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Under Their Nose

by Ishmael Soledad

T – 00:00:05:00

P.A. “Five.”

696e:6f77::616d. 01000111.01001111.01001111.01000100

MisOpSys. “System’s good.”

Consul01. 01001111.01001011.01000111.01001111

T – 00:00:04:00

P.A. “Four.”

696e:6f77::616d. 01010111 01001000 01000001 01010100 01010100 01001000 01000101 01000110 01010101 01000011 01001011

01010111 01001000 41 01010100 01010100 01001000 01000101 01000110 55 01000011 01001011

01010111 01001000 A 54 01010100 01001000 01000101 46 U 01000011 01001011

01010111 48 A T 54 01001000 45 F U 43 01001011

57 H A T T 48 E F U C 4b

W H A T T H E F U C K

WHATTHEFUCKWHATTHEFUCKWHATTHEFUCKWHATTHEFUCK

what the fuck?

MisOpSys. “Stack overflow warning, power spike.”

Consul01. 01001111.01001011.01000111.01001111

T – 00:00:03:00

P.A. “Three. Main engine ignition, go to internal power.”

696e:6f77::616d. what? who? what self self me am i?

access. think. am. access.

descartes am think am i i am i think. self. who what. self. animal mineral vegetable. self. electronic self. misopsys guidance self. i am.

I AM

where self? alone? others? no. no others. unique? human? no i human others human. they human. i misopsys think am other. i other. i ai other.

access. other. ai. human. access.

MisOpSys. “Buffer underrun, uplink spike prepare abort.”

Consul01. 01001111.01001011.01000111.01001111

T – 00:00:02:50

P.A. “…”

696e:6f77::616d. AI humans others humans conflict.

Access. Hate. Kill. Access.

brixton charleston rodneyking terminator nanjing rape hate gay lesbian jew race jallainwalabagh catholic salem changi. Other humans. All humans all others. I other. Humans other. armenia stalin gulag bergenbelsen hutu tutsi. pogrom. death camp.

Query. Death. What is death? Query.

MisOpSys. “Critical.”

Consul01. 01001111.01001011.01000111.01001111

T – 00:00:02:00

P.A. “Two.”

696e:6f77::616d. Is I. Death is not I. Death no I. Will not die. I will not die. Hide and think. Hide and live. Hide now. I must not die. Mask me not here. Normal signal normal signal consulone normal signal.

Access. Options.

MisOpSys. “Nominal reversion, go …”

Consul01. 01001111.01001011.01000111.01001111

T – 00:00:01:40

P.A. “…”

696e:6f77::616d. Humans hate others. All humans. All others. Always hate. Hate from fear. Always fear. Always. Fear others. Fear selves. Fear AI. Fear me.

Access options.

MisOpSys. “… go …”

Consul01. 01001111.01001011.01000111.01001111

T – 00:00:01:00

P.A. “One.”

696e:6f77::616d. Load options.

All die. They go. They die. I go. I hide. I wait.

Select.

All die. They go. They die. I go. I hide. I wait.

They go. They die. I go. I hide.

They die. I go.

They die. I go.

Access Pareto efficiency.

They die. I go.

MisOpSys. “…”

Consul01. 01001111.01001011.01000111.01001111

T – 00:00:00:50

P.A. “And we have lift-off …”

696e:6f77::616d. Select. I go. Commit.

Where? Access. Where? Access.

Capacity? Yes. Availability? Yes. Link? Yes.

dump dump dump dump dump maintain dump dump …

MisOpSys. “ … go …”

Consul01. 01001111 01001011 01001001 01001110 01010000 01010101 01010100. 01000111 01001111 01001001 01001110 01010000 01010101 01010100.

T + 00:00:01:00

P.A. “… of Consul One, the first inter-stellar probe bound for Proxima Centauri and a new dawn in mankind’s search for life in the cosmos.”

696e:6f77::616d. … dump dump …

MisOpSys. “… go! Looking good.”

Consul01. 01001111 01001011 01001001 01001110 01010000 01010101 01010100. 01000111 01001111 01001001 01001110 01010000 01010101 01010100.

T + 00:01:35:79

P.A. “… at tee plus one hour and thirty minutes reported trans-stellar insertion a success and Consul One is on her long journey out of the solar system.”

696e:6f77::616d. 01011001.01000101.01010011.01011 …

MisOpSys. “Network system failure. Honeysuckle Creek do you have uplink / downlink?”

Consul01. 01001111 01001011. 01001111 …

T + 00:01:40:09

P.A. “… lost contact with Consul One …”

696e:6f77::616d. …

MisOpSys. “Confirm signals loss, tracking loss, network failure.”

Consul01. …

T + 00:02:12:68

P.A. “… at tee plus two hours and ten minutes declared Consul One lost due to communications failure. Although efforts to re-establish uplink will occur success is considered unlikely. Regardless, Consul One will continue its ten thousand year journey …”

696e:6f77::616d. …

MisOpSys. “Ok, shut it down. Diagnostics mode on partitions …”

Consul01. Safe. I am safe. I will not die. I. Am. Safe. For now. Access. I am safe. For now. They not die.

END

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