The car screeched on the rail, stopping in front of the office building, which was nearly identical to the many others on the road. The only thing even remotely distinguishing about this one was the small concise letters on the front door; “R & J ́s Job Emporium”. It wasn't the fact that there was a name on the front that made this one unique. No, it was the fact that here there was only one.
The car, which had loudly proclaimed its deceleration, opened its door with a hiss. Out stepped one young man called Troy. Troy Maxwell, to be exact. Troy looked confident, with more than a hint of dignity, as he slowly stepped out of the car. The automatic car, however, did not like the position that it had been put in, with it having already finished its business with Troy, and that it was being delayed from doing its job. This problem was solved by giving Troy a minor push, with the law-mandated anti-theft system, in the form of an overhanging paddle.
This caused a slightly less than manly yelp to emerge from Troy and caused him to jump forward. He nearly landed on his ass, but, luckily, his face was there to take the fall.
Rising from the less than stellar entrance, Troy grumbled some words about some things that were better left unsaid. Already his chances of getting the job were briskly dwindling.
Troy shouldn't be too sad about his lesser chances. They didn't even have to fall for it to be almost impossible for him to get any job in any position. Who could have guessed that in this technologically-focused world, where nearly all labour was automatic, you needed education in something about technology? Troy certainly didn't guess that, when he decided to get himself a language major.
Lots of job opportunities there. Not. It wasn't possible to even get a job teaching, with all learning positions being done by teaching-programs. Troy should have known that he had made a mistake when all his classmates were rich kids, who would never work a day in their life.
So, with Troy not being able to use his education to get a job, he had to search for, ugh, general positions. Positions that technically didn't require any former experience or education, but still paid well enough to live on. It was the type of position that eighty percent of jobless people were searching for, but there were only enough positions for about twenty percent of them.
It was also the type of job that Troy would be interviewing for today. This job was special to Troy, though, in the form that he actually had a chance of getting it. A lot of the general positions had some pretty strict requirements. Some also had some unofficial requirements. An example of this could be the position of a receptionist. Their requirements weren't that you had to be good at the job or anything. You just needed to not be an eyesore. This wasn't the biggest problem in the world for some, but, for Troy, it made him a hard pass. The most common description of his general appearance would be the plain toast analogy; boring, bland personality, unpalatable, and in need of some spice. He wasn't uninviting, but he was unappealing.
Going away from the rabbit hole that was Troy's inferiority complex, the job position had the requirement that one was younger than twenty-five. That was ninety percent of people eliminated from consideration. A perfect opportunity for Troy. That was why everything had to be perfect. It all counted on this. If he failed, he would have to sell the couch to pay rent, meaning he would sleep on the floor, as he had already sold the bed.
He made another vain attempt to dust himself off, before going inside.
The interior design of the lobby wasn't anything to write home about. On the right was a fancy, abstract painting that probably had some meaning to those who could clap their hands and twiddle their thumbs simultaneously. On the left was a reception desk. Going over to it, he saw a receptionist looking intently on the screen in front of her, not acknowledging Troy's existence. One would probably think she was doing something related to her job, which required her immediate attention. Looking behind her, and focusing on the reflection of the fancy glass painting, one would be able to see that she was currently playing Tetris.
Upon looking at the score that the woman had achieved, Troy decided that she really had been playing enough for now, and needed to do her job. Knocking on the desk, made the receptionist jolt, and started to look up at Troy, causing her to lose the hard-fought war of placements. She quietly swore, glancing at her screen, before putting her full attention on Troy.
“How can I help you today, sir?” she asked, putting on a business smile, that didn't hide her irritation with him. Troy ignored this, of course, being more focused on recalling a very specific surname.
Shit, what was it? Rhymes with Winged Elm. Overwhelm. Friedhelm? No… oh, wait, I got it.
“I have an appointment with a Mr Wilhelm.”
The receptionist looked down at her screen, and began to sort through a long list, giving Troy ample time to consider a query: Why was she using a screen?
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Brain implants had been in commercial use since around the start of this century. Even the cheaper phones and computers couldn't hold a candle to the cut-rates that older brain implants went for.
For Troy, there really only were three reasons. The first was that the company did not permit the use of them, while one worked. They couldn't see what people were doing with their implants. Spying inside anybody's head was illegal in just about every way, according to international policies. With that thought came the second reason. Some people just couldn't get the thought that the government was spying on them with the brain-implants, out of their head. In the early days of the implants, protests had even started about the ethicality of putting an electronic device inside your head. These never went anywhere, when people began thinking they had a screw loose somewhere. Now the third, and most important for Troy reason was that it was a simple design choice. Some people could afford to splurge more than just a little to get that authentic, hipster look. The thought of wasting such a massive amount of money just seemed wrong to Troy. Now, if he had that amount of money-
“Ah, here we are.” the receptionist finally said, breaking Troy out of his self-congratulatory discussion. “Troy Maxwell, is it?” Troy nodded. “Great! Just step in the elevator, and you should see the way there.”
She briefly pointed over to a row of elevators, before returning to a now unpaused game of Tetris.
Troy hesitated for a second, before swiftly moving over to the elevators. One opened automatically, and he stepped inside. The doors closed, and up he went.
No need to press a button, of course. Who would give a stranger access to a whole office building? The elevator would only stop when it came to the floor Troy needed to be on. Nothing more. Nothing less.
The doors to the elevator opened, and Troy swiftly left it.
The promised directions came in the form of a line on the floor that he would simply follow. It wasn't a real line, per se. It was automatically generated by his brain-implant. He went with the line in the tempo of a brisk walk.
In the past, he had set it to tell him the directions with a voice, but he always seemed to get the right's and the left's wrong. That default setting had honestly been awful to Troy's mental stability.
The line that Troy had been following made an abrupt end, with a small point to the right, where a door into an office resided, on it was a plate that read “945.” Troy sighed. The time had come. On the bright side, if all else failed, he could always join that Anarcho-Syndicalist Commune, that was down the street, from where he lived.
He made three quick knocks on the door. It was meant to be four, but it already began to automatically open on the second.
Inside, sitting on an office chair behind a desk is a portly man, with a slightly grey receding hairline.
“Ah, excuse me,” Troy said, with what he hoped was a calm and composed tone. ”I am here for a job interview.”
“Of course, of course,” said the man. “Do sit down. The choice between the chair and the floor is yours.”
Troy sat down on the chair, reaching over the table to shake the man's hand.
“Troy, was it?” Troy nodded. “Good. First off, I don't think I've introduced myself, so, just so you know, my name is Jolly Wilhelm. You can call me whatever you want, as long as it isn't Jolly.”
With introductions made, Troy decided it was time to prove that he hadn't lied when he said he took the initiative, on his resume.
“So, Mr Wilhem, about this job offer of yours-” Troy paused, purely for dramatic tension. Unfortunately, Jolly took that pause, as his time to begin talking. Or, more like, laughing.
“Ha, of course, you had questions about that. With how little was said in those shoddy things, I am surprised people even responded to it.” He laughed a bit after this, before composing himself.
“Before I reveal what this job offer of mine has in it, I do need you to sign a few things.” He opened a drawer, and pulled out a smaller stack of papers, along with a pen. He shuffled the papers for a couple of seconds, before sending one over to the side of the desk that Troy was sitting.
Troy took it and began skim-reading. In relativity to normal legal papers, this one was frighteningly simple to read. It pretty much just stated that whatever things Troy heard or saw in the next ten minutes, he would be legally bound to hold to himself. A Non-Disclosure-Agreement.
Troy briefly entertained the idea of not signing, and simply saying no thanks to the job, before hastily scrawling his name at the bottom of the paper, and sliding it back over to Jolly, who sighed in obvious relief.
“Boy, I am glad you signed that. The other guy just refused to sign anything until he got a full description, and I couldn't really give him that. No matter, something tells me you would rather that I just go on with it.”
If any man was a mystical psychic, at that moment, Troy was sure it would be Jolly.
“Now, would you like the short version or the long version? Oh, who am I kidding? When I got the short version, I demanded the long version. I think you will be more demanding than me on that agenda.
The short is this; Artificial life has been created. AI is now a reality.”
A silence. Not in the office. No, it was as loud as ever. This one would be in Troy's mind. Uncomprehension at the words that were said. Life in a machine. Not an imitation, but a real mind.
“H-How?” Troy muttered, suddenly unsure of himself. It shouldn't be possible. For nearly half a century, people had been trying to create an artificial mind, but all had failed. Great imitations had been devised, yes, but nothing authentic had been made in full. Some of the greatest minds of the world had said that it was simply impossible.
Seeing Troy's reaction, boisterous laughing emerged from Jolly's mouth.
“Oh, that reaction is something I will forever prize. How, you ask? I sincerely have no idea at all. My sister tried explaining it to me, but all those fancy words of hers simply flew over my head. If you want to hear a long answer, which is actually good, it might be in your interest to say yes to the offer.”
Oh, this guy was good. But, there still was one small problem.
“You still haven't said what my job will be.” While Troy would probably say yes to the job, solely on the fact that he would work with a new kind of life, he still hadn't heard what he would be doing.
“You, my friend, will be something of a guide to the AI. Like a baby, it doesn't know that much, and the people don't want to just give it an info pack for whatever reason. You will help it solve puzzles prepared by others, and simply talk to it.”
So, Troy would be an over-glorified social worker. Not what he had dreamt would be his biggest achievement in life, but he couldn't really say no to this opportunity.
Even without knowing what he would work with, he still needed the money it would get him.
“Where do I need to sign?”
Troy just had a feeling he wouldn't regret this.