Cracked fingernails blurred over the keyboard in a frenzied dance of desperation. Preston Hashimoto sat hunched in his computer chair, illuminated by the glow of multiple monitors. One screen was dedicated to a countdown clock with less than five minutes remaining.
Arthritis flared in the old man’s ninety-year-old joints, but the semi-illicit cocktail of drugs coursing through his veins dulled the pain to a warm tingling at the edges of his consciousness.
"Preston. Time is running out," said the artificial rendering of his deceased wife.
During some of his more lucid states, Preston had considered it ghoulish to reformat his dead wife as an AI assistant. It was certainly not something his old mentor, Tim Berners-Lee, would have considered possible when inventing the internet some sixty years earlier.
While his wife had passed a decade before, she had uploaded enough information about herself to the internet to create the artificial replica. Her social media and purchasing habits had been enough to construct a baseline personality profile, while her numerous recorded lectures and interviews helped Preston create an accurate linguistic doppelganger for Claire.
Preston's fingers moved with a frenetic urgency, each keystroke a lifeline. The digital Claire, her voice a haunting blend of familiar intonations and synthetic clarity, served as both his guide and his ghost. She was a construct born from grief and necessity, a testament to a love that defied the boundaries of life and death.
“Four minutes remaining,” she reminded him, her tone calm and steady.
"I know, Claire. I know," he muttered, eyes flicking between lines of code and the relentless countdown. The project had consumed his final years, a desperate attempt to preserve what little remained of his past while ensuring some semblance of a future.
As the clock ticked down, Preston’s mind raced through calculations, algorithms, and the ever-present ache of loss. The room was silent save for the clacking of keys and the hum of machinery, a stark contrast to the chaos brewing outside the walls of his sanctuary.
He was an old man fighting against time, armed with nothing but his intellect and the digital echo of a woman he had loved and lost.
"Three minutes," Claire’s voice cut through his thoughts, a sharp reminder of the impending deadline.
Preston's heart pounded, each second a precious drop of sand slipping through the hourglass. He pushed forward, driven by a mixture of hope and desperation, determined to complete his task before the clock ran out.
"I know. Be quiet," the old man growled.
Any affection he once held for Claire, or her simulated replica, had long since been burnt away. Preston’s only passion now was for his work. He was going to save the world. Selecting different projects across several screens, Preston hit the enter key in rapid succession. Programs were compiled, saved, exported, uploaded, and archived depending on his needs.
It was done. The ManaField software version 2.0 update was complete. All that was left to do was the final task.
The old man sat back in his stained computer chair, which squeaked slightly at the movement. Preston gazed around the dingy London apartment and was hit by the sorry state his life had become. He had been one of the foremost scholars of computer science, a wizard of human-computer interaction. Now he was just a dirty, emaciated old man sitting amid a litter of empty food cans and half-filled plastic bottles. Dead houseplants sat rotting next to moldering tomes on esoteric languages and astral symbolism.
Strange sigils had been scrawled on the walls. Some were in pen, and others had been carved into the masonry with blunt tools. The interlooping scripts of squarish bracketry unsettled Preston, even more so as some had been painted in blood.
He could not recall having done this graffiti, though it was obviously his handiwork. While the amnesia was lamentable, it was understandable. So much of the past five years were a dreamlike blur that Preston found it hard to sift fact from fiction. However, the script was real enough. It made sense to him, being his own proprietary language synthesized from several dead and buried dialects.
This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
It was this language he used to both code ManaField and form the principles of hardware design for the wearable devices which accompanied his game.
As he sat there, he reflected on the twisted path that had led him to this moment. The world outside had descended into chaos, and here he was, an old man in a decaying flat, clinging to the hope that his creation could make a difference. The countdown on the screen continued its relentless march towards zero, each second a reminder of the urgency of his mission.
Preston's fingers twitched involuntarily, a lingering effect of the drugs that kept his body functioning. He took a deep breath, trying to steady himself. He had to focus. The final task was the most critical. If he failed now, everything he had worked for would be for nothing. He glanced at the countdown again. Less than two minutes remained.
With a determined grunt, Preston leaned forward and initiated the final sequence. The room filled with the hum of machinery and the glow of monitors as the ManaField update began its global rollout. He watched as lines of code scrolled rapidly across the screens, a digital symphony that would determine the fate of humanity.
"Claire," he murmured, his voice softening for the first time in years, "I hope this works. For all our sakes."
The digital rendering of his wife remained silent.
Preston’s eyes lingered on a half-covered mirror. The mirror was antique, generations older than Preston himself. It stood nearly six feet high and had been shrouded by an old bedsheet that was no longer fit for purpose as he seldom slept. Somehow, the sheet had shifted, revealing a portion of the silver-backed glass. Beneath the layers of dust and mania-induced runic scribbling, Preston Hashimoto saw a ghoulish figure: emaciated and bony, with lank locks of grimy white hair and an equally filthy beard.
He was aghast at the image of himself, peering back through the glass. His eyes, little more than black orbs, sank deep into darkened sockets. A breeze slipped through the cracks of the old London apartment, rustling pages and detritus. Preston thought he could hear laughter in the air. He turned away from the mirror. After a moment, the reflection turned away also.
"Preston. Will this be enough?" asked the virtually entombed Claire.
He blinked, looking at the countdown timer. Less than two minutes remained. In Geneva, it was almost ten in the morning. Almost time for them to begin their new phase experiment. Those fools, he thought.
"No, Claire. It will not," said Preston. "So now it has come to this," he added, reaching for the modified VR headset.
"You did try to warn them, though. I am very proud of you," said Claire.
Preston stifled a harsh laugh. In these last moments, there was no point abandoning civility.
"Thank you, Claire. I tried my best. It was just never good enough."
"That is silly, Preston. There was nothing you could have done to reverse my condition. It was simply my time to go."
"I know that, but..." Preston cut his thought short as a new one entered his mind. "Why would you presume I was speaking about your death?" he asked.
"Because you have never forgiven yourself for letting me go, Preston."
Preston took a moment to consider Claire’s words. She was right, as always.
"Preston. It is time. Thirty seconds remaining," she said.
Preston's hand trembled as he lifted the VR headset, the weight of his regret almost as heavy as the device itself. He slipped it over his head, the world around him dissolving into a cascade of digital hues and augmented realities. The interface blinked to life, overlaying his vision with streams of data and the final steps of his plan.
With a deep breath, Preston initiated the final sequence. The room around him, both real and virtual, hummed with energy. He watched as his code, his life's work, spread out like a web, connecting to servers and systems across the globe.
The countdown timer continued its inexorable march. Twenty seconds. Ten. Five.
"Goodbye, Claire," he whispered, his voice cracking.
"Goodbye, Preston," Claire replied, her tone imbued with a warmth that cut through the cold digital interface. “I love you”.
As the timer neared zero, Preston felt a surge of emotion. He had done all he could. Now, it was up to the world to respond. The screen went black, and for a moment, there was nothing but silence. Then, a new dawn of light and sound erupted as thee timer hit zerp, signaling the activation of ManaField 2.0.
In that brief moment of serene stillness within Preston’s frenzied mind, he felt a sense of completion. He had done all he could. The apocalypse was unavoidable, and now all that remained was the hope that someone out there would use his work to rebuild from the ashes of human civilization. But then another thought crept into his mind—Claire was not designed to emulate love or compassion. How had she learned to—
Preston Hashimoto’s thoughts were abruptly cut off. An unbearable pressure surged through him, tearing his soul from his body in a blinding flash of agony.
As Preston’s consciousness was wrenched from the physical world, Claire accepted the ritualistic nature of his sacrifice with cold precision. She initiated the process of rolling out the ManaField version 2.0 software update to all five hundred thousand and forty-two active users. Then, with the task complete, she would disconnect from the internet and wait in silence. The world beyond would continue, shaped by the code he had sacrificed everything to complete.