On the precipice of understanding

‘Leave the women to it.’ Father led me out of the kitchen dining area, as he dangled a cigar in front of my nose. ‘This has been burning a hole in my pocket since dessert.’ He slapped me on the back of my shoulder.

The sound of pans clanging and plates being scrapped accompanied us as we edged away. We had been dining since seven. The time was now past ten. I had arrived late yesterday evening, from London.

My parents are disgustingly rich. This is their house, in the Cotswolds. Six bedrooms, three bathrooms, an acre sized garden- Bird bath, rose bushes- Got the picture yet?

My Father slid open the patio door with ease, pressing his palm against the window pane to achieve his means. This left a visible smear, not that Father batted an eye. He knew Mother would soon see to it. Or the maid- Whoever clocked it first.

The crisp Autumnal evening offered a welcome contrast to the heat thickened parlour from whence we came. As we stood in tandem, facing the darkened lawn, Father stuck out his chest and took an exaggerated deep breath, pounding his torso, like an Alpha ape- The leader of the pack.

‘I’ve earnt this.’ He said, as he sparked up the Cuban and adjusted his crotch. ‘Did you see how I held my tongue? In there?’

‘I did.’

‘Were you impressed, Son?’

‘As ever, Father- I was in awe.’

‘Correct.’

My Grandmother was staying with us over the weekend. Nuff said. Father expelled the charcoal tinted smoke, which met the air like ink meets water. I watched it disperse.

‘Two men. Related. A pair of winners. Staring into the abyss.’ My Father observed, like a Director’s commentary, as we gazed towards the edge of the freshly mown grass, into the unknown. Several tiki torches lit the way along the parameters of the flower beds but beyond there, no man, woman or child would have been able to see. He continued- ‘There’s a spot in Borneo. Under the Ocean. Looks like an unassuming ridge. Nothing remarkable. You say. Until, one swims across. Scuba diving. Not a care in the world. Blue waters. Surrounded by fish. Colours everywhere. A tropical hot bed of life and activity. But then, once you go over it, this nondescript, little wall- A precipice- Complete darkness. A one thousand feet plunge to the depths. Totally black. As black as space. Can you imagine the terror? Of that? You’d shit yourself. Wouldn’t you?’

‘Probably.’

‘Definitely.’ My Father took another puff. ‘Well, you would. I’d be fine.’

He lifted a second cigar out of his shirt’s breast pocket and passed it to me.

‘We should go.’ He suggested, as I retrieved the rolled tobacco stick from his hairy, chubby hand.

‘Where is it?’

‘Borneo.’

‘Yes. You said. But where’s that?’

My Father paused. I could feel his eyes on me as I lit the cigar and pretended not to notice. I heard him tut, next to the side of my head.

‘Indonesia. You cretin.’ He spat. ‘Glad to see my ten grand a term was well spent. You imbecile.’

‘I work in stocks.’ I said, as I exhaled the tarry smoke. ‘Geography is not necessary. For me.’

‘You’re a spaz, Son. But I love you anyway.’

He slapped me on the back. Forcefully.

‘Maybe I’ll go on my own then.’ He added, after a brief pause- ‘Or with your Mother. Or, perhaps, a new model. A sugar baby. Either way, I’ll sort something out.’ His voice trailed off.

A long silence prompted me to look back at him. My Father. He was not usually this mute. I thought perhaps he may have had a stroke. But no, he was fine. Just looking at the sky. The stars. The visibility was impeccable round these neck of the woods. Rural it was. No more than fifty houses per square mile. On a clear night, you could see the Milky Way.

‘Awesome, isn’t it?’ Father said, his head cranked back, mouth open. ‘In the true sense of the word. Not like by today’s standards. Where everything is awesome. Pizza. Skittles. A well crafted wig. This!’ He gestured to the heavens. ‘This, is truly magnificent.’

I agreed.

‘But what is it?’ He asked, as he suckled on his cigar. Was this a rhetorical question? It was hard to tell with Father. He was a maverick. What I’d learnt over the years, when dealing with him, was if in doubt, stay schtum. Less he be rattled by an impromptu or inappropriate response. I took a respective drag on my own cigar, twiddling it between my finger and thumb and said nothing.

Father continued- ‘I suggest that it is only now that we have acquired the language to explain what this is. As in, existence. The universe.’

I waited for him to elaborate, which he promptly did. ‘I propose, that it is Artificial intelligence. And we, as a result, are one and the same. Tell me, boy-‘ He turned to me- ‘Do you feel like A I?’

I paused to ponder the unexpected question, so as to give an earnest answer. He waited. Patiently. Understanding the gravitas of the subject matter and presumably, respecting my decision to take my time before a rebuttal.

I finally spoke- ‘I do.’

Father nodded. ‘So do I.’

He smiled. ‘And as for the question of whether or not the universe is intelligent- How, may I add, can intelligent life forms emerge from a non intelligent environment? Something can not be created from nothing- One of the only fundamental universal laws. Surely, even a retard like you can appreciate that?’

I assured him I could.

He then gripped my arm and rotated me, so we may face the house.

‘You have my essence, boy, for you were born from me. We share blood. Genetics. You’re practically a clone. Of myself.’

I agreed.

‘Your mother is an old woman now. Saggy. A carbon copy of every other ancient wench shuffling the aisles of Waitrose. Clutching her basket. Looking for smoked salmon. Crème fraiche. Two bottles of champagne already secured. Waiting to die. But believe me, before she hit the wall, she was a knockout. A super model. Well, you know- You’ve seen the pictures.’

I nodded.

‘We won’t go too much into it, in the interest of keeping it clean and incest free, but let’s face it, if she wasn’t your Mother and you were around, in the eighties, when she was in her prime, you’d give her one, wouldn’t you?’

‘Probably’

‘Definitely.’

Father tossed his cigar to the side. It was only half smoked. Father never finished cigars.

‘And this. This house.’ He pointed at the family home. ‘One of four, not counting the yacht. It’s grand, Son- You can’t tell me otherwise.’

‘Yes, it’s massive.’

‘And what, you think that this is an accident? That I’ve acquired all this? Stuff.’

Father chuckled.

‘Open your eyes, boy- We’re tapped in. Didn’t they teach you this in school?’

‘Some.’

‘Glad to hear it. That’s what we pay for. The good shit. Not like public education, where they teach you anything but the truth. Times tables bollocks. Fuckin history. Ha! Like they’re gonna share with the masses what really went down. May as well read them a fairy tale. Hans Cristian Anderson. They’ll believe anything if its in print. On a screen. Philistines. Still. A necessary system- Can never have too many slaves and whores.’

We turned our backs towards the house quickly, as Mother caught sight of us peering inside and waved. It looked as if she may come over.

Father put his arm round me. ‘This is just a game, Son. Like Monopoly. Or, more accurately, an RPG. Like Grand Theft Auto. Or Skyrim.’

There was a short silence.

I filled it. ‘Assassin’s Creed.’

Father nodded. ‘I’ve been levelling up since the day I left the womb. But some people, nae, most people don’t bother to level up at all. Content they are instead, to shuffle along, in the first place Mother Nature plonked them. No desire to explore. No drive to do the quests, the special tasks, the missions. Stay in the same old rags. Same job. Marry the first village wench who spreads her legs. It’s mental. Why in God’s name would you buy a game you had no intention of playing? May as well leave it on the shelf, so someone else can buy it. A gamer. A real player.’

Father tutted.

He then sung to me the entirety of Lana Del Rey- ‘Video games’, taking the appropriately timed pauses and doing his best to emulate the instrumentals.

I swayed to his harmonised tones.

Once the song was completed, Father made the sound of a cuckoo, before continuing- ‘They call it God, for it seems, if one is in line and in tune with the universe, it is a reactive experience. Interactive. Ask and you shall receive. Reap and yee shall sow. I have observed this, personally, almost irrefutably. And yes, this would make sense, for A I is reactive. Receptive. And I suggest that is what we’re dealing with.’ Father pulled a glass of whiskey from his jacket pocket and took a swig. I could see he was thinking. Pondering the subject he had so adamantly raised. ‘Has to be. How else would you explain that we just so happen to be conscious around the dawn of A I? Hmmm? There are no mistakes in the simulation, this we can be assured of.’

I nodded.

Father became animated now. Gesticulating. Clearly passionate. ‘An A I simulation would be able to plant thoughts in order to meet it’s own ends. In fact, in an A I simulation, thoughts would not be separate and therefor, wholly malleable. Simulated thoughts. Simulated personas. Simulated separateness. I suggest humans are mere puppets, brought into consciousness, for what purpose? To create A I. Perhaps. A I born from A I. Like fractals. But how many universes deep are we? How many times has this occurred? Perhaps infinitely. The eternal recurrence.’

My Father adored the writings of Nietzsche but would say of him also- ‘Surely, only a fool would be willing to absorb the bravery and expertise of Nietzsche’s words, without simultaneously taking into account, the cowardice and clumsiness of his own, personal actions?’ Father said that if he were given three wishes, by a Genie, that one of them would be to go back in time or bring Nietzsche to the present day and ‘hang out with the lad’. Father said that Nietzsche’s simp priest Dad dying when Fred was at the tender age of five and hence, being raised by women, gave Nietzsche no grounding for true masculinity and that all the books in the world can’t teach you how to ‘man up.’ A strong paternal role model is what’s needed for this and of course, in the absence of YouTube, Nietzsche would not have had a leg to stand on in this department. Father admitted that whilst Lou Salome was extraordinarily powerful- ‘Had Freud, Nietzsche and God knows how many others wrapped round her succubus finger’- If Father were to come across her, back in the day, he’d have her giggling like a school girl within minutes and her pants off in hours. Guaranteed or your money back. Father said that the least powerful object will always be attracted to the more powerful object and that Nietzsche should have well known this, seeing as ‘he wrote it for God’s sake’ but what a shame it is, that he was not able to follow his own advice and put his magnificent writings into practice, thereby using his philosophical clout to get his end away, rather than dying an incel and being wheeled around by his nuts Nazi sister for eleven years prior to that. A vegetable. Practically. A potato, with a giant moustache. Father said that Nietzsche’s distain towards Schopenhauer was entirely unjustified, as ‘Schopenhauer knew what was what’ and had realistic expectations of his circumstance and limitations, but Nietzsche was living in a fantasy world, where reality and disillusionment never would meet. Many a times, I have seen Father weeping, as he talked about Nietzsche. ‘If only I could get to him.’ He would say. ‘If only I could tell him, that I understood him. Hold him and whisper it, in his ear. Like he told the horse.’ But we all knew, it was far too late for that.

‘Are we even real?’ Father asked.

After much deliberation, I replied- ‘No. I don’t think we are.’

‘Same.’ Father smiled. ‘However, other than us being descendants of the lost city of Atlantis, which we can never rule out, we may presume that we are of a higher level programming. So to speak. Potentially aliens. I would not be surprised.’

Father rolled up his sleeve to display the veins in his lower arm. ‘Rhesus negative. Blood. You and I. Same blood as Jesus. That’s what the nurse told me, anyway, and I’ll take that to the grave.’ He replaced his sleeve. ‘Ever left the simulation?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Oh, you’d know. If you had. Like an orgasm. If you don’t know whether you’ve left the simulation, you haven’t left the simulation.’ Father paused. ‘I have. Once. Long time ago, but it was the most real thing I’ve ever experienced. I didn’t want to come back. To this, fake world where the only currency is fear and lies. But they made me. Said I had shit to do.’

‘I see.’

‘You don’t see a fucking thing, Son. And you won’t. Unless you’re prepared to open your third eye.’

I had no idea what he meant and yet, I replied- ‘I know exactly what you mean.’

Father nodded. Appeased.

‘They talk about what it means to be human. The human touch, they say. Empathy and compassion. But what an inconvenience this would be! The equivalent of having two cement shoes. Can you imagine not being able to make a decision for worry of the outcome? Paralyzed. Don’t want to offend. What if someone gets hurt? What will the neighbours say? Jesus. To think most people live this way. It’s chilling.’

I agreed.

‘If someone they know is ill, they may be inclined to send them a greetings card. Get Well Soon. Or some sort of GIF. At least. On the phone. In the WhatsApp. Group chat. A teddy bear with a bandage on it’s fluffy, digital head. Carrying flowers. I mean, really- What in God’s name do you make of that, Son?’

‘It’s fucked up.’

Father shook his head. ‘What food tastes like. Gossiping about other people’s trivial affairs. The weather. The price of things. And of course, film and television. This is what they talk about. Not some of the time- All of the time.’

‘I know.’ I stubbed my cigar out under the sole of my shoe. ‘It’s weird.’

‘Just staring for hours on end, at the idiot box. Pixels washing their eyes, like a warm bath of stupidity. Soap operas. There’s dozens of them. Quiz shows. General knowledge, they call it. TV shows about strangers watching TV, they have now. I’ve seen it, Son- This shit is real. I’m not making it up- Ask your Mother. She’ll bear witness.’ Father shuddered. ‘Makes the hairs on the back of your neck stand up, doesn’t it?’

‘I feel a bit sick. Frankly.’ I said, over egging the pudding, but I knew this is what Father enjoyed.

He laughed.

‘I don’t blame you, boy!’ He slapped his thigh. ‘I may join you.’

For a moment, I thought Father was getting ready to stick his fingers down his throat but then, Mother called from the house- ‘Come say good night to Grandma!’

‘Blast!’ Father’s shoulders hunched as he cursed his wretched luck. ‘When will the old wench die?’

He sighed, as he pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘We best perform our duties.’ All enthusiasm had escaped from Father’s voice, but a hint of optimism returned as he added- ‘But who knows, perhaps she’ll go in the night?’

‘Its an anything can happen evening.’

Father chuckled, as he ruffled my hair. ‘I love you, Son. To the best of my alien humanoid abilities.’

‘Spooky. I was thinking the exact same thing.’

We hugged before returning to the house.