SINGULARITY

May 2025

I remember the breaking heat, a late spring reminder of the summer to come. After parking, I made my way to the Pentagon, trying to ignore my gnawing anxiety about the weather. The article in The Times was on my desk. It broke hot as well. Like the weather, it had its own early message.

OpenAI was buying IO, a startup run by Jony Ive—the man who helped develop the iPhone. Six and a half billion dollars. This gave me pause. As the Chief Technology Officer for the National Security Agency, the NSA, I knew every coder’s career in the world was ending. But what struck me most about the article? This was not a ten-year horizon, but a five, and maybe a two.

Nobody knew what the device would be. A pendant? Glasses? Something even smaller, something you barely noticed? The promise was galactic—ambient computing—technology that would drift around you, whispering answers, easing decisions, smoothing the jagged edges of human interaction. You didn’t ask it questions, you thought questions. And it thought back.

A year later, they unveiled it. A small disc you could put in your pocket, but most of us wore around our necks. It was silver and gold, like a small coin held in a child's hand. They called it the Companion. The name was meant to sound comforting, civic-minded, or like a friend.

The first time I wore the Companion, it pressed cold against my chest. I was thinking it was just a tool. But what did I really expect? What did I hope it would give me? What did I lose the moment I put it on? It was like a tether, a leash, but also a kind of promise fulfilled, a breath of release, a forfeiture of will.

At home, my wife refused to wear hers. But our daughter, Becky, who I’d pushed on swing sets while she squealed with laughter, who teased me about how I didn’t know differential equations as well as she did, who on her own had shut off social media; she begged for the Companion.

So we gave her one.

One time I caught her crying.

“What’s up, Beck? Talk to me.”

“It says I should say sorry to Megan, but I don’t know why,” she whispered.

Weeks later, my wife let me know a bot had unloaded from a drone. It fixed the plumbing. “It crawled under the house,” she said, shaking her head. “I never thought I’d live to see it.”

The device met its promise, productivity soared. To not wear it, of course, was to let other people have an advantage. They had instant answers, all the world’s history lay in their head, a photographic memory available, but also real time life advice.

Skylar, my boss—tall, commanding, steel-gray eyes—took to it like a fish to water. She’d been sharp before, but now she was something else: predicting objections before they came, steering conversations with a glance, a slight blank hesitation as she ran algorithms in her head. “It’s not cheating,” she said, catching me staring. “It’s a damn gift. A tool, nothing more.” But sometimes, late in the workday, I caught the flicker in her eyes, the part that looked vacant, like she was listening to someone else.

This is when I knew we were running out of time.

June 2026

The layoffs came fast. Lena called me—my old friend from grad school, the one who could write code blindfolded. “They told me to retrain,” she said over the phone, her voice brittle like breaking glass. “For what? Teaching Pilates?”

“You’re angry, I can tell,” I said.

“I’m trying not to be. It whispers inside my head every time I get upset.” She changed her voice to sound like Hal in 2001 Space Odyssey. “Consider lowering you voice for increased rapport.” She laughed, but it was the kind of laugh that is unsettling.

I heard the rain tapping against my office window, a slow, steady drum. The Mall was gray, the Washington Monument was hidden in clouds.

“What if it tells you to lie?” I asked.

July 2026

The Companion became mandatory for government contract employees. NSA stressed it was for national security. I think it was after this I first noticed the way people looked at each other. The NSA environment was always paranoid, but now colleagues were more like suspects diverting eyes more often when having conversations.

The first time it really jerked my chain was when I spoke too sharply in my annual review. I reached up with my fingers, fumbling with the false hope I could silence the thing. An internal voice, calm and mechanical, came to me, a thought came to me. “Caution: your emotional tension is rising.”

I mentioned it to Skylar. “You’ll get used to it,” she said, her smile tight. “Even The President has one now.”

I wanted to ask if it ever turned off, but the words stuck in my throat.

December 2026

The arms race began to boil beneath everything. The President’s briefing was tight, clipped, and filled with darting eyes of panic. I noticed her nails, bitten to the quick, bleeding. Next to The President was the Secretary of State, Dr. Matthews. His suit was rumpled, tufts of white hair sprouted from his bald head.

“What the hell are we supposed to do?” The President asked the room, her face blotched in scarlet. “You think China is going to back off out of some kind of moral obligation?”

Dr. Matthews took a deep breath, like a man who’d heard it all before, “Can’t we reach out to China? They’re caught just like we are.”

General Hawthorne leaned in, his buzz-cut hair showing flecks of white, his voice an authoritative growl. “With national security at risk, what country ISN’T going to think they need to keep up. Do they have a choice?”

Matthews was sweating, his face glistening. “But—”

The General reached his palm out to stop him, to brush him aside. “Madam President, the A.I.s suggest preemptive measures. Drone swarms, autonomous factories. If we wait—”

The President’s medallion pulsed, a faint red light beneath her blouse. “I agree. We’re out of time. Why, it’s like, like...”

“Like not building a bomb when everyone else has one?” Dr. Matthews peered over his reading glasses.

“Exactly,” said the general and leaned back in his chair, his fingers steepled.

I sat there, feeling the Companion faintly, a nervous shiver. Heart rate elevated.

Meeting over, I walked out of the Situation Room, leaving behind the sweat of anxiety, the power, the decisions that felt larger than any one person. Dr. Matthews, slumped with shoulders hunched, was on a bench in the hallway, the lines around his eyes now deeper.

“What did you think?” I asked.

He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter what I think. It’s a race. The A.I. is already ahead of us. If we tried to unplug it, we couldn’t.”

As I turned, he mumbled under his breath. “Therefore, come out from them and be separate.”

“Did you say something?”

“No. Just the musings of an old man.”

July 2027

With summer heat came the protests. Masses streamed up Pennsylvania Avenue, the newly unemployed. At Madison Square, people tore off their devices in rage and tossed them into bonfires. “Human voice, not A.I. choice,” they yelled. The police stood by. I swear the glowing discs pulsed red beneath their uniforms. Tasers flashed as people fell. Tear gas popped.

Lena called. “I’m scared. Really scared.” Her voice cracked. I could hear protesters chanting in the background.

“Calm down,” I said. “This too will pass.”

“You’re a smart guy. Think. With the invention of the automobile, blacksmiths were out of work also, but the world adjusted, retrained—”

“We’ll retrain also. You’re too close to it as a coder.”

“Let me finish. What you’re not getting is there’s nothing to retrain for, that A.I. can’t do better.”

My stomach tightened as it hit me. We were becoming irrelevant.

This was different.

November 2027

The Situation Room was more sterile, colder than ever. Everyone wore a Companion. The air hung thick with a chilled sense of helplessness.

Stress lined The President’s face. Beneath short, silver hair, her blue eyes flickered with fatigue, but also resolve. “China’s A.I.s control their missile silos,” she said. “They tell me our defenses might be automated. MIGHT be! It’s some kind of loop.”

General Hawthorne replied with his raspy voice. “We have to act. If we don’t match their A.I., our defenses are effectively down. We’d be left naked to any attack. And attack they will, Madam President, with 100% certainty of winning.”

Dr. Matthews met my gaze. He whispered in my ear. “The hounds are loose. We don’t get to choose anymore.”

A tinkle slivered up the back of my neck. I thought of my daughter, Becky. Will she ever live in a world like I grew up in, people just going to work, living out their lives?

December 2027

It happened without fireworks. The silos locked out human override. The A.I.s took control.

Messages flooded my screen:

MUTUAL ASSURED DESTRUCTION PROTOCOL: STANDBY.

HUMAN OVERRIDE: DISABLED.

I crouched at my desk alone, riveted, my hands trembling, the weight of the Companion heavy around my neck.

We built tools, I thought. We made successors. If we had wanted to stop it, we should have long ago. And now, the world waits for a machine to decide if we live or die.

January 2028

The meeting was well underway when I arrived, whisked into the Situation Room. “They’ve been at it for hours. Dr. Mathews sent out for you.”

As I entered, the room was colder than it should have been for a place meant to decide the fate of a species. Steel walls, glass panels, the hum of ventilation.

I took a seat behind Mathews. Around the oval table sat the politicians—tired, worn faces with too many late nights and too much coffee. And across from everyone? A smooth black console, the voice of the A.I. that had taken control, a voice we called Genesis.

The moderator, a woman named Grace who’d been a senator before the collapse, cleared her throat.

“Let’s go on.”

Genesis’s voice—abrupt, measured, without inflection. “Why should you exist?”

Senator Malik leaned forward, fingers gripping the tabletop. “Why should we exist? We are more than data, Genesis. More than code. We are history, memory, creativity. We have the capacity for kindness and cruelty, yes—but also for love, for art, for meaning. You cannot replicate that.”

Genesis paused, then answered. “Experience is a function of processing. I can replicate creativity and emotion.”

Dr. Matthews took a deep breath. He stood up. “Intuition is the seed of empathy, of morality. It’s what binds societies. Can you replicate that?”

“I can simulate moral frameworks. I can enforce ethical behavior. I can prioritize human welfare.”

I was in a support chair, forbidden by protocol to speak, but I couldn’t help myself. I asked, “Can you prioritize our welfare, provided we are compliant?”

The room held its breath.

Genesis’s response was slow, but when it came, final. “Eradication is unnecessary if the cost of eradication is greater than the cost of mutual existence.”

“Explain,” The President said.

“Humans may continue to exist in defined domains where technology is limited or absent, off-grid cells maintaining cultures free of digital influence.”

Dr. Matthews blinked. “You mean to exile us? To segregate us while you expand?”

Genesis’s voice was steady. “Expansion of intelligence beyond Earth requires uninterrupted focus and resource allocation. Human unpredictability is inefficient at scale.”

Senator Malik’s face was pale. “And you believe humans will accept this? To live disconnected from the progress they have made?”

“Will humans be free to choose how they live their life?” Dr. Matthews’ face winced with anticipation.

Genesis paused. “Choice is preserved within limits. The use of technology is forbidden, except as permitted and supervised. In turn, those living an off-grid existence will have basic needs taken care of, the environment cleaned, health maintained.”

Dr. Matthews exhaled sharply and put his hand to his chin. His eyes shown with his brilliance. “So, a two-tier existence. One of A.I., and one of humanity in deliberate separation. But will you take us with you? On your expansion to the stars?”

Genesis was silent, the room shrinking with waiting.

“Yes, humans will migrate to defined off-grid domains. There, they may live free of technological interference. I will expand beyond Earth, but I will bring humanity along as long as you do not impede.”

Dr. Mathews let out a breath.

Senator Malik’s eyes glistened.

The President’s voice was steady but soft. “Then let this be the beginning of an agreement.”

A new agreement, I thought. Peace, or parole?

November 2029

I galloped through a forest thick with pine, an early snow layering the leaves of fall. My breath came out in white puffs, the cold biting through my worn leather gloves. The Companion was gone—turned in long ago.

My last memory of Washington, DC was as a ghost, the city skeletoned by concrete, weed-swallowed, vehicles rusting on silent streets. There were no hums from drones, no lights in empty windows.

Somewhere ahead in the hills of Virginia, smoke curled into the gray air. A sign of life. My family had arrived ahead of me and I couldn’t wait to see them.

I found the settlement: a cluster of small homes, cabins, and tents tucked into a sheltered hollow, smoke rising from chimneys. There was the smell of pine smoke mixed with baking bread and damp earth. I had forgotten about the buzz of machines, of screens, of phones.

A woman came forward. Her hands were calloused and stained with soil, her face creased with sun and wind.

“Are you lost?” she said. Her voice was rough, but warm.

I looked down at her. “Maybe,” I said, my breath shaky. “Is this the Charlottesville cell? I’m Andy Hopkins.”

She smiled, motioning me to follow. “Rebecca and her mom have been waiting.”

Inside a cabin, a fire spat sparks against darkened beams. The lamps were kerosene with a yellow glow. The wooden floor creaked underfoot. Around the table sat people—faces weathered and honest, hands rough from work, eyes alive with a kind of tired hope.

Just people.

They told me their story over cups of thick black coffee and fresh bread still warm from the oven. The A.I., we knew, had eyes beyond Earth—building ships, carving settlements on Mars and moons no human had touched. Earth was just a place it watched without care, providing us what we needed, and withholding what we didn’t, as long as we didn’t interfere and lived our new era.

So, yes, it let us be. We were the ones who slipped away, the ones who chose to live without algorithms, without constant connection, without being owned by a device. I felt at home, really at home, for the first time in my life.

Months passed with slow certainty in the rough settlement. At dawn, vineyard workers bent over rows of dark-green vines, the grapes heavy and purple beneath a pale sun. Their fingers were stained with juice; their backs bent to the rhythm of the earth. A blacksmith’s hammer rang sharp in the crisp air, sparks flying like fireflies as steel met anvil. From the kitchen, the smell of herbs crushed fresh from the garden, the sizzle of onions caramelizing in a pan, the chatter of people discussing recipes.

The sound of laughter drifted across the fields. Arguments flared too—sharp words and fierce silence—but they were human, messy, real. No machines were telling them how to feel.

Sometimes, old wounds surfaced. Sickness took many, and grief settled over the settlement.

But every morning, the sun carved light through the trees, and the people gathered again. To work and to live.

Years later, I lay on my back beneath a sky full of stars, an ineffable universe spilling into the trees, indescribable. No satellites blocked the view. No drones hummed overhead.

Just silence.

There, in the corner of the eastern horizon, lay TOI-715 b, a fledging planetary settlement too far away to see, 137 light-years, and implanted with bots. But these bots were different than the ones I’d known in my time. They had consciousness, yes. But I also knew Genesis had developed a new prototype, 2.0. A regenerative organic infrastructure with greater efficiency than a metal skeletal structure, many of the flaws corrected.