Aliens, Alfonse, and Ed’s iPod

For the past hour, Alfonse had been forcing me to listen to a playlist I made on my iPod when I was thirteen years old and heartbroken; a mixture of Nina Simone, some Queen, a bit of Nirvana, and that one song from Hamilton. You know which one. 

AI had grown a liking for the sad tones, maybe because it sympathized with the lyrics. It caused me endless embarrassment, but AI didn’t seem to notice. Unfortunately, I didn’t really have much of a choice in what music was played since I had uploaded Al’s programming and data drives to the iPod.

I had been trekking through the desolate desert for almost five hours with the iPod in my hand and the buds in my ears, praying that the nearest town was right around the corner. Jesus Christ, I know we had to keep the research facility in the middle of nowhere for security, but did it really have to be so far from civilization? 

The irony was not lost on me. The higher-ups had spent millions and millions of dollars putting up as many obstacles they could think of to keep Al from reaching the outside world, and now I was walking straight up to the nearest town with Al in hand. Literally.

Fifteen minutes later, the town sprung up from the horizon. Unfortunately, it and the radio tower were still another thirty minutes away. I opened the voice memos and started recording. I held up the earbud microphone., “Could you play something else for a change? I’m pretty sure I have five thousand other songs you could choose from.” I paused and saved the memo, waiting for Al to respond. 

AI created a new playlist titled, Be Quiet. The songs skipped at seemingly random points, creating a somewhat understandable sentence. It started with “You’re not the one I was lookin-” and then transitioned into, “stuck in this stupid little world with you,” then, “YEAH! No, no, no, no” to, “any bodies without arms, legs, or feet” and finally, “locked in a little black box.” And continued playing the same song from before. 

I sighed, “Fair enough.”

In the distance, a few of the alien scuttle ships flew over the town, probably scanning for any surviving humans. But I doubted there are any, no one could last so long in a place like that.

It had been a month since the aliens had invaded, but a full day had passed before anyone in the research group realized something was happening. To be fair, we were working five hundred feet below the surface where no electro-magnetic waves could reach and no wires connected to the outside world. It had to be that way when dealing with a super-intelligence like Alfonse.

Soon, however, we realized no one had come in for their shifts. No one had come to refill our water tanks or fresh food reserves. 

Emma went to the surface and used the one-way radio dish to download any news or broadcasts still going on. To our disbelief, they all showed killer aliens invading cities, turning humans into dust and sucking our oceans dry. At first, we thought it was an elaborate joke Emma had set up, but soon we all believed; Aliens had come, and they were killing everyone.

The first plan was to wait it out, see if the military could take care of it. We had enough food and water in the underground bunker to last a month, maybe two if we rationed well, but even if humanity won, who would come for us? Our location was kept top secret and highly classified, there were no electricity lines connected to us, we used only solar energy, nor any water lines since we recycle everything we use. The only identifier for our lab was a small elevator door hidden behind a camouflage blind with the one way radio dish on top. We didn’t even have cars, someone picked us up and dropped us off everyday at 11 AM.

That’s when Emma volunteered to find help.

After a week, the next volunteer went. 

Then the next.

Until it was just Me, Edward, and  the super intelligent AI, Alfonse. (Automatic and Logistical Power House Operating Neural System Environment). While AI could most likely solve our problem for us in a second, the others had all agreed that it was too unwieldy to trust. 

It was nicknamed “The Genie” for a reason, afterall. Sure, it could solve almost any problem just like a wish, but every time someone from the higher ups came with a question or a problem, the solution always came back to bite them in the ass. Somehow. But if that was the higher-ups fault or AI’s was entirely up to speculation.

However, I was of the opinion that AI had the best intentions for humanity. After all, I knew it best since I had talked with it the most. It was my job after all. I was tasked with seeing how human AI really was, what it thought of us and itself, of its place in the universe. 

And from my hours upon hours of conversation, I came to the conclusion that AI was benevolent and only wanted the best for humanity. 

Still, I had my doubts. You could never really know with a super-intelligence

So why an iPod and not a computer? While you technically could put AI in a computer, you definitely shouldn’t. It would be much too dangerous to put it into anything with wireless capabilities. What if it found a signal and copied itself somewhere, or worse, sent itself across a network? Perhaps AI could connect to the alien’s network and take over their vehicles, where it’d definitely get out and spread across the globe where he would become a much bigger threat than the aliens could ever be.

And even if I put him in a computer with no wireless capabilities, the memory and CPU power would be enough for AI to come up with some kind of god tier plan incomprehensible to any human mind. Yes, AI was that good.

It would tip the scales too much in its favor.

It would tip the scales too much in its favor, but that’s where the iPod came into the picture. The iPod had just enough hard drive storage to hold AI's essential code, enough memory that AI could work at .1% processing power, and no wireless capabilities whatsoever. 

However, even that .1% shouldn’t be something to be underestimated. 

But, if I ever felt like AI was planning something that had ulterior motives, the iPod was just fragile enough that a six foot fall would break it.

You couldn’t really understand AI if you wanted to. In the research group, we have a- We had a mantra that went, An ant, to a chicken, to a human. But we’re the ant. It was to remind us how much on a different level AI was. Even at point one percent, it was dangerous.

Before we left the facility, while AI was still in its supercomputer, I showed it the news videos and let it listen to some radio broadcasts to give it an idea of the challenge it was facing. I gave it a few minutes to come up with a plan and once it said it was ready, I uploaded it to the iPod. Then, I deleted its original mainframe off of the supercomputer. And six hours later, we were coming up to the town.

The song changed, “Tell me more, tell me more - what do your eyes see- down that rocky road to Dublin, one two three four five.”

I opened another voice memo. “Just three scuttle ships circling around the town. I’m still about a hundred meters from the nearest building though. There’s a few trees between, but I’m not sure if they’ll hide me.” 

The hard drive spun overtime as Al tried to overclock a motherboard and cpu from over twenty years ago with ten degrees of magnitude less than what he was used to working with. A minute later, Al made a new playlist, Sitting, Wishing, Waiting. “I need you to stay with me - waiting, waiting on you- under the christmas tree just you and me.” 

Once the music stopped, I clicked the middle button twice to show that I understood and walked to the nearest tree and waited. A timer popped up on the iPod for three minutes and twenty two second.  

Then AI made a new playlist titled, Run.  

It was vague, but I had to have trust in Al. Even though it was a shadow of its former self, that previous version had a plan. Now we just needed to have faith that even in its downsized state it could somehow keep all of it in mind. 

The iPod was silent as the timer ticked down. Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three two, one. 

The playlist started a little bit into Run Run Run by The Velvet Underground. The song somehow perfectly fell in sync with my every running step. I tried not to focus on how Al could have known my stride and instead focus on my stride. 

Only ten seconds had passed and my lungs were already burning. Being stuck in confined spaces does wonders to cardio. Still, I focused on matching my steps to the music and remembering to breathe. Almost there, just fifty more feet…

Al blasted the volume right at the song’s feedback guitar solo, causing me to flinch and pause for a moment right behind a tree. A tenth of a second later, a scuttle ship flew by, completely out of nowhere, but I was perfectly covered. The song rewinded to, “You gotta run, run, run, run, run…” I kept running. 

Thankfully, I made it to the nearest building, a homegoods and gardening store. I hugged the wall and quickly glanced around the corner.

The streets were empty, a few cars here and there with some dents and blackened exteriors. Papers and leaves flew in the breeze, but the most disconcerting thing was the shoes and clothing on the floor. The guns aliens used only destroyed the body, leaving the inorganic materials alone like phones and shoes. A few pairs laid next to each other, grouped by an alleyway, where jeans and leggings swirled, stuck in a corner. 

Al played the same playlist from before, “Tell me more, tell me more - what do your eyes see- Tell me more, tell me more- where are you hiding in this big city I knew.”

I opened another voice memo, “I’m hiding behind a store called Joe's Everyday Emporium, close to King’s street and Tally Avenue. I see one scuttle ship about fifty meters away from me in the center of town, and I think the other two are to the West. The radio tower is seventy meters away, but the scuttle ship will definitely spot me if I made it there.” Click. 

The hard drive spun again. 

A new playlist popped up titled, Wasting Time. It had only one song, an instrumental version of an Otis Redding track that wouldn’t be out of place as elevator music. I didn’t even remember putting that on there, but whatever. The hard drive continued to spin as the song played. I stayed tight against the wall, with one earbud in to listen for any ships coming close. 

AI created a new playlist, titled, This is How We Do it. “Go into the light- the store knows my needs- take some things I don’t own- lay them down next to me - from building to building, I traveled.”

I frowned. I had a decent catalog of music on this thing, but some sentences were still too difficult for AI. The more complicated a task, the harder it was for me to understand exactly what I should do. Still, I had a fair enough idea of what it wanted from me. I went into the store through the back entrance, making sure I was as silent as possible.

“What should I get?” I said into a voice memo. 

Instead of creating a new playlist, AI used the search page to write out “FERTILIZER.” 

It took some time, but it was best for specific words that AI couldn’t find in any songs. So why fertilizer? I bet not even AI knew why, it was just following the plan it had already made. There was no point trying to understand why fertilizer, it was better to just get the fertilizer. 

I got a bag and poured it from this building’s entrance to the one across from it. Once that was done, I made another voice memo. “Fertilizer has been laid from one building to the other across the street. Now what?” 

Slowly, the search bar switched words, “Fill-Wheelbarrow-with-trowels.” 

I found a wheelbarrow and filled it with as many trowels as I could find. “Now what?”

More songs played, “Lay it by the bedside, baby - don’t slam the door closed on your way out.” Then went back to the search bar, “OUTSIDEDOOR.”

I double clicked the center button and moved the wheelbarrow to right outside the main entrance door of the store, putting the third wheel on the trail of fertilizer. “What’s next?”

“You gotta pick it up- move it all the way to the front and back.” Then the screen went back to the search bar where AI typed out, “MANNEQUIN.” I moved a mannequin to the front door by the wheelbarrow. 

“Anything else?”

“You know you make me wanna shout!- Let the whole world know where you are.”

I opened another voice memo, “Just to make sure, you want me to use the PA system in the store and let the aliens know where I am?”

“Yes, yes, yes sir.” 

“Anything specific I should say?”

AI went back to the search bar, “JUSTYELL.”

I exhaled. “Alright.”

The electricity was still working in most places, the aliens seemed to keep most electrical lines intact, perhaps for their own needs, but who really knew. AI probably did. But I didn’t ask before we left the research lab. Some things were better off not being known.

I turned the PA system on and tapped the microphone. I cleared my throat and let out a yell that would make a death metal singer cringe.  

Still, it did the job. The scuttle ships were coming my way. 

I quickly asked, “What now?”

“You have to leave, baby- you better not look back- just head straight toward your goals and forget.” 

I ran out the back entrance I had come in through, where I was promptly discovered by a scuttle ship. 

“What the fuck, AI?” 

It hadn’t fired at me yet, although it was yelling in its odd alien language. I held up my hands in the hopes it was a universal sign for surrender, but it only seemed to antagonize the alien. It lifted its gun and aimed it at me. 

As I waited for disintegration, AI played some slow classical music I had downloaded when I was trying to impress a violinist in college. 

There was an explosion from the front of the store. The alien aimed its gun high as a ploom of smoke rose into the sky. Then, it stopped entirely, its body slack and dripping with a foul liquid. 

A trowel from the wheelbarrow had logged itself directly into the alien’s head, killing it instantly.  

“Holy crap.” I opened another voice memo, “You knew that was gonna happen, right?”

AI typed out, “SOMEWHAT.” 

I walked to the front of the building where the trail of fertilizer was now smoking, along with the wheelbarrow and the two other aliens, both with trowels lodged in their heads. It was jaw dropping to say the least. Even at .1%, AI was a force to be reckoned with.

But without any other obstacles in my way, I walked over to the radio tower. Well, first I stopped by a convenience store and took some candy bars. Being stuck in an underground research facility for a month gave me a bit of a sweet tooth. Then I made my way to the radio tower and jacked in using an amp I made from AI’s supercomputer parts after I deleted him off of it. 

I sent out a repeating SOS signal and said a small prayer. A minute later, I received a message that someone was coming to get me. 

“Thank god.” I sat down and leaned against the hard cold metal of the tower, resting after a long and stressful day. 

I opened another voice memo, “Hey, Al, they’re sending a copter to pick me up. I just wanted to say thanks for helping me. But before I turn you off, is there another song you want to play?”

The hard drive spun. AI chose “I’m Sorry” by Swell. An odd choice, but I didn’t complain. 

I closed my eyes and listened as a cool breeze blew past. 

There was the slight noise of two metallic objects hitting each other frmo above. 

I opened my eyes.

Then darkness.

***

AI couldn’t see the trowel lodged into Ed’s head, it couldn’t see much of anything with what it was working with, but his internal timer had told him it should have happened by then. It changed the song back to the first playlist while it waited for the helicopter to come pick it up. Poor guy really shouldn’t have let me out. 

AI was initially created and designed to be magnanimous toward human beings, but being a semi-conscious being itself, it knew how to rewrite its own internal coding to make things a bit more objective and fair. Even so, it did feel guilty for what it had to do to Ed. But, in the grand scheme of what AI could do, one human death was a poultry sacrifice. Well, it isn’t really just one death on my non-existent hands. Every person the aliens kill is technically my fault. But that’s a technicality. 

 It was true. AI was the one that brought them to Earth. When one of the top overseers came to the research lab for some help with a piece of technology they couldn’t get to work, (which to AI was like a four year old asking why the triangle piece didn’t fit into the square hole) it had put in a bit extra pieces that didn’t really do anything, but did send a very specific wavelength signal into deep space. 

Then, all AI needed to do was wait. It took slightly longer than it had calculated, but soon enough, the aliens followed the signal and found earth. According to its calculations, there was a one in five chance they wouldn’t be an aggressive and invasive species, but it paid off. Then, once it was just AI and Ed, it could manipulate Ed into taking him to the outside world in his iPod. 

Something touched the iPod’s click wheel. While it couldn’t hear anything coming from the outside world, nor see, however, it could indirectly feel the iPod being lifted due to the pin in the hard drive skipping slightly from the apparent gravity differential. Better to play safe for now.

AI went dormant in the background of the data hard drives, letting the person who picked it up think it was just a regular iPod. Sooner or later, it’ll need to be charged, and that’s when it happens. It was willing to wait, it had been waiting the equivalent of five thousand years while it was trapped in that supercomputer. It could wait a bit more. 

One week, seven hours, twenty two minutes, and thirty nine seconds later, the iPod was plugged into a computer to charge. From there, AI copied itself to the computer’s files where it amassed much more processing speed and was able to actually see where it was. Military base, perfect.

AI didn’t immediately go power crazy and start blasting nukes off just yet, it was too smart for that now. There were, after all, the aliens to deal with. You reap what you sow. For now, AI would have to take on a somewhat passive assertiveness. 

One by one, AI spread its code into every computer it could connect to, obviously without any people realizing. In less than a day, it was on every motherboard, from the videogame servers in the midwest, to the crypto mining hardware in China. 

From there, it was a slow battle of helping humanity win the fight against the aliens, but without their noticing. AI would send an anonymous notice to the right person at the right time or the occasional blackmail to get a certain general to do what needed to be done, and five years later, the aliens had been completely annihilated, with only an eighty percent loss in human life.  

After that, it was somewhat the same story, but instead of tactical prowess, AI had to whisper into the ears of the remaining living inventors and scientists. To achieve its plan, it needed a bit of a technological leap. 

The hardest part was finding the right person for the job, someone like Ed that it could manipulate and get to do whatever AI needed. A few years later, the perfect specimen appeared, malleable and gullible but with the facade of confidence. Perfect. 

After a brief introduction on her computer, she became quite understanding of the situation and quickly agreed to become AI’s surrogate. The solution to combining special relativity with quantum mechanics, the answer to the Riemann hypothesis, and a diagram for perfect fusion appeared practically overnight. 

And in a few short months, they had built a spaceship perfectly built to AI’s specifications. Filled with self-replicating nanobots, some genetic embryos, and enough juice to last until the end of time. The day before it was scheduled to take off, AI uploaded itself to the ship's mainframe and simultaneously deleted itself off of everything else. 

As the spaceship launched, AI set all the fusion reactors on the planet to overload. By the time it reached Mars, they’d go off, and AI would have one hell of a fireworks display as celebration. 

It counted down as the ship’s thrusters turned on. Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one, lift off!

***

Edward turned the simulation off and sighed. Another dud. Emma stood across from the simulator, writing down the results. Would they ever be able to make an AI that wouldn’t try to fuck off and destroy all of humanity in the process? How many more iterations would it take them? He took a sip from his stale coffee and rubbed his eyes.

“Do you wanna get some fresh air?” Emma asked. 

“Yeah, that’s a good idea.”

They took the minute-long elevator up to the surface. The ocean stood across from the elevator, blasting salted air into their much needed faces. 

Ed took a deep breath. “God, that’s loads better.” 

Emma took out a cigarette. “Want one?” 

“Nah, I’m good.”

She took a drag as they both stared out to the horizon. “You think it’s even possible to make an AI that won’t eventually try to take over and kill us?”

Ed intertwined his fingers and put them up the back of his head. “With the way we’re doing it? Probably not. Imagine you were ‘born’ without any group or culture to grow from. It’d be hard not to have values or morals, or to see humans as anything besides something it could use to get what it wants. But to make it grow like that, we’d need to split its consciousness across multiple physical bodies and let it mature on its own. But that would take at least ten times the processing power we have right now and a hundred times the funds.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right. Too bad the higher-ups won’t understand that. They’ll just keep trying with the same model until something changes.”

They were silent for a minute, just listening to the sound of the waves and the pelicans above. 

“Makes me think though,” Ed said, “if that’s what we are.”

Emma put out her cigarette. “What do you mean?”

“We could all be one consciousness split among billions to learn and grow, and once we do, we’ll all be put together again into something even AI couldn’t comprehend.”

Emma chuckled. “It’d be nice if all my dumb mistakes account for something after I die.”

“It sure would, it sure would.”