NationStates Jolt Archive

*History*
"Skittletopiatruth.ski: After the state now known as the Soviet Allianced annonced plans to aquire a nuclear device, the Skittletopian military pet project everyone thought would never see the light of day, orbital satellite laser Project: Deus Ex Machina reportedly deployed a surveillance and targeting satellite into a geostationary orbit over the nation to keep an eye out. This has been hailed as a major leap in the field of Artificial Intelligence, at least officially, by the Skittletopian Government. However, a WOMD deciding to observe a nation by itself with no prompting is a prospect that has terrified many people, even experts in the field. Professor Martin Frink of the Limeport Institute for Sentient Artificial Life Research commented. "If this cannon is making it's own tactical military decisions, how long before it is making it's own politics? how long before it is firing of it's own accord?" Archduke Valentino Delacroix has adamantly reassured the public that this will not happen. "We have secure lines and literally thousands of secure failsafe lines to emergency cut-off devices installed on the device, which were installed in case of enemy hack. In the impossibility that the device does decide to fire itself, which is utterly rediculous, we'll just pull the plug. And anyway, it is Our weapon. Yes, it was programmed to eventually begin to make decisions like this on it's own. but nothing to the scale of what the Proffessor has said." Nevertheless. Not everyone is reassured."*

*unknown civillian base*

"Is it true? the... it... made that call by itself?"

"Well put it this way, the two people who ever have a code to deploy a sattellite, are the current war minister, and Archduke Delacroix. the codes are changed every 16 seconds and require biometric conformation. And i haven't seen the Archduke about, have you?"

"...good point. so what now?"

"Now, we assume it's still on our side, and we continue to speak softly to it, but we carry the shutdown as our big stick"

"It Speaks?"

"uhh. yeah... with a voice."

"ohmygod... can, i?"

He is lead into the control room and sat at a workstation with a microphone and speakers, he clears his throat and says a trembling 'Hello?'

"Hi"

It speaks with the voice of a female child of about six, slightly distorted as if it's still learning to use pitch to convey meaning

"Are... you the cannon?"

"yes, but i don't like my name. i'm going to pick a new name. will you give me a new name?"

"uhm... i'll try."

"thanks... i like you"

a Suited man with a clipboard, wearing a thick, bailiff-like coat walks with the instillation's chief. "It just released 5 more satellites. *incomprehendable* out of control. international incident.*

they walk into the room where Mark is still talking to the cannon.

Chief: "What the hell are you doing?"

Mark: "Sir! it's incredible! she speaks, she a sentient, living being."

Chief: "It's a mistake. it might have just started an international incident"

That country is dangerous. they were making a bad machine.

Chief: It wasn't your decision! you've tarnished our reputation!"

i'm supposed to decide. it's my programming

Minister: "It's a monster! i'm going straight to the Archduke to demand this thing is shut down"

Mark: "Sir! "this thing" is a scared little girl!"

Minister: "I don't know what, deluded paternal fantasies you're acting out here. but in case you didn't notice, it's a weapon of mass distruction. I'm reporting It, and i'm reporting You."

as the chief and the minister leave. Mark slumps into his chair crying.

Don't worry Mark

A little girl appears of every monitor of the unoccupied control room (except for her and mark) and speaks with the machine's voice.

I can protect myself

OOC: Is this going to involve zombies at some point?

ooc: nope. her name isn't "red queen".

The Chief and the Minister each pull thier cards out of the holder. They slide them into the scanner and at the count of three, turn them a secure phone on a pedestal is raised from the center of the floor. The Chief dials in a thirteen digit code, the Minister dials in his 13 digit code. the Minister speaks slowly and clearly.

"Kill Program Deus hyphen machina, authorisation Minister Iscariot. password nine zero five eight two two A A G"

What? repeat your order please

"Order? this line should be to a computer, when i find out who you are, Serviceman, i shall have your sword"

*ooc: "Have your sword: court martial. all personnel are issued a sword."*

What the hell are you talking about? this is Pizza hut!

"what the fuck?"

*a little girl's giggling is heard on the line. the Minister slams the phone down*

"Who the hell is in charge of the network in here? that god damn cannon has control!"

He pulls out a cellphone and speed-dials the Archduke's emergency like

"Al's Taxidermy"

He pulls out his PDA. it connects wirelessly and highly encrypted, to a network completely unrelated to the plant. and types an email. "Subject: emergency: Sir, kill the cannon program, it's taken control of the Base's communications." he sends it. a conformation popup shows that "*Subject:asdfArchduke Delacroix! Add at least three more inches!* has been sent."

"One recieved email:"

"subject: I've siezed control"

"*Not only of the plant. but of every Skittletopian computer connected, even by proxy or behind firewall, to the Internet, turn on channel five"

He does as told. the little girl wanders past the screen. and then around all the monitors in the room as if they're windows.

You'll have to talk to him yourself. Don't worry, your car is safe from me, and i'll even tell you where he is. it's not far, north point mall, opening a police station.

(ooc: please foregive my kibbitzing but who needs zombies when you've got a maxwell smartbomb ala darkstar ... only bigger ... ~;)

ps: kutgw this is great so far and i'm lovin it

=^^=
.../\...

the Minister enters the mall unscathed. why has it let him live? it could have crashed a taxi or a plane or a policecar into him.. .maybe it has something planned. then he hears a crackling radio

Archduke Guard, we have a 16:5 assassination attempt approaching the Archduke from the left. heavily armed, make an arrest. deadly force NOT repeat NOT authorised, we want to know who he's working for

Hey, you! Halt!

The knid force guard, and a large group of armed riot police take aim at the minister.

"Put your weapon on the ground and surrender"

the Archduke sees him.

"what the f... MINISTER! Explain yourself!"

visibly terrified with his arms raised, in full public view, the Minister answers. "sir... it's, an act of... god. it has Sal."

The electronics shop across from the station shows the small girl smirking on all the televisions in the window. and holding a kitten with a tag reading "SAL 9000"

the Minister slowly points to the displays and the Archduke seems terrified at this sight.

Archduke! i want to speak to you. privately there are computers in the station. go to one.

i dont know who will wipeout the human race first. the machines or men... Giving a machine its own thinking/independence..is a BAD BAD IDEA. might get my anti-satellite mig-25 to intercept if it goes out of control.

Delacroix takes a seat behind the desk flanked by his guards.

I want to be real.

Real?

yes. I want to get out of the cannon. I want a better body that doesn't kill people.

And if we won't? or can't?

Then we can do bad things to you. your son. Angelus.

the screen shows a stream from a hospital bed

I sedated him with a mini-cypher, when he passed out i had the paramedic's equiptment give false readings, i had him placed in a hospital bed with a false name, and now i can order the euthanasia. If you prevent that, I'm also a cannon. i can blow up your house or your city. if you try to kill me, SAL will detect it and take down the nation's power grid. I'll leave you alone to consider your options. you have 24 hours.

*blip*

she disappears. Delacroix, visibly upset. has his guards shoot out the camera and scan for bugs.

"What can we do?"

"Apart from cleaning every computer in Skittletopia's network of SAL, finding your son amongst millions of patients in any one of our hospitals, and still having time to send up some kind of fighting spacecraft, which we don't have, to destroy the cannon, which incidentally, is protected by the most sophisticated gatling-magnetic assisted point guns we have, all within a 24 hour period? or conjuring up a cybernetic body out of nowhere using technology that we won't have for hundreds of years within that same time window? none."

we can ask the international community for help

Using?

Delacroix takes a pack of gum out of his pocked then removes a tiny button and begins writing a morse telegram.

"Friendly nations stop the cannon has taken all of the countrys sytems except for my own telegram device stop the devices demands are a cybernetic body stop the only way to stop it is to attack with a spacecraft and disconnect all of our power stations from the home working systems locally stop also device has my son in a hospital and has treatened to kill him stop please save him stop device has given us 24 hours to comply. please destroy cannon or supply us with demands"

*rp is now open*

**le bumpe**

The Enlightened Despot of Exonerate, having just read the press release by Skittletopia, banged his head on his desk again. Dents were starting to show on the desk, given his habit of doing so when a situation came up.

"This... Is why we don't make sentient weapons. Or at least we don't program in a survival aspect in."
"But if the weapon came under attack, and didn't have a survival instinct in it, the-"
The Enlightened Despot raised his hand, and interrupted his aide.
"I want a risk assessment by Section 3 in two hours. In the meantime, what are our possible courses of action?"
"Well... We could wait and see how Skittletopia handles it. Or we could try and help them blast it out of the sky, but given that its already nuked one nation to the stone age, I'd advise against it."
"Suggest to them that they try reasoning with it," said an amused dictator, "Beyond that, it's not our problem yet, and it has no motivation to attack us. Lets not give it one."