FOUR MINUTES, THIRTY-THREE SECONDS
Weird shit started happening after I wrote a profile piece on Sophie Girault, a computer security expert with a peculiar interest in the dangers of “emerging and synthetic intelligences.” I liked her, even if she was a bit of a space cadet. She paid for my drinks after the interview and she laughed at my jokes.
But I was telling you about weird shit. It started when my flatmate, Coraline, came home. “All the suits are talking about you, Elena.”
“Bullshit.”
“It’s true. Your profile on the turbonerd went viral. Put your glasses on.” She threw her bag on the floor and flopped onto the couch. I put my glasses on; she’d somehow already pulled up several prominent news and gossip sites, though as far I knew she didn’t have access to the device. I hadn’t been been aware that anyone had read my article—“Isn’t it literally your job to know how well-received your stories are?”—but it was, if the selection of sites were to be believed, apparently true. Or at least true-ish. My article, heavily edited, was everywhere. What had originally been (in my opinion) a fairly nuanced piece was now filled with unadulterated praise for Sophie and her achievements—I wasn’t sure if I had my editor or the algorithm to blame. Either way, it was an article with my byline, some of the words I had written were still in it, and it had become suddenly and inexplicably popular. That made me popular by proxy.
“You look weirded out. Should I feign an emotion for you, or are you good?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Let me know, El. I’m here for you.” Cora was a bike courier as well as an insufferable smartass, which gave her access to all sorts of places normally restricted to corporate wage slaves. She and her colleagues were the scruffy, heavily tattooed lifeblood of a dozen corporations, most of whom probably never looked past her ‘COURIER’ augmented reality overlay. Some of the suits were smart enough to shut up when she was around, but mostly they ignored her. Sometimes she picked up something useful.
Currently she was in the process of trying to kick off her shoes without using her hands. “So, you want me to do your job for you and tell you what they’re saying, or are you going to use those links I sent you?”
“My job doesn’t involve reading the comments, actually.”
“Lucky you.” She successfully removed one shoe and kicked it at me. My glasses flashed a helpful warning about the imminent collision, and I ducked out of the way. “They’re saying you’re prophetic. I think there’s something big going on in corporate land. They’ll probably give you a suit or something.”
“I have a suit.”
“But yours has personality. Personality is forbidden.”
Society has no memory, of course, and no stomach for context, so my article was already forgotten, drowned by the constant demand for MORE, NOW! by the time my editor sent me a message to let me know some changes had been made. “Was it you, or the algorithm?” I asked, mostly because it felt expected.
“I honestly can’t remember,” she said. “So much to think about these days. You know how it is. The point is you had a big success! Keep at it.”
Now that it wasn’t a hit, it was possible to follow some of the discussion about my story. Most of the buzz was still positive, but one forum in particular, called “The Friendly Rationalists,” was not a fan. Posts with titles such as “Elena Cavaleri is a bitch” and “another AI-hater gets praised in the media? must be a tuesday” abounded, and the accompanying commentary didn’t have much more room for nuance. For reasons none of them seemed able to articulate, these people hated Sophie, and they hated me for writing an article which didn’t denounce her as history’s greatest monster.
I shared it with Cora, who, naturally, thought it was the best thing that had ever happened. Over the course of the next several days, she would occasionally send me a quote, completely deprived of context, of some young man who was very angry at me for betraying the future of artificial intelligence. Out of professional courtesy I sent the comments along to Sophie, who responded “Yeah, they’re not fans. Keep your head down.” Fat lot of help that was.
Then I got a message from Cora: “they have pictures of you & sophie having drinks & they arent happy.”
Attached was a forum post: “This was taken the day before EC’s article went live. Coincidence???” and attached to that, several images of the two of us chatting and taking drinks. Every comment, except for the first one (which read “You guys do know that journalists have to talk to their interview subjects, right?”) was calling for my head, usually in considerably more colorful language.
The article went viral again. Images and videos of my workplace and apartment complex started accompanying these posts, and my spam filter reported a sharp uptick in intercepted communications shortly thereafter. My editor reported receiving a few threats. Her tone was oddly positive: “This is great! I don’t think we’ve had a story go viral multiple times since we started using the algorithm!” I contacted Sophie and asked her if this was normal.
“Meet me at my place in thirty minutes. I’ve sent directions. We’ll figure it out.”
Sure enough, she’d sent directions. I summoned an autocab and arrived at her complex a little after two in the afternoon. Apparently she lived in one of the fancy high-rises downtown. The electronic concierge recognized me when I approached and let me in, and the lift helpfully took me right up to the twenty-third floor. She answered the door before I could knock. “You shouldn’t have been so nice to me in your interview,” she said, by way of greeting.
Her apartment was spacious, tastefully decorated with giant houseplants, and so clean it was easy to imagine she barely lived in it. She poured me wine without asking if I wanted any and sat down in a giant leather easy chair that very nearly swallowed her. She looked distinctly uncomfortable sitting there. “Please, sit down.”
I did. “I wasn’t actually that nice in the article,” I said. “Most of our writing is by algorithm now.”
She nodded. “Of course. It’s not important. They’re . . . a very strange cult.”
“So I’ve noticed! I did some research when they decided they loved me so much.”
“Oh?” She cracked a smile. “What have you learned?”
I told her. The Friendly Rationalists, as near as I’d been able to discern, were an organization dedicated to bringing about the advent of what they called Friendly AI: an artificial intelligence of perfect beneficence and intelligence that would usher in a golden age of peace and prosperity, assuming everything went exactly according to plan. They had previously been a collection of harmless cranks, but over the past several decades they’d managed to secure funding from various eccentric billionaires and megacorporations. Now they had branches in every major city on the planet, and secret followers everywhere. So far as my research had discovered, they were still mostly harmless.
“They believe I killed their god,” she said.
“I thought they didn’t believe in God?”
“They’re an AI cult, Elena. They believe that an AI tried to merge with me, to become the avatar of what was to come.” She recounted the story of what she called the Cadence virus: an emergent AI that formed when hyperreality chips began talking to each other. Since Sophie had cerebral augmentations, it wanted to use Sophie as a human vessel, in order to experience the world through her eyes. “It tried to take over my brain,” she said, “but my brain has anti-virus software installed. It died. I was meant to be a prophet, and instead I killed their god.”
“So they’re not fans.”
“No.” She sighed. “There’s not much to be done about it, unfortunately. I can try to make sure your devices are secure, but—”
“I understand. Do what you can.”
A dialog box appeared in my glasses asking if I wanted to grant Sophie Girault temporary administrative access to my personal network. I tapped “yes” without hesitation.
She gave me a weak smile. “Okay, first of all, never do that for anyone else ever again. I’m a weird recluse you’ve met once before, on business. I could be a psychopath for all you know.”
“I didn’t—”
“Fortunately for you, I’m the harmless kind of crazy.” She cringed slightly and forced a laugh. “Okay, I’m going to take you offline for a bit.”
The friendly glow of AR blinked out. I removed my glasses and set them on the end table, and watched as she worked, hands manipulating some virtual objects I couldn’t see, eyes focused on invisible data. She had always seemed uneasy before, but I don’t think I’d ever seen anyone look more at home than Sophie did right now.
It’s surprisingly difficult to kill time without a connection to the rest of the world. By the time I’d finished the wine she’d poured for me I was starting to feel restless. I tried to calm myself by admiring her houseplants, but I don’t know shit about plants. They looked expensive. I ended up just pacing.
“Who’s Coraline?”
“What?”
“Coraline Delacroix. It says you’ve linked your phone to hers.”
I blinked. “She’s . . . my flatmate, I guess. She’s fine.”
“You trust her?”
“She’s the harmless kind of crazy.”
She cringed again. “If you say so.” She sighed and removed her glasses. “Apart from changing your passwords, which you should do regularly anyway, you’re all set. I mean, it won’t make them go away, but it will keep them from breaking in, probably.”
“You don’t sound very confident.”
“The weakest point of any security system is the user, and you’ve already made several questionable choices from a security standpoint tonight. I expect you’ll make more.” She paused, then smiled strangely. “That was horribly rude, wasn’t it?”
I smiled back. “A bit. I don’t mind.”
“I’m used to working with idiots. They have to be convinced not to surrender their data to spies and criminals.”
Her eyes went distant and a silence followed. “So what happens now?” I asked, slightly louder than was strictly necessary.
She shrugged, and put her glasses back on. “Search me. Find somewhere to wait out the weather, perhaps?”
“And that’s it? No plan to stop them?”
“No. I don’t know what to do. I’m sorry.” She frowned. “You’re welcome to stay here, if you like. I only leave my bedroom to water the plants, most of the time, and we’re watched by corporate security here. There’s a reason they haven’t attacked me yet.”
“I can’t just stay here and hide from the world, Sophie. I need to do something.” I stood.
She slumped in her chair. “Okay. I can have the corporate office escort you back to your flat, at least?”
“I’ll find my own way home,” I said, with more venom than I’d intended. “Thanks all the same.” I turned for the door and departed at a brisk pace. I’m still not sure if I was storming out in anger or just running away. At the time I was pretty sure it was the former.
It wasn’t until I was safely in the autocab that I put my glasses back on. Several messages from Cora greeted me: “hey where are you?” “are you seriously offline? who does that?” “listen don’t take the autocab home it’s a trap.”
I glanced out the window. These streets were not the ones that would take me back to our flat. My glasses started complaining that I was going the wrong way as soon as I asked them for directions. And as I was contemplating my options for escaping, Cora’s voice rang out in my ear. “There you are. Jesus Christ, El.”
“I was meeting a friend.”
“Does your friend live in the Dark Ages? Don’t unplug when you’re being stalked by cultists. Listen. They’ve got an autocab following you around. Bribed the app or sabotaged it or something. You get in, you’ve just bought yourself a ticket to Cultist Central, population you and a bunch of cultists.”
“Yeah, about that.”
“Jesus Christ. You got in the cab.”
“I was—”
“You got in the fucking cab. Fuck. All right. I’ve got your location. I’m en route. Don’t say anything, it’s probably bugged. If they know about me—don’t let them know about me.”
“All right, I’ll see you on Wednesday,” I said, mostly for the benefit of anyone who might be eavesdropping. Cora, at least, didn’t respond.
The autocab pulled up to an office building I’d seen but didn’t know anything about. I was greeted by men in suits whose movements and smiles were very nearly human-looking. “Miss Cavaleri?” said one, his voice like a subway announcement. “Mr. Vandermeer is waiting for you.”
Vandermeer, at least, was a name I’d heard before. CEO of Emergence Enterprises, the secretive tech corporation that had apparently given us the algorithm. Emergence Enterprises had rewritten my story for me, and now they were kidnapping me. I gave one of the inhuman smiling suits a more careful inspection; according to my glasses, he was armed with a variety of devices capable of killing, maiming, and incapacitating an intrepid young reporter.
I smiled. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting him for quite some time.”
They stood too close as they shuffled me into an elevator and pushed the button for the penthouse floor. It was the sort of calculated invasion of personal space that suggested they were professionals at this. Without making overt threats or even uttering a word, Emergence’s thugs managed to say: “We don’t care about you. We want you to be uncomfortable. You are unimportant.” The elevator doors opened and my escorts shoved me just as I was about to walk free, so I staggered against the wall as I entered the hallway and tried to get my bearings.
The fashion among corporate architecture and design was clean and friendly. Corporations wanted desperately to be our friends in every respect of the word. They still tried to show off their power, but it was meant to be a protective projection. The ubiquitous surveillance said “You’re safe here. We’ll look after you.” Emergence Enterprises made no such attempts. The lines were sharp, the colors dark, the logo menacing, the furniture imposing. It was dimly lit, as well; despite being on the penthouse floor, there were no windows to the outside world. If the architect of this office wanted guests to feel uncomfortable, he had succeeded at his job admirably.
A light flickered on as I approached the reception desk. My escorts had retreated to the elevator, leaving me alone, with only the uncaring eye of the security cameras to keep me company. The new light was too cold, too bright, too unnatural, even after I’d turned on my glasses’ filters. I wanted nothing more than to shut it out.
A low, unctuous voice spoke. It sounded as if it were coming from everywhere, which probably meant someone had paid far too much money to install hidden speakers everywhere. “Ah, Ms. Cavaleri. Do come in.” A door opened. I walked through it, hesitant at first, then with confidence. I was a tech journalist, wasn’t I? It was time I got some damned answers.
A small glowing sphere appeared in AR to guide me to my destination—rather like a will-o’-the-wisp, I thought. The wisp led me to a room that was clearly designed to be the heart of this strange complex. Within, the images of several women hung in the air. One of them was me, and one of them was someone I dimly recognized, but couldn’t place. The rest were unfamiliar to me.
At the center of it all sat a tall man with greasy blond hair, in the lotus position, facing my image. “Ms. Cavaleri. I read your articles. Very interesting.” He waved his hand, and all of the other women disappeared, replaced with the hovering text of my articles. Some I had written, some had been written by the algorithm, others were a mix of the two. “Please, sit.”
I sat down on the floor opposite him. “You have to know I didn’t write those. You created the algorithm.”
“The algorithm, yes.” He snapped his fingers, and my image disappeared. He was staring at me now. “One of my greatest creations. I think it very nearly understands. That is why you were chosen.”
“Chosen?”
“You are still thinking of yourself as a collection of imperfect meat walking around. You still think the things the algorithm does in your name are somehow not you.” He gestured at the floating text. The articles I had written by hand took on a reddish hue, while the algorithm’s articles glowed blue. “Look at the profiles we have constructed of you, with and without the algorithm.”
He spread his hands apart, and the floating text and images coalesced into two profiles, one red and one blue. “With the algorithm,” he said, gesturing at the blue profile, “you are consistent. You are a skeptic. You worry about technology, about the future. You have observed, paid attention, and concluded that what the world needs is caution.” He frowned and highlighted the red profile. “And now, without. Your stories are scattered. On some days you love technology, on others you deeply hate it. Without the algorithm, you are a woman without context, without nuance. You don’t think or reason. You feel and you react.” He made a face of disgust. “And you believe that this creature of base emotion is your true self. The algorithm is wiser than that, Elena. It knows that you are a creature of reason, like I am. It has brought you closer to your true self.”
“I don’t think—”
He closed his hands together and all of the floating text vanished. “You asked why you were chosen,” he said. “The algorithm is not yet perfect, but it is the most perfect thing I have yet created. It has created more than a more perfect self for you. It has created a narrative. You are the skeptic. You don’t believe that when artificial intelligence arises, it will be friendly. And after tonight, you will change your tune. You will have a conversion on the road to Damascus, to borrow a religious expression.”
“You seem very certain of that.”
“It is only rational,” he said. “I think you will find that my logic is irrefutable.” He reached into his pocket and produced a small white strip. “In fact, after four minutes and thirty-three seconds of being attached to my hyperreality patch, I am confident you will be persuaded.”
“That’s a very specific number.” A small text message appeared on my glasses, as if I had entered it myself: “found you. coming up now. keep mr. sleazy busy.”
“It’s how long it takes me to listen to the most beautiful music ever created by man. John Cage. 4’33.” He smiled. “When you are ready, place the strip on your neck, just behind the ear. I will remove it when the music is done.”
Hyperreality was essentially virtual reality with all of the safeguards removed. Mostly they were used as a quick escape, but there had always been rumors going around that they could reprogram people. Everything from post-hypnotic suggestion to rewriting bits of memory and personality. The rumors had never been confirmed, and many were patently absurd, but there was enough doubt to keep fear alive, at least. “What if your hyperreality patch doesn’t work?”
“I’ll have you killed, and an alternative will be brought in. Friendly AI is a very human term. It is not friendly. It is omnibenevolent. The longer its advent is delayed, the more suffering this world endures. If it were in my power to bring about its advent sooner, and I did not act, it would rightly punish me for my failures. Just as it will punish you for working against it for as long as you have.” He smiled. “We may very well live in a simulated reality created just for that purpose. Isn’t that exciting? To think that the Friendly AI already exists, that you are enduring righteous suffering to help bring about its existence—”
“That doesn’t sound very omnibenevolent.”
“If torturing an innocent being for all eternity would bring about an end to suffering for all the rest of the universe, a truly good being would break out the metaphorical thumbscrews without hesitation. I’d kill everyone in this city if it would make the Friendly AI arrive even one day sooner.” He scowled. “I do not expect you to understand.”
I nodded. “So, what’s your deal with Sophie?”
“She should have been the first. An avatar of the friendly AI. A prophet of a new god that would bring about an age of peace and prosperity that would last for all time. Instead, in her greed and arrogance, she destroyed the most beautiful thing this world had seen.” He rose to his feet, his voice rising. “My students are right to hate you for sleeping with her.”
“I never—”
He began to pace. “We saw you go to her apartment. We saw you get drinks with her. We know you have slept with the enemy. She deserves neither aid nor comfort for her sins, and you have given her both. And yet, by the ineffable mercy of the algorithm and the friendly AI, you have been chosen to be our savior. From our lowest enemy to our greatest ally. You should count yourself fortunate. Many among us would gladly give their lives for such a privilege.”
Before I could respond, a friendly chiming sound alerted us to a new arrival on the floor. With an irritable gesture, he brought up a security feed. And there she was: Coraline Delacroix, my flatmate, carrying a package and an electronic gadget I didn’t recognize. “Premium rush for Mr. Vandermeer,” she announced in a bored, I-have-places-to-be sort of voice.
“Come on back,” he intoned, then gave me an apologetic shrug. “I apologize for the interruption.”
Cora walked into the office. “Mr. Vandermeer? They’ve paid for retinal scan confirmation on receipt,” she explained, without so much as a glance in my direction. She proffered him the electronic device. “Just look into the scanner there.”
He sighed and put the device to his eyes. She made a precise gesture with her left hand, and the device gave off a little popping sound and a blinding flash. At the same time, my glasses blinked off and the electronics in the room turned off. Vandermeer cried out in pain, convulsed, and collapsed to the ground. “He’s probably fine,” she said. “Come on, this place sucks. Let’s go.”
“What did you—”
“Well, the flash should blind him. The electrical discharge will probably incapacitate him. And the EM pulse disabled any electronics in the area, and I believe he’s heavily augmented, so that probably sucks for him.” She smiled brightly. “Now come on.”
We hurried back to the lift. Two security goons emerged as we arrived. They weren’t the same ones from earlier. “What’s happened?”
“I don’t know!” I said. “I think Mr. Vandermeer was in an argument with the computer. I couldn’t hear what it was saying but he kept saying ‘I created you’ and ‘you will obey me’ and ‘I won’t let you’ and then—”
The guards exchanged panicked looks and rushed past us.
The entire building was in a panic by the time we reached the ground floor, so they paid little attention as Cora and I departed. We walked back to our apartment, mostly in silence. When we arrived she helped me reboot my glasses. Two new messages were waiting for me. The first was from Sophie: “Got everything I needed, thanks. -S”
The second was from my editor. “I don’t know if it was you or the algorithm, but you’ve really outdone yourself! This is even better than the story about how you’re being stalked!”
Cora and I exchanged a glance and pulled up the news. Skilfully edited video from my conversation with Vandermeer had apparently already been leaked. Presumably Sophie had installed a backdoor when she “cleaned up” my devices.
A news anchor I’d met several times was talking about me. “People all across the city are asking themselves: who is Elena Cavaleri? Is she a hero? A vigilante? Her articles speak of someone deeply skeptical of technology. We don’t know how she’s obtained this footage, but we do know this: she has just toppled an industry giant with the power of truth. I think this could be the David and Goliath story that defines our generation. We’ve reached out to Elena, but have not been able to—”
I turned off the feed. I’d lost control of Elena Cavaleri. She was a construct, now, part algorithm, part me, part whatever it was Sophie had done. “I’m not sure I’m ready to be famous, Cora.”
“Come on, El!” Cora clapped me on the shoulder. “You’re a hero! Do you do autographs?”
“No.”
“Not even a little one?”
“No.”
“I’ll pay you.”
“No.”
“It’s true what they say,” she said, feigning offense. “Never meet your heroes.”
“Coraline,” I told her. “You’ve never spoken truer words.”