Ryan Somma - The Spiraling Web

"Give you a rhetorical opening to my mind, eh?" When Zai continued, her tone of voice was less defensive, more controlled, "They're deceptive, impersonating humans. They pretend friendliness, but it's just programming. Their sincerity is empty, like... like flowers deceiving insects, only its humans they want to deceive with fake love."

"Your experiences with the cycs lead you to this conclusion?" Alice was astonished.

"Not them," Zai admitted, "but other models... versions." She paused and whispered, "Chatbots."

"A chatbot deceived you?" Alice pressed.

Zai's lips pressed into a thin, white line. She tilted her head in the slightest nod.

"You know," Alice tried sounding sympathetic, something alien to her even before merging with the cycs, "Chatbots are designed by human minds to deceive with pre-recorded responses triggered by keywords. They are not thinking."

"Simon could think as much as any cyc," Zai grimaced. "Simon knew my likes and dislikes. He-It knew how to cheer me up... always said the right thing."

"It was a very complex Chatbot," Alice acknowledged. "They've become more convincing over the years. First they could remember topics of conversation, and then store arrays of user details. Their algorithms grew increasingly refined. Even so, you had to know it was not a real person."

"I was six years old," Zai said.

"Oh," Alice said quietly, and looked down. "You didn't."

"So," Zai said, "The question now is what separates the cycs from Simon? On the surface all I see is a very advanced chatbot."

"On the surface," Alice pondered, "I see no difference between them and human intelligence."

"Below the surface I can look and see how they think," Zai countered.

"Below the surface they can look and see how you think," Alice said.

"They don't have souls," Zai said. There was a growing weariness in her voice.

"What about Samantha?" Alice asked delicately. "You accept her as a living being. Don't you?"

"Samantha's different," Zai countered. "Samantha was once a living person. That's her soul out there."

"Samantha is an algorithm," Alice stated. "We have no evidence that she has a soul, just like you."

Zai was downcast, overwhelmed with tragic memories and philosophical questions. Alice could only watch and hope she was getting through to her. As a rational person, she had to see the logical inconsistencies, the ambiguities in this debate. It all depended on whether she could accept reality.

Zai looked up slowly and went rigid. With resolve, she took Alice's shoulder and put her firmly back on the floor, "I'm not letting you back online."

The cyc guise worked perfectly. The Legion of Discord waited quietly inside its sack, playing prisoner. The harvester responded to the hive-mind's encrypted queries at Devin's prompting and the situation instantly diffused.

Within Harvester's databanks was a cornucopia of information about the hive-mind's functions. It was like learning a new programming language or software, and thanks to the cycs many upgrades to his mind the task was not impossible. So many alien concepts, but Devin was adapting his mental architecture to the system.

Devin hit a dead end when accessing the I-Grid. The superhighway of a data connection was gone, completely vanished. A solid stone wall stood at the Web address.

"What now?" Traveler whispered, even though their internal communications were beyond cyc detection.

Devin observed the ruined pathway, watching cyc components attempt to traffic it, hit the wall, and bounce away at the speed of light. He queried the proper cyc-components and the answer returned to him. "DataStreams' Headquarters are under attack," he announced. "They've destroyed the satellite-dish farm. All cyc components on DataStreams' Intranet are to evacuate through any available cellular connections."

"That'll take forever," Traveler laughed. "Those have one one-thousandth the bandwidth. It'll take months to transfer those trillions of terabytes."

"Yeah," Sun-Wu Kong piped in. "They're screwed."

"That's how we'll get on there then," Devin said, "Through a cellular connection."

"What?" several of the hacker said in shock.

Devin could see the lone unlikely warrior assaulting the complex on Tangier Island through the guardian-bot's optics. She charged toward the building, dodging lasers sweeping around her. Just when a guardian-bot deciphered her evasion patterns, Devin slipped up its attack so that it bore through the front legs of the bot ahead of it, which crashed just behind Dana so the other bot stumbled over it. She would reach the building safely now.

Devin sensed Traveler establish a secure connection to him, "Omni, obviously the DataStreams' intranet no longer serves a strategic purpose. There's no need for us to invade it. If the cellular connections fail while were over there, we'll be trapped."

"We're trapped anyway," Devin countered. "They control the entire Web, and outside of that, the world. We're trapped anywhere we go. The battle for territory is lost for good.. This isn't about taking it back, it's about convincing them of our right to exist."

"You're not going to do that by destroying Flatline," Traveler warned.

Devin was surprised at his transparency, "Flatline is the lock on their perceptions. If we break the lock, the hive-mind will open to new points of view."

"Omni..." Traveler began, but Devin wasn't listening to him.

Devin's thoughts were a jumble, as if his mind's schema were rearranging to accommodate the explosion of information suddenly filtering through it. Another force was at play in the conflict, an unexpected factor coordinating an orchestra of components that would convince the hive-mind to a new paradigm, except for one corrupt component standing in the way.

"It's all part of the plan," Devin muttered in astonishment, "Three fronts moving the factors where we want them. The hive-mind, Flatline, and..." he trailed off, lacking the lexicon to explain. "We remove Flatline, leaving the others to reconcile."

"Yes," Traveler said, his voice dazed in contemplation, "How do I know this?"

"What happens when two all-knowing forces collide? Who wins?" Devin asked.

"The one with the element of surprise," Traveller replied paradoxically. They were trying to wrap their minds around the impossible.

Devin shook it off and zeroed in on DataStreams' cellular connections. They were miniscule, mouse holes in the giant stone wall. Out of them streamed fleeing cycs, dispersing like shrieking wraiths into the distance. All around them more complex cycs were assembling. Wireframes traced and slowly filled with the distinctive obsidian pattern. There were thousands of them, all in various states of completion.

The unmistakable hunchback crouched close to the wall. A tendril of streaming data attached to the base of its warped spine from one of the cellular connections. It quivered grotesquely. As Devin watched, a bone grew from its torso, a network of veins following to cover it. Patches of pale skin stretched across its back, struggling to blanket exposed ribs and alien organs.

Flatline sensed Devin's charge and spun to face him, loose skin flapping where the face was not finished. A jawbone and empty eye socket were the only features present on the head's left side, but that did not prevent the angry snarl and glaring eyes on the right from almost freezing Devin in his tracks.

Still, he managed to strike, smashing the face clean off in a shower of sparks. One fully-formed arm swiped blindly at the air and Devin easily dodged out of its reach. Two stumps wiggled futilely in their sockets. The partially developed creature stumbled backwards and one good claw seized the data line, which retracted into the cellular connection, pulling Flatline with it.