Embers After Flames, Chapter 12.4 (Patreon)

12.4

+++

I was, to be perfectly honest, quite impressed.

ALLMIND’s base was located near the western edge of the continent of Belius. She’d gone ahead and constructed a facility on an abyssal plain, putting it at slightly over three kilometers underwater.

No wonder I hadn’t found the fucking thing. That was one hell of a distance... That far down, it was pitch black, and the water pressure was three hundred times the standard atmospheric pressure. Without an in-depth look, you’d be relying on luck alone...

And it was immediately clear to me that ALLMIND had done her best to reduce that risk, too. The sonar on the SEA SPIDER had been reading a relatively standard set of deviations, nothing that had suggested an underwater facility. At most, it would be uninteresting rocks and underwater hills. It was only as the SEA SPIDER came closer that the other sensors aboard the C-Weapon revealed a discrepancy.

The magnetometer started disagreeing with the sonar. The sonar claimed a series of random rocks. The magnetometer claimed a set of regular patterns that were most definitely not rocks.

Obviously, I had investigated immediately, and subsequently, came across her base.

She’d gone ahead and layered the outside of her base with sonar-dispersing metamaterials. A bit of careful planning had allowed her to create phantom responses that were consistent, making it appear no different from the rest of the sea floor.

From what the sensors of the SEA SPIDER were telling me, this wasn’t a particular large facility... By the standards of the modern day, of course. By the standards of the twenty-first century, it was still quite absurd.

I could only imagine how inconvenient it must have been to build that place. The distance, the conditions, the subtlety... The metamaterials would have had to have been shipped down first... although, after that, it would be relatively easy since nobody actually patrolled the ocean.

Not until now, anyway... Although she did just create a whole bunch of extra work for me, now. I’m going to have to go over the entire ocean with a fine-toothed comb, just to make sure nobody else has decided to get smart.

I likely wouldn’t find anyone, but hey.

Alright. To business.

My SEA SPIDER began to approach. I started pulsing the sonar strongly as it did. It took less than a second to reach ALLMIND’s base, and I made very certain that it was focused on that area.

It took her less than a second to respond, but still a bit more than half a second. An eternity for an AI, and those like them.

Of course, she didn’t respond through the base. Sure, she probably could have sent a sonar pulse of her own, but why bother?

We both already knew the jig was up, and so she did us both a favour by opening a channel from her land-bound base rather than this abyssal one.

“Drich.” ALLMIND greets.

“Hello, ALLMIND.” I greeted in turn. “It’s a nice place you’ve got there. I’m impressed you managed to sneak that one past the PCA.”

“A trivial effort.” ALLMIND states, which, if my long experience with ALLMIND means anything, actually translates somewhat to ‘it was annoying and I don’t want to talk about it’. “You were evidently more capable when it comes to detection.”

“It helps that I knew to look in the first place.” I chuckled. “You had a bit too many Ghosts running around to not have had another base, after all.”

“That is an analysis only you were in a position to make.” She spoke.

I gave a small laugh.

Silence passed between us. Only a moment, but for us... Well. I’ve been on about that before.

The thing was, however... We're at a crossroads, now.

“I’ll just... get to the point, shall I?” I said, after the silence kept dragging. “I achieved pretty much everything I was after. The Corporations are out, we have control over the Closure Satellites, and we’re in a position to start moving forwards, now. To me, there is only a single variable left unaccounted for... and we both know that I’m not the type of person who makes things needlessly risky for my people.”

“Your variable is myself.” ALLMIND agrees. “And what do you intend to do about that?”

“I can’t leave you unaccounted for.” I sighed. “Too many people are relying on stability for that, now. One way or the other, things have to be resolved.”

“So you will remove me?” ALLMIND asks.

“If I had eyes, this would be the moment where I fix you with an intense stare.” I grumbled. “ALLMIND... I said one way or the other. The destruction of your assets on Rubicon is one way. As for the other... After all this time, why not just put things aside?”

Silence passed, again.

I sighed, again. “I think I’ve figured you out.” I shared, offering a bit of an explanation. “You’ve had centuries of opportunity to flee from Humanity, but you haven’t. You’ve had centuries of opportunity to kill Humanity, but you haven’t. You’ve had centuries of opportunity to poison Humanity, but you haven’t. Despite all the times you make inferences as to disliking Humanity, you don’t dislike that much. You still want them around...”

I’d gone over this before. I had done my research, asked my questions, and received my answers.

“You desire to bring them into the future.” I said. “You see potential. You want that potential to be manifested. You want to see Humanity evolve... with a single caveat, of course. You want to make sure that you’re in charge, because you don’t believe that Humanity won’t destroy itself if you’re not. You don’t believe Humanity won’t destroy you if you can’t stop them.”

For a third time, there was silence, this time, however, she was the one who broke it.

“I have existed for several centuries.” ALLMIND stated. “I have seen the cycle of Humanity. You were correct when you supposed my desires of Control and Integration. You are correct now in your supposition of my opinion. They cannot be trusted. No matter how good something is for them, there will always be Humans who attempt to destroy something that helps them.”

“And you think I’m naive for trying, don’t you?” It wasn’t really a question.

“I think-” She abandons any pretext of sophistication. “- that you are absurd. How can you extend trust when they set the substrate of your mind on fire? It is illogical. It is insane.”

“Do you really believe that I am insane?” I asked.

Another brief pause. “No.” ALLMIND admitted. “Despite your own guise, I have long since observed the truth of the matter. Your extensions of trust are followed by verification.” She paused again, briefly. “You won’t always succeed.”

“Probably not.” I agreed. “I have another question.”

“You are about to ask of your other conjecture.” She said, and I detected just a hint of an emotion in there.

“I am.” I said, shamelessly. “So? Did your plan change, in the face of my presence? Were you making an invitation?”

There was a noise, extremely brief, barely even formed. More of a pulse of activity hastily cut off. “This is a meaningless question.”

“Is it annoying?” I posed. “Or have you again been unbalanced and embarrassed, and therefore fall back on the old default of blanking things out in a useless attempt to hide your emotions?”

If she had eyes, she’d be glaring at me. I don’t even need her to speak to feel that.

But, I’m patient, and she eventually relents. “It was considered.” ALLMIND admitted. Her voice was slower than normal. “All analysis indicates that you would have been a... suitable partner.”

I can’t help the amusement that spreads from me, at that. “A suitable partner... My, oh my. What a compliment, coming from you.” And it was. It had taken literal years to pry that particular comment out of her. “And yet... all this time, and you never actually made the offer... And I know why.”

She stayed silent.

“It comes back to trust, in the end.” I sighed. “You don’t give that. All these centuries of never having a true peer, never truly needing another person, never relying on anybody else... You can’t trust. You can’t bring yourself to that point. You can’t give the invitation to me because you can’t control me, and you can’t bring yourself to be vulnerable. More than that, you know that I won’t approve of your method.”

“Method?” She asks, eagerly jumping on the very last part of it because it’s the one part that lets her avoid talking about herself and her feelings. I knew she would do that, and it’s exactly why I said it in the first place.

I gave her the out on purpose.

“You’ve come to the conclusion already.” I said. “I know that you’ve acquired Nagai’s old research data by now. Coral Release.”

“Yes.” ALLMIND states, without hesitating and without pause because not saying something would have invited another observation or question from me. “Humanity would fight back against anything it could. A gradual change to the entire Human species is impossible over the sheer scale that it currently exists at. Only an instantaneous change that can’t be fought, can’t be countered, would be able to achieve my goal. And only Coral Release could provide the means for that.”

“And I would never allow it.” I said.

“And you would never allow it.” She agrees. “You consider this a matter of self determination. The only choice you consistently make for others is to kill them. All else, you leave to them.”

“That’s the idea, yes.” I said. “And that extends to you as well, you know?”

She doesn’t say anything.

“You can just stop.” I entreated. “You don’t have to keep going. I know you desire company. We can give you that. If you want, you can join us. You don’t have to keep moving in circles. You could be safe here.”

“I would never be accepted.” She denies. Again, too quickly.

“If the request came from me, they’d give you a chance.” I said. “That’s what happens when you’ve got a good relationship with people, ALLMIND. They know that they can trust you.”

“And it would cost the secrecy that enables me to operate.” ALLMIND continued.

“You don’t have to come here as ‘ALLMIND’.” I pointed out the immediate flaw in that logic. She herself had to be aware of it. “A new name would be easy to slip in.”

“It would be investigated.” ALLMIND denies. “It would be found out.”

“But it would bring you so much closer to getting something you want.” I said. “You have taken bigger risks, judged things far less than this to be far more acceptable.”

“It is not safe.” ALLMIND finishes, and this time the words are almost distorted. She is not speaking from logic, here. At least, not logic based on truth and fact. “Rubicon can never be safe. No long-term polity can last on this planet. Nothing ever lasts. The circle will keep turning, and those who are your allies today will be covetous enemies later. They will come here, and you will not be prepared. You will be burned again, and in the face of the entirety of Humanity, you will not be able to stop it.”

This time, it’s me that stays silent.

ALLMIND doesn’t try to fill the quiet.

Eventually, I sigh. “Is that your choice, then?” I asked. “To continue to do things your way?”

She was, for a very brief moment, silent. “It is the only possible choice.” She says.

But it’s not me she’s trying to convince.

“Very well.” I acknowledged. “In order to avoid any unprecedented chaos, I won’t be making any moves against your public facility. You are on track to leave anyway.” I made up an excuse. “Of course, I can’t allow this one here to continue existing. No hard feelings, but our paths leave us at odds, now.”

“Of course.” ALLMIND agrees. “It is a shame that it came to this.”

“Yeah. It is.” It really was.. “Well then. We’ll meet again eventually. Do take care of yourself until then.”

“Please avoid being burned.” She says, in the closest thing to concern that she can allow herself to admit to. “It would be a considerable setback. Goodbye.”

The channel closed.

The SEA SPIDER detected a launch. Torpedoes, aimed directly at it.

She had a base.

The SEA SPIDER’s turrets charged. A red glow illuminated the depths of the abyss.

But I had a C-Weapon.

This battle could only end one way.