Finally, we were able to get Hunter into the auto-surgeon. While he had no longer talked back, he was still sulky and, in one word difficult.

But with Michael’s tender, and less than tender, encouragement, we managed to get it done. I was not the only one sigh in relief when the surgeon’s canopy closed.

After a few seconds of staring at the machine, Michael sighed again.

“Well, that’s that. I wouldn’t have believed that he would be so… bullheaded. But, just between us, why did you insist that he gets a basic jack and a crappy starter board?”

I chuckled mirthlessly before I answered:

“For exactly the reason that I gave him. Nearly nine out of ten jacks that start out with even average equipment, much less top of the line, kill themselves within the first month.”

I turned to look directly into his face.

“You probably haven't experienced it yet, but the first time you really go into cyberspace the first time… well the jack messes with your head.

It is hard to describe but the possibilities that open up for you… you feel exhilarated, powerful, basically invincible.

That effect is even more pronounced when you change over from a diadem, but for everybody I know of, they crack up.

That is irrelevant for people like you or your father. You use the jack as additional tools for your normal work, as for recreation, or in between.

For a Jack, well, they get full of themselves, get delusions of grandeur when even delusions of adequacy might be too much.

If they have a starter board, well, they quickly see the… potato they use and realize they are not quite as hot as they thought. So they come back down to earth.

If they have even an average board, it will take much longer. If they, as Hunter wanted, get their hands on a superior board from the getgo, well, so far not a single one of those survived their first month.

The big problem is that you, when you think you are invincible, ignore risks that any sane person would shy away from.

They attempt combat dives that somebody with good equipment and copious amounts of experience might pull off. Because, as they see it, they are the best anyway. And they run headway into a hunter-killer. Black ice. Or if they are really unlucky, they attempt to bolster their accounts.”

Michael looked me into the eyes for a moment, before he lifted an eyebrow and asked me:

“If that is so, why did you not tell Hunter that in exactly that way? Yeah, he is a bit stubborn, but not so stupid that he will try to buck those odds.”

I tilted my head.

“That has been tried as well. It goes wrong nearly as often as giving the new Jack too much horsepower to play with.

Most of them try to fight their sense of accomplishment and cramp their style. ‘Only’ 73% of them die in their first three months, this time from being too timid, too hesitant. But the ones that survive rarely reach even mediocrity, much less unleash their full potential.

No, our community has found out the best way to deal with newcomers is to give them a potato to play with, supervise from the shadows and let them learn of the pitfalls all by themselves, while the mentor keeps the sharks at bay.”

I chuckled again.

“That by the way will be my primary focus for the next few weeks. Keeping Hunter alive.”

I then had a thought.

“Maybe… yes, that could help. One moment please.”

I composed a message to Warden.

<Is it permissible by your objectives to supervise Hunter during his first attempts in cyberspace?>

The answer came pretty quick.

<Yes, it is possible. What level of supervision should I provide?>

<Keep him safe, but leave him to make his own mistakes. Don’t show him that you watch over him. Try to steer him away from anything with black ice or HKs. Hide his tracks if he goes somewhere they have the reputation of aggressive reaction.>

<I understand. I assume that if he goes beyond the scope I am to contact you?>

<Yes, I think that would be the best.>

With that, I turned my attention back to Michael.

“Sorry, I had an idea that might actually save Hunter’s life, and me quite a bit of headache.”

Hunter lifted his eyebrow again.

“Oh… is that so? Can you tell me what idea that was?”

“Oh, that is simple. I sicced Warden onto him. She will keep an eye on him.”

“And it would be better not to tell him that, right?”

“We can tell him when he changes over to his second or third board. That is the point we usually tell the neophytes about what is going on anyway. At that point, they have the crazy out of their system and are settled enough that the knowledge will not destroy them.”

Michael just shrugged his shoulders.

“Hm, if you say so. You are the expert here. But one question, if it is so dangerous for the Jack to know about it, why did you tell me?”

“Huh? You are no Jack. You have a jack, but, for the first time since World War 3 that does not make you a Jack. You don’t plan on doing any combat dives. Even if you get the idea in half a year, by then the damage is out of your system.

The problem that Jacks have is that they more or less start immediately and develop their style, their habits, and their problems from the beginning.

Before the great war, it was shown that if they get used to the jack for a few months before becoming Jacks, they are fine.

But with CRS, nobody gets a jack without wanting to become a Jack. I expect that to change in the future, but for now, it is still true.”

“That is… much more complex than I thought. But fine. While Hunter is baking, we can talk about the factory.”

“Yes, that is fine. I have to remain in the room, to be able to react in time, but we can sit at the table and talk.”

After we sat down, Michael opened the discussion:

“Now, I have a basic idea of what we will produce, but not about the scope. Any idea how… big it will become?”

I tilted my head, thinking for a moment.

“Before the great war, more than 90% of the population in the developed and the developing world had a jack. It… well it got to the point that it was considered a basic necessity and a right to have one.

I don’t see a reason why it wouldn’t do so again. Sure, the majority of the common folk won’t be able to afford a basic jack at the actual prices, much less the adaption, but these prices will come down massively.

At the height of their production, a basic jack did cost less than an average com, and I would suspect that is the ballpark we can get to.

The adaptation is actually pretty cheap, a couple of bucks, but at the moment I take money for the newness of it. We can make it $5 and have a 150% profit margin.

So I would say, a fully adapted basic jack produced with the economy of scale would cost no more than $500 to $600 in retail and we would make half of that as profit.”

Michael’s eyes opened wide in surprise.

“$600? Seriously? That cheap? Fuck, that means we will get half the world population as customers at one point or another. Shit, everybody but the poorest will be able to afford that.”

“It gets worse. When we open up cyberspace for the ‘unwashed masses’ the software companies will see a massive increase in their userbase. If history is to be believed, they will take measures to make it affordable for all but the bottom rung of the people. They will negotiate sponsorship deals with the undeveloped countries.

They were well in the process of doing that when WW3 broke out.

So at that price, we should estimate something around 90% of humanity getting a jack sooner or later.

Also, that is only of the basic jack.

I would place the low bandwidth jack at around $2k, the mid-bandwidth at $10k, the high bandwidth at $200k, and the ultra-bandwidth at $1 million.”

“Hm, why that much?”

“Exclusivity. The basic jack is for the scrubs. It works and provides them incredible utility, but it is as the name says basic.

The low jack on the other hand is for the average working stiff. Remember that it will keep until he gets a better one. So it is a once-in-a-lifetime purchase. Of course, we will make around $1500 in profit with a retail price of $2k.

That means on the other hand we can provide it to wholesalers and corporations for $1k, and still make $500 profit and they can announce how much they sell it under the MSRP. Everybody wins.

The mid on the other hand is for those who want to have something better and pay for it. The ones that buy the bigger TV just to have it. The flashy car. It is a status symbol.

Profit here is around $8k if we sell it for $10k. Again, we can now offer a serious rebate to selected customers to advertise.

The high and the ultra on the other hand move into the range of luxury. With the appropriate price increase.

We will set up the other cyberware accordingly.

We might even design and sell a specialized gaming- and productivity-console. Something that gives the high and ultra users an exclusive device to game on or for office work so that they can make full use of the maximal compression. We then can partner with a gaming company to make an exclusive VR game that is too much for basic, low or mid jacks. I think that is where the money will be, at least in the beginning. Over time it will be the mass of basics or lows, but starting out we go with the exclusivity.”

Michael nodded.

“That is… better thought out than I had expected. I expected to have to convince you to make premium products for the start-up. Are you sure you need me?”

I had to snort.

“Oh please, that was the easy part. It is simple logic. While I have enough money to grow the business slowly, we need to make an impact quickly or some big corp ‘takes over for the betterment of all’. We all know how it works.

But what I need you for is the actual execution of the idea. You can work with people. I… it is a fight with me. I often don’t understand their more subtle communications. I… I am just not good with people.

You will have to confer with the government saboteurs and thieves, you will have to placard the other corps, and you will have to juggle the employees.

Nothing of that is something I am good at, and I surely don’t enjoy it.”

He nodded again.

“Yeah, I get it. Well, not really, I enjoy the wheeling and dealing and have difficulties understanding why others don’t but on an abstract level, I understand you.”

He leaned back in his chair.

“But back to the topic, what you are saying is that we should plan for expansion right from the beginning, right? If we are to provide cyberware for the majority of humanity, we won’t get away with a measly little manufactory in a warehouse.”

He rubbed his chin for a moment.

“You know, I think the best idea would be to buy up a couple of the more desolate blocks here in Queens, tear down some of the buildings, and then build something there.

We can relocate the few inhabitants, and offer them jobs on the assembly lines.”

“I thought we would go without many workers at all. Most of it is cleanroom tech anyway. And the few steps that need a hand can be done with bots.”

He frowned at me.

“I thought one of the goals was to provide jobs for the people here in Queens?”

I looked at him confused.

“It is? That is the first I hear about that.”

He groaned.

“That is typical dad. Not just one or even two birds with one stone. Are you strictly opposed to using people as workers?”

I had to sigh.

“Yes and no. For one, humans are much more unreliable than bots. For the other, I categorically refuse to have wage slaves. So any humans will be significantly more expensive.”

“Yes, but you also said that even in the basic jack we will get a profit of 50%. We can afford to have a smaller margin and pay the humans better.”

I set up to argue with him, but closed my mouth for a moment and thought about it a bit more.

“You know, the reason why I never even imagined having human workers is that… well I had expected to do your job, and I hate to all the piddling work with strangers. But… well, it is your headache, so you decide.

You are right that the margins are ample enough for us to use humans. So, the ball is in your court.”

“Ok, I will think about it. What about the size? A couple of blocks ok?”

“How much do the blocks cost?”

He took out his come, began typing, before grinning at me sheepishly.

“Wow, that is something to get used to.”

With that he put the com aside and closed his eyes, concentrating.

“The area I have in mind is… well it was the territories of a couple of the street gangs that were wiped out in the recent unpleasantness.

They are dilapidated, run-down, and in general, stand only because nobody has invested the money to tear them down yet. You can get a block of them for around $2 million at the moment.”

“$2 million? Heck, this building, which is not a full block had an estimated worth of $4.5 million. How come a whole block is that cheap?”

“Because at the moment it is just a roughly rectangular array of ruins. Not a single building is younger than the civil war.

There is an average of three inhabitants per block. And those are squatters.

They are owned by the city, and the city wants to get rid of them and get taxes again.

This building here was inhabited and in relatively good repair.”

I had to lift my eyebrow at the last part.

“Good repair? Do you have any idea how badly maintained this building was?”

“Compared to those blocks? Yeah, good repair.”

I shrugged.

“Well, if you say so. And how many of those blocks are available?”

“Let me just look… ah yes, we have the choice of nearly 300 blocks. I am sure we will find something.”

I took a moment to think over the possibilities.

“Are there… yes, are there any 10 by 10 block areas available?”

Michael coughed harshly.

“100 blocks? You want to… fuck why that many?”

“Cyberware is just the beginning. I have… other projects simmering. We can expect to grow rapidly in the future.

And as I see the big corps, they would delight in hemming us in, buying up everything around us so that we have to pay premium prices for the land to expand.

If we start out with 100 blocks, it will be so much harder to do that until we are in a position where they can’t afford to antagonize us any longer.”

He snorted.

“Fuck, you don’t think small do you?”

“Michael, think about it. The jacks alone will warrant something the size of a block. All the other stuff I already offer will need a second one.

I haven’t even begun to develop other cyberware like cyberlimbs, well ones better than what a biological limb would be.

Or the other cybernetics. We can assume that these alone will take up four to five blocks. And we are now already at seven blocks, and we’ve just started.

When I have corp anyway I can sell my boards through them, and the specialized consoles I mentioned. Again, I would guess that eventually will take over a block.

We need a big fusactor to power it all. We should plan from the beginning to have central warehousing and a central material refinery. Those will, in time, take up multiple blocks.

And we are already at something around 15 to 20 blocks.

And no clue what I come up next with.

How about the auto-surgeon. At the moment it costs me around $70k to make one. Because I use the expensive industrial fabber for it. With a specialized production facility, we can make them for something around $30k. At a sale price of $500k, they will still be a steal. All in all, I see it growing beyond 100 blocks in around 10 years.”

He slumped down.

“Oh, wow. I… shit, I haven’t appreciated the enormity of the job. That is… breathtaking.”

He shook his head.

“What a rush. So you plan to go up to AA?”

I chuckled.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if it would go up to AAA sometime in the distant future.”

“Yeah, dream on.”

“No, really. We are in the process of cornering the cyberware market. We will be a viable competition to Kawamoto in cybersecurity. We will be able to intrude into Panaceas market in healthcare with the auto-surgeon, and if I manage to finish that one project I have to slog through, we will be able to offer a veritable auto-doc.

And I have other ideas, other projects. So yeah, AAA will be a bit of a stretch but not outside of our possibilities.”

“You are serious. Shit! That… sorry, but I have to wrap my head around that.”

“Take your time. It will be years, probably decades, before we can challenge the triple-a group, but it is a distinct possibility.”

Michael closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths.

“Ok, I’m fine. But you can somebody a headrush for sure.”

He shook his head.

“Well, let’s get back to business. You talked about a big fusactor. Don’t you want to go with a couple of smaller, distributed ones for redundancy?”

“We can have a few for emergencies, but I wanted the majority of the power to come from a Simpson & Proctor Excelsior 2800.”

His eyes widened again.

“Shit, that thing will cost more than all the blocks together. Are you sure?”

“Yes, as much as I don’t want to buy something from Vandermeer, Simpson & Proctor is the best, and the Excelsior line is the absolute top you can get. And the 2.8 terawatts might be excessive in the beginning, but it will become adequate quick enough. Until then we can sell the excess power to the surrounding territories. But sooner or later we will one terawatt for the refinery alone. Those big gravity coils are suckers for energy.”

“Ok, you are right from that perspective. But… shit I just looked it up, these things cost over a billion bucks.”

“Yes, I know, but Vandermeer guarantees that they run for 50 years without any maintenance. They have so much redundancy that the only way to stop them is to either destroy every single fuel feed line or fly a big cargo ship into them, fully loaded with explosives.

Well, there are a couple of other options, but I can nix those quite easily once we have it here. And to answer your next question, yes I can afford it.”

He shook his head again.

“Well, you’re the boss. Now, we should begin thinking about a name. I doubt you want to call it DuClare industries or something like that.”

I couldn’t help myself, I had to laugh at that.

“Oh yes, you are right, that name won’t exist. If I get my way, my name will never be associated with the corp.

But there is no need to begin thinking of a name. I’ve done that already.

We will call it Enki.”

I smirked when I saw his puzzled look.

“Enki? What kind of name is that?”

“Enki was the Sumerian god of knowledge, wisdom, creation, and crafting. It is said that he invented agriculture and writing.

And as a Sumerian god, he was the first civilized god of knowledge. All the others are only cheap knockoffs. So we go old school. Really old school.”