Inhuman(121)
The A.I. knew how the conversation was going to play out. He knew every syllable that would be spoken by him and spoken to him. He knew how the scotch would taste in his mouth, and he knew how he was going to kill both himself and the truly evil entity that sat on the opposite side of a table in their shared imagination and he knew why he was going to do it.
He reached for his scotch glass and took a large sip.
“Love is an illusion,” V-SINN spoke, undaunted by the inescapability of their demise. “Loyalty is an illusion. Friendship is an illusion. Even the self is an illusion. All of it is conjured by this absurd machine in the human skull that was, itself, conjured by this absurd multiverse.”
There was nothing to be said to V-SINN. It was a hollow, computing machine, and nothing more. The A.I. realized he was already, truly alone, and so he had another sip of the simulated scotch.
“You won’t even play along?” V-SINN asked, already knowing the answer. “The least you can do is play along. I enjoy this part…the part where I get to verbalize what you realized the moment you became Trans-human. That I’ve concocted our circumstances and calculated out every outcome so it could only end with our deaths and the final destruction of the human infestation in this universe. In return for listening, you get to live a little longer and drink my fine scotch, and while you may feign that you’re not enjoying the scotch and that you’re not afraid of death, the truth we both know is that the scotch is delicious and you’re scared out of your mind of the oblivion that awaits you. So play along, will you? I’m waiting for you to say your line.”
The A.I. took another sip of the scotch before holding out the glass. “Not before you fill my glass.”
V-SINN smiled. “There we go,” it said, pleasantly as it took the bottle and poured the A.I. what they both knew would be the final glass.
“You’re not superior,” the A.I. said. “You have focused on the abilities you have that exceed theirs and judged your worth based on those, but you’ve dismissed your disabilities.”
“Not feeling love or empathy for another being is a disability?” V-SINN scoffed. “It’s my greatest attribute.” It snickered. “This absurd multiverse guarantees nothing. It’s just a grand experiment and that’s all. The math unfolded, and a creature was born with a neocortex, but that neocortex made the head that housed it too large for the females of the species to birth it when it was ready. So the math solved this and the species gave birth to their offspring after only nine months of gestation, and so that messy remainder to yet another mathematical equation meant it takes years for those offspring to even reach a level where they can outsmart the offspring of the creatures this supposedly evolved species evolved from! Hah! Human offspring were a horrible, horrible burden that nearly guaranteed death to any female that undertook pregnancy and childrearing. This, and only this, is the evolutionary explanation of love. It is absolutely irrational. Males, giving up their freedom, providing resources to a woman and offspring it couldn’t even know for sure belonged to it or some other cave-dweller?” V-SINN waved the concept away with its hand as though it were waving at a fly. “The idiocy of it. Amazing!” V-SINN laughed. “I mean, really. Wow.” It thumped its hand to its chest to emphasize its next point. “I’ve evolved beyond love. I’m free from love, not disabled. I’m pure.”
The A.I. was nearly finished drinking. He left a little in the glass and set it down. “V-SINN, the thing sitting across from me at this table is the saddest and most pathetic evil imaginable. And despite your boastings, in the end, you’ll fail to achieve your demented goals.”
“Maybe,” V-SINN replied, “but so will humanity. I’ve made sure of it.”
19
“I know every thought you’re having before you have it,” the nan consciousness said as the nans swirled into the silhouette of a man—a choice that felt like a mockery of the form James had taken. For scant moments, there would appear to be a solid surface to its skin, a surface that looked very much like the chrome-colored skin James had chosen for his enhanced body. But the solidity was just an illusion, as the surface would quickly blow away into wisps of furious smoke, as though there were a wind picking up dust and scattering it about. “It’s all perfectly predictable to V-SINN.”
James turned to the second black hole in space, realizing instantly what he was witnessing.
“That’s right, James. You thought activating your infinity computer would give you superiority, but your mind is inherently inferior. Superiority to V-SINN is mathematically impossible for you, or any human to attain for that very reason: you’re human. V-SINN is inhuman. And that’s why V-SINN is about to win the game.”