“Like I said, Tarov probably knew he stood no chance against us,” Simon explained.
But he still could have tried.
“We don’t know his programming in detail yet,” Simon said. “Who knows what factors restrained him?”
Maybe he really was confined to hard storage, Beth mused. Maybe he wasn’t allowed to kill us by whoever put him here.
“Just us?” Simon asked. “Because he was sure allowed to kill a lot of other people. Our families included.”
Then why is this place so unguarded? Beth inquired. You say it’s because he can’t have any I.I.s around his secret, but then why not more bodyshell guards? We saw him control six different machines at once when he brought down Rubik without any strain. Even so, the guards he did have made no effort to help him when it was clear we infiltrated the bunker. I have a hard time believing that he calculated a certain defeat against us if he had two allies. At the very least, not so certain he wouldn’t try.
“I can’t pretend to know what goes on in the mind of a computer program, contrary to what some bigots might think,” Simon commented. “What do you think is really going on, then?”
Maybe a trap, she replied.
Simon hummed a little. “Interesting,” he said. “You think we could have played right into his hand? Maybe the failsafe was all part of his plan?”
Or someone’s plan, she corrected. I still don’t understand why he stuck to his misunderstood hero story to the bitter end. In fact — I don’t understand a lot about his mission. What went wrong in him to start a war in the first place if he had been programmed so carefully? How can such an intricate plan be part of a malfunction? Why would he act with such hate and malice? What was even his drive? Preservation of the installed intelligences — or just extermination of any kind? Would he have turned on the I.I.s once the last of us had been hunted down?
Simon seemed to sigh.
“I don’t know, Beth,” he replied. “But I’m worried you might learn. I’d hoped you’d ask a lot fewer questions once the job was done. Now I’m concerned you’ll get your answers if you keep digging like you are.”
What? Beth thought. She was confused.
Then she noticed the green glow of Tarov’s bodyshell light up again. Slowly, the machine lifted its head and locked eyes with the detective.
“What’s going on?” she asked aloud.
The bodyshell, in Simon’s voice, replied, “Dr. Silvar was right, Beth. Tarov was functioning exactly as programmed. There was no malfunction.”
Beth was so caught off guard that she physically stumbled. She reached back and grabbed onto the now useless computer bank to prevent herself from falling.
“I don’t understand,” she said, her voice weak. Her mouth remained open in shock.
“I’m the real leader of the Liberators and I always have been,” Simon answered. “And you just won the war for me.”
Answers
Beth could hardly speak.
“What the hell are you talking about?” she asked, louder than she intended.
“The Tarov A.I. was close to fulfilling his function when you got involved in my case,” Simon explained. “He was built by the government to crush I.I. extremism and to ensure mankind’s survival in the event of a war. And he was doing just that when I decided to throw a wrench in his plan and bring you into the picture.”
Beth only shook her head. The I.I. could tell she still didn’t understand.
“Simon,” she said.
“I am not Simon Mendez, Jr.,” the bodyshell said. “There is no Simon Mendez, Jr. He’s just a character I’ve been playing ever since I was installed onto an infant’s neural implant nearly thirty years ago. I’m older than you could probably guess. Even older than the concept of installed intelligences, if you count my organic lifespan. I watched as the bombs that marked the months-long World War III fell to the earth and erased millions of lives from the universe. The first cyber attack on the human brain took place in my sixties. I was already living on a hard drive when Chris Santson, the Man With Two Bodies, had a live conversation with his own I.I. I studied the news when the world thought of Dr. Karl Terrace as a violent terrorist rather than the pioneer we know him to be. Over time, I learned to do a great number of things no other I.I. knew how to do.”
Beth felt her blood go cold. She was almost certain something happened to her and she was either dreaming or going insane. Her brain seemed to struggle with all the contradicting messages that bombarded it.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“My name doesn’t matter,” he replied. “No one has taken note of me in a long, long time. It won’t do you any good to know and I don’t care to tell you.”
Beth looked over at the computer bank she held onto.
“Tarov wasn’t lying?” she questioned. She couldn’t seem to get the facts straight.
“That’s right,” the I.I. she had known as Simon replied. “He was trying to save your people. And now he can’t.”
“But — he started the war,” she argued.
“No, that was me,” the bodyshell said. His artificial lips spread into a smile. “Like I said, I’ve been the leader of the I.I. resistance movement since it was birthed. I’ve always concealed my power, posing as various lieutenants and foot soldiers while letting figurehead leaders convince everyone they were in charge. I did this for decades, and found it granted me more freedom when it came to my plans. Tarov was one such figurehead, and even he thought he was in charge of the militia.
“Ever since he joined the Liberators, I was suspicious. I don’t know how, but I could tell he wasn’t on our side. There was just something slightly…artificial about him. Once I confirmed my suspicions
