Welcome to Life, #54321


    Life #672


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    He held a revolution in his hands. The chrome thumb drive measured only several inches but the data within held immeasurable consequences. George Harker hesitated to hand it back.


    "So, it''s ready?" He glanced up to Judy Ribbon with her oversized coke-bottle glasses and frizzy brown hair pulled back, like always, into a sloppy bun.


    She rocked back and forth on her feet. Her hands stuffed in the pockets of an oversized lab-coat. Her struggle to contain her excitement was evident and who could blame her. The greatest minds on Earth had been wracking their brains for over a decade trying to solve the problem of Deep Thought. And she''d done it—or at least she thought she had.


    "Yes," she said breathlessly, as if she had just run a marathon. "Mhm, yep. I mean, I''ve not run it through human trials yet, but you know, It''s um--"


    "Have you showed this to Lee?" George cut her off, not to be rude but to spare her the awkward rambling she tended to fall into when nervous.


    "No. You''re the first one I''ve told. I was sort of hoping you could look it over with me? Maybe see if you spot any bugs that I may have missed and save me some potential embarrassment," Judy took her hands out of her pockets and put her palms together in mock pleading.


    "Of course. It''d be an honour. A breakthrough in DTP would be... wow. It''d allow us to explore far beyond our solar system into other galaxies even. Create and discover new Earths."


    "I know." she grinned.


    "You''ll be in history wikis. They''ll name planets after you."


    "I''ll make sure your contribution is known." She held out her hand for her thumb drive. "There''s a lot of data you''ll need to comb through, are you sure you''re up to it?"


    George nodded and Judy led him to her coffee stained workstation where she pushed the drive into the USB slot and gestured for George to pull over a chair.You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.


    She gave a brief, for her, introduction to what he was seeing before allowing him to read through and search for errors. The code was amazing, inventive, a true example of outside the box thinking—but it was also clunky.


    The virtual reality simulation Judy had designed to solve the issue of astronauts being unable to awaken after being cryogenically frozen needed some serious streamlining. Piles of redundant code and disorganised sorting would cause unnecessary lag—which, over time, could result in madness.


    But, as far as George could see, the concept and overall design should work. Judy likely solved the Deep Thought problem, the obstacle discovered when our first volunteer ''time-travellers'' were defrosted and revived only to remain in a coma, completely cognitively inert.


    It had been later theorised, and then proven, that the mind stays aware on some level despite being frozen. Long periods of total isolation and sensory deprivation cause the mind to degrade until it is no longer functional.


    There have been a multitude of solutions over the years, but none have provided the level of stimulation needed to keep a person mentally well over long periods of cryo-freeze. Until now.


    Outside Judy''s office window, the sky-rise apartments across the road began switching on their lights. George stifled a yawn as he reviewed the last chunk of sloppy code. Judy buzzed Stacey, her personal assistant, to bring them coffee.


    That must be nice. George typically had to fetch his own coffee and despite being the best programmer in Yuanfen''s tech division, his own office was half as big and he shared it with two other software quality assurance engineers.


    Judy stared at him, wide eyed, and in eager anticipation. "So... What do you think?"


    George turned his seat to face her. "You''ve really not shown anyone this?"


    Judy shook her head. "I''ve kept the entire thing under wraps. You know Lee, if he knew I was trying to crack Deep Thought on my own he''d have a fit. Better to wait until I had something solid to show, you know?"


    "Yeah." George tapped his fingers on her workstation and glanced at the screen. It wasn''t a dumb move. If Lee had thought her idea was bad, she''d be on his shitlist, but if their boss thought it was good, he''d have taken it over.


    Still, it was incredibly na?ve to not tell anybody, but Judy was like that, and also incredibly insecure. A by-product of being gifted her position and education via well-connected parents.


    George on the other hand knew exactly how cutthroat the world was, having earned his spot in the company through hard work and study. Should he warn her?


    Judy''s solution to Deep Thought was ingenious but also so obvious its a wonder no-one had thought of it before. And the coding was a mess. A major re-haul would be needed to ensure it operated as desired. That''s where the real work was. Ideas were a dime a dozen. Which was why one couldn''t copyright an idea. Would it even really be stealing if someone used her concept and redid the code properly?


    "Well?" Judy gave a nervous laugh. "Don''t leave me in suspense. What are your thoughts?"


    ...