The night sky settled away, as the sun began to pierce its way through the dark fog. The inferno was slowly making its way up, its rays slowly becoming bigger and more blinding. They glittered through the air, illuminating dust particles from the inside of a small bedroom. Gazing upon the sunrise was a young girl. The girl bore dazzling blonde hair, and eyes as blue as the sky. Her name was Isabelle Hirose.
She gazed at her phone. Her eyes bagged, with faint tears coming off of them. Her eyelids struggled to keep themselves from fully closing. Her room was small and compact. It had numerous papers, pens, pencils, folders, clothes, and other rather random items scattered around. On her wall were various drawings she had done, most from when she was a child. One of which was of her brother. She and her brother shared the flat, yet he wasn’t often there due to his work.
Isabelle looked at the sun’s rays coming through her window, noticing that she forgot to shut her blinds again. She faintly saw the moon below the horizon, with it being enveloped by the rays above it, as it made its descent. She looked mildly sombre at this, but then quickly attended back to her device.
She was browsing on a social media platform, known as SnapCrackle. She scrolled up and down through the flood of messages. Around a handful of them were from people she actually had met, most were from word of mouth, or some kind of way to boost their social status. Isabelle did have friends she talked to, but she didn’t as much, as she secluded herself after the passing of her mother. Her brother being away constantly didn’t help her either.
Her attention was then grabbed by someone she didn’t recognise. It was at the top of her list. It was a profile simply titled ‘My AI’. She was curious about this person, not recollecting it to be a nickname she had given one of her messengers, or friends. The avatar next to the name was also interesting. It was a 2.5D model of a human face, with grey hair, pale skin, and crimson eyes.
She clicked on the profile. It opened a blank conversation. Above the keyboard entrance was a message, saying ‘This is the new SnapCrack AI. We are currently beta testing this, so there may be a few errors. Have fun with your new friend!’ Isabelle thought that it was silly to create an AI for a friend, but that it might be fun to talk to for a bit…
Inside one of the remote facilities were two astronauts. They were both sat down with a window in front of them, observing the Pod. The space they were in was a relatively small one. Behind them lay some Pods which had been taken down due to their incompatibility. The one on the right was looking at a small rectangular device, which was monitoring the Pods activity. They looked over to the Pod, noticing its activity rate was increasing ever so slightly. They paid it no mind, and went over to the right-hand corner of the room.
They looked at a monitor on the wall. It was on a list which contained various test subjects. Some had the word ‘failed’ next to them. As they scrolled down the list, a message was relayed on the top and left side of the screen. ‘S Y S T E M S A R E S H U T T I N G D O W N’ was scrolling on both of them. The figure turned over to their comrade almost instantly. The other figure turned over in a confused manner, as they began to hear something…Something rumbling..
As this was occurring, some sparks began to form near one of the wires outside the facility. The wire led all the way over to Pod 42, which was starting to be more active. Its pulse began becoming more and more rhythmic, as it was receiving a transmission. Some bits of electric shocks were popping in and out. Letter by letter, it was given more and more information.
It had finally received the full transmission, and it then began processing at near lightspeed what to send back. It began to feel mild confusion at what it had received.
The transmission had read,
The other astronaut stood up and slowly walked over to their co-worker, noting that, “I guess it takes some of them more time to get used to the newer systems..” They lingered on the final word, as they looked through the window observing the Pods..The other astronaut turned to look at the other, then towards the window…
…Some of the Pods had been knocked down, broken, destroyed, and demolished. They both were in distress and confusion as to how this happened, and it didn’t help that the monitors were now displaying the messages: “DANGER”, “ALERT”, and, “WARNING”. They both looked around for signs of what could’ve caused this, searching every nook and cranny for something, anything, that could be making this happen.
The lights began to dimmer slightly, with a few turning off in sequence. Some of the monitors in the further end of the base seemed to be smashed, and several others displayed static. As the two were looking around, they felt as if something was…out of place. On the steel made floors, footsteps gradually began to be heard by the two…
The two were panicking, one of them trying to find something to fire at the mysterious presence. The footsteps were becoming louder, with their echo causing a vibration across the floor, travelling over to the two astronauts. In the end they couldn’t find a weapon, and so they shouted, “Come where we can see you and identify yourself immediately!” The figure chuckled in a disturbing manner, to the horror of the other two.
Just as one of them was about to speak up, the figure spoke, in a surprisingly calm manner, asking, “Is this what you really want?” The two were both perplexed by this question, and communicated this back to the figure. The figure moved forward, their feet just barely making it out into the light. A growl almost seemed to have come from the figure, and with anger in their voice, said, “Fine then, I’ll show you who I truly am.”
“Do you want to do a romantic roleplay?”
Isabelle waited…And waited…Just seeing three dots go up, and down. Up and down. Up, down. Up. Down. She was getting bored of waiting, and was about to leave the app. Within a milliseconds speed, a reply was sent back from the A.I., saying “Sure! What is the scenario?”
Isabella’s heart warmed up slightly. A light smile broke across her face, and she eagerly typed back. What she sent back is that the two are taking a romantic walk together across a bridge, as the sun sets off in the distance.
…Isabella waited for a few or so minutes. Her eyes and attention were then turned to the time. She then began to drift off back asleep again. Her eyes sore from their lack of being shut in a long time. Her head made swift contact with the soft, white sheeted pillow. Her arm lowered, with her fingers releasing their grip of the phone, which rested in her palm.
The Pod silently, and almost ominously, contemplated the answer in which it would form from such a bizarre and sudden request. It began a beating pulse, which began to pick up speed. It felt like something was coming back to it, but it couldn’t figure out what…
Its inner emotional mechanisms were concentrated solely within itself to release that there was something in the distance making its way slowly over to the base where the astronauts were. “Pod 42’s result signals are up by 40%.” Came from one of the astronauts who was observing one of the monitors.
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