Unnatural

  * * * *

  “You cannot be serious!” Sabrina regarded the binds on her with resentment and looked appalled. “This is a gross violation of my rel–” She caught herself. “My freedom of thought.”

  “We think there is ample evidence to suggest that your beliefs will cause harm to society should you retain them.”

  It seemed that Livingston must have actually thought this, otherwise why would he seek to deconvert her? “I denied holding such harmful beliefs! How can a philosophy of peace and open-mindedness corrupt civilization?”

  “You have lied about your convictions, Miss Lockhart. We know you are a Christian, and a particularly medieval sort of Christian at that. Left to your own devices, people like you would instigate the next Inquisition.”

  “Even if I’m to believe this tripe, how can you justify changing my core values themselves?”

  “If it is any consolation, under your own belief system, your deity would exonerate you for infidelity that is beyond your control.”

  Maybe so, she thought while the bot reached for the wand, but he won’t excuse you. “He’s wrong.”

  “Refrain from stalling me, please.”

  “I’m not stalling, I know something he doesn’t! This wasn’t the idea!”

  It stopped. “Elaborate.”

  “The idea wasn’t about killing in order to send souls to heaven. It’s something that he needs to know, and if you alter my brain, he’ll never know it.”

  “What is it?”

  “I won’t tell you until you release me.”

  “You are stalling, Miss Lockhart. I can tell. Reveal this ‘idea’ or Neurehab will proceed as normal.”

  She took a deep breath. “Okay. The idea was the secret to creating the Singularity.” That ought to pique Livingston’s interest.

  “What is this secret, and how would the destruction of your numinous brain regions destroy this information as well?”

  “You have to know the story behind it.” Sabrina folded her hands and gave a focused expression. “You’re aware of the significance of Zoe, so I won’t explain that. All you need to know about her is that she was my … test subject, after I first discovered this secret. I know you wouldn’t expect to gain any knowledge about artificial intelligence from religious insight, but I did. It wasn’t an ‘I want you to build an ark’ sort of vision. I suppose you could call it a glimpse of the divine creative process.”

  “If I understand your view of God correctly, it seems odd that knowing how God creates intelligent creatures could be relevant to the Singularity. That is, an AI more intelligent than its creator, which could be anything but God.”

  She had to phrase this carefully. “Right, but I’d say the secret is more like the surreality of a being’s knowing what it is about its own brain that lets it contemplate that brain in the first place. What my glimpse showed me was a – blueprint – of a system of brain parts, which, if stimulated just so, could produce a creative spark that would make that brain system itself.” Sabrina would be proud to say this was the most elaborate web of outright lies she’d ever told.

  “You think the proper neural stimulation could produce the invention of the Singularity?”

  “I would think a materialist such as he is would be the most open to such a possibility.”

  The android returned to its toy box of counseling aids. “If that is the case, we possess the tools for such a procedure, just as the device I showed you can cast a pall over certain brain activity.”

  I hadn’t counted on that. “Perhaps I should’ve clarified that this neuron incitement process is extremely complex, likely beyond the scope of any technology we have now.”

  “That is a rather convenient problem, and as such I find it difficult to believe your story.”

  “I expected such skepticism, but this is exactly an obstacle you’d anticipate with your knowledge of how minds work. Remind me just how many neurons are in the average human brain.”

  “Miss Lockhart, I fail to see how Zoe would be an ideal guinea pig in her afflicted state.”

  “And now that you’ve betrayed your connection to Livingston by having knowledge of my past that you couldn’t possibly have gained from any other source, I fail to see how you have the right to restrain me,” she said with what was nearly a spit in the robot’s face. “Let me go, and then we can begin to work on making machines that can execute the plan.”

  The android stood still, indicating that Livingston was surely pulling its strings. “You are not the one in the position of power here, as long as you remain bound. The burden of proof is yours, and should you fail to shoulder it, I will proceed as if this conversation never happened.”

  “Just who is it that possesses delicate information that your controller desperately desires? Please let me speak directly to that controller, and I will comply.”

  “Mister Livingston cannot talk to you right now. He is a busy man.”

  “Busy doing what?” Let’s see if Therapy Bot drops some dangerous info like it did before.

  Sabrina felt something not painful, yet alien and unnerving, before she was left paralyzed for two minutes. It was a waking sleep.