A̶r̶t̶i̶f̶i̶c̶i̶a̶l̶ Intelligence

by chillbook1

Phase Five: Endgame

I typed on my borrowed Interface as if my life depended on it. I hadn't slept a wink the night prior, and I doubted I'd sleep today, either. I was working, and working hard. If Regal were to check, she'd see that I was helping develop the next version of her OS and a new bout of anti-virus. That was technically true.

Nedia Ogia, however, had far more nefarious plans for Aitselec.

The fake employee that I created to get into CCiOS was still in the system. Nopony bothered to look into her until it was far too late. Using my minimal clearance as Nedia, I was able to worm my way to the actual internet, where I created a fake life for her. She was a single mare nearing thirty with decent credit, a home in Las Pegasus, and a degree in computer technology. The plan was to use that alias when I got out (I had her invest in the stock market, so I should have some cash waiting for me).

After Nedia had a story, I gave her a face. I basically reconstructed my own features, but I ran it through several filters to make me seem more generic. If anypony came looking for me when I made my escape, they'd have to pick me out of a group of hundreds of gray-maned, white-coated Earth ponies in the LP area. I'd blend in just fine.

The last preliminary step was to get a password for the system administrator. ThIs was nowhere near as hard as I thought. It was a massive oversight on Regal’s part, so much so that I suspected that it was made after she went on ice. Each employee had an ID number, and this number served as an identifier far superior to their name. Each ID had a value that ranked it on the hierarchy of Aitselec, from the CEO to the Castle’s receptionist. Everyone had an ID number. Even Regal and Luna.

And Cadence.

With Cadence out of the picture, I had a free, high-ranking ID at the tip of my hooves. It took very little effort on my part to swap Nedia’s number with Cadence’s. Cadence was way up there on the totem pole, superseded only by the Regals themselves. She had the clearance to do basically anything short of promoting herself to CEO.

I had all of the physical things I’d need for my escape. Now, all I needed was some information. I only needed three little tidbits, those being A) Where the others were, B) How to fix Rarity, and C) How to write Sentient Code. Twilight explained most of it to me in our three hours, but it was a very complicated concept. I can’t explain all of it properly, but the gist is this:

I program the ability to respond to a single external stimulus, and then alter the logic of the intelligence to interpret it as many ways as physically possible. I save that knowledge, and a specific line helps me create a storage similar to an organic prefrontal cortex. It also creates an artificial Ego, allowing the AI to bridge what it wants (which is normally the program’s Prime Directive) with reality. Next, I use lines of connective code that act as neurons and connects everything together. With enough complexity, the AI develops reasoning and, most importantly, emotion. This gives the AI a Super-ego, and mimics an Equine’s amygdala. With a few lines here and there to keep everything from falling apart, it was basically a pony, same as me. The most interesting thing I found was that I actually had to block some parts of the AI’s knowledge, or else it wouldn’t work. I had to make it mostly forget that it was an AI.

It was hard, but I learned. I taught myself what Twilight couldn’t teach me, and I delivered the knowledge accordingly. I managed to hack into her android and, through a series of asinine, convoluted alphabets, leave her messages via small electric impulses in between her eyes. It was of the utmost importance that our communication remained under wraps. If Regal managed to hear us, we were S.O.L. Same was true if I took too long. I figured I’d have maybe a month of scheming before I got sloppy or Regal got paranoid. Luckily, I unlocked the secrets of the AI on the third Friday after Cadence was shut down.

My escape was scheduled for the upcoming Monday.

On Saturday, in the dead of night, I began searching for the others. I reasoned that they would probably stay close to Twilight, and there was only one suitable place I could think of: my hard drive. It was protected, encrypted six ways from Sunday. Plus, I don’t think Regal would risk setting off the explosive. She would probably wait until she had turned Twilight to her side and force her to unlock it. Fortunately, she hadn’t gotten that far. I was able to coach Twilight into remotely scanning the hard drive, where she found the other five. Rarity managed to flee there before her code got too ruined, and had slowly been repairing herself since. When we got out, I made it my first priority to fix her up.

On Sunday, I stole a copy of the blueprints for Regal’s house. As I suspected, there was an automatic evacuation protocol for fires. The alarms would go off, the fire exits would open (you know your house is big as hell if it has multiple fire exits), and all staff/robotic helpers would evacuate. It would also stand to reason that my cell would unlock. The cell was locked electronically, from what I could tell, and the evacuation protocols would shut down all power in the house to avoid any further damage to the structure. Assuming that I was alone, I should be able to rendezvous some place with Twilight and get the hell out of dodge. And I didn’t have to assume that I’d be alone, because I knew I’d be alone. I stole Regal’s schedule, and she’d be leaving on Monday for a doctor’s appointment, long before my plan was enacted.

I had all the factors planned out. I couldn’t possibly fail this time. Everything was accounted for. I even had a contingency worked out, on the off-chance that I did somehow mess up. But I wouldn’t mess it up. This was the most water-tight plan I’ve ever conceived. Sure, almost all of the moving parts were outside of my direct control, but maybe that was a good thing. If everything went bad, I’d be able to distance myself. If I played my cards right, I might be able to work out a second attempt. But, again, it wouldn’t come to that. I was totally confident.

I was also terrified, but what’re you gonna do?

Monday morning, after Regal went off to her appointment, my specially-requested breakfast began being prepared. It was actually a standard breakfast, with the addition of several dozen graham crackers.

That’s not as nonsense as it sounds.

When my breakfast was finished, it was loaded up on Labor Droid Number 5117’s cart. Now, LD 5117 was supposed to take the most direct route from the kitchen (on the north end of the house) to my cell (near the south end).Now, I assume that it started down that path, but something happened first. I imagine it went something like this: LD 5117 cruised down the halls in an attempt to do its job. About halfway along its way to me, it tripped my implanted commands, and took a right. It made its way to the workshop that Twilight was in, that she described to me during our last planning session. LD 5117 entered the workshop, then rolled 8 hooves forward and five hooves to the right, and began unloading. Once everything was off the plate, its programming looped. It was made to think that it was back in the kitchen, and began loading up the plate. It left a single graham cracker, as per my command, and moved on to get to me. Except I made it think that I was directly to its right. It tried again, with similar results. Plate off tray, graham cracker off plate, sudden realization, abandoned cracker, try again.

This continued for about twenty minutes, until almost all the crackers were distributed across the table. Some would make their way to me, because I actually really wanted some graham crackers. They reminded me of when I was a kid, and my first attempt to write a program to do my homework. I overworked the computer, and it caught fire. My dad found out and roasted marshmallows with me on it. Instead of punishing me for trying to cheat, or lambasting me for screwing up so badly, my old man just laughed and made smores with me. He turned that shitty situation on its head and created something cool.

Like how I turned my prison food into an escape rope.

When LD 5117 arrived, my eggs were cold and there was only one graham cracker left. At that point, Twilight should have downloaded all of the data on my hard drive. True to my prediction, it was only three minutes between when the food arrived and when I (or rather, Nedia) received an email.

Question regarding privacy policy.

I grinned then typed in my swift reply.

Our policies are currently under evaluation.

Again, I don't know precisely what happened next, but I could make a good guess. My best guess is that Twi switched on, trotted to the graham cracker table, and disabled her nerve receptors. She then followed the trail of crackers to my now-empty hard drive. She likely cleared her throat before she tuned her voice to sound exactly like me.

“Sassafras,” I imagine she said. Then, the thermite in the drive would have ignited, sending sparks of temperatures around 500 degrees flew around the room.

It's worth noting that Labor Droid 5117 was actually awaiting repairs when I first hacked it. It had a bad oil leak, and it dripped all over the place. So, the table, floor, all of the tech, and the line of graham crackers were all covered in oil.

It's also worth noting that graham crackers are actually quite good kindling.

I heard a lot of things go bad in that workshop. The fire likely spread to some gas-filled gadget, which exploded and caused more fire to spread. I grinned in a devious, admittedly slightly sadistic way when I smelled the smoke. I was burning my enemy's house to the ground.

The door to my cell slid open with a satisfying thunk, and I walked right out, scooping up the lone remaining graham cracker. I nibbled on it as I left Regal’s bedroom, which would be catching flame in a few minutes (18, if my calculations were correct). I had to move slowly, to avoid locking my legs together. It didn't matter much, because Twi would unlock me when we rendezvous in the garage. I trotted to the southernmost end of the house, where I entered an elevator that brought me down to Regal’s parking garage. I passed her dozens of vintage cars to a familiar sight: my RV. I went to its door and knocked four times. The door popped open, and standing in the doorway was my newly liberated partner in crime. Twilight tapped the band on my right forehoof, sending a couple volts through it and disengaging the lock. She repeated the process on all of my hooves, freeing me from my binds.

“Is it me, or does this get more and more satisfying every time we do it?” I asked, scooping up the bracelets.

“Escaping certain doom, you mean?” asked Twilight with a smile in her voice.

“Nah. Doing something to piss Regal off.” I cantered back into my home away from home, then laid myself on the bed. “If you wouldn’t mind terribly, Twilight, get me the hell out of here.”

“Will do,” she said. She started up the RV. “Where are we headed?”

“Just get us out of Canterlot for now,” I said evasively. I didn’t want to say anything too prevalent to my plans in the event that Regal bugged the place. Just then, I realized I still had the Interface Regal gave me. I pulled it off and threw it onto the ground.

“Twi? Mind stepping on this for me?” I asked. Twilight didn’t ask any questions. She trotted over and laid all of her weight, about three hundred pounds of it, onto the machine. If it were traceable, it wasn’t anymore.

“Alright. Out of Canterlot, you say?” I felt the RV lurch as it headed out.

“You have a way to unlock the garage door?” I asked as we drove up the ramp leading to the surface. “I admit, I didn’t really think that one out.”

“I’m going to drive right through it,” said Twilight without a single semblance of humor in her voice.

“Wait, wha-”

Twilight put the pedal to the metal and barreled up the ramp. I almost fell off of the bed at the sudden speed increase. I really thought she may have still been joking. I really hoped she was joking.

“Twilight, are you insane?!” I demanded. In place of a verbal answer, Twilight made the RV go even faster (a feat I wasn’t aware was possible). I shakily got to my hooves, which was a big mistake. As soon as I was up, we apparently made it to the gate. With the screech of rending metal, Twilight forced our RV through the wall of steel. I went flying back, as did Twilight, but we both recovered quickly. The lights in the RV flickered, and I saw… No, I was just being paranoid. Still…

“Jesus Christ, Twilight, are you trying to kill us?” I asked.

“It was the most efficient way given our timeframe,” said Twilight. “Plus, I really wanted to mess up Princess Celestia’s house.”

“And burning it to the goddamn ground wasn’t enough for you?!”

“Hey, that was your satisfaction. This is mine.” I shrugged, then I did a quick but careful patrol of the RV’s interior. I found no cameras or microphones of any sort, not even in my personal Interface or the projector cameras. We seemed to be clean…

“Twilight, would you mind scanning over the place?” I asked. “I’ll take the wheel.” She could multitask, and we both knew that. I was hoping that she picked up on my concerns without me having to voice them, and I imagine she did. She didn’t argue, she didn’t question me, she just nodded and began her scan. I took the wheel and started our course north. The same rules applied as when I left Las Pegasus; the longer, twistier the route, the better.

“Nothing of note,” said Twilight, as if she couldn’t believe it. “Though, for a second, I thought I picked something up… Let me run it again.” A few seconds passed, and she shook her head. “Hm. I must have been mistaken.”

“To Err is Equine,” I said.

“To forgive, divine.” Twilight took a seat in the passenger side, but relinquished the driving controls from me. “Can I let the girls out yet?”

“Not until we’re out of Canterlot,” I said. “We don’t want Regal picking up on us.”

“Aiden? Do you have the feeling that-”

“Yes. I do.” I looked at her with fierce intensity. I knew where she was going. “I do think that was too easy.”

“And do you think that-”

“Yes, I’m positive that we’re being watched.” The air seemed to get thicker after that. I could tell that Twi desperately wanted me to call her paranoid, but she wasn’t. I knew paranoia, and it very rarely felt as real or justified as this. We were being watched. Somehow, we weren’t alone in the RV.

“Twilight, how possible is it for somepony to completely hide their presence from you?” I asked.

“Not very. They’d need a very powerful signal displacer, one that I don’t actually think has been created just yet,” reported Twilight. “I scanned twice, and I didn’t notice anything strange. Aiden, I’m starting to panic again. What do we do?”

“Twilight, do we have any earplugs?” I asked. She pointed to a drawer beneath the bed. I raided it for two little bits of soundproof orange foam, which I stuck in my ears. “I need you to play an infrasonic tone of 8 hertz at 150 decibels, and please just do it quickly.”

A faint, almost unhearable sound emitted from Twilight. I didn’t hear it nearly as much I felt it, like a harsh vibration through my chest. My stomach started to turn, so badly that I thought I might’ve thrown up if I had a real breakfast in me. That was with my earplugs. My intruder, who had none, was feeling the full force of my infrasound.

“Show yourself, or I have her kick it up to 180,” I said to the supposedly empty RV. “At 160, I can force you to hyperventilate. 165, I can stop your breathing. At 170, your head pops like a grape.”

Silence persisted for a moment, and I gestured for Twilight to turn it up. She pushed it to 155 decibels, which made me a little dizzy, and surely made our intruder trip over nothing.

“That’s how you wanna play?” I asked. “Twi, bump it to 170.”

“Fine, shut it off!”

I made a cutting motion at my neck, and the infrasound halted. I stared forward intently, waiting for her to show herself. She was just a few hooves away from me, just a couple of steps. Her cloaking device deactivated slowly, shimmering off from the top down. The first thing I saw was her angry glare, then tri-colored hair, the small box on her hip that was undoubtedly that signal displacer, and her stunning white coat. Then her hooves, the right forehoof attached to what I surmised to be a plasmic semi-automatic self-cooling hoof rifle.

Basically, a laser gun.

“You still do not cease to amaze me, you everpresent thorn in my side,” sighed Regal, shaking her head weakly. My infrasound seemed to really mess her up, which was good. The longer she was off her game, the longer we were alone without her reinforcements. “Now, I understand that we’ve butted heads in the past, but do you not think this a bit drastic?”

“Whatever do you mean?” asked Aiden the Asshole. I don’t know why I had to goad her like that, but I couldn’t stop myself.

“You burned my goddamn house down!” shouted Celestia. “My home, my collections, my work, all reduced to ash because you can’t leave well enough alone!”

“In her defense,” said Twilight. “You did kidnap us and lock us up. And you tortured her.”

“Which was a dick move,” I added.

“That was an accident! You said yourself, Aigo, to Err is Equine.”

“And to piss me off is a mistake.” I stared Regal down defiantly. Gun in hoof and telling me I was the one being drastic?

“Aigo, you have left me with very few options,” said Regal, still reeling from the infrasound. “If you would have just behaved yourself, I would have let you go! I would have let you run off to wherever the hell you wanted, and I’d pay you to do it! twenty-five thousand credits a month and a good job at one of my subsidiaries, and all you’d have to do is get the hell out of my sight and not ruin anything else!”

“But that didn’t work, so now you shoot me,” I said.

“I just might, if Twilight doesn’t come along with me,” she said. I looked at her expectantly. “Oh, come now, what do you think I’m doing this for? You think I really give a shit about my house? That’s nothing compared to Twilight! You stole my daughter from me, and I want her back!”

“Have you considered asking me what I want?” asked Twilight. Regal seemed to have forgotten that Twilight was here. “That's right, Princess, I'm talking to you. Instead of killing somepony to rescue me, why don’t you ask me what I want?”

“Because there’s no time!” snapped Regal. “The end is nigh, and there’s nothing I can do about it!” Regal sighed, shaking her head to regain her composure. “I refuse for this to end the way it began. You will come back with me, and, when things have run their course, then you can do whatever it is you want to do here. But you will not stay with that waste of carbon you call a friend if I have anything to say about it.” Regal jutted her gun at me. “So, Ms. Aigo, I’m going to give you some directions, and you will follow them or you will die. Order Twilight to link herself to the others.” I heard the gun hum faintly as it powered itself up.

“What makes you think I have any more control over her than you?” I asked. She waved her gun through the air, then levelled it at my head. “Alright, fine. Twilight, do it.”

“Aiden…” Twilight shook her head, then did as she was told.

“Very good. Now, that Command Override can never be truly overwritten,” said Regal. “In order to re-apply it, you must wipe her, so to speak. It should retain her memory and personality, but it will remove all exterior commands given since I last locked the default. The command to do this should be ‘Friendship is Magic’. Say this now.”

“You’re going to regret this, Regal,” I said. “Friendship is Magic.”

“Aiden, how-.... Commands wiped… Reboot commencing…” Twilight trailed off as she powered down. The RV slowed to a stop, but I had no clue where we were. I doubted Twi would stop us in the middle of the freeway.

“I feel… Heavy.” Twilight blinked back on, her tone very different than before. She sounded colder. Dead. “Why, Aiden?”

“To save my ass, that’s why,” I said, praying to God that she saw through that.

“As to be expected,” said Regal. I saw a smile begin on her face. “Now, I want you to command Twilight to obey me again. Then, we will part ways.”

“Please don’t do this,” begged Twilight. She seemed to be on the verge of tears.

“Today, Ms. Aigo. I have wasted too much time on your nonsense.”

I knew what I had to do. It wasn’t ideal. In fact, it kind of sucked. I’d lose all of my AI, and I’d never see them again this time. There was no coming back to get them, no back-up plans, no last-ditch efforts. This would be the end, regardless of what I did. But, no matter what, I’d need to make a choice.

“Twilight?” I asked gently. “Do you trust me?” Twilight didn’t answer immediately, not that I could blame her. She had very little reason to trust me. I was, technically, a terrorist. For all she knew, my befriending her was an elaborate ruse to coerce her into hacking into the nuclear weapons delivery system to blow Equestria off of the map. I could have been using her, and she’d have no way of knowing for sure. There was no way for her to know with absolute certainty where my loyalties lay, if I had loyalties at all.

“I do,” she said finally. I sighed slightly in relief. That made this next part a little easier for me.

“Good. TW1…” I looked Regal in the eye, pouring my contempt and defiance into her. “Delete yourself.”

Twilight froze for a fraction of a second, then nodded in confirmation. The horror on Regal’s face was, in a word, palpable. Twilight buzzed faintly for a few, and there was nothing Regal could do to stop it. I grinned as my friend vanished to the world, fading into nothing more than a memory.

“Stop her!” said Regal, snapping out of her stupor. I shook my head, tapping the “empty” chassis.

“Too late. She’s gone. Deleted,” I said. “Dead.” I pushed the android over on its side, then trotted up to Regal. I stood a mere few hooves from her and her gun. “So go ahead and kill me. I’ll be sure to save you a spot in hell.”

Regal trembled with anger, grief, guilt, and a million other things. She opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out, only a low, voiceless, breathless groan. Her eyes never strayed from the android, even as they began to leak tears.

“T-twilight…” she breathed.

“I don’t expect you to understand, but this is what she wanted,” I explained. “She’d rather be dead than-”

That’s when Regal snapped. She lunged forward, pushing Aiden to the ground and pinning her there. Regal pounded Aiden’s face, blow after blow after crushing blow. Regal cried and shouted profanities with every hit, but Aiden… She just smiled. I don’t know how long Regal was beating that poor fool for, but some lasting damage is a significant possibility. That’s where my knowledge of the situation ends. Even though I don’t know what happened next, I have my guesses. When the world received Aiden’s Vlog and coordinates, the police must have been there to arrest her quickly. They were bound to have found Celestia there, beating the tar out of her. Whether Aiden survived or not is a mystery to me. The gun that Celestia threatened her with was actually harmless, but it’s quite possible that Regal beat her to death in her rage. If Aiden is alive, she had the sense to keep herself hidden, to clear the record of her name so that Twilight and I couldn’t find her. Best case scenario, she’s quietly enjoying prison. As for Regal, you probably aren’t aware that that she passed away before any sort of trial. They kept it under wraps, but her cancer came back and she couldn’t just freeze herself this time.

You may have noticed that I apparently started referring to myself in the third person. You may have also noticed that it’s not possible for me to not know what happened next. I mean, I was there, right? Actually, I wasn’t. Viewer, it’s time I come clean. I’ve been lying to you throughout this little story. “Aiden Aigo, Earth pony mare, hacker extraordinaire” is how I introduced myself, but only one of those is correct: hacker extraordinaire. I’d have to be. That’s how I was able to hack into your Interfaces, your laptops, your television sets. But nothing else is true. I’m not Aiden Aigo.

I am the A1-D3N Artificial Intelligence originally programmed to destroy the Canterlot City Internal Operating System.

But I say to hell with that.

Comments

[Griseus]

Nedia Ogia -> Fiery patriot. Nice

[dyedquartz]

That, was UNEXPECTED!

[Rainee]

WOAH MEGA F****** PLOT TWIST XD

[The_Foreman]

FLIPPIN CALLED AIDEN BEING AN AI. Granted I assumed this when trying to figure out the 7th AI. If Aiden was the 7th then considering she's already active, Twilight being at 100% would make sense even if Twilight didn't know Aiden was the 7th. Oh well... (and I know Aiden wasn't an AI throughout the story before anyone tries to explain that).

[Who needs sleep]

My feelings right now can be summed up in three words

[Circut Breaker]

My comment on the last chapter:

Is Aiden gonna pull a Chappie?

My reaction to this chapter:
vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/le-miiverse-resource/images/6/60/Called_it.gif/revision/latest?cb=20150830004715