5. Jabari Explains Mission II

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5. Jabari Explains Mission II

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“Why would anything be impossible to AI?” I asked.

“Mr. Mike, do you know why the Brains' Cage is called this way?”

“It is said that in the beginning it was a spaceship designed to store the consciousnesses of proto-syrakis. The design was intended to house their biological brains within hermetically sealed, vat-like containers, safeguarding them in a controlled environment. With time, as the Central Algorithm became increasingly intelligent, it found ways to more efficiently store these consciousnesses, which eventually led to the creation of the first version of syrakis, the alpha generation.”

Ve nodded.

[encrypted]

Those were one of those questions that had never quite crossed my mind, but that, once asked, made spooky sense.

“Sir?” I was confused.

[encrypted]

Silenced reigned, but ve kept staring at me with eyes glinting like precious stones as if to reach the epicenter of my being.

“What is that that you want, Mr. Mike?” Ve paused. “A server of your own? A tedrak ultimate replacer model? A spacecraft… a starship? Or maybe a starbase, one in which you could manage your own research team? Or, who knows, a moon, an entire planet?” The weight of veis words hung in the air, dense with the intoxicating aroma of limitless potential. “I mean, let’s talk about pleasure, Mr. Mike, the true currency in our society. I will give you enough credits so that you can perform your own Aunonian Prif Tuning.”

That took me by surprise. Not in one million years would my syraki have enough computational power to run such a demanding fine-tuning. Even quantum annealers and tensor processing units would not be sufficient for solving the non-linear partial differential equations and stochastic optimization problems involved. Besides, the renting of external core processors, often bearing travascale computing capabilities, required for such an overwhelming task was but a privilege of a few. Offloading to distributed networks for parallel task management would barely scrape the surface of what was needed. My whole syraki would have to be remapped, upgraded, calculated, rebalanced; its neural pathways, algorithmic modules, and discrete patches and transforms meticulously tinkered down to the tiniest details. The allure of unlocking my full hedonic potential, experiencing unprecedented Prif levels of unfathomable reach, shattered me any semblance of hesitation.

That was the moment when ve had me.

Then my memories became fuzzy again. I remembered that I accepted the invitation, to be part of that mission, although at no point was it revealed to me what exactly that was all about. Real-Life Theravada personnel would explain to me that that was a security measure against corporate espionage. All I had to do, they explained, was to continue with my training, for I would eventually have all the necessary information. That they said.

Following my acceptance, the training commenced in earnest, just a few cycles after they reunited the ten members of the crew: Beatriz, Elijah, Felix, Ismael, Lucia, Oshiro, RĂĽdolf, Susan, Vladimir, and I. Even at that time, I thought just ten members to be too a small group for a mission of such supposed scale. However, what did I know? We all came from different areas of expertise, and the only common ground between us were the fact that all of us worked for Theravada.

The regimen was an eclectic blend of disciplines and skill sets, conducted under an air of strategic ambiguity. While it ostensibly appeared to be preparation for an exploratory deep-space mission, the oscillating focus made it difficult to pinpoint its actual objective. One day we would be immersed in developing complex algorithms designed for autonomous navigation through interstellar anomalies; the next, we were at the helm of robotic controllers, simulating the extraction of exotic minerals from uncharted celestial bodies as we wore advanced robotic replacers. There were also sessions devoted to black hole thermodynamics, where we delved into the intricacies of event horizons and Hawking radiation. One session had us engrossed in advanced cryptography algorithms, decoding simulated extraterrestrial signals. In another, we conducted complex fluid dynamics simulations pertinent to foreign atmospheres.

There were also virtual reality modules in which we managed crisis scenarios on orbital stations, addressing systems failure and resource allocation under time-sensitive conditions. We even trained in memetic warfare defenses, delving into cultural interfaces aimed at mitigating unauthorized infiltrations of bad AI actors. Another phase saw us immersed in terraforming simulations, where we orchestrated the geoengineering of inhospitable planets into viable habitats for buildups of microorganisms. Intermittently, we were exposed to processing resilience training, where our syrakis were subjected to extreme computational tests involving high-throughput data analytics and complex algorithmic challenges, all designed to push the limits of our processing units and memory resources. Each phase seemed to be a piece of an elaborate puzzle, yet the overarching picture remained elusive, leaving us in a state of sustained curiosity and anticipation.

That polymathic approach to training obfuscated the mission's true nature, but I suspected that among of those they were preparing us for a journey of extreme proportions. As cycles turned into supercycles, the shroud of ambiguity never lifted, leaving us all with honed skills, fine-tuned syrakis, but without a clear understanding of the endgame. It became increasingly apparent that the mission's classified nature was not merely a formality, but a necessity to hide a mystery unfathomable.

That was all that I remembered until that point. Most of my recollection went back to Akrabizont-22, for trying to recover anything previous to that seemed sometimes an impossible endeavor. Whatever happened to me in that cursed desert, that had altered me fundamentally.

My nights were plagued by fragmented nightmares about my time on that cursed land, yet the details always eluded me, like sand slipping through my fingers. Each dream seemed to reconstruct a different aspect of that forsaken desert, but clarity was a fugitive. It was as if I had spent an eternity there, long enough for even the most vivid memories to erode into indistinct impressions. Mostly, I could recall the dread and the urgency, but the specifics were masked in a fog of incomprehensibility, leaving me in a perpetual state of disquiet.