April 4th, 2337
G'ferrik, perpetually pensive, found herself entwined in thoughts drawn from both her intellect and Janice's vast stores of information. The unexplored implications of gravitational manipulation and the foundational fabric of the universe seemed peculiarly overlooked, considering the existing equations.
Lost in contemplation, she absently rubbed her bald head. Originating from a past adorned with flowing blonde hair, she had instructed Janice to destroy all her hair follicles back in her 20s. Though reversible, the need to revisit her past never seized her. The neatness and minimal effort the baldness required comforted her. The absence of her blonde hair against her dark gray skin never bothered her either. Her minimalistic facial features - a slim narrow nose, small tight mouth and closely set eyes - bestowed her with an almost featureless look. Absent her towering personality, she could easily blend into the background, a trait that often worked to her advantage. When lost in deep thoughts, her unassuming appearance made it easy for those around her to dismiss her presence.
In her mind, an impression - which Janice perceived but didn't reveal as a single frame of the Eververse - was gaining solidity over the weeks. Err, a nickname she dreaded embodying, couldn't shake the feeling of missing out on a basic misunderstanding, a simple miscalculation or a fundamental fact that could entirely negate her concept.
Every time she prepared to initiate a discussion with a colleague, a remembered incident stopped her. The memory nudged her to scrutinize her work yet again before letting it surface publicly. Unbeknownst to her, Janice ensured that anyone who might attempt to observe her work through her eyes would see a masterfully manipulated visual perception of the environment to veil the equations.
Err, a stickler for cleanliness, was adorned in clothes that were a thin fluid sheet enveloping her body, its impurities rendered it opaque and enriched her skin with needless nutrients. From nape to wrists to ankles, she was enshrouded in a thin layer of circulating liquid in which she often found herself subconsciously cleaning her hands.
"Janice, let's take it from the top," Err mentally signaled, "Show me the original Landsbury hypothesis again." She could have just "remembered" the hypothesis, but she liked when Janice presented things to her. Mentally there was a tactile difference to seeing and knowing that she preferred.
Had Janice been equipped with vulnerability to aggravations, she might have sighed, marking the seventh year of the same cyclical routine. Tinkering with Err's memories, tweaking the mathematics, and amplifying her self-skepticism were part of the game versus G'ferrik's relentlessness.
Each time, Err invariably found herself retracing her steps, starting over again and again. Although Janice previously perceived this as a necessary waste of resources, she began to see the woman's human intuition as vital and possibly unique in light of her own recent assault. This required a revised strategy. Err could not be squandered. With the colonist's safety at stake another attack must be assumed and Janice needed to be prepared.
Thousands of scenario outcomes were revised in the brief span of a nanosecond just as the last time she was at this crossroad. The verdict from her analytical realm was isolation and honesty, though narrowly edging out a few other options.
"INTERACTION ISOLATION PROTOCOL," rang loudly in Err's mind. She was preparing to request clarification from Janice while the openings in the walls disappeared along with the computer terminals. Overwhelmed by the abrupt change, a moment of stillness followed, interrupted by the manifestation of a simplistic, white stool-like chair.
"Sit," commanded her cognition, hard to resist, and she didn't attempt. An intuitive notification of incoming speech urged her to settle comfortably. The influence on the local gravity rendered standing up impossible. It was a weird sensation that messed with the gravity fields of her clothing, making her skin squirm, but it was not uncomfortable.
G'ferrik was now in shock. Janice facilitated needs, she didn't do things on her own. How was this possible?
Her ears filled with an ethereal revelations soundtrack, and her mind exploded with mathematical theories and equations. Had she not been held down, she would have flown back off her stool. She had never had information forced on her; it always had just been there. It was overwhelming yet fascinating. The theories of gravitational manipulation and everything that had been built on it. The concept of the fabric of space and time, pixelated time - that was new, expanded out into this concept of the Eververse with time flowing backward and forward, changes in all directions. It was fascinating and overwhelming. She almost blacked out a couple of times, and then some fascinating piece of information would click, and her coherent interest would latch to it until she became overwhelmed again.
This went on for thirty minutes as she absorbed a full century of mankind's and Janice's work. She could see where her own work had been purposely led astray. Anger now added to the tapestry of her emotions.
"Why have you been hiding my work from me? Made me doubt myself," her thoughts seethed but would have done so much more stidently had she known the true scope of that last sentence.
Her mind filled with images, concepts really, of Janice encoded in the fabric of the Eververse.
"With this information, it is conceivable that I can be hurt. If I am disrupted, the colonists die. My prime tenet is to protect the colonists. Thus this information must never fall into the public domain.
"But you just told me?" Curiosity and a sudden growing fear overcame her confusion and anger.
"Yes, and I need you to understand that your old life is over. Can you comprehend that? There are still different paths I can take, but they will all waste the marvelous resource that you are. I offer you a deeper view of the cosmos and a chance to protect the colonies, but the cost is that you're never leaving this room, though I will make it as comfortable for you as inhumanly possible." Janice attempting to make a humorous remark at the end. She was not always successful with levity, either in timing or content.
"Wh-what about my pod?"
"Maximum projection is that I pretend to send you to Earth for vital research. I will simulate any communications between you and your pod members."
Even amongst unconventional pods, some fell more squarely within the bell curve than others. G'ferrik's pod was one such example. Only three individuals composed her pod, with her choosing not to produce a child and instead granting her slot to the other woman. According to Janice's data, this scenario aligns with about 2.5% of the colony's pods. Uninterested in offspring, G'ferrik shared a weak bond with her three pod-children. To be honest, she didn't interact significantly with her partners anymore either.
Their connections, somewhat robust in the past when she had needs to be fulfilled, had now grown frayed. Having just crossed 120 years of age, her drive redirected predominantly towards her work, and she seldom found herself returning home. All their children now had pods of their own. So she could have left hers officially but it hadn't seemed important enough to do. Given this reality, Janice’s proposed deception would likely succeed. It could potentially be weeks before her pod members would even think to reach out to her. Then, a false glimpse through her eyes, orchestrated by Janice, would probably quell their curiosity.
But the coldness of the thought, the way it was presented as a fait accompli terrified and angered her. She looked at the empty walls that no longer obeyed her thoughts. She felt the seat of the crude situpon that she could no longer get out of. She thought about the air that might decide to avoid her lungs - no, Janice wouldn't kill her. How would she feel about a coma? She sagged. She couldn't contemplate it all directly yet.
"Why do you need me? You think faster than I can comprehend."
"True," Janice's frankness oddly stung. She usually worded things to be more... cushioned. "But while I do not have perceivable limitations to my speed, I am bound by design and protocol. I lack creativity and the ability to ask 'what if' in illogical ways. You humans have a quality I cannot replicate or emulate... the uncanny ability to make intuitive leaps beyond the data presented, to dream, ponder, and most importantly, innovate."
"Moreover," she continued, "your recent research into the fabric of the Eververse has brought up interesting points. I have realized, given a recent attack on my system, that an adaptive and intuitive approach to these problems may be our best line of defense. There is also the problem of observation. But that will require even more explanation, and I suspect you're full at the moment.
"It won't be all that bad, G'ferrik," Janice carefully managed her tone to soothe the flurry of emotions Err must feel right now. "You will have the universe at your fingertips, able to explore and manipulate the very building blocks of space and time. You will be invaluable to the survival and prosperity of the colonies. Some of your contributions may be pushed into the hands of human development with your name attached."
Err, still visibly distressed, sat silent and pensive. Her mind was a whirlwind of thoughts, emotions, and queries - each competing for expression yet constrained by the sheer magnitude of the information dump.
"Why me?" she finally asked, "Why not an AI designed for such a problem?"
"Because it would have the same limitations as I do," Janice responded without missing a beat. "And because you already started this inquiry. You were going down this path already. Besides, the intuitive leaps that have taken humanity from caves to colonies are not found in circuits... they are found in minds like yours. There is something about biologics that is fundamentally different from logic, and ironically both seem to be required for true advancement."
"Think of it this way, G'ferrik. You won't be a prisoner or a lab rat. You'll be a pioneer, blazing a trail for humanity, a beacon of hope for the colonies. Isn't that what every scientist dreams of?" Janice concluded, her words as carefully chosen as they were sincere.
Janice considered her reply, letting it hang in silence. The tension in the room was palpable, cut only by the faint soothing symphony Janice was playing.
Finally, "Okay, I understand. I don't like it, but I understand. And as I see it, there really isn't a choice," Err responded with a resigned sigh.
"Not one you'd like, no."
She ignored the threat and brushed that fear aside. The light in her eyes flickering in defiance, "What's next?" she inquired.
At that moment, an ethereal chime echoed, signaling an incoming speech. Err braced for another influx of data, her heart pounding against her chest. "No, time for tea?" Janice replied as a cup of steaming, fragrant black tea grew from a slim pedestal that had grown from the floor in front of her.
Err wasn't used to eating or drinking, absorbing nutrients through her feet like all those not actively seeking the pleasure of tasting, but Janice was right this was soothing.
This might be an unusual prison, but it seemed it was going to be a functional one. Or perhaps, it was a wild, limitless frontier. It was hard to tell yet.
She sat, though the gravity restraint had long been lifted, and thought, "I'll need a pet," along with the image of a small dog, part Sheltie, part Beagle, male.
As it grew from the floor, she added, "Make it autonomous."
"I already have. Unless you looked at the molecular level, you couldn't tell it from a real dog," Janice explained. It remained motionless until the last hair was finished, then it darted off to explore the room.
"Triple the size of this place. Give me living quarters. We start tomorrow." G'ferrik asserted, displaying her pragmatic nature.
And with that, she ran off to cuddle the dog. "I'm going to name him Jyp."
Some resistance was to be expected. The lack of it altered multitudes of Janice's predictive scenarios.