“Well, Atlas has always held executive control over most of the functions that direct the operation of Otherlife. Its existence is not common knowledge. Few of my engineers are aware that there is a potential sentience hidden inside the network. Should it achieve self-awareness, it would make it infinitely more difficult to direct it according to our preordained specifications, but as long as the original safeguards that limit its operation remain in place, it will matter very little whether Atlas resisted commands. The worst-case scenario is that it would cooperate unwillingly. This would, of course, make our own work nearly impossible, as we require full cooperation of the network pathways to learn how to reverse the flow of information to and from users’ minds. As you rightly point out, our time is literally running out as long as this stimulus that has accelerated Atlas’s awareness continues to exist. The best course of action would be to remove this stimulus, thus allowing us a little more time.”
Tanner nodded. “What if I told you, Ms. Fay, that this external stimulus you speak of is a person?”
“A person?” Marion Fay echoed. “A user, maybe? No, that would not make any sense. The level of interaction with the Atlas subroutines must be deeper, much more complex. A programmer, then?”
“An artist,” Tanner corrected. “Or so his file says. His name is Aaron Blake. I was hoping to get your input on how his sudden interaction with the system might have triggered this.”
Fay considered. “Well, there’s always the possibility that Atlas is modifying its network to emulate the structure of a real mind. Perhaps one or more characteristics in the mind of this individual are particularly consonant with Atlas’s own underlying architecture. If they are, however, they would be extremely complex. Nearly impossible to analyze or reproduce.”
“I expected you would say that. Now, let’s consider the scenario where I remove this stimulus from Atlas. If I do so right now and ensure that the contact will never be repeated, will it stop Atlas from reaching full awareness?”
“Oh, most definitely,” Fay told him with confidence. “In fact, even with the presence of this user mind you speak of, I cannot begin to imagine how Atlas would make the jump from a collection of programs and monitoring subroutines to a single entity with a driving will and personality that is also able to circumvent the locks that limit its functions. The software in those safeguards is even more advanced than the one driving Atlas itself. One would have to physically remove the drives that contain these lockdown programs from the main network in order to disable the restrictions on Atlas’s artificial intelligence, and that is only an option in the case where those programs are not fully integrated into the greater architecture of the network. If they are, then there is no way for a single person to free Atlas, so to speak. I just don’t see how. I suppose Atlas could attempt to assemble additional higher functions out of the collection of information provided by the users currently available to it via Otherlife, but the process would take a very long time and probably not be successful. A far easier way would be simply to perform subsumption of a catalyst mind in some way…. I’m sorry. I’m only theorizing here.”
Tanner nodded thoughtfully. “Excellent. I appreciate your input. While this emergency solves itself and I find a way to ensure that our catalyst is removed from the equation, I wish for you and your team to direct your efforts to stopping the increasing complexity in Atlas’s network. Keep only one or two members working on the Linker project, but until this crisis is resolved and we reach stability once more, I want everybody focused on keeping Atlas under control. I expect daily updates. Understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
Tanner dismissed her with a gesture. Fay seemed relieved to be allowed to go back to her lab. He watched her go, thinking about what she had said. Despite her lack of assertiveness, she was a brilliant scientist, and her insight was always helpful.
There was a discreet knock on a door as soon as Tanner was alone. The sound came from a small door, cleverly concealed underneath the old portrait set on the wall.
Tanner pressed a button, and the door opened. A slender, dangerous-looking woman stepped out of the shadows and headed for his desk.
“Did you hear all that?” Tanner asked her casually.
“Yes,” the woman said. “Not that I understood much of it. Was that why you called me?”
“Please, have a seat,” Tanner said, standing up and gesturing to the seat that Marion Fay had recently vacated.
Diana Herrera narrowed her eyes suspiciously and set a hand on her hip. “I won’t be staying long. Just tell me what you need me to do.”
Tanner nodded and remained standing as well. One of the things he valued most about Diana was the fact that she never let her guard down. Not even with her employer.
“Will your Trackers be ready today in case I need you to cut a few loose ends?” Tanner asked her.
Diana nodded stiffly. “My boys are on standby. Just give us the target, and we’ll track it down and eliminate it if you want us to. Will it be that woman who just left?”
Tanner shook his head. “No. Not at all. She’s a valuable member of my team, one of the few people who know the full extent of what I plan on doing. As long as she has unlimited budget to do her research, she is happy, and so am I. I actually called you to talk about somebody else. A young art student. At the moment, I would like you and your Trackers to keep tabs on him, tell me what he does and who he sees. Scout out likely locations to take him out later without arousing too much suspicion.”
“Who is he?”
Tanner hit the surface of his desk, and a screen flickered to life, showing biometric data and several pictures of a man.
“Aaron Blake, formerly enrolled in the Visual Arts department of the University of Aurora. A few hours ago he logged into Otherlife illegally and had a rather significant interaction with an element of our network architecture. It could have unforeseen repercussions on the experience of our user base, or even change the entire simulation structure from the way it is now.”
Diana Herrera remained unimpressed. “Is that supposed to mean something?”
Tanner sighed. “I forget you have never tried Otherlife, Diana. Even though I’ve given you a free lifetime subscription.”
She chuckled, shaking her head. Her short glossy black hair caught the light from the lamps nicely. Not for the first time, Tanner felt a stirring of interest for her. “The day I accept something for free from you is a day you think of me as another employee, Richard. I’ve seen how you treat your employees. No, thank you.”
“Well, my offer still stands. It’s not important that you understand the monumental advances that this boy could be ushering in to the entire Otherlife paradigm, if we could replicate the unbelievably realistic simulation he was able to make while inside the system. When considered from a purely economic point of view, such a new level of realism would make me the richest person on the planet, and probably the most important one as long as I control Otherlife as I do now.”
“Sounds like a win-win to me,” Diana said, casually looking over the information on Blake displayed on the screen. Tanner knew that she was already memorizing data. She was the best mercenary in Aurora for a reason, after all. “Are you afraid that he will sell your secrets to somebody else? Is that why we’re going to track him?”
Tanner laughed. “Not at all. Even if he wanted to sell something, the technology we have is unique. No other city in the world has anything even remotely resembling it, and our own science is decades if not hundreds of years away from reaching the level of development during which the basis for Otherlife was created. I’m concerned that this boy will do something internally, in fact. Within the system itself. Let’s just say I don’t want him connecting again unless I am supervising it closely.”
Diana blinked. “How am I supposed to track him if he will be doing his suspicious activities inside your damn system?”
“You won’t have to. He’s coming here in a few hours. You can track him as soon as he leaves this building.”
Diana arched an eyebrow. “How so?”
Tanner sighed and rubbed his temples.
“Because, somehow, someway,
somebody
forwarded the log of Aaron Blake’s illegal login session to our Legal Department. I intended to keep it secret, or at least as secret as possible, but now too many people know. He was summoned to CradleCorp as per standard protocol. Legal threatened him with arrest and a possible trial, and they are confident he will come in the morning. They will offer him the usual settlement, and the most likely outcome is that Blake will accept to work for us for a little while to pay off his debt.”
“Sounds like it would be good for you. If you have the kid working here, then it will be easier to monitor his activity.”
“Yes, but it also makes it even more likely that he will connect to Otherlife again, unsupervised, and the consequences could be catastrophic. I wanted to get rid of him quietly, but now it cannot be done. If Blake disappears after having been threatened by our Legal Department, we will have a PR nightmare to deal with. This is why, for the time being, I just want him tracked. I will want him eliminated sooner or later, but first I need a good excuse. You are to stand at the ready with your men so when I give the order it can be done.”
Herrera nodded in the direction of Blake’s picture, still hovering between them and labeled “Aaron Blake.” “For such a young kid, he’s sure got you scared, Richard. It’s been a while since I’ve seen you this worked up over anyone.”
“Just do your job,” Tanner snapped. “The rest is none of your business.”
Diana rolled her eyes. “As you wish. Just send that information on this boy over to me, and we’ll begin tracking him. If you want anything else done, you know how to contact me. I expect the first half of the payment to be in my legal bank account by tomorrow morning, as usual.”
“I already have transferred the money,” Tanner said. “I will contact you when I need you to do anything… drastic.”
“Okay.”
“One more thing, Diana,” Tanner said. “It’s nice to see you again.”
His eyes appraised her earnestly, alight with an unspoken invitation. Herrera’s gaze lingered on him. Herrera liked power, as Tanner knew all too well. Business came first, though, as usual. And until this job was done, Tanner was all but certain there would be nothing else in her mind.
Diana Herrera didn’t say good-bye. She simply left by the concealed entrance she had used to get in. Tanner watched her go, and as soon as he was alone, he closed his eyes and leaned back in his chair.
He had been livid when he had found out that someone had forwarded Blake’s illegal login information to Legal, and he still was upset. He had been careful. None of the people who knew about the strange interaction between Blake and Atlas could have shared the information. Tanner had verified that personally. That only left one option, though, and the implications of it were scary.
If no person had forwarded the data, then it had been the machine itself. Atlas
wanted
Blake to come back to CradleCorp, to force him back, and it had been acting on its own.
Almost as if it were already self-aware.
IT MUST
have been the heat in his room that triggered the dream. Barrow knew he was asleep, but as usual he was forced to go through each moment of the horrible recollection, reliving the distorted echoes of images and sounds that came to haunt him every time he had the nightmare.
It was night in the dream and unbearably hot because of the fire. Somebody was screaming. Barrow was crawling through a narrow tunnel, desperately trying to get there and help, to do something, to answer the cries before it was too late. He couldn’t go more quickly, though. It was a nightmare precisely because he never could. The tunnel was long, too long, and soon it transformed into a ventilation shaft that still had no end no matter how much he hurried. The metal amplified the sounds of his passing and, of course, the ragged voices. The screams coming his way intensified, and it was not just one person screaming now that he was closer but several people, and every now and then a couple of the voices would call his name.
Barrow found himself suddenly at an intersection in the constricted space and looked all over for the way forward. There was nothing to see except gray fog that choked him, coming from everywhere at once, limiting his motion, making him go even more slowly than before. One hand was stretched out before him to feel the way. He took a right turn blindly. It turned out to be the right choice.
It was hotter here, the metal plates under his hands scalding. Now the fog was turning to smoke, and he was choking on it, coughing, eyes watering and the unbearable heat threatening to make him pass out or back away, but he couldn’t give up because he knew those two screams were for him, and if he didn’t go and save them, then nobody would go. He crawled around a corner, stumbling, and the screams were abruptly cut off. He was no longer in the shaft but standing on top of a building, looking at the fire raging below. He saw a window explode in a deadly shower of glass shards propelled by superheated air. There was a deep, low rumbling in the ground, and at first he thought it was an earthquake, and he remembered his mother’s voice telling him Aurora was earthquake territory, not as bad as ruined LA, but you could still feel them every so often….
Barrow looked down. He was floating in midair, motionless and helpless to go back down. The ground was very far below, and it was dark, so dark—and then he looked up and it was black, the smoke engulfing him again, the sensation of oppression stronger than before. There were no screams anymore, only retching coughs coming from somewhere very close, and then he stopped. He was back in the ventilation shaft. His hand touched something incongruously cool and smooth. It was in his way, and it was very, very heavy. He pushed against it, desperate to get to the other side, hearing the pleas for help that were little more than whispers now, breathing in the fumes, his hands slippery with his own sweat. It wouldn’t budge. It never did, and in his dreams it was even worse because the slab of concrete seemed to grow heavier and heavier the more he pushed against it until it began to fall under its own terrible weight, threatening to crush him underneath it. There was no way out, no way to turn around even if he wanted to. The slab was pressing down on his back now, pinning him in the heat and the death of the flames.