Scale Free

by Patrick Arnesen

  I took the elevator down to the lobby and stepped out onto the street for the first time in years. It was summer in Vancouver, Canada. The office occupies one floor of a building on Broadway St. The rest of the building is used to house the server farm that hosts our uploaded minds.

  Things were pretty much as I remembered them. The streets bustled with garishly painted electric cabs. The sidewalks were heavily crowded with pedestrians. The style of clothing had changed somewhat. Women wore flowery skirts and tended to wear white tights on top of one or two inch heels. Men dressed the same as always as far as I could tell. I noticed that the ubiquitous HUDs glasses from the 50s had largely disappeared, replaced with something more subtle, I presumed. The street level was mostly restaurants and clothing stores. Above were offices and residential towers, where humans lived in their little 300 sq. foot apartments.

  Chapter 6

  I felt very out of place. These people looked busy. They hurried along with clipped strides, many engaged in remote conversations. Others stood along the walls staring out into space, obviously absorbed by their personal interfaces. Where I normally spent my day playing, sleeping or relaxing, these people worked hard to feed and clothe and house themselves. They urinated and defecated. They ate not for just fun but also out of necessity. As they aged they spent enormous sums of money on gene and nano-therapies to keep their bodies from decaying. And still they died - by the hundreds of millions.

  Vancouver was one of the most affluent cities on Earth, but the people along the equatorial bands had faced apocalypse. By the early 50s the average temperature in several areas had pushed past the point where grains and rice could grow. In some areas, the temperature would stay above 50 Celsius for weeks at a time. Crops failed and billions of desperate refugees began to push north or south to escape the famines. Millions without the means to leave died in the ensuing chaos and lawlessness.

  Northern countries had reacted in different ways. The European Union had closed and militarized its borders, using its wealth and power to hold back the waves of humanity; but the Europeans had suffered deep emotional scars of guilt in the process. Weaker nations such as Russia and Canada had been unable to stem the tide. Roughly a billion Chinese had streamed into Siberia. They had brought their own institutions with them and either ignored the Russian government's protests or bribed the local politicians into compliance. Although Canada had nominally maintained its sovereignty, it had been forced to throw open its borders and absorb 90 million Americans and Mexicans. Every year, millions more were receiving their Canadian citizenships. Vancouver had ballooned to over 12m. Toronto had passed 30m and was still growing. Whole new cities had sprung up in the north, where what had previously been tundra was being laboriously converted over to agriculture.

  Chapter 7

  Humanoid Robots were not a common sight in Vancouver and I was noticed at once. Westerners preferred to keep their robots dumb, specialized and looking more like appliances than people. The pedestrians on the street kept a wide berth. Most averted their gaze, but one woman shot me a hostile stare. To her I was probably an abomination. She might even have been one of the religious types who believed that I was a soul-less facsimile of my former biological self.

  I used my interface to signal a cab. In moments one exited traffic and glided to a stop beside me. I opened the door and got in. It was a standard cab, with two plush couches facing each other, and no driver. A voice asked me for my destination and I spoke the address of the NASC office. The cab accelerated smoothly to 120 kph. It raced through the city’s cross-streets without pause, in a breathless dance of automotive choreography. Humans could never drive like this. I could still remember stop lights from my childhood, but since manually driven cars had been outlawed in the city, they had become irrelevant and were eventually taken down. Now the cars spoke to each other, coordinating the smooth flow of traffic.

  The NASC office was in southern Surrey, and the countdown clock in the cab told me the trip would take a little under 15 minutes, so I set an alarm in my personal interface, disconnected from the robot and jumped back to the Polynesian sim, where I spent the rest of the cab ride in the woods, searching for a good tree for a new mast.

  Chapter 8

  The North American Security Commission. Put a democratic society under enough stress, subject it to enough fear and this is what you get. The NASC is a union of America's Department of Homeland Security, the CIA, FBI, Canada's CSIS spy network and elements of the RCMP. The decades of the mid 21st century were defined by unrelenting war and unrest. The Canadian and American governments responded by bestowing more and more power onto their various security organizations and integrating them tightly. Although the various arms of the NASC are still technically subordinate to their respective elected leaders, no elected representative would dare cross them. Just the hint of an investigation by the NASC was enough to make a politician's support and funding evaporate. Thus they virtually have a free hand to do as they pleased.

  The local NASC detachment was housed in a nondescript industrial-park building. The logos of the various agencies that composed the NASC flew from flagpoles in front of the building's main entrance. At the door stood a pair of security guards and a sensor arch for visitors to walk through. My approach caused some consternation. First they frisked me, which was a useless gesture given my total lack of clothing or pockets. Then they asked me to step through the sensor arch, but whatever data it provided didn't clear up their concerns. After some back and forth with their superiors it was decided that I would be given a security escort to and from Mr. Gaudet's office. Two armed guards came out of the building and positioned themselves in front and behind me. The one behind brandished a large mag-rail rifle.

  Chapter 9

  Mr. Gaudet turned out to be hard looking man of indecipherable age. He had clearly been on anti aging treatments for a while but it was impossible to say how long. He sat in a small office behind an old wooden desk. Like most modern offices, the desk was completely bare, the better to project Gaudet's private desktop interface onto. The walls of the room were also bare, though it was entirely possible that when Gaudet looked at them he saw pictures of his family or his dog or hardcore pornography or whatever else he pleased. Altogether there was nothing in the room to give me the slightest hint of the man's character. Mr. Gaudet was clearly a very private man.

  Gaudet rose to his feet as I entered, his face turning red. "I explicitly ordered VivraTerra to send a human representative."

  Had I been in a sim, my face would have turned as red as his, but as it was my robot just stiffened and made its best attempt to frown.

  "Mr. Gaudet. There are none of any authority to send. I'm sure you know very well that VivraTerra is a collective of uploaded individuals. I am here as its duly appointed representative."

  "Uploaded individuals?" he roared. "I'm talking to a computer simulation of a dead man driving a god damned domestic appliance! This Polis you're part of has killed more people than I can count, with your ridiculous fantasy of a digital paradise."

  The interview had clearly not started well.

  "Look, there's no point in arguing philosophy. I clearly believe that uploading doesn't kill you or I wouldn't be here right now. I am the appointed representative of VivraTerra's governing council and I have the authority to represent the Polis in this matter. There is no-one better suited to hear what you have to say, so you can either talk to me or I can leave."

  "I'm going to track down some HUMAN representatives of your company and drag them in here."

  "I'll save you the trouble. There are none. VivraTerra is a private corporation, owned by just one woman. She's an elderly lady, who for medical reasons is currently in cryogenic stasis. Her estate, including VivraTerra is administered by Western Trust Bank. All they're authorized to do is sign the annual certificate of incorporation and rubber stamp our tax forms. They have no idea how our organization is run and speaking to them would be a waste of your time. There are no
humans for you to talk to Mr. Gaudet!"

  "Ridiculous. In a company worth nearly half a trillion dollars there isn’t one human working for it!?"

  "At any given time there are thousands of very competent people seeing to VivraTerra's affairs Mr. Guadet. I'm one of them."

  Gaudet dropped back into his chair and sat silently for a while.

  "You should know that I find talking to a ghost inside of a fucking toaster extremely distasteful, but for the sake of expediency I'll leave my message with this machine. We have evidence that VivraTerra has violated at least 10 articles of the US nuclear regulatory act. This is sufficient grounds for the NASC to execute a warrant and seize any and all paper documents as well as electronic storage devices for the sake of gathering further evidence and building a case against the company. Should VivraTerra be found guilty in a court of law then the company would likely be disincorporated, its assets impounded and its board members, or in your case board member would face criminal charges, punishable by up to life imprisonment."

  That was a lot more than I had expected, but before I could find a response, Gaudet continued.

  "However the NASC is not unaware of the fact that VivraTerra hosts over 200,000 very sophisticated bio-neural simulations, each of which has great deal of autonomy. It's possible that what has occurred may not have been sanctioned by the company itself and that one of these neural simulations may simply be... malfunctioning. So we're giving VivraTerra exactly one week to voluntarily turn over the information we want and make a proper account of its behavior. If you do this to our satisfaction, then we may decide to forgo pressing charges.

  Gaudet projected a folder onto the table and gestured toward it. "The lab was partially destroyed by whoever was running it, probably in an attempt to cover their tracks. These are some of the before-pictures. We want to know exactly what VivraTerra was doing in Utah, and why, including any and all technical diagrams and details, and most importantly we want the blueprints to that nuclear fusion generator you built there. You have one week to come up with this information. Here are the details, now get out!"

  I downloaded the folder and, seeing no point in further dialogue without first reviewing its contents, surrendered the field to Gaudet and headed for the door. The guards escorted me out of the building where I dumped the robot into the next available cab and jumped back to my house.

  Chapter 10

  I sat down on a deck chair on the porch and used my interface to create a new desktop. I bent it into a curved surface, named it 'NASC research' and levitated it in front of me at arm's reach. It looked like a large floating pane of semi-transparent glass. Next I pulled the files out of the Gaudet's folder and spread them out over the desktop.

  There wasn't very much to review. The NASC was not the kind of shop that liked to volunteer information. The first file simply contained a street address of some building in Utah and the name and business number of the company that it was registered to. The company was named Orion Research Inc.

  I launched a mapping app and zoomed in for a bird's-eye view. The address turned out to be that of an airfield off HWY 40, about 150 km south-east of Salt Lake City. There was a single paved runway, a hut sprouting several aerials and a radome, and an enormous airplane hangar. The hangar's main door was about 60 feet tall and wide enough to engulf a jetliner. Its full length was nearly 500 feet. A quick search on the address revealed that the airfield was privately owned and was indeed registered to Orion Research. A further search on Orion came up empty. The company had no homepage and had apparently never been referred to by any website.

  Gaudet's folder also contained a few photos, apparently taken from inside the hangar. One picture showed a large server farm, probably 300 racks arranged in 10 long rows. The racks appeared to be full, which meant that each one probably held about one hundred blade servers. The racks were powered and cooled from above by cables and pipes descending from a metal scaffolding that ran down the length of each row. In the photo the machines all appeared to be turned off.

  The next photo showed a heavy, cylindrical steel vacuum chamber about 20 feet in diameter and 20 feet high. A tangled nest of wires and pipes sprouted from its domed roof. On the side facing the camera was an open heavy door with a window in it and steel wheel that operated its locking mechanism.

  The third photo was of the interior of the vacuum chamber. Suspended at its center was a spherical dodecahedron about 6 feet in diameter. It was composed of 12 circular metal rings. The rings did not quite touch each other and were each supported by four metal arms that extended straight out from the dodecahedron. The arms met up with a heavy supporting scaffolding that ran along the floor, ceiling and walls of the vacuum chamber. Encircling the dodecahedron was a sphere made up of a tight metal mesh, about 12 feet in diameter. Traveling down the support arms and into each ring were two rubber tubes, apparently there to transport some liquid or gas into the rings.

  The last photo was even more perplexing. It showed an enormous square steel-mesh box, each side about 60 feet long. The inside of the box was crammed full of high voltage electrical equipment. I could see what looked like massive transformers and capacitors. There were several stacked rings that looped around the whole inside of the mesh cube. Each ring was a large metal tube, heavily adorned with complex looking electrical machinery. The rest of the equipment I couldn't begin to identify.

  The folder contained only one other file, which was a short text document repeating Gaudet's demands for an explanation of the purpose of this equipment and the blueprints for their design.

  Chapter 11

  I stared at the photos for a few minutes but they meant nothing to me. Electrical engineering was hardly my forte. Well, first things first. I jumped back into the robot, got it out of the cab and marched it back up to the office and into its alcove. Then I jumped back to the house and sent a high priority message to Mr. Speer, requesting a meeting and sending him a link to my house.

  He replied within seconds, but only with audio. An orange 1970's style telephone materialized and began floating in front of me. The phone started ringing. I lifted the receiver from its cradle and brought it up to my ear.

  "Hello Jarrod, did you find out what Gaudet wanted?"

  "Yes Sir. The NASC found some sort of research lab in Utah and Gaudet's convinced that it was operated by VivraTerra, or one of our uploads. He says that we built some sort of experimental nuclear reactor there and he's giving us a week to hand over the designs or he'll seize all of our servers. He gave me an address and a few pictures. I'm sending them to you now".

  I made a copy of my open desktop, collapsed it into an icon and then shoved the icon through the mouthpiece of the phone. There was a few seconds of silence on the other end of the phone.

  "That's a lot of expensive equipment, but why does Gaudet think we have anything to do with it?

  "I don't know. All I have is those photos and the address. I guess Gaudet either believes that VivraTerra is directly involved, or if not, we have some way of finding out who is."

  "Did he actually say he'd confiscate our servers?"

  "Yes, and from what I could tell I don't think he believes or cares that turning off those machines would amount to an act of genocide. Sir, I have to ask - are we involved in this research company in any way?"

  "I've never heard of it and I don't see how it would be possible. VivraTerra exists only to maintain the hardware, software and legal infrastructure for our uploads. There's nothing in our mandate for funding energy research, let alone unsanctioned nuclear experiments. It's either a private upload or Gaudet is simply wrong about our involvement."

  "Yes, that was my conclusion as well" I replied.

  "Well I suppose the next step would be to find that upload if he exists. I'm going to call an emergency council meeting to start an investigation and organize a legal defense. Given the seriousness of the allegations against us, we'll have to take Gaudet's threat at face value. In the meantime I'd like you to
find out why Gaudet believes we're connected to this research lab. Please contact me at once if you find anything or need help."

  I paused for a moment. "Mr. Speer, there is one thing you could do for me. As you know my background isn't technical and I'm going to need some help analyzing all the equipment in these photos. I'd like to bring in an aid if I may. Melanie Cutler. I've known her for several years and I think she may be able to help."

  "One moment, I'll get her file. Yes that should be fine. She has graduate degrees in mechanical and computer engineering. One moment… I have just recruited her. Anything else?"

  "No that's all. I'll report back as soon as I have something."

  "Until then." The link went dead. I put the receiver back in its cradle and the phone dematerialized, then I collapsed the desktop and pocketed it.

  Chapter 12

  Melanie materialized in the kitchen less than five minutes later and stormed out onto the deck. She was wearing her usual Polynesian outfit which consisted of a bikini bottom wrapped by a light sarong and nothing else.

  "You had me recruited? What the hell?"

  "Hi Melanie. Uh, sorry about that."