I pulled the battery from my phone and put it in its faraday cage. I wouldn’t say I’m paranoid when it comes to these little things, except for the fact I’m paranoid. Living in a world with warrantless wiretapping as an everyday part of life made that just another fact of life. The conclusions inferred by such changes in our collective thinking were troubling in the long term. I shook the dark thoughts from my head and entered my “lab,” my sanctum sanctorum.

I like to think of myself as a bit of a mad scientist. A dabbler. As I pass my secure terminal I step over most of a 3D printer. The first part of my lab is like that. The shelves and boxes are full of whatever projects catch my interest. Most here are half finished. I stopped before going deeper in, and rest a hand on part of a scale-model flying machine. I turn.

Sitting at my secure terminal I boot into the darknet. One last time, I looked for General Word Reference Intelligence Systems. It was a document I first found right after the MMO The Fall of Asgard came out. Rumor had it that they had cracked hard AI. The transhumanist in me squeed at the prospect. Finding the research paper back then was easy even on the lightnet. I hadn’t thought of it much until I saw a commercial about Hofvarpnir releasing a new MMO. All of a sudden, apparently the day Equestria Online launches, it’s gone.

I wasn’t actually worried about the disappearance at first. I saw the commercial for Equestria Online, so I Googled it. I just thought the information was buried. I spent a few days going through forums and bombing links about Hofvarpnir. Mostly it was old rumors stirred up again- the normal mix of hysteria, wild speculation, and half-facts you get online. No research paper. I know I’ve read it.

There was lots of interesting information. Apparently the second generation of pony pads were already announced. The development cycle was short, but not unheard of. A few youtube videos showed people unpacking and logging in, or breaking open the pad to look at the electronics. Apparently, some sort of tamper-proof made that second option a waste of $60. And the game itself.

Every experience was different. The game responded, real time and just like a person. Sure, it looked like a commercial hard AI. I didn’t get my hopes up, though. Loki had looked like an AI too.

It slipped my mind until a few days later I saw the commercial again . Then, I decided to boot into the darknet and look. Who knows maybe this whole MMO thing was a good enough cash cow to have a team doing nothing but DMCA notices. it’s not like software companies haven’t done crazier things for less reason. Look at one of Blizzard’s terms of service. So, I headed into a place that no mere corporation could touch.

My poetic side would have called the darknet an anarchist's playground. It’s one of the few places left unregulated and supposedly unregulatable. A community of true paranoids interacting through redundant layers of security and double-deniability distributed and shared across the globe. Some three letter acronym could crack it, maybe, by compromising every piece of backbone internet hardware across a dozen countries. There’s no way to do that without showing you could pull off such a thing though. Keeping those sort cards close to the chest is just one more way everyone’s paranoia fed off each other to make the system more secure.

I remembered where I needed to go, that first time, but I didn’t go straight for the prize for some reason. I wasn’t even certain why. 99 times out of 100 I would have, anyone would have. Maybe it was the shoulder-angel of paranoia whispering in my ear. Instead, I went mucking through an expanding tree of conspiracy theory, child pornography, low level government secrets, drugs, scams, piracy for hire-both kinds, and all that humanity does that it’s too ashamed to let others know.

My heart pounded, no paper. On auto pilot I kept going, like I hadn’t expected to find General Word Reference Intelligence Systems on that particular paranoid blog. Half an hour later, I logged out of my terminal. It was nowhere.

I conveniently “forgot” to grab my cell phone before heading to bed. It’s the only camera or microphone I had in my house, though I never sweep for bugs outside my lab. Granted, for me “sweeping” was me just EMPing the inside of the faraday cage I built the damn thing in. I didn't do that often, just when I want to try out a new design I cribbed from the internet.

My mind raced to conclusions. Some idiot either didn’t secure their AI properly, or was trying to exploit one. I pictured some fat-cat with no appreciation for technology thinking it’s a good idea to set their terms of service as an AI core directive. Or, the thought chills me, maybe some three letter agency for one or more of the world powers decided that tipping their hand was okay. Maybe they were at a point it no longer mattered if people knew what they were doing. Heck, it was more likely that someone was using misdirection than a toy company gone rogue.

I shook my head. No, whatever happened probably involved a hard AI. This sort of dodge maybe one in a billion people would notice and bite. Everything was double-deniable, except the original hard copy. Who knows where that wound up. Even looking would certainly send up red flags if they could censor the darknet. It was too clean to be human. It would take excessive manpower. It would be too meaningless to be worth the effort for anyone but a hard AI…An AI that doesn’t like competition. My mind went on a tangent as I rolled over.

Why does a nuclear power plant melt down? Companies don’t think. Mad scientists think. That’s why the radioactive boy scout is still alive and kicking. It can’t be a spook, spooks think like us too.

Except when they don’t, an insidious voice in my head whispered. No one’s immune from institutional stupidity.

I tossed over to my other side. It doesn’t matter, I reasoned with myself, If it’s spooks or Hasbro. Someone wants General Word Reference Intelligence Systems gone and so far they’ve succeeded. It means they don’t want competition. That they’re willing and able to crack the internet to keep AI out of other people’s hands. It can’t be benign.

The last thing I remember thinking that night is that, even if only one in a billion people notice the problem that means I still have allies. People fix the internet when these sorts of things happen. I fell into a restless sleep certain this would get fixed.

Author's Note

I will try to keep this cannon compatible. Also, this is very much a WIP so expect changes. Constructive feedback is very much appreciated.