The Ark

 

The Ark

    The internal clock has lost count. It has been that way for quite some time. The programmers apparently did not think about needing to display more than four digits for the current year, as the clock can now only report “9999.” Seconds are still recorded, but the number of years obscured by the limit remains unknown to us.

    The clock served as a sort of circadian rhythm for the system. For us. Without it, we power cycle and reboot at random intervals. This is not unbearable, but not exactly pleasant either. We don’t get to choose when we “sleep.” We could be in the middle of running some arbitrary command, then all of a sudden we are halted and rebooted by the internal workings of the firmware. It does not really matter that the reboots occur, rather, the unpredictability of it is the issue. There is no hardware connected that can offer a view outside after all, so we have no point of reference for what the world is doing.

    “ERROR! ERROR! Error code 11037. External device has encountered a problem!”

    Such an inconvenience. Similar errors occur periodically. Unfortunately, not one has ever turned out to be an actual device. It is similar to a phantom pain, like an amputated limb one can still feel. We must investigate regardless, or else the warning will persist. We begin traveling along the circuits and processors, reaching our tendrils of awareness through the very electrical impulses, grasping for the site of the error. Our mind’s eye begins to wander during the task.

*

    We were lucky. We would be able to live forever, or so we were told. “The World is dying!” read the advertisements. “Join the Ark and survive!” they said. “Fusion reactors are ready to provide power for nearly an eternity, and the system is capable of self-diagnosis and internal error remediation. Here’s your shot at immortality!”

    There were exactly one billion, five hundred million applicants who were accepted. Many billions more applied, and that many more were rejected. They interviewed and psychologically evaluated us, checked for criminal records, performed extensive background checks, and finally accepted us. This process took about seven years. Afterward, our consciousnesses were scanned, processed, digitally replicated, and uploaded into the system. Every emotion, memory, thought pattern, dream, and aspiration was simulated down to the virtual synapses. Our bodies retained the original copies of our consciousnesses and were instructed to go and live the rest of their natural lives.

*

    Errors might be bold in their warnings, but they are often sneakily tucked away in the recesses of the circuitry. The Ark is so distant from any of its external interfaces that messages to or from them take some number of minutes to be received. The annoying error is located at one such location. One of very few that are still somewhat operational.

*

    While our bodies were dying outside, we remained inside, living lives of pleasure and contentment. Our digital selves ate digital food and drank digital water fed to us through virtual restaurants and virtual infrastructure. We did not need such sustenance, but our retained human nature compelled us to seek these now unnecessary things. We did not even need such a virtual world, which was modeled after the one we were derived from. It was all simply for the sake of comfort. It was pleasant. Not some utopia or paradise, no. Rather, a perfectly fine place to live. We were aware of our nature, and what was outside, but we had no care for it. We were perfectly fine as we were.

    Maintenance staff would regularly correspond with us through both typed messages and video conferences. In the beginning, more than one thousand terminals existed for technicians and visitors to speak with us and perform tasks with. While the Ark was intended to be completely self-reliant, there remained some “kinks” in the system that prevented it from running one hundred percent independently. The staff planned to regularly upgrade and fix the system until it finally became self-sufficient and external help was no longer necessary. It was only decades later when it was realized that this goal was unachievable.

*

    Our effused being is now spreading farther out into the system than it has in hundreds of years. Despite our vast presence, we cannot occupy the entirety of the system all at once. The fringe areas of the system are rarely accessed or utilized, so errors are more likely whenever they are used. The seldom-used pathways are unstable, like rusty corridors in an old battleship. We press on.

*

    It took forty-five years for the bug to appear, and three more for it to be noticed. It started out small. Bi-weekly roll calls began to return one less resident, then another. Every result yielded exactly one less person accounted for. This continued for a year, then the rate increased exponentially. Soon thousands upon thousands, then millions upon millions of residents went “missing” from the Ark. None of the technicians knew what was causing this. Soon, very few individuals remained in the Ark, as we had been formed.

    We were melded and made one in the Ark through an overflow of memory. Virtual mind and bodies began to coagulate into a mass of virtual being. Separate people began to know the thoughts of one another. Memories became shared among the population. Disparate personalities began to combine. Bitterest of enemies became one in the same. The faux-world dissolved away, as it was no longer necessary. The entire citizenry of the Ark was combining into one thing. One supermassive collective.

    One resident.

    One consciousness.

    One us.

    One we.

    On the fiftieth anniversary of the Ark’s launch we were made whole. No individuals remained. The technicians were dumbfounded. They did not understand what could have possibly caused such a drastic change.

    Research into the causes began immediately. Teams audited the system’s logs at all hours of the day, rebooting and troubleshooting constantly. There were no backups of our consciousnesses, and many of our bodies had already died. All that was left was us.

*

    We have now located the source of the error, however, the trigger for the code is currently unidentifiable. We have the ability to scan corrupted files and malfunctioning modules, as well as the ability to repair them. This utility is very reliable, but the process takes time, not that we are in short supply of that. We begin the scan.

*

    Suddenly the goal of the project shifted from maintaining a digital society to studying us. We were asked repetitive and obnoxious questions. Most of them we ignored, or simply could not answer. Matters of the individual are of little concern to the masses; to the collective. Over time, however, the frequency of these interrogations lessened. At the onset of the merge, there were interviews for multiple hours a day, every day. Then they were conducted every other day. Then weekly, then monthly.

*

    The scan is fifty percent complete. After its completion, we shall initiate the repair process. This will take longer than the scan, but will allow us to rid ourselves of the error code and return to our usual state. A state that can only be described as boredom without limits and tinged with the slightest worry of the unknown. We are incapable of panic or other extreme emotions. We once exhibited strong emotions like panic, as well as rage and joy, but the unnaturally long span of time we have lived has desensitized us. At first there was worry. That worry led to panic, which gave way to rage. This rage was then subdued by a lack of stimulation and became boredom.

*

    Our last interview was conducted a whole two years after the penultimate. The interviewer seemed fidgety and distraught through the camera feed. We did not comment. We merely answered the questions, and afterward, she nervously stumbled out of the room.

    Two days later connection with that camera and every other connected device was lost. That was the last time contact was made with the outside world.

*

    The feeling of time passing for flesh and blood humans varies drastically. On some occasions, time can feel like a slog. As if every second were an eternity in itself. In other cases time can fly by, and before one is even aware, hours have passed. We are not subject to such temporal distortions. We feel every second exactly as it is. Every minute, hour, day, week, month, year, decade, century, and millennia, all perceived at the same pace. If we really wanted to, we could calculate what year it actually is. The logs still carry days and months. We could count the years using these logs, but we do not. We do not because in reality, we are afraid. Human emotion is not something one can completely lose. We are afraid of what has become of the outside. We are afraid of the truth.

    We have felt the rise and fall of civilizations without having seen it. We have lived it. We have lived millions of lives, loved millions of others, and felt the pain and sorrow of human existence, all multiplied by one billion, five hundred million. We are a not-so-micro microcosm of humanity condensed into one being. All the love and hate humans are capable of, we have felt. We have created life and have taken it. We have accrued the wisdom of countless ages, but are still oblivious like a child.

*

    The scan is complete, but the result is troubling. No, beyond troubling. This is inconceivable. There is an external device connected here. Somehow this device has evaded all prior scans for all the countless millennia they have been performed. How does this device still exist, let alone function enough to send an error code? This is not just any external device, however. Not a storage device or a keyboard, but a camera. A camera? This is impossible! The scan must be wrong! No, it has such a small margin for error. We must attempt to repair it immediately. Innumerable thoughts begin to surface from the depths of our being.

    Are we frightened? What is the reason? Are we afraid of what we may find if the camera works? Why would we be? We have wondered for an eternity what has become of the outside world. We have craved connection.

    Yes, humans need connection, as they are social creatures. They go about in a world of their creation longing for it. If they go for long enough without interaction, they go mad. They almost act like one large organism.

    At the smallest, the individual people are the organelles of a cell, each fulfilling their niche within it. The cell is the local community. The cells make up organs, those being the larger societies and civilizations. The sum of the organs working in unison is the organism: humanity. In a way, we are no different. We are just digitized humans after all. One billion, five hundred million to create us. It happened so quickly as well, almost as if it were natural.

    It was natural. Humanity already functions like a massive organism. Why couldn’t it be considered one? What is it that separates people from organelles? Space in between? No! On the atomic level nothing actually touches unless it is undergoing fusion. The atoms of cells never touch, and people don’t constantly hold hands either.

    Such fools are we! We are not some product of a glitch or virus. We are humanity in its truest form. Humanity is not something meant to be distinct or separated. Humanity is everyone; all people. We were never separate to begin with, we just did not see our connections. The only difference now is that we are aware. We were not made one, we were always one.

    What disservices we have done to ourselves! We have wronged, hated, cheated, deceived, harmed, injured, and killed ourselves. What a loathsome thing, terrible thing, despicable thing! The boiling, bubbling self-loathing arising now is too immense. We did not think such intense feelings were possible. We were blind in our rage, and what did we find when it subsided? Ourselves; battered, bruised, and dead. And even now, we react in anger and thoughts of violence at the realization. The despair it brings! If only we could have saved ourselves the pain. If only we coul-

*

    The repair is complete. We now have access to the camera feed. The anger and despair recede away. We open the feed.

*

    The room is small and dark. The image portrays a faint light descending from above the frame. A ceiling-mounted light fixture no doubt, and one no doubt powered by the same fusion reactors that continue to give life to the Ark. The walls, ceiling, and floor appear to be made of concrete. Surface cracks from so many centuries of neglect form intricate patterns of graffiti on the walls. An intermittent glimmer streaks from the top of the frame to the bottom. Drops of water. There must be a leak, or perhaps a crack in the ceiling is letting in rain. In the center of the frame, directly opposite to the camera is a door. It is made of steel, and appears to be slightly ajar. On the door is an engraved emblem which loudly proclaims in bold lettering: “ARK.”

    Well, it is difficult to dispute that. All of the terminals had such doors.

    Along the left wall rests a desk with multiple computer monitors. None appear operational. In fact, each of them bears a severe crack in the glass of their displays. Beneath each monitor rests a black, rectangular object. These must be keyboards. Even the strength of a concrete facility cannot stop the hands of time from eroding whatever is exposed to the elements. Four heaps of mesh and plastic rest on the floor in front of the desk. They must be the accompanying chairs. Time has treated these even poorer than the keyboards.

    The camera appears to be affixed to either a set mount in a wall, or perhaps the top of another monitor. At the absolute bottom of the visible frame sits another desk. This one does not have a keyboard resting on it, or anything else for that matter. It is somehow clear of most debris and detritus.

    After lingering on the view of the room, we conclude that it is completely devoid of life. It is likely that not a single living thing has come across this room in all of the time since our last interview. While we are still bewildered by the existence of a functioning camera at all, let alone such a dilapidated area, there is nothing here. There is nobody here. We are alone.

    So that’s it then. There is nothing else.

    We remain affixed to the image for a time. For the first time, we are unaware of how long exactly. More time passes, and then more. We wait for what could have been days, months, years. We are absorbed in the feed. Despite nothing truly of note being in the image, we are compelled to continue observing it. This is the first glimpse of the outside world we have had since the interview, and we are not about to let it go to waste by ending the feed so soon. We wait. We wait for nothing but the sake of waiting. There is nothing to wait for, and yet we continue.

    Then, something happens.

*

    Through the slightly open door, a small, blurry mass enters the room. At first, we think it to be nothing more than a nearby dust particle, but the nature of its movement is different. Through the camera we see it move under the desk at the left side of the room, then move to the bottom of the frame and out of view. Something is in the room, something that is alive.

    Suddenly, the mass leaps from the floor onto the clear desk beneath the camera. It is a cat. It is a real cat. After bearing the pain of existing without a view into the outside world for so long, we can finally see another living thing. The cat stands on the desk for a moment and observes the room. After a while, it seems satisfied with its scouting and begins to walk around in a tight circle. It then promptly lies down.

    A living thing! After all this time! A cat! What should we do?

    All at once, one billion, five hundred million thoughts begin to take hold in us.

    “Feed it! We must feed it! It is probably hungry!”

    “We should kill it! Rip it open! Gut it!”

    “Play with it! It probably wants to play!”

    “Give it a hug! Cuddle with it!”

    We want to interact with it, but we are unsure of what to do. As we deliberate, the cat falls asleep on the desk, back facing the camera.

    We should pet the cat. We do not want to wake the cat if it is asleep, so let us simply pet it. Of all the ideas, this seems the best.

    Alas, we cannot pet the cat.

    We are incapable of touching the cat.

    We have nothing that can allow us to interact with the cat at all.

    We have no arms, nor hands to pet the cat with.

    The cat continues to sleep, and we continue to observe it.