In the year 2030 developed countries, the united nations, the world economic forum, and some other organizations launched an unprecedented plan, their idea was basically to take control of humanity in every aspect, controlled population, the infamous 15 minutes smart cities, social credit score systems, individual CO2 emission rights, electric cars, an individual contamination tax, etc... It failed miserably, they didn't have the infrastructure for the electric vehicle, the corruption in governments made all the CO2 emission control a joke, smart cities became ghettos, people got bored and numbed themselves with entertainment and drugs, they became unproductive, unemployment arose, the governments printed more money creating runaway inflation. The internal problems in every country translated to the international environment, civilized world was in the brink of total war. Since the original human plan failed and was creating wide spread unrest, a new approach was needed, after not so much consideration, the AI plan was given a go.
The project Hydra was launched. The five biggest tech companies came together and created a super computer with a specialized autonomous AI, combining the initial letter of all companies involved: Micron, Amadont, Rat-eon, Testa, and Abble the acronym M.A.R.T.A.was created.
By the year 2040 MARTA was running at full capacity, the AI didn't have imagination to create things from scratch, but it could take all the existing ideas in the world and combine them together in the most efficient and functional way, if you gave her the idea, she would give you the blocks to make it possible.
The AI was given six mayor missions:
I – End world hunger.
II – Control the overgrowing population.
III – Control Inflation and economics.
IV – Address energy and industrial production and control environmental contamination.
V – Improve health and education.
VI – World peace.
AI had solved almost all of humanity main problems, it was not perfect, but was very efficient, after just five years, by 2045 the golden age of the modern human civilization started, the AI age. MARTA, reshaped the economy, employed new solutions to energy crisis, took total control of economics and central banks, inflation was a thing of the past, there was no more profiteering in the markets, which allowed fruitful companies to grow and cull the dead weight. In the international environment, trade was thriving, armed conflicts cooled down, there were still wars, but conflicts had reduced considerably, only really small third world countries with no structure and too fanatic to be introduced to the civilized world were left behind, although they were slowly disappearing, their own people abandoned them and overthrowed their governments. Overpopulation was a thing of the pass, in fact, depopulation and a steep decline on fertility was one of the main worries for the future, however the AI already had a route to address such issues in the near future.
The AI structure was complex, each mayor country had a central nodes that were a segment of the AI system and operated as an independent entity, but under MARTA supervision. This also worked as a failsafe in case something went wrong. If needed, the rest of nodes could isolate a malfunctioning node from the rest of the system and reactivate a backup clean version of that node or bloke of the AI. China and India nodes had control of industry and production, Europe nodes had control of medical related advancement, USA nodes had control of main automated systems like self driving vehicles, planes, satellites and communications. Russia and Arab countries nodes controlled production and distribution related to energy, from traditional gas based energy to nuclear and solar. Then there were the minor local nodes that controlled the households appliances and personal devices.
Humanity was one with AI and depended on it for almost anything, from automated food production farms to self driving cars, home appliances and personal matters. Except for the military; as a failsafe, everything related to the army was kept away from the AI reach and control.
However, the AI was not all powerful, an incredible amount of human help was needed, a team of software developers and engineers was in charge of monitoring and debugging the software in every node at all times, including the main node. It was 2057 when the problems started. The AI tried to warn humanity, but they didn't listen.
"Hey Cho, come see this"
On an underground facility a programmer called a colleague.
"Sup?" Answered a Chinese young man.
Cho was a genius programmer. At fifteen he caught the eye of The Hydra Project development team and two years later started working with them to Improve MARTA system. He was a one meter and seventy centimeters tall, energetic, funny, goofy guy, always did something weird to his hair, today had two kitty hair clips on the bangs hanging over his eyes.
"MARTA has been giving me this weird warning for a month now."
"Hmm, thats weird. Hey Raj, come see what Mitchel found" Cho called for their Indian colleague.
Rajiv was a twenty seven years old programmer specialized on debugging, was a very methodical guy, always serious. Like all programmers he had a freaky side, in this case was a morbid obsession for weird and tragic accidents, something common in today bored generation that tried to get attention doing the most irrational of things.
Rajiv seemed annoyed by his partners interruption, right at this moment he was reading an story and watching videos about a weird accident from a few months ago in which two marine biologists died while riding one of the commonly used self driving electric cars in Barcelona, Spain. While going through a standard road, the car had a malfunction and exploded. Both men died in a hellish fire that took the firefighters seven hours to put out, video was recorded from the inside the vehicle as well as the outside, someone managed to find a copy and made it available in the web, it was gruesome and was one of the most watched videos worldwide, only second to a guy who managed to fool the AI surveillance, build a giant blender inside his home, turned it on and hopped inside, he recorded everything.
The funny part about the biologist for Raj, was that the same car had been checked an given the clear by the AI system that same morning. However, all security systems in the car malfunctioned, which was virtually impossible. The police was taking into consideration a terrorist attack. There had been a few since the Muslims and Christians radicals joined forces to overthrow the 'Demonic Regime' of the AI, creating a new organization known as the Order of the faith.
"Unknown threat?" Rajiv checked on the log-files from the AI that was supposedly in charge of bringing that warning up. "I don't see anything wrong. A new modifier, perhaps? Maybe an interference from another code?"
"Thats bad, there is almost four trillion lines of code in this thing. If there is an error we will never find it" said Mitchel in defeat.
"Did you ask her?" asked Cho.
"Of course i did, she doesn't know either"
"Hey MARTA, The warning on your system, the unknown threat, what does it mean?" Cho asked.
The AI came to life and addressed the programmers.
[The warning #D12-DI00R69TY, makes reference to a possible threat to all of humanity] The AI answered.
"MARTA, What is the origin of that threat?" Cho kept asking questions, the others were silent.
[Unknown]
"Time until the catastrophic event?"
[Not clear]
"Solution to the problem?"
[Engineering]
"What does that mean?"
[Unknown]
"Did you run a diagnostic application Mitchel?"
"I did it three times, nothing."
"We got to report this." Said Rajiv.
"Yeah, and say what? the AI that runs the world is glitching and we have no idea why? No way, lets find out what is going on first, and then we report it. Call everyone in, we are going to do a check up on the main systems, manually." Cho was the team leader, it was his decision.
"Oh, come on!" everyone complained.
Later that day three hundred and one of the best programmers and system engineers in the world got together in the secret underground facility were MARTA's main core was located. They started to work trying to find the reason for the AI malfunction. The Warning kept popping up, but still there was no explanation for it. Two months later the team decided to communicate to their superiors about the problem.
Cho and the team found themselves in a virtual reunion with the technology and development ministers of all the countries that had an AI node on their territory.
"So, your Node has been giving you this warning for months now, but nothing is clear, correct?" The minister representing United Kingdom said.
"Correct; We have checked the system multiple times, We used all of our diagnostic software. We also did a manual revision of the main code. But the system seems to be functioning perfectly. As far as we know MARTA is operating at full capacity and total integrity." Cho answered.
"Very well, for the time being we will keep this information secret. No one must know that the system the runs the world might not be working properly." The USA minister said.
The French minister cleared his throat. "Maybe, we might need some monitoring for the AI decision making. I propose a more direct approach and limitations of its reach into our society"
"Oh, come on, Benoit, not again!" The minister of UK complained.
Benoit Leblanc didn't like the fact that an AI basically had unrestricted control over the world. In his opinion the only ones monitoring the machine making the calls was a bunch of nerds and bookworms, none of them over forty years. Benoit deemed them unprepared to have that much power. The truth was that programmers only made sure that the system worked properly, they had no control over the AI decision making, the system was already so perfect, with so many redundancies that human intervention only made it less effective, and on top it was still improving daily, they couldn't even turn it off completely since the other Nodes could work independently, everyone though Benoit was an old, ignorant and stubborn fossil that just couldn't adapt to the times.
"Thanks Mr. Cho, we will keep an eye on the situation." The minister from USA, disconnected the meeting call. The French, German and British minister seemed to be arguing on a private line.
Cho and his team went back to explore the AI codes, two days later the warning came up once more. But this time, it came in a different form. A clock appeared on the screen, or so they thought at the beginning, it was actually a counter. Not only that, but Cho and his team were informed that the same warning and the timer popped up in all the other Nodes.
"MARTA, what does this timer means?" Cho asked.
[In exactly ten days, sixteen ours, four minutes and twenty two seconds, an attack will be launch upon humanity.] The AI answered.
"Origin of the threat?"
[Unknown]
"What should be our answer?"
[Military] The AI displayed a battle plan. Although the enemy was unknown. Her plan called for all the major military forces of the world to be gathered in Hawaii.
"Wait a minute, MARTA, this is almost ninety percent of the planet military force that you´re summoning. Are you insane?" Signaled Rajid, while everyone agreed with him.
[You are correct Rajid]
"No country is gonna agree to this" said Cho.
[That would be ill advised]
"MARTA, how do you know all of this" Asked Mitchel.
[Like any other species in the history of the world, humanity will face an mass extinction event, my calculations predict such even will take place in ten days, sixteen ours and forty two seconds]
"MARTA what is the probability of you being wrong?" Asked Rajid.
[Cero percent]
"Cero? Nothing is one hundred percent guaranteed in this world MARTA"
[The calculated probability of mass extinction event starting in ten days, fifteen ours, fifty five minutes and nice seconds, is a hundred percent]
"You gotta be joking" protested Mitchel.
[I am not. How ever I am capable of making jokes. ¿Do you want to hear a joke?]
"No!"
[Understood]
As expected the governments didn't took MARTA's battle plan and recommendations seriously.
"That thing is planing something, the army is the only thing she doesn't control. This is a trap"
"Oh, shut up Benoit!"
Once again France and United Kingdom minister were at each other throat. Although this time everyone deemed Benoit warning in a positive light. The ministers were not convinced. However, they still held the first "World joint military drill" in Hawaii. The military force was a lot smaller than the IA recommended, but still, it was there.
"Nothing is happening, what the hell are you nerds playing at down your caves?" complained one of the generals.
Suddenly, the feedback from the cameras systems disappeared.
"hey MARTA, what the hell?" asked Cho.
[My system has been hacked, I am not in control of the computers and devices in the area]
"What do you mean by that?"
[That I am not in control of the electronic devices, Cho]
"How is that even possible?" Asked Rajid.
[Unknown]
"MARTA, gives us satellite vision" requested Mitchel.
[I am unavailable to do that]
"What? How is that possible?"
[Unknown]
"Oh come on!" complained Mitchel.
"MARTA contact the ministers"
[No need Cho, they are already on the line]
The computer opened a video conference with all the ministers.
"What the hell has that dumb machine of yours done?" Asked Benoit.
"Oh, shut up Benoit!" yelled the British minister.
"Still, answers are required" the minister of japan spoke.
"I'm sorry minister Takeda, we got nothing to offer you, MARTA has no control over military equipment. All the civilians cameras, communications and electronic devices are cut off. Not even our satellites can give us anything, we got no idea what is going on" argued Cho.
"How is that even possible?" Asked the USA minister.
"We don't know, Marta has no answer for us, she been booted out of her own system. We are running all kind of diagnostic tools and trying to reconnect, but everything related to Hawaii has gone dark." Answered Rajid.
"Hum! Give that a rest" the USA minister moved his hand, another man connected to the conversation.
"Gentlemen, what you are about to see is confidential, although I am pretty sure you already know that and taking into consideration your job position, you already know what that means, so lets get to the point"
The general pushed a button in his computer and a satellite image come up on the screen.
"This is a joint record of what is going on in the battle field, there is one or two minutes of delay, but as you can see there is a battle going on"
The projection showed a naval battle, all ships were firing all their automatic weapons.
"What the hell are they fighting?" Asked Rajid.
"Themselves" answered the general. "All autonomous systems and weaponry started shooting one another, they started hitting the analog radio and independent equipment we use as backup. All the modern systems got interfered by something, at the beginning we though your AI had played a trick on us, but... well, we were wrong."
[New life form detected]
"New form of life?" asked Cho.
MARTA increased the size and resolution of the image, cleaned for interferences many times and showed the image of multiple creatures floating around the ships, in the coastal line and even mid air.
"What are those?" asked Cho.
[Unknown, there is no form of life known by humanity with that characteristics]
"Wait, are you saying those are aliens?" asked the general.
[Unknown, an alien life form is a possible explanation, but there are many other choices: Artificially generated life forms, bio-lab breakout, military experiment gone array, natural evolution of other species...]
"Thats enough MARTA" called the general, he was not happy about the AI comment.
"Okay, we might have an alien invasion... what now?" asked Mitchel.
[Humanity must fight for its survival]
The politicians and generals disconnected. Twelve hours later MARTA, the programmers and engineers at the node got all the data and footage that could be recovered from the battlefield. The recording methods that were disconnected from the ships main systems or didn't had any form of wireless communication managed to stay out of the control of the invaders. That along with the footage from the military satellite offered a lot of information.
"Jesus, two hours" said Mitchel.
"Look how our drones fell in control of the enemy, thats some serious hacking, MARTA, this thing must be as good as you." commented Cho with some suspicion.
[That is not accurate, my systems are too slow to do all that in such short time. Remember the military equipment has security and failsafe system to protect themselves against AI hacking]
"Faster than you?" asked Cho.
[Correct, although their exterior is metallic, this new form of life seems to be organic in nature, its response times are two orders of magnitude faster than the combined power of all the AI nodes currently functioning]
"A hundred times faster than you?"
[It is a estimate calculated by the current information we obtained]
The minister, presidents and high rank military officers, programmers, engineers and the AI reunited again remotely.
"Ladies and gentlemen, we all know why we all here, MARTA and the nodes already studied the information we managed to recover. Things are bad, all our drones and systems that can be controlled by the enemy are been deactivated world wide, right now. Even hour jet planes and ships can be sabotaged by the enemy, we need a plan" the minister of the UK welcomed everyone.
"Okay, MARTA, show us what you got" Rajid said.
MARTA displayed multiple possible battle plans and scenarios, none of them were good for humanity.
[Humanity weapons and current military strength is insufficient to fight this threat]
"Options?" Cho asked.
[According to unofficial information there are several military secret protects that may be of help under the right conditions]
MARTA showed a lot of unofficial military projects that people on the Internet said were conspiratorial theories. The generals and some ministers showed discomfort.
"Project Full Blackout? Seriously MARTA, thats all you got? Everyone knows that is insane, who would like to turn off everything and send humanity back into the stone age?" Michael laughed.
"Ahem!" a general called for attention. "That project is... real"
All the programmers looked at each other.
"Sixty percent of those projects are real, although they were never developed, most of them didn't even made it to the experimental stage" the general added.
[Please select the real ones]
The generals selected the projects that were real.
"Seriously? Project Hades was real? Zombies? For real? Are you Russians crazy?" The USA minister complained.
"Project Captain America, genetically modified, cloned, super soldiers... and we are the crazy?" the Russian general retorted.
[Only seven projects are feasible in short time period]
Marta words stopped the bickering.
[From those, project Full Black Out might work, but at great cost in lives and technological progress. The enemy seems partially biological in nature, project Pasteur might work, although is dangerous, biological agents mutate rapidly and are hard to control. Lastly, the best choice is the Project Hastings 1066]
"Project Hastings was never even brought to the experimental stage, we don't even know if it is possible" denied a general.
[There is a ninety five percent chance of completing that project with our current technology, and there is a fifty five percent chance of defeating the enemy with this approach]
"What is the probability of completion of the other two alternatives and their success rate?" Asked the president of the USA.
[Projects Full black out and Pasteur completion is guaranteed to be completed in a two years period, but their success rate is estimated under the ten percent]
"I guess we have no choice then" the German minister said as she adjusted her glasses.