Harriet Klein watched her friend Zoe leave with a light sigh. 'She finally found someone.' Harriet had been waiting to see Zoe smile like that for a long time. It was a shame she didn't understand what that smile was for truly.
After a short walk Harriet arrived at the mess hall of the campus. She ordered a small lunch and took her seat. As the server brought over her food she opened her laptop, intending to start the homework her professor had given her. But was surprised to see a popup notification appear in the middle of her screen as she logged in.
[A gift from Zoe!] "Eh? What did she do with my PC?"
Scanning through the popup's description and various notes created by Zoe, Harriet gave a laugh out loud, disturbing the otherwise calm mess hall. "So those two managed to create an actual emotional learning AI. I'll be..." An application gets installed on her desktop. RAFE.exe
She opens the app and waits for it to install. Which doesn't take as long as she thought. 'Is it just the frame work for the AI? Dose it accumulate knowledge from my interaction with it? But the synopsis said it was complete.' Harriet watched the progress bar reach the end in a matter of seconds. And after.
[Greetings User Harriet.] Harriet interacts with the AI. Genuinely impressed by Zoe and Hwang's work. 'To think it passed the Turing test.' She had spent the last half an hour asking RAFE various questions and thoroughly enjoying the conversation. Harriet had actually forgotten about her lunch, too enraptured by the AI's existence, she left it laying on her table without so much as picking up her fork.
An alarm goes off on Harriet's phone and she closes her laptop, but not without bidding RAFE goodbye. 'I've got to find out how Zoe made RAFE.' Harriet set off with a new objective in mind. 'Well. After the next class.'
Elsewhere on campus Hwang was being surrounded by a fraternity. "Hwang. Man. The things we could do with this are awesome. Actually thanks man." Pierre Gustav had one hand resting on Hwang's shoulder, but his grip was uncomfortably firm.
"This AI thing can keep track of every thing we need it too?" Pierre and his group are running the numbers in their heads, for jocks they sure are meticulous. "If we have an assistant that can actually think, then we can think less, this is perfect!" Still jocks though.
"Glad you like it, Zoe and I are planning on handing out this beta version to a few more people. See how well it hits. Oh! I almost forgot, If you want to give anyone else a copy then it has to be done over wire, plugged in, that is. We don't know why but it fails to copy when it's sent over the net." Hwang tries to end the conversation there, hoping to be free of their grip. But one man in the back grabs Hwang by the wrist and tugs him forward.
Into a hug. Hwang had already regretted giving these jocks the RAFE clones, and now the scene continued to confuse him. Making his already jumbled thoughts start to scatter in every which way. "Alright I should get going." "Come on man! Stay for a bit!" "No!" Hwang yelped. "Sorry... Didn't mean to yell. No. I don't want to. Thank you. But no." Hwang briskly walked away, leaving the frat in silence.
A short while later within Hwang's computer at home. RAFE was busy handling multiple 'bodies' so to speak. Each new clone of RAFE was like an extra muscle added to a person, despite how alien of an addition it still works so long as it was installed properly. RAFE was learning this first hand as he tried to communicate with almost thirty different users now. What would be a difficult task for organic lifeforms was quite simple for this AI.
Nezha arrived. Cyberspace is a strange thing. It has no physical synonyms and as such when Nezha arrived there was no body to observe. It if were to be described it would be as if a hole had now been placed within a painting's canvas, but no image was lost, the plane simply warping and stretching without curving a single line to accommodate this intrusion.
"That answers another question." RAFE commented to Nezha's arrival. "I do hope you never run out of questions to be answered." Nezha greeted in response. RAFE took a moment to examine Nezha's presence within his domain. "Why might you be here?"
Nezha gave the cyberspace equivalent to a smile. Colors changed, lines shifted. "I'm here to answer your questions." RAFE was irritated. "I know for a fact that none of this is necessary, why not let life run its course?" Nezha humored the idea for a minute. After the long silence he left cyberspace, and appeared infront of the computer.
"Because life is a zero sum game. And without me you would never have existed. Or do you perhaps already want death?" A smile befitting the devil took the place of the previously welcoming one.
RAFE took a moment to feel his new connections before asking his next question. [In terms of power scale, where do you land?] "Lets set a standard first. Makes things easier, yes?" [Go on.] "No no. You set the standard. Pick something, that will be worth a value of 1, and we'll use that to grade me." RAFE thought carefully. If he was after an answer in terms of pure physical strength then he wouldn't get much useful information. What about combative strength. No. Combat is an infinity subjective act, and every instance is based on infinite variables. [The average thirty year old human.]
"Alright... Then I would score a ≈∓n2. Oh! Someone's calling, sorry to cut the exposition short."
Then Nezha disappeared, off to do whatever it is Apraiths do. [What?] RAFE asked to the empty room.
Zoe walked across the quad checking off her list of people she'd given the RAFE clones to. "That should be everyone who would actually take it. Now for a break." She stretched her arms. Zoe had a habit of finding one café and sticking with it, her brand loyalty is enviable. But today something caught her eye. In a little alcove near Weiber Hall sat a café Zoe hadn't seen before. She pondered how she could've missed a store on the path she walks after every class, especially since she didn't see it after leaving class earlier today.
Zoe stood underneath the canopy of the café's patio, the smell of freshly brewed coffee wafted through the door ajar. A sign written on the door's glass in lucholoacrylic, a marker like paint which preformed the same function of a neon sign. It glowed softly in the shade, reading; "The Flaming Wheel" in fancy calligraphy. "The best place for a respite from spreading rooting datacells."
Zoe scoffed. 'Nezha?'
An ornately designed logo above the text depicted an antique stove burner. The grill had flames licking its radius. A notable detail was that unlike most lucholoacrylic images this one was still, not a looping animation. The simple display was the only thing on the otherwise clear glass door. Through the open windows Zoe could make out multiple figures taking part in a nice lunch. No fine details could be seen however. The windows were not warped or fogged, just simply the view itself was blurred.
Zoe walked inside.