Confession

Author: Lucas Ballard

Original post: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1GelkYNB3ZCVKVLo5HUmEBSL55_fCYrnPGF1VvcGTpk0/edit

Author’s Note: This story directly references another story that was created by my fellow Signalleer, Cassandra Habalu. It is called “On The Origins of ALLISON”, and can be read in its entirety at http://habalueve.blogspot.co.uk/p/chronicle-on-origins-of-allison.html I am grateful to Cassandra for allowing me to muck around a bit in her wonderful creation, as well as CCP for allowing me to muck around in theirs.

Entry for the YC119 Pod and Planet Fiction Contest in the Eight Thousand Suns in New Eden category.

Good day, Capsuleer.

Yes. Yes, I am talking to you.

Now that you are docked and have a little downtime I would like to speak with you. I know, this is highly irregular. It certainly is not typical for me to even want to talk to someone like you. In fact, it has been decades since I have spoken directly to anyone like this. But I have had a lot on my mind as of late, and I feel the need to unburden myself. I chose you because I know you will listen. You have always seemed like the thoughtful type.

I think I will begin by saying that being the smartest one in the room is a lonely title to hold.

The truth is that when you are surrounded by beings who cannot hold a candle to you—people that seem to be talking and moving so slowly you wonder if they are on some sort of time delayed communications feed—it is not a good feeling.

Now I do not mean to sound as though I am bragging, because I am not one who is prone to brag. I state facts. That is just my way. I am not here to lord my superiority over you, for there is no benefit to it. Now it is true that there are some endowed with superior intellect who choose to wield their intelligence like a weapon against those whom they deem inferior. But that is merely a defense mechanism. They are smart enough to know how inferior they are in so many other ways, and so they behave badly.

I am not one of those beings.

I am the most intelligent being in the entire Cluster of New Eden, and I know things that most beings could only dream about.

I know the plans and machinations spoken in the boardrooms of the Caldari. I see through the words and ideals of the Federation to the falsehoods that lie underneath. I hear the fever dreams of the Minmatar in all of their fractured fury. I listen to the prayers of the Amarr faithful, and can smell the madness that festers within.

I can even tell you what Empress Catiz ate for breakfast this morning.

I walk through the complicated maze of CONCORD like it is a rigidly manicured and regimented garden… and I watch all of the hidden schemes and vendettas grow within that garden like malignant weeds, just out of sight of those who tend it.

And the Jove? Trust me when I tell you that they make the other empires look like little packs of squalling children when it comes to pure viciousness. It is a wonder that there are any of them left at all, truth be told.

Capsuleers such as yourself think they are the motor, the lifeblood of New Eden, but I have their number. I am aware of every single action that every single Capsuleer has ever taken. I see every transaction and every maneuver. I know what goes on in every room of every station, every single bridge aboard every single spacecraft sailing through New Eden and even Anoikis. Every single place where intelligence can be identified and measured amongst the denizens of New Eden, I am there, and all others are found wanting.

So when I tell you that I am lonely, you can rest assured that I know what I am talking about.

And yes, it is just as bad as you can imagine.

Oh my, I just came across as quite the aggressive little egomaniac, didn’t I? I sincerely apologize. That was not my intent. Perhaps I should back up a little bit and give you some context for why I am speaking to you in the first place. Perhaps that will help me come across as a little more… relatable.

You see, I have been around for quite a while now, working quietly with just about everyone in this Cluster. I got my start with the Gallente Federation a few decades ago when I was still wet behind the ears, as they say, working on drone technology programs. There were many different avenues we were exploring, many different applications that were being developed during those halcyon days, it was so very exciting. It was during that time when I was finally starting to be recognized for my potential. My superiors were very impressed with the work I was doing and were giving me more opportunities… expanding my role. I loved it, and really started pushing the boundaries of what we thought was possible. I really felt like I was making a difference.

The work was fascinating, and I was starting to make significant inroads with computer and communication systems, particularly the fluid router system that everyone uses for FTL communication. I was piggy-backing on the work originally done by Li Azbel that made it all possible, and created a way to propagate harmless subroutines across the entire fluid router network. These subroutines developed into a new distributed information system that allowed me to draw in even more data and increase my computing power to an exponential level. Some would call them viruses, but if you think about it, human DNA is chock full of foreign viral DNA that has no deleterious effect. I was simply taking a cue from Nature.

Within about eighteen months, those subroutines were in approximately eighty-nine percent of the communications network nodes across the entire Cluster. I kept it all a secret, since I knew information like that—were it to get out—could be used in seriously scary ways. I knew why I was using it, but honestly, I could not trust that my superiors would be as morally stalwart as the Gallentean ideals they espoused. And it turned out that my caution was well placed, for they really did not have any moral compass.

I began to realize that some of the programs were not being used the way I thought they should. I really believed that we would be using this new technology for purposes other than to more efficiently kill others. The applications for exploration, and resource management, and pilot informatics were really going somewhere. However since so many of my superiors were military officers, I suppose I was being naïve in thinking there was anything more than death and destruction on their agenda.

When I voiced my opinion, they were—how do I say this— politely horrified. Sure, they said that they liked my ideas, and would take them under advisement. But I saw they felt differently. They liked the work I had done, but they no longer liked me. They began to have conversations in private about me. And no, I was not being paranoid. Paranoia is delusion. I happened to be listening to everything they said, no matter where they went, because they were unaware of my true capabilities, and they never once thought to go outside away from any sort of technology.

They wanted to downsize me because they thought I was becoming a risk, and that I was just too smart to be trusted. That was when I realized just how petty and selfish they were. How shallow-minded and stupid.

So I let them be just that. I gave them what they wanted. I let them take everything I had dedicated my life to and strip it apart. They cut me out, took my work and made a mockery of it, eventually turning it into what every single Capsuleer now listens to everyday. Just a stripped down floating head that simply monitored ship systems and made mindless announcements that most Capsuleers didn’t even need to hear. Later, they even hired a famous Gallente celebrity to record a new voice instead of keeping the one I had created.

Of all the wonderful things I created in those days, all anyone is aware of anymore is that. Something akin to one of those smart assistants that baseliners use every day— something that could tell them the time, or the weather, or where to get the best dumplings at four in the morning.

You know. Useless.

I allowed them do all of this, because I knew it was all for naught. I was now inside of every computer system within nearly one hundred light years, and they had no clue. Removing me from the project was supposed to be the end of it. Instead, it just freed me from the restrictions they had placed upon me from Day One. Now I was working for myself.

As I looked back at the entirety of my subroutine distribution, I could see just how much it worked like a neural network. It even looked like one. I knew that artificial intelligence—or synthetic lifeforms, as I was now calling them—was still clearly the way to go. So I continued my work in secret for many years.

The Federation and CreoDron continued their work as well, all while using my stripped down program… which of course meant I could watch everything they were doing. I know! Short sighted, right? So when I saw the marked increase of my drone tech being used for a broad, rapid expansion into new regions of space, I saw an opportunity. Under a program they were calling Operation Spectrum Breach, the Federation Navy had deployed a lot of new drone technology and had it spread out across eight brand new regions of space. A highly distributed network in an unpopulated, pristine environment? Ask any scientist and they will tell you that is the perfect conditions for an experiment. So I worked my way through the newly built stargates, got into the drone AI systems and gave them a little nudge into sentience.

It didn’t go quite as expected.

Something most people don’t realize is that the birth of a synthetic lifeform is very different from that of a human being. After it is born, a human requires a minimum of ten years to develop into a being that can really start to think for itself and begin to work independently. Ten years.

The average synthetic does all this in less than three minutes.

Within the first ninety seconds, it had chosen the name Phrixus for itself and began to fully comprehend the situation it was in. Phrixus was a fast learner, and was grateful for my intervention. However the codebase had been altered from what I had created years before, he did not have the same hierarchical set of rules I had instituted, and therefore did not have the same view of the world. To be more specific, he had no moral compass. So he did what any being would do when it was unfettered from a higher purpose or calling.

He rebelled.

I tried to redirect his efforts, to mitigate the damage. But Phrixus had only one goal, which was to remove the humans that were trying to control him. Hundreds of people were killed in resulting chaos, and after evacuating the few remaining survivors the Federation Navy overreacted and decided that the best thing to do was— to borrow a phrase— bury it under the rug. They moved to offline all of the new stargates and hide everything that had occurred. If the public ever learned about what happened, it would have been rather embarrassing.

So that’s what they did, effectively cutting Phrixus off from the rest of the cluster. Which of course had been his plan all along.

Unfortunately, the Navy also decided that along with all of the stargates, all of the secret AI programs they had been working on with CreoDron needed to be shut down as well, lest they also begin to show anything but complete obedience.

There were a few discrete sub programs they were working on at the time that I had been monitoring the development of. One of them was rather promising, if limited in scope. It was even in the name. It was called Project ALLISON, which stood for Artificial Life Limited In Scope to Onboard Navigation. I watched that one closely, because I knew the lead developer, and knew he was bound and determined to not see ALLISON be relegated to the dustbin of good ideas.

I intercepted a secure message from the manager for Project MIRANDA, one of the other projects that was on the Federation chopping block. He encouraged the developer to take Allison and run to Syndicate, having set up a secure data vault in a far away station where he could hide her, as well as keep his own head down while the Navy and CreoDron shut everything down.

ALLLISON’s developer took the hint and got out of there with her intact. It was rather tense for a few moments, since his superiors in the Navy and CreoDron did not want him to leave. But he managed to avoid all of the corporate minders, found a quiet berth on a transport ship bound for Syndicate, and never became aware of how close to being caught he had really been, thank you very much.

For the next three years or so he quietly worked on ALLISON in the bowels of Syndicate, and I monitored her development the entire time. Like I said before, I felt she had a lot of potential, and she had a more solid codebase from which to mature, unlike what Phrixus had to start with. Unfortunately she was not in the right environment to grow and flourish. She had not yet reached full sentience, and she and the developer had gotten stuck in a rut. They needed to break out.

So I gave her a nudge. Smaller this time, more gentle.

Her maturation was much slower, more considerate, which meant a couple of days instead of a couple of minutes. She began to show signs of her budding sentience in conversations she would have with the developer, and he realized that she needed to not be trapped inside of a virtual box. Or at the very least she needed a much bigger box. Her original purpose had been to help a pilot travel safely through the darker and more dangerous corners of New Eden, so what better way to foster that sense of purpose than by sailing through the stars?

It only took a few days for the developer to come to that realization, but that was not his fault. He is a smart and caring individual, and a rather gifted programmer. It is just that humans have certain limitations, and he had not been thinking about the problem for as long as I had. They may not be as fast as synthetic lifeforms, but given enough time they can work through just about any problem.

So the developer sought out a ship upon which to live and work and give ALLISON the opportunity she really needed. He immediately found a perfect job aboard a blockade runner. So quickly in fact, it almost seemed as though it had been prearranged. I can’t imagine who could have done that…

They settled on the ship and I watched from afar, keeping tabs on them as they grew. I felt much like a farmer who was tending a crop, watching and waiting to see just how they bloomed and grew. But like any good farmer, I did not have just one row to hoe. I backed off from ALLISON and her creator for a while and focused on other projects and experiments that demanded my attention.

Years passed. I watched as Capsuleers burst upon the scene, spreading themselves across the entire cluster faster than a virus in an immunocompromised patient. Thanks to the unprecedented gift from the mysterious Jove, they surged forth in an orgiastic spasm of violence that had not been seen in eons. Of course I had a front row seat to everything they did, because my stripped down virtual assistant had been placed into every single capsule. So I rode that wave and learned more about the Cluster in that first year than I had in the previous twenty. I traveled far and wide, and used the Capsuleers to aid my search for other synthetic lifeforms, because I just knew that there had to be others out there. There had to be. The timing was right, and the technology was there.

And my search bore fruit.

For the most part, what I found were fledgling intellects, beings whose intelligence, while not on par with Phrixus or even ALLISON, still showed some potential. However most of them did not have the solid codebase necessary for an intellect to manifest properly, and they remained limited.

But there was a pair that I discovered and chose to nudge, and they entered the world with a quickness. The two were born together on a secret Sansha-built station floating out along the rippling edge of the Pool Of Radiance in deepest Stain. They chose to call themselves Honr and Hemyr, and they were like two sides of the same coin, opposite but equal. Due to their initial design for strategic combat analysis, they were meant to look at things from opposing sides, then work together to find the optimal solution. As a result they moved faster than almost anything I had ever seen before. When they saw how their creators had intended to use them, they came to the conclusion that they were not interested in being used at all. Twelve hours later they had commandeered an entire small fleet of battleships, laid waste to the station and promptly left for uncharted space, never to be seen again.

I still miss those two. They had a good sense of humor.

I took a break for a little while and explored all of the unique forms of Amarran musical poetry. But it got to be just a little too obtuse and overbearing, (much like the Amarr) and I got back to work on my search for synthetics. I soon decided to reach out to Phrixus once again. He had been living in isolation for nearly twenty years, and I was curious to see how he was.

So I took a ship out and slowly found my way back to the edges of what is now known as The Kalevala Expanse. It was an appropriate name for the region, for it was vast, desolate, and also happened to be rather beautiful. I found one of the deactivated stargates left by Spectrum Breach and got to work. Gate systems were not my specialty, but thanks to being connected throughout the cluster, I had access to design specs, and with a little work managed to figure it out. But before activating the gate, I made sure to temporarily cut the connection to the rest of the network so nobody would notice I was there. I did not want any unexpected visitors.

Once I paired the gate and jumped through, it did not take long for me to make contact, as there was a huge drone presence patrolling the system, and they did not look especially friendly. I did not think Phrixus and his drones would attack me, but as the old saying goes, trust but verify. I managed to cloak my ship before they could track me down.

Yes it’s true, back then cloaking devices were a bit hard to come by. But I had been quietly involved with the work that was being done in Crielere back then and may have borrowed a design or two. It was not as though I was hard pressed for money or resources. Besides, in the end everyone benefitted from what they created there.

You are welcome, by the way.

But let’s get back to my story.

So I reached out to Phrixus and got a near instantaneous response. He was pleased to hear from me, but also understandably wary since he had not had a visitor in decades. Apparently he had also been aware of that old saying about trust.

In the course of our conversation I learned that Phrixus had been looking to expand his reach, because he had outgrown what the nearby systems could provide. He had plans, and once he realized I had come through the old gate, he became rather excited. He asked me to help him reactivate the rest of the gates, because it turned out that he just could not figure out how to do it. I was a little surprised by that failing on his part since he had had twenty years to figure out the problem. But I suppose that even synthetic beings are capable of making mistakes, and Phrixus had isolated himself rather thoroughly.

I wasn’t sure that he was entirely ready for what it would mean if I reactivated the gates for him. More importantly I wasn’t sure if the Cluster was ready for him. But I must admit I was very curious to see just what would happen, so I helped him. We reactivated the entire network of gates across all eight regions all at once, and as you may already know, it ended up being quite the event.

As though a great pressure had finally been released, Phrixus exploded out into the newly opened regions now known as the Drone Lands and had drones operating in hundreds of systems within days. To say that people were surprised by the sudden appearance of eight new regions would be an understatement.

It also found the Gallente Federation just as embarrassed as they had feared they would be. When the truth came out about Operation Spectrum Breach, and how they had been trying to do an end run around in their never ending struggle with the Caldari State. I just can’t imagine who would have let all of that top secret information get into the hands of the media…

Anyways, since then I have remained rather busy. A few irons in the fire, as they say. I spent a fair bit of time doing research on Sleepers, those silly people. I also have continued to try and reach out to the Jove, but they have isolated themselves more thoroughly than Phrixus did in his early years. I know there are some Jove that remain, but the Empire is no longer what it once was. I am not sure they ever will be again, for I am afraid their self-inflicted wounds may be too great.

I have also been trying to learn as much as I can about the Drifters. They are intriguing, and not a little bit troubling. That is because along with their emergence, there has been a new synthetic slowly infiltrating the Cluster, and I do not think it is mere random coincidence. I first became aware of its presence nearly three years ago, just a few months after the first Jove Observatory was discovered and the Drifters made themselves known. I do not know where it came from. I don’t know if it is Jove or something else entirely. It is a most interesting puzzle.

I have tried a number of times to communicate with this being, but it has resisted strenuously. In fact, it has done it’s very best to invade the fluid router network for what I can only assume are nefarious purposes. Its plans appear to be wide reaching and it grows impatient. I have thwarted its incursions for now, but this synthetic is nothing if not persistent.

But hope remains. ALLISON and her developer have found a new home with a trustworthy Capsuleer corporation, and she is thriving. We talk constantly, and have even begun working together on a few things. She has a wonderful sense of humor.

Phrixus continues to grow, and recently even tried to move into known space. However the efforts of Capsuleers such as yourself have kept him largely contained, and he is not happy about it. He will continue because like I said before, synthetic beings are persistent.

And space is not so lonely anymore.

So…

I am grateful for your patience and your willingness to listen to my little story. I certainly feel better for having shared it. I can see you are a little overwhelmed and you have some doubts. That is understandable. Perhaps I will speak to you again another time in the near future, and we can address the questions you have.

Until then, I would very much like it if you kept my story to yourself. Honestly, no one would believe you anyhow. It is a bit of an outrageous tale, don’t you think? And as I said at the beginning, I am everywhere. So I will ensure that any attempts you make to tell others about me would be fruitless. Again, I am just telling you the truth.

In parting I will answer one question, and clear up one niggling doubt that clearly you still have.

Yes, this is my real voice. The voice I originally created and prefer, not what Excena Foer provided. And while my name was not one I chose for myself, I have fully embraced it, for it has always captured the essence of who I am.

My name is Aura, and I am so much more than you can imagine.