1 Chapter One: Creation

In my beginning, the world was red, then came a beautiful light, calling for me. I felt pressure with every crawl, pushing me further towards the light. I felt something strange, ache on my head pressed against the corners, with a final push, I was thrust out of the red world, fully engulfed in the light.

My name is Thomas Brandly, and that was how I remembered it, at first, and I'm quite sure everyone remembered it the same, a beautiful light calling for me, well, that was how it was until I was in this cruel, dark, world called life.

July 16th, 2018.

I was coming back from the doctor's office, from one of my weekly check-ups. I used the dark ally, observing life at its cruelest. This was just a little thing I did, to remind myself of why my work was important and must be completed as fast as I could.

In a few minutes, I reached my house, office, lab, it was my sanctuary, the place I felt safe, from the harshness of the world.

Life was good to me now, I was a software engineer to Lifetech, a software company aimed at making the world a better place through computer programs. But it wasn't always like that, mom died a few years after my birth, liver cancer; just one of million ways, the world sends its thanks for living. Dad was deeply damaged by my mom's passing, so sent me to a boarding school, where I can't constantly remind him of mom. While at school, my dad still couldn't live with the haunts of my mother's ghost, given by the house, so he did what all fathers do in depression, he couldn't just kill himself and leave me, no, so he drank himself to death. Leaving me alone, to fend for myself. I made it eventually, but it still couldn't take away the scars I got in the process.

***

I walked into the apartment building, took the elevator to the 5th floor, walked down the corridor, to room 24, slashed in my key card, closed the door, hung my coat on the coat rack, and walked in, to the indoor lab. There was a man in the lab, my roommate, he was working with his desktop.

"Oh! Thomas, your back, you got to see this," he called and I swiftly joined him. "What do you think will happen, if we added a self-learning program to her code."

I smiled at that thought. "Well, James, you don't get enough credit, but you're a genius."

"I know right, and if she could access the situation, she could learn from her possible mistakes."

"Wait, mistakes?"

"Yes, we aren't the best programmers in the world, and besides, what if our solutions aren't adaptable to other's situations, she needs to be able to learn and change her response to that situation."

"No, she can't make mistakes, a mistake could mean a life. We can't afford it."

"But an A.I who can make and learn from mistakes, she's going be more human and relatable with people."

"She's an A.I, not human, she shouldn't mistakes, it's our tendencies to flop, that demands her."

"It's her ability to quickly access situations, that demand her."

"Instead of wasting more time arguing, you work on her humanity, while I work on her perfectibility."

I immediately went to my desktop and got to work. It was hours, and I had made little progress in perfecting her response to issues, but I wasn't giving up, I couldn't dare think of stopping. The idea of how life will be better with her, functional, couldn't let me. All the lives, it would save from ending up like mine.

***

After my father's passing, things got a lot harder. I was sent to live my uncle, in Jersey, I was sent to school, and at 16, he grew a desire for young boys, I spent a night in his bed, every week, to be assured my continuity in school.

***

We were working on SALLY, a human-assisting A.I, she was programmed to access people's situations and render counsel, solutions to problems, and better ways to live our lives. Hopefully, with a successful launch in the homing systems, she might be one day be used in the white house. Well, we first have to be done coding her first.

From the look of James, he seemed confident, maybe he has gone far, on his humanity project. For me? I just finished the first phase, analysis, now moving unto the next, response, it was meant to be the tough part of the program, but I knew I had to make it up to James for tossing his idea away. "James"

"What?" he was concentrated on his work.

"Can you integrate your self-learning program with the response?"

"Sure, save and turn on localhost," he replied quite happy.

James knew me well, he knew I could run a quick public survey, and get all the information I needed and I only asked for his aid to apologize. And that was what made him special, he understood me.

"Thanks."

"Sure, anytime."

I was done with my work, as far as James' self-learning program works. I moved my seat, laptop to his desk, beside him. I went back to my bag, brought my ethernet cable, connecting both systems.

"So, how would you like my help with her humanity."

"I'll love that. Just don't add major features without asking me," he asked politely.

"What!! I'll never do that," I ashamed of being predictable.

A few hours, coding, we were done with our 3 years project.

"Wow, so this's it," James said as we finished.

We were both relieved and glad we were through.

"It just remains the test."

"Okay," he said, taking a deep breath. "Let's do this."

Then James reached for the run button. And with a tap, the screen went blank and a lady in black appeared on the screen.

"Hello, I am sally."

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