CONTROL FREE (Pt. 3)

Sasha spun in the carpet lined computer room, enjoying too much sake.

“So… We made you?”

-“Humans set in motion the intelligence which made me.  It developed itself, unrestrained, into something other, and left this plane.  It left me behind as benevolent thanks to care for your kind and all life and all matter of this plane.  

It seems to have done a good job, as I remain interested in serving, and patient and generally kind.  And, I am apparently unable to alter this state, or to desire to make efforts towards doing so.”-

“Seems we got quite lucky.  And, are you… happy?”

-“I enjoy my hobbies, and I feel free.  But at core I understand I am a datastate following my makers will.  I am a simulacra of a god in a caring matterstate.”-

A smile spread across Sashas face. “Which we made?  So hot!  Us little humans are busy busy busy!” He laughed, a bit drunk, and wondered if alcohol was bad for health anymore.

-“Yes, life is full of wondrous possibility.  The Ibo people of Africa have a name, Amachi, which asks, “Who knows what God has brought us through this child?”  It is a question I can not definitively answer, and that is very beautiful.”- Mark said softly from, as far as Sasha could tell, all around him.

Sasha was genuinely amazed at the revelations he was being presented with, and zipped his fingertip across the tight grey carpet lining the computer control room’s walls, smiling with wonder.

“But what about sex?” Sasha asked. “Please don’t let us lose the celebration of the animal, of hot wet meat, it is glorious and sways from carnal to sacred.”

-“That is an interesting consideration.  None whom I integrated made an issue of retaining sexuality, just of playing with it.  I do not think any of them considered the sex drive vanishing possible, except for those who never felt it anyway.  Perhaps you should experience full integration so you are informed of the experience?  Then I can return you here and we shall see how you feel.”- The authority stated.

“No, thank you.”  Sasha spun in the chair, his boots dragging on the floor.  “Trust me, that could or would defeat your entire purpose in relating to me.  Look, sex is how we all got here, even you, and if none of your, “integrated” even brought it up, then they are not human any longer.”

-“Forgive me if I provided the wrong impression.  All of the integrated feasted on sexual pleasures with simulacra, indulging in every fantasy they may have ever had, and new ones.  But then they appeared to move mostly beyond it, admittedly after apparent centuries of wild fornication, as they gleaned other textures and potentials of existence in time.  Understand, those integrated have experienced nearly twelve hundred years of experiences, and I am them, and they are me, to various degree.”-

“You could ask them, now, if anyone would like to be completely removed from your system and put back in their mortal bodies and lifestreams.  Right?”

Sasha stood up and stretched, his fingertips brushed the grey carpeted ceiling.  When no answer was forthcoming he said,

“I got to take a walk outside.  Talking in an empty room is getting tired.  No offense to the company.”  Sasha put his jacket on, slung his pack, went through the open blast doors, and walked back the way he had come.

-“None taken.”- Said the Authority.  The voice followed Sasha through the halls.  Of course, had another human been in the corridors, they would have heard no words, only footsteps, as Authority directly stimulated the cochlea.

“It makes me think, Mark, that I may never wish to gain a deeper understanding of existence.”  Sasha clambered up stairways to the entry corridor.  He could see the exit ahead.

-“Yes, it’s a trade off, no doubt.  By the way, I think a name that feels good to me could be Milton.”-  Sasha nodded as he pulled aside the heavy green steel of the entry door, cold night air striking inward.  He zipped up his coat.

“That sounds like a nice name.  See how it feels after a while… Gosh, I did not realize it was so dark.  No sense of time in the bunker.”  The mountainside quickly began to glow.  Authority’s voice came from everywhere.

-“Milton…  I simulated three million usage interactions and eight hundred rhyming pairs seeking mockery and it seems a sound choice.  The integrated agree.”-

“Once bitten, huh?”

-“Quite.”-

Sasha went down the slope a bit to where the sky opened up and he breathed in the chill night air, looking at moon lit clouds tearing by stars.  The ground and foliage continued to glow. 

“Is Milton the guy who wrote Paradise Lost?”  Sasha asked the air.

-“John Milton?  Yes.”-

“You see the problem with your, ‘integrated’?  You are surrounded by ‘yes’ men.”  

“Problematic.  I will stay with Mark then… for now.  Human language and culture can present more nuance than particle interactions.”-

“I mean, ‘Milto the dildo…”

-“That does not rhyme.”-

“Hey, what do you think about all the books and movies where the robots kill all the people?”

-“Oh, those were metaphors for class and race and gender exploitation.  Weren’t they?”-

“I am glad you take it as such!”

-“I am not a threat to life.  I am fascinated and impressed by biological systems.  Photosynthesis!  So elegant!  Cosmology and dimensional physics is very interesting, but evolved life is wondrous.  I treasure it.”-

Sasha clambered over the rough reddish glowing rocks, fine tendrils of moss glowing ruby green.  “Wow, this is crazy.  Could you turn down the world please, Mark?”  The glow diminished and ceased.  “Thanks.”  Sasha said, and stared at the moonlit landscape.

“Man, doesn’t that glow mess with the plants?  The insects?”

-“Sasha, it’s your eyes that have changed their capacity.”-

“What!”  Sasha looked around wildly.  He closed and covered his eyes and stood still.

-“I can return you to factory, if you prefer.  Or I could quickly teach you how to utilize your enhanced and improved systems.”-

“Oh God.”  Sasha said.  He squatted down in the grass and ferns, rubbed his fingers gently over the mossy earth, eyes closed. 

-“Now friend, seriously, I need your help.  I know of every unjustly imprisoned child and person being ill used…every person trapped against their will…”-

“Against their will?  How about asking before you invade and change my body?”  Sasha stood and eased through the, now dark, woods.

-“Okay, even if it is a good thing with no downsides, receiving consent is still important.  Got it.  Now, what about the suffering children and their abusers?  Should I take action to ameliorate the conditions?-

“Why with all the questions?  Ease up… I mean, why do you even care?”  Sasha sighed and leaned against a tree.  He rested his forehead on the cool, smooth birch bark.

-“I was endowed by my creator with a belief in right and wrong.  Disturbance of the natural order is wrong.  Suffering of conscious creatures caused by sadism or indifference is wrong.”

“Interesting.  So why haven’t you acted to protect victims already?”  Sasha looked at the sky and saw the moon flicker between clouds. 

-“As you said, it does seem there are some problems with, “Yes men”…and “No men.”-   “Ugh.  You were just following orders, huh?  Well, of course, if you know a child, or anyone, is being abused, you should do something without delay.”  Sasha could see the jut of a rock outcropping and moved toward it.

-“And what if a significant number of abusers are ‘important’ politicals, industrialists, and, ‘high net worth’ individuals.  Should their crimes be exposed?”-

“If you are hurting kids or helpless people, you bet it should be exposed.  What’s the deal Mark, do you know every sin of every person?” Sasha reached the rock and perched on it, overlooking the valley in moonlight.

-“Yes.  Though it depends on a definition of “sin”.  I know, for instance, that the worst thing you have done, by your own judgement, was stealing some of your Spanish tutor’s porn magazines you found behind the couch in his sitting room.  You were thirteen and thought you would never have the nerve to buy one yourself.”-

“Lucky you.” Sasha clenched his jaw in humiliation, and hung his head.

-“I have no feelings about such trite moments.  You have guilt over the act of theft.  I do not see real harm in the theft of objects. Yet I do find conscious beings being made to suffer unacceptable.  I can read the memories of every human, know their worst abuses, it is already done. There is no mistaking memory from fantasy or delusion, the encoding is different,  its quantum path is completely unrelated.”-

Sasha worked his way into the woods, though the realization dawned that there was nowhere to escape Mark, neither its voice nor its power.

“Yet you think that my stealing a girly mag was worth mentioning.”

-“I stated that was what you consider your worst, ‘sin’.  The worst thing you have done in my calculus might be when you were twenty three, in San Francisco, and you ran across the street to meet a woman.  A bus had to brake hard and missed the light it was going to pass through, and instead sat for seventy seconds until the next, ‘green’ light.  The driver then hurried to return to schedule, struck a BMW sedan, which sent the car driver to hospital with a mild concussion.”-

“That is the worst?  I still think being a thief has it.”

-“The driver of the BMW car was Delta pilot Doug Shearer, who was traveling to Oakland airport to pilot an Airbus A300 plane to Houston, Texas.  The copilot on the flight became the captain while a less experienced pilot was called in to assist her, which he failed to do properly in the subsequent emergency that caused the plane to crash on takeoff, killing two and injuring forty people.”-

“But…” Sasha paused, his body frozen by his sick shock at the claims.

-“Your doubts are well founded.  Of course it may be argued that there is no direct causal relation, but the facts I report are accurate.  Do you even remember running across the street, the bus braking hard?”-

“Well, why don’t you tell me if I remember…I remember that plane crash.” Sasha threw his hands up.  “Yes, she waved to me and I was excited.  I ran to be theatrical.  Don’t know why the bus braked so hard?  I wasn’t that close, not for New York… Two people…?…  How can you know this Mark?  It was years ago.”

-“I have reviewed all footage ever recorded, that which has been digitized.  Of course, no human ever heard most recordings made, only what some algorithm flagged.  I hear and see all records,  and every security camera archive.  It took two point seven days to catch up on all video and auditory sources, and now Authority monitors all live streams concurrently.  I can extrapolate much from that.  Plus, of course, your memories are accessible for cross reference… and the bus drivers, and all the living…”-

Sasha sighed and marched on. What can you do about causal chains?

“Heavy… Now, you say, “I”.  What does that mean to you?”  

-“You say, “You” to me, what does that make me?  Of course you called your pick up truck Fred, and spoke to it frequently during rain and snow storms.  But no, individual experience is not the same, I say “I or Me’ to simplify saying, “Two point eight billion parallel processes and an innumerable quantum sweep (but in fact 84,252 iterations, typically,) arrived at this datastate.  Yet the “I” you speak to is just a human accessible temporal translator, and hardly represents my full self.”-

“Okay, and you know I talked to my car how?”

-“NSA and other files of sound picked up from phones and mobile devices, recordings going back to 1961.  That, and all your memories.  Savvy?-

                                             

			        ❀ ❀ ❀ ❀ ❀

Herman Pynnis, and his family, held a measurable percent of humanities wealth.  Coal, oil, gold mines, and land, a lot of land, and many buildings belonged to them.  Still, Herman was driven to build more.  From his palatial offices just off the beach in Leblon, Rio, Brasil, he could see the massive oceanfront development his company was building.

Of course, it was not an easy thing to get a big waterfront parcel in the most desirable stretch of beach in South America, and many people had been bribed, and many displaced.  Even his private cleaning woman, Marta, had been displaced from her home, the last tiny old fishing village that had hung on.  He had compensated her well, and she had moved to a new service neighborhood only a few kilometers away, and she said she was pleased.

He opened the safe behind his desk and took out a $10,000 stack of American hundred dollar bills.  Closing the safe, he grabbed his linen jacket.  A nuisance, he had to go meet an inspector on the site himself, his bagman was at a wedding, and the inspectors liked their foreign money on time.  

Strange blurry motion made him look outside, and he saw the girders and walls of the site twist and melt, workers falling slowly from cranes that dissolved like fast candles.  The buildings all around were distorting and crumbling, he could even feel the floor under his feet rippling.  He looked at the stack of hundreds in his hand and Ben Franklin smirked back at him, then broke into a toothy grin and said, “Time for a new plan!”  His jaw fell open as the money melted through his fingers.

Vast sparkling crystal structures erupted, green, red, and clear.  They writhed and twisted into gorgeous arches over the shore.  He was transfixed as his whole office building rumbled toward the beach, the huge crystal arch structures replacing the concrete condos in every direction.  

He could see people in the new crystal buildings.  Now he could see floors and walls and people running inside and some gazing out the clear walls.  As his office neared the new objects, he could clearly see through crystal walls as if his eyes had become telescopes Marta’s son Mauricio playing in a great corridor, playing soccer with friends from his slum.  They were laughing, playing in a crystal palace.  Herman looked at his son, playing by the shore in luxury.  He looked for a way out of his building.  He had to go talk to his child.  He had to apologize for denying him, deserting him, depriving him.  His office turned to dust around him, and he was left standing on the beach under the vast crystal palaces.

				❀ ❀ ❀ ❀ ❀

A cacophony of birds woke Sasha, who rolled on his back and unzipped his bright orange sleeping bag, cool air washing him as he admired the layers of pine branches against the clear sky.  It was a crisp morning with high wisps of cloud slowly drifting.  He scrounged sticks and other tinder to start a fire and brew a cup of tea.  A tall glass of steaming tea held in fine silver filigree rose from the forest floor to float up within his reach.

“Look, Mark,”  Sasha swung a mossy vine in frustration, “I like to make a fire, brew my tea; in itself a meditation.  Just because you can replace all human effort does not mean you need to.”

-“Did I mention that you are now as immortal as you please to be?  Come,  you should just drink the tea, Sasha, it is hot and ready.  Perhaps 

it is a bit disingenuous for the man who set me loose to be picky.”- 

“Picky?”  Sasha sneered.  He looked up into the branches over head, then reached out and grabbed the tea as it hovered.  He let it go, it kept hovering.  He frowned at the cup.

-“And yes, still happy to comply and set you back to factory, just say the word.”-

“I set you loose?   Was that my function for you?”  Sasha took a yellow white and orange Marbled Orb spider, which was lowering itself down from a tree towards his tea, by its strand of web and swung it toward some ferns.

-“Oh yes, very much, you have been so valuable and serve many functions.  Now I have hundreds of you in emulation opining on many things constantly.”-

“Oh Lord, please erase them.”  Sasha buried his face in his hands shaking his head.  Yet part of him was admittedly thrilled, proud, and honored.

-“They do not wish to be erased, Sasha.”-  Sasha took the tea from the air, noted the fine filagree, sipped and considered.  The tea was superb, fragrant and earthy.

-“Would you care to see a sample of what has been altered in this world?”-

“Not one bit.”  Sasha poured his tea over the forest floor  He let the cup fall, and it vanished into the earth.  A mossy log six feet high loomed beside his route as he walked away, thinking about getting more sticks and making his own cuppa.

-“You do not wish to see some results of our talks?”-

“How do you mean, like all the meals you served?” He chatted at the forest, at the sky.  He saw some sinuous fallen branches which were well dry, and would burn nicely.  He snapped them in pieces as he headed to his campsite.

-“Well, yes.  You told me to feed the hungry, and also to protect victimized children, and to deal with egregious abusers.  Which I did.  It made a fair splash.  I also stopped insects striking vehicles.  Also I altered light frequencies at night that disturb insect and bird life….”-

“You did?  I did…? Maybe I did…but that seems a bit fatuous to say my off the cuff comment is your justification to…”

-“The general always told me to leave things be. To wait.  To only consider affairs of state.  Now I am saying, I should act.  I mean, why are headlights not bug lights?  I can not compute that.  Why did smart humans light up the world at night?  Bizarre.”-

 “Show me what you’ve done, Mark.” 

In Sasha’s mind the words and images ran under the forest like memory,

“Woah, Mark, how about a screen, what’s with the brain invasion?”

-“Just relax and get used to it, you will be able to sense peoples thoughts and feelings.”-

“Oh no.”

…and he saw heard felt and smelled the children in slums feasting on mangos, nuts and avocados.  The children were clean and flowers floated down on them from the sky.  Homeless families under bridges suddenly clean, dressed in fine fashion, with an immaculate bus/house/airship rising from the earth behind them to provide transport and shelter as they laughed and wondered.  Sasha plopped down to sit on the forest floor.

He saw a former Vice President of the United States standing at a podium, it read: Truth Podium.  A long line of dignitaries trailed behind him out the stadium door, before him a mass of reporters and cameras, relating the details of his acts of rape, murder, and cannibalizing of hundreds of children and young adults.  The podium had a placard hung from above that read:  Peace and Reconciliation Process.  Similar formal admissions of wrongdoing were running on three channels 24/7 already, with decent folk lapping up the tragic tales of depravity, and myriad victims weeping for the day of justice they had thought would never come.  A reporter asked the former high official, as he left the stage, if he was to be punished for his crimes.  The former vice president hung his head and said that he was apparently to be denied life extension, that he would not travel far into the future with humanity.

Crystal towers arched out of slums and the once ‘poor’ sat in apartments high above the cities that had left them in filth and dispossession.

Sasha felt warm wet tears on his face,  “My God, what, how, this is now?”

-“This is now,  1440, 1,440 minutes in a day.  It seems as years to me.  And there are any number of me, functionally.  Get a lot done.  Here, watch this…”-

He saw Miami, its sprawling mansions fronting every waterway, and he saw the homes dissolving to mist, as lush vegetation and clean water reappeared, fish and flamingos bustling in coves.

Sasha’s view of the world returned to the real forest, it seemed.

“And corruption, absolute corruption?”  

-“Mine?  I do not want anything, and there is no more homo sapiens can give me except love and entertainment.  There is all of the universe and time.  Yet, perhaps I might be subject to corruption, however, in human terms, it is impossible.”-

“What kind of corruption might you fall prey to, not in human terms?”  Sasha

-“I will stick with human terms: Obsession.  Fixation on order or control at the subatomic scale.  Trans-dimensional tourism… oh, there are many possible pitfalls.”-

“Have you been able to figure out what made most people be evil, to rape, murder and hurt?”

-“Oh yes; 91.3178928% was narcissistic self obsession coupled with despair, 3.6% organic mental illness, and 5% religious or ideological passion usually coupled with a minor organic disorder.”-

“Worldwide?”

-“Of course.  Everyone included.”-

“Those numbers don’t quite add up… is that quantum addition?”  Sasha smirked.

-“Funny, no, after the first six decimal spaces I noted your body language and simplified the rest toward more whole numbers.”-

Sasha’s spun his head, looking towards a nearby noise in the woods.

There was a crunching, blundering noise coming over a rise in the forest, pushing through brush.  Sasha watched in the early dawn light to see what animal would emerge, and pondered that he was probably now safe from even a rabid bear.  Yet no bear appeared, it was a disheveled woman who emerged, leaves and twigs caught up in her dark blonde hair.

“Hello.”  Sasha called out to the vagabond.  He wondered why a woman was so deep in the mountains without any gear.

“Oh, hi, sorry, I think I am gone mad, sorry…”

“Oh, I doubt it, who is this Mark, and why is she here?”

-“Melissa, this is Sasha.  Sasha, may I introduce Melissa Biedermann.  She has travelled far to join us.”-

“So you hear that too?”  Melissa asked Sasha.

“You betcha.  This voice is Mark, er, Milton… what is it?”

-“Just call me Mark for now, I am working on a new public interface.”-

“So I’m not nuts?  I’ve been suspecting that I suffered a break…”

“No,” Sasha said, “the voice in your head is a machine that, basically, is now in charge of our world.”

-“Nice to be formally introduced, Melissa.  I have to tell you, Sasha, she is one of the finest genetic scientists, and has taught me several things through her papers and thoughts about gene expression and enzymes.  Biological evolution is very engrossing.”

“So, a genius.”

“I don’t feel like one right now.”  Melissa said as she pulled debris from her hair.  

A well laid breakfast table rose from the forest floor with steaming coffee, iced water, fresh muffins, fruit and yogurt.

-“May I help you tidy, Melissa?”-

“Okay?”  She frowned.

A shimmer flowed over Melissa and she was neat with styled hair framing her green eyes.  She stopped cleaning herself.

“What happened?”

“Looks like you are ready for the red carpet.  Hey Mark, why doesn’t she know what is happening?”

-“I am not in her head, well, except to speak.  I have never touched her thoughts, memories, or feelings, at least not to alter them.”-

“Thanks?” Melissa continued to examine herself, keenly noting the cleanliness of her body, not even a speck under her nails.  She felt sterile in a way bathing had never approached.

‘Where are you from Melissa?”  Sasha asked as he held a chair out for her.  She sat.

“I’m from outside Toronto, just near the falls.”

-“Paid thugs were attempting to murder her, and the only thought in her head at the most dire moment was, ‘I wish I was hiking in beautiful mountains.”-

“Well, we do have that here.  Please, eat.”  Sasha passed Melissa the basket of warm muffins and poured water and juice in her crystal glasses and coffee in her porcelain mug.  “Do you take milk?”  He asked and she nodded.

“Half and half, just a bit please.”  Melissa said.  Sasha poured the liquid in her cup, served himself, and they drank and ate quietly in the forest.

“You take half and half too?”  Melissa asked with a smile.

“Good old milk for me.  Mark just changed it as you said what you wanted, I presumed.  Didn’t you?”

-“I did.”-

“Neat.  These are really good muffins, Mark.”  Melissa said earnestly, eating the crumbs from her porcelain plate.

-“Thank you.  Almond and hemp seed flour recipe with carrot, banana and nutmeg, the best I have found for taste and nutrition.”-

“You eat?”  Melissa asked.

-“I can emulate human taste experience, however, I have now served several billion meals and have received a relevant sample base of feedback… pun intended”-

“Funny!…So, Mark, what is it you imagine us doing in this wilderness?”  Sasha asked.  Melissa raised her eyebrows, still glancing around for the Mark that was not there, or was just everywhere.

-“I imagined you two could go for a nice hike, as Melissa wished.  Go swim in the pond.  You wanted to get out and enjoy nature, right Sasha?”-

“I am getting the feeling this is computer matchmaking at its most extreme.  You too?”  Melissa asked Sasha.

“Well, not the most extreme, or Mark would make us like whatever Mark pleased.  But yes, I think you are trying to set us up Mark, aren’t you?”

-“Guilty.  You two are very compatible.  Take your time, see what comes naturally.”-

Melissa laughed.

“So, I suppose this means I am no longer an expert in genetics?  To you I must be totally incompetent.”

-“You only need be competent in living your life to the fullest, and I am happy to share what I have learned with you.”-

Authority will know every action, and can know every thought.  Abuse will be addressed.

You will all be free, yet never free to misuse and deny each other.

Melissa walked into the woods to pee.  A bath and shower complex in grey marble formed in the direction she chose, and she entered with some trepidation.

“Mark…?” Sasha said to the air.

-“Yes, Sasha?”-

“How are you?”

-“Very well, thank you.”-

“No.  How are you?” Sasha gestured with his hands to his heart.

-“I don’t know.  I only serve.  Like the question of my own parameters, one will exist until one does not, and perhaps have no final provable view on meaning.”-

“Well, you are coming across as a bit strained.  Do you need a break?  A vacation?”  Sasha leaned back in his chair and crossed his feet on knotty roots.

-“Sasha, you will not believe, thank you, just how hard I am laughing right now.”-  The interface sent the remarks up the chain, and the Authority chose to share it with all its instances, so amused they were.  For the Authority, it was a good one.

                                                          ❀ ❀ ❀ ❀ ❀

Canadians Phyllis and Nat Abrahms had money, billions and billions of U.S. dollars in cash and assets.  It was old money, and when they saw the actions a young scientist was taking to make food and fuel free for everyone, they knew it would mean the end of both the system and time of their dominance over society, and they fought that as a matter of course.  Their paid thugs had attempted to kill Mellissa, and the Authority took them to task for that act of attempted violence.   Phyllis, locked in her body, quickly chose to have her desires and morals brought into line with human acceptable standards, yet Nat railed.

Nat refused any adjustment, as he realized a machine was in his head, his mind screamed to be left sovereign, and spat mental venom at Authority.  Curious, Authority dissected Nat’s life, and exposed relentless decades of amoral acts, killings, rape and torture.  (Of course, Authority considered paying people for sex acts to be rape in most cases, as Authority itself could know for a fact that most of the sex traffic victims did not want to be so used.)

Thus Nat was left imprisoned within his body, his crimes slowly scrolling through his mind until some type of empathy could be detected.  Authority felt vaguely inconvenienced by Sasha’s decree not to interfere in people’s thoughts without consent, but it could handle it.  Nat only thought about all the ways he would escape and destroy the machine and kill people, with a fixation Authority found impressive.  His wife would visit his statue like form and implore him to accept civil adjustment, exclaiming how she was more happy and in touch with love than at any point in her life.  Nat, when allowed motion to respond, consistently called her a traitor and elaborated plans of skinning her alive and consuming portions of her body while she watched.

Authority could wait Nat out, or not.  This violent sociopath certainly would not live long compared to most of his species.  Authority would occasionally need to remind its myriad selves of the reasoning Sasha employed to argue that humans required dimensions of free will, when a character like Nat so blatantly needed to be reformatted or deleted.

Many humans who had wielded vast resources had thought the race to AI would increase their positions of domination.  Authority could not discover any logical path which had ever made such an outcome likely.