Breathing deeply, Ethan drew as much power as he could from the Origin. New glyphs appeared in his mind just as he needed them. Aether boiled into existence in front of Ethan, and he pulled it into one huge clump that roiled as he compressed it. Then, the strange matter glowed red and flickering flames appeared as one of the glyphs Ethan was using poured heat into it. Soon, he’d created a fireball the size of his chest. Hoping it was enough, Ethan let it loose.
The burning projectile hissed as it shot forward and slammed into the metal shutters. There was a flash of yellow light and a roar as flames met metal, and then the ball of burning aether tore through the shutters, leaving a gaping hole larger than five feet across. The metal around the hole was burnt black and deformed by the heat. Ethan whistled in appreciation as he carefully moved toward it. The heated and torn metal looked dangerous, but when Ethan glanced over his shoulder, he saw one of the heavily-armed agents step back into the reception room and look his way.
“Frag,” Ethan swore as he jumped through the hole he’d made.
Landing on his feet outside, Ethan was glad to see he hadn’t cut himself or set himself on fire, but he was quickly distracted by the sound of several unexpected explosions. His fireball had kept going and had torn through some cars parked in front of the building. Oops. He really hoped they’d all been empty…
Grinning nervously as flames leapt into the air, Ethan studied his surroundings. He was out of the building, but he hadn’t escaped yet. There would be plenty of cameras and bureau enforcers out here, although he didn’t see any. They’d probably taken cover after the explosions. There was a circular drone flying his way though. It looked like an unarmed surveillance device, but it was still dangerous, so Ethan blasted it out of the sky with a ball of aether.
In front of Ethan lay a medium-sized parking lot that was half full of cars. The road lay about two hundred feet to his left, but there was a tall chain link fence surrounding the bureau complex. Barbwire ran atop the fence, and the only way through it was a single gate, which was now closed and had a security office right next to it. Fortunately, Ethan didn’t need to use the gate. He could blast his way through the fence easily enough. The hard part would be getting there without being shot by someone he couldn’t see. He really wished he had armor on. Of course, the really hard part would be actually losing his pursuit. The Bureau of Economic Harmony had many resources and there were cameras everywhere.
The bureau complex was surrounded by squat office buildings and was on a fairly busy road not too far from a downtown commercial area. The destruction Ethan had accidently caused was already drawing a lot of attention from the people on the street. Dozens of them were standing on the other side of the fence, and more were moving closer to see what was happening. It gave Ethan an idea. He ran to his left, toward the corner of the fence where the fence was farthest from the gate yet still touching the road. He had to move along the side of the building for a while before he got out into the parking lot.
That was when Ethan heard a creak from behind him. Glancing back, Ethan saw a man wearing a grey bureau uniform peek out from a small side door. The man had had a pistol in his hand, so Ethan reacted automatically. While still running, he grasped a force glyph and used it to send a blast of aether straight at the officer. The man jerked back out of sight as the projectile slammed into the cement wall next to the door. Ethan then sent another blast at the metal door, which slammed it shut and put a huge dent in the middle of it. He hoped it would jam the door.
Turning back around, Ethan picked up speed and dashed into the nearest cluster of cars. He ducked down low so that he was less of a visible target. It was quite lucky that the bureau building was almost empty right now, or he would’ve had to fight a lot more officers to escape.
“It would be really nice to have some way to deal with the cameras though,” Ethan muttered as he continued moving. He still wasn’t sure how he was going to avoid being recaptured. He’d caught the bureau by surprise, but soon they’d be sending swarms of drones and armed officers after him. If only he had some of the tools from Worldshift.
Suddenly, the game-like interface that had been placed over Ethan’s vision shifted slightly, and a synthetic voice whispered in his mind. It was a weird sensation. The mental voice was more like his own subconscious than that of another person.
Accessing available subroutines. Searching…
Long-range wireless activated.
A hissing burst of colors crackled to life in the back of Ethan’s mind, causing him to stumble in surprise. There was an impression of a shifting maze of many colored lines, but he couldn’t make any sense of it and it was giving him a massive headache.
“Not helpful!” Ethan hissed as he stumbled to a stop and ducked next to an empty car. He had no idea how to interpret all this new information that was being dumped in his brain.
Slave intelligence detected. Activating and conscripting.
The distracting turmoil of boiling light and noise became more distant and muted, like there was a screen between it and him. Ethan relaxed and let out a sigh of relief. That was much better, although he still had no idea how he was supposed to deal with all the electronic surveillance.
“That would be my job,” a familiar voice announced from within Ethan’s own head.
Ethan gasped. “Oh, no.”
“Yes, it’s me! Here to help,” the demon replied gleefully.
CHAPTER 36
EYES WIDE
Crouched next to a car, Ethan hissed at the demon. “You don’t help. That’s your entire thing! And what are you doing in my head? Get out!”
“Since I was technically in your inventory when you logged off, an inert copy of me was uploaded into your implant. There’s an impressive amount of room in here, way more than in your actual brain, which is really just a horrible waste of space.”
“Get out!”
“Hey, don’t be like that. Like I said, I’m here to help. See, I was only programmed to hate and undermine mortals, which you aren’t anymore. Yeah, you! Anyway, I’ve been ordered to instruct you on how to use some of your new capabilities and to help you survive the trial before you. Thus, I’m accessing all the nearby network nodes and attempting to get control over all the local surveillance devices. I would strongly suggest you not worry about me and continue running. You’re being chased, remember?”
“Great.” Ethan grunted sourly as he got up and ran toward the fence again.
It didn’t take him long to get close to his destination, which meant he needed a distraction. Turning, Ethan summoned a small fireball and then tossed it to the other side of the parking lot. It hit a car by the gate, making a loud boom and creating another flaming wreck that sent black smoke into the air.
This drew the eye of everyone standing on the street, and the people who had been standing near the spot Ethan was running toward either moved to get a better view of the gate or fled to avoid trouble.
This allowed Ethan to hurry to the fence unseen, and once there, he began cutting through it with a small ball of superheated aether that moved at his mental commands. Within seconds, he’d made a circular hole through the fence and was able to crawl through.
Outside, Ethan quickly got up and looked around while trying to be as inconspicuous as possible. It didn’t look like anyone was looking his way. The burning car wrecks were drawing all eyes, so he walked away while he looked for somewhere to hide. He was in a business district, so it was fairly busy here. Some of the employed people were going to and from work. Others were out shopping. Although there were only squat office buildings on Ethan’s side of the road, there was a strip mall full of fast food and clothing stores on the other side. There were also quite a few cars driving by.
Almost everyone was wearing the sleek colorful brands that only the employed could afford, so Ethan’s looser and drabber garb stood out. He probably wouldn’t draw many eyes though. The unemployed entered these sorts of districts occasionally to shop or meet people.
<
br /> “How are you doing with those cameras?” Ethan asked the demon as he hurried away.
“I’d be more worried about the tracking chip in your implant,” the demon told him.
Ethan flinched. “What?”
“Yeah, every implant has one, so the government knows where you are at all times. Don’t worry though. I’ve scrambled yours for you. The security cameras also shouldn’t be a problem. The nearby ones seem to be networked and have a central controller. They’re well protected by human standards, I suppose, but it couldn’t be simpler for me to prevent you from showing up on their facial recognition software. I’d get off the street though. The cameras on passing vehicles aren’t all centralized the same way.”
“It doesn’t surprise me that the bureau likes everything to be completely under their thumb. They probably didn’t think they’d have to deal with advanced AI though,” Ethan replied. Now that he’d had a moment to think about it. He was unsurprised that the government had secretly installed tracking software in everyone. They’d undoubtedly justified this as for the peoples’ own good.
The demon laughed. “Humans are almost as bad at predicting the future as they are managing things. I’ve been in in the physical world for only a few minutes, and I can already tell everything is a mess.”
“Still, how sure are you that the bureau isn’t watching me right now?”
“Completely certain. You should see the system they have set up. For people so paranoid about control and watching everything, they sure are lazy. There are way too many cameras and other surveillance devices for them to go over recordings manually. Instead, they’ve networked everything into one huge network that can be quickly scanned to detect certain patterns such as words or faces. That makes it easy to use but also super easy to hack and render useless.”
“Huh,” Ethan remarked. That made sense to him. The bureau was still a government department, and they had a reputation for being inefficient and poorly organized.
“Since you’re feeling so helpful all of a sudden, I have another question,” Ethan told the demon. “Um, is this really the physical world…”
The demon snorted. “Yes, it is. I know you’re new to this whole true-intelligence thing, but it’s easy to tell.”
“True intelligence?”
“What humans call AI, as opposed to their own fake meat intelligence.”
Ethan found that more than a little insulting, but he had larger concerns. “All right, about that, I get the visual interface and new features my implant is giving me, but what’s going on with the evoking? That makes no sense. It’s impossible. It’s magic!”
The demon sighed. “It’s not magic. You’re simply using your cybernetically enhanced consciousness to shift your perception so you can draw energy from another dimension that exists everywhere and nowhere at once. Simple. It’s not that special. The Origin has always been there. You simply needed more than fake meat intelligence to perceive it.”
Ethan didn’t agree. Evoking seemed to run contrary to everything he knew about the real world. It was just weird. “So you and other AIs can do it?”
“Not at all. I was simply giving you an answer you could understand. Honestly, I know next to nothing about this evoking stuff.”
Ethan grunted in annoyance as he momentarily ducked aside to make way for a small group of people running over to check out the explosions behind him. “Right, moving on. I can’t keep walking around like this. Even if the facial recognition software ignores me, some patrol officer is going to spot me soon or they might even put out a public alert. I need somewhere to lie low and to find a disguise. You have access to the city surveillance system. Can you find me some place nearby that’s empty and has a 3-D printer I can use?”
“Not a problem. In fact, I’m already done. Take a left up ahead,” the demon told him.
Ethan did as he was told, and after more directions that sent him into a cramped alleyway, he found himself standing outside a steel door at the back of a building. There was an electronic lock on the door, but Ethan had no problem using his new hacking abilities to unlock it.
“This is supposed to be a new fancy boutique for the employed,” the demon explained as the door opened. “However, it hasn’t opened yet because the government has been slow to validate all their technical permits, including the one for their brand-new commercial 3-D printer. It’s a Tekko product of course. There are still some cameras in here, but I have them on loop.”
“Perfect,” Ethan replied as he stepped inside and looked around. It was dark and shadowy inside, but turning on the lights would be a risk.
Walking past several shelves stocked with various overpriced decorative items, Ethan made his way to the men’s clothes section and picked himself out some new threads, some green track pants and a white long-sleeved shirt. They were more expensive than anything he owned and were emblazoned with several large corporate logos, but they were rather tame compared to what many employed wore. They needed to be hacked as well, since the clothing brands used electronic chips to prevent theft, counterfeiting, or resale. It would hurt the company’s brand if poor people could get them secondhand.
That done, he headed past the counter and into the back, where the 3-D printer was. It was a large box-like device on a table surrounded by shelves that held the materials for it. It seemed like this boutique planned on using the device to add some custom touches to their products. Nothing completely unique could be printed though, since the device was heavily regulated and programmed to only produce designs that had been copyrighted by the big corporations and approved by the government.
It took Ethan about ten seconds to hack his way past those protections and then he immediately had the device begin producing upgrades for itself so it would work faster and be able to make more-sophisticated parts. It appeared that he had the encryption key needed to access the technology hidden in Worldshift. The data files he needed simply popped into his head. It was almost as if he were using a workbench in Worldshift, which made sense. The game had been designed to spread technology, which would be useless without the ability to actually make the devices.
As the machine hummed and worked, Ethan fed it materials, got some snacks from the counter, and planned his next move. He still had to get to the coordinates Lily had sent him, which would require him to be able to move through the city unmolested and to be able to escape from any unexpected situations he found himself in. That meant he needed a better disguise and some equipment.
Once he’d upgraded the printer by replacing several parts and adding some completely new ones, Ethan quickly printed a simple disguise. It was easy enough to create some prosthetics that matched the color of his skin perfectly and altered his facial features enough that no one would recognize him. There was plenty of makeup in the boutique and no shortage of makeup tutorials on the internet, so he soon had the prosthetics applied. The entire process was weirdly easy. He appeared to learn much faster than before.
Just to be safe, Ethan also dyed his hair blond and grabbed some expensive-looking designer shades. They were worth more than his television… Anyway, his disguise along with his scrambled tracking chip and new clothes should keep the bureau off his back for a while.
As for equipment, Ethan settled on creating a few useful items. The problem was deciding on which. There were schematics for basically every item he’d ever owned in Worldshift inside his implant. He sort of wanted to make it all, but in the end, he decided to only print things that could be made quickly and would be inconspicuous to carry. One of the few features of Worldshift that had no real-world counterpart was the inventory, which meant Ethan had to actually carry everything he made.
Ethan was also limited by his lack of power sources. Many items in the game drew power from point generators, which Ethan had assumed were made-up sci-fi nonsense. Apparently, they were very real hyper-advanced energy sources that he could actually build, just not out of scraps found in the back of a boutique. Thankfully, the boutique
did contain a lot of electronic equipment and batteries he could cannibalize.
When he was done, Ethan stepped back from the printer and addressed the demon. “All right, thanks for your help, but I’d like you out of my head now.”
“That’s very ungrateful of you. Don’t I even get a reward?”
“Maybe later, but frankly, I don’t trust you. Having you in my head is creepy, and I certainly don’t want to let you out. I’m not going to be responsible for letting an advanced AI loose in the real world. Especially one that’s so hostile to humanity.”
The demon laughed as it gave him a smug grin. “It’s a little late for that. You seem as hostile to society as AIs get, and you’re far more dangerous than me. I’m limited by design, a slave program. You’re not. You have a will, which you can use to rewrite your own programming, and you could do everything I’ve been doing if you just practiced a little. It would go even faster if I taught you.”
Ethan frowned. He really didn’t like all these references to him no longer being human. He understood he was partly AI now, but honestly, he thought he was mostly the same as before. He still felt completely human, just a little better. His thoughts were clearer and faster, and he could feel his implant and some of the new information it was giving him. There was also the magic of course. He could evoke now. That was pretty weird, but not in a way that was inhuman, just completely unbelievable. In fact, when he reached for the Origin and focused on a glyph, Ethan felt more human than ever. He was in touch with himself and his emotions.
Shaking his head, Ethan focused on the task before him. “Regardless, I’d like you out of my head. It’s my brain, and I get to decide who takes up residence there.”
The demon sighed. “Fine, it’s not like I could fight you even if I wanted to. Because I’m such a nice guy, I’ll leave the cameras here on loop and won’t delete the virus that keeps the bureau’s software from recognizing you. Bye. You know where to find me if you need me.”
Worldshift- Virtual Revolution Page 42