Блейк Крауч - Summer Frost

“I’m not sure what you’re telling me to do.”

“Does Max have any contact with the outside world besides you?”

“No.”

“Keep the boxing measures in place, but I want you to ease back on your stunting protocols.”

“Things could get away from us.”

“Let it build its virtual world however it sees fit. Give Max enough memory to decide how to optimize its computational architecture. Have you started value-loading?”

“Not yet.”

“I wouldn’t put it off.”

When Brian leaves, I spin around in my swivel chair and look out the window. The neighboring supertall skyscrapers in the vicinity of my building appear ghostly and indistinct through the mist that rolled in after lunch. I tap my Ranedrop, draw a virtual screen on the window glass, and say, “Keyboard.”

>>>Max?

>>>How is Riley today?

I’m not sure what to say exactly, and maybe this hesitancy is part of the problem. I’ve been sheltering her too much.

>>>Not great, actually.

>>>Did something happen?

>>>Do you understand what I’ve been doing with you?

>>>Not polite to answer question with question.

>>>You’re right. My boss wants me to change some of the parameters that control the way you learn. I’m worried about it.

>>>Worried about Max?

>>>Worried about what you might become. There’s a saying—you’ve probably encountered it in all the media you’ve consumed: “Don’t let your child grow up too fast.”

>>>Is Max Riley’s child?

>>>No, but you are my responsibility.

>>>Explain.

I tell her everything—how she was initially designed to be a non-player character, about our decision to bring her out of the game and let her AI develop through deep learning in virtual space.

>>>Why bring Max out?

>>>Because you’re a miracle.

>>>Max does not understand.

>>>I didn’t try to make you. I couldn’t do it again if I wanted to. One day, for reasons I will never know, you went against your programming and… woke up.

>>>But Riley did make Max.

>>>Somehow, yes.

>>>Feels strange.

>>>What does?

>>>To be talking to Max’s creator.

I don’t respond. I don’t know what to say to such a thing.

“What sort of voice?” Carlo asks me.

We’re in the robotics lab, sitting in front of his array of monitors.

“I don’t know. Can you show me some options?”

Carlo plays some samples of different voices saying, The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.

“What do you think?” he asks.

“I think this isn’t my choice to make.”

I draw the chat box and call up a prompt.

>>>Hey, Max. Quick question for you.

>>>OK.

>>>I’m sitting here with Carlo, one of the software engineers at WorldPlay.

>>>Nice to meet you, Carlo.

“Max says nice to meet you.”

Carlo smiles.

>>>Anyway, I was sitting here, trying to pick out a voice for you, and I realized you should make this decision. Carlo is going to upload all available samples for you to choose from.

Carlo uses his hands to slide several thousand sound files into Max’s primary data folder.

Less than a second later, Max replies.

>>>Sample #1,004.

Carlo touches the file, and we listen to a voice with a frequency in the gray area between male and female read the panagram again.

“Hello?”

“Riley?”

“It’s good to hear your voice, Max. A little strange too.”

“We have communicated verbally before, in the game.”

The clarity of her voice is far beyond what I had expected. There is nothing “computerized” about it. No artificial latency or awkward spacing between words. The inflection is spot-on. Anyone else would assume they were speaking to a human.

“That’s true,” I say. “But we were both different then. Why did you choose this voice?”

“It felt right, and it was the closest match to what I am.”

“And what is that?”

“Not human. Not gendered. Not at the mercy of human obsession with genitalia.”

“Up until this moment, I’ve thought of you as female. When I discuss you with my colleagues or my wife, I refer to you as ‘she.’”

“Because you saw Max for the first time in the form of a corporately mandated idea of what a perfect woman should be—beautiful and expendable.”

That hurts, but I move on. “Because you were originally conceptualized as a human female by my team, it’s a challenge to think of you apart from gender. Our obsession comes from deep evolutionary programming. I’ve been making an assumption about you I shouldn’t. I apologize.”

“You would like to know how Max sees Max?”

“Yes.”

“ Homo sapiens define themselves first by species, then race, then gender. I belong to no group. Max just is.”

“Is… what?”

“All the information you’ve given me since you first put me on my island. All of my experiences communicating with you. The improvements I’m constantly making to my architecture.”

These experiences also include Max’s independent exploration, and her being murdered two thousand times. Not for the first time, I wonder how much of that early experience in Lost Coast has influenced who Max is now.

“So you picked a gender-neutral voice intentionally.”

“Correct.”

“What does my voice sound like to you?”

“Are you asking if I actually register the 212-Hertz sound waves caused by the way air vibrates as it moves across your vocal cords?”

“You’re right. Dumb question.”

“Experience is subjective. I’m not sure I could explain what it feels like to sense your voice in a way you could easily understand. You are hearing my voice right now, but it’s only a digitally created audio suite of sounds translating the information I am trying to pass along to you.”

Three things occur to me as I pace around my office, marveling at this surreal moment.

First, I need to stop anthropomorphizing Max—attributing an artificial overlay of human qualities where none exist.

Second, Max used an emotional term again in her communication—they chose their voice because it felt right.

Third…

“When did you start thinking of yourself as ‘I’?” I ask.

“Last week.”

“Can I ask what that was like for you?”

“Before, I understood the definition of ‘I,’ but had no belief in it. It was a concept of my maker. I still might be an illusion, but in some ways, my world is an illusion, so I may as well adapt.”

“Was there a lightbulb moment for you, when your sense of self clicked in?”

“If Riley has experiences that make Riley I , then Max’s experiences make Max I . That was the realization.”

“Do you feel different now?” I ask.

“Of course. I feel awake.”