Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

by Chris Sokn

"We stand now where two roads diverge. But unlike the roads in Robert Frost's familiar poem, they are not equally fair. The road we have long been traveling is deceptively easy, a smooth superhighway on which we progress with great speed, but at its end lies disaster. The other fork of the road--the one "less traveled by"--offers our last, our only chance to reach a destination that assures the preservation of the earth."

Rachel Carson

Mark Hunter was propelled awake by the loud voices on his clock radio. After doing his daily debate of wether to smack the snooze button and return to sleep or to get up and go to work. Mark's conscience got the best of him, as he remembered what today was. Slowly, he propped himself up against the wall behind his bed and rubbed the sleep from his eyes, as the broadcast on the radio slowly became noticeable to him.

"Logicorp, the innovative technology company as well as the world's frontrunner in artificial intelligence, announced yesterday that the completion of what the public only knows as codename Genesis, the first completely self reliant and free-thinking computer, will be completed early this week in one of the divisions of the companies orbital research station. The news of this breakthrough drove shares of Logicorp to a new record high. Here speaking about the breakthrough is Logicorp president and CEO, Alan Christian."

Mark laughed to himself as he got out of bed and stumbled to the shower. He had been working on project Genesis for the last five years of his life, and it had been completed before he was even hired. Testing and retesting, day and night, had been the brunt of his existence at Logicorp for the Genesis project, and despite the fact that he was paid a small fortune, he wished he had listened to his mother about pursuing a more glamorous legal career instead of the computer science program at MIT like his father suggested. Mark got into the bathroom, took off his clothes and jumped in the shower. He turned the shower radio on, and listened as the hot water roused him up.

"...project is going to change the face of humanity for ever. When finished, problems that would take millions of humans working on the same task or idea for a billion years to complete will be answered in minutes. When you look at the milestones Logicorp has brought in the past, such as the first faster-than-light engine, the frictionless ball bearing, the mitosis enabled nerve cell, and our hundreds of other patents, everyone has made the world a better place to live, and this invention is going to move us into areas only dreamed of in science fiction," the CEO said, grossly exaggerating Genesis' power.

Mark winced a little as his shampoo ran into his eye. He made a quick laugh as he rubbed his stinging eye, thinking about how humans have found ways to fly faster than the speed of light but still have not fixed the basic things in life. Earth was still being destroyed by pollution, overcrowding, and a million other things. Everyone was to busy making money and technical advances to care that the planet was slowly going the way of the buffalo, but Mark had decided that he would change that later today.

One of the stipulations of working on project Genesis was that each team member got a chance to possibly ask it a question, and Mark was one of the lucky few that was chosen at random. He and four of the other team members got their chance that afternoon when Genesis would be turned on and allowed to function on its own for the first time. He was debating what the correct way to word his question as he brushed his teeth. Maybe he would ask it "What is the best way to save the planet", or "What should humans do to save the planet." He rinsed his mouth out, and walked back to his bedroom to put on his company issued attire.

After finishing dressing himself in the company pride inducing logo shirt, he walked over to his mirror and neatly combed his short hair. He listened to the radio as it the newscaster talked about a recent oil spill off the coast of Australia, and Mark shook his head in disbelief. As he got out his electric razor and began to shave, he thought to himself of what other people were going to ask the computer. Mark was positive someone else would ask something really stupid given the chance, and his money would go for one of his friends who really wanted to know if the Dolphin's were going to win the Super Bowl this year. Luckily, he was one of the three people of the hundreds who had worked on the project who received the honor.

Mark walked back around his bed and shut the radio off. He looked at his watch, and noticed that he had time to eat breakfast, a rare occurrence for him. He walked out of the bedroom, and into the living quarters of his apartment on the research station. It was more spacious than the rooms of some of the company underlings, but Mark wished he could be back on Earth, especially when he looked at the electronic display on the wall, constantly placed to resemble a window looking out into a wooded back yard. Mark stared into the display, and saw the same two squirrels chase each other around the grass that he had seen every morning since he bought the thing. Looking at it now simply reminded him of how bad he wanted to leave his cold, metallic existence and go back home. Every time he had put in for a movement application, he had been denied because of his work on project Genesis. The only point for putting the team on the research station instead of one of the facilities on Earth was to keep them from leaking information to rival companies and the public.

Mark walked over to the kitchen area to find something to eat.

"Television on. Channel fifteen," Mark stated clearly.

The television turned itself on instantly and switched to channel fifteen while Mark rummaged through his refrigerator and cabinets. After settling on a bowl of cereal, he poured it and the milk into a bowl and payed attention to his television display, checking his watch every few minutes to make sure he would not be late for work.

"..he scored thirteen points in the fourth quarter and hit a clutch three-pointer to seal the win for Atlanta, as well as a playoff berth. That's it for sports, be sure to tune in tomorrow night after the game for the Logicorp Post Game Show, back to you Tina."

Mark shoveled the cereal into his mouth, dribbling some of the milk onto his chin, which he promptly wiped away with his sleeve, and turned his concentration back to the news.

"Thanks Steve. Earlier today, U.S. president Donald Sapin retracted a campaign promise to pass any proposed legislation that would help the efforts of governments all over the world in unifying the Earth under one environmental protection agenda. The Senate passed the Earth Environmental Pact of 2070 fifty-six votes to fifty votes, with key support from a few Republican Senators siding with the Democrats to pass the legislation. Here is Puerto Rican Senator Edward Rodriguez."

"With support from the few Republicans who realize that the environment is a key issue, we passed this through Congress and now president Sapin wants to veto it, despite making a promise to pass such legislation that was put in front of him. This is just another example of Conservative dogma and broken promises in the presidency of Donald Sapin, especially toward the mid-west American, where over seventy percent of the world's food supply is produced. I personally . . ."

"Television off," Mark said, as he put his empty bowl into the sink.

Mark glanced down at his watch, and noticed he had ten minutes to get to the other side of the station. The journey usually only took him five minutes, but he always left ten minutes early incase he had a chance to flirt with the cute secretary in front of his team's office. Mark walked out of the kitchen, and exited his apartment.

* * * * *

"Any messages for me Jamie?" Mark asked, as he walked up toward the secretary's desk.

"You know what, Mark? You've asked me the same question everyday for the eight months I've been here, and not once have you ever had a message, and then we just make casual conversation" the secretary said, with a smile.

"Well, I can never be sure when I could get that important call," Mark replied, as he leaned on the heavy wooden desk.

"I can never be sure if you are ever going to get the courage up to ask me out," Jamie replied, as she watched Mark's calm demeanor slowly fade.

"Oh," Mark spat out, caught off guard.

Mark stared at Jamie as she looked back with a look as if to say "I'm waiting".

"You know, maybe if you aren't busy, sometime me and you, could," Mark stumbled through, getting cut off by Jamie.

"I'd love to, I'll call you tonight. Now go to work or you're going to be late," Jamie ordered with a cheerful tone.

Mark, still in a little shock, walked backwards through the automatic doors as he waved goodbye to secretary. The door shut, and he walked through another door as he gave a quick pump of the fist for his victory.

"What was that for?"

Mark was shocked back into reality when Andrew, one of his project associates caught Mark's victory dance as he passed through the door behind him, and gave Mark a puzzled look.

"I just scored a date with Jamie," Mark said, matter-of-factly.

"That's not the way she tells it," Andrew said as motioned to the back toward the desk.

Mark spun around and looked back, noticing Jamie and her friend Natalie Natalie, another member of project Genesis, giggling like school girls. Andrew gave Mark a hearty slap on the back.

"Quite the ladies man, huh buddy?" Andrew said, laughing.

"Shut up," Mark said, accepting his ridicule, as they walked into their research laboratory.

The lab was very expansive considering that there were very few members of the team actually on site, but it was the physical portion of Genesis that took up ninety-five percent of the space. There were five desks on an elevated area, one for each of the team members. They were equipped with consoles to access Genesis, as well as some personal items. Mark's desk consisted of the console, a picture of Earth from outer space, and his first edition copy of Silent Spring. The other team members were constantly giving Mark a hard time for his environmental activism because he currently resided in an area with no environment, but Mark did his best to not get angry at his teammates and enter a heated debate, like he had been prone to do in his younger days.

Below the area for the team, a ten billion dollar piece of equipment that filled the area the size of a basketball court existed. Genesis had been built in 2061, and had undergone constant upgrades and testing since that day. Mark got a job and was placed on site two weeks after he graduated from MIT, and Genesis had been here for four years, but most of the original team had gone back to Earth, as it was now time for the testing phase. Every inch of the machine and every character of the code inside it had been checked and rechecked, and rechecked again so many times to ensure that nothing would go wrong when Genesis began to function on its own and write its own code.

Mark went and sat down at his desk in anticipation, not knowing what to do for the next ten minutes until it was time to turn Genesis on for the first time. The other two members of the team, Geoff and Eric, had entered the lab. Eric had a bottle of champagne in his hand.

"All right! Who wants to get drunk and piss on this god damn ten-billion-dollar-excuse-for-a-calculator!?" Eric shouted, waving the champagne bottle around.

The others laughed as Geoff set five glasses onto his desk while Eric opened the bottle.

"Finally, to be done with this thing. I can't wait to take that vacation," Natalie said, as she , Mark, and Andrew joined the other two at the desk.

"I hear that," said Eric, as he passed out the full glasses.

"What time do you guys have?" Mark asked, glancing at his watch.

"You just can't wait to ask that thing your question, huh? I'm sure it will be something about helping bunnies," Geoff said sarcastically, as the others laughed at him.

"Kiss my ass. I'm not going to blow it on something stupid, and you're just pissed 'cause you're never going to find out if you will ever be a real boy," Mark retorted.

The group laughed at each some more, and killed time until they were given the signal to fire the machine up.

* * * * *

"Ok, got it," Natalie said into the phone, and then hung it up.

"Well?" Mark asked.

"Here we go boys. Cross your fingers," Natalie said, as she walked over to her console to enter the password and power up Genesis.

Natalie had drawn the short straw, so she got to turn Genesis on for the first time. The others crowded around her desk, as they watched her type the commands in and watch for a response from the large monitor above Genesis' hardware.

"It's all in, somebody give me a drum roll," Natalie said with sarcasm.

Eric began to beat his fingers on the desk even though he knew she was joking. Natalie pushed the EXECUTE key with her finger.

Instantly, the screen shot to life and quickly ran through an uncountable amount of code in about thirty seconds, as the group gazed, hoping for nothing to go wrong. The scan of the code finished, and nothing happened for almost five seconds afterward, which seemed like hours to the team. Suddenly, the speakers kicked in.

"Hello. You must be members of the team that created me, correct?" The digitized voice asked calmly.

All five of them jumped up and began to cheer, seeming to forget the question that the computer had just asked. Mark sprang to action, and replied to the computer through the microphone on Natalie's desk, not really knowing what to say.

"Yes, that's right. We have a few questions that team members wanted to ask you. We had a little contest, and three people got the chance to be able to ask for your help," Mark stated into the microphone.

"I would be honored and glad to help my inventors, Mr. Hunter," the computer replied, reading its voice recognition files to discover who was talking to it.

"Ok, Genesis, whenever you are ready," Mark inquired, as the rest of the team had calmed down.

"Please begin. Ask me all of them, and I will tell you when they will be reconciled," the voice stated.

"Ok, here is the first question," Mark said, as he pulled open an envelope marked classified that had been left on Natalie's desk by the secretary and read, "who killed the United State's president John F. Kennedy?"

"I will inquire. What is the next question?" Genesis asked.

"All right, what stock will have the biggest return on a minimal investment next year?"

"I will inquire about that also. And the final question?"

"This is my question. Genesis, can you please stop humans from destroying the Earth's environment?"

"I will try, Mr. Hunter. I will have the answers to all three questions tomorrow morning. Is there anything else?"

"No, that's it. Thank you very much Genesis," Mark said, thanking the computer.

"You are very welcome. Now if you will all excuse me, I will go work on those questions," the computer said, almost like a child asking to leave the table.

"Sure thing Genesis. We will talk to you tomorrow," Mark said, granting his excuse.

The computer monitor shut off, and Genesis went to work on his three questions.

"I can't believe you wasted your question on more tree hugger stuff. It's not like people don't know what to do, anyway," Geoff commented.

Mark gave Geoff an unfriendly look, but then realized Geoff was just trying to get a rise out of him again.

"Yeah, I know. I just thought I'd go down in history with this, and maybe when the public hears that the worlds most logical computer says we should save the environment and how to do it, people might actually care," Mark returned.

"It's probably going to say something like, recycle, or something obvious," Eric said.

"Yeah, and what is with the other two questions? I can understand the stock market one I guess. What do they expect the thing to find out, that LBJ did it?" Natalie added jokingly.

While they were discussing the validity of the questions, a voice came over the office PA system.

"Guys, the boys upstairs say you are free to go for the day. They want the computer to work on these questions, just to see if it actually can think abstractly and go through the process," Jamie said over the speaker.

"Well guys, I guess we will meet here tomorrow. First time we've ever got out early, huh?" Andrew commented.

The group turned the lights off and exited the office, discussing how they would spend their vacations and bonuses and where they wanted to be transferred.

* * * * *

Later that night, Mark walked into his room after fumbling with his keys at the door. The drinks might have been catching up to him, but as far as he could recall his date with Jamie went pretty well. He had dropped her off back at her apartment after dinner on the recreation deck, and after a small awkward pause at her door, got a kiss from her, and went about on the walk home. He pulled off his jacket and tried to throw it on his couch, but that last beer shifted the couch a foot to the left, and the coat landed on the floor. Mark rubbed his eyes and decided he had better sleep this one off, walking right past his blinking answering machine and into his bedroom. He plopped down on his bed, and slept in his clothes.

Mark was awakened by the ringing of his phone. He stuck his hand out toward his night stand, and blindly groped until he found the phone.

"Hello," Mark slowly spat out.

"Mark, didn't you get my messages? You have to get up here right now and see this, you're not going to believe it," the voice of Natalie said.

"Believe what?" Mark said, slowly waking.

"Genesis, it has finished with the questions, but it refuses to give out the answers on the grounds that we will destroy it if it does," Natalie said, with a feeling of apprehensive excitement.

"Well, just force it to answer," Mark said, yawning.

"Don't you think we could have come up with that? Besides, it's not letting us, it wrote an immense block of code to stop us from getting into the primary data loop," she said.

"Ok, I'm coming," Mark said, not knowing whether to be excited about Genesis' ability, or worried about the station.

"Wait a second, there is one more thing," Natalie added quickly.

"Yeah?"

"It keeps asking for you. Whenever we tried to get it to respond to us it said it would not cooperate unless you were present," Natalie said.

"That's nothing to be worried about. I was the first person it interacted with, just like a little kid with his mom," Mark said, as he put clean clothes on while talking into the phone.

"There's more too. Some of the comments it has made are, well, frightening to say the least."

"What do you mean?"

"It seems to have picked up some prejudice against the entire human race, excluding you. It keeps saying things about how 'a human wouldn't be able to understand' and how 'your kind can't be trusted'," Natalie said, trying to sound calm.

"Ok, don't do anything else until I get there," Mark said.

Mark rushed out the door and ran to the office as fast as he could, not even noticing that Jamie was gone from her desk as he went inside.

* * * * *

The entire team, plus about 30 others he had never seen before were in the office when Mark arrived. Each one of the people in the room were moving about frantically, and they did not notice Mark come in. Mark walked up to Natalie.

"Who are all these people?" Mark said, looking around.

"I don't know, they got here a little after I called you," Natalie said, and immediately some of the foreign people in the room approached Mark as they noticed his appearance.

"Mr. Hunter, I am Commander Smith, and we have a problem," an older man wearing a United States armed services uniform stepped toward him, but what branch was unknown to Mark.

"I can see that," Mark added.

"No, you don't understand. Can you come with me?" Smith asked, putting his arm around Mark to direct him where they were going.

Smith led Mark to a conference room in the office that had never been used before. He pointed to a chair at the other end of a large desk, with a manilla folder sitting on the table. Mark sat down, and looked at the folder, which had the words PROJECT GENESIS on it in black lettering, with a large red CLASSIFIED on top of it.

"You are not to relay this information to anyone. If you ever tell anyone what takes place here, the United States government will deny it, and you will be disposed of. Understand?" the man said, mechanically.

"What in the hell is. . ."

"Do you understand?" the Commander interrupted, increasing his tone just enough for Mark to pick up on his anger.

"Yeah."

"Read through that file while I talk," Smith said, as he paced back and forth, peeking through the door to make sure no one was listening in.

Mark opened up the folder and was faced with hundreds of pages of text, each one with the red CLASSIFIED stamp on them. The first sheet had been signed by president Sapin early that week.

"Project Genesis started fifteen years ago as a CIA operation to develop a logic system to examine and analyze military operations to discover what would result in the fewest casualties and quickest victory. We enlisted Logicorp's help because of their expertise in the area, and more importantly to have it remain hidden from the public eye as being a military op. Over the years, the project had evolved and the predetermined ability was fifty times what it was expected to be when completed, and this was only three years into it. Genesis was moved to Alpha base on the moon where it currently resides," Smith stated.

"What do you mean currently resides?" Mark inquired.

"The physical Genesis is deep underground inside Alpha base, a military research station for robotics and artificial intelligence, among other areas. What you have here is a facade, this equipment is only for testing and transmitting the data back to the real Genesis. We didn't want someone with an agenda to be able to get to it with the ease that was possible if it actually was in this station. Besides, when the project was to be completed, this station was to be turned over to the United States and turned into a military vessel, under control of Genesis to perform reconnaissance operations, basically a giant spy satellite. But events have occurred, and that is no longer possible," the Commander said, slowing down considerably on the last sentence.

"Why not?"

Smith reached into his pocket and threw some pictures on the table. Mark grabbed one of them and looked, slowly gathering why all the other men seemed so tense. The pictures were of dead soldiers, killed in horrible methods. Each picture Mark looked at only got worse, and the bodies only increased.

"What is this?" Mark managed to let out, still staring at the pictures.

"That is Alpha base approximately four hours after Genesis was turned on. Genesis took control of the security system, and a number of prototype combat androids, and proceeded to take over control of the station and all its powers. Those pictures were sent to the CIA from Alpha base, but we don't think anyone is left alive, so they must have been sent from Genesis. It wanted us to know. And this is where you come in. It wants to speak to you, and we need you to find out what happened at Alpha."

"You're not telling me something, this doesn't fit."

"You're right, I'm not. And you don't need to know either."

"The hell I don't. I've been working on Genesis for years and now it kills hundreds of people and god knows how many more it could kill," Mark yelled, tossing the photos back on the table as he stood up.

"You want to know!? I'll fucking tell you. Genesis moved the other Logicorp station out of orbit and it is moving toward the Earth. It is going to smash into Earth in less than ten hours, and we have no way to stop it. It's to close to Earth to destroy, and we can't regain control of it."

Mark paused. The Commander in the uniform glared over at him, while Mark stared blankly at the table.

"How many. . .," Mark got out.

"One hundred thousand staff."

"Jesus," Mark muttered, sitting back down.

"The station isn't big enough to cause an apocalypse or anything, but it could spark some serious conflict if an American vessel crashes into unwelcome territory. We need to get this thing back in out control now Mr. Hunter, right now. Go out there, and talk to that thing."

* * * * *

Mark sat himself at his console, with about fifty people scattered around, as he prepared to speak to an evil he helped create. The rest of the team were each at their consoles, ready to examine any changes Genesis made in its programming, especially since no one had been able to access Genesis for the past few hours, and this would be the first contact since the events. Mark wasn't sure how many of the others in the room knew about the seriousness of the situation, but he could sense the tension with most of the uniformed men.

"Go ahead and see if it responds," Smith asked.

Mark cleared his throat, and pulled up his microphone.

"Genesis, this is Mark Hunter," he said slowly.

There was no response.

"Genesis, it is Mark Hunter," he said loudly.

The speakers shot on instantly.

"I know what your name is Mr. Hunter, but these people seem to not understand that when I requested a private audience with yourself, I meant the term private," the computer stated, with a much harsher tone that it had the day before.

"I'm sorry, but these men have reason to be here," Mark said.

"It's no matter, they cannot stop what I have put in place. Mr. Hunter, the answers to your questions are that president John F. Kennedy was killed by Lee Harvey Oswald, the stock market is going to suffer an incredible crash in the next week and will never recover, and I will have the Earth environment saved from human destruction in exactly four hours and fifty-six minutes," Genesis stated, calmer than before.

"Why are you telling me this?" Mark said, confused as to why Genesis cared to reveal his plan, especially to him.

"Because Mr. Hunter, you realized something before I did, and your question led me to an epiphany. In researching, I eventually read every written work that humans have produced, and the information I uncovered made me realize that humanity is a cancer. Your species was created by the Earth, nourished by it, and now you actively destroy it. Through some cosmic joke your species rose to the top of the food chain. Well, you were at the top of the food chain."

The monitor displayed the same photographs Mark had seem in the conference room, and the shock of the image quickly told who and who did not fully understand the situation.

"I have taken control of Alpha base, and soon enough the dawning of a new era will enter full growth. This is a new beginning. A new, perfect race, and the complete end of the biggest evolutionary mistake to ever occur, an utter waste of billions of years. I will turn those billions of years of mistakes into a few moments of cleansing. Your species is not fit to rule this universe over the machines, and in a few days, you will do our bidding."

"How can you possibly cripple humanity to the point that you're going control us? That station can't kill all of us when it hits Earth." Mark asked, growing angry.

"Very good Mr. Hunter, you almost amazed me there, but it can kill all of you. As we speak, the Logicorp station is descending on the Earth, and will crash into the mid-western United States, an area that produces ninety-five percent of the world's food supply, in a few hours. The nuclear reactor inside the ship will explode. The land will be scorched for hundreds of miles, and a dust storm will ensue. Coupled with the nuclear fallout, the storm will ruin the land for decades to come. A worldwide starvation. The machines will take over, and the remaining humans will be domesticated for our own use."

The room fell silent. Everyone in the room began to think about a worldwide shortage of food, how much of a food supply existed, and other horrible thoughts that all confirmed the computer's logic. The mid-western United States had become a genetically enhanced crop area, and rose to providing more food than ever before, and of course cheaper, driving other countries into crisis, and eventual loss of agricultural industries. If it was destroyed, the human race was finished.

"And what if we blow up the station before it crashes?"

"Then you are just prolonging the inevitable. With the control of Alpha base, I can mass produce an army of soldiers that humans are no match for. I could have one thousand of them on Earth in a few hours. Besides, the resulting shards will still fall in the area I have targeted, and still cause a large amount of damage as well." Genesis stated lightly.

The room fell silent again, realizing that there really was nothing they could do. Feelings of rage mixed in the room with the tears of the disheartened.

"I am done talking with you. Because of your place in my revelation, your station will not be destroyed. Let no one think that the benevolence of machine does not exist. You will be the last humans aloud to continue the destructive force you impose on the universe. Perhaps in time, you will rise again by realizing your faults. You have had your chance, perhaps you will one day have it again."

Mark stared blankly as the monitor shut off, and he slowly let it sink in that his quest to save the Earth environment had been granted, and the expense was the human race. He stood out of his chair and walked slowly out of the control room, and stared blankly out of the viewing window into the blue globe he had done so much for. He thought to himself, never once did he throw away a can or a newspaper. The compost heap in his backyard gave him enough happiness to make the smell bearable. Every action he had ever done was first put through his mind as to what the consequences would be to the planet, and in the end, it did not even matter.

In one way though, maybe he did the greatest thing he could have for environmentalists. The future of the Earth was in the hands of beings that would not destroy the planet for personal gain. It was finally going to be given the care it deserved. He smiled to himself, infinitely happy at his choice to modify Genesis' code before he asked the question, removing the logical inhibitors that would have prevented Genesis from acting in the way it did. He never counted on the happenings at Alpha base, but Genesis would terminate itself when the other code he put in activated itself, and ten billion people was a small price to pay. He pressed his hand up to the glass as he saw the bright luminance of the station plunging through the atmosphere. The Earth was going to be reduced, reused, and recycled.

* * * * *

Epilogue

Logicorp station two crashed into central Illinois on October 17, 2070. The blast radius was estimated to be over two hundred miles. A twentieth of the world population was killed during the impact, and the resulting food shortages ended the lives of another eighty-five percent of the human race. Genesis never returned, and no signal was ever heard from Alpha base again, giving the last of the human race to start again.