NI (Natural Intelligence) The Creation - Next Level Artificial Intelligence

Chapter I In the Beginning

His eyelids felt tired and heavy. For hours he had been staring at the picture in front of him, trying to rediscover the principle that made the object in the illustration tick. People had been fascinated of its workings for millennia, yet never settled a solid theory behind the underlying mystery. Maybe we humans were taking the wrong approach by trying to solve the complex side of the equation that we failed to understand the simple mechanism from the opposite side. His mind was troubling him. An idea was telling him the object was no more than a simple puzzle that could be easily worked out, but his scientific-driven intellect was contradicting the notion.

"Eric Hamel!" a familiar female voice awakened him in his semiconscious dream. He lazily cocked his head and turned to the source.

"Well, I was expecting you to be in this place, just like in high school," said Vittoria, an attractive brunette, easygoing, and physically active young woman was the only dependable friend Eric had, whom he could talk freely and debate his weirdest ideas. They became close when they ended up as random partners in a science project. Aside from being active in the sport of tennis, which was evident in her athletic physique, she was also an academic girl studying in the same university with her neighbor and best friend Michelle. From time to time, she and her friend would come visiting the school library for some really old-style research, as opposed to googling on a computer browser.

"Oh, hi!" Eric's weary eyes greeted them. "I, on the other hand, don't expect to see you here," he responded with a lighthearted smile.

The two girls returned warm smiles as they sat on the opposite side of the four-seat table. "Anyway, my childhood friend, classmate, and neighbor Michelle. We are both taking biology course," Vittoria said, resting her book on the desk.

Eric nodded his head, acknowledging Michelle, a light blonde innocent-looking young lady with a strikingly alluring look. "Oh, wow...," Eric said. "Good for both of you. I love watching documentary films about nature and life; I guess that makes me a student of biology as well, in my own little way of course," he teased as he gradually became alert from his usual daydream.

Vitorria raised her eyebrows, flashing Michelle a timid smile. "Yes, of course. You know, Michelle and I had some conversations about exceptional friends we had in high school, and we talked about you, a lot," silently and quickly pointing her eyes sideways to her friend Michelle.

"Really," Eric said, "well I hoped she did not describe me as a nerd guy with thick, messy, black hair and thick eye glasses who loved spending all of his free time in the library." He probe his eyes to Michelle in inquiry.

"Not exactly, but somewhat close," Michelle replied in a serious tone, and the two girls burst out in conservative laughter.

"Speaking of eye glasses, I see you are not wearing yours. Did you misplace it again?" Vittoria asked, noticing Eric's brown, naked eyes.

"I am, actually, wearing contact lenses in case you haven't noticed. I only use my glasses at home."

"Aha, and you, actually, look smarter without your glasses," Vittoria teased, making Eric sigh and nod to a complete alertness. "So you are pursuing a medical course? I thought you were studying computer course." She was eyeing the book in front of him, which boasted a large picture of the human brain.

Mystified, he looked at Vittoria. "No Ma'am. I'm, in fact, a future Computer Engineer....."

Eric had been fascinated with computers ever since he was a boy. The things that a computer could do had opened an endless possibilities inside his young, imaginative mind that he dreamt of creating his own program in the future, which he hoped would someday change how humanity would interact with electronic machines. He had lost his parents in a car accident when he was just fourteen, forcing him to live a life of independence at a young age. His father had used to be an electronics engineer working in a computer company; and his mother, a nurse. As the only child, he was left with sufficient funds to continue studying and start his own career; as well as left him with bunch of electronic stuff in which he used to explore the world of computers and electronics, and oftentimes building his own futuristic Frankenstein-like gadgets inside his secret lab, the garage, which became his playground ever since.