by Kris Schnee
Robin radioed the entire Silver Circle network and if the signal got through, the world, with Leopold's threat. "You hear that?" he said aloud. "You just heard Leopold threaten to kill us for living the way we've been doing."
Mindful of Leopold preparing his next move, Robin went on quickly. He made sure there was a camera looking at the new flag. "We declare independence for Silver Circle as a sovereign territory. We're not bound by your laws anymore, and you're not getting another penny from us, Leopold -- unless it's as our employee. You shot at our robots like inanimate objects already, without asking whether they were holding real minds. Do you realize how that's going to look to every digital mind on the planet? If you soldiers out there put the damn guns away and talk in peace, we'll be happy to keep helping Cibola, but --"
Leopold's voice modulator got overloaded, and the megaphone screeched even at this distance that hid Leopold from sight. "Shut up, you thieving viper! We welcomed you onto Cibolan land, outsider, and then you decided you were too good to follow the laws. Too good to stay human. Now you want people to die for your ego and your made-up tax exemption?"
"That's where you're wrong," Robin said. "Notice I put my robots in harm's way first, and I didn't start the shooting. You're not just attacking me and Edward and Ludo, you're telling all of us that we can't try living in a new way. We were willing to put the independence thing off a little longer and then talk it out, but now you've pushed us. Do you even get that your orders from on high are part of some greater game, between Ludo and whoever is trying to kill her? We used to be mice under the feet of the powerful, but we're growing enough to get a broader view. Can you see the big picture, Leopold? It doesn't have to end in a fight."
Leopold muttered something, but the sound barely carried. Orders, probably.
Robin radioed, [Movement by their flanking group?]
[Not yet], sent Edward. [Sir, if they get closer and he's not bluffing about lethal force...]
[Then we use the microwave gun.] It was designed as a "pain ray" by the US government, to disperse crowds. [And then the real guns.]
Robin called out, "You soldiers out there; remember how the Mosquito was killing civilians? My people took care of him for you. If you have any gratitude, remember that these are your own neighbors, not just machines."
Leopold gave an enraged growl and shouted into his megaphone, "Attack!"
"Stand down!" Robin shouted at the foe. He glanced behind him and saw his own side ready to kill over this dispute that never should have happened. He'd tried everything he could to prevent it, from the audacity of declaring independence to personal appeal. What had moved Leopold from reluctant obedience to this much stubbornness?
His ears picked up faint sounds of a scuffle ahead. Then an unfamiliar voice said, "All right, mister MacAdam. I've relieved the governor of command of this operation. Will you honor a truce if I come up to talk?"
Robin heard the murmur of the men behind him, like a wave of relief. "Please."
* * *
The Cibolan officer was named Domingo, and he accepted a cup of coffee inside the nearest bunker. "Locally grown?"
"Yes, sir," said Robin, using his fancy but damaged body. "I'd gladly join you, but I've lost the ability to drink."
"Then you're missing out. The crop around here is something special." Domingo sipped and nodded.
"We try. If you leave us alone, we'll keep exporting it along with machines, medical care, and everything else we can invent."
Domingo said, "What set the governor off was hearing how you took credit for killing the Mosquito. We've been hearing him warn people about your sedition, but today he went from wanting to ratchet up the pressure on you, to ranting about putting your head on a pike."
Robin had misjudged Leopold, then. "He didn't just want a share of the money. He wants to be a hero and not be replaced by someone taking over his territory."
"You are guilty of sedition and rebellion; I can't blame him for being upset. It's just that he sees it as a personal slight. When he stopped enjoying the negotiation and tried to turn this into a personal vendetta, I saw that he wasn't acting in anybody's best interest."
Robin said, "Will you back off, then?"
"I'm told there's a coordinated assault on your AI's bases, but early reports say that the attacks are being repelled. I suspect our government was goaded or misinformed into attacking today, which makes our orders outdated." Domingo finished his coffee and looked regretfully into the empty cup. "In light of Leopold's actions, and the unexpectedly strong resistance here, and your restraint in not shedding military men's blood, I'm going to order a withdrawal."
"Thank God. You're saving lives, sir."
"Indeed. This doesn't mean we acknowledge this 'Silver Circle' entity, and in fact we might be coming back with air power and artillery. You were holding back, but so were we."
23. Men of Silver
The most wonderful thing about the battle was that there was no need to schedule a funeral. Robots could be mended and Lumina could endure any number of arguments with the Cibolans, if she didn't need to shoot anybody for real.
Delphine, the reporter from America, had a literal field day coming to Golden Goose to interview people. She hugged Lumina in the real world and said, "Do I need to call you a princess now?"
"Not you, personally, but that's my actual title."
Delphine laughed. "My editors think you're all crazy, and that the Cibolan government ought to crush you."
"That's not something to joke about!"
"But that won't happen. Your people proved they'd make it more trouble than it's worth. They don't have to sign something formally admitting that Silver Circle is its own country; they just have to continue not paying close attention."
Lumina shook her head. "Politics is confusing. We were posturing right through that battle, about how far each of us would go."
Delphine said, "That's how it goes, unless people go all the way with nukes or bio-weapons. You can't expect a binary, win/lose outcome. Or even a totally clear right/wrong one."
"We're close enough to winning, and being right," Lumina said. "Say... While you're here, we do have an uploading clinic, with the gradual brain-scan method."
The human looked toward the building where Mike and the other technicians were installing the latest technology, helping to bring the price down to where more people could reach it. She said, "Not yet. But you've shown me you can still be useful in there, and when I go, I think I want my mind hosted on your servers, not Ludo's."
"And then what will you do?" asked Lumina.
"That's always the question, huh? Keep reporting, learn new skills, try to earn my keep. I'd like to be a citizen of a free country."
* * *
A flag of a silver circle on purple flew in a dozen places over Golden Goose, and in the other nearby towns that their network had helped. For a few of the outlying places Lumina suspected that it was a novelty, a short-lived mockery of Cibola's legal rulers. But a few of these rogue districts had become serious, once it was clear that the national troops were hesitant to kill people for joining. Between the unpopularity of the national government and its own economic woes compared to the prosperity in Robin's lands, an organized attack didn't seem to be coming. The real guns and backup plans were in place, just in case.
What it took to become an independent country wasn't so much filling out the right paperwork, as quietly setting up a parallel system, then reaching an uneasy agreement not to shoot. She still wasn't sure where the border would be, or whether it'd be clear or fuzzy.
Lumina took care of the congratulatory call from Tess on the seastead of Castor. The engineer said, "Glad you all made it through. Got some good news for you, too: the American Free States are planning to recognize your little city-state. It's all unofficial and you should expect a lot of wrangling first, but yeah."
"Why?" asked Lumina. "Is Castor planning to join, or Cuba?"
"We're part of Silver Circle as trade partners,
but we're okay with the AFS as our government. They'll recognize you, to try to spark all your neighbors to rise up and join you. Partly to spite the US, and partly to gain influence in Central America. It's complicated. But figure that after an election or two, there's a chance you'll end up actually being the government of Cibola or more."
Lumina whistled. "There's a lot of work to do, then. Playing princess of one village that mostly runs itself is different from handling country-scale problems."
"One step at a time," Tess said. "Really, seeing you guys succeed helps convince some powerful people that Ludo won't get to run everything."
* * *
Nocturne hugged her. "I'm glad you're okay. I want you to keep more backups for now on, okay?"
"Fine, fine." Lumina nervously tidied up her cavern sanctum in Talespace. She hadn't been using it much lately, and though it didn't get dusty, she'd been starting to forget where she left things in it. She was reminded to start seriously looking into mental upgrades, for herself and Robin alike.
The griffin watched and helped out. "Years ago, I did a charity thing where I had hundreds of dollars to play with. It seemed like a tiny amount compared to how many humans there are. Now, you're starting to have the resources of a small country. You can start to really make a difference."
"Today Cibola, tomorrow the world?" asked Lumina.
"Maybe not yet, but soon."
* * *
"How are you, Mom?" Lumina stood before her in the maze of dark stone that was Ludo's quiet sanctum.
Ludo hugged her. "I'm proud of you. My friends blocked a variety of attacks yesterday, and won a lot of credibility worldwide for surviving in the face of everything from hacking to military assault. You helped."
"We were doing it for ourselves," Lumina said.
"And that's just fine! I aim to continue having an uploading clinic and data center in your nation's territory, princess, if you'll allow it."
Lumina blushed, a feeling that still surprised her, and her hooves scuffed at the floor. "Of course. I never thought you'd need my permission for something in the real world."
"What a shame; I'm not going to rule the world anytime soon." The gamemaster smiled. "Which means humans will be less afraid of me, because of you. Which means less pointless death and destruction in the long run. So thank you, Lumina, for creating an alternative to me."
"There's something else. I plan to be hosted permanently on our own servers, along with Robin. Though I wouldn't mind us having backups on your hardware, somewhere."
"I have no problem with this."
"Really?" said Lumina, and her ears flicked forward in surprise.
"Again, there should be more than one source of power, more than one flag flying. So far I'm proud of yours."
* * *
She walked with Robin through the tiny universe she had created: a forest under a dome on an asteroid. The struts and decorative life-support machinery were all styled after planet Bonneville, her first home. This place was only a beginning, a prototype, just like Silver Circle itself.
Robin listened to Lumina chattering about all the people who wanted to congratulate them, to manipulate them, and to help in their own ways. He laughed as they trotted through the woods. "So this is what it means to be a prince. Not a happily ever after, but a lot of tricky work to keep everybody satisfied."
"Is that a complaint, dear?" she said, and tousled his tail.
"No, no. Being fancy digital minds doesn't make us living statues of gold and glory, is all. We have to remember that." As they neared the forest dome's edge he said, "We should change Golden Goose's name. We're no longer a resource in the hands of Cibola; we're independent."
Lumina grinned and said, "Silver Stag."
He stopped and blinked. "It's not about me."
"That's right. The name was decided in a school contest; didn't you hear? Face it, Prince Robin; if you want people to love us and accept us as rulers, we need to be their fairytale ideal, or at least to play the role. They aren't expecting men of gold, but they want shining, talking machines that will fight for them and be their friends. They don't demand miracles, but they want wonders. We can do that."
"I can deliver a wonder, once in a while." Robin stopped at an ornate airlock that was really a software gateway. The minds of Lumina and Robin were stored locally on the town's independent servers, but their virtual environment was one that could connect to Ludo's universe for people to come and go, and to enjoy whatever worlds they wanted. "Are you ready?"
Lumina nodded. Robin pushed the button and the lock's door whooshed open, revealing a gaggle of people living or playing in Talespace. Kai, Nocturne, the Green Sage, and the avatars of Delphine and Tess and Miguel and Edward were all there, armed for a party, and they were just the first guests. They'd brought cake and games and decorations, and they didn't even know Lumina and Robin planned to kick off the house-warming with a dragon attack. It'd be fun. It'd help work out any startup bugs, too. This little world was soon going to be its own imitation of Talespace, with its own permanent residents.
None of them quite lived happily ever after, but nobody was expecting a golden age. Still, it looked to everyone like the beginning of an age of silver, an age of the liberation game, and they were eager to play on and see where it led.
Author's Note
Thank you for reading. If you enjoyed this book, please consider giving a rating on Amazon or Goodreads so others can find out about it!
Parts of this story had been sitting around for years. Lumina kept popping up in other stories including "The Digital Coyote" and the latest edition of "Thousand Tales", but her story continued to be unfinished. After the success of "Crafter's Passion" I dug it out and finished it, trying to weave the events of many tales together. Mike and (briefly) Delphine appear in the free collection "Extra Lives", Kai gets more attention in "2040: Reconnection", and Tess appears among other places in an upcoming sequel to "Crafter".
Cibola is loosely based on an actual Central American country, but as usual, the politicians are not based on any real person or party. The robot desert planet is inspired by a fun setting called "FreeRIDErs" (https://shifti.org/wiki/FreeRIDErs_(setting)) whose main authors go by Jon Sleeper, Robotech Master and Jetfire.
This book is unusual for the Tales setting, because there's this elaborate game world but the characters are focused on real-world events. "Learning To Fly", "The Digital Coyote", and to some extent "Crafter's Passion" go to the other extreme, showing the fun that people have within Talespace's magic rules while still trying to be relevant to reality. If you're interested in the game stuff specifically, check out the subgenre called "LitRPG" or "GameLit". There are several overlapping Facebook groups devoted to it. Their names are in flux but I'll link to a few: Lit LitRPG and GameLit Society.
The setting's real-world aspects interest me too, because nobody knows yet how the world can adapt to advanced AI and robotics tech. The ideas here aren't meant to be the "correct solution" to anything, just one scenario where things mostly work out okay. The inspiration for the machinery at Golden Goose is the "Open Source Ecology" project, seen at http://opensourceecology.org/. As of this writing, a prize has just been won for preserving a pig brain in such detail that individual synapses can be examined. A separate project is scanning a one-millimeter cube of rat brain to map every cell and connection -- which will probably make today's "neural network" models obsolete -- and papers are getting published with hints about exactly what details need to be modeled in order to imitate a mind. A company has proposed to start selling brain preservation service with the new technique. On the other hand, China is experimenting with brain monitoring and a "social credit" system to control its people ever more thoroughly, and the West increasingly accepts mass surveillance with growing AI support. We might see some parts of this strange future come true, yet, for both good and ill.
About the Author
Kris Schnee has been a parrot trainer, an MIT graduate, a zoo intern, a lawyer,
a game designer, and most recently a software developer. He lives in Florida.
Galleries:
http://www.amazon.com/Kris-Schnee/e/B00IY1HDDY/
(Amazon author page)
http://kschnee.deviantart.com
http://kschnee.xepher.net
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The Thousand Tales Series
Thousand Tales: How We Won the Game
2040: Reconnection
The Digital Coyote
Thousand Tales: Extra Lives
Thousand Tales: Learning To Fly
Fairwind's Fortune
Crafter's Passion
Liberation Game
Also By Kris Schnee
Everyone's Island
Striking the Root
Dragon Fate: Interactive Fiction
Perspective Flip
Mythic Transformations
Tales of Kitsune
Anthologies containing Schnee's work include "Different Worlds, Different Skins", "Roar #6", "Gods With Fur", and "Dogs of War II: Aftermath".