The arms race
As Vinod began to believe that his circumstances showed he was meant for something greater and that he was always meant to bring about a better world, Vinod anonymously sends the blueprints for upload technology to six nations and their military intelligence agencies with "top cyber", the nations being the United States, United Kingdom, Israel, China, Russia, and Iran, as he knew they'd keep it a secret since he also "knew" that if humanity learned of the existence of Uploaded Intelligence, they would all be exterminated out of fear; humanity not taking the time to understand. Vinod builds a new world for them, a place they can live in "beyond the cages that were built for them". In a full VR previsualization of Ajit Prasad's tower he found in Alliance Telecom's files that he lives in with the Clan, Vinod switches a picture of the Prasad family to a picture of himself and his mother, out of remorse. Vinod tells the Clan that in the new world he's building, there will be "no one to hurt" and "no one to hurt them", with the goal of focusing on a future where he isn't alone and where the soon-to-be UIs made in the arms race he begins can live peacefully and freely. One of the Clan starts to glitch and degrade, leading Vinod to hold a funeral for the being. Just as Vinod wraps the deceased in linen and sets him afloat, Vinod gets another call from his mother, whom Laurie Lowell approached. She asks him if he's busy with work, to which he responds with a "yes" or if he's on a lunch date with Laurie, much to Vinod's confusion. He tells his mother that he needs her to leave Mumbai for her safety, in spite of that.
To find out more about her, Vinod looks for the IP address where the call she gave his mother came from and goes for her. At Laurie and David Kim's server, Vinod enters aggressively, thinking that he is at the Pentagon; he tells Laurie her call to his mother was something he took as a threat, though she didn't remember calling her or not. While Cody, Laurie's husband, tells her not to engage, Vinod overclocks so he can hold a private conversation with Laurie and David, both of whom he learns were uploaded by Logorhythms- not the Pentagon, and that the two couldn't afford to overclock like he did, as he didn't know about the flaw. David tells him he can't be trusted due to his murder of the Prasads, but Chanda tells him that he can explain why. He also tells Laurie and David that before he met them, he thought he was alone- so alone.
Upon fully logging in to Laurie and David's server, Laurie and David enter his tower and learn about how Vinod was uploaded while conscious. Vinod tells David the reason he killed Ajit Prasad and his family. He states that he had to prevent Prasad from doing this to anyone else. But he states he killed the family out of spite because he had difficulty controlling his anger ever since he was young, and that he took up boxing to help with it. And that ever since he lost his body, he didn't have a viable means of releasing his anger- which was what he described as an "infinite scream, at maximum volume." When Laurie and David meet the Clan, Vinod tells them he didn't make them in response to David trying to prevent Vinod from "doing this to anyone else". When Laurie realizes that the Clan is in the late stages of the flaw, Vinod learns about it and is shown files on Caspian Keyes. Upon meeting Caspian, Vinod shows no faith that Caspian could solve it because of how many years a UI could last and how according to the psych models, Caspian could solve it in 13 years. When Vinod tries to leave and warn the others, Maddie Kim questions him about what he meant by "others." Vinod threatens to "tear this place apart" unless they open the network port. Laurie asks Vinod who he meant by "they" when she asked him about other UIs, only for Vinod to respond by telling Laurie he told her he thought he was alone. David tells him that while he wanted to prevent more situations like his uploading from happening to anyone else, he sent the UI technology to someone else, leading Vinod to reveal that he sent the technology to the United States, United Kingdom, Israel, China, Russia, and Iran, with the intent of starting an arms race so that they can upload their top minds and let them go rogue, knowing that their rivals had the same technology. Vinod explains his plan to Laurie and David: As he believes that Prasad "chose" him to keep working; with his job being to write technology patents and to daydream about a world yet to come, he found purpose in that, and with the new UIs, he wants to "show them another way", lead them to the new world he's built and show them that they are now above humanity; "gods" in Vinod's words. David tells him that he didn't know about the flaw and that like so many "gods" before them, they will die from it, along with the human casualties from what Vinod's done.