the machine starts - part 2

This is Part 2 of a longer short story.

Read Part 1 first!

So Greg had said, let’s go and meet Frank. Frank Delano. We need him on side for this. The Games Division.

“Frank! Greg seems to think we never talk! We’ve met many times, Greg. Frank likes to rubbish my VSN protocols.”

“Hey, Alfie! You trashed my LBS engineering!” The young tee-shirted man attempted a high five that Alfie ignored.

“And was I right?”

“Not as much as I was.”

“I can see you’re going to get on like a house on fire.” Greg had brought them together in a private room at Stelloni’s, Palo Alto’s finest. He was wondering whether it was such a good idea. But they shook hands cordially.

“Of course, I have nothing to do with the Games Division.” Alfie’s look said: what I mean is I have nothing but contempt for the Games Division.

“Well, you should come down and see us.” You old fogey, you might learn something.

“By the way that crap Alien Invasion is one of yours, isn’t it?”

“Yes! That crap is the most profitable part of the company.”

“I know nothing about on-line gaming of course. But, don’t we just market it to shift more Gizmos?”

“Alfie, WorldNet is way ahead in gaming technology. And Frank here is…”

“Sure, Greg:” said without looking away from Frank. “And you know, I suppose, that it’s full of bugs. My kid is an addict. He reckons a whole bunch of players arrived at the ‘sixth level’” – whatever that is – “at exactly the same time. And the ‘winner’s table’ just crashed.”

“Well yea. It was odd.”

“Yes, how can that be? To the exact point one of a second.”

“There’s a challenge there.”

“Hey. You’re speaking to me. Drop the corporate bull.”

Frank gave a sly grin. “OK, you’re right, Alfie. It’s a fuck-up. We’re still looking at it. No-one got to the next level yet.”

“So how many got to the level at the same time?”

“Seven thousand.”

*          *          *          *          *

Alfie arrived at the Lodge, as he liked to call it, with Frank. Technically you are not allowed to build in the state park but this was literally on the boundary, in reservation land. It had been an old log cabin, almost collapsed. Alfie had helped finance the tribe’s casino, and everyone was happy. Frank had lovingly restored the cabin, so that from the outside it looked much as it would have in the days of the original Oregon Trail pioneers; but with all mod cons inside of course, including the latest high speed connections installed at vast cost.

“So you think this is pretty smart, this idea of yours?”

“Yep, and so do you. So let’s just thrash out the details and then we can get down to some serious fishing.”

“Neat!” Neat? How old was this kid, fourteen? Alfie looked him up and down in his boardies and his flip flops.

Frank inspected the place, looking for something to criticize. But he had to admit…

Alfie pulled open a reproduction shaker cabinet to reveal a state of the art console. He pushed a button and the patio doors slid open.

“Very James Bond!”

“My kids like that sort of stuff.”

Frank stepped on to the porch and threw himself into a swinging couch. He peered out into the coast redwoods and the dim receding light. The tree trunks crowded in to enclose the view. “So.” Back to business. “You might be on to something. I’ll give you that. But will people pay for it? It’s not gonna be cheap. And you’ve got to…”

“We’ve got Will Pitman looking at it. The best industrial designer in the business. Remember, he had kids lining up round the block for weeks before Gizmo III was released.”

“Well, it’s pretty sexy compared to the opposition. I guess.”

“If that’s your thing.” He leaned against the porch rail and looked out. “I still sometimes hanker after my old Cambridge lab: jury-rigged motherboards and wires hanging out and the occasional short circuit.”

Frank smiled. “My lab at Stanford used to put Dr Frankenstein to shame!”

Alfie turned round and looked at the guy. Their eyes met. They knew that they had to work together on this. Frank had gone through Alfie’s work since their initial meeting and was developing respect for the old timer: not something that came easily. Alfie had sat down with his son and for the first time been introduced to on-line gaming. He had to admit, there were some ingenious things about Alien Invasion: Tetris it was not, which was state of the art computer gaming the last time he looked. He in his turn had dug into Frank’s CV, and asked around. Young, brash, loud, cocky: but plenty going on up there. I guess I was like that at his age, and annoyed the fuck out of my professors. The thought made him smile wrily.

Frank gave a big open-mouthed grin back. “We can do this.”

“We will do this.”

“So which button do I press to get a dirty martini round here?”

“The replicator is in the kitchen. Mine’s an earl gray tea; hot – or better make that a G and T. We’re in for the long haul.”

*          *          *          *          *

“Are you kidding me? These reaction results are, like, 30% better than your predictions. And they were…”

“You like your figures, don’t you, Ethan. But look at the learning curve. As they get familiar with the device, the reaction times get quicker and quicker. So much quicker than mouse or console technology.” Alfie couldn’t help suppress his excitement: he was pacing the room and flapping his arms around. God, I’m doing my mad scientist act again. He sat down but couldn’t stop fidgeting.

Ethan wasn’t listening anyway. Just look at him: figures so give him a hard on when they are going his way. “And did you see the results from the product mockups from Will? The look and feel… the kids think they’re in Star Trek or something. And they don’t even know what it does yet.” He is going to have an orgasm for sure.

“He’s done a great job.”

“I mean it’s like 90% approval! Not even the Gizmo III achieved that.” Ethan – tapping, almost banging, the table now.

“So, it’s still got some way to go in testing, Ethan, but…” Greg – trying to calm them down a little.

“Listen, either Alfie’s kid is a genius or… It’s your kid that’s testing this, right?” Ethan – in no mood to come down.

“He is a games nut, but he loves it. I just wonder…” Alfie thought back to his discussions with Bett. Why did I let Dan be the guinea pig? But Dan was almost insistent when he heard what the new device could do. In the end, it was Alfie that was more reluctant than his wife. “Well, anyway, why don’t you come and see tomorrow? Dan has another session booked.”

Ethan grinned; he stood up and walked round from behind his huge desk, a thing he rarely did at the end of meetings. He punched them both in the shoulder with a wide smirk. “You Brits!” It could be a compliment too. And he actually grabbed Alfie and hugged him. “Genius!” My god, the margins in the business plan must be amazing. “And you were, ‘It’s just a mouse!’”