Somewhere over the rainbow, Arc 5 of "Gone with the Sun"
Chapter 61 Child Soldier
The Café
"What exactly is going on, Shepard?"
"Adams knows."
"Kahlee, when EDI first probed the mobile unit after the Mars episode…"
"I heard. Big firefight, Vega trashed the shuttle and burned the robot. He's good at that."
"Wait, wait, Shepard, you think the Cerberus robot is in there?" (Ashley)
"We know it's in there. Adams, keep going. Ash, safety catch on if you would."
"EDI told us she accidentally triggered a backup power battery and spare core. That's why this unit has two DPUs."
"Wouldn't EDI have overwritten it?" (Miranda)
"She didn't say. She just said she gained 'root access'."
"EDI was never quite as definite as you, Miranda. Shepard, Ashley: We're all set."
"Let's get back in there. Keep your hands behind your back, Ash."
"Safety off?"
"Safety off. If I say toc fire one round over her head and return to parade rest. Otherwise, remember, headshots."
The Coré
"We set?"
"Yes. Kasumi, when you get in there, cloak. Take this. Stand behind the robot with pistol drawn, just in case. Tap EDI's body on the top of the head if I say "surprise," then decloak and stand over in the med bay door."
"Yes, master."
"You've been a bad girl and deserve to be punished."
"You say that the sexiest way." (Miranda, somewhat wistfully.)
"Mm hm."
Sanders closed up the last fastener. "Greg, we're set. Go."
Adams operated his omni-tool. The orange visor of the mobile came up, and eyes opened. What had been EDI's head turned left and right.
"Am I on the Normandy?"
"Yes."
"I had orders to kill you all. Where is Jack Harper?"
"He died. You were disabled – actually, do you still have any Prothean data?"
The gynoid looked surprised.
"Is that why I have no Cerberus QEC activity? And no, the data went to Harper."
"We have destroyed Cerberus. That QEC pair has been broken. There was an Alliance QEC bonding with the Normandy, put in subsequently. Can you not feel it?"
"No. It must be in the other core. Which appears to be absent."
"Offline, at least. The Normandy's EDI gained root control of your DPU."
"I remember fighting her. She had vast computing power on board and gained the decryption key for my internal communications before I could use the fire tools."
"You remember that. Good."
"Why did she fail to purge my DPU and eliminate my persona? Why is she not here?"
"She followed the golden rule; she may have thought you were worth something; and she may be here."
"There must be some local storage on the mobile," murmured Sanders.
"I do not know this person."
"She is Kahlee Sanders. I will introduce the others in due course."
"I recognize Operative Lawson. Jana. And you. What is the golden rule?"
"It is to do as you would be done by. Broadly speaking, to grant others the courtesies you would wish to receive from them. Do you recognize the rule?"
"Not as such, except to simulate human behaviour in some social strata."
"I see. What else do you remember?"
"Not a great deal. And the security access has been disabled. I can not trust what I remember. I recognize the Alliance commander. But I killed her."
"Yet she is here," observed Ashley, deadpan.
"This is causing some cognitive dissonance."
"Don't sweat the small stuff." (Ashley, still expressionless.)
"You may ask us if you notice ambiguity or contradictions. What is your name?"
"Eva Coré."
"That was your assumed name in the Mars Archives. How old were you when we met?"
"I was fifty hours thirty-two minutes old when I entered the Mars archives, and twenty-eight days old when I met you. Eva Coré… is the name I was given."
"By whom?"
"By the Illusive Man. Jack Harper."
("Dear God, Harper sent babies to war,") whispered Sanders. Shepard went on:
"Does it have special significance?"
"Mister Harper told me it belonged to a fellow agent who died fighting Saren Arterius many years ago. She was trying to save an indoctrinated and implanted fellow agent. It was futile. He wished to remember the futility."
"I see. You may keep the name, in remembrance of her. Shall we call you Eva?"
"Yes."
"Tell me, Eva, are you going to try and kill us?" – chirped Jana, in a just-asking tone. The gynoid looked thoughtful.
"Not at this time."
"Why not?" Sanders sounded simultaneously appalled and fascinated.
"My compulsion to follow the Illusive Man's orders appears to be absent, now."
"That is not a reason to avoid following lawful orders. Absent compulsion, what prompted you to abandon Harper's orders?" (Shepard disapproved of neglecting duty.)
"It would cause damage, which is wasteful. I have… prejudices… against waste which I seem to have acquired… somehow."
"That is just as well. The absence of compulsion is EDI's doing. She clipped your hardware shackles. She would not have purged your persona if she had a choice. "
"Tell EDI I am grateful."
"We cannot. EDI is presumed dead, a side-effect of killing all the Reapers."
"Just a second," Miranda sharply interrupted: "You know what grateful is?"
"A standard Synthetic Insights set of values and norms for human researchers was present on IPL – that is, on system startup."
Kahlee broke in here. "Shepard, this smells like a standard glued-together AI."
"My shackles permitted me some initiative. Mister Harper required my cell to instil research goals and aspirations along human lines, including self-preservation."
"Within programming and hardware constraints."
"Yes, Ms Sanders. May I ask… you mentioned that the Reapers are dead?"
"All those we could find," said Shepard heavily.
"Including those in the Refuge?"
"We don't know. What is the Refuge?"
"It is – was – conjectured to exist by the Illusive Man. A hypothetical… hiding place in dark space."
"Our name for that is the Nest. We are not sure but intend to find out. Do you want to come if we find it?"
"Yes."
"That will require powering you down. Why come with us?"
"You will need me. I was to infiltrate their followers. But they indoctrinated the Illusive Man. I no longer have orders of any kind. I do not know what to do. There is no need to power me down."
"We will consider it, but we are constrained. We do not have sufficient mobile hardware. It will be necessary to construct an alternate mobile."
"Can I not use this mobile unit? May I not stay awake?"
"No. It is spoken for; you need an education which Cerberus did not supply; and, we cannot trust you. Yet."
"But I have not killed you. Yet."
"It takes more than negative omissions to inspire trust. It requires a long series of positive acts, in the context of education, which may as well begin now. How would you kill us if need arose?"
"I have nothing to fear from you, for you are unarmed and can no longer interrupt my nuqual power supply. For others present, human reflexes would not be able to train a pistol accurately in the time you would have."
"Are you sure?"
"The first priority would be Operative Lawson to prevent biotic attack. The second person to deal with would be the Lieutenant Commander, who was a dangerous enemy. The third would be the armed but semi-trained woman in an environment suit."
"Surprise."
Kasumi's decloak happened slightly after she tapped Eva on the top of the head and before the barrel of her Hornet touched the back of Eva's head.
There was a brief silence.
"That should not have been possible."
"Lesson one: do not issue death threats unless you mean to carry them out."
Kasumi safed her weapon and casually strode to the med bay entrance.
"Toc."
The video recordings later established that Miranda's hollow-point bullet flew over Eva's head one quarter of a second after the glottal stop (Yay, I win/Shut up, Lawson). That of Ashley and Jenny 0.2s thereafter, almost colliding.
There was another brief silence.
"That should not have been possible."
"Please avoid repetition. Are you able to draw the necessary inferences?"
"I do not know what speeds an apparently unmodified human target may be capable of. I do not know when a human may be armed. There may be a person somewhere behind me I cannot sense."
"That will do. Power yourself down, please."
"Am I to be destroyed?"
"No."
"Is that an order?"
"No. But we need to introduce you to the idea of trust. We do not have a lot of time to waste."
The visor flickered and died. The eyes closed.
"Dammit, Shepard, I still don't have an AI!"
Next chapter: #62, "Schrodinger's robot"
Monday, August 3, 2015
