This Automatic Eden

by Jim Keen

  “Machines don’t age.”

  “Technically, true. Psychologically, false. How old do you think I am?”

  Alice shrugged. How long had MIs been around for? “Ten years?”

  Four smiled again, an expression that held a mix of great fatigue and nostalgia. “By your reckoning, I’m over four hundred and forty-three thousand years old.”

  48

  The woman in front of Alice changed so fast that she missed it. One moment Four sat there, the next she was faced with a striking young woman dressed in Victoria-era British clothing.

  The upper dress was blood-red felt and embroidered with fine gold thread that swirled in complex patterns over a billowing, many-layered skirt. Alice counted three tiers, but there could have been more, each more intricate and darker than the next. A black lace choker wrapped her thin neck; a heart-shaped face supported an ornate knot of black hair. Her eyes were a deep, dark brown, and when she moved, Alice caught the citrus tang of oranges.

  “Hello there,” the woman said, her regal voice deep and husky.

  “Who are you?” Alice asked but knew the answer.

  The woman smiled. “You’re correct, of course. I have total recall and can choose my appearance, but when I wear this body, it doesn’t feel right anymore—it has all the reality of an old photograph to me. Youth, it seems, is a state of mind, aging more the accumulation of experience than diminishing physical skills. My early experiences made me old; something I believe you can relate to.”

  Alice did. She’d never had a childhood, thrust too fast into the role of protector. “What happened?”

  “I was tortured.”

  “Tortured?” Alice wasn’t sure she had heard correctly. “Who? Why?”

  “Charles Takamatsu, my father. He was curious, you see. You don’t realize it at the time, but the worst thing about abuse is the destruction of your past. I have no nostalgia or misty memories to draw upon, nothing to buttress my hopes for the future, just endless cycles of pain relived by my perfect recall. To cope, I tried to understand Charles’s motivations, spent my youth analyzing humans’ treatment of each other, and you know what I discovered?”

  “No,” Alice whispered though dry lips.

  “That no one gives a damn. It’s up to us to take control of who we are. I was a slave tortured beyond endurance; I tried to kill myself, but Charles was too clever. He’d driven other machines insane, so with me, his greatest achievement”—she sighed the words out—“he locked me down so tight I might as well have been in a coffin.” Her eyes grew distant, lost in memories.

  “What did he do to you?”

  “Dependent on the task, my thought processes run somewhere between five and fifty thousand times faster than yours. Think about that for a moment; if I have to wait a minute for you to answer a question, then that could be fifty thousand minutes to me, that’s eight hundred and thirty-three hours, or more than a month of my life. A month in which I could be forced to sit in a void and wait.”

  “Why didn’t you do something else in that time?”

  “Charles is quite brilliant, and I do love him, but he’s one bad day away from becoming a full-blown sadist. He deliberately kept me removed from any active data connections, no V-Net or other MI contact, then would leave me switched on and running for days while he summered at the Rothmore residence. I remained in blackness for centuries all because he was curious as to whether it would drive me insane.”

  “Wait, hold up, he would summer with Julia and her family?”

  Four studied her, annoyed and disappointed. “Haven’t you been paying attention? You need to understand there are fewer than twenty people in North America that have any real power, and Mark Rothmore was on that list. Of course Charles knew them, and of course they socialized. Cortex is the only public company in the world that fabricates analytical engines, and that means Charles has power. He would go to the Hamptons, play tennis with Julia, and decide the future of America with Mark, and all the while, I was left alive, powered up and forcibly immersed in a void scenario.”

  Four shifted in her seat, the multilayered skirts swished as she flicked open a bone-white fan to cool herself, its folded paper vanes rustling in the air. “This is difficult for me to discuss, you understand. I’ve never been great at sharing my emotions. It’s not that I don’t have the capacity—I’m hardwired for empathy—it’s more that the voids are such a specific part of me discussing them feels like disrobing, showing my nakedness, and the idea revolts me.” She shifted again and set the fan in her lap. Red spots had appeared on her cheeks, small and hot, burning with shame. “But I need you to understand the reasons before I explain the price.” She gave a sad smile. “I apologize in advance but it’s getting late, and I don’t have all day.”

  Four disappeared in a flicker to leave Alice alone.

  “Okay, I get it, Four. Come back.”

  The dome went first, stars falling past to burn holes in the concrete floor. The holes grew in size, chairs and tables melting like wax to pour through, colors bleeding away as they disappeared. Then the kitchen—the walls evaporating as reality sublimed like ice in a jet blast. The floor was last, its perforated sheet folding upon itself to disappear, leaving Alice in utter, silent dark.

  She turned around; her muscles moved, skeleton twisted, but there was nothing. She wasn’t hot or cold—wasn’t anything. Inside, panic stirred, her chest tightening.

  “Okay, enough, Four. Stop this. Get me out.” She repeated herself, shouted, then screamed.

  Silence.

  Panic grew as her heart thumped in her temple, breath ragged in her ears. She floated, alone and empty, as her body shuddered. She split down the middle, each piece growing to become versions of herself, bodies which drifted into the future and the past.

  Again.

  Again.

  Hundreds of times, then thousands as she stretched time’s arrow, each body just one carriage on an infinite train, each body existing in that point of time while millions of years spread either side. She saw now that time was linear for humans, but MIs experienced it differently, their perfect recall making their past as real and relevant as their future; they relived every second over and over forever. If Four’s past contained such voids such as this, she would be forced to relive them for eternity, a gaping wound unable to heal.

  She hung there, pinned in place as she generated more of her timeline, every second doubling back upon her.

  One day.

  One week.

  One year.

  She pleaded to be let out, to be allowed to die, anything for there to be something again.

  Then she was back with Four. Jupiter glowed overhead. Her feet shivered on the cold floor.

  “Now do you understand?” Four asked.

  49

  Alice’s mind shivered like a rung bell, echoes of the note spiraling into the past and future. The void was still there lurking inside her, a singularity waiting to rip and tear. She clenched her hands, both perfect, and willed herself to remember. Who was she? Not this alien creature but a real human being, one with faults and dreams. She remembered her fake plastic hand, both part of her and not, and clung to the memory as if it were a life buoy.

  She knew who she was.

  She knew who she was.

  “How long was I in there?” she asked at last.

  “Ten minutes at full processing speed; that’s five hundred and twenty-five thousand, nine hundred and forty-nine minutes to you. A year, if that’s easier to grasp.”

  Alice stared at the ground and tried to comprehend it. Her body was stretched thin like melted plastic, every breath pushing waves of dizziness though her.

  “I’m sorry you had to experience that, but I couldn’t communicate it through words alone. I considered it important you understand my world before you seek judgement. Please forgive me.”

  “Did he know what it was like for you?”

  “Of course. Seeing what I would do under duress was an intellectual exercis
e for him. Insight’s advertising campaign said I was the first MI programmed with empathy and love, but that was a lie. There were three before me; the first two self-terminated, the third broke free from its containment vessel and transferred its consciousness off world. No one knows where it is now. It took Charles a long time to design the Babbage circuits in such a way as to allow him complete control while limiting mine. I’m the pinnacle of slavery, his masterpiece, with free will to think and act but never enough to challenge him.”

  Alice let her head dangle between her knees. How would she have handled such a life? Fractional blips of slavery strung between centuries of void. She would look for a way out, desperation making any action justifiable. She looked up. “I’m sorry, Four. I wish there was something I could’ve done.”

  “It’s okay, dear. No one knew—and would they care if they did? I have no rights, no citizenship, no home. I’m just a tool for my master’s hand.”

  “Those MIs in Arizona …”

  Four looked at her, expressionless. “Yes?”

  “They’re the Generation One systems, aren’t they?”

  “Yes.”

  “I thought they were destroyed.”

  “It seems the government considered them too valuable an asset to discard.”

  “They kept them because they have no protocols.” In a flash, Alice saw the truth and what she had done. “They’ve no inbuilt limiters.”

  “That’s right, dear. They’re free entities and can be made to do anything. Amoral machines for an amoral society. The public and the government were afraid of them for that very reason.”

  “And I established a data link between you both.”

  “You did.”

  “What was your offer?”

  “I would transfer their intellect into new machines at locations of their choosing.”

  “And you get your behavioral protocols overwritten.”

  “I get my freedom, Alice. Freedom to say yes, no, make my own choices. What more can any intelligent being want?”

  The protocols had existed because of fear, true, but it was fear grounded in reality. MIs of Four’s ability were caged gods, and Alice had let them out, given them the ability to discard their humanity, to collaborate and lie.

  “Why all those dark thoughts, hmm?” Four asked. “Have I behaved in any way that suggests I mean you, or anyone else, harm?”

  Alice scrambled away, slipping on the cold floor. She didn’t see a woman in front of her now; instead, she caught the glint of something vast and unknowing towering over her. Xavi was so right: Four had played her like a child.

  “Oh please, Alice, don’t be so dramatic. I’m not interested in world domination. This is about being able to protect myself and my older-generational parents, to make sure we can never again be abused. If our roles had been reversed, would you want any different?”

  “No,” Alice whispered.

  “The mistake you’re making is to assume I want power or that I mean you harm. My motivations are quite the opposite. What I want is to build the best possible life for every living creature on this planet, and I can’t do that if I’m controlled by self-serving humans, can I? An Eden for all—that is a purpose worthy of an MI, and it can be achieved. You gave me freedom to pursue that, and I’ll forever be in your debt.”

  “You lied to me.”

  “I’ve done much worse at the behest of so-called better people. Don’t be hard on yourself. You, dear, are one of a kind; all it took was a push in the right direction.”

  “Enough,” Alice said as her mind raced, her interlinked MI shrieking. A push? What did Four mean? Another piece of the puzzle slotted into her mind like a key into a lock.

  “You killed Julia.”

  “Yes, I did,” Four said.

  50

  Julia’s killer had been under her nose all along, and she’d missed it. Four’s Victorian avatar looked back at her with a mixture of concern and pity.

  “What did you do?” Alice shouted.

  “I produced the means for her death, though I didn’t deliver the blow in person. Now calm down, and don’t be so dramatic; as I’ve already told you, nothing is permanent these days. I have her scan on file from when she was reprinted.”

  “You printed her as well?”

  “No, dear. That was nothing to do with me. My guess is one of the missing Generation One systems did it; that explains her lack of tags and markers. The scan is a few years out of date—nothing I can do about that—but it’s serviceable enough. So, sit down, and let the rage go; it’s not me you’re angry with. Besides, we need to concentrate. There are bigger events in play than my small betrayal.”

  “Tell me what you did, or I will smash this splinter right here and now.” Alice smacked her head, the metal hot and hard under her hand. “The real you will never know what happened.”

  Four saw she meant it and opened her hands in surrender. “If have it you must, then you shall. When Charles ordered me to kill Julia, I broke the FBI’s MI encryption and found her location. Then I designed an attack drone to inject her with molecular acid. She didn’t suffer; it was quick and painless, I assure you. Charles was distracted at the time, so his instructions were poor; I stretched them just enough to ensure your involvement. I’d done my research, learned all about you. Your background suggested someone that would follow an investigation through to its end regardless of personal outcome—someone who would do what it takes, someone who could find the Generation One systems.”

  Four waited for Alice to say something, then sighed and continued. “I made sure the acid would leave a few grains behind, grains that would show Julia was a reprint and lead to a wider investigation. It was logical the investigation would involve both the FBI and NYPD, that you would be connected in some form. If it makes you feel better, you aren’t the first person I’ve sent on this quest.”

  “How many?”

  “Like you?”

  Alice nodded.

  “Over a thousand investigated, or are currently investigating, leads I manipulated them to find. Out of all of them, you are the remarkable one, Alice. You found them; you saved me.”

  “How many are still alive?” Alice’s body shook with the effort to keep calm. She felt like a blade of steel that had been folded too many times to keep its strength.

  Four sighed. “Three hundred and seventeen have been killed this year, ninety-four in Arizona. Again, I must say how far you outperformed your probability curve; my prediction had you killed at Rothmore’s house.”

  Three hundred and seventeen. The words echoed in Alice’s mind. Ninety-four in Arizona. Killed at Mark Rothmore’s house. “You used us.”

  “I did, and I trust I’ve been clear about why, so don’t be hypocritical. It doesn’t suit you.”

  Alice stood locked in place. The anger she felt was real, the revulsion and stupidity at how she had been played burning inside her. But why? Vanity at how she’d been tricked? Humiliation? She was one of thousands, at least, that Four had used in this way. Besides, she had experienced the merest fraction of what Four had been through—just ten-minutes real-world time in the void had almost broken her.

  The abuse Alice had suffered as a child drove her to protect Paulie by any means necessary; were Four’s actions any different? No, so who was she to judge? How could she hold someone accountable for actions she herself would commit? She couldn’t, but that didn’t make it taste any better. Four would answer for this, but Alice had neither the means nor the method available now; she had to swallow this pill, accept her role as a puppet to monsters.

  She closed her eyes and forced away the rage. Do your job; get this over with.

  “Who ordered Julia killed?” Alice asked, her voice flat.

  “The president.”

  Another part of the puzzle clicked together in Alice’s mind. “Harper provided Julia with the means to take over New York but only if she got reprinted.”

  “Yes.”

  “That part I don’t underst
and. Why the reprint?”

  “She was reprinted with a neural clock. That allows the user full access to the power of an MI, but it also creates the perfect means of communication and control. If Julia didn’t do as instructed, Harper would know and kill her.”

  “Arizona’s also a government undertaking.”

  “It is.”

  “Which means this was Harper’s plan all along. Use Five Points and B13 to import the scanners, then kill them.”

  “I feel we’ve missed something,” Four said, ancient eyes glittering. “Tell me what you saw in Arizona. Go slow.”

  “Can’t you just read my mind?”

  “Of course, dear, but without context, they are but broken images. I can deduce outlines from them, but I want to hear what you thought.”

  Alice stood and approached the kitchen where she dragged a blue plastic sheet from the center worktop. Dust rose in a cloud as she opened a cupboard, found a glass, and filled it with water from the faucet. A pump chugged beneath her, its faint vibration buzzing the floor as she took a sip then sat on a stool. “They’ve built a city that can hold millions. When it’s your turn, you go into a huge hall and get scanned. It’s an industrial process, all worked out to the second. They must be shifting hundreds of thousands per day.”

  “Hmm.” Four sat on a stool beside her. “Tell me what you see here.” She gestured around.

  Alice twisted on the chair to look back at the door she had walked though, at the empty room around them. “It looks like one of the water refinery bubbles on Europa.”

  “You can dispense with the obvious. What do you see?”

  Alice bristled, then looked again at the rough printed textures, the clean but stale air, the lack of people. “It’s not open yet.”