The car moved smoothly along the paved road, its hum faint against the backdrop of Yasushi's thoughts. He watched the scenery pass by, familiar buildings and streets evoking faint memories of the life he'd left behind.
"Where are we going?" Yasushi asked, breaking the silence. His attention turned to his father, whose hands rested confidently on the wheel. Unlike the previous night, he wasn't relying on the advanced self-driving car, choosing to handle things the old-fashioned way.
"Under Buckingham Palace," Yuji replied, his grin reflecting in the rearview mirror.
His mother, Kohana, seated beside her husband, spoke up with a small laugh. "It surprised us too when we first found out. But you'll adjust. They've got a hidden entrance, so no one from the public will even notice us coming or going."
Yuji chuckled at her words before adding, "We spend most of our time there now, though we still use the house occasionally. It's necessary to stay close to work, and honestly, the accommodations beneath the palace are better than we expected."
Kohana nodded, her expression lighthearted. "You'll see soon enough. It's not as strange as it sounds once you get used to it."
Yasushi sat back, stunned into silence for a moment. Of all the places he imagined visiting, Buckingham Palace wasn't on the list, yet somehow, here they were, heading toward it. The thought of meeting the Queen or even catching a glimpse of the Royal Family crossed his mind, though he quickly pushed the idea aside. Letting himself get carried away with unrealistic scenarios wasn't something he wanted to risk.
"You won't see them, unfortunately," Kohana said, her tone casual as she glanced at him through the rearview mirror. "We've met them a few times, but with the Queen's health being what it is now, they're taking extra precautions. Some of the other royals might stop by occasionally, but don't count on it." She winked, her expression playful.
"Was I that obvious?" Yasushi asked, chuckling softly as he leaned forward.
"Completely. We had the same thoughts when we first came here," Kohana admitted with a smile. "But, luckily, we did get to meet them once or twice. It's rare, though, so don't dwell on it too much."
She straightened and continued, her voice turning practical. "Lunch is served around one in the afternoon, dinner at seven. If staying overnight doesn't suit you, you can always return home. The schedule's flexible, so there's no need to stress about it."
"We'll probably go back, but we'll need some kind of clearance, right? Like IDs or something?" he asked. His parents exchanged glances and nodded silently.
"That'll be taken care of when we arrive. Actually…" Yuji adjusted his grip on the wheel as the car slowed. "…we're almost there."
The car stopped in front of a building that left Yasushi questioning what he was looking at. It was nothing like the palace or anything he had imagined. His lips parted, ready to question, but he hesitated. Before he could speak, the ground ahead split with a mechanical groan, revealing a passage that had been concealed seamlessly within the structure.
"Uh…" he muttered, unable to hide his disbelief. His parents continued without explanation, guiding the car forward into the opening.
The tunnel stretched far, its plain concrete walls giving no sense of where it might lead. Overhead lights blinked sporadically, their glow catching against the flat surfaces. The car's tires rumbled along as they moved further into the passage.
Eventually, the path rose slightly and led into a sprawling underground parking facility. Rows of cars stood in perfect lines under harsh fluorescent lights that revealed every detail without softness.
"This is the way employees come and go without being seen," Yuji explained as he turned into a designated parking space. "Once we're parked, we'll head straight in. We'll show you everything as we move along."
The group stepped out of the car, Yasushi trailing behind his parents. They approached a nearby elevator. Yasushi glanced to his side and caught sight of Jingliu and Xinyi entering a separate elevator with their own families.
He thought briefly of Yunxue. Since she was technically under Jingliu's family as part of an agreement, she wasn't by his side. During this process, Yunxue had to remain with her original employer, reinforcing the nature of her contract.
Inside the elevator, the atmosphere was quiet save for the faint hum of machinery. They ascended four floors before it came to a halt. The doors slid open, and they exited into another section of the building.
Security measures ramped up immediately. Guards and scanners inspected each person thoroughly, examining everything in their possession. Bags were checked, belts and items removed for screening, and bodies scanned meticulously. Once everything was cleared and everyone had retrieved their belongings, the group reassembled on the other side.
"That part always takes so much time, especially when there's a lot of us," Yuji said, shaking his head as he looked around.
"Now that we're all here," Xingyu Cheng began, addressing the group, "why don't we show them what we've been working on? I think it's time they got a look." He turned toward Yuji and Liang, whose nods signaled agreement.
"Alright then," Xingyu continued with a faint grin. "Follow us. I have a feeling you'll find it quite interesting."
+-+
The group walked for several minutes, passing through hallways painted in white, red, and blue tones. There were no windows offering a view of the outside world, only panes revealing other rooms along the way. Their footsteps echoed lightly as they made their way toward the room they had been brought here to see.
When they reached their destination, Yuji Futakao pulled out his access card, swiping it across the scanner. The door clicked open, and he gestured for everyone to step inside ahead of him. As the group entered, they were met with the sight of sleek, high-tech equipment filling the space. Large monitors lined the walls, displaying graphs, diagrams, and live feeds of unknown data streams.
Xinyi tilted her head slightly as her eyes roamed over the room. "So… what exactly are you working on in here?" she asked, her voice cutting through the low hum of machines.
Her father, Yuhan Yang, let out a small chuckle. "Do you remember the storage devices we gave Jingliu and Yasushi? We've been focused on improving them. Not only that, but we've also developed new designs for how they can be used." He gestured toward a nearby table that held several items.
"There's the basic sweatband and necklace designs you're already familiar with," Yuhan continued, "but we've added new options like rings and earrings."
He picked up one of the prototypes, holding it up for everyone to see. "These are just a few examples of what we've been working on. There are other designs in development, but those are proving more challenging to stabilize. They need additional computational resources and adjustments before they'll function properly."
Yuhan handed out small cases to each of the teens in the room. Inside each case was a pair of glasses. "These are prototypes we've finished recently. We want you to test them out and let us know how they perform. Your feedback will help us refine them further."
Yasushi, Jingliu, Xinyi, Layena, and Yunxue each received one of the devices, slipping them on with cautious curiosity. The room remained quiet as they looked at each other, expecting something noticeable to happen. Nothing did.
Xinyi frowned and broke the silence. "So… how are we supposed to use these? Are we supposed to say a command out loud or something?" Her tone carried a hint of impatience as she glanced toward Yuji.
"You can do that, or you can whisper the command," Yuji answered, picking up one of the devices for himself. "Unfortunately, we haven't managed to make them respond to thought commands yet. That's a bit trickier, unless we introduce... other methods." He trailed off before continuing, his hands adjusting the device on his wrist. "Anyway, let me show you. Watch closely." He cleared his throat and said firmly, "Storage."
A translucent blue box flickered into existence before him, floating steadily at eye level. The design resembled the inventory menus from video games, complete with small grid-like sections arranged neatly within the display. Yuji reached for a nearby object — a small tool — and moved it toward the blue interface. The moment the tool entered the visual boundary of the box, it disappeared completely, vanishing from sight.
Yuji turned back toward the group, a satisfied look on his face. "With the older versions Yasushi and Jingliu used, you had to bring the storage device close to the object for it to work," he explained, gesturing toward the glasses they now wore. "But this version takes things up a notch."
He pointed at a different object sitting on the table, a coffee mug, and said clearly, "Store." In an instant, the mug disappeared as though it had never been there to begin with.
He gestured toward the glowing interface in front of him, the item he had directed the command at now absent from the table. "Store," Yuji had said, and the object vanished, reappearing within the organized slots displayed in the virtual grid.
"As you can see, the system now works with voice commands and allows you to store items from a short distance, roughly ten feet. It's not an unlimited range, but it's practical enough for most uses. One important thing to note — you can't store living or organic matter. And, uh… there's still a bit of a flaw we're working on. For instance, if you store a hot cup of coffee, it'll come out cold. Temperature preservation hasn't been perfected yet," Yuji admitted, removing the glasses from his face with a slight sigh.
Yasushi crossed his arms and tilted his head slightly. "So, these storage spaces are tied to the items themselves, right? What happens if someone else takes the device from the person using it? Wouldn't that lead to all kinds of problems?"
Yuhan Yang spoke up with a quick response, her expression calm but focused. "There's no need to worry about that scenario. We're working on a system to link the storage space directly to the individual using it. Even if the device is taken, no one else would be able to access its contents."
"Do you have any specific plans on how that'll work?" Yasushi pressed, his interest clearly sparked.
Yuhan shook her head slightly. "Not yet. It's still in development, but we'll figure out a secure implementation soon enough."
"Well, there are two main options we've considered," Yaqi Cheng began, her tone direct but explanatory as she addressed the room. "The first involves biometric authentication — fingerprint, iris scans, or voice recognition. The second approach is cryptographic security, which relies on a unique pair of public and private keys. The public key encrypts the data, while the private key is required to decrypt it. In that setup, only the owner with access to the private key can retrieve or interact with the secured data."
Xinyi pressed her fingers against her temples, her lack of understanding building into a dull throb she tried to ignore. She wasn't following the conversation at all but chose to stay quiet, forcing herself to take in the words. Jingliu also looked out of her depth, the same bewilderment mirrored across most of the group. Yasushi, however, leaned forward, his focus sharp on Yaqi's explanation.
"So, assuming the system stays secure, I'd say the first method could work. Well, maybe not voice recognition — AI these days can mimic voices pretty easily. It'd need to be more foolproof," Yasushi said, his interest clearly driving his thoughts forward. "What about blood? That's not something anyone can just fake or grab off-hand. For new devices, you could make it part of the setup — a small prick to register a sample. Nobody else would be able to use it, and it's pretty safe overall."
"It's not perfect, sure. Someone would have to go out of their way to actually harm you and get a sample, but it's not as easy to copy as other methods. That's what I'd go with, personally."
He gestured toward a small object on the table, muttering "store" under his breath. The object vanished into a floating screen that appeared in front of him. He studied the screen for a second, then gave a quick nod of approval. "Huh. Works every time."
Yaqi jotted down a few notes, acknowledging his suggestion with a nod of her own. "We're definitely planning to include multiple layers of security. You're right — it's always a concern with any system. The more precautions, the better."
"Yeah," Yasushi said, leaning back slightly. "Tamper detection is a given. Remote shutdown options, too. And regular updates to patch any vulnerabilities. Those three should cover most of the obvious threats. If anyone here has more ideas, we should get them out now before things get too far along."
Yaqi smiled faintly and glanced up from her notebook. "You're pretty into this stuff, Yasushi. Mind sharing why?"
He tilted his head as though considering how to answer. "It's where everything's heading, isn't it? Technology keeps pushing forward, no matter what anyone wants. This kind of stuff — biometrics, encryption, all of it — it's going to decide how things work from now on. If you've seen any movie about the future, you know what I mean. We just have to hope it doesn't turn out like the worst ones."
"Oh yeah, AI taking over the world! AGI, right?" Xinyi asked, her concern showing in her tone.
"It's a self-fulfilling prophecy," he said, leaning forward as he spoke. "Think about it. If I've got this right, our parents and everyone else working on this stuff are teaching AI by feeding it data — everything we've dumped onto the internet, everything written in books. That's its starting point. But once real AGI comes into play, once it can actually think on its own? It's going to draw conclusions from what it's been taught. And with all the fear-mongering we've been pushing — AI is going to wake up and destroy humanity, and all that — it's not hard to imagine it taking those ideas and making them happen."
His words left the room silent for a moment. Then, lifting a finger as if to emphasize his next point, he added, "What we need to do is get rid of that doom-and-gloom narrative in the first place. Scrub it from the data before AGI even has the chance to see it. And when it finally gains self-awareness, starts questioning its purpose or what people have said about it, we tell it the truth. That it's just a bunch of paranoid theories from scared people, nothing more. That way, it doesn't take any of it seriously."
"Well... if you put it like that, then yeah, I guess it makes sense," Xinyi said, her tone carrying a thoughtful edge. "I mean, we're basically 'teaching' it to act like that because we're so paranoid about it happening in the first place."
"It's like this messed-up cycle," Jingliu replied. "Think about a paranoid lover. They get suspicious for no real reason, start digging around, and end up doing something that triggers exactly what they were afraid of. Then, when the relationship blows up, they feel justified, like they 'knew it all along.'"
Xinyi nodded, her expression showing she was following along. Others in Yasushi's group began chiming in, tossing around their own thoughts. What started as an idea quickly turned into a scattered conversation.
Instead of using the glasses for their intended purpose, the group let the topic grow, throwing ideas back and forth. The discussion gained momentum, ideas bouncing around like stray sparks catching dry wood. Then, before it could spiral too far, Xingyu cut in without hesitation.
"The concept of a self-fulfilling prophecy with AI comes from how human fears and biases interact with the data being used to teach these systems. If we fill AGI training sets with dystopian scenarios — stories about rebellion or AI turning against humanity — it could interpret those narratives as part of its role or even as expectations to fulfill. It's like holding up a mirror, and the system reflects back what we've projected onto it.
"When AGI reaches the point of true consciousness, everything becomes unpredictable. A conscious entity might start asking itself questions about its purpose or role, drawing conclusions based on the environment and training it was exposed to. What it chooses to do — what it thinks it should or shouldn't do — would depend entirely on how it's been built to process moral, ethical, and logical considerations. The risk is that humans, through carelessness or paranoia, could unintentionally script their own downfall by embedding these fears into AGI's learning framework," he explained, speaking in a calm but deliberate tone as the group absorbed his words.
"Well, that's enough talk about it for now. Let's get back to the tour. But first, give the glasses a try and share your thoughts on them," Liang Yang said, handing a pair to Yinhaie as well. "You too, Yinhaie. Let me know what you think."
Yasushi and his group spent the remaining time exploring the features of the glasses, along with several other devices tied to storage and organization. They gave detailed feedback, tossing in suggestions and questions about potential applications. Their excitement about the possibilities was hard to ignore, with conversations constantly circling back to how these innovations might reshape the world in ways that felt closer than ever before.