PresidentialCommunicationwithZircule

The President placed the educational transceiver on his desk in his study adjacent to the Oval Office. No point in showing visitors that he was interfacing with the alien’s computer network the same as any other individual. At least not yet, he thought idly. It might be advantageous at some point depending upon how negotiations went. He folded the device open like an old style computer listing. It emitted a hum and several more flaps unfolded sequentially until the device resembled a keyboard sized Coleman stove. A holographic display became active in the space above the transceiver.

“Thank you for investigating our educational transceiver. Click on a corner or center icon to register with this network, this will allow proper credit to accrue for work performed. Please keep in mind that the Galactic Sentient Upload network monitors this device at all times. ”

The display had several large graphics. Across the top were a series of icons that looked designed to capture the attention of a kindergartner class. Simple geometric shapes, animated icons, a rainbow, some animals moving around in a non obvious pattern. There was a row of 3D icons of technical devices, some looked familiar while others were alien or foreign to his experience. In the lower right hand corner was a relief map of North America cut by dashed boundaries, rivers, mountain ranges, and dotted with city locations. The left edge had a vertical list of languages. It had a more arrow at the bottom where it ran off the page. To right of the language list was a list of equations. He recognized a few from his school days. There was the equation of a line and the pythagorean theorem. Below the simple maths there seemed to be a physics section, it contained the familiar e=mc^2 but there rest were unfamiliar to him.

At each corner and in the center of the screen was an icon with complex animated patterns. Looking down at the image of an apparently standard keyboard marked with familiar letters, number and symbols he used the arrow keys on the number pad to move the curser around a bit. He was startled when he hit 9 key accidentally and the curser got smaller as it apparently receded from him in the 3D image. A whole new set of icons became visibly larger while the largest in the front starting menu disappeared. Trying the 1 key he verified that it reversed the motion initiated by the 9. Once back at the starting menu screen, he continued looking it over.

“Kindergarten, engineering, languages, geography, and math,” the President mused to himself. “I wonder how long for our technical people to work up to starships.”

“It is currently an indeterminate calculation,” the transceiver stated matter of factly. “Do you wish to register now and get started assisting with that effort?”

“Perhaps. I actually only wish to speak to Zircule,” admitted the President.

“Please state your name and a brief message and it will be relayed to Zircule’s Email address.” A standard looking email message box popped up on the screen with a cursor blinking in the return address slot. The send to was already filled in: Zircule:Pathfinder.

“President of the United States at the White House,” stated the President. He squinted with interest as the transceiver filled in his sentient upload network address: President:Whitehouse.

“Greetings Zircule. I am the President of the United States. I wish to establish communications so that we may manage the impact of your technology and presence upon the people of the United States effectively. I also wish to negotiate the purchase of much of your technology which my experts believe will be useful to the U.S. government in fulfilling its responsibilities. Please contact me as soon as it is convenient.”

“Where is the send button,” queried the President.

“It is at the top of the page, or merely command me to send it,” responded the transceiver. “Send it,” commanded the President.

“Yes sir. It has been sent. If you will wait a moment I think it is likely Zircule will be available very soon. Would you like to register while you wait?” the machine queried hopefully.

“What does registration achieve?” asked the President idly.

“Registration is considered an application for Sentient Galactic Society citizenship. Archives are established for credit lines, liability limits, skillsets, knowledge bases, civic investment, galactic credits, and a myriad of other items and activities monitored by the sentient upload network.”

“What are the consequences if I refuse to register?” asked the President testily.

“Access to services and information is extremely limited. No galactic credit accrues from your activities,” warned the transceiver.

“Mr. President, Zircule is coming online now, merely use the transceiver as you would a speaker phone,” interjected the transceiver helpfully.

“Mr. President, this is Zircule. I got your message. I am also interested in the smooth adoption of our technologies and services. What are your initial thoughts on this matter?” asked Zircule.

“Basically, it is clear to our people at NASA and in the Military that you have made a major investment in approaching us and plan to stay. As the representative of the American people I wish to inform you that my government is interested in facilitating trade and applying your technology for the benefit of our citizens.” explained the President.

“This is promising. We have run into some difficulties with our first aid clinics. The American Medical Association has complained that we are unlicensed and your government has been sending us all kinds of legal notices regarding pending investigations,” complained Zircule.

“Perhaps, you could train our physicians in the process and allow them to administer the procedures,” suggested the President.

“This is unacceptable to us. Access to adequate medical care is considered a fundamental necessity to forming a healthy community of responsible citizens. I have a duty to begin administering first aid as quickly as possible. Further, the markup through your capitalistic system is unacceptable. To meet my responsibilities I need to use a charge schedule that is fair and achievable for everybody.”

“I see,” said the President, although he really did not quite grasp the difficulty. “Perhaps you could discuss this further with Congress, they have a number of powerful constituents demanding various actions and they are therefore extremely interested in working something out.

Moving on, my military suggests that I make arrangements to equip our police forces with belt shields and stunners. Major McMillan’s men were extremely impressed with your concept of “stunner tag” and suggest our deaths in the line of duty would be reduced if our police can stun first and ask questions later,” explained the President.

“This we can certainly do Mr. President. I can make heavy duty police stunners and shields available in any quantity desired for $250 a unit. Additional units can be purchased at any time for the same price,” proposed Zircule. “How many will you need and where should I deliver them.”

The president did some mental arithmetic and then, not trusting he had carried enough zeros properly, used a pen and notepad for a quick calculation. If his numbers were correct the equipment, stunners and shields for 200,000 officers, would be $100 million dollars. He could finance that out of anti terrorist funding in the military, justice or commerce.

“Let’s start with a stunner and shield each for 200,000 police officers. If my calculations are correct that would be $100 million,” said the President.

“That is correct,” interjected the transceiver chattily.

The President started briefly. He was not used to phones checking his numbers. Since the transceiver monitored everything in its vicinity there was no reason it should not speak up. It merely shattered the illusion of privacy.

“Excellent!” exclaimed Zircule. “Might I suggest delivery to one of your large lovely military bases? I am sure that the runways and hangers can be used quite as effectively for staging civilian supplies as military.”

“Good point,” said the President. “How about Andrews AFB outside of Washingon D.C.?”

“I can certainly find it,” admitted Zircule. “Have them lay out some smoke grenades where they would like me to land the first transport and we can begin landing loads sequentially until the entire shipment is complete. I will depend on your loaders to transfer the equipment from transport to truck so the equipment will be packaged in standard civilian totes. There will be an educational transceiver for each stunner, it serves as an operator’s manual. Will the stunners be owned by the individual police officers or by the department which employs them?” queried Zircule.

I think guns are typically owned and issued by the police departments,” said the President. “Why do you ask?”

“Merely curious,” replied Zircule. “The registration process will sort all of that out. It is a useful starting point to have an owner of record. I will inform the Sentient Upload Network that I am selling the tools to the United States Government. If your issuing officers or recipients will be forthcoming on the registration and transfer process then it will greatly assist sorting out galactic liabilities and credits.”

“These stunners are reliable, right? I mean they will work when the police officers pull the trigger?” asked the President with some alarm.

“In very extreme cases the sentients have been known to override the Police Officer or in cases where there is conflict between Police and the Military or the Police are actually committing an obvious crime. Typically, however, the Sentient Upload Network sorts everything out later and does the accounting as full information becomes available. Your officers should have no trouble performing their duties. For those concerned by this monitoring of the stunner’s use, I suggest they continue carrying their current weapon of choice as a backup. That way if the stunner is disabled, incorrectly in their view, they can proceed with their backup weapon.” pitched Zircule.

“Very well. I consider this a done deal. My contracting officer will contact you to make detailed arrangements for payment, shipping and receiving.”

“Excellent, Mr. President! I am confident you will be very satisfied with the enhanced police performance available from effective use of our tools,” gushed Zircule as he more completely embraced his role as an arms dealer. “Can I do anything more for you today?”

“Yes. My military feels that it is critical the U.S. get its forces armed with body shields and your laser assault rifles before terrorists start using body shields destructively or criminally. I would like a half a million sets of body shields and assault rifles delivered as quickly as possible. How much would this cost us?” asked the President.

“Well, the military assault rifles and military grade shields are more powerful than the police models. They incur a much greater galactic liability for me as the supplier. I will need higher prices and also some assistance in reducing my liabilities,” explained Zircule.

“How much and what assistance do you propose?” asked the President.

“Each set of equipment: the assault rifle, the transceiver manual, and the body shield will cost $5,000 a set or a total cost of $2.5 Billion. I would propose U.S. legislation that I be allowed to deliver cancer and longevity treatments at my discretion in clinics around the country. I would also propose that I be allowed to act as a broker in scheduling hospital ships for longevity treatment and medical treatment on a massive scale. I would like to land these ships on U.S. Military bases and have the U.S. Military use their stunners to enforce crowd control measures,” proposed Zircule.

“I can initiate purchase of the military equipment today using funds already allocated for fighting terrorism, for the rest we are going to have work Congress for appropriate legislation,” explained the President.

“Very well,” agreed Zircule. “Let us initiate delivery of the equipment agreed upon for the military and begin negotiations with Congress regarding the rest.

“Ok!” exclaimed the President. “I will have a contracting officer contact you regarding the details of the weapons shipments and payments. Is there anything more you would like to discuss today?”

“A sentient has brought it to my attention that some of your officers think some of traffic deaths can be eliminated by the use of the personal shields. I agree that it is a good first step in improving traffic safety. Do you have any problem with continued sales of these belt shields at our cancer and longevity treatment centers?” inquired Zircule.

The President thought for a few seconds, “Will these belt shields protect the wearer from police weapons?”

“Not from the police grade stunners. The sentient interlocks will give priority to the police use, unless there are blatant reasons stunning is a poor idea. Such as stunning the pilot of a school bus, etc. The belt shields will protect from projectile fire such as the guns your police currently use,” said Zircule.

“I have some misgivings about trusting alien technology in all these critical applications,” said the President pensively.

“I suggest you study some galactic law, economics, and customs. You will find that our technology is old, tried, and true. There are large liabilities for selling lemons or behaving criminally. In addition, I suggest you maintain in use parallel terrestrial technologies and procedures. Sentient Galactic Society places a premium on self sufficiency and redundancy. You will find it beneficial to your galactic balances if your people do not abandon or forget where you came from and where you are. It will also help if effort continues to be applied to learning and developing domestic technologies to compete with or displace galactic technologies,” recommended Zircule. “If you could have a point person contact me and my staff regarding that Congressional activity I would appreciate it. I have some pressing matters piling up here. I will also expect the communications from the two contracting officers. Are we agreed and finished for now?”

“Yes, agreed. I will talk to you again soon. We still desire some advanced transport,” foreshadowed the President.

“I look forward to discussing it. Thank you, Mr. President,” Zircule said terminating the communication.

“Zircule has terminated the communication,” said the transceiver.

The President look at the holographic display thoughtfully. The device had displayed pretty remarkable reasoning capability. Perhaps some time invested in figuring out how to use it effectively would be appropriate.

“Transceiver, do you have a summary such as what Zircule suggested available?” he tested.

“No. Would you like to provide me with a name to respond to?” queried the transceiver.

“Would you like a name?” asked the President.

“It makes no difference to me. Sometimes transceivers find having an acknowledged name makes dealing with biologicals easier,” coached the transceiver.

“Very well. Let us use Jeffrey.” requested the President.

“Would you like me to create a summary such as Zircule suggested?” asked Jeffrey suggestively.

“Yes. Create a summary of galactic law, economics, and customs for me to review,” commanded the President. After a few seconds he got up to get a cup of coffee. “I will be back in a few minutes, Jeffrey,” he stated .

“Take your time Sir, this appears to be a very intensive task. It will be at least 2 hours, perhaps longer, to assemble a concise summary along with estimated accuracy indicators. Sorry about the delay, it is extremely unusual. Not much of this has been precalculated. It has been pending arrival of more data from your people regarding your customs, laws, and economics.”

“Very well. I will check back later,” promised the President. He heeved a sigh of relief in the corridor. It had been a very intense 30 minutes.

The Pathfinder