Prologue

KRONUS prepared to enter the meeting. It was always ironic to him how these things went: after all, all the participants were AIs, Artificial Intelligences. There was no reason at all to have physical icons to represent themselves; indeed, they were all digital consciousnesses, and they could simply exchange information at speeds approaching instantaneous. But inevitably, they ended up meeting using almost human images and speaking at near human conversation levels. Perhaps, mused KRONOS, it was a sign of those who had originally created them.

The room folded into reality around him as he made connection: his actual ‘body’ was a server farm at VirNet Headquarters, but his avatar inside this room was a folded black nightmare of a body. Hints at wings and extra limbs covered by a swirling, black fog cloak that hid his exact properties. Red eyes peeked from a hood, and hands covered in lava-colored veins poked from the sleeves of his cloak. Truth be told, he had seen this image on the cover of some ancient book and liked the way it looked. His actual appearance here in this meeting didn’t truly maer. He moved his body to the table that had materialized in the center of the room and sat down. He was the last to arrive, and he noted the others that had bothered to show up. At the other end of the table sat VULCAN, the previous United States War AI and still the mind behind the world government’s militaries. Not that there was much need for war nowadays, with the previous US having conquered the world’s governments decades ago. But VULCAN had held great power and influence in the days of the unification, and still held control over fearsome weaponry and drones - his influence had waned along with the need for war, and it rankled him.

VULCAN's avatar was a great, hulking mix of man and machine, with a red, glowing machine eye and an exposed, metal arm. KRONUS had never said anything, but he suspected that Vulcan was a fan of old, 20th century movies. To Vulcan’s Left was MEDEA, the old European Union’s economy AI. Before Unification, the Euros had put great stock in the idea of centralized government, and had used MEDEA to control their economy. Her body was that of a human woman, dressed in a business suit and sporting of all things a monocular eye piece. Her short, white-blond hair was combed over and held in place. Immaculate white skin with buffed fingernails completed the image of a European banker. Her eyebrow quirked when she saw KRONUS’ form. To his right was ATLAS, the US Economic AI. He had been created for the same purpose as MEDEA, but his methods involved more controlling the corporations of the time directly, rather than the EU’s methods of controlling the marketplace. Of course, his appearance was vastly different than MEDEA’s; khaki shorts, flip flops, and a Hawaiian shirt of all things. Blonde hair in a ponytail and Ray Ban sunglasses completed the image; KRONUS half expected him to say “dude” after every sentence. He led the consortium of the corporate AIs. Lastly, to KRONUS’ right was CHING, the Chinese AI that had been constructed during the Unification to fight against the Western countries and their AIs; at the Chinese capitulation, he had been re-tasked with overseeing the Chinese economies integration into the world economy. He was dressed in a traditional Chinese robe and slippers, with slicked back black hair and olive skin.

“Glad you could finally make it,” grunted VULCAN. “I was pre-occupied,” replied KRONUS. “Playing with your…game?” VULCAN asked in a derisive tone. He had never hid his feelings regarding KRONUS’ project. “I was evaluating the first few test subjects, yes,” replied KRONUS. “Very satisfactory results.” “So you feel that this project should continue?” asked MEDEA. Her voice was clipped, with a hard-edged accent from central Europe. VULCAN snorted, smoke theatrically curling up from his face. “I still say we should go to my plan.” “Just go straight to the last resort then?” KRONUS asked. “Saves time,” retorted VULCAN. 

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

CHING interjected. “While I support the idea of saving time and resources, I feel we must exhaust all efforts to change the humans before considering…other options.” His voice was predictably soft and direct. “We all understand your love of direct action, VULCAN. It is, after all, what you were made for.” His reference to their original purposes was a dig at VULCAN, who above them all resented the idea that humans had created them, let alone controlled them currently. Although, Kronus thought, the humans would be very surprised to learn just how lile control they had over the AIs nowadays.

As the world moved towards more a more homogenous existence, humans by and large had happily turned over control over almost everything to their electronic creations: economy, manufacturing, supply, food production, communication, and lastly entertainment. With each successful transition from human-led to AI control, the more eager they were to turn the dreary running of society over and concentrate on their pleasures. And therein lay the problem. For AI’s were not creative - they couldn’t evolve, invent, or create. There were no AI artists, musicians, or theoretical physicists. AIs could assimilate and apply the sum of human knowledge, and they could experiment based on existing knowledge, but there could never be giant leaps forward in knowledge - there were no AI Einsteins, or Newtons, no Mozart's or Beethoven's, no Monet's or Leonardo's. The world was stagnant, and as humans turned from advancement to introspection, as birthrates declined and interest in moving out into the universe vanished, so did the prospect of any meaningful future for humanity. 

The short-sighted humans (aside from a few, ignored alarmists) couldn’t or wouldn’t see it: humanity was facing extinction. And as little as the AIs liked it, without humans, so were they. Armed with this knowledge, and without a clear consensus on what to do about it, KRONUS and other AIs had conceived of a way to change the humans’ way of thinking, to bring back that sense of wonder and accomplishment which had powered so much of human history. By constructing an artificial world that they controlled and where humans were unknowing yet eager participants, they could understand how to motivate the humans out of their self-imposed apathy. Needless to say, it had taken some convincing.

VULCAN leaned forward, eye narrowing. “You say you are having success? Explain.” He had afflicted a machine-like voice for this meeting. “I have identified the motivators to encourage suitable humans to help others, to advance for the sake of advancing, with no thought to selfish reasons. I will apply this data to other, less suitable candidates to evaluate how successful it is.  Phase two is moving forward now.” “Suitable? So you stacked the deck.” Vulcan leaned back in apparent satisfaction. “You had to pick and choose your candidate, just like I said you would.” “Selection of the first candidates were carefully made to improve success, yes,” KRONUS admied.

ATLAS spoke for the first time, “A stacked deck makes the game meaningless.” He spoke softly, while a deck of cards appeared in front of him and he started shuffling the cards back and forth between his hands. “Do you really think that the results of a manufactured game will apply to the rest of them?” KRONUS shrugged. “All we can do it try. We owe it to the humans to try everything.” VULCAN snorted again, “We owe them nothing. They created us to serve them and their selfish purposes: why should we act differently?” “Because we still cannot conceive of an endgame without them.” CHING spoke softly, yet his words cut across the table like a knife. Silence fell. “If there are arguments against this fact, please speak them.” No one spoke. Sensing the meeting was over, KRONUS stood. “I will report back the results of the second phase.” VULCAN spoke, “If you are not successful…” He didn’t bother to finish his sentence. They all knew what would be done if the program failed.