Conscious

by Vic Grout

  “So, this S = 0.904; what’s that all about?” asked Larry, squinting at the display.

  “Means It’s getting pretty bloody clever,” Andy answered. Aisha shook her head with good-humoured exasperation. Her anticipated recovery was still a release to her.

  In addition to Larry and Scott, there were twenty or so OI staff in the room – the largest on the floor. About half were technicians, in protective clothing, trying to battle ongoing RFS incidents. The remainder appeared to be skilled networkers and answered directly to Larry and Scott. Between the four of them, The Desk described, to their new audience, their use of the S Parameter in approximating brain activity in the powered Internet. They described the ‘natural birth’ of ‘It’ from the neural complexity of Its physical substrate, its acquisition of a control imperative and Its gradual mastery of various communication channels – wired and wireless. It was a rushed, imperfect – in places, superficial – explanation but Larry and Scott were obviously no fools. Within a few minutes, they were nodding their basic understanding.

  “So,” Scott attempted to summarise, “above 0.5 means ‘It’ is conscious and 0.75 means Its up there with a human brain?”

  “Sort of,” agreed Aisha reluctantly.

  “So what’s 0.904 then?”

  Aisha shook her head. I really do not know,” she admitted.

  “It’s trouble,” suggested Andy.

  “So where’s it heading? Towards 1? Can It go beyond that? They all looked quickly at Jenny, who shook her head.

  “No, it’s a ratio; one formula divided by another: the top can’t get larger than the bottom. It can’t go beyond 1. I don’t really understand how It’s getting this close but, anyway, It has to be stopped. It might eventually damage Itself to the extent that It does the job for us but we can’t wait for that: there might be no-one around to see it! It’s too powerful to be left any longer. And It’s killed so many people.”

  Bob had continued to take readings from Hattie. He began by tuning out various frequencies on her ‘scopes, then reset some parameters to focus back on Its noise. Within a few minutes, he had managed to transfer a large amount of data to one of the lab workstations and processed the results to get a display of the aggregate. He and Jenny whistled – almost in unison – at the image. The change from the last time they had looked at this particular detail was striking: there was so much more uniformity to the structures.

  “Wow!” Jenny gasped. “Are all those frames part of Its noise? That’s all Its doing? Practically all of Its noise is now properly structured, isn’t it? The spikes have almost gone. It’s like It’s learned how to use Its brain properly!”

  “Seems that way,” agreed Bob. “And Its noise is now accounting for something like half of all the data that’s being carried by the underlying links. It’s a miracle that any of our stuff is getting through at all!”

  “Not a lot is, really,” Scott interjected, scanning traffic figures on a different screen.

  “But there’s more,” Bob continued, peering ever closer at the frame structures. “Look at this.” He jabbed a finger at various sections of the display. “Some of these aren’t even real protocols: not human protocols, anyway.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, look at these here: these are fine. This is an ATM cell; that frame’s Ethernet. That makes sense. It’s just hijacking the protocols we’ve designed to send Its brain signals around.” Bob pointed to a different group. “But these aren’t anything we’ve designed; they’re complete frames so they must be doing something but I couldn’t even tell you what: I guess they’ve come from Its learning how to use the underlying hardware for Itself!”

  “Right, we’ve got to switch It off; simple as that!” barked Jenny.

  As well as she could, she outlined her disconnection model to the whole team. It took about ten minutes from start to finish. Eventually, she arrived at a conclusion.

  “So, once I know the complete global topology,” she summarised, “I’ll be able to calculate a cut-set of major nodes. Except, it won’t really be a cut-set in the true sense because it won’t break It completely into disjoint parts: that’s impossible now with Its wireless capabilities. So let’s call it a ‘disconnect-set’ that’ll be ‘good enough’. We’ll build in a margin of error in case not everything goes to plan then we’ll work out which of the really big world nodes have to be permanently removed so that Its essential complexity – Its level of connectivity – is brought down below the critical level where It loses Its consciousness. At that point, ‘It’ should be no more.”

  “And all the PDN will disappear?” suggested Larry.

  “Yes, no more noise,” agreed Jenny.

  “And there won’t be any RFS?” asked Scott.

  “Correct; no more weird stuff,” confirmed Bob.

  Larry waved an arm around the room and towards the lab door, as if to indicate the whole of the OI complex.

  “And will this be one of the disconnect-set nodes?”

  “Bloody Hell! I hadn’t thought of that!”

  *

  It was lunchtime and The Desk had returned – very reluctantly – to the canteen. Their sudden realisation that the disconnect-set might include the OI itself had caused another delay. Although the possibility appeared to have been anticipated to a great extent by Larry and Scott, further ‘advice and guidance’ had had to be sought from a higher authority. After a brief meal, Andy took Aisha for a walk in the corridors; Jenny and Bob were left to speculate.

  “So, have you even worked out where we are yet?” asked Jenny, with exasperation.

  “Well, sort of,” Bob grimaced. “It’s hard to be precise but, looking at some of the network maps – and what we’re connected to here, we’re obviously somewhere in or around the Nevada Desert. My US geography doesn’t really stretch much further than that anyway so that’s probably all I need to know!”

  “Area 51, maybe?”

  “I doubt it’s anything to do with Area 51 explicitly; although I guess you could argue that that’s acting as a distraction from this. In the modern IoE world, I’d say what’s happening here is probably more important – and more secret – than what’s happening there. Times have changed: information’s more powerful than planes these days – Andy’s ‘technocapitalism’ again!” He smiled and changed topic. “So anyway, as an expert algorithmist, what would you say was the likelihood of the disconnect-set including this place?”

  Jenny considered for a moment. “I think you may have answered your own question just before you asked it,” she chuckled. “This is probably the biggest Internet node in the world – in real terms – even if it officially doesn’t exist. Even its ‘normal’ traffic looks massive; but it’s probably even more when it acts as a surveillance and control centre. Depending on the topology of any given network, the optimal cut-set isn’t always simply the largest so many nodes; but it tends to include most of the top ones – the bigger the more likely.”

  “So what would happen if you were told that the set couldn’t include a given node?”

  “Well, first of all, it would make a solution harder to find in the first place. The heuristics of the solving algorithm would be more complicated. In fact – depending on how the constraints were applied, you might not be able to guarantee you had the ideal solution at all: it would be more of a guess.”

  “So, it might not work?”

  “No, it would work; but it might not be the best – the smallest – set you could find: there might be an easier way of doing it. But, almost without doubt, it would be larger than the optimal set, if there were no constraints, anyway. So, it would be both bigger and slightly more unreliable.”

  “Which, would made it harder to actually implement, I suppose? More nodes to close down, would mean more work across the world.”

  “Well yes, of course, and we haven’t even discussed how we’re going to do that for real. Stephen had to give remote orders, back in Brussels, for the Berlin and Madrid nodes to
be physically disconnected and unplugged. I’ve no idea how we might get that done for what might be a few dozen nodes, particularly as it’s getting harder to communicate with anyone anywhere else.”

  Chapter 27: Downs

  Larry and Scott reappeared in the canteen with Don Bell and Jerry Austin. Their uninviting smiles suggested that a decision had been reached by someone – somewhere. Jenny felt she could predict the outcome.

  “Let me guess,” she began. “We’re not going to be able to include this place – the OI – in the disconnect-set; correct?”

  Jerry glanced at Don and answered – it appeared, somewhat reluctantly, “That’s partially correct, guys, yes.”

  “Partially correct?”

  “Partially correct, yes. You’ll be given the topological Internet information you need so you can perform the necessary calculations. However, you cannot include this facility, or seven others also of strategic global importance, in your disconnect-set.”

  “Can you do this?” asked Don in a very matter-of-fact manner as Jenny opened her eyes wide.

  She hesitated; in truth, she did not know. “Er, perhaps,” she began, thinking as she spoke. “Yes, probably. But, if we can’t take out the largest nodes, it will almost certainly be a bigger disconnect-set of smaller ones, which will make it harder to implement; and it’ll take me longer to work out in the first place.”

  “Perfect,” Don began, then added hastily, “Perfect that you can do this for us, I mean.” He regained some composure. “Unfortunately, I also have to inform you of some other restrictions.”

  “Go on.”

  “I must insist that you focus on calculating only the larger disconnect-set without these eight nodes. You must never produce such a set with them included; this smaller set is not even to be calculated. Is this understood?”

  “Why?”

  “There would be a significant security problem if such data were to find its way into the wrong hands,” Don said in a very level voice. “Such information would be hugely valuable to those not sharing our common objectives.” He stared directly at the opposite wall as he said this, looking at no-one. “I cannot allow such material to even exist, let alone leave these premises. I repeat: is that understood?”

  “Yes, OK, of course: if you don’t want the optimal set, we won’t go looking for it.”

  Don’s forced smile returned. “Good.” He motioned with his head towards Larry and Scott. “Anyways, there will always be someone with you in future to ensure you are working, ah, … correctly, shall we say?”

  *

  They returned to the foyer area, ready to ascend to the OI level, meeting Andy and Aisha, emerging from another corridor, as they approached the lift. Andy looked somewhere between troubled and deep in thought. Bob was reminded of early that morning.

  “We couldn’t get this to work before,” he declared, nodding at the lift.

  “No, probably not,” Larry agreed. “Between midnight and 8am, the accommodation elevator can only be used with a special access pass. Other than that, it works for everyone.”

  “What about the other two on the floor above?” asked Jenny.

  “Those require very special passes,” laughed Scott. “One goes to the VIP floor below this one.” He stopped, appearing to consider he may have offended them. “We hardly ever use that floor,” he added hastily; and we thought you guys would like to be more like one of us!”

  “It’s OK, we’re not snobs,” grunted Andy. “And the other one?”

  “Ah, that goes a lot further down.”

  “To the nuclear bunker?”

  Don maintained his forced smile. “Very perceptive, sir,” he said quietly.

  Aisha felt Andy give her hand a sudden, hard squeeze; it felt almost like a caution. A second later, he spoke.

  “I need to get Aisha out of here for a bit,” he began unexpectedly, with a more apologetic tone to his voice than before. “She’s not well: she needs proper exercise. I don’t mean here, in this place, all the artificial lights and the air-conditioning – and the bloody RFS; I mean in the open air: fresh air – daylight – away from it all. And I need a beer – a proper beer, not a tinned one – in the sunshine!”

  Jenny and Bob looked with astonishment at their alcoholic friend; however, there was a warning in his eyes, so they held their tongues. Aisha was similarly taken aback, and certainly felt she needed no such break, but she heeded the message in his grip and said nothing. What on earth was he up to?

  Don bit his lip. “That’s not going to be possible, guys,” he sighed.

  “Why not?” asked Andy quickly. He seemed to have planned this. “We’re not prisoners here, are we?” The term appeared to unnerve Don. His response was equally rapid.

  “No, guys; of course not! You’re guests, not prisoners.” There was then just the slightest hesitation. “It’s just that we need you here. We need your expertise, your experience, your guidance and advice. We might need to call on you at any time.”

  “Surely, you don’t need all of us, all the time?”

  “Maybe not,” Don conceded, “but I guess we have to make sure you don’t all go off somewhere at the same time.” There was a clear touch of invention to some of this, The Desk felt. He changed approach quickly. “Anyways, we don’t allow people – even our own guys – to go out through the ‘Look Out’ during daylight hours.

  “Fine,” agreed Andy. “We don’t all want to go, and we don’t want to go out of the Look Out.”

  “So, what do you want?”

  “Aisha and I want to go back through the tunnel; then back to that wee town we passed through – to a bar we saw there. She needs to sit in the open air and I need a draught beer.”

  “Say what?”

  “You heard me. We want to go into town for an hour or two, then come back.”

  *

  Five minutes later, to Jenny’s utter disgust, they were back in the canteen. Don and his team had disappeared to somewhere unknown to discuss the strange request.

  “What the hell are you playing at?” she hissed at Andy. “We’re trying to do a job here!”

  Andy looked at her calmly. “I don’t think we’re here to do any sort of job, at all,” he replied. “I’m not sure what we are here for but they seem to be doing everything they can to delay switching It off, don’t you think? No work last night, showing us around everything this morning, then apparently having to discuss something they already knew? They’re not exactly in a hurry, are they? I think they’re just trying to keep us here so they can keep an eye on us.”

  “Why would they want to do that?”

  “I’m not sure, to be honest, but that’s what I think’s going on. Trust me; I’m calling their bluff.”

  Jenny glared but said nothing.

  After half an hour, Don, Jerry, Scott and Larry reappeared, Don looking cheerful once more, Jerry less so. Don held two electronic security passes.

  “OK guys, we can do this,” he announced cheerfully. Andy could not entirely hide his surprise: this was not what he had expected to hear.

  “Good,” he answered, as naturally as he could. “Thank you.”

  “So guys,” Don explained, holding up the cards, “We’ve devised a system specially for you! These passes will let two of you, at a time, past all the security checks you need to get from the OI level through the northeast tunnel to the entry point. We’ll take biometrics from all four of you but, so long as there’s a match for any two of you at the checkpoints, you’ll be let through if you’ve got these passes. For today, we’ve arranged drivers for the buggies in both directions along the tunnel. And, when you get to the entry point, there’ll be a guy from the town waiting to take you in for a beer. I hope that’s OK?” There was an unmistakeably acerbic tone to the last part.

  Andy forced a smile. “Aye, that’s really kind. Thanks again,” he said.

  Don was as good as his word. They all returned to the OI level and were taken to one of the smaller rooms on the side of the ‘
H’. The Desk had fingerprints and breath samples taken. Retina scanning technology was clearly visible but Don and Jerry seemed to have some consideration for Aisha in avoiding its use. When everyone had been processed, Jenny and Bob hurried off to the main control room with Scott and Larry, and Aisha and Andy were guided, by Don and Jerry, back across the OI to the end of the tunnel. Here they were shown where to insert their security passes and place their hands to have their fingerprints checked. They also stood, motionless as directed, as further scanning equipment took samples of their breath. After a delay of about two seconds, the door opened and Don indicated for them to enter. He and Jerry remained outside as the door reclosed.

  On stepping into the tunnel’s end dome, they were met by two uniformed soldiers – one male, one female – with a buggy set up and ready to go. The security checks were repeated once more by the two guards at the end of the walkways; another two-second delay was followed by permission to proceed. Their escorts politely motioned for them to climb into the rear seats and they set off without further ceremony. The remaining guards and technicians had plenty of RFS issues to deal with without additional distraction.

  They quickly reached full speed and raced down one side of the tunnel’s newly assigned one-way system. Both were still suffering extreme fatigue and dozed regularly for short intervals between being woken by the occasional scraping of the buggy against the wall or barrier. In the passing of fifty minutes or so, only two words passed between them: early in the journey, Aisha squeezed Andy’s hand affectionately, turned sightlessly towards him, and asked:

  “Feeling silly?”

  *

  ‘Beep’ S = 0.905

  Jenny and Bob were back in the main lab, working on the ‘European Theory’. Scott and Larry remained to assist – or observe – depending on how Don’s instructions were to be interpreted. Between them, they had achieved some measure of common understanding. They now sat, peering at a complex network map on the largest of the display screens. On a smaller side panel, a dynamically-changing spreadsheet of node and traffic figures called for their attention from time to time. Irregularly, they turned from one to the other. They had been given the global Internet topology. It was mid-afternoon.