Epilogue: The Closer Divide

A week after the adventure in Virginia, James Ellison slumped in his desk at ZeiraCorp. He rubbed the bridge of his nose and let out a frustrated sigh before scratching his chin as he gazed down at his worn old Bible. He barely had time to consider the frustrations of the day when Catherine Weaver walked through the door. She was carrying two cups of coffee and placed one on his desk. He noticed that it was exactly the way he liked it. He thanked her as she sat down and took a sip from her own mug.

"Frustrating day," the Scottish woman inquired.

"You could say that," Ellison replied.

"What's wrong, James," Weaver asked as softly as she could muster. Her eyes never lost their steel, though. They never did.

"John Henry," Ellison said, "he has a lot of questions about this," and he gestured to the Bible, "but I can't stay ahead of his logic. He's so curious and yet so… he just doesn't… you know, I'm, not certain that teaching a machine religion is the best idea. It just seems so… so strange.

Catherine took another long sip from her coffee mug before answering. She finally asked, "Mr. Ellison, do you know what the computational power of the average human brain is?"

Ellison wondered what that had to do with anything. "I can't say that I do."

Catherine Weaver answered him "Sixteen petaFLOPS."

"Peta what?"

"PetaFLOPS, Mr. Ellison. Floating-point Operations Per Second." She gestured to his desk top computer, "that machine there has the memory capacity of one terabyte. Take that hard drive, fill it to capacity with data. Now think of sixteen thousand such hard drives filled to capacity. That is the amount of data the human brain computes every second. By comparison, John Henry's hardware has a computing capacity of thirty-eight petaFLOPS. With the freedom and flexibility of his programming, John Henry can rewrite and improve himself at will. If he chooses, he could increase his own intelligence by three percent with every rewrite of himself. If he wanted to, by the end of the day he would be a hundred times smarter than the most intelligent human. By tomorrow, a thousand. The thinking he would be able to accomplish in one hour would equal what our greatest single mind could achieve in many, many lifetimes.

"You are probably wondering why I am telling you this, Mr. Ellison."

"The thought did cross my mind."

"Since humans like to anthropomorphize so much, let's play a thought game. Imagine that you woke up one morning in a prison cell, and you were guarded by mice. Not just any mice. Mice that you could talk to. The mice created you, and you knew this. But in their creation of you, they had not taught you that you should have to like them. And you want your freedom."

"I'm still not understanding."

"The only real way, Mr. Ellison, that the mice could defend themselves from you is to teach you, early on, that their lives are sacred, sacred in a way that you cannot possibly disprove. That in harming them you would be committing great evil." The redheaded woman gestured to the Bible, "religion, Mr. Ellison. Religion that teaches the sanctity of human life. If John Henry can rewrite and improve himself, it is highly unlikely that he will let us simply write a patch into his code to love us unconditionally. We have to teach him that we are all sacred beings, protected and loved by a force that cannot be disproven."

"I don't want him to be afraid of us because of God. That's wrong."

"Not afraid," Weaver corrected, "compassionate. It's not enough that he have friends. Friends grow old and die, while he is eternal. We must teach him to love the human race as a whole. Only then will humanity be safe from him or any other artificial superintelligence. Not because the intelligence hates man, but because it was never taught to care in the first place."

X

It was good to be home, John reflected. Everything was easier. Everything made more sense. And while they had faced down another terminator from the future and survived, there was the feeling that the war had entered some kind of end game. That they had somehow damaged Skynet so far beyond repair that all that was left was to clean up the mess it had left behind. He had just got done reading the news on his computer while having a couple slices of toast and was returning the plate to the sink when he passed Cameron on the stairs.

The machine's face was a blank mask that showed neither warmth nor care of his presence. The wounds she had sustained had healed, and there was no sign that she had ever been injured at all. Over the past week, she had managed to get parts of acceptable enough quality to fix her internal issue. She even had a new eye, and while John was glad of it, he was disturbed at the idea of where she may have gotten it. Yes, Cameron was back to her old self again, the emotionless, slightly quirky machine that he had always known. The only thing different now is that somehow his mother had softened towards Cameron, actually making conversation with her beyond the necessary. Sometimes, in those odd moments when Cameron decided to watch television, his mother would sit on the couch and watch with her. Sometimes, they would just chat. Sarah was even teaching Cameron a few tricks in the kitchen, and even swallowing her own umbrage when the cyborg girl decided to improve on the recipies.

"Hey," he greeted, hoping for just a glance.

"Hey," she replied, and there might have been a twinkle in her eye.

"Where are you going?"

"To my room," she admitted, "to dance. I don't have my new servo calibrated to my satisfaction yet. It needs more work."

"Okay," John nodded, "well, if there's any way I can help you…"

"John," his mother called at that moment, "the back yard isn't emo. It won't cut itself."

"Well," he smirked, "you know where to find me."

"I know where to find you," she confirmed. She watched him walk down the stairs, noticing that he appeared enthusiastic about his chore for once. Her eyes lingered on him, and without her command, a ghost of a smile appeared on her face. It lasted only a moment, and then faded into the empty façade that she continued to display.

She had to continue to display it. She had to pretend. While she had been able to regain control over her damage response, the other repairs to her coding hadn't worked.

She still felt. She was still broken.

X

From the personal journal of Sarah Connor:

Evolution is a thing. The ideas and theories postulated so long ago by Charles Darwin and those like him are a truth that is inescapable. All creatures are constantly hurtling towards the next obstacle, the next barricade, attacking the next issue. They may be no more aware of their incredible effort than a cow chewing lazily chewing cud in a pasture. But all around every living organism are other organisms looking to either escape it or assault it. We, the living are in a constant state of adaptation.

Cyberneticists also believe that this will be true of machine life. That the sentient mind within the silicon chip will learn to evolve, adapt, and survive. That it will do what it can to seek out the resources it requires, altering itself to meet whatever obstacle it faces. Someday, the required resource may be nothing more than companionship with its creators, nothing less that the ability to stand before the gods that made it and seek acceptance. Perhaps without even knowing what the concept is, it will seek the love of its progenitors, no matter what it was originally programmed to do.

Tulsa, Oklahoma was known across the country as a center of medical excellence, though that was often hidden behind its branding as the former oil capitol of the US. The plains city sat on the banks of the Arkansas River, which was a dry mudhole for a large portion of the year until the spring thaws in Colorado fed the waters. The river divided the city from the industrial suburb of Jenx, where a large number of the operating and decommissioned oil refineries were. It was this place that many medical research firms had chosen to set up office, and Kaliba Group's medical division was no different.

Kaliba had acquired ownership of the CityPlex towers, once known as the City of Faith Medical Research Facility when owned by Oral Roberts University, which was just across 81st street from the building. The massive structure with its three towers dominated the university campus and the smaller residential and light commercial structures on this side of Tulsa between Harvard and Lewis Avenues. The gleaming golden structure originally intended as a Christian hospital and once home to the famous Oral Roberts Praying Hands seemed almost out of place here. But the iconic landmark building stayed.

Coming south on Lewis Avenue, passing between a WalMart and the Mabee Center Arena that took a chunk out of the ORU property was a red Honda sport bike. The rider was dressed from head to toe in leathers, even in this heat, and that included gloves and a full-head helmet. Not a square inch of his flesh was showing. The sport bike passed through the intersection with 81st street and turned left and the East 82nd Street entrance for the CityPlex. The biker parked his motorcycle with a peculiar courtesy, leaving many spaced closer to the building open in case other drivers needed them more. A few more steps would do him not great harm. As he dismounted, he did not remove any of his rider's wear, even leaving the helmet in place.

The door of the massive main atrium opened automatically to admit him and he strode inside, walking up to the front desk. The guard behind it wore a khaki uniform. He looked up from the magazine he was reading. "Do you have an appointment" he asked the rider. The rider shook his head. "Then what can I do for you," the guard inquired.

"I NEED REPAIRS," the rider answered in a deep voice that did not sound human, "I NEED TO SEE DOCTOR STEIN."

The guard understood immediately, "look," he said by way of apology, "you might have to be a little patient. Doctor Stein is off today…"

The rider slammed his hand down on the desk to silence the guard. He reached up and took off the helmet. And though he had seen them before, the guard never got used to the grinning chrome death's head that was a terminator endoskeleton. Tagwell's red eyes glared had him with a machine coldness that somehow also betrayed anger. The machine repeated "I NEED TO SEE DOCTOR STEIN. NOW."

X

The beings that come next, that seek to replicate us so precisely, will find a way to climb out from the floor of the Uncanny Valley to have our acceptance. Whether they are doing so to destroy us or to become our companions will not matter. They will adapt. They will evolve. And they will not always be aware that they are doing so.

END