The Nanotech Network Part 2

"NANOTECH" - mentally said Levshov. And although he p.r.o.nounced this command only in his mind, without any audible sound, the cyborg-bacteria that were permanently hooked up to the nerve fibers going from Levshov's brain to the muscles of his throat, easily picked up those weakest action currents that are always generated when we want to say something, even when we say it inaudibly, to ourselves.

The cyborg-bacteria took only one thousandth of a second to decipher the action current patterns in the nerve fibers and to understand that what they had received was the system activation command. One more thousandth of a second later, the cyborg-bacteria that were permanently hooked up to the nerve fibers going from Levshov's ear to his brain sent into these fibers a sequence of pulses, which, upon arrival to his brain, were perceived by it as a sequence of sounds, namely as words enunciated by a pleasant, "radio announcer's" voice: "SYSTEM READY". The further commands- and-messages exchange between Alexei Levshov and the NanoTech System was as follows: AL:>SUBROUTINE "I AM CALM".

NT:>PARAMETERS?.

AL:>BRING DOWN: BLOOD PRESSURE, RESPIRATION RATE, BRAIN.

ACTIVITY; STEP "MEDIUM"; DO UNTIL "ENOUGH".

NT:>OK.

Millions of cyborg-bacteria residing in Alexei's body immediately got down to work. In a second he felt an icy calmness come over him.

AL:>ENOUGH.

NT:>OK.

"So," - said Alexei to himself - "Firstly, disclosing the existence of the NanoTech network now would mean bringing the whole effort to ruin. Secondly, Mityai is an imbecile and a ruffian, but it is not his fault. He was made an imbecile by his parents, who conceived him when they were drunk. He was made a ruffian by the existing political regime. In the future, NanoTech might be able to correct both, and that means that potentially he is a human being, and therefore, he should be treated as a human being, and not as a bug to be smeared all over the wall."

In the meanwhile, Mityai who was absolutely unaware of the terrible fate that he had just escaped so narrowly, sat into his Mercedes and stuck his head out of the window: "Goodbye, Science. A client waits for me." He took a hand gun out of the glove compartment, released a safety catch, and tossed it back. Suddenly, a new idea struck him, and he once again poked his head out of the window and said: - " And you know, Science, what's funny? I have no orders for finishing off your kind, I mean, scientists. I have orders for businessmen, for politicians, even for journalists. But no orders for scientists. You are not even worth killing. That's how the things stand. Supply and demand. The invisible hand of the market. Adam Smith. That's what I call real science!"

He bared his teeth, showing a gold tooth, in what was probably meant to be a smile, stepped on the gas, made a complete circuit around the yard, at full speed ran the car into a puddle splashing water all over Levshov, and roaring with insane laughter rode into the street and was gone.

Levshov looked at the one hundred dollar bill in his hand, put it into his pocket, calmly shook the water droplets off, and headed for the bus stop. One hundred dollars almost amounted to his two months' salary at the research inst.i.tute. But even this pittance have not been paid him for the last four months.

2.2 The nightmare continues One hour later, Inst.i.tute for Molecular Biology Studies, Moscow.

If a researcher on the staff of the Inst.i.tute for Molecular Biology Studies had fallen into a lethargic sleep ten years ago, to be awaken only today to come and visit his inst.i.tute, such visit would have left him in a state of complete shock. His first thought would have been that while he was asleep, some terrible and irredeemable calamity had happened. What once had been a proud edifice of shining gla.s.s and polished marble, erected back in the days when science was proclaimed to be a "productive force of society", was now reduced to a state of decay and desolation, covered with layers of dirt, with many of the gla.s.ses broken and replaced with plywood. Inside, he would have seen deserted corridors - the staff was reduced to one tenth of what it had used to be and the people who were left were mostly those approaching their retirement age. True, he would have also seen some young people, who surely did not look like intellectuals and were carrying some boxes to and from lab rooms. Upon entering one of such rooms (if only he had been allowed to), he would have been shocked to see the valuable scientific instruments piled up into a heap in a corner, while the room itself had been converted into a warehouse for a commercial company dealing in ladies' boots, or wallpaper, or some such stuff. In the Inst.i.tute's scientific library he would not have been able to find even one scientific book published within the last five years. He would be astounded to see that librarians had been allowed to turn the library into a store selling all kinds of things that had absolutely nothing to do with books. True, among these sundry things he would indeed have been able to find some newly published books, but not scientific, but rather antiscientific in character: books on astrology, chiromancy, occultism, black magic and witchcraft, and so on, which would have led him to the conclusion that civilization is dead, and the mankind has been thrown back into the Dark Ages.

People can get used to the most horrible changes, especially if these changes don't happen overnight, but are spread over several years. And people got used to them and resigned themselves to them.

Alexei Levshov also got used to them. But never resigned.

That day, when he got to his work, he stopped for a second before a notice-board in the corridor. The most recently posted notice began with the words: "In view of the fact that the employees of our research inst.i.tute have not been paid their salaries for the last four months, the collective members of the research staff have pet.i.tioned the city authorities that they should not impose fines for arrears of rent and electricity bills...". Alexei skipped reading the rest, and stepped into the room where his lab was based. One glance at the faces of his staff was enough to tell him that something was wrong.

- "I have made up my mind" - said a researcher, young woman with her face turned to stone - "I have nothing to feed my kids with. I have made up my mind."

Everybody in the lab knew the story of this single mother. One old and loathsome "New Russian" had been propositioning her for a long time, offering lots of money.

Alexei came up to her desk, bent to her and said in a low voice: "I can't explain to you everything now, I have no right to, but I want you to know that this nightmare" - he made a sweeping gesture - "will soon be over. I implore you to refrain from making any rash decisions. You are talented, you must continue your research. You've got to stick it out for one more month. Take this for now." - he took the crumpled one hundred dollar bill from his pocket - "I don't have the right to tell you anything, but trust me, very soon, maybe even sooner than one month, something must happen ... something tremendous, something wonderful, something that is going to change everything ..."

2.3 Arrest The same day, July 6, 1997, 6 PM, Moscow.

They came up to him in the street when he was walking back from work, two from behind, one in front, all of them in civilian clothes. The one in front promptly produced a red KGB ID card, momentarily showed it to Levshov, and rattled off: "Alexei Petrovich Levshov, I presume? You'll have to come with us in this car.". Sooner than Alexei could reply, he found himself sitting on the back seat of a black "Volga" car, caught between the two men in civilian clothes who had come up from behind. The one who showed his ID took the right front seat and the car sped off.

- "Here we are! It has started!" - thought Alexei - "So they have finally found my 'autograph'. Now the things will start moving!"

2.4 Interrogation. The same day, half an hour later.

At first the Colonel was very polite and smiling.

- "Alexei Petrovich!" - said he, addressing Levshov with patronymic, which is the polite form of address in Russia - "I think I don't need to explain to you the reason why we have invited you here. But just in case you might presume to deny everything, I would like to show you this picture right away."

The Colonel pa.s.sed to Levshov a picture where one could distinctly see the inscription: "Made in the USSR by Alexei Levshov and a team of his comrades".

- "A good picture." - said Alexei - "A good microscope.

We never had one like this. And I guess you still don't have one like this. I would say it were Americans who took the picture."

The Colonel didn't respond.

- "So, it were Americans. " - said Alexei - "That means that my babies are already over there, in America. That's good. And the inscription did come off well. You know, it's the first time that I actually see it. I did issue the command to make the inscription, but I wasn't completely sure that the characters will come out well, or that the command will actually reach as far as America. That means that the system is fully operational. That's good. You, Colonel, can't even imagine how pleased I am with this photograph."

- "So, you are not going to deny anything, are you?" - Colonel's voice betrayed his slight disappointment - "In that case, I have only two questions: why did you do it, and who are the members of this 'team of comrades' ?"

- "I'm not going to give you any names. The team of comrades, who prefer to remain anonymous, have authorized me to conduct negotiations with the authorities. This picture,"

- Alexei put the picture to the Colonel's very nose - "this picture is my business card. It means that there is a power behind me, a great power, maybe even greater than you could possibly imagine. And that's why it's me who is going to make demands, and you better meet them."

- "Alexei Petrovich, I'm afraid that you are not fully aware of your current situation. Let me first read to you some excerpts from our file on you. Now then, Levshov, Alexei Petrovich, born 1946; in 1969 graduated with honors from the prestigious PhysTech Inst.i.tute, Moscow, and went to work at a secret unnamed research inst.i.tute, known only as the post office box number such-and-such; in 1976 became the head of the nanotechnology lab that was founded at the time at that research inst.i.tute.. But all this is not very interesting ... Here we are. This is sort of curious: in spring 1983 you wrote a letter to Yurii Andropov, soon after he had become the Secretary General of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Our man on the General Secretary's staff managed to make a copy of this letter. A very curious letter, and it reads as follows: "Dear Yurii Vladimirovich, I took the liberty to address you because I would like to draw your attention to a very important issue, so important that the fate of the whole of mankind may eventually hinge on it. In one of your recent speeches you exhorted the Soviet people to return to the roots of our ideology, to return to Marx. One of the fundamental ideas of Marxism is the idea that new socioeconomic formations come into being as a reaction of society to the emergence of new productive forces. From this standpoint, Communism as an economic formation cannot at present exist in our country in principle, because we are still using the same productive forces as the capitalist countries, and the economic formation that currently exists in the USSR can only be characterized as a form of state-monopoly capitalism. A social formation is a superstructure over a foundation consisting of productive forces. The breakthrough to Communism can only happen as a consequence of emergence of a radically new technology, the very logic of which shall make the social superstructure adapt itself to this new foundation. And such a technology may emerge very soon.

However, if improperly used, it may not only fail to free mankind from capitalism, but even might a.s.sist in perpetuating it, and the great historic chance will be lost forever.

My field of work is nanotechnology. It is not just one more technology. Potentially, it is a complete revolution in the methods of production, that is even greater than the Great Industrial Revolution of the 18th century, which, in its time, caused the demise of feudalism and ascendancy of capitalism. If we take the right steps, the emergence of nanotechnology should cause a similar natural extinction of capitalism. However, at present, all the research and development activities in the field of nanotechnology in our country are geared exclusively to military needs, and are not aimed at the above mentioned objective. We need to redirect the efforts of at least one of our nanotechnological labs from military to peaceful applications. I request that you grant me an audience so that I could explain to you my ideas and proposals on the subject."

The Colonel stopped reading, gave Levshov a disapproving look and said: "One can clearly see from this letter that even as far back as 1983 you were reluctant to work on strengthening the defensive potential of our Motherland."

- "Is this the only thing that you can see from this letter?" - asked Levshov, mildly amused.

The Colonel ignored the remark and went on leafing through the thick folder containing Levshov's file: "... So, the all-powerful General Secretary Andropov makes some inquiries, and soon afterwards grants an audience to Levshov, a chief of research in an obscure lab, virtually unknown to anybody. He has a conversation with him that lasts an hour and a half, instead of the scheduled ten minutes. The content of their discussion is unknown to us.

But we know that soon after that the nanotechnology lab headed by A.P.Levshov is taken from under the control of the Ministry of Defense Industry, and moved to the Inst.i.tute for Molecular Biology Studies which belongs to the USSR Academy of Sciences. However, the work in that lab still continues in strictest secrecy, even stricter than under the military. Our organization gets a directive from the "very top" to obtain for that laboratory some advanced j.a.panese equipment banned from export to the socialist countries... Well, all this, once again, is not very interesting, so we'll skip it... And now, we have reached the crux of the matter. In November 1991, when the country was in the state of complete disarray and chaos, our organization decided to a.s.sume the responsibility for the protection of the important state secret, which the work conducted in the A.P.Levshov's lab clearly was, and to move that lab from an Academy of Sciences inst.i.tute to one of our secret research facilities. Some of the lab staff, including Levshov, refused to transfer to our organization and stayed at the Inst.i.tute for Molecular Biology Studies. During the relocation to our secret facility some of the lab materials were lost. In particular, a test tube containing an experimental hybrid of a bacteria with a nanomechanism was found missing, which, in the opinion of some of our experts, set back the lab's work by at least fifteen years. Even back then there was some suspicion that it was A.P.Levshov who stole the materials, but at the time his guilt was not proven.

The same experts are of the opinion that by the end of 1991 the work on the hybrid of bacteria with a nanomechanism had progressed to a phase where the further work would not require the use of complex and expensive laboratory equipment. Some of them even go as far as to say that that the only thing needed for the further work on the bacteria hybrid was the bacteria itself, since it already had in itself all the tools required for any further modifications or upgrades, and that means that all the further development effort could be conducted at home... That's how the things stand, Mr. Levshov" - the Colonel looked up from the folder and once again glanced at Levshov - "This photograph is an irrefutable evidence that it was you who, back in 1991, stole the test tube with the hybrid, which was government property, and by so doing have inflicted a considerable damage to the defense potential and state security of our country. Moreover, by the mere fact of letting the hybrid loose, you have given all our potential military adversaries the knowledge about the current status of nanotechnology research in our country, which can only be interpreted as an act of espionage. All of this is sufficient to put you away for a very long time. That's why I don't recommend you to be impertinent and make demands. It is me who is going to make demands here."

Levshov replied with an inscrutable smile: "Oh, Colonel, you can't even realize how ridiculous all your threats seem to me. If you had only known what is going to happen within the next week. We are standing on the threshold of a new world, a world where everything will be different, where, in particular, the mankind will not be divided into nations and nationalities. The individuality of a person will become more important than his or her belonging to any particular ethnic or social group. With the disappearance of nations, their respective nationalisms will also disappear, and such notions as national defense, or espionage, or national security will just stop to make any sense, and will start looking like atavisms inherited from the Stone Age..."

- "Don't you even try to push me all this bulls.h.i.t, Levshov!" - barked the Colonel - "What I want from you is a clear and intelligible answer to the questions that I asked: who else works with you and why have you done this?"

- "Done what?" - asked Levshov.

- "This, for example." - the Colonel poked with his finger at the picture with the "autograph".

- "Oh, this! This was done in order to draw the attention of the authorities, to make them lend an ear to our demands.

By the way, Colonel, you still have not heard our demands, and I think that you should have had. If you had had, you would have asked a very different kind of questions."

- "So what are your demands?" - said the Colonel grudgingly.

- "Inform your superiors that I need a series of my TV appearances arranged, half an hour, prime time, each day for a week."

- "Do you realize how much this would cost? On what grounds do you presume to have it?"

- "On the simple grounds that I have something to say to the mankind, in stark contrast to the ones who use this time on the air now. I have a message of utmost importance."

- "Why do you need a whole week?" - asked Colonel - "Usually, terrorists take no more than five minutes to make all their threats and demands."

- "Now we have really come to the crux of the matter. You believe that I'm a terrorist. But actually, nothing could be farther from the truth. You are just too much used to the idea that nanotechnological research and development were pursued with military applications in mind. You just cannot imagine the peaceful applications of nanotechnology. You have absolutely no idea of what I and my comrades have done in this field over the last five years, while working at home. What we have done can improve the lives of billions of people on this planet. But we've got to have a way of letting people know about the possibilities they now have.

Of course, we could do this using the built-in capabilities of the NanoTech System itself, but we are concerned that if people suddenly hear a voice in their heads, a voice coming from nowhere, or see moving pictures materializing from the thin air right before their eyes, some of them might get panicky. We don't want anybody going crazy with fear and jumping out of the window, or anything like that. Television is something which is familiar to people, that's why we want to start a series of lectures on the uses of NanoTech on TV, and only after that we'll gradually switch to the purely NanoTech means of communication. As a matter of fact, we could have built our own TV transmitter - we have the capability - but we don't want to be pirates on the air. We decided to go through official channels. It might be hard for you to believe, but me and my comrades are actually law- abiding citizens. "

The Colonel was silent for half a minute, digesting what he had just heard, and finally said: "From what you have just told me, I understood only two things. First: you consider me a complete idiot who is supposed to believe all that bulls.h.i.t you gave me. Second: you have finally admitted that you have stolen the test tube with the hybrid. And as for your law-abidance, when I went to the public procurator's office this morning and showed him this file on you and this photograph, he signed a warrant to search your apartment without asking any further questions. The search is being conducted right now as we sit here, and I expect to have news from there any moment now. I think we are going to have lots of new subjects for our conversation pretty soon."

This time Levshov's smile was even more inscrutable than before. He said: "Well, let them search. I wonder what they'll be able to find there. And more importantly, whether they'll be able to understand what they are going to find there..."

2.5 The Search. At the same time at Levshov's apartment.

One of the two witnesses summoned to the search was Levshov's next-door neighbor, that is, Mityai.

While they were opening the door, the investigator once again went in his mind over the list of objects that criminals usually adapt to serve as hiding places for all kinds of incriminating things. But nevertheless, he was absolutely unprepared for what he saw as soon as the door was opened. Entering into the apartment he stopped, completely at a loss. His carefully laid-out plan for the search had collapsed in a wink.

- "Oh, my!" - muttered Mityai pensively, looking around - "Our science has completely gone down the drain!"

There was absolutely nothing in the apartment. That is, not a single thing. Bare floors. Bare walls without wallpaper. In the hallway, there were no coats or slickers hung up on pegs. Actually, there were no pegs, not even a nail to hang things on (if there had been anything to hang up, but there was not a thing). They went to the kitchen. In the kitchen, not only there wasn't a counter, there was not even a fridge. Only a gas range and a sink. The range was covered with a thick layer of dust, attesting to the fact that it had not been touched by a human hand for many months.

- "Poor devil!" - exclaimed the second witness, a warm- hearted old lady who lived one story up - "I wonder what he ate. He lived exclusively on cold food, I guess. After his wife left him for a New Russian four years ago, he completely went to seed."

As for the sink, its hole was plugged, and it was filled with water to the brim. But only with water. There was nothing else in the sink. No sign of any dishes.

In the bathroom, there was also not a thing, not even a mirror. Not even things for shaving, although Mityai immediately affirmed that Levshov went to work every morning smoothly shaven. In the bathroom, there were only a bath and a sink. Both were plugged and br.i.m.m.i.n.g with water. The biggest surprise was waiting for them in the living (?) room. There was also no furniture and no things in that room, except that more than half of the room was occupied by something very similar to a huge aquarium tank, but there were no fish in it. There was nothing in it but water. The walls of the tank were made of some strange sort of gla.s.s, very transparent, and infused with a mysterious l.u.s.ter. The last ray of the setting sun came through the window, fell on the tank, reflected from its walls, re-reflected, and the room was suddenly lit up with a piercingly brilliant iridescent glow. "It shines like diamond!" - exclaimed Mityai. He came up to the tank, and before the investigator could stop him, he pressed a small diamond, which was mounted into a gold ring that Mityai always wore, against the gla.s.s, and ran it across the tank wall. The result left him absolutely dumbfounded. He could not even say anything - the words stuck in his throat. The diamond has not left even a tiniest scratch on the tank wall. A six by nine feet tank, five feet tall, standing in the room of an impoverished scientist, was, to all appearances, cut out of a single diamond crystal...

2.6 The first demonstration of the NanoTech system capabilities.

The Colonel replaced the receiver and remained sitting deep in thought.

- "Well, have they found anything?" - inquired Levshov.

- "Levshov, why have you sold all the furniture and all the things from your apartment? Were you preparing to flee from the country?"

- "First of all, I have not sold them, I gave them away for free. But not because I wanted to flee, but because I no longer needed them. Being a System Administrator of the NanoTech Network, I can enjoy all the benefits of nanotechnology even now."

- "How did you come into possession of a water tank made of diamond?"

- "I've grown it. Gla.s.s can break, you know, but diamond is much stronger and from that standpoint is more practical.

You see, I just needed some vessel for all that water."

- "I see. You have grown it." - said the Colonel in a flat voice.

- "You know, Colonel, I really think I've got to give you a small demonstration, otherwise you just won't believe a word of what I say. A demo is worth more that thousands of words... Do you have a sink somewhere around here?"

- "A sink?"

- "Yes, a water basin with running water. A bathtub would be even better, but I don't expect you to have one here."

... Behind the door at the back of the Colonel's desk, there was a private rest room with a sink.

- "Well, just as I expected, you don't have a plug for this sink." - said Levshov - "But we'll fix this in no time."

He turned on the tap, cupped his hands and filled them with water. Turning to the Colonel, he said: "At the moment, I hold in my hands, together with the water, several million cyborg-bacteria. They are currently inactive. Now I am going to give them a command to speed up their reproduction. You won't hear this command - I'll enunciate it inaudibly, in my mind. Inside me, just as inside you and all the other people on Earth, there now live the same cyborg-bacteria, and these particular bacteria inside your body provide an interface between the nervous system of your body and the NanoTech System, that is, all the other cyborg-bacteria that live throughout the globe. This interface has two layers: a physical and a logical. Physical interface is implemented by the bacteria attached to the nerve fibers in your body, who tap into the action currents in these fibers and convert them into infrared signals used for data exchange between cyborg-bacteria. Or sometimes they do the reverse, converting infrared signals into action currents and feeding them into nerve fibers. As for the logical layer of the interface, it can be implemented by both the bacteria that reside inside you and all the bacteria of the NanoTech Network operating as a single global distributed computer - it all depends on the complexity of the task. At the logical layer, the commands of a NanoTech System user that are given in a high-level, almost natural, language, are converted into the NanoTech System executable machine codes. And now, watch closely."

AL:> NANOTECH.

NT:> SYSTEM READY.

AL:> OBJECT: IN THE WATER IN MY HAND.

NT:> OBJECT FOUND AND LOCKED ONTO, OBJECT BOUNDARIES SET.

BY DEFAULT.

AL:> MULTIPLY OBJECT ELEMENTS; RATE: MAX; DO UNTIL.

"ENOUGH".

NT:> OK.