Chapter 2: Technologic
It was late in the evening with Twilight Sparkle and Spike working in the library. However, instead of dealing with the normal duties that a librarian and her assistant would be working on, the two were busily piecing together a computer chassis.
“Spike, do you see a long cable with a rectangular input at one end?” Twilight asked as she was examining the large case that was slowly becoming a computer hard drive.
Amongst the wires and computer components, Spike rummaged through the pieces, “I think I found it.” He pulled out the long, grey cable and gave it to the purple alicorn.
“Thank you, Spike,” she said as she attached it in the back of the case. She made a mental note to herself, “This will connect to the monitor later on….”
“Hey, Twilight? Don’t want to sound all that mean or anything, but do you really believe this?” Spike asked as he watched Twilight fiddle around with the wire and the pieces of machinery.
“Hmm?” she looked up, “What do you mean?”
“Like with what Celestia said. I mean, this sounds too weird to be true,” the dragon explained himself.
“You mean with the AI?”
Spike simply nodded.
“Of course I believe her. Why would she lie to us about it?” Twilight asked as she rearranged some of the components in the chassis.
With a shrug, Spike replied, “I don’t know, maybe she wanted to play a trick on us?”
Twilight gave an annoyed glare at Spike, “I highly doubt she would do something like that.”
“Well, she does have us building a computer from almost scratch and it’s almost midnight,” Spike pointed out.
Rolling her eyes, the pony issued a request, “Can you get me the cooling fans? I saw them a second ago.”
Spike passed them off to Twilight as she started fitting the items into the chassis. “It’s just that, all of this seems too….fake. I mean, a program that has artificial intelligence. This like something out of one of my comics, like that robot that Hackney Pym created and it turned into the killing machine known as Ulterks!”
Again, Twilight glared at her assistant, “Spike, this is not a fictional comic book world. I’m not building some sort of artificial intelligence that is going to rise and try to enslave all of Equestria.” She then returned to shuffling the computer parts in the case, fitting them together.
“But this could be just be the beginning of something like that!” Spike grew excited.
Twilight looked back up, “Spike, it’s just one AI and it won’t be leaving the computer here in the library. Second, it’s not going to have a robotic body or anything like that. And lastly, Pym is an idiot genius when it comes to his inventions whether it was his shape-shifting powers or the robots he built. This is why I read the X-Ponies comic books. Now, are you going to help me finish up this hard drive or not?”
With a yawn, Spike answered, “Actually, I’m thinking of calling it a night. You can have fun with your little computer that’s gonna turn around and kill us all.” The dragon made his way up the stairs, leaving Twilight down in the main room with the large amount of computer parts and hardware.
“I’m telling you, I am not creating Ulterks!” Twilight shouted to Spike as he disappeared from her sight. With a sigh, she picked up the motherboard of the computer and started the final touches to the hard drive.
As she started the process of attaching the motherboard into the computer chassis, she began to think aloud, “I still don’t understand why I have to build this computer from scratch. This isn’t exactly my strongest subject….” her words were only audible to her as she continued working.
“Maybe Spike is right, this is a bit strange. Artificial intelligence is something straight out of a science fictional novel,” she continued talking to herself. “How can we really know if it does actually learn and grow as an individual? Couldn’t it just take the information from what it can gather from published works or something of that sort?”
Using her magic to make the minor adjustments to the circuitry, Twilight scanned the interior of the hard drive one last time, “All the circuits are in place, everything seems to be hooked up properly, excellent,” she mused as she lowered the cover of the chassis down, securing the internal hardware. “Maybe Spike’s imagination is getting mine going. There’s no way this program will turn into something out of Draught Adams’ ‘Hitchtrotter’s Guide To The Galaxy’ or Osamu Tokara’s ‘Astro Foal’. That’s pure science fiction.”