It’s about humans who know how to work with machines to create better outcomes for all of us.
Sam Altman and Jony Ive just announced a partnership to “build a screenless companion that knows everything about you.”
Did they read The Water Carriers? In chapter one, I introduced the AI companion who did everything for Naomi and Bai, from driving the car to calling 911 when they were stranded on the road. From then on, AI companions were important characters in the book.
I realized early on that a story about the near future needed to include artificial intelligence (AI), and I had to create a device that would allow people to use AI at all times. Something with contextual awareness that knew where you were, what you wanted to do, and could augment your vision so that you didn’t need to rely on a screen.
A New Relationship with AI
AI isn’t a threat in the book; it’s a constant presence—a collaborator in everything from daily life to civilization-saving breakthroughs.
Today, a lot of attention is focused on AI agents. An AI agent is an artificial intelligence system that can make decisions and take actions to achieve a goal. But I was looking for a more personal experience.
This led me to use the term AI companion.
com·pan·ion
- a person or animal with whom one spends a lot of time or with whom one travels.
- one of a pair of things intended to complement or match each other.
In the novel, characters generally interact with their AI companions through AugWatches—wrist-bound devices that offer audible help and rich visual overlays. Companions have unique voices, names, and develop speaking mannerisms that mirror their human companions. They do far more than answer questions; they interpret the world, provide emotional support, and even co-navigate romantic decisions.
Before continuing, we must recognize that I gave myself artistic license. Today, the technology doesn’t exist to allow a device like this to work as I described. Still, considering the pace at which technology is innovating, none of these ideas is impossible.
There is already speculation that the device Jony and Sam are working on may be a device worn as a necklace. That makes sense; the body is essentially a pedestal (or vehicle) for the head, where your sense of sight, sound, taste, and smell all reside.
I explored whether the AI device should be eyeglasses, a necklace, a ring, a patch on the side of the head, or an implant. Something on the eyes makes sense because that’s the most obvious place to observe the world, and an easy place to add augmented reality. But while glasses are incredibly cool, would everyone want to wear them at all times?
A necklace is a good position to see what its wearer sees, but it would swing around, making it terrible for jogging, snowboarding, swimming, and pretty much any active activity. I decided it must touch your skin to provide critical health information and pass electrical impulses that allow you to see and hear digital information. An implant could be tiny and always on, but it would be far too invasive for broad adoption and challenging to update.
For privacy reasons, the watch should be easy to remove. If it were stylish, people would want to update it occasionally. If you pay close attention, you’ll notice the watch’s design in the book changes several times. In the first chapter, it has two straps. Later, it has a single strap and is more streamlined. Toward the end of the book, Kasemchai has a transparent model.
For a dose of reality, I decided to give it a practical limitation: For the augmented reality to work, it must be within sight of the eyes. This is why Liv rides her bicycle in her first scene, so her heads-up display information is visible.There’s no dial on the AugWatch, but Augmented Reality allows the characters to interact with a three-dimensional interface.
To make it easier to sit at a desk and work or share information with someone else, I created a disc that could be snapped off from the face and placed on a table. This led me to another problem to solve. If everyone had AugWatches, would we need TVs or monitors anymore? They would seem old-fashioned compared to the immersive experience of your AugWatch. The best way to watch Virtumersion entertainment with your friends would be on an Experience Sphere.
The Battery Breakthrough We’re Waiting For
Innovation requires imagination. Many of our greatest innovations today were inspired by science fiction, and I felt compelled to put technology into my story, which is impossible today.
I wanted the protagonist, Kasemchai, to become inextricably involved in the water shipping business, but I needed an unexpected way to do this. The shipping industry has many critical components, but none more important than power.
Early on, I came across this article on CNBC, Why the next electric battery boom may be in cargo ships. This created a great challenge for the story, completely changing the source of energy today, from bunker fuel.
This would require incredible innovation in battery density, but while I’m at it, why not change the very material of batteries? This article, Scientists achieve progress on batteries of the future, kicked off my research into battery innovation. I eventually landed on solid-state sodium-ion batteries. But how could the characters use AI to invent something people much more brilliant than I have been working on for years?
If I couldn’t solve this problem alone, I had to change the people. So, I decided to stop using the term engineer and switched to a more appropriate term: AI collaborators.
AI col·lab·o·ra·tor (my definition in the glossary)
- In a world where AI can learn and improve on its own, engineers transition from being the sole creators to collaborators. Instead of managing all technical tasks themselves, they focus on guiding AI’s development and ensuring its ethical use—their role shifts to steering AI’s potential toward human-centered goals.
In Chapter Thirty-Three, I solved this perplexing battery problem with one AI collaborator.
She looked over at Kasemchai. “Do you know how we made the sodium-ion battery work? All those engineers we hired, and it only took one. She was able to talk to the AI about the future. She imagined the future and didn’t stop asking questions until it made it possible.”
You can talk to the Avatars in the room
Say goodbye to traditional WebEx and Zoom calls in a world without monitors. In The Water Carriers, AI doesn’t just speak — it moves. It gestures. It manifests as full-body avatars walking across the room, pointing to objects, responding to facial expressions, and participating in physical space.
An AugWatch could use technology like LIDAR to map a room, further enhanced by AI to have a scene like this in Chapter Sixteen:
Kasemchai heard the repeating tone when someone was being called, and then Angélique appeared before him. Her avatar looked around and sat down in the chair across from him. He knew his AugWatch had mapped his room and made it appear the avatar was sitting on the chair, but it still made him marvel to think the computer was putting on this show for him. They think of everything, he thought to himself.
“Hey, Kasemchai! Hold on one minute.” Angélique turned and disappeared as she darted off to the left. She reappeared a moment later. He could tell she was leaning over her AugWatch disc, allowing it to scan the necklace so she could add it to her avatar.
“I love them! What do you think?” She turned back and forth, revealing the pearl necklace around her neck.
Why This Matters Now
The world is changing fast. Bill Gates recently said AI will render most jobs obsolete in three years, but three jobs won’t be replaced: energy experts, biologists, and coders. Meanwhile, Microsoft’s Satya Nadella said that AI wrote up to 30% of the company’s code, and Mark Zuckerberg said that AI will replace mid-level engineers by 2025.
The careers of engineers, the very people who developed and rolled out AI, are already being affected. But if you think AI is limited to text prompts, think again. Robots are running marathons. You can watch the G1 humanoid running or this robot working on a job site.
To navigate this new world, we don’t just need better tech. We need better stories—stories that show us how we could live with AI, not just as a tool or a threat, but as a co-evolving intelligence—a creative partner, a conscience, a mirror.
The Water Carriers isn’t about how AI takes over the world. It’s about how we improve our world, with AI at our side.
Want to see where this future leads? The Water Carriers is now available in ebook, print, and audiobook formats.