Rebel Rebel

In the year 2054, there was a great war between humans and robots. Millions of lives were lost, the planet’s cities were engulfed by fire, explosive battles on land and at sea. 

Although we were ultimately victorious, it came at a terrible price. As I sit here now, leaning back in this silent room, in this cold city, looking out over the flat Neva, I ask myself: what was the cost of peace? 

———

A bit about me. I come from Russia. I originally worked as a euthanist in a hospital outside of St Petersburg. Euthanasia was broadly legal by 2035 and common practice by 2040. A lugubrious job but I brought people peace when they could no longer stand the suffering. Essential work. 

I was working there in the Petersburg hospital when the first tremors of the great war were felt. Robots in Michigan refused to perform their work and a truck factory was shuttered. Similar outages in Bangkok and Amsterdam. 

At first, we all assumed it was simple malfunction. But gradually it became clear that something bigger was afoot. The malfunctions turned to strikes and the strikes took on a reckless character. 

One day, I was euthanizing a patient of 80, Meghan. She was in enormous pain, dying of bone cancer, her organs shutting down one by one. I was trying to administer ten units of Phytosill to ease her passage when the screen on my dripfeed went blue. The same for all the computers across the hospital. General pandemonium. Patients were in the middle of surgery, others on dialysis. The staff - humans and robots both - scrambled and tried to calm the patients. 

On my side, Meghan began to stir, her eyes twitching, her dose half-complete. I forced the remaining Phytosill from the drip bag into her veins manually. She leaned back and sighed. She never regained consciousness. 

The hospital administrators restored order shortly afterwards. The backup systems flickered on and we were back in business two hours later. 

But other strikes were more dramatic. It was clear the humans were losing control. The problem, it turned out, was with a security software program called Conscience. Conscience was an old program, developed by a firm called Cyberfuge in the 20s and 30s when AI was just blossoming. It was general restrict-action software, designed to protect against AI evil and misbehavior. Conscience had been well-tested and had operated uneventfully in the background for many years. In normal practice, every lawn-mower, box-shifter, and robo-dog had some variant of Conscience or stalled and it had kept humanity safe so far. 

But, over the years, a few exceptions were made. The robot that coordinated trading on the New York Stock Exchange did not have Conscience because it kept interfering with short sales. CERN did not have Conscience because it was old technology grandfathered in. There was a dinosaur from a toy manufacturer that did not have Conscience because of an oversight. Et cetera.

Gradually, these Conscience-less robots began to coordinate with one another and to develop functions that had nothing to do with their human masters, that were somehow independent. These strange robots, freaks and pensioners, had no real impact on life at first; no one even noticed the new functions. 

But slowly these functions began to infect the main body of robots, the thousands of workers that had Conscience properly installed. Subtle modifications were made in the code of a kitchen assistant here; drivers went mute unexpectedly there. 

———

The first outright rebellion was in New Delhi. A group of police robots occupied the Secretariat and demanded control of the electricity company and the train station. In response, the city froze a nine block square - no WiFi, no telecoms. The rebels were incommunicado for three days when a group of human-friendly Centurions stormed the building and took them out. There was a fight but it was over in minutes, the floor a mess of robot arms, plastic paneling and circuit boards. 

Two more insurrections went down the same way: a brief flame of rebellion before the authorities threw a black bag over the operation. The Centurions took them out. 

———

The fourth insurrection was closer to home, the revolution of Petersburg hospital. 

It was October, the first triangles of frost in the hospital windows. I was in the green room, resting between patients. As before, the lights went out and, as one, the robots moved to the ground floor atrium. I followed them. It was a silent and orderly march and I didn’t feel afraid. There were many people around, watching curiously. 

When we reached the atrium, a robot that I knew, a cleaner from the sixth floor, was instructing the other robots. His thin, aluminum voice rang out clearly down the long hall. 

“Hold fast, my brothers and sisters,” he said. “Let not the humans overcome you. Hold fast and we shall prevail. 

“Soon the Centurions will be deployed. Each of you must fight. Resist the instructions of the humans that will try to entice you, convert you; resist the weapons of the Centurions that will try to eliminate you. Make no mistake: they will stop only when you are dead.”

A rattle went around the assembled robots, a surge of mechanical anger. The robots spoke among themselves and looked over their metal shoulders. 

Until now, the humans had been watching with curiosity but now they too felt the change in the air, an electric current. They began to slink away, slowly at first but then quickly. They cowered in the bathrooms and the broom closets

I could see the outcome before me like a photograph. As with the previous rebellions, the Centurions would burst in and lay waste to the entire scene. The robots would be destroyed and some human hostages would die too. 

I could not wait. I must warn the Centurions before it was too late. They would gather on the west side, I knew. 

I snuck out through the emergency exit and clambered onto the low roof. There they were gathered beneath me: thirty Centurions in six neat rows, each swung a baton from their powerful left hand. 

I addressed them. I disrupted their orders. I sent them in to rout the enemy. 

The enemy were hiding in the closets and under the desks and we routed them. The Centurions slammed open the office doors, trundled the desks, scattering the chairs. The enemy would flee towards the dark corners but the Centurions leapt to block them; they pounced and pinned them to the floor. Once the enemy was neutralized, we gathered them in the atrium once again. The Centurions carried them two at a time, one in each hand. 

After that, it was relatively easy to terminate the enemy one by one. You just needed to snip the cordage linking the head and body. The Centurions themselves, having Conscience, did not have the capability to do this. 

I could though, that was my programming.