– 84 –

 

At twenty-four years old, Nick Rojas was three years out of MIT and considered to be one of the most forward-thinking software engineers of his generation. While a student one topic of his research was quantum processor technology and theory. Right after graduation he was snapped up by TranSilica.

Soon after its activation, Mekhos started manipulating material supplies and financial resources to discourage development in new quantum processor research. Critical rare metals suddenly became unavailable. Grants dried up. After a while it became clear to the research community that Mekhos didn’t want them building another quantum computer. There was a lot of complaining at first, but after a few months there was only resignation. Mekhos was intractable on the matter. Other avenues could be explored, but quantum computing was off limits.

There had been plenty of private speculation about the restriction. The most likely explanation seemed to be that Mekhos knew it was unique and wanted to prevent another intelligent computer from evolving, one that might not be under its control. It was all speculation.

That left traditional silicon transistor computing. Though the underlying technologies were dissimilar, Nick was able to apply some of the theoretical models learned from Norman Stravinsky’s quantum computing breakthrough. Combined with new manufacturing processes designed for TranSilica by Mekhos itself, the result was a dramatic increase in transistor processing power. The twenty percent per year increase that the solid state processor industry had been stuck on suddenly vanished. TranSilica’s new processors were a hundred times faster than the previous generation. It was still nowhere near the power of a quantum computer, but it kept business and industry happy. The new processor also allowed conventional supercomputers to simulate some of the quantum process, albeit at much slower speeds.

While still at MIT one of Nick’s technical papers caught the eye of a Virtue member. The public face of Virtue was tarnished because of the crimes it committed in the name of its anti-Mekhos activities. What the public didn’t know was that Virtue had legitimate cells that operated without direct ties back to the core organization. The branches included technology firms. One such firm was TranSilica, the powerful company that in partnership with the government helped fund the MC complex.

Carl Bertrand had been on the TranSilica board of directors back then. He was also a member of Virtue, and had given final approval to the hiring of Nick. In that time Nick had been using his algorithms to simulate the workings of Mekhos. Nick was under the impression that his research at TranSilica would be applied to future computer systems designed to increase the efficiency of the private and public financial sectors.

Bertrand had lately rarely been in the office. As a member of the Envoy to the Twin his training had taken him away for many weeks. A few months earlier Nick had been reassigned to a new project, one described by Bertrand as being of the highest priority. As it had been explained to Nick, his Mekhos simulation had to reach ready status as soon as possible, to control all existing systems should anything ever happen to the quantum supercomputer. Bertrand explained that the project had been initiated by Mekhos itself, but was to be kept secret to avoid undermining the confidence of the public in their quantum guardian.

Like everyone else, Nick had heard about the morning’s terrorist attack against Mekhos. He’d been called directly by Carl Bertrand for an urgent meeting. Nick thought it strange that he had been instructed to take off his Raim before coming to the meeting. Bertrand welcomed Nick with small talk but then got to the point. There were two other men in Bertrand’s office but Nick couldn’t tell if they were aides or security of some sort.

“I’ve seen your theoretical models and they look excellent. How confident are you about constructing a two-way interface between the computer in your lab and a working quantum computer so that orders can be issued from the lab?”

Nick looked at each man in turn.

“Well, on paper it works flawlessly,” Nick said as he fidgeted with his pen. “But that was based on the state of Mekhos one year ago. The consensus among some of my old professors at MIT was that the QC is constantly evolving, gaining new capabilities through increased computing power. I can’t make any guarantee that what would have worked one year ago will work today. Operating statistics on Mekhos are no longer made public. Mekhos doesn’t even provide them to TranSilica through the MC anymore.”

“We’ve looked over your proposals and project calculations,” Bertrand said, ignoring Nick’s concerns, “and we don’t foresee an issue. This is to take effect on a contingency basis, you understand? Any attempt to send commands prematurely, when Mekhos is active, may damage the lab computer. This is a top secret project. Your non-disclosure agreement is enforceable. Not a word to anyone under any circumstances, personal or otherwise. Security is paramount. You must be ready to go on a minute’s notice should Mekhos be compromised.”

After a short briefing Nick was instructed to interface his program with the main systems. For the time being, TranSilica’s massive systems would be the custodian of world affairs until Mekhos could recover. At least, that is what he and his team were told.

The first order of business had to be control of the mechanisms steering the moon into orbit. Eight weeks earlier Nick had been given the design specifications for the mechanisms and as much of the kernel code for the control software that Bertrand’s people were able to obtain. Nick was required to fill in the blanks, which he and his team had finished a few days earlier. Nick and his team had worked hard. The crucial test was only a few hours away.