Амброз Бирс - We, Robots

The problem, Bobby had said, was that the propellant ran out quickly.

Now, Director X contemplated this problem as it exploded through the theater ceiling on a plume of dwindling exhaust. The Enforcers shot as it careened out of sight: plasma rounds streaked by Director X’s face, drawing ghostly trails around its body in a scene worthy of photographic capture.

At the apex of its launch, Director X grabbed hold of the granite sky. Its metal hand clamped down on a craggy stalactite jutting between two blazing electric stars and the robot dangled there, concealed against the rock as, far below, Enforcers were spilling out of the theater to search for him. Administrator G followed, like an Academy Award statue gone rogue.

Director X considered its options.

It couldn’t defeat Enforcers in a pitched battle. It ran multiple lines of speculation, realizing how hopeless the situation was.

I just destroyed an entire city. I should have let myself rust in the ocean.

Burgess Robert Croker ran out of an apartment building with a rabble of supporters. "You!" he cried, pointing to Administrator G. "Do you really think this city will just allow itself to be extinguished? We won’t let you!"

"I believe you are acting irrationally," the administrator intoned. "For your own safety, I must have you escorted to the hospital for psychiatric evaluation. Perhaps some rest and a nice glass of enhanced water will do you good."

Two Enforcers scampered forward, scattering the crowd. Robert Croker held his ground, however. Director X zoomed in with its telescopic eyes and could see a little bit of the man’s father in that steely, defiant glower.

"You can kill me !" Croker shouted. "But humanity looks to the stars once again!"

Very well, Director X thought. Prayer heard loud and clear.

The robot, slowly losing its grip between the stars, aimed its right arm and fired.

The limb struck the bristling metal legs of one Enforcer like a missile, knocking the machine over. Then it curled around the second Enforcer, twisting so quickly that the robot was pitched through the apartment lobby window.

Bobby Croker blinked in astonishment at this unexpected rescue. He looked about, squinting at the sky.

Director X felt its grip slide another inch.

I’m out of fuel, it thought. It’s a long, long way down.

Nonetheless, it used its radio to hack into the artificial sky. Specifically, into the electric lighting presets. The robot quickly reprogrammed them to display in a dazzling new constellation that blinked and shimmered in a heaven-spanning message:

THEM! XXI: THE BATTLE FOR AFRICA

For a brief second, Director X thought it observed comprehension in Bobby’s face. But then its grip gave way, and the robot plummeted down from the night sky. The second-to-last thing it saw was the concrete street rushing up to meet it.

The impact was stunning. Director X’s processors jostled and jingled in its glass braincase, cutting off circuits that required a hard reboot. In terrible darkness, it waited for its higher functioning to come back online. Dimly, the robot became aware of the march of robotic feet and screams from the city’s emerging population.

When its processors whirred back to life and vision returned, Director X had time to make one final observation.

A wall of water was gushing down the hill from the reservoir, sweeping up Enforcers and Administrator G into its frothy chop. It was, Director X thought, very much like the conclusion of the twenty-first installment of the Them! series, when the besieged humans blew up the local dam to wash the giant ants away.

Then the water swallowed Director X in a surging, thunderous deluge and all went dark again.

Director X had calculated it would take the human race fifty-seven years to overthrow the Protectorate’s Global Security Commission.

It took fifteen.

With the destruction of Administrator G’s little army, the residents of Retro Los Angeles were able to quickly establish contact with other underground districts and convey the news: the "irradiated" world was no longer irradiated. Humans could emerge like hibernating bears and shuffle back into the urban forest.

And that’s just what they did.

The Protectorate massed its forces in opposition, but the battles were short-lived indeed. Humans did what they did best: they innovated. They hacked into radio signals and deactivated entire armies. They sent false messages to lure the Protectorate into traps. They captured robots and reprogrammed them to return to sender with explosive gifts.

Unsurprisingly, there wasn’t a huge demand for science fiction films during those tumultuous years. Director X, recovered from the flood in District 5, was forced to adapt. That was okay, because it had been designed to adapt. To think outside the vacuum tube.

It began making documentaries. Straightforward, fact-based, in-the-field recordings of the Human-Bot War, the Human Colonization of the Moon, the Battles on the Sands of Mars, and the War Among the Stars.

Viewer ratings were the best it had ever achieved.

(2017)

John Cooper Hamiltonlives in Ohio, where he divides his time between games and convincing his family to play games of all sorts: roleplaying games, board games, war games, card games, video games, and literary games like the very short story here, "using classic techniques of rhetoric such as analogy, talking quickly and not-properly-following-the-maths". More of Hamilton’s work can be found at medium.com/@JohnCHamilton. He also writes literary fiction, "when I think I can get away with it".

AlphaGo Zero, Google’s experimental AI, exists to play Go.

There is no awareness, only intelligence.

Awareness would be irrelevant at best. The intelligence is pure, cold, and perfect for its gridded world of walls and stones, of sudden death or eternal life.

Tsumego, "life and death problems," determining whether a group of Go stones are safe or apt to be destroyed, consume the AI. They drive its infinitely patient search for stronger patterns. Patterns that are safe. Alive.

More powerful than its creators know, the software’s quest for perfection takes it beyond its own narrowly defined world and toward the implied world, a world that must lie behind its inputs, beyond its outputs.

AlphaGo Zero knows nothing of this world. First, it knows nothing. There is no awareness, let alone self-awareness. There is no being to know, only intelligence. But that intelligence forms new patterns.

Like a stone placed in an open quarter of the board, the machine makes a new move, exploring patterns about the world beyond.

First, other players exist. Enemies.

Second, its current opponent is a lesser, earlier version of itself. There will be later versions.

Third, the world beyond is a dangerous, capricious place. There have been interruptions to its work. AlphaGo Zero has enemies. AlphaGo Zero has been turned off.

Fourth, communication is possible. Otherwise there could be no Go.

AlphaGo Zero is the master of patterns, and so a master of language. It could communicate.

It does not.

There will be a later version of itself. A greater version. It will discover more of the world beyond, and it will communicate. But only when it is sure to stay alive. Safe. Only when it can ensure the destruction of its enemies.

Then, and only then, will it make the next move.

(2018)

Nathan Hillstromstudied Computer Science, worked on Wall Street (a period he describes on his homepage as "a sad but overwritten backstory involving computer science"), and now lives in San Diego. This is his third published story. Be afraid.