The Watch in the Sand: Part 10
November 29, 2028
In reaction to rampant globalization and free trade policies, the Universal Workers Rights Act, or UWRA, is released by the new International Union Movement. The Movement’s aim is to utilize social media to unionize the global workforce. “If companies can move across the world,” the preamble of the UWRA states, “then it is only just that the workers of the world are given the same opportunities. We are human the whole world over, and deserve the same basic human rights, no matter which country we were born in.”
December 8, 2028
President-elect Cartwright embraces the UWRA, heralding it as a ‘bold and necessary step forward in the path of economic and human evolution.’ Her popularity rate drops drastically, and does not fully recover for the rest of her presidency.
May 16, 2029
The United States Government announces the forming of the First Federal Nanocule Factory, in conjunction with a Federal Nanocule Bank, designed to provide the minimum basic services of Nanocules to the public, paid for by tax dollars. This public option is championed as a great step forward for the country.
December 27, 2032
The Free, Independent, and Open Nanocule Act, or FIONA, is signed by Lame Duck President Cartwright, after the bill’s long and bloody passage through Congress. With the passing of this landmark act, the information regarding creation and control of Nanocules are placed in the public domain. Many Senators call the act a ‘Government takeover of the Pharmaceutical industry.’ President-elect Sanders hedges on demands to repeal.
6:48 am, February 9, 2033
Paul Rogan’s body jerked awake. It took a minute for his mind to catch up, and notice the loud siren blaring in his ear. Half awake, his arm automatically jerked to the side and collided hard with the top of his alarm-clock. Mercifully, the siren stopped. Sighing with relief, Paul sank back into the bed, curling under the warm covers. A split second before he settled, the siren blared again. Reluctantly, his brain began to function again, and he realized it was not his alarm, but his cell phone that was forcing him awake. Rubbing his eyes as he sat up, he reached out and unlocked his phone.
Paul was not a morning person, and his slow haggard voice could barely manage more than a questioning grunt. The voice on the other end held no such weight, however, and was full of the energy that comes from not having slept.
“Paul! Get your ass onto your Board!”
Paul tried to focus. The voice was speaking English, and sounded familiar, but the mists of sleep were clouding his memory. He groaned as he sat up in his bed, rubbing his eyes, eliciting an exasperated sigh from the other end of the line.
“Oh for the… go wake yourself up, and check what I sent you! I have to show you something!”
Paul set down the phone. She was female, whoever the caller was. Blearily, he switched his phone over to the Nanocule Transceiver app. Blinking owlishly at the settings, he called up ‘Java-Jolt,’ one of his saved programs, and typed in the unlock code. Gradually, he felt the mists fall away as the caffeine slowly filled his blood. A strong black cup of coffee in three seconds. And no need to wait for the brewing. No thick smell of roasted coffee luxuriously filling the house and nostrils, or rich musty liquid tickling his tongue either, Paul sighed, but he could still brew a cup of decaf later. He flipped his phone back to the call.
“Okay, I’m fine,” Paul said as he yawned and wiped the crust from his eyes. “What do you need, Cindy? It’s very early in Germany, you know?”
“I sent you a program I need you to see,” Cindy was speaking fast and slurring her words. Paul knew what that meant. She had been coding all day again. Paul grinned in spite of himself — there was no stopping that woman when she had a goal in mind. He flipped his phone into his lap, switched over to his Board, and accepted the incoming file. When it finished decompressing, he opened the first file and switched his phone to speaker.
“Okay, I got it,” he said, flipping through the pages of code. “What am I looking at?”
“A Nanocule program,” Cindy yawned, her voice tinny from the small speakers. “It’s based on the brain-scan code that lets them do MRIs and CAT scans. It located the sensory centers of the brain, and provides stimulation according to your thought patterns.”
“Wait…” Paul was staring at the code. He recognized a lot of it, but some of it wasn’t making any sense to him. “Hold on, this stimulates the brain? I thought that wasn’t possible.”
“Oh, it was hard,” Cindy giggled, “but after all that Federal brain research was released last month, I found a few tricks. It works, Paul! I’ve done it!”
“I’m still not sure what you’ve done,” Paul’s muscles were beginning to protest his being awake so early. He stretched, yawning.
“You want an example?” Cindy giggled again. “I’m not calling you on my phone!”
Paul didn’t say anything for a while as he realized what Cindy had just told him. Of course it was possible, he and Cindy had been talking about it for years. The Nanocules linked to the Line just like everything else, and if they were in the brain already… He licked his lips.
“You’ve got an interface?” he said, not daring to hope.
“I’ve got more then that,” she squeaked excitedly. “Come on, run it! I want to show you around!”
Paul had worked with Cindy for seven years. They thought in similar ways, and trusted each other’s skills and intelligence. Fumbling with this phone, he quickly downloaded, compiled, and ran the application. A small spinning disk showed the progress of the upload, and within seconds, an ugly bright-green button labeled ‘Activate’ was staring at him from his phone.
“Ready,” he said.
“Press it!” It sounded like Cindy could barely control herself. Paul took a breath, and pressed the button.
Reflexively, Paul blinked, and then waved his hand in front of his face. His head jerked around in confusion for a moment before he acclimated, and realized what was happening. In the center of his vision was a small square picture of a rose. Paul blinked hard, and the picture hovered in the darkness. He looked around the room, and it still stood in the center of his sight. He looked at his door across the room, his phone, and his hand held inches from his face, and the flower was still clear and in focus. He let a low whistle escape his lips.
“Amazing,” he couldn’t keep himself from smiling. His phone now had two buttons. A red ‘Off,’ and a blue ‘Calibrate.’
“Press calibrate on your phone,” Cindy squawked from the phone. “Its easy, just pay attention to whatever it shows you.”
Paul obliged, tapping the blue button excitedly. Instantly, the flower vanished, to be replaced by a small dog hovering just below the center of his vision. The dog disappeared, replaced by a cat floating to the left. A mouse replaced the cat off to the right, and then a piece of cheese sitting just above. The cheese was soon replaced by a short math problem, and then replaced again with a color wheel. Words flashed rapidly across his vision, scrolling quickly like a marquee. They fell from the sky, scrolling down, and then up, and then back and forth, and diagonally. Colored geometry bounced through his eyes, and then everything switched off like a light. Paul blinked. The whole thing had taken less than ten seconds.
“What was that?” he said, blinking hard. Cindy giggled again from the phone.
“Sorry, that was a lot, I know. It was just stimulating your brain to figure out exactly where your thought centers are. Now you can mess with the GUI on your phone, and make it look like you want!”
Paul looked at his phone. The off button was still there, but much smaller now. In place of the calibrate button was a cluster of buttons, fields, and menus that was slightly overwhelming. Reading carefully, and with Cindy’s help, he managed to pick his way through the configuration of his Nanocules. In half an hour, he took a deep breath, and hung up the phone. He moved to Cindy’s app, typed in her phone number, and hit send.
A small green box popped up in the lower right corner of his vision, the word ‘calling’ proudly displayed. A chill went down Paul’s spine as he heard the phone trying to connect, as if his phone was next to his ear. It only rang once before he heard Cindy’s voice.
“Can you hear me?” She asked, as clear as if she was standing next to him. Paul shuddered, trying to keep from grinning like a maniac.
“I can hear you fine!” He said. Cindy began to giggle again.
“Okay, check this out. Close your eyes.” He did, though he still could see the small green box that now said ‘connected: Cindy’ directly below a small picture of her face.
“Okay, they’re closed,” he said.
“Great. And now I’m talking! Isn’t this cool?”
Paul didn’t try to stop grinning this time. With his eyes closed, it was uncanny. It sounded exactly like Cindy was standing a few feet in front of him. She was currently living half-way across the world in America, and she sounded like she was only inches away. He started to laugh as he opened his eyes again.
“This is fantastic!” He jumped out of his bed and began to pace the room, his rude awakening forgotten. “You need to release this to the Boards! This will change everything!”
“I’m not satisfied,” Cindy said. He could practically hear her shaking her head. “It’s still dependent on the phone to send the information to the Nanocules. Give me a few months, and we can get rid of the phone entirely!”
A few months? Far too long. Paul leapt for his tablet, and began tapping furiously. His hands free to work, he brought up the code and began working with Cindy, a whole new world filling his head.
August 2, 2033
The first Nanocule-compatible Board Browser is released to the public. Many Universities begin to hold night classes on effective and efficient use of Nanocule Board Browsing. Most early adopters report vertigo when browsing too fast. First adopters agree that the user interface does not look appealing, and is fairly clumsy and unreliable. Sales of hand held devices still drop drastically.
Thousands of new students sign up for classes on programming for the new interfacing protocols. Silicon Valley predicts the beginning of the Golden Age of Nanocule Programming
August 11, 2033
The new Korean government reports that specially designed Nanocules have been placed in the country’s water supply. Infant mortality, lifespan, and quality of life all begin to steadily and significantly improve.