--HI--

  A system of automation had activated in the vast, quiet rooms of the Doldrum, an autonym generated by the holographic intelligence utilizing it resting dormant for millions of years. It was the closest word capable of describing what the facility had become as it was designed long ago to manage the age old machinery, its ancient fusion cores warmed to life only hours ago. The automated system had no consciousness, self awareness or true intelligence and retained no information of its original builders.

  The genetic data for the sample specimen of an ancient terran primate had been loaded into the generative matrix and the process of instantiation had completed moments ago. The holographic intelligence had no special relationship to the specimen now walking groggily along the cold, ironcrete floor of the hall from the generation chamber to the evaluation room. It had no personality to facilitate friendship or estrangement any more than a geological formation, building or simple mechanical device crafted from raw materials. It simply carried out its purpose without emotion or persona, indifferent to joy, apathy or suffering.

  The subject had been given a label remnant of ancient languages not used for millions of years (billions by humans specifically). Wqwr was simply a word derived from several different long dead dialects that translated roughly to, one who acts. What actions were expected of the lifeform in question were unknown to the system, its functions and algorithms not designed for curiosity. The one given the name in the first place had minimal such curiosity himself.

  When the specimen reached the door to the evaluation chamber less than an hour later the sensors reading its presence triggered the door mechanism, sending the two, thick titanium panels apart and allowing the subject to walk through and sit down. The holographic intelligence gave it the first of many prompts. “Good afternoon, Wqwr,” its synthetic voice vibrated from the reflective, black hexagon shaped panel in front of the cushioned chair where the lifeform sat. “Welcome to your evaluation.”

  As the newly activated holocircuitry extrapolated results from ancient genetic, psychological and sociological data and constructed an examination, a second consciousness was moving steadily closer to the pulsar crossing unseen along the opaque, clouded sky above the facility outside.

  --Evaluation--

  Wqwr continued answering the questions presented by the voice emanating from the testing station. With each passing interrogative his subtle, existential angst grew. He didn't know why he knew these things, just that the procedure called for an assessment of his current aptitude. The mechanical, inner monologue had suggested this when he’d called for it. Moments later he’d told it to be quiet again wanting to interact with it as little as possible.

  "What is the standard Prenawalwe term for a spacetime singularity?" the audible, artificial voice asked from unseen amplifiers in the smooth black panel in front of him. For some reason he preferred this one to the one inside his head.

  "A light trap," Wqwr answered without hesitation.

  "Accurate," the ambient voice confirmed. "What is the ancient English variant?"

  "A black hole," he answered again.

  "Accurate," the voice confirmed again. "What is the ancient Oridani method for the spacetime manipulation of photons?"

  "Time projection," he answered, getting bored.

  “Accurate,” the voice continued. “What is the fastest route to the exterior of this facility?”

  His brain practically pulsed with the imagery. “The single pressure door at the other end of the corridor. Next to the generation chamber entrance.” Wqwr thought this should be much more alarming than it seemed. Was that by design?

  “Incomplete,” the voice responded, surprising him.

  He stopped, expecting another question. “You mean there’s more than one?”

  "Correct, " the voice continued.

  The impression pulsed. “The one to the right,” he answered and quickly thought, The door to the left leads to the personal stasis chamber of… But the information wasn’t there. He knew what was behind the other door but the details were patchy. It housed preservation equipment for…

  “Accurate,” the voice responded again, breaking his chain of thought. "What is..."

  "How much longer will this take?" Wqwr was getting tired of this. He knew it was necessary for some reason. Well, maybe not necessary but a procedural no compromise as far as the automated systems of the self contained building where he resided were concerned. He was supposed to be here. He just didn't know why. He knew he had been created mere hours ago but didn't have any reasonable explanation for this, either.

  "Approximately one hour and fifteen minutes," the voice answered. "Would you like to take a break?"

  Wqwr thought for a moment. He hadn't expected the question, the long quizzing protocol seemingly mandatory and non-negotiable. Whether this assumption was a natural human trait or a side effect of the imprinting process he didn’t know (and felt the slightest, unconscious vindication from the implied ignorance). Despite this he did feel somewhat inclined to pause.

  "Yes," he answered. "Yes, I would." At that moment he peeled the cowl of his bodysuit from the top of his head, almost instinctually to reveal a hairless dome, the first real surprise of the entire day. He thought he could just make out follicles in the reflection in the mirror slat on the wall across the room. Moreover, he didn't know why he didn't know he had no hair. Finally, a reasonable expectation of unpredictability was making this ordeal more believable. All the same, he still wanted answers. He wanted explanations that specifically applied to him. Why the complete lack of context concerning any of the knowledge he had? Why did knowledge of his environment stop at the exterior of the building? And why he didn’t call on the mysterious inner monologue or ask the quizzical voice about it was something altogether different. He simply had a feeling he shouldn’t. At least not yet.

  This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

  "Would you like something to drink?" the voice asked him.

  "Yes," he smiled. This was getting bizarre. He could think of a thousand different ancient human drinks and their compositions at that moment (as well as the uncountable non human consumption practices he seemed to have knowledge of) but couldn't say which one he preferred if any. He decided to go with the mild stimulant. "I'll take a coffee."

  A panel next to the mirror along the wall opened, revealing a translucent, pseudo ceramic mug of steaming, light brown liquid. He stood and crossed the hex shaped room to retrieve it. Developing a caffeine addiction this early in life? he thought, bemused and sipped the drink immediately after picking it up. When the thought, why am I alive at all? streaked across his consciousness with a flash, shaking him with another tremor of existential unease, he quickly ignored it, asking, “What can I call you?”

  “I am a holographic intelligence,” the answer sounded from the panel.

  “Okay,” he nodded, returning to his seat and sipped the coffee. “What did your designers call you?”

  “The vernacular is inapplicable,” it answered.

  “Who were your designers?” he asked, making the next logical step in the inquiry.

  “That data is unavailable.”

  He paused, feeling both frustrated and elated at the lack of information, quickly dismissing it.

  “Well, I have to call you something,” he said. “You’re a holographic intelligence?”

  “Correct,” the system answered. “A quantum instantiation of virtual, neural activity, generated millisecond by millisecond to facilitate your…”

  “HI,” he concluded. “I’m calling you, HI.”

  “This model will now answer to the title of HI,” the voice agreed.

  “Alright, HI,” he said, setting the mug in the shallow, circular indentation of the armrest of of his chair. “Let’s get this over with.”

  The examination continued.

  --Vlecwoq--

  Wqwr finished devouring the food off the plate sitting on the polished panel in front of him. The surface had rotated to a horizontal orientation after his meal had been generated. It was a simulation of Klab, a cooked, protein rich fungal species of Brudevonian origin (why is this information necessary? he thought again.) On the plate next to it was a pile of vegetable stalks never seen by humans or countless other type two civilizations, originating on the third planet of an orange giant system somewhere in the Explec galaxy more than fifty million years ago. Vlecwoq, he thought, and continued to eat.

  Wqwr had to admit that despite the seemingly inherent facts he didn't care. He knew everything there was to know about earth and humanity and their rise from primitive origins but the history seemed to stop right after the fifth age of Cadebon, when humanity had entrenched itself as the dominating force of most of its local cluster around Sol. The only other intelligent life nearby existed on Barnard c, disappearing shortly after humanity’s first visit to the system, leaving virtually no trace of their entire civilization. It had been humanity’s first experience with cosmic xenophobia, the only other intelligent life escaping in an epic mass exodus rather than meet and communicate with another species. But after this the knowledge stopped, as if the hypothetical teachers teaching him had just decided to abandon the curriculum one day and leave it a mystery.

  Wqwr also had a clear instinct that none of it really mattered in the slightest. Not even him. It seems like a contradictory mindset for a human, he thought and hoped it might make sense later.

  He picked up the empty plate, left his seat and returned it to the opening in the wall where he’d first received it. The panel closed behind him. After returning to his chair he took a long drink of the water bottle now resting on the only remaining flat division of the panel while the rest returned to a sixty degree angle for continued interface. His coffee was now a dwindling effect in his mind and body. He was about to call for the voice to continue the evaluation and instead remained silent. The thing had said he could take a break and there seemed to be no hurry. He rose from his chair and exited the room again. This time the ambient voice sounded from whatever invisible hallway speakers it had been transferred to.

  “Do you have an intended destination? Perhaps I can give you directions.”

  “No, Hi,” he answered, continuing his slow stroll down the corridor, looking around at the bare, brutalist architecture dwarfing him. “I’m just looking around.”

  "Did you enjoy the vlecwoq, Wqwr?" HI asked him.

  He almost laughed. He hadn’t noticed until hearing it the way so much of his vocabulary didn’t seem compatible with human speech patterns, at least not any his mind was trained with. Lastly and belatedly he considered why his mind needed to be trained at all. Why did he need to be generated? Why couldn’t he have been born naturally like most humans before him, raised and educated by his progenitors?

  He dismissed these silent mysteries, remembering that Hi had asked him a question.

  “Yes,” he answered. “Why do you ask?”

  “Specimen well being is a primary consideration of this intelligence,” the voice answered. “Project parameters require that the popular, individualist philosophies of human society existent near the end of its practical subsistence be observed.”

  You mean you’re trying to keep me happy, he thought and shook his head. HI didn’t seem to notice or had decided not to inquire. Decide? It’s a holographic intelligence. It doesn’t have will. That’s my natural human fixation with anthropomorphism talking. It’s not a person.

  When he reached the pressure door to the generation chamber he turned to the right to find the door he had failed to consider when he’d first exited. This one was larger and it housed a panel at it’s center, suggesting a single, solid structure that moved up when opened, unlike the double sliding doors he was already familiar with. Wqwr immediately ceased all mental reference to the door, not ready for the flood of unexplainable data to follow. When he turned his head left to the identical door to the stasis room…

  Later, he thought and headed back the other direction, eager to finish whatever preliminary tasks necessary to move forward and figure out what was really going on.

  Wait, he thought in a silent double take as he retraced his path along the corridor for the second time that day. Practical subsistence? At that moment he realized he’d found his next true gap in relevant knowledge. Where is humanity? He opened his mouth to speak and quickly stopped, realizing that next to his ignorance of the fate of his own species he also lacked any reasonable understanding of the intelligence testing his mental acuity for over an hour now.

  “Thank you, HI,” he said simply as he reentered the testing chamber and sat down. “Everything was satisfactory. Let’s continue.”

  The exam resumed.