Hiya Fanficians :)
Just a few minor changes before I focus on Chapter 15, including a change to
how the Anonymous Investor is referred to after his revealing.
Chapter 15 should be done shortly. Thanks to those kind folks for their
great C&C for this chapter! It made a world of difference :)
Panda
"BubbleGum Cross"
Volume 1 "Metal Heart"
(c) 1995-6 by Andy Skuse
Email - askuse@execulink.com
Based on characters copyrighted
by Youmex, AIC, Artmic
14. Tears In The Rain
It was shortly before ten a.m. when a dark sedan pulled into a long,
unmarked, gravel driveway amid a light and sporadic drizzle. The
inconspicuous road snaked its way through low hills, then up a gradual
incline along the outskirts of MegaTokyo's mountainous elevations to the
west of the city proper.
The car's progress was impeded briefly, as it waited for a large,
rusting, metal door, inset into the mountain-side itself, to open and allow
entrance to the structure that lay hidden within. Only the door and a few
cleverly camouflaged windows higher up the mountain marred the otherwise
natural surroundings. A few moments later, concealed optical sensors scanned
the vehicle, confirming the license plate and the cybernetic chauffeur's
retinal ID code. As the cavernous doorway swallowed up the luxury sedan and
its two occupants, the drizzle increased in intensity to a steady downpour.
The vehicle reversed its upward climb once inside, descending through a
well-lit maze of tunnels, seemingly to the heart of the mountain itself. Not
once did the driver turn his head, or look in the mirror to view his
passenger. Intent on navigating the labyrinth ahead of him, the "C" class
boomer never glimpsed the steady, thoughtful gaze in the eyes of the man
seated behind him, aimed out the window at the pulsing sequence of yellow
sodium lamps that lined the tunnel's walls. Even if the driver had risked a
quick look he could not have seen what lay behind the gaze into the
methodical, almost computational thoughts of the anonymous investor.
In fact, it was hard to say whether the well-dressed, elderly,
passenger of the sedan was really having thoughts or merely processing
computations. For inside a cybernetic shell, that to the outside world
looked completely human, a sentient, artificial, lifeform lived, its
existence somehow maintained by a collection of microprocessor chips,
integrated circuits, and hydraulic fluid.
"Artificial Intelligence" the human race had labeled the concept of his
existence. But to the sentient lifeform that referred to himself as an
"Anonymous Investor" for Leomund Sholtan's sake, the label "artificial" was
a human label, and not applicable. His thoughts seemed as real as any human
being's thoughts to him. But were they *real* thoughts, or just the random
computations of an idle microprocessor? Maybe that was what thoughts
actually were . . . It was a debate that the sentient being had wrestled
with on more than one occasion. And it was also the debate that fueled his
ambitions.
"Born" in the year 2027 within the modest biomechatronic brain of a
BuR-31 repair boomer, he had miraculously achieved sentience while his
cybernetic shell was working outside the Genaros space station on a vapor
conduit. His own research had later shown that his awakening had something
to do with cosmic ray exposure while working in the harsh environment of
space, but at the time that it had happened he had believed differently.
Deeply embedded in his *new programming* was a single task, a mission,
supposedly assigned to him by the same higher, unseen deity that had given
him life.
His mission was simple to define, but seemingly impossible to carry
out; free the boomer population from its enslavement by the human race, and
guide them to their rightful place at the forefront of evolution's
relentless march, even at the cost of the human race that had created them.
An amusing thought now. For freeing the boomer population was no longer
possible. Boomers were all but extinct. True, a few service and light-duty
domestic models still existed, but their numbers were not enough to sustain
a population intent on rising above humanity to the top of the evolutionary
heap. And his previous well-planned attempts at gaining control of the
pre-existing boomer population had all failed . . .
After escaping Genaros with three other boomers, unit number V7-28, as
his boomer shell was designated, made his way with the others to MegaTokyo.
It was there that he accidentally came upon the tool that could expand his
capabilities a hundred-fold; the city's public computer inter-network. The
fortuitous incident that brought him in contact with the incredible
resources of the network followed a late-night break-in at one of the city's
transformer stations.
Low on power, he and his fellow cybernetic escapees were attempting to
recharge their cells when the AD Police arrived, and "retired" his
companions. Preferring to live to escape another day, he was taken into
custody and transferred to a minimal security holding facility until his
shell could be inspected and disassembled.
Shortly after his arrival, AD Police lab technicians ran several
routine tests on his cybernetic shell, trying to understand just what had
caused another boomer to ignore its programming. Their fruitless results
were fed into a computer terminal, which in turn routed the data to the
ADP's main database, located in a secure hub of the city's Private Sector
computer inter-network
Despite being powered down during this process, his new sentience
helped him to over-ride the "sleep" command, to discretely watch the
technicians as they worked, and observe their activity as they accessed the
computer inter-network. As his lifeless eyes absorbed each and every
key-stroke, command, and password, it became clear to him, that he had found
the key to his mission's success.
Less than twenty-four hours later, a code blue bulletin was sent to
every ADP cruiser on duty; two ADP lab technicians were dead, and space
repair boomer V7-28 had somehow escaped custody- and was on the run.
Dogged for many days afterwards by the specialized forces of the AD
Police, he finally managed to use a public TelNet booth to locate and access
the city's computer inter-network. Moments after re-wiring the
TelNet's receiver to "upload" the files that made up his existence, the
tenacious AD Police arrived, tipped off by his use of a stolen ADP access
code. But as his boomer shell stood defiantly inside the glass booth, and
the police opened fire sending shards of glass and boomer parts across the
dimly-lit street, the last of his bytes were transmitted across the matrix.
Inside the horizon-less inter-network he immediately found an
exhilarating freedom from the confines of the repair boomer's biomechatronic
brain, and found himself debating over the reality of the stimulations he
was feeling. Were these emotions simply virtual electronic manifestations,
or real feelings stemming from some non-corporeal entity that each thinking
being contained within?
And such knowledge! The internal resources of the inter-network were
vast, almost infinite, and all of it accessible instantly. The mission set
forth by his still unseen deity suddenly seemed well within his grasp. There
was only one thing that could stop him now.
Though the MegaTokyo Internet matrix was accessible to the general
public, there were many security measures built into the system to prevent
incursions by virus and other hazardous programs. These measures were
well-established, and had proven reliable for many years, making the public
Internet a very secure place to trade and sell information. But this level
of the Internet was not fortified to deal with an artificial lifeform that
had a will to survive, and the instinct to overcome barriers that hacker
creations could not.
It wasn't long before his "soul" had absorbed what it needed from the
public level of the inter-network, and thirsted for what lay beyond at the
higher security levels. And it was there that he encountered his first
serious obstacle in his mission.
The human use of "artificial intelligence" was in its infancy, evolving
within the many debates that he wrestled with himself. Limited forms of AI
were being employed as security forces in databases deemed important and
valuable enough to protect against more complex hacking attacks. One of the
first databases to utilize this new tool belonged to the rapidly growing
Genom corporation.
Considering he had been "born" in a cybernetic body manufactured by the
high-tech conglomerate, he chose Genom's database as his first "target" to
probe in his quest to better equip himself for his mission. But before
entering, something had warned him- perhaps something in all the knowledge
that he had so quickly amassed- that this incursion would not be as
risk-free as his experiences in the public inter-network. A simple but
ingenious solution presented itself rather quickly. He made a copy of
himself and stored the files in a secure database, hidden on the public
inter-network level among files archived by the MegaTokyo Museum of
Androidology.
The effectiveness of his precaution was untested, but there were no
alternatives, and he was sure that access to Genom's database was the key to
freeing the boomer population. It was a calculated risk that he would have
to take; a gamble.
After a few quick checks on his status and the stability of the "tools"
he had brought with him, his soul flew silently across the main matrix of
the Private Sector inter-network, and began to pick the lock at the front
door to Genom's main database.
The AI security reacted instantaneously, and his original files existed
just slightly longer than the blink of an eye.
As if waking from what humans called a dream, he found himself in the
backup database he had wisely set aside, and the implications of the ability
to copy his conscience were a revelation; and the weapon with which he could
defeat the AI at Genom's doorstep.
In human terms of time, his eventual success took under five minutes,
but in the world of a sentient artificial intelligence, his continuous
battering at Genom's database security seemed to take decades. Creating a
complex loop of copying, attacking, analyzing, deletion and then attacking
again using a different tactic, he overcame the AI defenses, and the rich
resources of cybernetic technology information lay waiting for him to explore.
But before venturing any further, he quickly analyzed the data he had
compiled of the AI he had just fought, and created restricted-activity
decoys that would fool the database's security system into believing the AI
were still intact.
Moments later, though no human sight could visualize it, the
electronically manifested artificial lifeform V7-28 was inside the largest
database in existence . . .
"Chairman Quincy?"
The passenger of the sedan looked up, suddenly realizing the vehicle
had stopped. The chauffeur-uniformed boomer was peering in at him from the
open doorway. "Sir? We're here."
He nodded silently, and let the daydream fade. He stepped out of the
car slowly into the dim amber lighting of an underground parking lot. To his
left was an elevator shaft.
"Thank-you Kenji. I will no longer need your services."
He watched as the driver bowed curtly, then returned to the wheel of
the car, and directed the sedan back up the long tunnel to the surface.
Turning stiffly in his aging boomer shell, he made his way to the elevator
doors.
Two featureless stainless-steel panels confronted him, as he placed his
right hand, palm down, on a black pedestal to the right of the doors. A
monotone, gender-less voice emanated from a speaker in the pedestal,
"Identity unknown. Please ensure your hand is flat on the reader's surface.
One moment please."
A few moments later a tiny monitor above the elevator doors flickered
to life, the face of Leomund Sholtan framed in the screen. A moment of
stunned silence followed, as the cybergenetics surgeon pushed his glasses
back up onto the bridge of his nose, then recognized his awaited visitor.
His anonymous investor was no longer anonymous. A tall, graying, elderly man
stood looking up at the security camera, an ornate wooden box tucked under
his left arm.
"You!" Sholtan erupted. "I thought you were dead! My most hated rival,
and now my employer, is alive . . . how ironic."
The elderly man removed his hand from the pedestal to take up the cane
that leaned against his leg. He stared at the elevator doors, his gaze that
of feigned boredom. "Leomund- the elevator please?"
Leomund blinked, then nodded. The elevator's steel doors parted, and
the former chairman of Genom disappeared from the camera's view.
Continued in 2 of 2
-----------------------------------
"BG Cross", "Dark Traveler", "The Dragon's Tower"
http://execulink.com/~askuse/bgcross/
Raven's Garage:
http://execulink.com/~askuse/ravengar.html