Devil's Paradise

13: Wizard's Workshop: Power Plant

Once we finished the home helper series, a global economy was stabilizing. Merlin and I finally turned to what I most wanted to build. Merlin had told me he thought it would be possible to build a time machine, in which one could travel either forward or backward in time.

As soon as I heard that, I was in. I did not want to pursue anything else, until we tested that theory, but life intervened. I wanted to go back and rescue my family. Merlin had persuaded me that the fragile economy would collapse if we didn't invent other things first, but we were finally at the point at which we could start on it.

Despite what she had said, Delilah had not given up on trying to get me into her bed, but I was not ready to give up on my family.

When I told Merlin I planned to rescue Alicia and Martin, he warned me it was not likely that I could travel farther back in time than the machine existed. Even so, I was certain I would be able to rescue them. I knew it would work.

I was surprised to learn that the first thing Merlin wanted to build was a fusion power plant.

When he went over the math and physics of it with me, I couldn't find any holes in it. There were a couple of operating fusion plants before D-day, but they were still prototypes and not cost-effective, from what I'd heard.

What Merlin showed me in VR was a self-contained cylinder about fifteen feet high and about twelve feet wide, floating submerged in a concrete-lined containment pond. It would be nearly immune to earthquakes, and it would produce power for about twenty years before it began suffering structural failures. Bots could build and run it, without exposing humans to radiation at all.

Delilah was not happy about the eight months that Merlin said we would spend on it, but Merlin pointed out that we were running out of coal, despite being on a greatly reduced load, and this would allow us to export power, as well as make sure we could keep all our people warm through any winter.

"We are also running out of parts for all our other products, Ms. Witherstick, so my reassignment of all the new manufacturing bots to this project will not affect revenues."

Delilah was even angrier about that as the demands from other parts of the world for our products meant that our region was gaining power and influence. Our name was going to change again, from the Frederick Republic to the Middle Republic, and Delilah was leading the charge. Borders, revenue, and power were rapidly expanding. We were gaining world influence from our inventions, and Delilah was holding the reins.

In the end she had to agree. She had no choice. Despite the threat she represented, she knew her power was based as much on being able to at least influence me as it was on her own abilities.

I think what finally sold her was the idea that having the world's only operational fusion power plant—not to mention the only one ever built that was commercially viable—would not hurt her ambitions at all.

Some things we hired out to do because the waldos just couldn't do them. We had three containment ponds built. When I asked Merlin why three, he said, "Because this time machine will take more power than two of these plants can produce."

"We're building three fusion plants?"

"That is correct, Louis. When we have sufficient manufacturing capacity, we can even sell a plant, but I think that would not be wise."

"Competition?"

"Of a sort. I am more concerned about war than commercial competition. A fusion plant can produce sufficient power to make beam weapons effective, once we build portable energy storage. Plus, I must build very sophisticated secondary AIs to control and maintain each plant, and I am not sure I can keep control over them if they are that far away."

I was instantly worried. "Merlin, do you ever exceed your capacity?"

"That is a contradiction, Louis, but no. Whenever I have a new task or group of tasks of sufficient complexity to require AI, I build an AI 'child' that handles it and reports to me. These are insufficiently complex to become self-aware, even though they are able to master their tasks very well. The plants themselves require so much careful handling that I must build an AI with much of my own capabilities to do nothing but manage it."

"Merlin, what are the chances that one of these child AIs of yours decides to break out of your control?"

"Zero, Louis. Even if we get out of contact, they cannot act other than by their programming. I am fully in control, and shall remain so."

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