The show Dialogue on the network is their flagship interview program, a premium long-form series that has hosted some of the biggest names in the country.
In recent years, to keep up with market trends and expand its reach, the producers have started inviting guests who move the needle for the younger generation—people and events that have the internet buzzing. The network wants to turn Dialogue into the gold standard of news features, so they've poured massive resources into it, giving the show serious cultural weight.
This was exactly why Nick agreed to the exclusive. On one hand, the show is prestigious and influential; he had to show them some respect. On the other, he wanted a formal platform to address the recent controversies and trending topics.
At three in the afternoon, Nick finally met the legendary "Second Godmother of News" at the front of the company office. As for the "First Godmother," she's the one who anchors the seven o'clock nightly news and doesn't do field visits lightly.
"Hello, Ms. Jenkins," Nick said, reaching out with a smile.
"Hello, Nick. You're much more handsome than I imagined." Sarah shook his hand, then glanced up at the building. "Is this the headquarters? It looks a bit... compact."
Facing the camera crew, Nick felt a little stiff, but he kept his cool. "Our company is still pretty new. We haven't built our own campus yet."
"Is the building leased?" Sarah asked.
Nick shook his head. "To be precise, the office park's management committee provided it to us for free."
"Provided specifically for you? Just for Militech?" Sarah pounced on the keyword, her reporter's instincts sharp.
"Uh, no," Nick clarified. "The park has a standard support policy for tech startups that settle here. Our terms are actually the same as the other companies in the zone."
"But they haven't produced results as fast as you, or as impressive." Sarah offered the compliment, then smiled at the crew. "Relax, everyone. It's just a normal interview. We'll edit this later; anything that doesn't look right won't make the cut."
The tension in the air evaporated as everyone let out a light laugh. Sarah turned back to Nick. "So, Mr. Harryson—"
"You can just call me Nicholas. It's more casual, and it's what everyone here calls me," Nick interrupted.
Sarah nodded. "Fair enough. And don't be so formal with me either. Just call me Sarah. There isn't much of an age gap between us anyway."
Nick was speechless. He thought to himself: It's almost a twenty-year gap, and you're calling that 'not much'? But that was the rule with women; no matter the age, you call them "sister" or use their first name. If you call them "Ma'am" or "Auntie," you're asking for trouble.
"Alright Sarah!" Nick said obediently.
"There we go." Sarah smiled. "How about this: let's split into two groups. One group can go with your people to set up the recording site for the sit-down interview later. As for the other, you can take me on a tour of the company. You don't mind, do you?"
Nick shook his head. "Not at all. We're happy to show the world what we're doing through your lens."
Once the logistics were handled, Nick and Sarah started their walk-through with the cameras trailing behind.
"Your office conditions are a bit tight," Sarah noted, looking at the crowded workstations and the sheer hum of activity.
Nick nodded. "We expanded way faster than expected this year, so we're definitely outgrowing the space. The new office is already being renovated; we'll move in after the New Year, and the working environment will be much better."
"For a high-tech firm like yours, the local authorities usually provide more assistance. Why haven't you asked for more support?" Sarah dropped another pointed question.
"The support is there, and it's generous," Nick replied. "But there are plenty of other startups here too. It wouldn't be fair if we hogged all the resources. Besides, we've been lucky enough to see some success, so our operating pressure isn't that high. Those resources should go to the companies that really need them to survive."
"Is this the lab?" Sarah asked, spotting the specialized equipment and the focused engineers.
Nick nodded. "This is part of it. We have more space on the third floor."
"Can I take a closer look?" she asked, her eyes lingering on the hardware.
Nick smiled and nodded. "Of course. You're actually our first outside visitor to enter the lab."
"Oh? So you don't host tours? Your security must be pretty tight."
"It's mainly because we have a few proprietary projects running," Nick explained as he led the way. "It's not always convenient to have visitors."
"Is it okay for us to be in here today, then? I don't want to cause any trouble," Sarah said, pausing at the threshold.
Nick waved it off. "What you're allowed to see isn't classified. Don't worry, we've already cleared the area."
"Oh, that's a relief." Despite her words, Nick could hear a hint of disappointment in her voice. As a reporter, she wanted to see the things people weren't supposed to see. If everything was "cleared," it meant the juicy stuff was hidden.
Nick brought the crew into the third-floor lab. "This is the inner sanctum. Aside from the VP, none of the other employees even come in here."
"That strict?" Sarah looked around in surprise. The engineers barely looked up from their screens, completely unfazed by the cameras. Judging by the dense equations and diagrams covering the whiteboards, the workload was intense.
"I noticed everyone looks incredibly young," Sarah remarked.
"Yeah," Nick replied. "Our R&D team is mostly Gen Z. We have a lot of people in their early twenties, with only a few older leads."
"Why such a young team? What was the strategy there?"
Nick gave a helpless shrug. "Honestly? It was a necessity. Established researchers with big resumes usually look down on a small startup like ours."
"How is that possible? You've already made a massive splash in the industry. You should be a talent magnet," Sarah argued.
Nick shook his head with a wry smile. "At the end of the day, we're still a new company. People who have already 'made it' in their fields have a lot of requirements and risks to consider. With our current setup, we just can't give them what they're looking for."
After wandering around and finding nothing particularly scandalous, Sarah turned to Nick with a playful challenge. "I'm here representing the public to uncover some secrets, Nick. You wouldn't want me to leave disappointed, would you? What about that new tech from your video? Don't tell me you aren't going to show us."
Nick smiled and shook his head. "Of course, we've got everything ready. Right this way."
He led Sarah and the crew to a testing hub in the center of the lab. He pulled out a small microphone and handed it to her. "This is our new Intelligent Voice Assistant. Go ahead, say hello."
Sarah took the mic but hesitated for a long beat, staring at it. Finally, she turned to Nick. "What should I say?"
"Anything you want," Nick said. "Think of it as an impromptu stress test for us."
Sarah smiled, thought for a second, and spoke into the mic. "Hi there. I'm Sarah. It's a pleasure to meet you."
The second she finished, a pleasant, youthful female voice drifted from a nearby speaker. "Hello, Miss Sarah. Welcome to our home."
"Wait," Sarah said, surprised. She looked at Nick. "Can it identify gender?"
Nick nodded. "Yeah. Everyone's voice has a unique tone, timbre, and frequency—men and women are distinct. The system analyzes those vocal prints to determine gender. We're at about ninety-nine percent accuracy; the other one percent is just for those rare, unique voices that are hard to categorize."
"Can you introduce yourself?" Sarah asked the mic.
The speaker responded instantly. "Hi, I'm Kean, Nick's personal assistant. It's great to meet you. Sarah, is there anything I can do for you?"
"Like what?" Sarah asked, leaning in with interest.
"My job is to handle information services for my boss and creator, Nick, and assist guests however I can. I can adjust the AC, dim the lights, start a bath, change the TV channel, order DoorDash, read the news, give you the weather, and a lot more. What do you need?"
"Nothing right now, thanks. But can I ask you a question?" Sarah glanced at Nick, a small smirk playing on her lips.
"Of course. I'm happy to help."
Sarah dropped the smile and looked serious. "Will you ever harm a human being?"
"I'm sorry, I don't understand the question."
"I said, will you harm humans?" Sarah repeated, speaking slower.
"I'm sorry, I don't understand the question."
Sarah looked confused and turned back to Nick. "Is it dodging the question or refusing to answer?"
Nick chuckled and shook his head. "Neither. We just haven't programmed a response for that. Honestly, we haven't even included questions of that nature in its dataset."
"What? You haven't programmed the Three Laws of Robotics into it?" Sarah asked, genuinely shocked.
"Let's walk and talk," Nick suggested.
"Okay," Sarah agreed, keeping pace with him as they headed toward the exit. "But should I take that as you avoiding the issue?"
"It's not avoidance," Nick explained. "It's just that the technology isn't at that level yet. There's no need for those safeguards—at least not for this."
"I don't know, it feels pretty advanced to me," Sarah countered. "If I hadn't seen the hardware, I wouldn't have known it was a program. Its logic is incredibly fast, and the speech sounds totally natural."
"At the end of the day, it's just a voice assistant," Nick said. "It's just a little more humanized than the ones currently on the market."
"Isn't being 'humanized' the whole point of an intelligent robot? Doesn't that make it one?" Sarah asked, throwing another hardball.
They walked onto the set they'd prepared for the formal sit-down. Nick sat as a makeup artist started touching up his face. "Humanization is a broad term," he replied. "It's not exclusive to robots. We say a dog or a cat is acting 'human,' but that doesn't mean they have human-level cognitive logic. Artificial Intelligence is a spectrum. What we're using now is 'Dumb AI.' What people are worried about is 'Smart AI.'"
"What's the difference?" Sarah asked, even as she was getting her own makeup done.
"The intelligence level and the actual thought structure," Nick said. "In my view, a Smart AI has an independent personality. It can think for itself. It has a soul. Dumb AI is just a very good imitation of human thought patterns. There's a massive gap between the two."
"A soul?" Sarah looked puzzled. "Is that a scientific take or a theological one?"
Nick waved it off. "Our understanding of the 'soul' is still in its infancy. If you look at the research, the line between science and theology on that topic is pretty blurry. What I'm talking about is independent consciousness—the key to judging if a machine truly has humanity."
Sarah nodded slowly. "And your assistant? Where does it stand? Does it have consciousness?"
Nick shook his head. "No. It's just code. To be blunt, it's reactive. It takes what the user says and chooses from thousands of potential responses. The 'breakthrough' in our tech is simply that it picks the response that best fits the vibe of the room and says it in a voice that sounds alive."
"So it's just a very smart voice program," Sarah summarized.
"Exactly," Nick agreed. "But because people have such high expectations, it creates controversy and fear."
"The fear of the unknown," Sarah noted.
Nick smiled and shook his head. "No. It's people's fear of themselves."
Makeup was a breeze. Nick was young, and his features were sharp enough that he didn't need much—just a little foundation to keep the studio lights from washing him out. Sarah was already camera-ready, so she just did a quick touch-up. Within minutes, they were back in their chairs, and the conversation resumed.
Sarah jumped right back in. "Going back to what you said about humanity's fear of itself—how should we interpret that?"
Nick leaned back. "At this point, humans are the undisputed masters of the Earth. There isn't much left in nature that truly threatens us. What really scares people is the lack of trust and understanding between one another. That's what triggers our instinctive self-preservation. People fear robots will destroy the world, but I don't buy it. I think the only thing capable of destroying the world is humanity itself."
"Even if robots achieved consciousness," he continued, "they wouldn't be stupid enough to just burn the world down. If they ever developed that kind of malice, it would be because we taught it to them. A Smart AI would start as a blank slate. Its behavior would depend entirely on its upbringing—just like raising a child. The influence of its 'parents' and society is what matters."
"You seem very optimistic about the future," Sarah noted.
Nick smiled. "You have to be. No matter what's coming, optimism is a choice. Isn't that what we're told from day one—never give up hope?"
Sarah nodded, satisfied with the philosophical detour. She pivoted back to the tech. "So, how did you manage to make a program sound so much like a real person? What's the 'secret sauce'?"
Nick took a sip of water. "I call it 'linguistic warmth.' Previous voice programs couldn't grasp the emotions, moods, and tonal shifts inherent in human speech. Our technology allows the program to learn and simulate those nuances. That's why it sounds natural to you."
"It sounds simple when you put it that way," Sarah countered, "but if it's so easy, why have tech giants spent billions over decades failing to do it, while you pulled it off in six months? What's the secret?"
Nick laughed. "There are no secrets in R&D, just shortcuts. We got lucky and found one. I'd been conceptualizing this since college, but I never had the resources to actually build it until now."
Sarah's eyes lit up. "I'm curious about that. We looked into your background, and your four years of college seemed pretty standard. How did you suddenly 'explode' right before graduation? What changed?"
Nick thought for a second. "I wasn't any different from the other students. I just liked tinkering. But back then, I couldn't turn my ideas into reality. The 'explosion' was actually born out of desperation. I couldn't find a job. I applied to over a hundred companies and bombed a dozen interviews."
"So, out of necessity, I dragged my roommates into starting a business. I didn't expect it to take off like this, but the industry liked what we were doing."
"Why did those interviews fail?" Sarah asked. "Did you ever figure out why they passed on you?"
Nick gave a helpless shrug. "My thinking was too 'out there' for them. Most companies want young hires who are steady and follow the manual. I had too many ideas. Honestly, I'm grateful to those hiring managers. If they'd hired me, I never would have taken this leap."
"I bet those companies are kicking themselves now for missing out on you," Sarah teased.
Nick shook his head. "Actually, they probably feel lucky. If they'd listened to half the stuff I was pitching back then, I probably would have bankrupted them."
Sarah laughed. "What are you like in real life, Nick? Outside the lab?"
"Pretty boring, honestly. I'm a total homebody."
"So, the classic 'tech geek'?"
Nick shrugged. "Most people who can sit still long enough to build something are geeks. But hey, as they say, geeks are the ones who change the world."
"Do you have a girlfriend? I think the internet is dying to know," Sarah asked, leaning in with a gossipy grin.
"Nope," Nick said instantly.
"That fast? No hesitation?"
Nick smiled. "No means no. Why make it complicated?"
"Too busy, or just not interested?"
"I just haven't met the right person. My circle is mostly engineering students—it's a total desert when it comes to meeting girls," Nick complained, mock-sobbing.
Sarah laughed. "What's your type? Maybe I can set you up."
"Is this a public matrimonial ad now?" Nick asked, looking sheepish.
"If you want, we can cut this into its own segment and air it at the end of the show," she joked.
"Uh, I'll pass." Nick quickly changed the subject. "I don't have a specific 'type.' I just want someone independent, smart, and kind. The rest doesn't really matter."
"A very rational list," Sarah noted. She stood up, signaling the end of the session. "I loved the assistant demo. When can the public actually get their hands on it?"
"It's still up in the air. We have a lot of bugs to iron out and production hurdles to clear. But we're pushing as hard as we can to get it out there."
"I hope it's soon. I want to be the first to order one," Sarah said, extending her hand.
Nick stood and shook it. "I'll make sure a unit is headed your way the second we go live."
"It's a deal," she said.
"Definitely."
After grabbing a bite with Sarah, Nick finally said goodbye to her.
Off-camera, they'd actually covered a lot of ground that wasn't exactly broadcast-ready. Sarah had walked away genuinely impressed by the twenty-two-year-old, even going as far as to trade contact info and officially invite him for a follow-up exclusive whenever he was ready to show more.
Though the sit-down went well, it was mostly an unplugged session focused on what the public wanted to hear since they hadn't prepped a formal technical deep-dive. Sarah still had a notebook full of questions about the future of tech, but they'd simply run out of time.
Riding the wave of the hype, the crew scrambled back to the studio to get the episode through post-production for an immediate air date. The network wanted the ratings gold, and for Nick's team, getting the interview out was the fastest way to kill the online rumors.
Once word got out that Nick had finally broken his silence, a fresh wave of media outlets swarmed the office, but they were all stonewalled at the gates. Beyond the press, Tyler was buried under a mountain of inquiries from venture capital firms and tech giants looking to partner up.
They were the "it" company of the moment—everyone wanted a piece of the action. Tyler spent his days playing bouncer, sending a parade of opportunists packing. He later joked that the "Military-Civilian Partnership" plaque at the front door was doing half the heavy lifting in scaring off the sketchier characters.
Nick, true to form, dumped all the administrative chaos on Tyler and retreated back into the lab with his team. While the project was looking solid, the "to-do" list was still a mile long. The priority was ironclad stability: squashing bugs, optimizing the code, and getting the UI to a polished state.
Beyond the polish, Nick wanted to see just how far the engine could go. Right now, they were focused on a personal assistant model, but the core tech could be ported into anything—the automotive industry, mobile OS integration, enterprise smart-offices, or city-wide infrastructure.
The big question remaining was the business model. Did they want to be a hardware company selling a standalone device, or a Tier-1 supplier licensing the software to companies like Apple or Tesla? For now, the team was leaning toward a proprietary consumer product, but designing that hardware was a whole new beast.
Meanwhile, the network finally dropped the trailer for the Dialogue episode. Seeing the low-key Nick and the mysterious Militech facility on screen sent curiosity through the roof. Sarah's rapid-fire questions and the snippets of the voice AI in action were the perfect teaser.
"Will you harm humans?" That clip alone became the most shared soundbite on the internet. Everyone was dying to hear the full answer. People were also obsessing over Nick's mentions of "machine souls" and "digital personalities."
It wasn't just the casual scrollers; industry insiders and social scientists were leaning in too. Everyone wanted to know if this was a parlor trick or the real deal. If verified, this technology wouldn't just be a new gadget—it would be a fundamental shift in how humans interact with machines.
When the episode finally aired, it was a total blowout. Neither the producers nor Sarah had anticipated just how much of a sensation it would cause. Real-time ratings hit an all-time high, and when the segment featuring the live demo of Kean aired, the ratings spiked to a historic 8% share. For a serious news program in the age of streaming and short-form clips, those numbers were unheard of.
But the TV ratings were only half the story. The internet took the footage and ran with it globally. Within hours, content creators had translated the interview and the demo clips into a dozen languages, racking up millions of views on YouTube and X.
"Human fear comes from within."
"Robots don't hurt people; people do."
"True AI needs a soul and an independent personality."
"I'm optimistic about the future—isn't that what we're taught?"
Nick's answers were being shared as modern-day proverbs, and he suddenly found himself with a global fanbase. He was being called the contemporary Edison, Newton, or Einstein. Some even dubbed him the next Steve Jobs, which left him a little uneasy—he wasn't exactly looking to follow that specific life trajectory.
Regardless, he was a household name now. Militech and the Intelligent Voice Assistant were officially part of the zeitgeist. The world's focus shifted to two questions: When is it coming out? and How much will it cost?
As the dust settled on the interview, a new wave of tech executives began landing in Tampa, all of them hoping to get a meeting with the young man who had just changed the conversation.