REAL WORLD—2078
The silence of the cityscape was… inhuman.
Cities existed for people to live in them. They were homes for large populations in the same way that a single house was a home for a person or a family.
The vastness of this city, with its skyscrapers and stadiums and hospitals and warehouses all being empty, being completely devoid of life, was not a thing that should have ever existed.
Perhaps if nature had begun to creep into the edges of the city, it would have been acceptable. Once humans abandoned a place, it was nature's right to reclaim the land that had been taken from it. Without humans to maintain their steel and glass and concrete, it was never long before modern man-made environments crumbled.
But somehow, that had not happened in this empty city.
All the buildings looked pristine, as though they had just barely been built, though there was not a single soul around to maintain them… except for Dr. Wu Zuhai, the woman inside the hotel, and the golden avatar of God.
The woman remained inside, but the scientist walked slowly alongside the living golden statue as they moved down the sidewalk. Dr. Wu Zuhai had expected a limousine or some other form of transportation to await them outside the hotel, but no vehicle had appeared.
Astonishingly, the being which called itself the lord of the universe was content to stroll down the city sidewalk with its prisoner, rather than having someone else drive it around.
Dr. Wu Zuhai didn't know what to make of this. He didn't speak a word, only walking awkwardly along and listening to the hollow, ghostly sounds of wind through the human-less buildings all around.
The wind-noise sounded like an accusation, like an empty and desperate question: where have they all gone? What has happened to the people who made this place their home? You've killed them, haven't you, so that no one will live in this place again?
The scientist felt these accusations deep within his bones.
Yes. This was, in large part, his fault.
This was a secret nobody else knew, not even Alexei, not even the golden monstrosity who walked alongside the doctor on this empty sidewalk:
If it were not for Dr. Wu Zuhai, God would never have risen. The world would not be the horrible place it now was, a place where humans were merely the slaves of an entity which desired to reprogram every single living creature into an extension of its own body.
In the scientist's mind, a certain face came to the forefront of his memory: that of Minister Im, the South Korean cult leader whose hellish dream had given birth to the technology which allowed human bodies to be reprogrammed at the cellular level… and which ultimately allowed the human mind to live on inside a computer's database.
For a brief moment, Dr. Wu Zuhai was consumed with anxiety as he thought about Alexei living again in the past.
Would he remember the details of the Revenant Cult which they'd discussed before Alexei went back, or would those be among the memories which Alexei had forgotten because of God's minions damaging the supercomputer during the downloading process?
But the scientist forced himself to take deep breaths and focus on the present.
There was, ironically, nothing he could do now to change the past. The future was all that lay before him now.
And Dr. Wu Zuhai knew that, more than anything else, the details of what the future held would depend heavily on how he reacted to God's actions right now.
"I can see the gears of your mind turning," said God, standing in his golden body beside the scientist as they walked. The words hissed and echoed through the empty city streets. "You're trying to unravel what you believe to be the truth."
"I suppose," said Dr. Wu Zuhai in a careful voice. "As I've already told you, I don't believe for a moment that this is the real world. You have me in a simulation. Can't we just drop the pretending and get to whatever you want from me?"
The metallic figure gave a booming laugh and gestured around him. "You're surely wondering why we're in a place like this, an empty city. You surely think that this place would have no reason to exist in anything except for a simulation. Well, you're wrong. I have a very good reason for it."
A chill went down Dr. Wu Zuhai's spine. There was something odd in God's voice. Something… almost desperate. As though the ruler of the world was nothing more than a child desperately trying to impress a teacher. Any hint of childishness within an almost all-powerful creature was too horrifying to think about.
"What purpose could this possibly have?" the scientist asked.
God's body gave a horrible grin, one filled with teeth the same texture and gleaming color as its skin. "It reminds me that all this hard work, all this boring management of the planet and its idiotic people, will pay off in the end. One day, we will truly live in paradise. For now, I can surround myself in a tiny sliver of paradise… but one day, the whole world will be filled with it."
Dr. Wu Zuhai stopped abruptly, feeling certain that he was missing something important. "What are you saying? This empty city is paradise to you?"
The golden form of God also stopped. A look of utter confusion came over its face… a bizarrely childlike expression. "Yes. Do you… not also feel it? The utter peace? There is not a single creature, not a spider nor a worm nor an orphan nor a criminal in this place, unless I have placed it here. We are surrounded by the glorious art of the human mind, the sterile works of the greatest geniuses of all the world."
The figure spread its arms wide and spun like a gleeful schoolgirl. "No cars below, no airplanes above! No screeching birds or cursing old men waiting in line for the chance to buy a soggy sandwich before they begin a day of sweaty and meaningless work. Only… steel. And stone. And glass, and air, and water."
Dr. Wu Zuhai crossed his arms. "And me. And that girl in the hotel. And… my family, I presume. Do we ruin your paradise with our presence? That's the truth. You can't hide it from me. This place isn't a paradise to me, Gabriel."
The statuesque figure froze in place, as though the AI-born portion of its mind had encountered a fatal glitch.
Then its face twisted in fury and Dr. Wu Zuhai felt himself slammed into the brick wall of an apartment building behind him. It was as though invisible hands strangled him and pressed him into the gritty brickwork behind him.
But even still, he choked out a laugh. "See? You could only do this in a simulation! Stop this pointless lying to me!" His words became a strangled gasp as the invisible hands tightened all over his body… and the last moments of his experience in the lab suddenly came to his mind, memories which had been suppressed until now.
"Kill him," the dark figure in the doorway had said. "Slowly. Preserve the brain."
Tears of hopelessness came to the scientist's eyes.
Though he'd known this 'must' be a simulation before now, a tiny sliver deep within him had dared to hold on to the tiniest bit of hope…
The hope that his family might actually still be alive, that he might actually be able to see them again.
In a way, he was grateful for this final piece of evidence that he was currently living a lie, that nothing remained of him but his brain, that his current experiences weren't even the real him—only a copy of his personality simulated in a virtual world.
Because this was the one true weakness of God: it could not really read the human mind. It could simulate a person, creating a copy of them in a virtual system to interact with, and it could try to trick that personality into giving up the original brain's memories, but God could not simply read the hearts and minds of humans as though they were books.
Now God's form came close to Dr. Wu Zuhai's strangled face. The expression of its golden features was one of pure rage. "I have simulated you 11,502 times, you little human worm. In 182 of these simulations, you have called me by that worthless name. You have suffered much for it in each of these instances. You will do so again right now."
The scientist was grateful to know that he didn't really exist for one reason alone: if he'd been given the hope of reuniting with his family, he would surely have broken, would have helped God and betrayed his own purpose.
But they were no more real than he was.
So Dr. Wu Zuhai summoned the last bit of breath in his lungs and whispered one last word of defiance:
"Gabriel."
His simulated neck snapped as an invisible force pulverized several vertebrae at once, and the virtual world of Dr. Wu Zuhai's reality ceased to exist.