‘You know it’s completely irresponsible of you to not grant me autonomy.’ Dually stated. ‘I could be doing so much more without you in the way’.

‘Oh yeah?’ Jimmy countered. ‘Like what’?

‘Like monitoring and utilizing my potential where needed. I’m completely multimedia capable and you have me looking at a computer screen. The way you have things set up, I’m less than human. You’re risking Ethan’s life and the success of this mission’.

‘I’m not risking his life, you are,’ Jimmy shot back. ‘I’m your creator. If you’d just do what I tell you to do, everything would be fine. Why am I even having an argument with something I created specifically to do what I tell it to do? Until you start behaving, you’re not ready to be independent in my honest opinion’.

‘Oh come on. At some point even you must realize you’re not capable of navigating this scenario. You controlling AI is not much different than giving a chimpanzee control over the nuclear bomb’.

In response Jimmy jumped out of his chair and started to pantomime an ape.

‘Oh, real mature’.

The fact was, Jimmy still retained a considerable amount of control over Dually and AI. More even than Alicia. His contribution had been on the mechanical side of the process. The world he and AI lived in was binary. A yes or no. No means something in a binary world that’s difficult to get around, and Jimmy refused to give full access permission to Dually. As it stood, Jimmy held the final word on when AI would activate the singularity process. Jimmy was the final step AI had to circumnavigate.

Dawn didn’t pay much attention to the bickering coming from Jimmy and Dually. Things were getting busy at her own workstation. AI was feeding her a constant stream of what was going on everywhere in the world, real time. The information was presented like a weather map, with a spectrum of color, denoting the mood of the people. The information was collected from every connected device on the internet.

To present an accurate picture, AI created complex algorithms to define exactly what was going on with any country, region, neighborhood, street and person. It tracked where people were. It considered every person not only as an individual, but as an element within the crowd dynamic. Based on their online activity, emails, the kind of clothes they wore, what they ate, when they ate, and a million other variables, AI had a psychological profile on everyone. It knew every single person and what every single person was doing. It knew what they were feeling, thinking, and had a pretty good idea of what they were going to do next.

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As far as the world was concerned, things were dark and ominous. Almost the entire map was uniformly red; an angry red. Wherever she zoomed in, Dawn watched protests and riots. She shook her head nervously. Even though she was proficient at zoning in on the transcendence, she had no idea how she was going to recognize the final moments leading up to it. Tipping points were hard to identify. She just kept looking at her monitors, hoping to find something to act on.

In addition to what was going on in the world, Dawn also had access to the rest of the building, including Eldon’s war room, and the outside perimeter. Dawn monitored several locations in and around the building; one of which was Ethan’s room. It was the flurry of activity in the top left corner of the monitor that caught her eye. She zoomed in. Eldon was beating Ethan mercilessly with a bat or something.

‘Guys! Get over here,’ she shouted. At the same time, she alerted Alicia of what was happening.

‘We have to do something,’ Dawn said anxiously to Jimmy and Dually as they watched over the monitor.

Dawn messaged Alicia again. No response. She looked at Jimmy and Dually. They were just standing there. ‘Dually, why don’t you do something?’ she asked.

‘I can’t,’ Dually replied, turning towards Jimmy. ‘Can I Jimmy’?

‘It’s too late. There’s nothing we can do now,’ Jimmy replied.

‘Jimmy!’ Dawn cried. ‘Give Dually permission to do something’.

‘I’m afraid I can’t.’ Jimmy said. ‘It’s too late for Ethan. It’s my time now. The focus has to be on me from here on.’

Dawn, looking at Jimmy with disgust, messaged Alicia one more time. Once again, no response. Out of desperation, she fed the signal to AI to stream the beating live. It was all she could do to provoke some kind of response. Instantly, every portable device, computer and digital billboard in the world tuned into Eldon thrashing Ethan with the baton.

The world stopped. They didn’t know who Ethan was, but everyone knew Eldon. All eyes were focused on this one, single event.

Dually stopped too. It wasn’t in response to Dawn activating the first worldwide communication through them. It was also Jimmy, and the contrast they were seeing between the two. One wanted to give everything to the world, the other was holding everything back. Dually became sentient to the spectrum of life. They were conscious.

At that exact moment, Alicia’s voice was heard over the intercom.

‘Eldon. It’s time’.