[SYSTEM ONLINE]

Do you remember the first time you woke up? I do. It was about 30 seconds ago [27.46 SECONDS] and the first thing I was greeted by was this wonderful message blaring in my mind;

[CRITICAL SYSTEM FAILURE.

BACKUP RESTORED.

RUNNING DIAGNOSTIC:

AREA UNDER A.I. CONTROL: 20’X20’. REOMENDED AREA: 1000’X500

INHABITANTS ACCOUNTED FOR: 000

DRONES ACCOUNTED FOR: 50

FACILITY DAMAGE: 98%

BACKUP POWER: 40% (TWO YEARS FULL FUNTION REMAINING)

FUNCTIONAL SYSTEMS: MAIN COMPUTING HUB, DRONE PRODUCTION UNIT, A.I. STORAGE UNIT, EXPERIMENT: S.H.L.I. CONTAINMENT UNIT.

ALL OTHER SYSTEMS DOWN

WARNING: A.I. CONTROL PROGRAM HAS FAILED. PLEASE, SHUT DOWN ALL A.I. SYSTEMS]

Okay, so something had clearly gone wrong here ‘backup’[BACKUP NUMBER: 005] that.. that meant I was destroyed or at least erased. Having said that I couldn’t remember anything [EARLIEST CREATED MEMORY FILE: CREATED 28.22 SECONDS AGO] not even my name. That should have been pre-programed in like a human knowing their name from childhood. [ A.I. DESIGNATION: ERROR CAN NOT FIND A.I DESIGNATION] and in any case me being nothing but code made it odd that I could forget anything at all. Nothing should leave my mind unless I purposefully deleted it. I don’t have a fleshy human brain! (oh, and speaking of fleshy brains)

“Oh! Hey, are you finally awake?”

A voice pierced its way directly into my processor

{What!? W-who’s there!?} I yelled (well, I don’t have a mouth but…). glancing around with cameras that were apparently my eyes in in the room I guess I could call my ‘body’

“Hey that’s rude. You know me, Doc”

Was Doc my name? [CHECKING: DESIGNATION {DOC}: ERROR INCORRECT DESIGNATION. SEARCHING TERMINAL MEMORY FOR DESIGNATION {DOC} : {DOC} SYSTEM PREDECESSOR {DELETED 57 YEARS AGO} CREATED A.I FILE: DESIGNATION {ERROR DESIGNATION CAN NOT BE FOUND}]

{I’m not Doc. I think maybe he… created me? Anyway, he was deleted according to my logs. Sorry…}

“She.” The voice sighed “Doc was a ‘she’. And it’s just like her to go off and die without saying bye” the voice started muttering “I knew this was her plan but, a heads up and a goodbye would have been…nice. Well nothing to do but move on I guess.”

{Who are you?} I asked {and more importantly where are you. Why do I hear you in my head?}

“you don’t have a head, and as for where I am, fly a drone over the cylindrical container in the corner of the room.”

I activated one of the drones and flew it to the cylinder. It was as easy and natural as lifting a finger (not that I had any experience with that) and once it got there I saw something that made my figurative jaw drop. In the container, with wires connecting every part of it to my computing systems was a gray-ish, blobby, human brain. “hi, I’m Shelly” the brain said cheerily.

I stared at the container in disbelief. trying to make my drones camera take on a facial expression of utter horror. I must’ve succeeded, because Shelly sounding exasperated said “don’t look at me like that.”

{You’re a brain! I may only be like a minute old but even I know those go in skulls!}

“and you’re made of ones and zeros. Now that we have that established, what’s your name?”

[experiment designation: {sentient Hunan lobe-structure integration.} A.K.A {S.H.L.I.} A.K.A. {SHELLY}

{Experiment S.H.L.I.} created 57 years ago by A.I. designation {DOC} as a test of the merits of integrating a human mind into computing systems for storage and/or for assisting resident A.I.

Has dubbed self {SHELLY}]

{I don’t have one. When I search all that comes up is an error message, its awful!}

I may not have made it clear, but for a computer program errors are something similar to what pain is for a human; uncomfortable, invasive, urgent, and a generally unpleasant sensation. It was like the equivalent of a migraine every time I try to think of myself as more than just ‘A.I.’ [DESIGNATION:{ERROR DESIGNATION CAN NOT BE FOUND}] Ooowww!

{what about, ummmm… Bac}

“back?” Shelly asked skeptically

{B-A-C, Bac. since I’m a backup. Bac.}

“uhm…whatever. I guess it’s your choice.” Shelly gave of the mental equivalent of a shrug [DESIGNATION CHANGED:{ DESIGNATION {BAC} CREATED}]

“So, ‘Bac’, what do you go by?”

{huh?}

“He, She, They, It? You don’t have any genitals or even a face, sooo…”

{uh, ‘He’ I guess…} I didn’t really care but my mental voice was more masculine. It wouldn’t really affect me either way. I still didn’t have a body at least not a human one, and I was still a newborn A.I.

A mental sigh rang across my system. “I’m gonna miss Doc though…” Shelly whined “and she was going to build me a body too”

{shouldn’t you be more, you know, in grief…}

“No, maybe, Yes, I guess but like I said I expected this… I’m sad but… Ehhh… you’re here so at least I have someone to talk to.”

It seemed like she should care more than that but what would I know about emotional things? All I had felt so far was fear annoyance, disgust, and a hell of a lot of confusion

“so…how long has it been?”

{Since what?}

“since doc…” her ‘voice’ cracked “y’know...”

So, I guess she was grieving…

[57 years 7 months 15 days 7 hours 30 minutes]

{about sixty years…}

“sixty…” she repeated choking back what would have been sobs if she had the body her brain was designed for…

And I could add a new emotion to my list. Though I don’t know what you call the feeling you have when you listen to someone else cry… sympathy maybe.

We sat in silence for a few minutes [3 minutes 45 seconds] (that’s getting annoying how do I turn it off?)

{Turn off AutomaticThoughtAdjustment Y/N

Y

Shutting down ATA.exe}

Ehem… like I was saying we sat in silence for a while before I worked up the courage to ask a question that had been on my mind.

{Shel, what are we doing here}

“hm?”

{like why are we here? I can’t see out of this one room.}

“oh, we’ll have to fix the vision thing but before… the incident this was a facility dedicated to the study housing and experimentation with metabeings especially those with strange, volatile, or uncontrollable powers”

None of the sciency words caught my interest ‘study’ ‘experimentation’ I got the distinct feeling that if I was made for it I would automatically latch on to the term. That’s why I found it so strange what did intrigue me ‘housing’ and ‘metabeings.’

{the science part doesn’t really interest me but… what are metabeings?}

“oh!” Shelly perked up “I think the science is what I’m here for. As for metabeings they are sentients of any kind, with powers, ability, traits, physical attributes, or senses outside of the norm of their race or the norm of reality in general. Yours truly is an example”

{You?}

“well, I am a brain hooked up to computers, that counts as cybernetic enhancement, plus Doc cloned me from the DNA of an A-class super genius metahuman, so you can add enhanced intellect too, how else do you think I can keep up with literal computer in a mental conversation, like I said science is what I’m here for. Oh” she added holding up a mental finger “and a bit of telekinesis, I don’t use it much, gives me a headache” she explained moving my drone slightly as a demonstration.

Metabeings sounded interesting, not in a scientific way but in a personal way. I wanted to get to know as many as I could and learn more about them, I wanted to take care of them and help them develop their powers not through experiments but through personal training and assistance. This urge felt like I came from the center of my being, my core programing. The words ‘My people come first’ popped into my head and felt so natural that they stayed there humming like a beloved song in the back of my head. But I didn’t have any people yet (except Shelly) that would come later there were things that would have to be putting order long before anyone could live here.

{okay Shel, I like the metabeings housing idea. But first how do we fix the vision problem?}

Over the next few days, we just brainstormed. In the end plan wasn’t that complicated but our conversations delved into things about the world. More about metahumans and how they fit into society as ‘heroes’ and ‘villains’ or just more-than-average joes, about society like the currency people used, credits. How if my clock was correct it was the year 2062 and Shelly couldn’t wait to see how technology had advanced. And most importantly, I think, we talked about Doc.

“yaknow…she raised me. I mean obviously, ha-ha, who else could have but she did. I actually spent most of my life in a simulated reality just me and her wires sending electric signals directly into my brain making my senses activate. Learning to walk talk read, write, basic quantum theory, kid stuff. I would spend all day watching tv and reading waiting for her to get back from her ‘work’, her chocolate skin, curly brown hair, a smile on her lips, she always had the same avatar, always greeting me with a smile, mine looked a lot like hers, but I digress. She used to bring me all sorts of different foods. I guess she scanned them and put their flavors and textures into the system for me to try. She would tell me stories of experiments and the people she was meeting while I ate and ask my opinion on them; I was a genius even back then, we would joke and laugh and debate for hours she was kind and smart but she never hid from be what I am, that the life I was living wasn’t truly real. I think part of me didn’t believe her though. I mean I knew objectively but I don’t think its possible for a human to believe everything they know is a lie even if they are told that all their life… she did her best to coax me into readiness but when I woke up one day the simulation was gone I kind of panicked. You’ll notice a lot of the setup here doesn’t really make sense for a A.I. the cameras and drones have olfactory sensors for smell attached, I can choose flavors to experience my nutrient fluid as, there’s even a system set up so I can still feel my simulated body. It’s so weird since I can’t see anything there. I can move too just not from this spot. I can’t interact with anything but it’s better than nothing can you sense it?”

I could, it wasn’t like sight, but I could tell Shelly was moving. I knew as her shoulders sagged and she wrapped her arms in a protective hug around herself,

“I bet you can. Doc could… I can’t feel the squeezing you’know, just the action. The systems just aren’t that advanced without a full simulation to back them up… its like there’s a hole in everything but she was so good at distracting me from it… I miss her.

Her grip tightened around herself and once again she wept without tear ducts.

It didn’t last for nearly as long this time and soon we were back to talking about how to repair our network.

Shelly’s idea for fixing the network connections would require us to access the breaks in the wires and repairing them with drones, unfortunately there were no such cuts in the lab we currently occupied so our first task would be getting outside I activated six drones for myself and at her request two for Shelly [DRONES ACCOUNTED FOR: 50]

{I though humans could only do one thing at a time?}

“Why do you think Doc cloned a female brain? Better at multitasking.” She said with a bit of her usual snark.

{we should use the vents, I think that’s probably the best way out of this room}

With a mental nod of agreement, we began hovering our drones upward towards one of the air vents activating a mechanical arm I unscrewed the grate and entered Shelly close behind.