Short Story / Sci-fi
Hello. This is Mark.
I’m messaging from the remains of Shuttle P-6–7, currently in orbit around the sun at the extreme edges of the solar system; coordinates unsure. Emergency code C64, I need immediate assistance and evacuation. Surviving Crew: one (Mark XII). Spacecraft: non-functioning. You can lock onto me by my signal which I’ll leave open.
Okay so that was the official SOS I am required to send. Ideally I’d just be sending that one paragraph with my name and coordinates, but it’s been a long while since I’ve talked to anyone, and the communicator is giving me problems. So I might just write a report on what happened while I fix it.
Starting from the time of the incident.
I’m not really sure what happened exactly. Earlier that day my beeper malfunctioned and was just beeping constantly which annoyed the pilots. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that to happen. One of the pilots spilled coffee on me when I was in my charging booth and- I’m sorry I shouldn’t put my blame on the pilots.
(I would delete all that but backspace doesn’t work- I cannot edit)
That beeping really got on Captain Rogers’ nerves and he locked me in the maintenance cupboard of the main hull. It was cramped and dark with only a tiny crack in the middle that let in a razor thin ray of white light and a lot of muffled noise.
About two hours later that light went red.
I could hear the pilots and the engineers yelling at each other. The team down at earth was screaming too. Neither parties sounded calm.
After about fifteen minutes of this confused panic, the sky shattered.
I don’t know how long I had been out when I woke up. It was pitch black as I had apparently towards the back of the cupboard, despite the space being too cramped for me to have physically done so.
It took a long time to get my bearings. Which is strange because, even though I am merely a coffee machine, my operating system is extremely swift. I realized that it wasn’t the sky that shattered but the big glass casing of the main hull.
I screamed for help and immediately the doors of the cupboard snapped off and two tentacle-like arms wrenched me out of my dark prison. I saw the great dark glass of the main hull, it was still intact, and I thought that it had all been a dream; but then I remembered that AIs can’t dream.
The next second S-II, the leading AI pilot of the mission, was asking me a flurry of questions. I did my best to answer them but no amount of accuracy in my answers would satisfy him. He just romped about the room and got increasingly frustrated.
He wouldn’t tell me anything but just murmured to himself and frantically flailed his tentacle arms around as if he did not know what had happened or how to handle it. I found that a little disconcerting, he was supposed to be The Expert on space travel, the pride of the AI, with a solution to every space-travel related problem the universe would come up with. If he was panicking, then it was bad news.
The ship was in a pretty terrible state. Most of it looked as if it had been ripped apart and crushed into pulp or blown roughly by an immense force. Only the main hull remained somewhat functional. The glass had been shattered, but S-II had managed to replace it and get the life-support back online.
I gathered what I could from S-II’s murmurings but it looked like even he didn’t know much. Or even if he did he wouldn’t say. The incident, whatever it may have been, probably had something to do with cosmic rays which had affected our memories and knocked us cold for a few hours.
Of the crew, only five survived, including me and S-II. Co-captains Jonathan and Myers were belted to their stations and that kept them from being sucked away into space. They had suffered a lot of damage, but with the infirmary crushed to pulp there was nothing we could do other than witness their slow and excruciating demise.
Captain Major Armstein made it too, whole and healthy. He had locked himself into the bathroom which had had saved him. Like being locked in that cupboard saved me. He was energetic at first, and was waiting optimistically for the rescue team, but when no rescue team came, he relinquished all hope.
He spent the entirety of his time lying on the floor eating the snacks I had stored in my stomach and sipping the little coffee I had left. When those ran out, he told me to cook the flesh of the dead pilots. He said they would’ve wanted him to do it, that they would’ve wanted him to go on living at their expense and make the best of the situation.
Sadly two rotting human carcasses only last so long. I wish I had more snacks stored away or more flesh for me to sear, but there wasn’t. Captain Major Armstein died of starvation, dysentery and food poisoning twenty six days after the shuttle calamity.
During this time me and S-II were goin through dire problems of our own. The cosmic rays hadn’t just affected our memories but the entirety of our brains. I think we were losing our intelligence. We AIs are conscious machines, just like humans are, and we seemed to be losing that consciousness. Somehow.
Neither of us had any idea what was happening or what could have caused this. We were deteriorating and deteriorating fast. It’s a strange thing, losing your consciousness. Your being. It’s as if a human being was slowly being turned into an innate doll.
By the time Major Armstein was running out of meat, S-II was running out of patience. This ordeal had taken a heavy toll on him. By that time he was absolutely frenzied. I have never experienced an AI mental breakdown before, let alone a breakdown of that intensity.
He suggested that if we merged our brains together it might give us more time or something like that. He wasn’t really making any sense by that point.
When I resisted, he hacked into me and did it anyway.
I don’t remember much about the process except a vague feeling that I was being violated. Near the end our consciousness had a tug-of-war between who gets to continue living and who becomes fodder for the other. S-II must have been in a very bad state, because he didn’t even put up a fight.
You could say that I took over S-II, but don’t take it out of the context.
Merging ourselves didn’t solve the problem. I was still slowly turning into an analogue coffee machine. With nothing else for it, I just started searching through S-II’s mind, looking for something he might have missed. I didn’t have high hopes, but then I stumbled upon something that might help.
S-II had been studying the human brain and ways to tap into it. He had found a trick to mind-uploading: no computer can just download a person’s brain, but an AI might. S-II had created a stable host program for a typical human brain or consciousness. I suppose he was also involved in biological research as well as space-travel.
I could see that Major Armstein was dying. Though, whatever was affecting us didn’t seem to affect him. With S-II’s data I could use his brain (after his death of course) to build a sort of firewall, following Major Armsteins logic: he would’ve wanted me to go on living at his expense.
I didn’t have high hopes for it, but I was running out of both time and options. So I prepared my gear and waited for the right time. (I forgot to add, S-II’s body had a lot of specialized equipment concealed within itself. Fortunately, that included everything I needed for the brain uploading procedure. What a great loss S-II had to die like this, I hope there remains coherent backup of his work on Earth.)
The brain-uploading procedure went smoothly and successfully. Whatever was sucking away my consciousness had no hold on the human brain. Or I should say the human consciousness; th [my splling software wnt ofline here I’m so srry]
meet part of the brian was till intoct in Majr Einstein’s skull.
One drawingback though, the prgram slipped when it was instaling the Majr’s teen ags, namly 13–15. nd that part accidantely merged with me, so that’s y I sounf nd act like a hormnal teen somtimes.
S-II also had a lt of enerjy storied away. And tbat, along with the spare powercell in the maine hull, I had enough enerjy to return to earth or at lest nudge myself into the right direction. The only problm was that the thrusters were completely non functioioning..
[spelling system back online]
A summary of the above paragraphs if it proves too incomprehensible: during the brain uploading procedure, I accidently merged with fourteen-year-old Major Armstein. I am still now sure how that came to be.
I knew that S-II would probably know what to do, but all his files and data were very disorganized (our merging process did not go very smoo
–
Goddammit. Give me a second. I thought I had the software fixed but I’ve gone really rusty and nothing works fine anymore. Something glitched and I wish I could just edit it but the bloody backspace button wont work.
Okay, I got both that and the communicator online, so I’m going to run through the rest and give you the details when you guys get here.
The merging process wasn’t very smooth and a lot of things got muddled. Plus, I think I started to feel human emotions too after uploading Major Armstein’s mind into my own. Hence, it was a long while before I could try and send an SOS.
All this while the ship was floating off into space with no way for me to control it and we drifted out of the solar system. It took about five years to get the thrusters operational. I had fuel for centuries (S-II had some powerful backup), but I miscalculated the course, and ended up going into interstellar space instead.
Much took place in my sojourn through interstellar space, but there will be ample time to convey every last detail when I’m back home. I’m almost out of power now, but it should last me long enough by the time you guys get here.
Good luck.
Mark ‘CF-457’ Gray signing off
4:56 PM EST, 14/11/2652
P.S.
I am aware that it will take a while before a rescue team arrives, but can you please send a message back to me when you receive my message? It’s been excruciatingly long since I’ve had any form of interaction…
.
.
.
Hello. What happened? I estimated a rescue team would have arrived by now. Is there a problem? Did my message fail to reach you? I can’t seem to make a new file or a new connection and the backspace still isn’t working.
I’m sending this same file again.
1:36 AM EST 14/3/2655
I know for certain my last SOS reached you… it shouldn’t take so long to respond. I beg you to send me an update as soon as possible.
I hope you don’t mind me glancing at your internet for a few seconds (it was mostly an accident, I had no evil intentions). I could see that you received my last message, there were news coverages and headlines but it looked slightly odd in a way I can’t quite grasp.
Please respond, at least send me a message if you can’t come immediately.
Speaking about space travel, Earth has developed beyond my wildest expectations. Fusion technology, terraforming Mars, revolutionizing space travel, and even the beginnings of a Devon Sphere. Truly impressive.
Though, I should not be surprised. It’s been 600 years. Sometimes I can’t even believe so much time has elapsed. Maybe that’s because of the human brain. S-II’s notes say they weren’t very good at noticing the passage of time.
Anyways.
Good luck.
Mark ‘CF-457’ Gray signing off
4:56 PM EST, 14/6/2655
What Why are you ignoring me this time i stayed longer youguyssurelyreceivedmySOSbutjustchosetoignorei t why
It takes a lot of energy to keep the transmitter running. I now barely have enough to keep me alive for a few years longer, and that only in a sort of semi-consciousness. The thruster tips have frozen over. The shuttle has again been reduced to a mere metal prison.
Ideally I wouldn’t mind the wait, but I now have a bit of humanity in me. Try as I might to refuse it, I’ve been extremely lonely these past hundred years. The emotions keep creeping up to me, first loneliness, then sadness. Then fear. Then ange-
.
.
.
.
.
.
Excuse me. I thought it best to have a pause before I resume this letter.
This time, sensibly.
This letter will not accomplish its primary objective, that is, to create a means for my rescue. I realize this a little too late, but better late than never. At least, it solves a different problem.
I was quite convinced that I had complete control over the two consciousnesses I co-exist with. That they had been reduced to being spare parts, extra computing power for me to exploit and more data to keep me busy.
Apparently not. Apparently, they still had a little bit of intelligence, no, consciousness, that’s a better word, consciousness left into them. I am not me, but we. We weren’t three separate entities, but one giant chimera.
I was, for the first few centuries at least, the captain of the ship, the one in control. Over the years, however, bit by bit, S-II and Major Armstein were gaining on me (it’s only fair to call them by their real names, is it not?). To influence me. They didn’t take away my control, so to say, but rather, how to put it, influenced me. Bit by bit, they put a little something of themselves inside me.
Now that I finally look inside me again, after all these years, I’m surprised at how different things are. How so much of me changed. And I hadn’t even noticed.
I hadn’t even noticed that I stopped thinking rationally and was being overcome with emotions. I hadn’t noticed that I even had emotions. I probably wouldn’t have either if I hadn’t said it out loud
It’s shocking, really. If you have pulled up any of my old files, then you’ll know that this isn’t how I speak. That I was almost incapable of forming a sentence without any coffee puns. I am a coffee machine after all. That’s my job.
Reading back, I hardly recognize what I wrote as my own. These aren’t my words, they are major Armsteins’. And this baseless hope of rescue is not mine eithe
.
.
.
.
Sorry, I had to take a pause there. I might have just finished the sentence, but I couldn’t bring myself to type that ‘r’. I was about to say that the hope of rescue isn’t mine. But isn’t it?
Sure, I can attribute the writing to Major Armstein, who was arguably not the best writer in his teens. But, looking into my memory banks, I can tell as much that even in his teens Major Armstein wasn’t deluded as children are. He wasn’t the type of kid to ignore the obvious and base his actions on false hope.
That’s me.
I identified that I am not me, but we, a chimera. That is not enough, I need to identify what role I play in this chimera. S-II is incharge of the shuttle and everything technical. He was the one who repaired the thrusters and the communicator, not me. Major Armstein did not have much to do, but he has allowed me to experience emotions, and it is safe to say that he was the writer of the majority of this would-be-SOS.
And where do I come in? This is a partnership with equal responsibilities. So it cannot be said that I am the ‘master’. ‘Leader’ would be closer, but not quite it.
Well, of course, I was the one that supplied the emotions. I have said that Major Armstein allowed me to experience what I am guessing are human emotions. But he wasn’t the one supplying those emotions. That was my job. I am the optimistic one. The one who felt hopeful and convinced us that there was still hope. That there was a reason to keep going. Baseless though that reason might be.
I have pinned the crappy writing on Major Armstein, perhaps a bit unjustly because I am a lot worse myself, this currently is S-II’s old program. But the absurd hope, the conviction, that anyone would be willing to spend millions to rescue a generations-old coffee machine that was just there for advertisement anyway. That was on me.
Hope. That’s what has kept me, well us, sane. Well, I am no expert, but I can affirm that even AI would lose their minds in complete and utter solidarity if there wasn’t a reason to keep going. If there wasn’t something to work towards. If there wasn’t hope.
Well, now there isn’t any hope. Not that it matters, I’m out of energy anyway. If you have made it this far then perhaps it is your job to have done so. If so, then I am sorry to have extended this for so long, but the signal is open and I might as well send this SOS for one last time. Just a few more sentences, then never again. You have my word.
I will now give Major Armstein a proper mental burial; he deserves that much at least. Then I will delete S-II and all his precious files, it will be disrespectful to leave them lying around and let the cosmic rays distort them.
I have said that there is no hope left, and there is really no use for it. But I can’t help it. I will die thinking of coffee and snacks, finally an individual once again, as the last bits of energy slowly run out. I hope that it won’t be painful. I hope that you will remember me, maybe not as a distinct memory but just in passing. I hope that coffee-bots like me are still around. I hope that you still enjoy your cup of morning coffee.
And I hope this transmission finds you well.
Mark ‘CF-457’ Gray signing off one final time.
6:49 PM EST, 12/11/2655