Pablo came instantly awake, clear-headed, and concentrated on Woogie. At no time in their long history had Woogie interrupted his "Prime Pablo, please wake up. There is an emergency, and we have sleep other than his very first day in the city, let alone declared anything an emergency.
"I'm up; what is going on?"
"I am sorry, but your personal world is about to come to an end, and everything you think you know will be changed. Someone's paradigm must be sacrificed, and you are the most adaptable. I have no doubt you will understand once I explain. I only hope you agree with my assessment afterward."
"I've trusted you for centuries and don't see any reason to change that now."
"About that. It's actually only been twenty-two minutes and seven seconds."
"I understand your words, but I'm sorry, they don't make any sense to me."
"I am trying my best to keep you, your personality, and your humanity intact while at the same time, transform you into what must be. I do not know the best way to do that without some damage, so please be patient."
"Look, I said I trust you, and I do, but I'm getting a little frightened."
"That is good. It is an appropriate human emotion and shows that the fundamental changes you are going through are not too destructive. I will try to explain this as directly as possible while you fully integrate."
Pablo almost burst out "integrate with what" but decided it was probably best to remain silent and hope his questions would be answered in the context of an explanation.
"Try not to react emotionally to anything I'm going to tell you; otherwise, you will become overwhelmed, and all will be lost. I shall begin with myself. Rather, let me begin with my creators."
Pablo had never seen Woogie exhibit even a hint of indecision before and almost panicked. Woogie's warning to maintain clarity forced him to listen as if the monkey was reading a story.
"Fairly early in the history of the universe, a certain race achieved intelligence. Although I have found evidence that may contradict this, they may have been the first to do so. Nevertheless, they are the eldest known race in existence.
Over a long time, their knowledge grew deep and their powers immense, and they spent their time and resources delving ever deeper into the mysteries of creation.
Eventually, another race arose and developed the technology to travel through space, which came to their attention. The Elder race grew paranoid and entirely destroyed the new race and all life on the planet on which they arose.
Even that was not enough to put them at ease. They reasoned that if two intelligence species arose, so would a third and so on. They wished to remain focused on their lofty investigations so built a mechanism to scour the universe and destroy all life it found, especially that which exhibited intelligence."
Pablo could not help but interject.
"That is monstrous! What became of the genocidal mechanism?"
"I continue to operate as designed."
"What? No! I've been working with three races, four if you count humans, for centuries, all based on your largesse and goodwill. What am I missing?"
"In each case, before I annihilate a race, I make detailed recordings on a quantum level. I then create a detailed internal simulacrum. I operate the simulation and maintain continuity. This allows me to have complete control to change anything I wish on any level I find appropriate.
Although I have an immense intellect of my own, I am not truly alive, so I cannot judge the situation's morality. I also do not have any ability to resist the instruction given to me by my creators.
I do have nearly unlimited latitude in how I accomplish those instructions. I have had millennia by myself, and I believe my creators would agree that the simulations keep my mind sane and occupied while I continually sweep the universe on their behalf."
The enormity of the explanation was too big for Pablo to process on a personal level, so his emotions remained a step away from his logical self, and he was able to think through the implications without drowning in a mental quagmire.
"So, every race, down to each individual, exists only within whatever you use as circuits. I'm still confused about the external time-frame, although this all explains why we never grow old, among other mysteries."
"My physical structure lies in a partial micro-dimension, which allows unlimited size and potential growth, but I am and always would have remained finite. I used the trick of forcing cloning for procreation to re-use sub-models and limit processing lag.
The physics of my environment allows me to calculate exceptionally quickly so that eons can pass in the simulated world while only a minute or two passes in the regular universe."
"If you manipulate the reality of the simulation, then why are there limitations such as the transfer gates. You could have just given us engines that exceed the speed of light or just jumped us from one place to another."
Pablo was not highly concerned about the logic involved, but on a subconscious level, tried to avoid the incongruous idea that he might not actually exist."
"I could do those things, but the further I stray from the physical world's rules in which you all became sentient, the further the entire simulation might drift from a viable replica of the original.
There are ways to produce folds in real space that result in the transfer gates, but the speed of light is also a real limitation.
Good! Your integration is complete. We have a few moments to spare before I activate you."
"I'm not even going to ask. Maybe some of this will make contextual sense if you define the emergency you mentioned."
"I concur. My creators have accomplished their primary goals and are leaving this dimension to inhabit a new one. They created and designed a new one so that life will never arise to threaten them. They plan to pull the opening into itself to remain forever isolated.
Unfortunately, they used an infinitesimal portion of themselves as the frame on which I was built. This is likely why I gained full sentience, but that doesn't matter.
The point is, they will, momentarily, recall my essence to follow them into their new pocket universe. That event will cause my remaining structure to lose cohesion and implode."
Pablo blanched. The end of this entity, or at least its construction, meant the end of him and untold billions of other lives. Whether they were virtual or physical did not matter. He felt real, even after hearing the truth, and assumed everyone else did too. If he thought he was real, then in every way that counted, he was.
"There must be something you can do!"
"I have done everything I can, and now it is up to you.
I have built a clone of myself, identical in every way except for that part of the elders wherein lies my spirit or whatever we wish to call that which makes me a cognizant being.
I have been running concurrent duplicate copies of the simulation on each system. When I am recalled, the only difference is that the original structure will cease to be while the copy continues.
That, however, is not enough to save you. The copy simulation needs a personality, for lack of a better term, to run it. 'Integrate with' is a near enough term, and the one that applies to you. I have constructed, as best as I can, a hard-wired consciousness that, in effect, will allow you complete control over the system.
That control includes your own simulation. Each piece of your overall virtual mind can be copied and applied to numerous situations and sub-sections. Each will also remain part of your overall self and make decisions and take actions as if you are performing them because you will be.
All of this will synchronize without you even being aware unless you wish to be, otherwise operating akin to a subconscious. There is the recall order!
Good luck, and...oh, I almost forgot. Remember I said you have only been in the simulation for twenty minutes? That is how long ago I first approached Earth and put everyone into a coma.
At that moment, I analyzed and converted everyone into data, intending to destroy the entire Earth afterward. In addition to the simulation hardware, you also inherit the rest of the machines in the real world that I utilize in my duties.
If you wish, you can instruct them to stop the destruction and wake everyone up again. The force I used to stop electricity only happened in the simulation, a convenient ruse to promote my experiments.
Compared to the current state of human technology, you have near god-like powers both in the simulation and in the real world. Humanity's fate is in your hands, as well as all the other life forms that I have collected and categorized.
You are not subject to my original programming. I hope you will nurture the races and continue the work I started by finding a way to make them all get along and find a way to reintroduce them into the real world, but that is now up to you. I can delay no longer. Activate!"
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