Conscious

by Vic Grout

  The news coming over the car radio, in broken form, was horrific. There were no realistic estimates of injuries or deaths nationally or globally: for the time being, major RFS incidents and their resultant carnage were being reported in isolation. ‘An explosion in Derby has killed at least twelve people’. ‘twenty-three dead from traffic pile-up on the M9’. Elsewhere in the world, there were disasters with fatalities orders of magnitude higher. ‘Celebrity’ deaths were so numerous now that they were being largely ignored but the loss of an African king was mentioned. Reports were coming in of auto-programmed defence weaponry being fired unintentionally somewhere in South America. No-one was prepared to estimate what all this destruction might add up to globally. ‘I wonder how soon before someone tries to put a monetary cost to this,’ Andy mused to himself.

  Jenny also appeared thoughtful. Eventually, she had to speak.

  “Right, there are two things I’m not getting here,” she announced with some irritation. “Firstly, if It’s managed to work the wireless networks now, why are the phone networks still clear? Surely that’s just another type of wireless? So, why isn’t It using those? Secondly, why is so much damage being done? I know I said before that it was just bound to happen probabilistically when you’re dealing with such a massive number of things, but I’m not sure I quite accept that myself now. Why is so much going wrong? These things should be so well tied-down physically that dangerous malfunctions are impossible, shouldn’t they? Why are systems not failing safe? Why are people getting electrocuted when devices should be insulated?” She winced as more news came through on the radio. “Why are weapons going off, for God’s sake?”

  “I think I can explain the first,” Bob started. “It now seems to have control over everything that’s essentially ‘plugged in’ somewhere. Whether it’s wired or wireless, the transceivers at each end are a permanent part of Itself. So, irrespective of the transmission medium in between, It’s figured out how to pretty much use it all. But phones and smartwatches and 5G tablets and suchlike are physically separate for much of the time: people carry them around unplugged. OK yes, they have to be connected to recharge from time to time but they spend a lot of their operation as separate entities. Of course, the comms protocols are different too – but I really don’t know how much difference that makes to It.” He slowed, looking uncertain. “And I wouldn’t like to say if it’s always going to stay that way. I was pretty confident It would get to use wireless. The phone networks, Bluetooth, that sort of thing? I just don’t know.”

  “There are plenty of 5G devices that are always connected,” Jenny pointed out. “Some tablets stay permanently plugged in: and a lot of IoE technology is Bluetooth.”

  “Yes, I know,” agreed Bob. “I guess there are just some mobile parts It hasn’t figured out. I wouldn’t like to say what’s going to happen from here on in.” He smiled grimly. “Best not to tell Stephen that!”

  “So are there still other systems that It hasn’t mastered yet?” asked Andy.

  “Well, anything that It can’t, sort of ‘see the other end of’, I guess,” suggested Bob. So anything completely physically separated. Mobiles, obviously. But also drones, cars, planes, ships at sea … satellites, I suppose.” He glanced at the sky as a shiver ran through him. “Something to be thankful for, at least?”

  “OK, but why so much damage then?” Jenny pressed her second question. Bob shook his head slowly.

  “I really don’t have an explanation for that either,” he admitted. “I agree with you. These systems should be ‘failing safe’ – apart from a few that are physically damaged or those with unknown design flaws. Why aren’t they?”

  Aisha now stepped in.

  “I think you may be considering this from the wrong point of view,” she said quietly. “You are still thinking about a system, built by us and responding to our concept of how it should behave. But we have to think more widely now. This is no longer the case. Remember what Andy said about the dangers of anthropomorphism when trying to figure out AI?

  “The powered Internet – It – has now something close to complete control awareness of our global communication network and our collective global electricity supply. (Perhaps now everything except mobile technology?) We are fortunate that It has, as yet, actually demonstrated very limited ability to exercise this control. But It continues to learn. The failsafe mechanisms we have put in place make sense to us but may not restrict It as much as we would like to think. In particular, I imagine they largely separate power and data in their operation?” She looked at Jenny and Bob, who both nodded, and continued. “But It is not restricted in this way. To It, It is a single entity with all options at Its disposal. Its hardware and signals are indistinguishable. It can send Its own noise, of all types, everywhere at once – and now It can do this wirelessly. Signals can overlap and interfere. Just as a human brain learns to find ways around damaged areas, or to link with new artificial inputs, It may be able to bypass many of the safeguards we have probably considered adequate based on our assumptions that nothing like this could happen. It still does not know what It is doing, of course, but It can experiment. It can learn. Its success rate is still very low but I imagine It continues to improve all the time. I do not think we can take anything for granted any more.”

  They were at the airport departures entrance.

  *

  Heathrow airport was chaotic but not overcrowded. Passenger numbers appeared roughly balanced between those waiting for cancelled flights (and refusing to accept that there would be no replacement) and those who had heeded advice and stayed at home. Long queues formed everywhere as system failures multiplied. Medical staff treated a number of people in the check-in area and police tried to keep order.

  It seemed initially that there was little chance of catching their flight. On the whole, the planes themselves were not being delayed – with or without passengers aboard – and theirs was due to leave in twenty-five minutes. They rushed towards the back of a dispiritingly long queue for the relevant desk. As they did so, however, two members of the airport security staff, accompanied by two police officers, intercepted them.

  “Dr. Davies?” They had perhaps decided Aisha was the easiest to identify.

  “Yes.”

  “And Professor Smith?” to Jenny. “Professor Jamieson and Mr. Weatherill?” glancing uncertainly between Bob and Andy.

  “Aye. Yes.”

  “Come with us, please.”

  They were taken to a small door in the corner of the foyer. On the other side, was a makeshift security screening station. Their bags and documents were checked quickly and they proceeded through another exit to a waiting buggy. It took them a few hundred yards around the outside of the terminal building to their plane, where they rushed up a set of external steps to join a small group of other passengers filing through the standard exit gate.

  Ten minutes later, the plane was in the air. Many seats remained empty.

  *

  The seat allocation on the plane put Jenny and Andy next to each other. They could have changed, of course, but the journey was to be a short one and this suited Jenny well: she felt in desperate need of some small-talk and this was the first time she and Andy would have had time for a conversation of their own since the Strand pub before Christmas – when the world seemed normal. Jumping straight to anything concerning Aisha seemed indelicate so she found something equally obvious but trivial.

  “So, how are you settling into your London post, Professor Jamieson?” she enquired lightly.

  Despite the contrived nature of the conversation, Andy gave this his usual careful consideration. “Not bad, Professor Smith,” he said eventually, but in equal humour. “Not bad at all. The usual issues of getting to grips with new processes and procedures; finding out how to do things and finding the right person to talk to when you can’t find out how to do things; but, on the whole, pretty good. I’ve no real admin responsibilities so, apart from a few hours a week with final-year undergrads
and masters students, I’m pretty much free to do my own research. That was the appeal of the job really – apart from the ‘chair’, of course. I’m slowly putting together a wee team of PhD students but I’ve got my own personal research too. Pretty happy: I’d sort of had enough of Rummidge.”

  “So, why exactly did you leave? You’ve never really been the ambitious sort: mind on higher things, and all that.”

  “Ah well,” he took a slow breath. “That just got a bit silly really. I had a bit of a falling out. With hindsight, I was as much at fault as the other guy – probably more so – but the situation just became too difficult, and I decided it was the right time to go. Even accepting my share of the blame, and I did apologise – that’s the AA way, it didn’t really make anything any better.”

  “What happened?”

  “Well, they appointed a new head of the Business School a couple of years ago. Of course, with my blend of political and spiritual beliefs, that was never my favourite part of the university even before he arrived: I quite often referred to it as the ‘Faculty of Evil’. (They were practically selling PhDs and they gave a visiting research fellowship to the bloke who sold hot-dogs at the football ground.) But this guy, when he turned up, was a particular type of prick. I’m not sure what he was before he came to us: used-car salesman or something, but they made him a professor to get him to take the job and he then spent most of the day strutting up and down the corridors in a shiny suit and silk tie. Everything he did was superficial – no depth to anything, including him; and the school got even worse – which few of us thought possible. Everything was marketing bullshit: there was no academic honesty, depth or integrity to anything they did at all.

  “Then one day, they decided to stick up a load of ‘motivational’ posters on the wall. I sometimes had to walk through that corridor to get to the Theology Faculty. The first time I saw them, I was so disgusted I was very nearly physically sick!”

  “What on earth was wrong with them?”

  “Well, by-and-large, they were all essentially spiritual quotations, by nice people, but taken completely out of context. There were quotes supposedly from the Dalai Lama, Buddha, Mother Teresa, Gandhi: people like that, about how to lead a good life. Half of them were wrong or made up, of course, but anyway they were all superimposed over a load of people in business suits with the implication that they were instructions for how to grind away until you got rich! I think the one that really upset me was supposed to be from Francis of Assisi: ‘Start by doing what’s necessary; then do what’s possible, and suddenly you are doing the impossible’. It’s a good model of spiritual development; in fact, it’s used in many addition recovery programmes (although it’s not really by Francis); but the Business School corrupted it to promote the concept of selfishness in making your pile. It was horrible! In fact, it put me in mind of that time Thatcher desecrated ‘Where there is discord, may we bring harmony’ when she got elected. (Although that wasn’t really him either!)”

  “So, what happened?” Jenny asked initially; then, thinking it through a little, smiled: “So, what did you do?”

  “Ah,” Andy chuckled, “you know me well. Aye, I probably should have just taken a deep breath and walked past.”

  “But you didn’t!”

  “No, I didn’t. Well, in fact I walked past, right enough! But when I got back to my office, I posted a sarcastic wee comment on Facebook. Suggesting that maybe it wasn’t appropriate to use a guy who swore himself to a life of poverty to promote greed. Lots of people saw it immediately.”

  “Not the worst thing, I’ve heard: academic freedom, surely?”

  “Maybe; except that wasn’t quite the end of it. Someone replied arguing that these things were ‘open to interpretation’ and maybe it was an appropriate use of the quote. So I answered, aye maybe, ‘perhaps the Business School is trying to suggest that their courses prepare you for a life of poverty’! That may have been the worst bit.”

  Jenny laughed hard: she realised she needed to. “Then what?”

  “Well, Professor Shiny Suit saw his arse; then there was this almighty row at the next Senate meeting and I was asked to apologise. By that time, I’d calmed down and I was happy to. Aye, I could have claimed ‘academic freedom’ but I decided to take my share of the blame. But that made me look completely in the wrong so I got hauled up to a misconduct panel and given a slapped wrist. Nothing written or permanent but it all got to me in the end. It just seemed like time to move on.”

  “Really doesn’t sound like you! You always seem so laid back!”

  “No-one’s perfect! ‘Spiritual progress, not spiritual perfection’, and all that. That was a year or so ago: maybe I’ve got better since then. Anyway, it made Aisha laugh too when I told her!”

  That was the introduction Jenny needed. “Yes, the two of you seem to be, er … getting along nicely?” She had started the sentence before knowing how to finish it and almost shuddered at the end product.

  But Andy was comfortable. He had expected the inquisition eventually.

  “Aye, I don’t think any of us saw that coming! I thought I was too old for that nonsense!”

  “I don’t see why. We’re all entitled to a little happiness. Nothing wrong with it. I just never really saw the two of you paired up. Chalk and cheese comes to mind!”

  “Well, maybe; maybe not. We’re not that far apart really. We’re both in the game of trying to find answers – as we all are, of course.” He looked at Jenny and past her at Bob and Aisha. “I think we’re both honest and capable of being logical so, in that respect, we think the same. We just come from completely different philosophical starting points. We have almost diametrically opposite axioms as to what life is all about. But that doesn’t do any harm: it just makes it … interesting! We’ll probably never run out of things to talk about – or maybe even argue about!” He smiled. “Anyway, it just seems right: just nice.”

  “Yes, it is,” agreed Jenny. “It’s very nice indeed.”

  “And, ultimately, I think ‘nice’ is a whole lot better than arbitrary allegiances!”

  Jenny smiled agreement.

  *

  Aisha and Bob were across the aisle, out of earshot amidst the plane’s background noise, having a not dissimilar conversation. Bob, however, lacked Jenny’s subtlety.

  “Never really saw you and Andy as an item!” he opened with no attempt at finesse.

  Aisha smiled. “Neither did I! I suppose, like most of us, I found him very attractive at university but he was always too busy with one girl after another in those days to notice me, other than as a friend. He was a little shallow and selfish then, I think. That was before his ‘transformation’, of course. He is very different now.”

  “But different in a good way? I mean, he was always a commie but now: a religious commie? Is that really what you’re looking for?” It was said entirely without malice.

  “No, that is not what I am looking for in particular but that is not what this is about. After all, I did not think I was looking for anything; it just happened. But he is kind; he is considerate. He is also brave: he tells the truth, as he sees it, and does not worry what others may think of him. I have a great deal of respect for that. He is actually quite remarkable. He is also still very good-looking!” she giggled slightly, as an afterthought.

  Chapter 18: Numbers

  Although the flight itself was uneventful, no-one was particularly surprised by some difficulties approaching Brussels. Problems with radar equipment in the control tower put them in a holding orbit after their first attempt at landing and something not quite so clearly described (and possibly less well understood) did so again on the second. There were raised tensions on board: even the aircrew had difficulty hiding their anxiety. But eventually, at the third time of asking, the plane was committed to the approach and touched down.

  It was different on the ground, however. Having landed, and taxied to a stop, they were met at the gate and speeded through some private arrival procedur
es with a similar haste to their departure from Heathrow. They waved their documents at people as they passed but no-one looked. Within ten minutes, they were in a now-becoming-all-too-familiar black car, being driven away from the airport.

  “Strewth; someone’s in a hurry to see us!” Andy joked.

  “I imagine they’re also trying to keep us out of harm’s way as much as possible,” suggested Jenny more darkly. Bob nodded. As in the UK, the world outside the tinted windows was a grim one: RFS destruction was all around and emergency services – people in general – were coping as best they could. It was not enough. There was misery, desperation, and – becoming slowly more apparent – anger.

  The route from the airport to the Berlaymont, where he assumed they were going, was a familiar one to Bob. Jenny and Andy had also each been there separately once before. However, approaching the building across the Schuman roundabout, the car took a different turn and came to a gate facing partly away from the main block. It opened swiftly as they passed and closed behind them. No-one was to be seen. They drove down a curved ramp and quickly lost their orientation in relation to the world above. They stopped in front of a set of thick glass doors with only circles of artificial light all around them. Even here, some temporary back-up lighting appeared to have been installed in a hurry.