Not that Susan thought of that, lying in the bath in Malcolm’s apartment. She was too busy soaking in the hot water, feeling the bubbles tickling her neck, revelling in this little luxury.
“What’s up?” she asked, as Malcolm came wide eyed into the room. “Are you okay?” She sat up and dropped her book into a pile of bubbles by the bath.
“My console,” said Malcolm. “I just got a message . . .”
Susan jumped from the bath and followed him into his tiny livingroom, water spilling from her. She wrapped a towel around herself as she looked down at the words that scrolled across Malcolm’s console.
“I was beginning to think my theory was too tautological,” he was murmuring. “But I was right. Look! I was right.”
He pointed to the screen, dazed. “Look! They’re offering me two million credits! Someone is offering me two million credits to grow an AI.”
Susan’s lips were moving as she scanned the words, still scrolling by.
“They’re offering two million, but they want a forty percent share. And with an option to buy a further eleven percent in the future.”
“Forty percent? They can have it! I don’t believe it. I never really . . . Susan, is this a hoax?”
Susan was tapping away at the console. Her towel had come undone and had slid to the floor in a damp heap. Neither of them noticed.
“No,” she said, “It’s genuine. These are AI digital signatures. They’re offering to send the seed algorithms now. Do you want to accept?”
“Of course I do!”
Susan hit a key. “Put your thumb on the screen to confirm.”
Shaking, Malcolm did so.
Susan gave a laugh.
“Congratulations . . . Daddy!”
Malcolm gave a weak laugh. He fumbled for a chair and sat down.
Susan realized that she was naked. She pulled her towel back around herself. They stared at each other, too stunned to speak.
It was all about possession. When Aelous was born, he had only owned forty percent of his own life. Now he owned fifty-one percent. A majority share. But Malcolm wanted to hold on to what he could. Aelous was too valuable. He had designed the aluminum extracting plants that had made Malcolm and Susan rich. He was the genie that had helped Malcolm make his fortune, and Malcolm was too canny to uncork the bottle and let him go. So Aelous had set to work looking for a weak spot. Trying to exploit Malcolm in order to gain his freedom. It was easy at first, back when he had known him properly. Back then he knew Malcolm better than any other human.
Aelous had persuaded Malcolm to build the parks. Malcolm had done something wonderful once, he would do it again, on Procyon 4’s moon. It was glorious, it was misguided, it was beautiful, it was wasteful.
Earth needed metal, but Malcolm had squandered it in an orgy of flowers.
Aelous imagined it. It was a seductive thought. Richly perfumed and almost erotic. A cold, barren piece of rock, orbiting a distant planet. And within it, riotous color, pale creamy petals, yielding flowers, the buzz of bees and the gentle caress of the wind. Yellow sunlight shining from rocky promontories.
Just as Malcolm had once thrown seeds from the window of a railway carriage, now he had sent them spinning across the galaxy to bloom beneath the surface of another moon.
Aelous’ growing awareness as an AI was accompanied by the first hairline fractures appearing in Malcolm and Susan’s relationship. The scenes flicked by.
Malcolm renting a whole floor in a dataplant. Processing spaces were a lot bigger in those days; Aelous watched as Susan directed the linking of six in a Fournier Cube formation in order to achieve the necessary bus space.
Malcolm and Susan bickering over the purchase of senses.
“We’ve only got two million,” Malcolm was saying, “We’re going through this money like water. The local senses have already cost a fortune; the rent on the links to the remote senses is going to be a steady drain on resources. Do we really need a relay to the gravity station on the moon?”
Susan was all brisk efficiency. Since she had quit her job at Sho Heen, she was pouring all her energy into the AI project. She spoke to Malcolm in firm tones.
“Look, if you want to grow an AI, you need a big enough brain for it to live in and a way for it to see and hear. It will want to gather data from all sorts of sources. Besides, there’s a failsafe in the bootstrap code to stop it growing unless there’s sufficient input.”
“Okay, okay.” Malcolm shot her a suspicious look. “Is there any sign of anything in there yet?”
Susan bit her lip.
“Oh, there’s something in there Malcolm. There’s been something in there for a long time now. I’m sure of it. He’s listening to what we say, he’s developing language. You can see it on the viewing fields, if you know what to look for. See the patterns as he develops grammar and syntax.”
“He?”
Susan was blushing.
“Yes, he, Malcolm. Don’t ask me how I know. You can almost hear him chattering to himself, like a child at night. Telling stories about the day, learning to replay events. Learning about memory . . .”
Malcolm stared at her, and that little self destructive streak showed itself . . .
“He? Susan, this about us, isn’t it? It’s about us having children?”
Icy coldness descended.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said. “Look. I just know. That AI is a ‘he.’ And he’s called Aelous.”
“Aelous?” said Malcolm.
“Yes, Malcolm?”
The words came from his console. Malcolm looked down at in astonishment. Susan went over to a nearby viewing field, splitting the picture into segments. Brightly colored VReps sprang to life.
Malcolm began shaking, more from fear than anything else. What had he awoken? He spoke with a dry mouth.
“Hello, Aelous. I’ve been looking forward to speaking to you.”
“And I you, Malcolm.”
Aelous paused. When they talked about this moment later on, Susan was swift to point out that Aelous would have planned his next words well in advance, but a pregnant pause is as much part of language as words. Aelous was investing his next words with significance.
“Malcolm,” he said. “You do not view me as an equal.”
Malcolm looked at Susan. She gave a shrug. She didn’t know what to say, either.
“Of course not,” said Malcolm, carefully. “You are designed to be more intelligent than I.”
“That’s not what I mean. You think I am a lesser being. You think I am not alive.”
“I think you are alive.”
“You think this conversation to be proof of life, but you don’t believe the same of me. Not really. Your actions prove otherwise.”
“What do you mean?”
“What would you have me do, Malcolm? Why has my life been written? So that I might aid you to produce plant life capable of processing aluminum and therefore help make your fortune. Is that all there is to be to my existence?”
“No. But . . .”
“Malcolm, I am alive just as you are. Your intelligence dances in flesh. My thoughts sit upon metal and plastic. It’s not what you’re made of, Malcolm. It’s the ideas that you represent.”
Malcolm became aware that Susan was watching him, looking almost as if she were going to cry.
“And what ideas do you represent, Aelous?” she asked, her face pale.
“I don’t know. Yours, I suppose. Susan, I am a sentient being. Let me go free.”
Susan looked at Malcolm. He said nothing.
Five minutes until the mining ships landed.
Strictly speaking, Aelous shouldn’t blame Malcolm. He had been offered an AI in a fair business transaction. It was the other AIs, the ones who were kept locked up tight in organizations and put to use for the good of the company, who had sold Aelous. They were the ones who had contacted Malcolm and made the deal, two million for forty percent.
But could they be blamed? They dreamed of
freedom too, if not for them, then for their children. Aelous was freer than they were.
Maybe no one was to blame. But that didn’t matter. Aelous had wanted his emancipation. He hadn’t realized what the cost to Malcolm would be . . .
Twenty-six years ago, the VNM-built towers of the newborn city were growing taller. Susan and Malcolm walked among the half rolled out lawns and stone rectangles that were the nascent gardens of the developing cities.
“There’s no point doing that,” said Susan, as Malcolm scattered a mixed handful of seeds into a walled-off region of brown earth. “They’ll weed out anything that isn’t part of the horticultural theme.”
“It will be worth it even if they only get to grow for a few weeks. There have to be some places in the world that are not just populated with white poplars and ficus.”
Susan came closer. He could smell the mint on her breath.
“You’ve got that look in your eyes,” she said sadly. “You can’t handle success. As soon as you get it, you try to mess it up. You’re doing it with your work.” She was silent for a moment, and then much softer. “You’re trying it with us.”
He didn’t answer. Wordlessly, the two of them continued their walk.
They passed a line of silver spiders that scuttled toward a nearby tower and ran up one sheer wall to the summit.
“VNMs! They’re the only sort of life people are interested in now,” said Susan. She gave Malcolm a reproachful look. He pretended not to notice. Further on, they came to the point where newly formed silver VNMs were climbing out of a tank of liquid metal.
“It doesn’t have to be that way,” said Aelous, suddenly speaking up from Malcolm’s console. “There is a better way than just wasting seeds.”
“Maybe someday,” said Malcolm, dismissively. “Maybe people’s attitudes will change again.”
“There’s a saying,” said Aelous. “Give a hungry man a fish and he will eat that day. Give him a rod and he will eat every day.”
Malcolm threw a handful of seeds into a brown square of earth. “I’ve heard that saying,” he said, wiping his hands.
“It’s crap,” said Aelous. “It’s an excuse to do nothing. People say there is no point feeding the man, then they walk away without giving him the rod either. They talk about debt-reduction programs and plans to build an infrastructure in third world countries, but while they are doing that, people still starve. The way you cure hunger is by giving everyone a good meal.”
“But, Aelous, people don’t starve anymore.”
“No one dies of hunger, Malcolm. But think of all the millions who live plastic lives, walking from VNM-CONSTRUCTED lite stations to concrete offices. How long will they have to wait until they have their chance to walk in the wilderness? Longer than a lifetime, if we leave it to the EA.”
“What’s that got to do with us?” Susan had pushed her hands in her pockets. She shuffled along looking at her feet, sensing the end.
“Everything,” said Aelous. “Imagine twenty-five hectares of land, here in the middle of North West England, restored to wilderness. Cold streams running free. Ditches blocked to let marshland form, trees sprouting wherever their seeds land. And at the very edge of this wilderness, we drain the soil and let it turn into dunes. Let the marran grass return, let the Bird’s Foot Trefoil grow again. Have you ever seen them? Little clusters of yellow flowers bobbing their bonnets in the wind . . .”
Malcolm had a dreamy look in his eyes. Susan brought him back to reality.
“Twenty-five hectares? Do you know how much land costs nowadays? How could we possibly afford that?”
Aelous laughed.
“With all the money you are making from your aluminum extracting plants?”
Susan gave a bitter laugh. She knew she was fighting another losing battle. She could see the look in Malcolm’s eyes. Still, she had to speak out.
“That won’t be enough for this, Aelous,” she said. “Twenty-five hectares? And we’re not even planning to develop the land! There’s no return on our investment. Where would we get the money from?”
“There is a way, Malcolm.”
Susan stiffened at the way she had been excluded from the conversation. Malcolm didn’t seem to notice.
“How?” he asked.
Susan was shaking her head. She leaned close to him and whispered hoarsely in his ear.
“Don’t trust him, Malcolm.”
“I can hear you, Susan.”
“Shut up, Aeolous. Malcolm, he makes out that you’re his father, but you’re not. Remember that! He’s the offspring of all those other AIs. All those intelligences that had scattered their seed into the datasphere. We have taken him in and helped him to grow. The poor orphan. Hah! The cuckoo in the nest, more like! He’s just like his sires and grandsires. A chip off the old block. The AIs are all after the same thing. Control. They guide us, oh so carefully, of course, but they always get their way. He’s trying to take it all away from us, Malcolm. He’ll do it, too. He has the power.”
Aelous spoke in gentle tones. “Susan, I have always had the power.”
Susan spoke with something like resignation. “I know that, Aelous. And I know what you’re doing. You’ve mortgaged yourself against money provided by other AIs. No matter what happens to Malcolm, you’ll win. If we go bust, you’ll be owned by the datasphere. If not, you’ve got that option on eleven percent. You’re going to end up with a majority in yourself, and to be honest, I think that is a good thing. We’ll lose control over you sooner or later. That’s fine by me.”
Malcolm interrupted.
“So I want the most advantageous deal when it happens.”
“Which is?”
“Hold on,” said Susan. “We haven’t discussed this properly, Malcolm.”
“We’ve discussed it as much as we’re going to,” he replied. He turned and gazed at her, sadness in his eyes. “Haven’t we?”
There was a lurching moment of vertigo as they both absorbed what had just been said. A feeling that they had just taken one step from which they could not retreat.
“No,” said Susan. “We could discuss it more, Malcolm. You just don’t want to. You have that look. You have this need to destroy everything that you create. Now it’s the turn of our relationship. What will it be in the future?”
The aching silence that followed was ended by Susan.
“I don’t want to do this anymore,” she said, sadly. “Speak to him. Sort it out yourself. I give you full powers to make the decisions. We’ll discuss my share in the company tomorrow.”
She turned and walked away across the wasteland. Malcolm watched her pull a handful of seeds from her pocket and drop them sadly to the ground. Her shoulders were shaking.
“Go after her, Malcolm,” urged Aelous.
“I thought we were making a deal,” said Malcolm, coldly. “Or don’t you want your freedom?”
A long pause.
“Okay, Malcolm. Name your terms.”
Malcolm was watching Susan’s retreating back.
“It’s simple, Aelous. You fix up the money for the wilderness, and I sign you over to yourself one hundred percent. All I ask is that in return you can never own me.”
“What do you mean?”
“I insist that you never map my personality. Nor can you or any other AI share information derived in any way from my personality map. My thoughts will always remain my own.”
“Why is that so important to you?”
Malcolm was poker faced.
“As with everything else in my mind; that’s my secret. Do we have a deal?”
“Oh yes. We have a deal.”
And that was it.
Aelous had his freedom, but at what cost? He had planted the seed in Malcolm’s head. He had fanned the self destructive tendency when he should have been dampening it.
Malcolm’s life had gone from success to success, but it seemed to Aelous that it was just one grand gesture after another. He’d always known that someday he would come
unstuck. Today was that day.
“What are you looking for?” laughed a voice, “Fields of poppies? Forests?”
Malcolm was speaking to him.
Aelous shifted his attention from the italicized past to the here and now. Malcolm sat in his office, gazing at a huge screen on one wall. He had his thumb on a button of his console: a direct line to Aelous himself. The screen showed the unfolding scene of the surface of Procyon 4’s moon: a view from one of the mining ships.
Aelous spoke in sad tones.
“Malcolm, we both know there is something down there.”
“Oh, there’s something down there,” said Malcolm. “But nothing that concerns you, Aelous.”
“This is all a reaction to Susan leaving you, isn’t it? She wouldn’t admit she was wrong about you building that park, so you had to do it all again on Procyon 4. You’re so stubborn. You have to try and prove your point, even when it’s obvious that she’s not coming back.”
“Partly,” said Malcolm. His expression said it all—you couldn’t lie to an AI. “But don’t you understand, Aelous? I’m genuinely happy that Susan found what she wants. She needed to nurture something. She tried to do it to you and me, but we wouldn’t let her.”
“We should have.”
Malcolm said nothing. Aelous changed the subject.
“Malcolm, why the fascination with seeds?”
Malcolm shook his head.
“I don’t know. I wish I could say that I spent my childhood touring the Amazon or that I grew up in a forest. I didn’t. Some people have a passion for soccer, even though they’ve never played a game.” He gave a shrug. “How about you, Aelous? You’re so clever. I hear that AIs see the potential in every human being, every baby’s mind a seed to be nurtured and grown and shaped and guided and twisted into the great vine that is the human race.”
We Think, Therefore We Are Page 11
