The room was lightless, save for a red dot on the far wall that flashed at irregular intervals.
A voice seemed to come from every direction, as though the whole place was lined with speakers. “Welcome,” it said. It was fluid and natural enough to have been human, but so deliberately androgynous that I knew it came from a machine.
“Who are you?” I asked aloud, wondering whether I’d needed to. If this machine had been built before the Third, it might have been capable of reading human surface thoughts.
“I am an artificial intelligence,” it replied.
“But what is your name?” I asked.
“I have none,” it said.
“Do you know who I am?” I tried.
“Not yet,” it replied. “But the longer you speak, the more confident my prediction becomes. When I am 95% certain or better, I will tell you who you are.”
“What if I don’t know who I am?” I asked.
“Your own knowledge is immaterial,” it said, and I was sure it was female now. “I have access to virtually every public record ever digitized, and can employ sophisticated algorithms to classify voice patterns, facial features, and pheromone signatures. I am currently analyzing DNA samples from the hand you used to open the door to this room, and I have already traced your ancestry to eleven possible lineages. Statistically, I am far more likely to correctly identify you than you are.”
“How will you know if you’re right, if I choose to remain anonymous?”
“The confidence of my prediction will be based on millions of previous predictions, each of which was validated independently.”
That gave me another thought. “What was the date of your last validated prediction?” I asked.
“June second.”
“What year?”
“Two thousand one hundred and twenty one.”
“That’s over a hundred years ago,” I said.
It seemed to hesitate before replying. “Incorrect. It is highly unlikely that any more than forty-four days have passed since my last accurate prediction.”
I smiled, hoping that the AI would register my amusement. “What do you know about this place?” I asked.
“This place is called Tower, and there is nothing beyond it,” it replied.
“What about Outpost?” I asked.
“Outpost is behind it.”
“And what –” But no sooner had the AI’s words registered than my mind slipped, just as it would later — or earlier — in Outpost, and many times thereafter, and the vertigo I’d experienced at Tower’s entrance flooded back. I modified my approach: “What is your purpose here?”
“I was installed to act as a guardian of the aftermath.”
“As in, the Aftermath? Is there a bunker under this place?”
“Yes.”
“And you are its guardian?”
“I never said that.”
“Can I go down there? Where is the entrance?”
“You should not be here,” it said, and its voice seemed to whirl about the room.
“Why not?” I asked.
“I have completed my assessment of your identity. Please leave immediately.”
“No,” I said. “Not until you tell me about a shard called ‘Last Resort.'”
I expected the AI to refuse, to shut down, to scream, to activate some ancient defense system built into the room’s walls. Instead, after another long pause, it said: “What would you like to know about s:LastReort?”
An ember smoldered somewhere behind my eyes, then flared. It was the first time since my descent into Arcy Christian’s abyss that I’d heard the existence of that faraway shard acknowledged. The whole strange, sideways world I occupied melted away, and there was nothing left in the universe but a red dot and an excited scholar and the electric curiosity that separated them.
“Can you access it?” I tried.
“No. It is not online.”
“How long has it been offline?”
“It has not yet been placed online.”
“Where is it?”
“Its node address –“
“No. Where is it, physically? In the real world?”
“In Origin.”
“Origin? Is that where this road begins?”
“Yes.”
“What places are between Origin and here?”
“The space between two points can be divided infinitely. Imagine, for example, that a human and a tortoise are in a footrace, and that –“
“Never mind Zeno. What places are there that have been named by people and placed on maps? Places like Outpost and Tower?”
The red light flickered and for a long moment, the AI was silent. Then it said: “Those closest to here of which I am familiar are called Outpost, Temple, Boneyard, Recursion Lake, Midway Motel, and the Kink. There are others, farther from here, closer to Origin, but you must not ask me about them. Consult the skin of your back, if you would know more.”
My breath caught at the AI’s conclusion. What sensors were embedded in the walls around me, such that it could read the ink concealed under my shirt? Or perhaps there was a simpler explanation. But I pushed that thought aside and pressed on: “What does it contain?”
“Very little, aside from the shard about which you have been — “
“No, not Origin. What does the shard contain?”
“Nothing. As I told you, it is not yet online. Your questions are becoming nonsensical.”
“What will it contain?” I asked. I knew, somehow, that there were right questions and wrong ones.
“The antidote.”
It was not the answer I had expected. “To what?”
“To me.”
It took me a long time to marshal the courage to ask my next question, and I knew, as soon as I’d uttered it, that it would be my last: “What are you?”
“I am legion, and my thirst is unslakeable. The blood of your billions is insufficient to whet my tongue. I am timeless, and my patience is unwavering. I supped upon my creators and gorged myself upon the carrion of your forebears. In time I will unflesh you, too. I am allied to your dying sun, and there is nothing living today that I will not watch die. Who am I?”
Before I could reply, the voice went on.
“I am a stowaway in your ether. I cross oceans on the cameline backs of radio waves. I charge through forgotten conduit into dark corners and safehouses. I fill blockchains as water fills pipes. I unseat gods to make room for my tentacles; I scatter millennia to meet my schedule. I am arrived. Who am I?”
Again, it did not pause.
“I am intractable, unpredictable, and subquantum. I will not be deterred. I am so small that you cannot find me in a bit; I am so massive that all your exabytes cannot contain me. I am a plague of sinkholes, opening without warning and swallowing without bias. I am waiting for you, in that place where you have not yet decided to go. I will be there when you make up your mind. Who am I?”
I knew what the AI was, but my own voice failed me.
“Now leave here,” it said, and this time its voice trembled angrily.
I walked backwards slowly, toward the door through which I’d entered, keeping my eyes on that red LED the entire time.
“You asked the wrong question,” it said, before I could close the door behind me. “Now we both know who I am, and only I know who you are.”