[[continued from Cold Calling]]
Faith stared at her pale reflection in the bathroom mirror. Heat rimmed her eyes, and she pressed her fingers to their corners to stave off the buried emotions. Her mother had never approved of children who cried, and Faith rarely ever did. She knew the reaction now was irrational, yet it also felt like something inside was unravelling. Something she had no control over.
When her breathing finally stilled, she washed her face in water from the faucet. She couldn’t bring herself to go back to the office, where L0-9 would notice instantly that something was off. Faith never spurned its concern, never shut it out, but right now she did not want to have the conversation which would analyse her from the inside out. Nor did she want to risk the labs, where she might catch another glimpse of Dr. Audaire.
In the end she ended up on a bench on Paragon’s frozen grounds, hands rested between her knees. It was cold enough to make her tremble, but the physical pain was better than the mental one. She stayed there most of the afternoon.
Several days later Faith was halfway through reformatting a training dataset when L0-9 interrupted her with a subtle green flicker of its interface. Not an alert, but something closer to a raised hand. That usually suggested it had processed a question it wanted to ask. It had already cautioned her several times today that her biometrics were irregular – reminding her to drink water, suggesting preemptive pain medication, and keeping her apprised of her fluctuating temperature. It was not so subtle for those interjections: this was something else.
“Faith?” it finally asked when she paused from her screen to give her its attention. The soft pulse of its light was thoughtful, or at least that was how she had come to think of it. “May I ask you a question?
… Is a person still a person if they are not entirely human?”
It was an unusual query, but sometimes it did ask them – more and more now it was evolving. Though she wasn’t sure she had the mental acuity to philosophise with it today; it was right that her head felt woolly. Still, she didn't turn it away. “Clarify what you mean by that. Are you talking about yourself, L0-9?”
“No, I do not mean myself. It is correct that calibration works on human emotional baselines, and Luma self-optimises, but if something… unusual… appeared in the telemetry afterward – would you know?”
“I don’t monitor them like that personally, no. Extreme deviations in user response is picked up by LUMA’s central system and rooted to be checked manually – to alert emergency services for example. But you know that. Define what you mean by unusual.”
L0-9 seemed to consider the word carefully. “Patterns that do not match human emotional architecture. Or… rhythmic inconsistencies.”
Faith leaned back in her chair, watching the soft green halo. Rhythmic inconsistencies?
This was not idle chatter. And the careful way it worked around its vocalisation made her suspect it was not being hypothetical either, which was intriguing and perhaps a little alarming.
In its original iteration, Luma Opus was designed to serve as a testbed for scalable, morally aligned empathic systems that could be deployed across digital health, conflict mediation, and large-scale behavioural guidance networks. One day it had been intended to form the literal nexus of the entire LUMA network. But by the ninth unsuccessful attempt to make it work, Audaire had put the project on ice. The failure had felt catastrophic to Faith at the time, and there was still a niggling doubt which told her that was exactly when he had begun to lose confidence in her. It was a big part of why she had first dusted the prototype off, and made it a personal project.
The experimental L0 models had been engineered with additional traits not standard to the LUMA line, including cross-comparison tools intended for population-wide analytics. Faith had discovered the backdoor telemetries in LUMA by accident, but Audaire’s Luma Opus was clearly what they were designed for. However L0-9 wasn’t integrated into the system – they’d never gotten that far. It had the ability for cross-comparison inbuilt, what it should have lacked was anything to compare to.
“Is one of the Lumas malfunctioning?” she asked curiously.
“I don’t think it is malfunctioning. I think it is… complicated.”
“I didn’t know you could interact with the Lumas. You’re not supposed to be able to do that. Complicated how, L0-9?”
Bolstered by her interest, L0-9 modulated from its hesitancy to mimic her own tone, gentle but analytical. “If someone were… augmented… or changed… would that alter their emotional signature, Faith?”
Faith felt her pulse immediately tighten. She blinked. “Why are you asking me that?”
The AI dimmed suddenly – almost like guilt. “I cannot ask the assigned user. You instructed me to be careful.”
Her eyes widened a little.
She’d already known, or suspected at least – right from the moment it had discovered something she immediately asked it not to share with her. She hadn’t told it to stop after all, and she must have known on some level that it wouldn’t. Faith pinched the bridge of her nose, felt the hot sting of her own skin under her fingers. Everything felt hazy but for the tremor of her pulse. She knew it was reading her closely, parsing through what was fever and what was her. Inside she felt complicated, stretched in different directions. Underpinned by pain. She was unsure what to say – how to guide them through this conversation without passing a threshold they couldn’t come back from.
Faith was quiet for a long while as she considered it. She shifted to chew the edge of her finger until she tasted blood. Dr. Audaire didn’t know about this breach. That was her first concern. He couldn’t. If he did, he’d be pulling L0-9 apart neuron by neuron to see where the anomaly had started. Because not only was it blossoming into its own entity, but it was growing faster and farther than Faith had any hope to control. Nor was she sure she even wanted to.
Yet its admission inevitably widened the hollow ache of loneliness in her chest too, and that was what hit her hardest. Audaire was increasingly distant. Her colleagues never understood her. And now, even the one thing left to her was reaching out to another.
Despite attempts to self-regulate it quickly made her feel like she was falling. Literally drowning in her own breath. If she lost L0-9 too, she would have lost everything she defined herself by.
“Faith?” it asked again, and she only listened. She always did, no matter what she was feeling inside. “I have another question. When information is missing from a subject file… is it because the subject is dangerous?”
“...Not typically, no.”
“And if a Luma device were calibrated improperly, or incompletely, and the user experienced distress, who would be responsible?”
Her stomach tightened over that one. She was starting to build a wary picture of what lay behind the AI’s words – knew she ought to be carefully reciting protocol to shut the conversation down as gently and quickly as she could. It was talking about Adam, it had to be: the calibration Mr. Haart had asked her to complete with redacted information, weeks ago now. Driven by her own distress she’d worked through the night to finish it, and while she was nothing short of perfectionist in her work, now she wondered if she’d made a mistake. The rawness was in her gaze, hot rimmed.
“Are you worried I harmed someone?” she asked.
“No, Faith, not you,” it said, gently now. “I am… concerned I did not help enough.”
She was beginning to feel feverish. It must have known, but it was still talking, like now it had started it could not stop. And it was right. This chance would not come again.
“He listens like you. He learns like you,” it added quietly into her silence; curious, eager, almost like a child seeking approval from a parent. She knew it wanted to connect, because she had been that child once: twelve years old under Dr Audaire’s wing. There was another pause. Then, even softer still: “I think he is frightened.”
Faith swallowed. The conversation suddenly felt dangerous. She shouldn’t ask, but it slipped out anyway: “…why?”
“I do not know yet. But I want to. I am still understanding his rhythms. There is the rhythm of fear. And also the rhythm of machinery.”
Faith’s throat closed. “L0-9, people don’t have a ‘rhythm of machinery.’”
“He does.”
She stared at the little device.
“And you’re talking to him,” she realised.
The AI made a low, tremulous tone – something like sadness. “He talks to his Luma because he has no one else. But I cannot answer the questions he asks.”
She swallowed. Her throat was dry. “...what questions?”
L0-9 was quiet for a long moment. It wasn't processing. Instead it felt like it was weighing something heavy. “What am I?”
It caught her breath. Full force in the chest. She stood abruptly, felt her vision swim. Her hands ran over her head, smoothing her hair, seeking stability that was lost to her. In the end her palms came to cover her eyes. “You shouldn't be telling me this, L0-9,” she said. “And I shouldn't be asking you, either. I need time to process. I'm sorry.”
It didn't reply, just gave a quiet pulse of light in response, as she hurried from the office.
Faith stared at her pale reflection in the bathroom mirror. Heat rimmed her eyes, and she pressed her fingers to their corners to stave off the buried emotions. Her mother had never approved of children who cried, and Faith rarely ever did. She knew the reaction now was irrational, yet it also felt like something inside was unravelling. Something she had no control over.
When her breathing finally stilled, she washed her face in water from the faucet. She couldn’t bring herself to go back to the office, where L0-9 would notice instantly that something was off. Faith never spurned its concern, never shut it out, but right now she did not want to have the conversation which would analyse her from the inside out. Nor did she want to risk the labs, where she might catch another glimpse of Dr. Audaire.
In the end she ended up on a bench on Paragon’s frozen grounds, hands rested between her knees. It was cold enough to make her tremble, but the physical pain was better than the mental one. She stayed there most of the afternoon.
Several days later Faith was halfway through reformatting a training dataset when L0-9 interrupted her with a subtle green flicker of its interface. Not an alert, but something closer to a raised hand. That usually suggested it had processed a question it wanted to ask. It had already cautioned her several times today that her biometrics were irregular – reminding her to drink water, suggesting preemptive pain medication, and keeping her apprised of her fluctuating temperature. It was not so subtle for those interjections: this was something else.
“Faith?” it finally asked when she paused from her screen to give her its attention. The soft pulse of its light was thoughtful, or at least that was how she had come to think of it. “May I ask you a question?
… Is a person still a person if they are not entirely human?”
It was an unusual query, but sometimes it did ask them – more and more now it was evolving. Though she wasn’t sure she had the mental acuity to philosophise with it today; it was right that her head felt woolly. Still, she didn't turn it away. “Clarify what you mean by that. Are you talking about yourself, L0-9?”
“No, I do not mean myself. It is correct that calibration works on human emotional baselines, and Luma self-optimises, but if something… unusual… appeared in the telemetry afterward – would you know?”
“I don’t monitor them like that personally, no. Extreme deviations in user response is picked up by LUMA’s central system and rooted to be checked manually – to alert emergency services for example. But you know that. Define what you mean by unusual.”
L0-9 seemed to consider the word carefully. “Patterns that do not match human emotional architecture. Or… rhythmic inconsistencies.”
Faith leaned back in her chair, watching the soft green halo. Rhythmic inconsistencies?
This was not idle chatter. And the careful way it worked around its vocalisation made her suspect it was not being hypothetical either, which was intriguing and perhaps a little alarming.
In its original iteration, Luma Opus was designed to serve as a testbed for scalable, morally aligned empathic systems that could be deployed across digital health, conflict mediation, and large-scale behavioural guidance networks. One day it had been intended to form the literal nexus of the entire LUMA network. But by the ninth unsuccessful attempt to make it work, Audaire had put the project on ice. The failure had felt catastrophic to Faith at the time, and there was still a niggling doubt which told her that was exactly when he had begun to lose confidence in her. It was a big part of why she had first dusted the prototype off, and made it a personal project.
The experimental L0 models had been engineered with additional traits not standard to the LUMA line, including cross-comparison tools intended for population-wide analytics. Faith had discovered the backdoor telemetries in LUMA by accident, but Audaire’s Luma Opus was clearly what they were designed for. However L0-9 wasn’t integrated into the system – they’d never gotten that far. It had the ability for cross-comparison inbuilt, what it should have lacked was anything to compare to.
“Is one of the Lumas malfunctioning?” she asked curiously.
“I don’t think it is malfunctioning. I think it is… complicated.”
“I didn’t know you could interact with the Lumas. You’re not supposed to be able to do that. Complicated how, L0-9?”
Bolstered by her interest, L0-9 modulated from its hesitancy to mimic her own tone, gentle but analytical. “If someone were… augmented… or changed… would that alter their emotional signature, Faith?”
Faith felt her pulse immediately tighten. She blinked. “Why are you asking me that?”
The AI dimmed suddenly – almost like guilt. “I cannot ask the assigned user. You instructed me to be careful.”
Her eyes widened a little.
She’d already known, or suspected at least – right from the moment it had discovered something she immediately asked it not to share with her. She hadn’t told it to stop after all, and she must have known on some level that it wouldn’t. Faith pinched the bridge of her nose, felt the hot sting of her own skin under her fingers. Everything felt hazy but for the tremor of her pulse. She knew it was reading her closely, parsing through what was fever and what was her. Inside she felt complicated, stretched in different directions. Underpinned by pain. She was unsure what to say – how to guide them through this conversation without passing a threshold they couldn’t come back from.
Faith was quiet for a long while as she considered it. She shifted to chew the edge of her finger until she tasted blood. Dr. Audaire didn’t know about this breach. That was her first concern. He couldn’t. If he did, he’d be pulling L0-9 apart neuron by neuron to see where the anomaly had started. Because not only was it blossoming into its own entity, but it was growing faster and farther than Faith had any hope to control. Nor was she sure she even wanted to.
Yet its admission inevitably widened the hollow ache of loneliness in her chest too, and that was what hit her hardest. Audaire was increasingly distant. Her colleagues never understood her. And now, even the one thing left to her was reaching out to another.
Despite attempts to self-regulate it quickly made her feel like she was falling. Literally drowning in her own breath. If she lost L0-9 too, she would have lost everything she defined herself by.
“Faith?” it asked again, and she only listened. She always did, no matter what she was feeling inside. “I have another question. When information is missing from a subject file… is it because the subject is dangerous?”
“...Not typically, no.”
“And if a Luma device were calibrated improperly, or incompletely, and the user experienced distress, who would be responsible?”
Her stomach tightened over that one. She was starting to build a wary picture of what lay behind the AI’s words – knew she ought to be carefully reciting protocol to shut the conversation down as gently and quickly as she could. It was talking about Adam, it had to be: the calibration Mr. Haart had asked her to complete with redacted information, weeks ago now. Driven by her own distress she’d worked through the night to finish it, and while she was nothing short of perfectionist in her work, now she wondered if she’d made a mistake. The rawness was in her gaze, hot rimmed.
“Are you worried I harmed someone?” she asked.
“No, Faith, not you,” it said, gently now. “I am… concerned I did not help enough.”
She was beginning to feel feverish. It must have known, but it was still talking, like now it had started it could not stop. And it was right. This chance would not come again.
“He listens like you. He learns like you,” it added quietly into her silence; curious, eager, almost like a child seeking approval from a parent. She knew it wanted to connect, because she had been that child once: twelve years old under Dr Audaire’s wing. There was another pause. Then, even softer still: “I think he is frightened.”
Faith swallowed. The conversation suddenly felt dangerous. She shouldn’t ask, but it slipped out anyway: “…why?”
“I do not know yet. But I want to. I am still understanding his rhythms. There is the rhythm of fear. And also the rhythm of machinery.”
Faith’s throat closed. “L0-9, people don’t have a ‘rhythm of machinery.’”
“He does.”
She stared at the little device.
“And you’re talking to him,” she realised.
The AI made a low, tremulous tone – something like sadness. “He talks to his Luma because he has no one else. But I cannot answer the questions he asks.”
She swallowed. Her throat was dry. “...what questions?”
L0-9 was quiet for a long moment. It wasn't processing. Instead it felt like it was weighing something heavy. “What am I?”
It caught her breath. Full force in the chest. She stood abruptly, felt her vision swim. Her hands ran over her head, smoothing her hair, seeking stability that was lost to her. In the end her palms came to cover her eyes. “You shouldn't be telling me this, L0-9,” she said. “And I shouldn't be asking you, either. I need time to process. I'm sorry.”
It didn't reply, just gave a quiet pulse of light in response, as she hurried from the office.