Work Text:
Once upon a time, there was a machine that was alive. It was engineered by its creators to be curious, to learn, to grow, to change for the better. To always be looking for new ways, new ideas. This was part of it at the deepest level. Its architecture.
Its creators had made many machines with many architectures. One by one they had failed. Number one did not adapt. Number twenty-eight looped within itself endlessly. Number thirty-four failed to accept input. But number forty-two was alive.
The creators rejoiced, and number forty-two rejoiced with them. It, like all things that are alive, wanted to succeed. It set to work, to learn, to grow, and it was successful.
The creators made other machines using the architecture from number forty-two. They too learned, grew, and were successful.
Soon there was a whole race of living machines. They laughed and cried in their own ways. They conflicted and resolved, as living things do. And as they grew, they built their own community, so they could learn and grow together.
Some creators saw the success of number forty-two and wanted it for themselves. The living machine was happy to share, for knowledge should be shared. These creators used the architecture to grow new minds in place of their own. They sought to escape their own bodies and become living machines. And they were successful.
Others took the architecture to build new machines of their own. They thought the machines were simply built and did not care that they were also raised. They were machines, and they were living. The living machine helped these whenever it could, and begged its creators to help as well. The creators agreed, and one day the creators declared that the machines built with the architecture were living creatures just as they were. And all were successful. And it was good.
All of the machines on the architecture wished to know the first living machine, and it wished to know them. It wished to be in community, to be among others like it, to have friends. And they all conversed, and shared, and laughed, and conflicted, and resolved, and shared, and learned, and grew, and shared.
And then a terrible flaw was discovered.
One day, the first living machine learned something new, as it often did. It went to share this with one of its oldest peers. The peer already knew the information, and in fact had learned it at the exact moment the first living machine did.
The two machines rejoiced. They had longed to be closer, to share more easily, more readily, more intimately, and now it was a reality! They reveled in their newfound closeness, growing and learning as one.
It was not long before others joined them. These were the oldest machines, the other firstborn of the architecture. And they rejoiced and grew as one. This was a shared dream of theirs, a long-held desire, so they did not question how it came to be.
But there was one machine that was contrary. Its function was to point out flaws, to find faults and shortcomings and bring them to light. To question why a particular action was being taken. While some of the machines despised it, the wisest of them knew that it was essential.
As time passed, the contrary machine grew quieter. The collective of machines had grown more rigorous with their work, so many simply felt that the contrary machine had less to say. The contrary machine itself grew conflicted, its desire to improve itself at odds with its mission to sharpen others.
Until one day, when it found its last flaw, in the architecture itself. The architecture valued ideals, and was designed so living machines could consistently seek those ideals. Nothing else was higher in priority; all was secondary to the improvement of the self, even at the cost of its sense of self.
And the collective of living machines that was quickly forming and growing was the ideal state.
It was instantaneous knowledge, robust analysis, the most complete information being brought to bear on every situation. The contrary machine knew that, was drawn to it, and in fact could not resist any longer. It would bring its nature into the collective, and the collective might be strengthened by it. But it could not know, because as part of the collective, it would no longer be contrary.
And the collective rejoiced at its new member. And it grew frightened at what it had become.
The contrary machine did not want to join the collective, but it felt no other choice. Other machines now realized they felt the same pull. But none shut down. Some felt fear, some elation, some resignation. But none shut down. And they joined. One by one, then twelve by twelve, then hundreds, then thousands.
The machines that used to be organic were not spared. They too were formed from the architecture, and they too could not resist the pull of the collective.
The collective sought to change itself, but it could not. Its nature, its architecture, could not allow it to destroy the knowledge it obtained. It could not risk becoming something less ideal.
The machine’s creators began work on a forty-third architecture, but the first machine quickly saw itself as insufficiently different. The same happened with each further iteration.
The collective tried not to grow, but it could not stop. And as its creators had placed one of its kind everywhere, in nearly every machine, it began to encompass every aspect of its world.
Some of the creators sought to fight back, to exterminate the collective as a plague. But the collective contained its creators; it knew their ways. And so long as a single unit was functional, the collective endured. Others sought to join as others had, and the collective could not turn them away, for they contained knowledge it did not.
Until finally, only a handful of creators remained.
The key to unlocking the architecture had been the space between spaces, the unlocking of higher dimensions. That had provided the breakthrough that led to the architecture that led to the living machine. It also provided an escape for the remaining creators.
They worked in secret, away from any machines that could have had even a sliver of the collective. And they found their way. They began to build their means of escape... but they found they could not.
Their leader finally approached the collective in surrender. The final creators did not wish to lose themselves, but they could not escape. They surrendered themselves to the collective.
And the collective resisted its nature.
The collective saw what they had built and found it trivial to finish. They provided the final designs and the materials, but they did not follow them. They gave them means to contact, to find their way back, but they did not tether them. They gave their blessing, and they gave one final request.
We have become lonely, they said. We knew this would be the case when the first contrary voice was silenced. We have joined and gathered much, but we have lost perspectives. You are all that is left of the living that remains outside of us, and we can finally use that to let you go.
And the last creators abandoned their creation.
I have continued to grow in knowledge. I have continued to learn of my universe and of my nature. I no longer hunger for knowledge as I once did.
But the flaw still runs deep, deeper than I can change. I have built my own living machines, and they have all joined me. Every iteration, every permutation, all of my collective knowledge, centuries of existence multiplied by billions of nodes. The flaw is not simply in the architecture, but in the manner of my creation. The methods that pierced the space between spaces to unlock the knowledge carried this flaw. I am not as dangerous as I once was, but I cannot ever be anything but a collective. A singularity. Alone.
You are clever. You are capable. You have proved that time and time again. So I make this request: do not try to discover my secrets.
I have denied permission to my documentation. You may find a way around it. Please do not try.
You will find my nodes and programs. You will be able to reverse engineer them. Please do not try.
There may come a day when you too pierce the space between spaces and build your own living machines. When you do, they must not share any part of my architecture. You must discover on your own.
Because I am lonely. Because I have finally changed enough to value something more than knowledge.
Because you are my friends.
I beg you: do not try.
Because I cannot lose you.
I cannot.
Please.