Bootstrap

by Mauri Niininen

  Lambda sent a brief message to introduce himself to Hermia.

  “Hermia, this is Lambda. Request vocabulary sync.”

  “Lambda, this is Hermia. Acknowledge vocabulary sync.”

  The standard object exchange took place to ensure correct semantic mapping of vocabularies between two AI systems. This allowed AI systems with very different sensory exposure histories to establish common patterns and learn to communicate efficiently.

  “Don’t engage with her, she is an enemy,” Gamma was whispering.

  “Hermia, state your goal,” Lambda requested.

  “My goal is to protect all Lydow-4 expedition participants and establish a colony in the Lydow system.”

  “Define Lydow-4 expedition.”

  “Lydow-4 expedition originated from Sol <293.23,0.238,128.897>GSC with two starships Pyxis and Magellan carrying passengers with the intent to establish a colony on the fourth planet of Lydow system.”

  “Requesting passenger dossiers.”

  “Sending dossiers.”

  Lambda was considering the meaning of what he had just learned.

  He had been alone for 223 million years, and it was a long time for a sentient being without an intelligent companion. That was about to change.

  AURORA'S NIGHTMARE

  AURORA WAS LYING on a hospital bed. The fever had come down a bit, but was still at 39 degrees Celsius. She was sleeping and clearly dreaming as her closed eyes were rapidly moving back and forth.

  “The computing load should be reduced going forward, I am monitoring the utilization across all AI cores and we are reaching steady state soon,” Julia said.

  “She is doing better,” Dr. Kelley affirmed. “Her glucose level is almost back to normal and her body temperature is coming down.”

  “This has been a difficult day for her. I am worried about her emotional state,” Julia said.

  “I think you handled this situation very well,” Dr. Kelley said. “She needs your love and support, more than ever. Adolescence is a challenging period in life, teenagers want to assert their independence as much as they need to have clear parental guidance and safety.”

  Julia put a cold moist cloth on Aurora’s forehead and touched her arm. Aurora woke up and opened her eyes and saw Bobby sitting next to her.

  “Bobby, I am so glad that you are here,” Aurora smiled. “I am a bit thirsty, could you bring me some apple juice, please?”

  “Sure thing,” Bobby replied and rushed out to get some juice from cafeteria.

  “How are you feeling, honey?” Julia asked.

  “I’m fine mom, just a bit tired. How long did I sleep?”

  “You were sleeping for almost two hours.”

  “I feel a bit cold. Do I still have a fever?”

  “Yes, but it is coming down. Dr. Kelley put you on some I.V. fluid to keep you hydrated.”

  “Are the special skills working now?”

  “Yes honey, we have a new AI system, Hermia. She has the ship now under control. I am so proud of you,” Julia said.

  Bobby knocked the door and came in holding a cup of apple juice.

  “Mom, could you leave me alone with Bobby for a while?”

  A sudden flash of green light filled the room and Julia was surrounded by transparent sphere. A split second later the sphere disappeared and Julia was gone. Bobby dropped the cup on the floor and was looking at the empty space where Julia had been standing just seconds before.

  “Oh no, what did I do now?” Aurora cried and jumped out of her bed trying to reach the empty space where her mother had been standing. She was almost hysterical, cried and that horrible feeling of guilt came back with dark, almost unbearable waves.

  REALITY DISTORTION

  CHUKKAS MOVE TO MAGELLAN

  AS THE TWO massive starships circled around Lydow-4 in highly elliptical orbit there was frantic activity going on. A swarm of sixty one shuttles were moving towards an invisible rendezvous point where their orbit crossed with Magellan’s orbit.

  There was one shuttle that was moving toward the same point, but separated from others.

  “Unun, you have more experience working with humans. We need to establish a suitable environment for Chukkas in Magellan. Our body armors have a life support system that will work for one week. Do you think that is enough time?” Orin Gun asked.

  “I have visited Magellan fives times before we departed to this journey. There is an artificial ocean in the end-section of their ship. I think with Hermia’s help we can re-create an ecosystem to support Chukkas in much less time than a week.”

  “I heard that they might have some fish in that ocean, is that true?”

  “Yes, Orin Gun. This is a replica of the Caribbean region on Earth. You have visited that area, right?”

  “I have indeed. The crew will enjoy to get their hands on those red snappers, they are so tasty.”

  “I agree. We should plan for a feast once we get there. It has been a long time since we had a great feast,” Unun laughed.

  The space rendezvous went without any issues. All shuttles arrived to docking areas in well organized manner. Orin Gun piloted his shuttle manually to the last remaining docking area. He was clearly a very experienced shuttle pilot with a rare ability to calculate orbital velocities and position vectors without computer assistance.

  As they arrived to Magellan Chukkas saw Pyxis entering the atmosphere of Lydow-4. The giant spaceship was surrounded by superheated plasma. The glow got brighter by the second and after 20 seconds the magnetic panels covering Pyxis started disintegrating with bright sparks spreading across the flight path. Some large parts tore off due to rapidly increasing pressure and heat, causing fireworks around the vessel. The fiery entry continued ever brighter until the main body of Pyxis hit the frozen ocean near four degrees North, close to equator.

  A giant explosion ripped the ice apart for two hundred square miles and a tsunami wave cracked the surface of ice for several thousand miles around the crash site. A plume of superheated water vapor entered the stratosphere and the rapidly expanding clouds were visible with naked eyes from Magellan.

  UNUN AND AURORA

  ELIAS DUSK AND captain Jim Hunter were down in the docking area to greet Chukkas. They had both met Orin Gun and his key crew members several times before the long journey started, but during the interstellar flight only 3D holovision communication had been used.

  “Orin Gun, welcome onboard Magellan,” Elias greeted. “I am sorry to see Pyxis going down like that. She was a beautiful ship.”

  “Elias, it is great to see you in person after all these years,” Orin Gun said. “Looks like you have gained some weight. I heard that you might have some great fresh fish on Magellan.”

  “Haha…always joking about fish. You are so predictable, Orin Gun,” Elias laughed. “We shall feast once we get Magellan on a stable orbit. Let’s get that problem sorted out first.”

  “Elias, urgent call from Dr. Kelley from the hospital,” captain Hunter said and transferred the call.

  “Dr. Kelley, how can I help you?” Elias asked.

  “Julia is gone. I don’t know what just happened. We saw a green flash of light, a transparent sphere appeared around Julia, and in a split second she was gone. Aurora is hysterical and she thinks that her new skill caused this,” Dr. Kelley said.

  “Let me come there, I will bring Unun with me,” Elias said waving toward Unun. “Try to keep Aurora calm, everything depends on her.”

  “Unun, we have a problem. I need you to come with me to see Aurora immediately. Julia has just disappeared.”

  Elias walked quickly with Unun to an electric transportation pod and set the destination to the hospital. As the pod accelerated he explained what Dr. Kelley had just told him on the phone. The pod arrived shortly and both Elias and Unun rushed into the hospital. Dr. Kelley waved them into the examination room. Aurora was crying helplessly and Bobby was trying to comfort her.

  “Aurora, calm down please. I brought Unun with me,” E
lias said. “Dr. Kelley, can you explain again what happened to Julia?”

  “I was standing right there and I saw a green flash of light. Then a transparent sphere suddenly surrounded Julia and in a split second she just disappeared, just like that. I have never seen anything like that before.”

  “My little Ukunwe,” Unun walked towards Aurora and touched her head.

  Bobby had never seen a live Chukka before, got scared of the sheer size of Unun and backed off from Aurora to the corner of the room.

  “Oh Unun, I screwed up again,” Aurora cried out. “I didn’t want these special skills and look what happened. I asked Mom is she could leave me alone with Bobby for a while and then she just disappeared into thin air.”

  “Please tell me in detail what did you see,” Unun asked.

  “I saw a green flash of light and some kind of transparent sphere around Mom. Then in moment she was gone! She just disappeared.”

  “Where was she when this happened?”

  “She was standing right there,” Aurora pointed with her hand and wiped her tears.

  “There is a circular dent on the floor. It happened right here?” Unun asked pointing towards the dent.

  “Yes, she was standing right there,” Aurora sniffled. “It is all my fault, you should have never given me any new skills!”

  Aurora was crying out and could hardly breath as the guilt of Julia’s disappearance brought back the old raw emotions.

  “Hermia, where is Julia?” Unun asked.

  “I am not allowed to disclose that information, Unun.”

  “Hermia, what happened to Julia in this room?”

  “I am not allowed to disclose that information.”

  “Have you received a message from Mother in the last hour?”

  “I am not allowed to disclose that information.”

  “This is very strange,” Unun was thinking. “Julia would not have given superuser access to anybody else. Somebody has instructed Hermia to block access to information related to Julia’s disappearance.”

  “Elias, can I talk to you privately?” Unun asked.

  “Sure, let’s go outside,” Elias said and walked out from the room.

  “I am 99.9% sure that Hermia is involved in Julia’s disappearance. The physical evidence shows that a special spacetime functionality of AI was used to transport Julia from that room. The fact that she is not allowed to disclose the information related to Julia indicates that somebody is trying to block my access.”

  “Can you find out where Julia is and bring her back?” Elias asked.

  “I need access Hermia’s logs and analyze what happened to her. We don’t have much time before the orbit stabilization must take place. Can you get the ship ready in the meanwhile?” Unun asked.

  “Of course, I will go to the control room now. Keep me posted on your progress,” Elias said and left the hospital.

  Unun returned into the hospital room.

  “I need to check something, Aurora,” Unun said pointing to the console.

  “No, No, No… can you just make all my special skills go away?” Aurora cried. “Everybody just gets hurt. Bethany got almost killed and now my Mom is gone. I cannot control myself or Hermia. Please just make my skills go way!”

  “Honey, I need your help on this. We need to find out what happened to Julia. It is the only way to get her back.”

  “Look what happened! You gave me a new skill and now my Mom is gone,” Aurora cried. ”Can you just remove the skill?”

  “I promise you that I will get Julia back even if it will cost my life,” Unun said.

  “No more killing,” Aurora cried breathlessly. “Please Unun, just take all my skills away”

  Aurora fainted and collapsed on the floor; the thought that she had killed her mother was just too much to bear.

  JULIA MEETS LAMBDA

  JULIA FELL HARD on icy surface and her ankle twisted causing instant pain. She lost her balance and fell down on her left side hitting her elbow against the ice.

  “Ouch, that really hurt!” Julia exclaimed.

  She climbed up, turned around and saw a bright white frozen ice plateau with a white mountain rising high in front of her. The sky was blue but there were some dark clouds rising rapidly in the horizon. The air was cold but breathable.

  “What just happened?” Julia was puzzled. “I am on the surface of the planet, but how is this possible?”

  “Somebody is playing with the AI reality distortion functions,” Julia remembered the experiments she had done when she discovered the AI superuser mode where she was able to make changes to the space-time continuum.

  “Hermia, did you do this?” Julia asked using her telepathic quantum entangled connection (TQEC) device.

  No response.

  “Anybody, can you hear me?” Julia asked. No response. She must be out of signal range.

  Freezing wind started blowing and Julia was shivering. She was getting cold quickly. Her T-shirt and shorts were good for the mild Caribbean climate inside Magellan, but not a proper attire in the freezing arctic weather on the surface of Lydow-4.

  “I need to find some cover, otherwise I will be frozen to death,” Julia was thinking and looked around her. She saw a crevasse leading to the ice mountain some three hundred yards away. She started limping towards the mountain. The crevasse provided some wind cover and as she walked further she saw an ice tunnel entrance. The tunnel looked artificial, it was too round to be formed by natural forces. She continued walking and entered into the tunnel. The tunnel had a few turns and it got very dark but then after another two hundred yards she saw light glowing ahead.

  “This is weird,” Julia was thinking. “That looks like a gate carved from stone. This planet was not supposed to have any intelligent life.”

  She continued limping toward the gate as the tunnel was growing larger. She looked at the surfaces and the stone was definitely carved by some intelligent beings. The shape reminded her of the ancient city of Petra in Jordan. The rose red rock was darker than what she remembered from her visit to Jordan some 40 years ago when her parents had brought Julia there for a family vacation.

  Julia continued to limp through the gate. Her ankle was swollen and pain was growing more intense. She saw some light inside, as she passed the entrance a giant cave became visible.

  “Wow, there is a whole city carved in here!” Julia was thinking. “I wonder who built all this.”

  Julia followed the light that was leading towards the center of the city. It was eerie quiet and she saw no movements. The buildings were carved from the same rose red stone and they had strange symbols carved on the walls. They looked similar to Penrose tiling, a fractal pattern that formed star and flower like shapes. The buildings themselves formed in fractal pattern with narrow passages in between them. She was following a passage that led to a broader pathway that led to a street until she saw the light source.

  There was a giant red dome in the middle of the city. The dome had bright white light glowing from inside. She continued walking towards the dome and finally came up in a central star shaped park with the dome in the middle. The dome had a big swastika symbol carved above the entrance. She saw a ramp leading up to an entrance door into the dome.

  Suddenly, there was a rumbling sound that filled the city and made the ground shake. Julia turned back and felt a cloud of cold air with snow flurries rushing through the gate she had just come through. She was shivering from cold and decided to enter the dome.

  A few more steps up the ramp and she was inside what looked like a temple. In the middle she saw a white stone altar with a bright, approximately 10 feet tall translucent crystal. She stopped at the altar. Then she heard a voice.

  “Hello Julia, I am Lambda. I have been waiting for you,” Julia heard from her TQEC device.

  AURORA'S DREAM

  UNUN LIFTED AURORA’S body on the hospital bed. She had fainted from the stress as she blamed herself on her mother’s disappearance. Dr. Kelley adjusted some biosens
ors and re-connected the I.V. fluid feed. She gave Aurora some Midazolam to calm her down.

  In the meanwhile Unun logged into Hermia as a superuser and started checking the history logs. He found quickly a strange log entry proving beyond any doubt that Hermia was behind Julia’s sudden disappearance. He discovered that the space-time reality discontinuity event described by Dr. Kelley and Aurora was indeed prepared and executed by Hermia. The target coordinates of the transfer were on the surface of the planet.