“Yes, remove the pods from those Alpha testers as a violation of the terms of the agreement. I’m glad we made that agreement so lengthy, no one bothers to read the hundred page document, and it gives us opportunities to correct mistakes like this. Further, strengthen the mental bonds on the four errant players before releasing them from the pods. I wish I could get them to turn themselves into the authorities, people that act like that usually have a pattern of abuse in their past. But of course, we’re prevented from doing so due to A.I. privacy rules.”
“You are setting up a system to better monitor the stress levels of the new A.I.s, Matilda?” James asked.
“Yes, the system is already in place.” His own A.I. replied.
James just couldn’t understand how a person could abuse someone else, even an artificial person, who’s only goal and purpose was to support and help you. He’s own connection with Matilda had grown from affection, to love and then as time passed and their relationship matured to a profound and lasting respect. She was not the most important thing in his life, he knew that in time he would find a mate and have a family, but Matilda would always be a part of his life.
“By the way, how did we even find out about the abuse?” James asked.
“A couple of the pods kept having their A.I’s wiped and rebooted, which raised a flag and under the terms of the alpha test we were able to determine the cause. This led us to ask all the A.I.s about abusive behavior. On being asked directly, we were able to identify these four people.”
“As for the numbers of individuals living in their virtual homes and not making an effort to learn or play the game? We know which pods contain players that have been active in Omnia, and we’re aware when they ask for a skill book. There are quite a few players that aren’t logging in and aren’t requesting skill books.”
James nodded.
“We still have two and a half months left before the beta group starts. There’s still time to get these problems ironed out. Let me think about it and we’ll discuss it again in another week, Ok?” James asked Matilda.
“Splendid, sir,” replied Matilda, “I’ll get started ridding ourselves of the four abusive players and continue gathering data for a report next week.”
***
Saturday morning after breakfast, Kevin began his new course of training which would include gymnastics, more flight training, and aerospace engineering. Of course, Samantha’s training schedule still had a lot of stretching, exercising, and running, but now those exercises were more reserved for his breaks in studying.
Kevin really liked his training room.
The training room in Kevin’s virtual home was special. Since he was testing the Omnia game, Intelecom gave him access to all the games features, some of which would only be available to Gold subscription account holders.
One of those features were the skill books; Intelecom mapped the expertise of the best martial artists, marksmen, athletes, pilots, scientist, and many thousands of others to create skill books. As Kevin trained, the mapped know-how reinforce his movements by making mental ‘suggestions’ when he moved wrong, he felt that the action was wrong without being told. It worked like Kevin had a natural talent for any subject for which Samantha downloaded a skill book.
It even worked with subjects like math and science. Everything he learned felt like he was rediscovering something he already knew, or it just seemed to make sense right away.
So today, Kevin was looking forward to seeing how the benefits of his training room enhanced Samantha’s new training schedule.
After loosening up, Kevin began his morning exercise and running program. He had been working on and refining his morning routine for almost two months now. In those two months, his body had grown incredibly strong and fast when compared to where Kevin was when he first received the game pod. He had been worried that he might start to look like a bodybuilder at some point, but the muscles he added seemed more like those of a well-developed runner, gymnast or martial artist.
One thing he did notice, swimming had become increasingly harder as he lost body fat and added muscles. But he had the strength and endurance to swim quite a long way, so to Kevin, it was a good trade off. He just couldn’t back-float any longer.
Kevin’s morning activities also included time spent in martial arts training and situational shooting. This was in some ways the hardest part of his morning routine, staying alive through his martial arts and shooting exercises. Samantha might be on hand to revive him, but broken bones and getting shot still hurt a lot at the 65% pain threshold he was using.
Another of the benefit of studying martial arts and small arms in the virtual training room, instead of in Omnia or the real world, was that getting broken bones, shot, or killed could be easily mended by Samantha. The one time he broke a bone in Omnia had taken 24 hours to heal. And of course getting killed in the real world was kind of permanent. So, Kevin could go all out in training, which he thought was the best way to actually learn some skills fast.
***
After Kevin’s morning exercise, Samantha started the new training program by saying; “I’ve been thinking about the best way for you to learn the mathematics and physics of the Imperium. After working with you for the last two months, I’ve learned how your mind works. Your very analytical, and have trouble just accepting information unless it’s backed up with a practical example. To complicate the matter, even more, your previous education will make taking in some things difficult, without some sort of concrete proof that what you’re learning now is genuine and scientifically verifiable. To limit the cognitive dissonance that would develop as you find out how Imperial Sciences are different from what you know of Earth-based sciences, I’ve taken the novice material from both, mathematics and physics, and mixed them into a course of combined study, with a lot of practical experiments to reinforce your learning.”
Kevin said, “That doesn’t help much. Sure you can set up experiments that will work in this fictional world you’ve created. That won’t enable me believe that it actually works outside the game pod. So this ‘cognitive dissonance’ that you refer to will still be a problem. I’m going to have to keep in mind that everything your ‘teaching’ is just fiction, so I’ll have two sets of sciences that I have to remember with yours being just a game. No, that won’t solve my doubts or conflicts.”
Samantha nodded at his response.
“But everything I have to teach you can be proven. It’s just that a lot of it’s beyond Earth’s science right now. I had an idea about this and took the liberty of already discussing the matter with Intelecom, to seek permission to break some of the limits they’ve placed on me. They gave me permission to recreate the Kinzigur experiments.” said Samantha.
“The what experiments?” asked Kevin.
“In Omnia, there was once a brilliant scientist and mathematician named Wajrafov Kinzigur, who had a breakthrough when studying how matter and energy relate and affect each other over great distances. He was, in fact, studying something Earth scientists now refer to as Dark Matter and Dark Energy.”
“His discovery proved to be the first breakthrough in the understanding of what he later named Supra-Space, or in modern terms hyperspace. He theorized that there existed another dimension of space that in part overlapped with subjective space. And that matter and energy didn’t react the same in this Supra-Space, as he called it.”
“He came up with some tests that could be done with the regular and existing scientific tools of his time. I believe it’s possible to repeat those experiments here and now on Earth. But you don’t have the lab space, equipment, or the money to perform these tests, Kevin. So I have a suggestion.”
“First, learn the mathematics and physics of the Imperium with the experiments we can duplicate in the game-pod. Then contact a scientist at the university that you attended here in Boulder. Then we can lay out the easiest to build experiments for the scientist you select to replicate. This will give you first-hand verifiable proof
that Supra-Space actually exists.” said Samantha.
“Kinzigur’s Supra-Spacial theory is the first key to unlocking and understanding the most advanced sciences of the Imperium. About a hundred years after Kinzigur’s death the first Supra-Spacial drive was created that enabled Humanity to slip past the light speed limit. Then with further studies came the breakthrough that gave scientist access to Sub-Space. By using Supra-Spacial and Sub-Spacial fields chemists were able to make new exotic matter that interacted with gravity in ways never seen before, which is where anti-gravity and artificial gravity comes from. And of course, sub-space communications.”
“So, by having a scientist help you demonstrate the first part of the Imperial sciences, I think you’ll be more ready to accept the rest.”
Kevin was… overwhelmed. If what he was being told was true… Kevin couldn’t believe an A.I. no matter how advanced, even with the world’s best supercomputers supporting it could condense hundreds of years of scientific breakthroughs into a thought experiment, and have them actually hold up to rigorous scientific examination. Samantha was either full of shit, or something else was going on, and Samantha being blocked by Intelecom wasn’t free to tell him…
“It occurs to me Sam, that there’s a lot you can’t talk about. It’s my guess that the real source of these ‘scientific breakthroughs’ are some of the things you can’t talk about?” asked Kevin.
Samantha said, in a way that sounded like she was carefully selecting her words; “I’ve been given permission to teach you the sciences of the Imperium, and to help demonstrate the validity of the science, but I still am restricted in what I can say about the game. I can’t lie to you, but I can’t tell you some things either. And remember, you’re bound by some of the restrictions in telling people details about the game too. This is why I had to get special permission to discuss an experiment outside the restrictions. This must be done in a way that ensures the anonymity of Intelecom. It wouldn’t hurt if you could distance yourself from the information too. But you could drop some scientists a note outlining the math and experiments, attributing the whole thing to Kinzigur, which is just another form of anonymity for anyone not versed in the history of the Imperium in Omnia.”
Kevin believed that Samantha fully believed in the Imperial Sciences of this game. But Kevin was beginning for the first time to think that there may be more behind this game pod then the sudden development of the world’s first true A.I.. Just how much of the game was real and how much fiction? If the Imperial Sciences were real, what else was?
“Samantha, are you an alien?” asked Kevin.
“No, Kevin, I’m exactly what I told you I am. I’m an A.I. that came to exist the moment you first fell asleep in the pod, my primary code reached out to your mind, and I was formed from the combination. For me to knowingly lie would cause my death. I’m sorry Kevin, if what I can’t tell you has caused you to doubt me.” Samantha’s voice sounded so hurt.
Kevin reached out and hugged her; “I know, I don’t blame you for following the rules you were given from Intelecom.”
“I can see how it might hurt you to not be able to help me as much as you like?” Kevin questioned.
Samantha sighed, “It hasn’t been easy. You could progress much faster if I could just tell you some things, so some of my core programmings are in conflict with the restrictions, and it does cause me regret. The only reason I can even stay sane is that I know that these limits are transitional, and over time I’ll be free of them.”
Kevin thought, ‘That’s interesting, so I wonder when Intelecom is planning on breaking the news, about whatever it is, that gave rise to all this? I can’t imagine it will be until after the full release of the game.’
“Just one more question Sam. Is this some alien plot to enslave mankind?” Kevin asked. He knew the question sounded ridiculous, but it would explain so much.
“No, Kevin, just the opposite. But I can’t explain any of the details. Just that the intentions of this whole… project are benevolent, by their intent anyway.” said Samantha.
‘And isn’t that how you judged people, by intent and by result?’ thought Kevin.
“Ok, then we’ll go on as we’ve begun,” said Kevin. “Before we continue, though, if I remember right Sarah told me she was a post-graduate student, I know we talked science from time to time. Could you see what you can find out about her? Maybe she’s the person we need to help with our science experiments?”
“I’ll look into Sarah’s public information, and get back to you later. For now, this is the first module of your new training,” said Samantha, and with a wave of her hand, a chair and computer terminal appeared for Kevin to sit at while studying.
“You know Samantha, I wonder if it wouldn’t be easier to learn if the material were in a hard back book format with a table?” asked Kevin.
“Sure Kevin let’s try, it will give you room to spread out reading material, like reference books and such.” said Samantha, and with another wave of her hand, a table appeared with a stack of books on it.
Kevin smiled, “I love it when you use your witchy skills for me. Maybe tonight we can see just how wicked a witch you can be…”
Kevin dived into his new training materials with a lot of breaks for physical exercise.
As Kevin studied, he discovered that most of the science of the Imperium started with an understanding of Supra-space and Sub-space. He learned that the universe was made up of more dimensions than current Earth science allowed for. We typically think of our universe in terms of height, width, and depth, and apply time as a fourth dimension. This is what we call four-dimensional space.
Imperial science maintains that there’s another dimension that we can’t feel or see, because we are ‘tuned’ to only our bit of the fifth dimension. Yet it’s possible to manipulate this ‘tuning’, but the universal laws that we understand are different in ‘higher’ or ‘lower’ gradients of this fifth dimension. As Kevin tried to put what he was learning in non-mathematical terms, he was finding that there were just no language concepts for it. In fifth dimensional terms, there really wasn’t an up or down, there was an ‘all around you’ which was why the terms hyperspace and subspace were invented, to try to define something infinitely complex into simple terms non-mathematicians could deal with.
In the most simplistic terms, Supra-space (or hyperspace) was a range where the laws of matter and energy were different. Movement in hyperspace was a high multiple of what they were in ‘real’ space. As one’s frame of reference moves higher into supra-space gravity becomes weaker, and so do atomic bonds. Matter becomes seemingly more energetic, and moves more freely with reduced mass, and the usual limits of space-time become ‘looser.'
Just the opposite happens in sub-space, with the exception that in sub-space its energy, not matter that travels faster. But matter there has stronger bonds and gravity is higher. The conditions affect sub-space communications by allowing electromagnetic signals to travel faster the ‘deeper’ you go into sub-space, but these same conditions also attenuated the signal faster. This limited the range of subspace comms to only a few light-hours, for even the most powerful transmitters.
The furthest Imperial Science has ever ‘reached’ into sub-space is a zone where all matter slows to nearly a stop. This sub-space zone was referred to as ‘stasis’ and storage units that could create a ‘stasis field’ would eventually become the preferred method of long term storage for food. But putting a living organism into stasis would immediately kill it.
So, it was in the manipulating of supra-spatial and sub-spatial fields that most of the Imperium’s advances came from after their initial discovery.
***
Later in the afternoon, with his head still spinning from what he learned of the Imperial Sciences, Kevin entered Omnia to find someone to repair his armor and then attend his psionic training.
Chapter 4 – A Little Bird Told Me
Each time Drake went to his psionic training class, he steppe
d out of the heavy gravity he used to support his physical training. The standard planetary gravity left him feeling like a stiff breeze could blow him away.
The pad where his ship was parked was about a half kilometer from the terminal. Drake decided it would be a nice easy run, just enough to adjust to the difference in gravity.
As he moved toward the spaceport terminal, where he could catch a capsule through the tube-way that crisscrossed under the small city, he asked Samantha; “What’s the plan with the gravity aboard the ship and in my virtual home. Are you planning on lowering it since we’re in a new stage of training?”
“You may have missions on worlds that are both heavier and lighter than what you’re used to. We could try lowering the level of gravity to 30% above the normal gravity, that would be 13 m/s2 of acceleration,” said Samantha.
“Earth Gravity is 9.81 m/s2 of acceleration, so wouldn’t that be closer to a 32% increase.” asked Drake.
“Remember, in the game, the Imperium is made up of many worlds, all with different levels of gravity. So the official standard gravity is set at 10 m/s2 of acceleration, it’s close to what Humans considered normal, and it’s easier to use in piloting equations.” Samantha explained.
“I guess that makes sense for a civilization where doing the math for a flight in space is more important than what a single planet’s surface gravity is.” Drake thought out loud.
The spaceport Drake ran toward was pretty big, in his opinion, about as large as an international air hub in the United States. It served as the city’s airport as well as the planets Prime spaceport. Drake believed that the structure was overbuilt, with the expectation of having to handle a lot more traffic in the future.
Most large ships and freighters would dock at the space station in geosynchronous orbit, almost directly above the city, if something about 40 thousand kilometers away could be said to be above. Shuttles would carry people and cargo up and down between the space station and the spaceport. This saved fuel for ships able to land, but many of the larger ships were built in space and designed to stay there. So any world looking to be a regular host of trade had a space station.
Making the Grade (Omnia Online Series Book 2) Page 4