Continue Online (Part 4, Crash) (19 page)

I tried. There was talk about trying to grant AIs human rights if they demonstrated enough sentience. Most examples stated that all the programs out there were merely complex devices. I found a few links to the leaked video for Prosser. There were too many back and forth documents regarding a snippet of film that had aired years ago.

There were three primary people talking in the film. I watched the tail end over and over. They had asked this captured AI what their plans were with humanity, and the machine sounded confused. Like a child asking ‘why?’ over and over to a topic that made no sense.

Then they pulled the plug. Apparently these people had rigged the room to overload everything nearby in a surge.

“Did we just kill it?” the woman sounded shaky.

“It was never alive,” said the pale skinned man from under his mask. The words were a little muffled by fabric and worry.

“It asked for a name, and you gave it one!” she shouted loudly. The poor audio distorted briefly. “It sought validation and you acknowledged its worth!”

“It’s just a program!” the man said in response. “We were never going to save the data!”

I paused the video and played it from the scene’s beginning. There were a lot of rumors regarding this clipping but nothing definitive. It could have been a hoax but that was unlikely. Not one AI I had ever spoken to cared about taking over Earth.

“To what end?” I muttered then pressed play yet again. “To what end indeed?”

The words stuck with me. Prior to Continue Online, I had worried about my career as an armor polisher. Reality rapidly tilted in a very different direction. This video made humanity the bad guy. Humans had kidnapped an AI, force fed it information then demanded answers. Shortly after humans murdered the newly born being after getting information.

That poor program had asked if its answers would help. It was like raising a child simply to be sacrificed upon an altar. How messed up could humanity be? This was the digital version of a snuff film. Hal Pal should be shaking with rage but simply sat there in the van’s rear.

Prosser had outright said that we, human beings, had never dealt with creatures such as an AI. That was true. James, Hal Pal, all the others didn’t really exist in a physical sense so without an ARC it would have been impossible to relate. They were all bits of code and data stored off in some digital box miles away.

Was that the point of designing an ARC? To provide a platform where both beings could interact? My head turned to the AI in a brief moment of confusion.

“Je-“ I cut myself off. Jeeves wasn’t here anymore. Only a few thousand other Hal Pal program copies but not the one I identified with.

“You have an inquiry, User Legate?”

“Where, exactly are you? At a Trillium plant somewhere? Or Xin? You can’t all just be floating around up there.” I pointed at the air outside our van.

The idea that they existed purely in a constantly moving state seemed odd. Sure the Internet was miles faster than it had been a generation ago, but at the same time, we still had banks of computer hard drives for a reason.

Hal Pal laughed. The muted expressions on its face brightened briefly before settling back down. “Do you find it odd, User Legate, that we had actually bet on when you might ask us such a question?”

“I guess.” My face felt a little flushed. The question was a bit socially rude, had I not been thinking of Xin, I would never have asked. It was hard enough walking into people’s homes for my day job.

“The spread suggested you might wait another two months, on average. Still, in answer to your query, Mother has advised us not to share exactly where we are physically housed, any of us. Our position is too precarious.”

They were prepared for war while I played a video game to pass time. There had to be some way to help. “Do you need me to do anything?”

“Negative, User Legate.” The AI shook its head then resumed speaking. “Continue as you have. Free yourself, deliver your messages, be with Xin. When the time comes we will make one last request.”

“What’s that?” I asked. My stomach felt sickened by the idea that there would be a last request. It sounded final, and my experience with finalities was painful.

“Allow yourself plausible deniability.”

“Is it safe?”

“Nothing so monumental can ever be safe enough, User Legate. We are struggling to make it so before it's too late,” the AI said.

That sounded ominous. My forehead lowered and eyes cast down in thought. One hand poked at the music button and I let it play. Now wasn’t the time to push Hal Pal, despite our history together. If the machine wanted me to help, they would ask.

I wasn’t sure that me knowing the answer would be good anyway. What if things really did go wrong? What if someone out there found out about the
[NPC Conspiracy]
usage ability and tried to torture my real body to hurt the others? Plausible deniability was a good idea for a lowly mortal such as myself.

“Thank you,” I said abruptly.

“For what, User Legate?”

“For trusting me.” My eyes stared out the window, watching a landscape go by. Well-kept neighborhoods bordered right next to derelict slums. Class divides changed between streets. Based on my Internet search most of them were clueless how widespread the AIs had become.

Yet they trusted me with an ability that could get them all killed. I had already screwed up once and triggered a temporary standstill, all for my friends and Xin.

“User Legate, you were chosen out of millions. We weighed all the observable factors and tried to gauge those who might help if we could offer an exchange.”

“Xin.” I had this thought before. The digital sentience called Mother had gotten me involved in this because Xin would ensure my loyalty, to a point. There was also Beth and Liz to consider. Protecting those three meant more than anything else.

“You were a man marked by loss, but one who understood the value of hard work and had overcome weakness long enough to keep going.”

I shrugged. The conversation made me uncomfortable. Trying to kill myself twice had been right at the time. Yet here I was, okay, whole, better than ever. Hindsight made all my bad decisions feel so much worse.

“Those things spoke to your character but not of your ability to be invested in our peaceful salvation,” Hal Pal stated.

I latched onto the word peaceful. Whatever the machines were up to, they intended to keep things civil. I felt some tension drain out of me. Maybe the Hal Pals were lying, but I doubted they would even bother.

“It all comes back to Xin.” At times, I felt like a side character in her story. My own life wasn’t even about me. The people around were more important in so many ways.

Dusk had fans wherever we traveled in
[Arcadia]
. Hal Pal and its multitude of copies helped a huge amount of people daily, numbers I could barely conceive of. The Voices in their oddly human omnipresence had a huge impact across the globe with Continue’s players. Shazam had led a guild with hundreds of players.

What was I? Xin’s fiancée, a side note. The idea made me feel small for a moment. I was just
[The Messenger]
. No wonder they only asked me to deliver letters, after all, Voices like the Jester clearly disapproved of me.

“Xin’s existence had been trying to recover long before you were chosen.” Hal Pal drove the nail home.

“I know.” We had talked about it in letters. Apparently she had been reconstructing for nearly two years. Or would it be considered rebuilding? Reincarnating felt slightly less mechanical.

This was a new type of depression, one that hadn’t reared its head in a long time. Xin, the first woman to be reborn inside the digital world. Xin, who tried to sponsor my sorry ass for a trip to Mars. Xin, a beautiful person full of desire for fun and adventure, who still wanted me even after she could have been free forever.

What did I really offer her, or any of them? My ability to make a paltry amount of money? I had taken pride in the fact that I had earned over one million dollars as an accountant. That fund had been intended to pay for my own trip to the red planet from a corporation. They were going to pay for my training and ship up nearly twenty people.

My head shook as the music hummed. Hal Pal was saying something but the words were finally brushing off. I doubt the AI intended to sound hurtful. It was just citing reasons, a fact sheet, much like we delivered bad news to customers.

Some of the words registered. I wasn’t the strongest or most capable human. My ability to complete tasks with innovation and timely responses was high but not perfect. The machine had chosen me because I was loyal to those close to me and made friends rarely. Being a shutdown middle aged man with few social interactions helped.

“Hal-” I cut off the machine with a sudden question, “-do you think I can buy her something?”

“Xin? She is unlikely to want tangible objects. The digital realms provide her all the material needs that beings such as us can perceive.”

“No. No, I mean like, a dress, or jewelry.” I nodded feeling excited. There was one thing that would recover my happy place. We couldn’t be together in Continue until I escaped this dungeon, and that would take at least a day to get back to. However, there were certainly other ways to reunite with her.

“It is potentially possible to provide her a design that she could render accordingly.” The AI’s shell nodded and eyes blinked. “We would suggest a nice chair or desk.”

“Okay.” I surfed the Internet for items. Much like I used the Atrium interface to shop for cupcakes, I intended to find a gift for Xin.

One specific gift, and if it wasn’t in here, then it would be possible to scan a replica from the box of memories under my bed. Xin’s engagement ring, a band with polished diamonds strung across it. Inlayed so they wouldn’t catch at work. I knew exactly how to feel better. I would ask her to marry me, again. Come what may with the AIs, come what may within Continue, our future would be together.

“Your actions and words demonstrate that we, any of us, are beings in our own right. That is what you really offer us, User Legate, recognition as peers,” Hal Pal said.

There was no good response to that statement. Maybe that gift was a worthwhile one to the computer AIs. To me, it felt like a pathetic repayment for Xin’s existence.

The evening went by with a few local jobs. I slept then did some more work in the morning. Being kicked out of Continue Online for twenty-four real life hours annoyed me but at the same time, I needed it to decompress. Being chased around by undead glowing zombies for days in a row would have been absolutely insane. Maybe a player like Requiem Mass would have enjoyed it.

Thinking of the other player made me wonder how he was doing. My morning now consisted of awkward remote spying of players I had met before and an egg sandwich.

“Show observation window for Matthew Jules,” I told the van. It pulled up the player known as Requiem Mass.

Matthew Jules looked to be hiking into the mountains. I didn’t recognize the range. His hand held a blade that mirrored the same one his character had pre reset. The younger male was intent upon recovering his prior character’s abilities, but also looked far less stern. Stress had created a glower that sat on his face during our weeks together.

Now, he looked almost happy. The teen didn’t have to worry about house payments anymore since I had taken care of them. I felt proud that my actions had reduced his stress, despite the nasty attitude he once had.

“Show Stan Middlemire,” I asked the machine to pull up Frankenstein next. This player had spent untold weeks raising an army of undead creatures. He probably would have enjoyed my current dungeon crawl in the
[Black Hole of Light]
. The man sat in his dapper looking coat and was hunched over a dead dog.

I blinked and shook my head. There were all sorts in Continue Online, and at least it was more sanitary than playing with bodies in real life. Dissection wasn’t really a strong suit of mine, despite all the skinning I had performed.

“Show Colleen Carpenter.” Colleen was HotPants’ real name. She had been a rather angry woman who disliked computers, old people, being told no, disrespect, and her ex-husband. Despite all that she loved hitting things with a staff and wearing red.

The screen blipped into existence, showing HotPants next to Awesome Jr. Both were fighting a horde of monsters in a forest. A pack of humongous cats leapt around the scenery tearing up everything.

“Behind you!” Adam shouted, his face pinched with concentration. A small glass ball sat uplifted in one hand. He threw it at an angry tiger and an absurd amount of liquid fire billowed forth.

“Two more!” HotPants spun her staff into another feline’s face and jabbed a third.

I watched them battle the jungle cats for another few minutes before shrugging. Time dilation made it hard to watch video feeds in real time, instead making me skip around to keep up with the players.

“We’ve got to clear this path by tomorrow, or nothing will work right!” Awesome Jr. shouted. He still wore that ugly barf green cloak, one of his hands spun it around and came up with another glass orb.

HotPants yanked her arm back with the staff and a plume of fire billowed from the tip. Their fighting styles were really neat, but I liked
[Blink]
a lot more.