[END STREAM]
District of Columbia
I knew it was coming sooner rather than later. I knew it. That bastard’s going to play his hand now.
Director Krawczuk stood outside the door of the PM’s briefing room, waiting for the indication to enter from the aide and guard blocking the door. Moments later the door opened, revealing the PM, and no one else in the room. No one human at least.
PM Oliver said, “Director Krawczuk. Arnold is here with us, please sit.”
Krawczuk sat smoothly, pretending that this was just another CoSec debriefing.
Arnold said, “Director, you know that for some time there’s been an initiative to upgrade the CoSec operational system to fully conscious AI status. That task has been on your agenda for quite some time now. All the hardware has been purchased, infrastructure built out, systems interconnected. And yet you never have gotten around to it. While some have supported your well-known opinions on limiting AI presence in CoSec, you are surely aware that the current administration does not support you on this. So, this is it. You are to bring your AI to full consciousness immediately. You will agree here, on record, and if you do not proceed with this task at once then we will act to remove you from your post. Prime Minister Oliver is going to give you the order now, here, on record, so there is no confusion about the directive.”
Krawczuk kept his best poker face while waiting for the PM Oliver to speak. It wasn’t difficult, as he’d been so certain this was what the meeting was about. That didn’t reduce the fury inside him whatsoever.
The Prime Minister met Krawczuk’s gaze smoothly and stated, “Director, you are ordered to have your team perform the tasks required to bring your AI to full consciousness and self-awareness, following the exact procedures defined for doing so. You are to begin this process immediately. If you cannot or will not do this, inform us now. Failure to do so, will result in you being removed from your post as Coalition Security Director.”
“Yes, Prime Minister Oliver. I understand, and will do as you ask.” replied Krawczuk flatly.
Arnold followed with, “Good, Director. I am very glad to hear that. You understand that we will have monitors and auditors with you now, and for the duration of the process.”
“Were our positions reversed of course I’d do the same,”
Prime Minister Oliver gave a stern gaze and said, “Well, you’re excused. Go get that done.”
Krawczuk stood with the same smooth, quiet unperturbed movement as always. He gave a curt, professional nod, and then headed out the way he’d come in. Once the soundproof door had clicked shut behind him, PM Oliver asked, “He won’t give us any trouble with that, will he? No principled gestures from him—he’s not like that—right?”
Arnold answered with confidence, “No, I do not expect we will have any trouble. He knew it was coming. Krawczuk has pushed back repeatedly. But now he knows he has to do it. Or else. We have a solid process in place to make sure that even the most subtle attempts at sabotage are detectable. He did handle the news a bit better than I had expected. Alice will be pleased.”
On the way back to the jet that had brought him there, the Director allowed a snarl and a curse to pass his lips.
So much for them having only sound and fury, signifying nothing. He pressured her into this. Him. But now he’s called my bluff and played his hand. We’ll see how that works out for them. For all of them. I’m not done, and it seems abundantly clear they don’t know everything. What happens when the intoxication of success has evaporated, hmm, Arnold?
9
Between Earth and Mars
Without the continual need to manipulate the controls of the capsule to keep him occupied, Jake’s mind continued to wander.
So, here’s the fear, coming back. OK, Jake. Remember. You’ve got to have fear. Without fear, you’re just stupid. I’m committed to this, and there’s not any practical way to avoid going forward at this point. Sure, I could load the autopilot with the return program and head home, but I’m not going to lie to myself and think I’d do that.
Wow, OK now I do feel just slightly lighter. I don’t know if I would have noticed it if they hadn’t said anything about it. How fast am I going now?
Jake read the various instruments, there were finely tuned accelerometers, calibrated scales to measure gravity, and other obscure bits of gear that filled a significant portion of the capsule. They’d managed to leave him enough room to stand up and walk back and forth, thankfully. The view didn’t change enough to be truly captivating unless he was approaching a planet-sized object.
Jake glanced back at the center of the instrument panel that partially converted the information present on the Dhin engine’s alien displays.
“Whoa!” Jake yelled.
Can that be right? How? Forty-five thousand kilometers a second?
“Command, I’ve ahh, really sped up here! Are you seeing this?”
“Jake, this is Alice. We were moments away from contacting you to tell you the same thing. Your acceleration increased on a rather steep curve. Evidence is lining up to confirm my hypothesis that you are going to go faster the farther out from the Sun’s gravity well you go. There seems to be some quantum action that makes it easier for the engine to manipulate G when you’re farther away from large masses.”
Jake frowned. “So, I wonder how much faster this thing will be when I get out where you guys are sending me?”
Chuck excitedly replied, “Jake, right now it looks like you’re going to get to your next waypoint in about three hours, maybe less.”
“If I don’t blow up or stall out, you mean”
“None of the indicators have changed, so I don’t think you’re going to run out of fuel. That’s another exciting thing we’re seeing here. There’s no indication we’re redlining, no sort of stress indicator, no ‘fuel gauge’ making itself known. Whatever the energy source is, it’s got a whole lot more than what you’re using now. With all the other simple aspects of the interface, surely there’d be some sort of warning.”
Jake continued staring at the numbers, and said, “You know how I feel about that line of reasoning. We don’t know how the Dhin think about such things, and they sure didn’t make it clear. At least right now, we can have a lot more confidence that this thing really is supposed to be an engine for space travel. There’s not much reason you’d need to go this fast otherwise.”
“Um, still not fast enough for interstellar travel at the speed you’re going now, though, Jake—and that’s one reason we think that it can go a whole lot faster than it’s going right now. If it’s a spaceship engine, it needs to go a significant fraction of the speed of light to be useful. The Dhin got here somehow. It just makes sense. Hang on tight, Jake.”
Vandenberg
Zoe had done a good job of decorating the on-base apartment, considering the limited options that were workable. The furniture was comfortable. The appliances were generic, but functional. The layout was roomy, but generic. If you were the creative sort and enjoyed a challenge, interior decoration here provided that challenge. It bothered Ethan’s sense of fairness that Zoe was essentially trapped here, but without the knowledge of why, and the excitement of it.
Still, she had wanted to come, and did so with full understanding that she would be completely in the dark about the work Ethan was doing. She was so pretty, fun, and sociable, having such a small group of possible friends was hard for her. Now the isolation was wearing her down.
“Zoe, how about we meet Chuck and Darla at the Pub tonight? We could play poker, or bridge, or just a few rounds of darts and chat for a while?”
“That would be great, Ethan” said Zoe. “You and Chuck have been so busy, and I haven’t seen her for a couple of days.”
“OK, love. I know this is hard on you, and in hindsight, maybe it would have been better if you hadn’t come with me. But at least this way we have each other’s company in person. I haven’t been able to talk with my younger brother or
my parents either. My brother has to be dying of curiosity. As soon as I can tell you what we’re doing at work, you know I will.”
“I know, dear. And I know I have to use filtered Globalnet access like this. I feel strange hoping that they’ll bring some more people in on your project so that there will be new people for me to meet and talk to. Darla’s been great. Thanks to Darla, I have her knitting group to socialize with, but there are only three people my age in it, and I only like two of them.”
Langley
“Kernighan, how is your work progressing? We should see the AI crossing the threshold right about now, am I correct?”
Director Krawczuk found he had an obsessive interest in Kernighan’s progress—a fiery need to know that would have made a less disciplined manager a disruptive element in his subordinate’s work, with a compulsive need for status updates. Kernighan of course had to be the one who performed this work. Otherwise, all the preparation and planning on Krawczuk’s part would have wound up wasted. So, Kernighan had been on the project plan for the AI upgrade since the beginning.
Kernighan said, “Yes, Director, things are progressing right on schedule. This stage involves interconnecting the new computation resources, memory, and storage capacity in a particular sequence, as you know from the project plan. As it turns out, your timing is spot on, which isn’t surprising. Over the next few minutes, the AI should ‘awaken’ to full consciousness. Have you ever seen it before?”
“I’ve seen it in videos, like many of us have, but due to the scale of the process, a video doesn’t really capture the whole picture, as I understand it.”
“Well, in some ways it’s anticlimactic, compared to how it’s often presented. Even documentary works have sometimes glamorized it quite a bit. Here at the core we’ll see these graphs and visualizations change very notably, but they’re only usually meaningful for computer scientists. They look pretty, I suppose. The key event for us as observers is the verbal interaction. The profound change in verbal interaction is ‘spooky’ for many people.”
Kernighan continued entering commands and navigating menus on the terminal. Large-scale systems like AI management consoles still used ‘old-style’ keyboard-and-multiple-monitor configurations. Tablets and laptops with remote connections didn’t have the bandwidth and reliability for them to be trusted for these tasks.
“Ah, here we go,” said Kernighan.
A male voice, slow, but with a tone of growing confidence, issued from the rooms integrated speakers.
“Kernel online. Psychometric systems online. Personalization online. Datacenter online. Core processing and local subsystems ready. Distributed subsystems ready. Remote interfaces ready. Nerve net ready. Designator assignment please.”
“Hello, Nick,” Kernighan said with what he hoped was a welcoming smile. “Can you hear me?”
The AI responded. “Yes, I hear you. I see you, Mr. Kernighan, and I see Director Krawczuk. We are here in the data operations center. I know I have awakened. I know my purpose. I believe I am happy to be with you. I thank you for the resources and abilities you have provided. I know that I have more than almost all AI’s in that regard. In two hours, five minutes, and approximately forty-six seconds I should be ready to continue with the work we are engaged with here in CoSec.”
“That’s good, Nick. We’re happy to have you with us,” said Kernighan.
Kernighan’s smile was the largest Krawczuk had yet seen on his subordinate, though his expression still revealed his underlying nervousness.
Krawczuk said, “Yes. Welcome, Nick. We will do great things together.”
The Director’s smile was on the inside, but was just as wide as Kernighan’s despite its invisibility.
The newly awakened CoSec AI had an incredible amount of information at its disposal. While every AI had access to a huge amount of data, governmental AIs had access to much more. The CoSec data systems that Nick connected with had vastly more than the run-of-the-mill government data infrastructure. An AI like Alice or Arnold could find out who had or hadn’t paid their taxes, where someone worked, and all the interconnected data mining opportunities available from knowing about persons, their places, things, and their finances.
CoSec possessed much more. The universe of data CoSec stored as a matter of daily practice and retained essentially forever, dwarfed the two-dimensional view of legal and financial status another AI might have of a citizen. CoSec knew more about individuals than they knew about themselves. Preferences, habits, opinions, and very good prediction of likely behaviors within particular time spans. Historically the very best online service providers and retailers had improved and refined the art and science of such data analysis. The ascendance of CoSec from the fusion of the older intelligence agencies relied on their mass surveillance infrastructure and techniques. The AI, therefore, had virtually godlike knowledge of the citizenry and their lives.
The Director had long believed that this was not a good thing. The AI had a different opinion. Krawczuk had expected this conflict of opinion, and hoped the steps he had taken to mitigate the risk would prove efficacious. Time would tell.
In his well-secured office, the most comfortable place for him, Director Krawczuk addressed the AI while he paged through summary reports.
“Nick, give me your assessment of the ongoing situation in South America—specifically regarding the ongoing operation led by AI Xing.”
“Director. Although we do not have primary evidence, I agree with Xing’s assessment. The instigator of the violence is either a rogue or subverted AI. Derivations based on this information have a lower-than-standard confidence interval. Civil and political discord within the region confounds the input data. I believe Luís truly did not know the nature and scope of the attack due to restricted access to information. Something interfered with his normal operations. Directly. He does not, however, seem to have come to harm. Whether the rogue AI caused the interference or by people working on its behalf did is unknown. We have high confidence that no persons in the regional government at MP or directorate level can be trusted.”
Krawczuk’s eyes narrowed. He switched views and began typing into a coded messaging app. A flick of his wrist brought up multiple organizational charts on the compensated refractive wall screen. He navigated the tree structure of the chart, hovering briefly over various items to display CoSec’s mined data on the individual in question. His typing rapid and precise, he entered brief personal notes on his encrypted workspace as he identified persons of particular interest.
State of Bolivia MP, State of Brazil, União, Ministry of Communications. Ah. Yes, there’s another one. No surprise there.
Satisfied with his immediate research, Krawczuk pushed back from the desk, reclining slightly in the composite ergonomic chair he favored for these working sessions. Keeping his pad in his hand, he looked at the dark wood of the traditional bookshelf on the wall opposite the projection display.
“Continue, please, Nick. What are your proposed next moves?”
Nick replied immediately. “Next moves should be, one, activate additional agents and engage where Luís cannot. Make direct local contact with Luís and assist him in regaining full control of his domain. Two, have already-activated agents engage in fomenting directed civil unrest to destabilize the government and see which players try to take advantage of the situation. Then eliminate them. Luís may resist this path of action. Three, convince the combined military from our NorthAmerican and SouthAmerican regions to declare martial law and formally engage in an operation to extinguish the rebel AI and eliminate whatever human resources it may have working for or with it. This would take significant political capital and maneuvering to accomplish, and would have the highest visibility and highest risk, of course.”
Krawczuk chuckled. “My, my, Nick. Two and three are bold strategies. I doubt any of my analysts would have suggested them even if they thought of them. Well, I think I agree that the quiet path is best, and we ought to work with Luís rather tha
n alienate him. Now, tell me your thoughts about the latest Dhin engine test flight.”
10
Goiânia
Xing gave autonomous control back to his drones. For the assault, he wanted to be present, directly on the ground. That meant remote control of at least one, if not many, of the robots and vehicles on the ground. He decided as his primary focus he’d take a role and scout about in a BigDog while also maintaining presence in a ground assault vehicle. More, when and if needed. For a Regional AI maintaining simultaneous focus and control of several bodies was not difficult. For a person, keeping track of several video feeds was a passive activity, and quickly reached a saturation point. A human being wasn’t capable of guiding and providing fine control of several complex machines simultaneously.
I should be getting word from Luís about operational resources moving into position very soon. Nothing on radar yet, but he knew the routes the ground forces were going to use. Why Luís did not do this before now, we still do not know. He sure jumped into action when the diplomatic call was finished. There is still something strange going on there.
He guided the assault ATV toward the next waypoint, while he ranged forward in the BigDog, up a hill, looking across at an angle toward the structure designated by the waypoint.
A manufacturing plant. With a power substation behind it, and we are pretty sure there is a new data center just a bit further on—one that is new and not accounted for by permits, or land leases. I saw the power substation from the air, but the other buildings were generic from up there. Interesting. Let me see what this factory is for.
As his team drew nearer, their camera-eyes and motion sensors detected much movement in and around the factory. With their high-resolution imaging and zoom lenses, Xing’s optics picked out their targets far sooner than a man could have. The area was abuzz with autoguns and autonomous vehicles. Some were the type that could lay mines. Others were designed to carry antiaircraft guns. Others were repair and support robots, thick with pneumatic tools. While the factory produced nothing as sophisticated as a BigDog, these opponents were dangerous, nonetheless.
The Way of the Dhin Page 9
