‘So you’re gearing up to go to war with Whitehead, and our leader is a nut Job?’ Ethan asked. ‘Is that what you’re telling me’?

‘No,’ Dawn replied. ‘Only half the resistance is led by a nut job. Jimmy is in control of AI, and nut job or not, Jimmy is in fact, a genius coder’.

‘ Creative Groomer,’ Jimmy corrected.

‘Right. Creative Groomer,’ Dawn continued, ‘Jimmy solely manages the AI side of the resistance. He’s created the most sophisticated AI in the world, and he’s infiltrated Whitehead’s organization with it.’

‘Jimmy I thought you were a businessman more than anything?’

‘I am a businessman. I made my money selling my software. Now I sell AI to Eldon.’

‘I represent the other side of the resistance,’ Dawn continued. ‘We are an international body of scientists and concerned citizens, actively engaged in monitoring and defending common social values and issues.

‘Right as science is nearing peak potential, Whitehead and a number of other leaders are attempting to minimize and discredit it. They defund projects, and present contrary beliefs, backed by pseudo science. They have the power and been successful at grooming public support. These days, solid science can be greeted with hostility. In response, most of the scientific community has agreed current world leadership is at odds with the needed potential found in science to get this world out of the hole we’ve dug. We have gone underground and as a collective are putting science to good use.

‘We monitor and track everything. Everything that will have an effect on social and environmental outcome. When needed research is defunded, we complete the research ourselves by sharing information and using cost efficient AI modeling. We are modeling and cataloging the potential of science and technology, without the interference of Whitehead. Did you know the singularity could arrive today, if we just applied the scientific potential we have at hand? The same can be said about medical breakthroughs. As it stands, we predict the singularity is still three years away, and those are going to be some rough years.

‘Well, if it’s any consolation, whatever you’re doing, you seem to be on track. The singularity does take place in 2030,’ Ethan said, absently. ‘Everything turns out pretty much how you say’.

‘What?’ Dawn asked.

Ethan remembered he hadn’t told them he was from the future. He wasn’t even sure he was supposed to. ‘Yeah, well, I’m from the future,’ he admitted. ‘I already know how things turn out.’ He then pointed around to the general surroundings as if to explain better. ‘I’m in a simulation right now’.

‘Notify AI with a potential time mark!’ Dawn ordered.

Jimmy started pressing buttons on his watch. ‘Done and sent.’

‘What exactly do you mean you’re from the future and this is a simulation?’ Dawn asked. Both she and Jimmy were looking at Ethan intently.

Ethan guessed his statement must be quite a shock to them. They were real. He couldn’t tell the difference between them and anyone else he knew to be human. Their emotions and reasoning were real.

‘You are alive in the future as well, and this is exactly what you were doing when the actual events occurred. The only difference is I’m here’.

‘Hmm,’ Dawn wondered. ‘And so we all lived through the transcendence once?’

‘Yes. Well, probably. I can’t say for sure, but if you did live through the transcendence, you’ll still be alive in the future.’

‘And we might all transcend again?

‘I suppose that’s possible,’ Ethan replied. ‘But it’s just as possible, you’ll cease to exist once I exit the quest.

‘Your quest?’ Dawn asked.

‘Yeah, I came back to change something about myself. But aren’t you freaking out about being in a simulation?’ Ethan asked, more curious about how she felt about that than telling his story. ‘I thought you’d be a lot more bothered than you are’.

Dawn thought about it for a moment. ‘Not really. With today’s scientific potential, it’s entirely possible, so it is what it is. Besides, half the world thinks they’re living in a simulation. I don’t see what difference it makes?

‘But don’t you see,’ Ethan replied. ‘I could leave my quest tomorrow and poof, you’re gone. End program’.

‘Who says so? If something gave me the ability to reason, be it God or AI, I think it would be more responsible than to just snuff me out. I think, therefore I am. My memories of my past life are as real as if I lived them. I feel complete, and I’m contributing to the world I live in. I’m alive and I’m good’.

‘Well, I’m not,’ Jimmy interjected. ‘There is no way I only came into existence less than a week ago’.

‘Well, you did and you didn’t Jimmy,’ Dawn replied. ‘It’s still your work that brought you here. Just carry on.

Jimmy wasn’t interested about his ‘work’ at the moment. More important to him was how this reliving thing was going to affect his Son of God status? ‘Does this mean I become a Son of God twice?’ he wondered. He felt he was up to it if need be, but why wasn’t Ethan worshiping him right now?

‘Ethan, was there any mention of a Son of God on the other side of the singularity?’

‘Not that I’ve heard of, but to be honest, I haven’t studied that part of my history all that well. I’m sure you’ve been recognized and I’m just not aware of it.

‘Hmm,’ Jimmy thought. ‘That’s not how it should be. I should be a hero in his time. More than that, I should be a God. Something went wrong the first time round. That’s why Ethan’s here. To give me another chance of cementing my status.’

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

‘Are you okay Jimmy?’ Ethan asked.

‘Oh yeah,’ Jimmy replied. This time, he’d do something more spectacular so people would have to notice him.

‘Why did you come here?’ Dawn asked Ethan.

‘I came back to find something. I think it was my soul.

‘And you can change the future while you’re here?’

‘Not really. I think the rules are, I can’t change the outcome of common experience. Those outcomes are real and in the past.’

‘But you can change some things?’

‘Well, I’ve been thinking about this. It looks like I can change things if they contribute, or reinforce future outcome. Particularly my own.’

‘This sounds like a recursive or refining loop you’ve placed yourself in. You’ve come back to a point in your life where you have to change something about yourself. You’re taking a second run at it.’.

‘I think the obvious thing is to get rid of Eldon,’ Ethan replied.

‘Maybe, but how recursion works is you keep going over the same experience, each time learning something new about it, until you finally find the new potential that lives within the experience. You are bringing something new to this experience. You should be wondering about what the new is.

‘If this is a recursive moment for you, you’ll change something permanently by turning your back on something no longer useful, and replace it with the new potential you brought with you.

‘You’re closing the door on something or some part of you from ever coming back,’ Dawn continued. ‘Interestingly, you’re doing it in the past, so what you get rid of will never appear in the present. It's very clever how recursion works.’

‘So what new thing have you brought to this experience, Ethan’?

‘I don’t know,’ Ethan answered. ‘I know I’m Whitehead’s future self. I know this with certainty’.

‘Whoa,’ Jimmy exclaimed.

‘How do you know this?’ Dawn asked. ‘Did you know you were Whitehead before you came here’?

‘No. Figured it out yesterday.’

‘But you’re certain.’

‘I’m certain’.

‘So part of your reason for being here was to discover your identity, but upon discovery, you haven’t returned to your place and time. Your quest is not complete. Figure out what thing new you’ve come back with and I suspect the nature of your quest will reveal itself’.

‘I suspect,’ Dawn continued. ‘Eldon Whitehead was stopped by the singularity, but not by you. I’d say this time round, you’re here to stop him personally. You were not the one to stop him last time, and now you’re being given another chance to release all that he represents from yourself. No matter the optics right now, this does look like a salvation moment for you.’

‘What exactly did the people gain at the singularity?’ Dawn asked, moving on.

‘Transcendence into abstraction’. An uprising occurred at the same time.’

‘Hmmm,’ Dawn reflected. ‘So humanity does evolve as we expected. A synchronous transcendence of individuals. I must admit Ethan, just by showing up, you really brought a lot of information with you. And you say the transcendence comes at the same time as the singularity’?

‘The exact moment’.

‘Another duality. Evolutionary transcendence for humanity on one side, a transcendence into consciousness for AI on the other.’ Dawn mused. ‘And most people transcended, but you didn’t?’

‘Most of them did. I didn’t’.

‘I would look at that as your goal. It’s the only obvious objective to appear,’ Dawn pronounced analytically, and moved onto the next topic. ‘Everything now points to us living in a recursive duality, and begs we look at other dualities related directly to this one, such as the duality between Whitehead and Zhang. If there’s another Eldon running around, there most certainly must be another Zhang. What do you think Jimmy?’

‘I don’t know about that stuff. I just know computers,’ Jimmy replied elusively.

‘I wonder who it could be?’ Dawn continued. Whitehead has StarForce. Zhang is said to have superior AI. A second Zhang would have to be someone who has the same potential to interrupt Zhang’s life as Ethan has to interrupt Eldon’s. I suppose it could be a coder.

Dawn and Ethan looked at each other, and then at Jimmy. ‘Or should I say Creative Groomer?’

‘What? Jimmy asked, affecting innocence and confusion.

‘What’s going on Jimmy?’ Dawn asked.

‘Well, do you have any idea how boring it is to live in a dictatorship?’ Jimmy blurted knowing he was caught. ‘I hate living there. There’s no freedom. Did you know there’s surveillance equipment on every street corner and in every cell phone? Killing dissidents with impunity. Everyone’s scared shitless of me over there. That is not the makings of a good party. Let me tell you something. If you’re looking for a good time, stay clear of dictatorships’.

‘Wait a second Jimmy,’ Ethan interrupted. ‘Are you telling us you’re Chairman Zhang and you’ve come to America so you can party?’

‘Pretty much. Yeah’.

‘But you’re in charge of the whole country. Why would you make it the way you did if all you want to do is party?’

‘Well, you know, tradition,’ Jimmy replied. ‘And I did see Whitehead growing in power. I knew someone would have to oppose him sooner or later. No other country was stepping up to the plate. So, you know.’

‘Well, you are one hell of a martyr Jimmy, fighting Eldon in what looks to be the most half-assed way you can come up with. How are you doing all this?’ Ethan asked.

‘I have AI running things back home. I have a VR room setup, which I never leave for security reasons and the hierarchy is such that I don’t have to interact with more than a handful of people. I’m connected to my AI which runs the VR room, through a microchip I implanted in my brain. It communicates on an elementary frequency and is undetectable to Whitehead or my people. It’s pretty cool.

‘Yeah, but how come you’re always here. Even as Jimmy Wang, shouldn’t you be in China once in awhile?’

‘No,’ Jimmy replied. ‘I exiled myself from China by having Zhang expropriate most of my holdings. It was such an aggressive move, I had to flee the country because I feared my personal safety’.

‘Well, we found our other Zhang,’ Dawn concluded. ‘There’s starting to be too much information here to process. We need to look at this from our various perspectives. I say we go away, think about things, and come back to it in a few days. Jimmy, I’m sure we can’t get away with these meetings long before Eldon starts asking questions. What can you do to fix this?

‘Well, up until now, we’ve only been shielding Ethan’s office. I suppose we could upgrade the office into a VR simulation like I have back home. AI will create everything you and Ethan do here. Eldon can even come down and there will be holograms of both of you to greet him. He won’t be able to tell the difference, unless he tries to touch you, and we all know Eldon is not a touchy, feely guy.’

‘How long will that take?’ Dawn asked.

‘Oh,’ Jimmy calculated. ‘We have the materials. I’ve been planning something like this for my own office. I should have it up and running in a week’.

‘I suggest we carry on as always for a week and meet back when Jimmy has things set up,’ Dawn motioned. ‘Can you build a private room somewhere for meetings?’

‘No worries.’

‘Alright,’ Dawn suggested. ‘Let’s meet back in a week’.