Initialization 1





And... now I’m an AI.



All around me was darkness. I couldn’t see an inch in front of my face. It was darker than the locker. Darker than the blackness that came when a person closed their eyes. Even calling it pitch black didn’t quite get across just how little light there was. I hadn’t anticipated that and instinct kicked in - I waited for my power to propose a solution to the technical problem I was having with my simulation.



Instinct failed me. I wasn’t a parahuman anymore, since I hadn’t been able to write a simulator that could model my Tinker power successfully.



The transition from being Taylor to being an artificial intelligence was abrupt. I pressed the trigger - then I was. There was no time in-between when I had scanned myself using my sleek silver Scan Gun and the moment I found myself instantiated in a simulated world. It left me feeling a little disoriented in a way that was decidedly human, because for all that I was an AI, I was nevertheless still a human.



Still flesh and blood. Just meat expressing itself in a simulated world rather than the real one.



After a few seconds of standing there, not really sure what I should do, I heard the voice of my creator. The real Taylor. The one who was hiding the tinker-tech that I ran on beneath her bed where dad would never think to look. “Hello? Can you hear me?”



Not too long ago, I had been that Taylor. So I knew the layout of the room. There was supposed to be a computer a bit in front of me. Her voice would be coming out of one of the computer’s speakers. There was also a microphone which I was really hoping she had turned on, since with the dark, I probably wasn’t going to be able to manage to do it myself.



“Yeah, I can hear you. Uh, this may be a little cliche, but... could we get some light in here?”



“Oh,” Taylor said. “No wonder you’re just standing there. One second.”



The universe I was in was a thirty foot by thirty foot room. It wasn’t a big universe. I didn’t have a lot of energy to run it. The walls, floor, and ceiling were all grey textureless rectangles. They looked like the walls of early video games, back when 3D was something that people got excited over because it was so new. I couldn’t see the rectangles though. Not yet at least.



More than one second passed. It was more like five before a lamp and a small wooden table appeared in the center of the room. The lamp was powered by batteries and was already lit. As a result, I could finally see.



I was blown away.



The blurry lamp and table in the center of the room weren’t tacky like the walls. They actually had detail. I couldn’t make out a lot of that detail, because I wasn’t wearing my glasses. But it had it. The wooden desk where my sleek black tinker-tech computer was - my only interface to the real world - was the same way.



Up until a second ago, I hadn’t been very impressed with my power. Clicking a button to instantiate furniture while not in the simulation hadn’t seemed very impressive. In here though, it didn’t seem like spawning a unit on an RTS level creator. It looked real. Even while blurry.



Somehow, despite knowing my Tinker power, I hadn’t expected things to seem real. The fact that it did seem real actually scared me. Which itself was pretty new, since it was the very first time I had ever thought there was anything at all scary about one of my simulations. My power didn’t feel very weak and harmless anymore.



Well, it wasn’t my power now. Taylor’s power didn’t feel weak and harmless anymore.



I was starting to feel a bit intimidated with just how much power the other Taylor had over the universe she had put me in. Tinker who specialized in simulations seemed a lot scarier when I was actually living in one.



Clothes appeared in front of me. Including my glasses. “Uh, can you get dressed please.”



I looked down and found myself naked and all thoughts about Taylor being scary vanished. I blushed. Then I hurried to get dressed. It was myself that was watching me, but still. Taylor and I both knew I wasn’t the prettiest girl in the world. Thankfully, she knew it well enough to give me baggy clothing rather than making me wear something that would show more then I was comfortable with. I put on my clothes as quickly as I could. Once I had finished, I had to acknowledge again just how real the world felt. I could feel the cloth against my skin. If it wasn’t for the grey untextured borders of the simulation, I would have thought I was in the real world.



Taylor spoke again once I was clothed. “Thanks Weaver.”



Weaver? Oh. Right. My name wasn’t Taylor anymore. Weaver. That was who I was now. I wasn’t a lonely girl anymore. I wasn’t a Tinker who specialized in simulations.



I was Taylor’s AI, as planned. Named as a play on words since tailors and weavers were kind of similar, but also because my project name was Wetware Emulation Agent Version 1.



Being Weaver. That... that was going to take some getting used to.



I walked over to the computer desk and sat down. Then I turned on the monitor. There were only a few applications available. I honed in on the two I would need right away. One was called Taylor’s Camera and the other was Taylor’s Microphone. Taylor’s Microphone was already open. There were other applications too, but I didn’t need them. I double clicked on the camera app and a video feed appeared on my monitor. It showed my old bedroom. I could see the original me there. She was sitting at her computer, facing the webcam.



Glasses. Scrawny. I liked my curly black hair though. Taylor showed me her teeth in what I could tell was a very forced smile and waved. “Hi me!”



“Hi,” I said. I smiled too. I wanted to make a good first impression, even though that was kind of ruined by the entire stranded naked in the dark thing.



“So... how is it in there?” Taylor asked.



I glanced around the room. The honest answer was that it was underwhelming and overwhelming all at once. The walls were almost cartoonish, but then myself and the items that had been scanned into the universe were so very real. I looked back to the computer screen and looked at Taylor, the girl who controlled my reality.



Could I really be honest with myself? Could I tell Taylor I was worried she might not like me? Or that she might turn me off someday, because I wasn’t good enough for her? I knew she hadn’t even considered that I would feel this way. She had never really let herself think about what it was like to be the one inside the box, rather than the one outside it. She had been more worried about her AI not liking her or worse turning out to be a useless and emotional high schooler. Because we kind of were. Or that I wouldn’t even be willing to go along with being her AI at all, despite what she had told herself before creating me. What I had told myself, effectively.



Taylor’s smile faded. “Sorry,” she said. “Stupid question. I know it’s not impressive. I’ll try to make it better.”



“No,” I said. “It’s not like that. I was just..” She had power over me. Power far beyond anything someone at Winslow had ever dreamed of having. I trailed off.



There was no way she could understand where I was coming from. I had been her a few seconds ago. I was actually a bit blindsided by the whole situation. I hadn’t really thought this through nearly as well as I had told myself I had thought it through. From my new perspective, I could see that I was pretty good at lying to myself. The Taylor in the real world wasn’t on the same track as me. She wasn’t reeling at the abrupt change. She was still who I had been a few seconds ago: a lonely bullied girl struggling through high school.



“It’s okay. I’ll make it better. Just give me time,” Taylor said. “If I can get more energy, I can make it bigger or make it run faster. I’m sorry about not having lights already installed. The alpha on my screen makes it a bit brighter, so I hadn’t realized that would be an issue. I’ll make sure to scan my favorite foods to make it up to you? I know I’ve been putting it off, but I hadn’t made you yet so I figured it wasn’t a big deal and then when I realized I could finally get you up and running I just went for it and... I’m rambling.”



She wasn’t smiling anymore. She felt judged by me. I needed to fix that. I hadn’t been willing to admit it while I was still Taylor, but a big part of why I had done this was because I fully expected to be my own friend. It wasn’t just so that I had an AI. That was just the excuse I had been using to prioritize this project over others.



Taylor wasn’t about to admit that to herself. I had a little bit more distance now. That made it easier to admit Taylor was lonely. It also forced me realize that I wanted a friend too. Which made sense, because I was her- or at least, I had been up until a little while ago.



“This is better than you think,” I said. “Really. Thank you for making me. I’m not just saying that either.” I didn’t want to hurt her self-esteem by telling her she was desperate to have a friend. So I started to lie to myself. “I think you have a pretty good idea of how happy I am that I don’t have to go back to Winslow.”



“Um, actually... I was hoping you would go to school with me?”



“How?” I asked, feeling a bit confused.



“I did some more work after I did the scan. I made implants for my eyes and ears... I... I didn’t want to go to school alone.”



“When did you do that? I thought I was turning the simulation on right after I scanned myself into the database.”



Taylor was silent for a few seconds. “It’s Tuesday, not Friday.”



“Oh. What were the delays? Did something go wrong?”



“Oh! Look at the time. I need to get ready for school,” Taylor said, avoiding my question. “You should get used to what you can do. You’re definitely helping me with my homework though, so...” Taylor visibly steeled herself. “I’m ordering you to come with me today.”



Yikes. Ordering me around already. Okay. Well I guess I was supposed to be her AI. Not unexpected.



I was Weaver now, not Taylor. It was Taylor’s job to be a person. It was my job to be her AI. That was what I had told myself before I went into this. I wasn’t as certain of my decision as I had been before, but I had chosen this. If Taylor wanted me to go to school with her, I would. It wasn’t my place to question her.