Drift

Nexus Collective's project

Initially created to experiment with neuronal implants and helping the disabled, this prototype created by Nexus Co. Data Security allows any user with a Drift implant to connect to DS’ data network.

It visually represents the various data banks and the entire network of the company in the form of a low poly version of the city.

This network contains the integrity of protected and saved data by the company, thus encompassing near everything from being the number on in the market for digital services.

Drift ports

Requires a specific neuronal implant connected to the brain to access the remote data bank.

BUILDS

Drift BETa

# Visual feedback: Raw data in unorganized buildings

Initially tested as a VR build, the movements and interactions with the world were limited, until WILLIAM BENDER and JAKE TELING suggested coupling the project with the implants they were developing. The teams were merged as one and formed a collaboration on their brainwave controlled cybernetics project.

You can see the premises of the city’s silhouette but it tends to bend the laws of physics by turning it in all directions.
The start of the virtual library of Data Security, without the tags on the alleyways, if you will.

The run of the Beta marks the start of the Drift assistant program in Nexus Collective to navigate the data translation.

Drift 1.0

From 2063 til 05.03.2086

# Visual feedback: Packed data in solid blocks

WILLIAM and JAKE are working on a new neuronal implant that will allow them to directly connect to a virtual server.

As their CEO, Wolfmann, and his co-director, Marco, show special interest towards their project, planning a collaboration with the UMF; the two scientists decide to protect the use of Drift and create a copy of Jake to work as an encryption key, disguised as an assistant during development.

JAKE, the Digiscan of the eponym user, retains the access to the admin rights within his source code.

As the development of the Drift build progress, the running status becomes stable and the virtual environment can be safely navigated through.

However, still in its prototype era, the interpretations of the raw informations are packed in unorganized blocks that need decompressing before one may analyse the contents of the blocks. The unzipping and translation of blocks becomes the main use of the assistant programs. Unrestrained by the human brain's restricted comprehension of physical laws and space, assistants can navigate similar to ghosts through the Drift.

Seemingly on the right path to create the first prototype of mind-alterating technology with their functioning Drift ports, William and Jake decide to secure the project away from their CEO. However, their attempts to escape unarmed are fruitless as Jake disappears first, seemingly terminated by mercenaries hired by the higher-ups.

On the last fateful evening, William departs from Nexus Co, having purposefully altered the build to require extended maintenance to function again, and cut the JAKE encryption key in two parts. He leaves one half in his son's care, and the other in the safety of an ex-colleague and friend, Matthies Andersen.

It's not until 2080 that Nathan manages to grab hold of both of the JAKE halves and decides to dive into the Drift subject in 2082, in hopes of finding out what happened to his father.

While Nathan was working on completing JAKE again, Data Security (Nexus' legacy company) rebuilt the Drift and continued the Drift implant R&D, this time with the help of Pharmatek and the UMF.

Seeing the potential of becoming a Drift user, Nathan manages to get a hold of an implant with the help of a black market arms dealer, Ahmed, in November 2083. After extensive research and minor testing, Nathan agrees to the risky procedure of Drift installation and gets the component rooted into his cortex in December 2084.

However, Data Security gets there first and installs their first implant on a trained agent they commissioned in Pharmatek, Andrew, in January 2084. This date marks the recruitment of Andrew into the OPSY special operation forces and a step forward for the military grade Drift build the UMF aims.

In need of an Assistant, Andrew is provided a work-in-progress version of TANAKA, to navigate and monitor the Drift.

As the story progresses and Nathan manages to breach into Data Security's firewall, the company has no choice but to upgrade the Drift regularly. After months of cat and mouse game with the hacktivist cell leader, DataSec decides to force shutdown the Drift and reboot all access to the databank.

Their plan would've worked if TANAKA hadn't betrayed their cause and sacrificed his integrity to grant the cell a permanent backdoor into the prized databank archives.

Drift 1.1

From 05.03.2086 til 2090

# Visual feedback: Data packs set in divisions, restricted by various access checkpoints

Following the shutdown of Drift 1.0, Data Security has no choice but to upgrade their systems to a following version, enthused Drift 1.1. Requiring more power, users have no choice but reinstall their modules or change their implant altogether.

As is the case for Andrew, who gets his implant out and changed to a new one on March 5th 2086, while Nathan struggles to upgrade and calibrate his implant for years (March 2088), mainly due to his involvement with the rise of the rebellion uprising.

While the Drift may work in similar fashion, the virtual space feels more organized, sanitized and restricted than his previous version.

The data rows are packed in divisions and pathways are inaccessible to unauthorized users. Assistants now need to refer to a map to locate the data and have a timer set to navigate the archives. Luckily for Exagone, TANAKA's backdoor grants JAKE access to the Drift 1.1 build, albeit risky and unauthorized.

As the two users, Andrew and Nathan, rejoin in the Drift, their relationship has visibly changed. Negotiations are out the window as Nathan becomes Andrew's primary mission in the OPSY operations.

This change translates into the real world as the two settle their differences in a near-lethal fight in November 2087. Immediately following their altercation, Nathan's critical condition requires the installation of his dreaded spine implant.

The recovery of Nathan takes him away from the Drift momentarily and Andrew's escape cuts him out of the local network he had access to in the Labs. It isn't until months later that the two reconnect, now as allies, into the Drift to setup their final move against Data Security with JAKE.

After the events of Marco's death on October 25th 2088, the Drift is taken hold by JAKE and used to force reboot all of Data Security's network, now with the added safety of JAKE's monitoring and continuous rework to fix all of DataSec's outbreaks.

It isn't until the dismantle of Data Security in 2090 that the Drift is officially terminated, never seeing a 2.0, after a relentless help from JAKE to clean up all of the company's mess.

FUNCTIONS

Storage

The Drift is a visual translation of the data banks and the entire network of Data Security. As they are connected to every network in existence, they contain the integrity of protected and saved data by the company, thus encompassing near everything from being the number on in the market for digital services.

Security Scans

Data Security uses regular area scans to dig out potential threats.

Users

Contrary to Drift assistants, Drift users aren’t fully scanned and are limited by laws of physical space and their body cannot withstand prolonged use of the tool.

See: Effects of Drift Use

Users may interact through speech and visual stimuli, but physical stimuli is unsupported by the Drift technology, thus colliders do not register collisions between two bodies.

This may take users off guard at first but poses no threats regarding a user's recognition of his physical integrity once disconnected.

Data Access

While it may seem conveniant to have users asleep to use Drift, it’s actually unrecommended, due to needing the user’s full mental activity.

Thus, the user, once connected to the server with his Drift port, is in a slumber state. They are in a living dream like phase, their eyes closed and aware of their surroundings, though able to visualize further horizons. Their senses are numbed slightly, enough to concentrate fully on the Drift world.

Jake, in his human user form, described the feeling alike a lucid dream where your body is like a ghost. You are aware of the world around you, in a hazy form, but you cannot interact with the physics of it. However, your brain still follows the principles it is used to in reality. Gravity, perspective, time flowing, solid matter, and the list goes on.

Assistants, on the other hand, are aware of both worlds and can communicate between the Drift and users freely.

Assistants

Thanks to Digiscan technology, Data Security has managed to fabricate virtual assistants to better navigate the Drift structures.

Albeit unstable due to their experimental scientific status, these artificial guides are of capital importance to sort through the towers of data in the Drift.

Only two assistants are known to be refined enough for use:
JAKE and TANAKA.

Their functions are to navigate, locate, analyse and synthetize the raw Drift data, along with accompanying Drift Users through their visits and monitor their functions to detect overuse symptoms.

Exporting data

Exporting data requires the users to connect their implant to a computer with access to Drift and works as a relay point to transfer data.

The raw data is converted in readable informations with the help of Drift assistants who possess the technology to translate the code. However, assistants are more or less efficient depending on their conception and the success rate of their [DigiScan]. Thus, [JAKE] is an expert in translating and analyzing the data, while [TANAKA] has a harder time managing the raw informations.

The data can also be left raw and packed into mini banks, like the shards [TANAKA] leaves in [**Exa_Gone**]’s care before the Drift reboot. It takes a longer time to analyze the data off Drift due to missing plugins to uncompress the files but it is still possible with the help of an assistant (JAKE).

The informations can then be read, written, edited like a regular file. Sometimes, when written on external hardware, assistants use that opportunity to write on the disks hidden messages as follow.

Effects of Drift use

Damage and sensitive perception in the Drift

Due to the project’s initial purpose, Drift does not include physics interactions. Thus, no physical harm or touch can hppen between different users. Drift has always been and remains a virtual library of Data Security’s data banks, despite the UMF’s desire to update it as a virtual physical space in the future.

Though rigid bodies cannot connect, they mentally cannot grasp the concept of phasing through matter or flying, as these are not functions users are capable to operate.

Effects of prolonged use

Drift usage takes a toll on the user’s body if regular and excessive, as it requires a lot of brain activity and energy.

Similar to extensive periods of unrest and unhealthy habits, excess can be seen in the form of confusion, exhaustion, headaches, restlessness, mood swings, paranoia, and -in some cases- nosebleeds.

Disconnection

Forced disconnection is unrecommended and provoques the following side effects to the disconnected:

heavy nosebleeds

sensations of vertigo
headaches
confusion

Please refrain from severing the cable without proper disconnection protocols engaged.

Hosting the Drift

To host such sensitive data, Data Security relies on a closed network base to secure external threats. However, due to May City’s connection being provided and relying on DS’ services, Drift users can connect to the database when linked to a DS generator.

This workaround was left on purpose by [WILLIAM BENDER] and [JAKE] to access Drift after their departure from [Nexus Collective], creating a future backdoor for them to secure the project from the UMF).

This obvious fragility in the system set [MARCO ANATIA KALEO] on track to create a new data bank that is independant of their system and can be used remotely, especially for extractions and industrial espionage. Therein lies the base ground for the Drift Server Host program in [PHOEBE]’s experimental tests.

Digiscan

Otherwise known as the process of turning one’s mind and body into an Artificial, also called Drift assistant.

The technology was created partly by Matthies and experimented with William Bender and Jake Teling who, in desperate conditions, decided to scan the latter as a safeguard against wrong usage of Nexus Collective’s products.

DigiScan requires the host to possess a Drift port to gradually scan their brain waves and train the program with an extensive series of exercises.

An incomplete scanning may lead to a fragile AI sensitive to brain-breaking and limited functions (see TANAKA).

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