Maximo Duval turned to Dante. —Let me introduce you. —He said with a wave of his hand. —Dr. Malkovich is the legal representative of a group of players at Calypso and he often visits us to communicate the concerns of the people he represents... although it would be appreciated if he had the courtesy to announce himself first. —he said, glancing at the professional.
The newcomer ignored the hint and extended a hand towards the young man. Dante was surprised to see that he was wearing a curious white glove of what appeared to be silk; a rather peculiar detail in a law professional. —Dante Sebastian Joyner. —He replied by answering the greeting while squeezing the gloved hand. —It's a pleasure to meet you, Doctor.
The lawyer withdrew his hand and turned to Duval. —I guess now your staff is finally complete. —he observed. —It has been a really bad time to lose so many professionals at such a critical stage of the project.
The face of the enormous Director showed no signs of anger or any other visible emotion, but Dante noticed how the man's fist was clenched tightly. —Don't worry about my staff. —he replied. —All the necessary positions are filled and we have all the people we need.
—For the sake of the project, I hope that's the case. —replied the lawyer. —My clients are somewhat concerned about the decisions Calypso's management has made recently and would like to have some kind of response from those directly responsible.
—That's why the Council exists. —Duval cut off abruptly. —The internal affairs of the game are resolved WITHIN the game.
Malkovich smiled at him. —Of course he did. —he replied. —The problem is that the Council does not have the proper competence to deal with the "external" issues of the game. —he said, turning to pilot O'Higgins. —Right, Lieutenant?
The young woman frowned, but did not respond. She was staring at the man in the wheelchair.
—What do you mean by that? —Duval asked instead.
—I've had reports of a disruption of the game from the NUNS official watcher at Calypso. —explained the lawyer, turning to the Director. —One player has reported that he saw his play activity violently interrupted by a robot that has nothing to do with the fantasy universe on which this game is based... Do I understand?
Dante had enough with that and took a step forward. —That player tried to step on me like an ant without any kind of provocation. —He said. —What kind of "game" is that.
Malkovich shrugged his shoulders. —What's wrong with that? It's perfectly legal and permitted in this game... Or didn't you know?
—Mr. Joyner doesn't know the game yet. —The Director justified it. —So his lack of knowledge excuses him from this... but as far as Lieutenant O'Higgins is concerned... Is that true? —he asked, turning to the pilot.
—The Player was interfering with my mission to pick up Mr. Joyner. —replied the young woman with her arms crossed. —The protocol of interaction with the players allows me to exercise force in cases of non—cooperation of people or non—player creatures.
—Was it really necessary to kill a player? —asked the lawyer, making a gesture of helplessness with both hands. —Couldn't you just use your robot to pick up Mr. Joyner and leave the area without causing so much interference? I remind you that the Protocol clearly specifies that interactions with the characters and Calypso's world must be kept to a minimum... clearly you have overreacted and now a player reports that he has suffered what would legally be taken as an assault on his freedom... this could well be considered an abuse of authority and something that would deserve to be reported to his superiors.
—Do whatever you want. —the pilot replied without changing her expression.
Dante looked at Duval and saw that he was scratching his head in thought. —One moment. —He said, extending his hand. —The Lieutenant's action was correct and at no time did she intervene in the game. Her actions were in response to an intentional provocation.
The lawyer looked at him curiously. —Ah, yes? —he asked.
—The player you name was the one who used denigrating words towards the militia and the Lieutenant... I think the records of the game session will be enough to prove what I say. —he said.
Malkovich frowned but said nothing and let the young man continue. —The player insulted the lieutenant and used sexual and discriminatory insults... I can witness this if I have to.
Duval looked at him seriously. —Are you sure about that? —he asked.
—Yes, I'm sure.
The lawyer raised both hands from the back of his chair. —Calm down, gentlemen... you don't have to go to all that trouble for a simple episode of this kind... I'm sure everything will be resolved with a simple apology from both sides. —he said, quickly changing his mind.
The Director shook his head. —Good luck getting the Lieutenant to apologize to someone. —he said. —We'd better forget this misunderstanding and get on with more important business.
—I fully agree with his observation. —Malkovich replied.
Duval turned to Dante. —I will go to the conference room with the Doctor to settle those... "important matters" which concern him so much. Willy.
—Yes, sir? —replied the young man, turning his body from his chair.
—Give Joyner an explanation of the game... you know, the general idea and how it works. We need to get him up to speed as soon as possible with the general concepts.
The young man scratched his bald head and sighed with resignation. —Can't I just give him the orientation video?
—No, surely Joyner needs more than that. —replied the huge Director as he opened a door on the side of the office. —This way, Doctor.
On the other side of the door was a room that was a little smaller and a lot more tidy than the equipment filled office they were in at the time. Malkovich nodded to Dante and the young engineer and pushed his wheelchair through the door. —I'll be back soon. —said Duval, closing the door.
The three young members of the staff were left alone in the huge office, and Willy was the first to break the silence after a moment. —Well... I guess I have to follow the boss's orders... Is there anything you want to ask me directly or do you want me to start talking about Calypso? —he asked, looking at Dante.
—Just one question. —replied Joyner. —Is that guy that much of a jerk all the time or just when he has an audience around him?
—Malkovich? Be glad you saw his friendly side today. —he answered by turning his chair. —He's really insufferable... The day he quit Alpha Corporation the boss opened a bottle of cider to celebrate.
Dante looked at him in amazement. That guy was a co—worker of yours?
—For a short time, fortunately. —replied Willy. —He was the company's legal consultant in Eden and worked in this building as soon as the 41st Fleet left that planet... was the most unhappy seven months of my life to be honest with you.
Dante scratched his head. —Now that I think about it, having spent so much time out of that guy's sight didn't seem like such a waste of time. —He acknowledged. —What happened? Did he get fired for eating kittens or stealing candy from children?
—He quit of his own free will. —Willy replied, suddenly getting serious. —Now he works for the Swarm.
Before Joyner could ask another question, they were both amazed that Lieutenant O'Higgins had quietly approached them.
—What...? —What's wrong? —asked the young strategist as soon as the girl stopped in front of him.
—I didn't need your help. —she replied, staring at him with those piercing green eyes. —I'm not afraid of that little man.
Dante clenched his fists in indescribable frustration. Is that how that girl treated him after he wanted to help her? —I didn't do it for you. —He said, looking back defiantly. —I just wanted the truth to come out and justice to be done.
—You are the least likely person to talk about justice. —She replied with a glare of hate. —And a hypocrite to boot.
Joyner didn't know what to say. The young woman turned around and left the room through the front door, slamming the door.
The two young men looked at each other silently.
—Explain yourself now. —said Willy, pointing to the door.
—She's treated me like this since we met yesterday at Calypso. —confessed Dante, crossing his arms. —I have no idea what I could have done to generate so much hostility in her... I really don't understand her.
—Are you sure she's not an old childhood friend? —Someone you humiliated in the past or proposed to and then forgot about?
—My life has not yet fallen into those soap opera "clichés". —said the young man, sighing. —I really didn't know Lieutenant O'Higgins until yesterday and I swear I don't know what I could have done to offend her like that... although maybe...
—Maybe?
Dante shook his head. —I made a couple of enemies within the NUNS high command before I came here... it's possible this has something to do with that.
The young engineer nodded silently. —At least I have to admit you're good at it.
—In what? —Dante asked intrigued.
In finding high—level enemies for yourself. —replied the young man. —Lieutenant O'Higgins is no more and no less than the only daughter of the Captain of Macross 41, and I doubt very much that you could find a higher level enemy than that in the whole fleet.
Dante hit his forehead. —Deculture! —he exclaimed. —But isn't the Captain of this ship Abraham Simmons? I don't understand...
—Evidently, the Lieutenant does not want to use Daddy's surname to climb the ranks in the militia. —replied Willy with a shrug. —O'Higgins seems to be her mother's surname.
—So I got off on the wrong foot. —The young man acknowledged.
—Easy Mode is not your thing. —replied Willy. —Anyway, you'd better not provoke the Lieutenant anymore and try not to make things worse... the girl appreciates being left alone and with that premise both the Director and myself have gotten along very well with her since she was assigned to this role.
—I'll do my best. —promised Dante as he took his seat next to his new co—worker.
The Engineer gestured with his hand. —Now back to the game... Do you have any questions about how it works?
Dante thought for a moment but immediately knew what question was causing the most noise at that moment. —The SDF—1. —he said. —What are you doing orbiting Calypso?
Willy leaned back in his chair. —Ah. —he said, nodding his head. —I figured you'd ask me about that sooner or later. Let's say the SDF—1 is "Legacy Code"
—Legacy Code? —asked a confused Dante.
—So it was already there when we arrived. —replied the young programmer. —You'd be surprised to learn that much of the code that makes up Calypso's software was written in the twentieth century.
That really surprised the young strategist. —The twentieth century? That is, before the First Space War?
Nineteen hundred and eighty—three, to be exact. —replied Willy.
Dante scratched his head. —Did computers exist at that time? —he joked. —We're talking about almost a century ago.
Eighty—six years. —The young man corrected him. —And yes... believe it or not, the eighties were the decade when personal computers began to massify throughout the world. The origins of the UniEngine architecture go back to that year.
The young strategist shook his head. —It's hard to believe something like that. —He said. —I'm sorry but... I simply cannot understand how something that simulates an entire planet could have been created with the primitive computers of the twentieth century.
—Oh, of course Calypso wasn't programmed at that time. —explained Willy. —It's much more recent, like the rest of the software we use in the simulation, but if we talk about the logical core that controls all the different programs that make up the UniEngine, little has changed from that time.
—Explain to me. —Roasted the young man turning the chair as he rested his arms on the backrest. —I imagine there must be a story behind that.
Willy scratched his chin thoughtfully. —There is, of course, but something tells me you're going to be bored to death listening to it.
Dante looked at the closed door where Duval and Malkovich had entered a few minutes earlier and sighed. —Do you have something better to do? —he asked.
—I could work on the damn game. —replied the engineer with a laugh. —But I have orders from the Director to answer your questions so... what the hell, I'll tell you.
Before he started talking, Willy gestured to one of the walls and what appeared to be a medium—sized refrigerator turned on a couple of blue lights and began to approach the terminal where the two young men were sitting.
—You'd better help yourself to something. —said the Engineer as he chose an energy drink from the screen in front of the dispensing robot.
Dante selected a bottle of orange juice and the drink appeared through a small door under the screen. After picking up the bottle he waved and the robot returned to its place by the wall.
—Do you know what a Software Engine is? —asked Willy, taking a drink from the can.
Dante nodded. —I think that's what they call a whole package of programs... as a kind of generalization that covers several functions on which a certain software is based.
—It would be better to say it's a collection of libraries rather than individual programs. —explained the young man. —But you're pretty much right about one thing; it's a very general term that covers a lot of things, not just code or user data.
—And in Calypso's case... that "Engine" is the famous "UniEngine" you mentioned earlier, right? —asked Dante.
—Yes. UniEngine was one person's idea in the early eighties. Have you ever heard of Waltz?
Dante shook his head.
He was a brilliant Polish programmer, a pioneer among the enthusiastic users of 8—bit computers who began to become accessible throughout the world at that time... but especially in Europe and the United States.
Wladyslaw Waltz was just 13 years old when he received his first computer in 1983... a Commodore 64 of English origin for sure... the boy was fascinated with the capabilities of the computer and the impressive catalog of games it could run. Until then video games were crude and simple. Variations of the classic table tennis "Pong" and on the other hand the arcades that were already classics like "Pacman" and "Space Invaders". That 8—bit machine could run games of all kinds, in full color and with real sounds and music, not just beeps and bops as before.
Arcades, fighting games, races, even graphic adventures... the variety of games was HUGE and new ones came out every month. It was one of the first golden ages of the video game industry.
But there was another genre that had barely touched the primitive consoles and promising, but still not very powerful home computers... I am clearly referring to Role Playing Games, or RPG's as they are known in gaming jargon.
Waltz started playing role—playing with his high school classmates at that time, just when everything related to Dungeons & Dragons became incredibly popular among young (and not so young) people and monumental works like The Lord of the Rings became undisputed classics of a whole generation of "nerds" who played long sessions immersed in the fantasy worlds imagined by Tolkien in the safety of his parents' basements.
These worlds began to be transferred to the screens of the computers and consoles of that time, but the technical limitations bothered Waltz.
Used to using his imagination to perfectly recreate the worlds where Humans and Elves fought Dragons and Orcs, the simple pixels and limited color palettes of those processors left a bitter taste in the young man's mouth.
Still, he continued to share his free time with both hobbies and to close the gap between them. His first steps as a programmer were copying programs that were printed on the pages of the paper magazines that circulated in those days. His first language was BASIC and after copying hundreds of lines of code by hand and correcting dozens of errors by eye, he was able to compile his first programs.
We don't know well which was his first program, but based on some anecdotes of his friends at that time they were surely small programs to help in his task of Game Master when it was his turn to lead a game. Without a doubt one of his first programs was a dice thrower. Something indispensable for the game directors, who had to make hundreds of rolls per game to define the destinies of their players, tied completely to the randomness that those dice of many faces dispensed every night between junk food and carbonated drinks.
Waltz copied his first programs from the pages of those magazines, as did thousands of novice programmers who began gradually to learn to program in their homes, line by line, learning as they went along how to squeeze the humble capabilities of their small home computers.
Their programs written in BASIC to control the progress of the players and even their position on the map along with enemies and allies were a true wonder. Waltz's games were often witnessed by groups of people who were surprised by the incredible versatility of that computer connected to a simple color television. Maps that were once represented by scribbled pieces of paper and, in some cases, small hand—painted lead figures suddenly appeared in full color on a screen with special effects such as the flying of arrows, bloodstains and a bar indicating the character's state of health above his head.
But it was soon seen that those 8—bit computers were short on computing power. This was discovered by the young Waltz when during a game session of a particularly high level he had to give up using his faithful computer to go back to printed tables and hand calculator.
A gargoyle attacked the group of adventurers that Waltz was leading that night. That monster could fly several meters high and throw itself over the adventurers to attack with its claws at full speed. One of the wizards in his group recited a flying spell over one of the rogues in the group and using the amazing agility of his character plus the wizard's magic led to a fight at high altitude that proved too much for the humble processor of the Commodore 64.
Suddenly the game world had become three dimensional instead of just two. Waltz's programs could only calculate the positions of each player and monster on a two—dimensional plane. By adding the factor of height to the equation, the computer's architecture simply could not solve all the equations.
When Waltz's friends left almost dawn for their own homes, he lay on the basement floor of his parents' house while staring at the wooden ceiling above his head.
After a few minutes, he stood up and took the portable calculator that had been left on the table. He did a quick calculation and stared at the result that appeared in green numbers on the small screen.
—Shit. —he said, shaking his head.
The 8—bit processors could barely handle the positions of a dozen characters on a two—dimensional plane. The 16—bit architecture was ready to come, with the new models announced for 1985... But would that be enough? The third dimension might require 32—bit processors only to process all the data in a time frame accessible to a Game Director who wanted to run a smooth game without pauses between each action of a player. But 32 bits was something that was predicted could only arrive by the end of the 20th century, at least to the home markets.
— And will there still be enough computing power? the young man asked himself again. He took the calculator again and entered the right figures. Of course the small machine did not have the capacity to display such a large number of figures and the "E" appeared on the screen.
—32 bits won't be enough. —said the teenager looking at the yellowish plastic of his old computer. —Maybe 64 bits won't be either.
At that moment he knew that his desire was to build something for which technology did not even exist at that time. Waltz wanted to create a real game world, where absolutely everything was computed and tied to the program's will. No factor should be left to chance, the perfect game should not give any concession.
Was it possible to create such a game? And if successful... would it really be a game?
His body was exhausted from the long session of play, but not his mind, which worked like a full—powered turbine. While outside the small window overlooking the courtyard of his house the weak light of dawn had begun to filter through the thick glass, the young man swept in one arm movement all the leaves and chips that had been left on the table after the game. He wanted to start from scratch and for that he needed a blank sheet of paper, an empty space.
Taking a pencil and a sheet from the pile he had spilled from the table, the young man sat down to write what would be the beginning of something that was yet to come.
He needed a starting point and that could only be given a name.
"UniEngine". He wrote. —The Engine that moves the World.
On Monday, he went to talk to the Head of the computer lab of the school he attended, a young man almost as enthusiastic as the one who had participated in some of the game sessions that sometimes took place at the school. Waltz went straight to the point and told the teacher his idea, who listened attentively and quietly while the rest of the class completed their exercises on the old PET computers still in use in public schools throughout Europe.
— What you need is precision. — the teacher responded by interrupting Waltz in the middle of his idea. — And not just any kind; BASIC allows you to operate with numbers up to 15 digits ... but that's not even remotely enough to handle the operations that something on the scale you propose requires.
Waltz nodded. — I need millimeter precision in operations that require movement and tracking of objects and entities in a three—dimensional world, it's the only way to achieve the realism I'm looking for... on a planetary scale.
The professor looked at him intrigued. Was he serious? On a planetary scale? —So we're talking about a floating point representation of numbers that easily exceed the 32—bit architecture of a processor of the kind that they use in the university... 64 bits might be enough to process numbers like that, but the computing power needed... it might take thirty or forty years to see an architecture powerful enough to process instructions like that.
The young man looked at him with a determined expression. — I'm not going to wait thirty years. — he said.
— No," replied the master. — But if you start a project on that scale right now it's like wanting to build a skyscraper with your own hands; you don't have the tools and you don't know when someone will create them.
The young man shrugged his shoulders. —Then I will begin to clear the ground of stones and weeds with my own hands. —He said, raising both hands while smiling. —And in the meantime I will draw the plans.
The teacher looked at him perplexed, but the young man's enthusiasm was so sincere that he could only respond with a smile. —All right, but find someone else to share your dream; there are stones that require help to move.
Over the next three years, Waltz spent all his free time refining and transferring his ideas to paper, but also interacting with colleagues throughout Europe who shared his same passions. The introduction of modems as home computer expansions made it easier for young people to enter the BBS, a place previously reserved only for students from local universities.
Once the exchange of ideas was established among the community, Waltz's ambition took off without limit.
By 1988 he had formed a group of nine colleagues from all over Europe, all talented young people like himself, who, armed with the new 16—bit computers that had proliferated at the time, began to break the paradigms of programming and problem solving for which there was not even a theoretical framework to describe them.
As the decade drew to a close, so did some of the languages in which these pioneers developed their pharaonic project. Waltz had foreseen that programming tools, like their real—world counterparts, would fall into disuse and be replaced by more modern, versatile, and powerful versions. His vision allowed him to define strict rules to the way the project was worked, documenting each and every system that started to emerge as the work left the theoretical stage and started to produce the first foundations on which the real structure of the UniEngine would be based.
By the time the last decade of the century began, most of the work had moved almost exclusively to C language and PC compatible systems that offered the best calculation capabilities for the increasingly complex operations of the UniEngine project. Gone were COBOL, BASIC, Pascal and other darker languages that served their purpose during the first years of development.
And then, suddenly. The project disappeared.
Waltz had never been too open with the development of his project. He only talked about his ambitions with people he thought were up to the task of understanding the true goal UniEngine was aiming for. Because of this, and because the programmers' group was generally closed, by the time the WWW became popular among university students of programming sciences and other computer—related careers, Waltz and his group of 9 colleagues had completely disappeared.
Willy leaned back in his chair and looked at Dante with a smile on his face. —Can you imagine what that group of nine UniEngine programmers was called? —he asked.
—No idea. —recognized the young strategist.
—Oh, come on! —his companion reproached him. —Nine mysterious men in the shadows! The One Engine! All lovers of role—playing games! Doesn't that ring a bell?
Dante shrugged his shoulders.
—Now I have doubts that you are the right man for this job. —recognized the young man. —But the Chief is going to kill me if I ask for a replacement right now, anyway... of course I mean the Nazgûl, the Ringwraiths.
—Oh... I think I saw that movie. —said Dante suddenly.
—I should kill you here and now. —Willy sighed. —Anyway, Waltz took on (or rather, "Play") the role of Sauron, observing and controlling the development of the UniEngine as the Nine Wraith completed and documented each of the libraries and code that made up the project.
All of this took place behind the shadows of anonymity and very few people knew what was brewing in the depths of what, many years later, would be called the "DarkWeb", that is, the part of the network that was not catalogued or indexed by the best known search engines.
But at the end of the decade, the project suffered the first major setback in its long development.
—Let me guess. —said Dante. —The fall of the ASS—1 in July 1999.
Willy nodded. —Look.
A new holographic screen was displayed on his terminal and the young man used the keyboard to locate a specific point in a long string of lines of code that covered the screen from side to side. —Here.
After a line of code one of the programmers had added a note that said the following "I have just confirmed the death of Dark_Zero and its last update has been archived in the vault, with it are three of our people who died after the cataclysm that unleashed the asteroid in Europe. Following the survival protocol, I have delivered my three recommendations for replacements with my next update".
—They didn't even know about the alien ship yet. —understood Dante surprised by that. —Waltz also died during the event?
—No," replied Willy. —Although we don't have direct evidence of it, his way of programming and writing code is still present in the successive updates of the project, at least until before 2010.
—The destruction of Planet Earth. —said Dante. —How did the project survive the total annihilation?
The young engineer pointed at the screen and made the cursor move at full speed to a line of code where another comment was highlighted in orange.
"The order to branch UniEngine has been given and the backup of the main database has been copied to a secure storage, from here on everything that comes next will be considered as version 0.7446234b"
The date corresponded to the day of the first contact with the Zentradi forces.
Dante observed those words and understood much of what they implied. —Was this one of the only programmers who survived? —Was he able to board Macross before the Zentradi attack?
—Macross or one of the ARMD. —he answered. —We almost certainly know that it was someone with access to the military's network, probably a Communications or Intelligence Officer who downloaded one of the project's backups to the fleet that escaped Earth's destruction... how much this branch differs from the version that was lost during the attack... we will never know.
Dante looked at the screen silently. —Waltz died during the First Space War.
—Definitely. —replied Willy.
—And a single "Wraith" continued to develop while the few survivors remained in diaspora?
—He and at least one new Wraith continued to work on the project until the end of the First Space War. —explained the young man. —It would be almost ten years before a new member of the group was added to the project.
Dante nodded. —Humanity was reduced to a few thousand people... I suppose the shortage of programmers was the most likely cause.
—Yes, but look at this. —observed Willy. —Look at this part of the code.
The strategist looked where his companion indicated but only saw lines of code of different colors. —What am I looking at? —he asked.
—From the appearance of this new Wraith, the computer architecture derived from the OTec conglomerate and all the technology that was recovered from the ASS—1 is introduced.
—Quantum Computation. —observed Dante.
—The architecture of 256 Bits. —replied his colleague. —Suddenly all physical barriers in information processing were destroyed. The gross computational force provided by the architecture derived from the OT was such that it changed the programming paradigm again... and Waltz had also foreseen this.
Dante looked at him in surprise. —Forecast? —How is this possible?
Willy shrugged his shoulders. —Impossible to know... it is a mystery as it was that he had foreseen to recruit a Wraith to board some of the spaceships that survived the Annihilation... the point is that UniEngine took advantage of that unlimited capacity of calculation and for the first time in its more than thirty years of gestation the Engine could be compiled and executed in real time.
At that moment the lines of code ended abruptly and a legend announced that UniEngine version 1.0 had been successfully created.
—That is, a happy ending. —said Dante but his partner shook his head. —No. —he answered abruptly. —It was not a happy ending.
—Explain yourself.
—The development was then divided into two branches: the one in charge of improving the engine itself and the one that created the simulation subroutines for each of the entities and systems that Waltz had provided.
—I don't understand.
—That is to say, to apply the laws of the physics of the universe already known so that the UniEngine could simulate them perfectly.
—That is, gravity and all that. —commented Dante.
—In fact, the four fundamental forces or interactions are simulated. —The young man corrected him. —They are part of the core of the simulation and every time an entity or system makes a change of state and requires a computational update, it must first go through the rules of those four forces.
—What about the Fifth Force of the extended model," Dante asked. —Don't tell me that Waltz also predicted the appearance of the Dimensional Energy.
—Not directly, but it left open the possibility of incorporating a quina interaction, mostly because the standard model of physics of the last century was still incomplete and several gaps in particle physics remained to be filled.
—I understand. —And what was the other branch?
—The creation of an Advanced Artificial Intelligence system to give life to the simulated world. —Answered Willy.
Dante scratched his head and looked at the screen full of incomprehensible characters. —I'm beginning to understand where you're going and why you're talking about an unhappy ending. —he observed. —I imagine that all this progress did not go unnoticed by the Military High Command.
—Bingo. —clapped the young man.
Before Dante could ask anything else the door to the small auxiliary office opened and Duval and Malkovich were seen leaving in complete silence.
—Look at the boss's face. —Willy whispered to Dante. —I could sour the milk that is still inside a cow.
The man in the wheelchair advanced to the exit and turning around he nodded to the two young men, who also answered the nod with the same gesture. When the lawyer disappeared behind the large wooden doors, Duval approached them.
—His face is greener than usual. —observed Willy.
—Close your mouth or I will leave yours stained with blood. —replied the Director. —Did they at least take advantage of the time?
The young programmer nodded. —At least Joyner knows who Wladyslaw Waltz was. —he replied.
The huge Director twisted his mouth. —Great, maybe if he finds Waltz's ghost inside Calypso he'll be able to recognize him and ask for help.
Willy turned to Dante. —Oh don't mind him... by the way there are no "Easter Eggs" in UniEngine, so don't even bother looking for them.
— "Easter Eggs"?
—Secret messages that leave the programmers. —responded Duval. —Like the annotations in the code but within the already compiled program, however Willy is right; there are no such messages in Calypso.
—How can you be sure of that? —asked Dante.
—Because we have the source code for both UniEngine and Calypso. —explained the young engineer. —And there's nothing in either one.
The Director looked at the clock projected on the data terminal and snorted loudly. —We're wasting our time with this. —he said. —We'd better give Mr. Joyner some field experience.
—Do you want to send him to Calypso like a normal player? —asked Willy.
—Yes, remove his Alpha Corporation visitor status and create a temporary profile with random attributes... that will experience the game like any other player.
—Understood. —replied the young man. —Something else?
—Yes. —Where is Lieutenant O'Higgins...?
When Duval saw the way the two young men looked at each other, he knew that things could only start to get more complicated from there.