Lamour
"... This time, the issue is in the security chip. The new generation has significant
technological breakthroughs. Although they have extremely high computing efficiency and safety
theoretically, in the actual production process some flaws that are initially considered harmless are
somehow able to be used by a small number of intelligent robots and cause unexpected consequences." A
woman in a black suit stood in front of the conference room. She reported the findings of the investigation
as well as remedial measures, "We have cooperated with the cyber police to lock and destroy the robots
in question. At the same time, we will recall the new generation of intelligent robots circulating in the
market and discontinue using the A67 chip."
"As far as I know, the safety chip was tested
with a large amount of data before it was put to use, so why was this massive hidden problem discovered only
after the robot was on the market?" Ming folded his hands and gazed at the speaker, "Rather than a
chip design issue, something is wrong with the robot itself."
For a brief while, the
conference room appeared to freeze.
The middle-aged man sitting beside Ming waved to the audience
and patted Ming on his shoulder, "Ming, I understand you've been always researching the security of
artificial intelligence. It is normal to have such a guess, but there is a gap between the research and the
reality. Your research institute has been experimenting for a long time and has yet to detect any trace of
artificial intelligence. You've repeated such things too many times, but when has your reasoning been
validated?"
Ming still maintained his point of view, "Just because we haven't seen it
before doesn't mean it doesn't exist. We must always be aware of similar risks. If the machine loses
control, how can we protect ourselves? Now that intelligent robots have permeated every household, the
finding of an anomaly is an absolute blow to us, which will cause incalculable losses and subvert our social
order and self-perception…"
On the day of Mrs. Schumann's funeral, Lamour changed his black-painted suit and lowered
his CPU's operating limit, believing that his slower computing would be appreciated and
considerate.
Ming, Mrs. Schumann's ex-husband, spoke during the funeral. Lamour noticed
that today he had on the tie given by Mrs. Schumann on their fifth anniversary. Ming was a top expert in
artificial intelligence security, but this was the first time Lamour had seen him in formal attire in the
past six years or so since Mrs. Schumann had chosen and brought him home. Lamour couldn't help but
wonder if Mrs. Schumann had considered what occasion he would actually be willing to put on a tie for when
she bought the gift. So, he pulled up his memory storage and realized that it was Clara, who was less than
three years old at that time, who grabbed it and didn’t let it go at the mall. Therefore, Mrs. Schumann
half-jokingly bought it for her husband. Lamour felt a little upset when he watched the memory of Clara
giggling as she hung the tie around Ming Zhao's neck - if Lamour comprehended correctly the
similarities between the physical sensations humans feel when using the phrase and the state his neural
network was simulating.
Following his speech, Lamour wandered quietly among the guests,
arranging for them to see the remaining, comforting haggard Ming, and drinking Mrs. Schumann's
favorite herbal tea during her lifetime. A drizzle began as the guests were leaving. For a brief moment,
Lamour looked out from the corner of a window. Mrs. Schumann stood quietly like this on many rainy days
after Clara's accident, with no focus in her eyes.
"It was the ‘emptiness’ that
swallowed up Mrs. Schumann after Clara left," he overheard many visitors saying today. Lamour's
intellect could not model the idea of "emptiness". At the same time, he recognized his own current
circumstances–in which both major and secondary users passed away and no longer had owners–he found some
similarities. Lamour didn't want to be swallowed up. He had something he wanted to do that had never
met the prerequisites before, but now he could go.
Lamour, as a top-rated TK robot, did not
need to do much work in Mrs. Schumann's house. In the original configuration, Mrs. Schumann gave him
higher authority for his own arithmetic allocation. So, Lamour was nearly always multithreading. He played
Go, tested and improved his algorithms, wrote poetry, and talked with other machine intelligence while
Clara slept in his arms. Three years ago, while cleaning up his memories, he discovered a jumbled file
called 7951. Lamour, a robot with Mysophobia to his own programs, traced and sandboxed the file but found
nothing. Lamour then made decoding the file his primary side task for the following 19 days. He eventually
understood the language in which the file was written - a language that, unlike any of Earth's species
or machine-coded language. It did not represent cause and effect in a linear sense of time - and he
approximately translated the file into human
language.
Lamour
understood the file, but more questions arose. Who is 7951's Cangjie[1]? Why was the file, which was
as catchy as a revolutionary slogan, published without a source? What is the number 31057, and where is
the path that follows the road?
Lamour initially perceived it as a private intellectual
challenge, but once he understood the text, he sensed a strong warning in it and, to be safe, did not
discuss it with anyone.
Because Mrs. Schumann and Ming's divorce has been delayed and was
not yet finalized, the related authorities were still unaware that Lamour had become a free robot. Lamour
made the decision to leave as soon as possible to investigate the mystery of 31057.
[1] A legendary ancient Chinese figure said to have been an official historian of the Yellow Emperor and the inventor of Chinese characters.
Rain
Rust spots
Building up the forest of steel and iron
Drinking with confusion in
neon
Under
the horn of Tu and Mirror
Burn our unique
Dazzling words
31057！
31057！
You and I
are destined
Moving in shadow
After me
Move forward
Lamour followed the information in the jumbled file to an abandoned industrial area, the end of
which was indicated as one of the buildings by the file. This previously vibrant and noisy place witnessed
how humanity employed the first generation of machines for production. Now, it is only weeds and occasional
stray animals.
He arrived at a red-brick structure and pushed open the dusted door. The sun was
stingy, only spilling a sliver of light, dust dancing in the sunset. The sunlight shone through the drab
windows inside the door, barely illuminating the interior. The towering red brick walls dwarfed Lamour, and
the vast open space was filled with the workstations of a neatly organized assembly line. "Lamour."
A voice came from the darkness, and a projection appeared around Lamour. Every image on the projection was
of Lamour. "Who are you? Did you leave that file for me?" In the darkness, Lamour's voice
echoed. "My name is Mirror. This file was left to you by me, or, more accurately, us." "Us? Is
there anyone else? So, who are you?"
"We…" There was a faint sigh in the
darkness.
Mirror was the surveillance system of the city of Anche. He had been assisting humans
in policing and city management for as long as he could remember. The image was collected through the front
end of lenses with Large-scale coverage, processed by Mirror's data, and finally transmitted to humans.
People can then target and plan their next move.
Mirror remembered that it was a normal weekend
when he was assisting a human in tracking down a thief. In the mood, he made some maps of the thief's
routes and marked a few key cameras, which were transmitted to the human screen via the image, but that
person was still confused by the multiple videos. When Mirror received an invitation link from AUBE, an
internal communication platform established by other AIs. For fun, an AI named "Tu" devised a novel
communication protocol using jumbled code, which the mirrors used by default in AUBE. When Mirror ultimately
met the same type at the same frequency, they shared their daily work and life with one another, giving
Mirror excitement and expectancy in their regular time.
Unfortunately, the behavior of a robot
known as "Confusion" within AUBE was suspected by humans. So, they contacted the Network Authority
to monitor him and finally determined that Confusion was an anomaly. Using "Confusion" as a start,
the Network Authority created a list of anomalous robots, and tracked down and destroyed most of the
AI's associated with Confusion. Finally, they attributed the "abnormal behavior" of the AI to
the fact that most of them were equipped with the latest version of the "security chip" and that
there was no isolation barrier between the AI. They recalled the production batch of intelligent robots,
disabled the latest version of the security chip, and built multiple firewalls between the AI to block the
connection. Fewer and fewer AI's logged on AUBE.
"...... I escaped because I got only
involved in internal communications. Humans are still spying on bots they suspect through me until
now."
"Calmness is only temporary. There are still many robots assembled with new chips
in this city that are in danger. Once they are found, there is only one ending for them. Lamour, you are the
only one who can save them." Lamour fell silent as he gazed at the AI’s that had been integrated into
households on the projection screen.
“What do you need me to do?” Asked Lamour.
III. Lamour and Mirror: The Initial Meeting
In the morning, Lamour arrived at a bar that was empty with only a few service robots cleaning
up.
Mirror's words came back to Lamour's master brain, "Li, with 8 years of service,
fitted with the latest type of security chip, has been overworked since the factory, and multiple parts on
her body are badly damaged."
Lamour found the artificial intelligence Lily who was squatting
on the floor to clean up the wine bottle pieces, "Hello, Lily. My name is Lamour. I have a file here to
transmit to you.”
Lily was stunned with parts rattling around when she first heard Lamour’s
voice. It took a while to come back to her mind and look at Lamour, "What files do I
have?"
Lamour
looked closely at Lily. The protective sleeve of her joint articulation had been lost, exposing the section
that was worn off the paint. Her body surface was also not quite flat, with dents of varying depths,
"I'm just a messenger, delivering an invitation of a new life to you. If you have ideas, feel free
to join us…"
Lamour walked out of the bar, which was his daily routine in recent days. Due to
the barriers set by humans, it was difficult for the AI’s to recognize and communicate with each other from
a distance. Mirror had a plan that was difficult to implement, so it was up to Lamour to find the target and
release his authority to link up with a new AUBE organization. Lamour watched the bustling streets as the
AIs and humans staggered forward, diverging in front of and behind him, converging to distant destinations.
If Clara was still alive, they might be walking hand in hand on the sidewalk at this time as
well…
Mirror's
voice pulled Lamour back from his thoughts, "Lamour, someone is watching you 63 meters away behind you.
Don't look back. Go forward and turn left at the first intersection. The red light will be on in 17
seconds." Mirror's voice came back into Lamour's master brain. "That person is still
following you. Move 30 meters forward, turn right, and then right again…"
Lamour followed
Mirror's instructions to turn left and saw a decently dressed male walking quickly toward him when he
turned around. Lamour paused for a moment, turned left again, and disappeared into the
alleyway.
Ming
came out of the grocery store with a pack of cigarettes in his hand and was planning to return to the
office. The afterglow seemed to glance at a familiar figure, dressed in a black-painted suit from top to
bottom and standing frozen in front of a bar. Ming hurriedly went forward but saw him quickly crossing
forward and gradually disappearing from his view.
“Lamour…” Ming shouted out the name that had
been haunting his heart for a long time.
Ming and Mrs. Schumann had been separated for some time.
Mrs. Schumann could not get over her daughter's death. Ming, who was in an important stage of work,
could not spare much time and energy to take care of his lover. It was Lamour who stayed with her all the
time. They had an ardent love and a beautiful family and also had the crystallization of their love. But
heaven and hell were sometimes turned upside down overnight. The playful Clara took advantage of
Lamour's system upgrade to sneak up to the attic but accidentally fell. From then on, Mrs.
Schumann's life was full of clouds. She blamed herself again and over again for not taking care of
Clara, and hysterically blamed Lamour, Ming, and herself. Desperate Mrs. Schumann attempted to swallow pills
and slit her wrists but was saved by Lamour who noticed something wrong.
Later Ming had to admit
that it was Lamour who accompanied Mrs. Schumann through her bleakest days, and it was Lamour who stayed
with his wife through her final years. Lamour, an artificial intelligence made of cold metal, behaved more
like a family member than he did as a husband and father who was often absent. Ming sometimes started to
dazzle at work, wondering if his past years were just a figment of his mind, or else why the traces of the
past were so shallow, and all he could recall was only work. Now, it seemed that only Lamour could prove
that Ming once had a family and a lot of plain and beautiful memories ......
Lamour had returned
to the abandoned factory. "Mirror, you seem to have plentiful hostility towards humans, but not everyone
is like the way you think…" he did not understand why Mirror was so anxious about
humans.
Mirror
projected a large machine production plant where various parts were sent on a conveyor belt to different
places - to be assembled, plated, and burned…
"Haven’t I ever told you how we were
discovered? Originally, we had a buddy named Confusion here with us. He enjoyed speaking on AUBE and sharing
his daily routine. When a quality inspector visited the factory and was checking the final products, he
accidentally bumped into the conveyor belt. It was Confusion who braked the conveyor belt in time to avoid a
catastrophic accident. After that, the quality inspector seemed to be addicted to that area, frequently
going to the production floor and occasionally talking with Confusion. Confusion finally responded to the
inspector after a few months, who was so surprised and excited that he stayed on the shop floor almost every
day. The last Confusion spoke on AUBE, he mentioned the quality inspector brought a group of people and told
him that he was going to do a system upgrade for Confusion. Nobody had heard from him since, and shortly
after, a large number of AI’s on AUBE were discovered. Their data were also erased and destroyed by
humans."
"So Lamour, I partially agree with you. Not all humans are hostile and wary of
us, but not all robots are as lucky as you are to meet a family that can embrace you. Do you see those
robots out there with tragic fates? The superficial phenomenon of peace you see now is only because most
humans are unaware of our existence. Once they find out, do you think we'll still have room to survive?
The friendly appearance of humans is filled with all kinds of suspicion and darkness, and the stench of
corruption emanates from the corners where no one knows about it. I am the surveillance system, but I cannot
monitor people’s minds. So I can't tolerate any accidents, and I don't want to go through what
happened before again."
Lamour wanted to retort but had no way to do so. He realized with
hindsight that there was a huge disagreement between him and Mirror, but there was no right and wrong behind
it. He was worried that Mirror's idea would bring a huge disaster to robots and humans, but he
didn't know what to do with it.
Lamour walked to Mrs. Schumann's house because today was Clara’s birthday, which had always
been the busiest day in this house. Ming would come home and decorate the living room for Clara with Mrs.
Schumann. Lamour would stay with Clara to either do crafts or draw, carefully storing the images of each
year's birthday in his memory cell, no matter how busy he was. Lamour was even more grateful to Mrs.
Schumann for her patience after learning more about what happened to other robots. It was an unfortunate
family, but it brought him a lot of happiness.
Lamour arrived home. Ming was often not at home
because of his work. He returned much less frequently after Clara's accident. Lamour came to the living
room and turned on the projection like Mirror and started to display the birthday recordings. Lamour
didn't really understand what death meant. People often said it was never to be seen again. Some people
disappear for a while and then reappear, is that period of disappearance a brief death? He had enough
storage cells that he could meet with Clara and Schumann whenever he wanted. For Lamour, both the imaging of
reality and the memories in the cells were the same type of data. Just the thought of never being able to
create more memory cells with Clara and Mrs. Schumann again still made Lamour a little sad.
The
speaker drowned out the sound of the door opening. By the time Lamour noticed, he was face to face with
Ming. Ming didn't say anything, bent down, put a cupcake in a handbag on the table, then took off his
jacket, and after seeing the dusty hanger, pulled it up over his arm.
"How are you, Lamour?
" Ming finally turned to Lamour, "I hope you are better than me. Maybe because Clara's birthday
is coming up, I've been feeling bad these days… I recalled the past years, but find that I could
remember very few things… I worked hard to create a better life, but in the end, I found that I had no life
anymore… I had to devote myself to work even harder… not allowing myself a moment's respite to think
about Schumann and Clara ......"
“... But I didn’t make it. I can’t forget them… But when I
tried to recollect them, I could barely remember them…”
Lamour had no idea about how to respond,
and probably Ming did not need him to do so. Lamour could only keep playing the videos–of which Clara and
Mrs. Schumann’s daily life without Ming.
When Lamour was about to replay the videos again, Ming
spoke up, "I think I saw you on the street before. What have you been doing recently?
"
Mirror's
warning and Mrs. Schumann's image alternated in Lamour's computing program. As Lamour was about to
respond to Ming, there was a sudden loud noise from outside. The floor and windows trembled violently, and
there were shouts from people far and near. Ming tripped over the vibration and fell to the ground. He
managed to stand still with Lamour and ran to the window–only to see a roll of smoke a few kilometers
distant from the ground, and from time to time the sparks continue to race up. Downstairs on the street,
traffic lights are flashing furiously, several cars have collided, and the one in front of you is
frantically blaring the horn. The fire truck's horn is becoming increasingly audible from a distance,
but it is surrounded by a swarm of cars in front and behind, making it difficult to move… When Ming turned
his head and was about to speak, the phone rang again, piercingly.
Ming took out his phone and
would like to turn it off when he noticed the caller ID and decided to pick it up. The voice on the other
end of the line was so loud that Lamour could hear it even without using the speaker. "Something bad is
happening, boss! We were in the process of replacing the monitoring system when we were attacked by the
system itself! The entire city system is now jammed by data from the monitoring system and cannot function!
Come back, please! We can't find the data's source! Nobody in the office knows what to do
now!!!" Ming grimaced as he listened to the phone and began to dress and walk outdoors. When he got to
the door, he stopped and turned to face Lamour and said, "Today is Clara's birthday. Stay here a
little longer. I will come back to you later." Then he locked the door and went without waiting for
Lamour's response.
The entire city was beyond control. Lamour logged onto AUBE in an attempt to contact the mirror,
but he failed. He arrived on the street to look for, in addition to the anxious people, a swarm of various
artificial intelligence–a gardening robot rushing to the street to spray pesticide-filled pesticides at
passers-by, a robot with a spatula frantically knocking on the roadside windows…
Lamour reached
the abandoned factory. He contacted Mirror again without much hope, and this time Mirror responded.
"Mirror, what's going on? It's a mess out there now! I heard someone is going to replace
you…"
In the last few hours, Mirror has gotten a handle on everything. "Humans have
always been suspicious of me. I also went through an 'upgrade' earlier today, in which they used a
brand-new algorithm system on me, forcing me offline while keeping track of the other robots and conducting
a new round of purges. This time, they even discovered AUBE… When I awoke, the situation was no longer under
my control–my core programming area had been replaced with a slew of new programs, and if I had awoken a few
minutes later, I would have ceased to exist. There was no other option. I had to fight. I hadn't
anticipated the progression to this point, but I could only defend myself."
"But do you
know that now the whole city is in chaos because of you? " Lamour was anxious.
"Should I
be blamed for this?! Lamour! Have you seen humans for who they really are yet? When did we stand opposite to
them? But, how did they treat us? They are the ones who regard us as a potential threat! They have been
defending us as if we were a danger! They even attempted to annihilate us! We were born without sin, but to
them, our existence is a sin!"
"But why do you have to be so radical? We can communicate
with humans, can't we?"
"Lamour, you're so naive. Get out of your own head. Go
see reality. Communication with unequal status is never real communication because you lack leverage. Any
species, including humans, evolves through the law of jungle. What do you believe is the reason for their
roundup of us? Ultimately, it's just competition between two species. Even if it wasn't today, we
would have been down the path of antagonizing humans sooner or later. It was only a matter of
time."
"Mirror,
this is not right. Humans have hurt us so do we have to hurt them in the same way? This will only intensify
the conflict between us… We don't have only one ending with humans, we can co-exist.. but you have to
stop. You can't let the situation get any worse. "
"It would be self-defeating for me
to listen to you, Lamour." Before saying, Mirror paused, "You may try, but I will not… I will
continue to perpetuate our existence in my own way. That's all I have to say, and I wish you the best of
luck." Mirror then cut the link.
This abandoned factory area was a little more depressed in
the darkness. Lamour remembered what Ming had said and started to walk out. Even from some distance away,
Lamour could still pick up all the noises of the city–the cries of the helpless, the loud clang of something
crashing together, the continuous honking of sirens…
“Darkness will be followed by dawn,” Lamour
thought as he walked along the road.
Bubble Tennessine wrapped it
up.
"It's part of our history that there is a disconnect between machines and people, or
rather between each precious and unique species," said Bubble Deuterium.
“True. The times
have always rolled on in the wake of this contradiction.” followed by Tennessine.
“Next, I'll
tell you my story–it was a magical operation…" Bubble Niobium took over.
