“What do you mean thanks to me? I’ve done nothing except move somewhere else.”
He chuckled.
“Your little ploy with finding how the Phantom managed to steal all that money might have fooled most of the people, but not all of them.”
When Warden literally bristled immediately with spikes and grew to a gigantic size, Vandermeer held up his hands in a warding position.
“Keep cool. I am no danger to her. But you should be aware that a few people are aware that she is the Phantom.”
Warden shrunk back down to her normal size, but the spikes remained.
“That is unacceptable.”
“That may be, but you can’t change it.”
“We have to ensure that the banks don’t learn about that.”
Vandermeer shook his head.
“The banks do know about it. But thanks to you, Vivian is an extremely hard target, and they see no way to get to her without getting blown to pieces by you. Add in that nearly everybody believes that she only found the equation after the Phantom wrote it in the Abyss, and they’ve decided that as long as she keeps silent about it, and does not get too much money too quickly without any explanation, they will let it go.
They officially still search for the Phantom, but won’t go after her.”
I could not help it and shook my head.
“How?”
He chuckled.
“In the end, you are just too smart. Do you know how many people actually understand the Seeberger equation well enough to even understand how the quantum entanglement of photons might work?”
I shrugged.
“It has been more than half a year, so by now, I would guess a couple of dozen or so. Why?”
“You are off. By quite a bit, I might add. The actual number is one. It is only you who could understand it. Even the other K4s are running against a wall here. Two of the other 11 are working on it.
One thinks he has found the variables that he has to isolate to get to the explanation of the entanglement. And you manage it in three days? Get real!”
“Uh, I was in cyberspace. Those three days were more like 11 months for me.”
He scoffed.
“I know. And I also know how compression works. And when I freed the other K4, I hired most of them, much more amicably, I might add, and bought ultra-jacks for them. Those two have spent nine months with compressions ranging from 70:1 and 80:1 trying to understand it.
I would love to know your real compression sometimes by the way. Somehow I doubt the 90:1 you told everybody you have… but anyway, despite the corrected equation, despite them spending between 11 and 13 years, virtually, they have not made any sense out of it.
Fuck, one of them explained to me that it can’t work, just last month. Of course, you had to release the absolute proof that it does indeed work, not quite a week later. Boy was he pissed.
But what I am trying to say is there is no way that two people still alive actually understand the equation enough to make Q-links. Well, not no way, but the probability is so vanishingly low that it is negligible. That only leaves you as a possibility. And I am not the only one who understands that.
Not as many people as there should, but anybody who has spent any time on that equation, or had smart people do so, knows that it was almost certainly you.”
I was confused now.
“But… it is not that hard! I mean, I won’t claim that it is easy. Goodness knows it is not. But it took me a few virtual months to understand it. With only the tools I could make or afford by myself. No support structure, no team, and no budget.
Anybody who does have those things should be able to do the same in way less time. Heck, I deciphered the equation, corrected it, learned enough math and physics to really understand it, and created the first Q-links in less than six virtual months.
Whomever you have working on it already has the correct equation, they already know that it works, and they probably already have a background in higher physics. And you say that at least two of them are K4.
Something’s not right here. Yes, I am smart, probably smarter than any of them, but not that much smarter.”
He shrugged.
“Well, if you find out where they go wrong, you can tell them any time you like. Hell, I’ve created a virtual meeting room for all of them, even the three who choose not to work for me. You really should visit a few of the meetings there, I think.
It will probably be the only place where you can find people that are at least approaching your own intelligence.”
I shrugged.
“I will think about it.” To be honest, I had absolutely no intention of meeting even more people. At least not soon.
“Do that. I will send you the meeting address and the times. But… to get back to the topic of Panacea, while I appreciate what you’ve done here, I fear it is just a matter of time for them to get back to where they were. I want to stop them. And for that, I need your help again. In a small capacity though.”
I frowned.
“My help? What do you need my help for?”
He sighed.
“I am trying to invoke the Jepsen Act against Knowles. Get rid of him, and his family’s power once and for all. For now, I don’t have the political power to do so. But…”
The Jepsen Act… one piece of evil lawmaking that luckily never had been used. In essence, it said that somebody who is convicted of high treason to the Commonwealth will not only be executed but all his property will be confiscated.
Yes, I know, it is not that different from many similar laws in other nations. The evil thing here is what it defines as high treason. Among them are for example dishonoring the first councilor, disrespecting the council, making information that is damaging to the Commonwealth public knowledge, and depriving the Commonwealth of an irreplaceable resource.
Things that even in most tyrannies are not much worse than petty crimes can earn you capital punishment in the Commonwealth. And as I understand it, it was created explicitly to trap my family.
But I could not see any way Vandermeer could turn it around against Knowles, and for sure did not know a way that I could help with that.
“My help? You are aware that I no longer live in the Commonwealth, do you? And I certainly do not plan to move back to Seattle.”
In response, Vandermeer chuckled, confusing me even more.
“And that is exactly the help I meant.”
“Did I not just refuse to help?”
“No, you explained to me that you do not plan to come back to the Commonwealth again.”
I shrugged.
“Yes… but how can that help you?”
Now Vandermeer showed a downright evil grin.
“It is simple. Knowles stratagems have deprived the Commonwealth of an irreplaceable resource, and that for good as we just ascertained.”
“What irreplaceable resource are you talking about?”
“You of course. I just told you that two of the smartest people known to have ever lived took over ten years to unsuccessfully try to do what you did in less than six months.
That makes you an absolutely irreplaceable resource. Absolutely unique. And Knowles drove you away to the point where you will never come back.”
I could now see where he was going, but… it was a bit…
“That is a very strained reason. I don’t think the council will go for it.”
He slumped down a bit.
“You might be right, but it is all I have. We simply can’t allow the Knowles family to get back in control.”
I could understand him, but… he would have to burn way too much influence to make that happen if he even could. But…
“There might be another way. Do you have enough dirt on Knowles and his sons to put them in prison for a few years?”
He snorted.
“Easily, but that won’t do much good in the long run. They come out in a couple of years and will be even madder. And Panacea will give them the power to do something about their mad.”
Now it was my turn to grin.
“Just put them away. In a couple of years, Panacea won’t matter anymore.”
“How. I know, they are hurt. Hell, I had much fun denying them patent protection for all the drugs that you put into the dump. By the way, I noticed that one drug is missing from it. I fully approve of that. Though if you have the formula, I would be thankful if you could send it to me.
Panacea claims that they’ve lost it during the raid, and can’t provide it anymore. And the addicts are suffering.”
After a moment of contemplation, I nodded. Considering that it was my own mother who was among the ones suffering, I could hardly deny him that much.
He then continued:
“But as much as that hurt them, they still have their cloning department, their medical R&D, and most importantly the PEES. Those three will ensure that they will claw their way back to the top.”
“That is why I want you to take the Knowles out of the picture for a few years. I can’t do anything against their R&D department, though I think if the money dries up, that will evaporate as well, but the other two are going down over the next years.”
I closed my eyes and looked over the messages I had gotten for the timetable.
“Enki will announce a new cloning technology in a month. That will rip that leg out from under Panacea."
“New cloning tech won’t be much of a draw. Sure, one part is that they have the best tech, but more important is that they have the genetic engineers to prevent problems.”
“There are enough engineers outside of Panacea to give them a bit of competition, and when their order books dry up, I think most of theirs will walk away. And the new tech is… in one word, revolutionary. Around six times faster than what Panacea has, and it does not create the toxicity buildup that all other cloning technologies have. That means it can be used to indefinitely replace biological tissue.
And instead of a clone in six months, it provides one in one.”
He rubbed his chin.
“Ok, that might work. But it will be a hard sell. Panacea has sewn up that market for a long time.”
“And they jerked everybody around enough that everybody hates their guts. If there is a viable alternative, they will lose that market soon. We don’t plan to offer the service, we sell the cloning rigs, to everybody except Panacea, and maybe Dalgon. If the big corps get their own departments set up and there will be some competition, Panacea will lose fast.
Especially if the Knowles are in no position to intervene for a few years.”
“Ok, I see that. But what about PEES? That is the club they use to force all others to do their bidding.”
“Oh, that is the really nice one. I have… developed a new auto-surgeon. It is in my opinion the best that is available, and all feedback I’ve gotten so far confirms that. More importantly, I included a very powerful, fuzzy-logic-capable CPU in the design. That is by the way where Warden came from.
That alone is of course not enough to challenge PEES, though it will hurt Panacea on its own quite a bit.
But the coup-de-grace is right now in testing. I’ve taken the time and created a medical VI, which conveniently will be able to run on said auto-surgeon. Combine that with a specialized pharmaceutical molecular foundry and a nano-fab, and the auto-surgeon becomes a full-fledged auto-doc.
Something that any mercenary unit can put into an armored skimmer and use to compete with PEES.
You don’t need highly trained and expensive combat medics in the rescue teams if they can simply put the patient in the auto-doc and be done with.
And again, Panacea has not made very many friends the way they used PEES to force compliance with their wishes. You can bet that as soon as we offer the auto-doc, all the A-tier and higher corps will create such a service if just internal.”
I could not help but smile.
“And Panacea will finally reap what they’ve sown. I don’t think that they will be even a B-tier corp in two, maybe three years. And personally, I find the idea that they will come out of prison and stand before the ruins of what was once one of the most important corporations of the world much more satisfying than simply executing them.
That will come soon enough if they don’t mend their way.”
He chuckled.
“That is… very alluring, but you are aware that there is no money in creating a medical VI, do you?”
I shrugged.
“I plan to release the VI as freeware anyway. Give it to humanity as a whole. So what if I can’t make money on it directly, I never planned to do so anyway.
But Enki will be the only group with a VI-capable auto-surgeon at the ready. So we will make money hand over fist that way. Not that that is the goal, mind you. The goal is to break Panacea, destroying its PEES monopoly.”
He rubbed his chin, nodding the whole time.
“That it will do. That it will do. Knowles and his whole family are such big assholes that nobody can stand them. They pissed in so many cups, and spoiled so many deals and plans… the only thing keeping Panacea alive all those years was that nobody could afford to lose access to PEES.
He continued rubbing his chin.
“And it will be even better if we keep them in maximum security. They certainly are a ‘flight risk’ and have enough money that they can organize a breakout, so it is even warranted. Keep them out of the loop, don’t let them contact the outside world. When their lawyers finally get access, it will be too late to react.”
His grin became diabolical.
“I bet Panacea won’t survive the first year. They made enough enemies that operators, mercenaries, and even full-out corporate military will line up for a chance to kick their asses. And we don’t need to sully our hands. Except pointing them in the right direction to take out some of their hidden assets.
Yes, I like it. How soon can you get it done?”
I shrugged.
“The auto-surgeon is ready at any given moment. The VI is, as I said, in testing. If nothing goes wrong, it should be ready in a month or two. The nano-fab and the forge are trivial. The only thing is that we need to build up our defenses before we can release the surgeon.
It is a bit complicated, but… we’ve had too many too-important technologies in too short a time. The cloning rig, and everything that it entails to are… relatively unimportant. Yes, a revolutionary step forward, but everybody can get a cloning rig nowadays. Ours is just better.
The rest… well, the next one will be a problem. Unless we have some defenses in place that is.”
He nodded knowingly.
“Ah yes, your defenses. That was what you man Walker contacted us about. Of course, we will help you.”
I shrugged.
“To be honest, that is not really necessary. Michael has asked in case I can not get it done. And to be fair, the radar we have is… not the best. But we have other sensors that compensate for it.”
For a moment, Vandermeer looked at me confused, but then he frowned.
“Wait, I thought this meeting was the price of you getting the weapon tech. If you don’t need it, why are you here?”
I shook my head.
“Because Michael made a promise, speaking for me. And while I am not perfect in that regard, I always do my best to keep my promises, even those made by others if they are in a position to speak for me.”
He smiled, with a somewhat sad expression.
“I see. Your father was exactly the same. Honor, and loyalty… they were not just words for him. But please, be careful, that is what ultimately killed him.”
What can you say to something like that? He seemed to be honest, but I knew better than most how much the avatar settings in cyberspace could hide. Accordingly, I just shrugged. Even if he was honest, I never met my father.
He sighed but let it go.
“So you don’t need help with your military? Are you sure?”
I started to answer, only to stop again. I knew that our new anti-ship weapons were simply the best. And to be honest… I had a few ideas about how to use some of the principles to build new anti-personnel weapons, but… to be honest, even if the bots were working out as I thought they would, they would still tote around standard weapons. Chemically powered projectile weapons.
“To be honest, no, I am not fully sure. I mean, in anti-ship weapons we are covered. But in smaller-scale weaponry, infantry, and such… we might need help there. Or at least could use it.”
He looked at me intensely.
“Do you have enough men for it to count? I could send a battalion or two to help, you know.”
I rolled my eyes and looked up the number of bots we already had produced. At first, I thought I had looked up the wrong number, but then realized that Michael had not built one, but two bot manufacturies. And used most of the output for the new military bots. To be fair, the numbers were staggering.
“It seems that we have around a battalion of humans, though as I see it, we have no power armor for them yet… I have to correct that. But more importantly, we have around four and a half battalions of combat bots. That should hold quite some time.”
Vandermeer grimaced.
“Combat bots are… not good. Sure, they are better than nothing, but one human is usually worth four of five bots. You should not place your trust in them.”
I grinned and chuckled softly.
“You don’t know those bots. Yes, I know the problems with bots. They depend on their energy cells, have an average of four to five hours of activity before the cells are depleted, are slow to recharge, need charging infrastructure, are not very mobile, and are dumb as a stack of rocks.
Almost none of that is the case with those bots. One of the new pieces of cyberware that we are right now testing is a cybernetic digestive system. It enables those bots to run in low-powered mode indefinitely as long as they have access to some food source.
Even if they get no food, they can function for around 72 hours on their cells, and as soon as they get food, they slowly recharge the cells. Of course, they also have a high-powered mode where they can rip cyber zombies apart. They have enough energy for five to six hours of that.
And best of all, they do not do the processing internally, they are remote controlled, via Q-link. Remote controlled by a VI on an extremely powerful supercomputer I might add. And yes, it is a controlled VI.
Only the slow-to-recharge point is valid. We need to build enough charging infrastructure for them, but that is not a big problem.”
“Strong enough to rip a cyber zombie apart? How?”
“They are new tech. Well, not new new tech, but tech that nobody bothered to use. I actually designed the whole framework as cyberware for our men. I absolutely refuse to create cyber zombies, but with the new cyberware, who needs them? Intelligent people can now get a nearly 100% replacement of their body and remain living. No CRS anymore.”
I took a deep breath shook my head to clear it, and then shrugged.
“Only problem is that, unlike cyber zombies, those people are not disposable. That means we have to test this new cyberware thoroughly. The bots were originally a stopgap until we had the cyberware ready. But… why stop then? Especially as the only important piece of cyberware that I could not make safe so far is the reflex booster.”
Vandermeer seemed to think hard for a bit.
“I see. Honestly, if those bots really are that good, maybe Vandermeer could buy some. They sound useful at least.”
I shrugged.
“I have no idea. I am mostly the tinkerer who invents the stuff.” That was especially true as I was completely confused if I could trust him or not. Right now, my kneejerk reflex would be to not only say no but heck no. Fortunately, I was aware enough to know that this might not be the right response, so I held back.
Heck, if what he told me, it would be the completely wrong response. If only I were not so unsure if he said the truth.
Luckily, he accepted my words, and I was spared to go into deeper details here.
“That is fine. I will have the people I plan to send to New York go over that with your people.”
I nodded, not trusting myself to say anything. I… desperately wanted him to leave me alone, to not disturb my little piece of happiness.
“Anyway, Michael informed me that you want to hire me? Whatever for?”
Another heavy breath from the old man.
“Ah… yes. We… have a problem. One that I certainly have to explain to you. We need to get a handle on Sanderson’s Folly.”
He was right, he did not have to explain it to me. But I was unquestionably the wrong person to point at this specific problem.
“Yes, I know about the problem, and I agree that we have to do something about it. But… that is biology. I don’t like that stuff. Can’t really wrap my mind around it. You need a virologist or geneticist to work on it.”
He scoffed sourly.
“I have several virologists and geneticists working on it. Including another of the K4. Without results. We have not even found out what this cursed virus actually did. Much less how we can counter it. We are completely stumped here.”
What the heck was going on here?
“What about Project Revitalize? That has been going for what, 150 years now?”
The answer was preceded by a harsh scoff.
“As so many other things our ancestors started for the betterment of the Commonwealth, successive generations of Knowles have been running it into the ground. Completely haphazardly handled. Fuck, they did not even do basic research during the last 120 years. All that Revitalize knows is what was known in 2120.
They just took some chemicals, tested them in rats if they influence fertility in any way, and then ran human trials. They basically threw whatever chemical they could think of at the wall and looked at what stuck.
In all honesty, despite you and the other 11 functional ones, K4 should have never been approved for human trials. Yes, you twelve are a gift from the heavens, but all that suffering by the rest of the couples... it is hard to argue that it was worth it.
And the idiots Knowles had run this project did not even keep more than a bare handful of records. For all purposes, Project Revitalize might not have been existing for the last 120 years.”
Ok, as hard as it was, I had to agree about K4. Despite my own life being owed to it. But one thing was just plain wrong.
“What do you mean only a handful of records? I have exabytes of them. Sure, they were not the most meticulous scientists, but they put at least a modicum of care into their research.”
He sat just still, blinking a few times, before tilting his head.
“You… have… exabytes of records of Revitalize? I had people look into the hard records. There is nothing there. There is not even a hint that there ever was anything. How can you have that many records?”
I frowned and shrugged.
“I have no clue why you did not find anything, but I… well you know about my less-than-legal endeavors in cyberspace. I wanted to know, needed to know what they were thinking when they approved K4. So I went looking. I… routinely made a copy of everything.
There are decades of data. Lists of recipients of the various batches. The results of every batch, not even anonymized. Explicit descriptions of which couple had what effects. How the children developed. Scan data. Where the chemical in question came from. What preliminary tests were done. Everything.
You are right in that they did step into human trials way too early. Sometimes they did not even wait for the full results of the rat trials. In two cases, they were not even doing the rat trials first.”
During my explanation, Vandermeer balled his fists, closed his eyes, and took several deep deliberate breaths. After a few moments, he snarled: “Knowles!” But said nothing else for another few moments.
Then he opened his eyes and looked at me, and for the first time, I saw real anger in his eyes.
“Would you please agree to send me those files? This… fuck, Knowles must have had almost everything deleted. The hard records destroyed. The moment you stole his money, he must have destroyed the project. Just to spite us, to spite humanity.”
“Of course. I honestly thought that you already had everything.” Then I got to thinking. Dangerous, I know, but I could not help myself sometimes…
“But you know, that explains it.”
His eyes narrowed and he leaned forward.
“Explains what?”
“That you never tried to get more functional K4. You know, if there were enough of us, we could be the future of humanity. But right now, with only 12… that’s too much of a genetic bottleneck.”
Vandermeer shook his head, with a sad smile.
“You would think so, but it is simply too much of a gamble. More than 8000 pregnancies and only 12 of them could be called successful. No, we can’t take that chance. 0.15% is just too low.”
I shrugged.
“It is closer to 0.14% but whatever. The thing is that apparently, nobody did any real analysis of the data. I would have thought that you at least would have when you took over, but if you never got the data…”
He frowned.
“Why? What did you find in the data?”
“Well, for one, there were a disproportional amount of G-batch women in the trial.”
“Ok, that is a bit interesting, but those things happen.”
I chuckled.
“You don’t understand. There were exactly 933 women of the various G-batches in the K4 trial.”
His eyes got wide.
“Ninehundred… fuck me, do you mean all the living K4 have a G-batch mother?”
“Exactly. The vast majority of them were G2 with 273, then G5 with 197, G4 with 178, G1 with 155, and G6 with 118.”
He was visibly confused.
“Where are the G3s? I know that there were G3s in the trial. Your mother is a G3.”
I smiled.
“Add the numbers. G1, 2, 4, 5, and 6 together make 921. There were 12 G3.”
He gasped.
“12? Are you saying…”
“That every functional K4 has a G3 mother? And that every single G3-woman taking part in the trial had a functional K4 as a child? Yes, that is what I am saying.”
“That… that changes everything. Why did Knowles never…?”
“Think about it, until maybe eight years ago, all of us K4 were seen as disabled. Just to a varying degree. Only when the first one crushed every single IQ test did they realize that the functional ones were special in a good way.”
“But even then, Knowles should have seen to it that we get more of them.”
I sighed.
“A substantial portion of Panacea’s bottom line comes from cloning.”
“Yes… I see that. But… fuck, that even Knowles could sink so low? We are dying out for fucks sake. And this information might save humanity.”
Then he calmed himself down again.
“Now we have to find the G3 women. We need to… fuck, how do we find them?”
“The files. They are all neatly listed in there. Oh, one thing, so that you are not surprised, you won’t find me among the K4. I did not want them to find me, so I changed it. Before I copied the whole thing.”
He nodded.
“I can understand that. But you know that we will add you back in, right?”
I sighed.
“That is probably unavoidable.”
“Then I will have the project launched as soon as you sent me the data.”
I rolled my eyes.
“Get real, as I know Warden, you already have the data. Or at least reading access to it.”
“Correct.”
I nodded. Always efficient. As much as I feared her in the beginning, by then I could not even understand how I ever lived without her.
“Now that that is sorted, can we agree that you don’t need me to work on this biological stuff?”
He chuckled softly.
“Sorry, no can do. We really need you.”
I closed my eyes and took a few deep breaths before I asked:
“Why? Why do you need me? I’m not good at biology.”
He chuckled again.
“What you told me about your new cloning tech begs to differ. And it was you, not anybody else who found the cure for CRS. Both forms of CRS. But the reason why we need you is what I told you earlier.”
He rubbed his eyes for a moment.
“We have two K4s, specialized in physics, fully trained in physics, working together for 11 to 13 years in cyberspace not being able to do what you did in six months. And that includes learning physics. I have no frame about how much smarter you are than the rest, but I know how much smarter your fellow K4 are compared to us mere mortals. And it is mindblowing.”
I buried my face in my hands.
“That was physics. Math. I… I don’t know, I just have a knack for it. I have no such knack for biology. I… just don’t like it.”
“And still you managed to do something that many thought to be impossible. That is what I need, what humanity needs."
I balled my fists in frustration, while I answered him in a strained voice:
“I circumvented the whole biology issue. I created an engineering workaround that allowed me to develop the new cloning tech and the cure for muscular CRS.”
He patiently spoke then:
“Then use this workaround. Anything. We are stuck. I increased the resources for Revitalize a hundredfold, and we are stuck. I have a K4 working on it, and she can’t make any progress. We need somebody thinking outside the box working on it. And we need the best working on it.
You are booth.”
I hated it, but he was right. As I had complained so often, humanity needed to get a cure for the Folly. We desperately needed to lift that curse. And I could not even argue that I was not the smartest. I knew that I was smarter than the rest of the K4.
In the end, I could not justify to myself not trying to work on it.
“Fine. I’ll do it. But I won’t spend a decade on it. If I can understand it, I will do it, but if I run into a wall... I can't promise anything. And I’ll need resources. Eggs and sperm, from humans and chimpanzees. And if I find out what the Folly actually does, I need a virologist or geneticist to work with me. I have absolutely no clue about genetic engineering. And I for sure don’t intend to learn it.”
He nodded.
“That is ok, dear. I doubt that you will need even a year. How about you give me six months and we look further then? The rest… I can send you a few hundred units of the human eggs and sperm, but I have to look into the chimpanzee stuff. Why do you need it?”
“Chimpanzees are humanity's closest relative. If we can see why they can still fertilize the eggs, and humans can not, we might find a solution. And six months is ok. A bit longer than I really want, but… this is important.”
Vandermeer nodded softly, and materialized a tablet, pushing on it a few times.
“Ok, I… have everything, except the chimpanzee stuff on the way to you next week. Wednesday or Thursday at the latest. I will send a few fertility specialists along, as well as the weapon techs. And a small contingent of Vandermeer military. Can you put them up for the time being?”
I was a bit baffled.
“Ok, I can see the specialists, and the weapon techs, but why the military?”
He gave me a crooked smile.
“Because regardless of what happens, you are still my heir. And I want to do anything to keep you safe.”
“Uh, I don’t think I want to be your heir. I don’t want to run a corporation. That is the reason why Michael is the CEO.”
“That is ok. In time you can make a similar arrangement for Vandermeer, but you will own it, or most of it, at some point in time. Hell, you are already owning 5% of it right now.”
Wait, what? I did what?!?
“I own 5% of Vandermeer? How did that happen? And why don’t I know already about it?”
Another sigh from the old man.
“You inherited it from your father. I gave him the 5% as a wedding gift. Your mother has another 10%, and I have 65%. I also have the proxy for you and your mother. And you don’t know about it because we never talked. I assume Knowles did not consider it important for you to know. Now, can you put up the people or do I have to look into getting them a place to live?”
I took a heavy breath while rolling my eyes.
“I assume there is no way I can convince you not to send any military?”
When he nodded sagely, I shook my head. Stupid stubborn old man. Oh, of course, he was stubborn. I had to have it from somewhere. And I recognized the look he was giving me. I’ve seen it often enough in a mirror. There was no getting out of this.
“Fine, whatever. And it depends on how many. I have 38 moderate rooms, as well as seven somewhat bigger suites available.”
“What do you understand as a moderate room?”
“About 36m², including the small bathroom with a shower. But seriously, I don’t want them all full with your people.”
“Yeah, I can see that. I thought about a small platoon. Two squads, 20 soldiers, two corporals, one sergeant, and one lieutenant. The soldiers can double up nicely. Hell, in 36m² if you install bunks they can sleep 4 to a room. Then two lab assistants and two fertility specialists, maybe three each. And the techs, I would say three of them, and a major to work with your techs.”
I sighed. Way too many people, really. But… at this time I was not prepared to snub him. I… just did not know enough to know what I did not know.
“And if I find something?”
“Then you either have already cured the Folly, or I will connect to a geneticist and you can work on finishing it.”
I… was not exactly happy about the situation, but he was right at least at one point. We, humanity, desperately needed this cure.
With a heavy sigh, I nodded.
“As long as you don’t expect too much from me. I… biology is just not my forte.”
He nodded and smiled.
“I can understand that. All of your ancestors were more of the technical type as well. But to be honest, I would not be surprised if you actually get it done.”
He simply did not want to understand. Yes, I would look into it. I would try my best. But… there was a reason why I did not tackle the Folly before.
In the end, I blew out some air while I shook my head.
“I think I am at my limit. All this… it is too much. I think it is better when we stop it for now.”
He was obviously not happy about it but forced a smile.
“Understandable. I had nearly six years getting used to the idea. All this has to be world-shattering for you. You can call me anytime.”
“I will. It was… strangely nice meeting you.”
“It was nice to finally meet you as well.”
I stood up, gave him a wave, and moved back into my mindscape.
Here, I lifted the strict settings on my avatar and nearly fell down from the stress. Wow… I had not realized that I was that stressed, that impacted. After what seemed an eternity for me, I finally got a grip on my emotions, my raging mind.
Now if only I could trust him. But he was a politician. Even in the real world, sitting just on the other side of a real table from him would not allow me to find out if he lied or not. And I… was aware enough to realize that a connection to Enki, to me, was something any politician would love to have.
And I had heard what he had said in the council.
Mostly rhetorically, I asked into the air, but in reality to Warden:
“You can’t tell me if he was telling the truth, can you?”
Warden’s first words in her answer were no surprise:
“No, I can not. I would have had to have access to his neural signature when he was talking. The probability of that backfiring and making him into an enemy for you was too high to risk it.”
I nodded. Exactly what I had expected.
“But the research I have done in the archives corroborates part of his story. You already know about your mother. Several sources claim that Joshua Knowles, Benedict Knowles, Caleb Knowles, and Evan Knowles have a predilection for torturing and killing prostitutes and unfortunate ‘low-class’ victims.”
Yeah, I knew that much already. I mean, there were always rumors about that. But such rumors were not a really reliable source of information.
“Rumors won’t help me here I fear.”
“I am not talking about rumors. I have found several police reports that investigate some dead ‘peasants’ or prostitutes, including autopsy, where the act of torture was obvious, that all ended in the code 1788-1K.
Further investigation of Commonwealth Peacekeeper Corps procedures showed that 1788 means somebody untouchable did it, while the 1K suffix means it was a Knowles.”
I had to take a few seconds to really understand what she had just said. The whole concept of untouchable was so prevalent in Nowhere that the police had a separate code for it? Were those jerks for real?
“There… there is a code for it? Seriously?”
“Yes, there is an official code for it. The 1K for Knowles is by far the most numerous I could find in the police reports. Followed by 1D for Dalgon. Interestingly 1V for Vandermeer has the same priority, but has never been used as far as I can ascertain.”
I took a couple of deep breaths, trying to force down the raising rage.
“So… we can say with some certainty that Knowles and his spawn are sadistic murderers. Anything else?”
“Yes, a disproportionate number of the victims have been redheads. Approximately 12.52%.”
Ok, that was more than just disproportionate. Even in the and of the 2240s, redheads made up a whopping 1.2% of the population of the Commonwealth.
So, what Warden was saying is that 1. The Knowles were sadistic pricks, 2. They had been untouchable and 3. They had a grudge against redheads.
Add in that they apparently managed to get my mother declared dead… yes, it did fit what Vandermeer had said.
I sighed.
“Can you give an estimate of what Vandermeer telling being the truth?”
“All sources I can access taken together make it a probability of approximately 78.87% that he was telling the truth. There is a probability of approximately 3.36% that he was purposefully telling a lie. It is approximately 13.68% that he himself was misinformed. The remaining 4.09% are undefined.”
Ok, that made it quite clear. Sure, Warden did not have all the information. Heck, she only had what was in dark web archives. But what she did have said that Vandermeer told me the truth as he knew it with a better than 90% probability.
It seemed he really was another victim in all of this. Dang, it would be hard to let go of nearly 18 years of anger toward that man.
“What do you mean thanks to me? I’ve done nothing except move somewhere else.”
He chuckled.
“Your little ploy with finding how the Phantom managed to steal all that money might have fooled most of the people, but not all of them.”
When Warden literally bristled immediately with spikes and grew to a gigantic size, Vandermeer held up his hands in a warding position.
“Keep cool. I am no danger to her. But you should be aware that a few people are aware that she is the Phantom.”
Warden shrunk back down to her normal size, but the spikes remained.
“That is unacceptable.”
“That may be, but you can’t change it.”
“We have to ensure that the banks don’t learn about that.”
Vandermeer shook his head.
“The banks do know about it. But thanks to you, Vivian is an extremely hard target, and they see no way to get to her without getting blown to pieces by you. Add in that nearly everybody believes that she only found the equation after the Phantom wrote it in the Abyss, and they’ve decided that as long as she keeps silent about it, and does not get too much money too quickly without any explanation, they will let it go.
They officially still search for the Phantom, but won’t go after her.”
I could not help it and shook my head.
“How?”
He chuckled.
“In the end, you are just too smart. Do you know how many people actually understand the Seeberger equation well enough to even understand how the quantum entanglement of photons might work?”
I shrugged.
“It has been more than half a year, so by now, I would guess a couple of dozen or so. Why?”
“You are off. By quite a bit, I might add. The actual number is one. It is only you who could understand it. Even the other K4s are running against a wall here. Two of the other 11 are working on it.
One thinks he has found the variables that he has to isolate to get to the explanation of the entanglement. And you manage it in three days? Get real!”
“Uh, I was in cyberspace. Those three days were more like 11 months for me.”
He scoffed.
“I know. And I also know how compression works. And when I freed the other K4, I hired most of them, much more amicably, I might add, and bought ultra-jacks for them. Those two have spent nine months with compressions ranging from 70:1 and 80:1 trying to understand it.
I would love to know your real compression sometimes by the way. Somehow I doubt the 90:1 you told everybody you have… but anyway, despite the corrected equation, despite them spending between 11 and 13 years, virtually, they have not made any sense out of it.
Fuck, one of them explained to me that it can’t work, just last month. Of course, you had to release the absolute proof that it does indeed work, not quite a week later. Boy was he pissed.
But what I am trying to say is there is no way that two people still alive actually understand the equation enough to make Q-links. Well, not no way, but the probability is so vanishingly low that it is negligible. That only leaves you as a possibility. And I am not the only one who understands that.
Not as many people as there should, but anybody who has spent any time on that equation, or had smart people do so, knows that it was almost certainly you.”
I was confused now.
“But… it is not that hard! I mean, I won’t claim that it is easy. Goodness knows it is not. But it took me a few virtual months to understand it. With only the tools I could make or afford by myself. No support structure, no team, and no budget.
Anybody who does have those things should be able to do the same in way less time. Heck, I deciphered the equation, corrected it, learned enough math and physics to really understand it, and created the first Q-links in less than six virtual months.
Whomever you have working on it already has the correct equation, they already know that it works, and they probably already have a background in higher physics. And you say that at least two of them are K4.
Something’s not right here. Yes, I am smart, probably smarter than any of them, but not that much smarter.”
He shrugged.
“Well, if you find out where they go wrong, you can tell them any time you like. Hell, I’ve created a virtual meeting room for all of them, even the three who choose not to work for me. You really should visit a few of the meetings there, I think.
It will probably be the only place where you can find people that are at least approaching your own intelligence.”
I shrugged.
“I will think about it.” To be honest, I had absolutely no intention of meeting even more people. At least not soon.
“Do that. I will send you the meeting address and the times. But… to get back to the topic of Panacea, while I appreciate what you’ve done here, I fear it is just a matter of time for them to get back to where they were. I want to stop them. And for that, I need your help again. In a small capacity though.”
I frowned.
“My help? What do you need my help for?”
He sighed.
“I am trying to invoke the Jepsen Act against Knowles. Get rid of him, and his family’s power once and for all. For now, I don’t have the political power to do so. But…”
The Jepsen Act… one piece of evil lawmaking that luckily never had been used. In essence, it said that somebody who is convicted of high treason to the Commonwealth will not only be executed but all his property will be confiscated.
Yes, I know, it is not that different from many similar laws in other nations. The evil thing here is what it defines as high treason. Among them are for example dishonoring the first councilor, disrespecting the council, making information that is damaging to the Commonwealth public knowledge, and depriving the Commonwealth of an irreplaceable resource.
Things that even in most tyrannies are not much worse than petty crimes can earn you capital punishment in the Commonwealth. And as I understand it, it was created explicitly to trap my family.
But I could not see any way Vandermeer could turn it around against Knowles, and for sure did not know a way that I could help with that.
“My help? You are aware that I no longer live in the Commonwealth, do you? And I certainly do not plan to move back to Seattle.”
In response, Vandermeer chuckled, confusing me even more.
“And that is exactly the help I meant.”
“Did I not just refuse to help?”
“No, you explained to me that you do not plan to come back to the Commonwealth again.”
I shrugged.
“Yes… but how can that help you?”
Now Vandermeer showed a downright evil grin.
“It is simple. Knowles stratagems have deprived the Commonwealth of an irreplaceable resource, and that for good as we just ascertained.”
“What irreplaceable resource are you talking about?”
“You of course. I just told you that two of the smartest people known to have ever lived took over ten years to unsuccessfully try to do what you did in less than six months.
That makes you an absolutely irreplaceable resource. Absolutely unique. And Knowles drove you away to the point where you will never come back.”
I could now see where he was going, but… it was a bit…
“That is a very strained reason. I don’t think the council will go for it.”
He slumped down a bit.
“You might be right, but it is all I have. We simply can’t allow the Knowles family to get back in control.”
I could understand him, but… he would have to burn way too much influence to make that happen if he even could. But…
“There might be another way. Do you have enough dirt on Knowles and his sons to put them in prison for a few years?”
He snorted.
“Easily, but that won’t do much good in the long run. They come out in a couple of years and will be even madder. And Panacea will give them the power to do something about their mad.”
Now it was my turn to grin.
“Just put them away. In a couple of years, Panacea won’t matter anymore.”
“How. I know, they are hurt. Hell, I had much fun denying them patent protection for all the drugs that you put into the dump. By the way, I noticed that one drug is missing from it. I fully approve of that. Though if you have the formula, I would be thankful if you could send it to me.
Panacea claims that they’ve lost it during the raid, and can’t provide it anymore. And the addicts are suffering.”
After a moment of contemplation, I nodded. Considering that it was my own mother who was among the ones suffering, I could hardly deny him that much.
He then continued:
“But as much as that hurt them, they still have their cloning department, their medical R&D, and most importantly the PEES. Those three will ensure that they will claw their way back to the top.”
“That is why I want you to take the Knowles out of the picture for a few years. I can’t do anything against their R&D department, though I think if the money dries up, that will evaporate as well, but the other two are going down over the next years.”
I closed my eyes and looked over the messages I had gotten for the timetable.
“Enki will announce a new cloning technology in a month. That will rip that leg out from under Panacea."
“New cloning tech won’t be much of a draw. Sure, one part is that they have the best tech, but more important is that they have the genetic engineers to prevent problems.”
“There are enough engineers outside of Panacea to give them a bit of competition, and when their order books dry up, I think most of theirs will walk away. And the new tech is… in one word, revolutionary. Around six times faster than what Panacea has, and it does not create the toxicity buildup that all other cloning technologies have. That means it can be used to indefinitely replace biological tissue.
And instead of a clone in six months, it provides one in one.”
He rubbed his chin.
“Ok, that might work. But it will be a hard sell. Panacea has sewn up that market for a long time.”
“And they jerked everybody around enough that everybody hates their guts. If there is a viable alternative, they will lose that market soon. We don’t plan to offer the service, we sell the cloning rigs, to everybody except Panacea, and maybe Dalgon. If the big corps get their own departments set up and there will be some competition, Panacea will lose fast.
Especially if the Knowles are in no position to intervene for a few years.”
“Ok, I see that. But what about PEES? That is the club they use to force all others to do their bidding.”
“Oh, that is the really nice one. I have… developed a new auto-surgeon. It is in my opinion the best that is available, and all feedback I’ve gotten so far confirms that. More importantly, I included a very powerful, fuzzy-logic-capable CPU in the design. That is by the way where Warden came from.
That alone is of course not enough to challenge PEES, though it will hurt Panacea on its own quite a bit.
But the coup-de-grace is right now in testing. I’ve taken the time and created a medical VI, which conveniently will be able to run on said auto-surgeon. Combine that with a specialized pharmaceutical molecular foundry and a nano-fab, and the auto-surgeon becomes a full-fledged auto-doc.
Something that any mercenary unit can put into an armored skimmer and use to compete with PEES.
You don’t need highly trained and expensive combat medics in the rescue teams if they can simply put the patient in the auto-doc and be done with.
And again, Panacea has not made very many friends the way they used PEES to force compliance with their wishes. You can bet that as soon as we offer the auto-doc, all the A-tier and higher corps will create such a service if just internal.”
I could not help but smile.
“And Panacea will finally reap what they’ve sown. I don’t think that they will be even a B-tier corp in two, maybe three years. And personally, I find the idea that they will come out of prison and stand before the ruins of what was once one of the most important corporations of the world much more satisfying than simply executing them.
That will come soon enough if they don’t mend their way.”
He chuckled.
“That is… very alluring, but you are aware that there is no money in creating a medical VI, do you?”
I shrugged.
“I plan to release the VI as freeware anyway. Give it to humanity as a whole. So what if I can’t make money on it directly, I never planned to do so anyway.
But Enki will be the only group with a VI-capable auto-surgeon at the ready. So we will make money hand over fist that way. Not that that is the goal, mind you. The goal is to break Panacea, destroying its PEES monopoly.”
He rubbed his chin, nodding the whole time.
“That it will do. That it will do. Knowles and his whole family are such big assholes that nobody can stand them. They pissed in so many cups, and spoiled so many deals and plans… the only thing keeping Panacea alive all those years was that nobody could afford to lose access to PEES.
He continued rubbing his chin.
“And it will be even better if we keep them in maximum security. They certainly are a ‘flight risk’ and have enough money that they can organize a breakout, so it is even warranted. Keep them out of the loop, don’t let them contact the outside world. When their lawyers finally get access, it will be too late to react.”
His grin became diabolical.
“I bet Panacea won’t survive the first year. They made enough enemies that operators, mercenaries, and even full-out corporate military will line up for a chance to kick their asses. And we don’t need to sully our hands. Except pointing them in the right direction to take out some of their hidden assets.
Yes, I like it. How soon can you get it done?”
I shrugged.
“The auto-surgeon is ready at any given moment. The VI is, as I said, in testing. If nothing goes wrong, it should be ready in a month or two. The nano-fab and the forge are trivial. The only thing is that we need to build up our defenses before we can release the surgeon.
It is a bit complicated, but… we’ve had too many too-important technologies in too short a time. The cloning rig, and everything that it entails to are… relatively unimportant. Yes, a revolutionary step forward, but everybody can get a cloning rig nowadays. Ours is just better.
The rest… well, the next one will be a problem. Unless we have some defenses in place that is.”
He nodded knowingly.
“Ah yes, your defenses. That was what you man Walker contacted us about. Of course, we will help you.”
I shrugged.
“To be honest, that is not really necessary. Michael has asked in case I can not get it done. And to be fair, the radar we have is… not the best. But we have other sensors that compensate for it.”
For a moment, Vandermeer looked at me confused, but then he frowned.
“Wait, I thought this meeting was the price of you getting the weapon tech. If you don’t need it, why are you here?”
I shook my head.
“Because Michael made a promise, speaking for me. And while I am not perfect in that regard, I always do my best to keep my promises, even those made by others if they are in a position to speak for me.”
He smiled, with a somewhat sad expression.
“I see. Your father was exactly the same. Honor, and loyalty… they were not just words for him. But please, be careful, that is what ultimately killed him.”
What can you say to something like that? He seemed to be honest, but I knew better than most how much the avatar settings in cyberspace could hide. Accordingly, I just shrugged. Even if he was honest, I never met my father.
He sighed but let it go.
“So you don’t need help with your military? Are you sure?”
I started to answer, only to stop again. I knew that our new anti-ship weapons were simply the best. And to be honest… I had a few ideas about how to use some of the principles to build new anti-personnel weapons, but… to be honest, even if the bots were working out as I thought they would, they would still tote around standard weapons. Chemically powered projectile weapons.
“To be honest, no, I am not fully sure. I mean, in anti-ship weapons we are covered. But in smaller-scale weaponry, infantry, and such… we might need help there. Or at least could use it.”
He looked at me intensely.
“Do you have enough men for it to count? I could send a battalion or two to help, you know.”
I rolled my eyes and looked up the number of bots we already had produced. At first, I thought I had looked up the wrong number, but then realized that Michael had not built one, but two bot manufacturies. And used most of the output for the new military bots. To be fair, the numbers were staggering.
“It seems that we have around a battalion of humans, though as I see it, we have no power armor for them yet… I have to correct that. But more importantly, we have around four and a half battalions of combat bots. That should hold quite some time.”
Vandermeer grimaced.
“Combat bots are… not good. Sure, they are better than nothing, but one human is usually worth four of five bots. You should not place your trust in them.”
I grinned and chuckled softly.
“You don’t know those bots. Yes, I know the problems with bots. They depend on their energy cells, have an average of four to five hours of activity before the cells are depleted, are slow to recharge, need charging infrastructure, are not very mobile, and are dumb as a stack of rocks.
Almost none of that is the case with those bots. One of the new pieces of cyberware that we are right now testing is a cybernetic digestive system. It enables those bots to run in low-powered mode indefinitely as long as they have access to some food source.
Even if they get no food, they can function for around 72 hours on their cells, and as soon as they get food, they slowly recharge the cells. Of course, they also have a high-powered mode where they can rip cyber zombies apart. They have enough energy for five to six hours of that.
And best of all, they do not do the processing internally, they are remote controlled, via Q-link. Remote controlled by a VI on an extremely powerful supercomputer I might add. And yes, it is a controlled VI.
Only the slow-to-recharge point is valid. We need to build enough charging infrastructure for them, but that is not a big problem.”
“Strong enough to rip a cyber zombie apart? How?”
“They are new tech. Well, not new new tech, but tech that nobody bothered to use. I actually designed the whole framework as cyberware for our men. I absolutely refuse to create cyber zombies, but with the new cyberware, who needs them? Intelligent people can now get a nearly 100% replacement of their body and remain living. No CRS anymore.”
I took a deep breath shook my head to clear it, and then shrugged.
“Only problem is that, unlike cyber zombies, those people are not disposable. That means we have to test this new cyberware thoroughly. The bots were originally a stopgap until we had the cyberware ready. But… why stop then? Especially as the only important piece of cyberware that I could not make safe so far is the reflex booster.”
Vandermeer seemed to think hard for a bit.
“I see. Honestly, if those bots really are that good, maybe Vandermeer could buy some. They sound useful at least.”
I shrugged.
“I have no idea. I am mostly the tinkerer who invents the stuff.” That was especially true as I was completely confused if I could trust him or not. Right now, my kneejerk reflex would be to not only say no but heck no. Fortunately, I was aware enough to know that this might not be the right response, so I held back.
Heck, if what he told me, it would be the completely wrong response. If only I were not so unsure if he said the truth.
Luckily, he accepted my words, and I was spared to go into deeper details here.
“That is fine. I will have the people I plan to send to New York go over that with your people.”
I nodded, not trusting myself to say anything. I… desperately wanted him to leave me alone, to not disturb my little piece of happiness.
“Anyway, Michael informed me that you want to hire me? Whatever for?”
Another heavy breath from the old man.
“Ah… yes. We… have a problem. One that I certainly have to explain to you. We need to get a handle on Sanderson’s Folly.”
He was right, he did not have to explain it to me. But I was unquestionably the wrong person to point at this specific problem.
“Yes, I know about the problem, and I agree that we have to do something about it. But… that is biology. I don’t like that stuff. Can’t really wrap my mind around it. You need a virologist or geneticist to work on it.”
He scoffed sourly.
“I have several virologists and geneticists working on it. Including another of the K4. Without results. We have not even found out what this cursed virus actually did. Much less how we can counter it. We are completely stumped here.”
What the heck was going on here?
“What about Project Revitalize? That has been going for what, 150 years now?”
The answer was preceded by a harsh scoff.
“As so many other things our ancestors started for the betterment of the Commonwealth, successive generations of Knowles have been running it into the ground. Completely haphazardly handled. Fuck, they did not even do basic research during the last 120 years. All that Revitalize knows is what was known in 2120.
They just took some chemicals, tested them in rats if they influence fertility in any way, and then ran human trials. They basically threw whatever chemical they could think of at the wall and looked at what stuck.
In all honesty, despite you and the other 11 functional ones, K4 should have never been approved for human trials. Yes, you twelve are a gift from the heavens, but all that suffering by the rest of the couples... it is hard to argue that it was worth it.
And the idiots Knowles had run this project did not even keep more than a bare handful of records. For all purposes, Project Revitalize might not have been existing for the last 120 years.”
Ok, as hard as it was, I had to agree about K4. Despite my own life being owed to it. But one thing was just plain wrong.
“What do you mean only a handful of records? I have exabytes of them. Sure, they were not the most meticulous scientists, but they put at least a modicum of care into their research.”
He sat just still, blinking a few times, before tilting his head.
“You… have… exabytes of records of Revitalize? I had people look into the hard records. There is nothing there. There is not even a hint that there ever was anything. How can you have that many records?”
I frowned and shrugged.
“I have no clue why you did not find anything, but I… well you know about my less-than-legal endeavors in cyberspace. I wanted to know, needed to know what they were thinking when they approved K4. So I went looking. I… routinely made a copy of everything.
There are decades of data. Lists of recipients of the various batches. The results of every batch, not even anonymized. Explicit descriptions of which couple had what effects. How the children developed. Scan data. Where the chemical in question came from. What preliminary tests were done. Everything.
You are right in that they did step into human trials way too early. Sometimes they did not even wait for the full results of the rat trials. In two cases, they were not even doing the rat trials first.”
During my explanation, Vandermeer balled his fists, closed his eyes, and took several deep deliberate breaths. After a few moments, he snarled: “Knowles!” But said nothing else for another few moments.
Then he opened his eyes and looked at me, and for the first time, I saw real anger in his eyes.
“Would you please agree to send me those files? This… fuck, Knowles must have had almost everything deleted. The hard records destroyed. The moment you stole his money, he must have destroyed the project. Just to spite us, to spite humanity.”
“Of course. I honestly thought that you already had everything.” Then I got to thinking. Dangerous, I know, but I could not help myself sometimes…
“But you know, that explains it.”
His eyes narrowed and he leaned forward.
“Explains what?”
“That you never tried to get more functional K4. You know, if there were enough of us, we could be the future of humanity. But right now, with only 12… that’s too much of a genetic bottleneck.”
Vandermeer shook his head, with a sad smile.
“You would think so, but it is simply too much of a gamble. More than 8000 pregnancies and only 12 of them could be called successful. No, we can’t take that chance. 0.15% is just too low.”
I shrugged.
“It is closer to 0.14% but whatever. The thing is that apparently, nobody did any real analysis of the data. I would have thought that you at least would have when you took over, but if you never got the data…”
He frowned.
“Why? What did you find in the data?”
“Well, for one, there were a disproportional amount of G-batch women in the trial.”
“Ok, that is a bit interesting, but those things happen.”
I chuckled.
“You don’t understand. There were exactly 933 women of the various G-batches in the K4 trial.”
His eyes got wide.
“Ninehundred… fuck me, do you mean all the living K4 have a G-batch mother?”
“Exactly. The vast majority of them were G2 with 273, then G5 with 197, G4 with 178, G1 with 155, and G6 with 118.”
He was visibly confused.
“Where are the G3s? I know that there were G3s in the trial. Your mother is a G3.”
I smiled.
“Add the numbers. G1, 2, 4, 5, and 6 together make 921. There were 12 G3.”
He gasped.
“12? Are you saying…”
“That every functional K4 has a G3 mother? And that every single G3-woman taking part in the trial had a functional K4 as a child? Yes, that is what I am saying.”
“That… that changes everything. Why did Knowles never…?”
“Think about it, until maybe eight years ago, all of us K4 were seen as disabled. Just to a varying degree. Only when the first one crushed every single IQ test did they realize that the functional ones were special in a good way.”
“But even then, Knowles should have seen to it that we get more of them.”
I sighed.
“A substantial portion of Panacea’s bottom line comes from cloning.”
“Yes… I see that. But… fuck, that even Knowles could sink so low? We are dying out for fucks sake. And this information might save humanity.”
Then he calmed himself down again.
“Now we have to find the G3 women. We need to… fuck, how do we find them?”
“The files. They are all neatly listed in there. Oh, one thing, so that you are not surprised, you won’t find me among the K4. I did not want them to find me, so I changed it. Before I copied the whole thing.”
He nodded.
“I can understand that. But you know that we will add you back in, right?”
I sighed.
“That is probably unavoidable.”
“Then I will have the project launched as soon as you sent me the data.”
I rolled my eyes.
“Get real, as I know Warden, you already have the data. Or at least reading access to it.”
“Correct.”
I nodded. Always efficient. As much as I feared her in the beginning, by then I could not even understand how I ever lived without her.
“Now that that is sorted, can we agree that you don’t need me to work on this biological stuff?”
He chuckled softly.
“Sorry, no can do. We really need you.”
I closed my eyes and took a few deep breaths before I asked:
“Why? Why do you need me? I’m not good at biology.”
He chuckled again.
“What you told me about your new cloning tech begs to differ. And it was you, not anybody else who found the cure for CRS. Both forms of CRS. But the reason why we need you is what I told you earlier.”
He rubbed his eyes for a moment.
“We have two K4s, specialized in physics, fully trained in physics, working together for 11 to 13 years in cyberspace not being able to do what you did in six months. And that includes learning physics. I have no frame about how much smarter you are than the rest, but I know how much smarter your fellow K4 are compared to us mere mortals. And it is mindblowing.”
I buried my face in my hands.
“That was physics. Math. I… I don’t know, I just have a knack for it. I have no such knack for biology. I… just don’t like it.”
“And still you managed to do something that many thought to be impossible. That is what I need, what humanity needs."
I balled my fists in frustration, while I answered him in a strained voice:
“I circumvented the whole biology issue. I created an engineering workaround that allowed me to develop the new cloning tech and the cure for muscular CRS.”
He patiently spoke then:
“Then use this workaround. Anything. We are stuck. I increased the resources for Revitalize a hundredfold, and we are stuck. I have a K4 working on it, and she can’t make any progress. We need somebody thinking outside the box working on it. And we need the best working on it.
You are booth.”
I hated it, but he was right. As I had complained so often, humanity needed to get a cure for the Folly. We desperately needed to lift that curse. And I could not even argue that I was not the smartest. I knew that I was smarter than the rest of the K4.
In the end, I could not justify to myself not trying to work on it.
“Fine. I’ll do it. But I won’t spend a decade on it. If I can understand it, I will do it, but if I run into a wall... I can't promise anything. And I’ll need resources. Eggs and sperm, from humans and chimpanzees. And if I find out what the Folly actually does, I need a virologist or geneticist to work with me. I have absolutely no clue about genetic engineering. And I for sure don’t intend to learn it.”
He nodded.
“That is ok, dear. I doubt that you will need even a year. How about you give me six months and we look further then? The rest… I can send you a few hundred units of the human eggs and sperm, but I have to look into the chimpanzee stuff. Why do you need it?”
“Chimpanzees are humanity's closest relative. If we can see why they can still fertilize the eggs, and humans can not, we might find a solution. And six months is ok. A bit longer than I really want, but… this is important.”
Vandermeer nodded softly, and materialized a tablet, pushing on it a few times.
“Ok, I… have everything, except the chimpanzee stuff on the way to you next week. Wednesday or Thursday at the latest. I will send a few fertility specialists along, as well as the weapon techs. And a small contingent of Vandermeer military. Can you put them up for the time being?”
I was a bit baffled.
“Ok, I can see the specialists, and the weapon techs, but why the military?”
He gave me a crooked smile.
“Because regardless of what happens, you are still my heir. And I want to do anything to keep you safe.”
“Uh, I don’t think I want to be your heir. I don’t want to run a corporation. That is the reason why Michael is the CEO.”
“That is ok. In time you can make a similar arrangement for Vandermeer, but you will own it, or most of it, at some point in time. Hell, you are already owning 5% of it right now.”
Wait, what? I did what?!?
“I own 5% of Vandermeer? How did that happen? And why don’t I know already about it?”
Another sigh from the old man.
“You inherited it from your father. I gave him the 5% as a wedding gift. Your mother has another 10%, and I have 65%. I also have the proxy for you and your mother. And you don’t know about it because we never talked. I assume Knowles did not consider it important for you to know. Now, can you put up the people or do I have to look into getting them a place to live?”
I took a heavy breath while rolling my eyes.
“I assume there is no way I can convince you not to send any military?”
When he nodded sagely, I shook my head. Stupid stubborn old man. Oh, of course, he was stubborn. I had to have it from somewhere. And I recognized the look he was giving me. I’ve seen it often enough in a mirror. There was no getting out of this.
“Fine, whatever. And it depends on how many. I have 38 moderate rooms, as well as seven somewhat bigger suites available.”
“What do you understand as a moderate room?”
“About 36m², including the small bathroom with a shower. But seriously, I don’t want them all full with your people.”
“Yeah, I can see that. I thought about a small platoon. Two squads, 20 soldiers, two corporals, one sergeant, and one lieutenant. The soldiers can double up nicely. Hell, in 36m² if you install bunks they can sleep 4 to a room. Then two lab assistants and two fertility specialists, maybe three each. And the techs, I would say three of them, and a major to work with your techs.”
I sighed. Way too many people, really. But… at this time I was not prepared to snub him. I… just did not know enough to know what I did not know.
“And if I find something?”
“Then you either have already cured the Folly, or I will connect to a geneticist and you can work on finishing it.”
I… was not exactly happy about the situation, but he was right at least at one point. We, humanity, desperately needed this cure.
With a heavy sigh, I nodded.
“As long as you don’t expect too much from me. I… biology is just not my forte.”
He nodded and smiled.
“I can understand that. All of your ancestors were more of the technical type as well. But to be honest, I would not be surprised if you actually get it done.”
He simply did not want to understand. Yes, I would look into it. I would try my best. But… there was a reason why I did not tackle the Folly before.
In the end, I blew out some air while I shook my head.
“I think I am at my limit. All this… it is too much. I think it is better when we stop it for now.”
He was obviously not happy about it but forced a smile.
“Understandable. I had nearly six years getting used to the idea. All this has to be world-shattering for you. You can call me anytime.”
“I will. It was… strangely nice meeting you.”
“It was nice to finally meet you as well.”
I stood up, gave him a wave, and moved back into my mindscape.
Here, I lifted the strict settings on my avatar and nearly fell down from the stress. Wow… I had not realized that I was that stressed, that impacted. After what seemed an eternity for me, I finally got a grip on my emotions, my raging mind.
Now if only I could trust him. But he was a politician. Even in the real world, sitting just on the other side of a real table from him would not allow me to find out if he lied or not. And I… was aware enough to realize that a connection to Enki, to me, was something any politician would love to have.
And I had heard what he had said in the council.
Mostly rhetorically, I asked into the air, but in reality to Warden:
“You can’t tell me if he was telling the truth, can you?”
Warden’s first words in her answer were no surprise:
“No, I can not. I would have had to have access to his neural signature when he was talking. The probability of that backfiring and making him into an enemy for you was too high to risk it.”
I nodded. Exactly what I had expected.
“But the research I have done in the archives corroborates part of his story. You already know about your mother. Several sources claim that Joshua Knowles, Benedict Knowles, Caleb Knowles, and Evan Knowles have a predilection for torturing and killing prostitutes and unfortunate ‘low-class’ victims.”
Yeah, I knew that much already. I mean, there were always rumors about that. But such rumors were not a really reliable source of information.
“Rumors won’t help me here I fear.”
“I am not talking about rumors. I have found several police reports that investigate some dead ‘peasants’ or prostitutes, including autopsy, where the act of torture was obvious, that all ended in the code 1788-1K.
Further investigation of Commonwealth Peacekeeper Corps procedures showed that 1788 means somebody untouchable did it, while the 1K suffix means it was a Knowles.”
I had to take a few seconds to really understand what she had just said. The whole concept of untouchable was so prevalent in Nowhere that the police had a separate code for it? Were those jerks for real?
“There… there is a code for it? Seriously?”
“Yes, there is an official code for it. The 1K for Knowles is by far the most numerous I could find in the police reports. Followed by 1D for Dalgon. Interestingly 1V for Vandermeer has the same priority, but has never been used as far as I can ascertain.”
I took a couple of deep breaths, trying to force down the raising rage.
“So… we can say with some certainty that Knowles and his spawn are sadistic murderers. Anything else?”
“Yes, a disproportionate number of the victims have been redheads. Approximately 12.52%.”
Ok, that was more than just disproportionate. Even in the and of the 2240s, redheads made up a whopping 1.2% of the population of the Commonwealth.
So, what Warden was saying is that 1. The Knowles were sadistic pricks, 2. They had been untouchable and 3. They had a grudge against redheads.
Add in that they apparently managed to get my mother declared dead… yes, it did fit what Vandermeer had said.
I sighed.
“Can you give an estimate of what Vandermeer telling being the truth?”
“All sources I can access taken together make it a probability of approximately 78.87% that he was telling the truth. There is a probability of approximately 3.36% that he was purposefully telling a lie. It is approximately 13.68% that he himself was misinformed. The remaining 4.09% are undefined.”
Ok, that made it quite clear. Sure, Warden did not have all the information. Heck, she only had what was in dark web archives. But what she did have said that Vandermeer told me the truth as he knew it with a better than 90% probability.
It seemed he really was another victim in all of this. Dang, it would be hard to let go of nearly 18 years of anger toward that man.
