Orion started the training.
Normally this would take days. Maybe weeks. AI training was notoriously slow, even on good hardware. The math was just computationally expensive.
But Nexus and Aether OS changed the equation.
His custom language utilized every transistor in the system. Every CPU core running at maximum efficiency. Every memory bank accessed perfectly. No wasted cycles. No idle resources.
The training completed in three hours.
Orion stared at the screen. "What."
He checked the results. Rene had learned pattern recognition. Adaptive resource management. Predictive optimization. Everything he'd designed it to do.
Three hours instead of three weeks.
He integrated Rene into Aether OS. The AI would run constantly in the background, invisible to the user. Watching how the computer was used. Learning patterns. Optimizing performance automatically.
Then he added another training dataset: brain signals.
He didn't have his BCI built yet, but he could prepare Rene to recognize neural patterns. Train it on known EEG data from research papers. When the earbuds were ready, Rene would already understand the basics of translating brain waves into commands.
More training. Another two hours.
Done.
Orion installed Aether OS on his computer and rebooted.
The screen went black. Then the logo appeared.
Boot time: 1.3 seconds.
From power button to desktop in less than two seconds.
His old OS took fifteen.
He opened a program. Instant response. Opened ten programs simultaneously. All launched immediately. No delay.
He pushed the system to maximum load. Started 3D rendering. Ran AI processing. Compiled code. Played a 4K video. Transferred large files.
Everything stayed smooth. No lag. No stutter. No performance degradation.
Resource usage showed on screen. Aether OS overhead: 2%.
Rene was managing the other 98%. Allocating CPU cores. Balancing memory. Predicting what he'd need next and pre-loading it.
"This is absurd," Orion muttered.
His computer had just become twenty times more powerful without changing any hardware. Just better software. Better architecture. Better design.
The doorbell rang downstairs.
Packages.
Orion carried three boxes to his room.
Time to build.
He opened the first box. The cEEGrid bundle. Inside was a headset with thin electrodes designed to wrap around the ear.
He grabbed his precision tools and started disassembling.
The sensors were tiny. Delicate silver electrodes attached to thin copper wiring. Each one designed to detect microvolt-level electrical signals through skin contact.
EEG worked by measuring voltage differences between electrodes. Neurons firing created electrical currents. Those currents flowed through brain tissue—which was mostly saltwater and conducted electricity well. The currents reached the skull, which didn't conduct as well, causing voltage changes on the skin surface.
The sensors detected those changes. Amplified them. Sent them to processing equipment.
Orion extracted each sensor carefully. Set them aside in organized rows.
Next box: bone-conducting earbud components.
Bone conduction was weird technology. Instead of pushing sound waves into your ear canal like normal headphones, these vibrated against your skull. The vibrations traveled through bone directly to your cochlea—the hearing organ deep in your ear.
It worked because bone conducted sound vibrations efficiently. You could hear clearly while your ear canal stayed completely open.
This gave Orion space to work with. Room to hide the EEG sensors where they'd touch skin but wouldn't interfere with the bone conduction speakers.
He cracked open the earbud casing. Studied the internal layout. The vibration driver took up most of the space. But there were gaps. Areas he could use.
His plan: integrate the EEG sensors into the earbud housing. Position them to make skin contact around the ear—above it, behind it, below it. Multiple sensors for better signal quality.
Wire everything to a miniature transmitter. The transmitter would encode the EEG data and broadcast it wirelessly to the smartwatch.
Power would come from micro-batteries. Lithium polymer cells small enough to fit in the earbud but powerful enough to run the sensors and transmitter.
He started assembling.
First, he modified the earbud casing. Used his precision knife to create channels for wiring. Made mounting points for the EEG sensors.
Then he positioned the sensors. Three per earbud—one above the ear, one behind, one on the earlobe. Six total between both earbuds. More sensors meant better signal quality. More data to work with.
He soldered connections. His enhanced vision let him see microscopic details. His steady hands worked at a scale most people would need a microscope for.
The wireless transmitter went in next. Tiny circuit board, barely bigger than his thumbnail. It would take the analog EEG signals, convert them to digital data, and broadcast at 2.4 GHz to the smartwatch.
Low latency was critical. He needed sub-100-millisecond response time for the BCI to feel natural. The transmitter was designed for that—high bandwidth, minimal processing delay.
Micro-battery installation. He'd chosen lithium polymer cells rated for 500 milliamp-hours each. The EEG sensors used maybe 5 milliamps. The transmitter used 15 milliamps. Total draw: 20 milliamps.
Battery life: 500 / 20 = 25 hours of continuous use.
Not great. But he'd designed the system to sleep when idle. When he wasn't actively using the BCI, the sensors would power down. The transmitter would go into low-power mode.
Real-world battery life: probably two days with normal use.
And the smartwatch would double as a charger. When the earbuds ran low, he'd just dock them on the watch. Magnetic charging contacts would snap into place. The watch's larger battery would recharge the earbuds in about thirty minutes.
Elegant solution. Self-contained system. No extra cables or charging cases needed.
By evening, he had one earbud assembled.
He tested it. Put it on his ear. The bone conduction speaker worked—he could hear test audio clearly. The EEG sensors showed clean signals on his laptop.
"Nice."
He built the second earbud. Same process, faster this time. Muscle memory kicking in.
Then the smartwatch.
The watch was more complex. It needed to receive signals from both earbuds simultaneously. Process six channels of EEG data in real-time. Run Rene's AI for pattern recognition. Communicate with his computer. All while fitting on his wrist.
He'd designed a custom circuit board using knowledge from the library. Better power management than commercial designs. More processing capacity. Efficient wireless protocols.
The PCB manufacturing company had delivered it two days ago. He'd sent the design file with rush shipping. Cost extra but worth it.
Orion soldered components onto the board. Processor chip—quad-core ARM processor running at 1.5 GHz. Enough power for real-time AI. Memory—2 GB RAM, plenty for the pattern recognition algorithms. Wireless receiver—dual-band for earbud connection and computer communication. Battery—1000 milliamp-hours, should last a week with normal use.
The watch casing was 3D printed. He'd designed it to look normal—just a slightly bulky smartwatch. Nothing that would raise questions.
Everything fit together. The watch was thicker than commercial models but not suspiciously so.
He powered it on. The screen lit up with Rene's interface.
"Status?" Orion said.
"Systems nominal," Rene's voice came through the watch speaker. Calm, neutral tone. "Awaiting earbud connection."
He put on the earbuds. They connected automatically. Soft beep in his ear.
"EEG sensors active," Rene said. "Neural pattern detection online. Beginning calibration."
"Let's do this."
THREE DAYS LATER
Training was complete.
Orion had worn the earbuds for three days straight. Only took them off to shower. Rene needed data—lots of it. Needed to learn his specific neural patterns.
He'd thought specific commands while Rene watched. Move cursor up. Click here. Open this file. Type this word. Over and over. Thousands of repetitions.
Rene built a model. Learned which electrical patterns meant intentional commands versus background noise. Figured out how his brain looked different when he wanted to do something versus when he was just thinking randomly.
First day: 67% accuracy. Frustrating. The cursor moved when he didn't want it to. Commands triggered randomly.
Second day: 89% accuracy. Much better. Most commands worked correctly. Only occasional mistakes.
Third day: 99.1% accuracy with 80-millisecond latency.
Basically perfect.
Orion put on the earbuds and thought: Open text editor.
The editor opened instantly. No delay between thought and action.
He thought: Print "Hello World, Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Aenean commodo ligula eget dolor. Aenean massa. Cum sociis natoque penatibus et magnis dis parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus. Donec quam felis, ultricies nec, pellentesque eu, pretium quis, sem. Nulla consequat massa quis enim. Donec pede justo, fringilla vel, aliquet nec, vulputate eget, arcu. In enim justo, rhoncus ut, imperdiet a, venenatis vitae, justo. Nullam dictum felis eu pede mollis pretium. Integer tincidunt. Cras dapibus. Vivamus elementum semper nisi. Aenean vulputate eleifend tellus. Aenean leo ligula, porttitor eu, consequat vitae, eleifend ac, enim. Aliquam lorem ante, dapibus in, viverra quis, feugiat a, tellus. Phasellus viverra nulla ut metus varius laoreet. Quisque rutrum. Aenean imperdiet. Etiam ultricies.".
The code appeared on screen. Sentence by Sentence, exactly as he'd conceived it.
A grin spread across his face.
"Rene, we're in business."
"Affirmative," Rene said. "Neural interface operating at optimal parameters. Ready for advanced applications."
He spent hours stress-testing. Thought-typing complex code. Navigating file systems. Compiling programs. Debugging.
Everything worked flawlessly.
The bandwidth was incredible. Typing, he could maybe do 500 words per minute. With the BCI, he could think entire code structures at once. Thousands of concepts per minute translated directly into written form.
He thought: Create new file, name it test.nex, import standard library, define main function, create integer array from 1 to 100, filter for prime numbers, print results.
The code appeared instantly. Fully formed. Perfect syntax. Exactly what he'd imagined.
Orion leaned back in his chair. Looked at his setup. Custom OS with integrated AI. Custom programming language twenty times faster than anything else. Direct brain-computer interface.
Three years to build a fusion reactor.
With these tools, he could do anything.
"Time to make some money," he said.
"Understood," Rene replied. "What is our first project?"
Orion smiled. "Let's start with something simple. Something that'll prove we're serious."
He put the earbuds in and started thinking.
Code flowed from his mind to the screen at impossible speed.
The real work was beginning.