Truth & Code: The Future is Black and White
Sunrise

Sunrise

Block 7,927,936

“I love you, Lǎopó.”

“I love you too, Lǎo Gong.”

Han and Huifen had just made love as the first light of day was coming through the bedroom window. Huifen was lying against Han. Her bare breasts were up against Han’s chest. She lay naked with one leg over his leg, her knee slightly bent. Han had his left arm around her, caressing her bottom and gently kissing her right breast. Huifen had her hand between Han’s thighs, kissing him on the neck.

“Lǎopó?”

“Yes?”

“How about I take you to the sunrise at Ben Jianao?”

She sits up on her right forearm and looks at him.

“Really?”

“Yeah, sure. We are working on a new project, and I will need to go out to check on a new hardware installation.”

“Hardware? Really? That’s interesting.”

“Yeah, we are pretty excited about this new little project.”

“When do you want to do that?”

“I don’t know yet. The hardware will be ready in the next week or so. So, it’s just a matter of time to schedule everything.”

“Ok, great, but you know we must bring the kids.”

“Yes, of course. If we are lucky, they might be sleeping, and we can watch the sunrise together over the ocean, but if they are awake, that’ll be ok too.”

“I would love to do that. Should I buy anything special to wear?”

“No, just wear what you have on now,” Han says with a playful laugh.

“You wish,” and gently squeezes him between his thighs, “You ready to go again, my Lǎo Gong?”

Han pulls her on top of himself, and they make love again.

+++

“Mr. Tan, we are close to completing these extension ports.”

Min is standing with Han in his office. They are standing at the conference table, and Min has a representative section of an extension port laid out on the table to show Han how it interfaces.

“Here’s where the data device would insert.” She takes the data device and tries to plug it into the port. “Damn!”

“What’s wrong?” Han asks

“It’s upside down. You have a 50/50 chance of getting it wrong if you don’t look. Who designed this?” She says with a laugh.

“Yeah, it’s a funny design.”

“Ok, so you plug it in here as you would normally do on the prototype console. But it’s impractical for us to make new consoles for each node center. So, this end of the port extension,” She holds up the other end, “we will wire into our current console system directly.”

Min looks at Han intensely and rolls her eyes around the room.

Han nods.

“AI, off.”

Han looks at Min, pauses a bit, and then says, “You were saying?”

“I did a little more testing on the small storage device. As you know, we couldn’t get all the data on the console. So I got a little more on the test net, but I just wanted enough to see what our test net AI could do with trying to understand what we have.”

“The test net AI decoded this message from the beginning of the data and could offer a translation into Chinese.”

Han shows him the message in Chinese:

The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on the brink of second bailout for banks.

“What does this mean? That was nearly 150 years ago. What is a chancellor.” Han asks.

“What’s a bank?” Min asks.

“Also, the message on the console confirms that some synchronization is occurring. It would take a considerable amount of time on the console, but I calculate it may take just several hours on the AI network.”

“Well, that’s encouraging. Hopefully, we can get to the bottom of this puzzle quickly. Is this a piece of history from SO-Lands we have uncovered? That would be cool.” Han mentions.

“That would be cool, but the fact that the writing is not Chinese makes me wonder if it’s something else.”

“Ok, perfect point; my mind is racing with what is happening here.”

“So, what is your plan to install these port extensions?”

“Well, we are almost done with assembly. I figure we can deploy teams to do the installation and have them installed within about a week of the final assembly. After that, we will do as you suggest and activate the consensus feature again. I will call EMC ahead of time, so they know they will see a bump in energy consumption but that we are working on a solution to keep the feature active but decrease its energy usage. But to do this, we need to keep the system on for some time.”

“Ok, that sounds very logical. So I’m not sure there should be any objection to that.” Han adds.

“I suggest we keep the consensus feature active, complete the synchronization process, and then try to analyze the data and figure out what we have here.”

“Min, that sounds good, but once the data is out of the test net and on the SO-Land AI, we won’t get it back.”

“Yes, Mr. Tan, that’s correct. So, like the testing you did for every node, the data can stay on the Han Tech full AI at the node center. So it will benefit from the input from So-Land AI, but it won’t be on the SO-Land AI network.”

“Makes perfect sense; I mean, that was the purpose of the last update so that we can apply it to this as well.”

“Do you believe there would be any benefit to installing on every node at once, or should we do a test first?” Min asks.

“Even with our newest update, it would make the best sense to upload at one node center, analyze it and then decide from there. However, with my recent luck with the consensus feature, I don’t need to do anything to affect energy usage on the network. I mean, our core business is to protect the network. So, while I’m curious, we can’t do anything that may affect the SO-Land AI network.”

“Yes, of course, Mr. Tan.”

“I’ve already talked with Huifen about going with me to Ben Jianao for the testing.”

“Oh, that’s interesting.”

“Ben Jianao, where I found this, is my favorite place to do an install. It looks out over the ocean, and I always love to get there and watch the sunrise over the ocean.”

“That’s beautiful.”

“Yes, it is. Since I only see it once every three years, it has become a special treat. I wanted to take Huifen earlier when we first married, but the updates never coincided with a good time, and those tests are so intense for me that I’m it’s just a bore for her. She joined me for a short time on one mission in the northern SO-Land, and she didn’t last long. And then the kids came along. The last time I was on my way there, I called her, and she asked if she could go at some point. So I figure this would be a good excuse to take her.”

“Wow, that will be special.”

“Yes, it would be even more special if we didn’t have the kids, but such is life.” Han winks at Min. “This will be a nice trip for them anyway; they’ve never traveled this far from home.”

“That will be a special family memory. I know how much your family means to you.”

“Yes, they are my life. It used to be Han Tech, but those days are gone. My family is my life.”

+++

Han got home, and Huifen and the kids were in the playroom. He walks in.

“Hey, guys.”

“Hi, daddy!” He hears in unison.

“Hi, Lǎo Gong!”

“Hi, my love.”

“Guess what?”

“What?” The kids scream.

“Mommy and Daddy are going on a special trip, and you get to come along!”

“Where daddy?” the kids say in unison.

“Well, it’s one of my favorite places in all of SO-Land. It’s a long way away. So it will be a special trip because you get to go on a long trip and see my favorite place. We may even stay for a few days and see the big town around it.”

“Yeah!” They all scream.

“Huifen, we are pretty close to deploying our new project. I’ll leave early in the Han Tech AAPD, and you and the kids can follow after they get up and get ready. I can meet you at the nearby hotel with a great ocean view. You can even see the drone fishing ships from the hotel. They each have different lights on them depending on the fish they are trying to catch. It’s a pretty sight at night. We’ll stay there that night, and then we can all go together early the next morning to catch the sunrise.”

“Sounds like a plan, my love.”

“Don’t forget to bring your special apparel.” He winks at her.

“Of course, my love.”

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