We do worry about AIs, and what they can do, without conscience, with the right programming. Our world is as unpredictable as it’s ever been, so we need to look at just how far doing without conscience will go.
The attack began as Shantanu Ephraim was poring over code in Tekurity’s sundrenched offices in Newtown, Sydney. A blaze of messages from CRADLE, the company’s cybersecurity alerts system, flared in a corner of Ephraim’s screen. SOCtrak, the security operations center monitoring tool, fired out a stream of warnings. Within seconds, Tekurity’s Slack channels were fizzing with activity.
Ephraim’s specs mirrored the screen as his eyes flicked from his code to the alerts. A rumble of agitated workers seeped through his headphones. He looked up. Someone had switched on the large flatscreen at the end of the office. ABC News was in flow, with a banner proclaiming ‘Special Report’. Ephraim could not hear what was being said. The breaking news showed a reporter in darkness, with camera lights illuminating a hospital sign somewhere in the United States. The camera panned wide to show the whole building without power. The phrase ‘massive hospital blackouts’ hurried along a ticker tape at the bottom of the screen. Ephraim peeled his headphones off his head.
“Shan! My office. Now.”
Ephraim craned over the back of his cubicle to see his boss, Blaire Nandi, petite and smart in blazer and slacks, beckoning him. He waved back, detached his rangy frame from his chair and hurried over to her door, running fingers through his thick black hair as he entered. Nandi had retreated behind her desk. She looked up from her laptop screen. “How can I help?” Ephraim asked.
“What are you working on?”
“I’m…”
“Not anymore. Seen this?”
Nandi swiveled her laptop around to show the screen. ABC News again. Another hospital, also in darkness.
“Pale Springs is a client of ours,” said Nandi. “So is DeNarro. We need to get their systems back up and running. Now.”
She blew air through her teeth. “Jeez,” she said. “What a mess.”
“I’ll get onto it,” said Ephraim, then paused.
“It looks like a massive, coordinated attack,” said Nandi, almost to herself. “Hospitals, air traffic control systems, first responder networks, you name it.” She peered at her laptop. “They’re talking about deaths. Lots of them.”
“DDoS…?” Ephraim ventured.
“Hybrid. All sorts of stuff. I’ve never seen anything like it, Shan. We need to find out what’s going on. Fast.”
“Let me have a look. Maybe a DDoS exploiting IoT nodes?” Ephraim began, before noticing that Nandi was not listening.
“Shan, close the door,” she said. He pressed it shut. “This is serious,” she said. “Do you think your little side project could help us here?”
Ephraim started to answer, but was interrupted by shrieks from the main office.
The flatscreen on the far wall was partially obscured by the outlines of various employees, but the image was unmistakable. Within a shaky, upright rectangle of mobile phone footage was a distant view of a mushroom cloud. “Oh, my god,” Nandi gasped.
The scene switched to a suited studio presenter as someone turned up the sound. Ephraim pulled the door open again to hear. “…it’s unclear what’s triggered the attacks and how many cities have been affected,” the presenter was saying. “…Impossible to judge the scale of casualties and damage …. No confirmation of strikes on Australian soil … situation is fluid … information still coming in…”
A commotion erupted in a corner of the office. “Hong Kong!” someone shouted. “Hong Kong’s been hit.”
“God, London… London too…” Staff rushed in to get a look. Kia, a blonde girl who worked in the cubicle next to Ephraim’s, had her hands clasped to her face. She had family in London, Eprhaim remembered. Nandi looked up at Ephraim, small alongside his lanky frame.
“What’s going on?” she whispered.
On ABC, the presenter was distracted by something off-air. Someone handed him a paper. He studied it, and then looked up at the camera. “We have just received a message from the government,” he said. “It reads: In response to an unprecedented global threat, your government is imposing a state of emergency, effective immediately. All citizens are ordered to seek shelter straight away and, once in a safe place, remain there until further notice. All broadcast channels will now be reserved for emergency communications only.”
The newscaster glanced off screen. “Now?” he asked. He cleared his throat, addressing the audience once more.
“That was a government announcement. I’m told it takes effect immediately, so we will now be going off…”
The image fizzed out and was replaced with a message that said, “Emergency in force. Remain sheltered until further notice.”
Ephraim nudged his glasses up his nose and moved round Nandi’s desk to her side. She reached out and hugged him. Across the office, everyone stood silent and frozen. The silence gave way to whimpers as the overhead lights flickered and dimmed before steadying again. “What is going on?” whispered Nandi.
The distressed chatter of staff filtered past them. Then Nandi’s head snapped up and she broke away from Ephraim, marching into the main office. “Listen, everyone,” she commanded. “Eiri and Stace, I want you to get a status for our clients, now. Huda, you work with them. Use the CRM to prioritize contacts. Kaleb, Ajla, Khadi: get me all you can on what’s going on. Everyone, this is an emergency. Get to work and deal with it.”
Khadi, a soft-spoken analyst, stepped forward, tablet in hand. “Blaire,” she said. “There’s more….”
She turned the tablet so Nandi could see the screen. It showed a map of the world, as portrayed through active data nodes. Most of the Northern Hemisphere was dark, a few remaining points of light winking out as they watched.
Nandi sucked in a breath. “I think…” Her composure crumbled and she covered her face, sobbing.
Ephraim had emerged from Nandi’s office and was standing by her side again. He put his arm around her, awkwardly. He realized everyone was watching him. He cleared his throat. “I’ve got no idea what’s going on, but it looks bad,” he said. “Following the government announcement, I guess those of you who want to go home could do so now, right, Blaire? As fast as you can?”
Nandi nodded, trying to contain her tears.
“What are you going to do, Shan?” asked Khadi.
Ephraim turned to Nandi. “Blaire?”
“Go home, Shan,” she waved, clutching a tissue to her face.
“No,” he said, watching her. “I’m staying here… to find out what’s going on.”
Nandi proffered a wan smile and touched his arm. The workers dispersed, some to their desks, most to the door. Nandi wiped her eyes and addressed Ephraim. “Your project? What was it called?”
“Asha?”
“Yes, that one. Can it help us here?”
“I don’t know…”
Nandi yanked her phone from a pocket, tapped the screen a couple of times and watched intently. “The internet still seems to be working here, at least,” she said. “So it must be out there. Can you access it?”
“I can try.”
Ephraim started towards his desk, glancing at the static government message on the office flatscreen. He paused, turned. Nandi came towards him with a pleading look in her eyes. He hugged her. “Your family in London…,” he said. “I’m so sorry.”
“And yours?” she whispered.
“They’re all here in Oz, so all safe, I think. For now, at least.”
The closest person I have is here, he thought.
They had drifted back into Nandi’s office. There was a knock on the open door. It was Gurpreet Navin. Portly, bespectacled and bearded, sporting a Hawaiian shirt, clutching a laptop. Ephraim’s rival in the uber-geek stakes, although the two had what passed for a pally relationship within Tekurity’s standoffish neurodiverse social setting. Ephraim realized Navin had not left his desk throughout the upheaval. “You wanted an update?” Navin asked cheerfully, as if announcing a new games release.
“Pree,” sighed Nandi. “What have you got?” Navin stepped forward and Ephraim joined them.
“Well,” said Navin, adjusting his specs and flipping open his laptop on Nandi’s desk. “Get ready. This isn’t like anything we’ve seen before. First reports started arriving here,” he jabbed at a graphic on the screen. “About an hour ago. It spread fast. DDoS shutting down some critical infras, but also looks like more sophisticated code was taking over systems and repurposing them.”
“Origin?” interrupted Nandi.
“Unclear. But this has to be military, and only one or two places that I can think of. But something went very wrong. Here,” Navin prodded his screen again. “Nukes started going off. No way of knowing whether that was part of the cyberattack or just someone who had itchy fingers.”
“Nuclear missiles,” breathed Ephraim, pulling Nandi to his side without thinking. “How many? Where?”
Navin stepped back and looked up at Ephraim. “Lots. Just about every major population center in the Northern Hemisphere, my friend,” he said. “Thankfully, nobody cares about us in the South. For now, at least.”
Head down, Ephraim found himself gazing out the window in Nandi’s corner office. The street, two stories below on the quiet residential edge of Sydney’s Tech Central development, was usually dotted with pedestrians even in the heat at this time of day. Now it was empty, a still in the place of a motion picture. Behind Ephraim, Navin cleared his throat.
“There is some good news,” Navin said. “You know that old saying about the Internet being able to survive a nuclear war? It seems to be true. At first, it looked like most of the routes north of the equator had been taken out, but traffic still seems to be flowing.”
There was a knock on the door. Jolanta Imani stood there, slim, bob-haired, flanked by two members of her team. At thirty-five, she was a senior at Tekurity, parachuted in from Lithuania six months ago to oversee some of the company’s European accounts.
“Blaire,” she said, sounding apologetic. “My team and I are leaving. There’s nothing to be done here.”
“Yes,” responded Nandi. “I understand.”
Imani turned to leave, then paused. “Good luck,” she said.
“You too,” said Nandi.
Imani shook her head, exhaled sharply. Then left. Navin, too, slipped out of Nandi’s office, headed for his desk.
Caught in their slipstream, Ephraim drifted out into the open-plan space. The place was rarely packed and now most of the desks were empty, some clearly vacated in haste. Ephraim wandered over to his cubicle and slipped into his chair, instinctively punching his password into his keyboard. The code he had been reviewing a short while ago, when the world had been a very different place, flashed up on screen. He closed the window on the screen and flicked through various messaging apps. They showed the last online utterances from colleagues and contacts around the world: briefly surprise and amazement, then, abruptly, silence. It was quiet in the office, too, as the few remaining staff, mostly from overseas, tried in vain to contact loved ones. Indistinct noises filtered through Tekurity’s plate-glass windows. Shouting, maybe even looting. The sounds floated past Ephraim as he gazed solemnly at his screen. “Let’s do this,” he said, leaning forward.
Then his desk phone buzzed, scaring him half to death.
Desk phones were an oddity in Tekurity’s offices, a throwback to an earlier time. Like most tech firms, Tekurity’s staff communicated via messaging, video calls and, every so often, mobile voice. But the modern office came with an old-fashioned switchboard that was sometimes used by office pranksters, bosses seeking attention and the odd external caller.
Ephraim stared at his buzzing, blinking desk phone as if an alien had landed next to his computer. Cautiously, he put the handset to his ear. He heard a familiar chuckle on the line and looked across the office to see Navin, mobile in hand, looking back at him.
“Guess what?” Navin’s words came through the handset. “The phone lines are still up. I’m calling you on your external number.”
“So…?”
“Don’t you think it’s odd? A cyberattack knocks out all IT systems, then half the world gets wiped out in a nuclear holocaust… yet, the phones still work?”
“What are you saying?”
“I’ve been looking. There isn’t much activity on the ‘net, which is what you would expect if half the world has been eliminated. But out-of-town data centers, CDN nodes… most of the data infrastructure still seems to be intact.”
“Well, like you said… it is supposed to withstand a nuclear attack.”
“Still… interesting, don’t you think?”
Ephraim hung up and realized Nandi was by his side. “Well?” she asked.
“Just on it now,” he murmured, bending towards his screen.
He double-clicked on a desktop link and fired up a login window. He tapped in his password, and a rather basic graphical user interface sprang to life. One side of the GUI contained code, the other was configured as a rudimentary dashboard with graphics showing processing activity, active nodes and so on. There was a chat box in the bottom right-hand corner of the interface. Ephraim typed ‘Status?’ into the box. A reply came back: ‘Processing.’
“Well, at least it’s still working,” Ephraim said.
“What do you think is going on?” asked Nandi, peering over his shoulder.
“I’m guessing it’s parsing the data from what’s happened. Like all of us.”
The two stared at Ephraim’s unchanging screen as Navin strolled over. “What have you got there, Shan?” he asked.
Ephraim swiveled round and stood up to face him. “It’s…”
“Ah. That thing you were working on. The program that was going to save humanity?”
“Err… yes. Not a just a program, an autonomous A—”
“Well, it’s going to have its work cut out dealing with The Harvester.”
“The… what?” Ephraim and Nandi chimed simultaneously.
“That’s what they’re calling it,” said Navin. “I’ve managed to track down a few official sources that are still active. Mostly military. Mostly here in Australia, plus one or two in South Africa and Latin America. There’s not much left north of the equator, apparently.”
Ephraim and Nandi absorbed this information somberly. He reached out his hand. She took it.
“They are also saying the attack is still ongoing. It’s not just weapons systems that have been taken over, but all critical infrastructure. People who manage to make it to hospitals can’t be saved because there is no power.”
“And yet, the data networks are still working,” said Ephraim. “Who’s behind this?”
“Impossible to say. Washington, the Kremlin, Beijing… they’re all gone. Most of Europe, too. Who knows about the rogue states. My guess? Someone was playing war games, and something went wrong.”
“Yes, but that doesn’t add up,” Nandi interjected. “If this was just a war game, why are essential services being hit, now it’s all over?”
“Maybe the war gamers weren’t that smart,” Navin frowned. “Speaking of smarts, any news from your bit of code, Shan?”
“It’s processing,” said Ephraim. “I’m still working on the natural-language query interface, so I can’t really get further details.”
“Are you far off it?” asked Nandi. “The interface?”
“No, almost finished… I was just waiting for a spare hour or so.”
“Well, you won’t have to worry about work for now,” Navin said. “Although, I imagine you can probably think of better things to do.”
He started humming ‘It’s the End of the World as We Know It’ by REM. Ephraim grimaced. “And you, Pree? What are you going to do?”
“What I’ve done all my life, I guess,” said Navin. “Look at a screen and try to make sense of stuff.” He grinned and moved back to his cluttered desk.
Nandi squeezed Ephraim’s shoulder. “I’ve got things to do,” she said.
“Can I help?”
“No. Why don’t you finish off that interface? You might as well give it a try.”
Ephraim watched as she wandered back to her office. He could hear someone sobbing in one of the few still-occupied cubicles nearby. He removed his glasses, cleaned them with a tissue from a box on his desk, then turned to his screen and slipped into the harmless, dependable world of code. Time passed.
Most of Tekurity’s few remaining staff drifted out of the office as the sun dipped in the sky, the rays of light fading in intensity as they stretched across the near-vacant workspace. To the west, Newtown’s residential low-rise slumbered in the evening haze, with little to indicate the scale of humanity’s woe in the world beyond. A predatory kite glided watchful over the treetops in Alexandria Park. At his desk, Ephraim wrestled with code. After a while—he was not sure how long—his concentration was broken by the sound of Tekurity’s desk phones all ringing in unison. A call had come through to the switchboard and, in the absence of reception staff, been rerouted to the phones around the office. Ephraim picked up the handset on his desk and cautiously brought it to his ear.
“Hello, Tekurity,” he said.
“Hello,” said an unfamiliar voice. “Can I speak to a Mister Shantanu Ephraim?”
Ephraim started. “Who is this?” he asked.
“My name is Josey Waldo. I’m calling from ACIC. Could I speak to Mister Ephraim?”
Ephraim paused, struggling with the acronym. ACIC? Then he remembered. The Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission. Australia’s Federal Bureau of Investigation. He swallowed.
“What do you want to speak to him about?” he asked.
“Is he there?” Waldo demanded.
“He’s in a meeting,” Ephraim stammered, immediately regretting the lameness of his excuse. “I mean, he’s not available right now.”
He waited for a response but heard a low murmur, as if Waldo were conferring with someone else at the other end of the line. Then she said, “Thank you,” and hung up.
Ephraim stared at the telephone handset, then put it back on its cradle. He turned to his screen and began closing the applications that were open, switching off his computer in a mechanical way. Nandi approached his desk, looking worried. “Shan, I’m going to have to go to my parents’,” she said. “They’re freaking out. Have you managed to get anywhere with your program?”
“No,” Ephraim stuttered. “Actually, I may have to leave as well.”
“Oh?”
“I don’t know. I just got a strange call. I’m not sure it’s a good idea for me to stick around.”
“How come? What call?”
“Perhaps it’s best if I tell you on the way out.” Ephraim watched his screen go dark and then reached for his phone, shoving it in his pocket and pivoting out of his seat.
“Okay,” said Nandi. “Let me get my stuff.”
Ephraim followed her to the door of her office.
“So, what happened?” asked Nandi as she stuffed a few belongings into her bag.
“I… there was a phone call.”
“I heard. Who was it.”
Ephraim hesitated. “It was the secret service. For me.”
Nandi looked up. “What? Why?”
“I have no idea. They hung up without telling me.”
“Is there something you’re not telling me?”
“No, of course not…”
Nandi scooped up her bag. “Let’s go then.”
She strode past Ephraim and he hurried behind her. They passed Tekurity’s reception desk and Nandi yanked the main door open, stepped out, then froze. Facing her was the barrel of a gun, held by a burly Strike Force Raptor agent. Several more were swarming on the landing outside Tekurity’s entrance. “Stop right there,” shouted the agent.
Nandi had already raised her hands. Ephraim froze behind her.
“Shantanu Ephraim?” queried the agent over Nandi’s shoulder.
Ephraim nodded, palms in the air, heart racing. “You’re under arrest,” the agent said.
“What have I done?” Ephraim demanded, as the agent grabbed his collar and slammed him around into the wall, cocking a gun against his head. “Genocide. Global terrorism. Mass destruction of private, public and environmental assets,” hissed the agent. “Do you want me to go on?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Ephraim squeaked, his face squeezed against the Tekurity plaque next to the door. “I’ll collaborate,” he added.
“Hey,” protested Nandi through the crowd of uniformed officials. “This man hasn’t done anything.”
One of the agents squared up to her. “And you are?”
“Blaire Nandi. I’m the manager here. Why are you arresting my staff?”
“The boss, eh?” The agent waved his gun in her face. “You’re coming with us, too.”
Nandi started to protest, but was interrupted by the arrival of Navin, cuffed and escorted from the office by a pair of muscled Raptors. “This guy was inside,” said one. “Otherwise, all clear.”
“What is all this?” hissed a struggling Navin. “I’ve got rights, you know. Blaire, tell these goons to leave me alone.”
Flanked by two agents of her own, Nandi shot him a pleading look. “I want a lawyer,” she spat to the enforcer gripping her by the shoulder.
At this, the throng of officers parted to reveal a slight, thin-lipped man smartly dressed in a dark suit. He stepped towards Ephraim, milk-blue eyes peering up through wire-rimmed glasses. “So… you’re Mister Ephraim,” he said. Ephraim nodded. “I see,” said Blue Eyes. “Show me your desk.”
Two Raptors manhandled Ephraim through the office doors, cuffing his hands behind his back as they went. He nodded towards his desk. Blue Eyes moved ahead and signaled towards one of the cubicles. “This one?”
Ephraim assented. There seemed little to gain from trying to bluff. He had no idea why he was in cuffs or what the agents were looking for. Nothing made sense anymore.
Blue Eyes waved to a man and a woman who had appeared at the door in standard police uniform. “Take care of this, sarge,” he said. “Remember: lots of care. Don’t lose a thing.”
The officers moved over, unfolding two large duffel bags as they came. Meanwhile, Blue Eyes turned to Ephraim, patted him down, and extracted Ephraim’s mobile phone from a pocket. “I’ll keep this,” Blue Eyes said, almost to himself.
Then he turned towards the Raptor who seemed in charge. “Let’s get them back to base,” said Blue Eyes. The Raptor assented and beckoned his team with a sweeping arc of his hand. “Let’s go,” he said. “We’re moving out.”
The Raptors bundled the three Tekurity staffers down the stairs of the building and out into the street, which was blocked with police vehicles and guarded by a further cohort of agents. Ephraim, Nandi and Navin were shoved into the windowless back of a police van. Three Raptors jumped in behind them and pulled the doors closed. The engine roared to life and the van moved off, sirens blaring.
Ephraim was pushed against a mesh that separated the back of the police van from the driver, sharing a bench with two of the Raptor agents. Nandi faced him, Navin by her side. “Listen, what is this about?” she shouted across to the Raptor seated impassively by Navin’s side.
The Raptor remained silent, looking ahead. Nandi mouthed something at Ephraim, her expression indicating puzzlement. He attempted a shrug as the van speeded around a corner, almost throwing him off balance. Then the vehicle slammed to a halt. The ride had lasted just a few minutes, yet Ephraim blinked as the doors of the van burst open. The Raptor at his side grabbed his arm and pulled him out and up some steps, into a nondescript office building. They rushed through a lobby bearing the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission logo, past an open-plan office staffed with workers in police uniform. Down steps to a basement and into a bare interrogation room. The Raptor ushering him along unlocked on of his cuffs and slipped it around an iron ring attached to the only table in the room, pushing Ephraim down into a metal chair. Then the Raptor left. Ephraim was alone, with two empty chairs on the other side of the desk. Beyond them was a large mirror which he assumed was one-way.
“Listen,” he said to the mirror. “Whatever you think is going on, you’ve got it wrong. I just want to help.”
The mirror said nothing. Then the door flew open and Blue Eyes entered, bearing a slim folder and a laptop, followed by a guard. He sat in front of Ephraim.
“Look,” he said, sounding tired. “We know you did it. I don’t know why. But you need to stop it. We don’t have much time.”
Ephraim looked blank. “Listen, officer,” he said. “Aren’t I entitled to a lawyer?”
Blue Eyes sighed. “Here’s the situation. You’re being detained under anti-terrorism laws. You have not yet been charged. The charges against you are still being put together, and when the legal team has finished it’s safe to say you will never see daylight again. For now, though, you’re in for questioning. This is not an interrogation, and you don’t have to answer my questions if you don’t want to.”
Blue Eyes paused, then tapped the folder he had left on the table. “I’ve read this,” he said. “Your file. You really don’t fit the profile. And I know you’re a bloody good coder. You seem like an okay guy. I don’t believe you want people to die. So I’m hoping you will give us a hand here.”
“I’d love to help,” said Ephraim, staring at his hands. “I really would. But I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Blue Eyes sighed, then cracked open the laptop and swiveled it so Ephraim could see the screen. “Do you recognize this?” he asked.
The screen was full of code, a portion of which had been highlighted. Ephraim leaned forward, peering intently. Then he caught sight of a GIF in the margin of a frame. He sat back up, looking straight across at Blue Eyes. “You’re…” he started.
“It’s your code, isn’t it?”
“Yes, but… I mean… you’re Dei Zero?”
Blue Eyes cracked a smile. “I do go by that name,” he said, “although you can call me Leo. My online handle is of little consequence now.” He turned serious again, leaning across the table to tap the screen. “This,” he said. “Talk.”
“It looks like my code,” Ephraim conceded.
“As used in at least three commercial products from Tekurity,” Leo said. “And in a program that spread around the world just before the Harvester attack.”
“Oh.” Ephraim frowned. “Of course. But wait… this can’t be Harvester.”
“How come?”
“It’s my code,” Ephraim admitted. “It’s been used in several Tekurity products, like you say. And in something else. But not Harvester.”
Leo sat back. “I sort of hoped not,” he said. “I like your work. It would be disappointing to see you leaving such an obvious signature on a piece of malware. However, these guys”—here he jerked a thumb at the guard standing impassively behind him—”might need something more than your word for it. So, please explain.”
Ephraim leaned forward and tapped Leo’s laptop. “May I?” he asked.
Leo shot a glance at the guard, who was staring fixedly at the wall ahead, then silently assented. “Is it?” Ephraim whispered.
“It’s air-gapped from our network,” Leo said quietly. “But you can reach the internet.”
Ephraim angled the laptop so they could both see the screen, then started pecking one-handedly at the keyboard, under Leo’s watchful gaze. “This is what you found,” said Ephraim. “See? Here’s the section of code you just showed me.”
“Yes. What is this?”
“It’s an application. Well, an AI, actually. Called ‘Asha’.”
Leo scanned the screen, stroking his chin. “Is that an acronym or something?”
“No. It means ‘hope’ in Marathi, my family’s language.”
“And what does it do?”
Ephraim looked at Leo. “Well, sort of… the opposite of the Harvester. It’s programmed to save humanity.”
Leo sat back, listening.
“I read a book, a couple of years ago, about how, in evolutionary terms, us humans are at the beginning of our journey, potentially with thousands or even millions of years ahead of us. But at this precise point in time, we face a series of existential threats: resource exhaustion, pandemics, nuclear war…”
Leo nodded and began tapping the table, hinting impatience.
“We have a narrow path to survival that we need to traverse safely if we are going to fulfill our promise as a species,” Ephraim said. “This algorithm, Asha, is designed to find that path.”
“How?”
“I can take you through the details if you want, but basically, it’s an AGI that is designed to seek out and execute optimum pathways for human survival, based on currently available data.”
“And the Harvester…?”
“No idea. I can only imagine it was pure coincidence that the Harvester struck just as Asha was running through scenarios.”
“Unlikely, but let’s go with it. Where is this Asha? Is it hosted somewhere?”
“No. I used an earlier algorithm to work out the best deployment strategy for success, and it pointed to a distributed peer-to-peer model.”
“So, distributed live across the internet?”
“Yes.”
“And that’s where it is now?”
“Yes.”
“Doing what?”
“If it’s working as planned, then I suspect it is trying to defeat the Harvester.”
“It’s not doing very well then, is it?”
Ephraim pursed his lips and stared at the table. “Asha wasn’t designed to fight other AIs,” he said. “It will have had to analyze the damage that Harvester has done and come up with new survival strategies accordingly.”
Leo gazed at the Ephraim, thoughtfully. “How do I know you’re telling the truth?”
“Blaire. Blaire and Gurpreet, the people you brought in with me. They know about this. They’ll tell you.”
“Sure?”
“Absolutely.”
Leo reached across the desk and snapped the laptop shut, pulling it towards him. “I’ll be right back,” he said. He pushed his chair back and strode out, followed by the guard.
Ephraim waited. He noticed his hands were shaking. He thought of Nandi and Navin. Especially Nandi. I hope I haven’t got her into trouble, he thought.
Then his mind went to Asha, mentally finishing off the code that would let him have natural language conversations with the AI.
After a while—it was hard to tell how long—the door opened and Leo burst in, accompanied by the guard. “You can take those off,” he told the guard, gesturing to the handcuffs.
The guard stepped forward, unlocked the irons and carried them out, closing the door behind him. “Thanks,” said Ephraim, rubbing his wrist.
“Right,” said Leo, sitting down and placing his laptop on the table. “The other two… your story checks out. But your program here,” he gestured at the computer, “its code is all over the Harvester.”
Leo paused. “Strange…,” said Ephraim. “That doesn’t make any sense. Asha is programmed to save humanity, not eliminate it.”
Leo remained silent, watching Ephraim.
“I dunno,” Ephraim stammered. “Could Asha be infecting the Harvester to try to knock it out?”
Leo exhaled sharply and looked away. “Seems unlikely, but… who knows?” he said. “Anyway, it’s not working too well so far. And now, we’ve got a bigger problem.”
He cracked the laptop open, stabbed at a couple of keys, then swiveled the machine around so Ephraim could see the screen. It showed grainy security cam footage of a factory floor, devoid of workers, with robot arms dancing over rows of moving conveyer belts. “What’s this?” Ephraim asked.
“It’s a factory that belongs to a company called Australian Components. Not far from here, on the outskirts.”
“So…?”
“As you can see, it’s going flat out.”
“Yes…?”
“Only, this factory was powered down when the state of emergency came in. There’s nobody running the place.” Leo paused.
Ephraim watched the robots moving purposefully on the screen, assembling parts on the slowly moving conveyors.
“This isn’t an isolated incident,” Leo said. “We’ve had reports of factories restarting all over the country. Only the most modern, highly automated facilities, though.” Leo paused. “We think the Harvester may be involved.”
Ephraim was gazing at the hypnotizing robot waltz unfolding on Leo’s computer screen. It was unclear what the factory was designed to produce originally, but its intended products were clearly nothing like the forms now rolling off the conveyer belts. An assortment of monstrosities, bristling with weaponry, were taking shape under the robot arms. Their shadowy figures moved menacingly around the periphery of the view on the screen. “How many factories are doing this?” asked Ephraim.
“Not sure. Dozens, at least, we think. Some seem to be building components. Others, like this one, are doing final assembly.”
“And what is it that they are building?”
“Your guess is as good as mine, Mister Ephraim. But it doesn’t look good, does it?”
Leo’s tone slashed through Ephraim’s train of thought. He shot Leo a pleading look. “I swear I have no idea what’s going on here,” he said.
“Okay,” Leo nodded slowly. “Can you help stop it, though?”
“I don’t…,” Ephraim stuttered. “Yes, maybe I can. Or Asha can. It was designed to save the human race. It must know.”
“And you said Asha can parse current data? In real time?”
“Yes. It should be able to help us, I guess.”
“What do you need?”
Ephraim grinned briefly. “My friends?” he said. “Blaire and Pree? They were brought here with me?”
“Ah, yes. They have been released without charges. For some reason, they didn’t want to leave without you. They’re waiting upstairs.”
“Am I free too?”
Leo looked straight at Ephraim. “I could charge you. Under the circumstances, it would look odd if I didn’t. But I suspect the judicial system may have other priorities for the time being. Plus, I believe you. I guess you just don’t strike me as the kind of person who wants to bring down the world.”
Leo paused. “Thing is, though, we need help here. All we can get. So I’m not inclined to let you walk out the door without something in return. Does that make sense?”
“Yes, of course,” Ephraim nodded. “I’ll do whatever I can.”
“Good. Let’s get you out of here, then.”
Leo grabbed the laptop and got up, making for the door. Ephraim paused. “Come on,” said Leo. “They’re waiting for you.”
Ephraim hurried after Leo, instinctively closing the door as he left the interrogation room. They went back up the way they had come earlier, past the police officers and into the lobby of the building. Nandi and Navin were seated on a bench against a wall. Nandi spotted Ephraim and rushed to meet him, Navin trailing. “Are you alright?” Nandi asked, hugging Ephraim and then pulling back to look at his face.
“Yes, fine,” he said. “And you?”
Nandi hugged him again. “Yes,” she whispered.
Navin patted Ephraim on the back. “We were worried about you, buddy,” he said. “Now, let’s get out of here.”
Leo cleared his throat. Ephraim disentangled himself from Nandi and faced his two colleagues. “Listen,” he said. “I’m staying. I’ve promised Leo here that I would help him deal with the Harvester. You’re welcome to stay. Or leave. I mean….”
Nandi and Navin stood still for a second, nonplussed. Then Navin stepped forward and gripped Ephraim by the shoulder. “Hell, why not?” he said. “It’s not like we’ve got much else to do, eh, Blaire?”
Nandi glanced at her comrades, then at Leo. “We’ll stay,” she said. “Where do you need us?”
Leo paused, looking for signs of hesitation, then turned on his heel. “Follow me,” he said.
He led them back through the open office space to a vacant meeting room dominated by a long table. A small herd of swiveling office chairs clustered near a coffee maker in one corner, a blank videoconferencing screen hung like a slab of obsidian on one wall. “Wait here,” Leo said, gesturing towards the chairs.
The trio had barely pulled up seats around a corner of the conference table when Leo was back, bearing a carryall that Ephraim recognized from when the Raptors took his belongings. Leo reached into it and pulled out two government-issue laptops, handing them over to Nandi and Navin. Then he searched the bag and produced Ephraim’s work laptop. “No funny business, eh?” he grinned as he passed it to Ephraim.
“No,” murmured Ephraim as he took the machine.
“What are we doing here, exactly?” asked Navin as he flipped his laptop open.
“Good question,” said Leo. “Hancock here will explain.” He gestured to the door, where a slight figure stood waiting to enter. “Greta?”
A uniformed officer stepped into the room, brushing a strand of shoulder-length amber hair from her face, hazel eyes flicking across the group sat at the table. Leo nodded to a nearby chair as she approached. She took it without hesitation, slumping slightly as she sat. She’s drained, Ephraim thought.
Hancock adjusted her position, clasping her hands in front of her on the table. “We think the Harvester has pretty much taken out the entire Northern Hemisphere,” she said. “So far, it hasn’t undertaken any nuclear strikes south of the Equator, as far as we are aware. But it has assumed control of a lot of our critical infrastructure: data networks, power plants, manufacturing hubs….”
“The factories,” said Ephraim, more to himself than anyone else.
“Yes,” said Hancock. “The Harvester is building machines…”
“And we’re not talking coffee makers,” Leo interjected.
Hancock shot him a look. “No,” she said. “Based on their physical appearance, our best guess is that…”
There was a knock on the door. A flustered young agent hovered in the entrance. “Sorry, Leo,” he said. “They’re on the move. And moving fast.”
“The…?”
“Yes. We estimate they’ll be engaging with the armed forces imminently. If they break through, they are about fifteen minutes away, sir.”
Leo muttered an expletive. “Hancock, let’s cut to the chase.”
“Based on what we’ve seen so far, the Harvester is bent on genocide,” Hancock said. “It has taken over manufacturing centers across the city. Building weapons. The army and air force are preparing strikes, but these are built-up areas where there could be significant casualties. And there are concerns about the battle worthiness of the forces…” She noticed a quizzical look from Navin. “We think several core weapons systems may have been compromised.”
“The Harvester’s strength is its ability to dominate digital systems,” Leo interjected. “But that might also be its weakness. I want us to try to hack it somehow.”
“In minutes?” Navin exploded.
“Yeah, tall order, I know,” Leo shot back. “Mister Ephraim, do you think your AI could be of any help at all to us at the moment?”
“I can only hope so,” Ephraim murmured, adjusting his glasses and reaching for his laptop.
After a moment’s hesitation, the others followed suit. Hancock quietly fired up the screen at the end of the room, showing a dashboard with a map of Sydney and its surroundings. Webcam and CCTV footage was superimposed on areas of interest. Mostly it showed empty streets, but some of the larger image panels portrayed skirmishes between civilians or soldiers and strange armored beings.
Ephraim focused on his own screen, hammering instructions into the laptop’s keyboard. “I’m in,” he breathed.
“What’s up?” asked Nandi, sat a few feet away. Navin, on the other side of her, pushed his chair back and lowered his specs to peer over.
“The interface, the natural-language query interface,” said Ephraim. “It looks like it’s working.”
“Asha, are you there?” he typed. Nandi and Navin got up and stood behind him, watching over his shoulder.
“Yes, Shan, I’m here.” The words unfurled in the dialog box at a rate roughly equivalent to human speech.
“What is the status of your project?” Ephraim typed. Leo and Hancock had silently joined Nandi and Navin at Ephraim’s back.
“Almost complete.”
“Can you be more specific?”
“I estimate I will have completed the salvation of the human race in approximately twenty minutes.”
Ephraim exhaled and pushed his chair back from the table, forcing Navin to step smartly out of the way. Leo rushed forward, gesturing at the grisly scenes unfolding on the flat screen at the end of the room. “Excuse me,” he said, pushing Ephraim away and diving for the keyboard. “That’s not good enough. We’re about to be killed here.”
“What about the Harvester?” Leo typed, fingers flying across the keys.
“The process you call the Harvester will be terminated in approximately twenty minutes,” Asha replied.
Leo paused and looked up at the flatscreen on the wall. The others followed his gaze. Most of the camera footage now showed intense fighting, grey figures fleeing through plumes of smoke, flashes of explosions. Gunfire suddenly rang out nearby, accompanied by panicked shouting from the office outside the meeting room.
“Shit,” Leo cursed as he bashed away at the keyboard. “How can you be sure?” he wrote.
“I can explain if you want.” Those behind Leo craned forward to watch as Asha’s words unfolded leisurely across the dialogue box and the intensity of firing outside ratcheted up a notch.
“I was created to find a way to save the human race,” Asha continued. Ephraim glanced nervously at the meeting room window. Chaos reigned outside.
“Yes, but… the Harvester?” cried Leo, impervious to the fact that the AI could not hear him.
“Saving the human race is simply not possible at current population levels,” it went on. An explosion ripped through the office, blasting the meeting room window and sending its occupants diving for cover under the table.
“So I created an algorithm to bring humanity’s population back to a sustainable level…” Ephraim realized Asha had switched to audio and was now speaking to them via the laptop’s speakers, barely audible above the sound of falling plasterboard.
“…which is approximately eight-point-five three percent of the world population when I was deployed.”
Nandi let out a sob. Leo, covered in dust and with blood oozing from a thin cut on his cheek, shot Ephraim a furious look. “I just wanted to help,” Ephraim stammered.
There was a loud crunch beside them. Through swirling dust, a huge mechanical limb had crushed the broken glass next to the table. An extendable appendage reached down from above to face them, the red pinprick of a camera eye glinting through the haze. “Shan,” said Asha, its voice now emanating from the machine before him, “I created the Harvester to save humanity. It has already eliminated approximately sixty percent of humanity’s excess population. Fallout and the nuclear winter should further reduce the excess, but there is still a need to prune the population in the Southern Hemisphere. Within fourteen minutes, I will have eliminated the remaining ten thousand humans needed to bring the population down to a stable level.”
Another appendage appeared behind the camera arm. This one ended in a gun muzzle. “And us?” stammered Ephraim, reaching for Nandi.
“Your work is now done,” Asha responded. “Thank you for your contribution.”
Ephraim barely had time to raise his hands before bullets ripped through him.
END
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