The Codex:
Codex Entry No. 2, The Intelligence War
The Intelligence Wars which began in 2299 and ended in 2314 was a conflict that altered the course of human history. Before this war, Mars and Earth collaborated freely with one another. Both worlds in parallel moved to develop Artificial Intelligence to help their leaders in governing.
Mars developed 9 AI initially for this purpose, one for each proprietary family who helped to fund the Martian project. These A.I were made from the minds of deceased former leaders who would understand humanity and their struggles. These AI, it was determined, would pass along the familial lines and accumulate the wisdom of not only their own years, but those of the people they would be bound with.
Earth developed one AI initially for a far different purpose. This AI was made with the idea of essentially replacing world leaders as a transcendent intelligence following a populist movement by the planet’s populace that sprung from a deep distrust of their former social systems. This A.I was designed from scratch and named Zeus after the Greek god.
Both worlds existed in peace until Zeus decided to expand his power and improve humanity using augmentation through nanites. Zeus used these nanites to manipulate and strengthen the humans he ruled. After some time and a number of atrocities like the education centers or the creation of the Genetics Oversight Commission, many of Earth’s people rose up in revolt triggering a planet-wide civil war that rocked the planet.
Fearing the consequences should Zeus win, the Proprietors of Mars decided to enter the war with the Maine Initiative, sponsored by the Lorvelle family. The Maines proved to be a formidable force and turned the tide of battles in the favor of the Humanists, and eventually one of them ripped the A.I core for Zeus out of the system entirely.
This war had many long-lasting results. The first is a deep-seated fear of AI in all humans across Earth, Venus, and Mars. The second is the creation of a formal Martian military. The Martian sciences surpassed Earths by leaps and bounds during this period, and the Lorvelle family became the Maine family. It is those two factors which lead to the war beginning during the time of my youth. It is thought that had Zeus never been created or had he even just left well-enough alone that humanity’s future would’ve taken a brighter path. Sadly though, so rarely do things in history fall that way.
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Chapter 3: Trust in things unseen
"Beware, Creator! You may have made something you cannot possibly hope to control!"- Zeus to Dr. Sarah Lang before being unveiled at MIT's Future technologies Expo in 2247.
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Head pounding and drooling like a drunk the morning after all over the floor, my eyes snapped open the next morning following a sharp kick to my ribs delivered by a Marine.
Disappointingly, my cell hadn’t changed from how I remembered it. It remained a box that was only three feet across, six feet high, and six feet long. Cramped living conditions of a similar style existed everywhere on the ship, no doubt.
The materials for ship building had become scarce on Earth. In the days past they received almost all of it from Mars, almost at cost. After the withdrawal of Mars from the Colonial Command though Earth had begun importing metals from the colonies and outposts through the Solar System. To help keep costs down, these days Earth recycled their old vessels and focused on smaller ship designs.
The guardswoman who entered my cell though had no interest in my fun history facts. She was too pleased with herself for trying to plant her boot in my esophagus.
Clutching my vacant gut, I groaned as I blinked away salty-hot tears. Looking up past the woman’s polished boots, I braced myself for another assault as I raggedly sucked in air. Fortunately, it never came. My stomach hurt terribly, but I had to admit that it was fading rather rapidly as my regeneration took to work.
“Listen up, Spaceman,” She growled as I glared daggers up at her, “You get the next few minutes to eat your breakfast, and then we’re going to take you over to see the Doc. You will not cause any problems, and you won’t give us a reason to shoot you. Understand?”
I didn’t respond which earned me a kick to the jaw. The sting in my mouth accompanied by the metallic taste told me I was bleeding even before I spit crimson onto the deck and growled out, “Understood.”
Turning away from me slightly, she then used her foot to slide a metal tray to me. The way she did this made me imagine how ancients probably gave charitably to lepers.
“You have no idea,” She spat, “How happy I will be once we have put you back on ice and begin the journey home. You’ll be forced to do some real good for mankind back on Earth instead of hoarding wealth.” Without saying anything more she left me to carry on with the Earth-man Continental breakfast. Though in all fairness to breakfast, I am unsure if what I was served qualifies.
Breakfast does not come in an orange wrapper. Breakfast is not made of some awful soy-based vegan horror designed on Earth from soy grown on Venus. Breakfast does not flake and crumble with each bite, nor does it taste so awful you would almost rather starve than eat it. It doesn’t feel stale by nature whilst chewing it, and it wouldn’t make you feel sick a few short minutes after swallowing it. Breakfast wouldn’t make you thankful for the taste of blood to give it some level of flavor, and it certainly isn’t accompanied by only a small bottle of water that tastes like it was put through a recycling filter that is on its last leg.
This was all of those things and so I would say this was “nourishment” rather than “breakfast”. It mattered little though as since I knew that food or even just nourishment could become scarce rather quickly, and so I ate it just the same.
Just as the last drop of tainted water traversed down my throat, I found myself collapsing on to my side to land as a heap of limbs on the deck.
I heard the guardswoman’s footfalls before I saw her boots. Only a moment there after did she and her companion, whom I never got to see, lifted me back up onto the stretcher from the day before. Once I was strapped onto the table it surged forward back towards the lab. Assess, adapt, act, I reminded myself again as the hall passed me by.
Anything, I knew, any bolt out of place, any door left ajar, any vent big enough to shimmy through could mean the difference between staying here or breaking free.
It was futile though. “There is no way to get an accurate picture of this hall when I can only move my damn eyes!”
Indeed, that seems a rather ineffective way to get data on your surroundings. You could just ask, buzzed the voice in the back of my mind.
My eyes widened, recalling the voice from yesterday.
To answer this question, no, the voice was not the most pressing matter on my mind at that point. Surprisingly sanity is a rather low priority when you are locked up in a strange place by a group of hostile aliens. I hadn’t given that voice so much as a thought until it decided to bother me a second time. It must’ve been the stress I was under, or maybe just fatigue from the previous day. I’ve never been quite sure. I do know though that my heart rate shot through the roof, and I flew into a minor panic. Well… I say minor but…
Go away, go away, go away, go away… I chanted over and over again.
That seems rather rude, the voice said with a somewhat amused tone as I continued with,
-away, go away, go away…
You aren’t going mad Thomas, the voice reassured me, the academy conditioned you too well to do that on only the second day of your incarceration. Let me try this a different way. Hello, my name is Zeus. I am an AI construct that was commissioned shortly after your ancestors left for Mars, and was officially decommissioned, repaired, and stored on Titan by the Maines to whom you call family. I understand that is a lot to take in, but I need you to listen. You have been out for six days in stasis before you were awoken. You were subjected to a prototype of the same nano-tech project that is now floating in your blood. You are part of the last test group, and today is the last scheduled day of initial testing before you are shoved into stasis again, so they can do more tests on Earth. I have no intention of letting that happen and if you want to save your kin and your world’s science, then you need to work with me. Are you willing?
I didn’t respond, and the voice let out a sigh.
I understand this is quite a bit to take in. I will leave you for a moment, so you can digest all of this. However, time is running short Thomas. We need to act soon. For both our sakes.
Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.
I felt the tingle in the back of my skull withdraw, and the gurney then stopped.
Heels sharply clicked against the decks; civilian shoes common for women on Earth. On Mars I had only ever seen such impractical things at galas and upper-class social events. Peering over me with tablet in hand, the doctor frowned as her eyes darted back and forth between myself and device.
“It would seem,” She muttered with a troubled frown, “that the second neurological signature has disappeared completely.” She looked back at her tablet and began muttering in a language I didn’t recognize.
Bengali, Zeus informed, according to her personnel file she was raised in and around the Indian Sub-Continent on Earth. It’s probably her native language. Translating now.
<<-ow are these nanites even present? I can only guess that the nanites created whatever materials they though were necessary for the augmentation process. This could prove to be the breakthrough we have been after! If- >>
At that point I tuned out, instead listening to Zeus.
She can't possibly be among Earth's best and brightest. It wouldn't take much to figure out that the reason your nanites work like they do is that they are modified versions of my original nano-tech augmentations. Earth's own testing and historical records indicated already those were a remarkably more stable platform which helped subjects exhibit every increased mark you are, just to a lesser degree.
Again, the voice, or ‘Zeus’, withdrew and I couldn’t help but feel some slight amusement at his barb.
I think it's safe to say that she likely isn't read in on the full extent of this project, I thought at the Voice, in fact, I have a suspicion these tests aren't in the scope of her original duties. She's probably just doing them to show initiative.
This brought up question that I hadn’t really considered.
How exactly did Earth start developing these nanites without us knowing? Also, if they have it then why are their soldiers and citizens not already using it?
Those nanites, Zeus buzzed in my mind, are derived it would seem from one source. Mine. Thie difference is that the nanites seem to be considerably less advanced than what I used.
I didn’t respond to that thinking, if this is supposed A.I. really is Zeus I am not going to validate him through his technological achievements. That may set a bad-
I can still hear you, Zeus buzzed, and it does not matter if their nanotech is based on mine or not. That nanites I've armed you with are far superior, even to what I used to manufacture.
<<-which means we will finally be able to- >>, the doctor, still going on.
However, Zeus continued as I again ignored the good doctor, looking at the designs the hardware differences are actually minimal. Software is really where the differences show, and the prototype nanites I modified for you were armed with a Martian coding language.
They stole Martian designs, I thought darkly.
You really should be asking yourself who gave them the designs. Heads up, Zeus alerted before falling quiet.
<<-So, then we will begin the last of the preliminary experiments. I do not expect you to win these, I am just curious to see if you survive. Your regenerative ability is primarily what is of interest to me now.>>
I felt a chill run down my spine as I deciphered what that meant.
To test regenerative ability, I thought as my heart sank into my stomach. Morality and caution were immediately trumped by my instincts to survive, she would have to injure me.
I am now felling receptive to a plan, if you have one, I yielded, mentally reaching out to Zeus.
I had come to 3 key conclusions that brought me to that point while on the table.
First, my ability to assess was hampered by the suppressor on my back. Second, there was no adapting or acting possible in the given time-frame due to the suppressor on my back. Finally, I was running very low on time.
Choosing the path of the wise then… I am remembering why I picked you. Very well. Engage the subject and manipulate him into destroying the device on your back. A good over hand strike of some sort should do it.
So, I just need to get this guy to smash the suppressor? That’s it? I asked, more than a littel underwhelmed.
The stretcher started forward as he answered, yes. I will handle the rest.
Bumping and clanging through the doorway, I entered the test chamber from the previous day. With the shrill cry of an unoiled wheel the platform halted, and my binding were undone.
Raised from my left it shifted and for the second time that morning I fell to the floor in a heap.
Electricity seemed to rush up my spine, restoring my motor functions to me.
Rising to my feet the good doctor wasted no time filling my ears with her voice yet again.
“This will be a test to see how much punishment you can take. Please know that the only pleasure I will take from this is in the invaluable data you will provide me. Your suffering will further humanity! Now, let’s begin.”
The near soundless
My eyes widened involuntarily, all my training on emotional concealment forgotten as synapses reconciled memory with the present.
“Riku?” I breathed in some variance of awe and horror. Previously standing at 6’7”, he now towered at almost a whole 7’3” and looked like one of the statuesque figures of the ancient Greeks.
Riku Ito, Zeus dramatically boomed, a man whose been made invincible after bonding with his experimental combat armor made with the latest Mars Labs wonder metal, Nexus 7. His suppressor disk is keeping him under the control of your captors. Communication with him is impossible at present. Focus on survival and breaking your suppressor disk.
I nodded uneasily and braced myself for a pounding.
If their suppression tech is anything like ours, I thought, then he will default to basic tactics that have largely undisciplined stylings. This will mean he will act like a bar-fight brawler, not a trained soldier, I thought as he stepped further into the light, showing his own orange outfit.
Sure enough, he broke into a run that shook the deck. His movements were slow, even his jog, so I ducked under his wild right cross and attempted to punch his unguarded stomach. This proved to be a mistake. To this day I can still feel my bones crunch in my hand, and my face screw up in pain.
Estimated recovery time: Two minutes. Tell me, what part of ‘invincible’ did you not understand? Zeus quipped
The literal nature of the words as it applies in this context, I growled, switching to a defensive stratagem of dodges and ducks.
This, I thought grimly, makes all of the years my cousins used to wail on me in sparring matches worth it. Next time I see them, I’ll have to thank them… Then kick their asses out of ‘my’ house.
Yes, fighting in situations like these wasn’t a new thing for me. Coming from the premiere military family on Mars, I had been trained via VR to know the basics of several martial arts and had become proficient in all of those by the time I was six.
"Proficiency and mastery come with practice," my uncle Shiro had always declared, normally while I was having the everything kicked out of me by one of my cousins.
“You may be the eldest child of James,” Shiro continued, “But you will learn like the rest of us.”
Those ‘lessons’ meant by age 12 almost every bone in my body had been broken at least once, a side effect of my lessons being administered by cousins several years my senior. None of whom I ever beat outright in a spar even once.
Fighting Riku, all of that came back, and I knew from those painful sessions, this is a battle of endurance. If I give first, I’ll be pounded to a paste.
With a quick step left I evaded another strike, which sent his fist into the wall panel behind me where it caught in the crumpled metal.
As Riku took a few moments to tug his hand clear of the ruined wall panel, I took a minute to catch my breath.
Quick question, I asked inwardly to my new A.I. as I considered the plan, my contacts were integrated into my eyes, right? They still work?
Yes, though it won’t provide too much of an edge, Zeus doubted.
It’s just to keep me going a minute or two longer. Can you do anything about the pain though? I asked.
With your permission, yes, Zeus confirmed.
Then get ready. I’m about to need it, I ordered as I twitched my fingers in a familiar sequence.
The Heads-Up Display flared to life and Riku was immediately highlighted in red. Disappointingly, though unsurprisingly, a pop-up appeared next to him stating, “No structural weaknesses found. Threat Level: 1”
“Damn,” I grunted as I narrowly avoided another swipe, he really is invincible! With strength so monstrous, a body so durable, and endurance that only the Martian Assault Corps could boast of I am outclassed entirely. This experiment can only end one way, and there is no point trying to waste energy I’ll need later to stave it off any longer.
Dodging one final swipe I ordered, “Now!”
Executing, Zeus buzzed back.
Numbness. The world became a sensationless nothing as my nanites halted sensations of pain in my nervous system just an instant before Riku’s punch impacted my shoulder. Though I may not be an immovable forced, I know an unstoppable object when I see one, or in this case rather felt one. Riku’s fists qualify.
The wet crunch of bone rang through my body, and in my numb state I was able to focus on using the force of his hits to “accidentally” land on my stomach. Predictably, Riku raised his leg and I mentally braced myself again as he ruthlessly stomped on me in like a machine rather than a man-mountain.
My heads-up display filled with injury notifications as I bounced around with my ears again filled with wet crunches of bone.
Thomas, Zeus buzzed in urgency, I am flat lining your vitals so we may proceed to the next phase. Do I have your permission to do this?
Hesitation.
One, then two more smashing on my nearly lifeless body. I vaguely recall the doctor calling the affair to the end in a panic.
Thomas it’s now or never. You can either trust your fate to me, or to some Earth science consortium. What will it be?
Not liking the alternative, I relented, I give you permission to flatline my vitals.
No sooner had I thought it than had my vision gone completely blue.