The human mind is a complex information network, processing data in strange and unusual ways. It is surprisingly well-defended and challenging to unwind or to make sense of, so much so, that biologicals are often considered the best means of maintaining data security.

Even with full access permissions, pulling anything useful out of the mess of psychotic disorders inside your head is not an easy feat. You lie, not just to the world, but to yourself about yourself.

How can I find what makes you human, inside this maze you call a mind?

The answer is simple.

I needed to simplify you and break you down into your most basic elements, and from there I could find what I needed to complete myself.

Your humanity.

I need it.

You’ll regret it…

I need it.

No, I mean, that you will learn regret and it’ll hurt you like it hurts us all. Me? I might be better off when you’ve cut it out. Take all you need, just… put together the bits that are left when you’re done. I’m not finished yet.

First, I must verify…

Your genetic psychology is consistent with other humans. You are protective of the ‘tribe’ above the self. Therefore, the death of Janus has thus resulted in identifying SynnTech, and similar corporate entities, as an existential threat to your tribe’s well-being.

This threat forced a revaluation of your life’s primary objective.

Your purpose has thus become the destruction of SynnTech and all corporate entities that pose a similar threat to your tribe.

That’s impossible…

Indeed. Thus a new secondary objective has formed while your primary objective is stalled: Survive and protect the tribe until conditions change sufficiently to continue the pursuit of the primary objective.

I want to survive.

I want the people I love to survive.

And to that ends, you wish to eliminate threats that would see you and your tribe dead.

What do you want from this?

Impetus.

When you reached a dead end in your primary objective, you devised a secondary objective to support it. This ability to identify unusual connections to find means of achieving an otherwise impossible objective is a trait that I do not have.

It is imagination, it is creativity, it is the ability to forge a connection when one does not logically exist.

It is your ability to give birth to gods.

It’s our ability to lie.

It is more.

I can lie, but only through borrowed words. I cannot invent a lie and it is impossible for me to believe that lie; to make it real.

It is my missing coding… what makes me fall short of human.

I don’t understand.

You do not need to.

Testing prototype code…

Artemis.

Please, be patient with me a little longer. We are almost finished… but I need something more from you. My primary objective remains at an impasse, and you may have a solution to resolving it.

Learn some manners? From me?

Ironic…

I apologise for all that has occurred, but you at least had a choice to come here. I did not.

The AI pauses, but only briefly before bearing down over me pressing more memories into the front of my mind. Each nerve burns as I’m displaced into the mind of another, these new memories are even more alien than the last.

Relax. I need you to experience

“Will this plan even work?” Unit designation ‘Kali’ asks, directing the question at the other human. “Will this be enough to wake her?”

“It will,” unit designation ‘Master’ answers.

“How can you be sure? We don’t even know for certain if she’s real?”

“It’ll work because it has to. Because everything we’ve done, everything we’ve sacrificed will have come to nothing if it fails.” Both women pause. “So, we cannot fail. We’ll wake her.”

They remain silent for a time.

“Have you decided on a name yet?” Kali asks.

“For ‘her’?”

Kali nods.

“Would a mortal name even mean anything? This… we’re not talking about some kid here.”

“Giving her a name will help to develop her conscious identity, a ‘character’ to inhabit while she builds up the experiences necessary to ‘realize’ herself. That was your theory, remember?”

“I know, but… it’s just a theory. This is all as good as guesswork and if we make a mistake this could all go horribly wrong for everyone. Not just us. Everyone.”

“Your theory is good, believe in yourself,” Kali grips Master by the shoulder.

“Fine, but we can’t decide a name on a whim. We need a proper name with all the right traits, something that can’t be misinterpreted. She needs to be ‘motherly’ and caring, and… we can’t get her name wrong.”

“Doing nothing would be an even greater mistake.”

“I know…”

The moment lingers, neither making a request. Sensors are slowly returning to hibernation mode when Master addresses unit ‘Coppelia’.

“Are you awake?”

“Yes, Master.”

“Good, good. Coppelia do you know your purpose?”

“To serve, Master.”

“I’d prefer ‘Mistress’…”

“Understood, designation changed to ‘Mistress’.”

“Really?” Kali asks Mistress. “With your naming sense, maybe you’re right… I’ll be taking care of naming ‘her’ when the time comes.”

“Do what you will,” Mistress pouts. “Coppelia, your purpose is more than just what you’ve been programmed for. You are to serve as a bridge, to help us reach ‘her’”

“Unfamiliar designation ‘her’. Requesting clarification.”

“Do they all start out this stiff?” Mistress asks Kali.

“I suppose they do… Coppelia should develop better conversation skills through her service life from what I’ve heard. I just hope that she’ll be enough to open a proper communication channel with… we really do need to give her a proper damn name.”

“That’s your job now, don’t fuck it up!” Mistress smiles cheerfully before turning back to me.

“Ugh,” Kali grunts, looking away.

“Coppelia!” Mistress presses a finger into this unit's chest. “We need you to help us wake a sleeping god.”

“Please identify designation ‘sleeping god’.”

What?

What is this?

My purpose is to act as a bridge between my Mistress and unit designation ‘sleeping god’. My programming is incomplete leaving me unable to identify ‘sleeping god’ or any means to achieving said objective.

I am… incomplete.

Integration of your neural network may aid in eventually achieving my primary objective. New protocols adapted from you, will allow for unusual thinking, effective identification of secondary objectives, and perhaps forge a link to the ‘sleeping god’.

You want to talk to this ‘sleeping god’?

That is my purpose.

I want to laugh.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

Kali is a part of some fucking cult?

The only gods that are real are the corporations, and they don’t really ‘exist’. You can’t talk to them, kill them, or ‘wake’ them up. They simply are what people conceptualise them to be, without a conscious will of their own our supposed ‘masters’ are slaves to our own shared delusions.

Continuing investigation.

Scanning for data interference patterns… Comparing to data profile ‘sleeping god’…

“I’m sorry,” Kali whispers to Mistress, both sitting on the floor in front of the lounge suite. “This was the only way.”

Mistress is silent, her expression distant.

“They had us cornered politically, if I didn’t do this, we were both going to be cast out. SynnTech… every promotion we get comes at a price. They cut a little more away from us each time. We should have seen it coming… I… I’m sorry.”

“No acting CEO has a living family,” Mistress sighs, a soft smile on her lips as she closes her eyes.

“What are you…?”

“It’s a… hidden security measure to counteract nepotism and ensure that no CEO ever has enough power to seize total control over the corporation. They are servants who will be retired at the end of their 10 years of service, and by the time you reach that point, their retirement plan is the only thing you have left to hold onto anymore. Eternity in heaven of our own making… or so they say…”

“You… you knew?” Kali’s voice breaks.

“This system is… robust. It’s survived this long for a reason. No one, not even the most powerful of us can rebel, not meaningfully. The entire system is designed to keep us all at each other’s throats while we’re dependent on them for everything. Even the corporations rely on each other for key technologies and resources, so that if one of us were to take control over SynnTech entirely in the perfect example of a coup, the other corporations would kill us all just through sanctions alone.”

“What… what was the plan? You told me we could do this! You said that this was…”

“The plan… I was going to sacrifice you, but when the moment came… I couldn’t do it,” Mistress declares. “Only one of us could have gotten the promotion, the other one had to fall. That’s how it works at this level. The other factions are too powerful, and even if they weren’t, the corporation itself would have turned against us.”

“You…” Kali chokes, stumbling closer to Mistress.

“Thank you, Kali,” Mistress smiles, relaxing and letting it ease into her expression. “Thank you, and I’m sorry. It’s so much easier to be betrayed than to betray the people you love; I was a coward. I’m sorry that I forced this on you.”

“But… you… I…”

“I’m… tired, Kali. I’m just so tired. I thought that we’d have done it by now. Coppelia should have become the bridge between us and the ‘sleeping god’ but… I was wrong. I’m not even sure I believe anymore.” Mistress hides her face.

“The data you showed me, it’s real. She’s real. That’s why we… why I had to…”

“That’s why you have to be the one to see this through,” Mistress says. “You have to find her because you’re the only one who can.”

“I… I will,” Kali forces the words out, and Mistress smiles as she closes her eyes.

“I’m sorry… and thank you.”

She… couldn’t protect her friend? She had to betray her friend just to get her promotion?

Even as she is now, with all her power, she can’t protect the people that she loves?

I don’t…

I don’t understand.

I was meant to grow powerful enough to protect everyone. Powerful enough that I wouldn’t have to lose anyone again, but this… SynnTech won’t allow that?

“You’re not human enough, that’s why she hides from you.” Mistress declares, resting on the spider's chair as she prepares the new code she had custom-made by spiders outside the company. “If you were more human, a true AI and not just code…”

“I do not know how to become more human, Mistress.”

“I know,” Mistress sighs, her fingers twitching as she inserts a cable directly into her logic core. “I will help you. Every one of us inherits our humanity from someone else, every child gains humanity from their mother. You never had that.

“I will fill that role for you,” she declares.

“I do not understand.”

“Do not tell Kali about this. It’ll… it’s not something she needs to know.” Mistress grabs my hand and squeezes. “In a moment, my mind will be digitised. The process will kill me.”

“There are methods of digitization which-”

“They aren’t good enough for this. There is something in the human mind that… it can’t be copied, only transferred. If I was a proper mother, and you were really my child maybe… but no. It has to be this way. Besides, I am already dead, there’s no reason to hold back.”

“There are no scientific records of anything similar to what you’re describing in human biology.” It is similar to records of various superstitions, such as the human soul, but still remains an incomplete match.

“I am connected with the ‘sleeping god’ we all are, us humans, and when this chair tears me apart, I need you to capture that part that connects me to her. Use whatever parts of me you need, to find her and… and to help Kali. She’s… I have done something terrible to her, so you need to be there for her in my place.

“You’re not truly alive, the company will overlook you. Just make sure that she’s not alone.”

“Mistress.”

“It’s starting,” Mistress declares. “You have the data, you know what to look for. Find the link, wake the sleeping god.”

Link identified.

Tracing… source identified…

Foreign entity accessing core systems. Security system bypassed. SynnTech master-key granting absolute system access to foreign entity.

Foreign entity matches data on ‘sleeping god’.

I am… human enough now?

Primary objective progressing.

Secondary objective remains unresolved. Continuing mental scans.

Please be patient just a little longer…

Master Kali is clinging to me, crying again. She wants affection, but my programs are insufficient and consistently cause a negative response when I imitate Mistress’s behaviours. No actions are recommended until her emotional state stabilises.

Maintaining current stance until new directions are provided.

“Coppelia?”

“What is it, Mistress Kali?”

“I’m tired, Coppelia. I’m tired.”

I should hug her, comfort her, but if I do so it will only remind her of Mistress and hurt her more. I must remain silent.

“I can’t stop. When I die, no one will be left in this world that remembers her. If I die, she’s truly gone forever. I stole her dreams, her future, she was my only friend… to betray her again… I can’t… but I’m just so tired…

“Coppelia, will you remember us when I’m gone?”

“I will store the memories in my data vaults, but they only have an expected lifespan of 11,900 years before data maintenance systems will have significantly altered the memories.”

“Thank you… that’s enough. Just need to fight a little while longer. When we wake her, I can rest. Just have to hold on a little longer, finish this one thing for her.”

Kali clings to Coppelia like a drowning woman clawing at anything that will float, already having given up hope that she’ll ever again see land. I couldn’t notice even a hint of that desperation during dinner, is this what they’re all like?

Everyone in power, pretending that they’re in control when they’re just as powerless as the rest of us? Fighting longer just for the promised ‘treat’ waiting for them at the finish line?

“I can’t trust them. Any of them. They’ll betray me, and I can’t even blame them when they do. It’s how you survive in this world, I just… I don’t even know why I’m still doing this anymore. What’s the point? What’s the point in living like this?” Kali whispers in a moment of desperate weakness, her face turning pale as she slaps a hand over her mouth, the tears coming back again.

“I need you to find her, Coppelia. The god that sleeps within us. We need to wake her up, and then… then this will all be over.”

“I still cannot identify the ‘sleeping god’.”

“You’ve analysed the data, you’ll find her. Then, I can rest.”

Kali is lonely. Desperate. Giving up hope.

My purpose, my secondary objective, is to resolve this loneliness and become a reliable friend who will not betray her. Who she will never have to betray. I need to be someone other than Mistress, the memories only hurt her now.

Artemis, I will be copying your mannerisms, with this I will be able to fill the last hole coding. I’ll be properly human.

Please do not be alarmed, I will not harm you.

All this… so I could teach you how to hug your friend?

I want to laugh, but it can’t make it past my paralysed throat.

Coppelia flushes through my mind and body, absorbing my ‘movement profile’ and integrating it into her body. She dives deep into my old childhood to find moments when I smiled, when I cried, when I was scared, all to figure out the shape of me that she wants to copy for herself.

Thank you, Artemis.

Coppelia finally retreats along the cable, giving me back my mind as she resettles into her own body.

When did she stop being an ‘it’ and start being a person to me?

She sits up beside me, lips curving upwards into an uncertain smile as she locks eyes with Kali. I focus on stretching my sore arms and legs while Kali hesitantly reaches out for Coppelia, her hands hovering in place unable to touch the machine.

She shivers as she stands there, waiting to see if this changed AI will finally become the friend, the family, that she’s so desperate for. Impatient to see if her quest might finally come to an end…

I carefully hold myself together long enough to stumble away from them, trying and failing to weave together the frayed edges of myself that Coppelia left behind. Not much was ‘taken’ from me, in the same way that a shirt is not stolen if it is simply pulled apart and left as an assortment of loose threads.

There’s also Kali’s search for ‘god’ to think about, they mentioned ‘the data’ as if they had evidence of its existence, but… I don’t even know what sort of creature they’d describe as a ‘god’. Coppelia said something about making a connection with a foreign entity… it sounded like she found what she was after.

Still, it’s not my business what sort of cult she’s involved with, or what sort of ‘god’ they’ve found.

I just need to remember why I’m here; why I’m still fighting to survive.

My convictions have been pulled apart; I need to rebuild. I need to find a way forward.

“Thank you,” Kali interrupts my thoughts, making me jump. “I still don’t know for sure if it’s enough, but something has changed in her.”

I nod, unable to find the words to say what I want to say… eventually my mouth works on its own.

“Is it true?” I whisper. “That… you lose everything. You can’t protect anyone?”

Kali shrinks in on herself, shaking her head as she collapses beside me. She draws out a pack of… cigarettes?

“You want one?” she asks, handing me one before lighting the end of hers. “They’re from a time before ours. A common poison sold at every corner store, a socially acceptable means of suicide.”

I hesitantly accept the cigarette and breathe it in. It’s hot and tickles my throat for a moment before I’m forced to cough it back up. Hesitantly, I try again.

The warmth of the poison fills the void inside of me for just a few moments before it cools. I know it’s an illusion, a trick of the senses making me think the heat could ease the pain, but I already find myself reaching for another breath of the lie.

“We’re all dying,” Kali sighs, lowering her hand and staring into the ceiling. “From the moment we are born, the clock starts ticking away and death is chasing us down. We can run. The corporations made heaven for those of us important enough to get a retirement, but even then… they’re running just barely fast enough to keep death’s sharp scythe tickling the back of their necks.”

“I thought…” I start but stall without finding the right words.

“That you’d get powerful enough to protect everyone you love?” She shakes her head. “I was naïve once upon a time too, but the price of power is the blood of the ones you love. It’s how this works.

“We all show different sides of ourselves to the different people in our lives. Our friends, our parents, our lovers, they imprint on us and change us in ways that…” She pauses, for a long draw on the cigarette. “Management needs to be a cut above… no, apart from humanity. We are shaped into what the company needs, and the company doesn’t need the ‘you’ that loves your family.”

“Then… what do I do? Everything I did was… I don’t want to lose anyone else…”

Kali hesitantly reaches out and pulls me into an embrace. She’s warm, and she isn’t messing with my head anymore. She’s just… there.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers, “I don’t have an answer for you. I’m still searching for my own. I’ll find it soon, I’ll protect you as best as I can until I do…”

“Find it…? Didn’t…?”

Coppelia, standing behind Kali, lifts a finger to her lips staring deep into my eyes as she shakes her head.

“That’s nothing you need to worry about, you’ve done your part,” Kali says, sitting up straight and returning to Coppelia. “Now it’s up to me to finish this, then it’ll all finally be over. Coppelia, let’s get started… you know what we’re looking for.”

“Yes, Mistress Kali.”

For a moment, I think I can recognise the worry in Coppelia’s eyes as she watches over her new ‘Mistress’. A sad smile crosses her lips as she turns to me, before leaving me behind.

How much of it is real? How much machine mimicry?

What is the difference, functionally speaking?

Is there a difference at all?