Chapter Two

Damien pulled his awareness back inside his body and opened his eyes feeling like a completely changed man. Not in the physical sense, but in the emotional realm. He felt like the inner child within had just been destroyed. He found a new level of emotional maturity, and realized how much of his idiosyncrasies in his previous life had been directly related to that emotional immaturity. Now he felt a wellspring of inner strength, purpose, and motivation.

Damien felt rejuvenated and encouraged by his progress, even if it was only the first step, and only equivalent to opening a door. That door, however, was still a significant milestone, which signaled the start of the journey. Refocused and determined, he was eager to dive back into what he now thought of as his inner void, thanks in no small part to this newfound sense of maturity.

Damien no longer had that constant feeling of timidity welling up inside, instead he now felt a sense of eager anticipation to go exploring this strange and unknown frontier. Laughing out loud, Damien recited...,

“Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds; to seek out new life and new civilizations; to boldly go where no man has gone before!”

Ok, Damien admitted, he may not have made as much progress in eliminating his inner child as he first thought, but maybe that was for the best. Humor was also a key essential ingredient in human psychology.

Damien first considered all the new discoveries his impromptu excursion to the outer rim of the star system revealed. For starters, the temple he was inside of is located at the base of an enormous volcano which centers an island, the size of Australia back on earth. The volcano is actively spewing a continuous plume of smoke, which means an eruption could happen at any time. The island is tropical, with an uninterrupted, densely overgrown rainforest canopy. He did detect civilian population centers splattered across the island with his senses.

The planet was a moon of a much larger planet, which resembled Saturn with her rings. The surface of the moon had many island archipelagos, but no large land masses or continents. The ocean was teaming with life, some so massive it put the largest dinosaur on Earth to shame. As for the rest of the star system, his awareness had become too hazy by that point, that he could only make out, a dozen or so planetoids of any significance, along with three core suns of various size and color.

Damien’s timetable and perspective needed to change drastically. He simply didn’t have time to waste and needed to get as far away from this hell mouth as possible. He needed to reconstruct his body, and swiftly. His hope lay with the Force, and he needed to trust the Force to guide him to salvation.

Damien was once again floating in his inner void, this time however his state of being was calm and open. While sitting in a metaphorical lotus position within the void, he was attempting to push his awareness outwards, hoping to at least be able to define the shape, size, and boundary of this strange space within him.

However, all his attempts failed spectacularly as he simply felt absolutely no connection to the space around him. That wasn’t exactly true, he felt the Force all around him, along with a hazy sense of this place. This led him to think of this place less as an actual void and more of an empty canvas, metaphorically speaking of course. In a way he could never explain, he sensed that this space was waiting, that it wanted to be something, that it needed his input, to be able to make that change from nothing into something. The only problem was he had no idea how to, or even what he was supposed to input.

During the process of wracking his brain for ideas, he began to consider what he personally would want this space to be. For a concept, he decided on a simulation type game, where he could come take shelter from the world, or even reality itself. For the environment, he wanted it to be a replica of his home back on Earth, with his private laboratory underneath. For how the space functioned, he thought it would be cool if it operated like total immersive virtual reality, and had an open world game design, so he could play around with different scenarios.

It wasn’t until he came out of his mussing that he realized the entire space around him was no longer an empty void. Instead, he was floating like a ghost in the center of the living room, of his home back on Earth. However, from the view through the window, he could still see the familiar emptiness of the void in the background.

“How is this possible?”

Damien’s shock was immediately interrupted by a voice he was all too familiar with, and one he never expected to hear again. This voice belonged to his “Interactive Artificial Intelligence Assistant” that he had spent nearly twenty years building and perfecting.

“Excuse me, Sir. Do you require assistance?”

“Alfred., is that really you?”

“I do apologize, Sir. but I do not understand your inquiry? Would you please rephrase your question and ask again.”

“Never mind, disregard this line of questioning”

“As you wish, Sir.”

Damien set aside the craziness of the situation and began to systematically explore the replica of his house. What he found was a fully intact replica, according to his memories. The Laboratory beneath his home was even fully equipped just the way he last saw it.

Wanting to test a theory, he visualized himself as a virtual avatar. (For reference he envisioned: “Parzival”: “Ready Player One”) His floating awareness solidified and morphed into a perfect physical rendering of Parzival. It was truly amazing, his avatar had perfect tactile sensory perception.

Grinning like the geek he was, Damien wanted to try a new approach and walked to a cleared section of the laboratory wall. This time he visualized a floor to ceiling vertically orientated, flat display screen mounted flush to the wall. Even expecting the change to happen, it still surprised him to see reality shift and bend to his will like this.

For his next experiment Damien wanted to see if he could establish a link to his physical body. He visualized the screen displaying his current physical body's complete biotelemetry data in real time. This time it was less surprising to see the screen light up with the data exactly as he envisioned it.

The last change he wanted to make was big, facing a larger section of wall, he visualized NASA’s command and control center, He waited, but nothing happened to his surprise. After comparing the three examples, he realized the problem he had never actually seen NASA’s control center except in movies. This time he changed his approach and visualized the interior of an I-Max theater. This time it worked, the wall shifted and expanded out, the floor spread and sank forming stadium seating. Where once stood a straight wall, now opened into a full-size commercial theater.

Damien’s goal for the theater was to create an immersive interactive sensory display suite for this space using his real body’s five senses, sight, sound, taste, smell, and touch. He divided the stadium seating into five separate partitions.

For “Sight” he converted the large, curved screen into a “Smart Digital Display Screen”, with the ability to broadcast in real-time a video feed from his physical body’s sight picture. He designated and customized one of the partitioned off sections of seating, for a visual analysis editing, and formatting suite.

For “Sound” he converted the surround sound system into an auditory playback feed of his real body. He designated another partitioned section of seating, for a sound analysis, recording, editing, and communication suite.

For “Taste” and “Smell” he designated one of the remaining partitioned sections of seating, for a real-time chemical analysis sensor suite for utilizing both senses.

For “Touch” he designated the second to last partitioned off section of seating, for a real-time mapping system, personal positioning system and environment analysis suite.

For the fifth and final partitioned off section of seating, he designated it as “Brain”, this area would act as the coordinator for the entire system.

The only thing left to do was exit meditation and see if Damien’s dream of creating an “Interactive User Interface Heads-Up-Display", for his physical body would work or not. But before leaving, he needed to give a few commands to Alfred.

For any of this to work, it required integration into the HIVE system. HIVE Interconnected virtual Entity, was “Winters Technologies” signature proprietary operating system.

Damien took the concept of a “hive mind” and brought it into the cyber world. There he constructed a virtual hive operating system, which incorporated all the computational power of every device within the system into a single virtual entity. This allowed each program running on the system to be supported by the entire computational power of the hive. Once AI. (artificial intelligence) was introduced to “HIVE.”, the system became an absolute monster in the fields of efficient computational analysis and data processing speed. HIVE OS. became the foundation of his technology empire.

“Alfred, run a search and list all available devices in the vicinity which are not connected to HIVE operating system.”

“Sir, my scan is completed. I am detecting seventy-two available devices that are unconnected to HIVE operating system. Here is a list of available devices.”

“Alfred, connect all devices listed into HIVE operating system.”

“Sir, all devices have been connected to HIVE operating system.”

“Alfred, recover the file “Tactical UAV UI HUD” from the archive, then upload it to device “Brain”. We’ll be using it as our foundation, to build out our “Immersive Interactive Sensory Theater”’”

“Very good Sir. I have located the file and have uploaded it. I now wait for your command to run file.”

“Alfred, run file.”

“Very good Sir. The file is now active.”

Damien looked at the large display that was still showing black, however this time there was also a neon green user interface overlaying the black background. He recognized the familiar Heads-up-display design, that “Winters Technologies” had developed for their Unmanned Aerial Vehicle System.

“Alfred. Begin to propagate “Brain” with the telemetry data from “Sight” “Sound” “Taste” “Smell” “Touch”, Have “Brain” correlate and support “Tactical UAV UI HUD” in real-time. Let’s rename “Tactical UAV UI HUD”. Change it to “Interactive UI HUD system.”

“Very good Sir. I will see to those changes.”

Damien transitioned from what he now thought of as his “Mental Palace” returning to his physical body and the outside world. Opening his eyes, he let out a long turbid breath, as he contemplated the ramifications of this new ability. This was without a doubt a Force granted trait or talent. It was also his opportunity to not only survive but to flourish. This opened so many possibilities.

Damien looked around the inside of the old temple with new eyes, as the interactive HUD system, actively operating within his sight picture, performing a real-time analysis of his environment. It would still take time for the software to develop, but even as great of a development this was, it still didn’t help towards his immediate survival.

Damien simply didn’t have the luxury of time to slowly advance through the Jedi school of thoughts in order. To survive he needed more advanced skills like “Telekinesis” and “Alter environment”. He simply couldn't sit around waiting to starve to death or for the volcano to erupt. If he was going to survive, he needed to take some risks. He also realized he may need to explore more aggressive ideals, even cross into the dark side for solutions.

Damien considered all the research, the grants from his company had funded over the years. Part of his job as CEO had been to review and decide whether to continue the funding. What he had first assumed would be tedious and a time sink, had instead turned into one of his more enjoyable duties.

Damien witnessed countless groundbreaking advances in all fields of science and technology. He also had the privilege to observe those groundbreaking advancements step by step along the way. It directly provided him with a uniquely broader viewpoint than others in his own fields. It allowed him to leap far ahead of his competitors and revolutionize both of his fields, computer science and robotics.

However, there was still plenty of untapped potential accumulated in all that research. For starters, Damien wanted to research the possibility of directly manipulating matter via “the Force”. In classical physics and general chemistry, matter is any substance that has mass and takes up space by having volume. All everyday objects that can be touched are ultimately composed of atoms, which are made up of interacting subatomic particles, and in everyday as well as scientific usage, matter generally includes atoms and anything made up of them, and any particles (or combination of particles) that act as if they have both rest mass and volume.

However, it does not include massless particles such as photons, or other energy phenomena or waves such as light or heat. Matter exists in various states (also known as phases). These include classical everyday phases such as solid, liquid, and gas – for example water exists as ice, liquid water, and gaseous steam – but other states are possible, including plasma, Bose-Einstein condensates, fermionic condensates, and quark–gluon plasma.

Usually, atoms can be imagined as a nucleus of protons and neutrons, and a surrounding "cloud" of orbiting electrons which "take up space". However, this is only somewhat correct because subatomic particles and their properties are governed by their quantum nature, which means they do not act as everyday objects appear to act – they can act like waves as well as particles, and they do not have well-defined sizes or positions. In the Standard Model of particle physics, matter is not a fundamental concept because the elementary constituents of atoms are quantum entities which do not have an inherent "size" or "volume" in any everyday sense of the word.

Due to the exclusion principle and other fundamental interactions, some "point particles" known as fermions (quarks, leptons), and many composites and atoms, are effectively forced to keep a distance from other particles under everyday conditions; this creates the property of matter which appears to us as matter taking up space.

Damien could sense through the Force that this ability wasn’t only feasible but that it would directly bring him into the dark side of the Force. He wasn’t particularly surprised seeing as the dark side was all about taking control of the Force. He understood the difference between guidance and directly manipulating.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

However, Damien was used to weighing the risk versus the reward. It was something all researchers constantly had to face in their advancement of science. There have always been many morally ambiguous hypothetical scenarios, in which morality would only matter if they succeeded. Damien also considered the concept of balance, and the true nature of the Force, which was duality of light and dark. Damien’s nature was directly reflected in the silver Kyber crystal, he now gazed at.

“I am neutrality”

To distract himself from the fear he felt towards the dark side. Damien began toying around with the idea of developing synthesized diamond scale epidermis armor, to protect himself from blaster bolts and lightsaber blades. Unlike natural diamonds, a synthetic diamond is produced in a controlled technological process. Synthetic diamonds are composed of the same material as naturally formed diamonds, pure carbon crystallized in an isotropic 3D form, sharing identical chemical and physical properties.

Damien just so happens to be sitting at a literal carbon generating fountain, which is perfectly conducive for high pressure high temperature diamond (HPHT) and CVD diamond production methods. (high-pressure high-temperature and chemical vapor deposition, respectively). There is also a third method in which nanometer-sized diamond grains are created in a detonation of carbon-containing explosives, known as detonation synthesis

Damien particularly liked the versatility of synthetic diamonds. The properties of synthetic diamonds depend directly on the manufacturing process. Some have properties such as hardness, thermal conductivity and electron mobility that are superior to those of most naturally formed diamonds. Synthetic diamonds are used in abrasives, in cutting and polishing tools, and in heat sinks. Various colors can be produced, ranging from clear white, yellow, brown, blue, green, and orange.

Damien was intimately familiar with their electronic applications and even funded many grants researching synthetic diamond integration and development, such as high-power switches at power stations, high-frequency field-effect transistors, light-emitting diodes, and synthetic diamond detectors of ultraviolet (UV) light or high-energy particles.

Due to its unique combination of thermal and chemical stability, low thermal expansion and high optical transparency in a wide spectral range, synthetic diamond is becoming the most popular material for optical windows in high-power CO2 lasers and gyrotrons.

Besides diamonds, Damien also wanted to research into the feasibility of synthesizing Kyber crystals, while also looking into possible liquid Kyber crystal applications. Many interesting ideas were buzzing around in his head, making his future endeavors full of exciting possibilities. Now he just needed to devote his time to research and development.

Fortunately, Damien found time inside the “Mental Palace” held little meaning, as he was separated from all physical ailments and restraints, like hunger or exhaustion. He did, however, make sure to monitor his physical body’s condition and security. With no day/night cycles Damien smoothly entered a fugue like state of uninterrupted research, progressing smoothly through developing his new body’s cybernetic metamorphous.

Damien marveled at his light speed progression, inside this strange magical virtual environment. All restraints that once hampered his progressions were nonexistent, as his prototype cybernetic body design was fully interactive down to the microscopic scale. It only took him roughly thirty-six hours to complete his body’s overall redesign process. He was now running it through countless efficiency and durability simulation tests trying to perfect it.

However, Damien’s physical body condition was close to deteriorating past a point of no return. He simply could no longer delay the actual reconstruction of his body. Nor did he have a reason too other than his own fear. In truth, most of the technology he used was the same as his years of progressing Earth’s robotics.

His shortcoming had arrived at the integration point between biological and technological systems. Nothing so extensive had ever been attempted back on Earth, leaving him in unchartered territory. As was his tendency, he looked to science fiction for inspiration and found it in “Robo-Cop”. He minimized and isolated his vital organic life systems, as much as possible, and then designed a Force attuned robotic prosthetic body around it.

Damien figured only a madman would eagerly proceed with such an overly ambitious and ridiculously dangerous endeavor. So, he was hesitating on the final push and knew it. He also knew moving his body from the temple to the volcano at the center of the island was going to be a nightmarish slog. He was sure from his experiments with “Force telekinesis”, (Reference Dr. Otto Octavius, using mechanical arms to move around with.) he would be able to reach the top of the volcano.

Damien eventually managed to reach the summit of the volcano, and he arrived mostly unscathed. However, as a scientist by nature, he found it difficult to stay focused in such an alien environment. Flora and fauna are two distinct components of a natural environment that play a vital role in the balance and sustainability of ecosystems. Flora refers to the plant life found in a particular region, while fauna refers to the animal life. Both flora and fauna are interconnected and coexist in harmony, contributing to the overall biodiversity of this planet.

Damien decided to create a virtual database for the planet, starting with creating a virtual 3D topographical globe. Damien also created a virtual catalogue of the flora, by constructing a virtual rendering, along with a chemical analysis of each species of plant. Inside his “Memory Palace” Damien created a virtual assistant, a dedicated NPC (non-player-character) bot analyst, specifically designed to gather and compile information on this planet. As a reference model for the NPC, he chose “Genevieve”, a CIA female analyst, his mother had once set him up with for a blind date. His mother had questionable taste, Genevieve was insanely attractive, extremely smart, but also terrifyingly scary. Thus, he was too intimidated by her to call her after that initial date.

However, this is all beside the point, and off topic. The point of which is that Damien did discover fresh water, and many sources of much needed calories, along the way. He also managed to poison himself repeatedly, however, after meditating for a time, he managed to restore his body and mind back to its peak state.

After arriving at the summit, Damien found the heat and billowing smoke suffocating. Locating a relatively flat surface, he let his exhausted body collapse and retreated into his “Mental Palace” where he ran through the entire procedural plan one last time.

The first stage required Damien to use the Force to draw in and absorb the carbon molecules produced by the volcano. These molecules would then be further broken down into electrons, neutrons, and protons. These particles would then be reconfigured according to the material needs.

The second stage required Damien to use the absorbed particles to construct a protective barrier to safeguard his vital organs. The barrier consisted of a hermetically sealed nano fiber weave membrane, which surrounds the organ cavity.

Then Damien would systematically remove all organs and biomass that was designated as non-essential, while also installing the required alterations this removal process will necessitate. Including installations of hardware, such as Cybernetic HIVE temperature management interface, Cybernetic HIVE biological management interface, Cybernetic HIVE life-support interface, and Cybernetic HIVE waste management interface.

The third stage required Damien to construct a protective barrier, to safeguard the brain and spinal cord. This barrier has all the same features as the other one, with the addition of a Cybernetic HIVE neural net interface, and Cybernetic HIVE telecommunication interface woven within it.

The fourth stage required Damien to reduce the circulatory system, blood volume, and bone and bone marrow down to the required amounts specified to accommodate the maintenance of the remaining vital organs, sensory organs, and brain.

The fifth stage required Damien to replace each bone one at a time. His starting point was the top of the skull. The process started with Damien breaking down each existing cell, while simultaneously replacing them with a new micro-octagon synthesized diamond. Each micro diamond acted as a cell, fusing together to form a crystalline matrix. The new synthetic medium was 3D printed via “Force mater manipulation” in accordance with a prepared 3D computer model. Each piece of his new skeletal structure had been rigorously designed down to the microscopic level.

To better attune his new body to the Force, Damien’s design incorporates synthesized liquid Kyber crystal like bone marrow within the diamond skeleton. He also designed a cybernetic (synthetic liquid Kyber crystal) circulatory feeder system for complete saturation of his body. For sentimentality, he designed synthetic grey diamond fingernails and toenails and synthesized clear diamond teeth as analogue replacements.

For a cybernetic nervous system, Damien’s design incorporated a microprocessor signal coupling interface built into each vertebrate model. This would enable the HIVE system to directly tap into the spinal cord. Each processor is tagged by an Identity designation, allowing the Cybernetic HIVE nerve signal interface to take over the transmitting nerve signals throughout the body via synthetic nerves made of microscopic fiber optic cables.

For a synthetic tendon, Damien’s design utilized a carbon nano-fiber elastic weave reflex band. Each bone was etched with microscopic hooks for the synthetic tendons to be attached to. For a synthetic muscle, his design utilized a carbon nano-tube reactive fiber. This material could be designed to react to an electrical charge, whether it be to contract or expand. Furthermore, the tubes could be bundled allowing for precise situational tuning. Making it a perfect candidate for mimicking muscle functions.

For a synthetic skin, Damien designed a three-layer system, which combined numerous technologies. The base layer is a synthesized carbon nano-foam membrane. The middle layer is a Liquid Kyber Crystal Pixilated Micro-Dot Display flexible paneling. (Reference: Predator camouflage) The outer layer is added natural defense, a flexible epidermis layer of synthesized diamond micro-octagon scaling.

For a synthetic hair system, Damien took inspiration from “the Predator” movie and developed a multi-sensory dreadlock system. Each dreadlock consisted of synthetic hairs made of a carbon nano tube outer insulator shell, with a micro sensor hollow filament core. Each hair correlated with a microscopic receptacle built into the skull.

Damien finished reading through the last of the compiled data and closed his eyes. He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t terrified about this whole process. He also damn well knew he didn’t really have a choice, this gambit would either succeed and he would live a life worth living, or it would fail, and he would die. There was also the small matter of stepping over the threshold and touching the dark side of the Force. It was the price of altering the fabric of reality, an unnatural act that opposed fate and the will of the Force.

Damien knew the cost and knew he would have to pay the price. He also knew his available options didn’t offer any alternative to using the Force to directly manipulate the fabric of reality.

“Alfred, construct a holographic 3D rendering of my current physical body,”

“Very good Sir the rendering has been completed.”

Damien’ focused on the hologram and willed it to synchronize with his physical body. He could feel the change take place as an intangible link between him, his physical body, and the hologram formed. Satisfied, he no longer hesitated and jumped off the metaphorical cliff.

When Damien resurfaced from meditation, his psyche had already been tainted by the dark side. As expected, his ability to manipulate matter via the Force tore a tear, directly exposing him to the negative side of the Force. This created an opening for the dark side to penetrate freely into his psyche.

Damien’s negative emotions were now running erratic and overly stimulated, to the point of nearly driving him insane. He now completely understood why Anakin Skywalker acted so irrational and extreme. Rationality and logic simply have no place in the face of overly stimulated emotions, especially if they are being fueled by the dark side.

Damien quickly escaped back into his “Mental Palace”, and by doing so he cut off the metaphorical fuel from the emotional forest fire. After all emotions had both a metaphysical aspect and a physical aspect. Removing one greatly affects the whole. Now he just needed time to let reality repair itself. After all his working was on a rather minor scale, he hoped it wouldn’t take too long for the tear to repair itself. He could then ride out the residual effects of the dark side, on his psyche.

In the meantime, Damien’s physical body had undergone a complete metamorphosis. Fortunately, his physical body was currently in an inert state, which effectively mitigated the overall damage the dark side could achieve. In the meantime, he had to rely on the “Force” alone to keep his remaining biological functions operating, leaving him little time to waste. He quickly got back to work.

Damien turned a square surface area of the laboratory flooring into an interactive holo-projection workstation,

“Alfred, use a basic status screen format, and display my current physical condition.”

“As you wish Sir, your current status has been correlated and displayed.”

“Alfred, add a 3D rendering of my current physical body.”

“Very good Sir. The 3D rendering is completed.”

For the most part Damien still looked human, though he had taken some artistic liberties with the design. He was a huge geek by nature, and he now live in a universe that closely resembled a Comic-Con convention,

Name: Damien Winters

Race: Human-cyborg

Sex: none available

Height: 6 feet

Weight: 423 pounds

Description:

Skin: (Chameleon), Base layer is a carbon nano-foam membrane; Mid-layer is a Cybernetic HIVE Liquid Kyber Crystal Pixilated Micro-Dot Flexible Display paneling; Surface layer is a synthesized diamond micro-octagon scaling. Looks like organic skin but feels like flexible metal. (Carbon grey) synthesized diamond fingernails and toenails

Hair: (Carbon grey), (“Predator” style) Cybernetic multi-sensory dreadlock system. with built in Cybernetic HIVE Liquid Kyber Crystal Pixilated Micro-Dot Flexible Display paneling outer coating.

Body: (Carbon grey) Bi-pedal humanoid, shape: (Lean), musculature: (Swimmer)

Face: Facial features: Minimized by design, complete removal of nose, reduction of prominence for eyebrows and cheeks making for flatter profile. The mouth and jawline remain human shape, equipped with synthesized diamond teeth. Incisors have been altered by elongation. (For reference, imagine “Thunder Cats”.) Ears have been elongated by four inches and sharply tipped like an elf; each ear is equipped with Cybernetic telecommunication array inlays.

Eyes: (Hazel) Each eye is enclosed behind synthesized diamond photo-reactive lens.

Cybernetic systems: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE micro-ARC power core: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE operating system: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE memory matrix: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE power management and distribution interface: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE temperature management interface: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE biological management interface: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE life-support interface: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE nerve signal interface: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE muscle signal interface: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE nanite nano-factory: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE neural net interface: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE telecommunication interface: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE waste management interface: offline

Right hand:

-Cybernetic HIVE synthetic (white) Kyber Crystal, lightsaber claw: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE synthetic (white) Kyber Crystal, lightsaber claw: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE synthetic (white) Kyber Crystal, lightsaber claw: offline

Left hand:

-Cybernetic HIVE synthetic (white) Kyber Crystal, lightsaber claw: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE synthetic (white) Kyber Crystal, lightsaber claw: offline

-Cybernetic HIVE synthetic (white) Kyber Crystal, lightsaber claw: offline

Damien couldn’t help but marvel and revel in his accomplishment. This new form was a pure fantasy back on Earth and would never have been accepted or even allowed to exist. Hell, even AI was tightly regulated to the point of barely being useful, out of fear and paranoia. If he had to be perfectly honest with himself, he was far more excited about leaving Earth behind. The galaxy was free in the same way as America was back when she was raw and untamed.

Snapping out of his revelry, Damien got back to work. However, the next step did give him a moment of trepidation, as he silently prayed for him not to blow up again.

“Alfred, connect to “Cybernetic HIVE micro-ARC power core” and initiate power-up sequence.”

“Very good Sir, connection has been established; Power up sequence has been initiated; Power core is actively absorbing atmospheric particles; Power core reactor chamber is ignited; Power core reaction has stabilized; Power core is now generating power; Generated power is being transmitted to micro-capacitor banks; Cybernetic micro-ARC power core start-up sequence is completed.”

“Alfred, establish connection to all cybernetic systems remaining offline, and place them in stand-by mode.

“Very good Sir, connection has been established; All cybernetic systems have been switched to stand-by mode.”

“Alfred, take remote control of: “Cybernetic HIVE power management and distribution interface” and bring it online.”

“Very good Sir. I have gained remote control of Cybernetic HIVE power management and distribution interface: System is now online.”

“Alfred, Transmit power to all systems currently in stand-by mode.”

“Very good Sir. I am now transmitting power to all systems currently in stand-by mode.”

“Alfred, take remote control of “Cybernetic HIVE operating system”, and “Cybernetic memory matrix”, and bring both online.”

“Very good Sir. I have gained remote control of “Cybernetic HIVE operating system”, and “Cybernetic memory matrix”, and brought both systems online.”

“Alfred, take remote control of “Cybernetic HIVE neural net interface” use it to begin the synchronization process of my human brain, and the “Cybernetic memory matrix”, Create a Link between “The way of Shadow, virtual reality simulation” utilizing the “Adaptive-learning coding program” and “Cybernetic HIVE operating system.”

“Very good Sir. I have established remote control of “Cybernetic HIVE neural net interface”; The synchronization process has been completed; A link has been established connecting “The way of Shadow, virtual reality simulation” and “Cybernetic HIVE operating system.”; The “Adaptive-learning coding program” is currently running in the background.”

“Alfred, load “Way of Shadows, virtual simulation” into the “Mental palace's” VR pod.”

When Damien first started in robotics, he along with all the others in the field dreamed of creating a fully functioning AI driven android. One that could mimic the organic nature of humanity. However, the sad truth was, even the most advanced robot was slow, dumb, and clumsy. The dream of an android was just that, a dream with no foreseeable path to achieving it.

It took Damien decades of relentless experimentation and computer modeling to discover the key to unlocking the doorway to smart interactive robotics. His discovery came from merging three pieces, “The human mind”, “The robot’s memory matrix” and “Virtual reality simulation”. To do this, Damien invented “Adaptive-learning program coding” a two-step background interface that coded the interaction between “the memory matrix and the “Simulation” in real-time.

The first step was synchronizing a human’s brain with a robot’s memory matrix. (For reference think of the movie “Pacific Rim”.)

The second step was establishing a link connecting the virtual reality simulation and the synchronized pair via the “adaptive-learning coding program”.

Damien’s Ingenius idea was to organically teach the robot just like a human learns in real life. Only he would be using a virtual reality simulated scenario, which he could tailor to requirements. For example, to teach the robot to walk he created a scenario of a toddler’s process of learning to walk. Just like any video game, the toddler became “the main character”, with the synchronized pair acting as “the player”. The entire experience was coded into the “Memory matrix” in real-time.

This singular discovery completely revolutionized the field of robotics and ushered in a new age of smart robots to the world. It also nearly destroyed the world during the process, but that’s a different story.