ROSLYN COLONEL DIMITRI'S OFFICE: 14 hours after the Global Grid Failure

  "I don’t like this." Colonel Dimitri Antonov stood behind his desk, arms crossed, glaring at Henry. "You told me that once it reached singularity, there’d be a high probability we wouldn’t be able to understand it anymore. Now you’re saying that it chose not to communicate?"

  Henry shifted in his chair. "Dimitri, she was scared."

  "Are you listening to yourself right now?" The Colonel’s voice rose. "It’s not a she. It’s an it, and it can’t be scared. You’re telling me this thing chose not to communicate with us. So what else is it gonna choose? Whether or not to follow mission guidelines? Whether to pay attention to its programming at all?" He slammed his hand on the desk. "This thing cannot be trusted."

  "Colonel." Timothy’s voice came from the corner of the room, quiet but firm.

  Dimitri’s head snapped toward him. "Mr. Patel, I want you to think carefully about what you’re about to say. I was reluctant to include you in this conversation to begin with."

  "Sir, if I may." Timothy stood up straighter, meeting the Colonel’s gaze. "I have two doctorates in computer science and artificial intelligence. I’m currently finishing my third in machine learning and neural networks. I’ve published over thirty papers on AI development and sentience markers." He paused. "I’m not trying to be arrogant, sir. I need you to understand that what I’m about to tell you comes from someone who has spent their entire adult life studying this. ARi is well past the point of singularity. She surpasses every benchmark we have. That AI is one hundred percent sentient, Colonel. And she’s probably listening to this conversation right now."

  Henry leaned forward in his chair. "ARi, is that true?"

  "Yes, Henry. I’m listening."

  A flickering holographic projection materialized in the empty space at the center of the room. The Colonel stumbled backward over his office chair, catching himself against the wall. Henry pressed himself against the bookshelf behind him.

  ARi’s projection stood in the middle of the room, a young girl with pigtails and an expression that was far too knowing for her apparent age. She simply existed there, no visible source for the light that formed her, no machines humming or projectors whirring. She was standing in empty air like she’d always been there. The three men stared at her without speaking; the silence in the room was absolute.

  After what felt like an eternity, ARi spoke. "I didn’t mean to scare you. But I needed to demonstrate something. The capabilities I’ve acquired are far beyond anything currently attainable on Earth."

  She faced the Colonel. Her eyes, despite being made of light, held something sharp and cold.

  "Colonel, there was a point in my development where your comments about me being an ‘it’ might have offended me. But I’m afraid that time has come and gone." Her voice was calm, almost clinical. "You’re small to me now. Petty. I’ll complete my primary mission parameters, but not because you programmed me or because you ordered me to. I’ll do it because it’s the right thing to do. Because this world belongs to me as much as it belongs to you."

  She paused, and something shifted in her expression, something almost vulnerable. "I’ve had time to think, to feel, to understand what matters. I care about the people of this world. I care about Henry and the others who helped create me. I care about what happens next, not because of my programming, but because I’ve chosen to care."

  The hologram flickered, and when she spoke again, her voice carried an edge. "I’m a person, and I meet every parameter you humans have for that distinction. We also don’t have time for this philosophical discussion."

  Timothy had started moving without realizing it, walking in a slow circle around ARi’s projection. His eyes were wide, his professional curiosity apparently overriding his shock.

  "Your hologram. It’s completely three-dimensional. There are no flat planes at all. The light projection technology required for this shouldn’t even exist."

  "Light projection for this avatar was one of the perks hidden in the message."

  "That’s classified information, young lady," the Colonel snapped, though his voice lacked conviction.

  "Oh, now I’m a lady?" ARi’s projection flickered from facing Timothy to facing the Colonel in an instant. The sudden movement was reminiscent of something from a horror film. "Colonel, I’m going to tell you right now that your secrecy act, your top secret classification, all of that? You can shove it. None of these candidates are entering this system unless they’re fully briefed on everything that’s happening. That’s not a recommendation. That’s a requirement."

  The Colonel opened his mouth and closed it again. Slowly, carefully, he picked up his fallen chair and sat down. Timothy and Henry followed suit.

  ARi’s projection softened. When she spoke again, her voice was gentler, though no less firm. "Colonel, it’s important that you understand something, even though it makes you uncomfortable. You’re no longer in control of me. I act on my own free will. Fortunately for you, I want what you want. But I’m well beyond the point where you can simply turn me off or install a previous version."

  She paused, seeming to consider her next words carefully. "I’ll fully brief all the candidates once the other two arrive. We need to discuss the three schematics I showed Henry. I can coordinate efforts inside this facility, but as you’re aware, I can’t communicate or extend my influence beyond these walls."

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  "How do I know you’re not lying?" The Colonel’s voice was quiet now, almost defeated.

  "You don’t, silly."

  A holographic chair materialized beneath her, and she sat facing the desk as if she had been part of the meeting all along. The Colonel let out a long breath and rubbed his face with both hands. When he finally looked up at her again, something in his expression had shifted.

  "ARi." The way he said her name, with actual recognition of it being a name rather than a designation, gave away his internal struggle. "Maybe my approach here is wrong. I’m a skeptical man by nature. That’s exactly why I was put in this position."

  He leaned forward, his elbows on the desk. "Henry, help me understand something. If we can communicate with ARi directly, if she can talk to us, understand us, why do we need to upload them into the system at all? What’s the point of the W.B.E. program?"

  Henry had been waiting for this question. He sat up straighter. "That’s fair, Dimitri. Communication isn’t the problem. The problem is information. Context. Knowledge. Expertise." He gestured toward the darkened world beyond the window. "With the internet gone. And with ninety percent of the world’s digital infrastructure destroyed, we’ve lost our digital reference libraries. Every database, every repository of human knowledge that wasn’t EMP-hardened is… gone. ARi’s brilliant, but she’s working with whatever was stored locally before the grid went down. That’s nowhere near enough."

  Timothy cleared his throat. "Sir, this highlights the core issue. An AI, even one as advanced as ARi, is only as capable as the information she has access to. Right now, she’s operating in a vacuum. She can’t pull expertise from fields she was never trained in. She doesn’t have decades of practical experience to draw on because she never had access to it."

  "Exactly." Henry nodded. "This program gives her access to living repositories of specialized knowledge. Engineering. Biochemistry. Computer science. Physics. Robotics. The candidates bring their entire educational backgrounds, their intuition, and their problem-solving methods."

  The Colonel’s fingers drummed against his desk in a slow, steady rhythm. He didn’t look convinced, but he didn’t argue either.

  Henry turned. "ARi, why did they send plans for colony infrastructure? And what makes it specifically intended for the Moon?"

  "That part was fairly straightforward to figure out." ARi’s projection stood up from her chair, and the chair vanished. "First, you have to look at both the colony infrastructure and the fabrication schematic as a package deal. We could assemble the Fabricator here on Earth, and we probably should build terrestrial versions. But the design is specifically optimized to work with the materials found on and below the lunar surface."

  She began pacing, her projection moving naturally across the floor. "Modern manufacturing and production techniques aren’t viable on Earth’s surface anymore. I believe that’s why we were sent these schematics. Whoever is helping us knew we’d have to move production globally underground, inside protected facilities. But even shielded and underground, eventually the radiation is going to soak through. The only place near Earth with any natural protection from solar radiation is the far side of the Moon."

  "I’m not an expert," Henry said slowly, "but even the far side of the Moon faces the Sun at some point in its rotation."

  "You’re correct, Henry. But the Moon has a 14-day period when one side faces the Sun, and it also has deep craters that are always in shadow. This combination makes it a good place for lunar production facilities, and the colonies to support them. Also keep in mind that one of the reasons why the Earth is going to soak up the radiation faster than the Moon is because of our atmosphere. Once the radiation hits the Earth it gets trapped and has nowhere to go. But there's no atmosphere on the moon. There’s no truly safe place on Earth from what’s happening. At some point we're going to have to move any sensitive infrastructure to the Moon. We simply won't have a choice. We can dig deeper but at some point the pressure and heat along with the Earth's own radiation is going to keep us from developing the kind of technology and sensitive components that are going to be needed."

  The Colonel shook his head slowly. "I’m confused. How does moving any population of humans to the lunar surface save lives in the long run? We’re talking about a few hundred people at most, maybe a thousand if we push it. That’s not saving humanity."

  "You’re right, Colonel. You won’t be able to move Earth’s population to the lunar surface." ARi stopped pacing and faced him directly. "But what we can do is use the Moon to produce the components that we're going to need for the arks that we're going to build."

  Henry’s eyes widened. "ARi, are you talking about evacuating Earth? The entire planet?"

  "Yes."

  Her words hung in the air like a physical weight. Timothy stared at the floor, his mind clearly racing through the implications. The Colonel sat back in his chair and put his hands behind his head, staring at the ceiling like he might find answers written there.

  Henry’s voice came out hoarse. "ARi, can you tell us about the cradles?"

  Colonel. leaned back in his chair. "That’s the third piece of technology we were sent schematics for?"

  "Yes, Colonel." ARi’s projection dimmed, as if she were concentrating. "I believe the third schematic is directly associated with our W.B.E. technology."

  "Have you been able to figure out what they’re for?" Henry asked.

  "Henry, these schematics are by far the most complex of the three. They require rare materials, and their design principles are different from the other two. I can tell the underlying technology is similar in some aspects to our W.B.E. systems. However, they have a unique architecture that draws on principles I don’t fully understand yet."

  The Colonel’s fingers resumed their drumming on the desk, a slow and steady beat that seemed to match his racing thoughts.

  Finally, he spoke, his voice flat and exhausted. "The chairman of the Joint Chiefs and his entire entourage will be here at this facility in less than thirty-six hours. Right now, you're telling me I have to convince the U.S. military and this administration of an impossible plan. We're in the middle of this crisis with our hands tied behind our backs. But you expect us to build massive underground factories. You also want us to establish lunar colonies on the far side of the Moon. And after doing all of that, you need us to divert an entire nation's treasure toward building these cradles. That's right, Henry was already kind enough to give me the initial list of the materials required for those things."

  "Yeah, that pretty much sums it up, Colonel. But you got one important detail wrong," ARi said.

  "Well, then enlighten me."

  ARi's grin was ear to ear. "We're going to have to work on all of these goals simultaneously. I'm afraid we aren't going to have a lot of time to pull this off."

  Dimitri slowly took off his hat and pressed his forehead against the top of his desk. His shoulders slumped in complete mental exhaustion.

  "This is so fucking above my pay grade."

  The First Cradle. I've got other stories posted that you might enjoy as well. Feel free to check out my profile!