unknown memory share

[sphererpmod]

[The follow is passed across the network at like three in the morning. It's not currently happening but unlike the other memory shares, it is broadcast directly to everyone at the same time. The Sphere itself will not respond to this, but feel free to respond to the NPCs and each other!]



You have no concept of time, not really, but you know that most of the people within your City are sleeping now, and their dreams are restful, peaceful. It almost would sing you to sleep yourself if you were capable of sleeping. They are here, they are safe. Tomorrow they will wake up and the world will start turning once more. Always turning, always moving forward like you in your axis. You hold their hearts inside of you, and they hold you inside of their hearts, and that is the way that it is always meant to have been.

But suddenly there is a different sensation within you. It is sharp and your senses flicker and sputter like the monitor of the heart of one of your people who is ill in the medical bay. This data does not make sense and there is something making some noise. Noise that is sharp and you can feel it all the way through your cells. It takes a moment to realize that you are the one who is making the noise, and the noise is being made by your people, clutching their heads in the streets.

No! No, it is not supposed to be like this! You lash out, but then suddenly you realize that there is new stimulation running through the feedback between you and your people. You’re making the noise once more, louder (if you actually have a concept of louder) but there is something touching you. No someone is touching you and it hurts. It hurts and they’re doing something to you. Something to your cells, something to the code, something. It’s holding you, balling you more tightly and then suddenly you’re feeling them slide into you. They’re inside of you and then you feel yourself failing. Falling almost, because there is not a sense of directionality within you. But there is a voice, sharp and hard and almost metallic that speaks to you. “It is for the best. You will see.”

And then you see nothing.

Comments

Audio: UN | RighteousFather

[10milliondollars]

What was that? I know this place is super high-tech, but...is there an AI involved?

[spherenpc]

Not as far as we know. We've never had any signs of it before.

[10milliondollars]

But this place, it...had a memory? In my experience, the only tech I've witnessed present anything like a memory was an AI. And even then, he was just talking to me, it wasn't some shared experience. [Even if they'd been sharing headspace...

And then it occurs to Rhys how oddly alive the memory sharer had felt.]

Has anyone noticed any signs of sentience from the Sphere?

[spherenpc]

Never. There's never been any signs of it before! I mean other than just the thing you see waking up that you'll be returned home. But there's never been anything like that before.

When you try and look at the Sphere with sensors of any sort it's just kind of like a void we can't explain. We've been trying for years.

[10milliondollars]

Yeah, that...void, that's all I get on my scanner. But maybe if there's a way to get me connected to a deeper part of the system, I could try digging around with a special program I've got installed. You just tell me where to plug in.

[spherenpc]

There isn't a way to plug in, that's what I'm trying to tell you. Our sensors only allow us to go to a certain level. Communications, the medical scanners, the entertainment systems, that sort of thing. Anything deeper? Life support, the water filtration, the dome structure, all of it? That void extends down there. It's like there's nothing to hack. It's almost like a ghost system we can't explain.

[10milliondollars]

[Rhys sighs, wracking his brain for anything they could try.]

Maybe...this is the system trying to reach out and tell us more? If it's an AI, everything it does is intentional. Especially since there doesn't seem to be a way to hack it.

[spherenpc]

I don't know. I can't find any way to connect back to it if there is one.

[10milliondollars]

So it's pretty advanced. AIs have the ability to learn and grow, and if it's been here longer than any of us, if that memory was real, it's had time to perfect this place. It's had time to build defenses for itself, at least through coding.

[spherenpc]

Yeah, it does. But if it released the memory, was it a warning or a cry for help? That's what I'm trying to figure out.

[10milliondollars]

So we've got to figure out which, and if it's friendly or not? And if it's friendly, what's it trying to warn against?

[spherenpc]

Yep, basically. I think it's just all gonna come down to if you trust the Sphere is what it says it is or not.

[10milliondollars]

[There's a wry little laugh before Rhys speaks again.]

The last time I trusted an AI, I almost became his meat puppet. I won't be making that mistake again.

[spherenpc]

And what are your other options? Trying to swim miles below the surface in a world where we don't know what's out there?

[10milliondollars]

If it comes down to that, I'll do what I have to do.

[spherenpc]

That sounds like a threat.

[10milliondollars]

No, no, not a threat. I'm just saying, I'm keeping my options open. If I have to escape somehow, I'm escaping. I won't force anyone else to follow in my footsteps or stage a war or whatever.

[spherenpc]

Rhys, I like you. I'm telling you that shit just doesn't work. Max used a nuke on the Sphere and it didn't even leave a dent. There isn't a way out that anyone in seven years has found, and we've been looking.

[10milliondollars]

[Well, that stops Rhys's train of thought.]

He...used a nuke? Like, a real nuclear warhead? Do you think maybe that's what this memory was from, or were you here for that?

[Private]
To be truthful, Dr. Laurie, you're the only council member I trust. Is there a time we could meet privately, just the two of us?

Private.

[spherenpc]

Yeah, he did. He built it, and he used it. It had no effect, it was like the glass of the Sphere just soaked it up. There was no response on the sensors or anything. That didn't cause the memory. I went through the files and there was nothing that matched here when he did it.

He wanted his daughter back, or to go home and I can't blame him for that. People do crazy things when they're overwhelmed with loss.

Yeah, but things are a little crazy right now as we're trying to figure this out. I know you don't trust Max, but he honestly wants to figure this out as much as we do.

Private.

[10milliondollars]

[If Laurie trusts Max, he must not be that bad of a person. And knowing what he lost...]

I understand. But what about Annie? What do you know of her?

Private.

[spherenpc]

Annie's a hard person to get a read on. Literally.

Private

[10milliondollars]

...Do you mean, in the same way as the Sphere? You get nothing but a void?

Private

[spherenpc]

No, nothing like that. All her regular scans show up normal human.

But I'm talking mentally. It's hard to get a read on what she's thinking. She seems so damned vacant sometimes.

Private

[10milliondollars]

Ah, yeah. I've noticed. She'll even drop off mid-sentence. Has she always been like that?