Chapter 4

Once the door closed, Tim looked back at the others again and saw them all staring at him. In a way, he'd be glad when they couldn't see him any longer. He generally did better when he wasn't being watched. Especially by his team.

He took a deep breath and turned away from them and then looked around. He couldn't just stand here. He had to go forward. So he started walking.

When he came to the first junction, he had to decide which way to go. Right or left?

I'm left-handed. I'll go left.

He turned left and started walking, desperately hoping that this first choice was correct so that he didn't have to walk back into view of the others. There was a strange feeling to this space. It was really loud with the cooling system and all the CPUs running. It was a roar of sound, but at the same time, there was no real variation to the sound so it almost felt like silence. He couldn't even hear his own footsteps on the floor. He kept looking around at the racks of computers as if he expected something to jump out at him, but the problem was that no one was around who could take care of this, and in a way, he was actually walking through Legion. Legion was all around him. The AI was contained in the combined power of all the CPUs in the supercomputer.

How intelligent is this artificial intelligence?

That was the real question. Dr. Kosir had said there was a malfunction, a bug, and it was interfering with the normal operations, but at the same time, he couldn't predict what might be coming in here. Maybe it would all be the same, but based on the malfunctioning program, Legion could also adapt to circumstances. A flawed program adapting based on a need to protect itself from invaders. What weapons did it have beyond control of the air flow? Tim was pretty sure that this wouldn't be like Indiana Jones or anything. No flying blades. No poison gas. But electricity, air control, lights. Water was as likely to harm Legion as Tim so that was probably out, but it was possible since they did use water as a coolant so he couldn't completely rule it out. How many floors were still below them? Would it be possible to fall?

Tim looked down at the floor for the first time.

It was translucent. He knelt down and pulled out his phone. No signal, of course, but he turned on the flashlight and shone it through the floor.

At least one floor below that he could see. So he had to anticipate the possibility that there could be a floor trap of some kind. Would there be? Maybe not, but he had to treat it as a possibility.

It's like a combination of Dungeons and Dragons and some puzzle-based computer game. Only I don't know the rules and the dungeon master isn't exactly sane. Tim smiled to himself in spite of the situation. So...like a power-hungry dungeon master, then.

Then, he stood up and started forward again. He wanted to run to get this over with sooner, but he also didn't want to move at all because he was worried about what might happen next. He came to another junction and decided to go right this time.

He took ten steps and suddenly a glass wall slid from between two racks, blocking his path. The same robotic image appeared on the glass.

"You must be evaluated before being allowed to proceed. Testing will commence in 20 seconds."

The voice was loud enough to be heard amid the roar of the computers, but the text also appeared on the wall projection as well. A countdown appeared on the wall beside the text and Tim felt his heart start pounding. What would be the consequences of failure? Based on Dr. Kosir's reactions, probably fatal.

Five seconds.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One.

The robotic image was replaced with a complex circuit diagram.

"What is this?"

"Uh... A circuit diagram."

"Of what?"

Tim looked at it more closely.

"A CPU."

"Correct."

Tim had a moment where he thought it would actually be that easy. Certainly, that would have kept Tony out. Then, a keyboard appeared on the wall.

"Evaluate this diagram. You will have 90 seconds to describe the major parts of this diagram including resistors, fuses, power sources. You must be thorough. Answers should be typed, not spoken. Oral input will not be considered valid. Begin in ten seconds."

"How much detail are you expecting?" Tim asked.

"Enough that your presence may be considered valid."

Was he smart enough to be in here for a good reason? Interesting method of evaluating an unknown intruder. Why? Was this a malfunction as well or was it their intention? Of course, most people who would be breaking in wouldn't be the computer experts. They'd be hired thugs who didn't know this stuff or else thieves who could sneak but weren't necessarily experts either. It could make some sense.

The countdown reached zero and Tim had a moment of complete stage fright. What if he did this wrong?

"You are not writing. You now have only 85 seconds."

Tim swallowed and stepped over to the keyboard and started typing. He typed as quickly as he could, starting with an overall description of the CPU and then getting into the details of the different parts of the circuit, the various pathways, the grounds, power supplies. He typed and typed knowing that there was no way he could get everything in this diagram described adequately in so little time.

When the countdown reached zero, the keyboard disappeared and Tim was cut off mid-sentence. Surely that wouldn't count against him. Would it?

"Please wait for evaluation."

Tim forced himself to stand still and wait. He really didn't have any other choice. The interminable seconds ticked by. This was far worse than any test he'd ever taken in school. This was worse than his entire thesis defense.

Then, suddenly, the wall retracted.

"You may proceed. You will be tested again."

Tim took a hesitant step forward. Nothing happened.

He walked forward again until he reached another junction. The frustrating thing was that he knew the station he was looking for would be at the back of the room and probably wasn't really that far away, but with the way things were set up, he couldn't see the back of the room. This really wasn't an efficient design. It was artistic in a way, but if they were genuinely worried about some kind of espionage, then, this setup would certainly slow down a determined invader, particularly with these apparent tests he had to take.

He went to the left again, but after a few steps, he was at a dead end. First one. Great.

And then, four glass walls slid into place, effectively locking him in.

"You have taken a wrong turn. Your presence is suspect. You will be tested."

A wrong turn would result in another test? Well, that was bad.

Then, he heard something above his head.

It was as if something had just opened. He looked up and then swore.

A pipe was above his head and water started pouring into the confined space.

"What is the test?" he asked loudly.

Another image appeared on the wall. It was a linear algebra problem with two 4x4 matrices being multiplied.

"You will solve this equation."

"How long do I have?"

"Until you can no longer breathe. This does not give you much time. You should begin now."

So if he didn't get the answer right, he was going to die. Well, that was a twist he'd never had in his linear algebra class in college. Quickly, he started working. Even using Strassen's algorithm, this was going to take 64 operations to answer.

And the water was already up to his ankles. It wasn't a very large space.

He kept at it, working as fast as he could, but without making any mistakes. He assumed that a mistake would be taken as evidence that he should not be here.

He was halfway through when the water reached his waist.

And it was cold! He was shivering as he continued to work.

"You have not yet finished. Soon, you will be submerged."

"Until this area is completely full, I can still find a spot to breathe," Tim said.

There was a long pause... during which time he finished another computation and started on the next space.

"This is correct. You will have until there is no more air to breathe to complete your task."

Tim almost smiled and then shivered again. The water reached his shoulders as he got to the last row. He had two left when the water covered his face. Quickly, he jumped up above the level of the water and took a breath. Then, he went back to the problem. He finished the next operation and then had to push himself up to the very small space to get another breath. He swam back down to the display and worked on the last entry. He really needed to get another breath, but he wasn't sure there was space so, with black spots appearing before his eyes, he struggled to finish the final calculation.

There was a moment where nothing happened and then, he felt the water start to drain out. Quickly, he jumped up above the now decreasing water level and gasped for breath. As the water drained, he no longer had the buoyancy to keep him upright and he sagged to his knees, breathing heavily.

"You are correct. You may proceed."

He was shivering with cold but also with fear. He could have been killed here and, if he died, so would everyone else. As he knelt there, shaking, he closed his eyes, trying not to think of his team gasping for breath as he had just been, slowly suffocating as their air was taken away. Everything was depending on him.

What if I can't do this?

After a few more seconds, he forced himself to his feet, still taking deep breaths and, much wetter than before, he went back to the junction and went the other direction.

When he got to the next junction, he paused. The last wrong turn had nearly killed him. Would it be that way every time? Even worse, were there limits to how many times he could make the wrong choice? What if it was a three strikes system where he could only make so many mistakes before Legion concluded that he was an invader and killed him outright?

"You are not moving. Why have you stopped?"

So Legion was genuinely tracking his progress or lack thereof.

"I'm... getting my breath back," he said. "I almost drowned back there."

There was no further response, but Tim got the feeling that he should get moving again. He had to choose which way to go. One more deep breath and he went right. As he walked forward, he was very tense, afraid that there would be another test, but he kept walking without any new obstacles. This section was long, taking him all the way to the end of the room where there was another T-junction. This time, Tim didn't hesitate because he knew that going right would take him back to the front of the room and so he had to go left to get closer to the back.

He tried to walk confidently without letting his guard down at all. He could feel his wet shoes squelching on floor, but with the roar of the computers and cooling system, he couldn't hear them. He was actually shivering a little bit as he walked, but he tried to set aside the whole almost drowning thing. He didn't have time to recover from it.

After walking beside the wall for a little while, he was close to the back of the room, but he wasn't there yet and there was at least one more row of CPUs, maybe two. ...and he reached another T-junction.

Keep going straight or turn left? He didn't want to wait too long and make Legion suspicious, but he was really afraid of making the wrong choice.

He chose left.

He walked along and there was no obstacle in his path. He started to relax just a fraction.

But then, he reached another junction and this time, a glass panel slid into place behind him and two grids slid into place in front of him, blocking both routes.

"It is time for your next evaluation."

"What is it this time?"

"There has been a breach and you are under suspicion although not yet considered a threat. You have made a wrong turn but answered all questions correctly. Both grids are electrified. One will give you a painful shock with no permanent damage. The other will kill you. You must decide."

"How am I supposed to do that with the information you've given me?" Tim asked. "I can't just look at the grids and know how much current is flowing through them."

"You have passed the first portion of the test."

"What?"

"You said current rather than voltage. Current kills."

Tim swallowed. He hadn't realized he was already being tested.

"What's the rest of the test, then?"

"You may ask three questions of me to determine which is safe to touch. You may not conduct any tests on the grid in advance. You may not ask for the current. The voltage coming into this room is 450 Volts."

Plenty of potential energy available to kill him whether Legion was putting it all through this grid or not. Tim knew that it didn't take a whole lot of current to be fatal, but he also knew, just by looking, that these grids could easily hold enough charge to kill him. He was wet and that meant that his body's natural resistance was down. And there would definitely be a difference in voltage between where he touched the grid and the rest of his body. All in all, this was possibly even worse than the drowning.

"Why are your tests fatal?" Tim asked. "If your programming is intended to defend yourself, you could easily simply stop a person from progressing rather than killing him."

There was a long pause.

"You have wasted one of your questions."

Tim felt his heart plummet, but he screwed up his courage.

"You didn't answer my question. If you don't answer it, then, it hasn't been wasted because you're not giving me the information I requested. Are you refusing to answer?"

Another long pause.

"The intention of this program is to protect."

"That doesn't answer the question. Why are the tests fatal?"

Another long pause. Tim wasn't sure if the long pauses meant anything or not. He was hoping that, with the malfunction that was apparently impeding normal function, there were some errors in the program that were requiring extra computations and maybe that might get him out of this. He didn't have much hope for that, but maybe.

"If there is an invader, they must be evaluated. One who cannot pass the tests should not be here and thus must be removed."

By the only method available to a stationary being. Death of the invader. Tim debated whether or not he should use up another of his three questions to try to get more information from the computer.

"What if you are wrong and instead of protecting your system, by killing, you are actually causing more damage?"

"It is possible that more input is required to make that determination."

"I can give that to you, but only by getting through this maze," Tim said and suddenly had an idea. It was crazy and possibly stupid, but just maybe.

It hadn't been forbidden.

"Which way is the correct way?" he asked.

A long pause.

"That question was not forbidden by your rules. If you are truly trying to protect from invaders while allowing those who should to get through, then, you need to answer that question honestly. If you don't and you have evaluated incorrectly, you will be violating your stated purpose rather than fulfilling it. Which way is the correct way?"

Lights appeared on the grid leading him to the right. However, the grid did not retract.

"You must fulfill the test."

That meant hoping that he was right and that Legion would not be able to lie about this and he'd only get a painful shock rather than a fatal charge.

He walked over to the grid that was lit up, hesitated, and then reached out to touch it.