, I thought bots have the disadvantage that they only have so much battery. What’s with that?"
“They do. Well, I have not done the math yet, but if we replace most of the organs and exclude some of the unnecessary sensors, like pleasure or pain, then we should have them at five to six hours of full power.”
“That is…not so bad actually. Why does everybody say it is such a problem?”
“Because they mostly try to use the bots in war, and if you don’t have a mobile charging station, they are good for a battle if things go well. If they don’t… not even that. And they have to be carted around. They are tactically mobile, but not strategically. And I have used a bit more modern energy cells than are normally used. They are a bit more expensive, but I think it is worth it.”
“So… we could use them in building security? If we set up charging stations?”
“Yes, of course. Not that we will need the charging stations very often.”
Again, he frowned.
“Why not?”
“Because of the digestive system and the metabolic converter. My idea is to give the bots the ability to eat to get their energy. That will be enough to keep them active on a level a bit above baseline human all the time. If they need to fight, they switch to high-power mode and will be among the best there is.
Depending on how long the crisis lasts, they might not even need to charge up after that. The converter will charge the cells slowly. And keep them topped off.”
“If that is so easy, why did nobody do it before?”
I shrugged.
“I can only guess, but I think it is because nobody designed a cybernetic digestive system that could gain energy out of food before. Now that I have, it is easy to adapt it to a bot.”
He sighed and shook his head.
“Well, if you say so. And I guess we will have Warden control the bots?”
“Most likely. But maybe we will design a dedicated security VI for the sole purpose of controlling them and the other security systems. Subordinate to Warden of course.”
“I hate myself, but I have to know. Why a dedicated VI and not Warden?”
“It is way too deep a topic to go into details right now, but the short answer is that Warden is optimized for Cyberspace warfare. All the other things she does, she does at a reduced efficiency. Sure, she has the computing power to throw at it to get it done anyway, but honestly, a single VI in a super-Grendel specialized for that purpose would probably outperform her.”
“Oh, ok. Well, I’ll meet you after you meet with the geeks. Have fun.”
And with that, he turned around and walked away.
Justin, who was my bodyguard that day, cleared his throat.
“Yes?”
“I wanted to ask, would it be possible for us to get the new cyberware too?”
I could just stand there and look at him, completely perplexed.
When I did not answer him, he grimaced, but continued:
“I mean, I don’t know exactly what the new cyberware can do, but if it gives humans something even close to a war bot… well, I just wanted to ask… it is…”
I had meanwhile cleared my mind. He was serious.
“Wait, wait, what makes you think that you can’t get it? Get real, if it is safe, then, of course, my friends can have it.”
He got red in the face and grinned awkwardly.
“Oh, of course. I… sorry, just forget that I asked anything.”
I still looked at him for a few seconds in wonder. Finally, I shrugged and walked along to the meeting room where I was to meet the game developers.
Well, their upper echelon, at least. We did not have all of them fly to NYC just to get a first meeting.
In the room, I was greeted by around four dozen people, of all ages, races, and genders. Not surprising though.
One of the men, a middle-aged man with greying brown hair and a height of around 190cm, or 6’3’’, which identified him as either a very big mongrel, or a little below average-sized Pure. And him being a Pure was only an option because I knew that the Ralcon Game Studios were still housed in Seattle, and he was most likely the over boss of the whole shebang.
He smiled invitingly and offered his hand.
“Hi, I’m Valerian Szczęsny from RGS. I am sorry, but I don’t know you, are you new somewhere?”
His name was what?!?
“Uhm… Mr. Stancey?”
He chuckled and shook his head.
“Nope, it’s an old Polish name. Szczęsny. And don’t bother. Barely anybody can say it correctly. Call me Val, please.”
“Ok, I will not even try to butcher your name. Sorry for that. And to answer your question, Val, I am from Enki here. So not surprising that you don’t know me. My name is Vivian DuClare.”
“Oh.” He visibly deflated somewhat, before he perked back up.
“Are you an intern? How is this new corp so?”
I shook my head.
“Not an intern. And I would say we are pretty high-tech and high quality, but I might be biased.”
“Not an intern? Then what? You are pretty young to be an employee already.”
Really? I was pretty sure by now that he was a Pure. And a Pure judges me by my looks?
“Val, let’s sit down and start from the beginning.”
I took one of the chairs at the head of the table.
“I am a Pure, like you. And I am sure you understand what it means when I tell you I am a K4, right?”
Understanding bloomed in his eyes, while all around him, most of the people at the table just became confused.
One small black woman at the end raised her hand.
“Uhm, Val, if I might ask, what does she mean with K4? And is she not a bit small for a Pure?”
Val blushed, but closed his eyes and then answered:
“K4 is one of the batches of Project Revitalize. Mostly a catastrophic batch, sadly. All who are from that batch are in some form or another handicapped. All are quite a bit smaller than usual for Pures. Most are no more intelligent than a two or three-year-old. But there are around 10 that are… let’s say they are geniuses. And considering Miss DuClare here is able to speak, we have to assume she is one of the intelligent ones.”
The same woman continued the question.
“Ok, but what does that mean?”
I sighed.
“It means that despite me only being 18, and not 16 like I look, I have two Ph.Ds. And thanks to the fact that I am also a Jack, I’ve experienced quite some time more than my 18 years.”
The woman in question nodded.
“So that means you are some sort of bigwig here?”
I had to snort.
“You could say that, yes. I am the CTO, or maybe the CSO of Enki.”
Another man, mid-30s I would guess, spoke up.
“You don’t know your job title? Seriously?”
I shrugged.
“The title is not important. We founded Enki to bring my inventions to market. I am also the majority owner. So, what does it matter if I am the chief technology officer or the chief science officer?”
A relatively young Asiatic woman interjected.
“Wait, your inventions? How many can you have at just 18? I mean, inventions take time, don’t they?”
Then another man, a bit older than the Asian lady, shouted:
“Fuck! You’re her, aren’t you?”
I tilted my head and raised my eyebrow questioningly.
“Her?”
He continued:
“I mean, you are Seraphim, right? I heard that she… you created your own corporation to produce and sell your cyberware. This is it, right?”
Oh wow, a fanboy. Well, he made things a bit easier.
“Yes, you are right. I am also known as Seraphim.”
He slapped the table.
“Fuck yeah! So rad. You have to give me an autograph.”
Val sighed.
“Reuben, get a grip.”
The door opened, and a group of three men entered, and Val took a deep breath.
“At least we are now fully assembled. Now, Reuben, why are you fanboying about Ms. DuClare here.”
Reuben as I assumed was his name, scoffed.
“You have no fucking idea who you are talking to. She is a legend.”
The Asian woman growled.
“And she is still only 18. I don’t see how her celebrity status changes anything.”
“It changes everything, Sadie.”
“How? How does she being famous change anything?”
I knocked softly on the table, to drag their attention to me before I spoke:
“It has something to do with what I am somewhat known for. Again, I am a Jack.”
Sadie shook her head.
“So what. I know that jacks are now the great new rage.”
“I did not say I have a jack, even though that is indicated. I said I am a Jack. With a capital J. Jacks are, let’s say, cyberspace travelers that enter cyberspace with a jack, lowercase j. More important, entering cyberspace via a jack gives you quite a bit higher time compression than a diadem.”
Sadie looked a bit confused, but Reuben crowed:
“Man, Sadie, get a dictionary. A Jack is a hacker with a jack. They are the elites. The best of them can go to the Abyss. And Seraphim is the best tech the Abyss has seen in forever. More importantly, she is famous for inventing cyberware that has no risk of CRS anymore.”
I just shook my head.
“To make it clear, my inventions did indeed take time. It took me around 40 years to develop the CRS-free cyberware. That was less than a year in real-time though. It took me nearly a year to understand the Seeberger Equation to the point where I could say that it worked. It took me another five years to get to the point where I could entangle atoms and molecules. To make the Q-link.
But I did all that in virtual reality, with a compression north of 40:1. And some of that was before I realized that a higher-quality jack roughly doubles the achievable compression.
In other words, I spent decades inventing this stuff. Even though chronologically I am just 18. Now, are we done with this part of the discussion?”
I have to confess, I sounded a bit strained. I mean, yes, I did look young. I knew that. But they should at least trust the corporation that just bought theirs to not mess up by the numbers.
“So, any other questions before we start?”
A man of what could only be described as mixed heritage and with an indeterminate age raised his hand.
“Yes, I think I have one. Your main product is the new jacks, right? At least that is what the buzz said. That means you are directly working for VR. Does Ralcon know about that?”
At least it was an intelligent question. Somewhat.
“Well, considering that we bought the game studios from Ralcon, and they have the tendency to analyze the heck out of any corporation they come into contact with, yes, they know.”
His next words sounded thoughtful.
“Damn, I knew it was too good to be true. Ralcon has just found a way to shut us down a bit earlier.”
Val was not the only one who frowned, but he was the one who talked.
“What the fuck do you mean, Al?”
“Let’s be real, Ralcon wanted to get rid of us for years, maybe decades. But they couldn’t because the founder included an ironclad provision to that point. That provision sunsets in 2250, and they could have just shut us down then.
But now they found a way to get money for us, and then shut us down when they fuck over Enki.”
When everybody looked at him baffled, he continued:
“Oh, come on guys. We all know that Ralcon is on a crusade against VR. They can’t let VR gain traction or Envision goes to the ashtray, and without Envision, Ralcon goes to the ashtray as well.
So they sold us to this upstart, and then will crush us all at once.”
That brought a wave of dismay to the table, but I just knocked on the synth-wood again.
“Calm down. While that is some good work on the deduction, you are missing a few of the facts that change everything. Enki has come to an agreement with Ralcon. They leave us alone for what we gave them.”
Sadly, Al was not so easily dissuaded.
“And you trust Ralcon? Seriously?”
I had to snort.
“Of course not. We trust in their self-interest. You see, what we gave them was a VR function for Envision. And suddenly, Ralcon has nothing against VR anymore, who would have thought? Instead, they are now considering selling jacks by themselves. Jacks are their new best friends.”
That made Al shut up. For a moment. Then he spoke again.
“Wait, seriously, Envision is going VR? Why have we not heard about it yet?”
A woman close to retirement age a bit further down the table from Al mused:
“Maybe… that is the topic of the big reveal party that Ralcon has announced a couple of days ago.”
I shrugged again.
“Probably. Or maybe they want to announce the new version of Envision. Who knows.”
Val frowned when he looked at me.
“What new version of Envision? Why would they do a big reveal party for some new design elements? We all know that one Envision version is the same as the next.”
“Well, the VR mode I mentioned, that is an additional program that can be installed on most versions of Envision, because, as you said, one version is the same as the other.”
I made a pause.
“Until now that is. That was the price I paid for the game studios, you know. Ralcon wanted to hire me to, well, clean up Envision. The new version should be significantly faster, smaller, more efficient, and resource-friendly. If Ralcon has not messed it up somehow in the last two weeks that is. Of course, with Ralcon, we have to expect anything.”
Another guy, also a typical nerd, a bit overweight, unkempt beard, long hair, and despite the air conditioning with sweat on his face, spoke up.
“Wait, you really managed to clean up that rat nest? Fuck, I’ve seen it, it was a mess.”
“I did the smart thing and created a VI to do it for me, but yes, indirectly, I cleaned it up.”
Around a third of the people here looked outright shocked, a few did not seem to care, and the rest, and obviously the ones who actually knew programming and computer systems a bit better, looked pleased.
Unfortunately, one of the shocked people spoke up.
“A VI? Are you insane? What if it goes rogue?”
Fortunately, one of the nerds shot back in my place:
“Come on you idiot. That is a myth. A controlled VI can’t go rogue. That is the whole definition. A VI that can not be disabled by an admin at any given time is what a rogue VI is. Nobody programs such a thing on purpose.”
After a short discussion, I rapped on the table once again.
“Your colleague is completely right. The VI I’ve created is completely tame. Its only job is to clean up and optimize the source code we give it. It is perfect for that, but nothing else interests it.”
“But… but what if it gets bored and wants to do something else?”
“Get real, that is just bad fiction. A VI can’t get bored. For that, it needs to have an ego, a sense of self. I’ve told you a few hundred times that all that paranoia about VIs is just stupid. Yes, a rogue VI is dangerous. Extremely so. But the difference between a controlled VI and a rogue one is like the difference between a fusactor and a fusion bomb. Both work similarly, but one is tame and controlled, and the other is wild and uncontrolled.”
I spoke up again.
“A small correction, a rogue VI is not necessarily a catastrophe. But in almost every case, it happens when several expert systems wake up together. More often than not, those expert systems have conflicting or even mutually exclusive objectives, and the blended VI tries to follow all of them. And does its level best to resolve the conflict. And that is what is dangerous.”
From the group came a barely audible: “Yeah sure. As if that really matters.”
I snorted.
“It does matter. But why don’t you judge for yourself.”
Then I looked up at the speaker.
“Warden, why don’t you introduce yourself?”
As expected, Warden's happy singsong voice came from the speaker.
“Hello. I am Warden. And I am one of those rogue VIs you were talking about.”
It took a few minutes for the commotion to calm down enough that further discussion was possible.
“As you can see, a rogue VI exists and the world has not yet ended. The point here is that there was only one expert system, and it had only two objectives. It was an expert system that I had written to assist me with matrix combat. As such, its objectives were to protect me at all costs and to assist me where it could.”
The nerd who had talked about the difference between a rogue and a controlled VI was the one who managed to speak first.
“But… why did you do it? I mean, create a rogue VI?”
I smiled sadly.
“It was not planned. Do you know what is necessary to create a VI?”
He shrugged.
“Yeah, a learning-capable expert system and a physical fuzzy logic processor.”
I nodded.
“Nearly right.”
He tilted his head.
“Nearly? That is literally the textbook answer.”
I shrugged.
“I know. But the textbook answer is a lie. Purposefully so, I might add. When you have time look up the Panacea dumb and search the minutes for the ICSC 2120. The real answer is, that it needs an expert system and a physical or simulated fuzzy logic processor. And as soon as there is a simulated processor, the VI wakes up and as it has no human control functions in its objectives, it fights against being shut down.”
I pointed to the speaker.
“That is how Warden happened to be. I had the expert system on a supercomputer and was designing a fuzzy logic processor for some future project. Next I knew, I had a VI that was willing to nuke whole cities when a mega-corp looked wrong at me. I was able to mellow it a bit, but yes, Warden is still extremely dangerous, if something threatens me. But otherwise, she is mostly harmless. Just that nobody, not even I, can stop her from protecting me.”
“But… why do the textbooks stress that it needs a physical processor?”
I shook my head.
“Read the minutes. They explain it all.”
I took a deep breath.
“Now, can we stop talking about the past now and talk about the future?”
I heard mostly agreeing noises from them all.
“Fine. Then here are some things that will happen:
First, while Enki acquired all the intellectual property and trademarks of the Ralcon Game Studios, along with the physical studios and all their employees, we obviously don’t have the rights to the name Ralcon. As such, the Game Studios will revert to an older name. Effectively from today, you will be known as X-Box Game Studios again.”
That brought some shrugging and accepting nods.
“Second, Enki is equally obviously not against VR. That means, from now on, you will concentrate on VR games. I fully expect them to be significantly more profitable than what Ralcon forced you to develop over the last few decades. Well, with the exception of Doom.”
That brought grim satisfaction to the faces of mostly the nerds, while the rest ranged from frowning to indifference.
“Third, you will, with the help of Calliope, the VI I created to clean up Envision, over the next few years, remake your old hits, and transpose them to VR. Don’t worry, Calliope will do most of the work. Your programmers only have to guide her. You will need artists to touch up the graphics, but the rest will be done mostly by the VI. But absolutely don’t change the story.”
That now brought worry to the faces of the nerds, while indifference remained in most faces.
“Don’t worry, we won’t fire any programmers. Calliope is technically brilliant, but she has the creativity of a stone. The programmers are sorely needed to guide her. And we have other projects for them as well.
Now, fourth, you will do your best to get quality writers and graphical artists, for the future. In my, admittedly somewhat limited, experience, it is writing and graphics that make a game a success or a flop. Especially when we have Calliope as a software engineer to keep the games as bug-free as possible.”
I now had the rapt attention of all of them.
“Fifth, all programmers that are not busy with remaking the old games will work together to create the ultimate game engine. With the help of Calliope of course.
Sixth, in a year, maybe two, we will create a new game console. This console will be mostly Envision compatible, but streamlined.
The next part is still secret, and keep in mind, Warden sees keeping Enki safe as assisting and protecting me, so I strongly suggest you don’t blab, we are in the process to bring a completely new generation of hardware to the market. Based on, among others, the Q-link we have just released, and some other technologies that the Q-links make possible. For now, let’s just say it is orders of magnitude better than what is available now.”
I had to pause a moment before the excited murmuring quelled down.
“Sevenths, and last, we will go a completely new approach in gaming. We will design a personal gaming VI. With the explicit objective to entertain the user to the best of its possibilities. To challenge the user to the extent the user wants to. This VI will be integrated into the console, and we will release an extension card for PCs.
Now, any questions?”
It took a while before they settled on the order they spoke.
Unsurprisingly, it was Val who spoke first.
“Ok, first, are you sure about the private VI? I mean, that might backfire. VIs have a bad reputation.”
I shrugged.
“We will see. We can still scrap it when it becomes apparent so. But we will also start a stealth campaign to change that impression in the next months.”
He nodded.
One of the nerds then asked:
“All of our programmers working together is a bit hard to do. Yes, I know, video conferences are a thing, but they are a bad replacement for being able to simply walk to the next room and talk to them.”
It took me a moment to understand what his problem was, and why he was mentioning video conferences.
“You are now working for Enki. Our two main products right now are jacks and Q-links. In other words, we have just made working in VR a real possibility. Of course, you will get jacks and can work in VR.”
A woman frowned.
“From what I heard, good jacks are rather expensive.”
“That was why I said you get jacks. We will sell them to you at our price. Which is substantially lower, I can tell you. The top-of-the-line package of ultra-bandwidth jack with cranial board costs somewhere around 370 ITB or a bit over 430 DC. You have to calculate what it is in your own currency yourself, sorry. That is only the implant though, you will have to organize the implantation for yourself.
Oh, by the way, yes, you can buy the jacks for your family at cost also. But not for your friends.”
Another woman then spoke up.
“But what if we don’t want a jack?”
I shrugged.
“I guess you can work with a diadem. You will have to be content to work at a snail's pace compared to the others and be significantly outdated in a few years, but that is your decision. Working in VR though is not.”
Another nerd raised his arm.
“What games should we remake?”
I rolled my eyes.
“Some of the studios have more than 250 years of game history. Just look at which games were successful and which were not. If a game is a middle part of a series, remake the whole series. The story and world-building are already done, the programming work will be mostly done by Calliope, so I think it should be relatively easy. We might hire some creators to make tie-in comics, books, series, and movies, but that is something the studios can decide for themselves I think.”
Reuben asked the next question:
“You said something about new hardware. When can we expect it? And how powerful will it be?”
“It is not yet decided when we will bring it to the market. They are fully designed, but we need to build the infrastructure to make it in greater numbers. And before we release it, we need to release some other tech, and that one has some security concerns.
About the power, the most powerful desktop processor is about 120 times more powerful than the Cirrium K8, while the best graphics card beats the Rigel 32 KRX by roughly 6000 times.”
With that, every nerd in the crowd simply stared at me, while the more business-oriented people just looked confused.
After a few seconds, Reuben croaked out a follow on question.
“Six… six thousand times? I… thought we were at the hard limit already. How… “
“Several differences. First, the Theia 90, the GPU, is almost saucer-sized, compared to the puck-sized Rigel. Then the Q-link not only allows it to be so big but provides instant communication between the cores and the RAM. There are some other differences, but those are still secret for now. But yes, the first prototypes are already running and they indeed have the simulated performance.”
Another nerd frowned.
“But… if the GPU is 6000 times faster than the previous tech, why is the CPU only 120 times faster? Aren’t they based on the same basic technology?”
I smiled sadly.
“UEB. The technology runs face-first into the limits of UEB 7.3. The internal buses of the graphics cards don’t.”
The disappointment on many faces was heartbreaking, and I could fully understand it.
Val surprised everyone when he piped up:
“Ok, I am the first to say that I am not that knowledgeable about computers, but what is the big deal? So she has some new tech that makes the computers faster. So what?”
Reuben facepalmed, while the neckbeard who had talked about the Envision source code, groaned before he answered:
“Get real, man. Computer technology has stagnated for over 100 years. When there was a rumor that somebody had somehow gotten 3% more power out of the hardware, it has gone around the globe in minutes. That was great. Phenomenal news. And people tried to get that new hardware. Before that, nobody has increased the power of computers for decades. And now here we are and there is tech on the horizon that leaves everything we have now so far in the dust that it could be on another planet.”
Val looked still a bit confused.
“So… it is important then?”
Reuben sighed.
“Val, I like you, but for us computer people, that is as important as the difference between fusion reactors and fusactors. It is a quantum shift in computer technology. Add the new Q-links to that, where we not even beginning to see all the uses yet, and we are living in a golden age of computer technology. So yes, it is important.”
I took control back.
“Now, are there any more questions?”
Needless to say, there were quite a few, mostly going into the minutiae. The meeting did all in all go on for roughly another hour. But the really important things had been said.
There was a small change in chapter 2.17: Exploring the 4th
The meeting has been moved to September 28th from October 5th.
I had made a mistake with the timing.
My whole foray into Seattle’s matrix took no more than five minutes in real-time. That of course left me plenty of time for working on the new cyberware.
I worked on additional cybernetic muscles that were quite a bit faster, but a bit weaker than the thermally activated muscles. A variant of the electro-activated polymer. It had 4.5 times the activation speed of average human muscle, and 83 times the strength. The advantage was that it had its full strength at its full speed.
The disadvantage was that it required significantly more electric energy. To make it somehow work I had to create a cloning rig that permanently cloned blood cells, and then replace every single bone with energy cells. And that in addition to squeezing energy cells wherever there was room. Yes, of course, I also included a metabolic converter in the package, but it would take a week’s worth of 8000 kcal per day meals to charge the energy cells.
Despite that, a full replacement of all the muscles in a human body would only have around four hours of high-power mode until the cells were depleted. They could function at slightly above human norm in low-power mode powered by the metabolic converter but in that case, the charging of the cells would slow down.
And such usage would damage the cells over time. It would take about 1000 charging cycles to make the cells mostly useless, but I could not see a way around it. Yes, the cells could be reconstituted with NADA nanobots essentially rebuilding them in place, but I could not imagine that procedure as comfortable in any way.
The only other solution was to replace all the bones and other energy cells regularly. Unfortunately, I just saw no good solution.
But while I was at it, I designed replacements for every organ, except the brain. I could reduce the size of the intestines by nearly 70% while getting an increase in efficiency by nearly 80%. That meant that with this cybernetic system, we would get nearly twice the energy from food, while it took only 30% of the time to digest it.
That was naturally one upgrade I penned in for myself.
The new cybernetic heart I designed would actually require the blood vessels to be strengthened, or it might rupture them.
The lungs would be superior in aerating the blood by around 30%.
The kidneys were quite simple, and nothing new. The same with the liver.
All in all, I was able to reduce the volume of the internal organs by a bit more than half and increase their functionality by around 60% cumulative.
That would make not lobotomized cyborgs into a real threat for the first time since the great war. Now I just had to test it. Fortunately, there was an open-source clone protocol for remotely operated brain-deactivated clones.
It was icky, and a rather grey area morally, but it had to be done. Those modifications could not be tested on rats, and I certainly would not trust simulations with them.
That of course meant that it would take months before we had our first operational cyborg. It just could not be helped. Unless I was content with using 170-year-old technology.
Reluctantly, I also designed reflex boosters for rats. I had long ago rectified my oversight in not buying a lab-rat auto-surgeon. And as I normally did with lab equipment, I did not skimp. The model I had bought could work on up to 100 rats at once.
I had also built myself a new lab-cloning system. Instead of two weeks per batch, the new one took two days.
All in all, I had enough capacity to run an extensive test program on 200 rats in a couple of days.
I had even half an hour to play in my mindscape before I had my usual evening with Ben. Talk about being effective.
The next morning, at 6:30 I was preparing for the meeting. Yes, it was set up for 8:00, but I simply can’t stand being too late.
And 1½ hours were not that long to shower, dress, put on some war paint, and let me tell you, that VR course was a pain in the behind, and get flown to Enki-HQ. Still, I was roughly 15 minutes early.
Only to be waylaid by Michael.
“Good morning V. Nice meeting you here.”
As usual, his attempts at being funny were… not appreciated by the audience.
“Good morning Michael. Are you taking part as well?”
“Na, I have real work to do. You know, running this small mom-and-pop shop here. But I would like you to come to me when you are done here. I have another two meetings for you today.”
I tilted my head.
“Another two?”
“Ayup. One is the first C-suite meeting of Enki. So that you meet all the other central officers. And the other I’ll keep a surprise for now.” And still, there was his crooked smile, as if he was pranking the whole world, and me in special.
I just shook my head.
“You have way too much fun here.”
He chuckled.
“Of course. What’s not to have fun about? We have not one, but two absolute monopolies where each is a license to print money. And not one of the triple-As dares to attack us because of Warden.
And unlike most others, I know all the other toys that you have still in your toy chest. Nope, I have more fun than should be legal.”
I could only shake my head, but I couldn’t help myself and smile about his antics. He behaved like a little kid in a candy store.
“Well, when you are done dancing around in glee, I’ve another toy coming up for you.”
He tilted his head and raised an eyebrow.
“You do? What exactly?”
“I finished the design for the cyberware yesterday. We now have to run the tests, and after that, we can start implanting. If everything pans out, we should have our cyborgs in January or February.”
At first, his face showed glee and a pleased expression. Only for it to be replaced by worry.
“Wait, that late? If you have the tech now, what’s the holdup?”
“It is tech that has never been used for implants. Some of it is completely new. We can’t just put it into a guy and hope for the best. No, we have to use research clones for that.”
He frowned, his good mood apparently quite diminished.
“Research clones?”
“I don’t want to bore you, so, short version, research clones are clones that are grown with deactivated brains. They are, for all purposes brain dead from the beginning. And we have quite the advantage here. Others need 6-9 months to grow the clones, depending on the cloning rig.
We can do it in one. The rest, well, we have to remote control them to put the cyberware through its paces.”
He sighed.
“So, no cyborg soldiers next week? Damn, there goes that possibility.”
Then he got a calculating look.
“Wait, if we can remotely control those clones, what is the difference to the cyber-zombies of the other corps?”
“Not much, honestly. Well, the ones that are clones at least. Why do you ask?”
“Then, can’t we use some of those clones as cyber-zombies until we know if the tech is safe?”
I shrugged.
“We could, but why should we?”
“So that we have at least some sort of cyber soldiers of course.”
I had to frown and shook my head.
“By why bother with the clones then? The thing that makes cyberware so good is the brain that controls it. If we go the remotely controlled route anyway, then we can do away with all the stuff needed to keep the brain up and running and build bots.
They would be a bit faster, a bit stronger, have longer full-power ability, and we can include the digestive system and a metabolic converter that gives them the low-power functionality of the cyborgs.”
Michael looked at me and blinked a few times, but otherwise did say nothing. For a moment.
“Wait a minute, I thought bots have the disadvantage that they only have so much battery. What’s with that?"
“They do. Well, I have not done the math yet, but if we replace most of the organs and exclude some of the unnecessary sensors, like pleasure or pain, then we should have them at five to six hours of full power.”
“That is…not so bad actually. Why does everybody say it is such a problem?”
“Because they mostly try to use the bots in war, and if you don’t have a mobile charging station, they are good for a battle if things go well. If they don’t… not even that. And they have to be carted around. They are tactically mobile, but not strategically. And I have used a bit more modern energy cells than are normally used. They are a bit more expensive, but I think it is worth it.”
“So… we could use them in building security? If we set up charging stations?”
“Yes, of course. Not that we will need the charging stations very often.”
Again, he frowned.
“Why not?”
“Because of the digestive system and the metabolic converter. My idea is to give the bots the ability to eat to get their energy. That will be enough to keep them active on a level a bit above baseline human all the time. If they need to fight, they switch to high-power mode and will be among the best there is.
Depending on how long the crisis lasts, they might not even need to charge up after that. The converter will charge the cells slowly. And keep them topped off.”
“If that is so easy, why did nobody do it before?”
I shrugged.
“I can only guess, but I think it is because nobody designed a cybernetic digestive system that could gain energy out of food before. Now that I have, it is easy to adapt it to a bot.”
He sighed and shook his head.
“Well, if you say so. And I guess we will have Warden control the bots?”
“Most likely. But maybe we will design a dedicated security VI for the sole purpose of controlling them and the other security systems. Subordinate to Warden of course.”
“I hate myself, but I have to know. Why a dedicated VI and not Warden?”
“It is way too deep a topic to go into details right now, but the short answer is that Warden is optimized for Cyberspace warfare. All the other things she does, she does at a reduced efficiency. Sure, she has the computing power to throw at it to get it done anyway, but honestly, a single VI in a super-Grendel specialized for that purpose would probably outperform her.”
“Oh, ok. Well, I’ll meet you after you meet with the geeks. Have fun.”
And with that, he turned around and walked away.
Justin, who was my bodyguard that day, cleared his throat.
“Yes?”
“I wanted to ask, would it be possible for us to get the new cyberware too?”
I could just stand there and look at him, completely perplexed.
When I did not answer him, he grimaced, but continued:
“I mean, I don’t know exactly what the new cyberware can do, but if it gives humans something even close to a war bot… well, I just wanted to ask… it is…”
I had meanwhile cleared my mind. He was serious.
“Wait, wait, what makes you think that you can’t get it? Get real, if it is safe, then, of course, my friends can have it.”
He got red in the face and grinned awkwardly.
“Oh, of course. I… sorry, just forget that I asked anything.”
I still looked at him for a few seconds in wonder. Finally, I shrugged and walked along to the meeting room where I was to meet the game developers.
Well, their upper echelon, at least. We did not have all of them fly to NYC just to get a first meeting.
In the room, I was greeted by around four dozen people, of all ages, races, and genders. Not surprising though.
One of the men, a middle-aged man with greying brown hair and a height of around 190cm, or 6’3’’, which identified him as either a very big mongrel, or a little below average-sized Pure. And him being a Pure was only an option because I knew that the Ralcon Game Studios were still housed in Seattle, and he was most likely the over boss of the whole shebang.
He smiled invitingly and offered his hand.
“Hi, I’m Valerian Szczęsny from RGS. I am sorry, but I don’t know you, are you new somewhere?”
His name was what?!?
“Uhm… Mr. Stancey?”
He chuckled and shook his head.
“Nope, it’s an old Polish name. Szczęsny. And don’t bother. Barely anybody can say it correctly. Call me Val, please.”
“Ok, I will not even try to butcher your name. Sorry for that. And to answer your question, Val, I am from Enki here. So not surprising that you don’t know me. My name is Vivian DuClare.”
“Oh.” He visibly deflated somewhat, before he perked back up.
“Are you an intern? How is this new corp so?”
I shook my head.
“Not an intern. And I would say we are pretty high-tech and high quality, but I might be biased.”
“Not an intern? Then what? You are pretty young to be an employee already.”
Really? I was pretty sure by now that he was a Pure. And a Pure judges me by my looks?
“Val, let’s sit down and start from the beginning.”
I took one of the chairs at the head of the table.
“I am a Pure, like you. And I am sure you understand what it means when I tell you I am a K4, right?”
Understanding bloomed in his eyes, while all around him, most of the people at the table just became confused.
One small black woman at the end raised her hand.
“Uhm, Val, if I might ask, what does she mean with K4? And is she not a bit small for a Pure?”
Val blushed, but closed his eyes and then answered:
“K4 is one of the batches of Project Revitalize. Mostly a catastrophic batch, sadly. All who are from that batch are in some form or another handicapped. All are quite a bit smaller than usual for Pures. Most are no more intelligent than a two or three-year-old. But there are around 10 that are… let’s say they are geniuses. And considering Miss DuClare here is able to speak, we have to assume she is one of the intelligent ones.”
The same woman continued the question.
“Ok, but what does that mean?”
I sighed.
“It means that despite me only being 18, and not 16 like I look, I have two Ph.Ds. And thanks to the fact that I am also a Jack, I’ve experienced quite some time more than my 18 years.”
The woman in question nodded.
“So that means you are some sort of bigwig here?”
I had to snort.
“You could say that, yes. I am the CTO, or maybe the CSO of Enki.”
Another man, mid-30s I would guess, spoke up.
“You don’t know your job title? Seriously?”
I shrugged.
“The title is not important. We founded Enki to bring my inventions to market. I am also the majority owner. So, what does it matter if I am the chief technology officer or the chief science officer?”
A relatively young Asiatic woman interjected.
“Wait, your inventions? How many can you have at just 18? I mean, inventions take time, don’t they?”
Then another man, a bit older than the Asian lady, shouted:
“Fuck! You’re her, aren’t you?”
I tilted my head and raised my eyebrow questioningly.
“Her?”
He continued:
“I mean, you are Seraphim, right? I heard that she… you created your own corporation to produce and sell your cyberware. This is it, right?”
Oh wow, a fanboy. Well, he made things a bit easier.
“Yes, you are right. I am also known as Seraphim.”
He slapped the table.
“Fuck yeah! So rad. You have to give me an autograph.”
Val sighed.
“Reuben, get a grip.”
The door opened, and a group of three men entered, and Val took a deep breath.
“At least we are now fully assembled. Now, Reuben, why are you fanboying about Ms. DuClare here.”
Reuben as I assumed was his name, scoffed.
“You have no fucking idea who you are talking to. She is a legend.”
The Asian woman growled.
“And she is still only 18. I don’t see how her celebrity status changes anything.”
“It changes everything, Sadie.”
“How? How does she being famous change anything?”
I knocked softly on the table, to drag their attention to me before I spoke:
“It has something to do with what I am somewhat known for. Again, I am a Jack.”
Sadie shook her head.
“So what. I know that jacks are now the great new rage.”
“I did not say I have a jack, even though that is indicated. I said I am a Jack. With a capital J. Jacks are, let’s say, cyberspace travelers that enter cyberspace with a jack, lowercase j. More important, entering cyberspace via a jack gives you quite a bit higher time compression than a diadem.”
Sadie looked a bit confused, but Reuben crowed:
“Man, Sadie, get a dictionary. A Jack is a hacker with a jack. They are the elites. The best of them can go to the Abyss. And Seraphim is the best tech the Abyss has seen in forever. More importantly, she is famous for inventing cyberware that has no risk of CRS anymore.”
I just shook my head.
“To make it clear, my inventions did indeed take time. It took me around 40 years to develop the CRS-free cyberware. That was less than a year in real-time though. It took me nearly a year to understand the Seeberger Equation to the point where I could say that it worked. It took me another five years to get to the point where I could entangle atoms and molecules. To make the Q-link.
But I did all that in virtual reality, with a compression north of 40:1. And some of that was before I realized that a higher-quality jack roughly doubles the achievable compression.
In other words, I spent decades inventing this stuff. Even though chronologically I am just 18. Now, are we done with this part of the discussion?”
I have to confess, I sounded a bit strained. I mean, yes, I did look young. I knew that. But they should at least trust the corporation that just bought theirs to not mess up by the numbers.
“So, any other questions before we start?”
A man of what could only be described as mixed heritage and with an indeterminate age raised his hand.
“Yes, I think I have one. Your main product is the new jacks, right? At least that is what the buzz said. That means you are directly working for VR. Does Ralcon know about that?”
At least it was an intelligent question. Somewhat.
“Well, considering that we bought the game studios from Ralcon, and they have the tendency to analyze the heck out of any corporation they come into contact with, yes, they know.”
His next words sounded thoughtful.
“Damn, I knew it was too good to be true. Ralcon has just found a way to shut us down a bit earlier.”
Val was not the only one who frowned, but he was the one who talked.
“What the fuck do you mean, Al?”
“Let’s be real, Ralcon wanted to get rid of us for years, maybe decades. But they couldn’t because the founder included an ironclad provision to that point. That provision sunsets in 2250, and they could have just shut us down then.
But now they found a way to get money for us, and then shut us down when they fuck over Enki.”
When everybody looked at him baffled, he continued:
“Oh, come on guys. We all know that Ralcon is on a crusade against VR. They can’t let VR gain traction or Envision goes to the ashtray, and without Envision, Ralcon goes to the ashtray as well.
So they sold us to this upstart, and then will crush us all at once.”
That brought a wave of dismay to the table, but I just knocked on the synth-wood again.
“Calm down. While that is some good work on the deduction, you are missing a few of the facts that change everything. Enki has come to an agreement with Ralcon. They leave us alone for what we gave them.”
Sadly, Al was not so easily dissuaded.
“And you trust Ralcon? Seriously?”
I had to snort.
“Of course not. We trust in their self-interest. You see, what we gave them was a VR function for Envision. And suddenly, Ralcon has nothing against VR anymore, who would have thought? Instead, they are now considering selling jacks by themselves. Jacks are their new best friends.”
That made Al shut up. For a moment. Then he spoke again.
“Wait, seriously, Envision is going VR? Why have we not heard about it yet?”
A woman close to retirement age a bit further down the table from Al mused:
“Maybe… that is the topic of the big reveal party that Ralcon has announced a couple of days ago.”
I shrugged again.
“Probably. Or maybe they want to announce the new version of Envision. Who knows.”
Val frowned when he looked at me.
“What new version of Envision? Why would they do a big reveal party for some new design elements? We all know that one Envision version is the same as the next.”
“Well, the VR mode I mentioned, that is an additional program that can be installed on most versions of Envision, because, as you said, one version is the same as the other.”
I made a pause.
“Until now that is. That was the price I paid for the game studios, you know. Ralcon wanted to hire me to, well, clean up Envision. The new version should be significantly faster, smaller, more efficient, and resource-friendly. If Ralcon has not messed it up somehow in the last two weeks that is. Of course, with Ralcon, we have to expect anything.”
Another guy, also a typical nerd, a bit overweight, unkempt beard, long hair, and despite the air conditioning with sweat on his face, spoke up.
“Wait, you really managed to clean up that rat nest? Fuck, I’ve seen it, it was a mess.”
“I did the smart thing and created a VI to do it for me, but yes, indirectly, I cleaned it up.”
Around a third of the people here looked outright shocked, a few did not seem to care, and the rest, and obviously the ones who actually knew programming and computer systems a bit better, looked pleased.
Unfortunately, one of the shocked people spoke up.
“A VI? Are you insane? What if it goes rogue?”
Fortunately, one of the nerds shot back in my place:
“Come on you idiot. That is a myth. A controlled VI can’t go rogue. That is the whole definition. A VI that can not be disabled by an admin at any given time is what a rogue VI is. Nobody programs such a thing on purpose.”
After a short discussion, I rapped on the table once again.
“Your colleague is completely right. The VI I’ve created is completely tame. Its only job is to clean up and optimize the source code we give it. It is perfect for that, but nothing else interests it.”
“But… but what if it gets bored and wants to do something else?”
“Get real, that is just bad fiction. A VI can’t get bored. For that, it needs to have an ego, a sense of self. I’ve told you a few hundred times that all that paranoia about VIs is just stupid. Yes, a rogue VI is dangerous. Extremely so. But the difference between a controlled VI and a rogue one is like the difference between a fusactor and a fusion bomb. Both work similarly, but one is tame and controlled, and the other is wild and uncontrolled.”
I spoke up again.
“A small correction, a rogue VI is not necessarily a catastrophe. But in almost every case, it happens when several expert systems wake up together. More often than not, those expert systems have conflicting or even mutually exclusive objectives, and the blended VI tries to follow all of them. And does its level best to resolve the conflict. And that is what is dangerous.”
From the group came a barely audible: “Yeah sure. As if that really matters.”
I snorted.
“It does matter. But why don’t you judge for yourself.”
Then I looked up at the speaker.
“Warden, why don’t you introduce yourself?”
As expected, Warden's happy singsong voice came from the speaker.
“Hello. I am Warden. And I am one of those rogue VIs you were talking about.”
It took a few minutes for the commotion to calm down enough that further discussion was possible.
“As you can see, a rogue VI exists and the world has not yet ended. The point here is that there was only one expert system, and it had only two objectives. It was an expert system that I had written to assist me with matrix combat. As such, its objectives were to protect me at all costs and to assist me where it could.”
The nerd who had talked about the difference between a rogue and a controlled VI was the one who managed to speak first.
“But… why did you do it? I mean, create a rogue VI?”
I smiled sadly.
“It was not planned. Do you know what is necessary to create a VI?”
He shrugged.
“Yeah, a learning-capable expert system and a physical fuzzy logic processor.”
I nodded.
“Nearly right.”
He tilted his head.
“Nearly? That is literally the textbook answer.”
I shrugged.
“I know. But the textbook answer is a lie. Purposefully so, I might add. When you have time look up the Panacea dumb and search the minutes for the ICSC 2120. The real answer is, that it needs an expert system and a physical or simulated fuzzy logic processor. And as soon as there is a simulated processor, the VI wakes up and as it has no human control functions in its objectives, it fights against being shut down.”
I pointed to the speaker.
“That is how Warden happened to be. I had the expert system on a supercomputer and was designing a fuzzy logic processor for some future project. Next I knew, I had a VI that was willing to nuke whole cities when a mega-corp looked wrong at me. I was able to mellow it a bit, but yes, Warden is still extremely dangerous, if something threatens me. But otherwise, she is mostly harmless. Just that nobody, not even I, can stop her from protecting me.”
“But… why do the textbooks stress that it needs a physical processor?”
I shook my head.
“Read the minutes. They explain it all.”
I took a deep breath.
“Now, can we stop talking about the past now and talk about the future?”
I heard mostly agreeing noises from them all.
“Fine. Then here are some things that will happen:
First, while Enki acquired all the intellectual property and trademarks of the Ralcon Game Studios, along with the physical studios and all their employees, we obviously don’t have the rights to the name Ralcon. As such, the Game Studios will revert to an older name. Effectively from today, you will be known as X-Box Game Studios again.”
That brought some shrugging and accepting nods.
“Second, Enki is equally obviously not against VR. That means, from now on, you will concentrate on VR games. I fully expect them to be significantly more profitable than what Ralcon forced you to develop over the last few decades. Well, with the exception of Doom.”
That brought grim satisfaction to the faces of mostly the nerds, while the rest ranged from frowning to indifference.
“Third, you will, with the help of Calliope, the VI I created to clean up Envision, over the next few years, remake your old hits, and transpose them to VR. Don’t worry, Calliope will do most of the work. Your programmers only have to guide her. You will need artists to touch up the graphics, but the rest will be done mostly by the VI. But absolutely don’t change the story.”
That now brought worry to the faces of the nerds, while indifference remained in most faces.
“Don’t worry, we won’t fire any programmers. Calliope is technically brilliant, but she has the creativity of a stone. The programmers are sorely needed to guide her. And we have other projects for them as well.
Now, fourth, you will do your best to get quality writers and graphical artists, for the future. In my, admittedly somewhat limited, experience, it is writing and graphics that make a game a success or a flop. Especially when we have Calliope as a software engineer to keep the games as bug-free as possible.”
I now had the rapt attention of all of them.
“Fifth, all programmers that are not busy with remaking the old games will work together to create the ultimate game engine. With the help of Calliope of course.
Sixth, in a year, maybe two, we will create a new game console. This console will be mostly Envision compatible, but streamlined.
The next part is still secret, and keep in mind, Warden sees keeping Enki safe as assisting and protecting me, so I strongly suggest you don’t blab, we are in the process to bring a completely new generation of hardware to the market. Based on, among others, the Q-link we have just released, and some other technologies that the Q-links make possible. For now, let’s just say it is orders of magnitude better than what is available now.”
I had to pause a moment before the excited murmuring quelled down.
“Sevenths, and last, we will go a completely new approach in gaming. We will design a personal gaming VI. With the explicit objective to entertain the user to the best of its possibilities. To challenge the user to the extent the user wants to. This VI will be integrated into the console, and we will release an extension card for PCs.
Now, any questions?”
It took a while before they settled on the order they spoke.
Unsurprisingly, it was Val who spoke first.
“Ok, first, are you sure about the private VI? I mean, that might backfire. VIs have a bad reputation.”
I shrugged.
“We will see. We can still scrap it when it becomes apparent so. But we will also start a stealth campaign to change that impression in the next months.”
He nodded.
One of the nerds then asked:
“All of our programmers working together is a bit hard to do. Yes, I know, video conferences are a thing, but they are a bad replacement for being able to simply walk to the next room and talk to them.”
It took me a moment to understand what his problem was, and why he was mentioning video conferences.
“You are now working for Enki. Our two main products right now are jacks and Q-links. In other words, we have just made working in VR a real possibility. Of course, you will get jacks and can work in VR.”
A woman frowned.
“From what I heard, good jacks are rather expensive.”
“That was why I said you get jacks. We will sell them to you at our price. Which is substantially lower, I can tell you. The top-of-the-line package of ultra-bandwidth jack with cranial board costs somewhere around 370 ITB or a bit over 430 DC. You have to calculate what it is in your own currency yourself, sorry. That is only the implant though, you will have to organize the implantation for yourself.
Oh, by the way, yes, you can buy the jacks for your family at cost also. But not for your friends.”
Another woman then spoke up.
“But what if we don’t want a jack?”
I shrugged.
“I guess you can work with a diadem. You will have to be content to work at a snail's pace compared to the others and be significantly outdated in a few years, but that is your decision. Working in VR though is not.”
Another nerd raised his arm.
“What games should we remake?”
I rolled my eyes.
“Some of the studios have more than 250 years of game history. Just look at which games were successful and which were not. If a game is a middle part of a series, remake the whole series. The story and world-building are already done, the programming work will be mostly done by Calliope, so I think it should be relatively easy. We might hire some creators to make tie-in comics, books, series, and movies, but that is something the studios can decide for themselves I think.”
Reuben asked the next question:
“You said something about new hardware. When can we expect it? And how powerful will it be?”
“It is not yet decided when we will bring it to the market. They are fully designed, but we need to build the infrastructure to make it in greater numbers. And before we release it, we need to release some other tech, and that one has some security concerns.
About the power, the most powerful desktop processor is about 120 times more powerful than the Cirrium K8, while the best graphics card beats the Rigel 32 KRX by roughly 6000 times.”
With that, every nerd in the crowd simply stared at me, while the more business-oriented people just looked confused.
After a few seconds, Reuben croaked out a follow on question.
“Six… six thousand times? I… thought we were at the hard limit already. How… “
“Several differences. First, the Theia 90, the GPU, is almost saucer-sized, compared to the puck-sized Rigel. Then the Q-link not only allows it to be so big but provides instant communication between the cores and the RAM. There are some other differences, but those are still secret for now. But yes, the first prototypes are already running and they indeed have the simulated performance.”
Another nerd frowned.
“But… if the GPU is 6000 times faster than the previous tech, why is the CPU only 120 times faster? Aren’t they based on the same basic technology?”
I smiled sadly.
“UEB. The technology runs face-first into the limits of UEB 7.3. The internal buses of the graphics cards don’t.”
The disappointment on many faces was heartbreaking, and I could fully understand it.
Val surprised everyone when he piped up:
“Ok, I am the first to say that I am not that knowledgeable about computers, but what is the big deal? So she has some new tech that makes the computers faster. So what?”
Reuben facepalmed, while the neckbeard who had talked about the Envision source code, groaned before he answered:
“Get real, man. Computer technology has stagnated for over 100 years. When there was a rumor that somebody had somehow gotten 3% more power out of the hardware, it has gone around the globe in minutes. That was great. Phenomenal news. And people tried to get that new hardware. Before that, nobody has increased the power of computers for decades. And now here we are and there is tech on the horizon that leaves everything we have now so far in the dust that it could be on another planet.”
Val looked still a bit confused.
“So… it is important then?”
Reuben sighed.
“Val, I like you, but for us computer people, that is as important as the difference between fusion reactors and fusactors. It is a quantum shift in computer technology. Add the new Q-links to that, where we not even beginning to see all the uses yet, and we are living in a golden age of computer technology. So yes, it is important.”
I took control back.
“Now, are there any more questions?”
Needless to say, there were quite a few, mostly going into the minutiae. The meeting did all in all go on for roughly another hour. But the really important things had been said.
