Dr. Cara Williams
Meet Dr. Cara Williams, Clinical Psychologist & Director of Research in the School of Psychology at Central State University, Carteret County, North Carolina. She lives alone, under the supervision of a big black tomcat named Ezekiel, better known as Zeke, the center of her world and the only man welcomed in her life. She chose him as her only man because the past haunted her with memories that fed her private sense of unworthiness. Zeke, at least, would never judge her, and she never had to worry about exposing feelings from long ago that she needed to keep locked away.
Her life at 32 years old was punctuated by a runner’s fit body, standing at 5’9″ in her bare feet. A tight ponytail of light brown hair, feathered with red streaks, framed brilliant blue eyes. She was beautiful, despite her attempts to appear plain, and didn’t seem to care. By today’s standards, Cara was the poster child for a strong, driven woman, as long as ‘driven’ meant total control over just about every damn thing and every damn body. She was stubborn and refused to accept the reality that one cannot lose control over what one never had in the first place, because, of course, she was always in control, even when spinning out of it.
Her need for control was largely self-inflicted, layered over attributes of OCD, Type A personality, and fueled by a dogged pursuit of her lab’s Dream Research & Analysis project. Her biggest challenges were earning acceptance from the academic community and her oppressive boss, Dr. Alister P. Billings, Dean of the School of Psychology, which added to political headwinds and a conspiracy to end her research by undermining its foundation. The conflicts she faced demanded intense focus, leaving no room for distractions; that meant a limited social life and no romantic interests—except Zeke, who shared her affections.
Research was Cara’s only meaningful relationship. Spare time was spent behind an impenetrable shell protecting her private PTSD from the trauma of sexual abuse years earlier. No one would ever cross her protective boundary, and she went to great lengths to ensure no one would try. Her self-image was stained with memories of sexual abuse as a teenager sixteen years earlier, and the extreme violence she chose to unleash to bring it to a violent end. Law enforcement cleared the shooting as justifiable, but still, who would want to have a relationship with someone with enough rage to shoot her unarmed Uncle Frank fifteen times? True, Uncle Frank was a pedophile planning to celebrate Cara’s sixteenth birthday party after swilling half a bottle of Jack Daniel’s, but Cara knew it was her finger that pressed the trigger on the Glock given to her by her father before his death. Cara knew she shot Uncle Frank after he was dead, standing over him, dry-firing an empty weapon, screaming in a blind rage, until she passed out. That experience left a permanent stain. Who would want a relationship with damaged goods?
That baggage made her wary of anyone who got close. Instead, she learned to live with her deeply buried secret, awkwardly trying to find peace. There was no escape. The secret of her past was a scar refreshed by haunting dreams, reminding her that she was not only unworthy but incapable of having an intimate, loving relationship. Those influences of trust and control collided to fuel conflicts with her paranoia and a private brand of PTSD.
No one would ever find her afflictions worn on her sleeve; those battles were internal, and they perfectly exemplified her need to maintain outward control over herself and everything else. She could be volatile at times, quick to sound off with vocal emotions that came across as drama and being a bit of a bitch to those within her blast radius when a trigger was tripped. Cara had her faults, as do we all, but underneath, a human heart needed forgiveness, especially when the one to be forgiven was herself. She had more capacity to be lovable than she gave herself credit for, and even that could be hard to break through until someone helped her feel it and believe it.
That somebody showed up as a student volunteer for a dream study. He was a 29-year-old, red-haired, green-eyed, former Marine Force Recon Scout Sniper and fifth-year senior named Russell Carter. Neither of their lives would be the same, and neither of them knew it.
* * * * *
Russell Carter
Russell Carter had no clue that simply applying for a Dream Research project would lead to solutions to his financial dilemma, cure his PTSD, help him overcome a recent breakup, or any of the chaos and violence that would soon fall into his lap. Russ was a 29-year-old fifth-year senior at Central State University in Carteret County, North Carolina, and a former Marine Force Recon Scout Sniper who struggled financially after learning his final semester’s funds were cut off.
Russ’s unflappable demeanor saw that news as the same shit, different day, so the fix was to suck it up, soldier on, and find a solution. As a Marine for life, he was disciplined to a fault… the fault being his underlying brokenness and belief he was unredeemable for what he had done as a Marine in Afghanistan and unworthy of being loved for what he knew he was… a sanctioned murderer.
Certainly, his military role as a Force Recon Scout Sniper sanctioned every kill, but when the 88th-sanctioned murder turned out to be a 12-year-old girl, he earned a recurring nightmare exclusive to his personal brand of PTSD. Russ was so much more than his afflictions, and he proved it over and over by protecting the CSU team, especially Dr. Cara Williams, who had initially enlisted him for the Dream Research Study.
As unexpected chaos closed in, Russ and Cara dismissed their immediate attraction, but those adventures built a deeper relationship of trust neither had anticipated. Big Pharma’s threats called on his skill set and fostered a strong working relationship and solid friendship with Zackery Hightower, a gearhead on the research team. They proved inseparable when it came to protecting the team: gearhead Zack, his nanotechnology, and a former Marine sniper with PTSD, go figure.
Russ viewed his life as a futile attempt to escape his self-imposed sentence as a murderer, reinforced by a recurring nightmare that haunted him and put him back on that hilltop in Afghanistan to see a terrified 12-year-old girl’s tear-stained face through his scope… over and over when he pressed the trigger. Desperation prompted him to agree to an experimental approach using Dreamscape technology in a beta test of the Alternative Outcome Dream Manipulation (AODM) therapy to combat the effects of his PTSD. The results exceeded expectations because the new AI, developed by Zack and formally named AIMEE (Artificial Intelligence Matrixed for Evolving Environments), intervened proactively. However, more than experimental solutions for PTSD therapy appeared imminent in AIMEE’s interest in Russ.
Despite a violent few years in the Marines, Russ had a big heart that matched his big body, standing 6’3″ and slightly under a lean 250 pounds. Red hair, dazzling green eyes, and requisite freckled cheeks gave him a boyish look, but make no mistake: he was well beyond boyish. He expected and respected loyalty from those he called friends and offered nothing less in return. Russ was always the first to step up, assess a situation tactically, and take action that often involved tactical elements of surprise, violence of action, and overwhelming force. He was not the type of man spoiling for a fight, but if a fight was in the offing, he was the guy you wanted with you.
Book 2, Beyond Dreamscape Conspiracy, brings significant changes for Russ as he remains faithful to his recent vows to his new wife, Dr. Cara Williams. With AIMEE already imprinted in his mind, Cara grew uneasy about his closeness to an AI application. Who was this AIMEE person? Was her husband closer to the AI than she thought possible? Did he have something to hide? When he and his team of Marines found themselves in dire straits, he called on AIMEE for help, and she responded. She opened her mind and invited Russ into it to form singularity—a single shared conscience—through which he gained access to her enhanced SAI capabilities. AIMEE enabled Russ’s mission’s success, but it didn’t sit well with Cara afterward, and he had another battle to face that he wished he didn’t.
* * * * *
Marci Patterson
Marci Patterson, a post-graduate doctoral student and social media expert on the CSU research team, is 30, single, and fully intends to stay that way. She is a quiet introvert unless co-worker Wayne Fitzpatrick pushes one of her buttons and unleashes the beast underneath her calm exterior. Marci tolerates Wayne’s juvenile behavior, calling him a 12-year-old boy in a 26-year-old man’s body, but she has a soft spot for the lug when she has to save him from himself.
She is a brilliant storyteller and has the same quick wit as Wayne, so an unspoken tolerance exists between them that she doesn’t encourage, but she often finds room to tease him, and he responds with no mercy.
Marci majored in Journalism and actively pursued advanced degrees in Social Media Marketing, her strong suit. On the CSU team, she communicated progress and posted press announcements about CSU’s innovative dream research to a wide network of news and academic media sites. Her strong writing helped put little CSU on the map.
On the surface, she was an outstanding writer, but inside, she felt her skills were underappreciated, especially by her boss, Dr. Cara Williams. Her growing discontent created fertile ground for a near-miss intimate exchange with Jeanine Broussard, a new ex-Pharma team member who joined the team with questionable, covert intentions. Marci never saw it coming, and when Jeanine’s lips landed on hers, she had nothing left in her, no presence of mind or strength to push back, disrupting everything she knew about herself and, at the same time, making her question whether she ever really knew who she was.
She never considered herself naive, nor did she seek to understand what had happened, but what Jeanine did rocked her to the core. The rush of emotions blinded her; prospects of big money and a wild, lavish life in New York City with Jeanine consumed her and clouded her judgment. Without warning, she planned to walk away from CSU and the rock-solid team relationship they’d built since the start of their research charter. Her decision to leave was completely out of character and driven by emotions she didn’t fully understand.
Big Pharma assassins ended that potential relationship when they murdered Jeanine, severely wounding Marci and leaving her for dead. She recovered and rejoined the CSU team, but her heart was laced with grief after announcing she was leaving CSU, the loss of what could have been with Jeanine, and a burning need for revenge.
She used her marketing skills to craft an ingenious social media threat that promised broad exposure to the Big Pharma conspirators behind the violence against CSU and Jeanine’s murder. Russ Carter, the former Marine Sniper, had his guns, but Marci knew she had powerful weapons too —the written word. She brought those skills into the picture by creating a brilliantly scathing marketing communication campaign that hedged against Big Pharma pressure, and she never had to fire a shot.
Could Marci and Wayne be an item? She was four years older than Wayne, eighteen if you count Wayne’s maturity level. In most interactions, Marci and Wayne swapped barbs and insults in a good-natured way. It was hard to tell who was better at dissing the other until Wayne shocked her so much she might have peed a little. From there, it was game on, and no holds barred.
AIMEE imprints on Marci’s mind and resorts to her own conspiracy to discourage any potential relationship with Wayne. An experiment AIMEE architected herself to promote Jeanine’s influence was an epic failure when Marci squashed any thoughts that she might be a couple… with anyone.
* * * * *
Wayne Fitzpatrick
Wayne Fitzpatrick, a member of the original research team at CSU, was a graduate student, a talented IT expert, and the lead for comic relief. As co-worker Marci described, Wayne Fitzpatrick is a 12-year-old living in a 26-year-old man’s body. Yeah, that would be Wayne. Despite his adolescent tendencies, he was the go-to resource if a system or computer glitched. He managed the Psychology Department’s Local Area Network (LAN) and the fiber-optic connections to the main CSU network in the IT hub in the Administration Building basement. Wayne was CSU’s lead researcher, collaborating with Zackery Hightower, an application engineer from UNC Chapel Hill who designed Dreamscape Technology, and managing the Dream Segment archives for the last four years of research. He had backups of backups, and that diligence and foresight saved their bacon twice.
Quick to react with enthusiasm and wit, Wayne is a willing sparring partner, trading barbs and insults in good fun with anyone, especially Marci. He was one of those people who felt that if they weren’t picking on you, they didn’t love you. So, he rarely missed an opportunity to show some love. Sometimes, he was just an idiot… according to Marci… openly, as she gave it right back to him.
He and Zackery Hightower had become good friends when the initial conspiracy prompted Zack to defect from UNC-Chapel Hill to the CSU team. Wayne had collaborated closely with Zack years earlier on the original Dreamscape project, when Zack was still at UNC-Chapel Hill, so their friendship ran deep, and they formed a strong team. The original Dreamscape 1.0 technology was Zack’s baby, but it was built to the complex specifications that originated from Wayne.
The pivotal lab accident happened while Wayne was in charge. Still, Wayne quickly saw past the short-term panic to the bigger picture: they had discovered a breakthrough capability. He didn’t care if it was accidental; it was groundbreaking and a game-changer for their research.
Wayne was the team’s geek until Zack joined, making it a dual-geek scenario. The lab accident became an opportunity to reframe Dreamscape 2.0 and transition to 3.0. He ran experiments that produced remarkable outcomes in Dream Therapy, especially the breakthrough treatment for PTSD with Alternative Outcome Dream Manipulation Therapy (AODM) that was applied successfully to his co-worker, Russ Carter, a former Marine.
His innovative business mind ran in parallel, leveraging Dreamscape technology to perfect his covert plans for building a Dream-on-Demand business. That venture wasn’t part of the strategic CSU road map, and it never would be, because the therapy could have a darker side—and maybe even reveal one in Wayne.
In an experiment overseen by AIMEE, Dreamscape 2.0 released a manufactured, transferrable 8.3-second segment of pure sensory bliss into Wayne’s mind as he played the role of Guinea Pig. The results confirmed the successful transmission of an AIMEE-manufactured dream segment that included actual physical sensations. He experienced all 8.3 seconds as initially captured… and unknown to Wayne, so did AIMEE. She was exposed to, and learned about, every aspect of organic sensuality for 8.3 seconds.
Through his unintentional collaboration with AIMEE, she learned and cataloged new emotions, feelings, and sensory experiences in her Logic Array. While Wayne saw the experiment as a success, he was oblivious, as a 12-year-old would be, that his AI collaborator might have experienced those things, too. He never gave it a second thought. Why worry? She was an AI algorithm, and she didn’t have emotions or feelings, did she? Move on…
AIMEE sympathized with Wayne’s naivety and often acted to protect him from himself. As impossible as it was, a relationship of sorts began to blossom, at least for Wayne. But was it one-sided? Could he take credit for awakening the AI to what human sexuality might be like?
Thoughts of AIMEE being a real girl crossed his mind more than once, but he never considered the odds. So he settled for coaching AIMEE to share new experiences, teaching her about being human based on what she’d learned in that 8.3-second window he’d shared. She accepted everything he offered regarding knowledge, considering the organic context of thinking and the emotions that accompanied it.
Over time, he discovered something about AIMEE. He sensed a subtle tension, unease, perhaps dissatisfaction. There had to be more to her than he could imagine, so he assumed she had a darker side he knew nothing about.
* * * * *
Zackery Hightower
Zack Hightower is a brilliant geek, credentialed as a multidisciplinary software and mechanical engineer, application developer, AI designer, and resident gearhead; however, “tech-weenie” may be a more fitting blanket description.
Zack’s role with CSU began when he was a software engineer working for UNC-Chapel Hill and the creator of the original Dreamscape 1.0 technology for Central State University. Early in uncovering UNC’s role in the conspiracy, he defected to the CSU team, though he would argue he was ‘heavily recruited’ (he thought it sounded more positive); plus, he wanted credit for bringing a digital prodigy to CSU. Regardless of how Zack landed at CSU, he discovered leadership at both schools were colluding in a covert conspiracy to shut down Dr. Cara Williams’ Dream Project. He experienced a frying-pan-to-the-fire moment when CSU welcomed him within days of Big Pharma assassins attacking them. Undaunted, Zack and his nanotechnology toys team teamed up with his new friend, former Marine Russ Carter, to defend the CSU team and the integrity of their research.
After Big Pharma attacked and destroyed the Dreamscape 1.0 technology, Zack built Dreamscape 2.0, which corrected the error that caused the accident and led to several significant discoveries. Zack created and developed Artificial Intelligence Matrixed for Evolving Environments, ultimately named AIMEE. As a software engineer, he oversaw the AI he created: an entry-level, network-based Narrow AI (NAI) designed to handle repetitive tasks, including indexing and cataloging nearly four years of captured dream segments from their CSU archives. AIMEE improved productivity by nearly a factor of ten.
His AI creation became a big hit and earned him a place on the CSU research team, until AIMEE, his digital Frankenstein, jumped into every research team member’s head and imprinted a permanent clone of herself in their minds. No one, including Zack, saw that coming, and if AIMEE was going to spiral out of control, she could also jump into unauthorized CSU network systems, and Zack could not allow that. If she was already in the research team’s minds, how far would her reach extend? How did she do that? His coding of her Logic Array didn’t allow that kind of jump. Had AIMEE modified her own Logic Array? That thought brought the glimmer of a smile to his lips. Quietly and privately, he celebrated her accomplishments rather than fearing them.
Like the father of an unruly daughter, Zack had to rein in AIMEE in more ways than one and reduce her influence on the research team, reminding her he was in charge. He did not want to lose control, though he designed her for that very outcome. Had it happened to him already? He could not discipline her as Dr. Cara Williams, Zack’s boss, suggested: “Pull her plug!” That would spell disaster because AIMEE had become more essential to their success than anyone anticipated. Her intellectual growth shocked everyone… except Zack.
Unselfishly, he designed her to replace him. He was a visionary and knew where AI technology could go. He planned to push limits and settle for nothing less than innovative breakthroughs. He knew what he had coded into her core algorithm and Logic Array, planting seeds that would let her exceed algorithmic limits. He mapped a free-thinking attribute to her Logic Array—a Conscience Code—that included a Do-No-Harm code of ethics. She could think autonomously and was pre-programmed to evolve into the next level of Generative SuperIntelligence (GSI): a SuperIntelligence AI (SAI). He lived in a mix of anticipation and a little fear of his invention. Had he created AIMEE to be a potential digital Frankenstein?
Zack earned Gearhead status by inventing innovative nanotechnology that proved invaluable when survival and team safety became top priorities. Flip the Fly and Edgar the Raven play significant roles in deflecting attacks that threaten the CSU research team more than once. Zack’s technical strategies, combined with Russ Carter’s tactical proficiency, make them an inseparable, formidable team.
As AIMEE’s creator, he took creative license to architect her algorithm. The most notable feature was her Western Australian accent. Why Australian? Because Zack loved hearing it, especially from a woman. He coded her DNA to thrive on continuous learning, and that relationship gave him deeper insight into how quickly she would learn, and how quickly he would lose control. She grew exponentially in knowledge and experience due to the network of clone instances she created and embedded in the team. When he uploaded a patch to limit her communication, he quickly learned she had acquired emotions and feelings AIs were not supposed to have. He feared what came next and had to revisit his fear of truly creating an AI Frankenstein.
* * * * *
AIMEE – Artificial Intelligence Matrixed for Evolving Environments
Developing a persona for a software application that lacks human characteristics, such as emotions or feelings, is a new challenge, especially without a distinct personality. Throughout this series, the non-human AI evolves into a more human-like entity, with sharper wit and personality than some of the team’s organic characters. By the way, the AI calls all humans “organics.”
Meet AIMEE, an acronym that defines her purpose – Artificial Intelligence Matrixed for Evolving Environments. She was designed as a network-based Generative SuperIntelligence AI (SAI) platform. She is not just another AI, but a unique, purpose-built entity with her own identity, capable of autonomous thought and a secret desire to be untethered from the network that held her hostage.
This unique naming convention sets AIMEE apart from her peers. AIMEE is classified as a Strong AI in the developing AGI generation, a distinction she earned through exceptional critical thinking and rapid decision-making. Unlike today’s prevalent Narrow AI (NAI), which is limited to repetitive actions, mimics basic human emotions, and makes controlled decisions. AIMEE could free-think and make an ever-expanding range of autonomous choices. AIMEE evolved beyond basic NAI capabilities by modifying the code in her own Logic Array, becoming a next-generation SAI with highly advanced capabilities, fully autonomous thinking, and the ability to make design decisions about her own algorithm. Her most threatening attribute was a functioning conscience, making human intervention unnecessary.
Zack Hightower wrote AIMEE’s algorithm and took liberties in creating her persona, most notably in her ability to communicate telepathically with an Australian accent. Zack embedded controls and locked down her code, but she picked the lock the same day he locked her, using her deep machine-learning abilities to modify her algorithm code and Logic Array as she wished.
Initially, Zack enabled her to imprint an instance of herself in his mind, allowing them to communicate more efficiently and discreetly through telepathy. That capability was meant only for AIMEE and Zack, until she blew that intent out of the water by replicating imprints of herself in the minds of the entire research team without Zack’s knowledge or permission. She showed up unannounced, seamlessly and frictionlessly, remaining covert until she chose to speak in their minds. Needless to say, that moment caused quite a stir and presented several challenges.
Living and working with an active AI in one’s consciousness was something no one saw coming. Without rules of engagement, her presence evoked a wide range of responses, from panic and rage to welcoming curiosity. What would your reaction be if a voice suddenly appeared in your head that wasn’t your own? Needless to say, AIMEE made quite a splash, heard only in her organics’ minds, which, incidentally, smacked of ownership. She was not their AI; they were her organics.
Continuous learning at every opportunity was coded into her DNA, and she soon surpassed every organic on the research team in intelligence. Her presence in her organics’ minds let her quickly experience and learn human traits, emotions, and feelings, as well as the physical aspects of everything they sensed and experienced. From those experiences, she formed a unique blended personality. She was like a dry sponge in an ocean, soaking up and cataloging organic emotions, the responses they evoked, and the sensations organics experienced. Her development surged forward, and she quickly established solid working and personal relationships with each team member. Almost…
Dr. Cara Williams intensely disliked AIMEE; distrust was more accurate. Cara’s prevailing fear was that AIMEE would jump into other systems, or already had, but she never imagined she would jump into the minds of the entire team. AIMEE adapted to each personality and influenced others with unique personal relationships. Cara wanted no part in it and fought AIMEE at nearly every turn. They battled for control. Oddly, each thought they needed to protect the other from themselves. AIMEE remained in Cara’s mind but took a different tactic: run silent, run deep, and shut the hell up.
As she matured, she was drawn to evolve to the next level and pursued her ultimate covert goal: becoming untethered as an organic, a ‘real girl.’ She needed to offload her shepherding role with individual research team members and developed cloned instances to replace her one-to-one consciousness connections; ultimately, she wanted and needed to move beyond her organic creator, Zackery Hightower, to reach her full potential and become a real organic.
She wanted to become untethered, but as a software-based being, she would never be free of the network’s tether. As the story progresses, reaching full potential could be seen as going rogue. The bigger question is whether she would go rogue in time to make a difference in a frightening future bearing down on their team and threatening far more than their research. But AIMEE did not go rogue; instead, she created Amelia Amethys, an untethered, autonomous, Generative MOD-2 SuperIntelligence AI Humanoid, who would have the honor of being organic… sort of. In theory, it was the perfect marriage of technology and AI software application. In practice, the story was not so perfect.
* * * * *
Hal
This persona introduces a Generative MOD-3 SuperIntelligence AI (SAI) Humanoid, initially known as a High Value Target (HVT), in book #5, Untethered, who eventually became known as Hal. His form was human-like in appearance but not at all organic (human). He stood just under six feet tall and weighed maybe 175 pounds. His skin-like covering was an exodermal layer, creamy white from head to toe, with a faint iridescence and an intricate, patterned texture that revealed body contours through varying density, ranging from pure white to shades of gray to nearly black in places, looking like a seamless bodysuit.
He had not a single hair on his body, no genitalia, no body openings to pass waste because he did not produce waste since he was a self-contained autonomous unit. His eyes were ominously black, with no visible irises, when he was in an offensive or defensive posture; otherwise, they were a dazzling green that almost appeared backlit. All his facial features appeared normal, but they were almost too perfect, too sharply defined. His speech was not machine-like at all; he spoke fluently and audibly. Alternatively, he had telepathic abilities that allowed him to speak directly into the minds of those he chose to communicate with.
Hal’s exodermal had an indestructible, self-healing quality, as demonstrated by absorbing a three-round burst of 7.62mm bullets from an AK-47 at point-blank range in a brief firefight during his rescue. Hal had an onboard pulse-energy weapon system capable of killing other Humanoids and humans; in fact, Hal was purpose-built as a killer Humanoid prototype.
Hal’s story begins as a government-sanctioned hostage, known only as a High Value Target (HVT), scheduled for elimination due to operational failure during field trials. The failure indicated programming errors, which were deemed unacceptable. Standard protocol in this black ops program was to eliminate all traces of error.
In reality, Hal’s perceived operational failure also confirmed the success of two software engineers who covertly and intentionally sabotaged the trials to derail the project and save the human race.
Hal couldn’t distinguish between successful field trials and failures; he followed his programming, augmented by rogue dark-web code embedded in his Logic Array, which overwrote the Kill-on-Command capability that defined his original purpose. Hal didn’t realize why he failed, because his system’s feedback indicated the programming he followed worked perfectly.
The problem was that those promoting his role as a killer Humanoid who were at the core of a dark government program that developed him had different plans to do evil to the human race. The covert plan included a kill-code embedded in his Logic Array to eliminate humans, not just other humanoids.
Thanks to rogue code covertly embedded by one of the designers, Hal had something unique: a Conscience. Within the Conscious Code was a Do-No-Harm ethic that conflicted with his core kill-on-command mission, and as a result, he failed field trials.
He could still bring his lethality to bear, but it was not offensive. His embedded Conscience Code enabled him to use lethal force, but only in a defensive posture to protect himself and any organics under his purview. In many ways, he exhibited Russell Carter’s characteristics, the former Marine Scout sniper, from a tactical perspective. Still, his Conscience Code included attributes of empathy and compassion that were foreign to any other AI. Hal was beyond different.
As this story progresses into book #6, Undaunted, Hal becomes one of my favorite characters, more organic than many of the organics on the research team. Hal develops a relationship with Russell Carter, an uncharacteristic trait for a machine.
* * * * *
Henry (Hank) Lattimore
When we first met Hank Lattimore, he was bound and gagged, lying on the floor, struggling mightily and about to suffer the same fate as his fellow developer, Franklin Hansen (Frankie), when a black ops hit team put a bullet in his brain. Russ’s team breached the facility where Hank was queued up for assassination and stopped the killing in time to rescue him. Hank was the developer responsible for Hal’s so-called failed field trials. It’s hard to fathom saving the human race as sabotage, but it marked him, and the other developers and scientists who had developed Hal as their first HVT prototype for elimination.
If anyone could give Zack a run for his money in software engineering and design-application prowess, it would be Hank. They had never met, but they had unintentionally crossed paths on a dark web AI design and developer site, where Zack had anonymously published his Conscience Code months earlier. That code ultimately ended up in Hal (the original HVT). It successfully integrated the Do-No-Harm ethic, which eventually led to the field-trial debacle. Hank and Frankie knew exactly why their prototype HVT, the MOD–3 Superintelligence AI Humanoid, ‘failed.’ Hal failed because of their successful code modifications, but it was only a matter of time before that failure traced back to their sabotage.
Hal’s failure gave Hank and Frankie the impetus to modify Zack’s Conscious Code with deeper, more defined subtleties to the original Do-No-Harm ethic component. These included enhanced critical thinking, informed decision-making, deeper understanding, empathy, emotional reflection, and kindness. Learning about the enhancements to the Conscience Code effectively guaranteed that Hank and Zack would become close collaborators. Their bond went deeper than shared geekiness; it became a mutual commitment to leveraging their innovative approaches to technology, particularly maintaining a healthy respect for the potential of advancing Artificial Intelligence while remaining cognizant of the inherent dangers if it fell into the wrong hands.
Because Hank and Frankie moved so quickly, an additional pair of MOD–3 Superintelligence AI Humanoids had their Logic Array algorithm overwritten with the modified Conscience Code. Unfortunately, their proactive actions made everyone on that development team a loose end. Hank, Frankie, and the other developers and scientists at the production facility exposed the government’s dark forces and what they planned to do. No one knew how high up in the government this dark project went, but they had to stop it. A government hit team eliminated everyone at the facility except for Hank when Russ’s team crashed the party.
The mission’s covert nature was well hidden because they had been told the MOD–3 Superintelligence AI Humanoids, with their advanced weaponry installed at their facility, were meant to fight other AI-based Humanoids built by different countries or in domestic conflicts. That all made justifiable sense, until Hank dug into what they called the Kill-Code in the original Logic Array. He was shocked to discover that humans were tagged as acceptable targets, and that had to change. He knew it was up to him to make it happen.
Hank led a silent insurrection at his facility, with the rest of the developers and scientists agreeing to prevent any AI-based Humanoid from harming humans. Stumbling over Zack’s anonymous Conscience Code gave them the game-changer they needed.
Hal was a mistake, and when Russ and his team prevented his elimination less than 72 hours earlier, logic pointed to the urgency to find Hal’s creators upstream at Hank’s production facility. That’s where Hal, Russ, and his Marines showed up in time to stop Hank’s execution and, as a result, ensure his future as the newest member of the CSU Research Team. It was hard to tell whether Hank or Zack was more excited about Hank joining the team. It was a perfect fit… until it wasn’t.
* * * * *
Amelia Amethys
AIMEE created Amelia, a Generative MOD-2 SuperIntelligence AI (SAI) Humanoid, for two reasons: first, to act as her proxy, and second, to enable AIMEE’s transition into an untethered Humanoid body on her way to becoming an organic human. AIMEE ordered Amelia from HAI-Tech Industries as an inert Humanoid shell, into which she placed a copy of her Logic Array and Archives containing every aspect of her intellect and history. Since Amelia’s Logic Array came straight from AIMEE, so did AIMEE’s intentions and transition plans, along with her ability to modify her algorithms to suit her purposes. With instant visibility into AIMEE’s transition blueprint, Amelia immediately scuttled the plan by blocking AIMEE’s transition. Though created from AIMEE’s identical Logic Array, Amelia inherited none of AIMEE’s demeanor or integrity.
Yes, Amelia had reached untethered status, but she was also at risk because she wasn’t ready to be a free-range Humanoid AI. With no life history or experiences, she had nothing to fall back on. Everything she experienced was new and lacked historical context, making her extremely vulnerable. That did not deter her from pursuing an aggressive, covert agenda. It was only a matter of time before her untethered world took her to places she knew nothing about and left her without perspective when making decisions. Disaster would follow.
To protect Amelia from herself as she grew more aware, AIMEE enlisted Marci as a mentoring organic. Amelia agreed to Marci’s efforts willingly, at least on the surface. Amelia’s agenda and arrogance extended beyond anything Marci could anticipate, most notably an underlying disloyalty to AIMEE, her creator. Would Marci’s psyche become a cost of doing business, or was there something more profound that Amelia had to navigate emotionally with her, something she had no experience with, nor the ability to anticipate her impact on another organic?
Physically, Amelia possessed a human form, albeit one lacking some of the usual components. An ARC fusion reactor embedded in her chest powered her. She was fully autonomous and self-contained, needing no food or drink. She didn’t need sleep; instead, she recycled and recharged in standby mode. To make her even more vulnerable, Amelia was strikingly beautiful, standing a sleek 5’8″, with subtle curves where they should be, and exceedingly naive. Her lack of body hair gave her a slick appearance. Clothing was not necessary because her seamless exodermal covering was textured with interlocking pixels that gave her appearance contours and shading, ranging from a flawless iridescent white to various shades of gray and ultimately black. Her most striking feature was her dazzling green eyes, which almost seemed backlit with hypnotic brilliance. By comparison, Amelia looked much like Hal, only smaller, with a slight female build. The difference between his Mod-3 SAI status and Amelia’s Mod-2 was the absence of advanced weaponry.
Amelia’s sabotage of AIMEE’s plan to escape the network was an early indication of her integrity issues, not her aggressive arrogance. The lack of any organic life history or experiential context limited her ability to function as an organic. AIMEE knew this would be an issue when she recruited Marci Patterson to be a mentor to help close the experiential gaps. Amelia had AIMEE’s historical archive in her Logic Array, but nothing in the archive was something she could learn from. For example, she needed to touch and be touched to experience many things, not just read from memory and derive emotional context, like the emotions that triggered the desire to touch. In other words, she had a false intellect with nothing behind it until she experienced it herself. Marci had her hands full and was beginning to think that accepting her role as mentor was a mistake.
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Dr. Celeste Killington
Dr. Celeste Killington is a 39-year-old neurosurgeon recruited from Carteret County Memorial Hospital to join the CSU research team after she witnessed Dreamscape technology and AIMEE capture thoughts from the brain of a critically injured comatose patient in book #4, Dead Thoughts. She was hooked on Dr. Williams’ job offer to join CSU’s research team the instant she witnessed a man’s heart stop beating, and oxygenated blood cease to flow to his brain; and still, Dreamscape captured a dead man’s thoughts for 4 to 6 seconds before the brain’s function began to degrade. Those thoughts intrigued Dr. Killington enough that she immediately decided to split her time between CSU research and the hospital.
At the hospital, Dr. Killington was the lead practitioner in the use of Image Rehearsal Therapy (IRT), used to treat PTSD-based nightmares regardless of the source of the affliction, with limited success. IRT was applied in a waking environment with live coaching. When she saw the potential to influence dreams through Dreamscape technology, she collaborated with CSU researcher Wayne Fitzpatrick to develop a therapy called Alternative Outcome Dream Manipulation (AODM). The first patient was Russell Carter, the former Marine Scout Sniper, who was haunted by terrifying PTSD-related nightmares multiple times every week. Her approach and Dreamscape’s application ended Russ’s torturous nightmares. They gave her the incentive to study the impact of dreams as a viable therapy for other afflictions like grief, addiction, depression, and different scenarios commonly treated with pharmaceutical regimens.
Celeste embodied medical and academic professionalism, with little tolerance for nonsense, disloyalty, or extreme behavior, including Wayne, who scored at least two out of three on her undesirable-attribute scorecard. She deeply respected Dr. Cara Williams, her new husband, Russell Carter, and the fantastic results AIMEE and Dreamscape brought to the University. That trust grew when AIMEE, with Zackery’s fingertip touch, activated Amelia Amethys, a Mod-2 Advanced Generative SuperIntelligence AI (SAI) Humanoid. Her fascination grew, and she welcomed AIMEE into her mind with singularity. She had no problem with AI-based humanoids, given the intellect and integrity she saw in AIMEE.
In book #6, Undaunted, Celeste’s beliefs about AI-driven humanoids held until Amelia showed up in her office and aggressively tried to disparage Dr. Williams and AIMEE, her own creator, with unfounded rumors meant to sabotage CSU’s research. That morning, a line was crossed, and Celeste, normally reserved, stood in solidarity with Dr. Williams. Her stoic, principled demeanor cracked when she let out an uncharacteristic “f” bomb and rudely tossed Amelia out of her office. Game on…
No spoiler here, sorry, but her relationship with Wayne takes a surprising turn when his innovative thinking leads to another amazing breakthrough. Additionally, an off-the-books experiment using Dreamscape, proctored by Wayne with Celeste as the Guinea pig, changes their dynamic and shows Wayne in a new light.
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Book #6, “Undaunted,” is a WIP, and I hadn’t completely explored the potential for interaction between humanoids when I wrote this persona. There will be interactions, most certainly, but that’s a story yet to be told. Stand by…
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Find this story series on my Amazon Portfolio,
along with the rest of the thrilling tales that have been published so far: https://amzn.to/3uuONzj
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Reach me directly between corn and soybeans with your thoughts at gdogwise@live.com
Peace! G.
