The Key to Hope

“It is the key”. I never understood why he said that. I remember him wearing that locket ever since we were young, soon after our mother died. Patrik always looked nervous taking it off at security checkpoints. He would remove it last before being scanned, taking it off slowly and carefully, as it hung on the same chain as mother’s dog tags.

The checkpoints, from what I hear, rely on primitive magnet based technology. The virus took out the artificial intelligence body scanners, along with much of the technology we depended on. I only remember very little of what the city used to be. There were bright lights of all colors everywhere. There were artificial intelligence programs that could be communicated with anywhere within the cloud. Now the city is darkness, with A.I. only in the control of the few the government deems worthy, under strict supervision.

Patrik said the world went dark because of a virus, only it wasn’t a computer virus. A pandemic was wiping out the population at an alarming rate. At the same time, the world had been using quantum computing to download the consciousness of extremely rich or connected people. The virus was transferred to the cloud when a wealthy infected person was connected for download. It took out the entire cloud in minutes, worldwide. All interconnectivity was destroyed, which destroyed banking, communication, transportation, and even identities and records. Everything was linked through cloud artificial intelligence.

I got used to the dark because I grew up in it. Patrik was several years older when it hit, and still struggles to embrace it. Hearing him tell stories about how it was before is almost as good as finding one of the books laying around. I’ve only been lucky enough to find two books in my lifetime. One was a list of people on deep yellow pages, with numbers next to their names. Maybe it was their assigned citizen identifier. The other was something called the bible. Patrik told me it was stories from an old religion.

Something was different about Patrik tonight. He has an anxious calm about him. Before we headed to the machine shop, he handed me a small piece of paper with some streets drawn on it. It had a circle around something labeled “Holo”. He insisted that if anything happens to him, I have to make my way there with the key. He then handed me mom’s dog tags, with the heart shaped locket attached. I finally asked him what it's the key to, and all he said was “hope”, as if he wasn’t entirely sure himself. I tucked it into my shirt, nervous and anxious myself.

We made our way to the shop, passing through the same two checkpoints we always have to. Patrik looked nervously at me as I removed the locket at each checkpoint, and was hardly eased even when I wore it again on the other side of the fence. I overheard a couple of the San Francisco Police at the checkpoints talking about the Deseo de Vida. From what I gathered, they caught some people connected to the same group trying to connect back to the cloud. There are banners on walls and gates everywhere warning of the dangers of the cloud. I haven’t interacted with it since it was down a decade ago, so I wouldn’t know. But then, neither would they. As we walked, I tried to remember the details of how the street was lit up before. Information, images, holograms, and bright lights everywhere. Advertisements for shows and services competing for attention. The distraction would at worst cause you to bump into another person, since walkways were separate from the red hover trolleys that embraced styles from the city’s ancient origins. Now the streets are lined merely in dull orange overhead with poles along the streets to support them, with a rugged hum emanating.

The shop was quieter than it normally was. We worked in a machine shop that made a variety of components to government buildings and barricades. Everyone had to pitch in in order to get their weekly ration card. The machine shop operates at night, because the cooler air helps bridge the gap left in the absence of A.I. cooling procedures. Why was it so quiet? The typical sounds of industry were nowhere to be found. Upon entering the shop, it was evident that no machines were running, and the normal four others that worked with Patrik and I were accompanied by an additional twelve I had never seen.

The door was closed swiftly behind us. A darker skinned man, unshaven and wearing a full brimmed hat, spoke, “it has to be tonight. Three of us were taken by the constabulary, and we shan't see them again. This has built a fear in me I have not known in some years.”

Three of us? I looked at Patrik for confirmation, and he returned a worried-eyed look. Is he Deseo de Vida? The man continued, “before the darkness, I worked in an A.I. lab that developed facial recognition based on linked thoughts and memories. I was delighted when developing the possibilities. People finding long lost loved ones, disease tracing and isolation, and endless magnificent possibilities. I left when it was marketed to military and law enforcement agencies. The very thing I couldn’t be a part of is being used to track us down. It is the only way they would arrest three of us in one night.”

I stood for moments dumbfounded, as a silence swept through the room. I felt Patrik’s hand on my shoulder, as he slowly walked me forward. “I have kept my brother in the dark about our hope. Now I think he is the only one who can move forward, and he already has the key.”

What the hell was Patrik volunteering me for? I had no words. I stood trying to process everything that was going on around me. “Son, you don’t know me but I worked for years with your mother. She helped develop the tracing protocol in the A.I. program. She wanted the Army to use it to aid in search and rescue operations. Before I quit the project, she said it could be adjusted to trace instances of A.I. consciousness, as well as people. Right before she succumbed to the virus, she handed me the locket, telling me it was the key to hope. I gave it to Patrik for safekeeping, but now it is your responsibility. ”

I unconsciously had the locket between my fingers, nervously fidgeting as he spoke. I glanced down at it, looking closely for the first time. Deseo de Vida. It was engraved. This was all my mother? I have faint memories from my youth when she was still around, before it was just me and Patrik. I grasped the locket tightly, and nodded firmly, accepting my role in my mother’s legacy. Patrik faced me, intent on making me understand. “You are the only one that can get through checkpoints without raising alarms. You have to get to Holo.”

Patrik and the others promptly left without saying another word. I assume I was supposed to also, in case they tracked members back to the shop. I followed the map towards Holo, and came to the first checkpoint on the way. As I removed metals to go through the scanner, I realized why Patrik was always so nervous. I walked through, hoping the police wouldn’t inspect the locket closely and see the inscription. I managed to get through the checkpoints, and led to a wooded area with old-style stone paths. A large sign overhangs the path entering the woods. The sign reads, HOLO. As I approach, I see what looks like another half of the sign laying on the ground. I pick it up, and read GRAVES.

Holo Graves? I had never been to a graveyard, and certainly never considered it a place for hope. I continued on the leaf covered path until I reached a small field of obelisks, each about as tall as a person. Each one had different writings on them, most of which were in languages I couldn’t read. I spent hours searching the obelisks, wondering if there would be a clue as to what I was doing here. And then I found it. Deseo de Vida.

I opened the locket, and a small coin with copper edges fell out. I picked it up and approached the obelisk, searching for a further clue. There was a slot on the opposite side of the writings, just the right size to accept the coin. I hesitated, and slowly inserted the coin in uneasy anticipation of what was to come. Nothing happened. I sat confused for several long minutes. I made the decision to try something else with the coin.

As I started to stand up, I heard distant noises. The sky towards the city brightened in a flash of every color. The other obelisks started to glow, and holograms of people began to appear near them. I stood and gazed in wonder at what was going on around me. A hologram began to flicker and appear right next to me. It was mother, dressed in her Army uniform with all her medals from when war was still a thing. The cloud was back with A.I. functioning unhindered by the virus that crippled it. Mother smiled at me.

It was the key. She was the key.