The AI - Scifi Short Story - Chapter 4

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Jenny entered the small living unit where she woke up and looked around, thoughtful.

“Alfred, when did the aliens move the stasis pod to this place?”

“The day I woke you up, Jenny.”

Smiling, she sat on the floor.

“What is left of me, my personality, and my particular traits in your database, Alfred?”

The AI answered with a tone of surprise in its voice. “I have all the database your AI had.”

Jenny smiled again.

“Really? Okay, then. Tell me my feelings, Alfred.”

‘You are calm and reflexive." The AI stopped again. “That’s what I get. Your pulse is calm, and your brain function does not give much more.”

“Read me my medical files and hiring results, Alfred.”

The AI did as asked, and in the end, Jenny chuckled.

“Remind me, Alfred. Who did the reprogramming?”

“Dr. Lindsay did.”

“Okay, Alfred. Thank you for your help.”

“Is there anything I can do for you, Jenny?”

“Yes, Alfred. Can you please let me see what this room looks like?”

‘Why, Jenny? You can see it for yourself. It looks like your home when you last entered stasis. Familiar things bring a sense of security. Humans need it to thrive."

“I feel more secure in actual situations, Alfred.”

The room immediately became an empty square. Jenny looked around and saw that besides the door, there was no other opening. The windows she believed she had were nonexistent. Dull metal created the walls, ceiling, and floor.

Jenny sucked in air. She had a lot to do to take humankind back to where it belonged. Putting hands to the job, the woman spent hours in the AI library, randomly going through files. Satisfied she had the info she needed, she called the AI.

“Tell me the names of the humans living in this city,” Alfred.

“All the survivors live here, Jenny.”

“How many of them are married or have kids? Tell me in percentage.”

“25% are married with kids. 3% have kids but do not live with them.”

“Put them on a separate list. Please group them by their professional fields.”

So Jenny worked with Alfred, developing her secret project. The AI did not have as much control as it thought. As she seemed interested in finding friends and learning about the living conditions in the city, the system control relaxed.

“Now, Alfred, I need you to change this room. I need light spots instead of this overwhelming glare, and please provide different textures to create nooks. I need small objects to stimulate tactile awareness. Put them in a basket in the middle of the room, please.”

As the AI changed the place, Jenny ate some fruit, drank some water, and prepared herself to do what she hated most. She would talk to people.

Three hours later, on a corner of the room, there was a nook with grass and flowing heated water; on another corner, the walls were soft and so was the furniture. Another one had warm gel cushions.

Jenny was sitting in the center of the room, on a small yoga pad.

The ceiling became a realistic view of a clear Earth sky. Jenny asked Alfred to make it follow actual Earth hours. It was getting dark, and the room lights adapted to make the place even more pleasant.

“Alfred, get in touch with the AI of the list of humans I prepared and named Hope. Tell them I am awake and I would like to talk to them. I need some familiar faces around.”

“It is great, Jenny. It’s good to see we are adapting.”

Jenny did not reply. She closed her eyes, controlling her breathing, and prepared herself to receive her guests.

From her place on the floor, she heard the door slid open but did not acknowledge the people coming in. She did not open her eyes. Instead, she allowed her anxiety to grow. As more and more people crowded her space, she felt her body shake.

Every woman who entered stopped short. Some of them gasped. Some cried, as others just moved, choosing a cranny to sit.

When the door slid open for the fifteenth time, Jenny who had been counting, opened her eyes.

She looked around, nodding. She knew some of them, but not everyone.

“I thank you for coming.”

Professor Tracy Halloway smiled at Jenny, noticing how many drops of sweat covered her forehead. It was tough for her, having so many people in her personal space.

Her dark skin was beautiful under the light of Earth’s night sky.

Jenny Winston was a handsome black woman with a shaved head and muscular body. She used to fight and do meditation and yoga. Now, fighting would not happen because of the AI restrictions.

“I am glad to see you are well, Jenny,” Tracy Halloway said.

Patricia Wood scoffed. “Jenny would not give them the pleasure of dying.”

A few laughed.

Jenny grinned at her best friend. “Thank you for the vote of confidence, Trish.”

“Why are we here, Jenny? I am glad you are well, but you were never a people person,” no-nonsense Beth Gilmore asked going straight to the point.

“I appreciate the question, Beth. I am answering all your questions in the next minutes. But please, tell your AI to engage 'privacy mode'.”

The women exchanged glances, and Professor Tracy smiled widely.

“I knew it was a good idea to accept your invitation.”

Jenny nodded as the women complied. When the room was quiet again, Jenny bent her head.

“How many of you are aware they killed our people? It was not an accident.”

Silence engulfed the room.

Beth Gilmore slapped her thigh. “I knew it! I knew it, but nobody would believe me! They are so nice, so accepting, so fake!”

Trish was as pale as her white jumpsuit. “Are you sure, Jenny?”

“Yes, statistics don’t lie. And I had a delightful conversation with Governor Morar today. He confirmed.”

“It is a serious accusation.”

Jenny turned to the voice. It was Moraya. The woman was a delicate person, dedicated to painting, drawing, and singing. She looked stunned and hurt.

“Can you help me, Doctor Hallaway,” Jenny asked, controlling her growing unease.

“Yes. It is not an accusation, Moraya. Jenny talks about the statistics of survival. It is not possible that only women, inside a certain age range, with specific education and single survived. It was a selection, ladies. We were handpicked to be alive and here today.”

“It always bugged my mind,” Ellie commented." I am no biologist statistician, but as a pilot, I know my statistics, and what are the odds only women between 25 and forty survived?”

Jenny closed her eyes again, with a pained expression, as everybody talked at the same time. They felt agitated and angry.

Trish whistled. As a New Yorker, she had the ability perfected to a science. Everybody shut up.

“I told Morar I want a colony on Earth. Our people must go back home,” Jenny declared and closed her eyes again, suffering the new wave of noise.

Professor Hallaway stood.

“Jenny is asking a question, ladies. She wants your support for the project.”

“But Earth is uninhabitable.”

“Don’t be stupid, Regina,” Beth Gilmore said, waving a hand at the history teacher. “It was the situation one thousand years ago. Our world must be a paradise again. We can go home.”

“Oh,” Regina uttered, eyes wide. “I forgot it took us so long to wake up. Yes, I want to go home.”

Professor Hallaway turned to Jenny. “What did Morar say?”

“They woke me up because the humans are not good pets. He wanted me to influence you to behave.”

The room exploded in laughter.

“Oh, gosh,” Trish said, drying off the mirth tears from her eyes. “Why would they have such a ridiculous idea? You would punch a person, not convince them.”

Jenny’s smile was feral. “Because, my dears, Dr. Lindsay did not trust them. When they asked for a particular women’s group, she got suspicious. Then, she included a fail-safe in your AI programs and changed our medical records. Once it was done, she proceeded to make herself the most specific selection. Our fields of expertise can create a new Earth. Dr. Lindsay chose us as Plan B to save humankind by delivering the incomplete medical data to the aliens.”

“You must be kidding,” Professor Hallaway whispered.

“No, you said it yourself. We were handpicked. But not only to meet the aliens’ criteria. She included hers too.”

“But Lindsay died,” Beth replied.

“She was too old to give them viable children,” Ellie said deadpan.

Harriette, a mechanical engineer always easy to fire up, growled.

“They wanted breeders. She knew she would not survive, so she saved us. But she did not manage to save any men. The human race is doomed. If we don’t breed with these despicable creatures, not even a piece of our DNA will survive.”

Jenny smirked. “No, Harriete. You are wrong. We can get pregnant by artificial insemination. Professor Hallaway is the one to say.”

Tracy nodded. “Yes, of course. But where would we find viable sperm?”

Jenny shrugged. “On the moon. The cemetery is not a real cemetery. The pod facilities keep going with solar power. The men are brain dead, but not body dead. The underground vaults kept the most successful of our scientists. They are there yet.”

“Oh my God.” Trish put both hands to her head. “We must be as brain dead as they are. We can use their sperm and the viable women on the moon and revive our species.”

Tracy Hallaway nodded. “Yes, the stasis keeps the body in complete functional order.”

Jenny lifted her hand. “Not so fast, girls. We must be careful. These aliens are not good guys. They destroyed our species. They would never give us free rein. We must be very cautious.”

Professor Hallaway smirked. “But our Jenny here must have a plan.”

“Yes, I do. On our way to Earth, we will stop by the moon to give our fellow humans an appropriate death ceremony. As we do that, you collect the sperm we need, Tracy.”

Beth shook her head. “Even in privacy mode, our AI will denounce it.”

Jenny pointed to the ceiling. “Not when we are under Earth’s sky. Dr. Lindsay thought of everything. All of us are nondivergent at different levels and have a very particular chemical and electrical environment in our brains. The aliens have problems with the humans because the AI performs under low-level capability in us. Doctor Lindsay made it so that we can turn off our AI. The aliens can’t control us.”

“What?” Beth shouted.

Jenny smirked. Talk to it now."

Beth shook her head, staring into Jenny’s eyes. Her friend turned hers to the yoga mat as every woman tried to talk to their AI.

“It doesn’t answer.”

Jenny’s smile got wider. “Under Earth’s sky, we give the orders. Privacy mode is the code command. The AI is off until you turn it on again.”

Trish got very serious. “They will never let us go.”

Jenny smirked. “Oh, they will. Their people will send us home.”

“How, Jenny? How can you be so sure?”

“Because, my dear friend, we are an endangered species, and we

will sit down on their streets and start a hunger strike.”

Some women snorted.

“You are devious, Jenny,” Tracy Halloway said with a wide grin.

“And the AI,” Beth asked. “It is programmed to survive. A hunger strike put it in danger.”

“The AI can’t interfere. They are not strong enough. We just sit on the ground, and it can do nothing but make us even more unable to move. Now, tomorrow we start the strike. Let’s do it in front of the administration building. Let’s give these murderers a taste of human practices. Don’t forget to turn on your AI now. We only have a 25-minute window before the system accuses our absence.”

“You learned a lot in few hours, Jenny. How did you do it,” Professor Hallaway asked with admiration in her eyes.

Jenny shrugged.

“When Morar told me only women survived, I was sure it was their plan from the beginning. So I tried to find my friends and some people I knew. When eighty were neurodivergent I found the pattern. It was easy from there. The statistics guided me.”

“Easy for you, Jenny. You are a genius and a pain in the butt of any government. Human or alien.” Trish declared, and Jenny kept her eyes on the floor. She did not like praises and had problems looking people in the eyes.

Jenny got to her feet, and that feral smile that frightened Morar was back on her face.

“Go pack, girls. And have a nice dinner tonight. It is time to go home. Our hunger strike starts tomorrow.”