White Rabbit Project [IC]

by **The Cyberiad Council** » Tue Jan 16, 2018 4:42 pm

"One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Chesire cat in a tree.
'Which road do I take?' she asked.
'Where do you want to go?' was his response.
'I don't know', Alice answered.
'Then', said the cat, 'it doesn't matter.' "

6 Months Later...

Alex sat at his desk, not doing much. He monitored system readouts from the Rabbit, and unfortunately, they were as nominal as always. With a sigh, he leaned back in his chair waiting for the phone to ring. It was lonely and somewhat depressing at the Sierra Nevada facility since everyone left. There was literally no one still employed by Arc except himself, a janitor that was older than dirt, and an out of shape security guard that was asleep in the security room more often than not. Dr. Carroll didn't really count due to the fact he was the owner, and he wasn't at the facility too often. He had business to attend to: "managing Arc's assets" is what he called it. But that was just a euphemism for slowly selling their subsidiaries and patents. Carroll was pooling all the companies money to the White Rabbit Project. Alex knew that what they had sitting in the lower levels was groundbreaking; it would completely shatter the current understanding of physics, but that is only if it was what they thought it was...

Finally fed up with waiting, Alex decided to go raid the kitchen, but just as he walked into the hallway the phone rang. Alex raced back into the room, nearly slipping as he rounded the desk he picked up the receiver.

"Yes, Hello, who is this?"

[...]

"And you're calling about the Job offer?"

[...]

"Excellent, we will... ho... hold on; I am not at liberty to discuss the details of the job over the phone. We will fly you to our Sierra Nevada Facility, and then Dr. Carroll will explain."

[...]

"Yes, Fly. Are you still at the same residence we mailed the letter to?"

[...]

Great, then you can expect the helicopter on Wednesday. Oh, and pack light, the helicopter has a weight limit."

Hanging up the phone, Alex got up with a smile, but the phone started ringing again. A similar ensued, only to be followed in quick succession by six more. "Boy! I guess we timed the letters perfectly." With a satisfied smirk, Alex waited for another call, and when it didn't come, he picked up the phone and made a call of his own.

"Yes, Dr. Carroll?"

"This is Alex, I just got the calls, eight have signed up. They're flying in on Wednesday."

"Thank you, Sir."

That Wednesday, eight people stood outside of their homes and apartments probably feeling a mixture of confusion and excitement. True to Alex's word, a sleek helicopter appeared over the horizon and landed just in front of you. Looking inside, you saw a few other people, probably other people who were curious about the job offer too, but one thing that you noticed for sure, there was no pilot. Autonomous vehicles were becoming more and more common, but some people still had qualms about a computer taking their life in its hands. Regardless of your personal take on the issue, you climbed aboard and were rocketed towards California at speeds that would have been impossible just a few decades before.

The trip was smooth and pleasant for the most part and you got a beautiful view of the sun setting over the western horizon, but as you approached the mountains, you start to notice dark clouds bristling with lightning. Ignorant to the anxiety a sight like that might inspire in humans, the helicopter's computer continued unaltered on its flight path until the buffeting winds caused it to react. Rain pelted the cockpit window, and the wind screamed over the rotor blades. Flashing lightning brought the quick report of thunder. The light from the landing pad could be barely made out through the sheets of angry rain.

With a heavy thump, the aircraft touched down and clamps extended from the ground to lock it in place against the wind. An individual in a white poncho made a mad dash from the door of the main building to the pad and opened the door of the helicopter. "I'm sorry about the storm; we thought we could get you in before it hit. Come on, let's get inside." Alex hurried them out of the helicopter, and rushed back to the door and swiped a keycard. The locked clicked, and Alex head the door for them to run inside.

They were in some kind of lobby but the lights were dimmed so much that the lighting lit the room in terrifying bursts. A large glass wall to the left gave a brilliant view of a valley, and hallways branched off straight ahead, and to the right. It was decorated in a modernist style with lots of pristine whites, greys, and blacks with some red furniture to catch the eye. It looked clean and sleek; very befitting of a company on the cutting edge of science. It did seem peculiarly empty, no one other than Alex was in sight.

by **Pratse** » Tue Jan 16, 2018 7:36 pm

He regarded his watch with mechanical insistence. The digits, suspended on a screen of blue, pulsated forwards in the arbitrarily slow and tedious pulse of the second. Well this is boring, thought Andrés as he studied his digital watch. In a few clicks and taps, he navigated to the settings, where he configured the watch to display the microseconds as well. The final few numbers flowed forward in an invisible stream. That's more like it.

He dusted off his synthetic polyester jacket. He had followed up eagerly on the storms brewing on his destination, which he recited to himself again and again as one would a dash of verse by Dylan Thomas, by Yeats, by Wilde... his hair, combed in bland fashion towards the side and back, was unoriginal yet elegant; his business casual attire was spotless under the jacket, from his wool-knit cap all the way down to the secretly-waterproof khakis and Oxford shoes.

The tie, though, was a careless afterthought. He paid it no attention.

He pulled his phone from one of his pockets and obtained a curated dose of information. In the list of messages, he read once more his short, telegram-like spatterings to his brother, sister, father and mother... a quick good-by to a friend, an I'm leaving to another... at the very top, in a user's profile picture, he regarded the smiling face of his ex-wife.

That's right. Yesterday at the coffee-shop.

"You can't just leave like that!" she had screamed. At the time, the only thought he considered was that they would be ejected from the peaceful establishment if she didn't lower her tone.

He observed a helicopter approaching from the distance, its cold blades slicing through the pleasant air of that summer Boston afternoon. With automatic ease, it dived out of its path and sank to a few meters over the apartment building, still a few hundred meters out.

Greetings, Dr. Labastida. The purpose of this message is to inform you that you have been offered a job at our facility, in which you will be working with the brightest minds in the world at the cutting-edge of the human understanding of Physics...

"We're in an ongoing process," she cried, "And it requires the both of us! You can't just throw it all to the side and leave!" Her voice was still too loud, a shrieking, tearing burst.

His hands went to his ears as the vehicle approached. The deafening noise nearly blasted the earphones out of his head, the blades shrieking through the air, tearing apart the peaceful grey hum of the city.

... you will, of course, be working with the brightest minds in the world. We are at the cutting edge of science and, with your assistance, we would be sure to obtain answers to many of humanity's most pressing questions...

"Are you even listening to what I'm saying?" He nodded. "Not so loudly," he added helpfully, "they might run us out of this peaceful establishment."

As the roar of the blades bowed again to the pleasant rumble of the city, Andrés climbed into the helicopter. Quaint, he thought, there is no pilot. And then his attention returned to his phone.

... your work will be read as the genius of the age, the pinnacle of human consciousness and understanding. At Arc, we are already stretching and re-defining the boundaries by which we understand the universe and, with your assistance, we trust that we can discover where these boundaries really lie...

Her incredulous grey eyes stared deep into his own. He did not like the cold contempt of her eyes. She was still dazed by his compassionate suggestion: "What... what is wrong with you?" He waited for her to finish, but she did not say anything else.

The roaring of the blades resumed, rending the air of the afternoon and propelling the helicopter into the sky. Dr. Labastida regarded the city of Boston as a child would regard a playground, and his hand waved a good-bye to nobody in particular. He looked into the cockpit again, observing how the throttle and other interfaces continued to move automatically.

...you will be rewarded monetarily, and your financial situation will never again be in question... most importantly, however, you will be rewarded with knowledge and understanding. You will be counted among the brightest and most intelligent minds that humanity has yet produced.

"I'm leaving," he repeated, simply, easily, unassumingly, as if he was merely leaving to get an ice-cream-cone in the parlour next door. "You can keep anything you want. You can keep everything if you want it.

In an instant, the helicopter increased its pitch and blasted forward. Andrés grabbed onto one of the handles. I should have tightened my seatbelt, he thought. How irresponsible of Arc not to remind its passengers to fasten their seatbelts. Once he had leaned into the forces of gravity and secured his purchase on the chair, he quickly tied the buckle and released his pressure against the floor. He settled into a comfortable position as the helicopter clambered upwards at a seemingly faster and faster rate. The ground was so far below that he had trouble judging their speed, as well as their altitude.

*post about being in the weird room incoming, this post was about the trip*

by **Bredtonia** » Wed Jan 17, 2018 3:05 pm

“Be good, Mommy will be back as soon as she can.”

Jaclyn watched the goodbye affectionally. It was one she’d seen a few times already. The moment passed, and Angie brought herself up from her kneeling position with the intent to meet her friend’s gaze. She didn’t quite make it, however, her eyes lingering instead on the dry wood porch of the desert ranch house her best friend inhabited. This friendship had been the one good thing that had come out of her semester actually at the university. She trusted Jaclyn implicitly, and knew she loved Rocky almost as much Angie did. With a sigh, she knelt back down and put a hand on the Rottweiler mix’s jet-black head.

“You’re can leave him here as long as you need.” Jaclyn replied, putting a hand on Angie’s shoulder, “He’s always a joy to have around.”

“I can’t thank you enough,” the Angie said, her eyes betraying the real strength of the emotion, “I’ll come back and get him as soon as I can, but I think this is one of those intense fieldwork jobs. At the least, with the rate they’re paying, I can’t imagine it’ll last more than a month.”

Any further explanation was washed out by the growing racket of a passing helicopter. The family house was now long gone and Angie had closed out her long-term rental at the top of the week, so her friend’s ranch had been the best place to give her new employer as the forwarding address. Plus it saved her the trouble to finding another location where she could get picked up.

With a closing nod to her friend, Angie grabbed her daypack (serving now as carryon luggage) and gave her dog one last pet on the head. He looked longingly back to her, but remained still – held in place by a long-practiced command. A yelled salutation, reminding her not to forget to write them, slipped its way through the helicopter blades as Angie pulled herself through the door. She closed it behind her, but watched the ranch house disappear completely from view before turning her earbud back on and started listening again.

"…and it would be here, at Calypso’s castle, Odysseus would first be received with good Xenia, although his men would not fare as well…”

Angie paused the lecture as the helicopter stopped its rapid forward flight and started to settle into as close to an easy descent as the howling winds and driving rain would allow for. Finally accepting that they would be landing in the middle of the downpour, she unzipped a small pocket on the side of her pack and drew out the crumpled forms of her rain jacket & pack cover. Shifting around in the seat, she struggled to put both on without unduly crossing into any other passenger’s personal space.

Once that task was finished, she looked around again at the assortment of people sharing the cabin with her. Even with what little she’d gleaned from just observation and polite conversation, she could tell it was not the type she was used to seeing on her consulting gigs – especially the ones that sent helicopters. For one, there didn’t seem to be a single Cooperate among them. Not for the first time, she wondered what exactly she had agreed to.

The helicopter touched down and the door opened before she could work up the social courage to say anything. At the urging of her host and the driving rain, she slid out of the craft in line with the others and started for the shelter of the first building. However, shielded from the weather as she was, Angie gave herself the time to pause and admire lines and form the striking structure made against the green valleys and grey rock of the Sierras.

Looks like they’re trying to build a cooperate headquarters here – or a university. Angie thought as she finally ducked into the large, open lobby space. I can’t imagine how much this place must have cost in lobbying alone, much less the construction.

by **Reverend Norv** » Wed Jan 17, 2018 6:58 pm

No one on Earth was more comfortable than a PJ in a helicopter.

True, the helicopter wasn't usually pilotless. The Air Force still believed that a human being could react more creatively and productively under fire than a computer. But the principle was the same: fly into a blizzard of small arms fire and RPGs, secure a landing zone, get friendly casualties into the chopper, fly out again the same way. For James Bryant, the sound of those rotors meant the chance of death, and also the chance to save a life. It meant that he would soon be doing what he had been trained - and maybe born - to do.

There was a profound, almost teleological kind of comfort in that. Hence the quintessential calm of the PJ in a helicopter.

Of course, James didn't look much like a PJ any more. Instead, he seemed made of money - but old money, the kind of money that shows itself through restrained good taste rather than through flashy opulence. His charcoal wool suit fit him perfectly; his blue necktie was Thai silk; white gold glittered at his cuff links. But there were a few signs of what James really was. His gunmetal-colored hair was neatly combed back in a short regulation cut, and he wore tall upland boots of handcrafted leather instead of dress shoes. A battered barnstormer coat of brown horsehide covered his suit, falling to his knees, and a heavy canvas duffel bag sat beside him on the helicopter.

And then, of course, there was his pose: James sat in the open door of the whirlybird, one hand wrapped loosely around a security handle, one foot hanging out over a thousand-foot drop, the toe of his boot gently resting on the landing skid. His grey-green eyes gazed out thoughtfully at the landscape that moved swiftly by below, as if searching for a cloud of colored smoke signalling for casevac. He looked utterly at ease - and that was the surest sign of what he had been, and what he remained.

There was nothing overtly rude in James' response to the other passengers in the helicopter. In fact, he offered Angie and Andrés a friendly nod as each of them entered the helicopter, though the noise of the rotor made further introductions impossible without comms headsets. But something about James' relaxation suggested a readiness for action, a readiness that left little inclination toward small talk. His distant gaze gave little clue as to his thoughts.

When the clouds gathered over the Rockies, James simply scooted a few inches away from the door, but left his leg hanging out into space. When the wind began to howl, James flexed his grip on the safety handle, but did not otherwise react; he had once performed gastric surgery on a chopper floor in the middle of a sandstorm. When lighting filled the air with the smell of ozone, and rain lashed the cockpit and sent rivulets of water trickling down the scratched and battered surface of James' leather coat, the slightly-built man squinted a bit - and smiled.

When the helicopter touched down, James - having seated himself in the door - was the first passenger off. He slung his duffel calmly over one shoulder and slid easily out of the chopper, walking briskly across the landing pad after Alex toward the facility's door. Still squinting through the rain, he took in the sprawling compound around him. As he followed Alex inside, James' gaze moved quickly over the glass wall, the ruler-straight hallways, the expensive red furniture. Finally, as if he had reached some significant conclusion, he quietly said: "Huh."

Then James turned to Alex. "Mister Walker, I presume." His tone was polite, his accent pure aristocratic Texas, more debutante ball than cowboy. "Nice place you have here." Amusement flickered in James' eyes - and behind it, a hunter's watchful, knowing care. "Bit light on the staff though, I'd have to say."

White Rabbit Project [IC]

White Rabbit Project [IC]

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