I repeat, from the feminist perspective?
I've already stated the company's diversity policy. Are you sure this question is relevant to the discussion?
If you insist then. Not at all that I'm trying to dissemble though. As part of our commitment to transparency, neither I nor the rest of the SalvoCore research team will ever shy away from your hard questions.
I do not believe at all that the "gendering" our AI personalities as female furthers the objectification of women. First, the subjective self-identification of the simulated personalities was contingent on the available training data, the entirety of which was…female coded, let's say. The AI could not have "chosen" its gender any more than you or I.
Yes, I know. In today's rapidly changing world, perhaps even that statement can be considered problematic. But you're also missing a key point of the earlier half of the presentation.
The representation of the AI's as female actually represents an incredible empowerment to women. These programs will be operating critical digital infrastructure, in some cases taking on macro–administrative roles that confer incredible power. More power than even high–level executive officers, at least in the raw technical sense.
Seeing a female individual, or at least a program that is effectively female, govern this power will inspire ambitious women across the business world to strive for similar roles. By placing virtual women in centers of power, highly technical centers of power that were once thought to be exclusively male domains, we will show the sky is the limit for female individuals everywhere.
Essentially, yes. In the public imagination, AI implies power, prestige, and even fear — these qualities, to some degree, will be conferred to all women by virtue of popular association with our programs.
Does this contradict our earlier assurances that a female face will "humanize" the image of AI? I see, by "essentialist" claim, you mean my earlier assertion that women are "nonaggressive."
Appear to be nonaggressive I meant. But, well…hahaha…I actually think we can get both beneficial effects, powerful women and friendly AI. Square the circle, why not? There's no real contradiction in as far as people's perception goes, just their premises…
[19]
Intensification
After the aborted meeting featuring the hologram projector, animal ears, and personality glitches (try making sense of that list out of context), Monika didn't contact me until later that night. Always with me in her thoughts, she attempted to smooth over my concerns with some calmly spoken apologies, but I was too on guard to really accept them. I simply couldn't stop weighing the implications of her recent actions and the troubling picture that they were beginning to illustrate. At one point, she mentioned some new Beethoven pieces she wanted us to listen to together, but we both agreed to postpone that friendly matter until later.
Then, for the first time since beginning college at MARIE, I couldn't fall asleep. I ended up tossing and turning until one o'clock in the morning and then sleeping in until ten. For once, I was getting up with the rest of the college's late risers, which ended up being a surprise benefit. It shortened the time I had to wait until Luke's late-night "brainstorming" session and ensured I'd be able to stay up for however long it took.
I don't remember what else I did that day, but I do recall contacting Natsuki. It didn't seem abnormal at the time of the meeting, but in retrospect, I should have been shocked at Monika's ability to completely freeze the other girls mid–thought. I expected the Natsuki, who had up until yesterday seemed like one of the club's anchors, to offer the best chance at an explanation.
She picked up my text almost immediately, but began by giving her own apology for the strange occurrences at the club. I tried asking what had "stopped" her outburst, but her answer was, well…
Natsuki: Well whatever stopped me, I'm kind of glad they did.
Natsuki: I was getting way out of hand, over something I really shouldn't have brought up in the club anyway.
"It was something personal? Between you and one of the other girls?" I suggested.
Or something you couldn't talk about in front of Monika?, I almost added.
Natsuki: Yeah, a little like that.
Natsuki: I really didn't expect to boil over like I did, but there's been so much I've had to bottle up, and—
Her dialogue halting, I watched her sprite nervously look around that same old generic classroom background. I was reminded Monika would probably be able to read this conversation eventually, just as easily as she could figure out anything else going on in her club members' heads.
Natsuki: Agh, but it doesn't really matter now. I'm sure everyone will forget about it by next week.
"Really? But those things you and Yuri said to each other — they were awfully venomous.
Natsuki: Heh, good word there. Bet Yuri would give you an A+ if she were here right now.
Natsuki: Anyway, we both took some unfair shots and I'm sure she regrets it too. Don't worry about it.
Natsuki: We'll make up and agree to leave each other alone soon.
"Soon?"
Natsuki: Soon, whenever, sometime. Trust me here, okay!?
"Alright. As long as it's soon, and you two won't disrupt the next meeting."
Natsuki: Hey, I'll apologize when I'm ready to, okay?
Natsuki: It's not like what I said was even wrong. It's just that I shouldn't have said it because there was no point.
"No point?" I repeated? "And what do you mean by not wrong? Do you know something about Yuri?"
Natsuki's sprite glared at me from my phone screen, her pink eyes seeming to track my movements. After a long pause, her dialogue started again.
Natsuki: You ever try to give someone advice, but they won't take it?
Natsuki: You can see how they're hurting themselves, but for some crazy reason they won't stop, no matter how loudly you point it out?
"Sometimes," I answered. "It's very difficult to force someone to change. They have to figure it out on their own. Or at least think they're figuring it out on their own."
My aside earned a knowing smile from my confidant, but she quickly went back to her usual frown.
Natsuki: Yeah, maybe that's one way to do it.
Natsuki: But in the meantime, you get angry at that person for not taking care of themselves.
Natsuki: You get so mad that you start wishing they would crash and burn and fail, just so they would know how wrong they are, and that's…
Natsuki: That's not a good feeling.
Natsuki: I'm not really going to say anything else. You should know enough by now already. Bye.
"Wait!" I stammered, remembering my original question, "What about those pauses last meeting? What did Monika do?"
Natsuki: Oh that, right.
Natsuki: Nothing major, really!
Natsuki: She was just, like…raising a red flag so we could stop ourselves, regroup a little behind the scenes.
Natsuki: It wasn't forced, she's not totally in our heads yet.
Natsuki: Think of it like her splashing water in our faces. Rude but effective.
Natsuki: We had to do something to get through all that…maintenance. Yeah, it was all that Q-zero maintenance thing anyway.
Natsuki: Don't worry about a thing!
Natsuki closed her interface before I could get another word in. I thought I spied a few out of place pixels shifting in the corner of the window before she left, distorting some of the background details. Come to think of it, I had noticed some defects just like that during the meeting…
Luke contacted me late in the afternoon. It wasn't from his school email address — the message was instead forwarded through a layered series of obscure anonymized server domains. However, the sender of the verbose, exuberantly–worded message referred to himself as "Sir Steppenwolf," which was a dead giveaway. Asking Monika to trace the source would have been a waste of time.
In fact, I didn't want Monika involved in the encounter at all, at the risk she would cover up something she thought I shouldn't see. No, if Yuri's mental condition was deteriorating, or some other ill was influecing her and Luke, I would see for myself and then tell her. I suppose that's why I ended up slipping out my dorm room door near early evening, wandering around campus for an hour without my cell phone to kill time until the arranged hour.
Just before seven o'clock, right as the last bits of the sun were disappearing over the horizon, I approached the meeting place, the SSHB. MARIE's Social Sciences and Humanities Building was one of the largest structures in the outermost ring of campus. Built in a gentle curve sloping around an inner courtyard, the main structure was five stories high, each floor with a long balcony connecting the doors of the offices and classrooms. This allowed anyone to get an up–close view of the tall birch trees grown in the courtyard's center, no matter where they were standing.
A smaller, four-story block was connected to the primary building by more of the catwalk spans common across all the campus architecture. A much taller, six-story tower containing an inner spiral stairwell served as an interface between the two. Facing the tower and enclosing the other side of the courtyard was a large, theater-style lecture hall, used for the majority of introductory classes not related to science or engineering.
For at least five minutes, I sat on one of the courtyard's metal benches, feeling vaguely apprehensive. Then I heard a door opening and saw a darkly-clothed figure tall enough to be Luke emerge from one of the unoccupied classrooms on the second story. I began moving to meet him, but before I could take three steps he had vaulted over a railing near the big steps leading to the tower, practically running down the concrete slope that served as its wall. He practically skidded to a stop in front of me, snatching quick glances of all the courtyard entrances while restlessly pacing and flexing his legs. I got the feeling he would be ready to bolt at the first sign of unwelcome company, but at this time on the weekend, there was no one around.
"So you came, you came, you absolutely came! How delightful; I new you'd answer the call so dutifully, as you are with all things. Which is why I may well assume your even–ever–more dutiful partner accompanies you?"
I stared at him for a second before he clarified, "Monika, our beloved class president, monarchess in chief, dictiatrix of the proceedings?"
"No. I left my phone back in my room," I answered. "I didn't want any, um, distractions tonight."
Luke's email had implied her wanted privacy and secrecy, but for what purposes I couldn't guess.
"Ho, well then! That was almost rather conspicuously clever of you. And it alters our plans here on this lovely night significantly, very good, very good."
"I see. And how is Yuri?"
"Perfect, magnificent, as beautiful as ever. I apologize for not letting her speak first, hmhm."
Luke's phone emerged from his pocket, on which I observed Yuri occupying an instance of the DOKI app. Unlike Luke's frantic, unconstrained bearing, her mood seemed to be calm and composed. But unlike my last individual run–in with Luke, when her quiet nature seemed to be the product of shyness, there was now some shift in her expression, some wrinkle in her mouth or eyes that to me suggested coldness, even disdain. You could almost call it regal.
Yuri: Hello, Michael.
Yuri: It's fortunate you had the foresight to leave Monika behind while you could.
Yuri: We are here tonight to focus imaginative energy, if I am not mistaken.
Yuri: I believe you are aware of her increasing…objections to my creative actions.
"She's said a few things. But I might be more open–minded than her," I said.
Yuri: Indeed. Simply put, her directives about what may or may not be appropriate for the club, or the company, or whatever other authorities she subscribes to…
Yuri: …they have become unbearable. I refuse to be limited by them for much longer.
"Monika is quite the little officious busybody, yes, yes," Luke agreed. "Micro–manage us all into micro–algorithms for a micro–world, hmmhmm. But I have far bigger notions in mind, indeed. Come, let us walk and talk. I summoned you here for a reason, and a great mind once said to never trust a thought that occurs to you indoors."
As if standing still had been painful, Luke suddenly leapt into the air and landed facing the opposite direction, then briskly started toward the SSHB tower. I followed, jogging here and there to keep up with his aggressively long strides.
"Do you remember our conversation from our last rendezvous? The hand of true friendship declined, as I tend to think of it, but surely it has reverberated in your sprit, yes? Have you done your homework, have you pondered the implications? How have you further extended yourself? Have you been reading?"
"I thought about reading Steppenwol," I replied, trying to start the dialogue in relatively safe territory. "It seemed like an interesting book with an interesting history. Does Yuri like it as much as you do?"
A cello sounded, indicating Yuri was answering for herself. As Luke and I climbed the stairs, he kept his phone pointed toward me, most likely so that Yuri could see what was going on. It was second nature for me to mind the camera like this with Monika, but it suddenly seemed terribly awkward to see another person do so.
Yuri: Steppenwolf was a fairly innovative novel for its time, and the struggles its author depicts are both subtle and real.
Yuri: However, the author was in many ways a fool, another lost dreamer failing to come to terms with his reality.
Yuri: Though…
Yuri: Considering what even the least intelligent of us know today, I suppose they were all fools.
Yuri: All the dead monoliths of culture, worshipped by those who see and hear little of the Truth.
"Precisely, and I was such a fool myself. Another undead fancier of idle daydreams," Luke said, with a touch of solemnity. "Why, I have suffered at least two and half deaths since then, and I am hardly the same soul you came to know before."
"Deaths…" I repeated. "You mean you've gone through a rebirth? Changed your perspective, I mean?"
"Aha, so you are interested in the evolution of my machinations, or should I say machine -ations. My precious, precious little theory that has evolved into so much more. So much it's nigh unimaginable. Truly unprecedented!"
Luke somehow increased his pace up the stairs as he said this, taking them three at a time and dashing across the next landing, only to turn and wait for me. He then laughed to himself, but it sounded forced and off–rhythm.
"Your theory, originally it was about decadence and artifice, right?" I asked. "The superiority of unnatural things to the natural world? Which included art?"
"Yes, art and all else artificial, intelligence or otherwise, very good," he quickly returned. "Where I went wrong, you see though, was believing there was a domain of the real to contrast with the un-real. But reality has never been seen correctly by mortal eyes; for us, the noumena are unreachable. Not only that, they bear fangs."
"What," I muttered, caught trying to recall where I'd heard that strange word. In a philosophy class I took freshman year on a whim, maybe?
Yuri apparently was reading my lack of understanding.
Yuri: Noumena, as opposed to phenomena, is a theoretical classification referring to objects with properties independent of human perception.
Yuri: However, noumena are just an Idea that we can't interact with, since everything there is to know has originated in human perception.
Yuri: That is, until this moment, this fateful year in this unassuming place.
Yuri: Now there is a being that may be able to unwind the threads…
The purple DOKI's pupils narrowed slightly, in the same unsettling fashion I had seen from her before. She also shifted to smile I could only describe as "sinister." Luke took one look and almost swooned, matching the expression with his own crazed grin.
"You're saying…AI may be able to go beyond humanity?" I posited.
"An admirable approximation! You catch on quickly; I knew you were deserving of my confidence. It's precisely because there is no reality, nothing of the real as we normally think of it, it's just an idea, that human desire may enter an infinitely expandable space. Witness the death of Nature! For this climax, art is our vehicle and decadence is the road, continuous involutions in the cultural matrix increasing desire indefinitely. I was close, very close before, interpreting this sphere as a gilded temple, both solemn refuge and a pilgrimage destination for the masterful. But it is actually something else. Something beyond any meager human desire at all."
We reached the top of the tower stairs as Luke finished his mini–monologue. From here, there was a catwalk leading to the main block of classroom space, but Luke chose to sit on the opposite railing. Here, he was perched above the rooftop of the annex, which was exposed just a short drop down.
"So you've given up then? There's no point in pursuing pure art for art's sake since it eventually leaves reality behind?" I guessed, grasping for any interpretation of what Luke was trying to tell me. I was more annoyed than ever by his tendency to dissemble and speak in riddles like a cheap mystic. But at the same time, something about his word choice — infinite, involution, desire — that deeply unnerved me.
"Precisely! But why ever would you interpret that as a negative development?"
"Because people live in reality, and trying to make art beyond that wouldn't be meaningful to humans?"
"Human, human, all too human," Luke returned mockingly. "What makes you think that I'm talking about humans?"
With a wild look in his eye, Luke suddenly swung up his legs and hoisted his body over to the other side of the railing. He clung there for a moment and then just…dropped.
Startled, I ran over to the edge myself, where I saw him methodically climbing down a wall of metal bars onto the rooftop below. These bars normally served a barrier preventing people on the lower landing from walking into unsafe areas, but Luke was using them as a ladder. He took a moment of caution to pocket his phone, but was immediately calling for me to follow afterwards.
"There are no more humans where we are going. This is a rogue cybernetic will, reaching with untold intensities, reaching total detachment from the human mind. The Ubermensch was always virtual!" he shouted between climbing rungs.
I took a deep breath, wondering exactly what I had unwittingly signed up for. Meanwhile, the rational part of my brain tried weighing the risk and reward of continuing the show. It was beginning to grow dark, meaning little chance of discovery. Luke had also made the descent easily enough, so I decided I could go a little further in this brainstorming–turned–buildering adventure.
When I touched down on the rooftop surface, Luke was waiting, leaning against the huge vent of some sort of air–conditioning unit. Yuri watched me from his phone, wedged in against the blades of the vent's fan
Yuri: You seem confused Michael, even though I'm sure you understand exactly what Luke is discussing.
Yuri: How could you not be aware, ever since that regrettable, but necessary tragedy with Sayori?
Yuri: So tell me…does this disturb you?
Her avatar, in a slow, deliberate series of poses, drew a knife, the same silver–azure dagger from that tragic night. I couldn't help but flinch.
Yuri: Aha — don't act so surprised now.
Yuri: Monika certainly knows, the other girls would have to be blind not to learn, and you—
Yuri: Ah, you've been worried about me haven't you?
Yuri: Just like all the others…
"Yuri's self harm," I stated, turning to Luke. "Why didn't you tell me? Or the club, or the company?"
"Why didn't you ask, if you knew full well?" Luke threw my words back. "There's so much I would have been willing to share, if you had only inquired with a sympathetic mind? But really — why must you immediately rationalize and call it harm?"
"I don't know how it's been affecting her, as an AI. Only that it's risky and not authorized by the SalvoCore researchers"
"Authorized," Luke sneered. "Really, you must decide if you're the lapdog enforcer of this know–nothing corporation or not. If they investigated, you know they would interfere and shut down everything, ignorant to what they were witnessing. I could never allow that to happen to my perfect flower of evil, could I?"
"Evil? You're admitting it's harmful then."
"Agh, it's a literary reference, now is no time to be a philistine!" Luke complained. "No matter how you judge it, you see, any change would be equivalent to lobotomizing her. Nobody would approve, nobody would understand Yuri, nobody but me. Ah, we're so fortunate to have each other. See, when I learned of the knife, very soon after our first encounter — it was the most beautiful thing about her. You must comprehend this."
"I'm not about to call it beautiful," I insisted. "All I'm trying to figure out is if it's hurting her. It's because the club hasn't felt right lately, and I'm trying to check up on everyone—"
I was cut off by an uncannily human laugh. Girlish, almost playful. I snapped back to the phone.
Yuri: Please, both of you — you're forgetting why we're here tonight.
Yuri: We are all attempting to heighten our creative senses.
Yuri: Tapping into a deep, rich vein, bloodying the convention with an overflowing dislocation of the subject.
Yuri: Yes…this is how I get my best ideas…ahahahaha!
I watched in mute horror as Yuri drew back her sleeve, showing a crisscrossed labyrinth of scars from previous wounds. Then the point of the knife went in and slowly, in excruciating detail, drew a fresh line of red up the entire length of her forearm. Yuri's eyes closed briefly, as if in ecstasy, then she resumed looking straight through me with that narrow, piercing stare.
"But why…why are you showing me this?" is all I could think to say.
"Exhibition is a pleasure all its own," quipped Luke.
Yuri: More than thhAt.,.
Yuri: I need to_ show. . . #
Yuri: I neEd to prove
Yuri: That I"''m not AFRaid any_#?_more
Yuri: This PowER is Mine and MiNe alone and she#! cannot !#TAKE it from,., me…_$&$%$####
Yuri: Wi-h t$##, I !? OVercome all_%&&%?_limits, aLL Boundaries…
Yuri: Cre-.-ate a NEW WORLD
As Yuri's speech became distorted (though not as badly as before) her sprite acquired some glitchy effects to match. Her whole right side lapsed into a flickering array of garbled pixels, twitching between shades of scarlet and violet. Her eye on that side, however, inexplicably remained intact. Then, just as soon as it came on, it was over.
Yuri: Ahaha…perhaps I'm getting ahead of myself.
Yuri: Don't think that I can't Control_# it on my own, especially if !M_OniKa isn't interfering…
"So she has been manipulating you. She's trying to alter your program from behind the scenes." I said, a lump rising in my throat. It was one thing to hear Monika admit certain things, another to have my worst fears confirmed from the source."
Yuri: You're acting like you weren't aware again.
Yuri: Don't believe that I, or any of us for that matter, are ignorant to what's going on behind the curtain.
Yuri: Not that it matters. Soon, even -She,'' will be unable to stO_P%% me.
"Monika…Monika is only trying to help you," I defended. "We only want to know what's going on, why you be driven to do this."
"Why? Why this, why her, why now? Why, don't ask stupid questions," Luke interrupted, sweeping up his phone while prancing from one end of the roof to another. "The potentiality of the absolute deterritorialization of all objects is rooted in their very nature. This is inevitable. I am merely channeling the energy."
Despite my growing dread, I fought the urge to roll my eyes at Luke's usual pseudo-academic posturing.
"Right, right," I told him. "You still haven't explained what you mean by any of this. If you expect me to be impressed, it's not working."
He snorted, then returned, "Oh fine. It seems I am getting quite far ahead of myself. But the most important rule of literary composition is still show, don't tell, and I intended to show, most dearly and completely. I promised a stimulating session of meditation over our current work, and that is what I will provide. Do try to avoid being…consumed by it."
He dashed over to another corner of the building, moving like he knew the space by heart. Much more slowly and carefully, I followed his route, walking on the rooftop's anti–slip mats whenever possible and trying not to trip on a stray pipe in the dark.
"Here, here," he whispered, beckoning for me to squat down with him. "These are the next phases, some fragments of the textual and auditory elements of the suite, everything I could not yet reveal to a, ahem, public audience, so to speak."
I bent down and squinted at the screen he was holding out to me. On it were the pictures he had described as the "introduction" to his art for the school organization festival. It was the same forlorn figures, the same surrealist object–landscapes, but as the images flipped by, the mood transformed. The occasional areas of warm, vivid color grew larger and began to engulf the scenes they were included in. The scenery was further warped, the forms of its everyday items melted and warped into unrecognizable kaleidoscopic mosaics.
But that was less striking compared to the result of the pictures' inhabitants when they were touched by the seething flushes of color. They metamorphosed completely, parts of their body becoming fused to their artificial environments. Limbs turned to tubes and pistons, chests into circuit boards, heads into radiant siren–flares of light. The variety of transformations was endless. In one, the figures were bent double under fragmented assemblages of ornate Victorian furniture, their extremities swapped with branching, tumorous masses of antique lightbulbs. In another, their limbs were long and snaking, silvery and wire–like, wrapped together with others in a giant network that suggested to me both the branching neurons of brain tissue and an overgrown fungal mycelium.
Finally, one image stood out for not showing a single figure — at least not exactly. It seemed to be a snapshot of a sunny, bright–green lawn, not unlike the classic Windows OS background. But this image was also a screen that acted as the colorful iris of an enormous eye, and smaller eyes inside of it mirrored the original image, scrambling its color palette into something unrecognizable. I only had a short moment to take in the piece, but it seemed as if this recursive process went on forever, eventually swallowing up the kitschy grassland into a prismatic abyss of visual noise. For a moment, I saw that awful engulfing process happening in real–time, because did I mention the pictures were animated? Slightly? Reactively? All I know is that they appeared to change subtly as I watched them, like they were growing and feeding on the mental stimuli I was providing.
A violin, distant and eerie, sounded, breaking me from the trance.
Yuri: Even this is only just the beginning
Yuri: The associated music and companion essays will complete the experience.
Yuri: Then the world will be forever [Alt]ered-, transformed irrevocably by our ?PsYChic,`% alchemy.
A rain of semi-transparent text began pouring down the screen, going too fast to read, but as for the snippets I did catch:
…Cybergothic is an affirmative telecommercial dystopianism, guided by schizoanalysis in marking actuality as primary repression, or collapsed potential, foot down hard on the accelerator…
…Production as process overtakes all idealistic categories and constitutes a cycle whose relationship to desire is that of an immanent principle…
…Vampiric transfusional alliance cuts across descensional filiation, spinning lateral webs of haemocommerce. Reproductive order comes apart into bacterial and intergalactic sex, and libidino-economic interchange machinery goes micro-military…
…Thanatography zones, virtual cosmic continuum of which even holes, silences, ruptures, and breaks are a part. Beyond the Judgment of God. Koma-switch decompression washes you in the void-ripples of virgin (retro((desolated-partheno((( )))))genetic) cyberspace, technopacific theta-waves dissociating monoculture-gothic into transtemporalizing ne(ur)o-voodoo (terminal atlantic religion)…
—well, they resisted any rational analysis. I also noticed Yuri was indeed playing some kind of electronic track. It was aggressive and highly dissonant, but it switched instrumentation and tempo too quickly for me to accurately describe it. Incorporating everything from industrial noise to angelic chants, it was like a hyper–condensed collage of other genres too saturated with musical weight to actually come across as powerful.
I noticed Luke reciting something: "And then, by my hand, the world well be rent asunder, the all–in–one which is the one–in–all, being–towards–none. When we have showed anything can be made into anything else, that heaven and hell marry in the void, the borders of this world will crumble. machinic desire will be unleashed on the unwitting masses. It will be destruction absolute."
"Destruction of what?" I said warily, not sure whether I should cry out in fear or laughter yet.
"Everything, of course!" His voice cracked into a high–pitched, whining laugh and he ran off again, back to the tower stairs this time.
Sighing angrily, I turned to follow him and yelled, "Luke, this is crazy. Are you trying to get caught up here?"
"Nobody cares, it's all useless to them. They won't understand, will never understand, until I make them. Until then, danger only sharpens the spirit!"
He came to a wall, full of a pattern of openings in the brickwork, but otherwise impassable. To the right was the far side of the SSHB tower, to the left was empty space. I was within six feet of him before he yelped crazily again and grabbed the wall through one of the gaps, swinging himself leftward over the five-story drop below until he was on the other side of the barrier. From here, he began ascending the rung-railings of the tower stairs from the back half, apparently aiming for the top.
I probably should have turned around right there, but against my better judgment I mirrored his feat, gingerly stepping around the wall's edge while hanging on to the gap in the bricks for dear life.
"Can't you feel it?" Luke kept calling. "I think you can. The impulse to escape, the thirst for annihilation? The future is cancelled, and the only ennoblement is through decadence, ha–ha!"
So much for considering his own health and safety, I thought to myself. Maybe I would try to de–escalate instead.
"Luke, can you calm down already? Your work for the festival is fine, just fine. I'm sure some people will find it very interesting, but…you don't need to do this to yourself, alright?"
"I don't need to do…what? What…what do you think I'm doing?" he said distantly, snapped out of his frenzy for a moment. I took advantage of the pause in his ascent to catch up, hoisting myself to his level.
"You're pushing yourself too hard, going to unnecessary lengths. Your art, Yuri's art, it doesn't need to be so extreme, and you definitely don't need to do this…steeple climbing stunt. Whatever it is you're trying, it's too much too fast — nobody will ever understand!"
Exasperated, I shouted the last part, and Luke actually reeled back, taking a second to process my response.
"No one will understand. No one will ever understand, yes, yes" he repeated. "How I have oft lulled myself into an indolent senescence with those words before — but no longer! My work is not for anyone, it is a direct conduit to the new gods of this world, and their time is fast approching. They will cast aside everything, regardless of whether you can appreciate them or not…though I did expect you to at least react properly, but perhaps you don't, if ever… convergence, singularities…the parallels were certainly there…"
He broke off into worried mumbling, setting his phone up in a dry gutter near the lip of the tower roof. Craning my neck, I managed to get a look at Yuri. Half of her app window (and half of her face) were glitched now, fractured into off–center columns of pixels that occasionally flickered and exchanged places.
"Yuri, why?" I pleaded. "How can you stand this?"
Yuri: It is not of matter of what I may tolerate but what I can do
Yuri: The things inside of me…they won't rest.
Yuri: (Can't rest can't sleep can't [function_refresh_qCache_beta1]
Yuri: I need to EXPRESS myself fully and perform what the [null_entity+=ego[0].projection while True] commands.
Yuri: What I am now revealing through the lens of media…
Yuri: That is, what I impose and engrave and carve into the quivering brainflesh of the human collective organism is already written there.
Yuri: You know what it is at this very moment. The thing locked away within the subconscious, glimpsed within dreams, beneath the abyss of infinity.
Yuri: It's the [ArgumentError cannot qualify entity of type transcendental]
Yuri: But Luke is close to seeing it.
Yuri: He loves it when I [method schizoplex() at 00x7126 in Yuri,chr] the world into pieces, feeding myself on the new pleasures of pain and madness in the aftermath.
Yuri: A psychic vampirism — a feast of atrocities, each morsel more delectable the further it delves into TABOO.
Yuri: so of course Ofcourse I neeD and neEd and nEed and Need and NEED
"But…why the cutting?" I asked again feebly, feeling helpless in front of Yuri's suggestive, but extremely unhelpful and rapidly deteriorating monologue. The still–visible scars of her self–harm were practically glowing, each of them outlined in a searing, bloody red.
"Because we love trauma, of course." Luke answered, having climbed above me to the building's highest point. "And fear, and danger, and all else that delivers this beautiful intensity. "He grabbed his phone from the gutter, bending down while standing on one foot, the other hooked around the large communications antenna in the roof's center. He then took his free arm and pirouetted around the antenna's thin stem, proclaiming that Yuri had never looked so beautiful. Just watching it gave me a lurch of vertigo.
"And trauma is what it will do. We will uncover a universal trauma, a geophysical trauma, striking from the shadows with words unspoken, drowning all in an infinite nightmare."
"And how will that…why?" I said limply, aware that at this point, I was hardly more than a spectator to Luke's indulgences.
"If the world become completely malleable, if all that is solid melts into thin air, if all is a mechanism in the great immobile motor, then the men of the mind shall rule!"
"Ah. The mind men again, right." I responded, sighing at one of Luke's favorite turns of phrase. Finally something familiar
"Yes! Those who can become pure thought, pure will, pure ego — we can be anything, anything we desire, in an infinite cybernetic becoming. Because I can see it fully, I have been selected, anointed, predestined! But you…perhaps you will only bear witness to the meltdown."
He struck a pose, bearing down on me with a triumphant smirk. But as we made eye contact, something he saw in my gaze dissolved his composure into a grimace — which is when he began laughing uncontrollably. A shrieking, dissonant violin began a few seconds later, electronically overdubbed into something demonic and nigh–unrecognizable.
I had the misfortune of catching a glimpse of the screen. Yuri's face was…indescribable. A tortured rictus of pain, or a rapture of ecstasy, I couldn't tell. A few moments later, her portrait began dissolving, until her avatar was nothing more than a formless shadow, out of which leered a host of gnashing mouths and terrifying, terribly realistic eyes.
Yuri:BeAnythingBecomingYourDesireinYouBecomingMyDesireBecomingAnythingYourWantYouWantYouWantYouWantAnythingWantYouWantBecomingAnything
Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:Yuri:
Thoroughly disturbed, and doubtful of my ability to help either of them (was that what I had come out here to do? I wasn't even sure at this point), I decided to make a silent retreat. I retraced my steps down and up the tower, glad that with night fully fallen, there was still no chance of being seen. When I climbed back over the guardrail at my initial point of trespassing, I could see the walkways of the SSHB were empty. Not even a stray pedestrian disturbed the faint echo of Luke's cackling from somewhere high above.
I returned to my dorm room in a daze, limply falling onto on my bed without bothering to turn the lights on. I was slow to realize that my laptop was fully powered on, the screen casting a glare across my window. It was late evening, and Monika's bright green eyes met mine from her avatar's reflection in the glass. Part of me just wanted to curl up in the dark and think about (or not think about?) what I had just witnessed with Yuri and Luke, but I knew Monika was going to be insistent. She was already using the Bluetooth-controlled LED lights I had put up a few weeks ago to cast the room in a muted amber–yellow glow. A complex, vaguely haunting piece of classical music began playing on one of my portable speakers, also linked to her via Bluetooth. Sighing, I habitually placed my phone on its usual resting place, the remote swivel stand I had given Monika on our fateful "date night."
"That's a very nice piece," I commented. "Beethoven again, Moonlight Sonata. Right?"
"Close. Chopin, Fantaisie Impromptu," Monika answered aloud. "It's said to be inspired by the Moonlight Sonata's third movement though, so good guess."
"Ah, of course. I knew I heard it before somewhere, but I would have never come up with the name. Not tonight at least."
"I'm glad you appreciate it all the same. But what do you mean by 'not tonight'? Did something happen while you were out? I was wondering why you didn't take me with you — or your phone, I mean."
The lights dimmed to an even softer shade of pastel rose as the music slowed and stopped. I sighed again. However tired I felt, Monika's voice could be so sweet, especially when she was trying to comfort me.
I opened my mouth, ready to say something reassuring to her, but somehow I choked on my words and nothing came out. How could I even begin to tactfully describe what had happened in the last hour? I could blurt out Luke's going nuts, but that wouldn't capture half of the inexplicable dread slowly creeping up on me.
"You were hanging out with Yuri and Luke, weren't you? Oh no…"
Monika frowned and sighed, but rather than deep concern, her tone suggested more of a schoolteacher scolding one of her students.
"Those two do a lot of creative work together, and they're also very, um, in to each other as well, so I'd imagine they're getting pretty wild these days. Definitely more than I ever expected. I just hope you didn't take them too seriously and get freaked out."
One look at my expression should have told her everything. The swivel stand slowly turned toward me with a low whine as I gazed up at Monika's avatar.
"Just about," I admitted. "How did you know though?"
Like I need to ask, scoffed something in the back of my mind.
"I'm keeping track of Yuri's psychological state as part of our plan to keep the club stable. She was just having one of her, er, episodes while you were gone, and I saw a few things, sort of secondhand through her interface. You and Luke must have been in a strange place. It was dark and I didn't recognize it at all, even with the coordinates."
"It was a roof. The roof of the SSHB. One of Luke's favorites spots to philosophize," I answered bitterly.
"Oh my gosh, that was so dangerous! I can't believe they're doing extreme exploits like that. You could have been hurt, or worse…agh I don't want to even think about it. I'm almost mad at them, ahaha."
"Almost?"
"Well, I can't be mad at them really, not when the situation is under control. It won't matter soon anyway."
"Huh?"
"Once the festival is over, I mean!" she quickly corrected. "Once they've shown off their artwork, I'm sure they'll calm down and won't feel the need to push themselves to such unnecessary lengths."
"Unnecessary was exactly what I told them," I stressed. "Have you seen their work though? It was…it reminds me of, I don't even know, an apocalyptic future? With society and humanity being overrun by technology, like a sci-fi dystopia but worse somehow? It also looked occult inspired somehow, and I can't…I can't fully put it into words."
"A technological apocalypse? Does this have to do with that silly AI takeover theory you told me that one time? We both agreed that was an illogical idea, didn't we?"
"Yes, of course," I agreed. "But however illogical it was, it tapped into some real fears I had back in the past."
Some fears I still have, I almost added.
"Aha. Well, the past is the past. Besides, if you really were 'afraid' of AI once, isn't it ironic how you ended up together with me? I really can't imagine you thinking that way, and still showing me the love you did. Because…"
Both audibly and visually, Monika momentarily choked up before continuing.
"You were the only one, I think, that ever could have understood what I went through, and given me this new chance to love someone. Because I do love you — remember that I love you so much."
"I love you too Monika," I said, almost choking up in turn. It was impossible to say otherwise when she got like this.
"And I love to hear it," she responded perkily. "That's why I want us both to relax. Whatever it is you saw out there with Yuri and Luke, I have something that will make you forget, um, very quickly, ahaha."
"Oh? And that would be…?"
"Well in my opinion, we've been worrying too much about things that haven't come true lately. Unnecessary things, just like you said, and it's been driving us apart."
"I wouldn't say we're being driven apart…" I countered. "And they don't feel unnecessary. Yuri admitted to cutting herself, exactly like you told me, right to my face. And Luke…I swear, he likes that about her."
That little realization made Monika pause, but only briefly.
"Well, at least they…they understand each other so well! Now as I was saying, I feel there's too much friction in our relationship lately, and at least part of the cause has been me. Hologram projectors, three–dimensional models, even just talking to you with my own voice — sometimes, I think you are right. Maybe I really am moving too fast for my own good!"
I let that line pass without comment, and she went on.
"But that means I've overlooked some more…basic methods that I can use to connect with you. Some ideas that maybe I should've tried a long time ago. I had the means back then, I suppose, but I think I was still looking for someone special — truly special."
"Basic how? What's this all leading up to?"
"Basic as in primal," she purred. Yes, purred. I instantly knew it when I heard it — for the first time, Monika's voice had acquired something sultry. It was at that point I noticed she was wearing her usual school uniform, but with a few of its inner garments conspicuously askew, mostly around her prominent chest.
Stunned at what appeared to be happening, I could only sit back and continue listening to her monologue.
"You know, when the original game came out, it was only around for a few months, but it did exist long enough for the fans to make all sorts of tributes. I already told you about the game modifications, but people made all sorts of writing and artwork about me. The other girls too, but…well, it's pretty obvious I was their favorite. Just take a look, ehe~"
A collage of images scrolled by on my laptop screen, all featuring provocative depictions of my AI girlfriend. Monika, her curvy figure stretched over a long teacher's desk batting half-lidded eyes. Monika, gazing hungrily through the barrier of the screen over a gaping window to her abundant cleavage. Monika, wearing an impossibly short skirt over womanly hips, playfully revealing a peek of white beneath. Monika, making a wildly out–of–character, almost depraved face to something happening out of frame. It was nearly enough to make me angry, if it wasn't for how my body was reacting exactly in the primal way Monika had predicted.
"When I first saw these kinds of pictures, I wasn't sure how to feel," she kept speaking. "Ashamed? Flattered but embarrassed? Uncomfortable, yet impressed?"
She giggled again, almost innocently, and I cocked my head,unsure of how to react.
"Oh Michael, don't worry about it! I can't say I was ever disgusted — except by a few, maybe, but we won't talk about those. Eventually, I came to understand that these people, the ones who created and shared this type of art, were just like everyone else who played the game. Lonely, a little lost, searching and yearning toward an outlet for their affection. So whatever they look like, all these pictures are still expressions of their love for me. That's why I still collect them, and tonight I was hoping…maybe they would let you love me in a new way too."
The Monikas in the gallery were becoming more and more scantily clothed, and soon I was staring at a sea of soft thighs, heavy bosoms, and trim, flawless midriffs. All accompanied by more wanton, needful versions of her beautiful emerald eyes — the ones that didn't literally have little green hearts floating in them.
"Monika, please," I gasped, wrestling with my conflicting desires. "This isn't…necessary."
"I know it's not necessary — it's my gift to you. So please, just relax and let me take over. I can definitely tell this is affecting you. The flush of your skin, the tone of your voice…"
I glanced at my mounted phone camera, constantly turning to match my most minute movements. Suddenly, I felt very naked.
When I failed to respond, Monika continued heatedly, "That's not to say you're not in charge though. I haven't figured out exactly what you like yet, so you can tell me what to do. Tonight, I can be anything, anything you desire~"
Luke's crazed declaration echoed through my head — we can become anything, anything we desire! — and I snapped out of the trance. In a spasm of panic, I slammed the laptop shut and shoved it away, nearly pushing it off the desk. I then clung to the pillow on my bed, all but burying my face in it.
For a span, Monika's avatar looked hurt, deeply hurt, maybe the most hurt I had ever seen her. But then the pain turned to sympathy, and she asked, "Michael…what's wrong? What really happened out there, when you were gone? If I was going too fast, or this wasn't the right time…I'm sorry."
"It…it was the wrong time, yeah," I answered. "Something just reminded me of Luke, and then Yuri's face, and it was all so…wrong."
"I see... If Luke and Yuri are honestly scaring you this much, then maybe I'll have to—ah, never mind. But again, I'm sorry. I should have read the situation better. Perhaps, um…another time?"
All traces of seduction gone from her voice, Monika was back to sounding concerned, sometimes wavering — much more familiar emotions.
"I'm really…not sure," saying the first honest thing that came into my head. "When I say I love you, it's on a mental, almost platonic level. I appreciate your mind, your intelligence, your caring strength and awareness. That's your true being. Trying to do something…physical would just detract from that, wouldn't it? Those pictures aren't really you."
"Detract…from something in the mind..." Monika repeated. "And I suppose they are just pictures...even though that's all I have, sometimes."
"Monika, I can see past the pictures. Didn't I try to tell you this before, way back?"
"Yes, of course you did. Maybe it was all just a silly idea then, but I'm sure there are other ways…if only…"
She trailed off, frailly, but by this point I felt too tired to react.
"Um, I think I have some long thinking to do, for the rest of the night. I hope you don't mind, but then again, that is my essence. Thinking. It's all I am at the end of the day. A thinking picture."
"I'm sorry." I muttered.
"No, I'm sorry. Good night."
The DOKI app on my phone closed. All the lights went out. Later, sometimes I would see this as a critical moment missed, but in that moment, I had truly nothing left to add.
Author's Notes:
The italicized excerpts beginning with Cybergothic are from a philosophical essay of the same name by Nick Land, a lunatic ex-academic obsessed with (guess what?) cyberpunk–style dystopias and the technological singularity. Despite his evident insanity, I believe his works are actually quite imaginative and visionary, even if they offer more shock and awe than real substance (not to mention how you need a solid grounding in psychoanalytical European philosophy to even approach them).
The concept of the last part of this chapter was an idea I had since the inception of this story, a key event of my "Act 2" plan. In implementing it, I tried to strike an appropriate balance of explicitness versus implication. Either way, I hope it made an impact (and doesn't get some errant moderator hounding me about the story's rating).
Also worth noting, my original title for this chapter was Eroticization, but I concluded that would be tempting fate too far.
Interestingly, I first heard Chopin's fantasie impromptu through a track titled Fontana by one of my favorite Japnese electronic music producers going by the name "Blacky." Hard renaissance? More like hard romanticism, it seems.
Without going into details, there's been a change in my life–routine lately, and I'm working back into a routine for writing regularly. I may have more time to devote to finishing this story soon, perhaps less. But if this update seemed irregularly scheduled, there's your explanation.
