The other board members quieted and considered Aneki’s words. There had certainly been times in the past when the Court’s solution to contested technologies had been to share them equally among all of the members, thus maintaining the balance of power.
"What then will our response be, Aneki-sama?" asked Motoki Matsumara.
"There need be no response," said Yasuhiro Sasaki, one of the younger and more ambitious board members who supported Renraku’s aggressive stance in the market recently. "What does the
"That is simple," said Gordon Leighton with a nod in Lanier’s direction. "They have
him
to hold up to the Court as a source of information we could be exploiting." Lanier did not rise to Leighton’s bait, but it did not matter because the others had already begun to throw in their opinions.
"We cannot be sure . . ." Matsumara began to retort when Aneki again held up his hands.
"Gentlemen!" he said sharply. "Please listen to the report of Renraku’s response before you begin any debates."
The noise subsided, and Aneki swept his gaze around the table before continuing.
"As I said, we will not respond to Fuchi’s accusations with anything other than a denial of them. As Sasaki-san has pointed out so forcefully, the burden of proof remains with Fuchi. They must demonstrate some wrongdoing on our part for the
stood,
then walked over to the side of the table.
"Renraku’s growth and success over the past two years has been rapid enough to concern many of the members of the
"Do you really think that will happen, Aneki-sama?" Lanier said quietly from his side of the table, his ghostly holographic image
flickering
a bit as he moved.
"You of all people should know the answer to that, Lanier-san. You helped coordinate the Court’s operation to teach Aztechnology a lesson some years ago,
neh?
If the members of the Court feel sufficiently threatened, they will act. We must give them good reason not to act against us while maintaining Renraku’s growth and influence."
Aneki touched a panel set into the wall, and the wall of the conference room became blank, its thin polymer coating functioning as a computer display screen to bring up images at his command.
"The key to our goal," Aneki said, "lies here." The screen filled with an image that was as familiar to the Renraku board members as it would have been to their corporate counterparts. It was an image that had haunted the nightmares of many corporate systems analysts over the past two years. The picture on the screen showed a figure made of two different parts. The lower was taken from the Shroud of Turin, believed by many to be the shroud Christ was buried in. But the head of the image was a woman with an enigmatic smile. Both images had been reversed as photo-negatives, giving the figure black skin highlighted with white outline.
"The Leonardo image?"
Matsumara asked. "Of what use is that to us?"
"The image itself is of no use, Matsumara
-s
an. It is what the image represents.
The Leonardo Project.
The technology Leonardo has provided us is the same technology he used to simultaneously compromise the central computer systems of all of the major megacorporations. It is the selfsame technology that has made Renraku more powerful and influential than ever, made our computer systems invulnerable to our rivals’ deckers, and given us near-supremacy in the Matrix, allowing us to spur on our own research and development projects while subverting and gaining access to the work of our competition.
An unbeatable combination."
Aneki did not mention his concerns about Leonardo still being able to circumvent Renraku’s computer defenses when he chose to. Let the board consider Renraku invulnerable on that front for now.
"But," he went on, "the Leonardo technology has not reached its full potential. Thus far, our uses of it have been subtle and conservative. We have gained information from other corporations where we have not been able to go before, but the abilities Leonardo displayed, the ability to compromise the systems of all of the
Miles Lanier seemed to listen carefully while Aneki spoke, his fingers steepled in front of his chin as his virtual image leaned back in the motionless boardroom chair.
"Are you saying, Aneki
-sama,
that Renraku now has the sort of ability Leonardo used against us?" Aneki was not surprised that Lanier was the first to pick up on the implications of his words.
"No, we do not.
At least, not yet.
The difficulty does not lie in the technology; it is still years ahead of anything else that has been produced. Nor does it have to do with the skill of the user. Although Leonardo’s computer skills are no doubt significant, we have many of the finest deckers in the world in our employ and yet they cannot match the feats Leonardo performed with his cybertechnology.
"No, the answer lies instead in here." Aneki tapped the side of his head with a bony index finger. "In certain neurological modifications necessary to make full use of Leonardo’s cyberdeck technology, modifications intended to work in conjunction with the deck’s unique processing capability to increase the power of both many times and make the user unstoppable by conventional intrusion countermeasures."
"What are these ‘modifications,’ then?" piped up Shun Isoge. Aneki knew the man was involved in many biotechnology companies. Biotechnology and its applications interested him keenly.
"That is what we are in the process of determining," Aneki replied. "The nature of those modifications is being investigated even as we speak."
Once again the board members began chattering in surprise and the meeting threatened to become chaos.
"Why weren’t we told about this project?" Matsumara said, pulling a white handkerchief from his coat pocket to mop his damp forehead. Aneki was about to answer when Chairman Watanabe spoke, her voice cutting through the chatter like a sword, bringing silence to the room again.
"Security was too paramount, Matsumara-san. This project holds the entire future of Renraku. I knew of it, as did Aneki-sama and our appointed agents within the company. The board members were not informed because the project was in its most preliminary stages and security was the most important consideration." Several pairs of eyes glanced toward Miles Lanier as Watanabe continued. "Now, with the activities of Fuchi, it is more important to make sure the project is seen through to its conclusion with all possible haste."
"And what is this project, Madame Chairman?" Miles Lanier asked with a touch of exaggerated courtesy. Aneki cleared his throat and touched a control, transforming the wall-screen into a map of North America, with a patchwork of nations picked out in different colors. There were the United Canadian and
Four cities were highlighted on the map with glowing points: Seattle, Denver, the Federal District of Columbia, and Boston. All of them UCAS cities, save for Denver, which was held jointly by many of the nations of North America as part of the treaty that ended the conflict between the old United States and the Indian rebels who used the reborn power of magic to attempt to reclaim the land they considered rightfully theirs.
"These cities," Aneki said, pointing toward the map, "are all places where activities of tribes of children known as ‘otaku’ have been reported. The otaku have taken our name for those who obsessively become attached to the world of the Matrix and turned it into a legend, a story of children who have the ability to access the virtual reality of the Matrix without the use of a cyberdeck interface, using only the power of their own brains. R&D believes, and certain independent consultants have confirmed, that the Leonardo technology requires the special abilities of the otaku to realize its full potential. There are limits to the hardware and software that can only be overcome by engineering changes to the ‘human factor,’ to the brain itself."
"Ridiculous," Matsumara said with a snort of derision. "The otaku are only a myth, an urban legend. Are you seriously telling us that you are risking the fate of Renraku Computer Systems on the basis of a decker tall tale?"
"Many things were once considered myths, Matsumara-
san.
" Aneki countered. "Things like magic, elves, and dragons,
neh?
But one need only look at the daily newsfax to see that they are all real. Why not the otaku? How else can we explain why Renraku, with some of the finest research facilities and deckers in the world, has not yet realized the full potential of the technology we have acquired? Our research suggests that the otaku
do
exist, and they have a means of altering the human brain to function within the Matrix as a kind of bioprocess holographic computer system. In conjunction with Leonardo’s paraoptical cyberdeck technology, such an individual would be able to perform the feats we ourselves witnessed two years ago."
"The compromising of every megacorporate computer system in the world," Lanier said quietly, and Aneki nodded.
"
Hai
.
And with that ability in our control, there is no rival in the world who could realistically challenge us. Not when we can subvert their communications, command structure, records, and finances at will. The
"The other megacorporations would never stand by and let that happen," Isobe said. "It would collapse the Court, there would be corporate war
..
"No," Lanier spoke up before anyone else could answer. "I don’t think so. A corporate war would be too destructive to risk. The first-tier corporations have resources equal to those of the national superpowers that once existed, which means they need must avoid a war no one could win. If Renraku secures this technology, there won’t be anything the other corporations can do about it without risking the total destruction of the Matrix we all rely upon. They would look for other ways to subvert or steal the technology, but they wouldn’t go to war to prevent Renraku from rising to the top, not while there were still other options."
"The only trouble," Aneki said slowly, "is that the agents we have planted in the otaku communities we know of have been under deep cover for some time. Two are confirmed dead. Their bodies were found by our people. One is alive and in the care of a private clinic in Seattle, but shows signs of permanent brain damage. We are hoping her doctors will be able to provide some additional information. As for the final agent, there has been no word from him for several weeks, but an effort is underway to locate him. We must find him or, failing that, discover the secrets of these otaku some other way if Renraku Computer Systems is to survive."
At
first,
urban
tribalism
was
considered
nothing
more
than
another
fifteen-minute
fad
that
would
fade
along
with
all
of
the
other
crazes
that
came
before
.
But
the
tribals
didn’t
go
away
.
They
proved
the
adaptability
of
human
nature
by
finding
ways
to
continue
and
to
survive
.
They
took
ancient
folkways
and
techniques
and
adapted
them
to
life
in
the
urban
jungle
.
They
found
niches
in
the
city
ecology
where
they
could
live
and
hunt
and
raise
their
families
.
They
cut
themselves
off
from
the
rest
of
the
world
.
They
established
their
own
"
reservations
"
in
the
midst
of
the
chaos
of
the
sprawls,
staked
out
their
territory
and
defended
it
against
all
comers
.