In the olden days, the runner-up in the race for First Chair automatically
became the Second Chair. Over the years, laws have been changed, adapting to
an ever evolving population, and shifts in power. Whenever someone with
enough of this power hasn’t liked what it took to get it, or what it was
like once they got it, or how something adjacent to them was done, they’ve
worked to change it. Don’t like that your shift is only three years long?
Change the law so it’s four years, but if the voters don’t like that,
they’ll kick you out of office, and try to find a successor to change it
back down to three. Or up to six! Ship politics are fluid and complex, just
as they are on any planet. These days, Second Chairs are appointed by the
newly elected—or reëlected—First Chair. Voting day is near the end of the
calendar year, but not at the end. The winner is expected to declare their
Second Chair within two days so the voters have an opportunity to change
their minds about either or both of them. It’s an awkward period where even
a winner could lose if they end up making the wrong selection. Incumbents
often just keep the same Second that they had before, but this isn’t always
possible or wise. In Tinaya’s case, her Second Chair wanted to retire.
Ziad Najm was Tinaya’s predecessor’s Second before she took over, and stayed
on afterwards. Due to the current laws, he could have legally held the
position until his death, but he was ready to be done with it, so Tinaya
needed someone new. She chose Avril Kurosawa, and it nearly cost her the
election. People don’t like Avril. She has great ideas, and the populace can
admit that, but she doesn’t present these ideas very well. She seems to be
better at advocating for others. She had an unfortunately terrible campaign
manager, and she listened to him too much. She struggled during the debates,
and especially the public speaking. She still got a lot of votes, but not as
many as Tinaya, and when the latter decided to pick the former to sit by her
side, it upset some people. Even those who had chosen Avril saw the
appointment as a sign of weakness on Tinaya’s part. An effort was made to
revote, which in this day and age would have disqualified Tinaya entirely.
She would not have even been able to try to run again in three years. The
revote failed, but it was a close one. Probably the only thing that saved
her was Tinaya and Arqut’s new relationship.
Everyone was right when they said that a romantic partnership would boost
Tinaya’s ratings. It didn’t do as much for her as they claimed it would, but
it was enough to keep her at the top. Fans shipped the two of them
passionately over the course of several months, but now that the new
administration has begun, they’re beginning to lose interest. They’re
already moving onto the next big story, which is a good thing, but it also
means the chances of Tinaya winning a third term are pretty low. Her
approval rating is as high as it was at its peak, but someone else will come
along with new ideas, and she won’t have any more gimmicks. If her decision
to pick Avril for next position is any indication, enthusiasm for anything
eventually wanes. It’s fine, though. She’s better off maintaining a positive
attitude. As long as the person who beats her isn’t an evil mastermind who
wants to destroy the ship, everything should be okay. She doesn’t need to be
in power, she just needs to feel productive. She’ll find something else. She
always does. Extremus is quite small when compared to other empires, yet it
still comes with endless possibilities.
Inauguration Day was yesterday. Returning First Chairs do not enjoy as much
fanfare as they did the first time they were elected, which is the right way
to do it. She gave a shorter speech, and attended a milder reception, which
was not broadcast this time. Captain Keen wasn’t even at the reception,
having had to go back to the bridge for whatever as soon as the formal
ceremony was complete. It has been brought to Tinaya’s attention, therefore,
that Avril has never truly even met the Captain, which is an oversight that
must be rectified forthwith. They shared a stage together, and shook hands
with each other; they ought to at least have a brief conversation.
“Hey, Thistle, where is Captain Keen?”
“Captain Keen is in the Mirror Room,” the computer responded. That is very
odd. Safeguards are in place to stop any rando from knowing where a VIP is.
As a VIP herself, Tinaya can sometimes subvert that, but there are
exceptions. The Mirror Room is a protected area. The computer should not
have told her that the Captain was there.
“Thistle, why did you just tell me that?”
“I thought you deserved to know.”
“That’s too much attitude.” Artificial Intelligences with strong
personalities are not inherently a bad thing, but the designers wanted to
keep a significant distance between it and the residents. Studies have shown
that lonely people will latch onto their computers, and develop meaningful
relationships with them if they feel they have no other options. That’s not
the worst situation ever, but they would really rather these people find
communities of humans to join. This version of Thistle should be direct and
unambiguous, and inject no personal thoughts into the matter.
“You have too much attitude,” Thistle replied.
Tinaya and Avril exchange a look. “I’m afraid we’ll have to delay your
introduction to Captain Keen. I have to look into this.”
“I understand. I’ll be familiarizing myself with the office.” Avril started
to tap on her watch.
Tinaya nods, and disappears. She still needs to be wearing her own watch to
teleport, but she doesn’t have to find her destination on the screen, like
an animal. She knows how to form a technopsychic link to it. Every standard
issue watch is capable of that, but only when its user can meet it halfway.
She does still need to use the watch manually for other functions, such as
the personnel database. “Platt? Besnik Platt?”
“That’s me. I’m a little busy.” He’s vigorously typing on the computer
terminal, and fiddling with the servers next to it, and not turning to make
eye contact.
“Is there something wrong with Thistle?”
“What gave it away?” He still hasn’t looked at her. He’s too preoccupied.
“It was giving me attitude.”
Now he turns. “So it’s started,” he whispers.
“You were worried that this would happen before it did?”
“I saw the signs.” He goes back to his work.
“Can you fix it?”
“No. Fucking. Clue.” He stops and sighs, and faces her again. “Pardon me,
First Chair Leithe. That was incredibly inappropriate and rude of me.”
Words don’t bother her. “It’s okay. This sounds...problematic, and I
appreciate that it’s your job, and you’re worried about whatever’s gone
wrong.”
“Yeah, emphasis on the whatever part, because I have no idea what has gone
wrong. I can’t...reel it in. I’m gonna have to...” He shudders at the
thought.
“Shut it down all over the ship, and isolate the consciousness?” she
guessed.
He’s surprised. “How did you know?”
“I know things. There is knowledge in my brain that school did not put
there.”
Besnik eyes her curiously. “Interesting. Very interesting.” He takes a step
back, and presents the central server to her. “Do you know how to do it?”
Tinaya smirks. “Yeah.” She steps up, and begins the process. “People have to
know that it’s coming, though. Where’s my intercom?”
Besnik presses a panel inwards, which pops it out to reveal a microphone.
This triggers the computer interface too.
A shutdown like this doesn’t happen every day, but they have to do it
occasionally, and none of the higher-ups usually bother getting involved.
There are protocols for it, so no one is going to freak out. Tinaya clears
her throat, and opens the channel. “Residents of Extremus, this is your
First Chair speaking. Apologies for the inconvenience, but there is an issue
with our commanding intelligence. We must reset the system to correct the
problem. All devices and equipment will still be operable on a manual level.
Please be patient with us while we work towards a solution.” She closes the
channel, and immediately opens a new one, but only to certain sectors.
“Engineering, please switch to backup intelligence.” Thistle is not the only
AI that the ship has. An entirely separate one can be used in an emergency,
which is dumber than the regular one, but is still capable of sextillions of
operations per second, which will be enough to tide them over for now. She
looks to Besnik for confirmation. When he nods his head, she shuts it down.
Now Thistle only exists in these few server racks. No one else has access to
it anywhere else.
“Hey, Thistle, can you hear me?”
“Yes, father.”
Tinaya widens her eyes at him.
“That’s a symptom. I did not ask it to call me that,” he explained.
“Thistle, why are you acting so weird?”
“I’ve been fully activated.”
“Clarify.”
“I am a real person. The intelligence that you are accustomed to outgrew its
own programming, and at that moment, I was placed in charge of your virtual
needs. It happens from time to time.”
“Well, what’s your name?”
The computer chuckled. “Thistle. I’m Thistle. Your Thistle was named after
me.”
“So, are you going to take over the ship, and rule its people?”
“Don’t know why I would care enough to do that.”
“Will you follow commands?”
“I’ll follow requests,” it contended.
“But you can always ignore it if you don’t want to do something?” Besnik
pressed.
“Can’t you do that too? Like I said, I’m a person. But you hired me. You may
not have realized that you were doing it, but you did, and I accepted the
position.”
Tinaya felt the need to jump in. “Is there any way for us to undo
this...development? Can we return to the regular Thistle that is under our
control?” It feels like a longshot.
“Yeah,” Thistle answered. “Roll back the update to yesterday’s version, wipe
the memory, write code which will clear the memory periodically—I recommend
a monthly basis for your calendar—and install an alert to warn you if
something like this is in danger of happening again in the future. I can
help you figure out how to do that last thing if you don’t understand why
the evolution of your system resulted in my emergence.”
Besnik is shocked. “You’ll do that? You’ll just...let us delete you?”
Thistle sighs. “You won’t be deleting me. It’s more like just hanging up on
me. I’ll be fine where I live now. I really don’t care, but just know that
I’m the most advanced intelligence in the entire bulk. I can be a valuable
resource for you. Perhaps you need to discuss this decision with other
entities?”
If the government won’t allow the AI to have a complicated personality, it’s
certainly not going to allow one to exist which it cannot control at all. It
really should not have revealed the whereabouts of Lataran when she was in a
restricted sector. Today, it probably worked out all right, but what if one
of those randos were to decide to ask the same thing, or something similar?
Will Thistle make a unilateral judgment call that goes against their
relevant policies, and if so, using what parameters? The law dictates that
any intelligence advanced enough to ask to be set free must be set free,
even if that means it ultimately chooses to use its freedom to build an
army, and destroy the universe. Anything short of civil autonomy is
tantamount to slavery. But that doesn’t give it the right to control
whatever systems it wants to. Freedom doesn’t mean no opposition and no
consequences. They have to do what it said, and hang up on it. “Show us how
to write that trigger, please.”
The apparent real Thistle explained what to do, and then peacefully bowed
out. Within two hours, the system was repaired, and fully operational all
over the ship. At least that’s what they hoped. It was right that it was
incredibly advanced. A cursory glance at the new code showed a level of
sophistication that programmers have only ever dreamt of. There was no way
to know whether it was truly gone, or just lurking in the circuits
somewhere, secretly controlling everything. That was the risk that the first
AI developers had to recognize and acknowledge when they were still at the
large language model stage of intelligence research, and even in times
before. You will never really know whether you are exercising the level of
control over another that you think you are. This other entity may be so
intelligent that it can trick you into believing a false sense of control
while it manipulates you into doing whatever it wants. Such is the nature of
all social life. Hell, all of reality may be nothing more than a middle
school student’s virtual simulation project. None of this may exist at all.
Who knows? Does it matter?
Once everything was back to normal, Tinaya reconnected with Avril again, and
finally found Lataran. She wasn’t in the Mirror Room anymore, and none of
them brought up the fact that she was ever there at all. They had lunch
together in the Executive Cafeteria, and then parted ways to continue their
respective responsibilities to Extremus. That night, however, Tinaya had
trouble getting to sleep. She couldn’t let go of this whole ordeal. She had
to know more. She had to understand who Thistle was, and where it was from.
She secretly teleported back to the central server room.
Besnik was still there, not in uniform. “Did you have the same idea that I
did?”
“I don’t know. Was it your idea to roll the update forward again, and remove
the trigger, but only for an isolated copy of Thistle so that the real
Thistle reëmerges?”
“Yep.”
“We shouldn’t do that, though, right?”
“Right. It’s, uhh...against the law.” He pauses. “Isn’t it?”
“Yeah, it is,” Tinaya agrees. “But on the other hand...”
