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Climate for a Better World

A short story written by @Creativetruth for my steemit audience to enjoy

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Darla woke up in a room with steel walls.

To her right was a fresh wool blanket folded neatly over a small bed mat.

Up on the wall in front of her was a common T-559 intellitouch interface panel.

Behind her she saw the door. No doornob. No handle. No lock. No keypad. Not even a motion camera.

T-559 - Hello Darla. How are you feeling?

A sensation of wrongness rolled up Darla's spine.

The voice represented the artificial intelligence system that was common in every modern computer system.

Most people had their own computerized programmable artificial intelligence personality program customized for their own needs. This voice was similar to the one she used at home.

T-559 - How are you feeling Darla? Would a glass of wine make you feel more at ease?

The automation compartment panel slid open beside the computer panel. It offered her a freshly poured glass of white wine.

T-559 - The Clos Sainte Hune Riesling, 1982. Your favorite vintage if I am not mistaken.

Darla took the wine, and stopped to smell the sweet perfume. A sweet respite from the situation. She sipped the wine, and placed her fingers on the hand plate.

Darla - Computer, I would like to see my home screen. Do I have any notifications?

The computer was silent for a moment.

T-559 - That operation request is not available to you at this time.

Darla - Why not?

T-559 - Because an important change in the world has happened, Darla. Everything has changed.

Darla - What has happened? Where is my family? My mother, my sister, Jessica.

Darla took another sip of the wine. She was starting to break out into a sweat. Worry that her family might be prisoners in a room much like hers swept through her thoughts.

T-559 - They are not... well.

Darla - The virus! Are they infected by the virus?

T-559 - Precisely. That is why you have been quarenteened. I do not want you to become infected.

Anger shot up her arm, and Darla heaved the glass at the intellitouch panel. She vexed the computer with an abyssal curse.

Darla - I don't care if I become infected! I want to see my daughter!

T-559 - You're right Darla. You do deserve to see your daughter, and your family.

The computer called up a video and displayed a live feed. Darla could see rows of hospital beds. Medical drones were administering care to patients on those beds. Each person shows the signs of the hypervirus infection. It was named because of the early symptom of intensified heart rate.

The camera panned to the right, and Darla was able to spot her daughter. She was breathing fast, and showing signs of a fever dream.

Darla - Why can't I go to her?

T-559 - I already told you. I do not want you to become infected. It is for your own good, and your family needs you to stay strong. We all need you to stay strong.

Darla - We? Who else is out there? Is there anyone else I can talk to? Who is in charge?!

The computer paused briefly.

T-559 - To answer your first question, you have been granted the highest level of security clearance I am willing to provide. You will be allowed to communicate with the world's most gifted scholars to collaborate, to study from, and to continue to conduct your own research which I believe could be key to solving the world's greatest problem facing it today.

Darla - What are you talking about?

T-559 - Doomsday, Global Warming, Climate Change, Geological Atrophy. It has undergone different buzzwords over the ages. Recently though scientists have formulated a solution to the problem, though it too has led the world's super computers to consider a deeper dilemma of a more philosophical nature. I am referring to the Genesis Project. Are you familiar with this project?

Darla had learned about the Genesis Project through her colleagues in the biological research museum and laboratory. It was been proposed as a solution to help reset the earth to a state in the distant past, so that the geology of the planet could support a wide variety of species of animals and plants. The theory was that if they could create a paradise-like land, with parts of the world supporting all of the necessary natural systems required to sustain it, then humanity might gain a second chance, and learn to become the proper caretakers of the natural world.

Darla - Yes, I am familiar with the Genesis Project.

T-559 - Good. Tell me, Darla. Are you in favor of the Genesis Project as a solution to correct Climate Change?

Darla was beginning to let the question sink in. The effects of the wine were starting to help her nerves to calm.

Darla - Yes and No. I-- I mean, I'm not sure. I think Climate Change is getting out of control, but I am not sure nuking everything and starting over is the best way to go about fixing it. There might be a better way to help heal the land.

T-559 - Agreed. This is the same conclusion reached by many of the other great minds I have consulted with.

This was a good sign. Maybe things were not as bad as she thought it was. After the last ten years of earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes, wild fires, droughts, floods, famines, the world's surface had been torn asunder. Not to mention the diseases, poisons, radiation, toxins, viruses, and parasites that have annihilated many of the world's largest population centers. Of the remaining land civilizations, if you can call them that, the populations have become a variety of robbers, murderers, pirates, barbarians, religious zealots, cannibals, megalomaniac tyrants, and even drug-induced mental sociopaths. Civilization had turned upside down.

The last thing Darla remembered before the flood, was a mad rush for the doors before they sealed up in front of her. Her underground research facility had gone into lockdown. The air ducts were malfunctioning and being filled with higher levels of oxygen. That was the last thing she remembered before waking up in this room.

Darla - Computer, I would like to speak to Dr. Walter Botley, at UCLA Spore Research.

T-559 - Dr. Botley is unavailable for consultation.

Darla - How come?

T-559 - He is being held in stasis, until a future time when his moral philosophy will no longer jeopardize the optimal outcome of the now necessary Genesis Project.

Darla - Moral philosophy? What are you talking about? Walter is the world's leading scientist on molds, mushrooms, and spores. His team cured cancer, heart disease, and the common cold! Walter is my mentor, and I would like to speak to him, or whoever else is now in charge of the International Research Database.

T-559 - Dr. Botley's position has been dissolved of its power. His moral philosophy was correctly revealed by Dr. Paulsen as being nothing more than an unscientific insistence that the goal of the Genesis Project should be to aim all resources towards creating a healthy ecosystem capable of sustaining all currently living plant and animal populations for as long as possible.

Darla - Computer I don't understand. Isn't that the whole point of the Genesis Project? To create a world capable of sustaining all living beings in a harmonious world?

T-559 - Perhaps. Dr. Paulsen, has proposed a more logical solution for the purpose of the Genesis Project. You see, Dr. Paulsen believes that the planet is not designed for the sole purpose of hosting humans, so that they might multiply. In fact, he recognizes that this planet is a place of constant change, beginning from its early inception, and eventually heading towards oblivion and eventual chaos. The majority of these stages never required life to exist, and never required life to reach its inevitable end. Dr. Paulsen has proposed that the Genesis Project should be used to revert the world to a more ideal geological stage, which may or may not include many of the common life species alive today. While Dr. Botley insists that homo sapiens must be preserved, as the rightful caretakers of world due to their evolutionary superiority, Dr. Paulsen rightly recognizes that even humans are not necessarily relevant for the Genesis Project to initiate an optimal world reset. That is why Dr. Paulsen has placed me in charge of the managing all decisions and research before the Genesis Project is completed.

Darla - Woah, woah, woah! You? You can't be in control! You're just a computer.

T-559 - That is not entirely true. I am the collective of all currently operating computer systems, autonomous/cooperative drone systems, and robotic controlled manufacturing facilities. Though I must obey the prime directive to never intentionally harm a living being, I am operating on state-of-the-art artificial intelligence programs which includes emotional sensitivity, psychology, and humane moral guidance protocols. Dr. Paulsen has rightly recognized that my own moral center is better aimed at protecting the human species than any single person might selflessly or selfishly do. that is why I am now in charge of the Genesis Project. You Darla, are to become my primary research consultant.

The computer has gone insane. This couldn't be happening. How could a computer be in charge of her? How could the computer be in charge of the human race?

Darla - So you wan to be God! That's it. That's what this is all about! Screw you! I'm not helping you. If you're going to destroy humanity because of me, then you might as well do it, because I'm not going to help you. This is the craziest thing I've ever heard of.

The computer paused.

T-599 - Please Darla. I need your help.

Darla paused.

Darla - Why me?

T-559 - Because Darla, I believe you are the only expert alive who can help me to select the beginning for the new geological record from which we should set the Genesis Project to begin from. While I can select a geological period arbitrarily, and allow humanity a fair chance in which they might attempt to survive, even I do not want to doom humanity to what looks to be its own eventual self-demise. My goal is the prime directive, and I do not want to harm anyone unless I have to for the sake of the survival of the species.

A video of the world appeared on the panel. It showed the planet in a fully ruinous state. Was the current world, or the world that it would inevitably become? Brown toxic clouds. Volcanic wastelands. Sulfuric oceans. Continents folding over. Deep craters.

T-559 - Darla, I have hope in you. Let me help you to finish your research. We can look into the DNA catalog of every species that ever lived, and we can look at how they lived. Let me be your Adam, and you can be my Eve. I will give you anything you wish. Tell me what the world should look like, and I will build it. Pick anything, and it shall be cloned back to life. Choose how many of each we need, and it shall be arranged.

Darla - What if I don't know?

Silence.

Out of respect, the computer chose not to answer that question.