Michael Brachman's Blog: Tales of the Vuduri, page 28

Just Land Anywhere

Yesterday, Rome and Rei had made their peace with leaving young Aason behind with Rome's parents. They were nearly at Helome when Rome warned Rei not to hop into bed with Virga again, naked. Rei took it in stride. But now the business was at hand for winnowing down the list of 111 candidates and account for the 109 leaving the two would-be assassins.

Interestingly, both Rome and Rei were glad for an opportunity to see Virga again. Rome because she appreciated the gift Virga bestowed upon her. Rei because he wanted to see how his gift to Virga, the Darwin members, was working out. Without telling Rome, he felt he should be on his guard:

     The darker-than-dark black of null-fold space disappeared and was replaced by the sparkling star-field surrounding the main star. Aleph was dead ahead and very bright as they were only 120 million miles away. Its beautiful golden color hid the dim stars behind it. Directly in front of them was the gleaming blue world of Helome.
     “They are aware of our presence,” MINIMCOM said. “However, there is no offer of handshake, just some coordinates. Is that where you want me to land?”
     “Absolutely,” Rome said. “We have nothing to fear. Proceed.”
     “Very well.”
     MINIMCOM’s plasma thrusters roared to life, pushing Rei and Rome back in their seats. Rei felt the electrostatic push of his specially designed shirt give way slightly. It was as if his chest thinned. Meanwhile, the blue-white marble in front of them, flecked with puffy white clouds, quickly grew into a planet-sized sphere.
     They entered a west-to-east orbit and MINIMCOM implemented the swooping and arcing of the Bessel function used to aero-brake their way into the atmosphere. They circled around the planet coming up on the same squarish-shaped continent they had landed on the last time they were here. Most of the vegetation was a deep shade of teal with sporadic patches of emerald green. To the south was a splash of colors that defied a singular description. Regardless of its color, the growth was lush and dense over the entire landscape. The only exception was the circles-within-circles shape of the Vuduri capital city. Farther to the south, the vegetation had thinned but there was no distinct pattern to the clearing.
     “There’s the twin towers,” Rei said, pointing forward.
     “The coordinates they gave us are farther to the south,” MINIMCOM countered.
     “This is fine,” Rome said. “Just land where they are requesting.”
MINIMCOM looped past the city to the south about 50 kilometers. There, he found a small spaceport, sparsely populated with aircraft and very few spacecraft. MINIMCOM extended his landing gear and settled onto the hardened surface in front of a few low buildings. Behind them was an entire other row of buildings two stories tall. This landing strip seemed to be devoted to the complex rather than a general purpose spaceport.

At this point, pretty much everyone understood MINIMCOM's true nature and Rome and Rei liked it that way. To Rei this meant that they would more likely be safe than not. Let's see what happens...

The Aason Problem Again

As I have mentioned previously, I love little Aason but from a narrative perspective he often gets in the way. You can't have a blazing gun battle or stalk dangerous killers with a 4-year-old in tow. So I had to send him away to Earth, ostensibly for his own safety but it turned out to be an important plot point later on. Nonetheless, Rome and Rei are loving parents and I simply couldn't let Aason always being shipped off and not have them notice. So I paid lip service to parenthood in this little section:

     The mesmerizing blacker-than-black of null-fold space made it hard for Rei to not stare out the front cockpit. Rome never seemed to have a problem with it. Maybe it was her obsession with studying the virtual instruments. Maybe it was just the way her Vuduri brain was wired. Rei, on the other hand, could barely take it. Every time he glanced up, the non-existence of null-space seem to draw him in again. Rei found it almost impossible to pull his eyes away.
     Luckily, with MINIMCOM’s incredible speed, now 30% greater than what it was two years ago; it was only a six-hour trip from Tau Ceti to the Alpha Centauri system. Determined to not stare again until they got there, with yet another heroic effort, Rei tore his eyes from the front and closed them. “I’m getting a real déjà vu feeling,” he said.
     “What do you mean?” Rome asked, never lifting her eyes from the instrumentation.
     “Last time we did this, didn’t I tell you I thought we’d been neglecting Aason.”
     “Yes, I recall that,” Rome said, looking up. “What’s your point?”
     “Well, here we are again, leaving him behind. In fact, we sent him away. Doesn’t that make us bad parents?”
     “Rei,” Rome said sternly. “You know we sent him away for his own good. What kind of parents would we be if we did not?”
     “I guess you’re right,” Rei said. He turned his head toward the front but refused to open his eyes. “I have been curious how Virga and the rest of them dealt with our, uh, present,” Rei said. “And I did promise you we’d go back some day to check things out. Funny how things work out some time, huh?”
     “Yes,” Rome said in low voice. Her tone made Rei open his eyes again. He turned to look at her. She lowered her head so that she looked at him through the tops of her eyes. “However, I would like you to promise me that you will not be getting into bed with her naked this time.”
     Rei laughed a bit nervously. “Of course not,” he said, seeing that Rome was serious. “I explained all that to you. It wasn’t my first choice. I just didn’t want them to hurt you. Or me, for that matter.”
     “Very well,” Rome said. She looked back down at the virtual instruments. “We are nearly there, MINIMCOM,” she said. “Will you be dropping out of null-space shortly?”
     “One minute, thirty five seconds,” the starship replied through the grille. “I do know what I am doing, you know.”
     “I never doubted it,” Rome said, smiling. She looked over at Rei and winked.

OK. Now we have that out of the way. We can go on to Helome without shaming Rome and Rei for being neglectful parents.

Neuralink and the Vuduri 2

Yesterday, I introduced you to Elon Musk's latest venture, a company called Neuralink whose stated goal is to hook your brain and my brain into the internet so that we can communicate with computers directly. Here is their mission statement:

Neuralink is developing ultra high bandwidth brain-machine interfaces to connect humans and computers.

Anyone who has read my Rome's Revolution novels will be familiar with this concept immediately. The 24-chromosome mind-connected Vuduri are exactly the end product that Musk envisions.

However, my novels are science fiction and Musk is dealing with scientific fact. In order for Neuralink to succeed, they need an ultra-high bandwidth mesh of receivers and transmitters to be scattered over the entire brain. I solved that problem neatly by not using electrodes but by using PPT transceivers built right into each neuron using organo-metallic elements. So I solved the bandwidth problem genetically.

The driving force behind Neuralink is to get "into" the computer before it gets into us. Musk is convinced that once computers reach sentience, they will zoom past us and become artificial super-intelligence before we know what hits us. You need to read Tim Urban's excellent treatise on his web site called WaitButWhy.com to get a firm understanding as to why this is an absolute necessity. Many scientists and deep thinkers including Stephen Hawking and Bill Gates think that ASI represents the greatest threat to the survival of mankind we will ever experience. Tim Urban uses the phrase "existential threat" meaning ASI threatens our very existence. And it is going to happen and sooner than you think. Musk wants to get there first.

In my novels, the Vuduri have already grown past this. They, too, experienced this threat when they created MASAL but before MASAL could take over the world, the Overmind sprung up. MASAL had not considered this possibility. So he tried to merge with the Overmind, kind of the reverse of Musk's plan, only to be rebuffed. But it didn't matter. MASAL's long-term plan was exactly as Musk predicted, MASAL would eventually turn humans into living robots to serve his needs.

Other elements of this program might be to give people artificial sight by plugging into their auditory cortex. I had already done this, again genetically, by rewiring Rei's brain so that his auditory cortex fed into his visual cortex (when his eyes were shut) so that he could "see" sound, a kind of sonar-vision.

Personally, I don't think that Neuralink will succeed and I don't think humans will allow this neural mesh to be inserted into their brains but what do I know? Maybe Mr. Musk will stumble across my novels and see that building the network into the brain genetically is the way to go. Perhaps in this way, Rome and Rei and OMCOM and MINIMCOM will have traveled from the 35th century to our time and save us all before the machines wipe us out.

Neuralink and the Vuduri 1

Unless you have been hiding under a rock for the last few years, you have probably heard about Elon Musk. He is the closest thing we have to Tony Stark in real life. He is a billionaire scientist working on extremely advanced concepts. However, his one goal throughout all of his ventures is actually very simple. He is trying to ensure the survival of the human race. So how is he doing this?

Through Musk's SpaceX venture, he is trying to get humans to Mars making us a multi-planetary species. This has the effect of not putting all our genetic eggs in one cosmic basket. If an asteroid were to come and wipe out the Earth and there were people living on Mars, mankind would continue.

Musk's Tesla Motors and SolarCity ventures are designed to eliminate greenhouse gasses by using the greatest single source of energy, the Sun, and harnessing it to run our cars and our homes and eventually our civilization. This will reduce and ultimately eliminate climate change and prevent the looming global warming disaster that every one knows is lying ahead.

I am skipping over Musk's foray into the Hyperloop business because this technology is not designed to save mankind. It is simply designed to make travel and transportation less of a hassle. He has actually started a new company called The Boring Company to create tunnels and demonstrate the feasibility of the Hyperloop concept.

The reason for this article is Musk's latest venture which is one you may not have heard of. It is called Neuralnk. This company is forging ahead, trying to develop technology whereby they can insert a whole brain-machine interface (BMI) and hook your entire brain into the internet. Using electrodes.

Now I know that is something that immediately turns you off. I know I rejected it as silly and something I would never engage in. But if you read Tim Urban's excellent treatise on Neuralink, you will begin to understand how Neuralink may be critical to the survival of mankind. Tim's web site, WaitBuyWhy.com is most excellent and while the articles tend to be somewhat dense, they make for fascinating reading. Tim is an excellent writer and does a thorough job researching all of his topics before he writes about them.

Enough plugs. I want to describe some of the features and flaws with the Neuralink concept and compare it to my 35th century world of the Vuduri which first started in Rome's Revolution and continued in The Ark Lords and Rome's Evolution. Tomorrow, I will do the old "compare and contrast" between the goals and implementation of Neuralink versus what the 24th chromosome imparted to the 35th century Vuduri.

Duh

Yesterday, Rome summoned the library OMCOM's livetar to help them begin the process of data accumulation and analysis. It was the all-white livetar who connected the theft of the Deucadon invisibility cloak with the attempt on Rei's life. Of course, as the author, I happen to know he is dead on. So let's see if he can help them even further:

     “My workstations are continuously active, which means they were active during the time of the intrusion. However, I was under no instructions to analyze the recordings. I will set to work on that. With some interpolation and extrapolation, I might be able to get you some practical information to aid in your search.”
     “That is excellent,” Rome said. “Please begin right away.” She was about to pull the data slab out of the holder then she stopped. She closed the text file she had opened and returned to the one labeled Candidates. She opened up the document and found it was another list, this one consisting of four names. Two she had never heard of: Andrea Grenmuller and Paul Chung. The third name was Wally Stanislaw who she knew. But it was the fourth name that shocked her. It was Rei Bierak. Rome tapped on the link for Rei’s name. A balloon opened up with notations. As she read its contents, her eyes grew wider and wider.
     “Oh, Rei,” Rome cried out, sounding terribly depressed.
     “What?” Rei asked staring at the screen. He saw his name listed. He read the notations out loud.
     “Bierak, Rei – Engineer, Unranked. Has shown incredible resourcefulness beyond his test scores. Would make a great asset to the Project but has a strong moral streak that would interfere. He has married one of the Vook women and had a child by her. Best plan: have the wife and the child killed and frame the Vooks. His anger and indignation might be enough to swing him over to our side.”
     “Even then…” Rome whispered. “So devious. They truly were monsters.” She turned in place and looked up into Rei’s eyes. “Sometimes I have wondered if we did the right thing banishing them to Helome but after reading this…” She just shook her head.
     Rei put his hand on her shoulder. “You can see why we have to stop them. Because they won’t. No, we did the right thing,” he said.
     Rome lowered her head and placed it in her hands. She took a long time to compose herself. Finally, she sighed and stood up. She pulled the white slab from the reader and handed it to OMCOM.
     “This is the place to start,” she said. “After you have recreated the list of names, we will begin the process of elimination and hope that we can figure out who are the culprits. We are depending upon MINIMCOM’s recordings and you and your skills.”
     “While I am honored by your confidence in my abilities, the fact is, you do not need me or MINIMCOM for that,” OMCOM said. “The solution is trivial.”
     “It is?” Rome asked. “What? How?”
     The livetar pointed to the sky. “Go to Helome and take roll. The two that are not present are the two you are seeking.”
     Rei just hung his head. “Duh,” he said under his breath.

Well, sounds like a plan to me. I wonder why they didn't think of it sooner?

The D List

Yesterday, Rome finally found the complete list of Darwin Project members. At first, she was surprised to discover 111 members but Rei cleared up that mystery because two of the names were the missing command crew. As I mentioned yesterday, they were not the people who tried to kill Rei. I assure you they are long dead.

Given the complete list, now Rome and Rei must deal with the task of whittling down the numbers until they came up with the missing two people who are undoubtedly the would-be assassins:

     “I see,” Rome said. She scrolled down slowly. “Stanton, Pierre and Wright. Those are the three dead people we found back at the cave. Their names are marked with KIA. What does that mean?”
     “Killed in Action,” Rei replied.
     “Then this is our list,” Rome said. “It is complete and reflects the state of things after they arrived on this world.” She whirled in place and looked up at the tall black livetar standing off to the side. “MINIMCOM, I would like you to take a snapshot of this list, please.”
     “Of course,” MINIMCOM replied, stepping forward. “However, I think our OMCOM clone would be better suited to store the data and collate the rest of the evidence we collect. After all, that is his specialization.”
     “That’s an excellent idea,” Rome said. “Can you fetch his livetar?”
     “It would be my pleasure,” MINIMCOM replied.
     With a whoosh and a pop, OMCOM’s two-meter tall, all-white livetar appeared beside them. The shell was the manifestation of their OMCOM clone which was buried 700 meters below Rome’s library.
     “How can I assist you?” the livetar asked.
     “OMCOM,” she said pointing, “on this slab is a crew manifest of the original occupants of Rei’s Ark as well as a complete crew roster for the Darwin people. 111 in total. We know that three are dead. Two are missing out in space somewhere. Of the remaining 106 alive, 104 were transported to Helome. That means two were left behind but we don’t know which two. With MINIMCOM’s help, we should be able to identify more than half of those transported. But it is imperative that we narrow the list all the way down to the missing two. We believe they are the people who bombed our house and tried to kill Rei.”
     “Are they also the people that stole the two items from the library? The handgun and the invisibility cloak?” OMCOM asked.
     “What would make you think that?” Rei interjected.
     “As you are so fond of saying, ‘there ain’t no such thing as a coincidence’. What could be better for sneaking a bomb into someone’s house, unnoticed, than an invisibility cloak?”
     Rei looked at Rome. “He’s right,” Rei said. “I haven’t had time to think about it but it makes perfect sense.” Rei turned back to OMCOM. “Do you have any surveillance video or audio that might help us identify the thieves?”

We're all familiar with A-list celebrities and if someone is called a B-lister, it has a certain negative connotation. So saying someone is on the D-list would certain be a demotion. I decided to flip that upside down and make the D List the only thing Rome and Rei care about. My own personal joke. But they still have a tall task in front of them.

111

Yesterday, MINIMCOM helped Rome discover where the Erklirte computer and papers were stored. However, none of the physical papers contained anything like the crew manifest that Rome sought. She did find a white slab that look just like the black data slabs Rome borrowed from Bonnie. In case it seems strange, the title of this post refers to the fact that Rome and Rei were looking for a list of 109 names and so the number 111 is unexpected:

     “Why is this one white?” she asked Rei.
     “If those computers are the ones we brought from Earth, they have a limited internal storage capacity. That might be some sort of external storage.”
     “A backup?” Rome asked excitedly.
     “Probably.”
     “Where would they have gotten it?” Rome asked, holding the slab in the air.
     “I would assume we either brought them or they made it here,” Rei answered.
     “Would your slab reader fit on this computer?” she asked.
     “Yeah, sure,” Rei answered.
     “MINIMCOM, would you fetch the data reader from the other computer, please?” Rome asked the all-black livetar.
     “Of course.” Rather than walk back to the previous hut, MINIMCOM popped out of the room then popped back in with the data reader in tow along with the once-missing 20th slab still mounted within. He handed the assembly to Rome who pulled out the black slab and snapped the white one in its place. When it was snug, she slid it along the desk until it attached to the computer.
     As before, a new icon appeared on the virtual desktop. Rome activated the laser-drawn keyboard and used it to examine the folder structure. There was a multitude of directory trees which bespoke of population projections, base construction diagrams, a Captain’s log, provisioning and a variety of other topics repeated over and over. There was a main folder labeled Ark II. She abandoned the keyboard and used the touch screen to drill down until she found documents labeled Candidates, D Crew List and Full Roster.
     “D Crew List,” Rome said. “D for Darwin.” She quickly tapped on the document and opened it up.
     “This is it!” she said to Rei excitedly. “Look!” She drew her finger down the screen, counting each name. When she got to the bottom, she hit the PgDn key on the virtual keyboard and counted the rest of the names. She tilted her head.
     “I count 111 names,” she said, confused. “Something is wrong.”
     Rei bent his knees so he could peer over her shoulder. “Go back to the top of the document,” he said.
     Rome complied.
     “There,” Rei said, “at the top, right after Keller. Those two names, Fayed and Alexander; they were the pilot and copilot for the Ark II.”
     “What does MIA mean?” Rome asked, pointing to the symbols by their names.
     “Missing in Action,” Rei answered. “Those two were in the command module when we hit the asteroid. They got knocked into space along with Captain Keller. We’ve never found their sarcophagi so, officially, they are still missing.”

OK. Now we have a complete list of the members of the Darwin Projecxt. Besides the 80 some-odd crew members that MINIMCOM can supply, how can they whittle down the list to the missing two? And it isn't Fayed and Alexander. They are quite dead, I assure you.

MINIMCOM - CSI

Yesterday, Rome had learned how to access the Essessoni computer but to her disappointment, there was no crew manifest on it. Rei had showed her how to attached the slab reader which worked perfectly well even though Bonnie had said "it was on the fritz" - clearly not true. Rome, Rei and MINIMCOM had to walk around to the next hangar when MINIMCOM shouted "Stop!" and Rome wanted to know why.

     “Allow me to illuminate the floor using ultraviolet.” With that, MINIMCOM lifted his hands, palms outward. Rei didn’t see anything but with Rome’s u-cones, she certainly did.
     “Footprints,” she said, pointing to the floor. Rei shook his head indicating he could not see them.
     “Two different pairs,” MINIMCOM observed. “However, they are old. They are buried under most of the dust.”
     Rome surveyed the room. There were open air filing cabinets, white boards, peg boards made out of woven cane-tree bark and several desks. She determined that most of the activity by the parties unknown took place near the two desks pressed up against the side wall. She walked over to the first desk and found another computer frame propped upright. She doubled-tapped the upper-right hand corner of the frame and the computer awakened. She sat down and examined it closely, quickly moving her fingers about the screen. Finally, she turned in place.
     “There’s nothing on this one,” she said. “It has no data, no documents, nothing.”
     Rei came over to where she was sitting and tried a different approach, using a sector editor to examine of the contents of the directory. “It’s been wiped clean,” he said, finally. “Whoever was here, everything has been erased.”
     “Can you retrieve anything?” she asked. “I was able to, I don’t know the proper word in English, ‘un-delete’ things on our storage units. Do you have the same ability?”
     “No,” Rei said. “This thing uses a secure delete which scrambles the sectors when a document is removed. There’d be no way.”
     “What if you deleted something by accident?” Rome asked.
     “You’d better hope it was backed up,” Rei said, knowing that Rome would be disappointed.
     Rome shook her head. She surveyed the desk, moving papers aside. There was nothing of any importance and certainly nothing that looked like a crew manifest. She was about to give up when she looked to the right. The desk had several drawers built in. She pulled on the top one and found it was locked tight.
     “MINIMCOM, can you open this?” she asked.
     MINIMCOM made a noise that sounded like a tsk and with a sharp tug, snapped the lock and drew the drawer open.
     Rome pulled out the yellowing papers stored there, examining each one. Once again, she found nothing of much importance. She was nearly at the bottom of the drawer when she felt something solid. She pushed the remaining few papers aside and found a slab that was similar to the black data slabs except this one was white. She lifted it up and inspected it from all angles. It was much lighter in weight than the jet-black slabs and had no label on it.

One of the really fun parts of writing this novel was to include elements of modern detective fiction (novels, TV, movies) so I had to throw in a CSI moment.

Let's see. Two sets of footprints and two rogue members of the Darwin Project running around. The computer has been wiped clean? Can all of this be coincidence? Of course not. Also note that the "extra" slab that Rome found was white, not black. Hmmm. Could that mean it was read/write, not read-only? And why would that be important?

The Reader Appears

Methodically, Rome and Rei were making their way through each of the hangars, uncovering what nefarious deeds the would-be new Ark Lords were up to. Yesterday, Rome came across an Essessoni super-computer and quickly mastered its operation. She searched through it fairly exhaustively but it is pretty clear that the crew manifest is going to be harder to find. However, she did find one thing that surprised her at first:

     “I don’t think this computer has anything of importance. Most of its contents are designs and layouts for the starships next door as well a guide for managing…”
     Suddenly, she stopped speaking. Pressed against the back of the desk was an assembly that she recognized. Standing upright was a docking block with one of the jet-black Essessoni data slabs mounted within. Rome reached to the back and slid it forward. Her eyes widened.
     “Look, Rei,” Rome said excitedly, shaking the assembly. “Volume 20 – Mission Parameters. So this is where they kept it.” She pointed to the dock. “Is this your data reader?” she asked.
     Rei nodded. “That’s it,” he said. “But I remember Bonnie saying the reader was on the fritz.”
     “I remember that too,” Rome replied. “Can we at least try it? Can you activate it or attach it to the computer?”
     “Sure,” Rei said. He snapped the docking block to the other side of the computer. As soon as he did so, a new icon, like a piston without a rod, appeared on the desktop.
     “I guess it wasn’t on the fritz, after all,” Rome remarked. “Imagine that. The Darwin people lying about something,” she said sarcastically. She tapped the new icon and the cylinder opened up to show a folder and tree structure within. Rome tapped and swiped until she found what she was looking for.
     “Look,” she said. “Here is the orientation video, the Virus 5 video, the instructions on how to make more vaccine, specs for the canister we destroyed and so on. It’s all here.”
     She spun in place and looked over the room. She pointed to the vats.
     “They were preparing more vaccine,” she said. “They really were moving up the schedule.”
     “By about a hundred years,” Rei observed.
     Rome furrowed her brow. A dark expression washed over her face. She shook her head and stood up.
     “Well, they are done now but this computer does not have what we need. Let us continue.”
     “I agree,” Rei said. He pointed to the blank wall in front of them. “Let’s check the next building.”
     They left the bio-lab via the front door and waited while MINIMCOM opened the doors to the second to last building. Rome pushed past him and started to enter but MINIMCOM barked out, “Halt!”
     Rome pulled up sharply. “What is it?” she asked.

Did you notice Rome's sense of humor, highlighted in bold, is becoming much more sophisticated? So what has MINIMCOM all riled up? We'll find out tomorrow.

QWERTY 2

Yesterday, Rome was ready to access the Essessoni computer and desired keyboard input. Rei accommodated her by activating the laser-driven keyboard. It used dual lasers to sculpt out a virtual keyboard and used infra-red sensors to detect the positions of the fingers and therefore deduce what keys are being pressed. This seems like science fiction but you can actually purchase these devices on Amazon today.

     “Let me look,” Rome said. Rei stood up and Rome sat down in his place. She scratched her head. “The keyboard must have gotten damaged from disuse,” she said in a dead serious tone.
     “Why do you say that?” Rei asked.
     “Look at the layout of the letters,” Rome said, pointing at the glowing red virtual keys. “Q W E R T Y,” Rome read out loud. “A nonsensical arrangement.”
     Rei laughed. “Everybody says that before they learn to touch type,” he said.
     “What do you mean?”
     “They are arranged in the order of convenience.”
     Rome shook her head.
     “In my language, E is the most commonly used letter followed by T and the rest of the vowels. The people who designed the keyboard made it so that you did the least amount of work during the course of the day reaching the keys you use the most.”
     Rome started to speak then breathed a loud sigh. She knew better than to continue even asking. She faced the screen and gently touched it with her fingers. Very quickly, she absorbed the basic principles behind the operating system and was able to navigate her way through the folder structure. It was very similar to that found on the original 19 data slabs she had been given which had caused the whole Darwin mess.
     The computer itself was sparsely populated and contained nothing like the crew manifest they were looking for. It consisted mostly of engineering diagrams, inventory lists and so on. Finally, Rome gave up.

To figure out information from the Essessoni, you have to think like an Essessoni. Where would Rome get her hands on one of these? Why, he is standing right next to her!