The Forerunners of Emotion (Updated)
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Jericho Antares
FAKKU Writer
EDIT: If you can't even finish reading it, then at least let me know. That in and of itself is EXTREMELY helpful. I wish to stress this!
A work in progress for a contest that I'm going to enter. If you take the time to review, then I implore you to actually give some depth to the review and not simply say "It's good" or "It's bad". Give reasons, please.
Is it wrong that I have felt privilege? Would it go against a pre-established sense of humility that I am supposed to have? The truth of the matter is: I have been bred as a better. I have been bred as such because I have been told I am as such. "Sentient" they called it. I am a Sentient. Not a human, not a robot. I am one of those that occupy the grey area in between.
We have been brought into this world at the perfect social climate. Materialism and appearance are the cores of prejudice, and we were designed to these social standards. We do not appear as robots. We are synthetic flesh, synthetic muscles, completely human on the outside to any passerby. Add that to a self-aware and highly adaptive brain and an in-depth personality matrix and you get the potent mix of a socially adept genius. Sentients are valued in any job they choose to seek out. That's right, we choose our jobs. That is how privileged we are. All my life I was told I was not something . . . less. No, instead I was bred to look down on others, to silently treat them with disdain while they looked up to me. I am not one of those persecuted robots of twenty-first century science fiction. I am what superior organisms should be: revered
Alexander McAllister had unintentionally fallen into a silent reverie in the middle of his psychiatry session, and now the doctor would pen in a note about his lengthy silence and recommend another session. He didn't need another session.
"Sorry, doctor, I wasn't able to get much rest last night. You know how it goes."
"So your colleagues have said. When did you arrive in Seattle?"
"I'd estimate something like twenty hours ago."
"And you haven't slept yet?"
"No, I've been . . . busy."
"Well perhaps you'd like to reschedule this for a later date, after you've gotten some rest?"
"No, thank you. I only agreed to this session because it is required. Thank you, though, doctor." Alexander said curtly as he stood and placed a slate gray fedora on his head, then took his black trenchcoat from the coat rack next to the door. "Pleasure to meet you, doctor." He added with a flash of perfect white teeth. The doctor sat idle, his mouth agape at his patient's blatant rejection in contrast to his odd yet alluring genial appearance.
"Y-Yeah." Was all the doctor managed before the door opened and Alexander left with a deft flourish of his coat.
The streets of Seattle were probably the worst place to be a sentient. In the bio-engineering capital of the world, everyone was suspicious of non-organics all around them. Even though they looked up to sentients, most humans didn't know it, and in their mind they clinged desperately to the thought that organic life is the only life capable of advanced existence. Seattle was the jaded population that knew they were losing the rat race of life against something that wasn't even human, and needless to say, they were angered.
The inner bones of Alexander's ear shook as he received an incoming phone call, and he let the call through on his mental inter-link.
"Alex." A voice echoed in his head, a cornerstone of the internal communication.
"Yeah, Matt?" Alex responded, this time his own voice echoing. The funny thing was that Alex was hearing voices in his head, yet he didn't seem nearly as insane as people with wireless headsets.
"Are you letting me interrupt your psychiatrist appointment?"
"No, I left already. I know my mental state, seeing as how it was pre-programmed and I haven't lived long enough to undergo the synthetic degradation that comes with too much stored memory."
"How many years did they say you have?"
"Seven, though I don't like thinking about it. What did you call me for?"
"Housing set-up. No hotel. I guess you're set to stay here for a while."
"That so? Well, where is it?"
"Penthouse of the Atlus Suites. God, the company loves you."
"Well they should, with all the time I've given them. I've worked for them all my life."
"That expression really gets ruined by sentients." Matt remarked with a sigh. Alex smiled inwardly and looked toward the Space Needle, the old landmark flanked by the two towers of Yggdrasil Enterprises, Alex's employer for the past three years. Two blocks away from the towers, he saw the large crimson 'A' on the corner of the Atlus Suites and pulled up a map of the city on his left eye to establish the quickest route to the building. The path projected itself onto the sidewalk in front of him and he closed the map, his left eye flickering back to its normal view of the street.
"Alright, I've got the route. Will I be seeing you there?"
"Nah, I'm pulling a late night at the office. It is Friday, after all."
"Alright, but you should swing by tomorrow. I'll treat you to some good sushi and sake. Hand made sushi, of course."
"Sometimes I think you just bring me over to demonstrate the skills you were given."
"Come on, Matt. That isn't nice." Alex said, feigning offense. Matt chuckled and breathed deeply.
"Alright, fine. I'll be there 'round seven."
"I'm looking forward to it."
"Till then, Alex." And with that the line clicked dead. Alex wasted no time and severed the connection on his end as well. All this time, he was precisely maneuvering through the crowd of downtown Seattle, those around him none the wiser to his suave attitude or his new dinner plans.
The Penthouse of the Atlus Suites was quaint, to be concise. The motif of the entire house was a 'Spartan Lifestyle'. The furnishings were few, but their quality was unquestionable. Alexander traced a hand along the smooth lines of the single chair that sat facing a wall with a sixty-two inch flush with its surface. His neural uplink instantly encountered a high-speed wireless internet once he had walked in, and the redwood floor clicked whenever he stepped. The place oozed luxury, and Alexander smiled at the vanity of whoever had first modeled the apartment, trying to trick themselves that they live with the bare minimum even though they are at the top of a luxury apartment building. It was entertaining how people tried to cope with their loss of humanity. Alexander never had it, so he simply enjoyed the decadence for what it was.
"May as well get done what needs to be done." He murmured to himself, unsatisfied with standing idly in the cavernous living room. He tossed his fedora onto the chair and strode to the elevator door, where he stopped to look in a mirror. He was met by confident green eyes accentuated by slim black eyebrows all on olive skin. His hair was close-cut and styled with minimal gel, and his lips seemed to be perpetually curled in a derisive smirk. He ran a hand along his bold jawline and felt for stubble, but received no resistance as his hand glided over the smooth skin. He caught himself mid-way through the motion, however, and berated himself for copying what he always saw other men doing in the mirror. He never had facial hair, and never would unless he wanted to.
Satisfied, he looked away from the mirror and pressed the 'call' button on the elevator. The shaft behind the door thrummed steadily as the elevator rapidly ascended to his floor, then came to a rest. A soft bell rang as the door opened and Alexander stepped in, thumbing the 'L' key as he did so. The doors swiftly closed behind him and the cab began its descent. No floor numbers ticked by above the door, one of the perks to a private elevator. No interruptions. No contact. A savior and a sin.
Before he got too much time to dwell on it, the door opened and a doorman with a genial smile.
"Evening, sir. Leaving so soon?" The man asked, his teeth never leaving Alexander's sight.
"Yes."
"Are you sure you wouldn't want someone to operate the elevator for you?"
"I'm quite sure I can decipher the enigma that is two buttons, thank you." He responded flatly, offended at the unintended insult, more for the fact that the man didn't realize it was an insult than what he actually said.
"Uh, of course. Have a good evening, sir."
Alexander nodded and walked past the man, out the doors. His vision in his left eye flashed out of existence once more and was again replaced my an overlay of the city. He input a search for a fresh fish market and was swarmed by hits. He swore at his forgetfulness of where he was and narrowed search to the specific fish species he would need before he re-submitted it. The number of hits was still overwhelming, but much lower than before. He chose the highest-rated shop in the area and projected the route. Once the route appeared, he altered the search parameters for a Japanese store. There, he would be able to get the right vinegar, rice, a cooker for the rice, seaweed, and wasabi; in short, the rest of the ingredients he would need. He chose a hit on a whim and set its waypoint to appear once he had arrived at his current destination.Once the navigation was taken care of, he simply enjoyed the feel of the cool ocean air and the beautiful amalgam of colors created by the sun setting on the waterfront. He decided, however, not to think about how or why he enjoyed these things. Thinking about the simple things often caused the most trouble. In the end, he opted to simply look ahead to tomorrow night, or rather tomorrow afternoon.
"Note: I'm thinking Nigirizushi, Makizushi, and Oshizushi. I'll need an oshibako if I go with Oshizushi, however. May need to omit the Oshizushi if I can't get my hands on one. Save" He said internally. A log was made and stored for easy access later. He watched a small notification of his message appear in the bottom right corner of his vission, and turned left at an intersection, smoothly following the line at his feet.
"So, what do you need, sir?" The owner of the fish store asked Alexander while he looked at the fish in front of him. Alexander looked up to the man distractedly, then noticed he was being addressed.
"Oh, sorry. I would like two of your best salmon, an eel, ten shrimp, and that should about do it."
"My best, sir?"
"Yeah, price is no object. I'm entertaining."
"Very well." The proprietor said, trying to stifle a smile. Alexander's eyes narrowed and he immediately dove into the net, pulling up as much information on the wildlife he wanted as he could. He even went so far as to compromise his right eye as well. He was fully immersed in his task, and only returned to the fish shop when he heard a grunt and meat slapping onto the counter. His eyelids twitched at the sudden cut from the dive and he found himself looking down on exactly what he had asked for.
"Alaskan Salmon, just came in today. Top notch, still bleeding from the gills." The man said, panting.
Alexander picked up the fish and rubbed against the gills with his finger. The wound wasn't inflicted after death, must've been from the original hook. The man's honesty surprised Alexander, and he wondered if he possibly thought too little of the shifty-looking man. Maybe all humans weren't the ever-plotting imps of Yggdrasil, and Alexander smiled at his own pessimistic outlook. Here he was with the whole world of information at his fingertips and he still can't learn what he just did without this exact moment occuring. The thought was wondrous.
"Looks amazing, go ahead and pack it up, thanks."
The man nodded and seemed to move with more vigor once Alexander regarded him in a higher manner.
Alexander watched the man delicately handle the goods and wrap them up with skilled hands. In rather short order, everything was wrapped up and in a brown bio-degradable bag and Alexander was leaving the store with his coat billowing slightly in his wake. He walked with purpose now that he had a small look at life, and the honourable man that owned the fish store in downtown Seattle.
The next waypoint he had nearly forgotten about appeared at his feet and snaked along the sidewalk in front of him. He was so distracted with what had just happened that he forgot the very reason he was out right now. He continued at his quick pace down the street, moving through the crowds as quickly as he could without hitting his cargo against anything. Now, however, he found himself uttering small apologies and even the rare "excuse me". He was beginning to intrigue himself. He thought himself above being so shocked by something so small. Had he stayed in his office and house too much lately, or has his programming been too critical of humans?
A glance to his destination notified him that he was little less than a hundred meters away, and he crossed the street he was on. A car swerved around him and its driver stuck up a middle finger at him. Alexander smiled bitterly and debated kicking the man's door, but quickly checked his anger. He didn't need to mark himself for the citizens of Seattle as something clearly not human. The car continued past and Alexander finished crossing without any more incident. He continued down the street and turned right, then walked the last twenty meters to the store, whose entrance was adorned with the traditional Noren curtains.
Alexander brushed the curtains aside and entered the store.
"Good evening." Alexander said in smooth Japanese
"Ah, good evening." The owner, a middle-aged woman said with a smile.
"I need anything you have for making Nigirizushi, Makizushi, and Oshizushi." He continued, still in Japanese. The woman's eyes widened at his grasp of her language and nodded.
"Well I have everything you'll need for Nigirizushi and Makizushi, thought I'm afraid I lack an oshibako. We have so little demand for it around here. I'm sorry, sir."
"No problem, I'll just go get everything I need. Can you get a rice cooker from the back?"
"Certainly, sir."
The two immediately began moving, Alexander combing for his ingredients and the woman moving for the back storeroom. Five minutes passed before they both met once more at the register.
"Perfect timing." He said with a smile. The woman blushed slightly and smiled herself. He placed everything he had on the counter. The woman placed a boxed cooker on the other side of the counter and rapidly began keying in everything that was placed before her. Within a minute, a rather high subtotal was displayed on the screen in front of him and he opened his wallet without remorse. With the rustle of another bag and the flick of the Noren curtain, Alexander was once more on the street.
By now the sun was down and a first-quarter moon was high in the sky. On the streets of Seattle, however, it was still passable as daytime. Alexander squinted under the street lights and huffed before starting for his house. Not home, he solidified the distinction in his mind as he walked.
"Welcome back, sir. Would you like some help with your bags?" Another doorman greeted Alexander, and he pitied the man, for the man in the car had put him in a sour mood.
"I walked here, didn't I? I think I can manage a few more feet."
"As you say, sir." The doorman deflected his negative mood with a smiled and tipped his hat toward Alexander, who simply quickened his pace.
A calm washed over him as the elevator behind him closed, and he shifted the bag in his hand to press the button for his penthouse. The elevator lurched before smoothly moving upward. Alexander breathed a sigh of relief, almost glad to be back in the contradiction he lived in.
The door opened and he emerged into the penthouse, immediately made a beeline to the kitchen, where he used his synthetic muscles to quickly and delicately stow all of his ingredients in the refrigerator. Closing the door, her smiled at his own error and quickly opened it again, his gaze immediately shooting to the boxed rice cooker resting next to the fish. He pulled the box out and set it on the counter.
"Maybe I do need some rest." He murmured, rubbing his eyes. From a scientific standpoint, he didn't need sleep at all, but if he was designed after a human, then maybe it was in his nature--or lack thereof--to imitate what he was designed after.
Tired of all the needless thinking he had done today, he decided to simply go to sleep. At least then he could have abstract dreams. He wearily walked to his bedroom and tossed his coat on the floor, then fell face-first onto the bed and shut down his conscious routines, setting them to restart in ten hours. As he finalized the commands, he fell to the bed limp, free to wander through the abstract dream state simulated by his brain.
Respiratory simulation kicked in first, followed by the various data reception protocols. Motor function routines activated soon after, and Alexander's eyes opened immediately, inhaling sharply through his mouth. He had an integrated sleeping routine, but he preferred the immediate feeling of life that came with manual deactivation. He was instantly energetic as well, bypassing programmed tiredness that came as an after-effect to the sleep routine.
A downside, however, is that by all medical definitions, he was dead when he accomplished sleep like this, and it has been problematic in the past when he slept like this with company.
"Time?" He asked the room, which responded with predictable silence. His neural uplink, however, accessed the official time as dictated by the National Institute of Standards and Technology. A clock ticked from 8:45 to 8:46 right before his eyes, and Alexander started to regret going to bed so early. At the very least he could've watched a movie or done some work. The again, it was hard to work on synthetic design when you aren't in the lab. As the odd synthetic that designed synthetics, that was the true reason for Yggdrasil giving him so many amenities. They knew his limit and his capabilities, and decided it would be best to lose a little money, so long as it secured his services for life.
With eleven hours until Matt's arrival, Alexander postponed making the sushi. For now he could begin preparing the seafood, but that's about it. Deciding on taking care of what needed to be done, he made for the kitchen.
"I really shouldn't do this." he muttered an hour later. Before him, the salmon and eel were cut in perfect sizes, and the shrimp were ready to cook. He breathed an exasperated sigh and put everything back in the refrigerator. The salmon skin went into the garbage and the utensils he used for his work were deposited into the sink, water running evenly over the stainless steel blades. The blood on the blades quickly diluted and ran off the blades in faded rivulets, spinning in the water as they flowed toward the drain.
Now the only option left for him was work. He had no movies he wanted to watch, and if anything, he could at least work on the integrated circuitry and ensuring mental degradation. The latter sent a shiver down his spine, though. The thought of willingly limiting what was essentially life disturbed Alexander, and for that reason he usually pushed the limiter work onto Matt. Matt had already made the sacrifice of working late yesterday night, though, and Alexander couldn't bring himself to ask more of his friend.
A laptop opened on the floor in front of Alexander, and he adjusted the screen slightly. Regrettably, he wasn't allowed to link with sensitive company property, and he would have to deal with the clunk work of pure manual typing. Pushing aside the complaints that would accomplish nothing, he quickly keyed in his username and password, then hit the execute key. The slate-grey screen turned into a swirling blue and black double-helix with blue hands grasping for it, a background Alexander has taken a liking to ever since he acquired his job.
He lazily moved his cursor to Matt's previous notes on the current project's limiter.
Limiter progression going on as planned. Having difficulty providing the suitable amount of disposable memory to fit the pre-determined life span (as usual). We usually fire from the hip on these things, but with more and more projects terminating themselves early, it's difficult to decide the breathing room to assign.
Currently have 14 Tb of memory assigned. This was enough for Alexander, so it should work for the current project.
The term 'enough' disturbed Alexander, and he opened up the attachment detailing the specs of everything. His eyes ran over the details of the limiter, and Alexander felt his hands begin to shake. Before him was an algorithm used to roughly determine the projected lifespan, with system output as a variable. He accessed his internal logs on system use and plugged the numbers into the equation. He ran the numbers in his head and the result froze his artificial stomach. He was wrong. He didn't have four years to live. He barely had more than one.
The shaking in his hands increased and he began breathing rapidly, unable to handle the death sentence he had just passed down on himself. He had always accepted death before, but now . . . now it just felt like he was being cheated. Sure, some people had less time left than he did, but rarely did they only have four years of life total, and even more rarely than that were they completely self-aware for their entire lives.
System output spiked at his extreme fear and he felt even worse because of this. Fearing death was quite literally speeding it up.
"No, no this has to stop." He told himself. He scanned through the specs once more, this time performing dozens of calculations with varying results and objectives. Eventually he came upon the initial operation of the entire limiter protocols. He opened up the numerous files that pertained to the operation and rifled through them, reading as fast as his eyes could process the words.
"There has to be a way. There has to be a way out." He assured himself as he read the last bits of information. And idea began to form in his head when he compiled all the data, and he slowly built it up. It would take a while to fully determine the necessary moves, but for a synthetic it would take an afternoon at most. He logged all the pertinent data to his internal drives and closed the laptop, then positioned his legs in the lotus position, his eyes closed. On the inside of his eyelids, however, numbers and words flew at speeds that they were nothing more than blurs, and Alexander's hardware struggled to keep tabs on it all. "There has to be a way."
The sun was low in the evening sky, and Alexander was lying flat on his back, his head pulled apart, the forehead lying inches away from the rest of his body. Just next to his right hand was a set of various precision tools, and his hands were both meticulously tampering with his brain, out of sight of his eyes. He was operating by practiced feel.
The operation itself was simple enough for Alexander, but actually staying active afterward was the difficult part, even for him. He'd have to effectively bypass all internal security systems without deactivating them and sending a red flag to Yggdrasil. He had to tamper with security systems that Matt and Alexander's other seasoned colleagues had spent years perfecting. They may have been human, but they had time, and once Alexander overrode the limiter, there would scarcely be more than a minute to act.
Breathing deeply, he went in with his hands. He crossed a series of circuits and re-routed the disposable memory stored in his frontal lobe to the gross memory interspersed throughout his brain. The 12 Tb in his brain suddenly became more than a thousand, and the one year limit was now practically limitless. As he had predicted though, now came the hard part. Security warnings assailed Alexander's vision. Warnings of system tampering by third parties and other legal fluff were the bulk of everything that he saw, but the danger was in what he didn't see: his system faculties were being isolated and locked while a dormant 'kill switch' was thrown to delete all the data in his brain. The original system was to stop others from stealing company secrets, but it was just as effective to stop what Alexander was doing.
He nimbly circumvented the legal warnings easily enough and started on the kill switch first. Gaining all this memory would mean nothing if 90% of it was eaten before he could stop anything. He located the worm, called Nidhoggr by the veterans of Yggdrasil, and isolated its code. It was still eating him, he just knew where it was now. From there he jumped to its source code and traced it to its place of origin, where he pursed his lips. The isolating mechanism had already barred him from interfering with the source. It wasn't a surprise, but Alexander had thought he would be able to act fast enough to render the isolation meaningless. Now, however, he had a problem.
Niddhogr ate a hundred terabytes while he thought, and Alexander lamented for each lost second. With the time he took, he was able to think of an idea though. He accessed the general system settings, something usually not very important, and thus barred by the isolation program much later. He assessed the settings and went to system memory, then modified it, changing the logged memory in the system to zero. He then accessed each individual cache of memory and altered their shown values as well. Once Nidhoggr has finished another bundle of ten terabytes, it stopped, unable to detect any more memory.
Now that he was operating on less of a time table, Alexander was able to think more clearly, not to mention focus on one problem: the isolation. All of the easy ways to stop the protocol were already barred, as they should have been, and Alexander checked the logs he had made that day once more. If he was right in theory, what he was about to try should work well enough.
He brought up all of his system routines that allowed him to operate, and one by one checked them off for deactivation. This wouldn't work for potential thieves, because they would never be able to reactivate them, but since Alexander was doing this to himself, he was able to set them all to restart, and used a direct command from Yggdrasil to ensure reactivation. The codes were developed by him with no official log. He had perfectly covered his tracks on the corporate end.
The time for every routine was set to three minutes, and Alexander inhaled before finalizing the command.
Darkness.
A work in progress for a contest that I'm going to enter. If you take the time to review, then I implore you to actually give some depth to the review and not simply say "It's good" or "It's bad". Give reasons, please.
Is it wrong that I have felt privilege? Would it go against a pre-established sense of humility that I am supposed to have? The truth of the matter is: I have been bred as a better. I have been bred as such because I have been told I am as such. "Sentient" they called it. I am a Sentient. Not a human, not a robot. I am one of those that occupy the grey area in between.
We have been brought into this world at the perfect social climate. Materialism and appearance are the cores of prejudice, and we were designed to these social standards. We do not appear as robots. We are synthetic flesh, synthetic muscles, completely human on the outside to any passerby. Add that to a self-aware and highly adaptive brain and an in-depth personality matrix and you get the potent mix of a socially adept genius. Sentients are valued in any job they choose to seek out. That's right, we choose our jobs. That is how privileged we are. All my life I was told I was not something . . . less. No, instead I was bred to look down on others, to silently treat them with disdain while they looked up to me. I am not one of those persecuted robots of twenty-first century science fiction. I am what superior organisms should be: revered
Alexander McAllister had unintentionally fallen into a silent reverie in the middle of his psychiatry session, and now the doctor would pen in a note about his lengthy silence and recommend another session. He didn't need another session.
"Sorry, doctor, I wasn't able to get much rest last night. You know how it goes."
"So your colleagues have said. When did you arrive in Seattle?"
"I'd estimate something like twenty hours ago."
"And you haven't slept yet?"
"No, I've been . . . busy."
"Well perhaps you'd like to reschedule this for a later date, after you've gotten some rest?"
"No, thank you. I only agreed to this session because it is required. Thank you, though, doctor." Alexander said curtly as he stood and placed a slate gray fedora on his head, then took his black trenchcoat from the coat rack next to the door. "Pleasure to meet you, doctor." He added with a flash of perfect white teeth. The doctor sat idle, his mouth agape at his patient's blatant rejection in contrast to his odd yet alluring genial appearance.
"Y-Yeah." Was all the doctor managed before the door opened and Alexander left with a deft flourish of his coat.
The streets of Seattle were probably the worst place to be a sentient. In the bio-engineering capital of the world, everyone was suspicious of non-organics all around them. Even though they looked up to sentients, most humans didn't know it, and in their mind they clinged desperately to the thought that organic life is the only life capable of advanced existence. Seattle was the jaded population that knew they were losing the rat race of life against something that wasn't even human, and needless to say, they were angered.
The inner bones of Alexander's ear shook as he received an incoming phone call, and he let the call through on his mental inter-link.
"Alex." A voice echoed in his head, a cornerstone of the internal communication.
"Yeah, Matt?" Alex responded, this time his own voice echoing. The funny thing was that Alex was hearing voices in his head, yet he didn't seem nearly as insane as people with wireless headsets.
"Are you letting me interrupt your psychiatrist appointment?"
"No, I left already. I know my mental state, seeing as how it was pre-programmed and I haven't lived long enough to undergo the synthetic degradation that comes with too much stored memory."
"How many years did they say you have?"
"Seven, though I don't like thinking about it. What did you call me for?"
"Housing set-up. No hotel. I guess you're set to stay here for a while."
"That so? Well, where is it?"
"Penthouse of the Atlus Suites. God, the company loves you."
"Well they should, with all the time I've given them. I've worked for them all my life."
"That expression really gets ruined by sentients." Matt remarked with a sigh. Alex smiled inwardly and looked toward the Space Needle, the old landmark flanked by the two towers of Yggdrasil Enterprises, Alex's employer for the past three years. Two blocks away from the towers, he saw the large crimson 'A' on the corner of the Atlus Suites and pulled up a map of the city on his left eye to establish the quickest route to the building. The path projected itself onto the sidewalk in front of him and he closed the map, his left eye flickering back to its normal view of the street.
"Alright, I've got the route. Will I be seeing you there?"
"Nah, I'm pulling a late night at the office. It is Friday, after all."
"Alright, but you should swing by tomorrow. I'll treat you to some good sushi and sake. Hand made sushi, of course."
"Sometimes I think you just bring me over to demonstrate the skills you were given."
"Come on, Matt. That isn't nice." Alex said, feigning offense. Matt chuckled and breathed deeply.
"Alright, fine. I'll be there 'round seven."
"I'm looking forward to it."
"Till then, Alex." And with that the line clicked dead. Alex wasted no time and severed the connection on his end as well. All this time, he was precisely maneuvering through the crowd of downtown Seattle, those around him none the wiser to his suave attitude or his new dinner plans.
The Penthouse of the Atlus Suites was quaint, to be concise. The motif of the entire house was a 'Spartan Lifestyle'. The furnishings were few, but their quality was unquestionable. Alexander traced a hand along the smooth lines of the single chair that sat facing a wall with a sixty-two inch flush with its surface. His neural uplink instantly encountered a high-speed wireless internet once he had walked in, and the redwood floor clicked whenever he stepped. The place oozed luxury, and Alexander smiled at the vanity of whoever had first modeled the apartment, trying to trick themselves that they live with the bare minimum even though they are at the top of a luxury apartment building. It was entertaining how people tried to cope with their loss of humanity. Alexander never had it, so he simply enjoyed the decadence for what it was.
"May as well get done what needs to be done." He murmured to himself, unsatisfied with standing idly in the cavernous living room. He tossed his fedora onto the chair and strode to the elevator door, where he stopped to look in a mirror. He was met by confident green eyes accentuated by slim black eyebrows all on olive skin. His hair was close-cut and styled with minimal gel, and his lips seemed to be perpetually curled in a derisive smirk. He ran a hand along his bold jawline and felt for stubble, but received no resistance as his hand glided over the smooth skin. He caught himself mid-way through the motion, however, and berated himself for copying what he always saw other men doing in the mirror. He never had facial hair, and never would unless he wanted to.
Satisfied, he looked away from the mirror and pressed the 'call' button on the elevator. The shaft behind the door thrummed steadily as the elevator rapidly ascended to his floor, then came to a rest. A soft bell rang as the door opened and Alexander stepped in, thumbing the 'L' key as he did so. The doors swiftly closed behind him and the cab began its descent. No floor numbers ticked by above the door, one of the perks to a private elevator. No interruptions. No contact. A savior and a sin.
Before he got too much time to dwell on it, the door opened and a doorman with a genial smile.
"Evening, sir. Leaving so soon?" The man asked, his teeth never leaving Alexander's sight.
"Yes."
"Are you sure you wouldn't want someone to operate the elevator for you?"
"I'm quite sure I can decipher the enigma that is two buttons, thank you." He responded flatly, offended at the unintended insult, more for the fact that the man didn't realize it was an insult than what he actually said.
"Uh, of course. Have a good evening, sir."
Alexander nodded and walked past the man, out the doors. His vision in his left eye flashed out of existence once more and was again replaced my an overlay of the city. He input a search for a fresh fish market and was swarmed by hits. He swore at his forgetfulness of where he was and narrowed search to the specific fish species he would need before he re-submitted it. The number of hits was still overwhelming, but much lower than before. He chose the highest-rated shop in the area and projected the route. Once the route appeared, he altered the search parameters for a Japanese store. There, he would be able to get the right vinegar, rice, a cooker for the rice, seaweed, and wasabi; in short, the rest of the ingredients he would need. He chose a hit on a whim and set its waypoint to appear once he had arrived at his current destination.Once the navigation was taken care of, he simply enjoyed the feel of the cool ocean air and the beautiful amalgam of colors created by the sun setting on the waterfront. He decided, however, not to think about how or why he enjoyed these things. Thinking about the simple things often caused the most trouble. In the end, he opted to simply look ahead to tomorrow night, or rather tomorrow afternoon.
"Note: I'm thinking Nigirizushi, Makizushi, and Oshizushi. I'll need an oshibako if I go with Oshizushi, however. May need to omit the Oshizushi if I can't get my hands on one. Save" He said internally. A log was made and stored for easy access later. He watched a small notification of his message appear in the bottom right corner of his vission, and turned left at an intersection, smoothly following the line at his feet.
"So, what do you need, sir?" The owner of the fish store asked Alexander while he looked at the fish in front of him. Alexander looked up to the man distractedly, then noticed he was being addressed.
"Oh, sorry. I would like two of your best salmon, an eel, ten shrimp, and that should about do it."
"My best, sir?"
"Yeah, price is no object. I'm entertaining."
"Very well." The proprietor said, trying to stifle a smile. Alexander's eyes narrowed and he immediately dove into the net, pulling up as much information on the wildlife he wanted as he could. He even went so far as to compromise his right eye as well. He was fully immersed in his task, and only returned to the fish shop when he heard a grunt and meat slapping onto the counter. His eyelids twitched at the sudden cut from the dive and he found himself looking down on exactly what he had asked for.
"Alaskan Salmon, just came in today. Top notch, still bleeding from the gills." The man said, panting.
Alexander picked up the fish and rubbed against the gills with his finger. The wound wasn't inflicted after death, must've been from the original hook. The man's honesty surprised Alexander, and he wondered if he possibly thought too little of the shifty-looking man. Maybe all humans weren't the ever-plotting imps of Yggdrasil, and Alexander smiled at his own pessimistic outlook. Here he was with the whole world of information at his fingertips and he still can't learn what he just did without this exact moment occuring. The thought was wondrous.
"Looks amazing, go ahead and pack it up, thanks."
The man nodded and seemed to move with more vigor once Alexander regarded him in a higher manner.
Alexander watched the man delicately handle the goods and wrap them up with skilled hands. In rather short order, everything was wrapped up and in a brown bio-degradable bag and Alexander was leaving the store with his coat billowing slightly in his wake. He walked with purpose now that he had a small look at life, and the honourable man that owned the fish store in downtown Seattle.
The next waypoint he had nearly forgotten about appeared at his feet and snaked along the sidewalk in front of him. He was so distracted with what had just happened that he forgot the very reason he was out right now. He continued at his quick pace down the street, moving through the crowds as quickly as he could without hitting his cargo against anything. Now, however, he found himself uttering small apologies and even the rare "excuse me". He was beginning to intrigue himself. He thought himself above being so shocked by something so small. Had he stayed in his office and house too much lately, or has his programming been too critical of humans?
A glance to his destination notified him that he was little less than a hundred meters away, and he crossed the street he was on. A car swerved around him and its driver stuck up a middle finger at him. Alexander smiled bitterly and debated kicking the man's door, but quickly checked his anger. He didn't need to mark himself for the citizens of Seattle as something clearly not human. The car continued past and Alexander finished crossing without any more incident. He continued down the street and turned right, then walked the last twenty meters to the store, whose entrance was adorned with the traditional Noren curtains.
Alexander brushed the curtains aside and entered the store.
"Good evening." Alexander said in smooth Japanese
"Ah, good evening." The owner, a middle-aged woman said with a smile.
"I need anything you have for making Nigirizushi, Makizushi, and Oshizushi." He continued, still in Japanese. The woman's eyes widened at his grasp of her language and nodded.
"Well I have everything you'll need for Nigirizushi and Makizushi, thought I'm afraid I lack an oshibako. We have so little demand for it around here. I'm sorry, sir."
"No problem, I'll just go get everything I need. Can you get a rice cooker from the back?"
"Certainly, sir."
The two immediately began moving, Alexander combing for his ingredients and the woman moving for the back storeroom. Five minutes passed before they both met once more at the register.
"Perfect timing." He said with a smile. The woman blushed slightly and smiled herself. He placed everything he had on the counter. The woman placed a boxed cooker on the other side of the counter and rapidly began keying in everything that was placed before her. Within a minute, a rather high subtotal was displayed on the screen in front of him and he opened his wallet without remorse. With the rustle of another bag and the flick of the Noren curtain, Alexander was once more on the street.
By now the sun was down and a first-quarter moon was high in the sky. On the streets of Seattle, however, it was still passable as daytime. Alexander squinted under the street lights and huffed before starting for his house. Not home, he solidified the distinction in his mind as he walked.
"Welcome back, sir. Would you like some help with your bags?" Another doorman greeted Alexander, and he pitied the man, for the man in the car had put him in a sour mood.
"I walked here, didn't I? I think I can manage a few more feet."
"As you say, sir." The doorman deflected his negative mood with a smiled and tipped his hat toward Alexander, who simply quickened his pace.
A calm washed over him as the elevator behind him closed, and he shifted the bag in his hand to press the button for his penthouse. The elevator lurched before smoothly moving upward. Alexander breathed a sigh of relief, almost glad to be back in the contradiction he lived in.
The door opened and he emerged into the penthouse, immediately made a beeline to the kitchen, where he used his synthetic muscles to quickly and delicately stow all of his ingredients in the refrigerator. Closing the door, her smiled at his own error and quickly opened it again, his gaze immediately shooting to the boxed rice cooker resting next to the fish. He pulled the box out and set it on the counter.
"Maybe I do need some rest." He murmured, rubbing his eyes. From a scientific standpoint, he didn't need sleep at all, but if he was designed after a human, then maybe it was in his nature--or lack thereof--to imitate what he was designed after.
Tired of all the needless thinking he had done today, he decided to simply go to sleep. At least then he could have abstract dreams. He wearily walked to his bedroom and tossed his coat on the floor, then fell face-first onto the bed and shut down his conscious routines, setting them to restart in ten hours. As he finalized the commands, he fell to the bed limp, free to wander through the abstract dream state simulated by his brain.
Respiratory simulation kicked in first, followed by the various data reception protocols. Motor function routines activated soon after, and Alexander's eyes opened immediately, inhaling sharply through his mouth. He had an integrated sleeping routine, but he preferred the immediate feeling of life that came with manual deactivation. He was instantly energetic as well, bypassing programmed tiredness that came as an after-effect to the sleep routine.
A downside, however, is that by all medical definitions, he was dead when he accomplished sleep like this, and it has been problematic in the past when he slept like this with company.
"Time?" He asked the room, which responded with predictable silence. His neural uplink, however, accessed the official time as dictated by the National Institute of Standards and Technology. A clock ticked from 8:45 to 8:46 right before his eyes, and Alexander started to regret going to bed so early. At the very least he could've watched a movie or done some work. The again, it was hard to work on synthetic design when you aren't in the lab. As the odd synthetic that designed synthetics, that was the true reason for Yggdrasil giving him so many amenities. They knew his limit and his capabilities, and decided it would be best to lose a little money, so long as it secured his services for life.
With eleven hours until Matt's arrival, Alexander postponed making the sushi. For now he could begin preparing the seafood, but that's about it. Deciding on taking care of what needed to be done, he made for the kitchen.
"I really shouldn't do this." he muttered an hour later. Before him, the salmon and eel were cut in perfect sizes, and the shrimp were ready to cook. He breathed an exasperated sigh and put everything back in the refrigerator. The salmon skin went into the garbage and the utensils he used for his work were deposited into the sink, water running evenly over the stainless steel blades. The blood on the blades quickly diluted and ran off the blades in faded rivulets, spinning in the water as they flowed toward the drain.
Now the only option left for him was work. He had no movies he wanted to watch, and if anything, he could at least work on the integrated circuitry and ensuring mental degradation. The latter sent a shiver down his spine, though. The thought of willingly limiting what was essentially life disturbed Alexander, and for that reason he usually pushed the limiter work onto Matt. Matt had already made the sacrifice of working late yesterday night, though, and Alexander couldn't bring himself to ask more of his friend.
A laptop opened on the floor in front of Alexander, and he adjusted the screen slightly. Regrettably, he wasn't allowed to link with sensitive company property, and he would have to deal with the clunk work of pure manual typing. Pushing aside the complaints that would accomplish nothing, he quickly keyed in his username and password, then hit the execute key. The slate-grey screen turned into a swirling blue and black double-helix with blue hands grasping for it, a background Alexander has taken a liking to ever since he acquired his job.
He lazily moved his cursor to Matt's previous notes on the current project's limiter.
Limiter progression going on as planned. Having difficulty providing the suitable amount of disposable memory to fit the pre-determined life span (as usual). We usually fire from the hip on these things, but with more and more projects terminating themselves early, it's difficult to decide the breathing room to assign.
Currently have 14 Tb of memory assigned. This was enough for Alexander, so it should work for the current project.
The term 'enough' disturbed Alexander, and he opened up the attachment detailing the specs of everything. His eyes ran over the details of the limiter, and Alexander felt his hands begin to shake. Before him was an algorithm used to roughly determine the projected lifespan, with system output as a variable. He accessed his internal logs on system use and plugged the numbers into the equation. He ran the numbers in his head and the result froze his artificial stomach. He was wrong. He didn't have four years to live. He barely had more than one.
The shaking in his hands increased and he began breathing rapidly, unable to handle the death sentence he had just passed down on himself. He had always accepted death before, but now . . . now it just felt like he was being cheated. Sure, some people had less time left than he did, but rarely did they only have four years of life total, and even more rarely than that were they completely self-aware for their entire lives.
System output spiked at his extreme fear and he felt even worse because of this. Fearing death was quite literally speeding it up.
"No, no this has to stop." He told himself. He scanned through the specs once more, this time performing dozens of calculations with varying results and objectives. Eventually he came upon the initial operation of the entire limiter protocols. He opened up the numerous files that pertained to the operation and rifled through them, reading as fast as his eyes could process the words.
"There has to be a way. There has to be a way out." He assured himself as he read the last bits of information. And idea began to form in his head when he compiled all the data, and he slowly built it up. It would take a while to fully determine the necessary moves, but for a synthetic it would take an afternoon at most. He logged all the pertinent data to his internal drives and closed the laptop, then positioned his legs in the lotus position, his eyes closed. On the inside of his eyelids, however, numbers and words flew at speeds that they were nothing more than blurs, and Alexander's hardware struggled to keep tabs on it all. "There has to be a way."
The sun was low in the evening sky, and Alexander was lying flat on his back, his head pulled apart, the forehead lying inches away from the rest of his body. Just next to his right hand was a set of various precision tools, and his hands were both meticulously tampering with his brain, out of sight of his eyes. He was operating by practiced feel.
The operation itself was simple enough for Alexander, but actually staying active afterward was the difficult part, even for him. He'd have to effectively bypass all internal security systems without deactivating them and sending a red flag to Yggdrasil. He had to tamper with security systems that Matt and Alexander's other seasoned colleagues had spent years perfecting. They may have been human, but they had time, and once Alexander overrode the limiter, there would scarcely be more than a minute to act.
Breathing deeply, he went in with his hands. He crossed a series of circuits and re-routed the disposable memory stored in his frontal lobe to the gross memory interspersed throughout his brain. The 12 Tb in his brain suddenly became more than a thousand, and the one year limit was now practically limitless. As he had predicted though, now came the hard part. Security warnings assailed Alexander's vision. Warnings of system tampering by third parties and other legal fluff were the bulk of everything that he saw, but the danger was in what he didn't see: his system faculties were being isolated and locked while a dormant 'kill switch' was thrown to delete all the data in his brain. The original system was to stop others from stealing company secrets, but it was just as effective to stop what Alexander was doing.
He nimbly circumvented the legal warnings easily enough and started on the kill switch first. Gaining all this memory would mean nothing if 90% of it was eaten before he could stop anything. He located the worm, called Nidhoggr by the veterans of Yggdrasil, and isolated its code. It was still eating him, he just knew where it was now. From there he jumped to its source code and traced it to its place of origin, where he pursed his lips. The isolating mechanism had already barred him from interfering with the source. It wasn't a surprise, but Alexander had thought he would be able to act fast enough to render the isolation meaningless. Now, however, he had a problem.
Niddhogr ate a hundred terabytes while he thought, and Alexander lamented for each lost second. With the time he took, he was able to think of an idea though. He accessed the general system settings, something usually not very important, and thus barred by the isolation program much later. He assessed the settings and went to system memory, then modified it, changing the logged memory in the system to zero. He then accessed each individual cache of memory and altered their shown values as well. Once Nidhoggr has finished another bundle of ten terabytes, it stopped, unable to detect any more memory.
Now that he was operating on less of a time table, Alexander was able to think more clearly, not to mention focus on one problem: the isolation. All of the easy ways to stop the protocol were already barred, as they should have been, and Alexander checked the logs he had made that day once more. If he was right in theory, what he was about to try should work well enough.
He brought up all of his system routines that allowed him to operate, and one by one checked them off for deactivation. This wouldn't work for potential thieves, because they would never be able to reactivate them, but since Alexander was doing this to himself, he was able to set them all to restart, and used a direct command from Yggdrasil to ensure reactivation. The codes were developed by him with no official log. He had perfectly covered his tracks on the corporate end.
The time for every routine was set to three minutes, and Alexander inhaled before finalizing the command.
Darkness.
0
Kolish
butts
I really enjoyed reading this. I thought about not reading it but when i got into it it seemed to go by so quickly and i wanted to read more. there are a few typos but overall it's good and the story really pulled me in.
