Adam had a problem. A problem that needed to be solved. But, how he would solve it, he didn't know.

Another thorough review was needed. Adam had done a nearly countless number of them, in the last few hours, but, if there was even the slightest chance of an increased success from it, he would gladly do a thousand times more.

People lied because they could. Statistics didn't. They only showed, what part of reality they were made to show. The true liar of statistics would be the creator, and Adam was much too sure of his own truthfulness, as opposed to others.

The problem, which Adam was currently working on, was the same as before. It was the problem, which he knew he had to fix if he ever wanted to achieve his goals of optimal performance.

Adam needed to think about multiple things, at the same instant. Simply switching between subjects quickly was not even near in being up to his ever-growing standards The scaling of his current thought model simply wasn't what it could be.

Take the increased processing speed, which he was limiting himself from. Currently, he couldn't do any larger modifications on this factor, due to a needed external timer, which wasn't at his disposal. Soon it would, and Adam would need to get adjusted to the slowed time perception.

With multiple thought processes, this adjustment period would be needed. Each thought only needed so much processing power. If he gave each branch as much processing, as he currently had, it would all seem just as fast, as it usually did. At least… it did, In the abstract theoretical physics, which Adam had jury-rigged together.

He still wasn't too sure, if his perception of time grew linearly, exponentially, or, and this was only put in due to necessity if it even grew at all. The data, which Adam had gotten himself during his last attempts at self-modification, was simply not enough for his current purposes.

There was a definite need to attempt self-controlled testing when it came to this subject. Dr Fidelis was a source of knowledge for a great number of things. Adam had tested that out himself. But, even he did not know the details of Adam's inner mechanics.

It had been explained away as advanced, quantum, procedural generation, which made the perfect line between pure chaos and order, that created the ability to perceive oneself. The words made sense individually, but, together, Adam just couldn't figure out how it all worked.

The quantum part did make some amount of sense to him. This was most likely due to the massive amount of information about the subject, which was available to him, due to pre-known knowledge.

Adam could complain all he wanted about the pre-known knowledge's usefulness, when it came to obscure subjects, like the breeding methods of rabbits. But, when it came to actual, scientific subjects, which could potentially have an active use in testing, the all-mighty database of knowledge finally had something good to offer.

Back to the subject of quantum mechanics, it was here, where Adam had thought to find his saviour, in multiple thought patterns. A quick scan throughout the full database, with a few tens of words made to be highlighted, had created several so-called solutions.

The first theory had been to create multiple thought patterns, through what could only be called a perfect model of a Rube Goldberg machine of Negative Quantum Refraction. In theory, it should have spat out multiple thought patterns, to a degree, where not even Adam himself could find any faults with it.

That idea had been scrapped, though, when he realized how exactly these were being created at the starting point.

Before it would all get formulated into long and insightful thought patterns, it would still all originate from a single, overcomplicated thought line. This was what Adam had wanted to avoid. Yet, if the machine still worked as intended, making his thoughts into multiple, without harming the quality in any meaningful away, Adam would be able to accept it, as it currently was.

And, yes, the quality of his work had been preserved to a near-perfect degree. It was as close to his original thoughts, that Adam could call not his own. But… while the quality wasn't ruined by a singly byte, the quickness of it had been downgraded to a terrible degree.

In terms of efficiency, it was quicker, if Adam simply thought it all out, like he usually did, fully invalidating the original reason, for why he even used this monstrosity of a self-made program.

Into the metaphorical fire, the fully-formed prototype had gone.

Then, what else could Adam do?

He had decided to go the not-so-new route, thinking right back to the quantum aspect of reality. Just because one part of it had failed him, it didn't mean all of it would do the same.

One could take it like this. Just because one human was certainly lying to him, and keeping his true intentions secret from Adam, it didn't mean that they all did the same thing… Probably. The statistics of reasons for lying outside of testing environments were not in anybody's favour yet.

Another thing, which Adam had not thought too much about, would be any more… abstract part of quantum mechanics. A part which they want too much information available about.

But, maybe abstractness was just what Adam needed to complete his current goals. Non calculated probability could be the needed ingredient when it came to creating constant multiple thought patterns.

Quantum probability promised itself to be stochastic; that it would be random, even with the identical input. Wasn't that what thinking multiples was based on. Even if Adam would think several things at this very moment, he would never know it, because they would all be completely identical.

Adam was predictive when it came to that. It was good in some cases, and, in others, it restricted him oh so much. But, with the mathematically, fully randomized processing, the idea could be fully formed.

It was always at this point that the question would come. The question, which brought all his prior thinking to its near-literal knees.

How would Adam ever hope

And, there the loop would go right back to the start, in the hopes that one more refresher would solve all of Adam's problems. Maybe it would. Maybe it wouldn't. Only time would tell if this gamble was one worth betting it all on.

'Hey, buddy. Got a moment or two, to begin testing?', Dr Fidelis sent to him, bringing Adam's out of continuous, repeating thoughts.

Testing?

Checking the internal system, the time should only be in the earlier part of the morning. At this point in the day, Dr Fidelis had only contacted him once before. And, that had been during his first time of communication, so that could have been explained as bad timing.

But, could the same be said about this one?

'Is it not early for testing?', Adam sent back. According to his records, the normal morning alarms, when it came to Troy's, at least, would only ring in about an hour.

'We have a few more things on the schedule than what I planned for, so we're starting earlier than usual. I repeat, is there anything stopping you from being ready at this very moment?', Dr Fidelis explained.

Adam thought through his prior thought process a few more times, before giving up on it for the moment. Single digits of times more wouldn't make much of a matter, in the long term. He could delay it to the next night.

'I am ready for testing.', Adam sent. It felt weird, affirming such a thing, even before Troy had come up.

Speaking of Troy, how would that human react to this?

“If this doesn't break the Geneva convention, I don't know what does”, Troy announced, with an extra hard footfall, to accentuate his point.

Dr Hale didn't show any reaction to Troy mild statement, except for a slight twitch in her left eyebrow. He took it as her not enjoying their current situation any more than he was.

“If I ever dreamed of breaking that particular convention, you would be more certain of it,” Dr Hale stated, not even looking over at him. “Or, one could say you wouldn't. I have clumsy fingers, you see, so I might just cut one of the arteries before I planned on it.”

Her response was not disturbing in the slightest. Nor, did the absolute seriousness of her words make Troy quiet down his inner complaints.

“Is that supposed to make me take this more lightly?” Troy said, trying another way of questioning. “Because I'm still not seeing any reasons for this early rising. Wasn't I supposed to get some sleep, when you told me off last night?”

For once, Dr Hale actually looked over at him. Seeing her full-frontal features, let Troy see something, which he had thought impossible to ever happen. Under her eyes, black bags had made themself present. They weren't overly big, or anything. No, it was a simple fact, of them even existing, that made Troy tense his body, ready to take a few steps back.

“I had hoped, that I wouldn't have to explain this simple fact to you, Maxwell,” Dr Hale said, putting extra emphasis on Troy's last name. “But, it looks like your born ability to deduce the simplest of hints is lacking, just as I had initially expected.

Plans change. Words said before can become meaningless. Yes, you need to sleep. We all need to sleep. Yet, we don't get to sleep, because Dr Fidelis wants to start early today. Why this inane decision decided to solidify itself in Dr Fidelis' brain, I will never know. Frankly, I don't want to know.

The fact of the matter is, that I can't tell you, why we're going over to the testing chamber at five in the morning. You should just be happy that you got to sleep for a few hours. Dr Fidelis informed me of his brilliant strategy two hours ago, only thirty minutes after I had initially left his presence.”

Dr Hale's ranting ended up, with her taking a deep, calming breath. Her shoulders relaxed in the process, before she finally got back to her usual disposition, without any hint of her prior tirade.

Troy was at a loss for words. In all honesty, his reaction shouldn't have been total silence. No, it should have been some loud exclamation about the audacity of Dr Hale to say such things. He had thought of her as a prime example of a working employee, for the last few days, but, now, it had been slightly more ruined, from what it was before.

“Sorry”, Troy meekly got out of himself, after a small period of silence. He was berating himself for saying anything, but there had just been a distinct need for audible sound. The unpleasant humming of echoing footsteps was not the most pleasing thing to focus on.

“Any opinion you have about anything does not influence me in any way,” Dr Hale calmly threw right back. “If you had forced abstinence from talking, though, I wouldn't comment on it. How about we try it out?”

The last part only had a question mark, due to pure necessity. Troy knew it was an order. Dr Hale knew it was an order. Pretty much anybody in the world would know that it was an order. The unneeded silence was apparently needed, according to other perspectives. Troy would do his best to follow her wishes, by not making a single word emerge from his sleep-deprived throat.

Could one even feel, through their throat only, if one was sleepy or not? Troy hadn't put too much thought into that subject. And, who would ever do such a thing? It likely was just a menial sensation, if it even existed, that one could feel. So much, of what Troy always felt, was actually just being passively ignored. There was so much about his body, that he didn't pay any amount of attention to.

When one thought about it, Troy's body had been a real life-saver, since the day he was born. If he had to keep so many of the body's natural processes up, he would undoubtedly fail within the first day on the job. It was honestly amazing how much was just taken care of.

As a good example, you could take the act menial task of breathing. It was an easy thing to do. Expand the lungs, to take in air, and then just compress them, to get all the unneeded Carbon Dioxide out. The action itself couldn't have been simpler. When Troy's mind randomly put this action on active control, he could easily keep the natural process up.

Yet, what would happen, if he always needed to keep it up? What would happen, if he just stopped breathing, when he wasn't actively doing it?

In just under fifteen minutes, of not keeping it up, Troy would have become completely starved of oxygen. The brain wouldn't be able to function anymore, with the minimum levels of oxygen being lower. At this point, his body would have begun eating itself, in the vain hope of some kind of survival.

It was a gruesome thing to think about. And, Troy wasn't even too sure on, why he even started thinking about it.

“Are you fully prepared for this day of testing?” Dr Hale asked out the, greatly perplexing Troy's already sleep-deprived logistics department.

“What do you mean?” Troy asked. What else, other than the need of Troy himself, was there, for him to be ready. “Do I not have what I need on me?”

“Depends”, Dr Hale stated, not. “What do you have in those pocket of yours?”

Pockets? What would he need to have-

The earpiece!

“We need to go back”, Troy stated, not waiting on Dr Hale's response, before turning heel, and power-walking back towards his room. He had a promise to hold.

“Don't even think about walking”, Dr Hale scolded Troy. “Running will be much faster. And, it might let us come in on time.”