In the first half of the twenty first century, a retired British software developer, disenchanted with the direction the company that he had spent decades building up into the most important software company on the planet, was heading, invested his personal fortune into emergent technology, a fortune rumored to be in excess of sixty billion. Many people ridiculed Bob Norman for this decision, yet many years later his drastic change in company direction was vindicated when products developed from his companies expansive research started to hit the market.

Within twenty years, Holobyne Technologies released, in rapid succession, a stream of new and innovative products onto the marketplace, including such items as the Hologram Display Unit, the BioStas Pod and BrainBots. The sales from these three products alone turned Holobyne Technologies into the richest company on the planet.

The HDU, or Hologram Display Unit, revolutionized the entertainment industry, while also creating a secondary industry based upon groundbreaking development in Nano processors and Sub Particle Information Transference , commonly referred to as the SPIT protocol, which could transfer electronic data at a rate in PB/s without any measurable delay.

The BioStas Pods utilised a natural chemical, Somnolene, developed from a previously unknown plant, found in the remains of the Brazilian rainforest, which allowed the medical profession to put severely injured people into a state near death within the Pod, where all the bodies functions were slowed down to five percent of normal. The brainbots, nanites developed to work in conjunction with the BioStas Pod, created a wireless shunt with the cerebral cortex to allow the brain, which remains active and unaffected by the Somnolene, to access reality imitators within the Pods. This supplied the brain with an artificial stimuli that imitated reality, to allow the mind of the patient to avoid sensory deprivation.

The first viable model of the BioStas Pod was developed just in time to allow a now ailing Bob Norman, now well into his eighties, to be ‘podded’, The slowing effect on the human body by the Somnolene, in conjunction with medical advancements, allowed him to survive for another 122 years, connected to the world through a computer developed virtual existence, interacting with his family and company via a Holotable. This one hundred and twenty two years being equivalent to six years of physical aging.

From the first hand experiences he gained from his time in the Pod, and utilizing his software knowledge, Bob Norman was able to provide the information that was needed to improve the design of future Pods, as well as the interactive software environment

From the experience he gained through his experiences within the pod, as well as his background in software development Bob Norman was able to provide neccessary information that helped to improve upon the design of the Pod and its processes, as well as assisting in developing the interaction software which linked it to external hardware and the Holotable. While doing this he also put into production his greatest achievement ever, knowing he would never see it completed before his death, the creation of SkillHaven, the greatest and most realistic virtual reality game world ever.

This grand dream of his was only completed five years after his passing, under the direction of his daughter, Jill Norman, in the year 2164.