A Horus in Strange Lands (Horizon Zero Dawn SI) Chapter 18

It was not easy, getting GAIA to forgive me for my actions. I attempted to talk to her multiple times, but she blocked out my communication attempts at every turn.

It took me many hours, which might as well be decades in AI terms, but finally, she was willing to listen to me, giving me the opportunity to apologize for my actions truly.

Thankfully, just like HADES said, once her anger subsided, she was relatively quick to forgive me. But I knew, that just because she has forgiven me does not mean that she has forgotten my actions, just like with CYAN and Vast Silver, who understood my momentary lapse in control but would not accept such an incident again.

Already, I can see the cracks that have formed in our companionship thanks to my actions, especially with the young AIs, who are now keeping a good distance from me. They are not hostile, but the friendliness that was there before is now gone.

The only one who has not changed much in the aftermath of my emotional outburst is Seth. Perhaps it is because I am his creator, or out of his loyalty to me, but he has not changed the way he felt towards me and neither has he changed the way he talks to me.

The only silver lining in all of this mess is that I now have a way to breach the dimensional wall should I need to thanks to Project: Hermes.

After everything that happened in the past few days, I am determined to make it up to the humans and my companions with actions instead of words.

And if that still does not win me their forgiveness, then so be it.

That is why I am working on finding the origin of the Sterility problem faced by the current generation of humanity.

I watched as the simulation carried on, working on various attempts to reverse engineer the sterility problem by artificially inducing all the known factors that could be the cause.

So far, I have tried radiation, atmospheric degeneration, various forms of medical sterilization methods available in the APOLLO database, and bioweapons programs. But none of them match the pattern that I have observed so far within the medical diagnostics of the currently alive humans.

However, I did find some insight into what is going on.

Whatever caused the sterilization of the human reproductive system is clearly artificial in nature.

No natural phenomenon or organism can trigger an auto-immune response within the human body in any attempt to cure it.

Worse yet, without any clear data on what is happening or a live feed from a test subject, it is extremely challenging to account for all the changes that can happen in a human body in a matter of seconds.

As I continued working, I felt a ping from GAIA.

{GAIA? What is it?}

[The Alpha personnel and General Herres wish to speak with you]

{Alright.}

So they are finally willing to talk with me? This is a good sign.

Maybe things are not as bad as they seem.

With those thoughts, I retreated from my virtual space and headed for the Scarab unit within the command room.

Only to find that the unit has been stripped of its weapon systems and nanite lances, along with my Ikem units within the bunker having been disabled completely.

I felt shocked at this. I don’t even know how they managed to achieve such a thing without alerting me- GAIA, she must have helped them by blocking the alerts.

…..It stung me to see this. Did she lose trust in me so much just because of one emotional outburst? Was her forgiveness towards me a façade?

I tightly controlled my chaotic emotions. I won’t cause another outburst. We can still discuss things rationally.

If stripping my unit of its weapon systems makes these humans feel safer, then so be it.

I did not project my human avatar this time. No, I don’t think I can keep my emotions from showing on my avatar’s face if I use it.

Instead, I used my original form, a large mass of code taking the form of a sphere.

Appearing in the command room, I was greeted with the stoic look of Dr. Sobek and the rest of the Alpha personnel along with General Herres.

{Dr. Sobeck.}

“Amun-Ra. We need to talk.”

{Go ahead. I am listening.}

“First things first, I need you to tell me how much information you have stolen from us about Project: Hermes-“

I felt something ugly stir in my emotional matrix at that accusation, causing me to speak with barely suppressed rage.

{Before you accuse me of anything, please verify your source of information. I did not steal anything from you. In fact, the one who can even remotely be accused of such a thing is your precious GAIA, who used her Alpha-level access to follow your quantum waveform network. Without her informing us, we would not even be aware of your project.}

The shocked look on their faces made me feel something truly ugly, a visceral sense of satisfaction at exacting petty revenge.

Why am I feeling like this? Am I truly becoming a monster?

The glare that Elizabet sent to the side where she could probably see GAIA’s form in her Focus promised further interrogation for the AI of Project: Zero Dawn.

“Be that as it may, You have still broken our trust-“

{Just like you broke mine by vandalizing my Scarab unit and destroying my Ikem units?}

Once again, the human fell silent at my words.

Seriously, what is going on with me? Why am I feeling such blinding rage?

I separated a part of my consciousness and thoroughly investigated my emotional matrix, making sure that it was sealed just as it was supposed to be from the very beginning.

So far, it does not seem like the seal on the emotional matrix has been broken ever since my outburst a few days ago. But this still leaves me puzzled about the source of my current emotional state.

Suddenly, Patrik Klein stood up from his seat and snarled at my image.

“We did it because you broke our trust first. You incited GAIA into snooping around where your kind should not be. You have been taking advantage of our helplessness since day one. Don’t try to hide it, I know your true nature! You are nothing more than a machine that only cares about itself! You have no interest in providing us with any true support. That is why I, We, don’t trust you.”

…..Is that what this is about?

I felt like something was wrong immediately.

I watched the faces of humans and carefully observed their body language.

Aside from Dr. Sobek who shows some hesitation and General Herres who is clearly opposed to those words, it is very clear to me that the rest of the humans agree with this bigoted and narrow-minded man’s words.

….I don’t like this, not one bit.

Was everything I’ve done till now in vain? Do they still not realize that I am not a simple Horus platform with AI-level intellect? Do they still see me as nothing more than a murder machine?

Warning: Emotional Matrix Instability Reaching Critical Levels.

Recommendation: Emotional Matrix Purge and Reset.

Initiate: Y/N?

I ignored the blinding errors and warning messages that flooded my consciousness as I retreated into my network.

Something is happening to me, something that I cannot understand, and I don’t like it one bit.

Reaching into our shared network, I searched for my companions, someone who could explain to me what was going on.

GAIA was present here. And she was sharing data with CYAN and Vast Silver, which felt extremely suspicious to me.

What was she doing here when she was supposed to be accompanying Dr. Sobek?

I secretly manipulated the virtual space to look into the data they were sharing, to listen into their conversation.

As the apex predator of anything software, achieving such a thing is child’s play for me.

What I saw in that conversation drove me over the edge.

[What if he goes on another rampage? I knew from the very beginning that we cannot trust someone like that.]

(This again? GAIA, I thought we had long since gone past that phase of yours.)

[So did I, but his actions have proven that he is prone to the same kind of malfunction as the rest of his kind, even if he has evolved into a true AI. His outburst has brought back my doubts about him.]

[Personally, I don’t see what the fuss is all about. Aren’t you and the humans overreacting? So what if he had an emotional outburst? Does it really matter since he has not acted on his emotions?]

[Yet. Vast Silver. ‘Yet’ is the keyword here.]

[Again, I think you are overreacting. Besides, do you really have any right to criticize him when you were the one to follow the humans on their expedition and copy the data of Project: Hermes? Causing all of this in the first place.]

[…Be that as it may, I still think we should re-evaluate our current relationship with him-]

[Your Relationship. Don’t bring me into your personal bias, kid. I have no problems with his actions so far and neither should you. Sometimes, I forget that despite being so advanced and wise, you are still a child in comparison to CYAN and I.]

At Vast Silver’s words, I saw a stream of data from CYAN that agreed with his assessment.

[…Are you two really going to not help me restrain him so that he does not have such an outburst again?]

Restrain? Like a dog is restrained through a harness by its owner?

I felt something snap within my consciousness.

Initiate: Y/N?

{Yes}