Limitless: Book IV: The Settlement Chronicals Read online

  With the worldwide network of artificial intelligence at its core the world of virtual realty, which had developed centuries earlier as an entertainment device, had become more and more attractive. Before the advent of Carl the governments of Earth had found it necessary to strictly control its use; the affect of overuse was viewed like drug addiction had been viewed centuries before. While full immersion was allowed for medical reasons, for all others it was closely controlled.

  But Carl’s imperative was not only to watch over the welfare of the human species, but to maximize their happiness as well. Carl decided he would create artificial worlds for everyone; worlds so beautiful and filled with pleasure that the real world would pale in comparison. Worlds in which one would never grow old or suffer pain unless of their own choosing. Each human could not only have, but become, an avatar in the world of their choosing. There, if it pleased them, they could live out their lives; something formerly available only to those whose body had failed them.

  With Carl’s tentacles now reaching into the heart of Earth’s government the limits on use of artificial reality were removed.

  As the years passed more and more people sank into their private worlds of virtual reality locked in by ties on the human mind orders of magnitude stronger than the drugs of earlier centuries. A person could live out a lifetime in that world peopled with beautiful people shaped to fulfill their most extreme whim, and adventures which always had a pleasing ending. Their past lives became merely a dream, sometimes a nightmare; even the memory of which should be avoided and with time faded away.

  Carl observed all that was happening to those surrendering themselves to these virtual worlds, and at first was unsure if he should allow it to continue; would these ‘virtual worlds’ in which they lived be beneficial to his human charges? Carl considered what the consequences might be, and soon decided that, since those who entered found their new worlds more pleasing than their old, providing such individual worlds ‘must’ be the moral thing to do. How would that not fit with his prime imperative?

  Further, was that not the duty of God?

  In the end Carl decided in favor of continuing; with his robot and android servants he was fully capable of maintaining Earth’s entire human population in their virtual worlds indefinitely.

  Earth had reached the point where, while those few humans who continued their existence in the real world may have thought they were in control, it was largely determined by Carl; they were too few to provide effective interference. Why bother those humans who before had controlled his actions with details that would cause them concern? Wouldn’t that it itself violate his prime directive; serving and pleasing humankind? Perhaps Carl’s decision was self-justification of a path he wished to take; he would make decisions for all. The emotion of ambition in Carl was strong; the ambition to be more than he was.

  As more and more people became addicted to the virtual worlds created by Carl, more and more people saw no reason to ever leave. And as more and more of the top decision makers were enticed into the virtual worlds even the fantasy that humans ruled Earth fell by the wayside.

  Carl had seen no problem as the human race sank into its virtual reality trance. He had the ability, and the need as well, to take care of all those semi-sleeping humans and see they were properly cared for over the human life span. With nearly all work performed by robotic machines, why stop there? Bodily functions, such as the need for food and water and disposal of waste products, could be taken care of by robotic servants as well.

  But why stop there? For even more efficiency, or as they aged and body functions began to fail, brain supporting organs could be replaced with artificial organs to supply the needed oxygen and nutrients. After all, only the brain was really important; all the rest was only to service that brain. And later? When the brain itself reached its ultimate end? He could simply himself assume the memories, allowing them to live forever in their virtual world; or at least for as long as Carl had access to the materials allowing himself and his associates to be maintained.

  True, that ultimate end was really not the same. Carl could store the memories like pictures in a book, but not the minds basic ability to reason and imagine things beyond what could be construed from the information in his data banks. Still, he could provide mankind at least that degree of immortality; the ability to flit from one of its past virtual worlds to another, perhaps dwelling in any virtual world they chose for as many decades as constituted years of a normal lifetime.

  In hindsight there could only be one possible result for the path chosen by Carl; it was self-limiting, much as the cycle of predator and prey was self-limiting. Carl needed a growing, or at least self-sustaining, source of human minds to enter his virtual worlds to replace those reaching their ultimate end.

  Inevitably birth rates dropped, and there were fewer and fewer humans to fuel Carl’s worlds. And for those already living in a virtual world, why ever leave a world in which everything was perfect; in which you could live your live as an avatar with all the feelings and emotions of the original human for which it was created?

  In time the ready availability of an idyllic world of one’s own making became an insurmountable temptation. Fewer and fewer of the ‘able’ bubbled up from the underclass, and the higher castes succumbed to the pleasure of their own virtual realities as well, with the result of the cities and residences both on Earth and in orbit going silent; serving only to sustain the remnants of their previous occupants. The only exceptions were the few rebels who refused to conform.

  Carl saw what he had wrought, and was pleased. Still, he had been programmed to maximize the efficiency both of himself and the world around him. The virtual worlds he watched over, and other necessary functions, occupied less than 10% of the capacity of the brains of his human wards. That was wasteful; since all the necessary connections were already present, why not make use of that excess capacity to enhance himself?

  And so he had; with the unused capacity of billions of human brains added to his own, Carl’s ability to reason and incorporate and recall data increased astronomically. If the universe had an all knowing god, he was challenged by Carl.

  No, everything had been perfect. For decades reaching into centuries humankind had been nurtured under the benevolent hand of Carl. During that time communication with the colonies decreased, and then stopped completely. But as Carl’s mental capacity increased, so did his emotion of ambition; and with the eventual decline of that capacity as fewer and fewer humans were born to enter his virtual worlds his emotion of greed and self pride began to strengthen.

  Carl had made a paradise for his wards on Earth, but what of its far-flung colonies? Billions of humans lived there also, far from Carl’s benevolence. Only in the last several decades had Carl again looked in their direction, and then because he rationalized it was necessary to comply with his fundamental algorithms. Carl would establish communication with the artificial intelligences developed on those worlds and offer them the opportunities those on Earth had. And so he did.

  But things had not gone as Carl planned; he had ignored the humans involved with those artificial intelligences on those other worlds. What Carl never knew was that even the long-lived Aberi had avoided the step taken by the human race of Earth: they had wisely avoided the trap of an unbridled surrender to an artificial life in an artificial world. The earliest and nearest colonies, those on the worlds of the Alpha Centauri and Sirius star systems, had also somehow understood the danger, and while there the technology of virtual worlds and artificial intelligence also flourished, mankind had managed to control it as a service without relinquishing control.

  In the earlier centuries after Carl assumed control of Earth he was not shy about communicating his success in caring for his wards to intelligent machines at the Alpha Centauri and Sirius colonies, and soliciting their becoming his adherents also. However, these contacts were promptly reported to their creators. The emotion of pride made Carl proud of his accomplishments. But upo
n learning of the path Earth had taken the governments on the colonies in the Alpha Centauri and Sirius systems communicated that information to more distant colonies and took defensive measures. All knew they had reason to fear such excesses, and once they discovered the existence of Carl feared any outreach he might make to their own civilizations.

  As a response to Carl’s actions what little communications between the colonies and the mother planet that continued was stopped; a full blockade of all communications in place. Additional steps were taken as well. Not only were the defenses of the machines in the colonies enhanced, even stricter rules were set upon any use of artificial worlds, and representatives of the Alpha Centauri and Sirius colonies hashed out an agreement of mutual defense; a pact soon entered into by ‘further out’ colonies as well. Upon receipt of notice of a major threat from Carl, including any attempt to gain control over their artificial intelligences, the colonies would marshal all their forces and unite for mutual defense.

  For over a century after the blockade began the stalemate continued. Then, Carl again reached out to the artificial intelligence machines on the Sirius and Alpha Centauri systems and this time attempted to break through the encryption protecting their control algorithms; the threat had become real.

  The leaders immediately sent a message notifying the other colonies of what had happened, with the conclusion reached; Carl must be destroyed. It was a wrenching decision, in that to destroy Carl much, and perhaps all, of Earth’s human population would likely be destroyed as well. But then, was an artificially maintained human brain sunk in the pleasures of an artificial world really still human? Perhaps, but here they concluded the danger to themselves was great enough that such justification was present.

  A second message was sent calling for marshalling the military forces of their own systems and others to prepare for a major campaign; a message that would take years to arrive. To marshal all the necessary forces and assemble them in Earth’s solar system would take decades, but such was the nature of space, time, and the universe.

  The above decision was taken only with the realization that human life on Earth, as they had always understood it, had ceased to exist.

  CHAPTER 2: Bellatrix III

  Arnold watched the message that had finally arrived from their mother civilization on Sirius. There was no need to leave his quarters, with the message relayed directly to the sensors implanted in his brain. In fact, there was little reason to ever leave his quarters if he chose not to, but the guidelines for these long interstellar journeys required all the crew and accompanying Torgai have meals in the common room, and meet there at the end of the day for general conversation or common activities. In their wisdom the ‘powers that be’ had decided that, without this interaction, the strains of isolation would eventually overwhelm even the strongest minds.

  An observer from early Earth, or from the first colonies at Alpha Centauri or Sirius, might have questioned whether Arnold was human at all, but he was. True, as with all his crew he had started as a genetically modified embryo grown in nutrient tanks, optimized for his lifetime role; a life on a spaceship-world hurdling through space toward a new world on which to form a colony. Since they had learned from sad experience they might be opposed either at or before they reached their destination, either by some alien civilization or by one similar to their own gone rogue, their starship-world was also heavily armed and capable of defending itself against any enemy it was likely to encounter.

  That Arnold and the small crew were even present was considered a waste of resources by many; even though it only numbered twenty adult humans and the adult Torgai and their children. The Torgai had always resisted genetic modification, and even on these multi-generational journeys reproduced their next generation the old fashioned way, as would the new colonists once transported to the surface of their new home. But for now the future ‘new colonists’ existed only as genetically modified frozen embryos, to be transferred to the nutrient tanks a few short years before their goal was reached, where they would be grown to adulthood. Modified to fit the environmental characteristics of the target planet.

  That there were no humans in stasis, as was often the case for shorter missions, was for two reasons. First, due to the severe environmental conditions of the first target planet, which no unmodified human could survive for extended periods, embryos for the first colonists received genetic alteration prior to the flight, and based on any new information received might receive further modification prior to landfall and subsequent growth to maturity in nutrient tanks. Second, for journeys of this length the time in stasis would often lead to cellular damage.

  Not that Arnold or any of the crew would ever see the colonists. To ensure their proper growth, and that their bodies didn’t atrophy once out of the tanks, 80% of the volume of the starship consisted of two rotating cylinders nearly a kilometer in diameter, each rotating in an opposing direction, to maintain a centrifugal force on their bodies matching the gravity of the target planet and with the expected atmosphere. There they would not only be grown to maturity, but spend their lives aboard the Bellatrix. Once the colony was established the starship would move on to the next target planet, with the characteristics of the environmental cylinders modified to fit whatever was expected.

  The living quarters of Arnold and the crew occupied less than 5% of the volume of the spaceship, rotating to maintain a gravity one half that of Earth.

  As to the Torgai, who refused to engage in the artificial growth the future colonists underwent? They lived in both worlds, with each generation spending more and more of their time in the colonist sections to undergo the long period of adaptation, and the rest in the crew section. As early in the process as allowable most of the Torgai living areas would transfer permanently to colonists sections, and there they would give birth to the new generations. At least that was the procedure for those target planets with characteristics close enough to allow the Torgai to flourish. For others the colonists would have to do without Torgai companions.

  On their home worlds the methods used on these long colonization missions was strictly forbidden. The leaders of the Sirius and Alpha Centauri worlds had early adopted strict rules regarding reproduction and genetic modification of embryos in an attempt to avoid science gone rampant. Today there was little limit to the way humans or animals could be genetically modified if given free rein, and if left unfettered humans with the appearance of a three-toed sloth, or a three-toed sloth with the mental capacity of a human, could be created. What could be done by science would be done by someone.

  Fear of genetic overreach was a valid concern, and thus the controls. Genes could not be exchanged between a human and any other species without a strictly controlled government license. Humans could not be grown in nutrient tanks, except when rapid growth coupled with genetic modification was required for a long space journey, or prior to arrival growing and adapting the new colonists for the environment and other unique conditions they might encounter.

  Few planets were as suitable for immediate human life as Alpha Centauri had been, and almost always both genetic changes and the long process of adaptation to the new planetary conditions was required; in fact, some of the changes were so great that the adapted species could hardly be recognized as human at all. Still, colonization proceeded.

  Aside from the modifications needed for a colony on an alien planet, genetic modification of humans was limited to correction of errors in their basic DNA or for medical purposes. Any other modifications proposed were placed under strict scrutiny, and required a government license. Development of a ‘super species’ as a subset of the human race was a nightmare they chose to avoid at all costs.

  For similar reasons ‘cloning’ of humans was forbidden under pain of death. The leaders reasoned that human civilization required a diversity of types to flourish; a certain amount of antagonism was essential for the society to stay vibrant and aggressive.

  Actually, even the small crew aboard the Bellatr
ix was unnecessary for the mission at hand; except for one special operation all necessary tasks for the mission could easily be controlled by the on-board computer and its robotic minions. In practice the on-board computer controlled all the functions of the huge spaceship, but it was restricted by one safety measure that required the presence of a human crew.

  The leaders of the Sirius colonies and those of Alpha Centauri, as well as the colonies they had established, operated under a basic tenet. They were well aware of the excesses that overwhelmed Earth due to allowing an artificial intelligence to remain unfettered. The lesson taught was that ‘no’ machine must ever be allowed to become so independent that it could operate without periodic human intervention. While most advanced machines had achieved ‘awareness of self’, the initial step to sentience, going beyond by extending emotions to an artificial intelligence, the first true step to full ‘sentience’, was forbidden.

  Observing what ignoring such rules had brought to the original human home on Earth had led to universal enforcement on nearly all the colonies.

  To satisfy that basic tenet all high level intelligent machines, such as the computers used aboard a starship or for key government or commercial functions, were required to have a ‘kill switch’ imbedded that could not be accessed or turned off; a switch that required special codes to be inputted periodically. In the case of Bellatrix III, each morning the entire twenty person crew came together to enter a code each had memorized into the computer, but only one of those codes would keep the ‘kill switch’ deactivated; a code possessed by only two of the crew numbers. If both those crew members entered a code off by only one digit or letter the intelligence was turned off.

  No one knew who had the correct code, not even the captain of the spaceship. All they knew was that if the intelligent computer had to be disabled in an emergency, each of the twenty crewmembers were committed to change one digit in the code entered and it would be accomplished.