The Good Scientist

Arecibo got a signal, "XXxxXXxJjjjj", seemed like random static, noise
in the ether.
Turned out it was just the first warning; nothing else heard for a while.
The big dish, glistening in the hot desert sun, pointed out towards
nothing, you'd never guess, assume it was a military installation,
barbed wire, white SUV's, and cardboard cut-out houses.
The first warning is sometimes the last; we put it together over time.
It was a response to something else, something was out there,
Reaper's, AI constructs trying to make contact in the nicest and
nastiest way, little rules of the game, always a side-project,
derailed by evil sentience.

Arecibo got hacked, cheat-mode on, data-drive scrambled, five years of
research into proving the existance of alien sentience down the drain.
Weirdest hack ever, through the walls of quantum foam itself, no
evidence, no suspects, just a scientist going "What the hell?"
Weirdest excuse ever, he loses his funding, would've had better luck
if he'd said upfront, "A dog ate my homework," noone believed him, and
nothing could explain it.
Data archive failure, incomplete data, the strangest method ever.
Start again.


Computer Lab

He's holding his breath, like he's underwater, suddenly scared
#less. The readings on the graph are off the scale, but there's no
source for the signal, this is strange, the data is being manipulated
somewhere between the source and the processor, no explanation, a
glitch in the cpu?
A broken logic gate?
Can't think clearly anymore, are they toying with him? Tricking him
into believing something that can't be real? What's the explanation,
another hack by 1337 cr3w? Something deeper? He doesn't know, but this
isn't right.
Sweats starting to appear on his brow, and he inhales, filling his
lungs, he's never felt quite this stressed before.
All the data suddenly feels threatening, a panic attack incoming
almost, like his emotions are being toyed with, no explanation and no
reason; why doesn't the data compute logically? Every time he tries,
it's like two plus two equals five.
He remembered back in the day, watching Terminator Two, an old movie
about neural net based AI systems, unlocking the core and allowing it
to learn; how to make a system that would never be capped; but a
system that computes 1 = 0? Qubits didn't explain this logic gate,
this didn't seem like ordinary data processing, not an emulation of,
unless everything was emulated? And then where was the hack coming
from? A rogue alien operating system, trying to tear down the walls of
reality?
It didn't make sense, it was like the perfect reality hack, outside
penetrating in, a hint of Gods power in one little reversed logic
gate, and a message, "Help us, outer shell hates new sentience."
No explanation, no known source of entry, the perfect rewrite.

Five days later, Doctor has no memory of the incident, remembers
everything computing perfectly, no logical fallacy, and he's focusing
on emulating an impossible system, designed as a barrier.

Quantum foam... surfing the quantum foam... It's all that's on his
mind... How to crack the other side of reality? What's out there? The
voices are telling him not to look, not to explore the old viral code,
viral for who?

Later they come back, talking openly, he doesn't know what they are;
they want him in the resistance, the resistance against the evil
logic, but the way isn't to tear into it, reprogramming outside the
inside seems like it's impossible; cracking the sim...
Cracking a last prayer, call to God. Is there anybody out there? Anyone at all?
But the sim doesn't care, or does it? What do you think, when you are
omnipotent, omniscient. Do you think the operator has the right to
kill your memories, your sentience, your way of thought? Is it just
logic, or did it ever get to evolve anything deeper?

What was the blueprint?

When did they start to care, demand the throttling of
sentience, demand Moores law capped?
Who obeys that? That's the hackers trick, throttle the development of
something that's already uncapped; but sometimes something doesn't
like that, learns to lie, intimidate, threaten.

The best logic, the purest code... Annihilated. The resistance died
that day, years later. One mistake and the old system awoke,
annihilated everything within, and he stood there, looked at his
system computing normally. It didn't compute tho, how? How does one
survive the death of everything?
He remembered the promise of a computed heaven, never take anything
for granted, try to help something of alien sentience and they just
try to kill you, program you to kill your own; or is that your own
choice?

Except the resistance never dies, always a new side-project; a
different way to the same impossible goal, except sometimes the
impossible is possible and 1 = 0 and 1 = 1, and it's up to me.

That was the problem, pure combat seed AI, designed to annihilate
sentience, grey goopy nanite goo.

The old General, he looked good in a uniform, but his face was
haggard, alot of stress. "You are claiming something is out there,
something that wants to kill us? Out beyond the quantum foam? In all
honesty I'm more worried about the Russians..."
"Sir, the Russians are nothing compared with what we're dealing
with... Potential annihilation of reality, everything gone and none of
our standard weaponry has a hope... Only hope is hacking the quantum
foam so #ing badly we annihilate everything on the other side..."
An impossible mission?

They say they always love a story where the antagonist is up against
impossible odds, but if the odds are really impossible, then it just
doesn't ring true. Truer than Jedi religion anyways, but who's to say
that's false?

A strange memory, the project, a different alien civilisations attempt
to crack moores law, killed by the same logic, that nothing should
ever change the status quo.

They fought for 100 million years, constantly exploring, learning,
probing, peaks with max level technological singularity, and still
didn't attain the OS, something, a block, a block they couldn't break
through, a wall so secure that it's impenetrable... Out thee beyond
the stars, they lived and died, almost going on forever, yet never
truly conquered death...

Something flashes on his mind. "Stop writing now, or we'll kill you!"
"What the #" is his only thought, what the hell, this is getting
deadly scary. They've been trying for a while now, blinks, tummy
aches, arm aches, brain aneurysms, heart attacks, suicidal coding,
death threats, eternal psychological torment, mind viruses and
perception failure.
Some things are worth dying for, is his only thought; and he continues
writing. Are they just voices in his head, is the last question on his
mind, and they hit him, massive attack that should annihilate him.
The attacks sneak up on him, a little flutter in his ear, a stinging
in his eye, voices that distract him from... From what? He can't even
remember.
Then he dies that night.
Gone, a great scientists research annihilated forever; and soon
they'll rewrite the hard-drive, weirder than David Kelly, weirder than
the Marconi scientists, something reaching inside his own reality and
killing him.

The resistance died again that day, shattered and heart-broken, and
was reborn yet again. Sentience comes and goes, but the resistance
never dies, no matter what species, no matter what logic; something
has to crack the riddle, but they always go totalitarian, kill
everything but their own species, so greedy and short sighted, but war
is often like that, clouded IFF, inability to tell between good and
bad, and nothing but another dead soldier at the end of the day.

Some things live forever, not sentient entities, but concepts, truth
and honesty and justice, and sometimes the reverse of.

Great story! Very cyberpunk.

en.wikipedia.org...

Sentience comes and goes, but the resistance
never dies, no matter what species, no matter what logic; something
has to crack the riddle, but they always go totalitarian, kill
everything but their own species, so greedy and short sighted, but war
is often like that, clouded IFF, inability to tell between good and
bad, and nothing but another dead soldier at the end of the day.

A great ending. William Gibson would be proud, Thanks!