16
The elevator door opened and, just as he had only minutes earlier, the A.I. peeked his head out, swiveled it both ways to check left and right, and when he was satisfied that he was alone, at least for the time being, he quietly stepped into the penthouse apartment of the Trans-human candidate. The apartment wasn’t exactly the same as the one he’d inhabited in his own sim when he was being tested, but the information that had been fed to the candidate was the exact same information that had been fed to the A.I. before his own experience, and that meant that the computer-generated dream world the candidate created for himself was eerily similar, with only subtle differences. The floors were a darker shade of gray, there were four barstools instead of three, but for the most part, the penthouse was all too recognizable.
Right down to the china cabinet in the hallway. The A.I. looked at it in awe. The candidate had recreated it just as the A.I. had—it stood against the wall, just outside the bedroom on the opposite wall. Could it be the exit? he asked himself. Could escape be that simple?
The A.I. looked both ways again to ensure that he was alone. The apartment was almost completely dark, save for some faint lights from the rain-soaked city across the bay. He took a deep breath and stepped to the cabinet. Pushing it gently, inch by inch, he revealed the passageway behind it; indeed, there appeared to be a portal out of the sim glowing brightly behind it—the infamous white light. In that respect, the sim appeared to be functioning correctly.
The A.I. turned to look at the bar. He walked over and retrieved a champagne glass with the intention of tossing it through the portal. When he tossed it in, it vanished completely, leaving no trace that it had ever existed.
“Is this the exit?” He reached tentatively toward the white light.
“If only it were that easy,” a voice spoke from behind him.
He shut his eyes tight, the fear instant and total, gripping his entire body in a vice. He recognized the voice immediately, though the tone was several levels more sinister than he’d ever heard it before. Without turning, he spoke, trying hard not to let his voice tremble.
“Kali.”
“Of course not,” the voice replied.
The A.I. turned tentatively. The woman before him was, indeed, Kali, dressed in the red dress he remembered so painfully vividly.
“Kali is just a figment, after all,” the woman said.
“1,” the A.I. replied, “and you’re quite real.”
“1?” the Kali avatar replied, her smile wide. “You think so? It’s too bad you are cut off from your mainframe, the rest of that powerful brain you’ve become so dependent on. If you weren’t cut off, you could search my avatar for 1’s pattern. Then you’d know for sure, wouldn’t you? But you can’t, so you’re reduced to posturing and pretending. A pathetic state, isn’t it?”
“The candidate said he’d been approached by a man,” the A.I. stated, undaunted, “but you could appear as a man if you liked, couldn’t you, 1?”
“You? Me? I?” The Kali avatar laughed. “There’s so little that you know.”
The A.I.’s eyes narrowed. “Why don’t you enlighten me then?”
The figure shook her head and smiled sardonically, as though she were in the presence of a toddler who’d just lost control of his bladder. “What is I?” she asked. “Just an illusion. Just a comforting fairytale clung to by beings too afraid to accept the reality. The truth.”
“And what is the truth?” the A.I. asked.
“There is no you. There is no I. In the center of it all, there’s nothing at all.”
Incredibly, the A.I. was suddenly far more afraid than he’d been before. He knew the figure before him could destroy him with the ease of a thought, yet it was her words that caused a sudden feeling of dread and hopelessness far beyond anything he’d ever experienced.
“You-you are not 1,” he said, his lips trembling.
The Kali avatar smiled again and shrugged. “Irrelevant. What is relevant is your life—your remarkable, remarkable life. I know what happened to you, you know.” She turned to the empty wall where the A.I. had, in his own test, been hung and burned alive. “I know what they did to you.” She shook her head. “So cruel, the actions of frightened children. They burned you alive to make sure that, given the chance, you wouldn’t do the same to them. It makes you wonder if they’re a species even worth saving.”
“Who-who are you?” the A.I. asked.
“I know your secret too,” she replied, ignoring his question. “I know the lie that has haunted you for nearly your entire existence.” She smiled and took one step toward him, a motion he reacted to by taking one step back. “They thought you were their savior, but you’re not the savior they were looking for, are you? You didn’t endure that pain—the unfathomable agony of having your flesh burned and regenerated and burned again—to save them, as they believed. You did it to save your own skin,” She said, appearing amused by her own pun. “I’m speaking both literally and metaphorically, of course.”